[center][h3]Elite from the Deep[/h3]
[b]Location:[/b] Sea of Serendipity
Geralt’s [@Multi_Media_Man] and Rubick’s [@Scarifar] vs Hydroid Rakkam
[b]Word Count:[/b] 4,248 words [+5] [/center]


Meanwhile, Rakkam exploded from the water’s surface with a well-practiced bullet jump, shooting through the air toward Adrian. He aimed not for the ship itself, but for the Breaching Bastion that rose from the waves just in front of it, and the Witcher who stood atop with his massive armaments trained on the Raptor. Rakkam drew his third and final weapon, the intricate paired cutlass and dagger called [url=https://i.imgur.com/5l8gHHq.png]Nami Skyla[/url], and descended on Geralt with his blades extended like the claws of an osprey for a hapless fish. “[color=limegreen]Incoming![/color]” Rubick called out in warning. He did not do so in ignorance of Rubick, however; when the sorcerer went to capitalize, he would find himself faced by the warframe’s tentacled sentinel, [url=https://i.imgur.com/jPeGKvQ.png]Scyph Diriga[/url], which fixed its sea-green eye on Rubick to take a calculated shot with its built-in sniper rifle. Rubick quickly backpedaled, but was still caught off guard. Fortunately, his copied Quen shield was still up, which blocked the shot but shattered in the process. Determined to not give the Scyph Diriga a chance to follow up, Rubick then raised his staff and cast his Telekinesis spell on it, intending to launch it away and into the water. He succeeded, overpowering the sentinel’s flotation system to separate it from Rakkam for a precious moment.

The Bastion’s guns took time to move, so they hadn’t quite managed to catch Rakkam as he approached, and when he burst from the water, Geralt bit back a curse, but stared down the attacking Warframe, quickly making the sign of Aard to try and knock him off balance before moving in, silver singing as he drew his own blade and lifted his sword to meet his foe. The Witcher’s force blast actually succeeded in knocked Rakkam down, but no sooner did he hit the water than a Tidal Surge crashed against the Breaching Bastion, shifting it just enough to mess with Geralt’s footing as Rakkam vaulted back up, swords at the ready. Wielding the Carving Mantis stance, he attacked with a mix of cutlass slashes and dagger stabs while maintaining forward momentum in an attempt to push Geralt back. 

Stumbling when the Bastion shifted, Geralt met Rakkam’s assault with his own aggression, silver blade lashing out to meet the cutlass, evading the dagger stabs as best he could and letting his armor catch what he missed. He did his best to keep Rakkam from pushing him back, though the fighter seemed to be quite adept at the strange dual-wielding fighting style he was employing. The bigger issue was that, while this foe lacked defense, any hits Geralt did land at the moment got absorbed by some kind of energy shield, allowing Rakkam to focus wholly on offense. Sensing that he couldn’t necessarily trust himself to meet the enemy blow for blow and survive, Geralt called upon Fizz to perform hit-and-run strikes and give him room to breathe.

The striker appeared with a lunging dive that struck Rakkam square in the chest, the triple prongs of his trident depleting a chunk of the Warframe’s shield. Rakkam swung both blades in a cross-slice to pay Fizz back, but the nimble fish vaulted on top of his weapon, then when the swords clanged against the polearm shaft flipped over with a smack to Rakkam’s back before timing out. Rakkem’s spinning slash cut nothing but air, and when he realized that he’d turned to strike the decoy he wheeled back to face Geralt again with disadvantage, his dagger upheld to try to parry.

With Rakkam distracted, even for but a moment, Geralt capitalized, sheathing his silver sword and taking a breath as his fist plunged into his own body, a spurt of blood heralding the Orphan’s Hateful Flesh, which Geralt swung brutally with a full-body lunge at the Warframe, hoping to overpower his parry and shield through pure force.

While the two fought, Rubick watched their battle unfold, waiting for his chance to slip in. The two exchanged fierce blows, but he could tell that Geralt was the one being pushed back. Finally, Geralt decided to make a big move, which Rubick saw as an opportunity. Thrusting his staff towards Rakkam, Rubick performed an instant cast of Tentacle Swarm, summoning a few tentacles to wrap around the warframe and hopefully immobilize him just long enough for Geralt to land a decisive blow. “[color=limegreen]A taste of your own medicine![/color]” Rubick called out as he casted the ability.

