Tyrant - 15

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~*~
"Who the hell are you?" Tyrant asked. "Another Skull? Better costume, at least. Sword's a bit much, though."

"It's over," the Skull said.

"Yes. I thoroughly agree." Tyrant threw Sumerset's armored corpse aside. "It is over. Boomerang, would you be so kind?"

Boomerang Kid sprang out from his hiding place, his boomerangs spinning forward. The Skull's sword flashed out in two quick, murderous strokes; the boomerangs were neatly carved into separate pieces.

Boomerang Kid charged shortly after, a fresh pair of boomerangs in hand. As he brought the first one down in a jagged arc, the Skull side-stepped; the hilt of their sword snapped out and hammered into Boomerang's nose, neatly breaking it. Boomerang stumbled back just as the Skull's left knee snapped up into a brutal blow, leaving him breathless and confused.

The flat of the blade swung down to deliver a final blow against Boomerang's skull. He dropped to the ground, knocked out.

Tyrant watched, an expression of disbelief settling over him. "Impossible," he said. "You're dead."

"Oh?" the Skull said. "You think you know who I am?"

Tyrant narrowed his eyes. Energy coalesced in his irises; with a simple exertion, the energy extended into a murderous blade of heat.

The Skull's sword lifted up at an angle, meeting the heat-ray; they tilted the sword's edge, reflecting the beam up, then down--until it struck Tyrant's face, burning a path straight through his eyes.

"Fuck!" Tyrant roared, and he fell to the ground, clutching at his smoking eyesockets. The tissue damage healed rapidly, but for a moment, he felt panic gripping him. "You're--you're dead!"

He blindly grabbed the nearest thing he could find--an SUV. His fingers dented into its side as he twisted and threw it in the Skull's general direction; they easily sprang up above the SUV, feet blurring as they ran across its roof, leapt down, and landed in front of Tyrant.

"Elizabeth," the Tyrant whispered. "It can't be you--"

The Skull hammered their fist into Tyrant's face. The powered armor growled as it kicked into full-force; Tyrant flew back into the far wall and kept going. As he got back to his feet, he shook off his blindness and growled.

"Who are you?!" he roared.

The Skull took off her helmet.

An older and slightly more scarred Sue Daysdale stared him down.

"...what? You?" Tyrant said. "That stupid little--teenage twit? But your fighting style--that technique. It was hers--"

"Picked it up from her old teacher," Sue said, walking forward. "Picked up a few other things, too."

Tyrant narrowed his eyes. "You do know what I'm capable of, right? You realize you don't stand a chance in Hell against me. Not now."

"No," Sue said. "I've had two years to prepare for this moment, Scourge. Two years to train. To learn. And to prepare."

"I don't care if you had two hundred years, you snooty little fuck," he said. "You think you're going to defeat me? You and what army?"

Sue smiled. "Really," she said. "In the long history of human fuck-ups, do you think anyone's ever asked that question and not lived to immediately regret it?"

Lights flashed around the parking complex. Figures began to appear.

"What the hell--" Tyrant said.

"Two years to prepare, Scourge. Two years to gather weapons from every obscure corner of human history," Sue said. "Two years to train in their usage... two years to keep returning to this same moment... and use them on you."

Tyrant's eyes widened. Around him, more Sue Daysdales were appearing--all of them in the same armor. All of them with swords. And all of them holding a different superweapon.

"F--fucking... fucking time-travel bullshit!" Tyrant said.

"No shit, Sherlock," Sue said. "This one's for Sumerset. Everyone: Open fire."

All at once, Tyrant's world exploded into a thousand penetrating beams of light.

~*~
"Ambulance has Mulligan," Anna reported. "Lost contact with Sumerset. Wytch? Is Red okay?"

"Yes," Wytch said. "Hurt, but okay. Scourge hit us hard--"

"Something's happening in the parking lot," Mulligan said. "Something just--"

Everyone stopped talking as the parking lot where Sumerset and Tyrant had continued their fight promptly ceased to exist. In its place appeared a smoking, burning crater.

~*~
Tyrant fell to the ground. His left arm had disappeared from the shoulder joint down--holes riddled his body. Nearly every bone was shattered; his skull was fractured, his internal organs ruptured, and blood leaking from what might as well have been every pore.

As the other Sues disappeared, the one who had first approached him stepped forward, sword in hand. She pressed the crook of her foot down against his throat and pointed the tip of his sword blade at his face.

"I've had a lot of time to think about what I'm going to do to you," she said. "For what you did to Sumerset."

"Nngh..." Tyrant spat up a few chipped teeth. His regeneration was already kicking in, but the process was still too slow.

"Killing you is what he would have wanted, I know. Easiest solution. Stops you from hurting anyone else."

A brilliant, burning light opened up behind Sue; Temporis emerged from the portal.

"But I've thought of a better solution," Sue said. "I'm just going to put you somewhere where you won't bother anyone ever again."

Temporis opened another portal next to Sue; Sue crouched down and lifted Tyrant up by the throat.

"We're just going to dump you a six thousannd million years into earth's past."

Tyrant made a low, pitched whining sound. Sue smiled.

"Try fucking shit up there."

She threw him into the portal; Temporis slammed it shut. For a while, the two kept silent.

Somewhere behind them, metal clattered. Boomerang Kid emerged, a boomerang in either hand.

Sue turned to look back at him, sword still in hand.

"You can't be serious," she said.

Boomerang Kid paused, thought it over, and then turned and ran like hell.
~*~
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