Match of the Millennium

Description: Iris Osterlund's magical tradition doesn't really include battle mages, meaning she's been kind of making it up as she goes along. Brandon Malone has considerably more experience using magic to fight, and he gives Iris a firsthand demonstration of just what magic is capable of on the battlefield in a training bout.

[IRIS]
It hadn't necessarily been her intention to do so, but Djamila's sparring match with Iris made the Brit realize just how much additional space she had to improve, with the single-elimination tournament coming. After all, considering the brackets, there was a real -- if, probably, somewhat remote -- possibility Iris would have to face the dancer again... and considering how utterly one-sided their practice battle had been, if the wizard didn't take some time to really drill beforehand, it could mean trouble.

"Training" against a stationary target, for Iris's fighting 'style', is a little tricky compared to someone who learned a rote martial art. There's no katas, after all, in 'summon a weapon and smack someone with it'; typically, the thing that she drills is making the 'summon' and 'swing' parts as smooth and uninterrupted as possible. This afternoon finds her doing just that: trying to turn the swing of an arm into the swing of a weapon seamlessly, smacking a training dummy over and over with anything imaginable at this point: spears, daggers, mace, you name it.

As she does so, however, and falling into the not-exactly-trancelike state of training, Iris has a lot of time to think about her conversation with Djamila and Kenzo in this very spot only a few days prior. About the difference between wanting to win and wanting to be sure you gave everything you had in the process. About the difference between being here because it seemed interesting, and being here because it felt like something you could actually DO, a thing you could actually be "good at," a metric separate from winning.

Ichika's 'Warrior's Road,' as she put it.

Apparently, today's training, in Iris's case, is as much mental as it is physical.

[BRANDON]
Brandon, for his part was happy to take the day off from business after all, there are only so many times trailing cheating spouses in a given month a PI can do before start losing faith in humanity. When Iris sent the message requesting a training session, a tiny bit of faith in humanity as a whole was, if not restored, prevented from spiraling down like water in a bathroom sink.

Brandon gets checked in as usual at the reception area before making his way into the elevator. While on the elevator the thaumaturgic brawler takes out his deck of cards and begins shuffling. If security staff happened to be watching the feed at precisely that moment, they would see the deck glowing and his hands glowing as he shuffles.

As the elevator opens, Iris would be able to see that those glowing hands and deck and if she is particularly energy sensitive, she would be able to sense the energy within him restrained like its in a chain and then there the energy within the deck that, while identifiable as coming from him, seems to be stored within the deck.

"Hello! It's good to see you again. Do you have any questions before we begin?"

With a bit of sleight of hand, the deck disappears from his hand is returned to his pouch.

[IRIS]
One might think that a magus would be particularly attuned to chi -- a force that is, fundamentally, more or less the same as the power of 'magic' -- but in truth, even a very skilled wizard is not any more or less likely to be so. Iris is no execption; she can feel and sense 'magic', but she is not necessarily any kind of genius when it comes to doing so. It may be that in her case, the traditions in which she studied -- rune magic and seiðr -- are not necessarily 'high energy' magical styles. After all, the people who practiced them were, historically, a very... practically-minded people.

Still, all this time around fighters of all kinds who DO incorporate energy into their styles, magical or not, has helped to tune her awareness for a bit. This is why, shortly before Brandon's elevator car reaches the EVOLVE floors, there's a... tingling in the back of her head that makes her turn around and take notice, just in time to see the mystical detective emerging into the space.

A wooden buckler that she had called up winks out of existence as she gives a little wave to Brandon, who asks if she has any questions. "Not that can't wait until after," she admits. It had never really appealed to her before -- perhaps because it felt too much like 'work' -- but the making of truesilver, working alongside Aria, awoke a certain interest in making and artificing in Iris. The deck Brandon carries interests her, if only because she wonders how other traditions go about enchanting items long term. But... question for another time.

Right now, she's got bigger and more immediate fish to fry.

"I'm ready any time, really," the Brit says, cracking her knuckles and rotating her shoulder a little bit. "After all, the tournament's not going to wait for me to improve at my own pace, and I'm sure everyone else is working hard too, right now."

