Well, uh... I've been planning this fic for a long time, so cross your fingers with me, and we'll see if I'm able to write it as well as I hope to. The plot is a little cliche, I know, but I thought it would be so much fun to do it this way. I also recommend everyone go ahead and place their bets on who they think the victor will be. It would be fun to hear some guesses.

Thanks for reading, and I hope you like it. Sorry if I missed any mistakes.

Being a god was dreadfully boring. Watching over the threads of space and time was redundant after, well, an eternity of it. Luckily, humans were interesting. I especially liked their wars. I liked to watch them tear each other apart over small matters, set off devastating explosions, and throw the blame around until it was hard to tell why the whole thing had started in the first place. War was simply thrilling.

But even that became boring. It made me wonder why I should have to watch from a distance. I was a god, after all, even if I'd never been properly worshiped. With my strength I could destroy everything with the pluck of a single stand of the threads that held the infinite number of universes together. That would make things even more boring though.

It made more sense to bring myself some entertainment.

The idea came about when I noticed one figure in-particular. In some threads he was quite the legend, in others not but a whisper. It was unheard of to have so many universes where one man, different yet the same in each, could be connected to so many threads, so many fates. If he hadn't been a mortal, he could have been a god.

He was always so powerful, such a force to watch, yet he still had the space in his heart to care for his planet or friends or simply the fate of everything. Yes, this was the entertainment I needed. I only had to decide how many I wanted, and which ones.

I spread my gaze out across the endless expanse of the threads, choosing the ones I particularly liked, ones that were just different enough but mostly the same, just like him. Of course, just him on his own wasn't enough of a motivation, so I picked another from each thread as well. It would certainly tilt the balance of the game for a more entertaining run.

Finally, one-by-one I ripped them all from their worlds and tossed them into my limbo. Each one slept like a lifeless doll until I snapped my fingers, bringing them all to life. Perhaps I should have planned their meeting better, though it did bring a smile to my face to wonder how they would all tell each other apart.

Without looking, I knew Daiba's hands were trembling, ruining his aim. I knew he was trying to hide his fear, but his eyes were darting to every Mazone surrounding us. He took a retreating step to put his back closer to mine.

Yes, there was a chance we wouldn't make it out alive. There was always a chance of that. The idea didn't scare me, because I simply didn't have time to die at that moment. I had more important things to do. I would die later, when the opportunity was better. The only trouble was whether or not Daiba could manage to keep himself alive alongside me. Even with my help, he would need to be a quick shot.

"Gonna sing for me again?" he stuttered through a weak laugh.

I had to smile.

As the uniformed Mazone readied their guns, I felt his back against mine, and I could feel him shaking. Before I could tell him not to show his fear, I heard him give a short gasp. The weight of his back disappeared. I spun, shooting out a hand to catch him before he could fall. My thoughts raced as I tried to understand what had happened. They hadn't shot him. I would have heard it.

Then my eye opened. It was strange, because it hadn't been closed before. I knew it hadn't, and yet I opened it to see my hand still outstretched. I wasn't on the ship where I'd been before. Instead, the greenery around me looked as though it could only be from earth. There were mountains on the horizon and an endless field of flowers beneath my feet. Irritably, I thought I was dead for a brief moment.

"Captain," Daiba hissed, his hand suddenly tugging harshly on my arm. "What the fuck is going on? When did you change pants?"

It was certainly Daiba's voice, but he somehow sounded even angrier than usual. I glanced down to confirm that I was still wearing the same pants before I turned toward him. "What?" I frowned as I took in his appearance. "Are you sure you're not the one who changed clothes?"

It was much like his old outfit, but the pink coloring of the jacket and pants had been replaced by a deep tan, and his hair was a darker shade of blond. It felt like someone was attempting to pass as my crewman who most certainly wasn't him.

"What are you talking about?" he demanded. "Where the hell are we? This had better not be another goddamn Noo trick. I can't deal with this right now!" With an enraged yell, he kicked at one of the flowers underfoot. "Fuck this! Take me back right now you bastards!"

"Who are you?" I questioned slowly. I noticed that my weapons had disappeared from my belt, and I pawed for them to make sure it wasn't a hallucination trying to divert me. The whole thing felt like a hallucination, but it also felt too real to be.

"What do you mean!?" the young man barked. "I'm Daiba. Did you hit your head or something? Are you even the captain?" The angered glare never eased from his eyes as he looked me over. It seemed like he would punch me at any moment. He was pure rage and irritation.

"I am Captain Harlock," I answered calmly. "But you are not Tadashi Daiba."

"Who the hell do you think I am then?" he snapped. "This isn't even scary. It's just stupid." He returned to yelling at the sky. "Hear that you stupid bastards!? Your trick is fucking awful. Now put me back! I'm not scared of you!"

