Taking on the Spectre

[CaptainL]

For Luke, it didn't matter that Spectre had brought backup. It didn't even matter that she had established herself as one of the most feared and ferocious women in LAW, with an unprecedented and unimaginable amount of resources at her disposal and the cold cruelty to put all those resources to work for whatever wicked purposes she wanted. Right now, Spectre had his wife, and anything between him and the ring was just an obstacle that needed to be taken out along the way. Spectre didn't realize what it was she was messing with. Luke figured he could easily take on as many people as he needed to - and as he bowled through the crowd like it was nothing, it seemed like he was living up to his promises to himself.

Spectre, however, was undeterred. If Luke had raw size and strength on his side, then Spectre made up for that in mercilessness and deceit. She still had Flora within her grasp, and as long as Flora was there, she had leverage. Suddenly, the blue-haired girl felt Spectre's boot come down against her spine; her face contorted from the pain, and she let out a scream as her heel dug into her back, causing a few fans to gasp. When Spectre twisted her arm behind her back, as she was forced back up, she cried out again, doubling over forward. She might have thought that her righteous indignation alone was enough to let her stand up to Spectre, but when push came to shove and they were face to face, she realized things wouldn't be that simple.

Now, she was here in Spectre's grasp, the masked redhead twisting her arm behind her back hard. For a moment, her eyes watered and she winced against the pain. But when she looked back to see Spectre was looming just behind her, that made something drop in the pit of her stomach. A wave of icy cold washed over her body. Somehow, the threat of what Spectre could do to her loomed so much taller than anything Spectre was currently doing to her. In the face of that, all the determination that had fueled her a moment ago had suddenly been snuffed out.

Whatever it was, though, it wouldn't stop Luke. Now he was in range of the ring, and he grabbed the ropes, pulling up on them to haul himself into the ring. For him, it didn't matter that he was staring down the infamous Spectre. All that mattered was that he was staring down a woman who had made a grave mistake. His muscles tensed, and his eyes narrowed into a piercing glare. When he saw his wife shudder from the pain, his teeth clenched. But he couldn't let anything stop her. Not now.

"Put her down."

[Monsy]

“PuT hEr DoWn.” Spectre mocked, “mY wiFE, mY souL, my eeeeeverything.”

She reached over and snatched Flora by the chin, jerking her head up just for fun. The hammerlock to Flora’s back was twisted. A slow, methodical application like the motorcycle she used to ride. “She’s about to have her life changed. She wants to be front and centre, doesn’t she?”

Then she grinned, turning head to Flora. “Where do you think my machine should bruise first? You know what I do to your types, right? I take them, from anywhere, even their own homes, then lay them on a clean table. Chain them up. Sometimes both. Then, we show the world what a broken soul looks like, with a little help from me.” She grabbed Flora’s neck, squeezing it. “Maybe we can asphyxiate while she’s there. This neck is high value for some total freaks. We can cut the shot just over the lips, see her gasp. Higher the heart-rate, the more she’s choked. When you’re almost out— You get it.”

She leaned her head against Flora’s collar, then traced her hand down Flora’s thin body, pressing up against. Belly to back. She twisted the hammerlock just a bit more. Now her attention was back on Luke. A finger glossed over the belly, going around the naval in slow deliberate circles. "Help me out Luke. How do you want me to beat your wife again?”

[CaptainL]

Luke had made his point. He had taken out Spectre's henchmen, clearing the way forward to narrow in on the mastermind behind it all. Now he was staring Spectre down. His shadow fell over her - given the discrepancies in size between the two, it was plain to see that he could've crushed her here and now if he wanted to with ease. And yet, in spite of it all, Spectre wasn't the least bit intimidated. She barely even seemed to notice - her composure didn't break, and neither did her smug, self-assured attitude, as she twisted Flora's arm harder. In fact, she was mocking him, and his righteous fury. Luke's jaw dropped open in a gasp, and yet he couldn't even find it in him to voice the words behind his anger.

The blue-haired model whimpered as the pressure bore down harder against her back, causing her to sink lower with a shudder. When Spectre threw her arm around her throat and pulled back, pinching her airways, she let out a raspy, breathless gag, and her whole body spasmed. The hairs on the back of her neck stood on end at the thought that she was in Spectre's clutches, and at her mercy. The redhead could do whatever she wanted to her, and anything seemed on the table. That alone was a terrifying thought. But for Luke, it was even worse. He had to see all of this unfold, and all the while, Spectre was mocking him for even wanting to be involved. Her confidence more than made up for her smaller size. His eyelid twitched as the tension in his body rose. For a moment, that confidence was enough to even quell his own. How, he thought, could he stand up to someone like this?

