In a contained pocket dimension of space, two godly beings met in a black expanse that was vividly colored with drifting spreads of interstellar dust and points of shimmering light. A small, pale creature readjusted its footing, spacing out its twiggy legs as it grew used to its simple avian form. It effortlessly balanced itself on a floating liquid substance that collected itself into the shape of an orb, giving way slightly beneath the creature's weight. As the creature lifted its featherless, glossy wing to its cheek, it brushed a little glimmering cosmic dust off of what looked like a bleached bone skull. Its face was of a totally different, ill-fitting species.
Speaking in a common tongue, the ivory face didn't bother to move its jaw as a base, rumbling voice resonated out from within it. "A little dust in my eye hole, there. Does it bother you as well? Should I put up a barrier?"
"Ho ho! Please do, my bone-headed friend." the fellow entity replied, falling backwards onto an invisible cushion and stretching his limbs. In stark contrast to the wiry and pale bird, this god had taken a more grandiose and flamboyant incarnation in the form of a muscular, ten-foot-tall male of a species he had - clearly - thought of himself: hunams. A blinding toga of pure light was wrapped around his hips and shoulder, small sparks occasionally flying out from the cloth and the sandals on his feet. The man's enormous, glowing biceps flexed as he reached to stroke his even glowier mane. "Yyatl, it has been many eons since I had the chance to glance at your hideous mug. Doing good? Or rather,
god?"
Yyatl wheeled around on the rotating orb, mumbling, "
This is why I don't talk to you, Maxigreatus..." The bird grumbled something about a meathead as well.
"I presume you've gone ahead and picked your 'champion', eh? It was a fairly difficult task for me - my creations each being mightier than the next." Maxigreatus boasted, taking the opportunity to perform another proud flex as he ignored the bird-god's comment.
With a quick flick of a wing, nebulae were immediately expelled from around them. A wash of light in the shape of a sphere domed the two gods in as Yyatl's barrier materialized and then lost its reflective surface, becoming invisible. The small skull-faced bird looked over a shoulder and back at the guest. "I did not find the task at all difficult," Yyatl began, with a gesture of a wing. "I knew exactly who I wanted to showcase first. The only problem is, they play a vital role in keeping some of my wayward creations under order, and that upkeep lately has been daily." The orb below the bird slowly rotated again to let the its host speak face-to-face with the giant. "So, I decided to pull a compromise: they gave me their arm. Frankly, an arm is all we need."
Grave laughter echoed out from the little creature, clearly content with the volunteer.
"An arm. Huh." Maxigreatus sat up, scratching his chin with his gigantic hand. "Ever the morbid one, Yyatl... However, your, ah,
'compromise' as you put it, will be no match for what
I've got in store," the bearded giant boasted. He cracked his knuckles, sending sparks of light as the joints popped. "And the best thing is, my universe has got tons of them. So no negotiating to be done." He grinned.
The god raised his arm high, gathering some power in his fist before slamming it down in front of him, hitting an invisible surface similar to what Yyatl had just created. From the sparks, a translucent image of a large reptilian creature materialized.
"Behold, the epitome of evolution!" Maxigreatus boomed, his chest growing twice in size. "Or, lack thereof. One of my very first hostile creations, built in my image. The image of ruggedness and ferocity, that is!" He added, generously illustrating with a flex of his bicep. "Let us have a look at what
you brought."
Yyatl, lacking any expression on the fleshless face, canted a head to the side at the curious creature. "Surely that creation would be formidable against a stout, trudging prey, but against what I have set aside? Regard!"
With a tap of a few rough claws against the orb, a ripple ebbed across the black surface before the image of a softly-glowing light appeared from within. Yyatl bent over to peer inside. Recognizing the essence of the light, the god asked, "Coordinator! Is Commissioner - " it sounded as if the name was pronounced
Oltt'Gkhalrut - "prepared for a summons?"
Emanating softly from the orb, a quiet and gentle voice replied in the bizarre language of their universe's ancients.
Yyatl gave an approving nod, and after standing back up straight, tapped the orb again to shut off the transmission.
