Kombat Champion

by

Morpheus

 

Part Four

 

It was a strange and eerie sight which lay before me, filling me with a cold dread. And I wasn't the only one. A large group of people were gathered near me, each and every one of them staring at the vast dead city in the distance. And each and every one of them was filled with a fearful expectation.

Las Vegas was cold and quiet, without any sign of it's famous neon lights. There were no lights anywhere, no cars moving, no planes flying past or even any signs of life other than the occasional bird flying in that direction. The whole city could have almost been the worlds largest ghost town. And even from a distance, I could feel that there was something wrong.

When I had first heard about all communication with Las Vegas being lost some hours earlier, I had immediately rushed there as fast as I could. It wasn't an easy trip, nor a cheap one, especially when it came to getting a plane flight on such short notice. Fortunately most people had immediately cancelled their trips to Vegas and there were still airports outside of the main city...outside of the effect.

Tina had demanded on coming with me at first, but I had insisted that she stay behind and I wasn't about to take no for an answer. I had no idea what was going to happen once I got to Las Vegas, but I knew that it would be dangerous. And there was no way that I was going to just let my girlfriend walk into something like that.

Of course, I had wanted to protect Nancy as well, but knew that this was impossible as she was already involved in what was going on. She had been ever since she'd suddenly transformed into Vypra. So before I had climbed on the plane, I called her, getting her answering machine and leaving the simple message, "He's here... Look on the news..."

There had been no doubt in my mind that Nancy would know what I meant...and what I intended to do. After all, we'd talked about fighting Rekegei and his army a number of times.

Once I had finally arrived, I was able to get a little more information than what they were giving out over the TV news, but not a whole lot more. Mostly a lot of people were gathered around, back outside of the city, watching it and sharing what little they did know.

A vast invisible shroud had descended over the entire city, rendering all technology within useless. All electric power suddenly went dead. All firearms had become completely useless. Almost nothing that involved modern conveniences or science would work at all. But this was just as I had expected.

I did find out though that Nellis Air Force Base was right next to the city and was under the same shroud of technological deadness as everything else. And of course this was a huge worry to the government, who saw this as a confirmation of their fears that this was a terrorist attack, though they wrongly concluded that Nellis was the real target.

The Air Force had sent several fighters into the city to check it out, though as soon as they were within range of the aura they lost power and crashed. Several news and rescue helicopters had suffered similar fates and even one commercial airliner had crashed after the aura had appeared while it was flying overhead.

"Thank God it crashed outside the city," I muttered, wincing as I thought of all the dead people on board the plane. But how much worse would it have been if it had actually crashed into the streets of Vegas instead?

I took a deep breath and looked around the people who were near me. They were talking quite a bit, sharing what little they knew and their theories as to what caused the strange lose of power within Vegas. And some of these theories were quite wild, with the irony being the craziest ones were closest to reality.

Thousands of refugees had come running out of the city, on foot and on bicycle as no cars would work. They were promptly picked up by the government and rushed off to some tent city where they could try keeping things under control and had easy access to the people for questioning.

"It's a quarantine," one man exclaimed grimly, "The government doesn't want them to tell us what's really going on..."

I just nodded at that, knowing that he was right. If the public knew the truth, it would probably create more of a panic than there already was. Most people weren't exactly ready to handle the fact that alien warriors from another dimension were invading the planet.

"It's like an invisible wall," one woman near me told a friend. "We were trying to drive to the city to check on my sister, but as soon as we hit the wall...our car went dead."

"I put the car in neutral and pushed her backwards," the woman's husband added to the conversation, "And as soon as we were back on the other side, it started right up..."

There were other things being said, other examples of the weirdness that was going on. However, I barely paid them much attention. I had seen enough. I had heard enough. Now it was time to go in.

The military and police all had people set up to prevent anyone from going into the city, but they were too busy taking care of those who came rushing out. And since most people knew better than to go anywhere near Vegas at the moment, it was relatively simple for me to sneak around the checkpoints on foot and make my way there.

When I got closer to the main city, I was finally able to see some lights from within, though they were definitely not from any neon. There were flashes of light of various colors, but they would just come and go. I didn't take that as a good sign though. In fact, I took it as a very bad one.

Hundreds of people rushed past me, eager to get out of Las Vegas as fast as they could. Most of them looked terrified, though some were angry, sad or just completely numb. The expressions varied, though their determination to flee was the same for all of them.

All of the streets were filled with dead cars that had been abandoned when they had suddenly stopped working. And from the wreckage around me, it was obvious that a lot of people had lost control of their moving cards when it happened and crashed. There were wreckages from crashed cars all of the place, in the streets and even in the side of one building.

"My God," I whispered, wondering how many people had died just from car crashes alone. I could even see dead bodies in a couple of the crashed cars, though I think traffic had probably been stalled enough to keep most people from getting hit too bad when it happened.

And then I finally saw them...three men who made my heart nearly skip a beat. With a single look, I knew that they had to be members of Rekegei's army. Well, either that or members of some fantasy convention, but I seriously doubted the latter. They looked far too realistic for that.

One of the men was large, about six and a half feet tall, with a completely bald head, blue tattoos all over his face, and strange leather clothing. He had a cruel grin on his face, and a HUGE ax in his hands. It was an enormous double edged ax, on top of a long pole. And from the bulging muscles the guy possessed, I had no doubt that he could use it.

The second guy was nearly as large as the first, though not quite so tall. But where he was several inches shorter, he also seemed to be several inches wider and even more muscular. And where the first man lacked any hair, this second one seemed to have an overabundance of it, with a long shaggy mane down his back and a large beard. He held a huge hammer in his hands, with a metal head that made it look as though the hammer itself might weight just as much or even more than he did.

Then there was the third guy who was much smaller than the first two, not to mention thinner. In fact, he almost looked a bit effeminate and could have been mistaken as a woman from a distance, especially with his long black hair. This man was dressed in a purple and black costume that almost looked like something out of a comic book. Even his weapon was less fearsome looking than that carried by the men with him. He only had a bow and some arrows.

But as I watched, the guy with the bow notched an arrow... I didn't think much of such a simple weapon...until the arrow started to glow purple. He fired the arrow and when it hit the wall of a building across the street, it exploded as though he had used a rocket launcher against it instead of a bow and arrow.

"Holy shit," I gasped in amazement.

"This world is full of weaklings and cowards," the guy with the bow and arrows complained, "These people are no challenge..."

"Weaklings and cowards should die," the man with the ax exclaimed, "They should make room for the strong..."

"Then we should kill them all," the one with the hammer grunted in a gravely voice. "I crave challenge..."

And with that, he slammed his hammer onto the ground. Suddenly the ground shattered and a massive crater formed around him. I stared in shock at what a single swing of the hammer had done to the ground. It looked almost like a meteorite had hit it or something.

A moment later the guy with the ax started walking towards a minivan that was stopped in the middle of the street. He pulled his ax back, and was obviously about to swing at the vehicle when I heard screaming. It was only then that I noticed several faces staring out from the van windows... There were kids in the van.

"Stop!" I yelled out, catching the attention of the three men, "What the hell are you doing? There are kids in there..."

"Weak younglings," the man with the hammer snarled, "It is best to destroy them now before they grow up to become weaklings like all others in this world..."

"Besides," the man with the bow laughed, "They make fun targets... And with that he notched another arrow, this time aiming at the minivan."

I gasped in horror and cried out, "You coward!"

"WHAT?" Bow turned to me, a look of fury in his eyes.

"Killing helpless kids," I sneered at him, remembering what Keiron had told me about these people and their love of personal combat, "Only a coward attacks someone who can't defend themselves."

"No one calls me a coward," he snarled, his eyes narrowing with barely contained fury. "At least none who live..."

"I do," I told him grimly, pulling my katars out and letting him see that I was ready for a fight.

"At last," Hammer laughed, "Someone in this world with some fighting spirit..."

"Pity it's just a woman," Ax commented.

As I moved closer to Bow, I gestured to the van for the kids to get out. They nodded and ran out the side, with some skinny adult man that I hadn't even noticed with them. He must have been their father, though I didn't care much for the way he had been taking care of them. But once they all vanished inside of a nearby building...where who knew how many other people had taken refuge, I let out a sigh of relief and turned my full attention to the fight.

Bow snarled and fired an arrow at me, faster than I would ever have imagined. However, I had been expecting such a move and jumped to the side...only to be knocked off my feet as it exploded behind me. I had to jump to avoid another arrow, which just narrowly missed me.

"Damn," I grimaced, knowing that I couldn't beat him if I couldn't get to him...

Then I suddenly noticed that Hammer and Ax were both standing back, with no sign that they had any intention of jumping in and helping their friend. That just reminded me about the whole personal combat thing again... Apparently it was important enough to them that they wouldn't interfere.

"Thank God for small favors," I muttered, knowing that I probably wouldn't be able to deal with all three of them at one time.

"You're fast," Bow called out, "Very few have managed to avoid so many of my shots..." Then he laughed, "But none avoid them forever..."

I knew that he was right and that in order to beat him I'd have to get closer. So when he fired again, I charged straight towards the arrow, sidestepping it at the last possible second and simultaneously throwing a handful of my blades. This time Bow went on the defensive, and while he was avoiding my attack, I got close enough to swing one of my katars at him.

But to my surprise, Bow blocked my katar attack with his bow... The impact of the block created a slight clang...making me realize that his bow was made of some sort of metal. And more than that, it had small blades on both ends of it, making it dangerous in close quarters as well as at a distance.

Bow swung his bow at me, trying to get me with one of the blades. I blocked it and kicked him, catching him in the stomach and sending him back. He quickly rolled to his feet, and in an incredibly fast moved, notched an arrow and let it fly at me. I blocked it with my katars and let out a sigh of relief that it wasn't one of those charged exploding ones.

Then seeing that Bow was charging another arrow to shoot me with, I decided to beat him to the punch. I waited until he fired the arrow, then jumped to the side and flung some more throwing blades at him. This time though, I used a little trick that I'd picked up while training with Keiron and charged all of them up the same way that I did my katar. All of my throwing blades hit him with much more force, going much deeper and doing much more damage.

For a moment, Bow just stood there, staring at me in disbelief. The bow dropped from his hands and he finally collapsed to his knees, whispering, "I am defeated..." And with that, he collapsed the rest of the way to the ground.

"Oh shit," I whispered, suddenly horrified at what I'd done. I think that I'd just killed a man...though I couldn't be sure. I wasn't about to go check his pulse or anything.

"So this world does have fighters," Hammer said, raising his hammer and stepping towards me, obviously intending to fight me himself now that Bow had lost. "I shall enjoy this..."

Then without another word, Hammer came charging at me, his hammer already swinging. I'd seen what it could do when it hit the ground, and I sure as hell wasn't about to let it do that to me. I decided to take it on the offense right off the bat through and instead of jumping away from him, I jumped right at him, hitting him with a double katar punch before he could finish swinging his hammer, and then jumping up and away from him.

"AGH," Hammer grunted, dropping to one knee for a moment, his hammer swing having been disrupted. He glared at me with fury in his eyes, as well as a bit of respect.

