ABEL FULGURATE VERSUS ROBERT FALLSON

The sparring between the students was, frankly, exceptional. As Abel watched, unable to hide the fact that he found the creativity of the techniques and the showiness of some of the weapons inspirational, he developed a somewhat-familiar feeling. He had felt it yesterday, for the first time in a long time. It was a strange sort of sensation, not too unlike his electricity, but rather than arc through his muscles and bones this current flowed through his veins. After a brief inflection, Abel dredged up its name: hype.

Pure, exhilarating hype.

As he stifled it to keep him from jumping up and shouting as some of the other spectating students were doing, he realized just how long he had gone without excitement. Just as he had guarded the walls, he had guarded himself, but now, among kids his own age, he was beginning to feel some hype. The clangs of metal on metal and the flashes of color enthused him to such a degree that he was having some trouble observing them to get an advantage for later.  Only the seconds-long encounter between Diamond and Mokuren disappointed,  If the fox persisted in her egomania, Abel reasoned, she might need to be knocked down a few pegs.  Nothing was more infuriating than someone full of themselves, and this was somehow especially true for girls.  He imagined that Diamond would be nursing her own pride for some time.

Robert was barely paying attention to any of the matches before his own, he was nervous about what his own match would be like. "I'm going to mess up. I'll get floored in the first few seconds. Everything will go wrong," he said. As his turn began to near though, his tone changed. "I've gotta give it my best shot. I have to do my best. It doesn't matter how badly I do, as long as I tried my hardest. Man up, Robert. Man up." “Abel Fulgurate and Robert Fallson! Fight well!” Goodwitch's assistant called out. Robert winced at the announcement then said, "Well, this is it." He rose from his seat and approached the stage, encouraging himself as he walked. "You can do this, Robert. You can do this."

Clamoring to vent some of his stopped-up energy, Abel snatched up the Ampere from its resting place on the floor and descended through the bleachers to the arena. He didn't so much as look at his opponent before he jumped, arcing through the air to land with a crash on his upper back. Unfazed by the impact that would have winded most other students, he rose to his feet,  twirled the Ampere and waited.  [i]What sort of man is this Robert Fallson,[/i] he wondered, scanning the arena's edge for a sign of his foe.

Suddenly, Robert's opponent launched himself into the air and landed on his back. Robert watched confused as Abel took his stance. "Why did he do that?" he thought. Robert then cleared his mind of all distractions and took his own fighting stance, one that looked similar to that of a boxer's defensive stance. He didn't know how Abel fought, so Robert thought it best to let Abel have the first few strikes so he could better understand his opponent's style of fighting. He just hoped that he was making the right decision by doing that.

Thin, spiky red hair, bracers, and glasses.  At first impression, Abel couldn't help but think that Robert looked like an everyday dork.  As he positioned himself in a side-facing stance, one hand on the lower hilt of the Ampere and the other up next to the blade, he further considered that assumption.  Glasses didn't necessarily mean a thing; Abel himself was living proof.  As for Robert's stature, a slight physique only meant that what made him special -what got him into Beacon- was hidden. Abel, vastly preferring to see an enemy's strength worn on his sleeve, resented this realization.

"Start!" Came the voice of Ms. Goodwitch, sounding every inch like a command.  Unfortunately, it didn't seem that Robert was intent on immediately obeying.

Robert could tell that Abel was sizing him up. "What is this guy thinking?" Robert wondered. He quickly regretted not having the semblance to read minds or something. "Alright, what to think about this guy. First off, he's big. In a very intimidating way. The fact that he's sizing me up also means he doesn't lack intelligence. Umm, I'm not very good at this sizing up thing," he thought.

Abel adopted his characteristic frown after a few seconds.  In a way, nothing happening was more painful than getting hit. [i]Fine,[/i] he decided. [i]If Rob wants to wait and see what I can do, I might as well oblige him. Something fun.[/i]

He sprang into action. Pulling the Ampere up to shoulder height, he held it like a javelin while it switched into blade mode.  After a brief moment, the weapon was charged, and with a grunt the guardian hurled it forward.  It traveled through the air with an uncannily straight path, not arcing at all.  Scarcely had the Ampere left his grip than he took off running, closing the distance between him and the smaller boy with big strides.

