“Well, I’m not normally one to argue against polling data, but by the Darkness, you can be utterly terrifying, Ret.”
Timik and Valorier shrugged as Tanok swept up bits of rubber training mat into a neat pile. Meanwhile, Retvik had just torn through a second rubber mat with his teeth, and was now sitting on the floor, counting to ten out loud. Tenuk was sat by his side, being a fluffy kitty and purring. Psiksi had definitely backed off somewhat, having been closest to Retvik’s recent bout of rage. Tromos on the other hand was standing over Retvik, tutting.
“Come on, you idiot. You KNOW Rethans are bad at being Big Bads! What did you expect?”
Retvik took a deep breath, opened his mouth to speak, but then closed it and decided to count to ten again. He was absolutely furious, but he didn’t want to take his anger out on Tromos. Even if Tromos had just insulted him.
“Give him a minute!” Tenuk hissed. But since he was in the form of an admittedly rather large feline, it was hard for Tromos to take Tenuk seriously. “Retvik wants to do one damn thing, he wants to be the Big Bad, just once, and he’s just been told he’s not allowed to ever be the Big Bad!”
“It is rather unfair that Retvik can’t ever be the Big Bad just because he’s a Triumphant Champion!” Tanok finished cleaning up and approached Tromos. “Just because Ct’Tack didn’t want to play the Big Bad, and the Huntress died before these matches were even a thing, doesn’t mean Retvik can’t play a bad guy for once.”
“Yeah but let’s be frank here, Retvik doesn’t have a bad bone in his body!” Valorier countered. “He’s a Rethan. They only hurt whatever you tell them to hurt. Otherwise the armoured sillies wouldn’t harm a fly.”
“I will hurt you if you are not careful!” Retvik growled somewhat. Tenuk purred louder and climbed into his lap to calm him down.
Valorier laughed. “An empty threat, friend.”
Retvik snarled and climbed to his feet, putting himself in Valorier’s face. Now he was upright, he towered over the Vrekan gladiator. However, Tanok very swiftly put himself between them. Being a Lanex, he was just as heavily armoured as Retvik was, and was pretty tall himself.
“Alright, stop being a git, Valorier!” Tanok clicked. “Retvik’s annoyance is perfectly justified! Sure, Retvik is a very kind-hearted person, but there’s a thing called ACTING, you know! Tenuk here wouldn’t harm a fly either, but he’s proved himself to be one of the most popular Big Bads ever!”
“To the point that Phovos kinda wants me to do a Big Bad thing every fortnight!” Tenuk added. “Acting gets you a long, long way. Sure, my shapeshifting helps, but, like, every single Big Bad is acting, none of us are actual psychotic murderers or anything, we’re just playing a part. Retvik’s awesome, he can act too! And we all know he’s dangerous when he wants to be.”
“That and also Retvik helped kill a god once…” Psiksi muttered. “Sure, that poll said that viewers don’t want to see Retvik be a Big Bad, or Rethans playing Big Bads in general, but people don’t know what they want until they see it. I mean, no one knew they wanted to see a Skyan Big Bad until Kayel scared the shit out of everyone.”
Tromos crossed his arms and tutted. “Doesn’t matter what you all think. The polls and the data say no, tradition says no.”
“This particular tradition is stupid!” Tanok was starting to get annoyed too. Mostly because he secretly wanted to be a Big Bad one day. Lanex were somewhat popular both as competitors and Big Bads in Thirteenth Night and in horror showings in general, mostly because they didn’t have claws or tails or big jaws of teeth like most other races, and thus put on a better show. But Tanok was in a similar position to Retvik, he had a reputation of being a good guy and, worse, he sucked at acting. “It’s not even tradition anyway! It’s literally just the fact that Ct’Tack didn’t like horror-themed matches! I’d bet one of my spare masks that the Huntress probably would have salivated at the chance to live up to her name and hunt down other beings like prey animals!”
“Stormy boy has a point…” Timik nodded in agreement.
“Please don’t call me that. Us Lanex are very, very tolerant beings, but we despise mocking nicknames. I have a proper name, please use it.”
“Sorry, Tanok!” Timik smiled, then continued. “Retvik’s literally the best gladiator here, it sucks that he’s not allowed to have fun just because another super-good-but-now-retired gladiator says otherwise.”
“Well… fair… I guess… But good luck convincing Lord Phovos!” Tromos gave in. “She does not… what is it, Tenuk?”
Tenuk had raised his hand, wanting to ask a question for a while. “Why do you call Phovos ‘Lord’? She’s female, she’d be a Lady, right?”
“The ancient title of ‘the Raptor’ was always traditionally only held by male Ksithans. Since Lord Phovos refuses to let it go and also somehow refuses to die, she insists that we all call her Lord instead. In face, Phovos hates it when we call her ‘she’, she’d rather we all just stuck to male words for everything, but oh well.”
“So… Phovos… wants to be male?”
Tromos paused. “I, uh, guess?”
Psiksi snorted. “She can barely get over the sexual liberation of other races, she absolutely hates the fact that Kayel was a prostitute for a bit. The idea of being transexual is utterly beyond her, even if it’d probably make her happier if she did transition to male. But you Ksithans are still a bit funny about that sort of thing.”
“Psiksi!” Tenuk tutted. “We’re not supposed to-”
“Kayel’s fine with it. He’s openly admitted to it, and would rather we see him as L-Class, not K-Class. Plus, the dude’s a former teacher, out of all the house fighters we have, if I had to entrust someone with a kid of any race, it’d be Kayel.”
Timik and Tanok both nodded in approval. Retvik did too, but Psiksi’s mention of kids had distracted him greatly and gotten him lost in his own thoughts.
“Either way,” Psiksi continued. “We ain’t gonna convince the Raptor to let Retvik to be a Big Bad. Definitely not straight away. What we gotta do is convince her that Rethans in general are capable of being popular in an aggressive, evil guy role, before we get the kindest, nicest Rethan ever to try.”
“I am not that nice…” Retvik muttered.
“You really are. But that’s beside the point. Which of the other…” Psiksi trailed off. “Damn, we only have four Rethan house fighters now. You, Sehon, Kalis and Abius.”
Retvik sighed. “Well, half of us died in those damn fires. I am damn lucky I survived, and I am still, to this day, not really sure how. And Sehon still blames me for the deaths of the others.”
“Sehon has always been rather mean-spirited and envious…” Valorier admitted. “But honestly? I know Abius is a pretty simple fellow, but if we can convince them to throw on some scary armour, maybe we can convince Lord Phovos to give Abius a shot and thus convince her that Rethans can also be good villains?”
Timik rather abruptly laughed. “HAH! You’ll need all of Sini’s seduction skills to get Abius to willingly wear armour! His… their whole gimmick is that they don’t wear armour, ever. ”
“Or I could just talk to Abius?” Retvik shrugged. “I have been meaning to anyway, Abius is a good vok, I am sure they would like some fresh opportunities.”
Tromos gave in completely. “Alright, fine. Get Abius on board and I’ll speak to the Raptor. In the mean time, all of you, get back to your training. Some of you have matches soon!”