Let Them Eat Cake! [closed]

[Hysteria]

Talen emerged from the door to one of the challenge rooms within the Citadel with a look of boredom across his face. The young warrior turned to the attending monk with a scowl.

“That was piss weak. I've fought tougher field mice than that supposed 'Paladin'!” Talen flicked the top of his nose and squinted at the monk, “Get me someone stronger!”

The monk nodded and with earnest obedience hurried down the corridor in a hail of foot steps. Talen sighed and looked up at the ceiling with absent thoughts to his recent string of victories. The youth looked like your every day thirteen year old boy, if slightly better dressed, but he was far from it. He was a master of trickery, able to conjure shadows and master of his own body. What more, he could fight with the best of them.

Talen shook away the useless thoughts and started after the monk in a gentle pace. The boy had dressed for the day's fights in a particular style he had recently adopted. He wore simple black pants and a black shirt in a common Akashima style, with a light grey stomach wrap. The youth's left arm was completely covered by a long black sleeve, so much so it hung down over his hand by a good three inches. His right arm was nearly bare, with the sleeve barely covering his shoulder.

“W-were here sir.” The monk bowed to the youth and gestured towards the door.

Talen sniffed loudly in response and entered. A bright light always seemed to blind the youth as he entered the magical rooms. It was only as it dimmed could he actually make out where he would be fighting. This time the youth was caught somewhat off guard.

Instantly he felt his body try and adjust to an odd sensation. The area he was going to fight on was falling through the air. Not only that, the sky was littered with other objects, similar to large stones falling as well. The youth was standing on a fifty metre wide platform at a slight downward angle to his left. The brown, slightly sponge surface was marred by several large black slicks of liquid. Dotting the surface were several large wax candles, although the size would suggest the use of the word 'torch'. Talen's eyes dropped to his feet as he prodded the ground gingerly with his foot.

Its cake alright...

In fact, the sky was full of sweets. What had initially appeared as stones were giant man sized cupcakes, with sprinkles large enough to bludgeon a man. The cake he and soon his opponent were going to stand on was undoubtedly a chocolate lava cake, and the black slicks boiling hot chocolate. Although Talen resisted the urge to look over the edge of the cake for fear of unbalancing it, there was no ground the cake raced towards, just delicious dessert as far as the eye could see. Cupcakes, doughnuts, eclairs, child-sized jelly beans and more made up a huge assortment of falling sweets. Not all the sweets fell in perfect harmony however. The jelly beans raced passed the cake, and in front of Talen one splashed into one of the hot chocolate streak in a dangerous splash. The eclairs were lighter than the lava cake and slowly passed by, occasionally bumping into the cupcakes, which matched speed with the lava cake. Even though just looking at the scene was nearly enough to give someone diabetes, the sugar content was the least of the combatants issues.

[Silence Sei]

“Well it –is supposed to increase my likelihood of cake….” Sei looked at the bladed ring in his right hand, the one named ‘Neosaim’. When he had asked for a room in the citadel, this had been one of the arenas he would have never had guessed. Steam from the molten chocolate nipped at his skin, the sweet scent of frosting and burning wicks filling his nose.

With each step he took onto the battleground, he could feel his weight putting pressure on the soft floor. It seemed as though the entire fighting area was edible, save for the candles. As delicious as the entire thing looked, the mute could not help but get the feeling that there were unseen dangers strewn about this far fetched and festive fight. If anything, the intensity of the hit chocolate proved that there was at least one trap.

The Mystic often wondered why he was typically ‘walked’ into his fights, where many of his foes typically found themselves falling face first or just materializing from nothingness. Perhaps the mystical monks had more of a respect for the telepath than they let on? He had saved Radasanth in one way or another through many different occasions, after all.

In all of his thoughts, Sei barely noticed that his opponent was already present for the match. After all, they were fighting on a colossal cake, with a backdrop of other frosted goodies surrounding them. It was easy to be caught up in all of the glitz and glamour of a setting, so much so that one forgot where the real worry lie; at the end of the other person’s blade.

The mute looked around, quickly finding a humanoid shape and approaching it. It was always customary of the strategist to wish his opponent a good fight before the fighting even began. It was odd; Sei had not been to the citadel for a couple of years now, but something told him that he should be present today. Call it a hunch, but the mute had a good feeling about what awaited him here. As he got closer to his foe, the Mystic realized why.

“….Talen?”

[Hysteria]

“Sei...”

Talen pushed the word out through a thick mouth full of chocolate cake. With a guilty look the youth rubbed some of the chocolate from his mouth, but only managed to schemer a long line of dessert across his face. He had to admit, it was quite good cake.

“Sei,” he repeated with his mouth empty, “It has been a while. I guess I should tell you what I've been up to the last few months?”