"Wait, is he going to- Oh, man he is!" Robert said as Abel threw the Ampere. As the large, sharp weapon quickly sailed toward him, Robert rolled to his left to avoid it. He stood back up, only to see Abel's foot coming right for his face--a Flying Thrust kick, though he didn't know its name. Robert quickly dropped to the floor to avoid the incoming foot sandwich he was about to be served. "Can't we talk about this?" Robert asked Abel. His tone made it sound like a serious question, but he was actually joking. He then quickly turned around to keep his eye on his opponent, knowing that losing sight of Abel for more than a second would probably be a deadly mistake.

Robert's vigilance proved well-founded when Abel, undeterred by the failure of his knockout technique, pressed the assault.  Keeping his momentum, Abel kicked three times in succession, a roundhouse followed by a turn kick succeeded by another roundhouse.  These kicks were more controlled than the Flying Thrust, and in aiming for his opponents solar plexus, Abel hoped to land them.  It did not escape his notice that Robert had dodged twice now; if he was going to do it again, the guardian knew exactly how to handle it.  Still, he felt a slight trepidation; exactly what sort of nasty surprise was Robert holding back?

Robert turned in time to see the first roundhouse coming for him. He knew there was no time to dodge and tried to block it as best he could. Then the turn kick came and Robert blocked it with his bracers again. Unfortunately, he was too slow for the final roundhouse, which almost knocked Robert off his feet. "Alright, guess talking it through is not an option," Robert said. "Time to take the offensive!" he then shouted before jumping towards Abel. As Robert closed in on him, he ducked down a bit before going for an uppercut towards Abel's chin, just in case his opponent tried to counter.

Taken somewhat unprepared by Robert's shout, Abel nevertheless had to smother an uncharacteristic laugh.  He moved his arms aside, standing still as Robert darted in, and clenched his jaw shut when the fist shot up to uppercut him.  His eyes closed when the impact arrived, but only momentarily.

Unsmiling, Abel rubbed his jaw.  His azure eyes bore a smug look.  "You chose poorly."  His hands shot out, but rather than punching, he grabbed Robert by the shoulders.  "Shoulda kept your distance."  Closing his eyes again, Abel smashed his forehead down into his opponents.  The blow made him see stars, even with the protection provided to him by his aura--but probably not as many as did his opponent.

Robert stumbled backwards several steps, moaning in pain. "Ow, that hurt," Robert looked back up to his opponent. "Distance you say? Well, if that's what you want." Suddenly, he rushed back towards Abel and feinted with his knee towards Abel's chest, hoping to throw him off enough to get that aforementioned distance. He sprinted away about ten yards then began firing several shots in Abel's direction, hoping his aura could handle the 10mm rounds. Robert definetly didn't want to kill a fellow student in the first week of school.

The sound of gunfire, however low calibur, sent Abel into a crouching position with his armored back facing Robert.  The barrage of bullets failed to penetrate the plate, but Abel was still plenty spooked.  He had never gone up against live gunfire before; on the edge of the kingdom of Vale, the enemy was the Grimm.  No real fights, not even full-on sparring, occurred there, for to make an enemy was to weaken the links in the chain that protected civilization.  It occurred to Abel exactly what he was doing: letting Robert deplete his aura, bit by bit, simply because he could take it.  Sure, it provided a good show for the others, but if he wanted to win it was not a good plan in the long run.  Regardless, he had plans for Robert; keeping distance wasn't as good a tactic as he had led the gunslinger to believe.  Throwing out a hand, Abel reached out with his semblance.  Small, very thin, very harmless bolts of electricity arced out from his fingertips as if they were tesla coils.  The threads of lightening attached themselves to the Ampere, lying on the floor about twenty meters to Robert's right.  With a heave on Abel's part, the weapon began to move.  More bullets smacked into Abel's armor, causing him to duck his head.  A little more impulse, and the Ampere levitated from the ground and whirled horizontally through the air toward Robert's legs.

