From alt.games.mk Fri Jul 15 23:15:43 1994 Path: panix!ddsw1!godot.cc.duq.edu!news.duke.edu!news-feed-1.peachnet.edu!gatech!howland.reston.ans.net!usc!elroy.jpl.nasa.gov!lll-winken.llnl.gov!fnnews.fnal.gov!nntp-server.caltech.edu!mustang.mst6.lanl.gov!newshost.lanl.gov!usenet From: yol@lams.lams.losalamos.k12.nm.us (Jonathan) Newsgroups: alt.games.mk Subject: "The Scorpion Saga" (The First Tournament con.) Date: 14 Jul 1994 06:33:25 GMT Organization: Los Alamos National Laboratory Lines: 322 Message-ID: <302m7l$o0k@newshost.lanl.gov> NNTP-Posting-Host: transitory14.lanl.gov X-Newsreader: WinVN version 0.80 I go back to the Warrior Shrine later that night. The remains of Raiden's ashes are still in the same spot--right below his statue. Where the skeleton is, I do not know. Wait. Yes I do. I must have forgotten he is immortal like myself. He is probably back in his room by now. Or, up in the sky. I came back because I want to get a closer look at the statues here. I only got a glimpse of them while I was fighting with Raiden, and now I wish to look at them closely. I go over to my statue. It looks exactly like me, as I said before. To the right of it (my right) is a statue of a shirtless man wearing skin-tight shorts and sunglasses. I recognize him from somewhere, but I can't remember where. Just like I can't remember where I've heard the name Johnny Cage before. Wait a minute. That's it! That's Johnny Cage. That statue is of Johnny Cage, a.k.a. millionaire and moviestar, John Carlton. That's him! I've seen one of his many fighting films before. Before I died, of course. I saw the movie Dragon Claw, or Dragon Talon, or . . . No, it was Dragon Fist. Yes that's it. I remember I saw that movie once during my stay in America for a martial arts tournament. I pull out my battle plan. I will fight Cage right after Kano. Who is Kano? Well, whoever he is, I will surely beat him. I cannot wait to do battle with John Carlton, for I have a strategy: I have seen his movies, so I know his fighting style (he is all kicks). Should I use my knowledge against him, I will surely come out on top. I look at the other statues. Next to Cage, is a statue of a very muscular man. He has a utility belt of some kind strapped around his chest and shoulder. There are two blades strapped to his legs. But the strange thing about this man is that half of his face seems to be . . . . . metal? That's what it looks like. Metal. I do not know who this man is, but he does look intimidating. Next to him, is a huge statue of a four-armed brute that frightens me to look at him. I have no idea who this strange creature is, but it is just as well, for I do not wish to. I walk away from the statue with a strange feeling. Next in line is another shirtless man (this time Chinese) wearing long, loose pants, and flexing his muscles. I know at once who this fighter is: Liu Kang. I look at the next statue. Raiden's remains are below the feet of this one. I know who this is too: Raiden. I look at the next, and last, statue in line A woman with a skin-tight outfit, long wavy hair, and long wristbands upon her forearms. Sonya. Having observed the statues of the warriors, I go back to my room, where I sleep, waiting for my match with Kano. It is night. I was told this morning, after I awoke, that the fight was scheduled for tonight, not this morning. It is night now, and I am standing on a narrow bridge, less than a meter wide. Below me, are hundreds and hundreds of bloody spikes, some of them impaling fresh bodies. I see my opponent--Kano--on the other side of the bridge. He is dressed in white, with a brown belt running from his shoulder across his chest, and around to his shoulder again. The blades strapped to his calves look sharp, indeed. And half of his head is metal. The whole right side of his face, save his mouth, is entirely metal, with an infra-red eye glowing at me. This Kano looks so fierce, I do not know if I will be able to survive this match. "Round one. Fight!" I launch my spear. He launches his blade. My spear hits, but so does his long knife. It lodges in my center chest, and spews blood all over the bridge. I pull the knife out and toss it into the pit below. Kano appears enraged that I would do such a thing, and launches himself towards me in a spinning roll attack. I throw my spear again. It connects. "Get over here!" I yell pulling Kano in. I uppercut. As soon as he gets up, he throws a knife; his last one. I teleport, dodging it, and hit him from behind on the base of his skull. I follow it up with a sweep, only to be hit by his spinning roll attack. I fall to the floor unmoving. "Kano wins." "Round two. Fight!" Kano's blades have been retrieved for him by a monk. He now has them at his disposal again. He starts off with a jump kick. I teleport, knocking him out of the air. Before he can land, I toss my spear. "Come here!" I uppercut. Blood is everywhere. He throws a knife, which I quickly duck. Okay, he's down to just one knife now. I jump kick. His other knife collides with me as I come close. I feel a jarring pain in my stomach as I fall back. Kano approaches with a mini knife that he pulled out of his utility belt. Quickly, I rip the larger knife out of my stomach and impale him as he comes near. He lets out a sigh of utter pain and drops the small knife. "Finish him!" I uppercut. I don't know why I don't do my fatality, but I just feel the sudden urge to uppercut and see what happens. Kano's body flies, then falls past the bridge, heading for the pit below. "Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaah!!" His scream is cut short by his impalement on a