"Gotcha," I muttered, loving that look he was giving me. What can I say? I liked it when the bad guys respected me.

Of course my fight wasn't over and I wasn't about to forget it for even a moment. So while Hammer was getting back to his feet and raising his hammer, I was moving for another attack. He swung the hammer and hit the ground...but I had waited until just a moment before impact to jump towards him as hard as I could. I not only avoided the massive impact and shockwave of the hammer hitting the ground and creating another crater, but I also caught him when he couldn't use his weapon. This time, I hit Hammer with a half dozen katar punches, as well as several kicks. And I'd done it all before he could lift his hammer back up again.

At this point, Hammer staggered back, letting go of the hammer. I was amazed that he was still standing as he'd taken a lot more damage than Bow, but he was obviously ready to keep fighting. But instead of his hammer, he clenched his fists, then shifted position a bit, obviously changing gears to hand to hand combat mode.

For a brief moment, I was tempted to put away my katars and face him on even terms. But then common sense settled in. He was a lot bigger and stronger than I was, and there was no way that I wanted to risk him getting his hands on me. I was more than happy to keep using whatever advantage I had over him.

"You are very fast," Hammer grunted at me, "One of the fastest that I have ever seen... What is your name woman?"

"Kestra," I responded grimly. "Kestra...the Jagged Wind."

"Bojo Kai," he introduced himself to me, not moving his eyes.

Then Hammer...or Bojo as he said his name was came after me. He swung one heavy fist, then another. I had no doubt that they'd do a lot of damage if they hit, but I was a lot faster than him and able to block and redirect his punches while taking the opportunity to hit him with a few good kicks. They didn't do a lot of damage, but I figured that I might eventually wear him down this way.

Bojo and I circled each other for several minutes before he suddenly punched the ground with his fist, creating a small shockwave that knocked me off of my feet. It was similar to what happened when he hit the ground with his hammer, but not as powerful. However, it did catch me by surprise and he charged straight at me while I was regaining my balance.

"Oh no you don't," I cried out, shifting balance and slamming my katar straight into his solar plexus until my knuckles were touching his stomach.

I felt sick to my stomach as I actually twisted the blade then slowly withdrew it. I nearly emptied my stomach, though somehow managed to avoid doing that. I quickly reminded myself that I didn't have a choice, that it was him or me. I was trying to save Earth from the invasion and I would have to have a strong stomach to do that.

"I win," I whispered.

Then I looked into Bojo's eyes as he fell to the ground and was surprised to see a look of excitement there, and of pleasure. I didn't understand why he would feel such things after being beaten...after being ran through. But all that I could figure was that it had something to do with their love of personal combat and facing a real challenging opponent. Perhaps they actually found some twisted joy in fighting someone stronger than them. I didn't know, nor did I want to think about it too much.

At this point, Ax came towards me. He didn't say a word as he looked down at Bojo and Bow. He didn't even look angry or upset. He gave me a calm look and I saw a hunger in his eyes... He wanted to fight me...to beat me...and possibly something else.

"You will make a good mate," Ax exclaimed with a grin. "We shall have strong children together."

I nearly choked at that, "You've got to be kidding."

Unfortunately, I could tell from the look on his face that he wasn't. "If you agree to be mother of my children, we can avoid this fight," Ax told me with a smug look. "If not...you shall afterwards."

"I don't think so," I snorted in disgust, glaring at him and deciding that I REALLY didn't like him.

I wondered what Tina or Nancy would say if they found out that some guy I didn't even know had just asked me to be the mother of his children. Tina would probably give me some sympathy sounds while Nancy would burst out laughing. Of course, Nancy knew a few things about me that Tina didn't yet.

But Ax just gave me an arrogant glare and announced, "I am Therikon Drax."

"Drax?" I asked with a smirk, "As in rhymes with ax?" I laughed at that, "Give me a break..."

"Very well then," Drax growled, suddenly jumping at me and swinging his ax.

I was stunned by just how fast Drax was. He was a big guy, larger than either Bojo or Bow, but somehow he was faster then either of them. I was just barely able to get out of his way in time. Then he swung the ax at me again, grabbing it by the base of the staff and having a very long reach as a result.

"Oh shit," I gasped, jumping back and away from him, realizing that I could be in real trouble.

Drax didn't even charge after me, but stood his ground and swung his ax. With the size of that thing and his range, I didn't think that I'd be able to get past Drax's defenses very easily. In fact, I knew that I'd have a hell of a time doing that.

"Come to me little one," Drax laughed, taking another swing of his ax.

Then Drax paused for a moment, pulling his ax close to him. He muttered something under his breath which sounded like some sort of chant. And as he did so, the blade of his large ax began to glow blue. A moment later, he grabbed the ax by the handle and swung it at the ground.

"Uh oh," I muttered as the ax hit the concrete and went through it as easily as a hot knife through butter.

But the ax didn't just go through the middle of the street... It created some sort of blue ripple of energy which shot out at the impact and ran down the street...splitting the concrete apart as it went until there was a chasm in the road that stretched about twenty yards long.

"See my power and tremble," Drax announced arrogantly, making me realize that he hadn't even tried hitting me with that particular move. He had only been showing off. "Do you wish to surrender now little one?" He gave me a broad grin, "Think of the children we will have..."

"I'd rather not," I grimaced.

This didn't seem to bother Drax though, other than to make him more determined. He looked calm and in control as he ran towards me, swinging his ax. I wasn't sure that I could block something like that so did my best to avoid it. Of course, it helped to realize that he wasn't trying to kill me. That bastard wanted me for something else...

"I'd rather be dead," I muttered to myself, knowing that I had to find some way to beat him.

Then Drax paused and stood his ground, taking a position that dared me to attack him. He wasn't interested in chasing me down... He wanted me to come to him. And with that huge ax of his, I wasn't all that confident about my ability to break through his defenses. I was going to have to find another way.

I grimaced and ran towards Drax, throwing a hand full of throwing blades at him. And as he tried to block most of them, I shifted position and jumped, coming at him with one of my katars pointed straight at his face. But I had underestimated his speed because he lashed out with one arm and knocked me to the side before I could connect.

Drax swung his ax at me again, though this time I slipped underneath it and came up right in front of him with both of my katars drawn. And before he had a chance, I was able to give him a couple of good slashes across his abdomen. Then I rolled to the side and out of his arms reach, sending a few throwing blades at him to do a little more damage.

"You are strong little one," Drax growled, beginning to get annoyed. "Our children shall be powerful indeed..."

I tried hard to ignore his comments, but it wasn't easy. Every time he suggested that we have kids together, I felt like screaming or at the very least emptying my stomach. That was just plain disgusting.

After a moment, Drax began doing that trick with his ax again...the one where he made it glow blue. I grimaced and got out of the way, but when he slammed the ax into the ground and sent the cutting blue ribbon of energy straight at me, I stood my ground.

"Please work," I grimaced as I crossed my katars in front of me and braced myself, throwing out my reflection technique.

To my relief, my reflection technique worked great and sent his own ribbon of blue energy right back at him. Drax yelled in surprise and tried to block it with his ax...only to have his own ax cut in half by the attack. I nearly felt like laughing, though I didn't waste the time. Instead I jumped to my feet, kept my katars crossed, channeled my chi energy into them and then let loose with a chi blast that hit him right in the chest and knocked him flat on his ass.

Since I had already learned not to waste any opportunity in a fight, I charged straight at Drax, catching him as he got back to his feet. He tried to swing a punch at me though I managed to avoid it and return with a kick to his side. By this point, he was actually getting pissed, which wasn't surprising as he had a hole burnt right into his chest.

"I shall teach you your place little one," Drax snarled, his eyes suddenly glowing blue.

"Uh oh," I gulped, having a feeling that I knew what was coming.

Fortunately my guess correct and when Drax fired some blue energy blasts at me from his eyes, I was ready and threw up another reflection field. It took a good bit of chi energy to do that technique, but it was well worth it to see his own energy blasts come back and hit him in the chest, almost right in the same spot as where I'd already blasted him.

"Maybe now you'll learn your lesson," I teased Drax. "Don't try those kind of tricks with me..."

By then, it was getting obvious that Drax was pretty badly injured. He'd taken a couple of chi energy attacks right in his chest, and that wasn't even taking into account the fact that I'd hit him with a couple of throwing blades and a few good katar strikes. He was bleeding and looking weaker by the moment.

"Where is Rekegei at?" I demanded. "He's the one I want to fight..."

"How do you know of our master?" Drax asked in surprise.

"Tell me where he is and I'll tell you," I responded, keeping my distance for the moment.

Drax just laughed at that and decided for another attack, this time keeping it both physical and bare handed. Of course he didn't really have a choice since his ax had been cut in half with his own attack and his chi attacks just hadn't been working for him. However, he was pretty strong and fast, though fortunately, not as fast as me.

When Drax came at me, I met him with everything that I had, blocking his punches and returning with a few of my own. And mine were made much more dangerous by the fact that I was still using my katars. Every punch of mine that hit cut deeply into his flesh and after just another minute, my opponent collapsed to the ground.

"Where's Rekegei?" I demanded.

But Drax didn't answer. Instead, he gave me a bit of a smirk and said, "We would have had great children..."

"Damn," I grimaced, not sure if Drax was alive or dead either. Even if he was alive, he would have been unconscious, and I wasn't really betting on him living through all that damage.

But just then, a weak voice said, "Rekegei..."

I looked around and was a bit surprised to see that it was coming from Bojo. He was badly injured from our fight, but he was sitting up at least a little bit and looking at me.

"Take this," Bojo whispered, holding something out to me. I took a closer look and realized that it was a string of beads.

"No thanks," I grimaced, "I didn't do this to rob you..."

But Bojo smiled lightly at that before coughing up a little blood. He looked straight at me and responded, "No... It is proof that you defeated me in combat. The other's have them too."

I frowned at that, "I don't need..."

"Rekegei will not accept your challenge unless you have five strands," Bojo told me in a whisper. "He will not waste his time with one unless they prove their skills..."

I carefully took Bojo's strand of beads then looked it over. The strand was only about six inches long and the beads were a variety of colors and even shapes. It didn't look very important at all. But if Bojo was telling me this while that injured, I had to believe him.

"And where is Rekegei?" I asked.

Bojo stared at me for a moment before pointing down the street. But he said nothing more, closing his eyes and going limp instead. I might have taken him for dead...again, if it weren't for the fact that he was still breathing.

After a moment, I turned away from Bojo and went to check on my other opponents. I found a strand of beads tied to Bow's belt, and a similar strand around Drax's neck. That made three, so if Bojo was telling the truth, and I had no reason to believe that he wasn't, then I would only need two more strands of beads before I could fight Rekegei.

"Time to go get me some more souvenirs," I sighed as I began moving down the street again. I only hoped that I was still able to fight by the time I reached Rekegei.

I stared around me at what had been the crowded and busy city of Las Vegas, stunned by what it had become. The streets were filled with dead and crashed cars, and there was almost nobody in sight. Nearly all of the people who were still in the city, who had yet to evacuate and escape, were hiding within the hotels and casinos. They were staying off the street and out of danger.

