Match of the Millennium

Description: The battle between the masters of the Dragon and the Hawk occurs under the watchful eye of Shang Tsung. Someone doesn't get to walk away from this one.

[BAIKEN]
It took a day or two for Baiken to realize what she'd done: she had killed Akuma in single combat.

He wasn't the normal sort of opponent for her. He's not a monster, just a man - a man even more dedicated to his goals than she is. They'd both wanted to challenge the strongest, and they'd gotten each other, and - well, she'd won.

So she's feeling pretty good about that. Her path to the end of this tournament is finally clear to her. Maybe she'll be able to take out the monsters of Outworld after all. And yet she can't shake the feeling that there might have been more to that battle...

But Baiken has put that out of her head as much as possible. After that match, she has another: against a man named Erron Black, who she knows relatively little about except his choice of masters. Not that it matters; if they put her up against someone, she'll cut them down to move on.

Baiken arrives in the Throne Room quite early. She does not, however, approach the throne at any point; whether that's lack of respect on her part, or whether she hasn't been honoured with an invitation on the usual occupant's, she doesn't say. She stays near the southern side, leaning against one of the pillars that does double duty as a windbreak, using a long-handled tobacco holder for its intended purpose. A thin wisp of smoke drifts up and back before passing the pillar and being scattered by the wind.

It's vaguely prophetic, Baiken thinks to herself, as she watches it.

[ERRON BLACK]
Far off across the expansive chamber, one of two patterned screens flanking Shang Tsung's throne is opened with the soft whirr of polish bamboo sliding over wood. It is a subtle sound, humble even, soon followed by the quiet clonk of boots trudging across the immaculate wooden floor. A buckle jangles, a quiet breath gusts through the leather slits of a mask.
The man that ambles into sight from behind the throne is at once impressive, and utterly mundane. To one who has fought the likes of Akuma, hunted demons, and made her life into a series of battles, Outland's lone cowboy might appear more ragged than anything. Deep within the shadow cast by his wide brimmed hat, two points of brilliant golden fire burn where eyes should be. Other than that, he is nothing. A dusty grey mask. A tattered poncho. Bare arms corded with muscle and crossed with scars.
The various weapons strapped to the survivor's body clack and rattle as he comes to a stop not 20 feet from Baiken, seeming to drink her in. As he does, his hands rest lightly on his belt. Ready, but not overtly so.
"You look like you've seen a lot." the cowboy drawls, slow and low, smokey and just a touch jaded. Everything about him seems casual but tired. Just a bit too worn around the edges. He looks like a man with experiences, but not like a demon. Not the champion of another world.

[BAIKEN]
"A few things." Baiken puts out her pipe before tucking it into her robe, turning to look at Erron - she hadn't bothered, until he spoke.

He doesn't look like Outworld's champion. But then again, Baiken supposes she doesn't look much like Earthrealm's. One eye, one arm, a little roughly treated and worn by her time here. If Erron looks like some kind of archetypical cowboy (and he does, to Baiken's eye), she looks like some artist's impression of a female ronin, a wandering swordswoman who never settled down.

Except, of course, for his eyes. Those are something else.

Baiken scowls at some internal thought. When she speaks again, it's a little harsher. "I don't think we have much to say to each other. Nothing that wouldn't be said better without blades." She inclines her head toward Erron's sword, indicating it; she does not draw attention to the guns, though she expects them to be his first choice simply because nobody would bring that many if they weren't.

She pushes away from the pillar, taking steps toward the central line of the room. She wants the room to fight. "Unless you'd like to forfeit," she adds, doubting it would ever be accepted and unsure of what she'd do if it was.

COMBATSYS: Baiken has started a fight here on the right meter side.

                                  >  //////////////////////////////]
                                  |=------\-------\0           Baiken

COMBATSYS: Erron Black has joined the fight here.

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Erron Black      0/-------/-------|=------\-------\0           Baiken

COMBATSYS: Erron Black equips a dazzling Canary Yellow Soul Shard.

