The Akira Dome
The Secret arena for the Warhammer Corporation to have their gladiatorial battles to the death. While there is a stable of fighters that survive battle after battle, often executives and security officers who have failed too often in their duties are condemned to die for the entertainment of the masses. The location is rumored to be somewhere in China where heads of state, celebrities, important Warhammer executives, and other VIPs are brought in to watch the spectacle of violence.
A young Tarrasque stands in a wrestling ring in the arena. It is here that he found himself after being rejected by the Seven Shadows of Twilight for being of a childlike mind and uncontrollable by normal means. He is to fight and fight for the entertainment of a bloodthirsty crowd until he is dead. He is maybe seventeen years of age as he looks out at a roaring crowd. He’s already slain many opponents and gained fans.
His opponent on this night? A prototype of a new super soldier program. This creature is intelligent and follows orders while being bloodthirsty to a fault. They call him Kharnivore. He has not fought skilled opponents yet, but has slaughtered several disgraced executives. He steps out onto the entrance stage, stripped to the waist, with a pair of trunks on. He is nearly seven feet tall like Tarrasque and nearly as large muscular-wise. He grins most cruelly as he sees the goofy grin on the Tarrasque in the ring and makes his way down to get in. He gets nose to nose with Tarrasque as the bell is rung to start the fight.
Kharnivore - At least make this fight interesting.
Tarrasque - Fighting not interesting. Fighting fun!
Kharnivore - Not for you. Not tonight.
Tarrasque - You punch me or talk me all night?
Kharnivore growls and punches Tarrasque, hitting him harder than anyone has hit him before in his short life. Tarrasque staggers back to the ropes, shaking his head, and spitting both blood and a tooth onto the mat. Kharnivore follows this up by grabbing onto Tarrasque’s shoulder with one hand and punching him in the mid-section several times with the other before lifting him up and bodyslamming him to the mat. Tarrasque starts to get up, but catches a knee strike to the side of the face. Kharnivore pulls him up and bites into his left shoulder, drawing blood. Kharnivore steps back and forms his hands into a double axe handle and swings his hands sideways to crack Tarrasque in the side of the head to send him right back to the mat.
Kharnivore - I’m the better version of you.
He kicks Tarrasque in the ribs, rolling him over back to his hands and knees.
Kharnivore - I’m smarter. (kick) I’m stronger. (kick) I’m more durable. (kick) I’m everything that you are not. What are you?
Tarrasque - Str-
A kick to the face shuts Tarrasque up and sends blood and spittle flying across the mat.
Kharnivore - I didn’t catch that, you dumb beast. What are you?
Tarrasque gets up to his knees and looks defiant at Kharnovire, even as his face is a mask of blood.
Tarrasque - Me am -
Kharnivore grabs him by the shoulders and hits several knee lifts to the chest and face. He steps back, blood covering his knee.
Kharnivore - I still can’t hear you, you weak-willed cur. Are you even capable of speech or are you too stupid to understand my words?
Tarrasque - Me am -
Kharivore interrupts him again, but this time with a kick. The kick doesn’t land as it is caught by Tarrasque, who grins while showing off bloody teeth.
Tarrasque - Me am STRONG!
Tarrasque squeezes the foot in his hand, bringing out a crunch that even the front few rows of the crowd can hear just before Kharnivore howls in pain. Tarrasque throws the foot to the side, nearly bringing Kharnovire to the mat and grabs the wounded leg by the calf and palm strikes the knee cap, bending the leg the wrong way violently in an obvious break. This time Kharnivore falls to the mat while shrieking in pain. Tarrasque notices that his opponent is clutching at the broken leg while whimpering in pain so he jumps on the leg and kicks Kharnivore in the jaw.
Kharnivore - No! You can’t be this strong! I was promised to be better!
Tarrasque reaches down and grabs Kharnivore by the lower jaw. He sneers as he rips that part of the body away from Kharnivore with a splatter of blood.
Tarrasque - You talk too much.
