Hitman VIII: Codebreaker

[Sybre]

Thanks for being patient. Scene may actually come tomorrow due to an unprecedented homework overflow (and the fact that I miswrote some things in the scene and need to redo them).

Hey, we get it! Don't worry about us!

[Makuta of Time]

I'm always patient with anyone. Just don't rush your work or you'll get a bad grade.

[Chro]

Thank you for waiting. Due to the nature of the game twist, this was more labor-intensive than a normal scene to write, and the next rounds will almost definitely be similar.

Round One: First Blood

Location: "Downtown" Odina

From his tower window, the Shadowed One looked out over the island and grinned. The challenge was about to begin, and his employees would prove their worth.

As these thoughts ran through his head, one of his agents prowled through the streets below. This Hunter was known as Tyrant. He had a reputation for rage, and if there had been anybody non-hostile to observe him on this night they certainly would've noted that this hype was accurate. For no real reason Tyrant fumed and smacked rocks out of the street with a sledgehammer as he went, grumbling over his own lack of success insofar.

Unfortunately for Tyrant, his luck was not about to change. None other than Darkness lurked in the shadows of the street, waiting for his chance to strike with a newly-acquired flamethrower. There had been a sale. Everyone was picking one up.

As Darkness waited, Minion stomped down the road, making quite a ruckus. Tyrant stopped, seeing the behemoth in the street, and prepared to fight him.

Seeing that his opponents were mutually distracted, Darkness elected to act, and act fast - and so he did, launching forwards from the shadows, sending a burst of flame towards Tyrant with his weapon. The red-armored Hunter rolled backwards and out of the way, grinning to see that Darkness had failed. So confident was he that he somehow managed to forget that Minion was behind him. It turned out to be a fatal error, as a huge blade sundered his right half from his left. The sledgehammer he'd held rolled off into the gutter.

Darkness beat a hasty retreat, knowing that Minion would be unlikely to be able to hit him from a distance with solely a knife. As he fled Darkness heard from behind him a screech of pain, as Minion was felled by an unexpected blast of fire from the swiftly-appearing Guardian.

Distracted by the chaos, Darkness ran headlong into the waiting Eliminator, and fell back stunned. Eliminator swiftly picked up Darkness' flamethrower from where it had fallen, and walked towards him menacingly.

Over his enemy's shoulder, the shadowy Hunter spied Silence hiding in a window. Just as Eliminator activated the flamethrower to torch Darkness, Silence fired a poisoned blowdart into the attacker's neck. It found its mark, and as Darkness burned, Eliminator fell over onto his body, resulting in a pile of charred Dark Hunter.

Finding himself to be the only survivor of the encounter, Silence swung down from his post at the window, just as Phantom's bomb exploded behind him. Phantom himself was nowhere to be seen, and Silence turned his attention back to the scene in front of him as he landed near the bodies. As he approached to loot the corpses, a single shot rang out, and Silence fell - victim of Lurker's expert aim. He stumbled and fell into the gutter, consolidating the kill by hitting his head on Tyrant's discarded sledgehammer.

Mimic, true to his name, decided to imitate Eliminator. He walked out into the clearing, picked up the fallen flamethrower, and further burned Darkness' body. Surprisingly enough, nobody showed up to kill him - not even Lurker, who had left to buy more ammunition.

Elsewhere, Guardian had returned to his hideout after destroying Minion. He was feeling hungry from the combat, so he went to get a pair of false teeth from his cabinet, because without them he couldn't chew his food, or something like that. Little did he know that the wily Conjurer had filled his dentures with Ancient's Patented Exploding Denture Cream Plus. It didn't end well for Guardian - with a boom, his head exploded, and his body fell out the window into the road.

Conjurer watched the body fall past and pumped his fist in joy. As he did so, Gatherer stabbed him in the back using a syringe filled with poison. Gatherer wasn't such a great chemist, though, so it didn't have much effect aside from making Conjurer sort of sleepy. He drowsily stumbled away to collapse for a nap, barely avoiding setting off Charger's landmine. (Fortunately for Conjurer it had been hastily set, as earlier in the day Charger had left the scene to avoid being poisoned by Silence.)

Nearby, Gatherer was crying. Yup. Wasn't too happy with his failed poisoning attempt, I guess.

Vanisher wasn't feeling very sympathetic. Standing on a nearby rooftop, he decided to cap off the night's killings with a special move.

Carefully aligning his trajectory, he backed up. With a yell, the stealthy Hunter sprinted forwards, leaping forwards off the very edge of the roof, launching downwards towards Gatherer.