As the electricity arced towards Robert, he feared he was done for, until it went right by him. "Ha! Missed!" Robert shouted. Then it occured to Robert that he had been standing perfectly still when Abel had fired at him. "I was a complete sitting duck. How did he m-" Robert quickly turned around to see Abel's weapon, which Robert had completely forgotten about, now flying straight towards him. "Yikes!" Robert shouted as he jumped over the Ampere. The attack wasn't completely ineffective though, since Robert fell face first on the ground. Still, lying on the ground, Robert looked up and sarcastically said, "Cheater. You gave me bad advice."

The Ampere sailed toward its owner, spinning slowly now, not unlike a helicopter restraining itself to land on its pad.  It landed gently in Abel's hand.  "Yep."  He flicked a small switch beneath the dust crystal focus on the weapon's crossguard, and the head transformed into staff mode.  The guardian allowed Surge to flow into the weapon.  The focus began to spark.  "Except for that shooting, you've been pretty passive.  Not into it.  Don't worry.  Won't last much longer."  Abel crouched and then pumped his legs, jumping several meters into the air.  He pointed the Ampere at Robert's prone form, and fired off a lightening bolt that he knew would probably obliterate Robert's aura if it didn't get attracted to something metal.  Wasting no time, he switched the Ampere back to blade mode and threw it down after the bolt.  Finally, he returned to the ground in his polearm's wake, too hyped to suppress the urge to call his attack.  "Thunderclap!"

Robert looked up at the bolt of lightning coming straight for him. Not wanting to get barbecued, Robert did his best to roll out of the way. However, the speed of dork proved slower than the speed of light, and Robert felt an immense amount of electricity flow around his aura. It didn't prevent him from feeling some pain though, especially where Robert's skin was touching metal, like his bracers and visor. Luckily he had already been rolling before Abel started his attack, or else Robert might of found himself waking up in the infirmary. "Owww. Could you please not try and taze me? That would be nice." Well, Robert's sense of humor still seemed to be intact. He looked at where he had expected his opponent to land, only to find the Ampere impaled into the ground. "Where'd you go?" Robert asked. An immense amount of weight landing on top of him answered Robert's question. "Ow. You're very heavy," Robert said in a strained tone. "Sorry about this, by the way," Robert said before turning his bracers to blade mode and stabbing wildly at Abel.

Landing on Robert gave Abel no satisfaction, so when he felt his aura spiking downward alarmingly quickly, he felt he had a right to be indignant.  Abel jumped back with a growl of mercifully-lessened pain, grabbing the Ampere on the way, and looked down.  While his aura had protected him from the stabs, his greaves did in fact have small holes in them.  Just as an arrow pierced chain mail, the small blade had managed to slip by both his soul's defenses and his armor.  Abel, judging this to mean that he was worse off than he thought, cursed under his breath.  Some of the earlier bullets must have made it through.  Guns and knives, both rolled into little vambraces.  Was this guy some sort of assassin?  A plan formed in Abel's mind, and he let go of the Ampere and retreated farther.  The polearm remained upright in the air, and when Abel started moving his hands, the Ampere responded, a gleaming puppet.  It spun in midair, changing directions in a heartbeat to attack intensely and without hesitation, but more importantly keeping its wielder out of danger.

"Oh come on! In no way is that fair!" Robert shouted. He tried to aim at Abel to get him to lose his concentration on the flying Ampere, but only managed to get an occasional round off. The fight continued furiously for several moments, a flurry of blows from either side that were quickly tiring Robert out. If he didn't act soon, he'd soon become too tired to continue. "I gotta bring this thing down now," then an idea popped into Robert's head. "Oh man. This is gonna hurt." Dodging a thrust from the Ampere, Robert grabbed it by the hilt and, doing his best to handle the pain from the electricity running through the Ampere, tossed it as far as he could. He quickly turned towards Abel who was now, more or less, defenseless. "Ahhhh!" Robert yelled as he charged at his opponent. If he was successful, Robert planned on tackling Abel to the ground, holding him up at both knife and gun-point, and politely asking for Abel's surrender.

