All characters mentioned from the Bloody Roar series are copyright their respective owners.

            "What's wrong!?"  Dr. Parthing said ran in, panting slightly.  He saw me standing against the wall at the far end of the room with one of his big-ass picks in hand.  Busuzima was standing by the chair, confused.  "Hajime, what's wrong?"

            "I'm not sure, doctor."  He replied.  "The patient just woke up and screamed.  Maybe he needs more work done on him than we thought."

            "No!"  I yelled.  Realizing I was still yelling I took a moment to calm myself before speaking again.  "No, that won't be necessary.  My teeth are-" I was a bit surprised at how my teeth felt.  "Wow, my teeth feel great."

            "Then why did you scream?"  Busuzima asked, grinning slightly as he leaned over the side of the chair and awaited an answer.

            "Well," I started, now a bit uneasy.  I could have told them the truth, but really, who would believe me when I'd say that Busuzima is an evil, overly-flamboyant scientist  who experiments on people and zoanthropes for personal gain and gets it anywhere he possibly can?...Actually, they'd probably believe the last part.  Either way, I couldn't come out and say that so I had to make up something.  "You see, I was…"  I looked around the room for possible ideas.  My eyes fell on Busuzima's green hair.  "At the circus!...And I was…attacked!  By a clown!" 

Dr. Parthing was giving me a 'How-strong-is­-that-sleeping-gas?' look.  Busuzima just sat there and giggled like an idiot as I set down the pick and edged towards the door.  "Rummy the clown, he was!  It was when I was 10!  I was walking along a row of game booths when he dragged me in between Ring Toss and that game with the darts and the balloons!  He held a gun to my head and laughed whenever I flinched as one of the darts hit a balloon and-"  I had reached the door and glanced at my watch.  "Oh crap, look at the time!  I have to get home, do homework, wash the car, consider suicide or something like that!  BYE!"I rushed out the door of the office, down the hall, and into the lobby.  I was ready to push the door outside open but wound up slamming my face into it, not realizing it was a pull door.

            It was pretty easy to walk home because, for the first time in weeks, it wasn't snowing.  All of the roads and sidewalks had been salted, forming a nice path in between the eight-inch high snow that covered pretty much everything else.  I waited for a line of cars to pass before crossing to the next street, talking to myself the entire time.

            "Okay, this is getting weird; even for me, the guy who likes A1 on pasta.  I have Uriko in my English class, Stun's on the loose, Yugo…well, who cares about him?  Meanwhile I'm getting kicked around by a baton-twirling prep and that green-haired ass-bite is a dentist!"  I screamed as loud as I could, "DAMN YOU VOODOO GRANDMA!"

            It was after I screamed that that I noticed the biker who had stopped next to me.  When the line of cars cleared he gave me the exact same look that Parthing did before crossing the street.

            "I really need to stop talking to myself."  I said as I crossed the street.

            "Then shut up already."  A random passerby told me as he walked past me.

            I spent a lot of time just lying in bed and staring at the ceiling, letting everything that had already happened sink in and thinking ahead to what would come next.  Until now I had been too oblivious to notice that only the good characters had come out of the game.  Now some of the baddies were starting to come out, like Busuzima.  To top things off, Xion, Cronos, Uranus, Kohryu, and the fat guy…whose name escapes me for the moment…were next to make life more complicated.   Reluctantly, I turned on the GameCube to see what was next.

            The intro to the game was extremely short now that most of the characters were out.  I didn't even bother looking until the title screen came up.  I hit start a couple of times and wound up at the character select screen.  Before I could look, though, the phone in the kitchen rang.  I drearily got up, dragged my feet to the phone, and answered it.

            "Bronsin residence.  If you want to sell me something, shove it up your ass."

            "What happened to hello?"

            "Oh, hi Alex.  I've just been a little wired lately."

            "Gee, I had no idea."

            "Hey, I'M supposed to be the sarcastic one."

            "Oh, excuse me, your majesty."

            I sighed and sat down.  "What do you want?"

