Chapter 4: Gladiator

Balto ran as fast as he possibly could, using his virus power to help his legs move more quickly. The time it took to reach the spot seemed to be just as long as the aggregate days he had been waiting to receive exactly this kind of clue. Only one thought ran through his mind: getting to Jenna. “Hang on, baby!” he called out loud. “I’m coming!” He ran into town via a back street. The place Sorrow wanted him to go turned out to be a spot where the townsfolk would put things they didn’t need or couldn’t use, like scrap metal. These things would be picked up and used by people who could find a purpose for them. Recently, the area had been cleared out, leaving it mostly bare, and when Balto arrived, he saw that the scant leftovers had been moved off to the sides. He stood there, waiting anxiously for a few minutes. Then, he heard someone approach from up ahead, and his ears pricked up as he came to full attention. Sorrow walked out of an alley, and at his side…was Jenna, her scruff in his hand. Balto almost broke out in tears at seeing her alive, and the same thing happened to Jenna. “Jenna!” Balto choked. “Balto!” Jenna gasped. “Are you okay?” Balto asked urgently. “I’m fine,” Jenna said, bravely keeping herself together. “What about you? Are you hurt?” “No, I’m doing alright.” They both smiled, joy and relief taking over their emotions. “It’s going to be okay, Jenna,” Balto said. “I promise. You’ll be alright.” “I know,” Jenna replied. “I believe you.” “Not so fast,” Sorrow said. “Don’t get all happy just yet. We are far from done here. I didn’t bring Jenna here to benefit you in any way, Balto. I brought her because I knew her presence would make you come.” “Yeah, well, why don’t we just cut the chitchat? Have you forgotten that I took out everything you threw at me? Do your worst, slime.” “Strange you should mention the previous advance forms…one of them is here right now. But that’s not all. I was thinking what to do next, and then, the most fabulous inspiration hit me: what if you had to fight…all three at once?” From other alleys, a rabies advance form, a salmonella advance form, and a tetanus advance form appeared, surrounding Balto in a wide-spaced circle. Sorrow continued speaking. “But after that, I thought, why not put every card on the table?” Sorrow laughed as a strep throat advance form and a staph advance form appeared. “I just love difficult odds,” Sorrow said. “Let us stand back and watch, Jenna.” He looked around at the advance forms. “Kill him.”

Balto stood still as the advance forms all came at him in unison. When the first one swung, he jumped high into the air, and three of them barreled into each other, knocking each other flat. As Balto came down, he swung each virus arm at the same time, punching the two that were left standing in the face. The salmonella advance form tried to grab him, and he punched it in the chest, producing the noise of cracking ribs. It fell to the ground, temporarily incapacitated, but Balto didn’t have time to finish it off; the rabies advance form charged at him, and he rolled out of the way, leaving the tetanus advance form to get run over. Balto attacked the staph advance form, starting a high-speed duel, each swinging and blocking in a seamless flurry of motion. The strep throat advance form ran up behind Balto and prepared to swing at him, but he whipped one virus arm around with lightning speed, first knocking the blade aside, then cutting open its thigh, causing it to nearly fall down. Balto was using what the virus arms saw to tell where he had to swing, and it allowed him to fight off multiple assailants. However, when the rabies advance form charged him again, he decided that three was too many to be fending off all at once. The rabies advance form leapt at him, and he sidestepped. The staph advance form’s claws, which had been swinging at Balto’s head, barely missed tearing into the flying advance form’s back, and it pulled back instinctively. Balto used this chance to knock it off balance, sending it crashing down to the ground. The tetanus advance form took a mighty swing at him, and he redirected the blow with a virus arm. However, he wasn’t quick enough to deflect its next attack, a kick in the chest that sent him flying into the air. He fell to the ground, hard, but got up quickly. The salmonella advance form swung one long arm, extending just far enough that its claws slashed Balto’s shoulder. He yelled, stumbling a little as he tried to move forward. The tetanus advance form came at him again, swinging it arm blades over and over.

