Author's Note: For anyone who's been reading this regularly, sorry about the long pause! Had a lot going on in my personal life, but it's all settled down now. If you like the story, drop me a comment! I'm working on some professional writing projects as well, so I'd really love some feedback on my style!

Punch Club [I]

Kato steps in the front door of his apartment and notices something is different. There's a big, long metal thing behind his couch, for one. There's another absolute unit in the front parlor, crushing all the old college papers and unopened junk mail littering the floor. It's all pinned down, but at least Mara didn't get rid of the Good Junk, like he asked.

Aris comes from the kitchen, trying to sidle past a collection of grocery bags filled with garbage. The bags suddenly disappear before their eyes, evaporating into a floating image of one of those Grist Gushers, with a "+5" next to it. Aris, vaguely startled by this development, adjusts his gait back to normal, now that he doesn't have to weave through the mess.

"I came home on my lunch break, and now, after all this, I can't even get in the fridge to get my lunch!" he huffs.

"You had lunch in the fridge?" Kato asks. He feels a pang of envy, knowing that his stash of instant ramen is depleted and he already ate his leftover chicken parmesan for breakfast.

"Yeah, and your thinger is blocking it," Aris sighs, indicating some kind of round, metal platform taking up the entirety of the kitchen floor. "I'm just gonna go have a smoke."

He starts for the front door, then laughs a little. He turns back toward Kato. "You know, you have a real obsession with these dangerous games. Are you turning into an adrenaline junkie or something?"

Kato shrugs, playing it cool behind his shades. He's still sore with bruises from his last Strife against Aris. It wasn't a pretty sight.

"I just hope this doesn't get out of hand, like your last little shenanigan," he says, leveling his eyes at Kato. "I mean really, you're already knocking buildings over? Don't tell me all these fires are part of it, too."

Kato lets out the quietest of sighs. He was beginning to suspect as much himself, and these sunglasses apparently do nothing to improve his poker face.

Aris shakes his head, slightly bemused. He slips a cigarette between his lips and steps out the door, leaving Kato alone with his weird machines.

arousingAntagonism began pestering tuneHarmonic at 1:57 PM

AA: Oh, hey, you're home!
AA: Check out all this neat stuff!
AA: What's Aris saying? I can't hear you guys.
AA: I hope he's not too mad about all this. I told him sorry already. :/

TH: he's just hangry that he can't get his lunch

AA: Ah, shit. Now I feel like an asshole.

TH: don't worry about it
TH: he's got enough money for a new lunch
TH: so let's get cracking, how does this stuff work?

AA: It all starts with the one in the front room, the Cruxtruder.
AA: It's supposed to give us Cruxite Dowels that we use to make items with, but I don't see where they're supposed to come out.

TH: maybe this long tube in the middle?

AA: Yeah, but it's closed off with that cap, I think.

TH: ok easy

Kato delivers a quick strike with his fingertips, his hand bladed out flat and sturdy. The cap falls to the floor with a heavy thunk. Aris peeks his head in the window with a disapproving look.

TH: boom
TH: done

He squeezes his jaw shut, conscious of the fact that he's visible to Mara as he tries to hide the pain. Aside from the fact that he just slapped a heavy chunk of metal with his bare hands, he's sore all over from his previous escapade. It's crazy, he thinks, how far it got from one little joke.

~The Past~

It was Friday night - four nights ago. He was out at the Bullpen with a random assortment of friends. There was Bolbi Braggins, a friend from the community college Kato attends. He's in the computer science program and made it sound like a pretty sweet deal. There was Akira Takeshita, Theo's childhood friend, a Japanese expatriate who got acquainted with everyone during his frequent trips down from his Canadian university. He's staying in a youth hostel up the street. And finally, there was Todd LaRue. Dear, sweet Todd. Just a simple guy who wants nothing more than to go to his job and move boxes then come home and drink beer and listen to music really loud. He was in the same class as Theo and Ryui, but "your friends are my friends," as the saying goes.

"I saw you taking your karate class down at the gym," Bolbi said, the four of them standing on the front curb while everyone but Todd smoked a cigarette. It was a dig about having to take gym class in college, but it didn't bother Kato.

"Well, now that I'm seeking Higher Education, I've got to study my martial arts at a college level," Kato responded.

"You don't know martial arts," Akira groaned. "You Americans and your McDojos… You know, what is considered a black belt at one of your kid schools is barely above a white belt to real martial artists."

"I didn't go to a kid school," Kato replied.

