[center][color=CFD3C6][img]https://i.imgur.com/QxwohJt.png[/img][/color][/center]
[center][@Hammerman][@Gentlemanvaultboy][/center]
[hr]

Rurik gingerly touched his cheekbones. He'd taken a nasty hit. One of his last opponents had been particularly tough. He'd mostly, OK entirely, been on defense in every round so far. "Defense." Which was to say he'd stayed near Bak and let her do most of the work. Rurik's greatest achievements so far had been distracting their opponents until they forgot to pay attention to Bak, allowing her to shoot them. This generally left the enemy team reduced enough for Christine to easily handle stealing their flag.

He was sort of annoyed now, though. He supposed he shouldn't have expected to get out of this unscathed, but he'd nearly been KO'd in their last match, his team having to save him. He didn't want to be there to begin with, and he was being reminded why. Winning just meant he had to fight again. But losing on purpose was harder to justify when he was on a team... Especially when he didn't hate anyone on his team this time.

The point of all this was to say that stress and frustration were mounting and his motivation was starting its dive off a cliff.

And then Bak said something about really wanting to win this match in particular. Her timing was just oh so perfect...

Unfortunately for her, he just didn't really feel it in him to "give it his all" as Christine put it. A fact that may or may not have been clear on his face as he stood there, shoulders sagging and hands pocketed.