'Thy arrogance will be thy destruction.'

There was silence in the throne room of Lanka. Just mere silence, and nothing could, should, or would dare to cut through it other than the King, who did not. And so, Ravan's messengers, advisers, trustees, and most honorable warriors sat with the silence drenching them in confusion, anger, and a simmering wish for vengeance. And among all of this, their King still remained as quiet as ever. Quiet, yet deadly.

Finally, his words came, ripping off the tarp of emptiness. But the words he spoke made most of them wish to crawl back underneath it. "Dead, dead, dead." Ravan growled, sitting up from his slumping position, his oiled muscles rippling. "Every single time we send someone out there, they end up dead, don't they?" Ravan stroked his grisly beard thoughtfully, his jaw still clenched tightly so that the tendons of his jaw popped out of the smooth skin. "I wonder why, sometimes. Why should they end up dead? Those vanars have something up their sleeve, and they aren't telling us for some reason." That reason would be that they were in a war. "We need to get to the bottom of this!"

And Ravan collected his silky robes around his arms and stood up, his eyes blazing like an inferno, his entire body sparking with embers. And then he plopped right back down, grumbling to himself as his men exchanged uneasy glances. Ravan would kill them all. "But I'm not some detective," he growled. "I just know that they won't be able to kill me. I am invincible! I am the KING OF LANKA!" He thumped his staff like Merlin, and the courtiers began to cheer raucously. "So I shall go into battle today. And I shall show them that whatever means they are using won't work on this!"

And in the shadows, where Mandodari always stood, her face hardened, and her dark saris making it so that she would remain unseen, a queen's eyes finally showed the fear she had been masking for so long, though her lips still pressed tightly together as to keep her face neutral. Sulochana believed in Indrajit more than herself, she believed that they could defeat the "hermits" and reclaim their former pride. Mandodari did not. She very well knew how the mercenaries they sent came back with busted heads, hearts, ripped limbs, or worse. And she wondered, how would it be any different for her husband?

-----O-----

Vibhishan woke up with the sun streaming in from the translucent walls of the tent, and sat up, quickly grabbing some wattle from the boiling kettle which some vanar must have set there, and quickly dipping the English herbs into it. After a few minutes, the liquid stopped boiling, and he poured it into a small earthen mug. He stared at it for a moment, before taking a long sip, not grimacing as the hot drink rushed down his throat like a flood.

Vibhishan did not prefer the chai that Jambavan drank each day before healing or grabbing his club and making his way into the battlefield. Those leaves grew in Lanka too, and he remembered, they also grew outside the hermitage he used to live in. The hermitage which had seen the birth and bringing up of the monster that was his brother. And though Vibhishan never liked to admit it, he couldn't have stopped it.

Vibhishan drank English tea because it cleared his throat and burned his tongue, and for some time, cleared his mind from the drowsiness of his sleep. The drowsiness, yes, and also the dark little tendrils of hate that reached into his mind and pulled out his worst memories, mixing them with his best ones with only malice. Vibhishan drank English tea because the bitterness that had caused a curious Neel to spit it out made him blanch and drained the nightly guilt out of him. The guilt that he had just allowed his brother to capture an innocent woman. The guilt that his own were being killed, and he didn't care.

-----O-----

Ram walked in on Lakshman staring at the walls. "Come on! Let's go." he began tightly. Lakshman did not move. "Lakshman, come on. The sun has risen, and Nal's spotted the first legion of rakshasas charging. It'll be a couple easy victories today, but we'll still lower Ravan's pride a little bit." There was a pause in the speaking as Lakshman did not move. "Lakshman?" Ram asked, shifting his weight from foot to foot.

Lakshman turned around, and a small smile graced his face. "Yes, let's go." Because, for some reason, he felt that his Ram bhaiyya would accomplish something great today, even if he himself didn't feel too great. Who cared about that? As long as bhaiyya accomplished something, it didn't matter how he felt.

-----O------

Mandodari did not do a thing when Ravan walked into their room expectantly. Or rather, she didn't do a single emotional thing, for impassive and disapproving as she was. Mandodari first thought of herself as the dutiful wife of the King of Lanka, and the Chief King of the prosperous island state. So Mandodari calmly lifted the armor off the walls, where they had been pinned up, shining, and clipped them around Ravan's arms and legs, eventually putting a large chest piece over his head so that it covered his heart.

Finally, she picked up the dark, blackish golden crown of the King, the front of which had a small embellezone of Lanka's flag. Throughout this entire escapade, Mandodari did not say a single word, and Ravan didn't either. When she finally grasped his sword, she sliced her thumb so much that blood trailed down the entire length, but she didn't even blink as she traced the flowing red on his forehead. Would more blood mean greater chance of victory? Ravan did not speak as she finally performed the aarti, even as the blood did not stop.

When she set the flowers and the aarti down, Mandodari calmly watched as Ravan stepped back. "I hope," she began, her emotions drained. "-that you bring pride and victory to Lanka today." She had emoted too much in front of him when she practically begged for him to return Sita. He would not get to see her tears or hear the hope escaping her words. All he would see now was a queen.

-----O-----

Ravan rushed into the battlefield on his chariot like a lion. One moment, it was just the regular, and then suddenly the King of Lanka was amidst them, a threat that the vanar sena had not known before. As his charioteer held tightly onto the reins Ravan picked up his bow, moving it from arm to arm. Finally, he reached behind, picked up a sharp arrow from his quiver, and strung it. Without a second passing, the arrows were in the air, rushing against the wind, and embedded itself into Sugriv's leg without him noticing.

