The Silent Treatment

"You don't talk much do you?"

The Doom Slayer stood there.

"Yeah yeah, I get it. Silent badass that kills demons for shits and giggles. Newsflash pal – we're not killing demons anymore."

The Doom Slayer stood there.

"Well, maybe we are. I mean, there's that Dragonborn weirdo who passed through the Planes of Oblivion or somesuch, so hey, if we're not killing demons now, we could be killing them later."

The Doom Slayer stood there.

"Oh piss off."

Ranger watched the Doom Slayer do just that. Well, walk off rather than piss off – with all that armour, he didn't know how the psychopath would be able to take a leak anyway. Not that he minded psychopaths – he was a psychopath himself – but he preferred psychopaths to be able to communicate with their fellow psychopaths, so they could do psychopathic things together. Whether it be killing each other, plot ways to kill the elder gods overseeing the arenas, or both.

"Weren't you a silent protagonist once?"

Nyx. He looked over at her. The malem that wasn't a psychopath, but still killed indiscriminately regardless. Often with a shotgun.

"I mean, back when the slip portals first opened, didn't you just say stuff like "ugh" and "ah?"

He liked her.

"I mean, just saying."

'Times change." Ranger walked over to her, looking out to the void of space that surrounded this particular arena. "I figure I may as well talk now."

"Yeah, but-"

"And what's up with that B.J. weirdo anyway? Oh, sure, he's fine opening his yap when killing Nazis, but in the arena? Nup. Silent killer."

"There's something to be said about silent killers though." Nyx picked up her rifle and began field stripping it. "Bullets get results, words don't."

"What about the whispers of the elder gods?"

"Words, not whispers." Nyx removed the magazine of her rifle and sighed. "Don't know why I'm even bothering with this. The guns keep appearing anyway."

Ranger shrugged. That they did. It wasn't even the first set of arenas he'd been in anyway. He'd been quiet then as well, but now?

Well, 'now,' if time really existed in this messed up realm, was a different point from 'then.' Everything looked shinier, including his armour, despite the two decades of wear and tear it had incurred while travelling between dimensions. The Doom Slayer and Blazkowicz could be silent, but he? No. He'd speak his mind, thank you very much, whether it be shooting, ripping out the beating heart of his enemy, or both.

"Slash got fragged."

And if the elder gods didn't shut up, why should he have to?

Bastards.