The Colour Purple... The King of Fighters '95
Based on the Characters of The King of Fighters '95 Copyright 1995(C) SNK
Original Fan Fiction Copyright (C) 1995 [ENGEL] Design Room 1995
This (chapter) fanfiction was originally written circa: [XX.96] (Thank you)
"Which Character are you?"
Note to self: Legacy chapter numbering (32- - -), does not match.
ORIGINAL CHAPTER
From the darkness, two gray orbs peeked through the dark void only to be devoured whole as an eight foot high and seven foot wide specter of a human skull twice the allowed area forced itself through the narrow metallic pass.
…
"Come here." The middle aged man waved his hand upwards, coaxing the small child towards him. A tall, well built Caucasian invited the girl towards him while he waited, seated in front of a small table. In that cold, dark place.
The girl apprehensively took steady cautious steps.
"Let's play a game." He offered.
A bit fearful, a bit terse, she did her best to feign a blank expression even as she bit down on her lip, and step-by-step carefully walked around the table towards the man.
She put her right hand over his knee, and with a faint smile looked up to face him – giving him a coy expression wrapped with a sweet candy like shell and giddily tried to heave her body up to his lap with her other hand.
Just as the little girl was about to pull her bottom up to sit on the man's lap, he wrapped his one hand over her left wrist and with his other hand placed it over her shoulder to stop her in place.
"Wait." He said, with palm open to stop her.
The girl was a bit confused. She thought she did as she was instructed, as she always did to others before him, but this time the middle aged man looked at her with a bit of confusion, a perplexed look. She reflected that look at him – wondering, was that not what he wanted her to do?
No… No. A bitter tasting look overcame the man and he shook his head – at the same time he gripped the girl's shoulder hard and shook her a bit. Pushing her back until her shoes touched the ground again, the man waved his lethargic palms outwards slowly and repeatedly, groaning to himself.
"No, over there." The man pointed across the table at the singular seat at the other side.
Making her way back, the girl sat on the chair as she was instructed and shuffled in place, a bit unsure, a bit uncertain, she crossed her arms over her chest, gripping the upper sleeves of her biceps, curling inwards. She trembled in place, wondering in fear if she had done something WRONG.
"No. THAT'S not what I want, girl." He reassured her in a calm tone.
The clatter of wooden pieces on the table immediately ripped the girl away from her swirling downward gaze and she looked in confusion why dozens of small wooden figures littered the table in front of her.
Then one by one he placed the pieces neatly in their own squares, each SQUARE they could call their OWN – she finally noticed that the cold granite table had a peculiar pattern – neatly arranged and embedded in it were squares. In a neatly and uniformly arranged checkered pattern. Dark squares – and Light squares.
"If you don't mind, Rugal will take the white pieces, girl." He said nonchalantly, not even paying attention to the girl who shuffled in place trapped in a state of fear and confusion. "You take the black pieces and arrange them the same as me."
"Master…?" She whispered in a meek voice.
"Do it." He instructed, placing the pieces on their proper boxes in a neatly arranged manner without looking up.
The girl did as she was instructed and mirrored his movement. Putting the cylindrical castle figures on each corner, the pointy-headed piece, then the horses in between, then neatly lining up the small soldiers lining the front with their round heads on the front.
Laying them out, neatly, making sure they were absolutely straight, centered and in order, she, for some odd reason took extreme pride and care to make sure all her men were in clean and clear arrangement, perfectly aligned. With extreme caution and care, if only to somehow force her mind AWAY, to keep away the racing thoughts and memories of times more chaotic and HORRIBLE.
Then finally when all her horses, and all her men were presentable, prim and proper, she put her hands on her lap and looked up at her master with a slight glint of pride – forgetting – [it] ALL... if only for a moment. The sadness, and, the madness.
The man was already done and took slight amusement with her arms crossed at the girl. He leaned forward, with a hoarse grunt, pulled the shoulders of her blouse up to her neck and carefully buttoned the top of her collar.
She looked down at his hands. And while her master's face was handsome, clear, supple with a youthful glow, his hands told a different story. His hands were dry, tattered, wounded and weathered, his knuckles were flat, battered and riddled with scars.
…and she began to wonder – she let her mind wander outwards – for a slight moment she let her imagination fly calmly, when, in any other time she would close her eyes and cry silently because she knew deep down inside what she was doing was NOT right. Everything she did, and everything that was done to her, IT was not right. But this time, it was DIFFERENT.
Somehow, peculiarly, somehow, different…
Still then, she did not let down her guard. Not for a moment. Because she knew, the world was horrible… and what sick game was this man playing when he…
He finished buttoning her blouse, and she continued to watch his fingers.
"Hey."
Slightly catching her off guard, the man flicked his right index finger up her nose. In fright the girl put both hands over her face and recoiled back.
"Ha ha ha… HAHHA HA HA!" The man laughed heartily, blaring out loud.
The girl pushed herself back into her seat in fear, and slowly, slowly looked through her fingers at a blonde haired man laughing in his seat. He took a sip of his now cold tea and put it on the tray to his side.
Absolutely perplexed and taken aback, the girl pouted and puffed her cheeks, but the man continued to laugh innocently. He broke his warm smile and was about to say something, but instead stopped. He shut his lips and just smiled.
Leaning forward he reached out to her King and Queen pieces and exchanged their positions. "Do you know how to play chess, girl?"
"NO." She said tersely.
He smirked smugly. "Very well. You shall be taught." He said flatly. "And for fear of Rugal's easy boredom, it's best you learn quickly." He reached out and placed his pawn two squares forward. Across light squares – and dark squares. Reaching out. "Are you afraid of me, girl?"
