What I despise. (1 Person)

OOC: I'll be using Eiro for this battle. Link in sig.

BIC: Flamel stared at the wanted poster with glee. He had heard that two powerful warriors were in this town. One familiar, and one new. He had the perfect plan for an entertaining fight.

The explosive master found a wanted poster and swapped the picture of the criminal with that of the unfamiliar warrior. Seeing as Eiro, the familiar warrior, was a bounty hunter, she would try to catch the unfamiliar warrior. Creed smiled and leapt onto a nearby rooftop to watch the immanent fight.

~ ~ ~ ~

Eiro casually walked down the street, her armor clanking with every step. She of course received several stares from nearby civilians. Most people didn’t wear such heavy armor in the weather of the town, especially not black armor.

Eiro’s voice, changed into a demonic sounding snarl by the armor, asked what the villagers were staring at. They instantly turned and went back to their business. Of course, the female knight could care less actually. She was looking for a good bounty.

The wall of the town that was usually used for wanted posters quickly came into view. Quickening her pace to reach the wall, Eiro didn’t notice Flamel watching and snickering from a nearby rooftop. He had picked an incredibly good poster to stick the picture onto, as he was aware of the things she hated most.

The first poster to catch Eiro’s attention was one that had a badly drawn picture on it. Of course, the crimes that were listed were far worse than the drawing itself.

Crimes guilty of: 13 counts of rape. 34 counts of armed assault. 23 counts of kidnapping. 25 counts of murder. Prize for capture: 400,000 gold pieces, dead or alive.

The name on the poster was scribbled out, but the picture seemed strangely familiar. The knight slowly turned and noticed that one of the people nearby matched the drawing. Despite the bad quality of the drawing itself, this was definitely a match.

Flamel watched on with childish excitement as Eiro made her way to the unfamiliar warrior…

OOC: Sorry for the bad entrance post. Just a little note: Flamel is not to be discovered until the end of, or near the end of the fight.

OoC: Snap. I'm in. Let's go and get our throats cut. Link is post 683: http://www.zeldauniverse.net/forums/...?t=828&page=46

Kellson finished his small tankard of beer and dropped some coins on the countertop. "Tastes like horse piss. My hedgehog didn't like it either." A sniffing sound from his pouch concurred, and Spiny Norman stuck his snout out, peering around.

Stretching languidly, he adjusted his klibanion and pulled up his cowl, and walked out of the open roomed tavern . He nearly smashed headfirst into a walking suit of armor.

"Christ," he said in surprise. "I thought armor was supposed to have someone in it."

Ice blue light flared from the eye slits.

"Ah. There IS a a man in there. Have fun toasting. It's boiling out." Kellson began to walk away.

The harsh, ringing voice blared out behind him, "You want to get cut, dirtbag?"

Kellson paused in the doorway without turning. "That was random. And I thought I said a man. Wrong, wrong, wrong. Take it easy, big guy."

The armor-encased...thing...drew a spear from its back. "Take a look to the left."

Kellson did. "Oh, boy. A criminal. A good one, too, if no one's caught him yet. So, what's your poiiiiii oh Christ that looks like me. Who drew that? I look far more kingly and wonderful than that."

A spear buried itself in the wall.

"Oh, Christ!"

Kellson leapt as high as he could, grabbing onto the low roof edge and hauling himself up it. Peasants were already scattering. He drew his crossbow.

Hah. Like that will help against the mammoth in black. He cocked it anyways and backed away from the edge. The only way to run would be to make a chase on the rooftops or fly, and his wings were a very last resort. He drew a sword in his other hand.

That's not funny, God, he thought. I'm not a rapist. Or a kidnapper. And I've murdered a lot more than that. But I don't assault.

A crash from below indicated that the megalith of black was fast approaching.

OoC: All right: I'm dumping it on you to kick things off.

Eiro looked up at the building that Kellson had leapt upon. If she had been looking at the building on the opposite side of the street, she would have noticed Flamel trying to hide himself from view. Of course, she wouldn’t have cared even if she saw him.

