Post by Shugo Yuy™ on Sept 9, 2015 23:08:25 GMT -5
[[OoC: Post contains suicidal themes and gore. May also contain drug reference.]]
Holy shit… Arose has gone off the fucking deep end…
I ran through the structure, panting as I looked behind me at the broken floor and walls. The light fixtures suspended from the ceiling were falling and flickering. This was Arose’s sick sense of training. The old man had us playing a fucked up game of manhunt. I wiped the blood from the left side of my brow. It was starting to drip into my crimson eyes and blur my vision. I placed my back up against a concrete wall to finally catch my breath. I looked down at the Fallen Mark working its way up from my shoulder to my neck. This was going too far… I needed to stop… I had activated the Berserker and it still wasn’t enough to defeat Arose. I was… shaking in fear. The old man… when did he get this strong.
17 Hours Earlier
“I don’t know if this’ll work Arose.”
I looked out the passenger side window as Arose and I drove to a remote Yuy Corp facility… A facility that had once contained many experiments like myself. It was apparently used for storage of the “Projects” and their training. It was fucked up… But this trip served two purposes. The first was that the facilities in this compound would be some of the few that would be able to hold through my intense powers. The second was that I wanted to know more about my family. I wanted to know more about the atrocities that they committed. They monsters they made…
“Haha. I’m sure it will.”
The old man chuckled. He looked confident. He was always confident. Even when he was joking around and acting like a goofball. I wondered where it all came from? I mean… He just seemed so unserious all the time. Maybe it was just something that came with ol- with age. I could already feel his angry glare from just the thought of it.
“I dunno, Arose. I’ve seen you fight. You’re strong but… I don’t mean to brag or anything, but I’m insanely powerful. And if you’re serious about provoking Berserker… he doesn’t have the self-restraint I do.”
Present
The back of my head would rest up against the concrete wall as I looked up at the lights slowly. Fuck this… this fight had been going on for so long. I wanted to leave… I wanted to- Before I could continue thinking to myself, a hand stabbed straight through the wall behind me, wrapping itself around my throat. Arose held his arm threw the wall behind me, holding me up in mid-air while strangling the life from my body. I tried to pry his fingers off of my throat, but I couldn’t… I- He- Somehow I just wasn’t strong enough to actually pull free from his grasp.
This was insane. I raised my right hand up, placing it against the concrete behind me.I would form a lightning blade through the concrete aiming it at Arose through the wall. The arm quickly let go of me and disappeared through the hole in the wall. I fell from his grasp as he retreated and fell to the ground on my knees. I breathed heavily… This was fucking nuts… Arose was actually trying to kill me. I wasn’t sure if I had hit him or not, but I hoped to god that I had for my own sake. The Fallen Mark had once more completed in form. I was ready to fight Arose again.
Rolling forward, I put some distance between me and the wall. I was going to get this fucker. I was going to fucking kill Arose if that was the only way to stop him. Pulling up my right hand, I formed a shield of red electricity from it I would throw the shield at the hole Arose made in the wall, crumbling and destroying the rest of it. As my arm went out to my side from the follow through of the throw, I formed a blade of red lightning, roughly the size of my forearm. I lunged out behind the shield, bursting through the wall as it did. Arose was standing in the other room completely unfazed. I attempted to punch him with the blade of lightning, aiming for his diaphragm. I was going to kill him.
At least that’s what I thought, Arose had other plans. He smacked my arm away with a powerful open palm. The old man followed it up with a heavy handed fist at my cheek. My head moved with the punch before snapping back, my eyes completely red. The lightning blade disappeared and I tried to punch at his throat. Arose caught my fist and sent a precise karate chop down at the edge of my neck. Pain shot through my body, and I nearly snarled out as him as I tried to advance to hit him with anything, a fist, a foot, a headbutt. The old man just threw a heavy kick into my stomach, sending me back by a few feet.
“Come on Shugo. Where’s your self control? Or do you like being this monster? Does it make you feel like there are no repercussions for your actions?”
Seriously? He was scolding me right now? Was this his take on training?! In the sixteen hours we had been fighting, I hadn’t gotten a single hit in on the old man. And that infuriated me. I wanted to beat his smug face in. Holding my stomach with my left hand, I brought my hand up in front of my face, red electricity pulsating around my fist. Closing my fist, a two handed sword would form out of electricity within my grasp. I charged at the old man, slashing down at him. As usual… Arose just dodged it. The old man jumped back out of the way of my attack. Time and time again, I slashed at Arose. Time and time again, Arose effortlessly dodged it.