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Erron Black [E]  0/-------/-------|=------\-------\0           Baiken

[ERRON BLACK]
"Got paid to fight." Erron replies in a dry, but possibly regretful drawl, taking a couple of casual steps at an angle to clear Baiken's way back to the room's center. Only once she has reached her chosen spot does he turn about to face her, allowing her to choose whatever distance she wants. Still his scarred hands rest lightly over his belt, burning eyes fixed on the ronin with far, far too much calm. He does not look like a man gearing up for a life or death match. he just looks, tired. Worn thin. Like a man who has been at this far too long, to the point where it almost doesn't interest him.
"Could say the same to you. Girl like yourself could do good in Outworld. Walk away now. Live to do some good later." Though the words are offered, there is a note of finality in them. A dry awareness that they both know the talk is meaningless. Slowly, the gunslinger sighs.
"Can't say I didn't worn ya." he states, before his left hand moves in a blur of motion. Where there was nothing before, a fist-sized glass globe filled with shifting brown material seems to appear in his palm, flung in a quick underhanded throw toward where Baiken stands ready. The strange contraption is airborne for only a moment, heading straight for Baiken's chest...
When there is a loud 'CRACK!' and the sand grenade suddenly explodes in a blast of whirling desert sand.
Back where the grenade originated, Erron stands with his right hand raised, a smoking revolver gripped loosely in his rough fingers, and one out of 6 shots fired.

FIGHT!

COMBATSYS: Baiken equips a radiant Garnet Soul Shard.

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Erron Black [E]  0/-------/-------|=------\-------\0       [E] Baiken

COMBATSYS: Erron Black successfully hits Baiken with Badlands.

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Erron Black [E]  0/-------/------=|==-----\-------\0       [E] Baiken

[BAIKEN]
Baiken picks a spot that is neither literally across the room from Erron (because she does not want to get shot ten times while she covers the distance) nor right up in his face. A comfortable starting distance, fifteen feet or so; she can clear that fast enough without giving herself no room to maneuver.

The revelation that he's doing it all for money makes Baiken want to spit. Pah. Give her someone who wants to challenge and improve themselves, who wants to fight the strongest, or who has a reason for battle. Yes, Baiken takes matches that will get her paid (she needs to; air fare and replacement gear doesn't come free) but that's not the reason she learned to fight nor the reason she keeps doing it.

Her scowl intensifies. She doesn't even give it a verbal reply. Her expression is enough.

Erron takes the initiative with a grenade, but Baiken is fast. In the same motion she draws her sword and bats it with the flat, sending it careening to her side - but not in such a way that Erron can't shoot it anyhow. The desert sand blasts into the exposed skin of her face and chest, causing her to snarl - but not to slow down, which may be unpleasant for Erron.

Baiken draws up her arm and holds it across her body, covering her chest and ducking her head slightly. It makes it a little harder to see but protects her well. She literally runs toward him, closing the distance, and as she gets there she turns it into a sudden backhanded chop; she's got the blade in a reversed grip so she's still attacking him with the sharp edge, holding it more like a giant knife than a sword.

After the stroke, she flips the blade around in her hand, holding it properly and defensively. But now she's closer to Erron - and she's used the advance itself as an attack.

COMBATSYS: Erron Black channels the glare of the vicious eye.

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Erron Black [E]  0/-------/-------|===----\-------\0       [E] Baiken

COMBATSYS: Erron Black interrupts Suzuran from Baiken with Above Snakes EX.

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Erron Black [E]  1/-------/=======|=====--\-------\0       [E] Baiken

[ERRON BLACK]
While charging ferociously through an expanding sand storm might do a lot to put the fear of god into an opponent, it isn't the smartest tactic to employ. Perhaps Baiken, as so many before her, is under the false assumption that Erron is a distance fighter. After all, he has all those guns! Clearly he doesn't have the skill to stand toe to toe with a battle-hardened swordswoman like her. He's just a mercenary.
But as the Japanese woman lifts her head, sand scattering across the room behind her, she finds that the cowboy has taken three steps forward and drawn his other pistol. So not only is he much closer than he is supposed to be, but he is much better prepared as well.
Burning golden light trails out behind his left arm as he whips it up, leather bracer thwacking hard into Baiken's sword as she begins to swing it. The sharpened metal bites deep, tearing through hardened leather and digging into the bone beneath, but it's better than losing an arm, as Baiken can likely attest. This action also briefly opens Baiken up for a quick, vicious blow to the forehead, the grip of his right pistol being rammed home directly between her eyes.
Grunting,the merc then jerks his arm free of her blade and goes low, blood splattering across the now sandy ground as he hammers his left pistol into her right knee. Only then does he attempt to lunge up and smash her with a shoulder charge to the chest, driving her back in an attempt to gain enough distance to fire off a single snap shot toward her center mass. Perhaps she can defend against it, but he isn't going to miss without her thinking extremely fast.