Whenever I looked around me, I not only saw a city turned into a virtual ghost town, but I also sign all of the signs of war... Cars were overturned in the streets... There were huge holes in the walls of buildings and even in the concrete streets. The charred skeleton of what had once been a human being lay spread out on the sidewalk, along with remains which no longer even resembled anything like people.

"My God," I whispered, a chill of horror going up my spine. "This is some kind of nightmare..."

Unfortunately, I knew that it wasn't just a nightmare. Everything that was going on around me was far too real. Las Vegas had been invaded by fighters from another dimension.

"Sounds like something out of a video game," I muttered grimly.

In fact, the whole situation reminded me of a video game. That wasn't too surprising since I myself had been turned into a living, breathing video game character. But it was more than just that...

If this had been a video game, then Rekegei would undoubtedly be the main villain at the end of the game. The whole goal of the game was to get to the final level and beat him. And as with the game, the goal was simple and straight forward. But unfortunately, just like with any video game, you couldn't just go straight to the main villain. You had to go through all of the other levels first. You had to fight and beat all of his lackeys before you could get to him.

"Like Bojo, Drax and that bow and arrow guy," I muttered to myself. They would definitely be level bosses or something of the sort. And according to Bojo, I would have to beat two more fighters...two more levels until I could get to the main villain. "Rekegei..."

Then of course, just like with a number of video games, once you got through the level and finally reached the villain, you might not have enough life points left to survive a fight against him for very long. I'd played a number of video games like that. There were a lot of game that if you went up against the villain at full strength, it might not be all that difficult to beat him. However, there was frequently the catch that you could only fight the villain after going through the level and all of his little weenies, and by the time you reached the villain, your life points were already nearly gone and you started off the fight at a major disadvantage.

"It's just like the a game," I grimaced, thinking about how I was supposedly required to fight five people before I could face Rekegei. I was already sore and a bit injured from my previous fights, and if this continued, then by the time I was able to fight Rekegei I would no longer be in any condition to do so.

But unlike a video game, if I died in one of these fights, I couldn't start over. As strange as it was, this was real life and not some kind of game. I didn't get extra lives. I didn't get to start off again from a saved point. I didn't even get a chance to start the whole game over from the very beginning. Once I died here, I was dead for good.

"I'm not going to let that happen," I grimaced, clutching my katars even tighter and getting some comfort from their presence.

After a minute, I continued walking down the streets in the direction that Bojo had directed. I occasionally saw people...normal people who would peak out from their hiding places to see what was going on, or who would rush across the street and go from one building to another. The streets might be mostly empty, but the people were still around. Or at least those that hadn't flooded out of the city were.

And then there were the fighters. I kept catching glimpses of people in odd costumes, people who were obviously members of Rekegei's army. They were around as well, though I couldn't tell just how many of them there were. What I could tell though was that they seemed to have no uniforms, nor any form of organization. And from what Keiron had told me, I guessed that there were probably only a couple hundred of them...spread out over Vegas.

I had gone only a short distance further when I became aware of a lot of noise coming from ahead of me. I paused for just a moment, then rushed forward and turned the corner. But as soon as I saw what was going on, I froze for moment and stared in amazement.

There were a dozen members of Rekegei's army in the street, not running around and destroying everyone and everything in sight like I had seen some of their other members do, but just quietly standing to the side. They were all watching not only one...but THREE fights going on in front of them at the same time.

For a moment, I just stared at the sight in front of me, gasping as I recognized two of the fighters. "Nancy..."

Nancy, or rather Vypra was in the middle of a fight with some large and muscular woman. She threw a bunch of snakes at her opponent, then her glowing snake aura appeared around her. A moment later, Nancy jumped, her two katanas pulled out and providing the fangs for the glowing ghostly snake which struck at the large woman...

And at the same time, I glanced over and stared in surprise at Pi the Yellow Snow, who was busy fighting his own opponent. The fact that he was there at all was amazing because I didn't think that he was the kind to seek out any real fights...or to try saving the planet. I had imagined him hiding out during this invasion thing, but instead he was right in the middle of it fighting. He fired a spray of yellow water at his opponent, followed by a yellow blizzard attack which froze the other man in place.

Then my attention turned to the third fighter, who was a man that I didn't recognize but knew that he had to be one of Keiron's transformed champions. He was average height and build, with a blue and white costume that looked sort of like a ninja outfit. But his head was mostly uncovered, with only a blue bandanna over his nose and mouth, leaving his short white hair to flow free.

From what I could tell, the white haired champion that I didn't know was a hand to hand fighter without a weapon. He was punching and kicking his opponent, a tall skinny man with a scythe... And he was obviously fast. Then a moment later, the white haired man held out his hands and a ball of glowing blue energy appeared between them.

"Ka May Ha," the white haired man yelled out, obviously focusing even more energy into his glowing ball, "May HAAAA!"

And with that, the white haired man threw the glowing blue ball at his opponent. As soon as the ball hit, it exploded, sending the other fighter flying back and obviously injured. His scythe had even been dropped during the explosion, which the white haired man took advantage of by charging straight at the fallen man and launching into a rapid fire series of punches.

"He's good," I commented to myself, turning my attention back to Vypra.

But as I looked back at Nancy, I saw her opponent staggering and looking weak. Vypra was just standing back, holding her swords as if she was ready to attack as soon as the opportunity was right. Then it dawned on me... Vypra didn't need to attack as she had probably already used her snake fist strike attack on her opponent and she was in her last throws of energy. And my guess seemed to be proven as the large woman collapsed to the ground.

"Good going Vypra," I called out, carefully moving a bit closer.

"Kestra," Nancy exclaimed in delight as she finally noticed me. Then she smirked at me and added, "It's about time you got here."

"It wasn't easy getting a flight," I admitted, then gestured to her fallen opponent, "You'd better get her strand of beads..."

"What?" Nancy blinked in confusion.

I held up the three strands that I had already taken form my opponents, "Each of these guys seems to have one of these, and it looks like you might need to beat five of these guys for their beads before you're allowed to fight Rekegei."

Nancy blinked, "That's ridiculous..."

"And these clothes aren't?" Pi responded as he came up as well, apparently having finished his opponent while I hadn't been paying attention.

Nancy looked at his yellow ninja costume and nodded, "Good point."

Around this time, the last of the three had finished his fight and was coming over as well. The two of us just stared at each other for a moment before he held out his hand, "The name's Jake..."

"Kestra," I shook his hand.

"Game name?" Jake asked me. And as I nodded, he shrugged, "I prefer using my real one... Helps me remember who I really am."

However, the dozen or so members of Rekegei's army who surrounded us weren't about to just let us stand there and talk. And they especially didn't seem to want that after three of their buddies had just been taken out in front of them. I wondered what they would think if they knew that I'd taken out three of them myself. Then again, I realized that I'd held up the beads I'd won when I told Nancy about them, so they just might know.

"I challenge you," a large man who had scars all over his body snarled to Pi.

"I challenge you," a short man with a pair of strange looking knives in his hands exclaimed to Jake. "I'll tear you up for what you did to my cousin..."

And other challengers came as well. One skinny guy with a blue Mohawk challenged Vypra, while I was left with a woman who looked almost nothing like a fighter. She was tall and beautiful, with white clothes and a white loin cloth. Her hair was nearly pure white, with only a single lock of black hair which hung down partly into her face.

"You have obviously beaten three of our brethren," the woman told me in a calm, sexy sounding voice. "Unless of course you stole their tokens..."

"No," I told her, "I won those fair and square... One on one..."

The woman eyed me suspiciously, "Just out of curiosity, whom did you best?"

"Bojo Kai," I told her, "Some guy named Drax and a skinny guy with a bow and arrows..."

"Ah," she nodded, suddenly having a slightly more cautious look on her eyes. "If you tell the truth, you must be skilled enough..."

"I'm skilled enough," I admitted warily, wondering if she wanted to talk or fight. Then again, maybe she thought that it was good manners to get to know your opponent before fighting.

The woman nodded, then introduced herself, "I am Shiekra...known as the White Bride."

"Kestra," I responded with a nod, "The Jagged Wind."

And with that, Shiekra gave a slight nod of her head and began to back away, giving us room to find and letting me know that it was time to get down to business. She carefully unwrapped a long white silk scarf from around her waist and held it out to the side.

Suddenly Shiekra snapped her scarf and a long metal chain came whipping out from where it had been and launched straight at me. I jumped out of the way, but she yanked the chain and sent is slapping the ground nearby. Then she started to swing it around, cracking it like a whip.

"What the...?" I stared, seeing that Shiekra had the chain in one of her hands, while a long scarf in the other. She snapped the scarf again, and this time the scarf itself seemed to lash out like a whip, catching me on the edge of my arm and tearing through my skin as though it were a knife blade rather than just cloth. "Damn..."

I grimaced, trying to ignore my injured arm. Instead, I focused on Shiekra, knowing that she was more dangerous than she looked. She snapped the scarf again, and I jumped aside, only to watch it actually cut into the concrete street. There was no doubt that this harmless piece of fabric was anything but harmless.

"Where is your skill?" Shiekra taunted, lashing out with the chain this time. It, like the scarf seemed to stretch out to three times it's length whenever she did that, getting at me even though I could have sworn that I was outside of her range.

When Shiekra lashed out at me with her scarf whip again, I moved, slashing out with my katar and cutting it right in half. She cursed in some strange language that I didn't understand, though it was undoubtedly a profanity of some sort. There's a reason that dirty words are usually the first ones anyone learns in another language. However, Shiekra wasn't going to just sit there and curse at me. She lashed out with her chain, nearly hitting me with it.

"You can do better than that," I taunted Shiekra, who was swinging the chain around her head. The scarf had been dropped to the ground, apparently unusable now that it was cut in half.

Shiekra smirked, then swung the chain at me. It came much faster than I would have expected, and when it hit a car in the middle of the street, it nearly cut the car in half. I was stunned at that and made sure not to get hit by that thing. But while I was busy dodging her chain, I didn't notice that she had somehow pulled out another long white scarf...until she had swung at me with it and wrapped up my feet.

I hit the ground with a painful thud, unable to move my lower body much. It was wrapped up with one end of an extremely long white scarf, while Shiekra was firmly clutching the other hand. And it didn't take me more than a moment to realize that as long as I was wrapped up like that, I wasn't going to be able to avoid her chain. But this was obviously what she' d intended as she was readying the chain for another swing.

"Damn," I grimaced, slashing at the scarf again with my katar. But to my surprise, it didn't cut through it this time. In fact, this time the scarf seemed to be as hard and strong as steal. "No way am I being taken down by a scarf..."

Since my katars alone weren't going to cut the scarf, I channeled some of my chi energy into them, making them glow and giving them a lot more power. I grimaced and took one more slash with my katar, slashing through the scarf with the one blade while I used my other one to block her chain attack. My arm was somewhat numb from the force of her swing.

For a moment, I felt the urge to look over and see how the other's were doing in their own fights, especially Vypra. But I immediately pushed those concerns down, knowing that for now I had to be concerned about myself and my own survival. I had to win this fight. I HAD to.

