…

RUDY SCARLET.

HE IS ONE NOT TAKEN LIGHTLY.

CREATION OF RUBEN.

…

STRESS…

THIS IS NOT YOUR FIGHT.

…

One side, a determined stare, and a tranced pupil. The other, a blaze of passion and aggression. An imaginary inferno had somehow appeared forming a boundary, trapping the three. It made no sense, however felt so unbelievably fitting. An intense atmosphere for an intense situation. Stress could only give a nervous grin.

 “Hey Urchiri.”

“W-what is it?” she replied which slight unease in her speech.

“If this guy tries what I think he will, don’t try to hold up that sabre in defence as it just won’t work.”

“Huh? What is he gonna do then?”

“I don’t really know, however from what I’ve seen already, everything he can do, you cannot defend against.”

“Is he really that strong!? Or… am I just that weak…”

“I couldn’t tell you to be honest.”

“What do you mean…?”

“Well you se-“

Stress, not fully understanding the danger of the situation, forgot that the enemy was probably not going to wait for his monologue to end.

Rudy’s burning right side had just tackled right into him, a loud thud running through his entire structure.

“MR. STRESS!” was a cry he heard Urchiri yell once getting impacted.

“Urchiri! Hand me some water!”

Urchiri quickly swung her sabre in a whip-like motion which sent a small liquid ball over to him. However, Stress didn’t use it to extinguish anything. He held up his right hand into a fist, which then got doused in the sabre’s water.

Stress then drove his moist fist into the flaming side of Rudy’s head, making a loud clang and sending painful vibration throughout his entire arm.

“AAAAAARRRGH, that’s metal isn’t it! Is that a helmet underneath a mascot head or what?”

Stress was directly pinned down as he stared directly into the face of death, no matter how goofy one side looked. He was surprised that he hadn’t caught on fire yet, or maybe he just didn’t notice it yet over his adrenaline rush.

“You. Urchin. I’m sorry but I’m the only one allowed to make the jokes around here, sparkling little SNOB.”

“That’s just a tad harsh don’t yo-“

“I tell you when you can speak here. Metaphorically, I’m above you. Physically, I’m above you. Right in this moment, I, am, above, you. I’ve made myself so clear I’m practically a window. Actually, why did I keep you alive this long? Curiosity? NEVERMIND, HERE COMES THE BIG ONE!”

Rudy slowly dragged his hand higher and higher up, the flames slowly passing up his arm away from his body. Slowly, his form and body underneath started to rear itself behind the retracting flames. He saw plates of an unidentifiable metal, no signs of melting anywhere, maybe some singing, however. It made sense. He wasn’t wearing armour at all. Rudy Scarlet was a creature made from metal, a sentient machine. Stress could only laugh at the absurdity of it all. First another world, then non-human beings, then time travel, then sci-fi elements too. In truth, he hadn’t fully processed everything he had been taking in all this time, despite all his acting up until now signifying otherwise. All he could do was stare right up…

At the five ignited fingers above him, ready to pierce his organs.

“MR. STRESS! PLEASE! PLEASE DON’T GO PLEASE!”

Stress could’ve said something back at her, but he felt as if it would waste his final breaths, before he had to redo it all over again, and again, and again, and again, and aga-

The five needles from each finger pointed directly at his abdomen, and fired as fast as fast as blow darts…

“RAIN RAIN, GO AWAY!!”

Urchiri held her sabre like an umbrella, dispersing the attack just enough to direct the needles away from Stress’s body, into the grass beside him. In doing so, Urchiri had no water left inside of her sabre rending it useless.

“Urchiri! What a save! How did you even block that one without it just going through the thing?”

“A rhyme I really like. It says that if you bring an umbrella with you on a wet day, nothing from above with hurt you. I followed that and made my own umbrella!”

“That is a really odd solution but, I mean, it wor-“

“URCHIN!”

Rudy once again refused to wait and shoved Urchiri to the side as the flames spread back once again onto his body, concealing it.

 “NOW, I’M GETTING REAL TIRED OF YOU!”

Urchiri looked at Stress on the ground behind Rudy steadily approaching. Stress held up his hands and started to do weird gestures with them. The first one looked like he was giving something to someone despite no one being in front of him. The one after that was him tapping the back of his wrist repeatedly. He then nodded, got off the ground and ran towards the direction of the stage, which was to Urchiri’s left.

“Oi, Mr. Sparks I was taking a detour you kno-”

Urchiri had put all her strength into bash the back of her spiny head into Rudy’s back. Rudy’s robotic nature made pain a concept unknown to him. It merely just made him more violent.

“ALRIGHT I’M FINISHING SAID DETOUR THEN! FINE!”

Urchiri ran as fast as a child her age could. She was completely on empty in terms of her sabre, so there was no hope in her being able to have slightly less of a disadvantage. Rudy didn’t even need to run to catch up.

