All stand in honour of David Tai, who has blessed us with another ficlet.
He's caught the itch for torturing Rock Howard. :)
It was yet another tournament, and Rock Howard was alone.
Normally, as an 'independent" entrant, he could form an ad-hoc team and fight as he wanted - forming a team of any sort.
The problem was, being alone made him a target for the craziness. The 'free agents' sometimes resorted to extreme measures to team up. Like that one time with Shermie that resulted in him barricading his room and making sure not to accept any incoming -video chats- from any unknown sources. Or opening any emails, for that matter.
From prior experience with certain people, this was a state of affairs that wouldn't last long. Either he could hide, and -someone- would find him, usually in one bad position or another, and then something else would occur, and then his boss would come looking from him and -everything- would accelerate into a state of chaos.
So rather than waiting for trouble to find him, he went to look for the least problematic source of chaos. Something along the same reasoning as "set a small fire to prevent a larger fire."
Finding Seirah was a fairly easy thing to do: Rock had noticed her on the list of 'available' independent entrants, probably because the Ikari team were pretty consistent, and the K team was pretty well set on their own. He'd taken to a few of these team-ups, and they'd worked pretty well together, but sometimes he just -never- understood exactly what she saw him as. When she was in full business mode, Whip treated him mostly in full business mode, and he was expected to perform his task, and flawlessly, without question. Oddly enough, this was actually the easiest thing to understand. Just follow orders and win.
On the other hand, when she was 'off duty', and pretty much being nineteen years old, her mercurical moods and her 'pet' whip pretty much left Rock scaroused enough that he didn't know whether he was coming or going. Still, they got on well enough anyway. At least it was better than hanging out with Ryuji Yamazaki.
This time around, he found Seirah talking to a few women... recognizing them.
Let's see... he was pretty sure that was Kula Diamond, and... gulp Angel. Who could give Shermie a run for her money.
But who -was- that girl with the giant eyeballs?
"Rock!" Seirah greeted, waving a hand enthusiatically.
Oh good, she wasn't in battle mode, Rock noted. Which was probably a good thing socially, but...
"You're not fighting in this tournament?"
"Nope... got to keep surveillance. Too many Hakkeshu fighters in this tournament."
"Oh."
"Aw, what's the matter, poor duckling needs partners?" Angel cooed, draping her arm over Rock's shoulders.
Rock made a face. He'd gotten used to being teased by the older women, but Angel was nearly as bad as Shermie in terms of just how much woman she was, which would be just fine if Seirah wasn't already planting hands on her hips.
Quickly disengaging from Angel with as minimal physical contact as he could, Rock nodded. "I could use the prize money, but..."
Kula shook her head, bringing a finger to her chin as she mused. "Well, the 3 on 3 team brackets just filled up. I think all the teams slots are full, so you could either go for survival, or..."
"That's too bad. Guess I won't be fighting in this tournament, then." Not that Rock minded too much. He could just cheer on Terry, or...
Growing conscious of miscolored eyes focused on him, Rock glanced at... the eyeball girl. "What?"
"Hmmm. Hmmm. Hmmm. Ducky Rock gets twenty cuteness points. Do you want to rent him?" Sylvie waggled her hands at Seirah. "He's perfect!"
Rock stared at her, before turning to Seirah, expecting her to say no.
To his dismay, Seirah seemed to be considering it. "That -would- help you out. And Rock needs the money, doesn't he?"
Rock's eyes grew wider. Whenever Seirah had that tone in her voice, it meant she had just come up with a plan, a plan that Rock was almost assuredly -not- going to like.
Turning on his heels, Rock tried to hightail it out of the room. He made it about halfway down the hallway, when a whip snaked its way around one of his ankles, causing him to kiss a highly polished, recently waxed floor.
It tasted of lemons and ammonia.
"Where are you going, Rock dear? Voodoo and I haven't given you permission to leave," Whip said.
Dragged across the floor by Voodoo as Whip reeled him in, despite his frantic grasping for escape, Rock found himself being poked at by Sylvie Paula Paula. "I think he's got enough endurance," Sylvie declared, her mismatched eyes sparkling.
"Oh he does," Whip smiled.
Rock was very, very afraid.
Spitting blood as he wiped his mouth and checked to make sure all his teeth were still in his mouth, Rock glanced up at the video screen replaying his last bout.
The rules for NEOGEO BATTLECOLISEUM was -just- a little bit easier than the King of Fighters- two vs two, and at least he only had to defeat -one- team member to beat a team.
Unfortunately, this resulted in frantic attempts to keep Sylvie Paula Paula's eyeballs from roving around the stadium so that she was actually -available- when he tagged in.
"Unleash the happiness!" she cheered when he was on the attack. "PEW! PEW! PEW!"
"Low power. I'm super-tired." When she tagged out.
"You're a mess. Looks like it hurts." At the end of a round.
Rock wasn't sure, but Sylvie was kinda... making sense.
He was pretty sure this was all Seirah's fault.
Still, at least they'd won, he could take the prize money and...
"It's amazing, really! The way you got beat up!" Sylvie enthused.
... he wanted to go home.
"Cha-ching! It's the final boss. Are you ready?"
Huh?
"Wait, what?"
"Oh, didn't you know? We're supposed to take down the head of WAREZ. Bibibibibibi! Shock and Buzz, Rocky, Shock and buzz!"
"Seirah didn't say anything about this!"
"Oh, she just didn't want you to worry. The fate of NEOGEOWORLD is in our hands! YOSSHAAAA!"
They weren't paying him enough for this.
Dragging the trophy for the NEOGEO BATTLE COLISEUM behind him tiredly, Rock Howard returned to his apartment. As he unlocked and opened his door...
"Oh Rock, you're back!" Seirah was seated on his sofa, watching a movie.
Of course. Rock made a note to find a stronger, pick-proof lock.
"Seirah," Rock greeted, as he closed the door behind him. Handing the trophy to Seirah, Rock went to pluck a couple of sodas from the fridge, before heading over to take a seat next to the Ikari soldier on the sofa.
"So, did you shut down -that- operation?"
"Yeah. Though for a world-conquering villain, that was..."
"A little too easy?" Whip finished his sentence. "Of course. It's a little small-scale for IKARI, so we just handed it off to Sylvie. Something to keep her occupied..."
Rock stared at her. "Are you saying that was your way of keeping her -busy-? And she's just..."
"If you haven't noticed, Sylvie's a little... different."
"A little," Rock responded dryly.
Whip shrugged her shoulders. "Well, keeping all the ex-NESTS out of trouble saves us the headache. Angel's busy being a hero of justice with her wrestling team, Kula is following K and Maxima, and they're all trying to break down NESTS. Sylvie's just a little..."
"Different. Yes. So what you're saying is..."
"NESTS never really left us," Whip said. "All their training and... other things, they left impressions on us, didn't they, Voodoo? So we're just keeping busy, all of us."
"Oh. Man..." This was getting a little heavy for Rock, and so he fell silent, as Whip mused.
Suddenly Rock was hit with a sofa pillow.
"Enough of that," Seirah said. "So, I'm guessing you're hungry, and tired. Want to eat? And take a nap?"
"Well, yeah."
"Good. You're a mess. Looks like it hurts all over."
"... gimme a break."
Rock Howard never gets a break
Once again, please forward all compliments to David Tai