Showdown at Three


“So you showed up after all.”

“Well how could I not? It’s not everyday that I get a show like this.” Alex reached for his belt where he felt his gun firmly clipped. “But, there’s something that’s been bothering me. Why do this at three? Given the theme, wouldn’t this be more appropriate to do this at noon?”

“Ah, well that’s simply because we had to wait till we were out of school. Now anything else?”

“Nope…. I guess not, shall we get things started?”

“Hold it Alex, don’t you think you’re forgetting something? Something important to be discussed before this all begins?”

“Oh you mean a bit of exposition to explain how we came to this point, what our motivations are, and the reason and nature of our little duel?”

“Oh good heavens Alex no! No one wants to hear that! They’ll just get angry and see it as stalling to keep them from the action packed duel we’ve prepared! I meant that other thing!”

“Oh right. That.” Alex turned to face away from Rick. “Alright everyone listen up, and listen up well. The following action you are about to witness won’t be explained in all that much detail. In fact, some of you might accuse it of being a shark jumping moment and that the great author in the sky is just catering to a fandom. Regardless of if that is true, this is not to be confused for any serious stories. Think of it as a sort of filler story while the more interesting ones are being written. In short it’s not meant to be taken seriously so shouldn’t be read seriously. Instead, just sit back and enjoy the chaos and fan service.”

“Oh!” Rick interjected. “And don’t be alarmed if some unconventional narrative devices are used to speed the story along or introduce characters.”

Bio Information
Name: Rick
Age: 18
Gender: Male
Height: 5’11”
Weight: 159 lbs
Hair: Black
Eyes: Hazel
Info: A somewhat rash individual. He likes things to be done and over with so comes off a little impatient most of the time. Despite this he usually manages to remain somewhat level headed.

“I see….” Alex looked over Rick’s bio impressed. “Though, given there are only two of us in the story is a tool like that really needed?”

Bio Information
Name: Alex
Age: 17
Gender: Male
Height: 5’8”
Weight: 145 lbs
Hair: Blond
Eyes: Blue
Info: Tends to ask to many questions. Tends to forget answers to questions easily. Tends not to care. Seems to have a supernatural ability to always wear a baseball cap at all hours of the day.

“True it is a little unnecessary, but now we don’t have to waste time with characterization and description.”

“I guess….” Alex seemed uneasy. “But do we just start now? No one even knows where we are?”

“Anyone can see that we’re in the gymnasium Alex. It doesn’t take a rocket scientist.”

“Yeah! But if someone was to be reading this they couldn’t see that unless we told-“

At that point Rick spun around removing a silver gun with knobs from his waist. Spinning a few of them he pointed it at Alex. “Just shut up and fight, you fourth wall catering whore!”

“Hey using that word might offend readers!”

“And you know what, while you’re sitting here complaining about me offending them, they’re just going to have more time to realize this entire setup is impossible and stop reading!”

“Wait what?”

“Think about it. Do you really think no one is going to question how two ordinary high school students somehow have sophisticated ray guns and are somehow having a duel in the gym without anyone knowing.”

“Oh….” Alex reached for his own gun and brought it out. It was teal colored, covered in flashing buttons. “I guess you have a point. Alright, alright, from this point forward the fourth wall is in place. Lets go!”

“Finally!” Rick didn’t wait for another second, he immediately pulled the trigger. A bright burst of pink light shot out from it, heading straight for Alex, who barely ducked out of the way.

“Your gun shoots pink?”

“I have a sci-fi gun that warps time and space. My masculinity is hardly going to be called into question because the rays are pink.”

Alex fired his own gun, releasing a bolt of orange energy. Rick ducked behind a basketball cart, adjusting his knobs and releasing another way of pink energy at Alex. Alex performed a barrel roll away from the shot and released a barrage of orange bolts. Rick stood his grand and fired a ray directly at the bolts. The two forms of energy met in mid-air exploding in a bright rain of sparks. Rick took a single step back dazed by the bright display. That was all the time Alex needed, pressing a few buttons and then fired a bolt of energy directly into Rick’s chest.