Mimic, Dweller, Lurker, Primal, Charger, and Phantom looked on as Vanisher shot through the air over the street, leg outstretched, wreathed in flame.

Gatherer didn't stand a chance. His head was actually incinerated by the impact.

Round One Summary

Deaths

Minion killed Tyrant (Voltex)

Guardian killed Minion (ShadowVezon)

Conjurer killed Guardian (Norik)

Eliminator killed Darkness (Pulse)

Silence killed Eliminator (Burnmad)

Lurker killed Silence (Sybre)

Vanisher killed Gatherer (Kopekemaster)

Survivors

Codenames:

Mimic

Lurker

Primal

Dweller

Phantom

Vanisher

Charger

Conjurer

Usernames:

JiMing

Ehks

LOTR Nui

Lhikevikk

Voxumo

Blade

Axilus

Flaredrick

Edited May 26, 2014 by Chro

[Ehksidian]

That was amazing

[Chro]

Worth the wait, then?

[Kopekemaster]

Ha! I made it to Round One. I may be out for now but I'll be back you pesky matoran.

 

erm, dark hunters

 

But wow what a way to go out. My tears, ere they even fell to the ground, splattering, were turned to steam in the flame surrounding my wretched body. Pity me, fellows, pity me.

Edited May 22, 2014 by Kopekemaster

[Ehksidian]

hey

i survived

i just realized that

[Chro]

Ha! I made it to Round One. I may be out for now but I'll be back you pesky matoran.

erm, dark hunters

But wow what a way to go out. My tears, ere they even fell to the ground, splattering, were turned to steam in the flame surrounding my wretched body. Pity me, fellows, pity me.

It was specifically requested by Vanisher that you be killed not with a normal flamethrower, but with some sort of fiery divekick. Not sure I made it as epic as possible, but I was tired of writing by that point in the scene, and I think it was at least pretty interesting.

 

hey

i survived

i just realized that

That's the great thing about the codename system. I bet people would've wanted to target you directly, but they couldn't without knowing your codename.

Edited May 22, 2014 by Chro

[JiMing]

Well, that was quite the outstanding scene. I felt as though my patience was being tested, but then you release this masterpiece.

 

And a question you are probably asking yourselves... Did I succeed this night?

You'll all see at a later point.... (though it's quite clear I survived at the very least)

Edited May 22, 2014 by Edea Lee

[Kopekemaster]

wow

 

pile of charred Dark Hunter

And this XD Edited May 22, 2014 by Kopekemaster

[Voltex]

SV, I am developing a dislike for you akin to what I held for Shadowhawk before XIII in mafia

 

But thank you norik for avenging me

[Chro]

Remember, unless ShadowVezon was knowledgeable of your codename, he could not have deliberately targeted you with the intent of killing, well, you. For all he knew Tyrant could've been Sybre, Ehks, etc.

[Burnmad]

Hahaha, Pulse. >=D

 

-

[Voltex]

There are coincidental recurring occurrences of targeting, there are purposeful ones.

[Chro]

So you're saying that he knew your codename?

I think I'm missing something...

 

 

Oh, also this.

 

Reminder: If you are still alive and have not sent in your round 2 kill choice, please do not forget to do so! If I receive no PM from you by 7:00 PM EST on May 23rd, you will take no action in the round.

Edited May 22, 2014 by Chro

[ShadowVezon]

I had no knowledge of your codename, Voltex. I had completely different reasoning for attacking Tyrant. Also, by Knife I meant a back-stab, but whatever.

[Chro]

In Bionicle canon, Minion is a freakin' titan compared to many Dark Hunters, Tyrant especially... so I decided to do something a bit more massive.

[Ehksidian]

In Bionicle canon, Minion is a freakin' titan compared to many Dark Hunters, Tyrant especially... so I decided to do something a bit more massive.

dis gun be gud

[Chro]

The red-armored Hunter rolled backwards and out of the way, grinning to see that Darkness had failed. So confident was he that he somehow managed to forget that Minion was behind him. It turned out to be a fatal error, as a huge blade sundered his right half from his left. The sledgehammer he'd held rolled off into the gutter.

I think it was.

(Not for Tyrant, certainly.)

[Ehksidian]

 

The red-armored Hunter rolled backwards and out of the way, grinning to see that Darkness had failed. So confident was he that he somehow managed to forget that Minion was behind him. It turned out to be a fatal error, as a huge blade sundered his right half from his left. The sledgehammer he'd held rolled off into the gutter.

