Fair.

“So you’re our first opponent then, its an honour to face you, I am Xethoran, and this is my wife Vashti” The man with the massive hammer announced to zephyr across the clearing, he was pleased their first battleground was such a magnificent spot.

“it will be a pleasure to face you in a spot such as this where the trees rise so tall the tops are out of sight. I hope that you-”

“You’re boring me.” Zephyr took out his cigarette and put it out on the floor in front of him, “This ‘honour’ and ‘pleasure’ of yours, I don’t give a shit about any of that!”

The wind started to pick up, even in a forest such as this, the tall trees were bare and nothing impeded the wind, it traced patterns on the brown pine’s scattered across the ground.

“Besides? Don’t you two get it? Only one person can win the competition, are you going to kill one another then?”

“Of course,” Vashti smiled back “Our wish to change the world is the same, and we wont be apart for long after we win.”

Zephyr spat to the ground and said, “Geez, you two piss me off, let’s go already!”

“Yeah, go Zee, kick their ass!” Zephyr’s party of followers cheered from behind him. “They aren’t a match for you Zee!”

Zephyr never wanted anyone to following him around, but he never told them to stop either, sooner or later they might be useful for something he figured.

“Are you in that much of a hurry to fight?” Xethoran quizzed, “you truly are a man of no honour, we shall put you in your place!”

at that Xethoran ran at Zephyr full speed with his hammer.

Zephyr flicked a fresh cigarette into the air and caught it in his mouth, in one movement he pulled a gun from one of his back holsters and aimed it right at Xethoran running towards him, he fired his gun perfectly past the end of his cigarette, lighting it and the bullet continued on right at Xethoran, who blocked with his hammer. Zephyr jumped to get distance before his bullet hit.

It was no ordinary bullet of course, it exploded on impact and caused a massive fireball to shoot up and the smoke from the explosion engulfed Xethoran, it wasn’t enough to harm him but it had definitely knocked him off balance, he stood in the clearing smoke waiting for Zephyr’s follow up attack but it didn’t come, his wife had taken care of that.

“What the hell” Zephyr struggled, tied up in ropes to the branch he jumped to above Xethoran.

“You should be more careful with your strategies gun man, my wife is a master of ropes.”

Vashti moved her hand just a little and a rope moved from beneath the pine needles at Xethoran’s feet, he stood on the end of the rope and readied himself, his wife threw him full speed towards zephyr, his hammer drawn back ready to swing.

“Don’t take me so lightly fatass.” Zephyr was pissed he had to abandon his cigarette already but he didn’t have a choice, he flicked it up into the air from his moth and it landed on his boot just before Xethoran hit. The gunpowder Zephyr had across his body ignited freeing him from the ropes, and he used the force of the dynamite he kept strapped to his feet to jump higher into the trees, and to knock Xethoran back towards the ground.

Almost a hundred meters up, and his suit significantly more singed than it was before, Zephyr waited for the pair to make the next move.

Zephyr felt the tree he was on shaking and heard thumping footsteps come from beneath him, the fatass was running up the tree to hit him again. ‘must’ve realised my last escape was a one time only thing’ Zephyr thought, he started to ready himself for the attack but was pulled off balance, looking at where his branch joined the tree, a rope had pulled it out.

Zephyr fell down beside the tree and saw Xethoran running up along it towards him.

Zephyr smiled, “You guys need to vary your attacks more” Zephyr pressed the trigger and the tree a short way below him exploded, sending Xethoran flying. ‘those charges were a good idea’ Zephyr thought to himself as he grabbed a branch of the falling part of the tree and started to ride it down to the ground.

Turning though, he saw Xethoran had been caught in a web of robe quickly cast out for him, and the huge tree trunk half that was falling suddenly stopped mid-air, that too had been caught by rope sprang from somewhere. The sudden stop almost sent Zephyr misfooted and falling, but he righted himself to see Vashti standing further along the trunk from him.

“Are explosions your only trick?”

“Are ropes yours?”

A rope came up from behind Vashti and pulled her out of sight, Zephyr quickly looked to where Xethoran had been caught and saw his safety net was empty, Zephyr jumped from the hanging trunk quickly just before a hammer shattered it in two. Zephyr pulled out a machine gun and fired it behind him as he flew through the air, using it to get a little extra thrust and reach a higher branch.

Xethoran used his hammer to block again but it cost him is upwards momentum and so he fell somewhere below zephyr.

Zephyr Pulled himself up onto the branch and started to jump between trees quickly whilst looking around.

It seemed staying put in one place was a shitty strategy against these two, if he was moving he would be both harder to trap and to hit. He kept his eye open for any sign of Vashti, if he could get her then Xethoran shouldn’t pose him any difficulty.

Suddenly a hundred ropes strung up in the trees around and Zephyr froze in his tracks. He tried to see if there was someone coming, or if the ropes made any noticeable pattern, a discernible motive, it was clear enough when he saw it, even in the thinning light, the ropes had a slight purple shine, they were poisoned. An arena had been layed out that they didn’t want him escaping. He couldn’t climb the ropes either, his shoes were blown off before and he had no gloves.

He saw one of the ropes twitch a little and saw Xethoran running up the rope to look for him. Xethoran clearly had shoes, and Zephyr hid as close to the trunk of his tree as he could.

‘Now would be a great time to think of a strategy’ was what should of passed through his head, what he really thought he shouted loud and clear.

“Screw you ya bastard!” he leaped out from his perch and opened fire on Xethoran, his leap took him straight towards one of the poisoned ropes, so he threw his gun at the rope and landed on that instead, riding the rope down the funnel that it made towards Xethoran.

Zephyr pulled out a shotgun and aimed ready, around the next trunk his opponent should be waiting. But after sliding around the corner Xethoran was absent, Zephyr looked around for him only to see the large hammer wielding warrior come from above, once again Zephyr jumped aside to dodge the attack but it was a little too late this time and he had to block using his shotgun.

Zephyr was blasted full force right through one tree trunk and almost embedded into the next, he was lucky not to have hit a poison rope.

Now Zephyr really was aggravated, he pulled himself out of the crater his body left in the tree trunk and stood on a branch, he looked at his shotgun, it was severely bent out of shape.

“Don’t think you’ll be using that again any time soon Gunman.”

Zephyr looked across to Xethoran, standing on another branch not far off, he threw his shotgun at him, Xethoran found this act of desperation quite amusing, until the bent shotgun exploded in a massive fireball sending him flying right into some poisoned ropes where he became tangled.

“Noooooo!” Zephyr heard Vashti scream and he made himself scarce as she rode a rope up to her husband.

“Don’t worry honey, I have the antido-” Vashti was cut short, a rope passed right through her hears and then through her husbands.

“You’re not the only one who can use ropes bitch!” Zephyr whispered into her ear as the life left her. He held his weapon so she could see, “Harpoon gun darlin’, oh and I’ll be taking that, it’ll make it easier for me to get to the ground.” Zephyr grabbed the bottle with the poison’s antidote from her hand and waited until both glows had passed from their bracelets to his.

–

Zephyr walked past his followers, “Alright Zee you did it, two more glows means two deaths right?”

“Where to now Zee?”

Zephyr paused and sighed

“I need a drink.”