The knight knew it was impossible for her to jump onto the roof after her bounty. Her armor may have given her enhanced strength, but it sure as heck didn’t make it easy to jump high. Instead she decided to do something she remembered seeing a stealth warrior doing before.

Eiro unsheathed her remaining spear and stabbed it into the building about shoulder level. With one arm she hoisted herself off of the ground, ending up with her head two feet higher than the spear. She thrust the second one into the building at about that point and wrenched the first one from the building.

The knight repeated the process until she reached the roof. Of course, Kellson was waiting. The knight had barely pulled herself on top of the building when the warrior slashed at her with his sword. Blocking the blade with one of her spears, Eiro stepped to the side to avoid being knocked off of the building.

The bounty hunter struck at Kellson with her other spear, missing the smaller warrior by inches as he ducked to avoid the horizontal blow. She was taller than him with the armor, but she was well aware that her actual height was even shorter than Kellson’s.

Eiro hit Kellson in the jaw with her spear’s shaft while he was still ducked down. The warrior retaliated by ducking down and sweeping Eiro’s right leg out from under her. She let out a soft “Oomph” as she fell to one knee.

As Eiro was down, Kellson brought his sword down for a vertical strike. The female knight blocked the blade with her spears, putting them in an X position to stop the blow. The bounty swore under his breath as his hunter forced her way into a standing position.

The force of her spears against the blade caused Kellson to stagger back a foot before he caught hold of himself. Eiro swung at her opponent with the spear in her right hand. Kellson quickly sidestepped the blow and kicked Eiro in the face, giving him time to think of a plan…

Kellson brought up his crossbow, thumbing the release button for the actual 'bow' mechanism and firing three times at Eiro's head. The bolts ricocheted off, but bought him some more time to hop backwards. As she charged again, he dove to the left, flailing with his sword and firing off another bolt. The evasion took him off the roof onto the ground ten feet below.

He hit the dusty earth, rolling and bouncing upright, backing away steadily. How is that thing so strong? He tripped a running boy, yanked the staff from his hands and dropping his sword at his feet. "Keep it." The boy hopped upright and skipped off excitedly.

Eiro jumped down from the roof, smashing into the ground without toppling over. The force sent a tremor through the earth, making Kellson stumble. He regained his footing and charged at her. They traded off blows, two spears against one stave. Kellson ducked and weaved, falling back and attacking with a vertical strike. As expected, she made an 'X' to catch the staff. Kellson used his momentum and her weight to flip over her, land, and lash out with a roundhouse kick at her head. She staggered, and he fell over.

"Chrrrrist! What did I do to deserve this?" His foot felt broken.

The hunter still had said nothing. She whirled and stabbed with both spears where Kellson had been seconds before, but he rolled to the side and flipped back. He raised the crossbow from the ground, where it had been discarded, and pulled the trigger. A volley of bolts clinked off of her armor, but it barely slowed her down.

"Hm."

They charged at one another again. She smashed a spear-butt into his temple, sending him staggering back, clutching at his head. A thin trickle of blood began to seep down into his eyes, but he brushed it away. He grabbed her arms, heaving with all his might, sending her crashing into a mud-brick wall. It cracked but didn't break, and she swayed. He emptied the crossbow at her, sliding the cartridge out and reloading, backing away quickly. Eiro regained her footing and charged again.

"This is stupid." Kellson clambered up a second low roof, loping away. The familiar chinking and cracking of her spears stabbing into the walls. As he leapt to another close-by roof, a spear stabbed into his boot. It didn't go far, but it penetrated lightly into his flesh. He swore and hurled it back, turned, and continued fleeing with a slight limp.

I can't fight a collossus this way.

Eiro chased after her bounty. Although she couldn’t jump very far vertically, a horizontal jump was a different story. The armored knight easily jumped the gap between buildings, taking care to scoop up her spear after landing.

Kellson spun around and fired several bolts at the charging metal behemoth. Each bolt bounced harmlessly off of her armor, but the overall combined force of the projectiles caused her to stagger back a bit. She cursed under her breath when Kellson got lucky.