“You know, I hope that Dad is seriously pleased with finally getting his hands on you, you piece of BULL SHIT. I prepared so much just for this night, just to capture you, a WEAK, TINY, OBSESSIVE URCHIN all for this one interest of his. I don’t honestly give two rat’s arses about whatever crazy stuff he has in his brain, but Dad will be Dad, a genius and outright respectable person, one you should never put yourself above.”

Rudy had caught up to her and ended up grabbing the urchin part of her head and lifting her off the ground.

“I preferably need you in a somewhat decent condition once I hand you in, so I’m going to be just a bit generous today and only make you temporarily immobile, OK?”

Rudy held his burning other hand up to Urchiri’s feet, ready to immobilize them via force. However, Rudy had felt something fall onto his non-burning hand while preparing his attack. Then he felt it again, then again, and then more rapidly than that until it was clear what the sensation was, even to him.

It started lightly raining.

“Well, isn’t that lucky for you Urchin? That precious water that you use is now all coming down from the sky just for you. Isn’t that sweet?”

More and more steam rose from Rudy’s body as the flames he was engulfed in was getting only slightly extinguished by the rain. Rudy looked down at his burning hand next to Urchiri’s legs.

His hand was no longer on fire, exposing a steamy metal palm, with Urchiri’s sabre up against it, small amounts of rain curving and floating towards it’s stem like a magnet.

“You little snob.” was what Rudy said before the flames higher up on his arm shot right off into Urchiri’s legs, swaying her body sideways and out of Rudy’s grasp. She landed face first, letting go of the sabre. But she got up, slowly.

“You’re gonna waste more energy standing up like that, I know that hurt you.”

“IT DOES HURT! But I’d hurt more if I knew I was so weak that I was useless! Not just to Mr. Stress, but for me too!”

“Please spare me the words of sad cry-baby motivation you have. You lose this. There is no way around it. Sure I may be arrogant, but at least I’m not ABSOLUTELY SHIT IN COMBAT! YOU CAN’T EVEN RUN AWAY! WHAT DO YOU HOPE TO DO IF YOU CAN’T EVEN FUCKING MOVE! Spare my time from being WASTED further if you can.”

“N-no…”

“No? NO!? WHAT GIVES YOU THE RIGHT TO SAY NO? YOU. HAVE. LOST. IT’S SO ABUNDANTLY CLEAR! GOD, I HATE YOU TYPES OF PEOPLE. YOU PEOPLE WHO JUST DON’T GIVE UP NO MATTER WHAT. HOW ABOUT I BLOW OFF YOUR ARMS THEN, OR EVEN YOUR LEGS, THEN WHAT? PEOPLE SAY THAT THE WORST THING TO DO IS TO GIVE UP, BUT NO. GIVING UP IS A HELL OF A LOT BETTER THAN JUST DROPPING DEAD AND LOSING! HOW IN THIS FLIPPITY DIPPITY HIPPITY LICKITY FUCK ARE YOU GONNA NOT GIVE UP IF IT MEANS THERE WON’T BE A LIFE AFTERWARDS? IF YOU GAVE UP, YOU WOULD GET THAT LIFE TO LIVE, IT’S JUST ONE LOSS, BUT NOOOOOOOOO YOU HAVE BE ALL NOBLE AND HEROIC TO YOUR OWN PSYCHE. NO ONE IS BEING SAVED BY YOUR HEROICS! JUST. GIVE. UP!”

Rudy was limping, he had poured out his entire soul into all of those words. His regret, his hatred, his malice. It was for Urchiri alone. His rambling had left him standing there, now drenched in the torrential downpour that came from the light rain earlier, now way more potent. He then looked directly up into the rain dampening the remaining half of his mascot face. Steam had filled the sky from Rudy’s flames fighting to stay lit as well as the surrounding flames incasing him, Urchiri and Stress. He then looked dead ahead. He didn’t even have the energy to feel mad at her anymore.

“So that’s the extent of your willingness to change. How nice.”

Before him stood Urchiri, sabre in hand, the rain gathering so much around the sabre to form a giant murky blade filling to the brim with kinetic energy. Rudy could feel Urchiri’s very heartbeat from the blade alone.

“So then, Urchin, take a swing.” he said while ushering her in with his hands.

She took her stance, sabre behind her back. She then, with slight difficulty, swung the sabre as fast as she could. It grew larger and larger the more it cut through the air. It grew deeper, darker, grander by the millisecond. Before she knew it…

The sabre flew right out of her hands as Rudy slapped her hands violently.

“You. Have. Lost.”

The flames behind her shot right past her, gathering all onto Rudy’s right side, which was still somehow burning despite everything. She saw her sabre; however it was at least a couple of metres away. Rudy just stood above her, ready to kill her consciousness. Urchiri wanted to cry her eyes out. She truly was usele-

“I TOLD YOU TO THINK FAST DIDN’T I?!”

