[Round Zero: part 1]

[utopiamods]

At noon on the rest day, every screen in the campus lights up. It's the girl from the introduction again! She's grinning fit to burst, and her voice is bright and excited.

"Good morning, everyone! Round Minus-One is now officially over, so we'd like you to all report to the lobby for a special announcement, immediately! It starts in ten minutes, so don't be late."

The screens all go blank, before simply displaying the flashing text ALL STUDENTS REPORT TO THE LOBBY FOR 12:10.

Reaching the lobby, you find it empty of the usual staff. However, the doors to the tramstation are blocked by a large stage, spanning the entire south wall. In the centre stands the girl, in the flesh and just as sickeningly cheerful as her broadcast.

"Hi, everyone!" She waves, tilting sideways as she does so, and then clasps her hands together. "Wow, it's really great to see you all in person at last! You've all tried a lot harder this week, and it shows! We're really, really impressed with everyone. Ah, even though there was a bit of cheating..." she pouts, and shakes her head lightly, "But that's okay. We forgive you! You all know better now.

"But what we've called you here to say is this! We've been working extra hard too, and we've gotten a lot done with your help. So much that we're nearly ready for Round One!

"However..."

She's still smiling. It's a little unnerving, "We have to do some maintenance first, okay? And I'm afraid it would be a problem if you were all alive for that... you could cause us a lot of problems. So we're going to get rid of you for a little while. Think of this as a final test!"

She snaps her fingers, and your shadows disappear. No, not disappear. That's the wrong word. It's more like... they're abandoning you. Nearly forty pools of darkness flow up onto the stage, and suddenly explode upwards in tendrils and globs of black. The girl laughs as they finish changing, as they take on your shapes. As they reach into themselves and pull out inky replicas of your own weapons. They all laugh with her, in the emotionless tones of the Voice from your dreams.

"You can all draw your own weapons now, okay? Fight hard!"

[mod notice: NOW EVERYONE NEEDS TO READ THIS OOC POST BEFORE THEY REPLY.]

Comments

[queenscheckmate]

"Because I wouldn't killed someone I admire," she said flatly. "He is exactly what I aspired to protect in my world. I wouldn't want to destroy that."

Kallen dropped her gun on the floor. "I may have not been able to protect him but I will protect what he stood for." She shifted into a fighting stance. "You want to destroy his memory? Then you're going to have to kill me." Confident, but not stupid. "You want a fair fight? you have it right in front of you."

[warpwhatsir]

He threw back his head and laughed. "Tough words," he said with a sneer. "Your delusions are remarkable. Your world was undoubtedly no better than ours. Ours was wrought with wars and death and revenge between thousands of planets and galaxies." He shrugged. "But so be it. If you think you can kill me again, go ahead."

The foil remained firmly in his hand.

[queenscheckmate]

"You've got it all wrong. I will kill you and it will be the first and last time." She remembered the male mentioning his sport of choice, fencing. But she knew that his counterpart would not play fair. It would be hard to win to this win this fight but Kallen knew that somehow she could.

Call it a gut feeling.

She charged him, making sure to dodge his foil.

[warpwhatsir]

He just bared his teeth again and leaned out of the way, back bending in a way that barely seemed possible, bringing the foil around in a sharp jab. "Kill me, huh?" he snarled. "Let's see how true you are to your word. Let's see if you can watch me die again."

[queenscheckmate]

She ducked only slightly to have the hit graze over her shoulder. Ignoring the pain, she sent a fist directly to his face. "You mean for the first time. You don't need me to keep correcting you, do I?"

[warpwhatsir]

It connected solidly, but it didn't exactly look like he tried very hard to dodge her. He just came back up from where he'd hunched over, eyes still gleaming scarlet.

"Your shadow is you," he said primly, adjusting his shirt a little. "You just can't handle the truth."

[queenscheckmate]

Kallen backed up a little, placing some space between the both of them. "The truth? Want to share with me what that is exactly?"

[warpwhatsir]

A truly maniacal grin crossed his face then. "You killed him because you couldn't save him."

[queenscheckmate]

"..." True. That was how Kallen felt despite it not being the truth. She wasn't the one who pulled the trigger. She dropped her stance, lost in her thoughts.

He died because of her. Because she didn't react to the situation in time. She didn't see an opening to attack but should have made one.

"I didn't..."

[warpwhatsir]

"Yes you did."

[queenscheckmate]

"No..."

She knew she didn't but why couldn't she bring herself to believe it.

"I didn't kill Sulu."

[warpwhatsir]

"You're lying."

[queenscheckmate]

Kallen sighed. "If you believe that to be true, then take my life for revenge."

[warpwhatsir]

"Revenge?" He tilted his head. "Oh no. It won't be revenge. It'll be or the sheer pleasure of watching you die." In the blink of an eye he was lunging at her with the blade. What are you going to do, Kallen?

[queenscheckmate]

She closed her eyes, willing accepting the defeat that was about to be delivered to her.

Or it looked like that.

Once he was close enough, she opened her eyes. She moved out of the way too late (on purpose), the blade cutting into the flesh of her arm. She brought up her hand to take hold of the foil and struck Sulu with a blade of her own: her concealed pocket knife to his 'heart'.

"Sorry. I get the feeling that Sulu would be pretty pissed if I died right here. So for him, I have to keep going."

[warpwhatsir]

She was quick--disturbingly quick and he didn't have a chance to block or even see it coming. The dark Sulu got one last choking breath out, the foil dropping to the ground with a clatter. There was nothing but hatred in his eyes, his expression one the complete opposite of his real self.

"You... bitch."

The last words out of his mouth were slurred and faint, body twitching once around the small blade before he went limp, whatever fake life surging through him snuffed out.

[queenscheckmate]

Kallen shrugged. "I'm pretty sure I've been called worse."

After the shadow was gone, she fell to her knees, dropping her own knife and covering her arm. The blood seeped through her fingers like a waterfall. She needed to find the others so she could regroup with them. But for now she had to stop the bleeding before she would be on the verge of death itself.