SOS – Star Ocean Shorts

Quick Disclaimer: Don't own any of the Star Ocean series, never have, never will, blah blah blah. If I did own Star Ocean, I'd give more people British accents, give players the option of permanently killing off certain optional characters #COUGH#ADRAY#COUGH#, and include lots more cute scenes involving Sophia. Yes, I'm a fan of Sophia. Got a problem with that?

Oddly enough, not a single character says "bastard" in the whole game, despite the fact that Fayt can equip the Bastard Sword. But I digress...

Oh yeah, and I don't own Guitar Hero, Marvel Land (AKA Talmit's Adventure), Mario & Sonic Olympics, Azumanga Daioh, Scrubs, or any other game, anime, or TV show that I may mention! In fact, let's make this simple: I OWN NOTHING! Not even the clothes on my back! #realises he is now naked# Oh, crap! #runs#

Title: Albel Gets Owned
Synopsis: A certain Glyphian warrior gets introduced to a more modern form of fun: Guitar Hero.

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Why was it taking so long to reach this Moonbase or wherever? The longer there wasn't the chance of a fight going on, the more likely it was that one of those fools would come forth with a completely trivial question or statement. If Albel had to listen to that blue-haired fool repeat part of a sentence, or the blond maggot hitting on someone, or that lump of pure fan service asking one of the other unworthy worms about the aforementioned blue-haired fool, he could swear to Apris that he would throw up. Apris, the Sun God worshipped by the very country he was once at war with. Oh, how the mighty had fallen...
"Not that I care... but where are those maggots, anyway?"
Albel the Wicked had seen not hide nor hair of any other member of the crew (later to be dubbed as Defrosted Tuna Team) – despite the fact that he could care less about those fools, he still had to admit that being alone was rather boring. Regardless of who won between Airyglyph and Aquaria, why did the war have to end? Battling, torture, and even assassination were once the highlights of Albel's day. Nowadays he was kept on reserve while Fayt (blue-haired fool) brought along that pure fan service (he believed her name was Sophie, or Sophitia, or something along those lines – not that he cared, he was Albel!) and congratulated her every time she did something in battle. He probably paid her compliments whenever she managed to put her own undergarments on. A rather patronising action, but these idiots were too unintelligent to realise such a thing. This boredom was really starting to consume Albel, and thinking all of these thoughts about his would-be teammates did little to help. He now desired – nay, required to find one of them and insult them out aloud. Even without basic knowledge of spaceships, the Aquaelie was far too slow for Albel's tastes.

Now, who to pick on? There was always Fayt, that angst-ridden little blue-haired idealist who kept trying to do the right thing and then whining when something went wrong. OK, so a moderately attractive young woman died because he took her to see her friend who also died, big deal! Thousands of people died on account of the war, many of them by Albel's own hand, death just wasn't a depressing thing presently. Maybe a few reminders of who was responsible for Vendeeni ships attacking Elicoor II might push him over the edge? Nah, the only thing stopping him from committing suicide was the fact that as angst-ridden as he was, he was too proud to take the easy way out. That, and he'd no longer be alive for Albel to annoy. Or what about that blond moron, Cliff? Whoever started the dumb blonde joke trend must have met him on at least one occasion. Thinking about it further, the maiden of Aquaria was rather serious about the majority of things. Maybe Albel could find a way to get Cliff to call her something along the lines of "hot chick" again? Yes, Albel had heard that story from a previous visit to the castle dungeon. First Nel would get annoyed at Cliff, then he would try to explain that he was innocent, and Nel would assume he was lying through his teeth and pull them right out of his head. It would be like killing two Scumbags with one Slayer.

Now, for some reason, the blue-haired woman and fan-service girl had it in for each other – or at least the bluenette had it in for fan-service girl. Albel knew naught of the reasons, but he didn't need to know. By knowing that they annoyed each other, he knew enough. He could easily find one of the girls and then loudly talk about how hot the other girl is, but in order to accomplish that, he would have to learn their names. While pondering his moves, Albel literally walked into the uptight, blue-haired wench he thought of taunting earlier.
"Albel, watch where you're going!" She exclaimed.
"Be sure not to stand directly in my path in future, worm!" Albel retorted.
"My name is Maria – I'd think you would take the time to memorise that, since I made the effort to remember your name." Maria folded her arms and looked away. She seemed hurt... a nice little bonus in Albel's eyes.
"Where are the others?" He asked, retaining his icy soul.
"They're in the Holodeck on the Southeast of the ship. Fayt and Cliff have done a bit of tinkering, it seems..."
"Thank you, worm." Albel grinned as he walked away. Maria, while offended at being described as a worm, was at least grateful that Albel actually thanked someone. "By the way, one of the girls tried on a uniform shirt in your size, but she kept complaining that the buttons around the chest wouldn't fasten. I'd have a talk with Sophie about sizing herself up correctly."
"Huh?" Maria asked, watching Albel leave. "Oh, you mean Sophia... HOW DARE YOU MEAN SOPHIA!??!!?" Giving a satisfied chuckle, Albel made his way toward the Southeast Holodeck.