“Shall we kick things up a notch Shugo?”
Arose kicked up a metal rod that was laying on the ground. He held it like a baseball bat, behind his head motioning for me to come at him. I hesitated not knowing what he had planned… The old man… Was he scaring the Berserker? He gave me a sup nod accompanied with a wink… Yeah the old man was going down. I charged at Arose, red electricity trailing along the ground where my feet stepped. I swung down at Arose with my sword. The old man smirked as it came down towards him, he swung out the pipe at alarming speeds, shattering my sword completely. I stumbled back some. I was too late however, Arose sent a hard kick aimed right at my diaphragm. This attack was much harder than the last kick. The sheer force sent me flying.
My back hit a wall of concrete and then my head, shattering the wall completely. I could see the massive hole and wreckage as I went flying through the room. The first wall barely slowed me down. My back hit another concrete wall before my head once more bashed through it. I was dazed. That was the second wall I had been attacked through. It was crazy. How did the old man have this much power behind his attacks? Blood was already pouring down the back of my head. I blinked my eyes as I went flying through a third wall, once more destroying it completely. Luckily by the time I hit the fourth wall, I had lost enough momentum to stop flying. Instead, I impacted onto the wall, denting it and causing a small crater behind me.
I could barely see Arose approaching me, stepping towards me. This was insane. Looking down at my cut and bruised arms, I could see that my cellular regeneration was already kicking in in over time. I grunted out in pain as my body quickly closed the wounds that I had received from Arose’s vicious attack. My nerves were on fire. I tried to grit my teeth and bare it, but the healing was even more painful than actual attack itself. I tried to pick my body up. I tried to move. But I couldn’t… Come on…. COME ON! YOU HAVE TO GET UP AND KILL THIS BASTARD! COME ON! I glared up at Arose almost snarling as I sat there in pain.
“Come on Shugo. Take a look at yourself. You’re either the Hero, the man everyone looks up to, and protecting the school. Or you’re this. This guy who takes every chance he gets to lash out. Take his anger out on everyone. You’re either in perfect control or you go 0 to 60 in half a second. There’s no in-between with you. So come on Shugo. Dig deep. Who’s the real you?”
Arose stepped up to stand in front of me as my body continued to heal. I glared up at the man as I breathed in and out heavily because of all of the pain. I cursed my body for taking so long to heal. The look on his face… The concern he had felt so condescending.
“I don’t care. I’m not a hero and I always knew that. I fight because I have no other choice. I have to stop Riot. I have to stop Orochi. I have to stop anyone that attacks 552. That’s all there is to it. The Berserker’s just another tool to do that.”
I scowled out at him angrily. I could see the old man’s face sadden some as I spoke. Why… WHY DID HE CARE?! WHY DID HE GIVE A SHIT?! I growled slightly feeling my body heal enough to get back up. I would begin to stand in order to lunge up at Arose. Unfortunately for me, the old man quickly snapped the metal rod and stabbed it through my shoulder pinning me to the wall.
“What else is there though Shugo… The way you talk… You make it seem like you have nothing else. You make it sound like if you died tomorrow fighting them… You make it sound like that’s fine. That you’re okay with it.”
I swallowed some saliva as I fought back the pain. It was spreading to my chest… I didn’t remember being hit in the chest… But for some reason… there was a deep sharp pain emanating from within my heart. I pushed it off in my head.
“SO WHAT?! SO WHAT IF I DIE?! IS THAT SUCH A BIG DEAL?! WHY THE FUCK DOES IT MATTER?! PEOPLE DIE EVERY SINGLE DAY! MY LIFE WAS FORFEIT THE MINUTE I DIED AND MY FATHER USED SUPER SOLDIER SERUM TO MAKE ME INTO THIS! MY LIFE SHOULD HAVE BEEN OVER WHEN I WAS 7, AROSE! SO WHY THE FUCK SHOULD I KEEP ON GOING IF I CAN DIE MAKING AN IMPACT?!”
Arose’s face was shocked. He took a step back as if he wasn’t expecting that answer. He seemed like he was taking a moment to make sense of it all… The old man would suddenly become resolute as he stepped towards me. Arose brought his right hand up with an open palm. The old man thrust it forward quickly, and my eyes grew wide open. I felt his fingers penetrate the skin underneath my sternum. The old man’s hand would go further before it grasped my heart.