[BRANDON]
"Fair enough."

With that, the arcane private eye walks to the fighting mat with a calm demeanor. After a few steps, he windmills his arms to loosen them up before turning towards the other fighter.

There's no bowing or holding his fist out for a glove touch. His was not a tradition born out of dojos or gyms so those forms of showing respect are completely absent. His was a tradition born out of the fight halls here in Metro City. Instead, he gives a nod to show Iris that he's ready and goes into his stance, a modified Philly Shell boxing stance. Both hands open. Rear hand up and guarding his jaw, lead hand draped across the abdomen to both guard the body and keep a close to that pouch of his carrying his tarot deck.

"Let's see what you've got."

COMBATSYS: Brandon has started a fight here.

[\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\  <
Brandon          0/-------/-------|

COMBATSYS: Iris has joined the fight here.

[\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\  < >  //////////////////////////////]
Brandon          0/-------/-------|-------\-------\0             Iris

[IRIS]
Okay. A reasonable thing. But... what DOES she 'got'?

There's an actual blink of surprise on Iris's face as she realizes she never thought about that question before. 'Show me what you've got' is such a commonplace phrase, why would it ever come up? Perhaps it's the reflective mood she was in, practicing before Brandon got here. Maybe it's seeing him in a discernible, if not -- to her -- recognizable stance. What IS it that Iris has 'got'?

Well... the answer is, she's got 'access'. She'd thought about it before, in a few of her previous fights. Most of the fighters in the NFG she's encountered so far have been 'stronger' than her on at least one axis. Kenzo was faster; Djamila and Coco were physically stronger. Hawksley and Ichika had more control over energy. In terms of her raw abilities, Iris Osterlund is decidedly average. But it also means she has no glaring weaknesses, either.

But what does that MEAN, tactically?

Knitting her brow, she thrusts a hand out to the side, a chain whip appearing in a burst of rainbow sparks. "Alright. Let's go." Whipping her arm out, Iris attempts to snag Brandon's extended arm and pull him toward her, yanking him off balance... and if she can accomplish that, she pulls him right into a buckler that appears on her OTHER arm, looking to just straight up shield bash him back the way he came.

COMBATSYS: Brandon dodges Iris' Armed Combo.

[\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\  < >  //////////////////////////////]
Brandon          0/-------/-------|-------\-------\0             Iris

[BRANDON]
Brandon darts forward, both low and slightly off to the side taking him both away from the whip and unfortunately right into the path of the subsequent shield bash. He does have fairly decent footwork though and as a result, the moment he sees shield moving towards him, he circles around towards the whip hand while dropping low, using his body positioning to keep him safe, not unlike how a decently skilled boxer would.

With him positioned at Iris' flank, Brandon gives a shoulder bump, more to reposition her than to actually cause damage, before he snaps his hand out in the mechanics of a flicker jab, more to distract than to deliver damage. The fist stops short but the card held between the index and middle finger doesn't delivering both a slash and a small burst of energy.

The card that was in his hand? That would be a 2 of swords.

COMBATSYS: Brandon successfully hits Iris with Light Strike.

[\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\  < >  //////////////////////////    ]
Brandon          0/-------/-------|==-----\-------\0             Iris

[IRIS]
It likely comes down, in the end, to Iris underestimating a card. After all, she's never actually SEEN Brandon, or someone with a distantly similar style like Oswald, actually fight. It's natural to assume that a tarot card might give you a nasty papercut if you used it properly, but glowing or not, it just lacks the aura of threat. The buckler Iris summoned, atypically, hung around for a few moments more; she'd hoped to use it to deter any sudden moves on Brandon's part.

But she doesn't think to interpose it in the way of the tarot card -- it's just paper! -- and that proves her undoing; attempting to somewhat bat it away with her OTHER arm instead, Iris gets an empowered slash across her forearm for her trouble. Wincing, she pulls back, shaking her arm. That hurt, damnit! "Okay, note to self," she says aloud with a rueful smile. "'Card sharp' isn't just a metaphor."

