Forums → Art, Music, and Writing → The Way of Moderation has ended (page 566)
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Are you ready?
Warning: I'm going to leave you hanging.
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When I'm Gone
For all his agility, a man-sized ninja horse who had to bounce over buildings was easily matched by a building-sized mutant troll who could walk straight through them. Strop raced over the rooftops but frustratingly, he could barely keep the backs of the troll horde in sight. Frustration turned to desperation as they neared the courts, for if nobody was there to stop them, they would simply walk all the way through the Courts, then up to the Castle, and then-
The farthest troll suddenly reared back, roaring and clutching its face before crashing to the ground, flattening a nearby shop. The other mutant trolls stood their ground, forming a circle, the momentary pause allowing Strop to scramble up the nearest building, then up the leathery arm of one of the giants. With a confused grunt, it turned its knobbly head just in time for Strop to spring off its shoulder, rising up to eye-level, summon his banhammer, and slam it directly into the troll's temple. As it fell, Strop rode the bumpy length of its body until he slid off the troll's toes and landed in the middle of the courtyard of the Great Courts, where he came face to face with the spaminator bot, Flipski, laser ready to shoop again.
"YOU SHALL NOT PASS", Flipski blared, firing more bolts at the closing trolls. Yet as quickly as he felled them, the trolls merely shook their heads, stood back up and resumed their inexorable advance.
"Flipski, they're mutant trolls." Strop yelled. "They must've been flamed and come back, now even a perma won't stop them, they keep coming back for more!"
IMAGE (I'll draw this one later, probably Tuesday)
"BANNING," was all Flipski said, before he fired again. Scratching his head, Strop racked his brains for any more effective solutions but since this was the end result of feeding the troll, the only hope they had was to keep banning the trolls until they gave up. That was when he spotted the brain in a jar, in its habitual chuck-wagon, nestled behind Flipski's leg.
"Moe!" Strop almost fainted with relief. "We could use some help!" If there was a coolest head in the moderation team, it had to be Moe, and not just because of the hydro cooling system for his nutrient goop, which was normally reserved for supercomputers. If anything, he was the one who built the Courts, he of all mods would be the best equipped to save it. "Can't you get out here and use telekinesis or something?"
The trolls advanced another step forward, now threatening the first of the Court houses. The valves on Flipski's shoulder started whistling, steam blowing out of them. "He's overheating!"
But all Moe could manage was a monotonous, "I can't."
Strop threw a glance over his shoulder, and saw a troll take a clumsy swipe at Flipski, the massive hand scraping up cobblestones and almost blowing him over from the force of the wind. The troll stumbled, and leant against a Courthouse, causing several windows to shatter and part of the wall to cave in.
"Moe, this is no time for stage-fright!"
Moe still didn't budge. "I'm sorry Strop, I can't. I've lost my powers."
Flipski let loose another volley into the nearest troll, but the shot faded, the blow-off valves already glowing red. The other trolls picked themselves up again, and advanced, shoulders clashing with each other. Around them, the Court houses started crumbling, crushed under the legs and bodies of the trolls.
"What do you mean!?" Strop screamed, almost incoherently, as bricks and shards of glass fell around them with an almighty clatter.
"I can't do anything. It's been this way for months. I hoped the problem would fix itself before anybody found out, but..." Moe stopped, partially drowned out by the thunderous footsteps of dozens of trolls standing around them, not a hundred paces away. A sickening realisation hit Strop, all the worse for the fact that it was too late to do anything about it now.
"Darn it!" he shouted. "Darn it, darn it, darn it! If only I'd taken the time to act on my suspicions sooner."
"And what is that?" Moe asked.
"Where were you at the time Zophia threw the F-bomb at me and enacted rule 63?"
There was a moment's pause punctuated by a cheyow and a resounding crash. "Of all the things it could have been," was all probably-female-Moe could manage. "No wonder I had to take a break from my thesis."
"Great. And I don't even know how Zophia and Ubertuna are doing." Strop scuffed the ground with his hoof, every major organ in his body sinking. "Well, we've got until Flipski's laser gives out. Then-"
"OVERHEATED. COMMENCING COOLING CYCLE," Flipski blared, shaking his laser cannon arm futilely. "You got any other tricks, Flipski?" Strop pleaded. Flipski shook his head. Strop gritted his teeth, wielding that banhammer that had served him through thick and thin, Thor.
"Then I guess we'll just have to do as much as we can. At least die trying!" he muttered, preparing to make a last-ditch dash at the nearest troll, already lumbering towards the trio. But a massive metal arm barred his path.
"HALT." Flipski instructed Strop, who turned to him confused. Wordlessly, Flipski lifted Moe's jar from its wagon in one gauntleted mecha-hand, and handed it to Strop.
"Flipski, please don't do this," Moe begged.
Around them, the trolls jostled, all trying to be the first one to make it past the other. The ground shook with their struggle. Flipski was already drawing a circle around the ring placed squarely in the middle of his chest. The one that was surrounded by the black and yellow danger stripes, that had written, in ALL CAPS, the very clear instruction "DO NOT PRESS". With a faint whirr, an almost invisible covering over the shiny red button retracted, and Flipski placed his hand over it. Moe immediately redoubled the pleading.
"Flipski, aren't we best friends? Weren't we going to take a trip up the coast after all this was over? Just you and me and the chuck wagon? Who's going to pull the wagon if you go? What will I do without you?"
"TAKE CARE OF MOE," Flipski instructed Strop, who could only blink at Flipski with a frown of concern. "Flipski, what are you doing?" he protested. "There has to be another way." Flipski shook his head. Moe protested also, but Flipski just kept shaking his head. One of the trolls braced, causing a great crack to appear in the cobblestones, and shoved the other trolls to the side, sending them into the courthouses on the side, reducing them to rubble and clouds of dust.
"THIS IS THE ONLY WAY. NOW GO," Flipski said, turning his attention to the breakaway troll, covering the gap to them in two great strides. Strop had just enough time to swing his banhammer upwards with one hand, barely deflecting a meaty fist ten times his size, sending it into the ground where it burrowed so deep the tiles around it splintered like chalk. Strop cast one final look over his shoulder, to see Flipski standing there, stock steady, hand poised, as the other trolls started to move also, coming for Strop and Moe, for Flipski, and past him, towards the greatest court, and the gateway to Armor Castle. Then, cradling Moe's jar in his arms and ignoring his bleatings of "Do not want", Strop dug his hooves in, and ran.
With a resolute finality, Flipski pressed his DO NOT PRESS button.