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+--- Thread: [9-10] Cabana Boys (Hiro and Deadpool) (/showthread.php?tid=4724)
[9-10] Cabana Boys (Hiro and Deadpool) - Karl Jak - 07-21-2016
Quote:Hiro
Karl Jak
Deadpool
Yacht
At some point during the ride, the burping of the engine and the jostling of the truck’s cabin lulled Hiro into something that you could almost consider sleep.
“This doesn’t look right.”
Karl’s voice and the sudden jolting of the vehicle to a stop was enough to pull the samurai back into the waking world. Pulling himself up so he could lean through the rear window of the truck, Hiro winced and wiped some sweat from his head before glancing out through the windshield. While there were some trees around them, the road they were on led to a beach that was dominated by a singular structure.
A large lighthouse made from white stone.
“Lighthouse?” Hiro groaned as he noted some consternation spread across counselor Karl’s features. “How many lighthouses does this island have?”
The producer, starting to scowl, removed the keys from the truck and pulled out a map from his shorts. He looked it over for a few moments before folding it back up and stuffing it back into the pocket. “This is the place, Mr. Protagonist, but I don’t recall a lighthouse.”
“Didn’t you build this place?”
Karl silently stared for a few moments before nodding his head. “Yes, of course.” The man leaned back and tapped his index finger against his temple for a few moments. “Then again, there’s a lot crammed in this tight little mind of mine, so maybe the details go jumbled.” The man chuckled as he turned and smiled at the samurai. “We’ll just have to get out and look for it.”
“For what? A bunker?” Hiro asked as he slowly made his way down to the tailgate.
“Yes,” Karl quipped as he offered a hand and proceeded to gingerly lower the man down onto his feet. “It’ll be underground. All of my islands have at least three of them.”
“…for?” Hiro inquired.
“The competitions,” the producer explained. “The bunkers allow a small crew to monitor various events to ensure that they go smoothly. If not, the bunkers all have various fail-safes to protect the integrity of the competition and the lives of the participants.”
“Aren’t you little games about murdering people?”
“Obviously,” Karl chuckled as he rested a hand on Hiro’s shoulder. “But they have to be murdered in a way that doesn’t violate the contract they sign when they register. We at Syntech have integrity, Mr. Protagonist.”
“Of course, of course,” Hiro stated sarcastically as the two started away from the truck. “So the bunker is our way out?”
“Yes. Unless there was some kind of seismic shift, we should be able to connect with headquarters and figure out some method to leave this island.”
***
From the ocean side of the lighthouse, a large vessel came streaming toward the old wooden docks built at the stone structure’s base. Finding some difficulty with steering the ship, Deadpool could only shrug as the yacht crashed through the pier and came to a rest in the sand along the beach. A quick glimpse through the windshield showed that they weren’t more than a few yards out of the water.
“Easy fix.” The mercenary muttered as he made his way out to the top deck of the yacht. One hop later, he was standing on part of what remained of the dock. Before making his way toward the lighthouse, he glanced back to make sure that the yacht hadn’t been penetrated by any of the wood.
Still a virgin.
Turning back toward the lighthouse, Deadpool smiled behind his mask as he sauntered toward the structure.
RE: [9-] Cabana Boys (Hiro and Deadpool) - Hiro Protagonist - 07-23-2016
Hiro paused to grab his two treasures, tucking the rusty machete into one of his tanto holsters and splitting the leather. The locked, black briefcase he carried with his other hand, and the prime started down the road to the lighthouse with Karl Jak.
His head was still a bit druggy from the morphine, and now that there was no immediate danger, his mind wandered to the last couple hours. Barry. Hiro had seen people die in front of him before, friends even. He was no stranger to death. But Barry Sanderson had been innocent of this. He had only come because it was his job. And now, all Hiro could do was try to survive. Or at least, keep the bartender's memory alive, somehow. Visit his family, or something like that.
He raised a question to Karl Jak, the producer consulting his nap and muttering to himself. "So, uh, Mr. Jak....how'd you know where I was? Or where to find the car?" Karl raised his head from the paper and looked back. "Honestly, Mr. Protagonist? I was running from Mr. Voorhees. It was a happy accident you happened to be at the camp when you were. The car was similarly fortuitous. I found it in the camp's shed."
His question answered, Hiro returned to his contemplation as the two approached the base of the monolithic lighthouse. Karl pointed to the side and gestured to Hiro. "Search on the other side...it will look like a storm door, most likely cleverly concealed."
"Ah ha hah! A hunt for clues, my good doctor! Indubitably! That's just what this story needs now."
