Hard Spirits [Power Shot]

OoC: Please pardon any glaring grammatical errors, oh purple one.

BiC: Two fingers trailing against the rough stone wall, I walked down one of the many corridors in the Dome, counting my steps and lodging the infinitesimal nature of such a gesture into the smallest parts of my mind. It was the gesture that mattered, or so I had told myself. Two thousand five hundred and sixty-three steps ago I had been at the door of my room in the Dome. Though I had never truly considered the place to be mine, I found it interesting to venture into the vast and inexplicable place that connected to it and had discovered long ago that visiting regularly was the only way to keep my entrances and exits to this place open and ready.

A small thought had niggled at the back of my mind ever since my return to the mystical school of combat, one that I had been pushing aside and ignoring with all that was in me but, as I was loathe to admit at the time, one that was not to be pushed aside nor ignored. The question of whether I would be forced to come face-to-face with Zorlo again, to make a decision about him, was one that I was not eager to be asked or to answer. For that reason had I tucked it into the most secluded parts of my mind, ignoring it, and for that reason was I occupying myself with the purposeless squandering of time. Counting steps was impossibly boring, but by its very nature it demanded focus and attention.

So long as I focused on counting, I could not be questioning myself. So long as I focused on counting, I could not be concerned with the fencer. So long as I focused on counting, there was no end to the peace I could inflict upon myself. Even if I hated peace, it was far superior to the constant pressure on my mind created by that one question.

"Should I forgive him?" I questioned myself, grimacing at the sound of my own voice.

He had pushed a lever. That was not his fault, or really mine either, but it had happened and it had snapped something in me. Even if it was an accident, even if it was not wholly to be laid at his feet, it was something that had resulted from a judgement call he had made on his own without help or encouragement from me. It was from a prejudice he had formed on his own. In the same breath that he had denied me something he had first claimed to offer, he had pulled the wire of control too much and broken it in the process.

Of course, there was the reciprocal option. The equal and opposite reaction, as I had learned to be a thing that was supposed to always exist—according to the physics portion of the vast Dome library—in tandem with every action. My hand clenched.

"Should I kill him?" I asked, this time narrowing my eyes at the stillness in front of me.

I found that I had stopped moving, my fingers brushing against the stone as they fell to my side, and sensed that there was no right answer to that question, no right act to be found in the pursuit of such a goal. If I simply killed him it would be murder. If I forced him to attack me, or allowed him to push me into attacking him, and killed him in fury and blindness it would be murder. If I allowed him to be faced with insurmountable odds and crushed into a death of my making, but of the actions of another it would be murder. Murder was never a right act.

The options were before me, and both were intolerably disgusting to me. Had he been wrong and had I been simply irritated by his presumption, the situation would be changed and this would be a problem I had no need to face. The simple truth was, and I stewed on this as I turned and stared into the darkness of the hall behind me, he had been right .

It was his rightness that I hated. The truth it implied, that I hated more. I hated these things because they brought realization, they brought clarification and illumination, they brought the fullness of Knowing. I knew that not only was I no longer in love, but I had never been loved in return. That made me more angry than simply the presumption could have.

That made me furious and enraged and outraged and irate and wrathful and all manner of other forms of gloriously unfair forms of upset. My open palm slapped the wall. The tension in my muscles was fed by the rage, fueled by the rage, compressed by the outrage, focused by the ire. I knew that all I needed to do was give in to the wrath and it would all release. It would expel like electrical energy grounded into the earth, but at the cost of the control I had regained and kept of my own will. My refusal to be made inferior to others was built upon my refusal to surrender control of my own emotions.

"Control is the antonym to weakness," I muttered, glancing at the stone wall I had just slapped. It was as solid as ever, unaffected by my outburst. My smile came gradually, but it was bitter on my lips and unconnected to amusement.

Deep breaths—one, two, three—calmed me. The clenched left hand released, moved to the sword sheathed against my side, and I allowed myself the grip the hilt with a fondness that had never diminished during all the years I had spent wielding bladed weapons of the same type or similar. A release for emotions came from combat, and a sword was my perfect channel. Like a river diverted into the ocean, my rage entered the world through the movements of my sword. It was what made me so much better than the others. It was what made me special . My eyes scanned the hall and my vision dimmed as I hardened my will.