But critically, that buckler is STILL on her arm, and she does her best to use that fact to her advantage; bringing up one hand, she swiftly makes a motion BEHIND the shield; it would be clear to Brandon that she did something, but not exactly what. Afterwards, however, she kicks off the ground and Captain Americas her way right over to her opponent, charging with the shield held up in front of her. Certainly it might hurt a bit if it connects... but if and when it does, there's certainly more oomph in there than an average-sized adult Iris's size could produce, thanks to the rune of reinforcement she scribed on the inside of the buckler. Of course, Brandon has more experience using magic in combat, and might certainly be able to tell something's up with the shield, even if there's no overt magical energy imbued into the attack.

COMBATSYS: Iris successfully hits Brandon with Algiz - Shieldmaiden's Burden ES.

[     \\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\  < >  /////////////////////////     ]
Brandon          0/-------/----===|===----\-------\0             Iris

[BRANDON]
Brandon, having watched Iris' fight footage upon being asked to help with training her, is assuming that something is going on behind that shield. He decides to hold his ground if only to truly see the type of fighter he's dealing with in terms of what the footage doesn't show. So when Iris slams into him with the shield, Brandon tries to use a shoulder roll to both take the impact and if possible redirect it. The detective, due to the extra oomph put into the shield does neither particularly well and is sent flying before sliding on the ground.

As the thaumaturgic brawler rises back to his feet with a wince of his own his face. The hand holding the card maintains its hold on it as he gets back into stance. At least other than card being held up with the back facing her.

"I used reinforcement formulas on it so it holds itself together. At most, it will bend but won't fold or tear apart."

With a flick of the wrist, turns it so that the front is now showing not the previous 2 of Swords, but he's holding a Magician card from the Major Arcana instead. A ball of light leaps from the card heading right for Iris. By the time the ball of energy arrives, Brandon has made that card disappear with a flick of his wrist.

COMBATSYS: Brandon successfully hits Iris with I - The Magician.
- Power hit! -

[      \\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\  < >  ////////////////////          ]
Brandon          0/-------/---====|=======\-------\0             Iris

[IRIS]
Maybe at some point in this fight, Iris will stop underestimating seemingly harmless things in the hands of another magician, but it ain't now, that's for sure. Brandon reveals... well, not the SECRET of his deck of cards, but certainly one of the more interesting questions about it. Ironically, it really wouldn't have occurred to Iris -- someone who literally fights by summoning whatever weapon she can think of -- to make unassuming things weapons by reinforcing them magically.

Certainly compared to the huge as hell energy attacks she's seen some folks use, Brandon's orb feels a little modest... but that right there is the problem: it means Iris debates too long over how she should deal with it, instead of making a clear and definite decision right off the bat. She chooses too late to try and shift away from it, and instead her dodge attempt is clumsy and she ends up doing the exact OPPOSITE, smacking herself INTO said magical orb, which sends her sprawling on her back on the ground, the buckler on her arm finally disappearing.

As she gets to her feet, grimacing in pain, the Brit continues to reflect on what she's 'got', the question that's haunted her from the start of the fight. She knows what her weaknesses are, because she spent so much time addressing them. But... what are her strengths?

Frowning, and more importantly a little annoyed at herself, Iris unwisely takes off toward Brandon at a run before diving at him like a football or rugby tackle. If he doesn't get out of the way, however, both Iris and her victim vanish before reappearing in midair in a burst of rainbow sparks, Iris above Brandon, so that she can ride down to the ground alongside him in a teleporting slam.

COMBATSYS: Brandon blocks Iris' Nauthiz - Ominous Rainfall.

[        \\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\  < >  ///////////////////           ]
Brandon          0/-------/--=====|=======\-------\0             Iris

[BRANDON]
Well, that's definitely something that Iris can do better than Brandon. In combat teleportation. Brandon doesn't manage to get away from the tackle attempt. What manages to save him, is the fact that he manages to kick his legs backwards into a sprawl in an attempt to keep the fight standing or rather if it goes to the ground, it's on his terms.

