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The two stood opposite each other, staring across the circular room. Each stood between two pillars in the ring of a dozen of the thick round collumns. Before each of them, a circle filled with intricately carved tiles shown bright and colorful in the light from the glass dome in the middle of the vaulted ceiling. Behind each of them, the outer edge of the room was cast in shadow. The man panted heavily. His clothes were torn in places and dirtied from the excersie he'd already endured. His pants were a dark red, baggy all around his legs, but snug at his waist. Even clean, his long sleved shirt was a shade of dark grey, though it was verging on black as he stood there. His otherwise bare feet rested in a pair of thin, flimsy looking sandals.

Across from him, the machine leered smugly. It would have leered regardless, but as he stood tall, arms crossed in front of him, a certain amount of smugness was added to his skull-like grin. His rectangular jaw was filled with perfectly interlockiing triangular teeth. His six fingers and eight toes each ended in a point, and his form otherwise resembled a well muscled human male. A well muscled human male with two very large guns mounted on his shoulders. They had huge barrels, making them look like emppty cannons. Their barrels were a mat black, and the only ppart of his body that was not a well polished silvery shade, save the few spots that had become scuffed over the course of his encounter with the man he currently stared down across the room.

"You're tired, it would be easier on us both if you just layed down and died," the machines voice was hollow, echoing and almost grating. Despite the inability to affect his own tone of voice, the machine still sounded smug as it spoke.

The man's lip curled at the robot's suggestion, and he surged forward, his weary looking eyes grew wide, and fierce, then glowed a bright red. He brought his right hand up, palm open, with fingers hooked. A ball of flame appeared in his grasp and he pulled the arm back just enough to hurl it at the mechanical man. "Burn!" he shouted as the machine leaped upward, turned almost horizontal and pushed off of one pillar with his feet to fly off to the man's side.

"You first," he said as his feet met the ground, hiis toes digging into the tile and stone to bring him to a quick stop. Two gouts of flame poured from the attachments on his shoulders, straight at his opponent. The man leaped through the space the robot had been standing moments before, rolling behind one of the pillars as he landed. The machine charged the column as the two blasts of flame died out.

"I'll turn you to slag!" the man roared as he rolled away from the pillair to face the machine, his left palm pointed at the robot, fingers straight up. The red glow of his eyes seemed to be seeping out of his sockets like a mist, as the air in front of the machine ripped apart in a cloud of smoke and fire. The concussion of the explosion caused the man's clothes to flutter around him, but it sent the robot flying ooff his feet, to land hard on his back in the miiddle oof the room. The man extended both arms, and positioned his hands so both palms were toward his downed opponent and the heels of his hands were pressed together. A large flame burst into existance floating right in front of his hands, buring in midair. He pulled his hands apart, and the flame followed, splitting in two, but then surging forward in twin streams of flame that spiraled around each other as he twisted his hands, until he had switched which was above the other. He put the heels of his hands together again, just before the streams of fire hit their mark, and they went from the uusual orange and red of an open flame to a blinding white.

The machine sat up in time to get hit by the blistering heat. He pushed himself to his feet, then leaped straight into thhe air. The fire slinging human tried to follow with his stream of heat, but was too slow, and had to stop the flames in order to shield his eyes as the robot eclipsed the sun shining through the glass dome above. As the machine began to fall toward him, his glowing eyes grew wide, and he leaped to the side just as the metal man landed. A few tiles cracked under his sudden impact, but the real reason the man had leaped aside was because his opponent was glowing a dull red, steam rising off him in faint whisps.

"Too hot for you?" the dull voice still had a vague smugness to it as he turned and charged the human, flames bubbled up in the two shoulder mounted barrels, only spilling forth in twoo streams of flame as he closed on the human. The man backpedaled away, slipping between two pillars into the shadows, but his opponent persued. The shadows of the outer reaches of the room were lit up with each blast from the machines two flame cannons, as the man could do nothing more than leap out of the way and backpedal to try and forge some diistance between him and the mechaniical opponent. Between blasts of flame, the only light in the shadows was the dull red of the man's eyes, and the soft glow of the building flames in the machine's two weapons of choice.

As the man landed from one jump onto scorched tiles, he realized they'd made a complete circuit of the room without progress on either side, so he decided running was no longer a worthwhile option. He fell to on knee and placed his right palm on the ground. "Giving up?" the machine asked, "That's no longer an option," he laughed as flames build up on his shoulders once more. However, as the man's hand rested on the ground ,the stone around it began to glow a dull red, until he curled his fingers, each one cutting through the stone like putty. He took a hunk of the ground in hand and hurled the lightly glowing stone at the machine as he leaped to the side, between two pillars into the light. His blob of stone hit the barrel of one flamethrower, hardening around it just as fire shot out of the other barrel, right where he'd been. The machine roared in frustration, and turned awkwardly to face the human, the added weight of the stone throwing off his balance. "How dare you?" he roared as another stream of flame erupted from his still operational cannon. The human leaped to the side that the stone covered cannon was on, hoping to avoid the torrent of flame. However, as the uncovered cannon fired, the incapacitated barrel exploded, throowing the machine's right shoulder back, causing him to stagger to keep his balance, and forcing the stream of fire to sweep over the man's side.

He landed on his unharmed side and slid slightly, between two of the large columns, so thhat above his waist was in shadow and below bathed in the light of the sun above. The robot had staggered backward to keep his balance, and stood between two of the pillairs, his back in shadow and his front glinting slightly iin the sunlight. "Get up," the hollow voice demanded, "I want to make you pay for that." The man obliged, getting to his feet, but letting his burned arm hang limp at his side, the blackedned sleeve in tatters around it. His dark hair hung limply around his head, a few strands in front of his eyes, still glowing red, with the light seeping out fo the corners of his eyes like an angry mist. He bent down, his good arm scooping up what quickly became another ball of melted stone and tile.

A low rumble game from the machine, like a growl. No flames began to boil in his good shoulder, but despite it, he charged the man. The arm with his ruined weapon was raised high, claw at the ready. The man opposite him charged as well, the arm holding his blob of molten rock pulled back, as if he was going to shove it straight down the machine's throat. As they closed on each other, the man brought the hunk of glowing rock up and across, toward the working flamethrower. Just then, he heared the light hiss of air slowly seeping out of a small opening. His eyes grew wide, and suddenly the robot's smile seemed much more intentional. As the red-hot stone came close to the opening of the barrel, the fuel ignited, unleashing an explosion directly between them. Both fighters flew backward and landed on theiir backs, skidding from the center of the bright circle of tiles to just outside the ring of columns, both shrouded in darkness.

It took a moment, but there was a light groan, and the whispered sounds of a body rising from the ground. The man stepped into the circle of light, his shirt charred even worse, the burns on his arm now worse, and what was his good hand slightly blackened and very blistered. He crossed the lighted circle toward where the machine had fallen. It lay on its back still, the barrel of it's remaining cannon had been burst by the explosion, and it curled outward in strips, like a banana peel. The chunk of stone he'd thrust at the machine had left his hand at the explosion, and splattered over the machine's shoulder and the side of his face. This chunk had been much hotter than the first, and it had acted more like a liquiid, covering the burst cannon, the shoulder beneith it and the side of the machine's head in a hardened splatter of rock.

He presumed either the heat of the stone, or dual impacts of the explosion then the molten projectile had been enough to disable the machine. He sighed, and walked toward the wall of the room. He walked slowly around its circumference until he found the door he'd entered through. He laborously opened the massive portal and left the room of light and shadow.