Angad watched as his uncle teetered for a moment, finally managing to kill the edmon he had been duelling for so long, before falling himself. Seconds later, medics had rushed up, and removed his injured body from the field. But Ravan had not stopped, and lying in the dust his chariot kicked up behind him were many more vanars, moaning, with arrows in their chests, arms, limbs. The medics could not work fast enough.

Ravan did not even stop to see if his arrows had met their marks; every time the sharp iron had pierced through flesh, another would be racing through the wind. He was like a machine, like a robot, his movements were not discernible against the air. All they could see were flashes as he aimed, and fired. If he was lethal before, even more so now, with thousands of arrows escaping his fingers by the second.

He could not be countered fast enough. First, jumped Hanuman, who, even in his normal size, matched Ravan in strength and advantage. He pummeled the demon with his fists, but Ravan finally let go of his bow and pushed him away into the path of his chariot, which Hanuman could only just dodge. The blessed vanar sprung back onto the chariot, but this time, Ravan was ready, and stabbed his arm with a dagger. Though Hanuman was not harmed very much, he still winced as he flipped the demon king around and slammed him hard on the floor.

Ravan, with astounding agility, jumped back up, trying desperately to stab the vanar in the stomach this time. Dust rose from the Earth, kicked up by the heavy chariot as Hanuman and Ravan, two greats from their sides, brawled. Then Ravan tossed Hanuman away, where he skidded to a stop in the Earth. The rakshas laughed, picking his bow back up from the Earth, albeit with a large bruise on his rump.

But the vanar sena wasn't done with him quite yet. First there was Nal, and then there was Neel, who fought together, causing havoc on his chariot, ripping away the roof and trying to disable the wheels (one of them became loose), and overall just created chaos. But Ravan was done with them in a few minutes too, and back to shooting his arrows and using his magic.

-----O------

Lakshman had just finished slicing the head off another monster, and causing a few explosions. The blood splattered over his hands refused to leave, and he didn't make much of an effort to clean it either. Finally, he stepped back from the body, and just as he felt someone approaching him from behind, he swung around and embedded his sword into the demon's stomach, the demon who had meant to smash his head through with his spiked club.

Lakshman stepped back, crushing bodies underneath his feet, and twirled his sword so that any rakshas approaching him would get killed if they ventured within three feet of his circle. And then he breathed a sigh of relief that Maa Kaikeyi had bought him a sword when he was young, because these demons were approaching him. A shout made him look up, and there he saw the golden chariot of a royal for sure. Still swinging his sword, Lakshman stepped back, and then he caught a glimpse of him.

Grisly beard, unkempt face, rippling muscles, and yet a peeking potbelly. This had to be Ravan. Lakshman bristled as Ravan released another arrow. Ram bhaiyya had never cautioned him against approaching the demon king, had he? Good. Exhaling, Lakshman lifted his bow and quickly snapped the string, the string loaded with an arrow, so that it took off Lanka's flag from the top of Ravan's chariot.

-----O-----

Ravan heard something clattering above him, and looked up. The triangle shaped black flag with the human skull on it, the flag of him, the flag of Lanka, was gone, and his eyes followed it right where it sunk into the frothy depths of the Indian Ocean. And then he followed the path of the arrow, right back to a golden-skinned hermit. This was not Ram. This had to be Lakshman. The daring one. The one who didn't have enough of a brain to not disturb him.

Ravan laughed, and laughed and laughed and laughed. He shook his head and lifted his bow. "You, little boy, and me? Really? As if! I am Ravan, demon king of Lanka! I make grown men shudder in their sleep! I have killed hundreds of thousands of enemies larger than myself! I have made grown men faint, and for that matter, women too, for a different reason entirely!" (the latter Lakshman [and all his brothers] had done too, but Lakshman never noticed). "You won't be able to do anything to me! Hermit!"

With another arrow, another unforeseen arrow, one of Ravan's horses was killed, and the entire chariot unsteadied. Ravan glanced up again, and another arrow was released into the air, where the rest of his golden plated roof ripped off of his chariot and flew away. And then three more arrows embedded themselves into the chariot walls right above his head, in a perfect straight line. Ravan whirled back around, where Lakshman stared at him, figure burning.

"Cat got your tongue? Good. I hope it stays there and claws it out. I'd suggest that before you brag, Ravan, you think. Of course, that might be a little hard for you. And I'm not a hermit. I was not exiled. I'm still technically a prince, aren't I? Out of us both, you'd be the hermit, having stolen someone's wife. Close your jaw, you may dislocate it. Of course, that would render you unable to speak, which would be a favor to all of us, since you don't make the world any wiser or better with your talk. You know, for someone who says that words cannot be fought with, you speak a Little. Too. Much." Ravan suddenly stumbled, and soon came to realize that the man was targeting his wheels next.

A/N-Did someone say slow-burning trophy? *clears throat* No, no one did, because this will be split into two parts, unlike Ramayana_lover's three. I did try my best though. I did not start this fight guys. You know who to be disappointed in. *shakes head disappointedly*

No, actually the real reason I updated today (I wasn't planning to) is because I came up with a club! The LAaSAK Club! The Lakshman-appreciation-and-subsequent-almost-killing club! Here's where we can all write random unnecessary stuff about Lakshman getting hurt and almost dying (which we all seem to be prone to doing) shamelessly! Here is our official badge!