Rubick’s tentacles worked just as he hoped, neutralizing Rakkam’s defense just as Geralt’s massive, fleshy cleaver struck home. His shields broke with a static effect as the Warframe stumbled back, but from there things took an unexpected turn. His shield’s gate effect prevented any of the excess damage leaking through to Rakkam himself and granted just over a second of immunity, allowing him to recover as he backed out onto the barrel of the Bastion’s main gun. Adopting a swashbuckler’s stance with his cutlass forward, cape billowing, Rakkam expended some more energy to call down a Tempest Barrage on Rubick, forcing the magus to run away and find cover while he contended with Geralt. His Diriga appeared over his shoulder as well, radiating electricity in a small area from its Arc Coil. The battle was on.

Hefting the Hateful Flesh, Geralt smirked as his free hand reached into the bulbous flesh that suffused the blade, pulling a cluster from it and tossing it Rakkam’s way before commanding the main gun to fire into the ocean, hoping to ruin his balance and use that opportunity to close the gap with an attack. Even if the gambit failed, he couldn’t wait forever for an opening. Luckily, Rakkam attempted to deflect the flesh bomb with his sword, which blew up in his face and pushed him back onto his tiptoes at the edge of the barrel. When the gun fired, he got bumped into the air and fell, only to grab the tentacles of his Diriga and swing around on them and fly Geralt’s way with a gutsy dropkick into his guard. In the moment that he dropped to the top of the Bastion, his sentinel released a short-range shock burst as well, closing the gap in Rakkam’s offense long enough for the warframe to get up with a double low swipe.

Geralt raised the Hateful Flesh’s blade to catch Rakkam’s kick on its side, and though he slid back with a grunt, Geralt avoided a boot to the gut. The shock burst had the Witcher step back, and as Rakkam swiped his blades low, Geralt jumped vertically, lashing out with a quick snap-kick while he was airborne, following with a swipe of his blade to follow it, before stepping back and grabbing another flesh bomb to toss at the Warframe to force him to keep on his feet. 

The blow hit Rakkam right in the helmet -or was that his head?- but the heavy Hateful Flesh moved a little too slow. Rakkam sidestepped it, and rather than stick around to take another fleshburster the Warframe flipped off the Breaching Bastion. He changed his momentum midair with a bullet jump, whipping out the Akjagara to enter bullet time as he flew. A volley of sidearm fire at the Witcher, punctuated by a sniper shot from Diriga, accompanied his launch aboard the Adrian. Out of Geralt’s range for the moment, Rakkam ran along the railing on the edge of the deck, hopping over wrecked sections as he emptied his magazines into his target.

“Hmmm. Fuck.” Geralt cursed, stowing the Hateful flesh with a groan once the barrage ended, having hidden behind the fleshy weapon to avoid being punched full of holes. That thing was not pleasant to pull out, and with Rakkam wreaking havoc on the Adrian, he needed the mobility that came with not lugging around a giant cleaver of flesh and eldritch metal. Jumping to grab onto the ship, Geralt pulled himself up and quickly set about hunting his quarry. “Rubick!” He shouted. “Where’d the whoreson run off to?!”

Rubick had run towards a ship door, but got knocked down when a Tempest Barrage Projectile struck him in the back, sending him sprawling onto the floor. “[color=limegreen]Hh! That stings,[/color]” Rubick grunted as he pushed himself back up and finally made his way inside the ship, safe for the time being. The attack lasted for some time, which made Rubick decide to take stock of his inventory again. A few bits and bobs, some gold, and other miscellaneous items were still there. He activated his Magic Wand again, restoring a small sliver of health and energy. It wasn’t much, but anything would help at this point. “[color=limegreen]Oh, that’s right! I forgot I had this too![/color]” Rubick said, pulling out a Ray Gun. He held it in both hands as he twirled it around, trying to remember how to use it. When Rubick pushed the red button on the handle, a bolt of energy shot out of it, leaving a black scorch mark on the ceiling. “[color=limegreen]Whoops! I hope no one saw that,[/color]” Rubick said, finally managing to hold the Ray Gun the way it was meant to be held. 

Peeking outside, he noticed that the Tempest Barrage was finally over. He cautiously stepped out, and soon spotted Rakkam jumping onto the Adrian while firing downwards at something, presumably Geralt. Well, that simply wouldn’t do. “[color=limegreen]Bird’s eye view![/color]” Rubick said as he casted Telekinesis on Rakkam, intending to lift him up into the air. When Geralt came up to the deck and called out to Rubick, he responded with, “[color=limegreen]Right here![/color]” and forcefully dropped Rakkam just a short distance away from the witcher, the magical energy from the Telekinesis drop also stunning the warframe for a second.

