There is just too much I could say to all that.
...I shouldn't start. I'm just going to leave this here:
The following is posted on behalf of Klaus. This story carries a warning for gore, adult themes and subject matter. Despite writing it, Strop does not take responsibility for the contents within:
...
Klaus blinked fuzzily. Rolling over, he licked his shaggy chops. There was the faint smell of blood in the air, and that reminded him of food. Then again everything reminded him of food, so maybe he was just hungry. Pricking his ears, he heard a familiar noise, but in his half-asleep state, he couldn't figure out what it was. So planting his paws on the ground, with a heave he propped himself upright, then blinked again.
"AUGH WHAT THE FU-"
Klaus boggled. Not ten feet in front of him, on top of his favorite grassy sleeping mound in the forest, was the rear end of a mare. The mare was spreadeagled on the mound, whinnying her guts out, which explained the noise. But more importantly, emerging from the rear end of the mare was some twitching blob encapsulated in goo and gore. Which had to be-
"LADY, WHAT THE HELL ARE YOU DOING FOALING ON MY GRASSY KNOLL!?" Klaus screamed, but to no avail- the mare was obviously preoccupied, and even if she wanted to move, she obviously wouldn't have been able to. Just then, the rear legs of the foal popped out, accompanied by a gush of-
"ARE YOU FOR REAL!? YOU'RE GETTING BLOOD ALL OVER MY HEAD SPOT!" Klaus had barely been awake ten minutes and already his voice was becoming hoarse. Muttering about how much he hated kids (or did he?), he marched over to the struggling mare and gave the foal a tug, freeing the other hooves from the mare's behind with a slimy pop, the umbilical cord trailing behind. Blood and placenta be darned, he just wanted some peace and quiet.
But just then, as he cradled the foal in his arms, wiping away the muck from its nose, watching it gasp the first breaths of its life, he softened. How long ago was it that his dear friend, Strop, had presented to him (for his eighteenth, no less), a beautifully rendered sculpture of a horse giving birth, cord and all*? He remembered being so touched, he actually cried. Or nearly did, but he never cried (or did he?) Where was Strop these days? Probably in his tower in Armorcity, Land of ArmorGames. And how long had it been since he saw him last? Over a year, maybe? Even longer?
The foal having taken its first few groggy steps, nursed by the still panting mare, Klaus herded them off his grassy knoll and he lay back, paying no mind to the bloody mess that now liberally decorated it. From this angle, he couldn't see any of the pine trees that surrounded him- and if he thought hard enough, it would be the same view he got if he lay down in the middle of the Armusement Park. Except he couldn't do that without getting kicked by trolls or set on fire by... flamers. Which, probably, was part of the reason he had gone on sabbatical in the first place. To journey the world, to spread legend of his awesome all over. And to let his burnt fur grow back.
Except that as it was, there were precious few people around these parts whom he could awe with his sheer awesomeness, thus defeating the purpose. And besides, who was he fooling, he, freedom fighter of the Freemarket, entrepreneur extrodinaire, champion of the capitalist cause? A place like ArmorGames, that was where his work was most effective.
If only those fools... Well, maybe it wasn't to be. But it should be! After all, everybody obviously loved him (or feared him, he couldn't tell which he preferred), and he had a particularly special bond with the ninja horse (no homo). With them, they could do epic things. In fact, no, they DID epic things. And he missed that. Day by day he lived in hope that the moderators would decide that it was time.
"Time for what?"
"Time for a new moderator!"
Klaus' ears pricked. Did he imagine that just now? It could hardly be possible- for Klaus' ears had a very special ability, and that was the ability to detect when a moderator said "new moderator", no matter when or where he might be at the time. And if he was righted, and by gosh-darned he was, they needed one! They needed him!
The great brown bear leapt to his paws, stretching up to his full nine feet. Carpe diem, he was always fond of saying (or was he?) Seeing as the day had come, all that remained was for him to journey back to ArmorGames. And to go along with his ears, his brain had the special ability to be able to locate Armor City, no matter where he was.
Resolutely, Klaus dropped to all fours and loped through the forest. This time, he would not be denied.
---
Claws on stone was never a good combination. They slid, skittered and often chipped. But Klaus' were special- Klaus was A BEAR.
Not that this really explained anything but Klaus was indeed a bear and that was often all there was to it. So it was that Klaus was able to scale the wall of Strop's tower, despite it being over three hundred thousand kilometers tall. Yes, it really did crash into the moon on a regular basis.