Hiro jumped a good two feet straight in the air as a voice sounded from behind him. A strange man, dressed in a black and red spandex bodysuit had appeared out of nowhere behind the hacker and Karl. Wearing a fabcy captain's hat, the spandex covered stranger began strutting around the base of the lighthouse, poking at long grass.
"Ah, Deadpool. Excellent that you've managed to survive this long. Now I have -two- strapping swordsmen to travel with."
Hiro just stared at Karl, then back to this Deadpool, rubbing his eyes. "Well, it's not the drugs....Deadpool, huh?" He squinted. The guy looked kinda familiar. "What are you...some kinda ninja Spiderman?" The hacker froze, feeling a blade on his throat suddenly as Deadpool posed dramatically in front of him.
"What are YOU, some kinda throwaway Akira reject crossed with Donald Glover? Oh, and you're welcome for the save." Deadpool pulled the sword away to reveal two perfectly bisected halves of some horrid, long legged mosquito type thing falling off of his sword. "Tsete fly! Those things can carry allll sorts of nasty diseases! Saw a special on the discovery channel."
Karl watched this with an amused smirk on his face, and shrugged, poking through more weeds with the toe of his camp sandals. Deadpool looked at the oddly dressed producer and held up a hand to count on his fingers, only to see that the hand he raised was a stump. "D'oh! Forgot I pulled a Luke Skywalker. Well, anyways. Hi, Lrak! Or Biz-Karl-o! Or Karl Two! Or Karl Beta! Or-"
Hiro cut him off before the assassin could really get up to speed. "I'm Hiro Protagonist, Deadpool. And right now, I'm a little fucked up. So, let's say we find this secret tunnel so we can get to Karl's bunker and save Neo Toky- I mean, get the hell off this damn island, yeah?"
RE: [9-] Cabana Boys (Hiro and Deadpool) - Deadpool - 07-24-2016
Beneath Hiro's bronze skin, a yellowing undertone showed through his pallid visage. The painkillers had kicked in before whatever antibiotics he took, rendering him a high and ill rendition of his true self.
”Look, I know you're not feeling well—your signature depicts you as Static Shock strung out on meth, and the guy in the back must be your junky buddy—but I'm trying to think of a cool name for Karl Two.”
Karl perked his head up, furrowing a brow towards the mercenary. “Karl Two? Making less sense than usual today, huh Wade?”
”Not unless you're the same Karl I turned into a toothpicked hors d'oeuvre,” Deadpool replied. He wondered how long it took his narrator to spell hors d'oeuvre, and quelled a chuckle before it became audible. ”And if you are him, you're not getting your yacht back. I marked it as my territory and all; even cemented my own body groove into your bed.”
Karl's face showed a mixture of confusion and skepticism. “You sure your mind isn't playing tricks on you? Perhaps being at sea for so long had you hallucinating. You do have a very creative mind.”
”Number one: I wasn't at sea for that long—only like a day n' a half in-character,” he retorted. ”Number two: I got the evidence in my backpack—maps, journals, a Sasuke doll . . . I'm keeping that last one for personal reasons.” He readjusted the book-bag slung over his shoulder and gestured towards it.
A rumbling groan came from Hiro. “What part about feeling loopy don't you understand, Peter Parker?” Despite his bubbling irritation, the morphine doused his frustration with a languid tone. “You can converse about the meaning of two Karls, stuffed animals, and whatever else you want in the bunker.”
Karl gave a wry expression; drawling a hum, the executive chewed over the mercenary's words. “Another me you say,” he muttered. Then he shot a glance towards Hiro and said, “My chocolate friend is right—let's find that bunker first.”
The three of them broadened their search. They separated, but stayed within shouting distance of each other. Hiro kept near the lighthouse while hunting for the bunker; occasionally, he would lean against the graystone pharos to take a break, and wait for the spikes in his opiate high to subside (he periodically 'rested his eyes', and allowed the morphine to gradually keel him over, but before the weight of his body could topple him he'd snap back to consciousness). Karl managed to find a sturdy piece of wood. He meandered through the tall grass, whistling some made-up tune as he tapped his stick against the ground—dull noises meant earth, clangoring sounds meant metal.
Deadpool slipped away to the waterfront of the lighthouse. He sat on the side of the dock, legs swinging in the air, with his hands wrapped around the Sasuke doll. As he stared into the toy's blank gumball eyes he wondered where the little fuck went. Prior to now he hadn't given it much thought, if any (or anything else during his time in the limbo realm of inactivity, for that matter), but now memories of the last Dante's Abyss were jumping to the front of his mind—Warpool Valenchiha.
