Brucenorris007

A Hero Tale {Complete}

Bruce, though still intermittently dizzy due to his head injury, felt a rush of vigor at being surrounded by his element once again. He erected a curved, sloping structure between himself and Alvios before the two collided and he half rolled, half slid to the ground beside him.
Still in his Sage state, Bruce sensed everyone through the earth, getting at least a bearing on what was happening. He'd harbored no doubts that the others would be fine, but it was still gratifying to have confirmation.
A bit wearily, he stood, noticing that, unlike Zelriane, Shaidra had chosen to stay, and with her was an archer- Dacer, Bruce suspected.
"I" Bruce said, his voice husky with the fatigue from expending as much Ki as he had. His blade nonetheless appeared again in its sheath, and he flexed his fingers, the material used for his replicated hands returning to him. "Need a drink."

A Hero Tale {Complete}

Bruce's body received a shock all at once with the momentary cessation of time. Had his head not been in sage state, it could well have been permanently damaged. As it was, it was still bleeding far more than was healthy, and though he'd managed to recover from the shock quickly enough to grasp at the edge of the wind platform Jeff was so heroically maintaining for him, he knew he couldn't risk doing anything fancy to bring himself back onto it.

The forgotten copy of his left hand flew under him and boosted one foot upward until he could clamber back aboard. Bruce heaved a surreptitious sigh- he'd not called upon so much of his Ki reserve at once before, and though it was exhilarating to know it was possible, he also had to focus harder to force his body to do what needed doing.

"I can hear you." Bruce rasped, standing upright on his platform. The walls and outer cage of chains dissolved gently, "Hardly dead."

Bruce kept his gaze steady on Zelriane, dismissing entirely the occasional blurriness in his vision. He casually ran his left palm along the back of his head, only lifting an eyebrow at the blood that came off onto it.

"I hardly call this a victory for me," Bruce said, still assessing his bloodied fingers. "But if the duel ends here, there must be terms met, and we never got around to agreeing on those."

Bruce's gaze flickered past Zelriane to Shaidra before returning to the green-eyed masked member.

"I make no demands, being no victor. But equal terms for both parties strikes me as fair and honorable."

Bruce's darkness scoffed and laughed at the mention of 'honor', but he silenced it.

"Jeff and I are returned to where we were taken from," Bruce said, gesturing to his valiantly conscious companion. Remembering how this encounter began, he took out his sheath and pointed it at Zelriane. "And you both... well, return to your own home."

Bruce lifted his sheath up to rest on his shoulders, making a point of holding it in his still bleeding right hand. His two replicas hovered to either side of him, waiting.

A Hero Tale {Complete}

Bruce's countenance faltered for just a moment. He had seen and heard many things in his life- it required something truly absurd for him to break character.
"HA!"
A bark of laughter escaped him, and given the depth of his voice, it echoed. The Ki he'd used to strike his nerve center wasn't affecting his body by overexerting muscle- it was a stimuli to trigger a self-taught behavioral response which made it easier to shut down the conscious brain to body connection and allowed his mind to focus on other things while his body simply moved according to his reflexes.
Bruce landed on his platform and stood up straight, the dirt material of unknown origin moving beneath his robe again.
The dozen swords that had formed from the mace doubled in number again, each flying to alternating positions on either side of his cylinder of chains, which continued to grow steadily smaller and tighter. Four of them flew inside the cylinder above them above, and each sword came to rest in a position mimicking that of when Bruce prepared to draw it from his sheath in one motion. One last sword, the twenty-fifth, remained in Bruce's floating right hand.

Fractured mind? Bruce had some concerns about Jeff but he was hardly under significant psychological pressure.

Give out? True, he'd want a drink after this, but Bruce's body 'gave out' when the mission was done or he was in pieces.

The grid that Bruce's cylinder of chains had formed repeated itself at the top and bottom, just an inch above the floor. The difference was that the chains on the bottom grid served dual purposes, as each link had razor edges sharp enough to slice a thread of hair falling from one's head. The walls and the ceiling of the cylinder were the same. Within the tiny gap of each link was a spike. The gaps in the floor grid were smaller than those of the walls of chains- if Zelriane wanted to keep his feet, he'd have to jump.

