Description: Not going down in Chinatown: Wing Xiaoping! Third offense: bumfighting! When a drunken lethargic Ter rudely interrupts her extremely loud and extremely Chinese bout of haggling, the young Queen of the Streets demonstrates the potent morale boost she derives from reconnecting with her homeland by beating the crap out of the Godhand. At least someone in the world is more of a poser than she. (Winner: Wing)
Contrary to what might be expected, Wing Xiaoping, self-proclaimed queen of Hong Kong's back streets, does not at all feel at home in Southtown's Chinatown. The streets are unfamiliar; the people, though in large part Chinese, are strangers. Many of them speak Mandarin, which is not her first language. And frankly -- though she would never, ever admit this -- coming here only makes home feel even farther away. For the first time since arriving in Japan, young Wing sat alone for a while, brooding rather than stomping around. For the first time, she begins to regret being such a nuisance to her grandfather, if only because she didn't expect quite such a punishment.
But then it passes.
Besides, there are /some/ things that are quite familiar.
"You call this a humbao!?"
Like the haggling.
"What leavings did you put in this!?" shouts the cute little highschooler, now out of her Justice High uniform and dressed in low-slung baggy tan cargo pants and a red tank top with 'Danger!!' printed in orange and white on the front. Her eyes blaze with affected righteous fury; her opponent maintains a fierce scowl, unintimidated. "I refuse to pay such a price for cardboard and dung!"
"You whelp! My ingredients are top notch! This is a bargain!"
Wing flails her arms in the air as though trying to make herself look bigger, as one might do to frighten off a mountain lion. "I should report you to the authorities!" she cries. "I'll pay half, and do you a favor!"
This continues at some length, the participants enjoying themselves immensely: there hasn't been much business today, and Wing, though you'd have to know her well to tell -- and no one really does except her grandfather -- needs a little moment to recenter herself. Then she can go back to, you know, being an FOB OG.
They really are making a lot of noise, though.
A lot of noise.
Like, a really really -huge amount of noise-.
It's enough to wake the dead.
Or if, well, not the dead, then that rather large pile of rags and debris parked in an alley. Crumpled in a doorway, next to a dumpster - near the little street stall. For a moment, it looks like the trash is /alive/. Old newspapers slewing off like a little volcanic eruption.
Then a tousled human head emerges from beneath the mess. Followed shortly by the rest of a man, rolling onto the alley floor with the elegant grace of the homeless sleeper.
Which is to say, none at all.
He groans, rising on his knees and elbows, then staggering to his feet. Swaying unsteadily, he leans against the wall, drags himself to the mouth of the alley... and then glares out, onto the road. At the girl and old man arguing over the quality of his food products.
"OI," he swears, flecks of spittle flying from his mouth, "BLOODY /chee bai/! People TRYING to SLEEP here you KNOW!"
Or at least pass out in peace, because he -reeks- of alcohol. And other things as well, not nearly as pleasant, but alcohol is thankfully at least the predominant smell. It saturates his whole body, unshaven face and bloody eyes all the way to jaundiced skin. And his clothes, the ratty once-colourful hawaiian shirt and ripped jeans.
"HAH? HAAAAAAA?"
"HAAAAAAA?"
Wing responds in turn.
Eyes widening, haggling totally forgotten, the girl stomps away from the shocked and bewildered man at the counter and closes in on the drunk with a sinister look in her eye. Clearly, returning to her Chinese roots through noisy and belligerent haggling has in turn returned her to her personal roots as a noisy and belligerent person-- a gangster, if you will. Well, she wills, even if you don't.
And now that Wing Xiaoping, Queen of the Streets, is feeling back to her old self, not even a lousy drunk will be spared her wrath.
"You human trash!" she spits fearlessly up at his face, moving in within arms reach with her hands balled into fists at her side. "Call me that again, I dare you! I'll save your mother some grief and bust your teeth in! You'll never be able to mouth 'chee bai' again!"
Wing begins to jab her fingers into his chest provocatively, determined as always to be the first one to step things up.
"And even if you got fake teeth, and /could/ talk again," the girl continues, eyes gleaming with malice, "the recurring /nightmares/ you'd have of me would make you too scared to /try/!"
There, that should teach the loser.
"Oi, oi, oiiiiiiii," the man replies, his hackles rising. His bloodshot eyes widen, red-streaked whites stretching across his face... even as his pupils shrink to the size of pinpricks.
He growls, a low and dangerous sound, clenching a fist. Long fingernails digging into his palm. He trembles with anger, veins standing out against his neck. He takes a step forward.
It'd be totally dramatic. It would.
If he didn't promptly trip over his own feet, fall ass-over-skull forward, and end up at Wing's feet with his face on the pavement.