She had been standing too close to the edge of the building when the bolts hit. When she staggered back she found that there was nothing to stagger onto. With a scream, which she promptly cut short, Eiro fell off of the roof.

Kellson debated on whether to check and see if his pursuer where dead, or keep running. The scream showed that his opponent was definitely afraid of flat out falling from a roof, yet the golioth had survived jumping off of one.

-

Eiro sighed and slowly stood from the crater her armor had left in the ground. She had completely forgotten that her armor protected her against such things as falling from such a height. The armored knight picked her spears up from where they had fallen and used the now-familiar form of climbing she had used to get onto the roof two times previously.

“You’re not getting away from me,” she thought to herself. “I know how several of those crimes feel, and nobody should know that. You’re going to pay for what you did, it isn’t even about the money now.”

Eiro rammed her spear into the wall one last time before propelling herself back onto the roof. Much to her surprise, Kellson hadn’t even gone on to the next roof. Unfortunately for her, he was aiming at her with his crossbow.

This time Eiro wasn’t quite as lucky as before. A flurry of crossbow bolts flew at her from Kellson’s weapon. Although several of them bounced harmlessly off of her armor, two of them managed to pierce the small area between Eiro’s shoulder and neck that had less protection than the rest.

She let out a scream of pain as her crimson blood seeped through the wound. Somehow the wound disabled the voice changing effects of her armor, at least temporarily. She was surprised to hear her own female voice again.

The look on Kellson’s face showed that he was just as surprised as she was. Eiro refrained from pulling the bolt out, preferring to keep it in for a short while so she could hear what she had not heard in a long, long time.

"My God, I'm fighting the mammoth she-demon from Hell!" Kellson crowed. He reloaded the crossbow slowly. Ha, I'm such a good shot. I should win a medal.

"You're not getting away," Eiro yelled. The bolt was lightly stained with blood, but she didn't notice.

"Get away from what?" Kellson shouted back. He charged, dodged under a spear and swung at her face with the crossbow, missing by inches. "I didn't do anything!"

"Liar!" She smashed him hard in the leg with the end of a spear. Kellson cried out and fell to his knees. Eiro punched him in the face, sending him sprawling. She grabbed him by the throat and lifted him off the ground, throttling him. Kellson coughed violently, scrabbling at her hand with his own, then fell limp. She dropped him to the ground.

"Ha ha, just kidding!" he wheezed. He raised the crossbow and jammed his finger into the trigger, sending a stream of bolts at her face. Shrieking, she fell back, allowing time for him to get up. "I swear, I usually have a better reputation with the ladies than this," he said, grinning lopsidedly. A trickle of blood came from the corner of his mouth, and his throat was badly bruised.

"I'll bet, rapist!" She threw herself at him once more. He skipped back, twirling his staff he plucked off the ground, chanting, "I'm not, I'm not, I'm not, I'm not!"

Their spears locked. He brought his face close to hers and raised the bow. "Really, I'm not."

“Then how do you explain the poster?!” she shouted. Across the street, Flamel Creed was snickering. He hadn’t expected Eiro to believe the poster that long. It meant a longer and more entertaining fight though.

”I don’t know who made that poster but it’s fake.” Kellson replied. Eiro pretended to relax. She wasn’t quite sure yet if he were lying or not, and she wasn’t going to let her guard down if he were lying.

Eiro suddenly pushed off of Kellson’s weapon. She would take him alive, just in case he really was telling the truth. Of course, that would be a difficult task with this one…

The female knight thrust her spear towards Kellson, who quickly sidestepped the attack. Remembering that the crossbow bolt was in Eiro’s shoulder, he brought the shaft of his weapon down on the sharp piece of wood. Eiro screamed in pain as the bolt was driven deeper into her shoulder.

The female knight dropped her spear from her left hand as her entire left arm went numb. She knelt down to her knees, gritting her teeth in incredible anguish. The bolt was now poking out the backside of her shoulder plate, dripping with crimson blood.

Eiro clutched her shoulder with her right hand, just as blood began to dribble out of the front side as well as the backside. She stayed kneeling, even as Kellson slowly approached her.