"I don't like those scarves very much," I exclaimed, going on the offensive and charging right at Shiekra. But before I could get too close, she threw up a scarf into the air, which spread out all over me. Before I realized it, I was entangled in another scarf, this time with my whole body being wrapped up in it. I struggled to get free, then let out a grunt as a horrible pain hit me in the side.

"I fear that I am somewhat disappointed," Shiekra commented. "I had expected more from you..."

With a loud yell, I struggled to get free of the scarf. I finally pulled away from it, just barely in time to avoid another lash from her chain. The ground crumbled where the chain hit, right where I had been laying on the ground a moment earlier.

"You sure do love to accessorize," I called out, my mind racing as I tried to come up with some ideas.

Up until then, I had been holding back on using my chi energy as I didn't want to drain myself too badly by the time I faced Rekegei. But now there was no doubt that if I didn't start using my chi abilities more, I wouldn't survive long enough to face him.

Shiekra was swirling her chain around and suddenly let loose with it for another attack. I stood my ground and crossed my katars to brace for the attack, though as soon as the chain was in motion for me I did something else instead. I channeled my chi energy through my katars and fired a blast of energy straight at my opponent. Shiekra let out a shriek as she was blown back, the front of her clothes badly burned from my blast. She had even dropped her chain...

I wasn't about to waste an opportunity and immediately charged towards Shiekra. She began reaching to her waist for another scarf, but I used my elbow to slam her in the face. For the briefest of moments, I felt a bit of guilt for doing something like that to a girl, but I quickly shoved it aside. My reluctance to hit girls had gone out the window around the time I had become one myself, not to mention the fact that Shiekra was part of a plan to wipe out the Earth. I wasn't about to let myself feel guilty for stopping that.

"You chazact," Shiekra shrieked at me, "My face... You'll ruin my face..."

"And I love you too," I responded, grabbing for the chain that she had dropped and wrapping it around her neck...

Shiekra struggled and tried to pull the chain away from where I was choking her around the neck. But she was going pale and quickly losing the struggle. It was obvious that she had lost, and she finally realized it herself. She held her hands, or at least one of them out in a sign of submission, giving me a pleading look with her eyes. And then, she reached around her neck and tore off the string of beads that she'd had wrapped there, dropping them to the ground.

"It's not a black tournament," I whispered, letting her go to drop to the ground. I didn't want to kill her if I didn't have to, and it was already more than obvious that I'd won. And as I picked up the beads she had dropped, it seemed that her fellow fighters agreed with the sentiment. They glared at me yet seemed to accept that I had indeed won that fight.

Then, Just as I was picking up my prize, I heard a loud scream and snapped around. I stared in horror as the large warrior with the scars all over his body held Pi above his head. And from the angles of Pi's limbs, it was pretty obvious that he had several VERY nasty broken bones. Hell, one of his legs was dangling in a completely unnatural angle...

But to my surprise, Pi wasn't completely finished. He put his hand right to his opponents face...then unleashed an ice attack at point blank range. The big scarred man screamed, or at least tried to before his entire head turned to ice. He dropped Pi and then collapsed to the ground himself, his head shattering as he hit the ground.

"Ugh," I grimaced, not sure whether to count that one as a victory for Pi or not. Pi was alive and the other guy was dead, but I didn't think that Pi would ever fight again...

However, Vypra and Jake were both doing pretty good in their own fights. Jake used some sort of explosive chi burst to take out his opponent at close range, while Vypra had already hit hers with a snake fist strike and was playing defense as she waited for him to collapse from weakness.

Just then though, I noticed that the fighters of Rekegei's army were beginning to come towards us. I gulped, suddenly realizing that we were about to be challenged again. In fact, I realized that we would be challenged again and again. We would get more and more tired and injured, while our opponents would still be fresh to the fight. They would keep challenging us to personal combat without giving us any time to recover, until we couldn't last any longer.

"Oh hell," I grimaced, definitely not liking that one bit at all. It just didn't seem at all fair. Then again, I don't think that they cared about fairness... You don't go invading other people's dimension and killing innocent people if being fair was very important to you.

Suddenly, I realized that there were more fighters present than when I had started my fight with Shiekra. There were twice as many, perhaps even three times as many. And then they all suddenly went quiet, making me even more nervous as I wondered what was going on. It was only then that I noticed the direction that most of them were looking.

"What the...?" I started, then gasped as I saw the man coming towards us with an entourage of fighters surrounding him.

With a single look, I knew that this man had to be Rekegei... All of the fighters were deferring to him and he had an air of command. There was no doubt that this had to be their leader. This had to be Rekegei the Black Flame.

Rekegei was not quite what I had expected. To be honest, when I had heard about this horrible warrior Rekegei, I had imagined him as some sort of 7 foot tall monster that was built like the hulk and had glowing red eyes. But the man who came towards me looked surprisingly normal. He was about six feet tall and pretty average sized, though it was pretty obvious that he was also made of solid ripped muscle. Rekegei also had spiky blonde hair and a somewhat charming grin which gave him an air of being an easy-going and nice guy. However, the darkness in his eyes spoke otherwise.

"You're Rekegei?" I asked when he was closer.

He stood there for a moment and slowly looked around, at me and then the others. And since I was the one who had spoken, he finally turned his attention back to me and answered simply, "I am he..."

I heard a gasp from Vypra while Jake just got into position to attack. However, with the group of fighters who were gathered around Rekegei, I knew a direct attack like that wouldn't work...and apparently so did he as he stood his ground.

"I challenge you to a fight," I looked straight at Rekegei. "Just you and me..."

Rekegei seemed amused at that and actually smiled. "Finally, someone with fighting spirit... I had begun to wonder if all on this world were cowardly weaklings..."

"A fight," I insisted, shifting into position.

But Rekegei shook his head, "I only fight those who have proven their strength. I will not waste my time on weaklings."

I grimaced at that statement but bit my tongue. Instead, I held up the four strands of beads that I'd already collected, "Does this prove my strength?"

Rekegei gave me a steady look for a moment and then burst out laughing. "You've bested four of my warriors... But you must best five before you prove yourself worthy."

"Fine then," I snapped in annoyance, gesturing to the fighter that was the closest to me, "Then I'll fight him..."

"I accept," the man quickly exclaimed, giving me a hard grin which suddenly made me wonder if I'd just made a big mistake.

The man that I had just challenged was about six feet tall, perhaps a little less. He had long red and gold streaked hair and wore a costume of red and yellow. And there was no doubt from the look of him that he was more than ready to fight.

"Very well," Rekegei exclaimed loudly enough so that everyone could hear it. "Chiagsu shall fight..." He paused to give me a questioning look.

"Kestra," I told him. "My name is Kestra."

"Chiagsu shall fight Kestra," Rekegei called out.

The various fighters didn't cheer, though they did start to talk loudly among themselves. Mostly they seemed to be trying to decide just how fast Chiagsu would kill me. Some were even offering bets, but I didn't hear anyone willing to bet on me winning the fight.

"Are you sure this is a good idea?" Nancy asked me, looking pretty worried.

"No," I told her truthfully, "But it's a little late now..."

"Good luck," Jake told me grimly.

With that, just about everyone started to move back again, to give me and Chaigsu room to fight. I just grimaced and braced myself, while Chiagsu reached behind him and pulled out a sword that I hadn't seen strapped anywhere to his back. It looked like he could do the whole summoning weapons thing too.

Chiagsu held his sword over his head in a dramatic pose, giving me a decent look at it. His sword seemed to be sort of like a katana, though not quite the same. It was more like a variation from the katana blade, with a golden wrapped hilt. And from the way he held it, I had no doubt that the man knew how to use it too.

"BEGIN!" Rekegei called out.

As soon as that single word had been spoken, Chiagsu was in motion. He came straight at me, swinging his sword with incredible speed. It was all that I could do just to block his attack. And as he kept coming, I was put in the defensive, a position that I really didn't like but seemed to be stuck with far too often.

Chiagsu and I went at it pretty intensely for several minutes, katana against katars, with both of us slashing and blocking at blinding speed. So far he had to have been my fastest opponent, and he seemed surprised that I was able to keep up with him.

But then Chiagsu decided to change the rules a little. He stepped back for just a moment, and his sword began to crackle with electricity. It seemed to run up and down the whole blade, making it look MUCH more dangerous. If that thing didn't cut me, it might very well electrocute me instead.

I wasn't about to risk that kind of thing so channeled some of my chi energy into my katars. Hopefully, having my own weapons powered up would act as insulation from any shocking surprise that he might intend. I could only hope.

"Taste my blade," Chiagsu commented, coming at me with his sword again.

He had obviously expected me to block the attack, and I didn't disappoint him. However, he was obviously surprised that I didn't get a shock out of his trick. I was just relieved that my own trick had worked. And as we continued swinging blades at each other, sparks flew with every block and contact of metal. But after just a minute, his sword had stopped sparking and glowing, while my own blades were quickly losing their energy as well. Soon we were back to just bare metal against bare metal.

After a few more minutes of this, with neither of us having any real advantage, Chiagsu decided to get tricky again. He jumped back and suddenly threw what seemed to be a small handful of lightning at me... As the ball lightning came at me, I was easily able to avoid it, though that nearly drove me right into his sword. He was moving fast and it was hard to dodge both his attack with the electricity and the follow up with the sword. He tried that once more though before switching tactics yet again.

This time Chiagsu made sure to get a good distance away from me, then he held is sword up over his head. Suddenly, lightning came out of nowhere and hit his sword, almost as if it were a lightning rod. Unfortunately, the lightning didn't seem content to remain in Chiagsu's sword because a moment later, it shot out of the sword and straight at me. I just barely managed to get out of the way before it burned a large section of the ground where I'd been standing.

"Man, what I wouldn't give for one of Pi's attacks," I muttered to myself, specifically thinking of that water blast thing that he did. Something like that might work great against an enemy who used electricity like this. However, I didn't have any kind of water attacks and would have to make due with what I did have.

I started charging straight for Chiagsu, determined to give him a bit of pain, but he raised his sword for another one of those lightning attacks that I assumed were his signature move. And the moment that he raised his sword, I saw my opening. The entire front of his body was open...so I threw a double handful of throwing blades right at his midsection.

Chiagsu quickly tried yanking his sword back down to block the throwing blades, but he only brought his sword back down in time to block a couple. At least three of my throwing blades had hit their mark and sunk into his flesh.

"AGH," Chiagsu yelled in pain, quickly trying to regain his defense though it was too late.

I came at Chiagsu with all of my katar skills at the ready. He tried to block and defend himself, but the injuries I had given him with my blades had done their job and were not only severely slowing him down, but were messing with his ability to properly move and stretch his body. It took me only several moves to get past his defenses, knock the katana right out of his hands and send a katar straight into his gut to win the fight.

Once Chiagsu was down and on the ground, I made a show of taking the string of beads from his belt and holding it up for Rekegei to see. I glanced back down to Chiagsu for just a moment, knowing that he was still alive, but that he wouldn't be in any condition to fight again for some time to come.

"Here's the fifth one," I told Rekegei, trying not to show him just how tired I was getting. "I believe that you owe me a fight..."

"Very well," Rekegei laughed, giving me the same kind of charming smile that he might if he'd asked me out on a date and was confident that I'd say yes. "You shall have it..." And with that, he began to move forward, his posture getting more dangerous and his expression more serious.