The tendril of black at the edge of my eyesight was faint enough that it shattered the moment I heard a footstep behind me. My turn was pronounced, but non-aggressive. No need to provoke an unnecessary fight.

Rarely did the Dark Eye venture outside of his dungeon into the Dome.

This was because, unlike others, Chronos lacked an ability to communicate with the Dome. Its voice eluded his ears, or rather avoided them, so the metal man was forced to rely the Domerii to lead him whenever he went on one of his walks. The small, happy ghost was a sharp contrast to the ronin that wandered the hallways, menacing and dark as a scary night. So Chronos had the Domerii lead him down pathways where there would be no students, no teachers, just him. “Domerii,” he muttered, and stopped just beside a ceramic pot. “Is something wrong?”

The Domerii nodded happily. “Very good, Master,” it piped up. “Your ability to sense things throughout the Dome is getting better. Soon, you won’t even need me to navigate for you.” Chronos held up a hand, an order for silence, and the ghost ceased to speak.

“Someone is here,” he said, as he attempted to sense the energy. That was one of the drawbacks to having a numbed nervous system. You could not feel even the simplest thing, like a breeze or even a sword strike. However, it was compensated for, because Chronos’ other senses were perfectly capable of determining what was happening. “Malice, and a degree of insanity.” He looked to the Domerii for confirmation.

“Yes, Master. Someone unfriendly is here tonight.” Chronos knew it was nightfall, his internal clock was always correct. It was sometime after one, roughly halfway to two. “Should we find them and remove them?” Chronos nodded. “Can you sense where they are, Master?” The Dark Eye concentrated, trying to listen to what the Dome was trying to tell him.

“Library.” Without another word, the Domerii smiled, and proceeded to lead its master through the corridors and passageways that led to the vast library of the Dome. Along the way, the Dark Eye began his usual preparations for battle. He inspected the Energy Vials filled with Negation Serum that were stuffed in his utility belt, and made certain the Arm Striker was ready. His powerful staff was little use in the Dome, as it constantly picked up any magical properties and, given the Dome’s attraction to hardened warriors, it served little purpose other than a jumble of vibrations and rhythms he couldn’t decipher.

So when the Arm Striker started to settle down on his back, and pulsate to one specific vibration, the Dark Eye took attention to its rhythm. It was oddly faint for the disruption he was sensing inside the Dome itself, which meant that something was rather off. “He’s here,” the Dark Eye murmured to himself, and opened the door to the vast library. It smelt of parchment and history, a nice fragrance for those who enjoyed it. He proceeded directly to where the Arm Striker told him the intruder would be, following the steadily rising pulsation.

He found the intruder facing the wall, furious for some reason. Chronos allowed his footsteps to echo, and they clattered against the ground as he approached.

My foot set itself on the wood floors of the library when I turned, the dust and grit of the stone hall disappearing into mere memories as I felt the Dome shift around me. The smell of dust and parchment filled my nostrils. The air pressure changed notably, forcing me to pop my ears from the quick change, and my eyes adjusted quickly to the change in lighting. What had been the dull glow of evanescent lights in the hall changed to the clear, crisp whitish lights of a studying place. It grew colder. I felt the largeness of the place immediately, the moment my second foot touched the ground and my boot made a satisfying thump.

A clue had been given to me. This was no ordinary man. That someone could simply stroll through a place in the Dome and pull someone from a completely different area was amazing, but to do it without a struggle from the person involved was impressive. Whether that had been an action brought about by the Dome or this man was to be judged, but I felt instantly that there was a reason for our meeting. Judging by his look, I was decently certain that it was not to discuss the more rational types of conflict management or the higher points of philosophical morality. He looked more like the type of person to smack the back of my neck with his ... stick ... and stomp on my head a few times for good measure.

The black clothing, dark skin, red hair, and impressive stave were probably to blame for the initial impression, but it was his manner that kept it going. He stared. He was expressionless, perfectly, as if he had no way to correctly assume any one expression. He looked like a person accustomed to pushing his emotions away even as he exploited the emotions of others.