Meanwhile, in the Southeast Holodeck, Cliff had introduced Fayt to something he was finding a lot more fun than even the battle simulators!
Has he lost his mind?
Can he see or is he blind?
Can he walk at all,
Or if he moves, will he fall?
"Hey, no fair! You're cheating, Cliff!" Fayt cried, watching Cliff nail three closely-placed notes while only strumming once.
"How are Hammer-ons and Pull-offs cheating?" Cliff asked in his defence. "They're a vital part of becoming a god at this game!" Fayt's small hands fumbled with the guitar-shaped controller he was holding, while a certain adrenaline-fuelled Klausian had been rocking out for quite a while without getting tired.
"I hate to say it, but maybe Guitar Hero's just not your thing, Fayt?" Nel pondered.
"No! I'm not stopping until I can beat this song!" Fayt objected, trying his best, but not quite moving his hands fast enough, or sometimes too fast... or sometimes he did that annoying thing where you move your hand too far to the right when you're sure you hit that orange note, and it ends up really pissing you off. Why exactly had Fayt attempted Expert mode on his first try?
"You don't need to be good at this game, Fayt, you amaze me with your battle skills!" Sophia assured. Before anyone could answer, a sharp bright light shone through the Holodeck, indicating that the door had opened.
"Greetings, maggots!" Albel sneered, gaining unimpressed looks from Nel, Cliff, Sophia, and Fayt, of whom he proceeded to insult respectively: "Well, well, if it isn't the Wits, the Ditz, the Tits, and the One-Who-Throws-Fits?" Cliff spent a while trying to wrap his head around the situation, while Nel just shook her head in disbelief, and Sophia frowned while covering up her chest. This left Fayt to ask the following question:
"What do you want, Albel?" he did not sound impressed.
"To put it simply: I'm bored." Came Albel's reply. He then turned his attention to the game, picking up one of the controllers. "And what manner of entertainment might this be?"
"It's a game called Guitar Hero," Nel explained. "It seems to emulate the guitars we have on Elicoor II, only the controller has more basic implementations, and the guitars I have seen on this game look electronically advanced."
"Yeah, you guys only have acoustic guitars at the moment!" Cliff added, deciding to forget about deciphering Albel's insult and stick to conversations he knew about instead.
"Hmmph! Let me give this a try..." Albel smirked.
"You might want to start on Easy mode first..." Fayt warned, gaining a scowl from Albel. "... it... it's really hard..."
"Insolent fool! You dare insinuate that I, Albel the Wicked, cannot handle the difficulty of a mere game!?" Without giving Fayt a chance to answer, Albel began flicking through all of the songs the Defrosted Tuna Team had unlocked. Each song sounded more alien than the last to Albel, however. "What are all of these sounds I'm hearing?" He asked as a hot riff was laid down.
"It's called music, Albel." Sophia smiled.
"I know what music is! Are you really that stupid?"
"No – she was patronising you." Nel replied, laughing to herself on the inside. Choosing to ignore the insolence, Albel finally decided to choose a song at random – Symphony of Destruction, as performed by Megadeth. An amazing part of the tinkering Cliff added was that the player now played to the actual songs – not a cover in sight! Or should that be not a cover in earshot? Well, it was irrelevant.

To everyone's shock, Ablel had picked the game up remarkably quickly, perhaps indicating that he played guitar in his spare time? Only ten minutes before the arrival at Moonbase, and Albel had decided to choose Career Mode (naming his band Glyphian Shred), and gained a 5-star rating on every song! He took great pride and glory in looking at Fayt, Cliff, Nel, and Sophia many times, watching one face after another gain an increasingly surprised look.
"How on Elicoor II did you do all of that?" Nel asked in shock. "I can barely pass Medium!"
"It's simple, maggot..." Albel sneered, basking in the glow of his unrivalled narcissism. "Like I always say: It's not the great who are strong; it's the strong who are great!"
"Then how come I'm not as good at this game?" Cliff asked.
"You maggots will simply have to face the fact that I have greater-skilled hands than the four of you combined, be it with swords, inventing tools, or these remarkably easy games..." And with that, Albel slowly took his leave, intending to show those peons his godliness for as long as physically possible.
"Do you mean to tell us, Albel," Sophia finally spoke up. "That you have more skill in your hands than all of us combined when it comes to handling things that are long and hard?" Fayt snorted and threw his hands up to his mouth, trying his best to hide his laughter – he understood instantly what Sophia was insinuating!
"What!?" Albel cried, his face blushing as furiously as the fury he felt. "You suck!!"
"Nah, we'll leave that to you!" Nel added, falling to the floor and clutching her stomach in a fit of laughter.
"... oh, NOW I get it!" Cliff started laughing too. Albel was on top of the world a moment ago, or at least on top of the Aquaelie, but one little comment had made him feel like the very worm he so often described others as. Those insolent maggots would pay very dearly very soon, but for now he felt it best to just take his leave...