Re: The Phenomenal Fracas! (GBS2G6): [Round One: Afterparty]
09-12-2010, 02:02 PM
Originally posted on MSPA by MalkyTop.
"Seriously, that was the stupidest thing I have ever seen and had the misfortune to be a part of," Eureka bitterly repeated for probably the twentieth time. Syvex had learned to tune this out by now. "Seriously. I'm surprised you haven't killed yourself before now."
Eureka paused and looked around, which Syvex appreciated. It was very tiring to ignore someone like Eureka.
"Where are we even going anyways?"
"I don't particularly know."
The dark-haired woman rubbed her eyes and looked back at Syvex. The dark rings under her eyes seemed to grow darker. "We're just wandering around aimlessly on a cable that hangs over a probably bottomless pit."
"Well, I was interested in that tall building over there," the shadowy beast said, gesturing with one of his arms to a tower in the distance. "It's a quite prominent building. Rather visible."
Eureka squinted at the building. It was indeed visible. And tall. "That's it. Really." Syvex shrugged, a far more interesting act than it sounded due to his six arms. "We came all the way to this ooooooooh so scary dangerous place and you're not even going to bother to make some plan of action. We are basically playing tourist. Snapping pictures of the only building that exists in this stupid place."
"We did just get here."
"Well we did fall all this way! Didn't you get a delightful view of this stupid place?! Didn't you at least scope it out?! Like, I dunno, see the other side?"
"Didn't you?"
"No! I was too busy falling out of the goddamned sky! Tied to a CRAZY SHADOW LIZARD THAT DOESN'T KNOW ANYTHING ABOUT WHAT TO DO WHEN EVERYTHING'S TRYING TO KILL YOU!"
The words rang out, probably allowing everybody to hear them for miles, but right now, Eureka didn't care. The most important thing was to complain loudly about her partner's stupidity.
"...That woman back there didn't try to kill us."
Syvex realized that this was the wrong thing to say when Eureka stopped walking, raised her head to the sky, and screamed, "AAUUUUUUUGH."
"Why? Why am I doing this? Why am I letting you lead me to my eventual, gruesome death?" the cloth mage cried.
"Because you love me?"
Eureka looked back down at the sharp grin and glared. "You don't even know how much I ha--"
It was at that moment that Eureka was wallopped over the head by what seemed to be a thick pillar of sand.
As she stumbled to the side and held a hand to her bleeding head, Syvex wheeled around to see Tamerlane, who simply said, "Get a room."
"Someone already made that joke," Eureka hissed back. "And it wasn't funny the first time."
As she started applying a bandage to her head (dammit why was she always the one getting cut up), Tamerlane focused on Syvex and held out his arm. "The Core, please."
Syvex tauntingly patted the humming machinery. "Oh, this old thing? You really want it?"
Tamerlane scowled. "Hand it over."
"You know, I don't feel inclined to," he replied.
"I do not see this ending well," Eureka muttered darkly.
"I'm giving you an option," the sand mage said tersely. "You can either hand it over willingly or I will take it by force from your cold--" The sharp blast of dark energy was the only retort he needed.
Ducking under, Tamerlane stepped forward and sent a long blade of sand through one of Syvex's arms. As he expected, it regenerated quickly. Syvex chuckled in a quite infurianting manner.
"Don't you see? I'm in my element here, sandman. And the desert's not all that close, is it?"
The bounty hunter hopped to the side as a portal opened up where he had been, getting a little too close to the edge of the cable they were standing on. Another sand attack made a gash in Syvex's shoulder, which quickly knitted itself up. He raised his arm again.
And felt something grab onto it. Ah, finally.
With a hidden smirk, Tamerlane pulled on the scarf before Eureka could, moving her forward slightly and sending her sprawling on the ground instead of him. In this moment of vulnerability, he swooped down quickly, pulling the unhappy cloth mage up and into an armlock.
Tamerlane pointedly set the cutlass against Eureka's cheek. He gained satisfaction watching Syvex's smile die away.
"Now then--" His satisfaction suddenly died away when he felt his bandaged arm being compresed by his own bandages. With a low grunt, he smacked Eureka's head with the hilt of the cutlass and the bandages loosened as she fell limp.