When Spectre made threats about everything she could do to Flora, that was a step too far. Luke clenched his teeth, and the bile rose in his throat. He wouldn't listen to this any longer! "That's enough-!" he cried, moving to snatch his wife back from Spectre's clutches. In any other circumstance he might think twice about baiting her ire, but not now. This was something he couldn't ignore. If Spectre wanted a fight right here and now, he wouldn't hesitate to give her one!

[Malkavia]

This was good shit, the kind of TV drama that makes the sleazy kind of slick-haired, mid 40s producers who ran LAW rub their grubby paws together while they salivated over the viewcounts and advertising throughclicks.

Even Dot, as she lay belly-down in her appointed place atop the ceiling ventilation pipe, couldn't help but smile behind her black visor as Lucas mowed his way through the lesser Spectre helper fuckwits.

You get her Lucas!

The Digital Kitten

Was it perhaps an insubordinate, even rebellious feeling, this cheer she silently gave? Of course it was. But fuck it. Was there anything so sweet as a man giving life all the KICK he's got, all for his sweet lady love?

Dot adjusted the thick bungee chord tied figure-eight followthrough style about a silver carbiner that connected to an ankle harness about both her feet. Her life was about to depend on the integrity of that knot and the strength of the carabiner. Her life and, as importantly, Spectre's demonstration.

She rose to a kneel, slung her hammer over her shoulder, and took one last breath down to her toes before she pushed off the huge steel pipe and dove into the light. Wind whipped across her face as she tumbled through the air, glittering black and pink in the stagelight while gasps rose oh-so-back-shiveringly wonderfully from the cunts in the crowd.

Would Lucas turn? Would he see the digital kitten and her hammerhead twice as thick as her head arcing through the air towards his noggin? Would he duck?

She felt the chord turn taut and tight against her legs as the pendulum of her arc reached its maximum rushing speed, and the momentum of the hammer tore at her outstretched arms. She wanted to howl, to laugh, to tell Lucas to get his filthy mits off her boss—but she kept silent as an owl. She could adjust the arc a few degrees, but if Lucas really got out of the way, there wasn't much she could do to change this train's trajectory.

But then, a loved one in distress — especially one as beautiful as Flora — makes for powerful tunnel vision.

[CaptainL]

Luke already had raw brute strength on his side, but that strength was amplified even further by the rush of adrenaline that could only be brought on by seeing his wife in danger. With a single tug, he was able to pull Flora away from Spectre's clutches, and she threw her arms around him to hug herself closer to his body, looking back and forth in a panic. Things had escalated far out of control by this point. Luke was just supposed to cut a promo on the next opponent he had in his sights, and now things had evolved into a hostage situation. Luckily, it seemed like things were finally starting to get back on track. Luke had put a stop to Spectre's tricks - he wasn't going to tolerate her threatening him or his family any more, and the cold, stony glare he shot her right now said as much about what he thought of her.

What he didn't see was that the chaos had only just begun. The sight of a woman in an elaborate electronic helmet descending from the rafters like a secret agent in a movie was a sight that garnered plenty of gasps and cries from the crowd - some could only imagine that this was some sort of dramatic publicity stunt, and others had to ask themselves just how many resources Spectre really had at their disposal. Flora looked up, glancing back from over her husband's shoulder, to see the masked woman alight on the ground, and there she let out a gasp. "Luke! Look out-!" she cried, trying to get his attention. All she knew was that nothing good could come from another intruder being thrown into this match.

"Ah..?" Luke began to look back, but it was already too late for him. Dot had already struck - and it was just then that the head of her mallet met his skull with the sound of a loud crack, causing him to fall to his knees with a cry of pain. He clutched at his head, rubbing at his temples to try and dull the ache that was now throbbing through him. His vision blurred, and a ringing noise echoed through his ears.

Flora landed nearby, breaking away from him just in time to avoid the brunt of the blow, but she was nonetheless drenched in sweat, her breaths quickening into pants. This was decidedly out of hand, she thought - she didn't know who Dot was, or where she had come from, but she couldn't allow this any longer. She couldn't allow her husband to get hurt!

"STOP!!" she cried, rising to her feet and spreading her arms as though to hold Dot, Luke, and Spectre apart from one another. "Just...stop-! You've already made your point! Can't we just...wait for the match to settle this?!"

[Monsy]

That couldn't have gone better.

Spectre looked at Dot with a genuine grin pulling up ear-to-ear, feeling bubbly in all the right places. Warmer too. To anyone else, that look was the same vile, shit-eating posturing they've grown nauseous to. Its effect was similar to an onion, with loaded eyes starting to tear up as another favourite dropped to her knees in-front of the virus. Hearing him cry out was enough for a few folks, with many keeping Flora in their sympathies for what she was going through. Spectre took a step forward, licking her lips once, then was about to lift her knee and crown him with her boot until Flora got between them! "Huh??"