Talen paused, the steady eyes of his Capitan was unnerving, the youth struggled to find the words to express himself. He had been absent from the Ixian Knights for more than three months without a single word to anyone. Now he appeared like this, in front of the man he has sworn allegiance to. It was more than a little bit awkward for the youth. As always, Sei was silent.

“Well, I decided to go to the moon. Long story short, its quite inhospitable. The food is terrible, it was populated by these evil little creatures I liked to call Moonies. Most ironically of all, they were naked, and their little butts were as white as, well, as white as the moon. It was all quite ridiculous. But I'm back! Did you miss me?”

Talen reached into the folds of his cloak and drew out a cigarette. With the utmost attempt to look cool, the youth flicked the cigarette into his mouth and lit it was a flame that sprung from his index finger. With a deep breath of the drug filled cigarette the youth waited for his boss's response.

[Silence Sei]

It was hard to take the youth seriously as he explained his adventure. The story seemed even more ridiculous thanks to the splatters of chocolate covering Talen’s mouth. As the boy spoke, the mute could not help but smile. His general had returned, with a fantastic journey of which to tell the rest of the Ixian Knights. However, once Talen withdrew the cigarette from its pack, Sei’s jovial face turned into a grimace. The tobacco in the boy’s mouth reminded the Mystic not only of Talen’s true age, but also of the cruel realities that had happened in the past few months.

“Talen…,” Sei spoke calmly, as a leader should, “Cassandra was dismissed from duty, William betrayed the team for her, Duffy has abandoned us, Kyla was mortally injured about a week or so ago, Seth Dahlios has stopped talking to everyone, and….

At this point, the mute began to realize that his whole body was trembling ever so slightly. He closed his eyes for a moment and took a deep breath, embracing the sweet aroma of frosting and chocolate all around his person. The smells reminded the telepath of his room back at Ixian Castle, before all the drama with his soldiers and generals had happened. It reminded him of home.

“Talen Shadowalker,” Sei bowed his head and kneeled to his friend, grabbing a hand full of the soft, moist ground below as he did so, “I humbly request that after this engagement, that you return to active duty on the Ixian Knights roster. Now, more than ever, we need someone who can not only work in the shadows, but prevent themselves from being overcome by them…”

Sei gave his general just enough time for a yes or no answer before he threw the clump of cake careening towards Talen’s tiny body. The grim expression on the Mystic changing back to happiness. At least for now, he could escape all the worries that came with being leader of the Ixian Knights, and just have a good old fashioned food fight with a friend.

[Hysteria]

Talen stood like a gapping fish at the news from his Captain. The news was far more shocking than he had originally thought possible. The boy’s bravado was stripped away in those few short sentences. For once in his life Talen was not the carefully constructed mischievous youth, he was just himself, small, weak and afraid. The boy musted himself and nodded at first before being able to make a sound.

“I… had no idea…” Talen lifted his hands helplessly, “Of course I will return. The Knights are my family. Without them…”

Talen let his words trail off as the thoughts were too painful. The youth turned his faced away from Sei for a second to collect himself. As he turned back he wore his trademark grin. With a flash the youth brought his sleeved arm up and revealed a pistol. With an easy blast of dark magic channelled by his weapon the piece of cake Sei threw burst into a million pieces.

“Come now! If we are going to have a food fight, we should crank this up a notch. We are Ixian knights after all aren’t we?”

Talen’s grin widened further as shadows flowed from his black hair down his arms and hardened into cruel looking arm-length gauntlets. The youth lifted the shiny black metal armour and flexed the small blades adorning his fingers. His hands closed around his weapon and his eyes turned to the the candy heavens above. With the precision of a boy who spend too much time shooting cans he released a shot into the side of a man sized jellybean and changed its direction towards Sei.

“Mind the weather! It’s a killer this time of year!”

[Silence Sei]

Sei’s eyes followed both of Talen’s blasts with precision. As the child fired upon the clump of cake that was flying towards him, Sei could feel small speckles of icing splatter upon his cheek. As Talen unleashed another ‘bullet’ upon the jellybean, Sei had already titled his head upwards, watching as the giant confection fell over his form.

Sei smiled and looked back to his opponent, reaching behind him for the two glowing swords at his back. About two feet before the jellybean landed on its intended target, an orange flash jettisoned through the candy, and what was once the size of an average man was now no more than dozens of baseball sized sweets raining down around the mute. The orange streak landed at Sei’s side, stopping long enough for one to recognize the being as Sei himself, or rather a doppelganger created by the warrior’s Gemini Blades.

“Let us see if you are still worthy to bear the mantle of one of the Nine Generals of Ixian Castle! Sei exclaimed, pointing his blades towards the child. The clone reacted as a soldier would when their commander gave an order, jumping from the gooey deliciousness at his feet. He ran through the battlefield with arms crossed, his own Gemini Blades on each side of his face. When he got close to Talen, he would uncross his arms, hoping to shear the boy in two in one swift move.

