Greg Veder vs The World

Aggro 4.8

– o – o – o – o – o – o – o –

"You're… alive?" The bug girl's voice was raspy, the dense smoke in the air obviously clogging her airways. Even then, Greg could hear the sheer disbelief in her voice as she limped over to him, one arm wrapped around her midsection. Lady Bug visibly flinched as she caught sight of the body next to Greg, the bloody, slowly healing form of a near-human Lung as the silver scales began to slough off his skin.

Greg cut off his laughter and slowly turned his head to face her. A hand rose to his face, Greg wiping the remaining crumbs from his mouth as he tried to think of something to say, staring blankly at her cracked lenses. It was a struggle, really, and that was without any exaggeration.

The pain in his chest, courtesy of Lung's claws, was only made worse by the fact that he could literally feel the blood leaving his body, his health slowly dropping with every second. His legs, or at least the parts of them that didn't survive Lung's flames unscathed, were also a testament to how hard-fought the battle was.

Reinforced cloth and plastic had warped and melted onto the bare skin underneath, adding on a [Second-Degree Burn] debuff in addition to the [Moderate Bleeding V] that was draining his life-force so steadily.

Hell, if it wasn't for that new perk he had just chosen, he'd definitely be a goner by now.

"You're alive," she echoed, raw shock clear in her voice.

"Sorry… to… disappoint," he forced out, wincing.

"No!" She shouted, her voice as uncomfortable as her posture with the way she seemed to shrink in on herself. "I-I just thought you… died. Lung… his claws… the fire…"

Yeah, Greg thought, gasping slightly as he shifted his body. Blocking a blast of fire like that with his unfocused aerokinesis was definitely not one of his brightest ideas. Launching himself directly at Lung's face a moment after recovering a sizeable yet still middling fraction of his health had been a new level of retarded, something he wasn't aware he was capable of reaching.

Still, he thought to himself, breath coming to him in short, shallow gasps, I saved the girl. Not all bad, right?

He gave the girl in question a smile, utterly uncaring of how the blood splatter all over him may have made him appear to the insect-themed cape. "Yeah, the fire. Figured… figured only one of us was a Brute, so…"

The bug girl didn't respond, simply staring at him through those creepy lenses.

"'Sides… Ev… everybody gets one." Greg gave a shrug, wincing at how the drop of his shoulders seemed to send spasms of pain through his ribcage for some reason. I'm gonna feel this in the morning… or not, I guess. Thank you, Gamer's Body.

"Really?"

"... No." Greg grit his teeth with pain again, trying to pass it off as a grin. "Joke. Family Guy… June Sixth. Two-thousand."

"... Oh."

"Yeah... classic episode." Greg let out another wheezing laugh again, his own joke getting him.

"I can't… ," the bug girl cut herself off, her body language somehow conveying a mix of gratitude and shame, "you... let yourself get hurt to… to save me?"

"I wouldn't say… that, exactly," Greg replied, dragging himself forward with the sword he had planted blade-first into the asphalt. "I didn't think about it. My body just… acted on it's own," he blinked, smiling slightly for a single moment at his own reference, "Besides... what kinda jerk... would just watch a girl die?"

"So, you knew you wouldn't die, right?" She seemed to be almost pleading, her legs bowed as she tried to get closer to him without quite squatting low to the ground. "You knew you'd be…" Her head turned to glance at his charred legs, the costume still smoking in the cool night air, "...fine."

"No..." Another pained laugh spilled from Greg's throat, the sound more like a hoarse cough than anything else. A second hand gripped onto the hilt of his sword and he found himself leaning on it from his position on the floor. "... I didn't."

Lady Bug seemed to slump slightly, unsure of what to say as she sunk to the ground next to him, sitting on a large clump of bricks apathetically.

"If it's any consolation," he glanced up at Lady Bug's mask, "it does hurt like hell, yes. Just not as much as it should." The truth of that statement could not be exaggerated.

Anyone else in his position should be one of three things right now; screaming their head off, numb from blood loss, or dead. By all rights, he probably had to thank his powers for whatever it was doing right now to keep him thinking relatively straight. Although, Greg thought to himself, I could be the second.

Still, he doubted it.

"It's… it's not." She seemed to give off a full-body finch as she spoke the short sentence, Greg letting out a quick, hoarse bark of laughter as the pain in his legs flared in time with her words. Ironically, that seemed to make her flinch again.