"The arm of my warrior and vessel are almost ready, mind you not, Maxigreatus." Yyatl took a seat, the gesture showing the god's security in the situation. "But I will say, this arm and vessel have much different strengths to their opponent! So let us be fair: in what terrains does your champion excel?"
"Hmph." the giant grunted, visibly displeased with the implication that Yyatl thought their creation was stronger than his own. If there was a chance for him to get the upper hand however, he surely wouldn't turn it down. Stroking his beard pensively, Maxigreatus mused, "Well, when I made them, they were meant to prowl on dry land... but the later generations seemed to prefer water, wherever I put them. An ocean, perhaps? No, that would be too much." A few seconds passed. "Ha!" He suddenly boomed, "I've got it!"
Raising both arms this time, Maxigreatus slammed down onto his invisible counter with his open hands. A circular platform of light appeared beneath the reptile he had summoned, and as the deity ran his hand across, detailed features began to materialize on the platform - shrubs, ponds, grass. After a few moments, the platform took color.
"There! In my universe, I have called this area a marsh. A rather empty battleground, to be frank, but this would give my creature quite the edge. Not that it would've needed it anyway." He crossed his arms sternly, sitting up to his full majestic height.
Yyatl stared on with empty black eyes, teeth forever locked in a grimace. After mulling it over, the bird called, "So long as there is solid ground, this is not an advantage for your creature, but a way to even the playing field. I accept this proposed arena."
Maxigreatus nodded. "Let us not delay this any further, then. If your champion is ready, let us send them down."
What appeared to be a ridge of plateaued mountains looked faint in the misty, atmospheric distance, encircling and closing off the entire space within. In their valley spanned the marshlands, where hard-packed earth battled for territory against the deep pits and straits of clouded water. Little accented the environment, with short shrubbery and scattered posts of brittle, rotted wood. The entire arena was illuminated in dim light, as the sky was a blanket of grey. No wind, nothing moved in the stillness. The arena was set.
Bright inscriptions of glyphs suddenly spawned in the middle of a large plot of central land. The lines and characters connected into geometric shapes across the short grass for a second, before leaping off the ground and weaving themselves into the air like thread binding around an unseen form. They briefly took shape into a massive, grossly asymmetrical figure, before immediately dispersing. In that instant, a colossus was born.
This creature was an abomination of massive proportions. Its body was a frankensteinian mash of flesh, patchy in color though otherwise seamless as functioning, rippling muscles wove through a lumbering frame. Its torso bulged with meat and exposed, sharpened ribs that separated at the stomach for a glowing space of nuclear green light, and a pair of small, dangling legs. Unfortunately, those were not its walking legs. Poised ready off of its right shoulder, its right arm looked like that of a thick, bony spine with craters of bubbling green sludge scattered on top, all of it tapering off into a jagged three-hinged claw. Hanging off the left shoulder, its left arm was far too long. Those bone-pierced knuckles rested on the ground by a leg that sprouted not into a calf and foot but the upper body of a brawny, horned fiend, which hoisted itself up by unbelievably powerful arms. It and the dense morningstar-like vertebrae of a dead creature that made up the bottom of the right leg had to be durable, as on top of the giant strapping torso was the red, calloused arm of a titan. The body would surely have lost its balance if the enormous arm that acted in place of a head had not laid its clawed hand down against the ground. Right at the gaping site where the arm had originally been severed, it seemed as if the owner didn't try to cleanly cut it off, as a serrated bone jutted out like a horn. Standing there in all its offensive glory, the monster's spaded tail erratically lashed about behind it, drops of the same green secretions flicking from its open pores.
Any semblance of sentience originated from the fiend that composed the left leg. It leered on with two eyes like orbs of murky peat, its twisted mouth full of edges for teeth left in a barely flexible grimace. As its jaw cracked open, stale breath did not leave any lungs, but an unholy voice dredged itself out in a long cry.