[Hysteria]

Talen’s blue eyes remained steady as watched the jelly bean cut to ribbons. The youth’s had not expected any less from the man he had chosen to serve. The smile that had found its home upon Talen’s face slid off as he saw the familiar sight of Sei’s doppelganger.

“Like old times!” Shouted Talen.

The first time Sei and Talen had met Sei had used his doppelganger to great effect in the Cell Tournament. That time had not ended so well for the youth; he had been impaled upon a spear of light Sei had created. This time the youth intended things to be a bit more dramatic.

The metal gauntlets encasing Talen’s arms sparked and exploded into flame. The youth dropped to one knee and lifted up his arms, almost as is he was doing two fiery fist pumps. The fake Sei’s swords clashed against the youth’s armour. Talen’s face turned red as he held the swords open in front of him. When Talen’s cheeks expanded he looked almost as if he would explode with the force of stopping the blow. Instead of yielding, Talen’s mouth erupted, sending a stream of thick black and sticky liquid through the air towards the doppelganger. The liquid was a unique formation of volatile shadow magic. As it passed through the flames licking across Talen’s arms it erupted in fire itself and continued towards the fake Sei’s chest.

[Silence Sei]

The liquid found its mark, washing the doppelganger’s face with an inky blackness. The Sei clone stumbled backwards, dropping his swords in the process, and attempting quick jabs in front of himself. The actions were for naught, however, as the fake Sei had created a sizable distance between Talen and himself, causing a gap that the not reach with fists alone.

“Focus!” the true Sei shouted to his double, “You should know what comes next!” The imitation stopped his flailing, nodding at the orders of Sei Prime, and held his arms open wide. As the flames consumed him, the presence of the fake Mystic disappeared from existence, fading into the multi-colored lines that had formed him. The blades belonging to the second Sei disappeared, and the real ones on the real Sei’s back faded in their glowing blue hue.

The smell of burnt flesh and hair off-set the sweet smell of the battlefield. Sei smiled, surprised by Talen’s ruthlessness, but impressed that he would be so eager to hurt a superior officer when push came to shove. The telepath brought his hands together several times, making a slow clapping sound. While most would see the action as arrogant, Sei was legitimately showing his admiration for Talen’s tactics.

“Well done, Lord Shadowalker,” Sei spoke as he cracked his knuckles, a large jelly bean slamming to the frosting floor and splattering the Mystic’s face with a thick sugary coat, “You have improved greatly, since the Cell. Lets just hope I have not run you out of tricks yet!” Sei waved his hand, a wry grin upon his face.

As the motion finished, two large vines of seaweed sprouted out from the cake –laced ground, the green weeds attempting to wrap themselves around each side of the young Talen. Sei looked up into the air, smiling as the boulders from his Octopus’ Garden spell began to rain down, straight towards the general area of the seaweed as if the plants had targets painted on them. If the vegetation had grabbed Talen, it would take some clever trickery to release himself from the tight grip of the spell. Needless to say, if the seaweed had missed their victim, it would be considerably easier to avoid the boulders for their eight second duration.

Regardless, this was a spell that had caused many of Althanas finest to fall. Now was the time to see just how greatly Talen had improved his skill set.

[Hysteria]

The Cell… Echoed Talen, thoughts of the woeful performance of the youth, ending with the young warrior pierced on the end of the blade of light danced through Talen’s mind. The youth had indeed come a long way since.

The cold slimly seaweed crawled around the youth legs like hundreds of tiny tentacles. Talen knew the spell instantly and his Captain’s Octopus garden. What’s more, he knew what happened next. The youth waved his arms in wide circles around himself, leaving trails of darkness that expanded until he was completely hidden in a black sphere. In the blink of an eye the shadows became real, trapping the youth in a cage of shadowy metal. The stones fell from the sky, slamming into the cage with tremendous cracks. Inside, hidden from view, Talen was safe.

The youth’s eyes rolled as the deafening sound of the rocks hitting the metal filled the tiny space. There was little time to rethink his actions as the youth dropped to a sitting position in the remaining seaweed and composed himself. Every move he had seen his captain use, every time the boy had watched his captain fight came flooding back to him. There were so many skills Sei’s disposal; Talen only held the tiniest hope of defeating him. Regardless, Talen had made his mind up to try, and try he would.

As he sat there Talen’s very form seemed to become lighter, less real as he made his body move from the reality that he and Sei inhabited to another, more darker domain. To release the anchor holding the boy to the world was by no means and easy feat and the distance required more time than he could conjure in the few seconds he had while Sei’s spell continued to train down attacks. Talen was forced to wait.