Braal punch Conley
By LazerTH
~*~ A tale in which a giant troll punches someone stronger than him ~*~
After the fall of Praetoria, the human Well of Furies abandoned Emperor Cole. Realising that having just one Champion was a silly idea, he diversified and made a blanket choice of Primal Earth's Incarnates; the very ones who worked together to vanquish the tyrant emperor. He needed champions to fend off the army known as Battalion; devourer of Wells. Even the divine manifestation of humanity's potential needed defending from this coming storm.
Not all Incarnates are heroes. The Well of Furies is an irresistible prize for villains and rogues of all kinds. After all, what do humans with power want? More power! One of those humans was Conrad Conley, an alcoholic Vanguard scientist who thought it was a great idea to merge Rikti Magus and human physiology. As no-one liked the Rikti (it was Vanguard's job to stop the alien invaders) or was stupid enough, he volunteered for his own experiment. As with every other mad scientist, the experiment went horribly wrong and he (inadvertently) killed everyone in the laboratory when he woke up from his drunken stupour. Some say that the real tragedy of his transformation was that he could never get drunk again; his body is now a living furnace of incalculable physical strength.
Then there was Braal.
Braal... is Braal. He's classified as a Troll, but that would be like classifying a tsunami as a little splash. Imagine a mountain made entirely of granite. Now imagine that mountain was painted green all over, sprouted horns and tusks, and wore a leather jacket, denim jeans, and leather shoes large enough to fit a surfboard inside each. Nobody knows how they found a needle strong enough to pierce his skin, but tribal tattoos wreathed his bricklike face. His barbarian belt was thick and wide enough to strap around a car. When Braal walked, the heavy chains wrapped around his neck jingled as the earth cracked and shook. Despite boasting a presence and personality that would make an erupting volcano go cold with fear, Braal was hailed a hero because he punched more bad guys than good guys. He was even a member of a premier supergroup, Silver Aegis.
For reasons unknown the premier villainous organisation, Arachnos, busted Conley out of jail. Yes, even he was imprisoned once thanks to a small army of Paragon Police Department (PPD) wielding 'confiscated' Malta bioelectric feedback guns (Sappers). They'd sunk him into a molten block of Impervium (a metal almost as tough as Braal), crystallised it and buried it so far underground that Arachnos had needed a Nemesis mole-machine and crane to hoist him out.
After drinking deeply of the Well of Furies, Conley gave Arachnos the finger and became an independent mercenary, going wherever the scent of wealth drew him. His favourite place was the ancient land of Cimerora accessed through the Midnighter Club's time travel portal. When he wasn't reducing entire armies of insurgent Romans, cyclops and minotaurs to cinders, he amused himself in the present time period in the Rikti War Zone's Architect Entertainment (AE). With the scientific magic of virtual reality, he trained heroes and villains with equal enthusiasm. It was his way of preparing Primal Earth and Praetoria for the war effort with Battalion.
One day Conley decided to rob the Atlas Park bank. To any other villain or rogue, this was a monumentally stupid idea because that area of Paragon City not only had the highest concentration of superhero activity, but was Braal's pad. Yes, the entire area was Braal's pad, because no-one dared tell the troll where to sleep.
The not-so-jolly green giant hadn't noticed the ruckus yet. Conley zoomed past the PPD barriers, punched everyone inside the bank unconscious (in his line of work, killing was bad for business; the person you kill today could be your client tomorrow), melted the four-foot-thick, reinforced steel safe door into slag, and then whistled a merry tune while piling all the gold and diamonds he could find into a sack.
Conley strode down the street with a sack of swag slung over his shoulder. A catgirl heroine leaped into the air, intending to sink her sharp claws into his back: he turned slightly to punch her square in the jaw, breaking it and giving her whiplash. "Eighty-seven," he said.
A few blocks away, a large man wearing the American flag charged at Conley down the street at near-supersonic speed, bellowing a battlecry and swinging a warmace. Conley stepped to one side and gave the superhero a clothesline so traumatic it dislocated several vertebrae, sending the poor (super)man spinning like a top through the air before crashing into the side of a building. "Eighty-eight," Conley said. A shadow fell over him, which was quite a feat since he was over seven feet tall, clad head-to-toe in blood-red and ash-grey Vanguard armour, and literally on fire.
