Chapter 5: Lizard-serpent vs. Spider

Now, it was time for the last fight of the matches. The instructors leaned forward in their seats, expecting something grand between these promising cadets. Commander Sheilds looked down at the two cadets entering the ring and sat next to his second in command, the black-haired beauty Agent Conners. He leaned over and whispered, "Hey, Elisabeth, what are the betting odds on those two? See, I have a pot going on with the other instructors about the matches."

She turned to look at her commander with a tired, dead stare and replied, "Not only is that against regulation but petty."

He strained a stiff smile and looked back at the area. "You could loosen up some more. Against regulations. What have you become, the boy's mother or something? Not that it matters, then no cut of the pie for you," said Shields. He lifted a remote and pressed a button, sounding the gong to start the match.

Agent Elizabeth Conner looked down at her pupil, who took a stance before running forward as he always did.

Nicolaus ran straight toward Sarah as a green scale armor surrounded his body. At the same time, his nails thickened into claws from the fingertips, and a tail extended from his back to balance his strides. Nicolaus furrowed his brow and thought. I know that Miss Fangs said I would face the hardest opponent for me, but I've known Sarah since childhood, not including the last four months with our instructor training. She couldn't have improved that much, right?

He quickly shook any thoughts of doubt and rushed in.

Sharah only stared at Nicolaus advancing with cold, glassy eyes. She thought to herself. I wonder if he noticed yet? No, he is as dense as ever. Sarah closed her eyes and slowly shook her head back and forth in dismay.

Nicolaus took a small flask from his pocket and took a swig from it. He took out a lighter from his other pocket, lifted it before his mouth, and sprayed. Flames jettisoned toward Sarah, blocking her vision. The light reflected off of her eyes as they were centimeters away.

Sarah's fingers twitched, and she was pulled down and dragged under the flames. Flying through the air like a marionette, her left arm changed into a black lance. Her body twists mid-air and flays as she shoots faster straight towards Nicolaus' chest.

Nicolaus jerks his body to the right before the spear strikes and grabs it under his armpit. He uses her momentum to lift them both into a through to slam Sarah into the ground back first. Bracing for the impact that didn't come, the sensation of rising instead increased his confusion.

Sarah's spear retracts and morphs back into a normal arm, escaping Nicolaus' grip. Leaving him to fall back to the ground and Sarah to continue to rise up skyward. From her right arm, small black spear-like legs grew. She turns around in mid-air and now swings toward Nicolaus with her new weapon first.

In his shock at what was happening, the clothes around his arms, chest, and legs fused and grew large sandy and dark brown scales as he looked up. He once again took a swig of the liquid in his flask and took out the lighter. He spits flames out that miss and race above her head.

Sarah's swing stops. She loses her momentum and starts to fall down. Sarah waves her arm with the spear legs, grabs onto something unseen by the eye, and walks upon it like a tight rope. She looks at Nicolaus with a smug smile. Sarah sits on it, swinging her legs back and forth, thinking about what she will do next.

A column of fire races towards her again but misses as she flips back, going between her stretch-out legs. She turns over, stands back on the tightrope, and smiles while waving down at Nicolaus. She sees his smile and stops. Sarah starts to see her arms get faintly brighter and looks up to see balls of flames raining down over her.

She curls up as black armor grows from her back, blocking the descending flames. Her thread slackens. Sarah starts to fall amongst the flames. She reached out her hands and made a few more twitches with her other hand's fingers as she fell. A smile filled with madness and bliss filled her face with a new column of fire racing towards her.

Small rope tights around Nicoluas' right ankle, raising up like a varmint caught in a noose trap. The flames from his mouth continue to scatter around as a free firehouse thrashes about, creating a hellscape infernal smith's forge out of the ring. The flames briefly danced about until Nicolaus closed his mouth, stopping the flames. He spits out the remaining liquid below him and cuts himself with the claws that grew from his morphed hand.

Both Niclous and Sarah landed on the ground of the smoldering arena. Nicolaus winced in pain, but Sarah gasped for air from the pain and smoke surrounding her from the landing. The flames faded, but smoke continued to cover their field of vision.

Small red lights cut through the blurred smoke from above, signaling the blaring of fans ringing through the arena. The smoke continues to fade with the ability to see being restored to the fighters. Their eyes water with tears, and they continue to look at each other.