At that moment, the floor grid began moving upward, ready to cut into anything that could be considered an obstacle. The twenty four blades all sang out with horizontal slashes, aiming to meet at the center of the cage. The slicing shockwave each produced burst through the vertical chains of the walls, but they immediately repaired themselves and the cage kept shrinking. The space between where each shockwave met was less than a foot, the uppermost horizontal wave just shy of Bruce's sphere. Zelriane had to keep going up swiftly to avoid them all, and he'd lose at least a large part of one appendage if he twisted his body between them. The four swords overhead brought down vertical projections of the same nature, all of them aimed to just skim the outer edge of Bruce's chain sphere. They intruded on the space Zelriane would need to avoid the horizontal cuts and get to the cylinder's wall, if he so chose to lose fingers instead of arms.

All the focused, musically tuned Ki being expended came with a price- the sphere of chains spinning around Bruce were compromised, more so behind him than in front of him. He changed them to leave a vulnerable point at his back so he could maintain the necessary spinning in front to keep Zelriane out. The swords that had slashed dissipated, having done their task.

A copy of his left hand had now formed in front of him. It flew out the hole behind him.

Two-tenths of a second after all this had been made to happen, the chains in Bruce's broken sphere shot out new lengths with spiked ends from all angles toward him- they were designed to react to his sage state and dissipate just before striking his body.

Another tenth of a second after that, his copied right hand, Ki all rippling toward the blade's apex for maximum piercing potential, came rocketing toward Bruce's back, right where his lungs would be, intent on puncturing Zelriane's own organs when the Order member inevitably came to attack. Bruce's real hands each gripped curved daggers, jamming them backward simultaneously toward where an opponent's legs would meet their torso.

A Hero Tale {Complete}

Bruce pricked a particular nerve center in his neck with a Ki-tipped finger, kicking his reflexes into overdrive and giving his instincts reign over his body's reactionary motions. His platform fell sideways at a right angle as Bruce heaved his weight to one side to avoid the first projectiles. He couldn't match Zelriane's speed, but with his body moving faster than his brain, it left him with more singed robe and less physical damage. He even departed his platform at several points, always seamlessly bringing himself back to it, rolling, flipping and twisting- his body dictated its own movements.
The network of chains that had risen from the floor snapped taut vertically and wrapped around Bruce and Zelriane with a huge diameter, the vertical chains close enough to prevent escape. A horizontal series completed a cylindrical grid that covered the ground and reached for the upper ceiling of this dimension. The cage encroached slowly, gaps in the grid tightening until only a hand might be able to get through. The mace that Zelriane avoided before broke apart into a dozen identical swords to the one Bruce carried a sheath for. His earthen right hand circled around the outside perimeter of the cage, looking as though it were patrolling for the perfect instant.

A Hero Tale {Complete}

Bruce didn't blink. He didn't flinch. He didn't react at all to the sight of Zelriane's arm. Inexplicably, blood had begun dripping slowly from his right hand, despite his sage state. The hand that Zelriane had shattered gathered together again, faster now that he was aware of its existence. Bruce's blade halted in midair, flying back into the grip of its master.

"Disappointing." Bruce drawled, and though there was a note of malicious sincerity in it, his tone was dismissive.

'Exciting!' His darkness whispered.

The network of chains which were still scattered around the arena rose as one, avoiding Jeff and Shaidra though he did not consciously will it. He was too entrenched in his mission.

'Take his fingers! His toes! His arms! His legs! His face!

The chains nearest Zelriane shifted seamlessly into one of his massive maces, the red tinge a little deeper. The air rumbled as it swung at his left side from behind with enough force to shatter bones, joints and muscle fibers. Simultaneously, his floating hand made a sweeping horizontal slash. A projection of Bruce's emotion-driven Ki shot toward Zelriane from the front, the apex of the arc as sharp as his blade. Bruce knew how fast Zelriane could jump, and that he seemed to go as high as he wanted. Nonetheless, he made an estimation of how far up he'd travel and fired half a dozen spearheaded chains from several angles toward that general location.

"Your pain isn't necessary, though," Bruce's voice rumbled, taking on a hint of the anticipation he felt for hunting down evil. "Just that you bleed.