"Braal eighty-nine," the troll grunted before swinging his fist. Conley stepped back to brace from the impact and a second later found himself in the sewers, covered in rubble with sunlight streaming from the Conley-sized hole Braal just made in the road.
"Silver Aegis, eh? I've trained some of yours," Conley acknowledged his opponent. He dropped his swaggerific bag o' loot on the rubble pile before kneeling to gather enough strength to perform his version of the Rising Dragon Punch of Streetfighter fame. Yes, Conley had earned so much Incarnate power that only videogames can adequately describe the ludicrous abilities he possessed. A moment later he was three hundred feet in the air, and Braal was slightly above that, reeling in midair from the megaton hammer that was Conley's fist. Conley made a three-point landing reminiscent of one of his childhood heroes, Iron Man, who only exists within the realm of comic books and films in Paragon City.
Braal landed with the grace of an elephant, crushing a truck or two.
Conley backhanded a stone gargoyle wielding a staff, sending the noble demon into la-la land. "Ninety. Give up yet, number eighty-nine?"
"Braal punch Conley."
Conley's hand knifed through the dump-truck Braal chucked at him but it was enough of a distraction for Braal to get near and punch the rogue upward and away. Though a great runner, Conley was, like Braal, unable to fly. The latter chased his target with a mighty leap. They cleared Atlas Park's eastern War Wall (a citywide forcefield wall erected to keep Rikti and Arachnos out) and landed in the Hollows.
This was Braal's other pad, home to other trolls who lurked the tunnels. It was a hazard zone, a section of the city too damaged for human habitation. It was a natural haven for villains, of course, and foolish young heroes often left the relative safety of Atlas Park to test their superpowers here.
Conley stood up from the shattered earth, matching Braal's punch with his own. There was a shockwave, blasting both combatants apart as the laws of physics objected strongly to their atom-smashing force. Some of the dilapidated buildings nearby collapsed.
Braal's broken hand was already reinserting joints, reassembling powdered bone and replacing sinews. Conley was unmoved.
"I'll burn you faster than you regenerate."
The mad scientist reared back his hand to pitch the ball. "PYRONIC CORE: FINAL JUDGEMENT!"
That was the fancy name of an Incarnate ability known as 'Judgement'; an ultra-powerful ranged area-of-effect (AoE) attack designed to incinerate multiple opponents in one blast. It was the equivalent of a small tactical nuclear warhead.
Braal climbed out of the glassed crater a bit melted and crisped on the edges (like a giant green cheese sandwich left in the oven too long) but still alive.
"Even Judgement isn't enough? You're holding up well for a non-Incarnate," Conley praised him, his fiery orange eyes laughing.
"Stop talking," Braal rumbled, hurling what used to be a brick wall at the burning man. Conley just walked forward, allowing the wall to burst into effectual debris against his body. He could see that the troll wasn't regenerating quickly enough; his other Incarnate ability, Reactive Radial: Flawless Interface, was still eating up Braal's body with divine napalm. Every punch or projectile Conley threw left his victim covered in all-consuming flames that only flared for a few seconds but were impossible to put out, and renewed with each attack.
"You're willing to die for a bank?" Conley said, hefting up the troll by his neck. The troll's skin bubbled like pea soup.
"Braal home!" the troll said, headbutting the smaller man. "Braal friends! Braal..." Conley let go and Braal kneed him in the balls, bellowing, "...FAMILY!"
Conley landed a hundred yards distant. He showed no signs of being on the receiving end of a groin attack that would have killed not only his future children but ancestors as well. This was probably because Conley had lost his reproductive organs; adopting Rikti physiology was, in hindsight, an awful idea after all. The aliens grew their young in breeding vats; sex was no longer part of their culture or anatomy.
"Friends," the rogue murmured. The flames died in his eyes. "Family. I have that with my supergoup, the Blood Artists. Our adopted matriarch has reprimanded me on numerous occasions for harming members of our family."
"Go home to mommy."
"I think I shall. I'm not willing to die for a bag of loot, anyway. I'll stand with you on the frontlines when Battalion arrives."
Just like that the battle was over, Conley vanishing in a flash of light from his supergroup teleport beacon. The supernatural flames left Braal, who regrew his flesh and muscle after a while. The troll stood, spat blood into the dirt and leapt two miles west for home.