This is not going to end well...
Characters: Astrid Hofferson, OPEN
Setting/Location: District 1
Date & Time: Day 0, after most of the other people have woken up
Warnings: Anyone that Astrid stumbles across is probably getting attacked and held hostage for info, sorry.
Summary: Astrid wakes up, doesn't bother with her Junogram, and waits to ambush someone for information. ( Read more... )
She got hit around the mid-section and went flying, dropping her axe in the process.
And crashed into a fruit stand.
Do not underestimate the Viking capacity for pain, though, Shizuo. It hurt, certainly, but pain was just weakness leaving the body, right? Although, in Astrid's case, she didn't have much weakness in there in the first place.
She got up and when she did? She was grinning.
"Finally."
Someone to fight, even if he wasn't who kidnapped her. Here, Shizuo, have a melon hurled at your head at the velocity usually reserved for throwing axes at dragons. Also have a Viking girl running in, this time ready to dodge the lamp-post.
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Whatever tenuous grasp he usually had his power and his rage was gone now. The girl got up, she fought back. Maybe she had the same kind of strength as him, maybe she was a martial arts master like Simon. Maybe she was just gutsy and about to get killed. Whatever the correct answer didn't matter much. She had pissed him off, so he'd hit her, she got back up, so now she was annoying in two ways. It pissed him off, but it was exciting too.
He swings the entire lamppost up in a block to catch her incoming attack.
"Finally you get a chance to meet your death. Is that what you're thinking?"
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Hey, if she died right here and now, it'd be in battle. Maybe a pointless one, but that's what mattered, about your death. Not the whys, the how.
"Stop talking and fight like you mean it!"
He got that pole up to block her just in time and her fist slammed into it with a rather painful-sounding noise, though not quite a crack, but even that moment of blinding pain wasn't even enough to slow her down. Her other hand grabbed the pole with an iron-fisted grip so he couldn't swing it again, and she aimed a vicious headbutt at his face.
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He held the pole between them with only one hand, the cords of muscle on his hand and arm clearly standing out, but it still seemed oddly effortless. He shoved back against her weight to send her off balance, but doesn't follow up with an attack.
Instead he stood straight, wiped the blood off his face with a free hand, and popped his broken nose back into place with another crank.
Shit, blood was all over the clothes his brother had given him.
"Oiii, brat. You're really annoying." His nose still bled, but he didn't really blame her for that. They were fighting, after all. Blood happened. Hopefully he could get the stains out later.
Shizuo put both hands on the lamppost held between them, stared at it briefly. Then curled his fists down on the metal with his full strength and twisted until it shrieked and tore, breaking in half. Now he had two shorter weapons, kind of like seven foot metal tonfa. Not that he wielded them in way that looked at all professional. He just figured now he he could attack her twice as much.
"Reallyreally damn annoying. But I don't hate you." And he swung at her again.
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One of those impromptu tonfas connected with the side of her face. That was going to leave a mark--and possibly a fracture--but it didn't get a reaction from her, either.
However, it did knock her to the ground, and she used the momentum to roll back. She wasn't trying to escape, however. No, she was unarmed, he was armed, and her axe was over there. She needed a weapon.
And the chain from one of the wagons in the street was perfect.She unhooked it and yanked it free with a rattling noise.
"Really?" she asked, ignoring the blood streaming down her face, approaching him, swinging the chain, gathering momentum with. "Because you have a funny way of showing it!"
Admittedly, said way of showing it was providing her a good fight, so she had no complaints. She swung the chain towards him and it went so fast it made a whistling sound as it whirled through the air.
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He lifted one half of the lamppost and used it to catch the chain, twisting so that it wrapped tightly tightly around the lamppost.
"At least you've got guts. At least you aren't like those bastards that talk tough until someone beats their face in."
Then Shizuo jerked that tonfa to the side. 'To the side' being a fairly wide arc that would have sent several people flying if the street weren't clear of onlookers by now.
"At least I'm not hearing "I'll get you next time" while you run away crying!"
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She slammed into another stall. Vegetables this time.
