Night 47: Courtyard
[from here]With a little push from her hands on the top of the wall, Teresa gained enough momentum in her vault from the greenhouse yard to be a good couple feet away from the wall. Landing in a three-point stance, the large metal weapon barely clearing the ground, Teresa too a quick look around. She didn't see anything, didn't sense anything,
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Niikura was the first to drop down into the courtyard, and he immediately had his flashlight out and sweeping the area, searching for any sign of movement. Flowers, trees, a bench or too...nothing that seemed too dangerous. There were two other patients in the courtyard as well, but they seemed to be having a chat rather than scrambling for the pond or the shed near the pond. That was good; maybe they hadn't heard the woman over the radio.
He glanced back toward Morgan. "Looks good; all clear so far."
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If there were anything worth finding, there'd better be two. Niikura had managed to mostly counteract Mello's first impression of him as clueless and clumsy, but any spoils to be found were, obviously, morally Mello's.
There was, however, a more immediate problem, he saw when he got closer to the shed, in the form of the fruit loop with the slingshot between them and it.
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As they drew closer to the shed, though, Niikura realized that his initial impression of a conversation was completely off. A quick swipe of the flashlight confirmed that one of the men was armed with not only a sword in the form of his nose but also a slingshot - which was a low-level weapon at best, but the way this man was handling it suggested that he had mastered its finer points.
The question was, would this tengu let them pass in favor of his current target, or was he going to multi-task? As vicious as he could get, Niikura didn't enjoy fights against people he had no beef with. But if he had to..."Ah, boy, this is going to get a little messy, ain't it?" Hey. No reward without a little risk, right?
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"Hey! Don't think you can sneak around the legendary pirate Usopp, I see you!" Usopp shouted, jogging further past the shed he'd used at first for cover, no longer pretending to hide for sniping. That never worked. It always came down to chasing, screaming, and blunt objects, not to mention way too much bleeding. He reached over his back with one arm anyway, pulling around the body-length green slingshot Kabuto, his left hand rummaging in his bag to put away the smaller-ranged pachinko shooter and get out something more helpful.
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"Whatever you're reaching for, I wouldn't if I were you," he called to Usopp. Presumably the kid was going for ammo. "Put both hands where we can see them."
When he'd wanted to run into something whose ass he could kick, he'd hoped for a monster, not a fellow prisoner. He held the pipe ready to swing, as if to say, I'd prefer not to hurt you, but that doesn't mean I won't, and he was relaxed, almost smiling. This was a pleasant nighttime stroll compared to some of the shit he'd been through.
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He didn't quite shift his grip on the flashlight yet, preferring to keep the beam of light trained on their soon-to-be opponent for the time being. Obviously this guy was a distance fighter, which meant that once he got inside his firing radius, he could work things his way maybe. But first they had to go through the motions, let things build up a bit. Hopefully he could still dodge projectiles. Sort of.
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Something about this felt bad. They were coming at him with weapons. There were three of him, and one might be coming after him from behind. Definitely the time for heavier measures. But it wasn't their fault, was it? They were all just really sick, and had to...
One of them was trying to blind him with the light, but he squinted and focused on how how far away they might be, especially judging from the height of that light, proof at least one was on his feet again. Knocking the sun filters down on his goggles would only make it harder to see in the dark, and besides, their eyes would all have to adjust soon enough, so he closed them momentarily. "Hi no tori-boshi!This explosive was designed for detonation almost within Usopp's hands, a combination of fiery chemicals and gunpowder that burst briefly around Usopp in a circle, ( ... )
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When he heard the alleged pirate shout out something else he couldn't catch well enough to translate, Mello scrapped the idea, half-formed anyway, of trying to remind him that the prisoners were all on the same side. He was pelting towards Usopp, ready to swing the pipe, and he hastily detoured in hopes of avoiding the fire blooming around the younger man. The edge of the outspreading flames caught him anyway as he hit the ground again, mostly on purpose this time, rolling and cursing out loud, pipe cradled against his chest so he wouldn't lose it.
"Fuck, fuck, vosu, cepec, kreten--" It felt like his legs had gotten singed, and ( ... )
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Unfortunately, he was too close to Usopp to truly avoid the massive flames the "pirate" had just produced, and Niikura held his breath as he dodged the main body of the bird and dropped to the ground, feeling the fringe of flames from the bird's wings lick the back of his shirt. Gonna get a nice tan from this, aren't I? He gritted his teeth and rolled over in the grass, smothering the flames.
Only one thing was on his mind, though: Usopp hadn't followed up on his attack, probably thinking that he and Morgan would take him at his word and limp off. Big mistake: even if Usopp had a phoenix at his disposal, Niikura wasn't some ordinary person who'd run off just after seeing a nice pyro display. No, he was going to keep on coming until he couldn't. As he ground to ( ... )
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Usopp collapsed to the ground, dropping Kabuto and pulling his hands up protectively now, trying to shield his face, bleeding a little already from the hit the flashlight had made. "Stop it! Okay! Enough!"
Blowing up their surroundings, even setting them on fire hadn't worked. How desperate were they to get past? It couldn't matter to him, his only job was to get them to stop. And if Usopp wanted to do that, he couldn't hold back on really aiming attacks now, even if he'd been completely off avoiding them. Turning around one of the curled hands and averting his eyes, he triggered the small seashell in his hand, letting out an intense burst of blinding light, at least having the sense to only yell after he'd pressed the button ( ... )
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That look toward the 'pirate' was a mistake. Mello threw his arm up to shield his eyes from the light stabbing at them, a fraction of a second late, and staggered to a stop, blinded. God damn it, whatever was in that shed had better be worth it, because this was turning into way more fucking trouble than it had any right to. He squeezed his eyes shut until the afterimage and spots dancing on the inside of his eyelids had faded.
When he looked again, he saw that more people had joined the crowd, and that the bastard who'd snuck in while Mello and Niikura were preoccupied had made it to the shed. Oh no you don't, he thought, and sprinted for it, giving Usopp a wide berth in case he had something else up his sleeve. ( ... )
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Shaking his head to try to clear it of a lingering buzz from the solid hit, Usopp got back up to his feet.
[to here]
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