OOC: This thread is starting right in the middle of a fight. If you want to join, keep in mind that your character will have been fighting with my two (
Aleksandr Sokoll and
Kichaa Mesoa) for a while now. Feel free to make assumptions on why they're fighting, or just fight, but there's one thing I don't want in here and this is it:
FLASHBACKS.
So don't include those. Two
character spots are open, so if you want to come in with one, go right ahead, and if you want to come in with two, go right ahead. If you come in with one, though, you'll have to work with someone else during the fight.
IC: Aleksandr Sokoll and Kichaa Mesoa leaned their backs against one another, chests heaving in a mismatched rhythm. Blood dripped from a cut below the wizards' eye and from the cold iron of the swordsman's sword. Eyes closed in the trust born from unadulterated desperation and the tiredness born from strenuous combat, the two were disturbingly symmetric, the combined demeanor of their fatigued stance strangely alert in its carelessness. They knew where they were in the instinctual way only a person who has fought somewhere knows that place so thoroughly.
"Are they coming?"
The single shaft of golden-white light in the room beyond, defined by the dust motes dancing in its light, cast an eerie panel of shadows across the columns between which they were resting. A sound of footsteps, morphed and distorted by the concrete walls and stone pillars, echoed into the corridor to their left. It ricocheted off into the corridor to their right, reverberating quietly and loudly at the same time and encompassing the enclosed space of the underground palace. The shaft of light from the ceiling behind Aleksandr—and in front of Kichaa—was the only source of illumination through the entire hall, the sconces having long-since bereft of their torches and the braziers having long-since burnt to gray ash.
"They're coming," Kichaa muttered, his eyes still closed. His tone was more longsuffering than worried or frightened."
"Have you ever fought anyone for this long before?" Aleksandr asked, opening his eyes to turn slightly towards his battle companion, "This cannot possibly be ordinary."
"Not ordinary," Kichaa muttered. He rubbed the slight, sticky film of saliva from his lips with one fist. "Usually I'm in it to kill, not to win."
"I see your point."
The two of them stood almost at the same moment, as if on some unspoken agreement. Kichaa opened his brown eyes, let them adjust to the cool, dry underground air once more. He rotated his neck in a slow, purposeful circle and ignored the sound of Aleksandr coughing and setting his staff. The cold iron shuddered slightly as he planted his feet more firmly, his arm shivering with the rest of his body as he coughed. Dust was everywhere in the underground palace, but the ash and the lack of moisture on this particular level was almost intolerable to him. Time seemed to be passing at a snail's pace underground, where no sign of light and no graduated change in the general atmosphere could signal any passage of hours.
Kichaa had long since let go the hope that he would end this fight quickly, or that his wizardly compatriot could do much more than give him support. He had always detested fighting in an enclosed space, or in the dark, but this situation had him pushing his luck. Most of his reactions were dulled by the darkness, his sight was all but nullified unless the wizard did something that was particularly flashy, and he was having trouble finding room to move quickly in the closed space between the walls and the columns. All he knew with certainty was that there was one fewer column now than there had been when they entered, and that it was all the fault of his support magician.
That, and he was at a standstill. Whoever he was fighting was good enough to avoid getting knocked out of the fight, but not quite good enough to end the fight on his—or her—own strength. Hell, there could have been two of them. The silhouettes had been either changing or morphing throughout the entire fight, appearing first to be one thing and then to be another. It was almost confusing.
"Ready to go again?" Kichaa asked.
The sound of footsteps seemed to be getting closer.
"I am ready when you are," Aleksandr replied, the runes of his gauntlet glowing vivid blue with the energies of his gathered magic. It cast a glow into the corridor near them, shocking Kichaa's eyes only a bit.