And refused to let go of the chain. Even though she was having trouble getting up on her own power. (And she was still trying to).
"I'm a Viking! I don't cry."
Ever.
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She'd done pretty good.
But it was time to end this.
He lifted the lamp post straight up into the air, dragging her back to him, and when she swung his way, he was ready with a headbutt.
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Hello there, bloody nose. Is that your friend unconsciousness trying to stop in to say hi? After such a magnificent headbutt, her vision was fading in and out, and the only reason she stayed conscious was through sheer force of will.
But she was definitely down.
Oh hey, there was her axe.
There was a nearly feral growl and a vicious kick was aimed at Shizuo's knee, as she let go of the chain and tried to crawl for said axe.
Down, but not out apparently.
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The kick to his knee, like the broken noise, didn't produce a noise of pain, but he stepped back from the sheer force of it, weight shifting to his other leg. She'd torn his pants a little, too. He'd be pissed about that later, when he noticed.
But it wasn't enough to bring him down or take his attention away from her, and if there was any hope that Shizuo would not try to hurt a wounded young girl crawling toward her last line of defense...
Well. No.
At least as he hurled the lamppost and chain at her back, he did so that the weapon would crash into her horizontally. If he hurled it like a javelin she might really die.
And as much as a part of him chanted endlessly for her blood, he'd never killed anyone, yet.
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This time she let out of a cry. It was one she couldn't bite back, and she immediately looked enraged that he'd managed to get that out of her. For a moment, she just lay there on her stomach, trying to catch to catch her breath. Defeated at last.
...Or not. He'd thrown the pole and chain at her.
In one swift movement that took pretty much the absolute last of her strength, she grabbed the pole, climbed up on one knee, and with the chain still attached, used it the pole to swing the chain at him again. At his head, in fact. She was snarling like an animal as she did it.
Vikings don't give up, Shizuo.
Stubbornness issues.
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So there was a pause between Astrid attacking him and him realizing he was being attacked. And it was more than enough for the chain to wrap tightly around his neck.
A normal person would probably just flat out have their throat crushed in such a situation. As it was, it hurt. Aah, it really hurt. But his muscles protected him from not being able to breathe at all, from going down onto the ground suffocating.
Not that he really cared if his body got broken anyway. Whatever. He'd been destroying it his entire life.
He grabbed the chain that came away from his throat, that attached to the half-a-lamppost, and he held it tight. He probably could've just broken it with his fist, but it was conveniently chained to him and so instead he just held it and spun. Turning his entire body. Swinging the lamppost off the ground using himself as a pivot point.
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She let go but not fast enough since her reflexes were now shot, and the end result was her arm was painfully yanked, almost out of the socket. There was horse tack shop. Lots of rope. And she was knocked into it...and in her struggles to free herself, she was horribly, hopelessly tangled.
There were more snarls and sounds of rage, but she couldn't get free.
The fight was over, but it wasn't over from either of them standing down.
As she thrashed and struggled, she cursed her head off.
"--FLATULENT, THREE-TOED SNOTBOX THAT EATS THE EAR WAX OF RABID GOBLINS--!"
Rassum frassum RAGE! VIKING RAGE!
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He was aware of her, though, vaguely. Not of her feelings or her rage, which he didn't really care about, but of the fact that he'd just thrown her into several stands and hit her with a lamppost. Also several times.
His blood cooling down was always a bit like waking up. Only he'd woken up this way so many times, that his head clearing to find himself amid a street of destruction didn't cause much of a reaction. At least she was well enough to scream at him. That was good, also kind of irritating, what was the idea behind fighting him, then complaining so loudly about losing? Shit. She was already annoying him again. But he really didn't want to fight her anymore. Really didn't want to lose it again.
He turned away from her insults, placing his glasses back over his eyes, and shoved his hands in his pockets, and walked calmly away.
Ahh, and his clothes were bloody and cut. He would have to find somewhere to wash up.
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Oooooooh. Shizuo, next time she saw you, there was going to be a fist with your name on it.
Not that she knew your name.
(All in all, though, she had to admit, that had been a good fight).
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