"What, the McDojo offers adult classes, too?" Todd laughed.

"Guys, seriously… I'm a black belt in Bujinkan Budo Taijutsu."

They didn't believe him.

"Come on, man," Todd went on, "I've probably been in more fights in the pit at concerts than you have in your life, Mr. Martial Arts."

"Alright, you want me to prove it?" Kato asked, cracking his knuckles. "Let's go."

"What, right here?" Todd looked around the parking lot. There were a few other people having a smoke, but otherwise the lot was fairly quiet. The other two guys looked at Todd expectantly, waiting to see if he'd live up to his boasts.

"Alright, what the hell," he agreed. "I think I've had enough drinks to do this." He raised his fists in a typical white guy faux-boxing pose. "Just take it easy, alright? I don't want to be feeling this in the morning. And no ball shots either."

"You got it," Kato said, spitting out the last of his cigarette. He turned sideways, blading his hands – one out front and one by his chest. Todd bounced nervously back and forth, but Kato remained as still as a stalking snake.

"Go!" Bolbi shouted, cutting the tension.

Todd swung first with a few slow and clumsy hooks. Kato kept well out of range, though he bobbed his head a little to make Todd think he actually had to dodge. After each of his swings, Todd left himself wide open. Kato stepped diagonally forward, closing in on Todd while remaining on the outside of his latest swing. He gave a quick karate chop, striking Todd in the cheekbone just below his eye. Though it was a light strike, the closeness of it freaked Todd out and made him stagger backward.

Todd seemed about to make a comment on it until he realized how little it actually hurt. He shook his head and moved back in on Kato. This time, Kato went on the offensive first, making some obvious punches toward Todd's face, letting him block it with his raised forearms. When Todd began to settle into this block, Kato quickly changed it up and crouched low to strike Todd in the stomach.

Todd reeled back, doubling over. "Oof, okay, man," he grunted. "That one got me." He chuckled good-naturedly, but there was a bitterness that said he was still in this fight.

Suddenly, Todd straightened up and shouted, trying to scare Kato. Kato remained unflinching, his face a mask of placidity with his sunglasses at night. Todd barreled down with his fist raised, but Kato fluidly sidestepped and came back with a punch of his own. His powerful swing, coupled with Todd's own momentum in the reverse direction, made for quite an impact. He struck right between Todd's eyebrows, snapping his head back and sending him tumbling over backwards. Todd hit his head on the sidewalk and went limp.

Exciting Tennis

Having left the castle in the capable hands of his loyal pawns, the Super King's golden hovershuttle descended into a private park, barely a few seconds away from the castle he had just left. It pleased him to know how many Boondollars of fuel he had just burned for what could have been a five-minute walk. It really puts a number on the value of his time.

He emerged from the ship, stepping down across a staircase made of his loyal servants' hunched backs. Another servant quickly scuttled over with a gym bag. He set it down on the ground and began rummaging for Super King's things immediately. Sweat trickled down his broad, carapaced face, and he jittered nervously as he tried to get the necessary items before Super King's patience ran out. Several months ago, it had been a fairly luxurious and rewarding job to work in the palace. Now that the White King had has this sudden change of attitude, however, his job was demanding, demeaning, and just plain depressing. This is how the servants on Derse are treated (or so the Prospitan propaganda machine says); this is no way for a free citizen in the capitol of wisdom and righteousness to live. Rumor around the castle was that the Super King's change had come from the four-pearled ring he now wore around his delicate, white finger. The servant dared not look for fear of invoking Super King's wrath.

"Hurry now, servant boy," Super King crooned, gazing out across the park. "My lesson can't wait forever. Change me!"

The servant quickly righted himself, carrying the tight-fitting hot pink shirt and shorts that Super King would need for his athletic endeavor. He gently removed Super King's royal smock of frills and ribbons, ignoring the salacious giggles and suggestive comments as best he could.

"Make sure to put my nipple guards on, or my sensitive areolas will chafe," he added. The servant quickly fished them out of the bag and applied them. He finished by pulling the tight-fitting booty shorts up to cover the Super King's bulging jock cup, his face uncomfortably close to His Supremeness's Royal Crotch.

"Oh, don't be such a prude, my boy," Super King reassured the quivering servant, "we're just a couple of manly men suiting up for a bit of sport. There's nothing wrong with being nude together in the locker room." If only they were in a locker room, and not in the middle of a city park, the servant thought. At least the park was devoid of other people, due, of course, to the air raid currently carpet-bombing the city.