“What in th-“

Stress had snuck up behind Rudy and clogged in his massive metal head with the same burnt banner he used to set him alight.

“What. Wait. I’m… shutting down? But I… I didn’t… I didn’t even… do… anythi-“

That hit of full blunt force was the thing that knocked Rudy completely out. Stress had, upon further inspection, made a large dent into his jaw, which completely fractured the structure of the head (and sent an incredibly painful shockwave down Stress arm once again). Stress just turned around to look at Urchiri, expecting a joyous expression. She looked relieved, but there was an air of dissatisfaction to it too, although that may only look that way due to the rain. Despite that, he spoke clearly to her.

“I’m sorry OK? I just thought that you weren’t gonna be able to beat him without your sabre on hand so, I just wanted to help out a bit. Weeeell, it’s no big deal right? We kicked the ass of evil, and that’s what matters at the end of the day.”

“… Mhm.”

“Damn this place is a wreck, and I bet that we’re gonna look mighty suspicious if we stay here alone, especially seeing as the police have evacuated most of the people here and it looks like some officers are still here. Do you have anywhere we can go for the time being? Someplace easy to get to yet somewhat hidden…”

Urchiri lit up with an idea.

“Oh, I know I know! Wanna come to my awesome cave home?!”

“Cave home? Well, a cave is secluded so I guess it could work.”

“Yay!”

“Is anyone even at your home right now?”

“Nope! It’s mine and mine alone!”

“Ok, no negotiations make things easier.”

“You’ve mentioned so many big words!”

“I like big words. They make me feel bigger for using them.”

“Antidisestablishmentarianism. That’s a big one! (Dunno what it means though.)”

“How the heck do you know that?! Wait, we’re just wasting time on pointless banter! We need to get to this cave of yours.”

They both walked side by side through the destruction they’d caused until they stood on the open street

“Hey, can I hold your hand?”

“I don’t feel comfortable with that. Also, you’re leading the way.”

“Awwww… I wanted to see if your sparkles would pass on to me if I held your hand!”

“That’s probably not how that works.”

“You’re no fun!”

“Nah, I’m a ton of fun to be around I swear.”

“Well… you aren’t wrong…”

“Hah! I am validated!”

“What does that mean?”

“Forget it…”

They began to run straight forward into the moonlit streets ahead of them, Urchiri guiding the way for Stress, worried she wouldn’t stop to look both ways when crossing the road.

…

SHE HAS POTENTIAL. AS EXPECTED, HOWEVER...

STRESS IS FULFILLING THE BIGGER ROLE…

STEP ZERO HAS ONLY JUST BEEN COMPLETED, NOT EVEN STEP ONE…

STEP ONE WILL ONLY BE COMPLETED ONCE SHE IS DEFEATED AND RETRIEVED…

NOW. YELLOW. COME FOURTH. YOUR SPOTLIGHT HAS FINALLY ARRIVED JUST FOR YOU…

AS FOR STRESS… I’M SURE.

YOU WILL ENDURE, EVEN IF IT BREAKS YOU, AND I KNOW IT WILL.

...

ARC 1: UNDERWHELMING TRAILBLAZER – END

RECAP:

Stress had found himself inside of an alternate world where magical kinetic objects can manipulate certain elements and products. One such person with a kinetic object, more a kinetic sabre, was a young urchin girl whom Stress had nicknamed Urchiri and then she added on the Beanie before it (Full Name: Beanie Urchiri). Stress was trying to figure out the rules of this world, developing a concept called Time Bomb Theory. After a rough first time round and encountering Pitch Black, a mysterious unidentifiable being, he had many run-ins with the Scarlets and their many tricks and torture. Once Stress had first destroyed the son of the family, Rudy, with an ability that Stress called Release Your Stress, Urchiri was fully captivated and once the Time Bomb Theory was proven wrong by an odd fault of people remembering the past timeline, Rudy had had enough of Stress’s shenanigans and him and Urchiri duked it out with Rudy. After ultimately coming out victorious, Stress and Urchiri set sights on a short-term hiding spot in the moment, that being Urchiri’s own habitat. Not only that, but two of his own friends plan to meet him tomorrow. Whatever could happen next? Find out in the next arc!

CURRENT PARTY:

Stress – The Eccentric Yet Boring Protagonist

-        Has Release Your Stress (Very Overpowered)

-        Average Strength

-        Has defeated Rudy Scarlet

-        Can control timelines (somewhat)

Beanie Urchiri – The Sparkle Obsessed Child

-        Has a Kinetic Sabre

-        Uses Hydrokinesis (Junior level)

-        Young and Weak

-        Assisted against Rudy Scarlet

-        Loves Sparkles

-        A little stupid