Rick was struck, but he couldn’t let that bother him, and he ducked behind the bleachers to buy a little time. As he did, he could feel the entire room becoming pleasantly warm and he had a vague idea of why. Looking at the back of his hand he could see brown fur starting to grow in. As it spread over his entire body he felt his clothes loosening. He had lost a good foot of his height. It wasn’t until he suddenly felt something flop down over his face he realized what he had been transforming into. Tossing his new long ears behind him so that they hung behind him he was able to recognize his form. A brown furred rabbit. A quick glance over his shoulder allowed him to conclude that at least his tuft of a tail didn’t look like a ball of cotton. Still he was a little bit irritated. A rabbit, really? Predicting the next step of the transformation he quickly kicked off his shoes. However, he was not in time to save his socks from being ripped apart as his feet morphed to become larger and more paw-like. His legs were a different shape now, and they felt stronger. As humiliating as this form was, he realized it just might give him an advantage. He was already forming a plan. He quickly tightened his belt to avoid his pants falling down and removed his shirt and jacket. He had a plan.

Alex was walking slowly toward the bleachers. “Can’t believe I scored the first hit. I mean based on the style of wr- Well you know never mind about that.” Alex pressed a few buttons on his gun to change their settings, and then looked behind the bleachers. It was dark, but he could see Rick, and the best part was Rick hadn’t noticed him yet. Without wasting a moment he fired his ray, and was slightly surprised to see a pair of hockey sticks with a shirt and jacket over them fall over.

“Surprise.” The voice had come from the brown bipedal rabbit now directly behind him. Alex didn’t even have time to react. The rabbit had fired, spun the knob and pulled the trigger again. Before he could even react Alex was struck twice, and the changes were taking place as he scrambled to put distance between himself and Rick.

“Stupid, stupid, stupid.” Alex chided himself as his size started to decrease, features soften gray fur started to cover his body. “How could I not see that, wait is my voice getting higher pitched?” Indeed it was, he had been struck twice and so was now undergoing two transformations simultaneously. His body had decreased in size far too much just for an animal hybrid. The higher pitched voice. It occurred to him what had happened right as his body finished regressing to age seven. He nearly tripped as pants fell around his ankle just in time for a big bushy tail burst out behind him, lifting up the back of his now quite oversized shirt. It wasn’t the tail that made him realize what he was though, but the increased agility and control of his movement that caused him to finally realize he had been transformed into squirrel kid. Not to bad for a duel like this, but for some reason he kept finding himself wanting to stop the duel and chase after every single shiny object he saw. Clad in only his baseball cap and an oversized shirt, he ignored these fun distractions and ran out from under the bleachers then immediately up onto them.

“Running away already?” Rick turned a few more knobs on his gun, firing them up at the bleacher. The squirrel quickly climbed away from the shots before pressing a couple buttons on his own gun.

“Why don’t you pick on someone your own size!” The squirrel taunted while firing an orange bolt.

“To slow.” The rabbit jumped to the left as the bolt flew past him with a smirk. You didn’t really expect that to, Gah!” He had been interrupted as the bolt had bounced off the basketball goal, and hit him in the back. “Clever thing.” His age had decreased, now finding himself at eight years. He had been hit by a nearly identical attack.

“Actually, I missed and just got plain lucky on the shot.” The squirrel smiled, and fired off a second shot without changing the buttons.

“Argh!” The rabbit tried to dodge, and he would have succeeded. If it weren’t for the fact with his younger age his pants were falling off again, and as he tried to jump to the left he tripped and wound up being hit. Once more he found himself regressing through age, now gaining back baby fat and losing some of his coordination. The now four year old rabbit quickly got up abandoning all his clothes and ran to the opposite side of the gym. Doing so he fired multiple rays over his shoulder.