A Hero Tale {Complete}

Bruce's inhibitions and hesitations shattered the moment Zelriane moved. He gaged the distance he covered before Jeff's tech kicked in- counting seconds would be useless since the time span was so brief.
Two strands of chain in the outer sphere of his spinning wall broke even before Zelriane stopped, each end of the chain splitting into arrowhead spikes that shot toward where his feet were after he paused. If Bruce could make the foul creature bleed from his feet and legs, it would begin to scratch the ache Bruce had to cause him pain.
'Hello, Sakki.'
While his chains were seeking to ruin Zelriane's mobility further, he angled his platform sideways, crouched down and shrinking his inner sphere of chains still flurrying around him. The outer sphere burst outward to allow him passage, and the chain followed him for a short distance before shifting into spearheads that launched themselves toward Zelriane and everywhere in his immediate vicinity. Each projectile's razor edges were tinged with red, the Ki comprising them having darkened several shades, reflecting a leak of Bruce's emotions. Their trajectory was not random, intended to push Zelriane away from him and Jeff and into a particular area.

As Bruce redoubled the chains of his inner sphere, the dirt particles that he'd been gathering formed into a familiar shape and his sword dislodged itself from the ground, sailing through the air hilt-first into an exact replica of Bruce's right hand. The blade was tinged a similar color, and the Ki rippled toward the edge, on a mission for vengeance. Choosing his position based on how far Zelriane had been able to move a moment ago, and accounting for the fact that he'd likely move a bit farther now that he knew Jeff's attack had some effect on him, Bruce waited for three quarters of a second before his dirt hand slashed downward diagonally. He wasn't counting on tracking Zelriane, only predicting.
'Welcome to Hell.' Bruce's blackness sang from within.

A Hero Tale {Complete}

Bruce's first impulse upon seeing Jeff fall, his body spasming in agony, was to help him. Not knowing how, though, he stayed where he was. The sensation of something vaguely familiar and black spoke from within his soul. The blade he'd lodged in the ground earlier quivered.
He stared down his nose at Zelriane, the shadow of his own hair masking the expression on his face. A voice Bruce had long since forsaken mused in his mind.
'Perhaps he's the sort who might enjoy being fed his own entrails.'
The corner of Bruce's mouth quirked upward briefly before he could suppress it. He kept his gaze steady on Zelriane, his expression not a glare, but reflective of a kind of hunger. The chains, still circling around him, shivered and jangled, though the flow of Ki remained strong and constant. There was, however, a new... edge to the music of it.
"So, you do have a personality." Bruce said, his tone calm, with no difference in his voice that would be apparent to anyone save maybe Jeff. He talked as though he weren't cataloguing every word Zelriane uttered for future reference and dissection. "Good to know."

Bruce didn't miss the way Shaidra had slunk away, nor the evidence that she genuinely had her own intelligence, though some part of her psyche might qualify as broken.
"Seems rude to give orders to the one who owns the roof over our heads." Bruce said, just loud enough for her to hear. He didn't look at her when he made the idle comment, largely because the glimmer of blackness in his eyes demanded he keep them on Zelriane. "I am curious- and forgive me for my ignorance in the ways of science, Shaidra- but in searching for proof, experiments are the favored means of gaining results, correct? I just wish to know how many of those present are test subjects and who the administrator is."

Bruce didn't expect to really persuade Shaidra to just let him and Jeff go. She was clearly smarter than Zelriane, though she took orders as though she weren't- she believed herself physically inferior. Allowing himself to bring his full attention back to the green-eyed sack of arrogance and molded excrement, the cries from within for retribution and unsightly punishment flared again.
"I find it amusing you think I can trust your stakes, particularly as you have not named what's in our interest for accepting. You only name terms for our loss, not our victory, or our survival, which I grant you is the most likely of the three." Bruce said, keeping his voice loud enough to kill any possibility of either Order member hearing the follicles he'd dropped earlier gathering together.

A Hero Tale {Complete}

Bruce lifted one hand to his face, tapping a finger against his chin. He hadn't honestly expected things to go so smoothly that Shaidra would simply comply with his request and send them back, but he hadn't anticipated her to show knowledge of things like atoms either.
Doubt festered in the corner of his mind- Jeff was the only one with sights still on Zelriane's person, and yet Bruce hovered in midair in relative safety behind his chains, trying to communicate with the one who'd brought them here. If Jeff got fatally wounded and they were stranded in this pocket dimension despite his efforts, what then?

