thearena | (no subject)

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Who: Zombie Orc and You
What: Orc has died and his shambling undead rock monster corpse is looking for a meal.
Where: Anywhere in the arena.
When: The start of week five
Notes: Violence towards zombies, maybe some zombie on human action.

The creature that had been known as Orc was no stranger to hunger.

There was a time in his life where he never went hungry. Even the faintest growling in his gut could be cured by threatening some weaker boy for his lunch money and then using it to buy snacks. Or stealing candy bars from the local gas station.

The came the time of the FAYZ when there was never enough food to go around. He tried to fill the emptiness in his belly and in his heart with alcohol, but it was a poor substitute.

But this hunger was different. This was the hunger for life. For the flowing blood and vibrant pulsing flesh of a living creature.

They were all around him. So much faster then he was as he drug the extra weight of a boulder with his every heavy step.

He was a stone covered beast starving for human flesh. Slow but powerful and still full of anger that he could not understand.

Do you dare get too close?

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Howard isn't sure if he's approaching Orc to apologize or scream at him. All he knows is that he recognizes that gravelly trudge across the asphalt of the parking lot instantly, and it pulls him out of the car, all blind ninety pounds of him walking with one hand to the vehicle to make sure he doesn't lose it.

"Orc?" His voice is quiet as he asks the blackness he lives in to produce his friend. His feet, put in socks to cover the exposed skin, feel as if they're being stabbed by a hundred nails whenever he puts weight on them.

Orc grunted and turned slowly groaning into the echos of sound, his eyes searched the short range of vision he had and he took a breath. He could smell life.

"Rrrrrgh." was his response as he started the heavy shuffle towards Howard.

"Orc?" Howard keeps feeling his way around the car, made suddenly nervous by the strange growl. "I can hear you, man, I just can't see you..."

He finds the door to the back of the car and decides that that's safety. He keeps his hand on it.

A thud.

Then another.

Then another.

Faster and faster each step, louder and louder till the ground seemed to shake as the beast that had once been Orc thundered at the scent of life and slammed into the side of the car.

"RRRRRGH!!!"

Howard shrieks as something hits the car so hard that he loses grip on it. He throws his hand back, finding the metal again as the vehicle rocks back towards him. He throws open the car door and clambers inside, tripping and fumbling the whole way, helpless.

The beast stops while the noise echoes all around him in the garage. When this settle he snarls and stomps forward again clawing at the vehicle. His fingers find purchase in the drivers side front door and he peels it away as easily as peeling an orange skin from the fruit.

Not smart enough to take a knee so he can reach farther his hand hooks into the car and gropes blindly for the boy who is out of reach and also likely scared out of his mind.

Howard screams. He doesn't care who comes. He feels the brush of gravelly fingers against his wrist and he knows that touch, knows it's Orc, and he can't do anything about it. He clamps his hands over his head and curls up under the dashboard, as far from the sound of Orc's roaring that he can get.

"I'm sorry!" he screams. "I didn't mean it!"

Unfortunately this just frustrates the beast that was once Orc and he digs his feet into the ground pushing the wreckage of the car across the parking lot as he uselessly grasps for Howard still coming up short.

After about twenty feet of screeching metal and scraping concrete he stumbles and falls flat on his face.

"Uuhhhhhhhh."

Howard doesn't get out of the car. Maybe a year ago, back in the FAYZ, he would have gone to help his friend. But that was a year ago, and today Howard is blind, raw, hurt in body and soul.

So he stays under the dashboard, shaking and whimpering.

It took a very long time for Orc to rise again.

The whimpering had gotten so soft that it was drown out by the ringing in his ears from the sound of metal on stone. By the time he was up again the ringing was gone but his hearing was not completely recovered.

Turning around slowly he sniffed and a ding from the elevator drew his attention.

With heavy, unaware footsteps he lumbered away leaving the meal he had been denied to cower in fear and wonder just what his life had become.

It was safe to say that, when Shepard rounded a corner and caught the shadow of Orc's stony shoulders against the dim window-light, she has seen something like this before.

A Brute was a massive, hulking, abominous amalgamation of flesh and technology. It could not eat, had questionable brain-processes, and contained a mutant mixed-chirality biology that would have had heads scratching if said heads hadn't been preoccupied with either a swift exit or a firm and fire-heavy response.