As for the matter of how Klaus got across the moat undetected, that was a trade secret.
He swung his arm into another hold, then hauled himself up with a grunt. The palings of the foundations of the room itself were just above, so all he had to do was not slip and fall to his death, and it'd be all apples! As he hung by the tips of his claws of his two front paws, he took a moment to ponder the physics of an eight-hundred pound bear and a three hundred thousand kiolmeter drop. Then he figured he was getting distracted, so he scrambled up the side of the clock-tower wall. As he drew level with the circular stone arch that was supposed to be the mounting for the clock face, he took a peek in and his heart started racing. Standing in the middle of the room, scratching his privates (as guys do), wearing absolutely nothing (as guys do... sometimes), was his best friend and companion, the ninja horse Strop.
Klaus thought he might swoon right there and then**, but somehow managed to stay focused. Given his limbs were finally tiring, he edged over to the arch, which protruded a little way from the face of the wall, allowing him to rest slightly.
Right then, a pair of black furry fingers tweaked his ears, his special ears, and yanked. Flailing, he lost his balance, and with a yelp, crashed onto a bed, bounced off it and landed in a heap on the floor. Right away, he sprang up as if nothing had happened, because nothing really had happened, and stared at his assailant. That's when he noticed that his assailant was the very same as the horse-guy he had been oogling just half a minute earlier.
"Ewww dude, you're naked, that's totally not appropriate you dirty ninja."
Strop simply put his hands on his hips. "You're not wearing anything either, Klaus."
Klaus the bear stared at Strop, his gaze lingering over Strop's crotch probably slightly too long to be considered not suspicious. Then he pouted. "Dude, we haven't seen each other for six months, and this is how you greet me?"
"I'm naked. And what are you doing in my room. Again. Is this about the Way of Moderation?"
Instantly as he said it, Strop figured there was a good chance that might have been a bad idea. Klaus instantly perked up and went into hyper mode: "Hell yes! My dream is coming true! After so many years of hard work for this place! When I become mod I'll fix everything and everybody will be so happy! It'll totally be the new Auschw-"
"For God's sake Klaus, I've told you before, AG is a dictatorship. Not a concentration camp!" Strop's sharp interjection barely held-off the imminent opening for a Godwin's law joke. He muttered, "And how did you hear about it anyway?"
"You see this scar?"
Klaus ran his left paw up his right arm, revealing a furrow in the fur of the upper arm. Strop glanced, but knew he didn't have to- he'd seen it quite possibly a million times. So instead he ducked into the closet while Klaus started rambling.
"I was in Vietnam, see, and my commanding officer told me to go back in time..."
Strop wriggled into the familiar black one-piece ninja suit. As he was taping up, he felt the usual vibration and so summoned his modphone and looked at the display.
"My task was to assassinate baby Hitler. So I went back in time and found baby Hitler, and knifed him in the arm."
It was from one of the regular citizens of AG, so Strop thumbed the IGNORE button and poofed the phone in a puff of smoke.
"Then I threw the baby off a cliff. The baby survived. I was that baby."
Strop, now fully dressed, boggled at Klaus. "What the f- dude, you need to stay away from 4chan district."
Klaus pouted and looked at Strop with wide eyes. "You know I love you."
"I need to go. Business awaits." And with that, Strop firmly put the hoof into Klaus, sending him sailing through the window of the tower.
"NO HOMOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO" Klaus screamed as he fell, his voice fading until there was a distant splash.
---
That was how it always went, Klaus reminisced with a sigh, shortly before his nostalgia was interrupted by his hitting the water at terminal velocity.
Klaus splashed to the surface and coughed up several fish and some seaweed. Strop kicking him into the moat from the top of the tower was just his way of expressing love. Klaus would return the affection by lacing his water with liberal doses of coloxyl and senna***, but he'd have to find an apothecary first, and moreover, an apothecary who actually knew what coloxyl and senna was. Which, given the population, wasn't awfully likely. But first, he had to get out of the moat, which would involve a few seconds of swimming, for an awesome bear like Klaus.
He was just about to start paddling when he fell asleep, face down, in the water.
TO BE CONTINUED...
* I have links to the images that inspired Klaus' take on the introduction. Don't make me post them.
** Hey, Klaus is making me write this while he traipses around Europe, so I think I'll take a little artistic license.
*** Hospital-grade laxative combination