For that matter, it was working. I felt startlingly angry and vengeful just looking at him. It may not have been rational or philosophically moral, but I felt like he was the perfect person to help me vent, willingly or not. It took an effort of will to push down that reaction and replace it with a reasonably calm exterior. Even if I chose not to smile, there was a gut feeling deep inside me that said this dark stranger would never return the gesture. He seemed as cold as the steel in my sword.

I shifted, crossing my arms over my chest, and leveled one of the ‘looks' people are known to give other people, notably the ones who bother them. This one was laced with a twinge of anger, resentment, and firm rejection. Though it may have seemed an impossible thing to do with only one small, relatively insignificant look, I could feel them all combining to form the perfect expression for how I felt about this person and his sudden intrusion into my thoughts. That he was rudely refusing to speak was distantly annoying.

Aha! I had found a reason to pick a fight with him. Short of kicking him in the shins, though, I could think of no reliable way to do that. I certainly would not be the one to start it. That was a definite. It was always better to let someone else start it. It was stupid of me to decide I was going to fight him, but I had all but made up my mind—or what was left of it—and I felt the savage smile already working its way through me.

OoC: We need some theme music.

YouTube - The metal-Tenacious D

BiC:

The ronin, without moving his head, glanced at the sword that the boy was slinking into his hands. Chronos knew metal very well, and the steel that had forged the sword he was observing was a very sub par, nothing compared to his own, personal store. The boy himself was also outclassed, the Dark Eye noticed that, though several years of training had been wasted on the boy, the muscles were present but not altogether developed. The training had done little to produce a competent warrior, but rather a specimen that seemed to look the part of a fighter then a fighter itself. The boy also seemed to be rather annoyed, the Dark Eye could tell from the increased agitation present in his face, in the way his muscles flashed in lithe, uncontrolled spasms.

“Hey!” he shouted. Chronos, to be polite, glanced up to the boy’s face, more of a gesture then anything. “Who’re you?” Inwardly, the Dark Eye decided that the boy was not only foolish-looking, but also rather ignorant. Deciding that the boy was not particularly dangerous, the ronin twirled the Arm Striker a few times, then latched it to his back.

“I am Master here,” he replied carefully. He wanted the boy to fear him, and people do not fear what they understand. “I also ask the questions.” He caught a glimpse of a slight flinch from the boy’s cheek. The Dark Eye could be a very scary orator if he chose to be. “You are an intruder here. Leave, or I will make you.” The words did not have the intended effect that the Dark Eye was attempting to convey, as the boy tossed back his head and chortled merrily as if Chronos was capable of humor.

“You?” The child looked Chronos over, almost torn between jest and fury. “Look at you! Thinking that leather makes you look oh so cool. Thinking that I’m just a little puppy dog who’ll do whatever you say.” He laughed, and the volume of his voice filled the otherwise silent library. He waved his sword casually, obviously comfortable with it. “We’ll see!” He shouted once, then charged forward in a violent burst.

Chronos allowed himself a moment to judge exactly where the sword was going. It wouldn’t hurt him, the Dark Eye knew that, but the ronin did not wish for the boy to dent his sword on account of his stupidity. So, when the boy threw out his sword, apparently assuming that he was going to decapitate Chronos, the Dark Eye’s arm flashed out like a snake and wrapped its fingers around the blade, effectively stopping the boy in his tracks. The boy’s eyes flew open in shock as he attempted to remove Chronos from the weapon. “L-let go!” he ordered, gritting his teeth. A sigh issued from within the ebon knight’s cowl. Chronos, using the majority of his considerable weight, tossed the weapon and, as a side-result, the boy. The child flew across the room, and smashed hard against one of the bookshelves. He grunted, and the Dark Eye watched as he slammed hard against the floor. He coughed, and Chronos turned towards him, menacing.

“Weakling,” the ronin murmured. “Is that all?”

OoC: Since I can only assume you are less of an idiot than it would take to completely misread most of a post, I will also assume that the new non-player character you just inserted is only a character which distantly resembles my character. Though I have no idea why you would insert that non-player character, I suppose I can play along for the moment.

Please, do not force me to make assumptions again.

