[A/N: 10k reads? I love you guys ❤️]

The next day

It was a lovely morning. The weather was calm and agreeable, as it always was in Goiky; the sun shone down on the newly rejuvenated fields and forests, always warm but never unpleasantly so, and any thought of rain or snow simply didn't exist. The objects living there never got tired of the balmy, peaceful, unchanging environment.

It was nearing noon. Everyone was up and about at this point - either wandering about amiably, or chatting with friends, or showing off their still-new powers, if they had any. Most objects were concentrated in that area between the bathroom patio and the golden forest; the main site for a contest whenever one was going on. Everyone's favorite spot.

Well, at the very least, it was Loser's favorite spot. That alone bumped up the popularity of the area significantly.

The golden cuboid himself was currently surrounded by several other objects. He was often the center of attention, but today, he happened to just be in the literal center of the crowd, and was only talking to a couple others at once, Cake included.

That would soon change.

Another small group of objects - Eraser, Balloony, and Naily - purposefully strolled through the crowd and close to Loser, but not too close. He noticed them and paused the conversation to wave. "Hey, guys! What's up?"

The three of them exchanged glances that he couldn't quite interpret. Instead of responding to his greeting, however, they turned around. "Hey!" Naily shouted, addressing the rest of the crowd. "Can you all listen up for a sec? We got something really important to say!"

It took a few moments, but everyone else - not all the contestants, but everyone who was nearby enough to have heard Naily - halted their conversations and looked towards the trio expectedly.

"Thanks," Eraser said. "Anyway, this might be a bit blunt, but Loser stole someone's power yesterday."

He pointed accusingly at the celebrity, who looked shocked. So did everyone else; nobody was sure what to say for a second, so Eraser took the opportunity to continue. "You all know how my super power is super hearing, right? Well, last night, I was lying awake trying to sleep, when I overheard Loser and Cake talking about something..."

He proceeded to explain how Cake had discovered his own power and told Loser, and how Loser in turn revealed to Cake that he'd accidentally taken Leafy's airbending, and how they theorized that they got those powers from touching the energy sphere that surrounded the mansion two nights previously, at the party.

"I remember that," Liy piped up from somewhere in the crowd. "I was outside when that happened - they both tried to get inside, but the weird bubble thing just repelled them."

Several objects turned to look at the mansion, the ruins of which were still lying in a heap across the field. Several more stared at Loser and Cake with confusion and curiosity. "Loser, is this true?" Gaty asked cautiously.

Loser put on a smile - one that radiated apology, but also confidence. "Sadly, yes. But it happened by accident. I would have told Leafy the moment I found out, but I wanted to try and find a way to reverse it before saying anything. No harm, no foul, right?"

"Yeah!" Cake agreed. Many others nodded at this as well, satisfied. "Hang on!" Eraser shouted. "There's more!"

Loser's smile twitched nervously, but it was barely noticeable. "After that, I definitely couldn't sleep," the pink parallelogram went on. "And after a while, I heard someone get up. I looked around and saw Loser sneaking about. He went up to Basketball while she was sleeping, touched her forehead, and purposely stole her power, then did the same to Marker, Balloony, and Barf Bag."

At this, several cries of outrage arose from the listeners. Some were yelling at Loser, but most were directed towards Eraser, not believing him, or not wanting to. "I have proof!" Eraser yelled, and everyone instantly shut up. He turned to Balloony and Naily and nodded.

Balloony took over. "So, uh, I don't know how many of you know, but after the whole mansion thing, I gained the ability to be invincible. I couldn't be killed, which was actually really convenient. But if what Eraser is saying is true, then..."

Reluctantly, he picked up Naily, turned her point to his face, and closed his eyes as he slowly brought her closer and closer, until

pop

Naily dropped to the ground. Everyone stared at Balloony's remains for several seconds, stunned, before slowly rotating to look at Loser. A bead of sweat rolled down his head as he felt a few dozen pairs of eyes on him.

Then he looked at Cake, and his composure almost broke when he saw his close friend's expression. "Loser..." Cake nervously began. "Did... did you really...?"

"No, no!" Loser shook his head vigorously, trying hard to keep his look of confidence intact. "I don't remember doing that. I must have been... sleepwalking." He latched onto the weak defense. "I'm pretty sure I've sleepwalked before. My powers must have made it more extreme, or something-"

"No."