But he hauls himself back upright. Because it'll take more than THAT to put him down. Queen of the Streets? HAH. That's nothing to TER, the MIGHTY GODHAND of...
...er...
...well. Hn.
Somewhere. Of somewhere. Yeah.
Totally.
In a heavily Chinese-accented voice, Ter hisses, "You play play with me, is it? You think I don't have brain, is it?"
He ignores the vendor. His eyes are locked firmly on Wing as he hauls himself back upright. Or mostly upright, anyway.
"I ALREADY GOT FAKE TEETH YOU KNOW!"
Ter screams this last part, holding his mouth open for emphasis, pulling his jaws all the way apart.
He -does- have fake teeth. Two, at least. Made of gold.
Because all good Chinese gangsters have gold teeth.
It's like, mandatory and stuff.
Of course Ter's gold teeth look slightly corroded. Which should be impossible, considering, well. Gold and all. But then...
Well? His body odour? That's bad enough. And his clothes, they stink. Through and through. But when he opens his mouth again, another scent joins the miasma. His /breath/. Not just bad. It's more than bad. It's like the organic fragments from his last meal decomposed in his mouth, and the yeast from all the beer he's been drinking has evolved sentience and developed civilization - before annihilating itself in massive nuclear war.
It is, in short, a mouth with /presence/.
Wh, what is this power!?
Any observer can see the deep shiver that travels up Wing's spine, her skinny frame trembling visibly for a brief moment, as Ter's abyss-breath passes over her. When the scent fades, her eyes are a little wild and her hair, oddly enough, appears a bit more frazzled.
Gold teeth really are important though, aren't they.
"W, well," she sputters, leaning back a bit without actually backing down. "I'll... I'll give you more, you creep!"
It's not her fault she can't afford a grill!
"Look!" Wing, recovering valiantly, pokes him in the chest again. "I'll make this simple. Get down on your knees and apologize for insulting a lady, and maybe I'll let you walk away in one piece!"
She pauses with an odd expression-- and then giggles.
"He he he..."
It's kind of cute.
"...gah ha ha hah hah!"
Okay, that's not.
"Oh, who am I kidding!? I'm no lady!" She begins to poke him repeatedly, harder now, grinning hugely. "I'm Wing, the Queen of the Streets! Kneeling isn't enough! Kowtow before me!"
His breath aside, there is little Wing enjoys more than picking on the weaker or less fortunate.
Ter gapes for a few long moments, mouth hanging open...before shutting it with a snap. He stares at the girl, goggle-eyed, his face a dumb caricature of blank incomprehension. He just stands there for a good while, saying nothing, while his brain cells struggle to fire beneath the deep morass of substances marinating his brain.
It should be noted, at this point...
...that he isn't actually making -eye contact- with Wing.
Nope, his eyes are somewhat lower, on the fabric of her t-shirt, trying his level best to look down her collar.
He leans forward a little, coming uncomfortably close to Wing. Too close. Like invading-personal-space kind of close.
Beat.
"...hah? Not a lady ah? Then what are those?"
COMBATSYS: Ter has started a fight here.
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Ter 0/-------/-------|
COMBATSYS: Wing has joined the fight here.
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Wing 0/-------/-------|-------\-------\0 Ter
Wing has gotten this before.
Admittedly, normally she takes to wearing baggy hoodies, especially when she tries to act tough on the seedier streets of her hometown. But she's discovering that it's a real pain to lug around so much heavy clothing in her Rock The Bells backpack, so she decided to go a little lighter today-- and this is what she gets.
I mean, they're small, but-- they're /there/.
Wing's expression is strangely distant, quite unusual for her.
"Want a closer look?"
And her tone is strangely neutral.
The shorter girl sidles closer--
"Here..."
--and with a flash of her eyes, her face abruptly a mask of fury, she leaps straight into the air to slam her forehead right into Ter's face, her little frame suddenly possessed of enough force to snap bone on impact.
"CHOKE, SUCKA!"
Normally, this is the end of it.
COMBATSYS: Ter endures Wing's Taiga Style.
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Wing 0/-------/------=|===----\-------\0 Ter
You know the old saying.
Fist, meet face?
Well this is more like face meet face. Or not. Because that might actually be pleasant for Ter. But a rock hard skull of solid bone slamming into -your- face is hardly a pleasant sort of thing.
There's a horrible, horrible -crunching- sound, a spray of red in the air. Then the man called Ter is sent sprawling back, his head snapping at the neck, crimson blood still geysering from his...
...nose.
And not in the Japanese anime 'ooh I'm so turned on' way either.
No, that's the kind of blood you get when your flesh and cartilage has been completely shattered.
"OOOOOOOOW!"