BiC:I watched, pacing off to the side, as the newcomer launched himself towards the dark man. He was weak, unskilled, his weapon poor grade even to the naked eye, and his body far from fit for the stress of real combat. My critical eye surveyed him even before he moved and knew him as the person he was: weak-willed, arrogant, most probably rich. Rich young brats loved to find no fault in themselves, to challenge the strongest and assume that the strongest would simply lie against their attack because they had the correct heritage or because of some equally idiotic kind of notion of the same sort.

When he moved, my disgust was only compounded. His style was loose, but not as comfortably loose as it should have been, and appeared to be following a strict form even in its looseness. He had no mind of his own and had most probably been taught a style from some traveling warrior or the like. If he had paid a copper for his training, he had overpaid. The way he held the sword seemed to be the way someone would hold a seemingly harmless snake they had found in their garden: uncaring, without empathy or desire to understand, and thinking it completely harmless in its entirety. Unlike the snake, however, a sword wielded carelessly would most certainly produce death or dismemberment.

However the case may have been, the fight was over before it started. As hulking and graceless as the dark man was, he was quite obviously immune to the uncouth youth and his meager skills in combat. If there was a surprise in the entire encounter, it would have been that the fight had lasted as long as it did. The fight was educational, though, however brief it had been.

The steel sword I carried would be pointless against this hulk. Even that small knowledge would be good for something in the storm that was to come. Just that fragment of information could save my life if I used my head. By the time the boy had hit the rug covered stone of the library floor, I had already gathered enough opinion of this dark fighter to know exactly how I would fight him if he spared enough of his arrogance to notice me.

"Boy," I growled, catching his gaze from around the hulk, "get lost. I was here first."

He wiped his mouth and glared at me, but when he climbed to his feet and picked up the sword he was ready to leave. The steel slipped into its sheathe with a snick and he stepped away, his shoulder radiating ice. I could almost sense the thoughts running through his head, and could practically taste the aura of his resentment. The angry red hues that danced across his shoulders ... I closed my eyes to those, and looked away. I had known it would happen, but the first instance had been enough to disquiet me. It was easier to avoid them now, but the dusty red of that aura was reminding me far too much of my own.

My control had been slipping.

A deep breath, a moment to steady myself, and I was once again ready to take on the dark man. Whether I was ready on a physical or martial level, there was no doubt—this darkly clothed, dark skinned man was my superior in action and motion, and I stood as much chance fighting against him as a wasp has against a cat. Oh, I could sting him and I could annoy him. That was a certainty. It would be a miracle, though, if I could actually harm him. Beating him would be an act of God.

Capital-G God, too, not one of the pantheons.

I took a step towards him, watching the boy scamper away, and allowed my wrist to rest between the grip of my sword and the angle of my hip, my legs splayed slightly further than shoulder width and my knees bent only enough to keep them from buckling. The fierce smile that had been at my lips, I noted distantly, had never waned. Perhaps that was why the boy had been so willing to leave. I probably looked just as arrogant as the man who had thrown him down in the span of a heartbeat. Maybe I was.

"Is your attention sufficiently present," I taunted, moving my free hand up to flick across an itch on my cheek, "that you can see me move?"

Did the Dome play games with him? The Dark Eye growled as he faced this newest threat, which looked exactly like the person he had just sent cowering away. To the ebon knight, though, detail was everything. This one was tall, almost as tall as the Dark Eye himself, but nowhere near as heavyset. Oh, sure, the man had muscles upon muscles, but only the Dark Eye’s arms were made of steel itself. After several moments of surveying this person, the Dark Eye found it suitable to answer. “Yes,” he muttered, in the emotionless, metallic tone that he was well known for. He will move quicker than I, thought Chronos, noticing the development of his foe’s calf muscles.

Chronos took a step forward, gauging the boy’s reaction. Interestingly, the stranger followed his example, itching for a fight. Though the man had a calm face, his muscle movement gave away his anxiety, his urge. A twitch there, a fidget there. He was deeply interested in fighting, though the logic of his reasoning eluded the Dark Eye. “You will not garner much information by standing there breathing,” he said with a slight growl. Chronos was sure that nothing he would be able to do would make this man fear him, but that did not mean he wouldn’t try. “I would advise attacking.” To taunt with the stranger’s ego, Chronos holstered the Arm Striker, fairly certain that his good left arm would suffice for the fight ahead.

