Nightshift 44: The Coliseum
[Warped in from here.]
When Guy's eyes opened, it was almost as if he was waking up, and yet he knew that wasn't the case; he was standing, with a weapon in his hand, and somehow feeling far more comfortable than he had in weeks.
His gaze was on his feet, and it took him a few seconds to let everything sink in. He was wearing boots. His boots. ( Read more... )
When Guy's eyes opened, it was almost as if he was waking up, and yet he knew that wasn't the case; he was standing, with a weapon in his hand, and somehow feeling far more comfortable than he had in weeks.
His gaze was on his feet, and it took him a few seconds to let everything sink in. He was wearing boots. His boots. ( Read more... )
In Jade's words, it was a miscalculation. He hadn't properly judged just how badly Sync wanted to make him pay, and so he was completely blindsided when the boy jumped up and knocked his sword clean out of his hand.
The sound of the Jewel of Gardios clattering on the dirt a few feet away was the last thing he registered before he was assaulted with a world of pain. He'd been on the receiving end of this attack before, but that had always been with Tear and Natalia there to back him up with healing spells. Now? He was already far too injured, not to mention worn out from his Mystic Arte.
The pain was so all-encompassing that Guy couldn't properly register where new bruises were forming, or where bones might be breaking. Part of him feared that he wouldn't even live through to the end, and yet with that last hit he was finally knocked back so hard that he crumpled to the floor in a sad imitation of how Sync had collapsed earlier.
Covered in blood and contusions, Guy struggled to even try to lift an arm, and yet it seemed like he could barely manage that. He hadn't breathed his last yet, but he knew for a fact that Sync wasn't going to let up now.
He turned his head, just slightly, catching sight first of his sword (too far to reach) and then of Dias' corpse further on. Was that what he had to look forward to? He could only see the lower half of Claude's body, but maybe that was for the best. He didn't know if he had it in him to face Anise or Claude right now.
Through the pain and the half-consciousness, Guy finally managed to turn himself so that he was at least laying on his back. It killed him that he was basically helpless to Sync's whims now, and yet it was hard to even worry about that when the primary sensation for him right now was all that unbelievable pain.
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"Guy!"
Anise was screaming from the stands.
"Don't just lie there! Stand up! Guy!" Her panicked voice came out shrill and hoarse. The tears she had been struggling to hold back were pouring out now.
Guy couldn't lose here. Losing meant dying. Anise had already lost plenty of friends here, and now she had to lose one right in front of her eyes? And lose him forever, at that? She couldn't accept that. She wouldn't!
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Claude's fist slammed against the unseen wall out of frustration. He already knew it was futile, that there was nothing he could do for Guy from behind here. And yet that only heightened the panicked sensation that twisted in his gut, and strengthened the urgency in his words.
"You gotta hang in there!" The shout was punctuated by another pound of his fist. "Guy!"
Anise was screaming for Guy to get back up, too, Claude realized, but he didn't take his gaze off of his friend for even a moment. Even though his chest began to tighten with dread, he couldn't allow himself to just stand back and quietly accept what was happening. Guy had to pull through. The only other alternative was to let Sync kill him!
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And then there was the shouting. At first everything seemed to have been coming through a filter, but both Anise's and Claude's cries soon became crystal clear. They were screaming, pleading for the blond to get up, but Sync knew the truth.
Guy was going to die.
The God-General slowly made his way over to where the latter lay, paying no mind to how Claude was pounding uselessly at the invisible wall. It excited him to know that he'd finally be able to get even, all the while squeezing out every last bit of misery from everyone around him.
Eventually Sync found himself hovering over the swordsman's form, taking the time to admire every wound he'd inflicted while scowling at every one he hadn't. He didn't bother to pay any respect as he casually stepped onto one of Guy's arms, making sure to press his entire weight against the fractured bone before stepping on the other and repeating the process. The replica continued this until he was satisfied, finally stepping off and circling around until he was crouched behind Guy's head.
Given their physiques it was no surprise that Sync struggled to move Guy, though he refused to give up until he had the latter just where he wanted him. Eventually, with a good amount of work, the God-General had managed to shift them until the swordsman's body was facing Claude, blonde head forced upwards so that Guy had no choice but to look up at the other swordsman. Meanwhile, Sync was on his knees behind him, one of his arms around Guy's neck in a loose choke hold while the other hand was clamped tightly into the latter's hair. However, instead of paying any mind to Claude, Sync's attention was solely on Anise.
