The Dark Ages [Dark Data]

[Hiro Protagonist]

Pressure Mounting Up

Hiro was starting to breathe heavily, the tussle against the mad alchemist and his horrific experiments starting to wear him down slightly. It hadn't been that long since the fight against the warlock, and unlike his implacable rusted companion Okor, Hiro was not cut out for endurance. He was a shock and awe combatant, steady enough to hold his own in a duel or in a battle, but multiple fights strung out one after the other were one of his soft points.

He'd tried to train himself for more endurance, spending nights practicing with a long piece of rebar he called his "Redneck Katana". It had helped his balance and his form, but the hacker was just not built for constant entanglement. These thoughts were running through his head as he made another split second dodge to escape the burning acid hurled his way by the two flesh dogs.

The silence thwipping of his shuriken pistol cut chunks of flesh off the hellish pets, but it was no use. The dropped pieces just globbed back onto their bodies, and Hiro's strongest projectiles had only managed to scorch their twisted pink flesh. Five Chernobyl Packets just didn't pack enough of a punch, although their erstwhile ally in the orange combat suit seemed like they were toting an armory that was more equipped to fight horrendous, formless monsters. The beam she'd unleashed definitely hurt the things. It seemed like Hiro was the odd man out in this fight, so he scanned the battlefield and zeroed in on the one target he was more used to dealing with; the corrupted alchemist.

Just as he was about to dash forward and engage, Madotsuki underwent a blinding transformation and rushed him, firing blasts of light and momentarily overwhelming the mad potion brewer. "Well, shit Mads...didn't know you could do that." Hiro muttered to himself. Maybe a boost would be prudent. The gently glowing purple of the darkchips slotted into his wristcomp caught his attention, and the hacker could feel the urge to use it tug at his head. Perception slowed as he held a miniature debate in his head. He was sure his program had isolated the corrupting effect...but the gnome had seemed worried about other energies she'd detected. But she was a bumpkin! A friggen' magician, living here in this primitive, backwards verse that didn't even see fit to send troops to defend their villages. He could handle anything these fricken' chips threw at him, and Nebula to. Better to use the enemy's weapons against them.

Plus, he felt a little emasculated seeing a 16 year old go all biblical in front of him.

-tap tap tap-

Immediately, his body was covered in dark purple flames and he felt as if he'd slammed four energy drinks in a row. The colors got brighter, noises got sharper, and his vision went eagle-eyed with detail. Which was good, because he saw the angelic Madotsuki sail backwards as the alchemist hit her with some sort of yellow, molten spear that flowed back to his arm. 

Purple smoke formed an outline of the hacker before dissipating as he dashed forward, katana ready to be drawn in a powerful slash. He zipped in front of the Darkling man with intense speed, and drew a thin bloody line across his coat, which made the man shrug and swing his metallic appendage at the silicon samurai. Hiro responded by dropping into a defensive stance, catching the approaching limb in the elbow and arresting it's forward momentum. They both paused, simultaneously as the motion was something neither had expected. 

But Hiro was much faster.

The counterattack nearly cut the man's fleshy arm off, and the hacker took a step back to boast as purple flames set the man's clothes alight with cinders. However, his blow hadn't damaged his target enough, and before he could twist away golden fingers grasped the bare blade and squeezed, shattering his sword into glass crystals. A reflexive jerk to the left prevented Hiro from getting a handful of glass shoved into his torso, but didn't stop the meaty fist crashing into his jaw and sending him backwards a few steps.

Sheathing the katana handle and setting the reforge function, Hiro drew his tanto and circled around the alchemist, still burning with the flames of power. Dash, dash, dash, and the damage was showing. Like most of his opponents, Hiro was just too fast, his tanto finding unprotected spots seconds before they disappeared again, a blade through the ulna, a severed pinky, a nose tip severed. The hacker-ronin was a jive talking blender, and it never showed better than when he had two weapons in his palms. The overconfidence was palpable, which is why he felt something was wrong as the alchemist stared at him with glee.

No, stared past him.

His coat flapped but not fast enough. flames trailed behind him.

He could see the ball of disgustingly green acid sail less then three inches from his nose as he backflipped over it, the gooey dogs looking self satisfied as they thought they had got him, when instead their projectile hit their master instead.

Thank Omni for superpowers, right?

922 Words
Hiro used Inner Power darkchip, +1 to all stats for the round
Hiro used Totsuzenshi, Chernobyl Packet, Eldar Pistol, Regretful Tanto.