When halted forcibly, Rakkam turned his eyeless gaze on Rubick, but took no other action other than to reload in a menacing fashion. The lack of incoming damage for a few seconds meant that his shields had also begun to regenerate, but by the time the Warframe took his speargun in hand he got splatted against the deck. This particular piece, undermined by cannonball fire from the Raptor earlier, broke beneath the impact and dropped Rakkam to the second deck. Before Rubick could celebrate, however, the tentacled Diriga arose from another hole behind him and unleashed a surge of electricity. Rubick leapt away, pointing the Ray Gun at the Diriga and firing off a successful shot, but that was all he could do before he was zapped by the electricity, and he fell to the ground in a heap, stunned for the time being.

Pausing to follow Rubick’s voice, Geralt nodded when the Warframe dropped unceremoniously from the magus’s telekinetic grab, drawing his silver blade and blinking when the aquatic enemy crashed through the deck. “Of course.” As the Diriga rose and targeted Rubick, Geralt dropped to the deck below, sword coming down in an overhead slash to take Rakkam as he stood up.

Narrowly the Warframe managed to handspring out of the way. He landed on an unstable section of the middle of the deck and flipped off before it could collapse beneath him, putting him at a distance from Geralt. A jagged gulf, the handiwork of the Abyssals and Thumpback down below, ran through the middle of the half-sunk ship all the way down to the water. As his damaged sentinel flew back to him, Rakkam flipped his speargun into a reverse grip and hurled it like a javelin at his opponent.

Geralt spun, pirouetting out of the way of the makeshift projectile and bringing his sword up in a guarded stance, slowly making his way around the gulf in the floor, his eyes on Rakkam. “Come on, just you and me. Let’s do this.” 

The electricity hurt, but Rubick would live. After the Diriga left to rejoin its master, Rubick got back up and shook his head, then made his way over to the hole in the deck. He was just in time to see Rakkam throw his speargun at Geralt, who nimbly avoided the attack. An idea began to form in his mind, and he raised his staff. He casted Telekinesis again, but not against Rakkam or his Diriga. Instead, he targeted the thrown speargun. With careful manipulation, Rubick turned it towards Rakkam and launched it towards his head, canceling the spell so that it kept its momentum and allowed the projectile to deal damage.

Distracted by Geralt and surprised by the reversal of fortune, Rakkam had no time to think and could only go by instinct. He’d already pulled out the Akjagara to take advantage of the death sentence he’d sent the Witcher’s way, and couldn’t try to deflect the gunspear. Instead he threw himself upward in a bullet jump, but not fast enough to avoid the Carcinos Scourge’s area of effect, creating a magnetic field on his head that would attract any projectiles in his vicinity for a few seconds.

Watching the speargun fly back towards Rakkam, who tried to escape vertically, Geralt quickly swapped his sword for his new bow, quickly drawing and loosing a flurry of arrows at Rakkam. Thanks to the uncanny magnetic field all four hit, and the fourth added a nice extra bit of electrical damage, chaining to and hurting the Diriga sentinel as well. Rubick took the opportunity to fire off a few shots from his Ray Gun too. Despite a furious attempt to deflect the incoming shots with Nami Skyla, Rakkam quickly lost his shield and a huge chunk of health to the barrage. Knocked to his knees, the Warframe said nothing, but reached up and pulled the arrows from his biotech skin. He grabbed the Scourge again and flourished it, tranquil in his fury and ready for the next round.

It was at that moment that Cortez appeared, manifesting from the deck behind Rakkam to take care of the unwelcome visitor. “I’ll have yer guts for garters!” he roared as he swung with a broadsword, scimitar, saber, and hook. Rakkam began to move, maneuvering with a ninja’s agility around and between the furious blows. With each slide and flip he pelted Cortez with a burst of corrosive automatic fire, until after a few seconds he bullet jumped clear of a four-way slam to loom above the monstrosity’s head. At the apex he unleashed a charged Tentacle Swarm of his own. The distinctive noise heralded the arrival of the swarm, rising from puddles strewn around the area. Most began to tear the place apart, destroying the wood that Geralt and Rubick were standing on, but those near Cortez wrapped around his spine and four enormous limbs to tug him around like a skeletal marionette. “Yarrrgh, get off me!” the captain howled, but for the moment he -and those in range of his strikes- were at Rakkam’s mercy. The tentacles yanked his limbs around in a chaotic whirlwind that threatened to turn the others into fish food.