“Oh, you would?” Finally the foe spoke, with a stable, even tone that hid the majority of the apparent stress the man’s psyche was under. “Maybe I will.” Chronos knew he would, it was only a matter of time until the brawl began. The problem was the standoff, which was a required segment of almost any battle that the Dark Eye found himself in. Unfortunately, he did not have the time to deal with a five-minute staring contest, in which he would arise the winner. The man with no eyes always wins, he thought dryly.

Allowing the stranger no time to prepare himself, the Dark Eye geared up his body and charged forward at a lumbering lurch. The metallic body clanked on the stone steps of the floor, and Chronos’ good arm lunged downwards, aiming for the stomach. There were no vibrations from the Arm Striker, which either meant that the man was just a man, or the man was incredibly skilled at concealing his powers. Either way, Chronos’ foe found fault with the Dark Eye’s attack, for he ducked and sliced at the metal giant’s ankles. The sound of metal scrapping echoed through the library’s walls, and the Dark Eye noticed that his left boot had a slight gash in it. The foe looked surprised that his attack had had no effect, but recovered quickly enough to block a kick from Chronos with the blunt side of his sword.

“This might be interesting after all,” Chronos muttered, and advanced.

An unexpected attack is difficult to recover from, even for me, and I have been in the business of fighting for almost eight years, not to mention fighting for sixteen or more. Gathering that much experience gives a kind of power of its own, honing the reflexes and the mind so that the body is able to react to almost any scenario. That I had been able to dodge his first attack was wrapped up in a package of luck. He should have crushed me with it.

My body reacted naturally, almost without direction from my mind—almost—and I felt a dull thrum course up my arm as my sword punched a clean gash through the boot and struck against the same metal that covered the rest of his frame. I was genuinely surprised I had managed to hit him back at all, even if he was bigger and clumsier than myself, and felt myself half-step back to block his second attack. This time, it was far more than luck that allowed me to survive it. Even his kick felt like it could have broken a brick wall. Of hitters I had stood against, he was number one or two, and completely out of league from anything short of an exceptionally powerful drake. The sinking feeling I felt in the pit of my stomach settled in when I heard what he said. Good lord.

He was playing with me. Those had been love taps, if not less. From what I saw with the kid, I had known that he was probably better than most of the people I fought, if not all of them. That he could back up the skill with power this raw said something about my chances. I found myself taking an unconscious step back as I stared at him, observing the dark metal and the dangerous lines of his musculature. Something in me was snapping and ready to go, and I found myself hard pressed to bite back the response that part of me would trigger. There was nothing that told me exactly how that would end, but I had a decent enough knowledge of myself to know that the strong likelihood of doing something stupid was far, far out of the question.

Holding it back only went so far. I was an offensive man. My body had not been honed into a weapon for nothing, and I stopped after just one step: it was enough to rally what little I had left of my firebrand courage. Stopping used up the rest of it, and I found myself facing down a larger, stronger, and most likely more intelligent foe. Fear never even touched me, nor did the concept that it would be smarter to back down and give up to this other fighter. It simply was not in me. Instead, I gripped by sword one handed and did the dumbest smart thing I could possibly have done under the circumstances.

I attacked. My weapon dipped forward with my arm, my entire body moving in a thrust as precise and calculated as any karate punch, the left side of my chest throwing back as the right pushed forward. The length of cool steel in my hand was useless. I had no delusions of grandeur on that count. This was nothing more than conveniently disguised play fighting until I found some kind of weakness in the hulk of metal. My feint worked beautifully. If I had not known that was what I was doing, I probably would not have even noticed when my entire center of balance shifted and my right heel pivoted. All the force I had put into the lunge flashed to the side, bringing me close to the metal man, as my left foot lashed forward towards the back of his calf to trip him.

Chronos, in his own way, was only vaguely aware of the fact that he had been kicked in the calf. Considering the fact that his opponent was obviously very strong, that did not mean that he was capable of injuring the Dark Eye. He heard a slight grunt issue from his foe, and turned around to spot the man recovering from the damage he had caused his leg. His muscles were shaking lightly, but Chronos doubted the man would stop. The Dark Eye surveyed his opponent, who had started to rush forward again, lunging with his sword.