The crowd parted to see who had spoken. Donut was staring at Loser from several feet away. "There are two parts to my powers," the pastry began to explain. "Telekinesis, and mind reading. I discovered it when talking to Golf Ball and Tennis Ball yesterday. After that, I didn't read anyone's minds purposely, to respect privacy, but I just took a glimpse into Loser's mind now. And he was awake when he took those other powers, and he ABSOLUTELY knew what he was doing. And what's more-" Donut pulled out something from behind his back and brandished it; his diary. He was visibly angry now. "Loser had this when he got eliminated, and read through the whole thing. That's a seriously insulting breach of my privacy. And he claimed that he hadn't when I confronted him about it, then changed his answer later on when I did it again. I don't know what you all saw in Loser before today, but I hope you all know now that he's nothing but a dirty, stinking liar."

A deadly silence settled upon the group. Once again, everyone turned back to look at Loser, and this time, their stares weren't full of confusion, but of anger.

Cake's alone wasn't angry; rather, it was completely covered in disbelief. "Loser... y-you..." he stuttered.

More drops of sweat appeared on Loser's body as the crowd began to slowly close in on him. "I- I promise, I can explain-"

"Save it," a new voice snapped, cutting him off. Or rather, it was still Loser's voice, just coming from someone else's mouth. Teardrop pushed to the front of the crowd, looking more pissed off than anyone else there. "Do you know what it's like?" she said, using his voice so that he couldn't. "Being misunderstood for your entire life? Being mute is hard. Nobody paid attention to me, because they all thought I never cared about anything because I 'didn't' speak. I've had to fight hard to get any messages across. But while being mute taught me a lot of valuable skills, I'm infinitely grateful to suddenly have this incredible power that grants me the ability to speak. Sure, it's unorthodox. But I wouldn't give it up for anything in the world! What right do you think you have, trying to steal abilities that never belonged to you in the first place?" She was shouting now. "You think that because you're sooooooo popular, you can do anything you want and not have to deal with the consequences?! Well, buddy, do I have a message for YOU. You-"

Loser suddenly reached out and grabbed her arm. "What- hey!" she gasped. "Let go of me!! What are you-"

Something changed suddenly. Teardrop's mouth kept moving, but no sound came out. It only took her a second to realize what had happened, and her mouth dropped open. Loser let go of her arm, having already stolen her power. She staggered backwards, trying to form words again, but still nothing. She blinked in astonishment, and regular-sized teardrops began to roll down her face, quickly disappearing as they were absorbed by her body. Everyone else stared at her in shock and pity.

Finally, someone moved. "That's it," Blocky growled. He raised his right arm and used his power, transforming it into a weapon. "I think we've tolerated this jerkwad for long enough." Without wasting another second, he fired at Loser. The shot blasted into the yellow cuboid forcefully, but simply bounced off and slammed into the dirt below instead, creating a brown cloud of dust.

Blocky lowered his arm, bewildered. "What? Why didn't that..."

The dust cloud moved, and Loser shot out of it, grabbing Blocky's blaster arm with a strength the wooden cube didn't know he had. "Don't you remember?" Loser said, almost taunting him. There was a new look in his eyes, something unnerving. "I've absorbed Balloony's power. You can't kill me."

Loser continued to make intense eye contact with Blocky as they struggled. But in a matter of seconds, Blocky's right arm turned back into a normal one. Loser pushed him away and turned his own right arm into what was just recently Blocky's blaster cannon. "But I can kill you."

With that, he lowered his arm and shot a laser - not at Blocky, but at Book, who was just a couple objects objects behind. Despite her yoylemetal protection, she disintegrated instantly. Their current source of recovery, gone in an instant.

And that's when all hell broke loose.

Objects began to scream and flee from the scene as Loser took potshots at them. A crazed look had appeared on his face; something inside him had snapped. Cake alone stayed put at first, a little bit behind Loser, too shocked to move a muscle.

Donut was just as startled and terrified as the rest of them. But, he remembered, Loser wasn't the only powerful one there. He stepped forwards and raised his arms with the intent to hopefully use telekinesis to restrain Loser when a shimmering purple wall suddenly blocked his way.

"What the-" He looked behind him to see Lollipop holding her own hands in the air to create her impenetrable bubble of energy. Also inside the bubble were the few others who had happened to be close enough to her at the time - Pencil, Pen, Bomby, Needle, and Match. "What are you doing?" Donut asked Lollipop.