”It used to just be Warpool,” the mercenary interjected, ”but he insisted that his name be in there somewhere—teenagers.” He shook his head and chuckled. ”Where are you? Maybe your on the other side of this island, holding a Deadpool doll in your hands. I like that idea.”
But he knew that wasn't the case. Fantasizing such things was just a means to deny the bitter truth. The undeniable verity of what really happened to Sasuke; so blasphemous that even articulating it was deemed heresy in the Omniverse.
“Jackpot, boys!” Karl's voice boomed.
Deadpool stuffed the Sasuke doll into his book-bag. He got up from the dock and made his way back around to Karl and Hiro.
Karl stood with one hand holding his wooden rod and the other on his hip. The tall grass reached halfway up his khaki shorts. Hiro stood beside him, leaning forward; his eyes wandered behind closed lids.
”Look's like those raindrops finally fell, huh Eddie Cain?” the mercenary quipped. ”Nights like this, man. Nights like this.”
“Care to put those brawny arms to good use?” Karl asked. “You're stronger than me, and Mr. Protagonist here is a bit too subdued to do manual labor.”
”My STR stat is only a 1, but I'll give it a go.”
The mercenary analyzed the door, running his eyes along the exterior. Dirt washed over most of the door's edges, but at the top it it two hinges jutted up from the ground; peering at them, he could barely see the round bolts capping off their ends.
”Lemme get that stick for a second.” Deadpool said, reaching a blind hand towards Karl. The executive filled it with the wooden rod.
The mercenary took the tip of the stick and dug next to an outer hinge bolt until he felt it lodge into a crevice. A rush of satisfaction flowed over him. He guided the wooden rod along the crevice, carving out the edges of the door. When he finished, he used the stick like a crowbar and levered the door ajar. The hinges cried a plea for WD-40, screeching as they twisted around the bolts.
A dry musty odor breathed into the air, soliciting Karl to shield his nose with his forearm. The executive took a step closer to the bunker and peeked his head over the doorway. Darkness swallowed the concrete stairs half of a dozen steps down. “There should be a light switch on the right side,” he said. His voice traveled passed his arm muffled and adenoidal tone.
Deadpool nodded. ”If I don't make it back, tell everyone I died masturbating to Leslie Jones.”
His boots clapped against the steps as he descended, bouncing echoes into the bunker. Visibility dwindled, then ceased to exist. He grazed his palm over the wall like a blind man reading braille till he found the switch. He flicked it in the opposite direction.
Starting from the rear, light panels flickered on overhead, bathing the bunker in an early morning blue.
Small monitors filled the back wall from end to end. Their screens were blanketed in a layer of dust. Below them, a dashboard stretched out wide enough to accommodate for the four swivel chairs, along with the four laptops.
”We're good!” Deadpool shouted. He gave a thumbs-up to Karl and Hiro.
Quote:My Count: 1094/Site Count: 1155
RE: [9-] Cabana Boys (Hiro and Deadpool) - Karl Jak - 07-25-2016
End of Round 9
“Damn it,” Karl muttered as he stood up from the console. “It’s no use. Something’s knocked it offline. I don’t know how, but it’s not going to serve any use for us.”
“I’m a hacker,” Hiro mumbled as he lurched toward the console.
Karl let out a laugh. “You couldn’t hack a lunchbox at the moment, Sweetheart.” Standing up from the console, the producer frowned as he thought something over in his head. “There’s one more bunker… it’s underneath the city. We should probably head there at some point.”
RE: [9-] Cabana Boys (Hiro and Deadpool) - Deadpool - 07-26-2016
“Maybe right now I cant,” Hiro said. He waddled over to one of the swivel chairs and collapsed into it, limbs sprawled as he laid in the seat awkwardly. “Just give me a couple, then I'll hack this baby deeper than its ever been hacked before.”
“As much as I'd love to watch you do anything that involves going deep, we don't have time for that,” Karl replied matter-of-factly. “This isn't just some basic server problem—I could call customer service for that—so the combination of the time it would take you to sober up AND crack the issue is time my sweet ass doesn't have.”
Hiro sighed. He pulled himself up and stooped forward, resting his arms on his knees. “How far is this city?”
Karl rolled his tongue around the insides of his cheeks as he guesstimated the distance. “A dozen kilometers or so, give or take.”
”Hi, I'm still here.” Deadpool waved his hand from the back of the bunker; the two of them turned to him. ”Sorry to cut your 120+ word conversation short, but you need to take a look over these maps and logs.”
He walked over to his associates and removed his backpack, placing it down on the console. The front of it displayed the face of an adorable white kitten with a sparkling red bowtie in front of her left ear. Karl glanced at the bag, then shifted his eyes to Deadpool and nodded. The mercenary unzipped the bag and delved a hand inside, pulling out a gibbous journal which he handed to Karl.