“Fine… FINE IF YOU HAVE A DEATH WISH! I’LL GRANT THAT TO YOU RIGHT NOW! IF YOU WANT TO LEAVE ALL OF THE PEOPLE THAT CARE ABOUT YOU THAT LOVE YOU! IF YOU WANT TO LEAVE A SPACE IN ALL OF THEIR HEARTS, A SPACE THAT ONLY YOU CAN FILL! THEN FINE SHUGO! DO IT! LEAN BACK RIGHT NOW AND YOUR HEART WILL TEAR FREE! YOU’LL BE DONE! THIS WILL BE THE END OF IT! IS THAT WHAT YOU WANT?! OR WILL YOU CARRY ON?! WILL YOU LIVE?! WILL YOU FIND A REASON TO TAKE A STEP FORWARD?!”
I looked up at the old man with a pained expression… not because of the hand threatening to tear out my heart, but because of the old man’s words. They struck a chord. I knew how messed up I would be if Jacket, Soran, or Valo died… Why didn’t I think about how messed up they would be? How could I be… So damn selfish. I breathed in deeply, as my hand grasped Arose’s wrist. I looked up at him as tears began to form in the pits of my eyes.
“I’m sorry Arose… I want to live… I’m sorry Arose… I’m sorry.”
The tears continued to fall from my eyes. Arose quickly removed his hand, leaving my heart intact. The old man pulled the pole in my shoulder free. I just sat there crying. Yeah… It felt like crap. My chest almost instantly healed from the hole. I wasn’t in physical pain anymore… but I felt something more in my chest… A knot. A pit. Whatever you want to call it. It hurt. I felt two arms wrap around me, feeling Arose pull me into a hug.
“It’s not your fault. It’s okay, son. Everything will be okay. It’s not your fault. It’s not your fault.”
I could hear the old man was choking back tears as he hugged me tightly. It felt good… Arose’s concern for me… And… hearing him call me son. He had been my mother and father’s best friend in high school. And he was my godfather. I had been trying to stand tall for so long. It felt good just crying and letting out my feelings. I gripped his arms tightly as I continued to cry.
“Take it from me… It’s a lesson to be learned, Shugo. Even the good guys get burned.”
Holy shit… Arose has gone off the fucking deep end…
I ran through the structure, panting as I looked behind me at the broken floor and walls. The light fixtures suspended from the ceiling were falling and flickering. This was Arose’s sick sense of training. The old man had us playing a fucked up game of manhunt. I wiped the blood from the left side of my brow. It was starting to drip into my crimson eyes and blur my vision. I placed my back up against a concrete wall to finally catch my breath. I looked down at the Fallen Mark working its way up from my shoulder to my neck. This was going too far… I needed to stop… I had activated the Berserker and it still wasn’t enough to defeat Arose. I was… shaking in fear. The old man… when did he get this strong.
17 Hours Earlier
“I don’t know if this’ll work Arose.”
I looked out the passenger side window as Arose and I drove to a remote Yuy Corp facility… A facility that had once contained many experiments like myself. It was apparently used for storage of the “Projects” and their training. It was fucked up… But this trip served two purposes. The first was that the facilities in this compound would be some of the few that would be able to hold through my intense powers. The second was that I wanted to know more about my family. I wanted to know more about the atrocities that they committed. They monsters they made…
“Haha. I’m sure it will.”
The old man chuckled. He looked confident. He was always confident. Even when he was joking around and acting like a goofball. I wondered where it all came from? I mean… He just seemed so unserious all the time. Maybe it was just something that came with ol- with age. I could already feel his angry glare from just the thought of it.
“I dunno, Arose. I’ve seen you fight. You’re strong but… I don’t mean to brag or anything, but I’m insanely powerful. And if you’re serious about provoking Berserker… he doesn’t have the self-restraint I do.”
Present
The back of my head would rest up against the concrete wall as I looked up at the lights slowly. Fuck this… this fight had been going on for so long. I wanted to leave… I wanted to- Before I could continue thinking to myself, a hand stabbed straight through the wall behind me, wrapping itself around my throat. Arose held his arm threw the wall behind me, holding me up in mid-air while strangling the life from my body. I tried to pry his fingers off of my throat, but I couldn’t… I- He- Somehow I just wasn’t strong enough to actually pull free from his grasp.