spike below. I hear an awful squishing sound as he hits; probably his intestines being skewered by the spike. Now I wish I hadn't done that. I look below me again. The body is gone. Gone? To where? Kano had just been impaled by the spike. Where could he have gone? Suddenly I see a ninja carrying him away. "Sub-Zero!" I call. He turns. I find he is not Sub-Zero at all. Instead of blue highlights on his uniform, he has green. "No," he says. "Reptile." "What?" I say. "My name is Reptile. If you wish to fight me, heed my words. Perfection is the key. So is a fatality. Blocking will get you absolutely nowhere. Look to la luna. TIP EHT FO MOTTOB." "What?" "TIP EHT FO MOTTOB" He pulls out a piece of paper and scribbles something on it. Then he sticks it to a spike and walks off. Reluctantly, I make my way down to the bottom of the pit and pick up the paper. It says TIP EHT FO MOTTOB. I have no idea what it means. It looks like some kind of code, or another language. I put it in my pocket and climb back up onto the bridge. I hear the sound of jaws crunching down on something, and someone licking his lips. As though eating. I follow the approximate direction of the source of the sound and peer down into the pit. I am disgusted by what I see: Reptile now has his hood off, revealing a lizard-like head. But that's not the disgusting part. He is eating Kano. Kano's torso is open now, and I can see his intestines being eaten by. . . . . I cannot bear to watch, it is so horrible. That Reptile creature is even more depraved than Shang Tsung. I turn and run. It is morning now. Early morning. I have just finished my match with Johnny Cage. I won both rounds. He did not stand a chance, because of my strategy. It seems that his career as a moviestar is not only rewarding, it is his undoing in a tournament. I did not kill him, however. I like him. I did not wish to kill him. No, not a moviestar that I liked. I did like that Dragon Fist movie in America. Cage did a fine job. That's why I did not kill him. I am back in my room now, pondering over the clues Reptile gave me. Fatality is the key. Perfection is the key. Blocking will get you nowhere. Look to la luna. And the most mysterious one of all, TIP EHT FO MOTTOB. I have no idea what the last one means. I have kind of figured out the others. Well, except for "Look to la luna." I think it means that you must win a match without blocking, win without being hit once, and do a fatality. But I don't know what the other two mean. Look to la luna, I think, is Spanish. I believe I heard some people speaking it during my stay in America. But I am at a loss for what it means. Perhaps Shang Tsung can help me. As for the other one, I do not know where to start. I go to the Throne Room, the same place that I fought Cage this morning. Tsung is still sitting in his chair, and he still looks dead. I approach him. "Yes?" he turns his head to look at me. That's all he does in here. Turns his head and claps, turns his head and claps. . . . "I wonder if you could help me.," I say. "Do know Spanish?" "I know every language," was his lifeless reply. "Well, then, could you tell me what this means? Look to la luna?" "Ah, so you've seen Reptile," he says. I nod. "It means, look at the moon." "The moon?" "Yes. The moon above the Pit. A silhouette flies past the moon if Reptile wants to fight. All you have to do is follow his directions, and you shall be able to do battle with him. I trust he gave you other directions?' "Yes, he did," I say. "Including a message that also appears to be in another language" I show him the paper Reptile had given me. He laughs, "Not at all. It is in perfect English. Just read it backwards." "Oh." I leave. I am back in my room now, decoding the message. I am doing exactly what Tsung told me. Reading it backwards. Or writing it backwards, actually. So far I have BOTTO. Okay. Let's see. The next letter is M. That gives me BOTTOM. Bottom? Bottom of what? I guess the next letters will tell me. Okay. The next word is FO. Reversed, it would read, OF. BOTTOM OF. EHT backwards would read. . . THE. BOTTOM OF THE. TIP backwards is PIT. BOTTOM OF THE PIT. Of course! The bottom of the pit is where I'll fight Reptile. All I have to do is win the match without getting hit once, and without blocking, do my fatality, and I'll get to fight Reptile. But now I have another matter on my hands--Sub-Zero, my mortal enemy. He is next in line on my battle plan, and I am very anxious to destroy him. I want to do exactly what he did to me. First I'll torture him during the match. Then, after he has endured as much pain and suffering as he can stand, I will burn him to ashes. But I will not stop there. I will ensure that his death is as disgraceful as deaths can be. I will burn his ashes. And then burn them again. Then I will scatter them in the wind, and dump the remaining ashes into the ocean. Then I will destroy his statue in the Warrior Shrine. I grin as I think of this. I cannot wait at all for the morning to come. It is morning now. I have just been led to a large cavern by a guard. Inside, the cavern smells of rotting flesh. I soon find out why it smells that way: It is filled with rotting flesh. There are skeletons hanging in shackles from the dirty stone walls. Bits of bloody skin stick to bones, scattered about the floor. Maroon colored blood plasters parts of the walls. I walk up to it, and, find that it is still wet. I look over to my right. There is half of a human leg lying on the floor, severed at the knee. It lies in a pool of blood, still wet. I dislike this place. It is too. . . . deathly. All around me this place