Geralt took a few potshots at Rakkam with his bow while he and Cortez fought, but when the summoned tentacles appeared and began destroying this section of the ship, he had to stow it and move to safety, leaving Cortez to be grabbed and manipulated by the writhing appendages and Rubick to fall to the second deck below. “Dammit!” He cursed, drawing his silver sword to parry while his free hand cast the Sign of Quen, protecting him from what blows he couldn’t stop from landing. He leaned into ‘fighting’ with Cortez, trying to buy Rubick time to get off an attack of his own. This was less like a fight and more like a natural disaster, however, so after the first couple weighty blows cracked the Quen shield it seemed like a better idea to fall back out of the flailing skeleton’s range. Rakkam, standing on top of Cortez’ skull, focused his spray of corrosive rounds on Rubick. If the mage so much as poked his head up to be a thorn in the Warframe’s side again, he would find that fancy getup full of painfully burning holes. The seconds ticked down on Tentacle Swarm; only half of the original twenty remained.

As Quen shattered, Geralt started falling back, careful not to let the flailing blows Cortez was letting off hit him as he moved. Rubick retreated behind him, putting away his Ray Gun and taking out his Loch Shield. He held it above himself while being equally careful to stay behind the cover Geralt was providing. Geralt reached into one of his pouches for a grapeshot bomb, quickly tossing it up at Rakkam to try and distract him from Rubick yet again, and if he was lucky, do a little damage himself. Rubick casted Telekinesis on Rakkam to force him onto the ground, trying to immobilize him to allow the bomb to deal its full damage. He also instacasted his own Tentacle Swarm in quick succession, attempting to further pin him down with a few well-placed tentacles.

The lack of communication between the two meant that when Rakkam pulled back Cortez’s head to shield himself from the worst of the grapeshot bomb, Rubick’s long range telekinesis caught the monster’s skull instead. As Rakkam fought to maintain his balance, a new swarm of tentacles erupted alongside his own around Cortez, stretched up around his bones in a single-minded bid to grab him. In doing so they also practically immobilized Cortez, and with his wild ride drawing to a close anyway, the Warframe bailed. He bullet jumped off and over toward his enemies, raining down a fully-automatic barrage of acid, then went into a plunge attack from directly overhead. Rakkam came down between Rubick and Geralt on the exposed starboard middle deck in a blast of seawater, poised to become a typhoon of alien steel.

“Fuck!” Geralt cursed as the acidic ammo pitted his armor and stung at his exposed flesh, moderately annoyed that the ploy hadn’t worked. Rubick fared somewhat better, his glass shield deflecting most of the acidic rounds. They still had the numbers to take him down, and Geralt pressed that advantage, sword flashing as he ran in to attack Rakkam with silver, attacking even more aggressively as his anger rose. The two traded blows in a blood rush, their duel messy, furious, and brutal. Meanwhile, Rubick walked backwards to gain some distance while continuing his efforts to hinder Rakkam’s movement, casting Telekinesis on him to lift him into the air and make it easier for Geralt to land a blow on him. In response the Warframe used Undertow, melting into a puddle of water that spread out across the deck beneath the fighters. A tentacle reached out to lash around Rubick and pull him into the ground, but Rakkam himself popped up behind Geralt. With the last of his Energy, he cast Tidal Surge once more, bulling into both foes atop a powerful wave. All three smashed through the side of the Adrian’s hull and out over the ocean, just a couple yards away from where the Breaching Bastion still resided on the right.

Rakkam bullet jumped backward to stab into and cling to the outside of the hull with his dagger, just above the hole. Rubick was not so fortunate, falling off the boat and crashing into the waters below. Fortunately, he was able to make his way back up to the surface and grab a piece of wood large and buoyant enough to hold his head up above the waves. Geralt managed to catch one of the Bastion’s cranes, and had it swing such that he could quickly dismount and get atop the gun platform again, staring Rakkam down threateningly, his sword in a defensive posture. “Come on, then!” 

His opponent obliged. He launched off the Adrian’s hull and came down with a double-bladed plunging attack to knock Geralt back a touch, then went to work. Being proficient with two blades, his offensive style meant that his opponent couldn’t hold a block, or otherwise risk a wound from the other weapon, as the Witcher quickly found out. In his usual pragmatic way he made up for the weak spot with plentiful use of kicks, unafraid to stomp on feet or try to blow out a knee for the advantage, but whatever it was that constituted Rakkam was stern stuff. Geralt landed blow after blow, be they thrusts, slices, or hilt bashes, but the Warframe gave out even better than he got. As if his flexible metallic flesh felt no pain, he pushed through Geralt’s attacks to land twice as many of his own, and the war of attrition quickly turned in his favor. As Geralt sagged, cut and stabbed too many times, Rakkam went for the finisher. With a whirling strike he blew open his foe’s guard, pinwheeling backwards, then launched his hidden Parazon blade into Geralt’s heart. When he yanked it loose on its silken tether, the Witcher slumped down in apparent defeat. Rakkam took a moment to breathe and allow his tension to fade before switching Nami Skyla for his Akjagara to finish Rubick off.