"As I was saying," he growled through gritted teeth. "Give me the Core."
Syvex hesitantly reached back, looking at the unconscious woman, at the ground, at the cutlass...and then grinned. Tamerlane felt himself getting worried, but tried not to let it show.
"You won't kill her," the dark beast announced smugly.
"Not unless you give me the Core."
Syvex laughed his damnable laugh. "We leave when one of us dies. And that also applies to Finch." Tamerlane said nothing. Saying something might give something away, though maybe it was useless. Syvex seemed to have it all figured out already.
"You kill her, we shuffle off to the next round. And when we do, we may be teleported to the opposite ends of the battlefield and you would have to go through the trouble of tracking me down again...except, without Finch's prattling to distract me, I'll be able to sense you before you can even see me. Get the picture?"
"I can track you down."
Syvex thought for a while. "And we'll both know where we are relative to each other. Oh, but guess what! I can make portals and you can't.
"And even if you did somehow manage to catch up, by then, perhaps I would have destroyed this little thing out of spite...what do you think?"
Tamerlane managed to unclench his jaw to say, "And you'll be down your one and only ally."
"I think you underestimated something, Sandman," Syvex purred, now exuding smugness like a smog. "It' s something called 'desire.' Indeed, these hostage situations would work if I desire that Finch not die, but you know something? I can make more allies. In fact, I can ally with that sharp-toothed trashcan behind you."
Tamerlane tensed, but did not turn around. The cutlass did press into Eureka's cheek, though.
"No? Oh well, it was worth a shot. The point I'm making is that my desire to save Finch is not exactly as strong as your desire to get your grubby hands on this Core thing. Is it worth it to give you what you want in order to save her? I think not." He paused. "What do you want this for, anyways...?"
Tamerlane did not grace Syvex with an answer.
"Nothing? Oh well. I may find out later, I suppose."
"You're bluffing," Tamerlane tried.
"Maybe so. But by the end of the day, if you kill her, this thing will end up getting smashed. If I am bluffing, the only difference will be that I will suffer heartbreak at the loss of my dear Finch. But I think the satisfaction of ruining whatever plan you've got will offset that."
It pained him to admit it, but this line of action was pretty damn useless. Tamerlane scowled and let Eureka drop to the floor, where she groaned.
"You don't have to go away empty-handed, however. I will willingly give up this machine thing if you do something in return."
"And?" Tamerlane asked impatiently.
"Kill Thatix."
The two watched each other uneasily. And then, abruptly, Tamerlane turned and left.
Syvex waited until he was out of sight before moving towards the groaning Eureka. He wasn't sure if Tamerlane really was going to go ahead and kill Thatix or just going to bide and wait for another chance to steal away this Core, but at least the whole mess was over now.
He helped her up and she muttered something that he was sure was some sort of jab or complaint about something or another. "Mhmm," he said distractedly, looking around. There were probably monsters prowling nearby and they probably were very fond of injured prey. He needed to get inside quickly.
With a bit of fancy portalwork, the two were in front of the prominent tower. Eureka seemed to be awake now. He could clearly hear her mumble, "...you and your stupid portals..." before raising her head blearily.
"Mhmm," Syvex repeated and pushed open the door slowly, carefully dragging Eureka in. He carried her over to the wall and sat her down there and only then did he turn to address the horned figure. It was very feminine in appearance. He decided to call it a 'she' for now unless corrected. She had ominous glowing hands. The left was glowing blue and the right was glowing red. She was wearing a pretty revealing dress. How scandalous.
What are you doing here.
Syvex grinned helplessly. "If you want the whole story, it's a bit long. Actually, I suppose it's not too long, really, it's just that we've been collected together by this--"
Leave. Now.
"Well, as you could probably see, my friend is a little injured here..."
Leave.
"You're not very polite, you know that?"
Leave.
"I think I know the perfect present for you. Ever heard of a thesaurus?"
Leave.
"Why?" Syvex grinned. This whole thing was probably very unwise to do but he had to admit he was having a little fun. "Are you hiding something in here?"
Leave.
If he could, he would have cocked an eyebrow. "So you do have something hidden here?"