[BAIKEN]
It's not the smartest tactic, perhaps, but it gets the job done, and Baiken would rather do that than wait for it to disperse while Erron has the option to keep shooting her.

Unfortunately, Erron is better prepared for it than Baiken credited. She's trusted to speed and strength to get her this far (well, and determination, and a healthy dose of luck) but, at least this time, he's faster.

Baiken tries to push through Erron's arm with no particular luck as he blocks it. Understanding that that tactic isn't going to work, Baiken aborts it, switching the grip on her sword just as he drives the butt of the gun into her forehead.

Half-dazed by the impact, Baiken nonetheless doesn't drop or stop moving. The pistol hammer doesn't take her off her legs; Baiken suddenly goes to a half-crouch and so he hits her thigh rather than her knee, which rocks her but does not trip her. The snap shot hits solidly, though, the impact catching her to one side of midline but still in the torso.

Baiken lets out a pained grunt. She tries not to let her new injuries slow her down, but it's hard, and so she goes to give herself a little cover; she snaps her right sleeve, the arm that isn't there, at Erron's face.

Of course getting hit by Baiken's sleeve does nothing, except perhaps get in his eyes for an instant. That's why, with a whisper of steel, something slides out of the sleeve; a length of metal, blunt, as wide as her arm would be with a squared tip. She swings it, trying for a dazing blow to the side of Erron's head as she lashes out in a horizontal sweep - such a weapon is no good for thrusting.

COMBATSYS: Erron Black blocks Baiken's Youzansen.

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Erron Black [E]  1/------=/=======|=======\-------\0       [E] Baiken

[ERRON BLACK]
The blows come quick and fast. Hit, partial hit, partial hit. Then Erron is dodging backwards, revolvers spinning once around his hands before being tossed smoothly down into his thigh holsters. This puts him right at the max range of Baiken's lashing sleeve, the cloth whispering past his mask as he continues to move back. Waiting. Judging. This next strike will hurt, even if he takes it on his guard. But he knows that he needs to accept it. He knows, because he has done it all before. Seen it all before. They didn't send a monster out to fight Baiken, because in some ways, Erron is better than a monster. He is a veteran the likes of which few people have seen.
Where is the attack?
There...
Digging his boots into the sandy ground, Erron lunges forward and lifts his right arm high, catching the blunt head of the heavy club in a block against his bicep. The force of it is almost enough to throw him off balance, but he slips beneath it and comes right back in to the ronin's personal space. Blood continues to drip from his left forearm as he crowds in and leads with a swinging left haymaker aimed for his smaller opponent's left cheek, then twists into a blistering right. Another forward step and two hard hooking body blows are aimed at Baiken's ribs, followed by a pivot as Erron puts all of his weight behind a rising right hook sent squarely for the swordswoman's temple, attempting to take her clean off of her feet.

COMBATSYS: Baiken fails to interrupt Put 'em Up from Erron Black with Sakura.
# Disabling hit! #

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Erron Black [E]  1/-----==/=======|=======\-------\1       [E] Baiken

[BAIKEN]
Erron /is/ good. Baiken will freely admit that. She's not the sort to belittle her opponents' skills when they have them, and he certainly does. She's not sure whether she's better than he is... but she's certainly going to try to prove that.

Baiken withdraws the flattened club; it slides back up the sleeve with a steely whisper as she continues to move, pressing the attack. Even as Erron starts to strike, she's got her sword out and is preparing to thrust, pink chi glittering along the edge of the blade.

She doesn't get a chance to land it.

The haymaker catches her on the side of the head, and she weaves. She might have been a little dazed before, but the constant hits to her head are adding up. Baiken /does/ thrust as the chi shines, but she's off angle, and Erron slams several hits into her ribs without her managing to interrupt him.

The right hook is a champion's blow. It not only takes Baiken off her feet, it actually picks her up and launches her. She manages to twist in midair to land back on her feet, somehow, but she's apparently working entirely on reflex; her eyes are somewhat glazed over as she staggers for balance, and it takes her a few moments longer to recover and do anything other than react out of sheer instinct.