"Protecting us."

"But we need to stop him!"

"How?" she snapped back. "You saw and heard everything, Bagel Brain. He can't be killed, and he already has a weapon. But as far as I know, my barrier can't be broken, either. If we stay inside here, we'll be safe. No point in stupidly sacrificing yourself and giving him more power."

"Looks like others are already doing that," Needle pointed out.

It was true. The sight of Lollipop's shield had reminded several other objects that they had their own powers, and many stopped running to face the yellow cuboid. "Oh boy," Lollipop muttered.

Flower was the first to charge Loser, petals spinning violently, but he just sidestepped her and she face planted into the ground behind. Loser stepped towards her, but froze suddenly, struggling against an invisible force. "I've got him!" Pin's voice emanated triumphantly from the air.

"No, Pin!" Coiny cried out from a distance. "Don't touch him!"

Loser suddenly vanished. At the exact same moment, Pin appeared next to where he was, a look of realization and surprise on her face. "Oops." She was suddenly shoved aside by an invisible Loser.

"Well, that's just perfect," Pencil groaned from inside the bubble.

A bit dazed, Pin got up and grabbed for the space where Loser had been a moment ago, but he was already somewhere else. From a few feet behind Pin, a laser emerged from the air and disintegrated her.

A tense, unexpected, silence rapidly descended upon the field as objects stopped moving and listened carefully for Loser's footsteps, which were almost completely inaudible upon the soft grass.

An exclamation of surprise came from Coiny and all turned towards him as something tried to restrain him. But he quickly wriggled out of the invisible grasp, and before Loser could move again, Coiny whipped out a bucket of paint and tossed it desperately at a spot on the grass. The paint hit something in the air and immediately made Loser completely visible again.

"Yes!" Coiny cheered. Loser managed to wipe some paint out of his eyes and mouth, but the rest was already beginning to harden on his body. He cursed under his breath and became visible again, then proceeded to promptly blast Coiny with his arm cannon before the poor currency could dodge.

--------------------

In the section of the golden forest nearest to where the carnage was going on - which was still quite some distance away - Clock was wandering around, simply enjoying the beauty of the trees. Woody had done an amazing job the previous day.

An odd noise reached his ears, one he was vaguely familiar with but couldn't quite place. A... he didn't know how to describe it.

So he did his best to follow the noise. It led him to the edge of the forest, where the density of the trees lessened and eventually disappeared altogether. There, Clock got a good view of the entire mess caused by Loser. He gasped. What? What was happening? How was it happening? Why was Loser killing so many objects?

He didn't know the answers, but he knew he had to do something if he could. Clock quickly called upon his ability and felt the movement of time start to slow and grow cold until it stopped completely. Not wasting any frozen time, he sprinted to where the chaos was occurring.

Unfortunately, time is an extremely powerful force. It always wants to move forwards, and when it is denied that privilege, it pushes and pushes and pushes until whatever barrier it has struck gives way and allows it to continue freely. Because of this, Clock knew that he only had approximately two 'minutes' before he collapsed from the sheer exhaustion of holding back a nearly unstoppable force. And, also unfortunately, as he was quite a distance away from everyone else, most of this precious frozen time was consumed by the journey there, even though he ran as fast as his legs would take him.

Clock finally arrived, panting heavily. He would have been sweating profusely had he not felt frozen to his core. The very air around him almost felt as if it was a tundra lake, oppressing and absent of heat.

He took in his surroundings as quickly as he could. Loser himself was the obvious center of attention, covered in dried paint and facing Pie. He had his cannon arm pointing at her, and a laser was stock-still in the freezing air, already on its way to hit the baked dish. Pie herself was apparently leading Black Hole over to Loser and had a startled expression on her face, having seen the laser beam. Right behind Loser, Flower was about to attack, unnoticed, and Bottle was also advancing on him from farther away. Cake stood some feet from Loser, and even if time itself hadn't been frozen, he still wouldn't have been able to move from shock. Even further away than Bottle was Lollipop and her shield, which enveloped Donut, Bomby, Needle, Pen, Pencil, and Match. Everyone else had already fled or could still be seen running away.

Clock absorbed all this in about five 'seconds.' But there was still much information he was missing - why Loser was doing what he was doing, how he had gotten Blocky's arm cannon, and more. Despite this, if so many objects were fleeing or had already fled from Loser, Clock surmised that it would be hard to stop him. And, he suddenly realized, he didn't even have any actual plan for what he would do when he got there.

