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Mandatory Introduction Sequence3,065 words
The Show Goes On2,816 words

The Show Goes On

If there's anything Trixie hated being called, it was selfish. How could a being as amazingly great as she be selfish? In fact, just living and allowing the other three members of her team to breathe the same air as her must've been a godsend.

“How is it fair that you attract the most money but do the least amount of work?” Sunset was… a complication to Trixie. She wasn't a necessary cog in her perfect machine of a team.

“Well maybe if you were smart with money, the Gungeon would look favorably upon you as well.” Trixie retrieved a golden coin from her pocket and started flipping it around in her hands. “What do you have, Sunset Dimmer?”

“Wait, what?” asked Sunset. “What did you say?”

“Sunset Dimmer, Dimmer,” she repeated. “Honestly, if your hearing is half as bad as your skill with money, I don't know why money isn't running from you.”

“I would be upset, but that's one of the stupidest things I've ever heard.”

“Alright you two,” said Starlight, walking up the middle, carrying a new gun. “The floor is almost done. Stop trying to kill each other and kill the Gundead.”

“Found the shop!” called Luna from across the room, where she was sticking her head into the doorway of another door. Whatever Trixie thought she was doing at the moment was dropped to rush over to the store. She basically barreled past Luna and entered one of the only docile places the Gungeon had to offer. Trixie moved about the place as if it were her own home.

“Oh. It’s you four.” The Shopkeeper was always the same, on every floor without fail. “I look forward to your business.”

“Okay Discord,” said Trixie, waving an item in his face. It looked like a belt with large pockets to hold things. “How much for the junk, hm? How about 20 shells?”

“Spare me the antics,” said Discord, a smile forming on his face. “That utility belt is worth north of 50 shells. And seeing as though you’re trying to haggle me, I’m inclined to raise the price to 75.”

“Dissy, can I can you Dissy?” asked Trixie, leaning on the table and giving Discord her best smile. “I know that you know that we all know that you’ll eventually sell me the belt for, like, 20 shells. Let’s cut to the chase.”

“75 shells,” said Discord in his slithery voice. “No ifs, and's, or buts about it.”

“Let me see what I can do.” Trixie turned away from the counter and faced the rest of her teammates. “Uh, guys?”

“No,” grinded said Starlight.

“No,” said Luna.

“Hell no,” said Sunset, crossing her arms over her chest.

“Just this once?” she asked, folding her hands. “Please? I won’t ask for anything more ever!”

“Can we even share money in this place?” asked Sunset. “And if I could, I’d burn it over giving it to you.”

“Sorry, kid,” said Starlight, heading out of the door. “Guess you’ll have to get lucky on the boss.” The four left the store, Trixie wearing a dejected look on her face. When the door closed fully, however, Trixie started beaming.

“Why are you so happy?” Trixie lifted her shirt slightly to show off her new utility belt. She pulled it back down quickly like showing it for too long would somehow reveal her theft. Above her head, a purple skull appeared just to disappear a few seconds later.

“You stole the belt?” said Sunset, raising her eyebrow. Trixie’s triumphant smile dropped.

“Yes, Sunset Dimmer, I stole the belt. I didn’t know simple actions were that much of a struggle to you.” ground her teeth. “Now if we could make our way to the boss room? I want to try out my new equipment!

“Wow, what a dick,” mumbled Sunset as the other three followed after her.

After a few minutes, the group met up at the first-floor boss door. Luna was the first to move on it, causing it to lift it’s head up. The four stepped into the darkness.

“Got any wishes this time around?” asked Starlight, looking back at Sunset. She scoffed.

“Only for a quick and easy boss fight.” The four continued walking into the darkness, until eventually it surrounded them. The door, which was quite a considerable distance away from them now was slowly closing, removing the only source of light.

“It is taking quite a bit of time to start...” said Luna. She took out her gun, which glowed a slight blue. “It’s making me uneasy. Stay on your toes.”

The rest of them withdrew their firearms. The room remained quiet and silent until, finally, a single focused beam of light fired down onto the arena.

“Hey, all.” It was a tall man with greenish skin, no face, and a black suit. The man allowed his name to pop up, letter by letter above his head.

“Anonymous the Re-Gun-Structor,” said Trixie aloud. “What the hell? Is the Gungeon running out of clever names, or something?”

“Well, to be honest, Chain-ge Gunner wasn’t all that impressive anyway,” said Starlight. Anonymous’ health bar popped up. “Let’s just take him down already.”

“That’s fine,” said Anonymous, shaking his head. “I get it. You’re all looking for the gun, and I’m an obstacle. Go on, then. Take your best shot.”

“Hmm.” Trixie shot Anonymous right in the head, taking a quarter of his life points away. “Wow. Was I always this great and powerful?”

“You really got me,” said Anonymous, recovering from the shot. “This should be easy for somebody like you, then?”