The crowd cheers Tarrasque on as he works to dismantle the latest project of the Seven Shadows, the elite research and development team of the company. But he is not the only one watching as high in a VIP box we find a young, new executive by the name of Allen Anderson. He had been managing wrestlers after a brief career as a wrestler himself. He stands in the VIP box with a glass of whiskey on the rocks that he swirls in his hand before taking a sip. Next to him is the Director of Warhammer North America, Sebastian Jalabert. The man appears to be older than what could be believed with thread bare hair, spotted, wrinkled skin, and looking to be not much more than skin and bones. He sits in an electric wheelchair with a life support system on the back of it. It has tubes and wires that go into Sebastian’s body at several different locations to keep him alive when his own body fails him.
Sebastian Jalabert - We already gave you a stable of wrestlers. You ask for more?
Allen Anderson - This Tarrasque. He’s amazing. He would be great in a wrestling ring as well as the deathmatch ring that he’s in here as.
Sebastian Jalabert - And when he murders his first opponent like he just did with Kharnovire?
Allen Anderson - That’s why I will train him to not do that. You see, they have been ordering him around like he’s a soldier. I think he could be more than that. He could even be someone my children would like very much. I have Riley, Marcus, and Kira. They will eventually outgrow his current intelligence level, but right now? He’s child-like, they are children. It’s a match made in heaven.
Sebastian removes an oxygen tube from his nose and moves it away so that he can light up a cigarette. He takes a drag from the cigarette and coughs violently, lightly bloodying a handkerchief. He goes back to the cigarette as if nothing was wrong.
Sebastian Jalabert - Why would we release Tarrasque to you? He is a fan favorite, after all.
Allen Anderson - And he will be a fan favorite at Hardkore America as well. Let’s not forget the natural disaster that struck the Bahamas and I was there with ships that were filled to the brim with refugees looking to escape to America. They never made it to America. Did they? I sent them to Desolation in Africa so that you could broker a deal with Cardinal Mariano Urizar. You owe me for that.
Sebastian flicks ashes onto the floor with a cough.
Sebastian Jalabert - Of course, I remember what you did for me. I’m surprised you can live with yourself after you did that.
Allen looks down into the ring as Tarrasque raises his arms in victory over a slain Kharnivore.
Allen Anderson - It eats at me, to tell you the truth. I don’t know how much longer I can look at my family, knowing what I have done to give them the life I always wanted for them.
Sebastian Jalabert - Do they know you sold nearly fifty thousand souls to work to their dying day in the industrial hell that is Desolation?
Allen Anderson - No. I will not tell them such things. I only told them that I was scouting out a new wrestler to add to my stable. Not that he’s in deathmatches day by day. I want Tarrasque. He deserves better treatment than that he gets here. He never asked to join a secret super soldier program. He never wanted to be transformed. To lose his family to a vile sorcerer and his slaver guards. He deserves to be treated like family, and I will see to it that he is.
Sebastian snuffs out his cigarette butt against the side of his chair and puts the oxygen tube back in his nose.
Sebastian Jalabert - Fine. He’s yours for the taking after tonight. I’ll have some of my Solar Guard take you down to the chamber he’s kept in. He’ll get cleaned up and then meet you.
Allen Anderson - Thank you.
Sebastian Jalabert - Don’t make me regret this, Anderson.
Allen Anderson - Oh, you won’t. He’ll make quite the impression on Hardkore America and beyond.
The scene fades back to the present as Tarrasque sits on the side of a luxury king-sized bed in his hotel room. He is flipping through images on his smartphone (that he does actually know how to use) and stops as he sees images of past family members and friends. Allen Anderson, Marcus Anderson’s father, comes up a few times in his photos section.
He places a hand on the image of his very first wrestling manager and closes his eyes, a single tear escaping and running down his cheek. He opens his eyes and turns on FaceTwatter Live with a grin.
Tarrasque - Viktor Kriegson. Me am veteran. Me fighting since me was sixteen years old. You think you better than me? You wrong. Me am strong! That phrase serve me for many years. Me say me start when me sixteen. Guess what me no slow down and me almost fifty! Side effect of super soldier program.
He grabs the phone to the room and hits the code for room service. He tells them that he’s hungry and wants his last order repeated before hanging up.
Tarrasque - Me am strong. Me am always young. Me heal fast. Me am Wolverine, but no claws.
He just shrugs and looks on.
Tarrasque - Viktor, you am strong, but not strong like me. Me wipe floor with you when we meet in the ring. See you then, Viktor.
The scene fades to black.