This was insane. I raised my right hand up, placing it against the concrete behind me.I would form a lightning blade through the concrete aiming it at Arose through the wall. The arm quickly let go of me and disappeared through the hole in the wall. I fell from his grasp as he retreated and fell to the ground on my knees. I breathed heavily… This was fucking nuts… Arose was actually trying to kill me. I wasn’t sure if I had hit him or not, but I hoped to god that I had for my own sake. The Fallen Mark had once more completed in form. I was ready to fight Arose again.
Rolling forward, I put some distance between me and the wall. I was going to get this fucker. I was going to fucking kill Arose if that was the only way to stop him. Pulling up my right hand, I formed a shield of red electricity from it I would throw the shield at the hole Arose made in the wall, crumbling and destroying the rest of it. As my arm went out to my side from the follow through of the throw, I formed a blade of red lightning, roughly the size of my forearm. I lunged out behind the shield, bursting through the wall as it did. Arose was standing in the other room completely unfazed. I attempted to punch him with the blade of lightning, aiming for his diaphragm. I was going to kill him.
At least that’s what I thought, Arose had other plans. He smacked my arm away with a powerful open palm. The old man followed it up with a heavy handed fist at my cheek. My head moved with the punch before snapping back, my eyes completely red. The lightning blade disappeared and I tried to punch at his throat. Arose caught my fist and sent a precise karate chop down at the edge of my neck. Pain shot through my body, and I nearly snarled out as him as I tried to advance to hit him with anything, a fist, a foot, a headbutt. The old man just threw a heavy kick into my stomach, sending me back by a few feet.
“Come on Shugo. Where’s your self control? Or do you like being this monster? Does it make you feel like there are no repercussions for your actions?”
Seriously? He was scolding me right now? Was this his take on training?! In the sixteen hours we had been fighting, I hadn’t gotten a single hit in on the old man. And that infuriated me. I wanted to beat his smug face in. Holding my stomach with my left hand, I brought my hand up in front of my face, red electricity pulsating around my fist. Closing my fist, a two handed sword would form out of electricity within my grasp. I charged at the old man, slashing down at him. As usual… Arose just dodged it. The old man jumped back out of the way of my attack. Time and time again, I slashed at Arose. Time and time again, Arose effortlessly dodged it.
“Shall we kick things up a notch Shugo?”
Arose kicked up a metal rod that was laying on the ground. He held it like a baseball bat, behind his head motioning for me to come at him. I hesitated not knowing what he had planned… The old man… Was he scaring the Berserker? He gave me a sup nod accompanied with a wink… Yeah the old man was going down. I charged at Arose, red electricity trailing along the ground where my feet stepped. I swung down at Arose with my sword. The old man smirked as it came down towards him, he swung out the pipe at alarming speeds, shattering my sword completely. I stumbled back some. I was too late however, Arose sent a hard kick aimed right at my diaphragm. This attack was much harder than the last kick. The sheer force sent me flying.
My back hit a wall of concrete and then my head, shattering the wall completely. I could see the massive hole and wreckage as I went flying through the room. The first wall barely slowed me down. My back hit another concrete wall before my head once more bashed through it. I was dazed. That was the second wall I had been attacked through. It was crazy. How did the old man have this much power behind his attacks? Blood was already pouring down the back of my head. I blinked my eyes as I went flying through a third wall, once more destroying it completely. Luckily by the time I hit the fourth wall, I had lost enough momentum to stop flying. Instead, I impacted onto the wall, denting it and causing a small crater behind me.
I could barely see Arose approaching me, stepping towards me. This was insane. Looking down at my cut and bruised arms, I could see that my cellular regeneration was already kicking in in over time. I grunted out in pain as my body quickly closed the wounds that I had received from Arose’s vicious attack. My nerves were on fire. I tried to grit my teeth and bare it, but the healing was even more painful than actual attack itself. I tried to pick my body up. I tried to move. But I couldn’t… Come on…. COME ON! YOU HAVE TO GET UP AND KILL THIS BASTARD! COME ON! I glared up at Arose almost snarling as I sat there in pain.
“Come on Shugo. Take a look at yourself. You’re either the Hero, the man everyone looks up to, and protecting the school. Or you’re this. This guy who takes every chance he gets to lash out. Take his anger out on everyone. You’re either in perfect control or you go 0 to 60 in half a second. There’s no in-between with you. So come on Shugo. Dig deep. Who’s the real you?”