            "I figured you could use some time to loosen up, so why don't you come to the Crying Critic with me and a few other guys?"

            "Who are these "few other guys"?"

            "Just a few friends."

            "Isn't that a comedy club?"

            "Yup."

            "Alright, I'll go.  I could use a good laugh…By the way, why did they name that place the Crying Critic of all things?"

            "There was a critic there on opening night that didn't like the first act and hurled insult after insult at the comedian.  The comedian got so mad that he jumped into the audience and started beating the living crap out of the critic."

            "…Is that guy still performing there?"

            "No."

            "We're going then."

            I grabbed a jacket and headed out the door, not remembering to check the Character Select screen.

            I couldn't completely remember the last time I had been anywhere near the Crying Critic, but I do remember that it was a lot cleaner back then than it was now.  I didn't even want to know what the suspicious stain on the wall outside was.  Thankfully, it was mostly covered by a gigantic snow drift from the blizzard that hit a couple hours ago and was still going strong; strange how a whole crap-load of snow could just appear out of nowhere.

            Alex was waiting for me outside the entrance in what was quite possibly the biggest coat I had ever seen.  From a distance he looked like a big blue punching bag.

            "Cold enough for you?"  I asked him.

            "Dude, where the hell have you been?"  He asked.  "And where the hell is your jacket!?  It's five degrees out here!"

            "I left it in the car."

            "You're nuts, you know that?"

            "Whatever, let's just hurry up and get inside."

            We both approached the doors and were quickly stopped by what looked like a bouncer trainee.  He had a big nametag on his jacket and had the build of a stereotypical donut-scarfing cop.

            "You fellas got some ID?"  He asked us with a faint southern accent.

            Alex and I pulled out the IDs we had made in the photo lab at the high school.  We made sure to pay attention to detail and had fooled so many people with them that we had been able to do all kinds of stuff with them.

            "Okay, Mister…Weinberg."  He said aloud, "And Mister… Beleviderie."

            "That's Mister Belvedere to you."  Alex said before taking our IDs back as we entered the Crying Critic.

            We managed to suppress our laughter until the front doors shut.  "That's Mister Belvedere to you!  Oh man, I almost lost it on that one!"  I choked out in between laughs.

            "Thanks for the complement," He read my ID and handed it back, "Max Weinberg."

            We entered the main hall as the first performer finished his act.  A huge applause echoed off of the walls as Alex and I took our seats toward the back, so as to not attract unwanted attention to the suspiciously young-looking attendees.

            The club owner came out on the stage from the back room as the audience calmed down.  "Ladies and gentlemen," He belted into the microphone, "We are proud to present our next performer.  He made his Crying Critic debut a few nights ago and is quickly climbing the ranks as one of the top comedians today.  In two weeks he will be going on tour before stopping by New York City to shoot his own episode of Comedy Central Presents-"

            "He can't be too bad if he's on CCP."  I whispered to Alex.

            "Please welcome, Golan!  "Ganesha!"  Draphaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaan!"

            "Oh good God no.  Please tell me he didn't just say-"

            "He did."  Alex replied quickly.

            Sure enough, who should come out on stage in a waddle/run but the fat guy himself, Ganesha, as the audience applauded him.

            "How are you guys doing tonight!?"  He asked the crowd as he grabbed the mic like it was a fresh hot dog.

            "I think I'm going to vomit."  I mumbled as I banged my head against the table.

            "You don't look so good, man."  Alex said as he stood up, "Why don't you call it a night?"

            "Good idea."  I answered as I stood up and made my way to the front doors with Alex.  We could hear the audience suddenly burst into laughter; apparently Ganesha was quite the funny man.  That distracted both of us long enough for the "bouncer" to catch us before we got to the doors.

            "Hold on a minute!"  He said, "I remember now!  Max Weinberg is that drummer on Conan O' Brien's show!"

            "Speak of the devil!"  I exclaimed, pointing behind the bouncer.  "There he is!"

            The "bouncer's" eyes lit up as his head snapped back to look.  "WHERE!?"  He darted off to look for Max as Alex and I slipped out the front doors.