Rule by ijnfleetadmiral
7818. Efforts to organize a Killer Instinct tournament are to cease immediately.
Wright walked through the base on her way to Headquarters. It was a beautiful fall morning, and the slight crispness in the air made her want to buy some apple cider and go sit in the park and watch the leaves change.
It's an idea for my lunch hour, she mused as she neared the Operations building, noticing the large crowd gathered in front of the bulletin board.
Immediately, her 'spidey-senses' started tingling. Uh-oh…better go take a look.
She made her way over to the crowd and then slowly managed to get to the front to see what all the interest was about.
PLACE YOUR BETS NOW!
KILLER INSTINCT: THE INTERDIMENSIONAL TOURNAMENT!
WHO WILL TRIUMPH FOR THEIR CAUSE, AND WHO WILL SUFFER THE AGONY OF DEFEAT?
PHOENIX IS SENDING OUT INVITATIONS SOON!
SEE NEVADA TO PLACE YOUR BETS!
Wright sighed and pulled the notice off the board.
"Hey, what gives?" Johnston complained. "People need to place their bets!"
"Shouldn't Admiral Briggs have precedence?" Wright asked. "I mean, he is the CO here, after all…rank does have its privileges."
Johnston seemed to consider that statement for a moment, then nodded.
"You got a point," the destroyer conceded. "Tell him to bet on Jersey…she'll kick every last one of those other guys' asses! Plus, she'll look hella awesome in B. Orchid's outfit! Professor Crowning will definitely like it!"
Wright smiled wanly and headed off to see Admiral Briggs.
~~~
"You have got to be kidding me."
Admiral Briggs stared at the flyer before looking up at his Secretary Ship incredulously.
"What's truly concerning is the fact that those two could feasibly contact other dimensions," Wright stated. "SecNav only knows what kind of experiments those two are running 'off the books'." She cringed when Briggs gave an involuntary twitch. "Sorry, sir."
Briggs sighed. "Get Phoenix over here now…I want to nip this in the bud before it's too late."
~~~
Light cruiser Phoenix shut the door to her lab with a pout. Briggs – ever the party-pooper – had put the kibosh on the Killer Instinct tournament.
"What's wrong?" SoDak asked, looking up from a computer screen that displayed computations that would give Einstein a headache.
"Briggs," Phoenix growled. "He cancelled the Killer Instinct tournament."
"Rats," SoDak muttered. "That's the problem with flag officers…once they get stars upon thars, they tend to lose all sense of creativity."
"Actually, I think it was done to preserve the fraying strings of his sanity, but I like your way of thinking better. Enter that into the log as to why this experiment was halted. 'Halted due to creative stifling on part of upper command'."
"Gotcha." SoDak turned back to the computer as the door opened and Taffy Three walked in, Jersey trailing behind them like an exhausted mother.
"We're here to place our bets!" Johnston announced. "Where do we sign up?"
"Can't take your money, sorry," Phoenix stated. "Briggs put the kibosh on the whole thing."
"Aww, man!" Johnston whined. "But Mama already bought her outfit and everything!"
"Something tells me she'll find another use for it," Phoenix snickered at Jersey, who glowered at her.
"Kindly fuck all the way off," the battleship snarked, hating how the cruiser was absolutely right in her statement.
"Whoa…" Sammy B. gazed at Phoenix's latest creation in rapture. The fully functional, combat-ready replica of the Fulgore robot from the game stood in the corner on a charging panel.
"Pretty impressive, huh?" Phoenix grinned. "Damn shame we won't be using him now." She sighed. "Guess I'll just deactivate him and save him for a rainy day."
"C'mon, squirts!" Jersey announced. "Let's go get some lunch."
Before the group left, Sammy B. went back over to the Fulgore robot and murmured something, then ran to catch up with the rest of Taffy Three. Phoenix thought it odd that the little murderball did this, but soon pushed it out of her mind and went on with her work, which included powering down the war machine.
~~~
It was built to fight. To kill. To destroy. But only when commanded to. And it would seem that such actions were not currently needed. However, one of the humans approached it without fear. Despite its youthful appearance, the machine could tell it was a fellow warrior.
"Worry not," the little warrior murmured. "Gargos the Destroyer will soon breach the dimensional gap, and when this occurs, Lord Khorne will need great warriors like yourself to lead his armies. Rest until then."
The machine heeded the little one's advice. It would rest…for now.