The God-General's gaze was emotionless, even when he pulled his arm back, slowly strangling Guy in the process.
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For their sake, he tried once again to make his body move, but it refused to respond, and his blood went cold when he heard the footsteps of Sync moving in his direction. He wanted to order his friends not to watch - whatever Sync was going to do to end this, it wouldn't be pretty - and yet his throat felt dried out. No words would come.
It was a whole different story, though, when Sync suddenly did the unthinkable and pushed his weight down on Guy's broken arms, first one and then the other. While Sync was small and thin, his weight was enough to make the pain blinding, and Guy lost all semblance of pride as he screamed out hoarsely each time the God-General stepped down. He wasn't sure he'd been through this amount of pain before. Not like this.
If anything, that made him even more certain that he was going to die.
His stomach churned and he felt like he was starting to go into shock, but he forced himself to stay aware. He couldn't back out now, especially not when he realized that his body was slowly being moved until he was faced with Claude once again.
He wanted to look away - Claude shouldn't see this - and yet there was nothing he could do. Then Sync's muscled arm jammed under his neck and pulled up against his throat, closing down his air passage. The swordsman gasped for air, taking wheezing breaths as he once again tried to pull up his crushed arms so that he could remove the God-General's grip.
They wouldn't move.
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He was going to die.
She couldn't do anything to stop it. Claude had tried, but even he was just as helpless, with the barrier separating them. And now, as if he hadn't done enough, Sync was moving to choke Guy. Was watching the only thing they could do!?
Anise's body shuddered with each shaky breath she took. It was difficult to even process the kind of cruelty she was witnessing. Her trembling body suddenly grew stiff, however, when Sync's cold, green eyes turned to her.
"Stop it," she pleaded, despite knowing it was no use. "Stop it!"
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When Sync did the unimaginable and began to press his weight down on both of Guy's undoubtedly broken arms, Claude pressed himself against the wall, as if unable to believe what he was witnessing. Screams sickeningly similar to the noises that had roused him that night Sync had stuffed him into a closet echoed throughout the coliseum. Desperate, Claude briefly paced up and down the edge of the invisible barrier, like a caged animal looking for some sort of escape. But no matter where he looked or touched, there was no apparent weakness in the wall. Martin Landel had set this up to be a fight between only Sync and Guy, even if that meant locking Claude out while he was forced to watch that monster torture his friend.
Being a spectator alone was unbearable enough. He couldn't begin to imagine what Guy was going through on the other side of the wall, as Sync grabbed him by his hair and began to strangle him right before Claude's eyes. The way he'd deliberately turned Guy to face him while this was going on didn't go unnoticed. Sync was trying to make this as painful as possible for everyone involved, that bastard!
But it was the realization that Guy was unable to fight back, that he was going to be condemned to a gruesome death he didn't deserve, sent Claude sagging to the ground. He faintly felt his sword slip from his grasp as it clattered onto the dirt beside him. This was almost exactly what had happened when he watched his father die -- powerless to do anything to save anyone, he'd been forced to his knees and frozen into place.
The same sorts of feelings coursed through him -- terror at the thought of losing someone he loved, fury at such senseless cruelty, horrified from finding himself completely and utterly useless...
"That's enough, Sync!" he yelled -- at least, he tried to, but his voice caught in his throat on the last syllable as his eyes began to burn with tears. "Please..."
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"Anise..." Despite his exhaustion, Sync's voice rang clear, and yet it wasn't 'his'. It would've seemed to most that he'd planned to soil Ion's identity, but that wasn't the case. In reality, Sync had done nothing but speak naturally, effectively dropping the voice he'd been forced to use for so long. In many ways it was both foreign and familiar, but in the end it brought the same empty feeling.
"... It was my fault from the start, wasn't it?" The replica eventually began, refusing to look away. "None of this would've happened if I hadn't been born like this. I never would've been thrown away, tossed aside to be picked up and molded into what I am now."
It was an achievement in itself that Sync could say that so sincerely, but maybe that was because he no longer had the energy to be bitter. He was tired, and it must've shown, but Sync pressed on anyway. The God-General didn't care if anyone dared to interject, or that there were even other people around in the first place. Meanwhile, his grip remained relentless, even though he was hardly paying attention to Guy anymore.