Chronos parried with his good right arm, his skin hardened so that he would be able to keep up with the slightly denser weaponry of his opponent. Chronos allowed himself to be pushed back, to give his opponent the illusion of victory. His metal began to accumulate along his arm, but he did not release it from within his trench coat. To do so too early would be disastrous to his plans, after all. Finally, the sword point wavered just the slightest bit to Chronos’ advantage, and the ebon knight grabbed the blade between his fingers, and forced it into the ground, splitting the stone floor. His opponent’s body followed the motion, and Chronos delivered a smashing knee drive to his chest. The wind knocked out of his lungs, his foe gaped in surprise as Chronos punched his face.

The foe, knowing the situation would probably end badly for him if he stayed where he was, lunged behind Chronos, who was too slow to stop him. The Dark Eye considered his opponent’s physical capabilities: the punishment he had just administered would have downed a commoner like a sack of bruised peaches. Therefore, the conclusion that could be drawn from the situation was that the Dark Eye was dealing with a professional warrior or, at the very least, someone with a least five years fighting experience. The foe shoved Chronos as best he could, which, given the situation, was a fair amount. Chronos was rammed into a bookshelf. Meanwhile, the metal in his right forearm was finished stockpiling.

“Time to upgrade,” the Dark Eye murmured to himself, and allowed the stockpile to form into a small ball suspended in the middle of his palm, connected by a tough strand of metallic tendril to his flesh. He raised his hand calmly, and pointed the highly dense ball at his opponent, who looked at it with mild interest.

“The hell’s that?” he asked.

In response, the ball sprang out in a powerful tendril, aimed directly for the man’s sword. Before he could do anything, the metal wrapped itself around the blade, and started dragging the man in like a fishing pole drags a pike towards a hungry fisherman.

"Dammit."

I held the sword one-handed, my legs spread for balance, and stared at the dark man with an expression that felt like it fell somewhere between surprise and disgust. The tentacle screeched against my blade, pulling it with a grip strong enough to indicate that whatever it was, the metal was anything but normal. No ordinary metal could establish that kind of grip without completely fusing on touch. My grip wrenched to the side almost immediately, jerking his bulk forward just enough to send him off-balance and get me a few inches of leeway.

Shriang.

The moment I gained my leeway, he lost his mobility and I grounded off his attack. The point of my blade dug deeply into the stone underfoot deep enough to root it. It shuddered once at the pull of the tendril before setting itself into its position. The shriek of metal on metal grew harsher as I stepped forward, one hand moving idly to heft a larger hard-back tome from the shelf. I tossed it at him and the movement almost casual in its scary coldness. For a moment, I felt my blood cool and my sight clear as I looked at him, as I understood completely that whatever he was, whoever he was, the dark metal he commanded was too dense to pierce.

A dull ache had already settled into my shin from my ill-conceived attempt to trip him, a slight reminder of the sharp pain that had come from the kick itself. A contest of strength was no contest with this man; from what I had already seen, he was a lumbering brute, and lumbering brutes were almost always stronger than me. No one could be excused for calling me weak, but in general there are hundreds of kinds of fighters who can overpower me strength-to-strength. I was reasonably certain that a man who carried that much metal with him was one of those kinds. Battling with either agility or speed would be a fruitless attempt, of course. If his defense was so impenetrable, quick attacks would be as useless as hitting him with a feather. My mouth twisted down and I frowned at him.

It really was hopeless. That's just pathetic.

Following in the wake of the book, I stepped forward and into his personal space—close enough that, had my intentions been considerably more friendly, we might have been lovers. One arm dipped under his shoulder, the other pushing forward sharply, while my left leg planted itself firmly behind him. In the space of a second, maybe less, I had position myself. I looked him right in the face, grinned, and twisted my body. Judo. Gotta love it. He fell like the overgrown brick he was, and my hand on his chest just made it that much faster and harder a fall for his spine to take.

Pointless? probably.

Chronos did not particularly care that he had just been thrown to the ground. Crafted from metal, stone was nothing to the Dark Eye as he crashed to the ground, shattering the slated tile underneath him. But with every closed door there came an open window, and the ronin took advantage of it. He grabbed the arm currently pressed against his chest and, with as much delicacy of someone snapping a twig, broke the bones in his submissive hand by squeezing his metallic fingers. The man shrieked, and tried to twist his arm away, but the Dark Eye was rather interested in pressing his advantage, and smashed the hand’s broken bones into the stone to drive the point home. Chronos then kicked the man with a spare leg in the face, whereupon he fell clattering to the ground.