A cold trickle of dread down his back somehow managed to add to his already-frozen body. The very edges of his vision started to darken, and Clock knew he was out of 'time.' In a last-ditch effort to do something before passing out from exhaustion and letting time flow once more, he dragged himself over to the surprised Pie and lunged in front of her.

--------------------

Both Loser and those protected by Lollipop's shield were watching Pie when Loser fired at her, so both parties were astonished to witness Clock materialize from thin air and take the shot for her, disintegrating immediately.

"What?" Pen commented, flabbergasted. The others felt the same.

The moment of surprise was more than enough to let Flower leap at Loser, her petals spinning around her head at an incredible speed. They hit Loser and bounced off, sparks flying everywhere and nearly setting the grass alight. Both objects staggered back from the blow, but Loser recovered first, swiftly lifting his arm up to blast Flower in the face and obliterate her.

He turned just in time to be swarmed by a wave of pies - specifically, clones of the no-longer one-and-only Pie. He was immediately pinned down, unable to fight back against the sheer number of baked goods. Even his power absorption wasn't working; he deduced he would have to get to the original Pie to take her ability, but she was a ways away, with Black Hole floating over her head.

"Don't worry, Pie!" a voice chirped cheerily. The clones paused for a second before getting shouldered aside by Bottle, who had arrived. "I'll help you hold Loser down!"

Pie's eyes widened, and Black Hole shook himself from side to side. "Bottle, don't!" she shouted.

But too late. Seconds after Bottle had grabbed Loser's arms, she felt the strength being drained out of her. It only took a single slap from him to shatter her into a million glimmering shards of dust. Her stolen super strength subsequently allowed him to easily push away any clones that tried to restrain him afterwards.

Pie stepped backwards in a rare moment of visible panic. Before she could properly flee, though, Loser ran up and grabbed her arm, swiftly absorbing her power before slamming her against the ground. She exploded violently, her blueberry filling adding a new layer to Loser's already painty covering.

Black Hole had finally had enough. His goal was to prevent death whenever he could. Despite that, if it wasn't for Balloony's stolen immortality, he would have killed Loser then and there, as he agreed with Pie when she said earlier that sacrificing the life of one to save the lives of many was better than leaving the life of one to snuff out many other lives. But because death was no longer an option, what Black Hole did instead was different; he went as close to Loser as he could and trapped him in his accretion disc. "There," he said confidently. "Super strength won't help you if you're floating helplessly through the air."

Quickly, Loser cycled through the stolen powers in his mind to see what he had at hand. A thought struck him - one of the powers he had absorbed last night. Basketball's power, which was the ability to manipulate the gravity of individual objects. And Black Hole was all about gravity. Holding the image of a dial in his mind, he held out a hand to Black Hole and, with extreme effort, set the dial to zero. No gravity whatsoever.

Gravity suddenly gone, Black Hole vanished from existence and Loser dropped to the ground, free.

He took a deep breath before looking around. Everyone else had already run away. Everyone except Cake, still frozen in place... and a little group of objects protected by a purple bubble of energy.

The cube decided to calmly stroll over to Cake first.

--------------------

The seven objects inside the bubble watched apprehensively as Loser made his way over to Cake, talked to him gently, and laid a hand on his shoulder. Having seen how Loser had stolen the other object's powers, nobody needed to be close to know what the contact meant. Before long, Cake finally scrambled away from Loser.

The cube then turned towards them and started a slow walk over. "Uh, Lollipop?" Pen whispered. "How's that shield holding up?"

"Just fine," she whispered back. "I can hold this up for a long time if necessary."

Loser reached them and stared at them blandly through the shimmering barrier. "I don't suppose you'll let me in?" he wondered.

Needle answered this by spitting on the ground in his direction with contempt. Loser raised a single eyebrow.

He raised his right hand, flexing his fingers into a fist, then punched the bubble with as much strength as he could muster (which, given that he had Bottle's super strength, was quite a lot). The shield wobbled, but didn't break. Everyone inside flinched instinctively, including Lollipop, but hers was so subtle that Loser didn't see.