Finally, the servant removed a tennis racquet from the gym bag. He held it out to the Super King, prostrate on one knee with his head bent, as if he were presenting the legendary Caledfwlch itself to him. Super King daintily accepted the racquet, then crossed the park to the gate on the outside of the tennis court, which another servant opened for him.

The tennis instructor waited on the court for him. He began his lesson, but quickly trailed off when he noticed Super King yawning with boredom. He opted instead to dive right into the excitement of the game. He served the ball, but it flew right past the uninterested Super King.

"Oh, was I supposed to hit it?" he asked. "No fair, I wasn't ready! Do it again!"

The instructor served another ball. This time, Super King hit it, but it went right into the net.

"I've made it into the goal! Point for me!"

A servant ran a fresh tennis ball into the Super King's waiting hand. He served this time, and it went into the net again.

"Goodness, another point for me! For a professional tennis instructor, you sure are doing a lousy job against me. I guess I'm just naturally that good!"

The instructor began to protest, but the servants lined up along the side of the court began to shake their heads, and the instructor opted to remain silent.

The game continued in this way until the Super King grew tired. "My wrists are so terribly sore!" he whined. "Servant, come play for me."

Super King retired to the bench, while a clueless servant took his place. The instructor served the ball, and the servant flailed the racquet about with a visible lack of skill.

"Play better, silly boy, you're making me look bad!" Super King called. His voice was cheery, as if delivering a joke, but there was a hint of a real threat underneath it.

The instructor began to lob him a few easier serves, but the game grew dull. "I grow tired of this!" Super King proclaimed. "I declare myself the winner! As I seem to be a master of the sport already, I'm afraid your services will no longer be needed, Mr. Tennis Instructor. Surely, this should cover the cost of the first lesson." The Super King casually tossed a dense Boonbond onto the court, cracking the pavement.

"Now come along, servants," he called. "I've got a 12:00 tee time on Skaia I don't want to be late for."

Punch Club [II]

"Oh shit," Kato muttered, maintaining his fighting stance, just in case Todd decided to get up and keep fighting after receiving a total knockout.

Akira bent down over Todd and began prodding his face. "He's still breathing," he announced. "I think he will be okay."

Bolbi began to clap. "Nice work, man! Maybe I ought to sign up for that martial arts class next semester. That was pretty badass!"

"Maybe we should take Todd to the doctor," Kato suggested.

"Nah, he's fine," Bolbi insisted. "Come on, do me next," he said, seeming oddly encouraged by Kato's knockout. "Come on, show me some stuff, I wanna learn your cool ninja moves, too!"

"I'm not really teaching you anything by kicking your ass."

"Ass-kickings are life's way of teaching you lessons," he countered. "Now come on. Schnell!"

Kato launched in with a series of light fingertip strikes to show Bolbi that he was utterly unprepared. He was too slow to block a single one.

"That's what I'm talking about!" Bolbi laughed. He began to bounce around on his toes, jabbing at the air in imitation of boxers he had seen on TV.

Kato dove in with a real strike this time. Bolbi actually dodged it – his fancy footwork wasn't for nothing, but it WAS mostly for show. He continued dancing sideways, directly into the path of Kato's next strike.

Bolbi staggered, then dropped to his knees, stumbling over his own toes. He hunched over, coughing like he had been winded. When he looked up, however, Kato noticed he was laughing so hard he was silent, tears streaming down his face.

"You good?" Kato asked. Bolbi held up a hand, indicating to Kato that he should hold on a minute. Bolbi began to choke out his hysterical laughs, punctuated by gasps of breath. When it seemed he had it under control, he suddenly lunged up, trying to catch Kato by surprise with an uppercut.

It nearly worked. Kato leaned back, feeling Bolbi's fist whizz past his nose. He let the strike pass, then bent forward again, using his momentum to carry through into a headbutt. Bolbi sprawled out on the pavement, blood trickling from his nose as clutched his gut in a renewed fit of laughter.

~The Present~

Kato realizes he's been having some sort of epileptic moment, as he suddenly stops spacing out at some kind of blinking white light. Even after looking around the room to orient himself and rubbing his eyes to refresh them, he is unable to tell exactly what it is. Best he can tell, it's some sort of floating magic globe in front of the Cruxtruder. He catches glimpses of it, when it's not lit, and all he can distinguish is some sort of light grey circle, but then it flashes again and blinds Kato even through the sunglasses.