“Exactly. And I will be relishing in the shells and items you give me,” she said, taking aim once more. She pulled the trigger and let the bang ring through the arena.

“Wow,” said Anon, brushing off his shoulder. “I can’t believe you missed your shot on a stationary target. That is sad.”

“Be quiet! I-I meant to do that.” She loaded a few more bullets into him, all of which were seemingly less effective than the last. Anon chuckled at the futility of her attacks. “If I had help, it would be much easier!”

“What about those three?” he asked, poking a finger at them. “They’re probably just as dumb as you are, though. I didn’t know Tweedle Dum ran with The Three Stooges now.”

“You weren’t funny the first time,” said Sunset, cocking her shotgun and firing at Anon. “And you aren’t funny now, are ya?”

“Not feeling the jokes, huh?” said Anon, brushing off the bullets. “ It’s kinda like how I’m not feeling these bullets. I’m pretty sure that you’re definitely supposed to have a higher chance of hitting your target if you’re up close and personal with a shotgun. Much better chances than with a revolver.”

“He’s… invincible?” mumbled Luna. “Would the Gungeon ever make an unbeatable boss?”

“No, I certainly have a weakness,” said Anon. “I just have really low hopes that you four will figure it out. Only one person has ever figured it out, anyway. So I’ll offer you two options.” Aside from Anon rose a fire pit. “Either stay here and shoot futilely, or jump in there, die, and hope we don’t meet again.”

The four studied the pit, clearly seeing the fire that rose from its depths. Anon motioned towards it, showing it off like a new car.

“Anyone want to step up? Don’t be shy.” Trixie stepped forward towards the pit, gun lowered, and took a deep breath. “Oh. You sure do give up easy. Tell whatever's down there I said hi.”

“No.” Trixie cocked her gun back and pulled the trigger at Anon’s head.

“You couldn’t have expected that to work. There’s no way.” The black landscape warped and in its place was a large scrapheap, full of metal pieces. The four backed away from Anonymous and readied their guns once more. Anon motioned around him. “But even I admit that I have a soft spot for reckless bravery.”

“Well, at least we got the boss to start…” said Starlight.

“Shooting me isn’t going to work,” said Anon. He reached his hands out and attracted metal to his hands. Once it got to him, it was a simple flick of the wrist before a large blaster appeared. Trixie backed up into her team. “But shooting you should do just fine.” He spun around and sent out a volley of shots. The four tried their best to dodge them.

“What do we do?” asked Trixie. “He doesn’t take damage from our attacks.”

“There must be some way of beating this boss…” said Luna, grinding her teeth as Anon sent out another wave of bullets. “Trixie! Try shooting him in the head again!”

“That won’t work,” said Trixie.

“Well, I’m not seeing any other solutions!” yelled Sunset, pulling out her shotgun and popping off a few shots.

“This isn’t even fun.” He grabbed some more metal into his hands and flung them around the arena, creating small turrets. They went about their business pretty quickly, shooting almost nonstop at the four. “A little bit of this, a little bit of that.” He sent more and more turrets out, covering most of the arena. Anon clasped his hands together and brought them all together in a mash-up of metal until they exploded into ricocheting bullets. Everyone but Trixie was fast enough to hit the ground. A bullet sailed into her side.

“Son of a bitch!” she yelled.

“Somebody’s upset.” Anon shook his head. “Call it repayment for shooting me in the head.” Trixie ran up to Anon and launched a punch at him. He was smart enough to dodge, but didn’t have enough sense to expect a follow up. Trixie kicked him in his leg as hard as she could, bringing him to his knees and his health bar down to half. Anon tackled her legs and pointed his gun at her stomach again. Sunset took this opportunity to run up and punt kick Anon in the face. This time, however, it didn’t do damage.

“What the hell!?” asked Sunset. “How come when we do damage, nothing happens!?” All the while, Sunset was kicking Anon in the head, futilely trying to get him off of Trixie.

“Listen,” said Anon, a grimace on his face. “It wasn’t funny the first time. It won’t be funny the next time. Stop trying it.” Trixie wriggled herself from under Anon and loaded a few more bullets into him. He shook them off just like he did the last ones.

“Get out of there!” called Starlight. “Regroup back here!” Sunset took off, but Trixie stayed put. She grabbed her gun and pointed it at Anon.

“Why don’t you people ever learn,” said Anon. “That. Will. Not. Work.” Anon got to his feet, and Trixie’s gun followed him. “You are such an idiot. I can’t believe—”

Trixie grabbed the gun by its nose and smacked Anon in the side with it. He grabbed his side gingerly and backed up quite a bit.

“No one calls the Great and Powerful Trixie and idiot.” The four watched as his health bar dwindled down to a quarter. Anon looked at her with a fire in his eyes. She started backing up with her team. “Especially not to my face.”