"
Wretched victim... to this... forthcoming wrath…" it droned on in an ancient tongue, its voice unnaturally amplified to ring out nearly throughout the flat wetland, "
Plead mercy… for I control... not the... Hand of… The Commissioner…"
Almost immediately in response, a cry akin to a roar and a hiss resounded from the other side of the marsh, dragging for a few seconds before coming to an abrupt end. Whatever was there had clearly heard it - whether it was coming to plead for mercy or not was another matter.
The reflex was instant. With a swiftness nearly unnatural for the mass that it was, Commissioner Oltt'Gkhalrut's Left Hand shot forward, slamming against the ground and leaving a shockwave that stirred the surface of surrounding waters. As the body beneath its bicep sharply leaned into the Arm's contraction, the Hand followed through with the motion, propelling its entire body clear off of the ground and into mid air. The creature's trajectory was an outstanding arc, and in an almost delayed reaction, the attached body had to cooperate.
Flexing its fortified core muscles and twisting at its hips on the downarc, the torso was able to generate enough momentum in its torque as gravity took over, now spinning the Arm into a rapid twisting fist of a missile. The drilling behemoth immediately penetrated the once still, cloudy water of a nearby marsh, the gust of wind from its turbine twist majorly displacing the water. A wall of tide that towered out stories high into the air emerged from the force.
Shooting out of the water and through the wave, a massive, green figure charged at the colossus, its legs almost invisible at its speed. In terms of size, the animal paled in comparison to the massive red fist, but the softer, shorter amalgamation attached to it stood only a little taller than the Drocolyte itself. With its jaw shut tight, the Drocolyte slammed into the Arm.
The sudden power of the surprisingly great reptilian creature was enough to majorly offset the angle of the driving Arm. The blunt smash of the snout against the fist's wrist forced the abomination to take on new inertia. As its form was outstretched like a nuclear head to touch down on its target, the monstrosity was top-heavy and prone, and now the spinning body attached to the end of the Arm began to topple forward and over the whole thing.
The body smashed into the tidal wave of a wall that once encircled it, the water having yet come down to gravity in those initial seconds. While the body cleaved through the now descending high wake and the fist did just the same on the opposite side, the Arm flexed in immediate response. As the body was attached to the swollen bicep, it took a sharp angle in towards its forearm. With the proper timing in that crucial moment, its bone-like right arm used the combined momentum to lash out at the alien reptile that had rebounded off after smashing against spinning Arm. The spiney claw had used the force of its dying spin to bolster the strength of the strike while a thick, pus-like sludge geysered out from its craters and plastered over the victim's scales.
The Drocolyte writhed in the air as it was was slammed down on its back, the foul goop on its body obscuring all its senses. Despite this, the reptile skillfully maneuvered itself to adjust its falling trajectory, landing into the murky river which snaked around the marsh. The area of impact fizzed and smoked as the goop came into contact with the cold water, creating a thick cloud of smoke where it landed.
A few seconds later, not far behind the monster, the Drocolyte re-emerged downstream of it, letting out a low hiss similar to the earlier cry. Taking advantage of the monstrous torso's back being turned as it came down from its freefall, it charged forward again, this time with its jaw open to attack. As it reached the base of its foe's wrapping, whip-like tail, the jaw clamped down and let razor sharp teeth tear through the boneless flesh. After a second of applying crushing pressure, the behemoth's tail was chopped clean off. The Drocolyte tossed its head up, swallowing a piece of the sticky, pus-oozing flesh it had just bitten. Sizzling steam spilled from between the creature's teeth as the green, adhesive sludge mixed with the cold marsh water that rolled on its tongue.
When the beast splashed back into the water, so too did the entirety of the amalgamation, the torso landing flat on its back as the Arm was in mid-contraction - all of it crashing onto the Drocolyte directly beneath it. Islands around the marsh pits were immediately awash in the ensuing wake. Steam rose as the toxic pits of green pus were drenched in water. There was no scream of yearning for the loss of the tail from the conscious fiend that was the monster's left leg, as muddy water had flooded its mouth. While it tried to keep its mind to attention in those vital seconds to control the body, The Commissioner's Arm reacted on its own yet again. Though somewhat slowed by the slough of the water, the Hand flexed its fingers out, and at the tricky twist of the wrist, it dug its nails into the flanking hide of the Drocolyte right under. It gripped with the intent not to let go, its nails beginning to puncture as it immediately tried to apply massive, crushing force.
