"Begin!"
Kade sighed and lunged forward, hitting Arms in the gut again then dropping to the floor, rolling to the left, and standing up. Satisfaction filled him as he saw the pained expression on Arms' face. Then, a confused expression flashed across Kades face.
'Was Arms' hair always that grey?'
Kades eyes refocused, and he moved forward before his opponent could react and slammed his fist into his face. Watching Arms' head snap back, he failed to notice the kick coming up, only feeling it connect with his ribs.
Snap!
Kade felt a tremendous force impact him and flew out of the arena. Counting to 13, he heard his loss being announced, then ended his life with a trigger squeeze.
This time he was brought back to mid-swing, his fist flying at Arms' face, it connected, and Kade used the momentum to jump forward slamming into his opponent's shoulder and flying past him half-hazardly. Tumbling into the sand on the other side of the arena, He scurried to his feet, huffing as dizziness overwhelmed him.
Before he could even focus his eyes, he felt an impact slam into his nose, disoriented, he was hit again, and again, and again. More times than he could count he felt his face get mashed in by Arms, who was clearly not happy with him. Falling to the ground, Kade plopped into the sand extremely dazed. The long-armed man stepped back, chuckling.
"Good try, kid."
Arms snapped his fingers, and Kades' head splattered against the wall, his gray matter reduced to sludge.
Kade awoke to the moment before he lunged at Arms, staring at him in shock.
'What the fuck, this guy is insane!'
Filled with rage, Kade pulled the revolver out of his pocket and aimed it at Arms' head.
"Surrender."
Arms stared at Kade in shock, his mouth agape.
"C-coward... fine... I surrender."
'No, I can't have people knowing I have this thing..'
'I need to think of something.. something that I can use to win without the gun, and without letting him hit me.. Oh! It's so obvious!'
Bang!
Kade drops to the floor, dead.
He becomes conscious in the moment right after punching Arms in the gut and rolling, focusing on Arms, he moved.
Kade lunged at arms, grabbing his, well... arms. Pinning his limbs to the ground with all of his limbs, Kade finally feels like he has a chance against this insanely powerful individual.
'Now for the painful part'
Lifting his head in the air, Kane brings it down with tremendous force, cracking it against Arm's skull. Instantaneously, Kane's head is filled with ringing and a white-hot pain, but he does not cease his efforts, again he headbutts arms, and again, and again until Arms struggles no longer.
'he should be unconscious now.. damn that hurts.'
Standing up, he staggered backward until he felt his back touch the wall, and then he allowed himself to fall into a sitting position, trying to quiet the screaming in his head. Looking forward, he noticed the guy he just sacrificed eleven IQ points to was not moving, he would've seemed dead if not for the violent heaving of his chest.
Kade stared up at the Pertis guy furiously, praying that he'd announce the only one still conscious to be the winner. Pertis obliged.
"The match goes to Kade! In a... head-spinning finish!"
'Wow. So funny.'
Kade dismissed the medics who ran up to him, letting them focus on Mr. Arms. Climbing out of the dome, he plopped onto a bench and sighed, pain still coursing through his forehead.
Soon, the Zebra girl from before walked up to him, grinning.
"Well, that was something else.. uh...."
"Kade."
"Kade! Unique name! Good job with those headbutts! the match was simple and quick!"
'simple.. and quick, huh? Yeah, right.'
"Thank you"
The girl sat down next to him, completely ignoring all concepts of etiquette.
"You're up against me next round, so I hope we can both have fun! Please don't kill me... If you promise me that, then we can fight safely!"
Kade chuckled. "yeah, I won't kill you, I probably won't even hurt you in this state."
'I need something lethal and reusable in the future, using my hands and head seems quite impractical'
Before Zebra could say anything, Pertis' voice rang out.
"Alright! That is enough for today! I'm betting each of you could use something to eat! Follow me."
Pertis stepped away from the guardrail and moved towards the door, waiting for everyone to gather behind him. Kade slowly rose from his bench, walking up and stopping a few feet from him. The man glanced him up and down and smiled. "That fight did a number on you, huh? Well, you are the one who chose the brutal route, what do you expect?"
Kade scoffed. "yeah yeah..."
Pertis signaled to everyone before opening the doors and walking out into the open air. Following him, Kade saw it was getting late, cold wind dove over the walls surrounding the compound and whipped at him, offering a weirdly pleasant freedom from the aching in his skull. It was currently golden hour, and yellow light painted the camp in a picturesque light.
The group was brought to a larger building, it was quite simple, with brick walls and a slanted roof, it reminded Kade of a church in a weird way.
Moving through the white doors of the building, Kade gazed upon the interior, it was extremely well lit, with a huge amount of tables accompanied by chairs filling the room, at the end of the area was a wall with a square slot in it, there was a counter coming out of the slot, which was full of metal trays, all holding different parts of a meal. Moving closer, Kade saw shredded chicken, lettuce, hamburger buns, and beef patties, as well as various condiments. Pertis spoke.
"Feel free to eat as much as you want, all! It's for you!"
Sitting down in a seat at the back corner of the dinner hall, Kade let everyone else grab their food. People seemed hungry, and rightfully so, they were scrambling over each other, yet some made room for people like Zebra and the Kid, people who had probably scared them with their combat skills. This intrigued Kade, he had not seen Zebras fight, he should've watched. She went against the quiet girl, no? Odd. The quiet girl was also getting food, she looked uninjured..
'How did Zebra win, come to think of it, she didn't look beat up either...'
To his dismay, Zebra soon came up to him, holding two plates of food, one with a very vegetable-rounded meal, littered with some protein, and the other with a hamburger and barbecue chicken sandwich that made Kades' mouth water. Zebra sat down, placing the sandwich plate in front of Kade.
"Here you go, loner, I saw your fight, you need it, I can't even count how many times you headbutt that guy, it was.. brutal."
Before Kade could respond, a plate flew past his head, and he heard yelling. Two people he had not previously made note of were crashing against a table, hands around each other's throats.
'No rest for the wicked, huh?'