I think it was.

(Not for Tyrant, certainly.)

 

poor jim.

sundered in two while so young.

[JiMing]

 

 

The red-armored Hunter rolled backwards and out of the way, grinning to see that Darkness had failed. So confident was he that he somehow managed to forget that Minion was behind him. It turned out to be a fatal error, as a huge blade sundered his right half from his left. The sledgehammer he'd held rolled off into the gutter.

I think it was.

(Not for Tyrant, certainly.)

 

poor jim.

sundered in two while so young.

 

To be fair, the fellow suffered the second awesomest way to die during that scene.

 

Being sundered in half is pretty high up there in cool deaths.

[Ehksidian]

To be fair, the fellow suffered the second awesomest way to die during that scene.

 

 

Being sundered in half is pretty high up there in cool deaths.

 

at least he didn't get killed with denture cream

i mean

what kind of death

and what kind of weapon

is that

[Chro]

Yeah, I was confused when Conjurer told me he wanted to use that, but I decided that I could probably make it work.

[JiMing]

To that, all I can say is I'm surprised Conjurer wasn't ShadowVezon. =P

[Chro]

Ah, that's another interesting thing here.

Also take note that I am not The Joker for this game, and am simply my normal self. That means no Exploding Teeth, no Rubber Chickens, and no Bologna.

Bet you didn't expect that!

[ShadowVezon]

To that, all I can say is I'm surprised Conjurer wasn't ShadowVezon. =P

To be honest, me as well. But, as I told Chro, I'm not The Joker, as I am currently undergoing therapy.

(No, not in real life, silly.)

[Axilus Prime]

That was an epic post. It was written so well that there were never any moments when I couldn't tell what was going on.

[Chro]

Yay!

Hopefully the next one will be similar in that respect.

Unfortunately, it may not show up for a little while, because although it is the weekend and I have received all of the PMs for this round, I have a lot to do, including a couple of essays and something like eight hours of driver's ed work.

[Makuta of Time]

Placing conveniant filler post so Chro can post seen soon.

[Ehksidian]

need more filler?

no?

well too bad >

[Kopekemaster]

In a thrilling twist, Kopekemaster comes back from the grave, defeats everyone, and wins!

Edited May 26, 2014 by Kopekemaster

[Chro]

You wish

 

 

Scene is being written now

[Ehksidian]

MORE FILL

[Chro]

I've decided that the scene is going to take til tonight to upload... but it'll be worth the wait. I'm making it even more awesome. I think Vanisher is going to enjoy it (although hopefully everyone will).

Edited May 26, 2014 by Chro

[Kopekemaster]

I know I will. My sudden return will be as unexpected as it will be Deus ex machina.

You all will perish in my arising glory.

[Chro]

Thank you for waiting... again.

Now I have two essays to go write.

Round Two: Vanisher's Last Stand

Location: Vanisher's Apartment

Vanisher stood at the edge of his balcony overlooking the city. He was confident in his own abilities - so confident, in fact, that he had decided to rent an apartment to relax in while he waited for the other Hunters to finish each other off. While they were totally adept at murdering each other, Vanisher was quite certain that the other Hunters would be entirely unable to kill him.

Behind him, Lurker slipped through the darkness, hoping to do just that. He suspected that the Shadowed One would give an even bigger payoff to whoever took out the rebellious Vanisher, and Lurker was hungry for the bounty.

Apparently unaware, Vanisher did not turn around, even as the gloves Lurker wore erupted in flames. He had activated his Flamethrowing Fists, a definitely legal import from Xia.

The very slight crackling noise and burning smell caught Vanisher's attention. The Hunter smiled, but showed no other reaction, waiting to strike.

Lurker, standing to Vanisher's back, couldn't see this, and thought his target was still oblivious. Taking a deep breath and steeling himself, he sprinted forwards. As he rocketed towards Vanisher, his target reminded the red Hunter of his own codename's significance, disappearing from where he had been standing on the ledge.

Lurker had figured that his enemy would dodge, and accounting for this, slid to a stop, spinning around and raising his fists again.

"Time to play Whack-A-Vanisher, eh? Too bad I didn't bring a sledgehammer..." This chatter was simply an attempt to distract his opponent, as Lurker prepared for him to reappear. And, just as Lurker had expected, Vanisher phased in immediately behind him.

Now it was Lurker who smiled, as he whirled and leapt back into the room, putting distance between himself and the balcony. He pulled his arm back and charged up a fireball, knowing that Vanisher had no long-range attacks to counter him. "Take this!" He let the orb of fire fly.