Nicolaus straightens his poster and starts to walk toward Sarah. His upper body swells with muscles bulging in mass that is covered in his black and brown scaled armor. An onlooker would compare him to a lizard man from a fantasy at the waist up.

His bulky form now rushes with no thought but onward. His now extended arms claw and trash at the ground to move the body of this mad beast towards his prey, only that much faster. The reason could no longer be seen in his eyes.

Sarah could only look at this clumsy mass of violence and wondered if Nicolaus really lost himself or if it was a ploy to lower her guard and what tactics she would need to use against him.

When he was right in front of her, Nicolaus dived forward with maw opened full of razor-sharp white teeth and two elongated fangs bending up.

Sarah jumps over the beast, leaving threads trailing behind her. They cover and wrap around Nicolaus. She lands and pulls on the many threads attached to her fingertips. The thread lightens at every joint of his body, holding him motionless in the air before he could crash into the ground claw first.

Stopped in place, this beast thrashed around in vain, only to suddenly stop. His muscles shrink, and his face regains its human features. Nicolaus tries to pull himself from the loosened restraints, but they tighten around him as an anaconda strangles its prey with every breath.

He continues to think of a way he can get out of this problem, only to feel himself tilt sideways a little in his restraints and the pressure of a girl sitting on his back before he could process this happenstance. Sarah questions, "Well, do you give up, Nicky?"

"Not yet. I can figure a way out of this problem."

"Sigh, still as stubborn as always."

"And you're not?"

"True, but-"

"Besides, it's not like we can go all out anyway. Right?"

"Oh. Really," Sarah questions with a dark smile spreading on her face. She opens her palms and waves them in a wave-flowing motion. The threads move up and down over Nicolaus. Sarah pulls with her left arm, and he starts to spin in place until Nicolaus is encased within a cocoon of webbing.

"Now, will you stay still or surprise me, sweety," said Sarah to the cocoon above her.

It started to swing and sway until it stopped.

"Is that it? Common, a bagworm could do more over a fire," taunted Sarah. Smoldering black smoke rose from the cocoon.

"I didn't mean to light yourself on fire. You know I and your mother will be troubled if anything happens to your face."

The smoke stops, and a bulge from one side of the ball expands until it bursts open. A silvering blurred column rushes towards Sarah. An abyss of darkness reflects within her eyes. It inclosed around her and snapped tight with the mouth of the snake.

The large snake extended from the cocoon-like a snake charmer's basket and swung a little left and right. Many of its scales were broken with lacerations, with streams of red blood oozing from the wounds as the sap on a great tree.

It closed its eyes in a relaxed manner before opening widely again. Its maw opens wide with Sarah holding it open with four new black spider legs extending from the back. Her black world was filled with light, revealing black flesh walls and a tunnel of flesh in front of her eyes. She only laughs before yelling out toward the beast, trying to swallow her whole. "Don't you think this is a bit much for our first kiss, Nicky?"

The enclosing floor stops with a slight opening on her back. It fires thick strands of webbing that bind to the tightropes outside. Sarah grabs ahold and pulls herself onto the tightrope. She was looking across at the giant snake spitting its forked tong in her direction.

Sarah was giving him a stern look of indignation before it crumbled in embarrassment. She shakes the slimy liquid from her arms and face before smelling her arm. A relaxed look of surprise spread across her lips. She had a shy look race on her troubled face. "Well, it's good to know that you are brushing your teeth daily since I smell like peppermint toothpaste. Aunty must be proud of her boy."

The snake's eyes opened wide for a second before it looked down at the ground in shame, with its eyes racing back and forth in a panic.

"An opening," Sarah said. The snake looked back at her with a white thread shooting from her wrist and sticking to his lower jaw. She swung down from her tightrope with the beast shaking its head back and forth in vain as Sarah made a once over, binding the mighty maw and standing upon his head.

Now holding the tread tight, she exclaimed, "Now we see who holds the rains in this relationship. Hahaha."

The snake thrashed around, trying to smash Sarah against the ground only to fail by repelling down to the other side or bending down and missing the ground as it passed by.

Sarah flails around his head until she blinds one of the snake's eyes, covering it in webbing. She repels to the other side. Sarah held out her palm, redlining to blind him, but stopped seeing the reflection within his yellow eye showing a giant claw hand extending out to crush her. Sarah failed to notice the snake's head swung back to the side of its cocoon basket where the arm jettisoned from.