"WAIT," Nancy cried out, suddenly jumping between us and giving me a worried look.

Rekegei scowled, the darkness in his eyes seeming to get even darker for a moment. "What is the meaning of this?"

Nancy gulped, then quickly blurted out, "This isn't fair... She's just gone through five fights in a row and she's tired and injured."

"Nancy," I cautioned, giving a nervous glance to Rekegei and being afraid of what he might do to her if she interfered, "Vypra..."

But Nancy continued, getting just a bit more daring, "I thought you liked a challenge... How can she give her best fight if she's still worn out from these other five fights...?"

There was a moment of silence while Rekegei glared at her. Then he slowly nodded his head, "Very well." And with that charming grin of his, he looked to me and said, "You have two hours to rest. Then we fight." And with that, he turned and walked off, with most of his fighters going along with him.

I stood there for a moment, letting out a sigh of relief before finally turning to Nancy, "Thanks." Then I immediately followed that up with, "What did you think you were doing? He might have had his people kill you for getting involved. You know how important these jerks take personal fights..."

"Well I wasn't about to let you fight when you're so out of it," Nancy told me, "You wouldn't stand a chance..."

"You're right," I admitted.

I had been thinking the same thing myself. It was just like in those games... By the time I got to the main villain, I was too weak to last very long against him. If she hadn't interfered and given me more time, I was sure that I would have lost this one.

"Two hours," I sighed.

I had only two hours to recover from multiple scrapes, lacerations and severe bruising, not to mention the fact that I was completely drained. How in the world could I be expected to recover from my injuries and regain my strength with that short of an amount of time? How could I possibly get back to top fighting shape that quickly? It was impossible.

Then I grinned defiantly, "No problem..."

I took a long, slow, deep breath, clearing my mind of all thoughts just as Keiron had taught me. All that I was truly aware of was the flow of chi energy and that of the world around me. It was peaceful, allowing me to temporarily forget about Rekegei and the fight that would soon await me.

When I had finished with my meditation and opened my eyes a minute later, I felt utterly fantastic. I was calm, relaxed and not to mention completely healed. Even my energy had returned.

"I'm ready to fight," I smiled to myself, feeling much more confident now that I was back to top condition.

For most people, it would be nearly impossible to recover as completely as I had in such a short an amount of time. But unlike most people, I had an ace up my sleeve in the form of my second wind technique. As soon as Rekegei had given me my two hours to rest, I had used my second wind to take care of my energy level and physical injuries. And after two hours, as well as some meditation, my chi levels had been recharged as well.

Then I slowly looked around the hotel room that I was in and frowned slightly. After Rekegei had left, Nancy, Jake and I had gone straight into the nearest hotel casino and asked for a room. The people who had been hiding out inside had been rather reluctant, until they realized that we were fighting the invaders. After that, they had been more than cooperative.

"Where's Nancy?" I asked, only then realizing that both she and Jake were gone. I'd been lost in my meditation for awhile and hadn't noticed either of them leaving.

I looked at the clock and saw that I still had about twenty minutes, though that didn't make me worry any less about Nancy. Las Vegas was a very dangerous town at the moment. Rekegei's goons were running all over the place.

"Oh shit," I gasped, suddenly realizing where Nancy went.

I knew Nancy and I knew that she wanted to help me fight Rekegei. And since Rekegei would only accept fights from people who had beaten at least five of his warriors, she and Jake had probably both gone to earn a few more strings of beads.

"Damn," I grimaced, worried about Nancy and hoping that she was all right. Going through five fights one after another wasn't easy, and she didn't have my second wind technique to help her out either.

After a minute, I turned and went to the bed where Pi the Yellow Snow was spread out and asleep on top of it. At least he hadn't run off to get some more victories under his belt, but of course that would be difficult with one leg completely shattered and an arm that had a compound fracture.

Pi groaned and opened his eyes, giving me a steady look before smirking, "Looking hot babe..."

I grimaced, "Don't make me kick your ass again..."

But Pi just grinned, "Sounds like fun."

"You never learn," I scowled at him, finding it too hard to get mad at him when he'd been so badly injured.

"Don't worry about me," he told me, apparently guessing my thoughts. "We heal pretty fast anymore... I mean, give me a couple weeks at the most and I'll be up and dancing a jig..."

"Well," I grinned, "If you dance as bad as you fight, it's probably better that you stay in bed..."

Pi just laughed at that, then gave me a worried look. "Be careful," he warned me, "That Rekegei sounds like a real bad-ass."

"Thanks," I told him.

Just then, the door to the hotel room when flying open. I snapped around, instinctively snapping into a fighting position until I saw that it was Nancy and Jake. Then I started to relax until I realized that Nancy was injured and that she was leaning against Jake for support.

"Nancy," I gasped.

"I'm all right," she told me, letting go of Jake and limping a little as she made her way to sit down on a chair. "I just got into a couple fights..." And with that she held up a total of four strands of beads.

"And got hurt," I pointed out.

"A broken arm, sprained ankle and dislocated shoulder," Jake commented casually.

"I'll be all right," Nancy protested, looking embarrassed.

"Yeah," Jake nodded, "But you won't be fighting for awhile..."

"You sure you'll be all right?" I asked her.

Nancy just nodded, then told me, "I barely survived that last one." She cringed, then pleaded, "Please don't tell Tom about this... He was worried enough that I had to sneak out to come here..."

"What about you?" I asked Jake.

Jake was silent for a moment but held up five strands of beads. "I've got enough to fight Rekegei, but I don't know if I have the energy left..." He let out a long sigh, looking pretty tired and bruised himself. And I doubted that he'd be able to recover anywhere near as fast as I had.

"I think it's about time," Nancy said, pointing to the clock.

"Good luck," Pi told me from across the room. Then he added, "I think you're going to need it."

"Just great," I grimaced. Then I took a deep breath and promised, "I'm going to do my best."

I clenched my fists tightly, knowing that I would have to do better than my best. I was going to have to win. There were no ifs ands or buts. If I lost...I hated to think about what that would mean for the world.

"There is no try," I muttered, repeating the words of a famous green Muppet, "There is do...or do not." And I fully intended to 'do'.

After I had spent a moment gathering my strength, I left the room, only scarcely aware of the fact that Jake and Nancy were slowly following after me. I was too focused on what I was going to have to do...and what it would mean to not only me but everyone else if I failed.

"At least I have Jake as a backup," I reminded myself, knowing that he had his five beads so that if I lost, then he'd be able to challenge Rekegei as well.

When I got back out to the street, I was somewhat surprised to realize that everything had been cleared out of the way. All of the cars and all of the rubble had all been removed from the street. There was just a large empty clearing remaining, perfect for fighting.

The audience had already gathered and were surrounding the clearing. There were dozens of Rekegei's warriors there, possibly even all of them. And it was obvious that they were all waiting for the fight to begin.

"I bet people would pay to see this," I muttered, thinking about how famous Vegas was for hosting fights. I slowly looked around at the buildings around us, wondering how many people might be watching the show from their windows. However many there were, they were doubtlessly in for quite a show.

"They sure are scary looking," Nancy said as she came up beside me, leaning on Jake for support. She gestured him away and reminded him, "I am a happily married woman you know..."

"Take him down hard and fast," Jake told me, then stepped back so that he could watch the fight clearly without getting in the way. "And make sure that he doesn't get back up..."

"Good Luck," Nancy told me again.

Just then, Rekegei's warriors began to move aside. They made a path and their leader slowly came walking through. Rekegei flashed that charming grin of his, right before his expression hardened. He slowly looked around, his dark eyes locking on me with a powerful intensity.

I gulped and stepped forward into the ring, taking a deep breath and telling myself that I could do it. Somehow, I would do it.

Rekegei and I stood in the designated fighting area and just stared across at each other for nearly a minute. Neither of us said a word or made a move as we tried taking each other's measure. But when he began to smirk, I had a feeling that I had just been found wanting.

I just tightened my grip on my katars and said, "Come and get me..."

But to my surprise, Rekegei made no move to charge at me. Instead, he shifted his position into a casual stance and gestured for me to come to him.

"Go get him," Nancy called out to me.

I grimaced, then charged straight at Rekegei. I knew that this might not be the smartest thing to do, but I was getting impatient and someone had to do something if that fight was ever going to actually start. And as I got close to him, I leapt, my katars extended for a fast series of punches. But before I could connect, Rekegei's arm suddenly shot out. I barely saw him move, yet I felt myself get hit three times and thrown back.

"KESTRA!" Nancy screamed out from the side as I hit the ground hard.

As soon as I hit the ground though, I shifted position and quickly returned to my feet, just in time to play defense against Rekegei. He was coming straight at me, fast and furious. His fists launched out with blinding speed and incredible power. It was all that I could do to block his attacks, which didn't leave me much opportunity to go on the offensive.

I found my opportunity a few seconds later by leaning back from one of his punches, hitting the ground with my hands and rolling backwards. As soon as I sprang to my feet again, it was to launch a bunch of chi charged throwing blades right at him. Unfortunately, none of them got through his defenses.

"I am most disappointed," Rekegei said in a casual tone. "I had been hoping for a greater challenge..."

His comment made me grimace, but I wasn't going to give him the satisfaction of an answer. Or at least I wasn't going to give him a verbal answer. Instead, I crossed my katars, channeled my energy and released it as an energy blast that caught him straight in the middle of his chest. His clothes were burned and it was obvious that I did some damage, just not anywhere near as much as I would have liked.

"So you can attack," Rekegei commented grimly, glaring at me with those dark eyes of his.

"You bet your ass I can," I snarled, leaping straight at him with my katars at the ready.

Rekegei blocked one of my katars, but I was fast enough to get past his guard with the other, at least enough so that I could give him a nasty gash on his shoulder. However, he didn't seem all that bothered by such a small injury. Instead, he seemed almost amused.

A moment later, Rekegei held out one of his hands. There was a brief moment when I wondered what he was going to do before I noticed the fire which suddenly appeared in his palm. Rekegei was holding a ball of fire, though it was anything but ordinary fire as it was all black.

"Like antifire...or negative fire," I muttered, thinking of a film negative.

Rekegei remained where he was for a few seconds, apparently just to give me time to see his black fire and admire it a bit. He certainly did have a flair for the dramatic, which he demonstrated by suddenly throwing the ball at me. I'd been half expecting something like that so I'd thought to jump out of the way.

"Holy shit," I exclaimed as I looked behind me to where the ball of black fire had hit. There was a section of the street which now had a big hole melted in it, and a few flickers of the black fire still danced around it. "So that's why he's called the Black Flame..."

I stared at Rekegei, who just gave me that charming grin of his and seemed to think that I should be impressed. Of course, it didn't help my confidence any in that he was right and I was impressed. He'd just burned a nice sized hole in the ground and could easily have killed me if I hadn't been any faster.

Unfortunately, Rekegei decided to impress me some more because the black flame once again appeared in the palm of his hand. But what was worse was the fact that he had the same black flame in his other palm too. He suddenly clapped his hands together, and the flames in them seemed to merge and burst out, forming into a long whip made of the black fire.