When two disappear and then reappear, Brandon finds himself not where he was expecting to be. As the two fighters descend, Brandon's legs are still under him and so he ends landing hard on his knees. It's a blessing in disguise since the end result is him ending up with his hips lower than Iris' own hips.

He gets up to only one knee on the ground as he grabs for the back of the other spell caster's legs and drives his shoulder forwards to knock her on her back in an attempt perform what wrestlers would call a double leg takedown. With his hands occupied though, there's no cards being grabbed nor is there energy utilized to enhance it.

COMBATSYS: Iris blocks Brandon's Medium Throw.

[       \\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\  < >  /////////////////             ]
Brandon          0/-------/--=====|=======\-------\1             Iris

[IRIS]
There's an 'oof!' of expelled breath as Brandon's defensive maneuver puts him in position to attack Iris before she's necessarily ready, the shoulder ram briefly knocking the breath from her, but in a momentary burst of effort, she kicks her legs free from Brandon's grip and ends up rolling backwards across the floor, coming to a stop in a crouch on one knee, much as the detective did after her own attack on him.

Mint's talk about momentum rings in her ears for a moment, and even Iris herself feels a sort of... itchiness, a desire to dive back in rather than taking it slow. But the truth is, she's been going all out since the fight started, and perhaps a second to stop and let her body -- and maybe more critically, her mind -- take a break for a second. So, that's what she does.

"They don't tell you how hard it is, when you sign up," the Brit says to Brandon, with rueful good humor in her voice. "How hard it is to actually cleanly hit the other person, I mean. Fencing in school was so much easier. I was the only one taking it seriously, so if I struck first, I got the point every time."

COMBATSYS: Iris gains composure.

[       \\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\  < >  /////////////////////         ]
Brandon          0/-------/--=====|=======\-------\0             Iris

[BRANDON]
"Heh. It's funny. Some times it comes down to skill. Sometimes brute force, physical or energy-wise." He felt like he needed that clarification especially since he knew that fell on the brute force end of the spectrum just because of his energy even when he wasn't tapping into his energy directly. "Sometimes, it can even come down to who wants it more. All that just to land a hit let alone being the one to raise their hand in victory in the end."

With Iris not pressing the attack, he thought about for some people, whether or not they went to bed hungry was determined by whether or not they were standing in the end. It made plenty of people harder to solidly hit just because they were just that determined. There were times where he was that desperate.

With a quick snap of the wrist, The Empress card appears in his hand as his body becomes shrouded in a pale yellow light. He then proceeds to rush right at Iris and practically run her right over.

COMBATSYS: Brandon successfully hits Iris with III - The Empress.

[        \\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\  < >  ////////////////              ]
Brandon          0/-------/-======|=======\===----\1             Iris

[IRIS]
If it's coming down to a question of 'who wants it more', it definitely feels like an outside observer of this fight would say the answer is Brandon, who has landed a number of clean hits on his British opponent, who cannot say the same. One would think it easy to avoid a purely linear charging attack, but despite Iris's best attempts to do so, Brandon's forward momentum carries her forward and slams the young woman right into the wall, causing her to exhale sharply, arching her back.

It takes a second for Iris to come down and recover from that, as one might expect, clutching a hand to her stomach for a moment and taking a couple deep breaths to get the wind back in her, as it were. "Well," she mutters, "it doesn't seem like I've got any of that stuff, for the moment."

She has about enough focus in her, at this moment, to hold out a hand, summoning whatever weapon she can think of... not even properly focusing, just going for whatever makes it to her hand, and then INSTANTLY swinging it at Brandon before he can make any sort of followup attack, not even LOOKING at what she got: the black and gold baseball bat she called up in her fight against Ichika.

COMBATSYS: Iris successfully hits Brandon with Medium Strike.

[            \\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\  < >  ////////////////              ]
Brandon          1/------=/=======|=======\====---\1             Iris

[BRANDON]
Anyone were to ask Brandon, he would say that it was none of those things in this particular instance. There's one more factor that he likes when its on his side but doesn't want to rely on either because she is a fickle mistress.

Brandon steps back while Iris takes a moment to get her wind back. After all, he's not here to smash her into ground, he wants to let her work and figure things out and try new things.