The squirrel had jumped down the bleachers and in hind sight that perhaps was not wises of decisions. As he realized something. As much of a mockery of physics had been made on this day, it was still determined to insure gravity was still enforced properly, and Alex came to the realization that he couldn’t control his momentum once airborne. So, when one of the rays was fired directly at him, there was nothing he could do but take the ray and except whatever transformation awaited him. It seemed Rick hadn’t managed to change his ray’s settings yet either then, as he just found himself becoming much younger. It should have been somewhat difficult to walk and run, but the squirrel part of him seemed to help a little bit. When the effects finished though, the three year old’s shirt was falling around his shoulders.

The rabbit’s own personal blunder fresh in his mind he realized his chance, turning the knobs on his ray he fired before the squirrel had a chance to free himself. A direct hit, he kept the trigger held down and walked towards the toddler squirrel slowly. Keeping the ray on him.

“Ah!” The squirrel squeaked, as he started to decrease in size rapidly. More age regression? No, it just seemed he was getting smaller. It was a shrink ray! He quickly set his own ray for the same setting, but was unable to fire. He was to small to hold it and the gun dropped to the ground with a clang. Still the rabbit hadn’t let up on the ray as he shrunk smaller and smaller. He tried to make a run for it as his shirt fell to the ground, but there was one small problem. His hat had fallen over his tiny body engulfing him. The ray was cut off from him at least, but he still continued to shrink for a couple of seconds until he was just under an inch tall. “Well, crud.” Somewhat timidly Alex lifted the edge of the hat up and stepped outside, only to find a Rick’s ray pointing directly at him.

“Admit defeat.” The young rabbit smirked. “Or I’ll shrink you to the size of a grain of sand.”

“I…” The teeny squirrel looked around the gym. There was no way he still stood a chance in this fight. Not like this, not while the rabbit was so much bigger. Yet, the offense he had suffered at this man, erm boy. He’d rather be reduced to the atomic size before surrendering. He held up his hands. “I surrender.” Then a sly smile covered the squirrel’s face. “Nothing.” He back flipped away from the shrink ray as it was fired with far more grace than any toddler should have landing next to his own now enormous gun. Then, he kicked the trigger activating the ray, and it just happened to be aimed at the rabbit. “Lets even the odds a little bit.”

“I swear.” The rabbit shrunk in size, fast. This was quite tedious, but he was far more annoyed by something else. “If I find out that little pun was on purpose I shall murder you in your sleep.” He dropped his own gun before it became to heavy, and waited patiently for it to finish. In the end, he was slightly above an inch tall. “I’m still bigger!”

“SQUIRREL RAGE!” The squirrel having evened the odds pounced the rabbit and grabbed his ears and began to pull on them. “Say uncle!”

“NEVER!”

“SAY IT!”

“Over my dead body.”

“Fine, then admit you were wrong!”

“About what?”

“You know, that um, thing……”

“Oh, you mean the reason we were having this entire fight?”

“Yeah!”

“To tell you the truth, I can’t even remember.”

“You know what, neither can I.” The tiny squirrel let go of the tiny rabbit and smiled sheepishly. “Huh, I thought it was something important, but I guess it couldn’t be that big if neither one of us remembers.”

“I guess not.” Rick mused. “Oh well, guess this was all completely pointless.”

“Oh wow, I hope no one is upset about this. I mean people were probably expecting some kind of scandal and previous motivation for this.” Alex rubbed the back of his head.

“What it’s not like anyone was forced to hear anything about this. They can hardly complain when they inquired of their own free will.”

“Do you really think it’s best to antagonize them like that?”

“What do I care? I’m hungry. Wanna split a hamburger?”

“Sure!”

The two one inch tall animal children left the gym. Many questions can be asked about how they managed to open the door, or for that matter how they managed to get around within a decent amount of time while being so small. Well, this they had created an ingenious problem solving method. However, that is beyond the scope of this tale and so not of interest. If you’re more curious as to how two tiny animal people managed to go about their daily lives without anyone bothering them? Well, in today’s politically correct society it’s considered very rude to acknowledge other people as different from you, so most people were busy trying to ignore the fact this was abnormal. If you’re not satisfied with that explanation well sometimes life is disappointing.