[ERRON BLACK]
As his final blow sends Baiken tumbling away, the dusty cowboy slides back a step through the sand. Another fighter might throw in a taunt here, or sneer. Another fighter might bask in the glory of battle, or the blood of his enemy. But Black is a practical sort of guy. Even as Baiken is touching down on her feet, the blazing fire in his eyes seems to redouble.
Then he draws.
It would be no stretch to say that Erron Black is the finest gunman ever to have lived. For over a century and a half he has plied his trade, proving time and time again that he is, indeed, the best.
His draw, usually impossible for even a trained eye to follow, is nothing more than a golden shimmer. it is as if the revolvers appear in his hands surrounded by halos of golden light, his thumbs and fingers working the mechanisms as his feet and shoulders brace for recoil.
'POWPOWPOWPOWPOWPOWPOWPOWPOWPOW'
The shots blur together into a single cascade of light and sound, flashes of fire jetting from the end of the weapons as a cloud of smoke billows around the cowboy. Ten bullets, all perfectly aimed, are sent across the short distance between Baiken and her opponent. Two for each leg, two for each arm. Two for the gut, but none for the head. It is as if superheated metal were raining from the sky, crashing down in an attempt to bury the abnormally skilled swordswoman.
In the wake of the thunderous noise, the sound of Erron thumbing open his pistols is near inaudible, bullet casings glittering in the sand as they spill out through the haze of smoke to lie at his feet. Above, scarred fingers begin flicking new rounds into the empty chambers of his guns.

COMBATSYS: Erron Black channels the glare of the vicious eye.

[       \\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\  < >  //////////////////            ]
Erron Black [E]  1/-----==/=======|=======\-------\1       [E] Baiken

COMBATSYS: Baiken channels the fortress of the steel will.

[        \\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\  < >  //////////////////            ]
Erron Black [E]  0/-------/------=|=======\-------\1       [E] Baiken

COMBATSYS: Baiken just-defends Erron Black's Packing Heat!

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Erron Black [E]  0/-------/------=|=======\-------\1       [E] Baiken

[BAIKEN]
If there's one thing Baiken is, above all else, she's determined.

She fights through the dizziness and blackness in her eye with sheer willpower, and this actually seems to be working; her glazed expression is fading as she grits her teeth, glancing left and right before focusing right on Erron.

At that instant, he's got a gun pointed at her and is preparing to fire. Baiken tenses her entire body and springs - but forward, towards him, not away.

Baiken moves so fast she appears to blur. Erron might be able to draw faster than the eye can follow, but Baiken can rush almost that fast. The constant 'POWPOWPOW' of his guns are counterpointed by a series of ringing sounds as Baiken slashes at the bullets, deflecting several even as she moves toward Erron, a blurred streak and little more.

She reappears, coming out of the dash into a normal step - one step /beyond/ Erron. She has her blade in her hand, and she slides it back into her scabbard as she comes to a stop, setting it there with a soft 'click'.

If all went right, it's that instant when Erron realizes he's wounded: when the single slash Baiken delivered at a speed so fast it was impossible to tell she was striking finally makes itself known. Erron would have to be truly skilled to avoid it - which doesn't make it impossible, of course...

COMBATSYS: Baiken channels the strength of the killing fist.

[        \\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\  < >  /////////////////////         ]
Erron Black [E]  0/-------/------=|=======\====---\1       [E] Baiken

COMBATSYS: Erron Black channels the spread of the lightning nerves.

[       \\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\  < >  /////////////////////         ]
Erron Black [E]  0/-------/----===|-------\-------\0       [E] Baiken

COMBATSYS: Erron Black blocks Baiken's Tate Shunmaku.