Apparently the woman was not fond of having to repeat herself so often. This time, she let her actions speak.
"Seriously, that was the stupidest thing I have ever seen and had the misfortune to be a part of," Eureka bitterly repeated for probably the twentieth time. Syvex had learned to tune this out by now. "Seriously. I'm surprised you haven't killed yourself before now."
Eureka paused and looked around, which Syvex appreciated. It was very tiring to ignore someone like Eureka.
"Where are we even going anyways?"
"I don't particularly know."
The dark-haired woman rubbed her eyes and looked back at Syvex. The dark rings under her eyes seemed to grow darker. "We're just wandering around aimlessly on a cable that hangs over a probably bottomless pit."
"Well, I was interested in that tall building over there," the shadowy beast said, gesturing with one of his arms to a tower in the distance. "It's a quite prominent building. Rather visible."
Eureka squinted at the building. It was indeed visible. And tall. "That's it. Really." Syvex shrugged, a far more interesting act than it sounded due to his six arms. "We came all the way to this ooooooooh so scary dangerous place and you're not even going to bother to make some plan of action. We are basically playing tourist. Snapping pictures of the only building that exists in this stupid place."
"We did just get here."
"Well we did fall all this way! Didn't you get a delightful view of this stupid place?! Didn't you at least scope it out?! Like, I dunno, see the other side?"
"Didn't you?"
"No! I was too busy falling out of the goddamned sky! Tied to a CRAZY SHADOW LIZARD THAT DOESN'T KNOW ANYTHING ABOUT WHAT TO DO WHEN EVERYTHING'S TRYING TO KILL YOU!"
The words rang out, probably allowing everybody to hear them for miles, but right now, Eureka didn't care. The most important thing was to complain loudly about her partner's stupidity.
"...That woman back there didn't try to kill us."
Syvex realized that this was the wrong thing to say when Eureka stopped walking, raised her head to the sky, and screamed, "AAUUUUUUUGH."
"Why? Why am I doing this? Why am I letting you lead me to my eventual, gruesome death?" the cloth mage cried.
"Because you love me?"
Eureka looked back down at the sharp grin and glared. "You don't even know how much I ha--"
It was at that moment that Eureka was wallopped over the head by what seemed to be a thick pillar of sand.
As she stumbled to the side and held a hand to her bleeding head, Syvex wheeled around to see Tamerlane, who simply said, "Get a room."
"Someone already made that joke," Eureka hissed back. "And it wasn't funny the first time."
As she started applying a bandage to her head (dammit why was she always the one getting cut up), Tamerlane focused on Syvex and held out his arm. "The Core, please."
Syvex tauntingly patted the humming machinery. "Oh, this old thing? You really want it?"
Tamerlane scowled. "Hand it over."
"You know, I don't feel inclined to," he replied.
"I do not see this ending well," Eureka muttered darkly.
"I'm giving you an option," the sand mage said tersely. "You can either hand it over willingly or I will take it by force from your cold--" The sharp blast of dark energy was the only retort he needed.
Ducking under, Tamerlane stepped forward and sent a long blade of sand through one of Syvex's arms. As he expected, it regenerated quickly. Syvex chuckled in a quite infurianting manner.
"Don't you see? I'm in my element here, sandman. And the desert's not all that close, is it?"
The bounty hunter hopped to the side as a portal opened up where he had been, getting a little too close to the edge of the cable they were standing on. Another sand attack made a gash in Syvex's shoulder, which quickly knitted itself up. He raised his arm again.
And felt something grab onto it. Ah, finally.
With a hidden smirk, Tamerlane pulled on the scarf before Eureka could, moving her forward slightly and sending her sprawling on the ground instead of him. In this moment of vulnerability, he swooped down quickly, pulling the unhappy cloth mage up and into an armlock.
Tamerlane pointedly set the cutlass against Eureka's cheek. He gained satisfaction watching Syvex's smile die away.
"Now then--" His satisfaction suddenly died away when he felt his bandaged arm being compresed by his own bandages. With a low grunt, he smacked Eureka's head with the hilt of the cutlass and the bandages loosened as she fell limp.
"As I was saying," he growled through gritted teeth. "Give me the Core."