"Not good," I muttered to myself.

There are times in life where being right about something is NOT a good thing. And unfortunately, this was one of those times. Rekegei snapped his black flame whip, and I just barely avoided being hit by it. The whip hit the ground behind me and burned a nice little trench in the concrete. And he was snapping the whip at me again.

I dodged around and avoided Rekegei's whip for the next minute or so, which was obviously beginning to annoy him. He would snap the whip at me and I'd jump to the side, avoiding any contact with it. I'd been a bit afraid of actually blocking his whip as I'd seen what it could do, but decided that it was time to shift back to a more offensive position. So when he snapped the whip at me again, I stood my ground and used my reflection technique, hoping and even praying that it would work.

"Yes," I grinned as the black flame snapped back at Rekegei and hit him square in the face.

His whole body seemed to burst into that black flame. But after a moment, I was stunned to realize that he didn't really seem bothered by it. The fire was going out from his body, except from where it continued to flicker in his hair, but he barely seemed to have been touched by it much less actually injured. In fact, the most that I seemed to have done with that move was to merely surprise him.

"Oh shit," I gulped, realizing that Rekegei must be immune from his own black flame. "Not good... Not good at all."

Just then, Jake suddenly came charging into the battle area, a glowing ball of blue chi energy held in his hands. And since he was going straight for Rekegei's back, it was obvious what he intended. Jake was taking advantage of Rekegei's distraction to finish him off.

Jake was just barely able to fire his chi blast before several attacks came bursting out of the sidelines. Within a moment, Jake had been hit by several chi blasts of various colors and styles, as well as some sort of energy arrow and a glowing red rope which tangled him up and dropped him right there on the spot.

"JAKE," I called out in horror, seeing that he was badly injured yet still alive.

I quickly looked over Rekegei's army on the sidelines and was relieved to see that they weren't in the middle of rushing the field. In fact, they were standing back which made me realize that they were only keeping Jake from rushing the field. These guys took personal combat VERY seriously, and he'd just broken one of their prime rules. Jake had just interfered in a fight between two individuals.

Rekegei staggered a bit after Jake's chi blast had hit him in the back, but he didn't go down and made no sign that he was about to. In fact, he seemed barely affected by that attack at all, though he did seem furious. He snapped around to face Jake, and without any hesitation lashed out with his black flame whip.

"JAKE," Nancy and I both screamed out at once, but it was too late. By the time that we'd been able to yell, Rekegei's black flame whip had already hit Jake and burned him in half. There was no doubt that our companion was dead.

I stared at what was left of Jake in horror, barely having known the man but feeling horrible that he'd died in such a fashion. I wanted to scream out, to demand to know why this had to happen to him. But the truth was that I already knew. Jake had been trying to stop Rekegei and save the Earth, the same as I was. He'd seen an opportunity and he had gone for it. There was little doubt in my mind that I would have done the same thing if our places had been reversed.

"My God," I whispered, fighting back the tears that threatened to come.

At the moment, I wasn't about to let myself cry. I wasn't about to let myself fear sadness or grief. Instead, I focused it all on rage and determination. How dare Rekegei and his people come to my world? How dare they kill countless innocent people? If the only thing that these guys respected was strength and personal combat, then by God I was going to give it to them.

I let out a scream, followed by a blast of chi energy which Rekegei only barely managed to block, and then even some of it got through his defenses and hurt him. And while he was dealing with that, I let loose with some chi augmented throwing blades, following that up with a direct charge straight at him. Rekegei was so overwhelmed by blocking one attack after another that I was able to break through his defenses and injure him with each.

Rekegei was definitely loosing his cool at this point and there was no sign of his charming grin. Instead, he only had a fierce grimace and a dark glare. I had finally gotten him to take me as a serious opponent.

"You will burn for that woman," Rekegei snarled, nearly spitting it out.

"You've already tried that," I taunted him, "And as I remember, you've got a horrible aim.."

I stuck my tongue out at Rekegei, just to piss him off a little more, then charged at him again, jumping to the side at the last minute to send a barrage of chi enhanced throwing blades instead. And while he was blocking those, I swung back and got him good in the side. Unfortunately he was fast enough to hit me at that point and send me fly.

"Ah shit," I grimaced as I got back to my feet, my whole side aching where he'd hit me. In fact, it hurt like hell and made it a little difficult to breath. I figured that if Rekegei hadn't cracked my ribs with that blow, he must have at least bruised them pretty good.

Rekegei winced and staggered a little from the injuries that I'd given him with the last attack. And a moment later, he gave me a steady look, one that meant business. And with that, he held out his hands, the black flame appearing in both of them. But the flame got bigger and darker than the previous times that he'd summoned it. There was a look of intense, absolute concentration on his face.

"I don't like the look of this," I muttered, glancing to Nancy and silently praying that she didn't try jumping in to help me. She had the look on her face that suggested that she was considering it. But to my relief, she glanced to what was left of Jake and gulped, deciding to remain where she was.

When I looked back to Rekegei, he was taking his two hands and bringing them together again, much like how he had when creating that black flame whip. But instead of a whip, Rekegei formed a large sphere of the black flame which was about the size of a beach ball. He held it in both hands and slowly raised it above his head. And suddenly, I really didn't like that look on his face.

"Why do I have a bad feeling about this?" I grimaced, bracing myself for just about anything.

However, I wasn't quite prepared for what Rekegei actually did with his ball of black flame. Instead of throwing it at me like I had expected, he just let go and dropped it to the ground.

The moment that Rekegei's flaming black ball hit the ground, it sort of exploded and black flames rushed out along the ground in a rapidly expanding circle. Rekegei stood in the middle of the growing circle of flame, completely unharmed, though everything else was burned and melted.

I managed to jump as high as I possibly could, just before the black flames reached me. However, there was nowhere to come down as everything within the circle was still burning. My heart raced and my eyes darted around for a way out, but there didn't seem to be any. In just a moment, I would land in the middle of the burning circle and die.

"Kestra," I heard Nancy call out with more than a bit of fear in her voice.

However, I wasn't about to give up just yet. I crossed my katars, channeled my energy through them and blasted the ground below me just as I was beginning to fall. The raw force from my own chi blast was enough to send me flying right back into the air, and with the angle I'd used, right towards Rekegei.

"Surprise!" I shouted as I landed right on Rekegei, driving my katars straight into his shoulders.

Rekegei howled in pain and dropped to his knees, knocking me off and onto the ground. Fortunately, the flames had already died out near the area where they'd started so I wasn't burned to a crisp when I hit. However, Rekegei immediately kicked me before I could get to my feet, so I went flying back again, this time with a crunching pain in my side.

"You vardech," Rekegei snarled furiously, "No one escapes my flame burst..."

It took me a moment to realize that he meant the flaming circle thing that I'd just escaped. "Sorry buddy, it looks like I just did..."

I smirked, feeling a bit pleased at myself for beating what was probably his signature move. However, I couldn't feel too enthusiastic about that as I hurt like hell. I had little doubt that this time I did have a broken rib or two.

Rekegei held his hand as though he were about to summon more of that black flame that he seemed so fond of. But this time there was only a faint flicker of fire in his palm, not nearly enough to form one of those fireballs that he threw earlier. He scowled in annoyance, making me realize that he was out of chi energy.

"That big one used it all," I whispered in relief.

I was realistic enough to realize that I didn't really have any major advantage over Rekegei at the moment. He might be injured and out of chi energy, but I was pretty wiped out myself and didn't have a whole lot of chi energy left either.

"I'd better make it count," I grimaced, deciding that it was time to use the ace up my sleeve. "Get ready for a second wind..."

With that, I took a deep breath and used my second wind technique. I felt what was left of my chi energy flooding through my body, repairing my injuries and restoring my energy. A moment later, I was back at peak condition though I decided not to let Rekegei know that. Instead, I stood up and limped and doing my best to look as though I were still injured and exhausted.

Rekegei smirked down at me, looking absolutely confident in his coming victory. I just staggered a little, glaring at him defiantly. And when he came charging at me, I quickly snapped into motion, blocking his punch with one katar while slamming his side with my other one. He backhanded me in retaliation, but I turned just enough to avoid most of the impact from the blow.

After this, Rekegei and I slowly circled each other for half a minute before going at it again. This time there were no fancy tricks or chi moves, only our own physical abilities. We launched into a long series of rapid fire punches and kicks that would have been hard for even most trained martial artists to keep track of. It was just my katars against his fists, and I was under no illusion that my having weapons gave me an advantage.

Ten minutes after Rekegei and I had begun our brutal face to face assault on each other, we were both getting tired and injured. He had taken more than a few nicks, cuts and bruises, while making sure that I got my share of damage as well. I was bruised all over from Rekegei's ferocious attacks, and that was after I'd managed to block, deflect or straight out avoid the worst of it.

Finally Rekegei and I pulled back from each other and began circling again. We were both looking for some weakness in the other's defense and trying to come up with some strategy to win. It was obvious to both of us that this fight couldn't go on for much longer so we were both looking for anything that would tip it to our advantage.

I took advantage of the brief opportunity to look around me and scan the sidelines. To my surprise, Rekegei's soldiers were watching me with expressions of respect. I guess I must have earned quite a bit of it in their eyes since I'd been able to keep up with their leader for so long. And since I was paying attention, I could actually hear a couple of them putting bets on me.

But then I overheard a couple of guys talking about how I might make a good mother for their children and I cringed. That was the last thing I wanted to hear.

I quickly returned my full attention to Rekegei, knowing that I couldn't let myself get distracted like that. I couldn't give him that kind of an opportunity.

"I could use a third wind about now," I muttered, wishing that I had the chi energy for something like that.

Then I froze, smiling slightly as I realized something. Ever since I had gone through that training with Keiron, my ability to regenerate my chi had increased quite a bit. In fact, I had already built back a small amount of chi. I didn't have enough for a chi blast or any of my fancier tricks, but it just might be enough...

"You are a skilled warrior," Rekegei suddenly exclaimed, giving me that charming grin of his though it seemed a bit forced. "If you should survive this battle, I would like you to join my warriors..."

"I don't think so," I responded, not about to let down my guard for a moment.

Rekegei just shrugged, "It is unfortunate then that you challenged me, for I shall regret having to kill one who has provided me a challenge..."

Suddenly Rekegei came charging at me, though I had been expecting this. After those last statements he had made, I figured that he intended this to be the attack that finished me. And from the dark look in his eyes, I had knew that I didn't dare let him get his hands on me.

When Rekegei got close enough to me, I made my move. I threw a hand full of throwing blades straight for his face. And when he went to block those ones, I charged my katar with every bit of chi energy that I had left...and drove it straight into his chest. It hit dead center and sank all the way to the hilt, causing Rekegei to stagger back a bit.

"Gotcha," I grimaced, knowing that the fight was over.

However, Rekegei proved me wrong by grimacing, spitting up some blood and then coming at me again. This time his charge was slow, but there was a lot of purpose in it. His eyes burned with an intensity that I'd never seen before. There was a fierce determination in his face and I suddenly realized that he intended to kill me with his final breath.