“Did you figure it out?” asked Anon, smiling from ear to ear. He stomped and created a chasm behind Trixie, preventing her from regrouping.“This might actually be a worthwhile fight after all.” Anon dug his hands into the ground and caused two much bigger hands to form behind him. He made finger guns and started shooting big globs of metal at her.

“Run!” yelled Starlight. And she did. Trixie ran, dodging the pieces of metal moving at incredible speeds. She ducked and fell onto a pile of metal, cutting into her arm.

“Damn it!” she yelled, grabbing her arm to stop the pain. It didn’t. “Just keep going…” She stood up and clenched her fist, her anger drowning out the pain. She ran towards the crouching Anon, picked a metal piece and flung it at him.

“Oh!” He looked up, flipped the metal around, crafted a spike, and sent it at Trixie. She took out her gun, popping the metal spike out of the air. “Nice, nice.” Once she got just close enough. Anon covered his body in a metal ball.

“Oh, come on,” said Sunset from above. “Are you that much of a coward?”

“Cowards always win, though,” said Anon.

“Stay out of this, Dimmer!” yelled Trixie, looking back up to the three. Anon took this chance to use the large hands he had control of and grasp Trixie around the sides and lift her into the air.

“You had so much potential.” He tossed her up into the air. He removed himself from his ball, waving his hand in a large circular motion, picking up a significant portion of metal. “But I’ve got to finish you off. I’ve got a tea time to make, you know?” He lifted both hands above his head and shaped the metal into a giant drill fit to pierce the heavens. Once he brought his hands down, the metal was sent spiraling at Trixie.

If she wanted to survive this, she’d have to do more than shoot.

Still, in midair, she faced off against the giant drill and studied it carefully. As if her life was about to flash before her eyes, the world slowed and allowed her to act as she wanted. She flipped herself around, letting the drill pass above her, When she looked back down at Anon, he was beaming. She took out her gun, looked right into Anon’s eye, and shot him right in it.

Anon blinked.

Anon rubbed his eyes just for a second, shook his head and looking down at the ground, he took more metal in his hand.

“That. Didn’t. Hurt—” Trixie landed with a thud right in front of him, a sharp piece of metal in hand. Perfect for stabbing holes in the stomachs of smug assholes. “But… that might.”

“Silly Anon,” said Trixie, letting go of the spike. “The show never ends when I’m on stage.”

Anon fell to the ground and sunk into the metal. His health fell to zero and a podium fell to the ground. On top of it was a small silver bell. When Trixie picked up, it popped up as the “Aged Bell”.

“Hey.” Trixie turned around to her team. Starlight and Luna were smirking and Sunset grinning slightly. Sunset stepped forward. “What was the thing you figured out?” Trixie, smiled wide.

“It’s not that hard to figure out,” said Trixie, shrugging. “You have something up there, right? You can do it.” Trixie walked out of the boss door, and back into the Gungeon. “Now, with this, I have some some business to take care of.”

“Sunset, calm down.”

“She ruined the run!” yelled Sunset, literally trying to climb over Starlight’s shoulder to get to Trixie. The four stood outside of a door on the second floor. It was obviously a shop door, but it was locked. A picture of Discord’s face was hastily drawn on a piece of paper and taped to the door. Under it, it said, “Boo Hoo Hoo”.

“How did I know he would react like that?” asked Trixie, hands up in surrender. “I thought he was joking.”

“Why did you try to steal twice?!” asked Sunset. You already had what you wanted!”

“But… the RUBE-ADYNE looked so nice…” Sunset tried to jump over even more. Luna sighed and headed off to the next room. “Okay, fine. Maybe I messed up. But hey, at least I know I’m not thatbad.”

A red bullet soared past Trixie’s head and implanted itself into the wall. Sunset dropped from Starlight and hid behind a table. Trixie laughed nervously for a few moments before taking cover.

“You spawned in cursed bullets.” Luna took cover behind a table. “They do more damage now.”

“Well…”Trixie took out her gun and readied it. “It can’t be that bad, can it?”

“Oh it can,” said Starlight. “You’re paying for drinks tonight.”

“B-But…” Trixie stuttered. “But it’s free.” Starlight laughed.

“I know what I said,” said Starlight. “Okay, everybody. Three, two…”

They four ran into the danger, guns readied and wills signed.

“This chick is just like you, you know?” Anon was walking around the lava covered floor of the bottom of the Gungeon. “Well, maybe not that much like you. She seemed kinda stupid at first. But she beat me. Can you believe it?” Anon sat down and sighed. “I think she’ll be down here soon enough. If she could get her head out of her ass.” Anon looked over at the one he was talking to.

“Oh really?” She smiled, brought her hammer over her head and slammed it down with a loud thud. “I can’t wait.”

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