Brandon is not expecting a surprise baseball bat. Whatever follow-up attack he had planned goes out the window as the black and gold baseball bat slams into his stomach, folding him before his body hits the ground.

"I'm surprised it wasn't a cricket bat."

Brandon slowly gets back up to his feet once more before taking that modified Philly Shell stance once more as he moves in towards the other magic user and then a 4 of Cups appears in one hand as a 4 of Swords appears in his other.

A plate of pale yellow light apears under Iris, and she might find that there's significantly less traction under her right before that 4 of Cups card disappears. He then lashes out with that newly freed hand towards her ankle to take her foot from under her and with less than ideal traction under the remaining foot sending her falling on her back. He then attempts to assist that fall even further by drawing energy from the card into his fist as he punches her down to the ground.

COMBATSYS: Iris interrupts Charged Combo from Brandon with Isa - Fimbulwinter ES.
- CRAZY Hit! -

[                 \\\\\\\\\\\\\  < >  //////////////                ]
Brandon          1/---====/=======|=====--\-------\0             Iris

[IRIS]
As the bat disappears in a burst of rainbow light, Brandon can hear Iris saying -- interspersed with deep breaths -- "Well... I AM American on my father's side, actually." That much is true, but more importantly, she's realized she summons that bat more often in moments when she is trying her damndest to fight off discouragement and frustration. Perhaps it's because that's what came to her hand as she was fighting Ichika in the first fight of the NFG's second round... and when the sword-wielding schoolgirl was trying her damndest to encourage Iris to keep going in the face of failure.

Ducking back a few steps, Iris blinks in surprise as Brandon's counterstrike begins not in his hands, but at her feet, feeling her booted foot start to slide across the floor. However, in a sudden flash of insight, Iris blinks as Brandon reaches low, and then extends a hand out as she falls, tracing what is by far the easiest of the runes she knows in the air: 'Isa', the rune of ice, which is a simple vertical line.

Brandon's trip does send Iris TOWARD the floor, but his followup strike never lands: as Iris falls, a small ramp of ice crystallizes into existence beneath her, sending the Brit(ish/American) sliding down it and across the floor *at Brandon*, where she all but baseball slides into place on the ground right next to the detective before slamming the hand that traced the rune into the floor. The spell, having been only partially activated by the slide, suddenly completes in full, and a column of ice and snow erupts from the point of Iris's touch as she gets to her feet, creating some distance. If she knows fights, Brandon will be primed with fighting spirit when he recovers, and she needs to be on her toes to deal with whatever form his followup takes.

[BRANDON]
When Iris traces the rune in the air, the detective suddenly gets a bad feeling that is immediately justified when after she had ditched baseball bat and slid right next to him. At that point, he's too committed to his attack to do anything about the ice column sending him up into the air before he drops to the ground in a heap.

Though primed with fighting spirit as it were, Brandon doesn't immediately make a move to close in. Instead, the mystical brawler returns to his stance once more, bouncing on the balls of his feet in those slightly scuffed white dress shoes. He's watching her every move. Waiting and giving himself options.

"You got me good."

COMBATSYS: Brandon thinks things through.

[                 \\\\\\\\\\\\\  < >  //////////////                ]
Brandon          2/<<<<<<</<<<<<<<|=====--\-------\0             Iris

[IRIS]
Her breathing continues to be heavy -- this is taking a lot out of her -- but a wolfish smile manages to cross Iris's face at Brandon's compliment. "Well, it took me bloody long enough," she says, rolling her shoulders a bit and thinking about her plan of attack. Someone sitting and watching your next move carefully is never good, after all. "I hate to say it, but if you hadn't tried that trick with the sliding disc -- neat idea, by the way -- I likely would never have thought of it."

She can't sit here watching him forever, though, and in her experience, fights where the two participants sit and stare at each other have a tendency to become extremely stupid, extremely quickly. Extending a hand, she summons up a familiar weapon for her -- the slender spear she uses for many of her attacks -- and taps the butt of the haft against the ground a couple times. "Let's see if I can keep the momentum up."

Then she hurls the spear.