A Vanguard, lightly armored, armed with a single weapon, could take one down in a minute— or two. Biotics were a hell of a thing, and with the tribal masks Kurloz had shown her how to use... A familiar adrenal thrill, a familiar, impossible target, among all the rage-feedback from mask use, among the grief of loss, and the bald, punishing uncertainty of both Capitol and Arena.

How could she resist?

"Hey! Fatso! You want some of this?"

The creature formerly known as Orc turned to gaze sightlessly in her direction.

He hungered.

With a roar of challenge he lumbered forward in a clumsy shuffle, arms up groping at the air in her direction.

Good boy, come to mama.

The Mnemonic was the first motion of a breast-stroke, shoulders swung wide, muscles bunching across her back that triggered the complex ripple of neuro-electric potential. Gravity bent the universe around her and for a moment the sound of Orc's roar turned basso and strange, doppler-shifting as she kicked off with a shout and met him head on, zooming like an unstoppable bullet along a frictionless corridor of space, guarded only by a mass effect envelope, a barrier, and her own strength of will.

Most people preferred to shoot their bullets using guns. Shepard was of the opinion that if you were going to do something right, you had to do it yourself.

Normally a person throwing themselves at a stomping rock monster is a terrible idea, one that's likely to result in bruising, broken bones and possibly humiliation.

But no one ever accused Shepherd of being normal.

With the mask unlocking her abilities she was able to slam into him with a force that would have startled Orc, if he was still capable of emotions other then hunger. Instead his growl came out garbled as the stones across his skin shuddered from the impact and he stumbled back a few steps.

Recovering he took a duo of massive swipes with his thick hands, trying to grapple her.

Normal people had homes and families and if they lost people then those people had graves. You could visit them and leave flowers. You never flinched away from certain locations on the galaxy map because you'd left someone you love to burn there, or to be picked-over by carrion birds. You never had to write home to normal people's mothers, letters that started off I regret to inform you, like a fake sweepstakes letter and ended up winning them a lifetime supply of regrets.

But then, there was the way Orc's bearish arms swing for her; normal people didn't know to duck under the retaliatory attack, to dive between the beast's knees and elbows, roll and come up ready to kill.

So, there's that much to say for a life free from normalcy.

Shepard slammed her fist into Orc's exposed flank, a vicious Nova, and this time the Mnemonic was a raised fist, like an exaggerated biotiball maneuver, spiking the ball directly over the net and into your opponent's unready face. She'd used it to dent steel plated decks and blast cracks into concrete. The area of effect was massive, a corona of blue that spent the potential charge gained on her unweildy passage through the corridor.

But she didn't let up for a moment. The Nova was a delaying tactic, a breath of air, a second to let her amp cycle, it did damage but more importantly, it make a weak point. She brought her arms up, and at point-blank range, found that frictionless bullet's mind and charged again.

Chunks of rock exploded from his flank at the attack exposing human flesh underneath, but the creature knew no pain.

Only frustration at being denied it's meal. Another roar and it twisted to try and swipe at her. Too slow! Every motion was like he was fighting in syrup as she blasted him off his feet with her next attack. The impact of his heavy body hitting the floor boomed like a canon in the hallway and shook the falls around them rattling pictures and shaking the light fixtures over head.

The lumbering hulking zombie tried to crawl towards her, too simple to even consider standing up just yet.

Again she was reminded of Reaper forces, of the mindless hungry grasping of Husks, the utter relentlessness of a creature that did not fear death. Possibly could not fear death— couldn't fear her. More's the pity, with the coronal blue rippling around her arms and shoulders, throwing back reflections and highlights off the multitude of polished surfaces, however dusty.

Thane had called her Siha, a Valkyrie warrior-angel, a creature of vengeance and death. At the time she'd been flattered, but skeptical. Right now, it felt true.

Orc was a force of nature, blind and hungry. She raised her hands like a hammer over his head and scattered blue-white shearing forces along the gravity planes. The hammer dropped, and she rolled away, only to strike again and again and again, conscious only of the heat in her amp, the timer ticking down until the mask put its fangs in her, and the dance of act-and-reaction with the sluggish giant.

Die, you son of a bitch. Rest in pieces.

And so he did. Orc never stood a chance in this state. When Shepherd finished there was nothing left of the rock monster save for piles of scattered pebbles.

She had exposed the truth beneath the stone, a fifteen year old bot who had been dead for hours, possibly days. His face torn up from the bites that had created him, his bones broken from the force of her blows. His skull caving in had been the last blow.

Silence settled over the area. Another victory.

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And finally . . .

Late but worth the wait~

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