He pulls himself out of his reverie long enough to look at his phone.

arousingAntagonism stays pestering tuneHarmonic at 2:01 PM

AA: Wow, that really worked…
AA: I guess those Ninja Lessons your mom paid for really worked out.
AA: Woah, what the Hell is that?!
AA: Hey, hello!
AA: What are you staring at, dude…?
AA: Don't you have a seiz-
AA: Oh.
AA: You're moving, at least.

TH: uh yeah…
TH: i feel like a boxer who took too many blows to the head

AA: Um, dude, are you concussed?

TH: we'll see

AA: Hopefully this game has some healing items, lol.
AA: Anyway, I think this is called a Sprite or something?
AA: Oh, there it is.
AA: Kernelsprite. Such an ugly name…

TH: i'll take a colonel's special with a large sprite

AA: Do I look like a drive-thru window to you?
AA: Anyway, I didn't get to read up on this much…
AA: The official documentation doesn't even mention it!

TH: so do you think it's like my fairy guide?
TH: i'm not standing around translating all these blinks through morse code just to see some bullshit protip

AA: Well, I don't know…
AA: Let's just keep moving on with this Alchemy system.
AA: The next step is to turn that crank on the side of the Cruxtruder, and some Cruxite should come out.

Kato locates the little black wheel at the base of the Cruxtruder's chimney-esque tower and gives it a good turn. It offers a surprising amount of resistance. He gives it another go-around and hears a metallic sound from the top. One more turn and a smooth cylinder of some silvery, crystalline material begins to emerge from the pipe.

He finishes the last few cranks and the cylinder emerges fully, toppling out and onto Kato's desk. His books and papers go flying, flinging the rusty tin coffee can containing the ashes of the dearly departed Bootsy into the air.

Kato watches it spin through the air in slow motion, regretting the bitch it's going to be to clean up. Suddenly, there is a white flash as the Kernelsprite shoots across the room and suddenly becomes brighter than ever before.

SPRITELOG:

Bootsprite: BARK!

Bootsprite: BARK BARK BARK BARK!

Bootsprite: BARK BARK WOOF!

Aris: Is that a DOG in there?!

Super Pwnball

Theo enters the front door of his home, sweaty and hassled. It seems his Mom isn't home from her grocery trip yet and may never be, at this point. That's good; it gives him time to get to his room without having to discuss why he's home from work an hour after his shift supposedly started. At the top of the stairs, both of his brothers' doors are closed. They're both in there playing video games, no doubt. Good. Theo goes to his room and does the same thing.

He sees he left Super Pwnball running on the Kbok 180 hooked up to his enormous cube of a CRT television set. He was having a really good run just before work and he didn't want to lose his score. Unfortunately, he doesn't have time to pick it back up now, however badly he wants to. He's got to play a different game, an Important game (if ever there was one). Theo immediately begins to miss the time when he could play games just for fun.

Luckily, when he wakes his laptop up, SBURB has finished installing. "Time to get to play," he thinks, cracking his knuckles.

tortugaTerran began pestering arousingAntagonism at 2:16 PM

TT: Ok, I'm on… What do I do now?
TT: It just says "searching for connections…"
TT: Aren't we all, computer, aren't we all…

AA: Oh, hi.
AA: Sorry, I'm in the middle of figuring it all out with TH.
AA: I think we've got it locked down on the player side. I'll send you some notes on that…
AA: I'm about to dig in to the building controls, though.

TT: What building controls T-T
TT: I don't see anything…

AA: Oh yeah yeah sorry.
AA: Crap…
AA: I had this whole plan, but I don't know if it's going to work now.
AA: PP has been having connection issues for the last hour, and now he's being all flaky again too…

TT: Nobody wants a flaky PP.

AA: Yuck! STFU!
AA: Fine, I'll stop trying to be cool and anonymous with my totally badass hacker jargon.
AA: Our friend NICO is having internet problems.
AA: But see if you can connect to him anyway.
AA: You'll want to be his Server Player. Make sure you pick that option, it's very important.
AA: Then when I'm done with Kato, you can be his Client Player.

arousingAntagonism shared a link:
bogglestrive/documents/ipowjefIO8NSDOPElawjfkusf/usp=sharing

AA: Here's my notes so far. This should tell you what to do for now.
AA: If Nico doesn't show up, poke around with the building controls and see if you can figure out anything new to add to the Boggle Doc.

TT: Ok, sure… Will do.