"That's great," he paused for a moment, groaning as the skin on his legs began to quiver, burned flesh slowly sloughing off as the healing process continued, "I… I guess. Don't worry, though. I'm healing up fine. Be good as new in under an hour or four?… fuck."He said the last part in an undertone, trying to avoid scaring the newly christened Lady Bug anymore than she already was.

"Why?"

"What?" Greg blinked slowly at the question, confused for a moment as to what she was referring to.

She didn't repeat herself, her hands wrapping around her mid-section and tightening as if in some kind of self-hug. Funnily, to Greg, it kind of removed any lingering fear factor her costume had for him, seeing the wearer so nervous and unsure of herself.

"Honestly, I… have no idea," Greg spoke up, smiling slightly. He closed his eyes for a moment, shifting his arms away from his slowly-sealing chest wound and pulled tighter on the sword he had plunged into the ground. "Normally, I'm all about that zero accountability life but… yeah, burning is a…" he paused, smile fading slightly, "painful way to go. Couldn't let that happen… you know."

Chuckling again, Greg looked up at Lady Bug, a wide grin beneath his slightly melted mask. "At least you're okay, though. That's… the good part."

"I almost died."

The sentence came out of nowhere, Greg blinking in surprise this time rather than pain. "Well, yeah."

She tilted her head toward him, her mask displaying no emotion and leaving Greg floundering somewhat as he tried to think past the pain.

"Well, it's true."

"Thanks." There was no hiding the sarcasm in that, no matter how quietly the actual word was spoken.

"Not like… forget it." Greg shook his head, his hands rising to the hilt of his sword and grabbing tight. "Don't… don't." Groaning, he grabbed hold of the sword and began to pull himself to his feet, slowly. The blond let out a hiss of air as he felt the the burnt skin on his legs cracking as he began to put weight on them. Closing his eyes, he did his best to ignore the odd sensation of rivulets of liquid dripping out of his leg wounds as he got to his feet, not wanting to spend the time to even contemplate exactly what could be running down his thighs.

Opening his mouth, the word came out with a low hiss. "Reinforcement."

He kept the level of it low, just enough to let him stand and move without too much trouble, not for any sort of daring-do. The skill was like a balm, a soothing warmth that spread all over his body, slightly easing the pain he felt from both his legs and his chest wound. As low as it was, the glow wasn't even visible, which was even better.

A much more relaxed smile on his face, Greg pulled himself up to his full height and rested both hands on Gram's hilt, the newly-named sword still lodged in the asphalt.

"My lady," he began, voice somewhat steadier with the constant pain at a much lower level. He stretched out his slightly deformed gauntlet, opening his hand for Lady Bug to take as he slipped into his well-polished accent. "You performed valiantly, especially against a foe so fearsome as the one which we faced together. You would have died without my assistance as would have I without yours. Now, will you take my hand so we may kindly make our escape before the dragon awakens once more?"

Lady Bug nodded slowly and placed her hand in his, Greg quickly pulling her light frame up with barely any effort. He tilted his head to glance down at Lung's tattooed form, the cape's naked body sans scales, before glancing back up at Lady Bug again. "Hold up… wanna take a selfie with Lung?"

The question came out quickly even in his hoarse voice, Greg simply saying the first thing on his mind the moment he glanced at Lung's body.

"What." She almost pushed away from him, her hand freezing before she made contact with his slightly deformed, blood-splattered breastplate. Instead, she simply stood there holding his hand and repeated the same word. "What."

Greg shrugged slightly, his shoulders bobbing as his smile grew. "Yeah, I mean, why not, right? I need a new PHO pic. 'Sides, how many people can say they got a selfie with Lung and lived to tell about it? Emphasis on lived."

"N…" For a moment, she seemed to be thinking about it, her head tilting slightly before she shook it. "That's a terrible idea."

"Really?" Now, it was Greg's turn to tilt his head. "Somehow worse than attacking Lung by yourself with bugs?"

At his words, Lady Bug flinched, prompting Greg to frown slightly as she shrunk away from him slightly, letting go of his hand.

Blinking slightly, Greg stepped forward. "What's wrong? Yeah, it was a dumb plan but… I mean, I've had dumber. Well," he pursed his lips, "not dumber. Definitely not nearly as dumb either. I mean, this was Lung we're talking about," Greg remarked, gesturing to the unconscious Asian man off to the side. "Still, relatively dumb."

Smiling, Greg glanced back at Lady Bug, the cape silently staring at him from behind her mask. She seemed almost unsure of what to do, her arms tight around herself once again. Greg lifted an eyebrow, noting a few bugs beginning to make noise in the background as they skittered back to their hiding places.