"No!" She said again, quickly snapping a smug reply.
I am not sure what happened to you before we met, little girl.
But Rugal promises you – henceforth – when we meet, [here], all He will ask from you, is for your time, to play a GAME. A simple game. Nothing more… and nothing less.
The girl retained the bitter scowl on her face, but in due time, her once cantankerous shoulders realized – and after seconds, minutes, hours, though the span of slow, dreary days, of boring years within that peaceful black floating fortress, her cold face, once so fortified, began to crack and the radiance of a soft smile seemed to glow in between the sad spaces in between.
[Master and Servant]
She took a black pawn, lifted it up and put it two spaces forward to meet face to face with her master's own piece.
In the throne room, Black Noah, 198X.
…
11:3X PM.
The rapidly beating steps. From the heels of her leather soled platform shoes it clattered on the floor, echoing down that long hallway. So, she ran. She ran feverishly, desperately – rolling and weaving her shoulders so hard and so fast that in her mind, it seemed like her joints were about to tear at the seams and disintegrate, RUNNING, so fast, as if it was her very life that relied upon it.
11:3X PM, Johannesburg. Underground facility. Brahms secret laboratory.
A low groan, seething from the spaces of her teeth, a gray fog emanated out into the air, only to take shape as a large monstrous form. To make the entirety of her desires, from a very, very small wish – from a very, very small girl, into, a reality. A BEHEMOTH. A RAGE that so very much longed to become real.
…
"After all you've said…" Even after all you've taught. "…to me."
The first lesson – to think two, three steps ahead…
The second lesson. That you can not save everyone. The ability to whittle the world into a simple and unemotional exercise of cost versus benefit…
…EVERYTHING… everything you taught me…
You foolish, foolish man. Don't you realize it by now? Don't you realize that even a small, weak… and INSIGNIFICANT :y8irl has to teach you? That even with a PERFECT clockwork attack… the WHOLE GAME ENDS instantly if the king is taken?!
…
"MASTER RUGAL!"
…
A single, cool white, three foot long halogen bulb exploded at the same instant her shoe hit the floor.
Swerving her shoulder back and forth feverishly, the woman ran down the pure white, steel clad hallway with every last bit of her might. From the back to the front of the hallway, one by one, the horizontal glass bulbs shattered loudly and brightly when the shards glittered like stardust from the ceiling to the ground, echoing her steps with glitters of bright, yet fading light.
A gray wisp momentarily appeared and disappeared on her left hand side, but without a care she continued to RUN. The FIRST lesson. A dark demon ran by her with rash fervour, leaving in its wake a rapid, fully automatic array of steps that soon whispered into nothingness.
Let's play a game… you and I…
"Left side, after me…" She instructed.
The BEAST – part 10.
For only YOU and I exist HERE.
…AND we, [you and I], my master, will have no qualms – as we stand here with each other – because you MADE the spaces in between, irrelevant – making yesterday and today – ONE and the SAME, when we willingly make an ENEMY of the WORLD abound!
"A!"
…
11:3X PM.
The BEAST, Heidern momentarily looked up, distracted for just a moment, but that was only for an instant. IT pushed with the entire weight of its body and further drove Rugal's head back into the ground. Framing his enemy's eye in between its index and middle finger, the BEAST pulled its right arm back with index finger extended.
No. No.
Rugal grabbed Heidern's left wrist with his right hand.
…
Crash. One by one – starting from far away… one by one the halogen bulbs shattered as the monstrous pressure raged through that narrow metallic pathway. Crash, cash, kink CraSH! The sound of each bulb exploding – first from far away and with a steady pace came forward one by one, replacing the far away light with a darkness; one by one until each rung of the long winding ladder of light disappeared each and every step as an invisible force approached.
A.
The hallway was finally a pitch black.
A man is defined by every soul he touches.
Two gray orbs peeked through the dark void only to be devoured whole as an eight foot high and seven foot wide specter of a human skull twice the allowed area forced itself through the narrow metallic pass.
…
The span of time immediately STOPPED.
[STOPPED.]
In a last desperate attempt, when a cool freezing wind passed through him, Rugal threw his left hand up to stop Heidern from gouging his eye in slow motion, just as he felt his extremities petrify in place.
Then. A cold and hollow echo, a single step raced by Rugal's left temple – and the black water launched up into the air.
A.
TIME slid to a slow and careful halt, just as Heidern's fingertips crept millimeters from his eyeball. Threatening to end it all.
…
Slightly catching her off guard, the man flicked his right index finger up her nose. In fright the girl put both hands over her face and recoiled back.
"Ha ha ha… HAHHA HA HA!"
…
Mature?
"I am here," Mature, Rugal's one and true liege replied so clearly. "Let's…"
A MAN IS DEFINED, BY EVERY SOUL IT TOUCHES.
Chapter 150: Games for Girls
A silver coin entered the slot with a familiar click and whirr…
"Let's play a game… my Master." She said, calmly, cracking a slight smile. With a soft yet firm voice. And finally, at long last – those wishes and memories – once sad and bitter, had changed – erupting now into a sweet taste at long last – trapped back many years, months, weeks, days, minutes and seconds… just to intersect distinctly in that one point. Came hurtling to the present.
Her right foot touched the floor.
"Asobou! Washi no shujin yo!" The camera of the world revolved three revolutions up and down her body, until finally placing itself square in front of her face. Mature tilted her head up and opening her eyes, her pupils swirled into cloudy pools of white.
An 8 foot tall and 7 foot wide skull hurled itself with the same impact as a 16 wheeler trailer truck DIRECTLY into Heidern's face with a ferocity that sent the monster clear 10 feet backwards into the air.