[           \\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\  < >  /////////////////////         ]
Erron Black [E]  0/-------/--=====|-------\-------\0       [E] Baiken

[ERRON BLACK]
It is that moment, after shooting and before he begins to reload, with bullet casings glittering between his feet, that Baiken slides her sword back into its scabbard with a soft shnick. Her back is to the cowboy, thick smoke billowing between them, but it is now that she might expect to hear him fall. Now that the wound should begin to register.
Only, as the smoke drifts lazily apart, it reveals the mercenary standing perpendicular to where she last saw him. The blade that should have hit his side, cleaving through him, must have hit his back. But, there he stands, masked face turned toward her, and scarred fingers calmly reloading.
It is only then that the leather scabbards holding sword and rifle to his back sag open, revealing a thin cut running through the tough leather, and the scratch beneath that mars the barrel of the rifle as well as the sturdy bone of the blade. He must have turned at the last moment, using the weapons on his back to parry away the blow so that only the shallowest of cuts reveals itself across his back, vest and undershirt torn open on either side of the X of weapons.
"Quicker than you look." Erron drawls, his tone dry but perhaps also impressed. The flickering fire in his eyes seems to have died down a good deal, but still he seems fit and ready to fight.
As he eyes Baiken, the cylinders of both revolvers snap back into their housings with a metallic click.
Whipping the weapons into a twirl around his hands, the mercenary closes on Baiken with two quick steps and catches his guns out of the air, wielding them almost like brass knuckles as he aims three quick but vicious jabs into Baiken's chest, followed by a lunging gut punch and a tight, rising uppercut for her chin.

COMBATSYS: Erron Black successfully hits Baiken with Rapid Jabs.

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Erron Black [E]  1/-----==/=======|=------\-------\0       [E] Baiken

[BAIKEN]
Baiken was hoping Erron would fall from that, but hope isn't a guarantee and she isn't so much better than him - if she's better than him at all - that she feels confident in saying that it will do so.

And indeed it doesn't, as Baiken turns back, seeing the leather of the scabbard starting to part. Damn, Baiken thinks, though she's not the sort to spend all her time cursing her fate. She'll just have to keep fighting, then, in an attempt to put him down.

She lets out a grunt more than a word in acknowledgement of Erron's drawled compliment, being too occupied to do much else. She's expecting gunfire but this time there isn't any; he comes in close without firing at all.

The lunging gut punch impacts Baiken, but she's expecting the chin impact this time and manages to turn it. On the plus side, she's not completely dazed this time; on the minus side, she's still hurting. She's starting to really feel it, even as tough as she is.

Baiken roars, suddenly, a wordless shout. She draws her sword in a sudden motion - and not that long after she put it away, either! But this is an iai strike, aimed upward at an angle to shear into Erron's torso before he can get ready to punch her any more. This one is a single powerful blow with every iota of power that her one-armed body can deliver. More than it looks like it can, that's for certain.

COMBATSYS: Erron Black channels the glare of the vicious eye.

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Erron Black [E]  1/------=/=======|==-----\-------\0       [E] Baiken

COMBATSYS: Erron Black interrupts Tetsuzansen from Baiken with Trick Shot EX.

[             \\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\  < >  ///////////                   ]
Erron Black [E]  0/-------/------=|=====--\-------\0       [E] Baiken

[ERRON BLACK]
It is the in drawn breath, the stance with feet firmly planted, and the look in Baiken's eye. All of these things register in the cowboy's mind, dragging up old memories. memories of another time, another place. Far from here. A time when he fought men like Baiken. Men with her grit and tenacity.
perhaps it says something that he is still alive when they are not.
Golden energy pulses to life, engulfing the cowboy in a brilliant halo as he tosses his left revolver down into its holster. What happens next happens too fast to be seen. Baiken's sword begins to rise, the blade nothing more than a flicker carving its way through space, and Erron barges forward, left hand coming back up with a globe of glass cupped in his palm.
Stepping in past the blade of the sword, Erron takes a brutal forearm strike to his ribs, the rising blow powerful enough to fling him sideways off of his feet. But even as he tumbles backward through the air, he finishes his throw, and the globe of sand flashes across the distance, passing beneath Baiken's sword and exploding into a rising column of sand between her feet.
Twisting through the air, Black sights down his revolver, tracking the Ronin's progress as she begins to rise into the air herself.
Half a heart beat passes.
'POW!'
A single bullet rockets from the barrel of his gun, trailing smoke and flame as it flashes across the distance and punches through Baiken's simple clothing. The metal round tears through skin, muscle, and finally deflects off of her left hip bone. Changing course, it tears a bloody path up her side, slips past her ribs, and deflects off of the bones of her shoulder. Only then does it tear itself free of her skin and flash across the distance between shoulder and head, rotating so that the word 'BAIKEN' can be glimpsed carved into the side of the bullet.
The final destination of the bouncing round is the swordswoman's jaw, the bullet ploughing into her face like a punch. Perhaps it is fortunate that it was robbed of much of its power by passing through the rest of her body. or, well, perhaps that isn't fortunate after all.
In regular time, smoke billows from Erron's revolver as he hits the sandy ground rolling. Equipment shifts and clatters as he kips nimbly up to his feet, spinning to face his opponent as the golden glow fades from around his body.