reeks of blood and rotting flesh. And in the distance, I think I can hear the sound of someone eating. . . There are eyes. Dozens of eyes staring at me from the dark depths of the tunnels beyond the fighting grounds of this cavern. Glowing, bright, yellow eyes, all staring at me. I look over at a spineless skeleton. It grins at me. A sinister, evil grin. I am told that this place is called Goro's Lair. I heard Tsung talk of Goro when I arrived on this island. For some reason, I have a strong feeling that it is him eating away at the human flesh in the background. Either that or Reptile. I turn my head in disgust at the thought of it. Sub-Zero is led into the fighting grounds. He looks startled to see me. His eyes appear wide with fear. I approach him. "Hello, Lin Kuei," I say. He recognizes the tone of my voice from when he killed me. "You," he says. "Yesssss," I hiss. "You murdered me, Lin Kuei. Or Sub- Zero, rather. Now, I have come back to claim my revenge on you, you disgraceful bastard!" A guard comes to separate us. As we stand apart from one another, I feel a sudden power about me. I feel extremely powerful, as if I could defeat the world. Then my power mixes with my feelings of anger and hatred. And they all combine into one awesome force: the most powerful force in the universe--revenge. "Round one. Fight!" I have waited all my eternal life so far to hear those words spoken while Sub-Zero and I were in the same fighting ring. I teleport as he launches his dreaded ice. I hit him from behind. Then I show no mercy. I hit him with rapid jabs to the face. Blood flies with every hit, adding to the already plentiful collection in Goro's Lair. I sweep him and throw him. Then I toss my spear as he throws his ice. We hit each other. But he is just stunned; I am frozen. I feel the cold, numbing feeling spread throughout my entire body. I hate that feeling. I hate Sub-Zero. I hate Tsung. I hate - Lin Kuei walks up to me and uppercuts me, hitting me with a power slide attack before I get a chance to hit the ground. He tries to roundhouse me. I duck and throw my spear, which he blocks. I don't know how it can be blocked. But he did it. The spear falls to the floor. I crouch to retrieve it, but Lin Kuei grabs me and throws me. I try to jump away, but he freezes me in midair. I am suspended in midair, while my whole body is numb with cold. It all feels very strange, but I know one thing for sure--I hate it! He uppercuts me. I go flying. Blood spews and falls (there is already quite an accumulation on the stone floor of the Lair). He tries to follow it up with a slide, but I block and spear. "Get over here, you sonuvabitch!" I yell. I uppercut him, with satisfaction. He hits the ground with a thud. I jump in to kick. As I do, he delivers a round kick that sends me flying backwards. "Sub-Zero wins!" The word "wins" scorches my heart. I cannot believe he just beat me. I am helped to my feet by two guards who appear out of nowhere, and my spear is returned to me as well. "Round two. Fight!" I throw my spear. He throws his ice. Sub- Zero jump kicks me and follows it up with a slide. I am not off to a good start. He tries to throw his ice again, but I counter it with a sweep. I teleport, this time with a kick. It hits him in the center of his face. I attempt an uppercut. I miss and he slides into me. He throws his ice blast at me once again. It barely hits me. He uppercuts me. I land in a pool of blood. He jumps towards me, attempting to jump kick. I uppercut before he can pull off the move. Sub-Zero is sent flying high in the air as the blood erupts from his cuts. I teleport and hit him with my punch. He falls to the floor. "Scorpion wins!" The same two guards (I assume that they are the same) revive him. They apparently use some sort of dark colored liquid that they rub on the downed opponent's face. I've never really paid much attention as to how they revive a beaten fighter. Sub-Zero is on his feet again. I walk over to him. "This round," I say, "will be your last." As I turn away, he sweeps me. I quickly get up and launch a barrage of punches at his center chest. The guards scurry to our sides, trying to break up the fight. Apparently, they do not want us to destroy ourselves until they give the word. Their efforts are useless, however. Sub-Zero and I throw them off like someone would a bug sitting on his arm. I am suddenly even more angry than I was before the fight. This anger is what keeps pushing me to continue with this bloody battle. What we have here is not a battle of martial arts. It is a battle of sheer will and courage. A street fight. I am choking Sub-Zero with all my immortal strength. And he is pounding on my rib cage with all of his too. I cannot stand the pain any longer. I release my tight hold on his neck and back away. He comes closer. In the time of a heartbeat, I whip out my spear and slash Sub-Zero's jugular. Blood comes spewing out of the open wound in a straight line, falling to the almost maroon floor in that formation . Then I launch it with all my might . "Get over here!" my hoarse voice is almost a whisper. I reel him in and uppercut him. I hear a laugh in the background. An eerie laugh, made by the same deep voice. Somehow I know that laugh means the end is near. I throw my spear. In a last move of desperation, he throws his ice. We hit each other with our projectiles. "Finish him!!" No! I am frozen! I cannot perform my fatality! I cannot kill him! I think very sadly to myself as I watch my murderer fall over on his back, I cannot get my revenge. . . . . . . . Next. . . . . . 'The First Tournament' continued Jonathan