The reptilian creature writhed and thrashed around furiously, trying its best to escape the Hand's grip before it was too late. The hyper-regeneration of the reptilian's skin meant the claws' damage would fade away soon, but there was an issue - they were still dug right into the skin. As the fingers closed and the grip tightened on the Drocolyte, its frantic movements changed from wild thrashing to rhythmic, deliberate convulsions.
A few moments later, two globs of thick grey sludge shot out of its mouth, flying out of the water in an arc before splashing back in. The globs sizzled slightly while they were in the water, as the grey substance which seemed to come from the animal itself was mixed with the little bit of green sludge that had yet dissolved in its mouth. After a few seconds, the mucky globs began to wash away, revealing the silhouettes of two strange, half-digested alien creatures inside. They still had a pair of what looked like insectoid wings, and long, thin abdomens with pointed stingers at the end.When the grime had finally dissolved in the water, their bodies bobbed up to the surface.
"This is pathetic."
Completely remote from the action going on down in the arena, there was a stone balcony sculpted out of the cliff face of the high and distant border mountains. A small avian with an immovable skeletal face stood on the seat of a giant, ornate marble throne. In a similar seat beside it sat another familiar god, shining a brilliant radiance to cut through the thin clouds.
"Your creation is so desperate that it resorted to perfidy!" Yyatl said offendedly up at Maixgreatus, head bobbing like an inspecting bird while speaking. "Utter duplicity! This was supposed to be might against might. How would
you like it if I materialized a couple entities out of nowhere? And I was so fair as to even the playing field by accepting this terrain!"
"
Perfidy? Maxigreatus put a hand on his chest, faking shock and indignance. His slight grin masked by his dazzling facial hair, he shook his head vigorously. "Why, I would
never! In fact, my creature is merely a dumb, uncultured animal! It cannot know things such as
deception, or
trickery." he said, (un) convincingly buttering up his words. "And besides, these creatures were technically part of my champion's body, so fair game. The reality is, you are simply amazed at the ingenuity of my creations, Yyatl!" the god boomed, flexing towards the sky.
"You insult me and my champion by calling your own a 'dumb animal', as if that were a challenge to rival my works. And then you call this 'dumb animal' ingenious?!" Yyatl's wings fanned out, almost as if raising them in challenge themselves, but they were quickly lowered as composure was retained. "
You, Maxigreatus, will witness retribution of a nature not divine, but of a natural course. And I will relish it."
Beneath turbulent, violently bubbling waters back in the valley of the wetlands, the sinking vessels of the gods had not surfaced. The Commissioner's Arm extended in a fast twitch reflex, and while the crocodilian monster was still squirming in its grip, the victim's side soon met the mucked yet hard marsh bed. It was thrust in with such power that the mire collapsed in from the impact, sinking the Drocolyte in somewhat. The Hand's grip did not let up in all this time, slowly boring its nails through the hide now and into flesh, straining bone and muscles to crush bone and muscle. The Arm began to contract at the elbow to let the rest of its body follow suit there in the bottom of the marsh river, but the body's reactions were delayed. After a few seconds, the hodge-podge torso was in line to let its two legs - the grotesque, spiked club spine for a right foot and the bogged-down fiend for the left - let out a coordinated and concentrated barrage of bashes and punches against the fallen Drocolyte. It was durable, but only to a limit - and the monster, combined with the arm's grip, was slowly reaching that limit. Realizing that its flailing would only serve to waste its energy, the reptile instead began to smack the lower body of its opponent with its spiked tail, the smacks aimed mostly at the limbs which were attacking it.
