Day One: Part 1

[Violet]

“You know, I can really appreciate a man with his own theme song,” Violet called into the darkness. There was no response, expectedly, but she still felt better for saying it all the same. “I bet Buu would have loved his own theme song. Big, bad guys tend to like shit like that.” She muttered the last to herself as she bent down to sort through her opponent’s bag that he had so thoughtfully left for her. She almost felt bad that she got out of her first face to face without a scratch, and he even left a consolation prize. How sweet.

All of his rations were untouched, which gave her eight portions of food, and plenty of water to last her for another day. She would be well fed and hydrated, which would definitely be great for the solo survival aspect. The only thing she would really need to worry about is some idiot trying to pick a fight. This battle was hardly a battle at all, so she didn’t take too much confidence from it. It was luck, pure and simple.

She disposed of the extra compass and map into the brush, rolled the extra bag up and placed it in with the MRE’s and water. She decided against placing her weapon in the duffle bag, as the extra rations took up the space it once occupied.

Adjusting the duffel across her back, and the weapon resting snuggly in her left hand, Violet took another look around, almost willing the masked man to come out. She knew he couldn’t be dead. Call it a hunch. Maybe, just maybe, she’d made a friend.

“I know you’re still out there,” she called once more into her wooded surroundings. “If we ever meet again, perhaps we can call a truce.”

The woods fell silent, save for the sing song chirps of crickets and other small insects that inhabited the foliage and underbrush. Violet trekked onward, keeping the water in sight, but staying far enough into the woods to be as hidden as possible.

Her thoughts were far from silent as she strode through the dark trees and crunching underbrush. Although she kept one half of her mind alert to dangers, the other half was rife with memories of competitions past. The bonding, the betrayals…most especially, however, the death. She reveled in it. As much as she hated to admit now, that part of her that was more bestial than human had kept her alive. That part of her that loved the sound of ripping flesh, of blood dripping to the ground in wet plops…of her hands delving into the still warm bodies of her prey, liquids covering her skin the further she went.
It never really left, it just lay in wait for an opportunity to come out again. In the many years since Bardock died, she hadn’t been allotted many opportunities, so the beast within her simply slumbered, undisturbed, but still hungry for something her human side just couldn’t provide. The Abyss provided the opportunity, the question was, was she strong enough to handle unleashing something she had such little control over? Would she even be able to transform into the physical manifestation? It took such a toll on her that she wondered if it would even be a wise move to do such a thing, and leave herself so vulnerable. Perhaps there was a way to satiate that bloodlust while maintaining her physical form and not make herself such a weak target.

The warm press of dawn hung on the horizon, the separation of water and sky becoming ever so subtly lighter as the sun began its ascent. Sunrise was still an hour off, provided time worked similarly here as it did back home. Who knows with Syntex, though. They had designed an entire world out here that could be manipulated at will, so she supposed that if they felt like it, they could make it high noon at the press of a button, exposing those who chose to be out in the open to anybody who just happened to be nearby.

It was a stupid strategy, to stay out in the open. Same went for those heading towards landmarks, where death was simply a few short steps away at any moment. Everybody would be flocking towards those places, hoping for items or a chance meeting, but could very well mean the end for most.

That was fine for her, let them pick each other off. She would be more than happy to come across them, weakened by injury or malnutrition, and take them out, securing her spot ever so closer to the top. She knew she probably wouldn’t win, but she could get damned close.

The only thing that would make this game better for her was someone she could journey with. It didn’t matter whether or not it inevitably ended in battle, but a simple truce until the end would be nice. When she partnered with her clanmates all those years ago, she accepted that they would all have to battle each other eventually, and it wasn’t something she was afraid of doing again. The people may change, but the goal stayed the same: make it to the end with as little conflict as possible, then have one giant melee to determine who was the best.

She relished the idea of such a battle, but knew in her newly weakened state, stripped of her powers, she’d be about as damaging as a pebble against a brick wall.

But hey, she’d try her damnedest or die trying.