Disclaimer: I don't own Mortal Kombat or any of the cool things affiliated with it.
A/N: This is my first really big fanfic, as well as my first attempt outside of humor and parody, which is the reason I started it on this new account. It's a shift to a much darker tone than anything on my previous account, so I have no idea how it'll end up. It's probably going to be unbelievably long-like, at least 40 chapters. I don't know if anyone will read it, so please review if you do, eh? If I get enough positive reviews then I'll definitely finish it. If not, I'll scrap it. Anyway, I hope you enjoy it!
Clad in the traditional garb of the Lin Kuei, the man crept through the ventilation shaft as silently as possible. His pursuers were not that far behind him, and any sound made in such a small aluminum shaft would make unbelievable amounts of noise, carrying back to where his adversaries sought him.
The man found his exit eventually-a small branch off from the main shaft, leading to the back of the building he was escaping from. Or attempting to escape from, at least. He crawled nearer to the opening, escape so close he could almost taste it. As he began his emergence from the cramped space into the silver moonlight, he allowed his concentration to slip for the slightest moment, a fraction of one second, and it happened. His foot caught on the bent lip of the shaft, and he fell, clanging loudly into the trash receptacle below him.
The fall was the least of his worries, however, as he soon heard, echoing through the ventilation systems, the sounds of his pursuers shouting to each other. They knew where he was now. They knew his escape was eminent. They would now be redoubling their efforts; the last thing this fugitive needed.
"Curses!" muttered the tired man under his breath. He agilely flipped out of the garbage bin, landing on his feet in the gravel. He took off running as fast as he could, paying no attention to where he was going. The important thing was to get as far away from this place as possible, as fast as possible. He was no more than perhaps four hundred meters away when his first pursuer slid out of the ventilation system and spotted him. Said pursuer immediately began sprinting in order to narrow the slight head start the man had. He was wearing nearly the same clothing as his quarry, except with perhaps a little less decoration. He was, after all, a lower ranked Lin Kuei.
More Lin Kuei began to slide from the shaft, men and women alike, all wearing the same general outfit. Their masks were each slightly varied in design, but other than that, there was no defining feature among them. Their quarry risked a glance behind him and saw them coming on strong, so he put on a burst of speed to reach the trees nearby before they caught him. He succeeded in disappearing, at least temporarily, among the trees.
This man knew what he was looking for, and he also knew he would know when he found it. He sought a portal. Not an inter-realm portal, nothing so fancy as that, but a portal nonetheless. It was set up long ago in order to provide an escape route for those who knew how to use it, and it would be strong enough to at least get him out of the country. He also had the good fortune of knowing where to look for it, while his opponents only knew what he was looking for, not where it was. In addition, they lacked the authority required to command the portal to open. This Lin Kuei, however, was in no shortage of authority.
He found what he was looking for shortly. His opponents directly behind him, he began the necessary rites to open the portal, his only route of escape. He succeeded with his hunters not one hundred meters away. As he stepped into the portal, he turned to smirk at his would-be assailants-and his heart nearly stopped. There, behind him, was the only man in the world that could follow him through this portal. His challenger, clad in the same high-end Lin Kuei garb as he himself, wearing the Dragon Medallion, once his, around his neck, stood behind him.
The world before him was twisted as the portal obscured his vision, and transported him to who knows where.
He emerged, alarmed and out of sorts, in a deserted street in what appeared to be the backwater area of some very large city. He spun on his heel to see the same man from before step onto the solid ground outside the reach of the portal.
"You have nowhere to run, my worthy adversary," said the dark man. "Surrender to your fate; fighting is futile." The fugitive's eyes darkened. "I'll never surrender to you, traitor! You only won that medallion through treachery and cowardice!" was his response.
The dark man's eyes flashed. "You dare impugn my honor?! You will die, here and now, and no one will be able to say that I am unworthy of the title of Grandmaster! Fight!"
The dark man raised one arm over his head and held the other before him in a threatening offensive stance, clearly designed to intimidate. Not alarmed in the least, the tired man adopted a swaying stance, more designed towards defense than offence. He prepared for his enraged opponent to rush him in an attempt to kill him immediately, and end this fight quickly.
He was not disappointed. He blocked the powerful roundhouse punch aimed at his face and countered with an uppercut towards his opponent's gut. This, too, was blocked, and an elbow was sent flying towards his chest, which he blocked easily enough. This cycle of striking, blocking, and countering carried on for well over a minute, until the tired man got a grasp on the dark man's arm as he tried to punch him in the jaw.
He flipped the man onto his back, and attempted to stomp on his throat, ending the fight earlier than he could have hoped for. But it was not to be, as the dark man broke his grip and rolled away. They circled for a short moment, each wary of his opponent's every move. The slightest twitch of the arm, the smallest glance to the side, none of these went unnoticed. Finally the fugitive saw his chance and came in hot. He began with another uppercut, this time to the chin. It landed squarely, launching the dark man into the air, and he followed up with a kick to the stomach, which was in turn followed by leaping down strike of the heel, placed solidly on his opponent's head. This caused the man's face to be painfully planted onto the blacktop road they were fighting on.
Both fighters took a moment to regain their sense of balance after their brief aerial struggle. The tired man came in with an underhand blow to the gut, and a palm to the side of the dark man's face, which sent him sprawling on the pavement. The downed ninja seemed to be unable to get up. The tired man walked quickly towards him, his lungs burning and his heart barely able to pound fast enough to keep him moving. "You're finished, traitor." Said he, as he grabbed the medallion hanging around the man's neck, and hauled him into the air by it. He set him on his feet, and, though he seemed a bit shaky, the dark man managed to stay there.
As the seemingly victorious fugitive prepared to end the life of the man before him, something unexpected happened. He heard a sound, the smallest, most insignificant scuffling, as of a shoe, but it was enough to turn his head. If someone was there, that person was a witness to this fight, which was unacceptable. The dark man took the opportunity granted to him, perhaps by the Elder Gods themselves, he thought, and pulled a knife from a sheath on his leg. He drove this knife into the chest of the man who would have slain him.
The defeated warrior fell to the ground, blood flying after him. He fell gracefully, almost beautifully…until he hit the ground. When he did, he thudded down sullenly, limbs going akimbo, and there he lay, smote into ruin on the poorly managed pavement of some strange road in some strange country. He felt the pull of the blade that administered his death blow as it was removed from his breast. He felt the renewed pain as this occurred, but he had no energy to cry out. He heard the voice of the dark man, is challenger, his opponent, and his bane, as he spoke to what he believed to be the dead remains of his adversary.
"You should have known better to run, my friend. It would have been so much easier for all of us."
As the footsteps of his victorious enemy echoed through the doomed ninja's mind, he thought to himself. So this is how it ends. My mentor once said all warriors die the same way-facedown in the dirt…and he was right. My line, the greatest line the Lin Kuei has ever known, is ended. There will be no one to carry on my abilities.
This was to be his last coherent thought in this world. He looked towards the sound of scuffling shoes, believing it to be a hallucination, a repetition of the sound that caused his fatal distraction. What he saw was a teenage boy, his face pale as snow, his eyes wide as the winter sky. The sole witness to the last stand of one of Earthrealm's greatest warriors.
Said warrior reached out his hand. He touched the boy's boot. And he allowed the last of his energy to flow from his mind, body, and soul.
The shiny scar across his eye gleaming silver in the cold moonlight, Sub-Zero breathed his last.