"I must look like a monster, but I can't help it. I've lived this empty life for so long that I've forgotten how to be happy..." He paused, realizing his mistake and laughed. "No, it's not that. I've just never learned how."
Sync's laughter eventually died, relaxing until he was gazing up at her with a serene look. His visible eye drooped, though that smile remained.
"But if things had been different then you... you would've been my guardian, and you would've protected me all the same, right? You would've shown what happiness felt like, and we would've been together until the day I died."
By then his smile disappeared altogether, replaced with a solemn expression. It was hard to make out if the God-General had been sincere, or if he just wanted to hurt Anise in the worst way possible, but maybe that was why he was so dangerous in the first place.
"I'm sorry, Anise. I'm sorry I ruined this for us."
Without warning, he suddenly twisted Guy's neck until a loud snap penetrated the air.
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Watching Claude sink to the ground in defeat seemed to cause Guy's own limbs to slacken in kind, not that he was able to move them much in the first place. They had lost; that had to be clear to everyone here, Sync included.
As the God-General started to talk, a veritable monologue, Guy felt like the words were coming to him as if through a thick wall. It was like he was in a dream, and he could tell that his body was giving in bit by bit, unable to fight back any longer. His vision clouded and his eyes started to close, meaning that he was no longer able to keep eye contact with Claude. That was probably for the best.
Though Sync's voice was there up until the end, Guy wasn't processing the actual words as he gradually choked. There was simply no way to stop this, and he hated that it was like this; he hated that it seemed to be almost predetermined.
He had fought so hard to escape things like the Score, and yet in this most crucial moment he couldn't get away from what was apparently his fate.
With that unavoidable snap, Guy's body finally lost whatever last bit of life it had been holding onto. It slumped against Sync coldly, broken and bleeding.
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It was hard to believe that that soft voice and gentle face belonged to the very same person whose arm was presently clamped around Guy's throat in a deadly grip. And those words, which dragged Anise's buried feelings of pity up to the surface...
But they were lies, weren't they? They were true, but Sync didn't mean what he was saying. He couldn't mean something like that while slowly killing her friend at the same time!
Guy... Anise wished she had a chance to apologize to him. If it wasn't for her, this wouldn't be happening. Tears streamed down her cheeks, one after another, as she kept her pleading eyes fixed on Sync.
The sudden snap of Guy's neck caused those eyes to widen with shock. A horrified gasp escaped her lips, but that was the only sound she made. Her throat felt like it was closing up, and she found herself unable to scream or cry out.
Guy was dead. The realization made her blood run cold.
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And then the boy turned his attention onto Anise, speaking in a voice that Claude recognized from when he'd assumed the identity of Ion, not to mention all those times Sync had taunted him during the day. Hearing his words made Claude tighten his jaw, his eyes flashing. Just what the hell was he getting at, saying stuff like that?! Half of it barely even made sense to Claude. And yet even though he'd long ago figured out that there was a lot he didn't understand about the Auldrantian patients in Landel's, that did nothing to ease the growing hatred he harbored toward Sync.
But the more Sync talked, the thicker Claude's anxiety for Guy became. The thought of losing him along with Dias was almost unbearable, and there wasn't a damn thing Claude could do to stop it. But suddenly that all came toppling down the moment Sync decided he was tired of playing around, twisting Guy's neck in one horrifyingly swift motion.
For a moment Claude was too stunned to even do anything as the realization that Guy was gone tried to sink in.
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Or maybe he was just bored.
It was obvious that, despite his words, Sync felt absolutely no remorse for what he'd done. The fact that Guy was dead didn't seem to deter him in the slightest, repeatedly twisting the swordsman's neck back and forth while enjoying the resistance of bone sliding against bone. While watching Anise cry like that had been satisfying, he eventually grew tired of looking at her and instead focused his attention back towards Claude.
"..." At first the replica looked pained, but that expression soon disappeared from his face as he carelessly tossed that dead body off of him. Sync carefully stood on his feet, wavering slightly as he fought the urge to collapse out of exhaustion before making his way over to where Claude was. His movements were slow and sluggish, but he eventually dropped back down to the floor, sliding against the invisible wall until he was now resting comfortably in front of the horrified blond.
And it was there that he watched Claude, not bothering to say anything as he graced the latter with a half-lidded smile.
It didn't matter if the Head Doctor removed the wall separating them; he had won, and not even death could take that away from him.
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