She drops down the side of the serpent's face and lands calmly on the ground. She looks up to see the beast hit itself in the face, letting out a hiss in anger. The snake retracts within the cocoon, leaving the giant arm's claws to swing around, causing the threads to be cut. The basket falls apart after it hits the ground.

Nicolaus stumbles out it. He looks out at Sarah with a new black eye that gets quickly covered in scales. He composes himself before getting back into a new battle stance. Sarah can only hold more expectations for him standing before her again, ready for more punishment.

Nicolaus walks slowly towards her. Sarah quickly, getting bored, opens her palm and shoots her threads at him. Nicolaus' arms enlarge with open palms, grabs the threads, and pulls Sarah towards him. In the shock of the moment, Sarah's reaction is delayed, and Nicolaus lands a clean blow, sending her crashing into the ground.

Sarah fumbles around, not being able to get up, and hardly can move properly. Nicolaus walks up to her with his fists still raised for any move Sarah prepares to make. A tail extends from his back, and it wrapped around Sarah's ankle, raising her into the air, handing upside down. They look into each other's eyes.

"So, how do you like being hung by the ankle?"

"Oh, don't be so petty."

"That punch of mine seemed to have really done a number on you. Why not call it a day and surrender already."

"What, and end my winning streak."

"Since when?"

"Does that even matter, Nicky?"

"Guess not."

"So, are you going to let me down now?"

"Are you going to surrender first?"

Sarah smiles innocently while her fingers twitch slightly. They both flip and tumble in the air. Nicolaus lands with his enlarged fists on the ground; in contrast, Sarah is swinging in the air like a marionette and puppeteering herself at the same time.

A pained expression spreads on Nicolaus, with him fumbling back. Sarah's right-hand spear passes around his left shoulder, ripping the scales from them. She swings up and around for another joust.

He looks at his raw, bleeding shoulder for a moment before looking back at her. She swung herself, holding her spear to the side as if to close-line him, but barbed spikes grew from it, creating a saw. It cuts and rips away the scales covering Nicolaus's chest in passing.

Sarah's body continues to flutter and dance on the string holding her up. She comes back down near the ground and swipes the saw at his legs, but Nicolaus kicks the bottom of his heel into the blade, stopping her momentum. They collide into each other's bodies and are entangled within the threads.

Sarah's long, black, angular legs emerge, pulling and cutting the threads binding her to Nicolaus. New threads bind her up. She now towers over him, still trying to cut the thread with new nails and claws. Three of her black spear legs held at his throat, with the fourth piercing his tail in place that was slithering at Sarah's right side.

She gurined at Nicolaus. Her heavy eyes droop, and her breathing becomes slightly sporadic the longer Sarah stares him down at him. "So Nicky, as you can tell, I am almost out of juice and will collapse. The question for you now is. Do I try to struggle just to have my neck split in three as she falls for the chance of victory, fame, and a dinner? Or take the loss and have the girl before you embraced in your arms until the medics get here?"

Nicolaus's body relaxes, and he looks at Sarah and then at his teacher, Elizabeth, in the stands. Her stern glare knowingly looked back at him. A small smile creeps across his lips. He lets out a small laugh. "Haha, I give. You win this round."

"Good, but next time, don't hold back. I don't need the handicap," said Sarah with a smile. The spears at Nicolaus' throat retract while cutting the threads binding. He is now lying on his back, looking at the falling Sarah collapse onto his chest before he can grab her. Although late, he holds her close within his embrace with her head next to his. "Nice recovery, my hero."

"Sorry, I didn't think you, with your will to steal, would actually collapse onto me."

"Quiet. Just accept your reward and let me sleep. I am spent," said Sarah. She squirms a little like a cat before finding a comfortable position and uses him as a body pillow.

A gong sounds. "The winner, Sarah Turner. A great match, indeed. It's a great way to bend the rules about not fully transforming during the match while still walking the line. However, it was crude in execution," said Commander Shields with a big grin plastered on his face from the winning he racked in from the betting pool. "Now, medics hurry up and get them treated. This is a military facility, not a place for flirting."

The wall fell, and the medics raced toward the contestants in the arena. They gave them a once look over before trying to separate the two.

As they tried to gently pry Sarah off of Nicolaus, she tightened her grip, refusing to let go of her pillow. In their exasperation, they lifted them onto the gurney and wheeled them away.