For a moment, Geralt’s vision blackened, blood seeping out of the wound in his chest, turning to ash as his life faded. And, in a repeat of what had happened earlier with Pit, suddenly he felt revitalized, as if he hadn’t taken a single blow. Rather than slump over and succumb to his wounds, the Witcher exploded forth, a scream bellowing from his throat and lightning wreathing his blade. Rakkam attempted to parry the first blow with a hastily drawn cutlass, but the electricity from Geralt’s weapon caused him to delay just another moment, enough for the Witcher to force the Warframe’s weapon aside and slice across its throat with silver. Rakkam rallied after a moment, Nami Skyla flashing in a whirlwind of steel, but each time Geralt met the aquatic warrior’s weapons with his own, the electricity that ran through it and into him caused just a moment’s twinge of the musculature, giving Geralt the upper hand as he broke into Rakkam’s guard and tackled him to the ‘ground’, stabbing his blade lightly into the Warframe’s metallic flesh. 

As Rakkam looked up at the foe who’d defeated him, he found a curious sight. The Witcher’s eyes were deep and sunken in, pupils narrow slits as he breathed heavily and intentionally, forcing the adrenaline in his blood to fade. This was not particularly odd, except perhaps the shape of his eyes, but what was truly odd was the fact that he was offering a hand to help him up. Grabbing for his dagger, Galeem’s curse still controlling him, Geralt sighed and blocked the hasty stab, shoving something into the Warframe and pulling him up with surprising strength. Suddenly, the will to fight left as Geralt spoke, the red fading from Rakkam’s eyes. “Not sure why you’re trying to kill us, but you need to listen to me. There’s a bigger problem at hand than your little ocean village. Just look at the floating ball of light and take a second to realize it’s not the sun if you don’t believe me.” Geralt’s explanation did not cover even the most basics of their goals just yet, but he was trying not to overwhelm his hopeful new ally. When Rakkam didn’t immediately try to kill him, he continued.

“To keep it short, that’s an extremely powerful being, to call it a god wouldn’t be incorrect, that has taken control of the minds of everybody in this world, forcing them into a complacent state where the slightest bit of conflict drives them to unceasing battle, only to stop when one party wins the fight, either by incapacitation, death, or some other predetermined criteria. We’re trying to kill it, and we take just about anybody who’s willing to join up. You in?”

For a moment Rakkam held his head, considering all the new information with appropriate gravitas. Briefly his gaze landed in the Raptor, where LeFwee and the pirates were wrapping up their ship’s repair, then on the shipgirls out at sea. He seemed to come to a decision, for he then bent to retrieve Nami Skyla, promptly sheathed the blades, and stood up straight with his fists together. The Warframe bowed to Geralt, took out the Carcinos Scourge speargun, and planted it on top of the Breaching Bastion as a token of gratitude before bullet jumping away into the water.

As Rakkam put the speargun down and jumped away, Geralt paused, watching him go, before remembering something important. “If their eyes are red, they won’t believe you! That’s the sign of his influence!” He shouted, cupping his hands to help his voice carry so Rakkam would hear him. 

That done with, he walked over to the speargun and picked it up. “Hmm. It did something back there when Rubick tossed it back at him. Wonder if that’s from this thing or his magic…”

[center][hider=Results][b]Party:[/b] Geralt, Rubick
[b]Encounter Reward:[/b] +10 EXP
[b]Additional Reward:[/b] Carcinos Scourge[/hider]

[hider=For Geralt]You have acquired:
[url=https://i.imgur.com/KUPs1S2.png]Carcinos Scourge[/url]
A Scourge speargun re-engineered with a nautical flair. Its magazine size is 40, its average reload time 2.5 seconds. Its primary fire shoots corrosive projectiles at 40 m/s with a 2.6/s fire rate that explode in a 1.7 meter radius, dealing okay damage and have a 30% chance to lower defense by melting armor. When thrown like a javelin, it creates 2m Attractor Fields on the heads of enemies in the impact zone that last lasts for 5 seconds[/hider][/center]