Unfortunately, Vanisher was more than prepared. He was perfectly experienced in dealing with fiery attacks, and opened a small portal in front of himself, into which the fireball flew, and... vanished.

"Thank you. I shall." He smiled sinisterly.

As Lurker stood waiting for a counterattack, a portal opened in the air behind him. He turned just in time to see his own fireball slam him in the face, throwing him backwards, past Vanisher (who waved goodbye innocently), and over the balcony, down towards the street below.

Vanisher sauntered back to his position on the balcony and leaned on the railing, still.

This was exactly the opportunity that Mimic was looking for. From his perch across the street, he began to slowly pull the trigger down on his sniper rifle, imitating the technique he had witnessed Lurker use the night before.

With a crack, the bullet lanced through the air, whistling towards Vanisher's head.

Before Mimic could so much as blink, however, the bullet had disappeared into a portal created by Vanisher. Mimic gasped. Then, knowing what was about to happen from watching the earlier battle, he swiftly ducked and covered, just as another portal opened and the sniper bullet whizzed by his head into the wall.

Down on the street, Lurker was staring up at the top of the building where Vanisher was, trying to gauge how to reascend without being seen. He'd barely escaped with his life the first time, thanks to a convenient Levitation Kanoka, but might not be so lucky again. The crimson Hunter reluctantly came to the conclusion that he would need help, and pulled out a communication device.

Dweller, Primal, Conjurer, Charger, and Phantom all arrived on the scene at roughly the same time, having been summoned by Lurker. The six Hunters all stared at each other in vehement silence; each itched to pull out his weapons and lay waste to the others. Their anger was drawn from various sources: Conjurer had survived an attack by Charger in the last round, as Charger had done with an attack by Primal; Phantom was bitter over being spurned by the others; and Dweller was just plain angry.

But they restrained themselves, knowing that an alliance would be beneficial in dealing with the overpowered Vanisher.

Vanisher heard a ding as the elevator outside his apartment reached the top floor and opened. He turned away from his balcony and walked calmly back to the center of the room. Taking a seat in a recliner, he began to wait.

The elevator opened. Six determined and furious Dark Hunters piled out, clamoring to be the first to Vanisher's door to have a crack at him.

"Listen," whispered Lurker. "It may not be in your nature - I know it's certainly not in mine - but we need to work together here."

"No," said Dweller. "This is my kill! You can all get out of my way. I really, really want this guy dead, and I'm going to do it."

"Shut up," Phantom muttered. "What do you propose, Lurker?"

Vanisher heard his opponents conversing outside his room.

"How can they be so stupid as to reveal their presence to me prior to their attack?"

Perhaps they had a plan of some sort... he pulled a pair of katana from a rack on the wall and started walking back and forth.

"Alright," said Conjurer. "Let's get to it. Charger?"

The Kane-Ra stepped up to the door. Within, they could hear Vanisher impatiently pacing.

With a roar, Charger ran full-on into the door, slamming it down and into the room. Whirling his twin katana, Vanisher swiftly cut it in two as it flew towards him, and the halves bounced off over the balcony.

The six Hunters charged into the room, spreading out around Vanisher to the best of their ability, though it became difficult to do this when he swung his blades around threateningly.

Primal and Charger pulled out razor wire. Dweller and Conjurer drew daggers. Phantom wielded a pocketknife. Lurker reignited his Flamethrowing Fists.

Vanisher looked unconcerned. "Let's dance, then."

All at once, Lurker, Phantom, and Conjurer rushed towards Vanisher. His swords became a blur as he fended off their attacks one by one. Conjurer swiped with his daggers; Phantom's pocketknife flashed in the dim light as he jabbed at their target's weak points; Lurker managed to get in a few fiery punches, but his gloves overheated and went out.

Before he could restart them, he felt himself pulled against Vanisher, facing his allies, with a katana to his neck. Vanisher swept the other blade around, knocking Phantom and Conjurer away. Lurker gritted his teeth. This was it.

He was right. Primal, seething with fury, yelled incomprehensibly and ran forward, wire outstretched to strike at Vanisher. The white-armored Hunter spun his captive around, and with that, Primal unwittingly wired Lurker to death.

For just a moment, all of the assembled Hunters paused in shock. Even Charger.

Unceremoniously, the chaos resumed, set off by the Dark Hunter alliance's de facto leader's death. Phantom rushed again, twirling his pocketknife and slashing at Vanisher with it. Outside of the fray, Dweller hurled his daggers, one after the other, aiming at the center of the conflict. The intended target, spying the thrower, opened a small portal, into which one of Dweller's daggers flew. Along with it went a grenade, courtesy of Primal.