When Kellson was less than three feet away Eiro leapt from her kneeling position, attempting to tackle Kellson. Her bounty leapt out of the way, making sure now to keep his distance. Much to her embarrassment, Eiro tripped and fell.

Across the street, Flamel watched on. Eiro didn’t have the use of her left arm, but Kellson seemed to be growing tired. It was definitely a mystery as to which one was going to win…

"Stuff the flaming poster," Kellson panted. He reloaded the crossbow, still backpedaling frantically as she attacked furiously with her good arm. He ducked to slowly and the spear left a thin gash on his jaw. He stumbled, and she charged with renewed vigor.

A blur of brown leapt at her and ripped the bolt from her shoulder. Eiro screamed louder as a massive hedgehog, the size of her helmet, hopped off her and brought the stake back to Kellson. He took it impassively and watched her from a safer distance of five or six feet.

"Stuff the poster," he repeated. "Anyone could draw trash like that and make it look like me. God knows I have stunning good looks." Even his casual arrogance was now tired. No one he fought was ever this strong or persistent.

Eiro slowly stood erect, towering over her foe. He craned his head back until he looked into her icy blue eyes. At the same time, they attacked. He brought up his crossbow with a flick and shot off five bolts in rapid succession as she hurled herself towards him once again. The bolts clattered off of her armor and she smashed him in the face with one gauntleted fist. Kellson felt his cheekbone crack slightly, and he dropped the crossbow and fell to his side, crying out in pain.

The tip of her spear touched his throat, and several houses away, Creed frowned. That wasn't as long as had been hoped. He watched with the disappointment of a child who has run out of presents to unwrap as Eiro kicked the crossbow off the roof.

"Are you a rapist?" she ground out between clenched teeth.

Kellson slowly raised himself to one knee. "No!" His mouth was dry, dusty, and talking hurt the splintered bone.

"Are you a kidnapper?"

"No!" He only had a dagger left. It would have to count...

"Are you a murderer?

Kellson stared into the blue, unwavering chips of stone. He smiled grimly.

"Yeah."

He brought the dagger up, knocking away the spear. He grabbed it and pulled, throwing himself over her head. As she turned, he twisted, pulling the spear from her grasp and snapping it in half on his knee, tossing the remains off of the side and ignoring the pain from his kneecap. He shrugged, and threw the knife onto the ground, as well.

"So, what now, milady? Here I stand, with no weapon to guard myself with but a savage hedgehog that is somewhere down there, retrieving my weapons. You can probably rip my arms off with your bare hands, but I'm not doing anything, I'm just standing here, haha. I've probably killed more people than you've ever met, but I'll just stand here."

Eiro clenched her fists. "I don't meet many people, and the ones I do are just like you. They don't live much longer."

"No, I suspect they don't." Kellson cocked his head. "My God, you really believe that poster, don't you? Ready to believe anything, so long as there's a reward at the end."

Eiro took a step forward, and the roof split into a spiderweb of cracks. Kellson took an answering step back.

"Yeah, you're a bit upset, then." He swayed slightly. Details were blurring. He blinked. He could've sworn he saw someone hiding, watching on another roof. He blinked again, and shook his hair out of his eyes.

"Your move, milady."

Creed frowned. It was obvious that both Eiro and Kellson were injured and tired, but neither one was giving in. It was time for a little intervention…

Flamel dropped down from the roof, nearly colliding with a merchant upon his landing. He didn’t care to pay attention as the merchant chattered in a foreign language, he was going to make this much more interesting by throwing himself into the mix. Both warriors were tired, so he could probably take them.

Creed casually walked over to the building Eiro and Kellson were on the roof of. He could hear the clanging of colliding weapons, obviously they hadn’t given up their futile fight against one another. Flamel rested both hands on the building’s wall, focusing on it.

-

Eiro dove at Kellson, letting out a light moan of annoyance when he sidestepped the attack. She was hurt, and tired, and would probably pass out if the fight continued for another twenty minutes or so. A familiar voice suddenly shouted up from below.

“Bombs away, bounty hunter!”