Syvex hesitantly reached back, looking at the unconscious woman, at the ground, at the cutlass...and then grinned. Tamerlane felt himself getting worried, but tried not to let it show.
"You won't kill her," the dark beast announced smugly.
"Not unless you give me the Core."
Syvex laughed his damnable laugh. "We leave when one of us dies. And that also applies to Finch." Tamerlane said nothing. Saying something might give something away, though maybe it was useless. Syvex seemed to have it all figured out already.
"You kill her, we shuffle off to the next round. And when we do, we may be teleported to the opposite ends of the battlefield and you would have to go through the trouble of tracking me down again...except, without Finch's prattling to distract me, I'll be able to sense you before you can even see me. Get the picture?"
"I can track you down."
Syvex thought for a while. "And we'll both know where we are relative to each other. Oh, but guess what! I can make portals and you can't.
"And even if you did somehow manage to catch up, by then, perhaps I would have destroyed this little thing out of spite...what do you think?"
Tamerlane managed to unclench his jaw to say, "And you'll be down your one and only ally."
"I think you underestimated something, Sandman," Syvex purred, now exuding smugness like a smog. "It' s something called 'desire.' Indeed, these hostage situations would work if I desire that Finch not die, but you know something? I can make more allies. In fact, I can ally with that sharp-toothed trashcan behind you."
Tamerlane tensed, but did not turn around. The cutlass did press into Eureka's cheek, though.
"No? Oh well, it was worth a shot. The point I'm making is that my desire to save Finch is not exactly as strong as your desire to get your grubby hands on this Core thing. Is it worth it to give you what you want in order to save her? I think not." He paused. "What do you want this for, anyways...?"
Tamerlane did not grace Syvex with an answer.
"Nothing? Oh well. I may find out later, I suppose."
"You're bluffing," Tamerlane tried.
"Maybe so. But by the end of the day, if you kill her, this thing will end up getting smashed. If I am bluffing, the only difference will be that I will suffer heartbreak at the loss of my dear Finch. But I think the satisfaction of ruining whatever plan you've got will offset that."
It pained him to admit it, but this line of action was pretty damn useless. Tamerlane scowled and let Eureka drop to the floor, where she groaned.
"You don't have to go away empty-handed, however. I will willingly give up this machine thing if you do something in return."
"And?" Tamerlane asked impatiently.
"Kill Thatix."
The two watched each other uneasily. And then, abruptly, Tamerlane turned and left.
Syvex waited until he was out of sight before moving towards the groaning Eureka. He wasn't sure if Tamerlane really was going to go ahead and kill Thatix or just going to bide and wait for another chance to steal away this Core, but at least the whole mess was over now.
He helped her up and she muttered something that he was sure was some sort of jab or complaint about something or another. "Mhmm," he said distractedly, looking around. There were probably monsters prowling nearby and they probably were very fond of injured prey. He needed to get inside quickly.
With a bit of fancy portalwork, the two were in front of the prominent tower. Eureka seemed to be awake now. He could clearly hear her mumble, "...you and your stupid portals..." before raising her head blearily.
"Mhmm," Syvex repeated and pushed open the door slowly, carefully dragging Eureka in. He carried her over to the wall and sat her down there and only then did he turn to address the horned figure. It was very feminine in appearance. He decided to call it a 'she' for now unless corrected. She had ominous glowing hands. The left was glowing blue and the right was glowing red. She was wearing a pretty revealing dress. How scandalous.
What are you doing here.
Syvex grinned helplessly. "If you want the whole story, it's a bit long. Actually, I suppose it's not too long, really, it's just that we've been collected together by this--"
Leave. Now.
"Well, as you could probably see, my friend is a little injured here..."
Leave.
"You're not very polite, you know that?"
Leave.
"I think I know the perfect present for you. Ever heard of a thesaurus?"
Leave.
"Why?" Syvex grinned. This whole thing was probably very unwise to do but he had to admit he was having a little fun. "Are you hiding something in here?"
Leave.
If he could, he would have cocked an eyebrow. "So you do have something hidden here?"
Apparently the woman was not fond of having to repeat herself so often. This time, she let her actions speak.