“Why're you carrying a girl's bag?” Hiro inquired.
An instinctual sensation to backhand the dopefiend flared up within the mercenary. He glared at Hiro and flashed the front of his palm. ”This is a Hello Kitty backpack,” he retorted, ”from the mid 90's.”
“You might be the weirdest guy I've met in the big O so far.” The bronze samurai leaned back in his seat, lacing his hands behind his head as he bowed the spine of chair backwards. “Go ahead and get this multiple Karl thing out the way, so we can get to the next bunker.”
While Deadpool and Hiro bickered, Karl had been mulling over the contents that the mercenary forwarded him. The executive unfolded the maps and gave them quick surveys, dismissing to the console afterwards, unsurprised by what he saw. The log was another story; with raised eyes, he meticulously read each word individually, scoping particular details.
Deadpool noticed the quizzical expression plastered over Karl's face. ”Believe me now?” He felt wrinkles pervade the sides of his mask as he smirked widely.
For once, he had the type of proof he needed to validate the nonsense he spewed. He watched the executive closely examine the journal. His faded blue eyes were great at curtaining his emotions, but this time they displayed them like a clean window; they captured feelings of shock, bewilderment, and curiosity.
Karl closed the book and nonchalantly tossed it on the console, near the unfolded maps. “I admit that's my handwriting in there,” he replied, shrugging his shoulders. “But it's not MY handwriting. Understand?”
”Yeah, the bold all caps made it pretty obvious,” Deadpool quipped. ”But that's all you gotta say about it?”
“Unless I see this other Karl standing in front of me with my own two eyes, I don't see hoopla—it could have been anything with the ability to shape-shift.” Karl answered. “I just want to know what happened to this imposter.”
”I penetrated him with my long, strong katana,” Deadpool said with a leering grin cutting into his mask. ”He couldn't take it, so he went overboard; after that, I'm not sure.”
Karl laughed. “Must have been a very weak copy of me then . . . but let's table this conversation.” He shuffled through the unfolded maps on the console until he found the one he wanted, separating it from the pile and pointing his index near the middle. “This is where the city is, I'm certain of it.” His finger slid down, curving to the right before stopping near the southern shore. “And this is where we are.”
“That's gotta be less than twelve kilometers,” Hiro interrupted. He bent forward; a light blinked on the side of his visor as he studied the map.
The executive sent him a light smile. “We're going to take a winding detour.” He zigzagged his finger back up to the city. “Taking the way already paved could lead us to more pirates, so we will go off course to make sure we don't have any tails.”
”I don't mean to burst your bubble,” Deadpool said, ”but I read someone calling it a jalopy, which I'm pretty sure means it's piece of shit.”
“It's a piece of shit, that's for sure,” Hiro agreed, chuckling. “It was a rough ride even on the beaten paths getting here.”
“We'll be fine,” Karl replied. “Plus, I like it a little rough.” He refolded the maps and placed them on top of the journal, shoving them across to the mercenary in a neat pile, waiting for him to return them to his Hello Kitty backpack; he did. “Great, now let's blow this popsicle stand.”
”That's what she said,” Deadpool muttered as he lent Hiro a hand to assist him out of the seat.
“No sweetie, that's what I said.” Karl undid the top bottom of his polo, exposing a thin patch of chest hair sprouting up as he winked. Then he headed for the stairs.
“Yo, mind helping me up the stairs?” Hiro asked the mercenary. “The morphine is wearing off, but my legs still feel noodly.”
”Sure,” Deadpool replied, ”as long as you don't try to pickpocket me.” He threw Hiro's arm over his shoulders and started to walk him out of the bunker.
The bronze swordsman pulled close to Deadpool's ear and whispered, “Do you think our Karl is a copy too?”
The mercenary had zero reasons to believe it, nor did he care to find out. He recalled his last feud with a Karl, and remembered how it momentarily left him looking like Chris Elliot during Scary Movie 2—My strong hand!!!
”Not sure, skinny Booker T.”
The duo made it out of the bunker and towards the vehicle. The back door and passenger side door were already conveniently left opened. Karl sat behind the wheel, staring at the pair.
“You two make a fine couple of bodyguards,” the executive told them in a flirtatious voice, “White Lightning and Chocolate Thunder—I like the sound of that.” He patted his hand against the passenger seat. “White Lightning, up front with me.”
Deadpool sat Hiro at the end of the rear seats, and closed the door once the samurai scooted to the far end. ”Oh, and lemme guess, you're Daddy?” he scoffed while getting into the passenger side.