Kellson seemed confused as to who the voice was, and diverted his attention from Eiro. The female knight however, remembered the voice from mere weeks ago. She quickly grabbed her bounty and leapt off of the roof, narrowly missing the resulting explosion.

The entire building erupted into a massive explosion, sending flames everywhere. The muffled screams of those inside could just barely be heard as the explosion began, abruptly cut off near the end. The entire time Flamel merely stood with a twisted smirk on his face, staring at Eiro and Kellson.

“I saved both of your lives just there,” Creed said. “I could have created the explosion without announcing it. Then again, where’s the fun in killing you without any kind of fight first?”

Eiro rose slowly, still in incredible pain. It all made sense now. Flamel was an intelligent and tricky madman, he had drawn the so called “Wanted Poster” that caused Eiro to fight Kellson.

“Creed,” she said, gritting her teeth in a mix of anger and pain. “You are going to pay for that…”

Eiro wasn’t alone. Kellson too had pieced together what was going on, and was standing beside the female knight. At the moment, it probably wouldn’t be healthy for either of them to attempt to fight this “Creed” alone, especially in the state they were in.

Flamel laughed like a man who had just won the lottery, his eyes staring straight up into the sky. Just as his laugh was finishing off, the madman snapped his fingers.

Both Eiro and Kellson leapt in opposite directions as an explosion erupted where they had been standing. Eiro had known Creed long enough to know to get out of the way if he snaps his fingers, and Kellson pretty much figured that out by the way Eiro had been ready to leap out of the way ever since they started talking.

Creed continued to smile as he jabbed his finger in the direction of Kellson.

“You know,” he said, making sure to speak loudly enough for much of the remaining people in the street to hear him. He didn’t seem to notice that many people were running away from the area. “That fellow is a wanted man, and the armored one is his accomplice. Overall they are worth quite a bit of money.”

Eiro looked in every direction, making sure not to keep her gaze away from Creed for too long. It seemed that his desired effect was happening, as several people were coming out of alleyways with crude weapons. How the heck they reached that area so fast made no sense, but now was not the time to think.

Flamel crossed his arms, still smiling like a madman. The way he fought didn’t require him to strike a fighting pose, merely to be ready to snap his fingers.

OOC: Plot twist. I was itching to use Flamel in an actual fight, so that’s why I came up with this little twist. A link to Flamel Creed’s profile is in my sig.

OoC: Good stuff.

IC: Kellson snatched up his crossbow and whistled. Spiny Norman the hedgehog flew out of an alley and attacked some of the more violent villagers. "Distract him!" Kellson yelled to Eiro.

"How?" she shouted back, but Kellson was already firing at the mob. Two of them already fell, for they wore no armor and the wooden bolts penetrated their skin and clothes easily.

Eiro charged rushed at Creed, diving at his legs to avoid a firey explosion and knocking him to the ground. She locked his fingers into her own and squeezed. The explosions stopped.

Kellson whirled, cloak billowing behind him as he fired round after round into the oncoming mob. Norman guarded his back, spiking anyone who grew to close. Kellson shot the final man and reloaded, this time with metal bolts. Waving Norman away, he loped to Eiro's aid.

Eiro was many times stronger than the average human in her armor, but Creed was no slouch. He lashed out with his legs, head, and elbows, brusing them but successfully loosening Eiro's grip so that he was free. He jumped up, raised a hand, and smiling, began to snap his fingers.

Kellson took aim and fired. A metal bolt embedded itself in his thumb, stopping the explosion. Creed howled. He snapped with his other hand, and an entire building crashed onto Eiro's head. Kellson winced but made no move to help her.

"That really wasn't very nice," Creed said. His thumb was mangled, but the bolt fell out. "Now I won't be able to use that hand for much of anything."

Kellson half-raised his arms in the universal gesture of 'Wanna fight?', and mockingly sobbed, "Waaaaaaaah."

Creed stuck out his tongue. He snapped his fingers, but Kellson had already leapt into the sky.

Erupting from his shoulders, a pair of angelic, feathered wings unfolded and beat the air, starting several small dust devils. Kellson crowed to the sky in triumph; no one could beat him in the air. He cocked the crossbow and aimed at Creed's left eye, then right.