Rekegei was severely injured, and very likely mortally wounded, but that didn't seem to slow him down much once he'd made up his mind. Before I had realized it, he was right in front of me, throwing a punch at my face. And when I went to block it, he snatched my wrist, twisting my arm and causing me to scream in pain.

"My arm," I screamed out, sure that he'd dislocated it. It felt as though he were going to tear my arm right out of my shoulder.

But this wasn't enough for Rekegei who held his other hand out. A small black flame appeared in his palm, which apparently took just about all of his effort. It didn't look as large or as powerful as his previous attempts to summon the black fire, but I knew that at this range it wouldn't have to be. At this range, even the small fireball would be completely lethal.

"KESTRA," Nancy screamed out, rushing out onto the field to help me. I don't think she'd even considered what would happen to her if she interfered.

"Stay back!" I yelled back, not taking my eyes away from Rekegei for a moment.

Rekegei didn't say a word, though it looked as though he was attempting to. He opened his mouth though all that came out of it was a bit of blood which ran down his chin. He glared at me and made the move to slam the ball of black fire right into my chest.

I reacted out of desperation and instinct more than any carefully crafted plan, and reached behind me with my free hand to summon the katar that I had thrown at Rekegei. It appeared in my hand when I called for it, much to my relief, apparently having returned to whatever limbo it came from after I'd thrown it at Rekegei.

An instant later, I punched at Rekegei with a powerful uppercut that drove my katar straight in under his jaw and right into his brain. Rekegei immediately froze and a blank look appeared on his face. His eyes, which had been previous dark and vicious now appeared as flat and meaningless as a couple of marbles. Even the black flame which had been burning in his hand went out. And as a demonstration, Rekegei collapsed to ground as limply as a rag doll.

The crowd of Rekegei's warriors which had been surrounding us and watching the fight suddenly burst into a roar of noise. I couldn't even make out what they were all saying, nor did I really want to. At the moment, it was about all that I could do to just remain on my feet.

"I could definitely use another second wind," I sighed.

"Are you all right?" Nancy asked, suddenly appearing by my side. She put her arm out and helped support me, which I thought was ironic since she was the one with the broken arm and badly sprained ankle. "I can't believe that..."

"Yeah," I grinned at her, "We did it..."

Suddenly I realized that Rekegei's warriors were no longer just standing back and giving us a lot of space. Now that I'd just killed Rekegei, they were all closing in, giving me some pretty intense looks.

"Uh oh," I gulped, realizing that with Rekegei gone we would still have to deal with these guys.

I grimaced as I stood over Rekegei's fallen body, barely able to stand as I did so. I had finally taken him out, though it had taken nearly everything that I had. And unfortunately, it didn't look as though my fighting was over as I still had to deal with his army.

"I thought that Keiron told you that all we had to do is beat Rekegei," Nancy grimaced, letting go of me and reaching for her swords.

"That's what he told me," I protested, looking around me and getting ready to fight. I knew that I wasn't going to be able to beat all of them, or even a fraction of them. There were far too many of them for me to even take on one at a time.

"You beat Rekegei," one man said as he stopped in front of me.

He was large, close to seven feet tall and covered with leather armor. A huge broadsword was strapped to his back though he made no move to draw it or even attack me. Instead, he just stood there, looking down on me with a fierce expression.

"It was a fair fight," I pointed out, clutching both of my katars and bracing myself to use them again if I had to. "It was one on one..."

"You beat Rekegei in personal combat," a tall woman with a purple Mohawk stated.

"You have proven yourself a great champion of your people," the seven foot tall man said, giving a faint nod.

"She beat Rekegei in personal combat," the woman with the Mohawk yelled out for everyone to hear.

There was a loud burst of noise at that, but the large man in front of me held out his hand and suddenly it all died down. He and the woman with the Mohawk stared at each other, then at me.

Finally, the large man growled. "You beat our leader in personal combat... By our rules, that makes you our new leader..."

"What?" I blinked in surprise.

Nancy stared at him for a moment, then at me. "You've got to be kidding."

"You command," the woman told me, "and we obey."

"Until someone challenges you," Nancy pointed out, "Then they become the new leader...."

"Oh," I groaned, not sure that I liked the sound of all this. I wanted to stop this army from attacking Earth, not take it over.

But as I thought about it, I suddenly realized that this was exactly what Keiron had intended when he told me that we had to beat Rekegei. As long as Rekegei was in charge, he'd lead them from one world to another, attacking place after place. In order to stop the warriors, someone would have to take control of them. I would have to take control of them. And the only way to do that was to beat Rekegei.

I stood there for a moment, staring at the large man and the woman. Then I took a deep breath, trying to remain calm and think things through.

"So I'm your new leader?" I asked slowly, wanting to make sure that I understood it all correctly. "And you have to do whatever I tell you to do?"

"Such is our way," the woman pointed out with a nod.

I could tell that these warriors were all pretty surprised that anyone who was not one of their own had been able to beat Rekegei. And I had little doubt that it wouldn't be long before one of them got the bright idea to take leadership of their group back away from me, which could only mean my death in personal combat. That just wasn't going to cut it.

"I have just two orders for you," I said. Then I frowned and repeated it, yelling it louder, "I have only two orders for you all!"

"And these orders are?" the woman asked casually.

"The first," I responded grimly, "is to leave this world... I want you all gone!" I slowly looked around to make sure that they all saw how serious I was, "I want you all to go back to your own world."

"And the other?" the big man scowled.

I stared up at him for a moment before announcing, "I want you all to stay there."

A loud murmur started up from Rekegei's warriors. I couldn't quite make out what any of them were saying, but it was obvious that a lot of them were unhappy with my decision.

"I want you all to go home and stay there," I ordered. "It's not right to go from world to world causing this kind of destruction. In fact," decided to hit them where it hurt, "those are the acts of cowards."

The crowd suddenly erupted into even more noise, though I just stood there and glared around. I was pretty unhappy with these guys and was more than willing to let them know.

"Only cowards attack those weaker than them," I growled, gesturing to the buildings which surrounded us, "How many innocent people have you all killed, just because you could? If you want to fight, you can damn well fight each other instead, because I don't want you doing this to other worlds again..."

"You might have gone a little far," Nancy warned me.

After a moment, the woman with the Mohawk took a step towards me, giving me an intense look as she did so. For a brief instant, I was sure that she was going to attack me for daring to call her and her people cowards.

But to my surprise, the woman simply stated, "I have long desired to see my family again."

"I haven't seen my sons in years," the seven foot tall man added.

"My wife...," another man said from the side.

"My oldest boy should be of age to choose a school," the seven foot tall man grinned with a sudden expression of great pride. "And I can begin instructing my youngest..."

Within moments, a large number of the warriors were nodding their heads and making similar comments. And when I looked at them, there were a lot of looks of homesickness.

"That's unexpected," Nancy commented with a look of disbelief.

I just nodded, knowing exactly how she felt. I had expected them all to fight and argue about going back to their home, not stand around and look homesick.

It was about this time that a man stepped forward with a strange looking crystal ball in his h ands. The crystal ball was glowing and looked as though it had a rainbow trapped within. And as he came forward, the other warriors stepped out of his way, giving him a clear path.

Mohawk gave me a steady look before saying, "I assume that you would choose to remain in this world..."

"You'd assume right," I told her.

"That is a pity," the large man beside her commented. "You are a great warrior... I am disappointed that I shall not be able to challenge you myself some day."

"We all have to live with disappointments," I told him, giving a forced smile. I was just glad that he didn't seem interested in challenging me right then and there. But there was probably some kind of rule against challenging someone right after a huge fight like that.

I turned to look at the man with the crystal ball and watched as he lifted it above his head. The crystal glowed brighter and suddenly the rainbow that had been contained within burst free and escaped. It swirled all over the place, with every color there was swirling and mixing. Then the colors finally pulled themselves back together, forming into the shape of a large circle in the air.

"It's like something out of Stargate," I exclaimed, thinking of one of my favorite shows.

Since the gate between worlds was now open, the warriors wasted little time before going through it. Each of them paused to bow in my direction before going through and vanishing. After just a couple of minutes, only a few of the warriors remained, and even they were soon to be gone.

"You are a great champion," Mohawk commented, giving a bow before she too rushed through the glowing circle and disappeared.

"I wish you good fortune and good fighting," the large man told me just before he stepped through the circle as well.

Finally, all of Rekegei's warriors were gone except one. The only one who remained was the man who held the crystal ball above his head. Then even he bowed to me before silently walking through the gate, which suddenly snapped shut and vanished behind him.

"They're gone," Nancy whispered, staring around the empty city streets. There was a whole world of relief in her voice as she exclaimed, "It's over..."

I just nodded at that, "Finally..." Then I let out a long sigh of relief and told her, "Now I just want to go to bed..."

"Right this way," Nancy told me, gesturing to the hotel where we'd stayed during our two hour rest.

We walked right past Jake, or at least what was left of him. I tried not to look at Jake's body, feeling a surge of guilt because he had died while trying to help me. He had died because I hadn't been able to beat Rekegei soon enough.

"Poor Jake," I whispered, "We need to make sure he gets a good burial..."

Nancy nodded, "He deserves it."

After a minute of silence, Nancy and I went back inside of the building. The people who had been hiding inside immediately began to scatter, though a few who recognized us from earlier remained behind. They gave us odd looks.

"You don't have to worry about those guys," Nancy called out, then gestured to me, "She kicked their leaders ass so they've all left."

"What?" one guy who was a manager of the hotel gasped.

I just nodded, "Yeah... They're gone and they won't be back. It's safe again."

The manager, as well as everyone else within hearing gasped and rushed to the doors to look outside. And as soon as they saw that it was clear with no sign of those warriors anywhere in sight, they began talking excitedly. I barely paid any attention to this though as I continued towards my room.

"At least the lights and power are back on now," Nancy commented, making me realize for the first time that everything was back up and working. "That'll make things a bit easier..."

Once we were back in the room, Nancy checked on Pi who was excited to hear that the fighting was done and over. I just collapsed into a chair, wishing that I had enough chi for another second wind. That would certainly make it much easier to recover.

"They're gone?" Pi gasped out after Nancy had explained about my victory, "All right..."

"For good," Nancy grinned.

Suddenly, someone was knocking on the door. "All right," Pi exclaimed, "It's room service..."

Nancy and I both glared at Pi before she quickly went to open the door. To my surprise, Keiron was the one standing there. He didn't say a word as he came in, then slowly looked around the room.

"I see that you have succeeded," Keiron said, bowing towards me, "You have my congratulations."

"Thanks," I told him.

"So you're the one who did this to me...to us," Nancy exclaimed, giving Keiron a steady glare.

"That I am," Keiron nodded.

Nancy glared at him for a moment more before asking, "Now that Rekegei is gone, can you change us back?"

"I fear that this is not an option," Keiron shrugged, not looking at all sorry. "I did that which was necessary to create champions for your world... Those forms, as well as the skills and powers which come with them are yours to keep for the rest of your lives."

"Just great," Nancy groaned, not looking too disappointed.

"Do you think that there's any chance they'll be coming back?" I asked Keiron. "I told them to go home, but what if...?"

Keiron was silent for a moment before slowly saying, "I can not say with certainty that they will never leave their own world again. But I am confident that they will not return to their old ways. Without Rekegei to lead them to other worlds..."