The crowd gasped. Another daring move from her tonight -- and the odds have only gotten worse! Although, even as the crowd watched with longing for their favourites to escape this, many had a feeling in their gut that told them that the cards were no longer in Luke or Flora's hands. Even with this truth rapidly validating itself, she called them out! Now the crowds were humming with support. To both push her defiance -- and in agreement to restore reason before the match ahead.

"Flor-a!" "Flor-a!" "Flor-a!"
"Flor-a!" "Flor-a!" "Flor-a!"
"Flor-a!" "Flor-a!" "Flor-a!"

The Virus's face went straight in the momen. She made a tall posture, dull and flat eyes, surveying left than right slowly. Middle fingers, people rubbing their eyes, and a noticable swath of audience members she looked towards either hid their faces or the faces of their loved one, giving back looks of stoic disdain, fear, disgust and overwhelming emotion that was on the verge of breaking down. Spectre folded her arm towards her shoulder, pointed at Flora then clicked her tongue. "See that problem right there, Dot?" Her brow raised, then an expressive cocky sneer re-developed like it was her base state. "Concuss it."

[Malkavia]

"CaN't wE JuSt WAit fOr the maaaAAAAAAAAAAAaaatch to sEtTlE tHiS?!"

As Dot's pendulum swung away from the ring, over the entrance ramp, Flora's plea played over every speaker in the room—except, that wasn't quite her voice. It got stretched, exaggerated a whiny caricature elevated to screech even more desperate than its original.

After that came a giggle, high pitched and sweet as bubblegum but layered with a level of autotune synth, while Dot bent at the waist and reached her hands for her own boots. "You think the game gives a shit if the bell's rung?" asked a sing-song voice with the same synthetic layering. "Life itself is one big match, snookums." On the downswing of the pendulum, she loosed herself from the bouncing bungee, flipped, and landed into a squat mid-ring. Her head pivoted towards ol' Flora, and Dot could see just a tinge of her pink LED reflecting off our girl's pale skin. "One you're solidly losing if you're married to this limp-dick roadkill."

Dot didn't turn her gaze from Flora—but as she stood, and as the chants for Flora, Flora, FLOOOOOORA filled the space between her ears, she clenched her fists. She dropped her hammer, knit her fingers, and cracked her knuckles. She sauntered into the crossfire separating Spectre and Flora, hands clasped behind her back, shoulders and face leaned out, as if she were trying to catch Flora's smell.

When the order came to concuss, Dot watched Flora's face for half a second—allowing her just a moment to hear and process what was coming. Dot wanted to see her pupil contract with fear. Then she reached out at top speed and aimed to land a three-step maneuver:

One—grab her pretty face. Smash it — CRACK — into Dot's naked knee.

"Leeeeeet's kill Flora." Dot's voice chimed through the speakers, soft and singsong.

Two—she hoisted one arm under Flora's shoulder and the other through her groin, and LIFTED...fireman's carry style.

Clap, clap, clap-clap-clap. Were those from the audience? Or the speakers?

"LET'S KILL FLORA!" Now the voice was deep, baritone, and accompanied by an audience chorus that exploded from the speakers—giving rise to an artificial chant aimed at burying the asinine crap from the stands. As Flora squirmed and struggled on Dot's shoulders, her visor angled down towards the ol' hubby. A line of interference washed down her kitten-face, like someone had bumped the HDMI chord.

And...Three—Dot dropped the woman, this cow stupid enough openly defy the Virus, into the hardest goddam kick-to-the-face Dot could manage. Go the fuck to sleep.

[CaptainL]

In most circumstances, Flora would've been the type to stop and blush if she heard the whole crowd chanting her name - in the leadup to a match that she wasn't even in. But desperate times called for desperate measures, and she wasn't going to stand idly by while this woman berated and threatened her husband - not even if she had threatened her just as coldly a moment before. Flora was a valet - her official job was to stand in the corner and look pretty. She was really a glorified part of Luke's entrance, and mostly as a way for him to boast about how he had married a gorgeous model in order to build himself up even harder. But if things were truly this bad, Flora knew that wasn't going to be enough. For Luke's sake, she had to make a stand. And that had won over the hearts of the whole arena!

In this case, though, Flora couldn't afford the time to get flustered. Here, she was on high alert, and she needed to keep the two assailants at bay! Her stance never wavered as she forced herself between Luke and Spectre, keeping her arms spread wide. Adrenaline was pouring through her veins, and her muscles had gone rigid as her heart pounded. Her head was still spinning from the whirlwind she'd been through a moment before. But she held firm nonetheless. At the least, she thought, she had intervened. It would be okay now.