The cuboid nursed his right hand, then got an idea. The objects inside watched in horror as he created one, two, four, ten clones, which quickly surrounded the energy shield. All ten doppelgängers then began to rapidly slam the bubble with both fists, over and over and over. It flexed dangerously, but constantly held fast. With every blow, Lollipop flinched slightly again and again, but Loser kept failing to notice. The others huddled around her in the center.

Finally, it stopped. The clones disappeared one by one as Loser realized he couldn't get through by force. So instead, he rotated on the spot and began to leisurely walk away.

Those watching were extremely confused by this action. "What's he doing?" Donut wondered. "After all that, there's no way he'd just... give up."

Lollipop gritted her teeth. "I don't know, but if he comes back here and tries that again, I don't think I'll be able to hold this up for much longer." The six other objects there saw for the first time that Lollipop was trembling a dangerous amount. Sure, the shield was unbreakable, but the more force applied to it, the more tired she got.

"Maybe he-" Pen gasped. "Oh, no. He almost definitely is looking for Naily. Can't she teleport through walls?"

"Maybe he's looking for Taco," Needle added. "She can walk through walls."

Bomby put his hands to his head. "What are we going to do??"

"Oh!" Pen gasped again. "I can get us out of here!" He uncapped himself and knelt down and quickly doodled something on the ground. The grass shimmered and was replaced by a rectangular doorway into what appeared to be...

"Are those the original contesting grounds?" Needle wondered.

Pen nodded. "Loser's never been there, and it's so far away that even if he knew where it was or even that we were there, it'd take him forever to get there!"

Without any more hesitation, Needle leapt through. Bomby followed her, but before Pen got the chance to jump through himself, Donut grabbed his arm. "Wait." he told him. "How do we get rid of this doorway? There's no point in escaping if Loser can follow us through."

The ballpoint's face fell. "Oh... I actually don't know. I've only ever drawn doorways on sheets of paper before, which I would just rip up afterwards."

Donut's stomach dropped and his face turned pale. Lollipop groaned with exasperation, but Match stepped forwards. "Pencil and I can stay behind," she offered.

The other four objects still there swiveled around to look at her. "What?" asked Pencil, dumbfounded.

"Think about it, Pence-Pence." Match's expression was forlorn. "Your eraser can erase, like, anything now, so it can probably erase this doorway. You three go through, and I'll, like, hold Pencil and use her head to get rid of this portal thingy."

A range of emotions shifted through Pencil's face briefly before finally settling on acceptance. She sighed. "You're right. I gotta say, though, I wasn't expecting you to be so selfless to offer yourself to stay behind. And I wasn't expecting myself to help you."

"This is, like, bigger than us."

Without another word, Donut and Pen dropped through the portal. Lollipop inched towards it gradually, waiting until Match had Pencil in her grasp before finally letting the bubble drop and falling through the doorway. The moment she was gone, Match pushed Pencil's eraser head along the ground back and forth, and within seconds, the doorway was gone. Both girls breathed out a sigh of relief.

Match's sigh suddenly turned into a strangled gargle as Loser appeared without warning and grabbed her. (Or rather, it seemed as if he had appeared; the girls simply hadn't been paying attention as he ran up to them.) It took only a moment for him to absorb her power and snap her in half before grabbing Pencil.

The woodsicle chuckled, knowing she was about to die but still wanting to gloat. "Too late, Loser. The others already got away, and you're not gonna find them. You may be powerful now, but as long as someone's still out there - even if you get everyone else here - there's still a chance they can take you down." She realized something else. "And what's more, you can't even take my power!" she crowed. "You don't have the head of an eraser? Whaddya say to that?"

Loser stared her dead in the eyes, and she defiantly stared back. "Do I look like I need your power?" he said slowly, before using Cake's ability to drain the life out of her. Pencil dropped to the ground, nothing more than an empty husk.

--------------------

Lollipop fell out of the doorway leading to South Goiky and immediately collapsed onto the grass from exhaustion. Barely a moment later, the doorway vanished, and the others sighed with relief. Unknown to them, at the same time, Match and Pencil were simultaneously releasing relieved sighs across the planet.

Donut sat down hard on the grass, doing his best to let his heart rate slow down. Needle and Pen were looking around the endless grassy fields, perhaps reminiscing on old times. Bomby was staring off into a distance with a look in his eyes that Donut couldn't decipher.

Nobody uttered a word for several minutes before Pen finally broke the silence. "So," he said, "now what?"

None of them had an answer.