"And what about you?" I asked. "What are you going to do now?"

There was a moment of silence before Keiron slowly responded, "I will return to my own world." His expression turned quite sad. "When Rekegei killed my son, I was left with a grandson to help raise... And now that Rekegei has been dealt with, I can face him with a clear conscience."

"Wow," I whispered, having heard about how his son had died due to Rekegei, but I'd never heard anything about a grandson. "I didn't know..."

Keiron only nodded, then gave a weak smile. "I am eager to return home, and to have my brethren recalled from their missions as well."

"So you're leaving, eh?" Pi exclaimed as he sat up on the side of the bed, wincing a bit as he did so.

"I guess we should thank you for helping us fight Rekegei," Nancy admitted, though Keiron only shrugged.

"Thanks," I told him simply.

I didn't specify whether I was thanking Keiron for giving me the form and power of a champion, giving me the training which I used in my fight against Rekegei...or for giving me a whole new life with a thousand new opportunities. Nor did I see any reason to specify as I meant all of those and more. Without Keiron, Rekegei would have been running over our world with no one to stop him.

Keiron stared at me for a moment and smiled. "You have done your world proud. You have done me proud. You truly are the kombat champion." And then he gave me a deep bow  before adding, "Farewell and good fortune..."

A moment later, Keiron turned and walked out of the hotel door. All three of us watched him closely and I felt a bit sad that he was going to leave.

"Goodbye," I called after him. "And good luck..."

Pi just sat there with a grin, waving to Keiron and calling out, "So long and thanks for all the fish."

I glared at Pi, annoyed at his being a smart-ass at that moment, but when I looked back to Keiron he was gone. The man who had created Kombat Champions and created the champions to save our world from Rekegei was gone.

"So what now?" Nancy asked.

I hesitated a moment, then sighed, "We rest and recover. And then... Then we go one with our lives."

I let out a faint sigh as I slowly walked down the street, barely paying any attention to my surroundings. Instead, my thoughts were a million miles away. Well, Las Vegas might not technically be that far away, but sometimes it seemed like it.

It had been four months since the big battle in Las Vegas, and I still kept thinking about it nearly every day. Fortunately though, the whole story wasn't in the news all of the time anymore.

Right after the whole thing had happened, the news had kept going on about some sort of electro-magnetic pulse or at least some form of electro-magnetic interference which had temporarily wiped out power in Vegas. Never mind the fact that all cars and every other form of modern technology besides electronics had gone dead as well.

At the same time, there were some people in the government and news who were claiming that the 'terrorists' responsible had also let loose some sort of hallucinogenic gas which made everyone see people in strange costumes fighting out in the street. That was a nice and convenient way to explain away the witnesses who'd seen people shooting energy beams and the like from their hands.

"Worse than the costume theory," I muttered, thinking about how some people thought that the costumed fighters were just people from some sort of fantasy convention that had come out and been mistaken for other things.

And of course, there were more than a few people yelling out the magic word of 'conspiracy'. They were claiming that the whole thing was result of some Top Secret government weapon having accidentally gone off from Nellis Air Force Base and having caused the whole mess.

"So much bullshit," I thought aloud, knowing that there were a thousand theories, with only one or two of them even coming close to the truth.

Then again, I don't really care what other people thought about what happened in Las Vegas. I didn't care if people never found out about how I'd fought Rekegei and saved the world. In fact, I preferred that they didn't.

However, there were a few stories floating around about me. There was talk that a blue haired woman had fought the leader of the warriors and chased them all away. Fortunately, most people didn't believe those stories, and few who did thought to connect them to me. After all, how difficult was it to dye your hair blue?

Chase Maxwell and several other people I worked with had been giving me odd looks now and then since the whole incident, though none of them had come right out and said anything. I think that Chase at least suspected something but had decided that he didn't really want to know. And for this, I was quite thankful as I didn't want to give any more explanations.

But as for myself, I had been keeping pretty busy since the fight in Las Vegas. I had been working pretty hard over the last two months on Chase Maxwell's latest movie and we were halfway through filming. It was great, and exciting to be the star of a movie.

And then to make the movie even more exciting, it wasn't going to be direct to video anymore. After what had happened in Vegas, interest in martial arts and fighting stories had increased and Chase got a lot more money for the movie. In fact, our budget had more than doubled, so for once Chase was going to make a movie for the big screen...with me as the star.

"I can't wait to see it," I grinned, hardly able to believe that I was going to be in a movie that was in the theaters. "I can't wait to see that last one with Tyler either..." But the movie that I had already made with Tyler Reese wouldn't be out on video for at least a few more months.

At the moment though, I wasn't thinking of work so much as some personal business that I needed to attend to. That was why I was currently walking down the sidewalk, on my way to take care of my little errand.

I had to admit though that I probably wasn't dressed the most appropriately for what I had to do, but it was what I felt like wearing. My long blue hair was flowing free rather than being kept in the pony tail that I usually wore. Add that to the fact that I had on a nice blue dress and a pair of stiletto heeled shoes and I made quite an impression. Guys were staring at me quite a bit, and though they did nothing for me, I still found the attention to be rather amusing.

"I've been wearing grungy clothes and dressing like some kind of warrior all week," I told myself defensively, thinking about all of the tough rebel leader scenes that I'd been filming for the last couple of weeks. "I deserve a chance to dress sexy now and then too..."

Of course, wearing sexy clothes was one of the things that I'd come to enjoy about my new body and life.  But there were so may other things as well, and far too many to possibly count.

When I arrived at my destination a minute later, I paused, all thoughts of my clothes, the admiring looks I was getting and even about my busy movie schedule all flew from my mind. Instead, I grew quite serious and braced myself for anything that might occur. I only vaguely wished that that I'd dressed a little more sensibly before I finally went in.

I stepped into an office and stared at Beauchamp Meeks, who sat behind the desk. The woman who always seemed to accompany him was behind him while two of his fighters stood to the side, looking pretty tough, though I knew that neither of them would be any problem for me. Then again, since I was wearing a dress and high heels, I wouldn't be at my best.

"Mr. Meeks," I nodded to him.

"You said that you had something that you wished to discuss with me," he responded in a fairly pleasant tone.

I just nodded, silently reminding myself that this man was connected with a few illegal dealings besides just the underground fights. There was no telling what he might do if I got him angry.

"I've decided not fight anymore," I told him, "At least not in any of these arenas..."

Mr. Meeks suddenly sat up a bit more straight and gave me an intense look. "And might I ask why? Your fighting has made me a good deal of money, and I believe that you can say the same..."

"I can," I admitted, "But I've decided that it's time to move on to other things. I've enjoyed the chance to fight here, but now I need to leave..."

For a moment, Meeks only stared at me with a deep scowl. I knew that he'd made quite a lot of money from my fights, so he couldn't be at all happy with my decision to leave. I braced myself for what might come next, knowing that he might very well try to stop me.

"I'm sorry to hear that," Mr. Meeks frowned, "I wish you well in your other endeavors..."

I blinked in surprise, a little startled at his comment. "That's it?"

Mr. Meeks nodded. "I won't lie and say that I am happy about your decision. You have made me a great deal of money and would continue to make me money as long as you fought." Then he paused for a moment, leaning back and rubbing his chin. "I could force you to continue fighting in the ring... I doubt that physical threats would work, but I could always use what I know of where you acquired your birth certificate and legal standing..."

"Oh," I gulped, never having considered that he might try blackmailing me. I had thought that he might try some sort of strong-arm tactics, or try having his fighters stop me directly. But if he told people about my birth certificate being a phony... Well, I knew that I'd been in deep shit and without any legal standing again.

But to my surprise, Meeks just shrugged. "However, I am wise enough to quit while I am ahead. You could undoubtedly make me more money, but I suspect that in the long run it would not be to my best interests and that I would lose money..." He gave me a gentle smile before adding, "I believe that my best course is to accept that I have already made a great deal and to let our dealings end on a pleasant note."

"Thank you," I told him, letting out a sigh of relief.

"Your records are good ones," he told me with a pleasant nod. "They will bear up to most scrutiny, and I assure you that I have no intention of ever recommending that anyone take a closer look."

"Thanks again," I responded.

Mr. Meeks stood up at that and offered his hand, "I wish you luck. And if you are ever interested in returning to the ring..."

"I'll come to you for sponsorship," I assured him with a smile, taking his hand and shaking it.

I turned and left the office a minute later, feeling much more relieved that this whole thing was taken care of. I was no longer in the underground fighting business. Sure, it had made me a good deal of money while I'd been going, but now that I had some legal standing and was involved in making movies, I figured that I had better straighten my act out all the way and go legitimate.

"There's always the Ultimate Fighting Championships," I reminded myself, knowing that I wasn't out of fighting for good. There were still plenty of places that I could go legally, though I knew that none of them would provide me with any challenge. In fact, the only real challenge I had was when I sparred with Nancy. "She's going to be glad that there wasn't any trouble...."

Nancy had suggested going with me when I quit, but I had turned her down, telling her that I could take care of it on my own. I was glad that everything had worked out all right or I might have had to listen to an 'I told you so' or two. That definitely wouldn't be pleasant.

Of course, Nancy had been pretty happy to stay at home with Tom. He'd had a bit of a hard time accepting that Nancy could kick his ass without any effort, but she hadn't shown off much and was working hard to help him accept the new her. And it was undoubtedly working very well as they both seemed deliriously happy.

"I can't wait to get home," I grinned, my thoughts suddenly turning to my own lover Tina.

Tina and I had gotten even closer over the months, surprising me at times by just how close we had become. It was hot and passionate sex, as well as so much more. Sometimes it seemed strange being in a lesbian relationship, though most of the time in only seemed wonderful. In fact, I had finally moved out of Tom and Nancy's place, and had gotten a place together with Tina.

One of the first things that I'd done after moving into the large apartment with Tina was to buy a new computer and entertainment center which were even bigger and better than the ones that I'd lost. But the irony was that I wasn't all that interested in watching movies or playing video games anymore. How can those things possibly compare to all of the excitement that I get every day in my own real life?

"What game could compare to her?" I asked myself with a dreamy smile, eager to return home and into her waiting arms.

I sighed faintly as I thought about my beautiful Tina and what we would do once I got back. But even though the two of us had become so extremely close, I still hadn't told her about who I had been before my transformation. I still hadn't told her that I was a guy named Craig Belmond, nor did I ever really intend to.

"Craig is gone," I told myself aloud, knowing that it was true.

The person that I had been before my transformation was long gone and would never return. I wouldn't return to being Craig even if I could. I had changed far too much for that, and not just physically. There were times when I could barely even remember what it was like to be that person. That life was in the past and I preferred to live the one that I had in front of me.

"Who I was before is irrelevant," I whispered with a smile, "All that matters is who I am now..."

It had been hard to accept at first, but I knew who I was. My drivers license said that I was Karen Tracy Roads, though I knew that I was MUCH more. I was a movie star, a fighter, a lover and a friend. But more than that, I was Kestra the Jagged Wind...and the Kombat Champion. And the truth was...I wouldn't have it any other way.

 

THE END