"Laugh this one off after it rolls around in your skull a few times."

Flamel jammed his wounded hand into his pocket. It would probably heal in a week, and then he’d have the use of that hand back. Of course, that would do nothing for the moment.

“You are really annoying, you know that?” he said. Kellson fired at the madman with his crossbow, and Creed naturally jumped out of the way. Just before he landed, Flamel snapped his fingers.

Kellson ascended higher with a quick beat of his wings, avoiding an explosion that erupted where he had been standing. Creed sighed; it was obvious that medium and large explosions would be too easy to dodge. A quick volley of small explosions though…

Flamel snapped his fingers in rapid succession, creating as many small sized explosions as he could with one usable hand. Kellson dove and weaved through the seemingly countless miniature explosions, although he couldn’t dodge them all.

He let out a yelp of pain when several mini-explosions managed to strike him in the chest, knocking the wind out of him and causing light burns to his clothing. Creed laughed and initiated another volley of miniature explosions, laughing as Kellson dodged them.

Although Kellson was managing to dodge the bulk of the explosions, he was spending too much time dodging to fight back. After a few minutes of this he began to tire even more, something Flamel noticed when several more explosions hit him.

A metal hand suddenly erupted from the rubble behind Creed, grabbing and lifting him upside down via his ankle. Eiro was holding Flamel, and she definitely wasn’t happy. Creed let out a holler of pain when she squeezed his ankle, effectively breaking it.

Flamel grabbed Eiro’s armor for a brief moment, but was quickly tossed to the ground. Eiro was well aware of the fact that Creed could cause inanimate objects to explode just by grabbing and holding them for an amount of time, and that wouldn’t be pretty if he did that to her armor.

The female knight drove one of her spears towards Flamel’s face as the madman unsheathed his shortsword. Creed barely brought his weapon up in time to stop Eiro’s attack, pushing off the ground with his working foot.

Flamel flipped over the female knight and pulled his other hand from his pocket, thrusting it into Eiro’s back. Time seemed to slow down as Creed began the process of blowing up the female knight’s armor. Of course, Kellson was a rather good shot with a crossbow.

A sudden pain erupted from Flamel’s shoulder, causing him to holler again and lose concentration. Kellson had shot him in the shoulder with his crossbow, and a bolt was now sticking out of it. Eiro spun around and smashed her fist into Creed’s face, knocking him into the ground.

Creed groaned with pain. He hadn’t been expecting Kellson and Eiro to fight so well in their weakened state, and thus had not fought them at the level of his own power that he should have. Nonetheless, he paid the price.

With a crossbow bolt in his shoulder, a broken ankle, a mangled thumb, and numerous bruises throughout his body, it was obvious that he had lost. Eiro slammed her foot onto Flamel’s wrist, breaking that as well.

“You’re going to jail this time Creed,” she said.

Kellson reloaded the crossbow, coaxing as many metallic sounds as possible out of it. "Why jail? Heard of jailbreaks, woman? Unless you cut off his hands, he'll just blow the entire thing sky high with everyone still in it." He cocked the bow, savoring the click. "It would be so much easier just to shoot him...."

Eiro was silent. Creed was on the ground, gasping. "You wouldn't do it, Eiro, right? It'd be murder, then."

Kellson shrugged, descending to the ground to rest his wings. "So? I could do it. It'd be one more murder on a long list. No one would notice."

Wincing, Creed summed up all of his energy and snapped his fingers on his semi-good hand. A huge explosion blasted Eiro and himself into the air. He had shaped it well; it was spread under the woman, to shake her, and under the ground he laid on, to send him flying into the air. Eiro, despite her weight, was flung backward, while Creed launched into the air, going a long way.

Kellson watched him go. "If he's still alive after surviving a fall like that, I'll go get him. Even if he isn't, he will be soon." He flexed his wings, preparing to fly.

"Wait," Eiro said.

OoC: I have no idea what to do now, and because you're outnumbering my character two-to one and have the majority, you can decide. I didn't know how Eiro would act if Kellson tries to kill Creed in his helpless state.