Balto was blocking the blows, but it took great effort because of the beast’s strength. He was driven back, little by little, as the advance form kept attacking, and soon, his tail hit a wall. The advance form attacked with an upward diagonal swing, which would have taken Balto’s head clean off if he hadn’t dodged to his left. However, with no room to back up, he wouldn’t be able to dodge forever, and the advance form knew that. It swung sideways, and Balto flattened his back against the wall to avoid the strike. The advance form took aim and went forth with its strongest swing yet. Balto ducked just in time, and the advance form’s blades struck the wall. But then, there was no further attack. Balto looked up and saw that the advance form had swung so hard its blades were embedded in the wall, preventing it from attacking. It growled and thrashed, trying to break free, and Balto knew that if he wanted to kill the beast, he would have to do it before the other advance forms, who were hanging back to stay out of the way, realized what was happening and intervened. He extended a virus arms’ teeth and ripped up the advance form’s face, destroying one of its eyes. It yelled with rage and heaved, tearing a section of wall out as it finally broke loose. Balto backed off, and the other advance forms went to move in on him, but the tetanus advance form charged him, swinging. The other advance forms knew that their half-blind comrade would pose just as much danger to them as to Balto, so they reconsidered their idea and moved back, forming a half-circle, intending to attack Balto if he backed up too far. Balto had no intention of backing up; he knew he was in a much better position if he stood his ground. The advance form, insane with rage, swung back and forth again and again, but since one eye was gone, it could hardly see what it was doing. Balto stayed on its blind side, carefully blocking its wild, inaccurate attacks. He lashed out after one attack, punching the beast in the jaw. It moved back a step, then shook its head and came at Balto again. He ducked an attack and punched the advance form in the stomach, and as it bent down, he smashed it in the face again. It grunted and straightened up, preparing to swing again. When it attacked, Balto smacked its arm aside and punched it in the chest twice. These blows were merely in preparation, though; he yelled and swung as hard as he could, once, twice, dealing bone-shattering blows to the advance form’s head. It groaned and took a couple of steps backward. This time, Balto didn’t wait for it to attack him again. He stepped up to it, punching left, right, left, right, hitting the beast over and over, striking harder and harder, faster and faster. Blood began spilling from the creature’s mouth, and it tried desperately to stay on its feet. Balto empowered himself with Ebola, drew a deep breath, and let it out in a mighty roar as he began punching the beast so rapidly the virus arms were in a blur. Crunching and squishing noises began to sound, and blood sprayed from the beast’s mouth in a steady stream as the attacks kept landing. Balto drew one virus arm far back, and then shot it forward with titanic force, sending the advance form crashing into a wall. It fell to the snow, and took only a few more choking breaths before dying.

“Go, Balto!” Jenna shouted. Sorrow smirked. “One down? I wouldn’t be inclined to start the celebration.”

Every advance form attacked Balto. He dodged a swing from the strep throat advance form and punched it in the back, causing it to sprawl facedown in the snow. The rabies and salmonella advance forms swung at him in unison, and he jumped into the air, somersaulting, deflecting their blows and hitting back before he hit the ground. He grabbed the staph advance form and shoved it into the rabies advance form, giving himself a short moment of time to avoid the strep throat advance form, which had gotten to its feet and was attacking him again. He gave it a one-two punch to the stomach, knocking it away, and turned back to face the salmonella advance form. It swung both arms at once, and Balto ran forward, underneath its attack, reaching up with a virus arm and shredding the muscles of its left arm. It shrieked, and Balto knocked it over. The staph advance form attacked him, cutting his back and one of the virus arms while he was distracted. Balto jumped up, spun around in midair, and gave the advance form a devastating left hook to the face. As he came down, the rabies advance form leapt at him, and Balto jumped up again, grabbing the beast in midair and smashing its head into the ground as it fell. The salmonella advance form reached out and cut at Balto’s ribs, and he screamed with pain. It pulled back and tried to stab him, but he ran at it and punched both of its legs, causing it to fall. The strep throat advance form tried to skewer his head, but he ducked and grabbed its arm, at the same time breaking the other. Then, he got an idea. He drove the teeth of one virus arm into the soft inside of the elbow of the arm he was holding onto. The beast cried out, struggling with Balto, who was twisting and pulling. The struggle did not save the advance form, which uttered a bloodcurdling scream as Balto twisted hard and yanked, severing its arm at the elbow. The other advance forms halted their attack suddenly as they saw what Balto had done.