It's probably a familiar move by now, for anyone who's watched Iris fight: she hurls the spear into the air, teleports up after it, and catches it before dropping onto her opponent. Certainly, this seems to be following that pattern, when Iris blinks out in her own burst of rainbow sparks...

Until the spear disappears before ever reaching its target, and Iris reappears BEHIND Brandon, lashing out with a summoned chain as before. Her goal is much like it was earlier in the match: grab him and yank him in her direction, but the pull is considerably more forceful this time... and if he comes flying at her, Iris answers by quite literally swinging that baseball bat from before to homerun the detective out of the park!

COMBATSYS: Brandon counters Jera - Festival of Plenty from Iris with XII - The Hanged Man.
- Power hit! -

[                  \\\\\\\\\\\\  < >  ///                           ]
Brandon          1/-------/<<<<<<<|=====--\-------\0             Iris

[BRANDON]
After seeing the spear go up to the air, Brandon flicks his wrist to make a card appear in his hand. He has seen that sequence of events before and so when she disappears, Brandon immediate looks up. When Iris disappears once again, again, the detective starts to look around with a look of shock on his face.

Brandon, much to his surprise and dismay, gets pulled towards Iris but he still has that card in his hand. He knows that his timing has to be on point. The brawler manages to get his feet under him just before he gets next to her. It is at this point that Brandon reveals the card he's holding to be the Hanged Man.

A glowing arcane circle forms right under the weapon summoner. As Iris starts to swing, a rope of energy forms beneath her before pulling her by one leg upside down into the air leaving her hanging upside down, much like the namesake card. While she's upside down, the magical further draws vigor from the other magic user before eventually releasing her and dropping he back on the ground.

[IRIS]
That... certainly catches Iris by surprise, which makes the painful followup all that much worse. Of course, Hanged Man in the tarot is the card that most symbolizes loss and regret, which is definitely in no short supply as the Brit shakily gets to her feet. She thought she'd had it, there, for a second. One good hit and she'd at least swayed the momentum back from being quite so one-sided for a moment, but now... well. Maybe better to...

No.

She was already tired, and that attack made her feel all the more exhausted. But if anything, that simply says she has even less to lose than normal by going all out. Bringing her hand up, she summons not another spear, but a javelin: shorter, lighter, and most importantly, more intensely designed to be thrown, which is exactly what she does. Then another. Then another. Then ANOTHER, until there are four of them in the air toward Brandon as Iris vanishes again, each thrown weapon traveling at a different arc, a different velocity.

When she does reappear, it's near to the second one she threw, but right to that moment, it COULD have been any of them. Someone's apparently been thinking about how telegraphed her signature technique really is.

"Not... done... yet..." the Brit bites out, as she attempts to drop onto Brandon from above.

COMBATSYS: Iris keeps on fighting!

[                  \\\\\\\\\\\\  < >  ////                          ]
Brandon          1/-------/<<<<<<<|======-\-------\0             Iris

COMBATSYS: Iris successfully hits Brandon with Raido - Solstice Journey ES.

[                        \\\\\\  < >  ////                          ]
Brandon          1/----<<</<<<<<<<|=======\-------\1             Iris

[BRANDON]
Brandon knew that Iris was exhausted, especially after having used the Hanged Man on her. However, Iris shows that she wants it more when she wills herself back to her feet. In theory, Brandon should have an easy time moving out of the way while she's further tiring herself out chucking javelins at him.

That first one catches him as he misreads the trajectory as he's clipped by the thrown weapon. It never actually breaks skin but instead pins him in place allowing Iris to descend upon him.

Brandon yanks the javelin away from his pants and tosses it aside as he considers his options. He could send a massive swirling cluster of energy in Iris' direction. He could demonstrate fruits born from having a purification ritual forcefully implanted in his brain and then repurposing it to demonstrate a proficiency in moving energy from one place to another. He could do that. But at the moment, he has nothing to prove and his purpose was to make sure the person he was training with got in some good work. And she did. There was no need to risk injuring her so close to the tournament when most would've gone down.