A bright, amused laugh filled the air. I couldn't guess the age or gender of whoever it came from. I couldn't even guess their location, but they appeared above me, floating in the air as though they were sitting on some invisible ledge. Their appearance was just as impossible to distinguish as their laugh. Clearly, whatever it was wasn't human. Its hair was a shining silver as though it could have been made from the metal. Pupil-less white eyes took us in with a warmth of kindness, along with its sharp-toothed smile. All of its features seemed sharp as well – its nose, brows, and chin. Age was impossible to determine. I could only guess somewhere between thirteen and twenty-five. It was all at once beautiful and disgusting, and I swore it looked slightly different every time I blinked.

"You are fun," it called down to the one calling himself Daiba. "I think I'll like you."

I had thought the thing was the "Noo" the boy had been speaking about, but he looked just as confused as I felt. "The hell are you?" he yelled.

It shook its head, long hair brushing against its shoulders. "Not important. You'd much rather meet the rest of the players, yes?"

With a snap of its thin fingers, over a dozen more people appeared around us. They were all in pairs, with nearly everyone looking just as on-edge as us. Every group was different, but in each one I found a man who could have been my twin. There were eight of us in all, many wearing similar uniforms to my own. A few stood out wildly, and some were taller or shorter. Some had slightly different shades of hair or two eyes instead of one. All but one of us shared the same scar. All but one wore a skull and crossbones. And as it happened, most of us were wearing different pants, and they all had empty holsters where their weapons should have been.

My Daiba was with one wearing black pants and a face void of expression. "Daiba," he called with a voice that sounded different to my ears, but one that I knew was my own. He eyed me with an almost invisible frown as our Daibas hesitantly began walking to trade places.

At the same time, I heard a few other calls for other people. All of them were uncertain.

"Captain?"

"Harlock?"

"Tadashi."

Except the very loud one from one of the young boys. "Harlock!" he screeched. "Who are these people!?"

"I don't know," a younger me in an odd outfit replied shortly. "Quit yelling." There appeared to be three clones in particular that stood out from the other five of us. Two were simply younger and with both their eyes. The one in white pants and a black shirt was paired with the loudmouth boy, who continued to badger him with questions, while the one in a blue one-piece remained absolutely silent alongside an irritable-looking man with a commander's cap who appeared taller than me.

But the strangest one, who all of us had taken to staring at the most, appeared to have been taken straight from the old west. Dual scars ran up from his jaws into his cheeks, unlike the rest of us, and he still had both his eyes. Not only that, but his partner was a short, bespectacled man wearing an oversized cloak. Tochiro. The two were muttering to each other while the cowboy sipped something from a flask. He appeared wholly unimpressed by the matter at hand, unlike the more animated Tochiro.

The groups with men that looked more like me were still strangely varied by their partners, but they all wore black pants. Of course, there was the one who had a very similar but much angrier Daiba, but there was another who had a young man who looked to be in his early twenties at his side. The boy's hair was a fluffy brown, and his jacket was a bright orange. His doppelganger partner was thinner than me, more hints of emotion in his face. He was the only one of us who appeared to have blue eyes instead of brown.

The next one's jaw was squarer, his build holding more muscle, but the boy at his side was the smallest of all. He looked a couple of years younger than Daiba at least, and he stuck close to his partner's side.

The last one of us stuck out easily due to his height, taller than any of us. His uniform was accented by metal pieces of armor, and the young man who must have been his partner stood slightly away from him. Like the younger me in blue and his partner, these two didn't seem as interested in each other as everyone else.

"Captain," Daiba muttered as he reached my side. He looked like he needed to sit down, his eyes wide with confusion. "Are we dead or dreaming?"

I placed a hand to his shoulder to steady him. "Honestly, I don't think we're doing either at the moment." The world around us felt too real to come from a dream. The wind brought my hair to brush against my face, and the dirt shifted beneath the weight of my boots. Death didn't seem like a reasonable option.

"Alright, are you all settled?" the thing still sitting above us called. "Afraid I got you a little mixed up when I pulled you in. You all look so similar, you know. But I'm tired of waiting. I need to get on to explaining the rules of the game."

I was going to speak up against it. I think all of us were, but the first one to speak was the man with the commander's cap. "I'd much prefer if you'd start by introducing yourself." His voice was deep but young, though he looked my age.

The creature's white eyes flashed with a sudden upset, but it quickly returned to its more excited demeanor. "I don't have a name. I never needed one. I am a god, as you would call it. I control the splitting threads caused by the infinite number of choices and decisions made. It took me ages to pick out all of you, so I hope you'll keep me entertained."

"So you're saying we're all from different universes then?" I questioned. "But we're all the same person?"

"Not all of you," it shrugged. "Just the ones that look like it. Except for that one I pulled for the fun of it-" The creature pointed toward the cowboy, "-you're all Phantom F. Harlock. And those three are all Tadashi Daiba in some form." My Daiba along with the one I'd talked to earlier and strangely enough the one in the orange jacket were all pointed at. "I wanted to keep your partners varied, but he's always so different that it fits well. You're all very lucky, you know," it grinned. "Being chosen out of all those infinite possibilities."

"You know we don't exist to be your entertainment," my double with the youngest boy said. "I'm not sure what you have planned, but we'll take no part in it."