Arose stepped up to stand in front of me as my body continued to heal. I glared up at the man as I breathed in and out heavily because of all of the pain. I cursed my body for taking so long to heal. The look on his face… The concern he had felt so condescending.
“I don’t care. I’m not a hero and I always knew that. I fight because I have no other choice. I have to stop Riot. I have to stop Orochi. I have to stop anyone that attacks 552. That’s all there is to it. The Berserker’s just another tool to do that.”
I scowled out at him angrily. I could see the old man’s face sadden some as I spoke. Why… WHY DID HE CARE?! WHY DID HE GIVE A SHIT?! I growled slightly feeling my body heal enough to get back up. I would begin to stand in order to lunge up at Arose. Unfortunately for me, the old man quickly snapped the metal rod and stabbed it through my shoulder pinning me to the wall.
“What else is there though Shugo… The way you talk… You make it seem like you have nothing else. You make it sound like if you died tomorrow fighting them… You make it sound like that’s fine. That you’re okay with it.”
I swallowed some saliva as I fought back the pain. It was spreading to my chest… I didn’t remember being hit in the chest… But for some reason… there was a deep sharp pain emanating from within my heart. I pushed it off in my head.
“SO WHAT?! SO WHAT IF I DIE?! IS THAT SUCH A BIG DEAL?! WHY THE FUCK DOES IT MATTER?! PEOPLE DIE EVERY SINGLE DAY! MY LIFE WAS FORFEIT THE MINUTE I DIED AND MY FATHER USED SUPER SOLDIER SERUM TO MAKE ME INTO THIS! MY LIFE SHOULD HAVE BEEN OVER WHEN I WAS 7, AROSE! SO WHY THE FUCK SHOULD I KEEP ON GOING IF I CAN DIE MAKING AN IMPACT?!”
Arose’s face was shocked. He took a step back as if he wasn’t expecting that answer. He seemed like he was taking a moment to make sense of it all… The old man would suddenly become resolute as he stepped towards me. Arose brought his right hand up with an open palm. The old man thrust it forward quickly, and my eyes grew wide open. I felt his fingers penetrate the skin underneath my sternum. The old man’s hand would go further before it grasped my heart.
“Fine… FINE IF YOU HAVE A DEATH WISH! I’LL GRANT THAT TO YOU RIGHT NOW! IF YOU WANT TO LEAVE ALL OF THE PEOPLE THAT CARE ABOUT YOU THAT LOVE YOU! IF YOU WANT TO LEAVE A SPACE IN ALL OF THEIR HEARTS, A SPACE THAT ONLY YOU CAN FILL! THEN FINE SHUGO! DO IT! LEAN BACK RIGHT NOW AND YOUR HEART WILL TEAR FREE! YOU’LL BE DONE! THIS WILL BE THE END OF IT! IS THAT WHAT YOU WANT?! OR WILL YOU CARRY ON?! WILL YOU LIVE?! WILL YOU FIND A REASON TO TAKE A STEP FORWARD?!”
I looked up at the old man with a pained expression… not because of the hand threatening to tear out my heart, but because of the old man’s words. They struck a chord. I knew how messed up I would be if Jacket, Soran, or Valo died… Why didn’t I think about how messed up they would be? How could I be… So damn selfish. I breathed in deeply, as my hand grasped Arose’s wrist. I looked up at him as tears began to form in the pits of my eyes.
“I’m sorry Arose… I want to live… I’m sorry Arose… I’m sorry.”
The tears continued to fall from my eyes. Arose quickly removed his hand, leaving my heart intact. The old man pulled the pole in my shoulder free. I just sat there crying. Yeah… It felt like crap. My chest almost instantly healed from the hole. I wasn’t in physical pain anymore… but I felt something more in my chest… A knot. A pit. Whatever you want to call it. It hurt. I felt two arms wrap around me, feeling Arose pull me into a hug.
“It’s not your fault. It’s okay, son. Everything will be okay. It’s not your fault. It’s not your fault.”
I could hear the old man was choking back tears as he hugged me tightly. It felt good… Arose’s concern for me… And… hearing him call me son. He had been my mother and father’s best friend in high school. And he was my godfather. I had been trying to stand tall for so long. It felt good just crying and letting out my feelings. I gripped his arms tightly as I continued to cry.
“Take it from me… It’s a lesson to be learned, Shugo. Even the good guys get burned.”
