Vaas Montenegro Learns the Magic of Friendship

"RUN, FORREST! RUN!"

And Jason Brody ran. Vaas watched the bastard run through the jungle, grinning, hoping he'd trip and break his neck and save his guys the trouble of blowing his head off. But soon enough, the boy disappeared into the trees.

"Go get him," Vaas said. His pirates whooped and began their chase, firing their weapons. Brody would be his in five minutes time.

But as time passed, Vaas began to feel increasingly sure that his men had failed. Again.

Vaas told one of his pirates to keep a lookout while he went to have a piss break. He went into the jungle, clambering over tree roots and bushes, and fell into a fucking hole.

Those fucking Rakyat sons of bitches. Them and their goddamn holes.

He he felt around for his pistol, found it, and holstered it. The walls and floor of the hole were made of a sort of red clay, too wet and slick to get much of a handhold.

Well, shit.

Upon turning around, Vaas saw that there was a small, narrow tunnel, leading deeper into the earth.

His natural curiosity piqued, Vaas entered the tunnel, his head lowered to avoid hitting it on the low-hanging ceiling. As he went deeper into the tunnel, the light began to diminish, soon disappearing entirely. Vaas wandered in perpetual darkness for several minutes, before his right foot found open air in front of him. He stepped back, startled, and tripped as the heel of his boot caught in the clay. The empty air in front of him must have been another pit.

Huh. A hole in a hole. Go figure.

Vaas got up and crouched, preparing to leap across the hole. He jumped, and his head struck the ceiling. Pain roared through his skull. He saw stars, and found himself tumbling into space. There was darkness all around him, and none of his flailing limbs found any contact with any solid surfaces. He didn't know which way was up or down. He began to laugh hysterically. What a strange way to die.

And then there was light all around him, and he could see the ground spinning up towards him, a blur of green. He landed on something, something warm, and... Feathery. His face was buried in a soft and fluffy material. He lifted his head, and saw a cyan-blue thing staring at him. It screamed, and he screamed right back. Only then did Vaas notice that the thing was flying, and he was still hundreds of feet above the ground.

The creature skyrocketed upward. Vaas gripped on for dear life as it did a complete one-eighty and shot towards the ground. Right before they impacted, the creature righted itself so that it was parallel with the earth. Vaas could see a lake in the distance, rapidly approaching. Just as they flew over it, the creature did a barrel roll, and Vaas lost his grip. He tumbled across the surface of the water like a flat stone, finally sinking beneath the surface. The shock of the cold water jarred him back to his senses, and he managed to resurface soon after he went under. He gasped for breath, and swam to the nearest part of shore.

As he dragged himself onto the muddy ground, Vaas could see through blurred vision more of the technicolor things- they almost looked like horses- converging on his position. Vaas didn't know what their intent was, and he didn't really feel like finding out.

He pushed himself onto one wobbling knee, and drew his dripping 1911 handgun, which, miraculously, was still in its holster. With a shaky hand, he lined up his crosshairs on a particularly brutish-looking red horse-thing, and pulled the trigger. Somehow, Vaas kept his weak grip on the gun despite the recoil, and he saw blood splatter as his shot hit home, square in the creature's neck. It staggered, let out a short grunt of pain, and collapsed. He could feel his head swimming, his vision blurring; he managed to slide his gun back into its holster, more from habit than conscious action.

Vaas fell forwards and lapsed into unconsciousness, barely aware of the screams around him.

***

Vaas pounded on the cell bars, again and again. He pushed, he pulled, he slammed his whole body against the bars, to no avail. Vaas threw himself against his confines, one last desperate time, and sank to the ground, breathing heavily. His guard, a large gray stallion with what appeared to be an ornate prosthetic leg- Vaas guessed he was some sort of veteran- in ornate gold and sapphire-blue armor, chuckled with amusement, leaning on his spear.

He turned his head to look at Vaas, smirking, and said, "Do you know the definition of insanity? The true definition?" When Vaas didn't answer, the stallion continued. "Insanity is doing the exact same thing, over and over again, and expecting a different outcome." He laughed, as if this was incredibly amusing.

Vaas contemplated this for a moment, and laughed as well. "What's your name?" he asked.

"Lieutenant Colonel Sharpened Sword," the guard said. "What's it to you?"

"A Lieutenant Colonel on guard duty..." Vaas scoffed; as if rank meant anything to him. To Vaas, he was just a guard. Suddenly it occurred to him that the guard had said his name was Sharpened Sword. Surely he must have misheard. "Wait, what was that last bit?"