We all voiced a chorus of agreement, and the creature's smile cracked like a porcelain mask. "You will," it said, its voice ice. The air grew cold, and the blue sky was overtaken by deeply gray clouds. The flowers under our feet withered until there was nothing but dry, crunching grass. "You will play, or everything you know will be wiped out, so I suggest you listen to the rules if you hope to get out of this with both your lives and the lives of all of those you care about intact."

As it spoke, most of the younger men looked up and listened intently with wide eyes, while the rest of us studied each other. I was curious about them. It seemed only natural to be. I wondered how we were different and the same. I wondered about how their lives had played out to make their expressions darker or lighter than my own. I wondered about the cowboy's Tochiro and if any of the others had one, but I also listened. I didn't like what I heard.

"This game is very simple. Your goal is to be the last one alive – or last ones if you can keep your partner alive as well, though that isn't very important. So the other side of that coin of course, is to kill everyone else. To start out, I will place all sixteen of you across the game board I designed, which consists of four areas. You'll learn about them while you're playing. Across the board are traps and extra weapons you can use, but none of the traps are set. That is for you to do. From the beginning, you will have a weapon of your choice. Your ammo will not run out if you chose a weapon of that nature. If you win and your partner is dead, I will bring them back for you, and you will be returned to your home just as you were." Its smile returned, but the sun did not. "If you both die, then I may still bring one of you back, but you will remain here with me to keep me company for as long as I see fit, and I will destroy your universe for good."

By the end, we'd all turned to stare at it. No one was pleased.

"We won't fight," I said. "We won't give you what you want."

"If you want a proper fight, we'll take you on," the young one in blue said. "But I won't turn on them when we're all fighting for a just cause."

"I don't know what's going on, but I sure don't feel like going up against all these guys," Tochiro squawked. The cowboy remained silent.

"I've been up against gods before," the one with blue eyes smirked. "It looks like you're all selfish cowards then."

I expected more anger from the creature, but it laughed instead, bringing a rolling thunder from the clouds above. "You all have so much faith in yourselves, but how well do you really know each other? How far would you be willing to go to save someone? Now understand that the other you might be thinking the same answer, or he might not. You're all the same person, but you're vastly different, and your partners aren't just here to look cute."

I heard a few cries of offense from the younger ones, including Daiba beside me.

"And you know," it purred, "there's already one among you seeking out your weaknesses and plotting the best ways he could take each of you down. Don't be so trusting. Kill your doubles before they kill you." Its eyes seemed to be focused on each of us and yet nothing all at once. It brought up its hand again.

"This is all going a little fast, don't you think?" the young man next to the tallest one of us said, the first of his pair to speak. "I think we need a little time to think all this over before we get started."

"You've already proven that you won't listen to me, and if you feel like talking, you can do it on the game board," it shrugged. "I don't feel like wasting any more time. Let's get onto the show. Now choose your weapon wisely, boys, and good luck."

With a snap of its fingers, I was alone again, this time in an endless darkness. I could see myself just fine, but there were no lights. My dragoon appeared a few feet in front of me, my saber to my left. A few more guns and swords also showed, larger and smaller. Almost every weapon I could imagine was laid out in front of me, but the most respectable one I felt I could use against my doubles I snatched from the ground before sliding back in its holster. My saber could still kill just as well as any other gun, and I hoped I wouldn't have to use it.

I didn't want to fight any of them. I didn't want to do any of this at all, but I was certain we all felt the same way. What I couldn't be certain was whether or not the others were willing to carry out the game to its conclusion. For me, killing one of them would be a last resort, but I knew Daiba would be more trigger happy.

A world grew around me. First, a blazing blue sky appeared. Then my feet sank into a soft sea of sand that rose and fell in wave after endless wave. I guessed this was my area – a desert. If there were only four, I assumed other people were in the area with me, but I couldn't see any. My best chance was to start walking to get out of the heat.

Feeling a light pressure against my wrist, I raised it to find a leather strap, covered in marble-like half-spheres all the way around. A quick count put the number at sixteen of the gems, and every two had a different shape stamped on it in black. There were circles, stars, squares, and a few others. I had a feeling they represented all of us, but I wasn't sure why.

This so-called god acted more like a child than anything if it thought this was a game. Perhaps it was like chess in a way, but we were all pawns. We were nothing more than sacrifices for the game's end unless we played with a less offensive strategy.

There was no means to count time in this fake world. The sun set and rose faster than it should have, so I could only guess. But it was certainly a good number of hours later that I spotted the line of trees in the distance. It looked like heaven to me, after all the sweat that had collected over my entire body from the blistering heat of the desert. Then I heard a crack, followed by the clear sound of one of the gems shattering. I held up my wrist to see one of the spheres – one with a circle stamp – had become nothing but shards lying on the sand.

My stomach sank as I understood the meaning of the bracelet, and the meaning of the sudden loss it was showing me.

And they're off. Don't be too concerned with nameless god OC thing. They won't get much screen time. It's more fun just to write all the boys suffering. (Real sorry for the severe lack of girls.)