Theo connects to Nico and sees the inside of his house. It's a bit disorienting. There's the table where they play Magic Cards, there's Theo's favorite chair to sit in when he goes over to get blazed. There's Cat Stevens, eating some leftover snacks off a plate in the kitchen. Theo's gonna have to wash these goddamn dishes for them next time he's over.

He checks Mara's guide, then checks the Phernalia Registry. There's everything she wrote about. He places it wherever he can find open space in the cluttered party house. He starts scooting some chairs around to make room. It seems he's finally caught Brad's attention. He sees Theo's big green cursor hovering in the air with a folding chair hanging from it and tries to pull the chair away. Theo drags against him and manages to yank it free. Forgetting where he intended to put it, he sets it down right there.

Brad runs over to the wall where Theo has placed the Totem Lathe. He starts trying to muscle it out of there, and when that proves too difficult, he starts rocking it back and forth like a vending machine he got his chips stuck in. Theo pokes it back into place with the cursor. Brad stares angrily at it. He appears to be muttering curses, but there's no sound being picked up.

As a peace offering, Theo turns on the kitchen sink, soaking the dishes piled up there. Zooming in, he discovers he can select individual dishes. He picks up the sponge and starts washing.

Punch Club [III]

"That's two down," Kato said, looking at Todd and Bolbi on the ground in the bar parking lot. "Akira?"

"Oh, please," Akira scoffed. "You could not hold out against me."

"You think you got more game than these goons?" Kato smirked. It was a little more inflammatory than he would have liked, but he was heated up, his blood pumping fast.

"For you Americans, martial arts are an extracurricular activity. For us in Japan, it's part of the main curriculum. I'll have you know, I did quite well in our physical education class in secondary school."

"You studied it in school?" Bolbi laughed. "Earlier you guys called me racist when I asked if all Asian people know karate."

"Shut up," Kato and Akira spat. Their eyes were locked now, sizing each other up.

"Well, you're definitely proving me right," Bolbi added, trailing off as he began to feel the intensity building.

"Let me show you how it's done," Akira began. He inched forward with a series of straightforward punches that looked more like he was doing warm-up exercises than trying to land a blow. Kato easily reached over Akira's long arms and gave him a good slap in the face, knocking his glasses askew.

"Hey, watch out!" he shouted. "I don't know if it's possible to get new glasses while I'm traveling abroad!"

"Sorry," Kato mumbled.

Akira adjusted his glasses and started in again. His strikes had more variety this time, but it still looked like he was just performing his kata.

"Akira," Kato said, easily parrying his friend's strikes, "you said you learned in school, but how long has it been since you actually put any of it into practice?"

"I'm just a little rusty!" he insisted. Kato wove around Akira's flailing arms and slapped him good on the back of the head.

"Okay, okay," Akira said. "So I haven't been practicing very much, alright? I've been busy with my uni studies!"

"So you give up?"

Akira began to laugh. "I still have one more trick up my sleeve," he said, suddenly serious. "Though our respective styles of martial arts may be tied by the same roots, in modern times, they have diverged. There is a special training that all martial arts student in Japan learn, something you Americans haven't caught up with yet. I spent weeks with my P.E. instructor working on my signature technique… Get ready for my… HURRICANE PUNCH!"

Akira bellowed the name of his technique as he lunged forward. Swirls of cloudy air began to circle inwards towards his withdrawn right fist, creating a vortex around it. With all his accumulated might, Akira threw his punch, his fist bursting forth from the cloud of icy air surrounding it.

With all the telegraphing Akira did, Kato easily ducked the blow. As Akira threw his full body weight into the punch, arcing clear over Kato's head, Kato stood again, grabbing Akira around the midriff and turning his momentum against him by tossing him backwards into the side of a parked car. Akira fell to the ground and the car's alarm began to blare.

"Wow, that was pretty cool," said a woman behind Kato. He turned to see that the other smokers had been watching this last fight. "Are you guys, like, a fight club?"

"Uh, yeah," Kato said, going along with the dumb joke. "That's exactly what we are. Come down to the abandoned Corn Belt brewery tomorrow night if you're interested in joining."

"Um, I'm not," the woman said. "But thanks anyway. Byeee."

~The Present~

arousingAntagonism stays pestering tuneHarmonic at 2:03 PM

AA: …and then with that, we should be able to make whatever item we need.

AA: Did you catch all that?
AA: Looks like you're spacing out again.

TH: i'm thinking i need my own signature move.

AA: You mean like in wrestling?