"So… we doing this or not?"

Before the girl could answer, Greg froze as he heard something clambering towards them and glanced around them, the sounds of flickering flames making it hard to triangulate the source of the sound. Lady Bug obviously heard it too, the girl suddenly drawing closer to him. Around them, bugs began to drone.

Suddenly, three massive creatures hit the asphalt.

Greg's eyes widened behind his mask and he wrenched his sword from the ground, and protectively moved in front of Lady Bug, mouth set in a determined frown.

Massive barely described the beasts. At least a good seven feet tall at the shoulder, they were covered in spikes and stained, bloody-looking bone spurs, with their visible skin looking like well-tenderized hamburger meat. Their mouths were open wide, disgustingly large amounts of saliva dripping from their rather sharp teeth as they growled at the two of them.

Oddly, Greg didn't feel the least bit threatened. He did feel annoyed, though.

Incredibly. Annoyed.

Still, he didn't let the annoyance rise to the surface, his mind trying to focus on how to beat three of these things while keeping Lady Bug alive. She was his responsibility and unlike the pet goldfish he had when he was nine, he wasn't gonna let her die after knowing her for less than half an hour.

Legs burnt to a crisp or not, he could [Reinforce] them into fighting shape for at least a few minutes. He just fought Lung and wasn't dead, so Greg definitely wouldn't let himself go down to a bunch of demonic things. Not if he could help it, at least.

"Holy shit, did you kill Lung?"

Greg frowned at the voice, both at the question and wondering where it had come from. His gaze slowly, reluctantly, rose until he spotted the four figures riding the monsters, his eyes widening as he took them in.

"No," his mouth answered for him, his eyes locking on to the skinny teen wearing a poofy shirt and a white opera mask, realizing he was the one who asked the question. I know this guy.

Lady Bug remained silent.

"He's just knocked out," Greg continued, keeping one eye on the dogs as he tried to shake off the faint feeling of familiarity he seemed to be getting from not just the white masked cape but all four of the capes in front of him. "And a bit busted up," he added, rather downplaying the collection of slowly-recovering wounds that littered the Asian cape's naked body.

"Looks like you gutted him." The next voice was from the girl… boy?... muscular individual on the creature next to the opera boy, a person wearing a plastic dog mask, like the type you'd get from the dollar store. Whoever they were, their voice was gruff enough that he doubted he could tell their sex with it on.

"He did," came the third voice, a blonde girl, finally speaking up. She wore a domino mask and a dark purple costume, her eyes staring past the two of them to lock on to Lung's still-healing body. "That sword… all the blood…" Her voice became slightly distant at this point, "... severed Lung's axillary vein, cut out an eye, flayed him in several places, ripped open his stomach… and that's not even going into all the bee stings and insect bites. "

Her pensive expression transformed into a knowing smile as she shifted her gaze onto Greg, her eyes glancing at his sword for a moment, before glancing back at him, "Wow, you're one ruthless kid."

"And you're… Tattletale." The word left his mouth as a smile grew across his face as well, sudden realization hitting him as Greg recalled where he knew these guys from. The four of them were a new villain team that had popped up not too long ago in the city, mostly known for robbing other villains and other small-time stuff. Undersiders.

"Oooh, looks like Tats has a fanboy," the white masked cape, Regent, cooed.

Greg frowned at the same time as Tattletale's smile brightened. "Not exactly, Regent."

"Not exactly is right," Greg interjected, his grip tightening on his sword. The hilt and guard was already glowing a soft gold, even without Greg having even reinforced it yet, the blade itself more lustrous than he'd ever seen it. "I know her, I know all of you, because I edit your wikis on PHO, even though someone keeps trying to change it."

"Ha! He's a nerd!" Regent crowed, raising his scepter as he let out a cackling laugh. "A fuckin' nerd, Tats! Who edits wikis in their off time? Fuckin' nerds, that's who!"

Both Tattletale and Greg scowled at Regent's sentence, both for clearly different reasons. "That nerd cut Lung up with a sword, Regent."

Greg's grip tightened again. "This nerd has a name."

Their leader, Grue, a well-muscled cape who dressed to fit his powers, was the next to speak, his voice deep and low. "What is it? Your name, I mean."

Greg tilted his head to face him, just barely spotting the outline of a skull on his biker mask. "Glad you asked, Mr. Zork. The name's Prodigy and this here," Greg said with a gesture behind himself, "is my partner, Lady Bug. Lady Bug, these guys are the Undersiders."