He shook his head again. There wasn't time to dwell on weighing his options. Zelriane was adamant about returning to the tower, presumably with Shaidra. If that happened, they could be stranded here anyway. He focused back on Shaidra's brief sentences, suspecting that some of them were recitations of things she'd been told rather than observations she'd made on her own. He couldn't say where that suspicion came from. It lingered nonetheless.
'A nucleus and electrons?' he wondered, his gaze wandering from Shaidra's black, curious eyes. He pondered what he, with his spinning chains, might look like to a mind like hers. Was he the nucleus?

"Touching the nucleus might be dangerous." he said, keeping his tone soft though his voice was deep. He wasn't trying to threaten her, but he just couldn't say for certain that she wouldn't try something... unusual. He bent down on one knee on his platform, letting it sink just a little lower in the air, and tightened the radius of his chains as they spun around him- he'd prefer to avoid mistakenly hurting her were she to jump and reach out. "It would," he paused, thinking of the right words. "Upset balance."

Bruce's mind raced, staring into Shaidra's mask as if some key understanding could be pulled from behind it. He had no idea about cameras or what it referred to. The suspicion that she was reciting something she'd been told grew when he pondered what she'd said about their goal, their home. He could only assume that 'they' referred to the rest of the Order.
"Shaidra," he whispered, as though requesting to be let in on a secret. "What goal do you seek?"

A Hero Tale {Complete}

Bruce felt Shaidra's gaze linger on him, and he spared her a glance. He wondered about this odd individual. Zelriane clearly expected her to take direct orders, yet she had her own thoughts.
Bruce's brow furrowed- he had come to terms with the fact that children were used as soldiers and killers in conflicts years ago. Even youth could be taught to understand the basic implications of their involvement and the difference between right and wrong. But Shaidra had uttered a single word since she'd reappeared, and her understanding seemed borderline infantile. She understood pain, since she'd redirected Jeff's second attack back to him, yet she hadn't initiated any attempts to cause either of them injury. It seemed she comprehended simple speech. Zelriane had taken up a different tone with her than Rajaka. Did she know the full ramifications of the Order and what they represented? Or their overall schemes?

Bruce shook his head lightly- regardless of how he felt about it, they were in the middle of a fight, and as far as they knew, she was their only way out. He couldn't help seeing her differently than the other Order. She was the first he'd seen who acted with an intrinsic motivation to protect and care about something outside of their ego or the advancement of evil intentions.
'She can teleport at least five people at once,' Bruce thought. 'Probably more than that. There's no indication that doing so has tired her out in any way.'

He grimaced, noting Jeff's injury. If Shaidra intended to turn every attack against Zelriane back at them, it left Bruce back in the same position he'd been in with Rajaka, little he could do. He'd still try, of course, but...
An idea struck him. For some reason, he was able to capture Shaidra's attention. She didn't seem receptive to orders, at least from Zelriane. Would she take requests? It was worth trying.

Bruce looked back at her through the whirling mass of chains surrounding him.
"My friend and I," Bruce said in a not unkind voice, gesturing to Jeff. "We do not have a way back to our home. Would you allow us to leave?"

A Hero Tale {Complete}

Bruce released a breath- they'd been betting on an interruption like this since the beginning of the fight, and it seemed to have paid off. Zelriane would still be tricky to contend with, but in terms of raw power, the playing field had been leveled somewhat.
Shaidra's form caught his attention, and the sad, childlike attention she paid the broken piece of her home struck something in him. He knew that sympathy for the enemy was dangerous. Yet he'd learned, quite recently, that repressing his emotions would stunt his potential and lead to ultimately more dire consequences. The teleporting creature seemed to have already finished grieving the damage done, but he spoke anyway.
"I am sorry," he whispered, his rumbling voice carrying. "That your home has been hurt."
He turned his attention to Zelriane, recreating the sphere of chains around him and his platform he'd used earlier- a dozen strands whipped rapidly around him clockwise horizontally, while another dozen circled him counterclockwise vertically. Bruce would have added that he'd make sure to avoid further damage to Shaidra's home, but that would have qualified as a promise. And Bruce never made a promise he couldn't keep.