[BAIKEN]
Though Baiken manages to deliver the blow, it's not nearly as clean as she was hoping for, for Erron is still moving - and, more, still trying to kill her.

Resheathing her sword in almost the same movement she drew it in, just a smooth draw-slash-return, Baiken nonetheless does not move quite fast enough to avoid the cloud of dark sand erupting under her feet. She finds herself unable to keep purchase, rising up - and who put sand in a throne room?

One bullet, as it turns out, is enough. Almost.

Baiken is impacted over and over by the single bullet, ricocheting into - through - her body. It rips a line from her hip upward to her chest, toward her shoulder, out and back into her jaw; by this point it's lost a lot of its force, but it's still enough that she really feels it. She's not dead, but she must be in agony. She spits blood, though the spit has nothing compared to the spray from the actual bullet.

But it's only /almost/ enough. Not quite.

As Baiken descends, she throws something at Erron. It comes from her 'empty' sleeve, now proven to not be so empty at all; a claw made of a boxy 'hand' with hooks where the fingers should be. She throws it just past Erron's shoulder, lands back on the ground with a staggering step - and yanks on the chain that connects it to her with her free sword hand. The disc of crystal set into the sword's pommel glimmers faintly in the throne room's light as she pulls as hard as she can, trying to dig it into Erron's shoulder and drag him off balance - and maybe all the way over to her.

COMBATSYS: Baiken channels the strength of the killing fist.

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Erron Black [E]  0/-------/------=|=====--\-------\0       [E] Baiken

COMBATSYS: Erron Black dodges Baiken's Kabari.

[             \\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\  < >  ///////////                   ]
Erron Black [E]  0/-------/------=|======-\-------\0       [E] Baiken

[ERRON BLACK]
Black's second revolver drops into its holster as he eyes the wounded warrior, watching her twist through the air in a spray of blood. Watching as the clawed contraption is thrown, clattering past him, and she lands, poised.
Baiken's jerk on the boxy contraption sends it flying back through the air toward her, the mercenary having taken a quick side step that allows it to whip harmlessly by. If her wish was to bring him in close, however, it seems that it will be granted. For as the chain trap is pulled back into her sleeve, the cowboy is charging across the sand in a dead run. As he runs, he reaches over his shoulder and jerks the long bolt action rifle from his back. It is a battered weapon, scratched and scarred by more than her sword, and fits nicely into the merc's arms.
However, as he comes in, Erron drops the butt of the weapon and grabs it by the barrel. Both scarred hands clamp vice-like on the weapon, shoulders flexing as he puts his charging weight and all of his muscle into swinging the stock up and around into Baiken's left side. If he can hammer the weapon home and stagger the swordswoman, he will twist it deftly through his hands, snagging the lever and working the action with a crunching 'chlhk, chk'.
Then, sighting down the weapon toward Baiken's center mass, he will fire, the heavy rifle letting out a loud 'CRACK!' as a single round is drilled through the air toward the ronin's heart.

COMBATSYS: Baiken blocks Erron Black's Ace High.

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Erron Black [E]  0/-------/------=|======-\-------\0       [E] Baiken

[BAIKEN]
Baiken lands, having not made contact with the claw. She simply yanks it back toward her sleeve, entirely reconcealing it from view - she's not going to need it after all, apparently...

When Erron comes in, Baiken's feet shuffle in the sand to make sure she's braced properly and she has her sword out again by the time he's gotten his hands on the barrel. She can't completely deflect the swinging weapon, but she manages to divert it slightly; it doesn't hit as hard as Erron is probably hoping, nor does it make her stagger more than slightly.

Baiken snarls, the sound slightly distorted by the damage to her face. She can't talk, or at the very least won't. Instead she just pushes forward, delivering a sweeping strike with her sword left, then right, followed with a single massive, crushing overhand slash that would threaten to bisect a weaker opponent, splitting them right down the middle! Where her previous technique was speed, when she blurred past him and struck, this one is all about power.

