The stray cat jumped off the table and wandered over to Melfice.

http://www.acc.umu.se/~zqad/cats/1161382100-cookie.jpg

((You didn't know? Well, I guess that means I don't rant about it as much as I fear that I do. That's good to know. :D ))

"Battlestations!" Mauve cried. "The best part of honest journalism!"

She turned her microphone on to Super Special Awesome Mode. What? Microphones don't HAVE Super Special Awesome Modes? Well what kind of crappy equipment are YOU people using?!

"We report for the GOOD OF MANKIND!" she said. She brushed a stray hair behind her ear and angled herself so that the camera would get the best view of the room behind her.

"Good afternoon, Nuklear Power Forums," she said as soon as the camera was rolling. "I'm here in the hall of the new POS Industries building, where today's contestants are preparing for the battle ahead. The Combat Arena's official referee, REI, has recently issued a warning for an initiation ceremony to begin shortly. Currently most of the contestants are fueling up on food for the day ahead, which will no doubt be both long and bloody."

"Let's get in and talk to a few of the brave men and women who will be laying their lives on the line for a prize which hasn't even been established." She moved in towards some of the competitors.



They were going to out-report their competition at all costs, dammit!! Or at least until they got bored and decided to just harass the competitors mid-battle. That's fun too.

Keyman turned around to find himself suddenly face to face with Mauve again.

"Oh, hello. Is there anything I can do for you?"

As everyone finally got seated at their tables, the house lights dimmed. Lasers and spot lights flashed about and a billow of smoke began emanating from the stage. A rumble could be heard just before the pyrotechnics went off, the lights came back up, the music kicked in, and Pedro O'Sullivan took the stage.

"Ladies, gentlemen, and other assorted unclassifiable individuals... Welcome!" the Hazel-Eyes White Capitalist greeted his audience, "Yes, Welcome to the Second Annual NPF Arena Tournament, where most of you shall be duking it out for the prize of one million dollars in cash, a snazzy championship belt, and a first-in-line spot for the Make-A-Wish Foundation! I'd like to thank you all for coming out as our guests here today, and I'd like to take this time to get you all acquainted with the house rules. Specifically, that this is my house and I rule. Mi casa es su casa, just so long as su don't be fuckin' with any of mi shit. Comprende? ...Good."

"In an attempt to minimize the possibility of any disruptive elements," Pedro continued, casting glances over the Newb entourage, Demetrius, and CT, "I would like to introduce you now to a fun little security measure provided by our friends down at PhoenixCorp. In fact, let's give Madame Phoenix a round of applause, shall we? Without her assistance, much of these events wouldn't be possible, I'm sure." A spotlight was cast over to Phoenix's table as POS led the crowd in applause, while a table carrying several dozen pairs of oddly-designed boots appeared behind him. "This handy-dandy little one-size-fits-all rocket boots have been filled with a new fuel developed by our scientists that, with just a few milliliters, can propel just about anything far beyond this planet's gravitational pull. Should anyone in the tournament or in the audience get out of line, they will be teleported directly onto the offending individual's feet and immediately activated. It should be noted that they cannot, under any circumstance, by steered. Moving on...."

A large viewscreen lit up behind him, showing a bracket with eight spaces with the names of all 24 competitors directly to its left. "Eight of you will move on to round two of our competition, where you will begin fighting each other one-on-one in single elimination combat for the following three rounds. Now, I'm sure many of you are wondering how we're going to whittle 24 combatants down to eight in one round. The answer, friends, is quite simple: the first round is a battle royale qualifier, in which you will all face each other at once, and the last eight standing in the ring will move on! Eliminations will be judged by KO, ring-out.... or death."

A hush came over the room at that last revelation. "Oh yes," Pedro chuckled, "Sorry about that. Unlike the previous tournament, no precautions have been put in place to protect your lives. I find people move with a lot more purpose when faced with their demise, after all. Anyway, eliminated contestants who escape with their lives will be treated to a full rest at our in-house spa, so it's not all bad."

