I felt a slight sting on my knee as I kicked off of the wall, launching over my pursuer. I execute a backflip, landing so I face his back. I felt my muscles tense, and energy mixed with anger pulse in my fist. The next moment, there was a loud crack, and he fell forward, screaming, onto the filthy pavement. My right arm trembled with leftover energy, and I glared down at his pathetic figure. A sharp scent hit my nostrils, and my head reeled with pleasure and hunger. I shook my head and gripped his grimy hair, yanking his head back with extreme force. He whimpered as I looked coldly at him. His eyes begged for mercy. I smirked, and slammed his head into the cobblestones, face first. He screamed and tried to struggle, but he was paralyzed from the waist down due to his freshly broken back. I frowned and slammed his head down twice more. He still screamed. I rolled my eyes and stood, still having a firm grip on his hair. He whimpered and whined in pain, and I bashed his head twice into the brick wall. After the second hit, I didn't pull back. Instead, I let go of his hair. His face stayed pressed against the wall, half crushed inward. I sighed and smiled, proud of my handy work. Blood lay all over the alley, in glittering red pools. The graffiti on the wall was now splattered in blood, as far as 6 feet from his mutilated body in every direction. My ears pricked as faint sirens wailed in the distance. Crouching, I ran toward the wall and propelled myself up. Moving quickly, I scaled the wall and ran across the rooftops, heading back to the outskirts of the city.
The wind whistles through the shattered windows and the crumbling walls, creating a sort of eerie music. I sit on the pile of blankets, temporarily dubbed my "bed". I glance around, taking in the old building that I had come to call home. I sighed and gathered up the blankets, folding them neatly and shoving them in my bag, packing what little I call mine in a compact fashion. I banged my fist twice against a wall.
"Trigger initiate. Stall."
Nothing happened, or so it seemed. In truth, mechanisms inside the walls were alive and working hard. I felt the deep hum in my bones, something my enemies couldn't do. Smiling, I jogged outside and headed toward an empty horizon. My pace picked up as I pulled out a small black box from my pocket.
"Rhythm."
I felt a familiar energy pulse through my veins and throb in my skull. I had accelerated to a full sprint as the world began to spin and warp. Everything seemed to zoom ahead of me, then come rushing back as I felt my body stretch and elongate, then everything went black.
I slowed to a stop, standing on a checkered surface. Blocks hung in the air, immobile. The sky was tinged pink and the ground was folded into rolling hills in every direction. I pocketed the box and jogged toward the famed playing field. The playing field was where people from the physical world came, in spirit, to battle against others with things called allmates. Allmates are similar to Pokemon, except they are sentient beings, mechanical, and you buy them instead of capturing and training them. I grinned as I pulled out a long chain of individual key chains. Each key chain had a different feature. One was a pair of wings. Another, a claw. Each different charm represented a feature on my allmate. See, I had cheated a little. I made my own allmate. But the downside to this, was that I didn't have a physical allmate. My allmate was, in a way, me. I was jerked from my thoughts as I spotted a pair of people battling solo. Curious, I walked closer. One of them glanced around nervously, he clearly hadn't been here before. Although he had looked right at me, he didn't register that I was there. Because, in a way, I wasn't there. When people come to Rhythm, they don't come in the physical. They come in the mental/ spiritual. While I, being from Rhythm, always come in the physical. To the others, this place is Rhyme. To those born here, it is Rhythm. I watched with interest as the frightened one glanced at who I assumed his allmate was. I laughed. His allmate was an old model. Ren, if I was correct. While his opponent, who was covered by a rabbit mask, had Pseudo Rabbits. I watched as the blue-haired owner of Ren suddenly changed. His demeanor became calm and collected. I watched in amazement as this newbie, who had never played in Rhyme before, kicked his opponent's ass. Then they both started to flicker. I lunged forward and threw my black box at the blue-haired boy, locking onto his location and taking me with him.
