“I want to do something different…”
Bakxs was a very tall, very scary-looking Ksithan. He’d lived in Palaestra for most of his life, going through an interspecies educational system and looking for a way to express his artistic ideas and possibly even make some money doing so. A world full of creation, stuck inside his head. Unfortunately, it seemed as though the rest of Palaestra didn’t care, so Bakxs had been forced to do something else for a living.
Every Tuesday, Thursday and Saturday, when the sun went down, Bakxs would go to the Battle Arena in disguise. During the night, Bakxs would become Iason, the terrifying Masked Menace, terrorizing up to eight challengers in the Thirteenth Night contest. Eight challengers all competing for both fame and a cash prize. It was all so simple, the challengers had to survive for twenty minutes in an arena, with only basic tools, having to complete several tasks before they did so. Iason though would hunt them all down, silently stalking them through trees, water and mist.
Iason was very good at his job. So far, only a handful of people had made it. The few who had won had all faded from fame, but this Battle Arena show was now so popular that it was one of the most-watched shows on the planet.
“Something different?”
Not many beings knew who the guy behind the mask was. One of them was the Raptor, the ancient Ksithan warlord who had been in charge of Palaestra for years. Phovos was known for being somewhat stuck in her ways.
“Yes.”
“Like what?”
“I don’t know…”
Bakxs cursed under his breath. He should have come in here with a plan. His secret job meant that he could speak directly with the Raptor, but in his excitement, he’d basically forgotten what he wanted to say.
Luckily, thankfully, the Raptor didn’t seem too annoyed.
“You want change, what sort of change? Something completely different? Just some little changes? What?”
“Well…” Bakxs sighed. “It sounds embarrassing… I mean, I make enough money doing this… But I’d…”
“Yes?”
The Raptor was intimidating, even though she didn’t intend to be. Bakxs wasn’t even sure how she was intimidating, as she was a pudgy, short, green Ksithan, nothing too out of the ordinary aside from her age.
“I’d like to be the good guy for a change. Or at least not the bad guy. For a change.”
Phovos smiled. “That can be arranged.”
“Yeah but-” Bakxs paused. “Did you… agree?”
“If the main character of one of my most profitable shows wants a change, I will give him that change. The question is, how do we portray a monster like you as a good guy?”
Bakxs shrugged. Fortunately, Phovos already had an answer.
“We need a plot for you. But first, we need an origin story. Why did Iason become a monster in the first place?”
The towering Ksithan blinked. “I had never… thought of an origin story…”
“Really?” Phovos smiled. “You should go think about that.” The Raptor smiled, then glanced down at her wrist. “But perhaps after your training?”
Bakxs looked around for a clock, then just took Phovos’s word for it that it was training time. “I’ll come back tomorrow, before my show, with an origin!”
“Good. Now get going.”
With a grin, Bakxs waved a thank you and sped off, not wanting to be late for his Monday sparring session.