"Now, on to the last thing you need to know before we begin," he carried on, holding a small device up in his left hand for all to see, "This apparatus is one of our own inventions here at POS Industries. Remember the items each of you submitted upon registration? Well, each of you is to be randomly assigned one item from the pot, and these devices will allow you to summon them. Each one contains a biometric scanner that identifies the specific person and, when activated, will use the same teleportation system utilized in our rocket boot ejection system to vanish and materialize that person's assigned item in its place. You will be given one device each as you enter the ring, and upon your elimination the weapon or item given to you will be teleported away, regardless as to whose possession it's in at that point. Let me demonstrate how you activate it..."

Pedro pressed a button and the machine beeped, vanishing in a flash of light and being immediately replaced in his hand by a hot dog. Taking a bite, POS continued. "See? Easy enough. Now, if you all don't mind, I'd like for the competitors to make their way through the door to my right as any of you who are here as spectators exit to the stands through the door on my left. Have fun out there and try to keep it interesting. Think of the ratings after all!"

And with that, Pedro turned and made his way to his private box to watch the violence unfold.

"...But... Where's the hats?" Nikose murmured, now worried about what Fenris might have gotten him into.

CheshireThief aimed the Universal Remote at Pedro and pressed the [Pause] button. He ran over to him and pressed the button again to cancel the effect.

"Sorry about that, but I just had to ask..."

CheshireThief flashed one of his signature grins, light reflecting from his incisors.

"Did you prepare my private box, and may I have some guests join me?"

Pedro, rather unpleased at being stopped on his way to go do some serious drinking, glared at CT.

"I'm sorry.... Who are you again?"

Rolling his eyes, CheshireThief snapped his fingers, summoning the legions of fangirls (and a few creepy fanboys).

They lifted the Bard upon their sea of outstretched arms amidst various cries such as "CHESHIRETHIEF! THE GREAT ONE! I LOVE HIM! NPF BARD!"

Knowing the forumites, it was highly likely that before anyone actually GOT into the arena, there would be shenanigans. Hawk, here on serious business, decided to just head through the right hand door as quick as possible. The quicker he got into the arena, the quicker he could assess any and all tactical advantages available, as well as see what weapon he had been given for the upcoming fights.

Really, it was the weapon he was most interested in. Not since he had been trapped in his cursed form for all those years had he been weaponless, until now.

Well, mostly weaponless, he still had one trick up his sleeve...

Smiling a rare grin, Hawk entered the arena.

Nikose decided it was easiest to just stay next to fenris and tag along any direction he went.

Pedro raised an eyebrow at CT for a moment, rolled his eyes, thought for a moment, grinned evilly, smiled contentedly, and finally shook his head chuckling as he continued on his way, the door hissing shut behind him.

As Hawk walked through the door, the shimmering around him got stopped, and TEN fell to the ground with a hard thud. "Well, isn't that rude. I'll just have to get my information some other way. Can't stand not knowing. I need intel."

With that, TEN went to find Amalgam, and the two of them headed to the stands.

Keyman entered the arena, received his device, pressed the button... and found himself to be holding the Headband of the Shattered Soul. "Well, well, well, isn't this interesting," he said with a grin as he donned the splitting headgear. "Hey Nikose," he said in harmony with himself, "how do you like my hat?"

Nikose's eyes hardened as he looked at Newb. "Mockery is never amusing. I was lied to, and I am upset about it, now that I realize the mockery." Nikose cracked his knuckles. "And if this means I've been entered into some kind of fighting contest..." Nikose rolled his head, cracking his neck, before pressing the button and having the necklace appear in his hands. "...Then I guess I'm going to fight." He put on the necklace, and immediately, his muscles swelled and smoothed out as his body became healthier than it had ever been before. even his shadow seemed tougher and more solid.

"But I just thought it was really cool that I got Amalgam's headband..."

The flowing set of robes and a mask stayed in a roughly humanoid shape as they levitated out the doorway and towards the arena.

Upon being subject to spotlights and accolades by the POS staff, Phoenix took this moment to raise her hand and adress the crowd. Especially that annoying Ugainlus guy who'd insulted her earlier today. Upstart dark knights.

"Just for your information, each of the boots is also equipped with a target designator, so that once you break low orbit, the ECS Isparlian's anti-fighter beams will be able to target and vaporize your corpse. We wouldn't want to be enviromentally unfriendly, now would we?" she giggled with a sly grin.

With that, she stood and followed Pedro to his viewing box.