She'd probably be roaring if she could. Instead, she just keeps bullying Erron, staying uncomfortably close and with that blade of hers at the ready, eye full of anger and grit.

COMBATSYS: Baiken channels the veins of the burning blood.

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Erron Black [E]  0/-------/------=|=======\=------\1       [E] Baiken

COMBATSYS: Baiken channels the strength of the killing fist.

[              \\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\  < >  //////////                    ]
Erron Black [E]  0/-------/------=|=======\=------\1       [E] Baiken

COMBATSYS: Baiken channels the glare of the vicious eye.

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Erron Black [E]  0/-------/------=|=======\=------\1       [E] Baiken

COMBATSYS: Baiken successfully hits Erron Black with Tsurane Sanzu Watashi.

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Erron Black [E]  1/-------/=======|=------\-------\0       [E] Baiken

[ERRON BLACK]
'Clang!"
Baiken's initial sweeping cut is deflected away with the barrel of Erron's rifle.
"CLACK'
The second cut is caught on the rifle butt itself, the cowboy giving careful ground and waiting, always waiting.
'PING!'
Thrusting his rifle up in both hands to catch Baiken's descending sword, the cowboy is sent staggering back in a fountain of blood as her weapon cleaves right through his own, sword continuing past the rifle to carve through vest, shirt, and skin. The gash that is left in his chest runs from his right collarbone to the bottom of his sternum, muscle and skin gaping open in parted flaps.
The halves of Erron's busted rifle hit the ground with soft puffs of sand. But rather than falling, he throws himself forward, attempting to drive his knee viciously into Baiken's gut and carry her over backward. If he can only get her down, he will kneel atop her, blood gushing from the wound in his chest, and sight down the dual revolvers that now hang in the air before her eyes, one working, one ruined.
The hammers of both guns will cock with a quiet series of clicks...

COMBATSYS: Erron Black channels the strength of the killing fist.

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Erron Black [E]  1/-------/=======|=------\-------\0       [E] Baiken

COMBATSYS: Erron Black channels the glare of the vicious eye.

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Erron Black [E]  1/-------/=======|=------\-------\0       [E] Baiken

COMBATSYS: Baiken channels the spread of the lightning nerves.

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Erron Black [E]  0/-------/-------|=------\-------\0       [E] Baiken

COMBATSYS: Erron Black successfully hits Baiken with Goner.

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Erron Black [E]  0/-------/-------|====---\-------\0       [E] Baiken

man-made thunder echo's throughout the chamber as Erron unloads all 11 of his remaining rounds point blank into Baiken's face, the superheated barrels belching out acrid smoke and flames. The sound of splattering flesh and cracking bones overlaps with the ringing ping of bullets as they impact the marble floor before humming away in all directions.
The entire gory event takes only moments, after which Erron staggers to his feet, blood continuing to gush from the wound in his chest, and takes two, then three steps away from the nearly headless corpse. Slowly, tiredly, the badly wounded merc makes his staggering way across the throne room, retracing his steps toward the screen through which he arrived.
He is far, far too old for this shit.

[BAIKEN]
The best that can be said for it is that it's brief.

Baiken's damaged face splits into a grin as she slices through the rifle, and she presses the attack, pushing onward. It's only another couple blows now, she thinks; one good one could end this at any time, but it's mutual. She doesn't have much left either, no matter how much she wishes she did.

But she's taken enough injury that she's slower. Less fast on her feet - and for someone who fights like Baiken, that's devastating.

Baiken takes the knee to the gut because she simply cannot get out of the way fast enough. She pitches backwards, already throwing out her arm to catch herself. And she does, managing to hit the ground on her back better than expected and start to push herself up - until Erron, who outweighs her, slams down and plants both knees on her, preventing her from rising.

The guns fire. Baiken has a bare instant to realize what is about to happen before it does. All she's done - and it ends here in a spray of blood and worse material. Her body hits the ground almost immediately, unmoving on the throne room's floor.

COMBATSYS: Baiken takes no action.

[                        \\\\\\  <
Erron Black [E]  0/-------/-------|

COMBATSYS: Baiken can no longer fight.

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Erron Black [E]  0/-------/-------|

Log created on 15:50:26 12/18/2016 by Baiken, and last modified on 04:43:12 12/21/2016.