At least, that was what she thought. But when it came to the Spectre, things were rarely that easy. Just then, her voice began to play from the speakers, distorted and mocking - and when Flora heard that, she let out a gasp. "W-What..!?" she sputtered, looking back and forth. Where had that come from? How had they gotten that clip so quickly - was there someone backstage in league with them? Flora couldn't trust her surroundings any more - she couldn't even trust the arena itself. Anywhere she looked could be a trap. The only thing she knew was that she wasn't the one in control here - and anything could happen next. With that thought came a chill wave that rushed over her - and that would lead right into her coming eye to eye with the unfeeling, unchanging mechanical mask on Dot's face.

In the scant split-seconds that passed, Flora's mouth dropped open in shock. She realized, then and there, how open and vulnerable she was - how she was alone in a ring where Spectre and her entourage held full control, a lifeboat in a storm-tossed sea. But any thoughts of fear and panic that cut through her head were quickly overridden by something else - the sensation of Dot's hands grabbing her face and pulling it forward. Flora didn't even have time to gasp before her face was thrust hard into Dot's knee - but when it landed, it landed with a crack, causing her to shriek as her head was thrown back and a blinding pain went pounding through her skull. Her head was still spinning, and she barely had any time to think of what awaited her when Dot swept her up off the ground. But Luke was stirring to lucidity, even as he dealt with the throbbing pain in his skull - and when he looked up, he would look up just in time to see his wife writhing in Dot's clutches.

"Stop!! Let her go!!" he barked - but it was no use. Dot nailed Flora straight downward, driving her face-first into her raised knee. There was a muffled cry, and her hips jerked into the air - but then, the life drained away from the valet's body, and she fell limp, dropping unceremoniously to the ground at Luke's side. Spectre's foot planted on Luke's chest, and he hissed through his teeth, twisting back and forth on the ground - yet, no matter how much he should well have been able to overpower someone as comparatively small as Spectre was, he couldn't even find it in him to do that, as though the panic had frozen him in his tracks.

"Nnngh...what...do you want?" he hissed, looking back up at Spectre. "We've already agreed to the match, right? So...why bother with all of this?"

[Monsy]

Now THIS was what an amigo looked like.

Two words. Hop to.
LETS KILL FLORA.

Spectre might have joined in on that. No truer and more in-touch words have been spoken. Dot had plucked her thoughts right from her mind… Or maybe peeped some of the planning boards and saw all the tid-bit lines. Or maybe it was when they rehearsed and workshopped lines, voices and material in that abandoned factory they spent all Sunday climbing through and scaling, sending their quips down old pipes, threatening each other with the whole dictionary that it would equate to the synopsis of the CIA handbook. Nevertheless, the Virus had a dumb smile seeing Dot elevate the mood standard by two notches. She felt almost an itch to compete. . . Then again--that can be a later thing.

LETS KILL FLORA.

Spectre matched the cues like theatre. When Dot did the first knee, Spectre threw her fist down in gesture, lurching and having a silent yell of. ‘YEAHH!’ Before evolving her smile to that signature machiavellian ear-to-ear grin that showed both rows of pearly whites. She put an arm out, half-bent, palm-up, a finger curled to beckon, then lifted it like the maestro. When Flora was on Dot’s firm shoulders, Spectre grabbed her thumb across her throat.

“Crack her -fuckin- SKULL!”

And just like a robot, she executed. Four jets of purple flame shot from the corners of the ring on impact, rising high before dying out over the next ten seconds. The crowd’s mood turned somber. The final holler of Flora snuffed them out like taking oxygen from a fire. It left only the husband, the real fighter between them, who couldn’t even manage to lift a meagre hundred-pounds off his chest.

Her foot stayed despite him. The way he spoke, with all that vim and vigor, turning softer and defiant on her in real time. Then underneath that, when she sniffed the air, she could smell delicious fear everywhere. Something she couldn’t empathize with, but left tastes of honey on her tongue--so good that she could drool buckets. She started blushing.

“Luke, come on.—YOU called out ME.” She laughed, looking at him wildly with joy. “It’s all your stupid fault. Because of you, you and her might just end up my slaves. Or maybe I’ll just take one, if I’m feelin’ generous.” She turned smug, then continued, “But fine, I’ll give you ONE dose of honesty.” Spectre lifted her hand out, palm-up, poised for Dot’s chin elevated to the correct height, which was just about her forehead-level, then waited for a tic for Dot to swoop in so Spectre could scritch-scritch her chin. “It’s a labour of love for us.”

Then, if all timed well, they’d stomp his face with two feet placed side-by-side, matching each other movement for movement without a word.

[Monsy]

This thread is concluded. Unfortunately, the match this ties to is DNF