That same blade, due to Vanisher's portal shenanigans, whirled through the air towards Charger. He dodged, falling through a hole in the floor in the process. The knife proceeded to, somehow, fly past everything else and embed itself in Phantom's neck. He groaned and fell to the ground, and Conjurer kicked his body aside. "This is your fault," he yelled to Primal over the din of combat. "If you hadn't dispatched Lurker we wouldn't be falling like this!" He drew a knife to stab Primal, but the latter dodged. Now two members of the loose alliance were in outright combat with each other, forgetting all about Vanisher for the time being.

This suited Vanisher just fine. He surged forwards across the floor, spun his katana above his head, and brought them down on Dweller. The latter blocked them with his knives, and attempted to spin his own knives around to break the deadlock. Vanisher grinned down at him, and pushed forwards. A small portal opened behind the other Hunter, about ankle-height, and from it rolled a grenade. Dweller attempted to spin himself around and get out of the way, but Vanisher shot a burst of fire at him and launched him back onto the explosive. It ended with a bang for Dweller.

Primal and Conjurer suddenly realized that they were the only two left to fight Vanisher, and their duel slowed to a halt. They turned back to their opponent as he walked casually forwards, now geared up with katana, Flamethrowing Fists, throwing knives, several lengths of razor wire, and more assorted implements of destruction and homicide.

"May as well give it up now, huh? I can do this the painful way... or the even more painful way."

Vanisher approached Conjurer and Primal. The two usually mighty Dark Hunters began slowly backing away from their impending doom.

On the balcony, the previously inert body of Phantom gradually rose to its feet.

In his hand was a pocketknife.

Barely alive, the Dark Hunter that the others had thought dead limped towards Vanisher, who - between his overconfidence and the collective din made by the clanking and such of his various weapons - neglected to turn and see Phantom's approach.

"Hey."

Vanisher didn't hear him.

"Hey!"

The overpowered and overarmed Hunter spun around to see a weak and half-dead Phantom limping across the room.

Phantom stopped walking and looked up, trying to draw himself up to his full height before his enemy. "Do you really think you can kill me that easily?"

"Well," said Vanisher. "I actually do. Are you going to come over here and stab me with that little pocketknife?"

"No, I'm going to stay over here and do it," Phantom responded, as he drew back his arm and then hurled the pocketknife across the room, straight into Vanisher's left eye. In response his right eye blinked.

Conjurer and Primal watched as the body of Vanisher fell through the hole in the floor, landing - very dead - next to the unconscious Charger.

They simultaneously looked up to see Phantom stumble once, before opening his mouth.

"And just like that, you vanish... like a ghost. Or, I suppose, because of a ghost..."

With that, he too fell through the hole in the floor, dead of Dweller's knife wound.

Round Two Summary

Deaths

Primal killed Lurker (Flaredrick)

Dweller killed Phantom (Blade)

Phantom killed Vanisher (JiMing)

Vanisher killed Dweller (Voxumo)

Survivors

Codenames:

Mimic

Primal

Charger

Conjurer

Usernames:

Ehks

LOTR Nui

Lhikevikk

Axilus

[JiMing]

 

OH WELL REALLY NOW

YA'LL REALLY NEEDED TO GO AFTER ME.

 

 

*sighs* Well, maybe that flaming divekick last scene was TOO epic.... Everyone wanted a piece of me....

 

I'm just going back into the corpse heap and wait for next game.... See you then.

[Chro]

Three people targeted you. I just decided to throw everyone else in as well.

If you must know, here's my scene sketch:

Lurker attempts to burn Vanisher but fails.
Mimic shoots at Vanisher but misses.
Conjurer stabs Primal, but fails.
Lurker calls in Primal and others for help. Vanisher holds Lurker while Primal accidentally wires him to death.
Dweller knifes Phantom.
Vanisher's bomb takes out Dweller.
Phantom is not dead and knifes Vanisher. Then he dies.

Really, not everyone was out for your blood.

Edited May 26, 2014 by Chro

[Blessed Blade]

HOLY HECK THAT WAS AWESOME. xD

 

The end result was a freaking triangle of death. xD

[Kopekemaster]

 

 

In response his right eye blinked.

oh my gosh i'm dying

 

 

Kopekemaster's resurrection scene has been delayed until the next round. Thank you for your patience.

 

 

But wow anyway that was amazing. Worth the wait.