"Sharpened Sword," he said, annoyed. "And I'm only on guard duty because the Princess requested me especially."

"Sharpened Sword..." he paused. "What kind of horseshit name is that?-" the guard jammed the butt of his spear through the bars, hitting Vaas square in the gut. He grunted in pain, fell over on his back, and folded his arms around his stomach, cringing.

"... Ow," he said. "But seriously, what the fuck-" the guard thrust the butt of the spear through the bars again... only to have it torn from his grip as Vaas lunged forward and wrenched it away. The guard lost his balance and fell. Quick and silent as a snake, Vaas thrust the spear point forward and placed it flat-side-down on the guard's throat, with just enough force to cut off airflow. The terrified stallion attempted to scream, but all that came out was a hoarse rasp.

Ha. Hoarse.

"If you unlock this door," Vaas said, as calmly and casually as if he were merely making idle conversation with his would-be captor, "I will let you live. I will not even try to stop you if you call your friends for help." The stallion's face was darkening in color, frozen with terror. "All you have to do is turn a key and run away." He raised the spear, and the guard gasped loudly for air, clawing at his throat. "If you make a sound between now and then, I will kill you. When your friends come searching for your body, I will kill them too. I will kill every. Fucking. Horse. On this planet. I'll end up getting out eventually either way. Now, up. Come on, up." The stallion didn't move. "I said UP! HEY! YOU FUCK! GET THE FUCK UP OR I'LL CUT OFF YOUR DICK AND FEED IT TO MY DOGS! OKAY? DON'T THINK I WON'T!" The guard scrambled to his feet, heaving. He stumbled over to the far side of the room, shuddered, and retched up a yellow-red slime, spattering the stone walls and floor of the dungeon.

Agonizingly slowly, the guard made his way to the cell door, stopping every now and then to cough up more blood and mucus. The rusty iron hinges screamed as the door was opened, finally coming to a stop. Vaas stepped out, breathing deeply.

"Thank you," he said.

The guard took a deep, shuddering breath. "HELP!-" the scream ended in a gurgle as the bullet exited his neck. The only weapon that the guards had taken off of Vaas was his knife; pointy equals bad, after all. No one knew what his gun was, so they left it on him.

The guard's eyes were wide and pleading as they stared at Vaas, conveying both terror and sorrow. They clearly said Why?

"I'm sorry..." Vaas began. "I'm sorry, I don't... Like the way... You are looking at me!... Okay?!" He pulled the trigger once more, spattering more blood on the walls. Lieutenant Colonel Sharpened Sword fell to the floor, dead.

"Do you have..." BANG!

"A fucking problem in your head?" BANG!

"FUCK YOU!" BANG!

BANG! BANGBANGBANGCLICK!

The magazine was empty.

The deceased guard's upper torso was a mess of blood and gore. Blood pooled on the floor, pouring from the stallion's mouth and nostrils as well as the bullet wounds themselves.

Breathing rapidly, eves wide, Vaas ejected the pistol's magazine and let it fall to the floor. Fumbling at his belt, he found his extra magazine-holders and extracted a new clip. He slid it into the chamber and cocked the gun.

His boots were bloody. His pants were bloody... Everything... Everything was bloody.

He could hear the distant clip-clop of hooves on stone.

More were coming.

The room he was in had two entrances, two torch-lit stone hallways on either side of the room. The way that sound echoed, it was hard to tell which hall the reinforcements were coming from.

It was only then that Vaas realized what exactly was happening: he was fighting horses... Armed horses... And in all likelihood, he was probably going to die. Because he couldn't shoot a few fucking equines. He almost wished that Hoyt could see him now. He'd probably think it was the funniest damn thing he'd ever seen.

He peeked his head out into the hallway on the right.

A gilded javelin flew past his head, taking his right ear and a good chunk of his face with it.

At first there was only the cold sensation of the cool dungeon air on the exposed flesh... And then the pain. It was an agony beyond any he'd faced in his life.

He fell forward onto his knees, into plain sight of his pursuers. He screamed as blood poured from his wound onto the floor, only to have it end in a grunt as the second javelin took him in the stomach.

He groped at the wound, pulling on the spear's shaft only to have blinding agony erupt through his abdomen.

"For Celestia!" he heard. Others took up the cry, "For Celestia!"

He didn't know who Celestia was... But she sounded like a cunt.

The last thing Vaas Montenegro knew was the cold... Only the cold...