He paused, gesturing to the one in black. "The boss, Grue," his hand moved to the girl in purple, "The Thinker, Tattletale." The girl in question wiggled her fingers at them as he moved to the one in white, "Regent, and finally," he paused, turning to the girl in the dog mask. "Hell-"

"Bitch."

Greg blinked as she interjected. "Really?"

"Mmhmm," Tattletale hummed affirmatively as she leaned forward on the dog-beast, her gaze locked on to him. "She prefers Bitch."

Ignoring the painful twinge in his stomach, Greg shrugged. "Sure, why not? A bit… much, but okay."

Sensing that the situation was no longer quite as volatile, Lady Bug stepped out from behind his back, the sound of swarming insects fading to nothing as she calmed down. "Hey."

"Hey there," Tattletale's smile quirked upwards at the Bug Girl's words. "Thanks for taking care of Lung. Tonight could have ended badly for us."

For us?

"For us?" Greg echoed. He blinked rapidly as he took a few steps forward, barely noticing the monsters in his path as he stared daggers at Tattletale. "Lung was after you guys?"

"Yes." Grue nodded hesitantly, his voice slightly less forceful than before. "He was, yes. Thanks for taking him down. It couldn't have been easy."

Greg stared at him for a few moments, his mouth slightly open, before he let out a bark of wheezing laughter. "Yeah, you're right. It wasn't. I mean, the fire gave me a mad case of dry eye but other than that," Greg retorted, letting out another hoarse laugh, " I can sleep it off. Got off pretty easy, all things considered."

"Your legs look like hamburger," Bitch cut in, voice little more than a growl.

Shooting her a look, Greg snapped back, "So do your dogs, but at least, I'm nice enough not to mention it." The girl growled at him, her dogs following her lead.

Rolling his eyes, Greg chose to ignore her, turning back to Grue. "In all honesty, it could have been a lot worse. Luckily," Greg's mouth opened into a slight smile as he put an arm around Lady Bug's shoulder, pulling her forward slightly even as she tried to wriggle out of his grip, "I had my partner here on support."

"I can see that," Tattletale spoke up, grinning. "She did a good job too. A couple hundred bites and stings to the crotch alone would keep anyone off their game. Although," she glanced back at Greg, eyes locked on to the sword in his grip, her eyes flicking between it and him, "you and that sword…wait... what is that?"

Her voice came out in almost a whisper, her smile shriveling the longer she stared at him.

"My sword?" Greg glanced at the blade, idly lifting it closer to eye level, before glancing back at the Thinker cape, blinking in confusion as she pressed her thumbs to her temples. "My powers make it glow different colors sometimes, I guess. What of it?"

"Huh," Tattletale shook her head furiously, one eye open as she kept staring, almost as if she couldn't tear her eyes away from either him or the object in his hands. "I… I don't…" She blinked, both eyes opening for a second before she shut one tightly again, leaving the other fixated on Greg. "... doesn't make sense… concepts?"

"Tattletale," Grue's voice seemed to relax it's impressive baritone, the cape actually sounding worried about his teammate. "What's wrong?"

"Yeah, Tats," Regent cut in, the humor in his tone still present. "You fried your brain or something?" Bitch said nothing, simply turning her masked face to stare at Tattletale as her dogs idled beneath her, obviously uncomfortable at being still.

A twinge at Greg's side brought attention to the pain in his ribs and still-healing chest, Lady Bug's gentle prodding far more painful than she realized. He turned to face the girl at his side, her black hair blowing in the gentle breeze as she whispered a sentence. "These guys… They don't seem like… heroes."

Greg opened his mouth to quietly affirm her correct assumption that the Undersiders were not, in fact, heroes of any sort only to find himself unable to speak, his eyes widening in shock.

The words froze on his lips as the cute-looking blonde let out a strangled, choking scream, sounding for all the world to hear as if someone was trying to kill her. A moment later, her hands flew to her head, the rest of her suddenly going limp as she fell bodily off the giant monster dog.

Everyone froze as Tattletale's body hit the ground with full-force, her hands not instinctively moving out to break her fall like one would expect. In unison, their gazes locked on to the Thinker as she twitched wildly on the ground, limbs spasming as she foamed at the mouth.

Four masked faces turned to face him in eerie synchronization, the atmosphere suddenly taking on a much more serious tone, the beasts' growling only adding to the tension.

Suddenly struck with nerves, Greg let out another hoarse laugh and said the only thing that came to mind at the moment, his grip tightening on Gram as he spoke.

"So… does she do that often or...?"

Spoiler: STATUS