"Good job, Iris. I'm not sure how prepared you'll be for the next fight considering I don't fight like Buford. At the very least you got a chance to see what fighting another practitioner is like."

COMBATSYS: Brandon chooses not to act.

[                          \\\\  <
Iris             1/-------/=======|

COMBATSYS: Brandon can no longer fight.

[                          \\\\  <
Iris             1/-------/=======|

[IRIS]
"Hah... hah..." She's taking some very deep breaths, Iris is, leaning forward heavily, hands on her knees. The Brit had every expectation Brandon would take one final shot at her, but he opts not to take it, and releasing a whole bunch of tension at once, Iris literally falls over backwards, laying there much as she did after her spar with Djamila, staring at the ceiling.

It takes a minute or two, but after a bit she's able to haul herself upright and lean back on her hands, looking at Brandon carefully. "You went easy on me right at the end, there," she says, raising an eyebrow. It's not as if she's upset, but she DID notice. "And trust me, I'm glad you don't fight like Buford. If you suddenly started shouting at me like some froth-mouthed MRA subreddit poster, I don't think I could handle it."

There's another pause, and then she shakes her head a bit at the idea that this may have been of dubious help. "Honestly, it was a big help, I think, Buford be damned. I knew you'd be ready for any of the basic tricks up my sleeve, so I had to keep trying to get creative. It didn't always WORK," she adds, with a rueful smile, remembering Brandon's rather deft deflection of her first fake out, "but you kept me needing to think. Plus, you did some tricks I certainly don't know, and have given me some things to think about. Maybe I need to think up a few new moves of my own..."

COMBATSYS: Iris takes no action.

[                         \\\\\  <
Iris             1/------=/=======|

COMBATSYS: Iris has ended the fight here.


[BRANDON]
The detective nods as he flicks two cards into his hand. While yes, his deck can be used for fighting, it does have some out of combat uses as well. For example, one of the minor arcana cards are used to patch up the hole in his dress pants caused by getting pinned by the javelin. The second one gets used to remove dirt and grime from it.

"Saves a fortune on dry-cleaning bills." He then pauses a moment to make the cards disappear once more before responding to Iris. "My job was to make sure you got a good workout and a chance to see what another magic user was capable of doing. With your fight being so close, I didn't want to risk you possibly gettinginjured and not being a hundred percent by the time your match comes up. I meant technique-wise though spewing the stuff that nutball does might be good to help you keep your head while in his presence. Personally, I'd consider /not/ using my deck just so it would be over faster."

He then moves slowly over to one of the chairs to sit down. While less tired than beaten up, Brandon still would rather no longer be upright. Iris got in some pretty decent shots and it will take time to heal even with taking advantage of his ability to move energy around.

"I am still available to answer any questions you may have."

[IRIS]
It still takes a bit for Iris to get off the floor, herself; Brandon did a number on her, and if it hadn't been for sheer, stupid willpower at the end, he'd probably be having this conversation with a thoroughly unconscious Brit magus instead. She wobbles a bit over to a chair, slumps into it, and looks over at the detective with a sharp laugh. "Yeah, I can't tell if I'm eager to fight him so I can slap some sense into that mouth of his, or if I'm scared to fight him because the idea of losing to him makes my skin crawl."

False binary, Iris! It can be both!

"I'm gonna take you up on that," she says, to Brandon's offer of further help. "My family, we're not battle mages by design. Seiðr is for things like enchantment and divination, not blowing someone's head off with a fireball from 50 yards. But you showed me today there's uses of magic in combat that don't HAVE to be blowing someone's head off with a fireball from 50 yards, or making a sword pop out of thin air to smack someone with."

She tappity-taps on her LifeBand(tm) and, after a second, walks over to the dumb waiter in the room, retrieving two bottles of water. She sits down heavily with one, hands the other to Brandon, and salutes with it. "So, here's to you. Thanks."

[BRANDON]
The private investigator nods as he takes the offered water bottle then twists off the cap before likewise raising the bottle in salute. "And to a good workout session." With that he takes a gulp of beautiful, wonderful water.

Log created on 14:54:08 10/28/2023 by Iris, and last modified on 09:05:01 10/31/2023.