----------------------------------------------------------------

Meanwhile, the PX-05 made her way in a calm and orderly fashion through the door that the contestants were advised to proceed down. Although she wasn't quite sure how a biometric scanner would function on something lacking the similar biological composition of a human being, crunching the mathematics required to modify the device took her quantum-computer 'brain' a mere two seconds.

Sigh

Should have defragged before the tournament.

K36 strolled towards the arena muttering to himself "Something good Something good Something good" repeating it 36 times then pressing the button he had been given.
A purple hat with a white feather popped into his hand. "...shit...either this is Kharma for making fun of the pirate or I said it 37 times.."

Looking around he spotted Nikose, he sprinted over and held the hat out "I judge this hat to be awesome."

I took a small roll, smashed it up into a little ball, and threw at CT's head, grinning when he noticed me. I knew he'd enjoy watching this.

Nikose stopped and grinned, before saying, "Thanks. You gonna wear it for the fight now?" He stretched his arms. "I won't attack you during the qualifier round."

And lo, Fenris was about to do the biggest amount of bullshitting ever.

"I'm so sorry for lying to you, buddy! Can you ever forgive me? I just needed my bestest buddy there beside me so I didn't get creamed." Fenris convinced Nikose of his innocence while he accompanied him to the ring.

"How would-" "-the three of you-" "-feel about-" "-an alliance?" "After all-" "-several people-" "-working together-" "-stand a better chance." Keyman said to Nikose, Fenris, and K36.

Karesh put Nikose's hat on over his helmet before turning to Newb. "That sounds a little like cheating."

Raggy wandered into the center of the ring carrying a sign that read "Qualifying Round: Battle Royale". Somehow he/she/it had managed to change into a bikini, that was barely more then a few cubic feet of cloth, in the time it took to walk from the buffet to the ring.

"Well, I'll forgive you either way. But don't think I'm stupid." He stretched again, and lightning began sparking from his eyes. "Mostly I'm just glad for this little amulet!" he said, happy suddenly, as he stroked it.

He looked to Keyman. "I don't think that'd be a great idea, what with everyone around. so no technical teams, but I'll play by the "I don't hit you, you don't hit me" rule."

"Show me-" "-where it-" "-says we-" "-can't cooperate."

Monitoring Newb, Nikose, and Karesh's conversation by means of her forearm hand-device, Phoenix smirked, and took the liberty of patching herself through to the staging room's speakers.

"Greetings ladies and gentlemen! Although, one imagines you are not going to be very gentle for long, eh? This is a friendly reminder that the map you are playing on today is DM-Pedro. This means, "Deathmatch." Not "Team Deathmatch", or "Team Fortress", or even "Team Capture the Flag". You're going to be fighting them, the other people, and there is no 'them' in 'team'. Thank you for understanding."

"Ah, it says it right there. Oh well."

The three Keymen headed to different corners of the arena to see what they could find in the way of hiding places.

Shouldering the assualt rifle, I walked past them and said "Hey, uses less effort if they're close in. Take out a number of them with one good, or large, shot."

Fenris laughed. And laughed. And laughed more.

"Who says we'd be close together? You assume that we're stupid. Anyway, I'll play by the "I'll pretend you don't exist and you do the same for me" rule," if that's okay with you, Nikose."

Fenris pulled out the sword and the banstick, setting the banstick to his favorite setting: Move Threads.

"I'm ready."

Phoenixbot hefted her issued weapon, which wasn't much of a heft at all. The rather long and serrated golden blade of Mesden's craft weighed close to two grams. Given it's weight, and the android woman's strength, swinging it at blinding speed would be trivial.

A quick once-over with her scanners indicated the weapon was of the ethereal type, capable of ignoring armor, circumventing deflection, and being generally nasty to their squishy soul-bits. "Oh, the poor dears" as Rei would say.

Shouldering the sword, she strode out toward the arena.

K36 wandered into the arena, purple hat on his head.
He loaded 6 of his shells into his shotgun while he wondered what everyone else had, and what they could do.

Nikose calmly detached the silver brooch that held his cape on, and refastened it with a purple one. He gave the Brooch a shake, and it became what looked like...

...a belt buckle. It even had a strange Silver coin inside of it.


EDIT: ((POS put up a new thread already. D:))