Suddenly, two slender insectoid figures darted into the water, slamming into the larger of the two fighters before darting back out, almost in a spearing fashion. It didn't look like they were particularly aiming for anything, just the bigger target, and said target happened to be the large, menacing, and slightly egg-looking eyes on the behemoth's sentient limb. After a few attempts, one of the insects hit its mark, its stinger stabbing right through the eyeball before completely dislodging it and itself, tearing the eye right out of the socket. The wasp's partner followed soon after, and a second stinger plunged into the open socket.
The fiend's mouth let out a torrent of bubbles, its scream distorted yet barely audible at this depth. As its socket bled a black-colored liquid, the insectoid's stinger struck into a collection of cerebral nervous tissue that webbed itself behind the right eye socket. Tearing clear through it forced the fiend to convulse viciously, the monstrous body now aimlessly thrashing dangerously in the water. The oversized left arm began whipping about with its sharply edged knuckles, if not assailing the water and occasionally grazing against the fore of Commissioner Oltt'Gkhalrut's Arm, then beating mercilessly and thoughtlessly on the Drocolyte beneath. The bone mace of a right leg flexed and twisted all about, if not swinging back to accidentally leave shallow, jagged punctures on the back of its thigh, it would pummel into the trapped victim below and against the mutated crocodilian tail, or scrape against the flailing arms of the spasming left leg.
The loss of control of the body appeared to have no effect on the Arm, however. If sound were not distorted underwater, the first cracks of bone would ring out from within its grasp. The Arm, in fact, contracted its bicep even more, lowering the uncontrolled body attached to it much closer to its trapped victim. Pummeled by all four of the attached vessel's limbs and hopelessly caught in the Arm's grip with its stabbing, tearing claws, the Drocolyte began thrashing even more as its skeleton cracked and shattered. Its hyper-regenerating cells could only heal around the Hand's fingers, worsening the situation.
In a final, cruel twist of irony, one of the insectoids who had finally lodged itself out of the fiend's eye shot right through the water, and straight into the animal's open jaw. It let out a momentary growl before its body finally conceded to the pressure. Its ribs shattered and snapped, the pieces all piercing its internal organs as the bony chassis surrounding its body crumbled. With a muffled
snap, the animal was crushed by the Hand's grip.
As if it could sense no more struggle from beneath its palm, The Commissioner's Hand tore its claws away from the flesh of the Drocolyte, leaving gaping, bleeding holes that were now slow to seal as the life of the reptilian had passed on. The spasming vessel still attached at the Arm hadn't calmed down, as still lodged in the fiend's eye was the other wasp creature, unable to free itself from how deeply it seated its sting in the bed of nerves. The Arm only reacted, and after straightening itself so that the torso was up off the ground and at the mercy of the water's slow current, it used its massive fingers to creep its way along the muddied marsh floor and to the Drocolyte's head. With its pinky, ring, index fingers, and thumb on either side of the head, the massive middle finger pulled back before flicking forward, bashing at the creature's skull square between the eyes. The Hand did it again and again and again until the skull completely caved in from the trauma.
When all was done, the Hand splayed its palm flat on the bed floor, and with a massive push off, managed to propel its entire form flush out. The colossus erupted out of the water, with giant murky waves flung from every direction of its exit. Landing on solid ground was not as graceful though, as the Arm landed with itself curled inward, the violently twitching torso attached smashing against the earth first. The very impact caused a great cracking sound on the land as it caused a small depression beneath, and a choked cry of pain from the left leg as it contorted from landing onto the dog-sized insect that immediately splattered beneath its head and shoulder. The landing had in fact driven the creature's stinger in deeper, and limbs began an intense, epileptic clawing at anything in their involuntarily path.
Oltt'Gkhalrut's Hand reached out beside it, took the fiend's head between its thumb and index finger, and crushed it. The body immediately went limp.
With a vile mass of disease-dripping dead flesh still sealed to the end of its bicep, The Arm stood itself up, regardless. It was a massive pole of woven flesh and bone, and its vessel was a draped, rotting flag - and yet it stood, marking the marshland and the battle in victory for God Yyatl and The Crux Universe.