Distracted by Robert's displacement of the Ampere, Abel instinctively reached out with his electric threads to regain control over it.  By the time Robert's cry announced his approach, the other boy was too close for an effective kick.  Rather than punching, which Abel knew was not his strong suit, he allowed himself to fall backward as Robert jumped into him.  As he fell, he used his shin as a support to keep Robert's momentum going, and the leader of Team Rampaged, still somewhat disoriented by the electricity, flipped overhead and was sent sprawling.  Unfortunately, Abel rushed the move, and couldn't stop his head from colliding with the ground.  He felt the pain from the impact keenly, and as he gave an upside-down glance to the huge monitor displaying aura readings, it became obvious why.  His aura was surprisingly low, in the orange in fact; the fact that Robert was in the orange as well, however, galvanized him into action.  Abel regained his feet, and recalled the Ampere back to his hand.  [i]Time to win this.[/i]  He jumped forward and swept wide with the Ampere several times, making broad, horizontal swathes.  The first inflicted a glancing blow, but Abel found the next strike blocked by both of his opponent's bracers.  Increasingly angry, Abel attempted an overhead smash. While he instantly realizing his mistake, the move was too committed for its momentum to be stopped.  The Ampere's blade collided with the floor, severely jarring both it and its owner and releasing a thunderous [i]clang[/i] that reverberated through the arena.  The guardian staggered, pulling up the weapon sloppily with numb hands in a paltry attempt to shield himself.

Robert dodged and blocked Abel's attacks as best he could, but he could see his aura slowly dropping on the HUD of his visor. As Abel raised his weapon in anger, Robert easily sidestepped the rage-fueled attack and sent a kick flying towards his opponent's ribs. The guardian had raised his weapon too quickly though, and Robert's foot instead struck the blunt side of the Ampere. Unwilling to let this opportunity pass him up though, he pushed off of the Ampere and propeled himself into the air. While falling downwards, he fired the last of his rounds at the disoriented Abel, who -still vibrating from hitting the floor at full strength- remained too shaken to effectively defend himself.  While only two shots were fired, they proved more than enough.  Abel staggered, and while the bullets were slowed by the last of his protective aura, they still hit him with enough force to make him gasp in pain.  Blood began to seep from the spots on his jacket where they had hit. "Oh, no. Are you okay? I... I didn't mean for that to... What do I do?" Robert said at the sight of Abel's blood. A moment passed in shock, and then Abel's features turned dark.  The Ampere levitated from his palm, ready to strike, fast as lightening. Robert had no time to act and raised his arms in what would be a futile block.

"Enough!"  Ms. Goodwitch shouted forcibly.  Her echo pierced the momentary rage that possessed Abel, and the Ampere dropped to the ground with a clatter.  He unbuttoned his blue jacket, and two bullets clattered to the floor.  Their legacies were mere flesh wounds, no deeper than cuts.  He looked at Ms. Goodwitch, then back to Robert, then to the monitor where the bar beneath his portrait blinked red.  "Robert Fallson is the victor," announced Ms. Goodwitch decisively, motioning for the combatents to leave the ring.  "Mr. Fulgurate, if your aura doesn't heal you within the next twenty minutes, head to the infirmary."  Not wanting to make a scene, Abel obliged. Robert lowered his arms and peeked over them as if they were actually providing some real protection and by moving them he was making himself completely vulnerable. "What? I won?" he asked. Robert had to use all of his self-control to not start jumping up and down in excitement. After all, he didn't want to act too boisterous.

As Abel walked up the stairs to the bleachers, he approached Robert. "Looks like you got me.  Didn't even take that many bullets, those things pack a punch.  You earned it I guess."  He rubbed the spots on his white shirt, showing that the blood wasn't spreading much.  "Definitely a good show for the others.  Next time I might not take it so easy on you--I'm not lyin' when I say it sucks to try and get in on someone playing proper keep-away."

"Uh, Thanks. You're definitely really good. I'll be sure to try and get better before we fight again," Robert replied. As he walked off the stage, Robert couldn't help but continue feeling an immense amount of pride. Which was why he wasn't paying attention to where his foot was going when taking the last step on the stairs and fell on his face. "Can't have one moment of happiness before it gets ruined by my luck, can I?" he said while rising off the floor. He walked up to where he had been sitting before his match began and took a seat, ready to watch the rest of the student's matches. Beside him, Abel seated himself, evidently feeling some sort of comradery with the boy who had beaten him. Robert was especially excited for Priscilla's fight, ready to cheer her on as soon as her name was called.