The Dark Eye’s foe lumbered back into the fight, clearly distracted from the pain that was circulating from his hand. Chronos, a studier of human anatomy, had shattered the bones in such a way that it would be impossible for the bones to just be popped back into place, and had instead opted to crush the bones into tiny pieces that would painfully stab the inner muscles of the hand if he even moved it a millimeter. The Dark Eye, who rather wanted the fight to end, as he did not normally engage in brawls with complete strangers, drew out the Arm Striker and bashed the boy’s leg before he could make a move, too distracted by pain. Pain was a very, very good distracter, thought Chronos, as he casually smacked the man to the ground again with another punch.

Not satisfied with the message he had delivered physically to the foe, the ebon knight lowered himself to the man‘s level, and grasped him by his neck. He lifted the stranger until they were eye to cowl, with the foe‘s toes just grazing the ground. “We are done here,” he growled. “Get out, and never show your face before me again.” He tossed the man to the nearby wall casually, then turned to leave.

But he could not. The foe, desperate, snaked himself along the Dark Eye’s left leg, and pushed him to the ground with another judo technique. “Not yet,” he panted.

I hurt.

A lot of warriors and knights try to block out pain completely, but I have never agreed with that approach. Pain was a part of life, a part of learning, of growth. Just about anything worth earning gets earned through a combination of will, effort, talent, and pain. Pain is just the price paid to make sure the other three are not completely wasted. The last time I tried to block out pain, the result was almost a premature death. Pain is just the nervous system telling the mind that bodily harm is occurring or has occurred; it is a warning, a defense. Ignoring it is tantamount to ignoring the natural instinct to stay alive.

I hurt.

Pain can be used. It is one of the best motivators in known to humankind, as evidenced by the prevalent use of physical pain as a method of coercion. It also happens to teach something that pleasure could never teach: what not to do. Pleasure addicts. Pain, as a general rule, creates and maintains mental barriers.

I hurt.

I had been fighting a man who was made of solid metal. I was in pain because I had chosen to fight him the same way I would have fought someone else, knowing full-well that he was much more powerful than myself. I was in pain because I had created a mental barrier around one of the few things to cause me pain. I was in pain because I hated one man with the very core of my being, so much so that the hate itself had ceased to have any meaning and become nothing but intention. I was in pain because I was too angry. I was in pain because I had denied myself power so many times, in so many ways, that most people who seek power would say I was insane. I was in pain because of who I am.

Screw it.

I could deal with it. This stupid hunk of metal was emotionless. He was a rock, and defeat was my own, personal hard place. As far as I was concerned, he stopped existing for all of about five seconds. It was just long enough to gather up what I knew and put it to use.

He was metal, he was beyond emotion, he was beyond pain, he was almost as fast as me and quite a bit stronger, and he had the benefit of experience. He was smarter than me, probably. The only things that measured against each other in this fight had been my stupid determination and his sheer brutality.

"We are done here. Get out, and never show your face before me again."

I looked up from the wall and formed a fist. It hurt. It hurt a lot. A vicious smile twisted on my lips and I closed my eyes, knowing almost instinctively that he was turning away, hearing his boots as did. Then I moved. My chest struck his upper back and I hissed sharply at the pain, but my arm lanced out and under his shoulder. My wounded hand latched onto his upper arm and shots of red fire needled into my skull, but I wrenched him off balance. My legs snaked around his and I pushed him down with enough force to crack beneath him. Hairline cracks formed a web around him.

"Not yet," I wheezed.

I reached for the sword that had fallen from my hand, felt the reassurance of its hilt, and straightened myself above him. I felt dramatic. I felt powerful.

I hurt.

The sword whistled faintly as it fell onto his chest, and I felt a sort of grim satisfaction almost instantly. The steel screamed against the black metal of his torso, cracked, and broke. The fragments fell from the hilt and landed across the floor. My smile would probably have been incongruous to anyone watching, but I imagine the dark man knew why it had formed. There was a small, precise notch in his chest, exactly where the point of my sword struck him.