TH: no like in anime

AA: Yeah, I got a move for you. It's called Punch Yourself in the Nuts Explosion.
AA: Guaranteed to be a knockout every time.

TH: for me or for them?

AA: Guess which one.

TH: hmm not interested
TH: keep the ideas coming tho
TH: it's getting the juices flowing

AA: I don't want to hear about your juices.
AA: So did you see my instructions or not?

TH: not

AA: Well the good thing about Pesterchum is that all the words are still there. Scroll up and read them and go do what I said.
AA: If you're lucky, we'll get to start fighting monsters soon and then you can work on your stupid Anime Power Fisting move.

Kato puts his phone away, grateful that Aris let him finish his conversation before giving him another lecture. When he looks over, though, he sees why. Aris, who had known Bootsy both as an old doggo at his Auntie's house and as a young pupper at Kato's Grandpappy's house out in the sticks, is fully immersed in giving the boisterous old boy a thousand head pets and cheek scratches.

"Awww, you brought Bootsy back!" he coos.

"Yeah, it's him all right," Kato agrees. "If not in body, then at least in spirit."

"Your game did this?" Aris asks. Kato shrugs, but it's an affirmative sort of shrug.

"Man, I know SkaiaNet is into some next-level stuff, but this is seriously Next Level," Aris continues. "I might need to look into this game of yours, for research on a case. What's it called?"

"S-Blurb," Kato says, emphasizing how clumsily it rolls off the tongue.

"Well, why don't you show me how it works."

"Stick around, then. Me and Mara are working it out."

"Alright then! Adventure awaits! Let's get to work, and maaaaybe we won't let this endeavor end in disaster!"

Spitball Deucey

One uneventful night in Derse, just before a certain eventful morning, the night clubs were hopping. The Midnight Crew had their hands in almost every one of these dens of debauchery. Derse is a small planet, even though it's densely populated, and the powerful crime syndicate has stomped out or absorbed every other gang in town. Now they get a cut from every one of these clubs each week, a "protection" fee to keep corrupt police off their case and to stop the Midnight Crew's own boys from getting too out of control. These bars are also a haven for the gang to conduct its business: selling illegal drugs, gambling, working out assassination contracts. Yes, the city is in the palm of their collective hand. They're riding high, and the members of the gang are living the life.

Yet there's one among them who isn't satisfied. One of the head honchos, Clubs Deuce, sits in the back of one of their syndicate's loyal night clubs. From his spot in the VIP section, he watches the meat-headed young men of the Crew get loaded, spilling their drinks, harassing the waitresses, picking fights, and guffawing moronically the whole time.

"Ain't this what life's all about?" Diamonds would ask him, each time he brought up this feeling of discontent.

"Yeah, but…" Clubs would respond, unsure where the feeling is coming from.

He remembers when the gang used to be just the four of them, when they were just making their way in the seedy underbelly of the crime world. They used to have so much fun, when there was some risk in putting themselves on the line. Now they were virtually untouchable. Clubs decided he needed a change of scenery and slipped out the back entrance to the alley behind the night club.

Clubs eyed a pile of trash, against which an old plate leaned. He fished a straw out of his jacket pocket, plucked from a drink he was not interested in finishing, and the crumpled-up wrapper it came in. He popped the wrapper into his mouth, chewing gently and mixing in spit to turn it into a gooey wad of pulp. Using his tongue, he pressed it into the end of the straw. He took aim at the plate and let out a big puff.

Bull's eye! The old plate dinged as the spitwad struck center, sticking to it like a piece of gum. Now this felt like the good old days. That's what was missing – mischief! Crime was never about wealth or infamy or building an empire to him. It was about causing a commotion, about the rush you get from breaking the rules on purpose. Clubs used to do all sorts of petty vandalism, but once the operation started getting big, the boss put the kibosh on that.

Well, forget him! Clubs was a big shot capo of a crime syndicate, untouchable, in his own words. He was gonna do what he damn well pleased! He trotted back into the night club, then gathered up a few of the goons he could trust with a secret. Tonight, they were going to Prospit – they were going to illegally enter the sovereign nation, pull off a robbery, and smuggle the goods out, just for the hell of it! He didn't care how sloppy they were, he was just excited to smash a window, and maybe a few expensive lamps or security guards' skulls for good measure. It would be an easy-peasy, in-and-out job, and the boss would never know.

Clubs and his secret team departed, unaware of how their plans were about to spiral into chaos, thanks to the interference of one Armored Dupe.