Karl cackled with delight. “You said it, not me.”
The executive twisted the keys in the ignition. The engine hiccuped as it struggled to start, but he persisted; tapping against the pedal, he continued to turn the ignition until the engine came to a dull roar. It snarled and whined when Karl shifted gears, but calmed to a grumble afterwards.
“Let's say we listen to some tunes,” Karl said, barely audible over the sound of the jalopy. He pulled a cassette (a mythical old version of MP3s created in the 1960s, kids) from a compartment under his radio and inserted it inside—Free Fallin', by Tom Petty.
* * *
Karl followed along with each verse of the song, tapping his hands against the steering wheel as he swerved around trees and crushed small shrubbery. The jalopy rumbled violently across the rugged terrain with the bed of it screaming softly over every jutting stone. From the back seat, Hiro—who now looked well enough to hack Megatron—tinkered with his visor. His mid-length dreadlocks blew in the air like waving tall grass.
Deadpool gazed out the window with his fist propping his head, watching the skyline of the city steadily climb over the horizon, enlarging with every kilometer they traveled. A sweet anxiety churned inside of him. He wondered what type of adventures loomed there. Perhaps other survivors were already posted in the town, waiting to ambush whoever arrived. The possibilities exhilarated him; they turned him on like a woman in a latex bodysuit, bound and gagged.
Quote:My Count: 1405/ Site Count: 1483
RE: [9-] Cabana Boys (Hiro and Deadpool) - Hiro Protagonist - 07-28-2016
Every bump in the road of Karl's swerving, meadering path towards the city sent waves of vibration up through the seats, jostling the jalopy's passengers. Karl and Deadpool seemed undisturbed by it, but each rough jump was making Hiros wound twinge. Not cripplingly so, but it was enough to cut through his dwindling morphine haze.
The hacker was troubleshooting his visor, trying to figure out where exactly his anger triggered power boost had come from. Unfortunately, this meant rewatching his own third person footage, and that meant seeing Barry die all over again. It didn't hit as hard this time, mainly because Hiro was not the sort of man to dwell on the past. Blasting down a course of action meant that you understood consequences were a thing, and you had to learn to accept them. Still, it was disheartening to see the poor bartender decapitated anew, and with the very blade Hiro had in a holster.
Technical details from the spike in processing power displayed over the footage. There. Right as he got enraged....no way. The sensors were reading an external power increase, which meant HE had generated the increased speed and tactical focus. Pulling his goggles off and staring down at his hands, Hiro felt like a bit of a fool. He was capablenof anything he could think of here, and he used that power to make a fancy sword. Talk about willfully ignorant.
Pushing these metaphysical musings out of his mind for the moment, he turned his attention to his tao traveling companions, specifically, the one called Deadpool. Shouting above the noise of the music and the crunching sound of underbrush, he asked. "So, Deadpool, right? I didn't see you on the plane!"
The spandexed ninja turned his head back and nodded. "Yeah, I heard about your one man talent show in the bar. You like to party, huh? Actually, forget that. You DEFINITELY like to party. Who else would take morphine that doesn't give them HP back?"
The hacker blinked for a second. "You're, uh...you're kinda out there, huh?" The crimson caperer flashed him a thumbs up and punched Karl lightly on the shoulder. "I like this guy, Karl! I should read his book sometime...maybe you could get him a copy of my stuff, too." The producer just gave a wide grin and nodded, steering around a fallen log. "Maybe so, Deadpool, maybe so."
Hiro just sat back in his chair and half closed his eyes, letting the rushing air and little pangs of pain in his stomach jolt him out of his narcotic high. Peering through the darkness, he could spot a dull glow rapidly approaching and the silhouette of buildings within a mile or two. Karl pulled the jeep onto a manmade, asphalt road, slowing it's speed as the trio approached the town. But it seemed as though the settlement was inhabited...
His goggles focused in on one of the stumbling frames, and with a chill, Hiro spoke quietly. "Those people are dead. No life signs at all." Abruptly, Deadpool stood up in his seat, waving a sword. "ZOMBIES!?! Oh, be still my cancerous heart. Drive us closer, I want to hit them with my sword!" Karl bit his lip and turned back towards the recovering samurai. "We do need to go through them to reach the bunker....I suggest you get your slicing hand ready, Chocolate Thunder."
Pulling the machete out of its sheath and adjusting his position so he could reach past the bars of the jeep, he muttered, "Jeez, am I the only black guy in the Omniverse?" Deadpool laughed with insane glee as a new song came on the radio, and Karl jumped on the gas. "WAAAAHAHAHAHAHAH! It's killin' time!!!"
Quote:I'll Be Gone In A Day Or Two