He reels, clutching his injured probosis. But the second his hand touches the damaged ruin of flesh, it sends a new spike of pain blasting through his nerves. He gives another scream.
"Y...y...you," he splutters, gasping for breath. His voice is barely coherent, distorted as it already -is- by his accent, and made worse by the broken nose.
"CHEE BAI," he screams again, repeating the profanity he used earlier. Louder this time. Much louder. Loud enough that it echoes down the street, rattling shophouse windows, sending people scurrying for cover. This is Chinatown. In -Southtown-. Twitch reflexes for random street violence, they're high.
And this looks like big trouble in little...
Well. You know.
Ter lifts a hand, snarling. It'd sound more intimidating if there weren't a distinctly wet sucking sound to said snarl, and if said snarl wasn't more of a whimper. A lot of a whimper, actually. Mostly a whimper.
But the sound of his arm igniting, that's definitely a roar.
Crimson energies erupting round his shirt sleeve, exposed forearm, his hand. Like fire, like thunder, a whirling jagged maelstrom extending into a cone of power as he slams it forward.
COMBATSYS: Wing blocks Ter's Big Hero.
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Wing 0/-------/-----==|==-----\-------\0 Ter
"Aiyaa--!"
Wing's desperate expletive replaces whatever smug comment she had planned for her whimpering, cowering, defeated opponent; for while he is definitely whimpering, he is neither cowering nor defeated, and the sudden overwhelming flare on his arm is more than enough proof of that. Only her quick reflexes save her from getting a heat treatment, the young Queen of the Streets covering her face with her forearms and allowing herself to stagger back from the blast. "What the hell--!?" Gritting her teeth, she pulls her arms away.
Now she /really/ looks pissed.
"You ASSHOLE!" She slams her right foot on the ground to accompany her furious roar, the pavement cracking beneath her foot. Fists clenched at her side, the wind begins to whip up around her, doing little to further protect her modesty. She's already sworn off skirts forever after last time; maybe she'll just have to go around in a parka from now on. "I don't feel bad about sending you to meet your ancestors anymore," she snarls. "They couldn't possible despise you any more than I do!"
Tendons straining in her slender neck, her arms begin to tremble.
"TAKE THIS--"
And fiercely she punches out at the air. This in itself does nothing; there is no projection of chi, and she is too far away now to make physical contact. Yet the sheer transferred force of her blow, having gathered so much energy into herself, causes such a stir in the air in front of her it is enough to create a gale-force blast at her opponent, picking up trash and debris as it does so.
"HaaaaAAAAAIIIIII!"
She doesn't know who or what this guy is now at all, but frankly, she doesn't care. She's really itching to kick some ass again, though-- and he's made himself a priority target.
"Better run, punk!" she announces cheerfully, wiping a droplet of sweat from her brow as she surveys her own prowess; even if the attack isn't successful, she can always be proud she helped clean the street a little.
COMBATSYS: Wing successfully hits Ter with Dragonforce.
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Wing 0/-------/-----==|======-\-------\0 Ter
Oh, he's running.
Really, he is. He's backpedaling, fast as he possibly can. His tattered old sneakers slip-sliding on the pavement, reversing faster than Michael Jackson can moonwalk. He is, in fact, managing to run. Backwards. Away from the massive whirlwind of trash-bearing power speeding down on him.
It's an amazing act of physical dexterity. Really, it is. It's amazing how he can -do- that.
Oh wait. He can't.
With a ear-renching YELP, a high falsetto shriek, Ter trips over his own heels. He falls, arms flailing - just as he gets hit by the contents of a trash can, wadded-up takeaway boxes, drink cups, miscellanious debris, all accelerated at a ridiculous rate.
Then he gets hit by the trash can.
In the face.
There's a horrible metallic BONG.
When the aluminium can slooooowly tilts away, it's got a clean impression of Ter's mangled features stamped into the metal, twisted in to a horrible grimace. Flattened nose and all.
"...a...ancestors?!"
Ter pries his abused buttocks from the pavement. His sneakers hit the pavement, digging into the concrete.
"You want ancestors, ha, girl?! I HIT YOU SO HARD YOUR /GRANDCHILDREN/ ALSO FEEL! HIT YOU UPSIDE DOWN THEN YOU KNOW!"
With this dire, and somewhat chronologically confused, pronouncement, Ter charges towards the girl, thrusting his energy-charged hand forward. It's still burning brightly, trailing retina-searing trails of crimson light.
COMBATSYS: Ter successfully hits Wing with Jab Punch.
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Wing 0/-------/---====|======-\-------\0 Ter
"Gah ha ha ha huunfhh--"
Wing's eyes bulge slightly, both at Ter's pronouncement and at the blazing fist that connects right in her gut. But while the blow pops her into the air slightly, when she looks back up at him the overall effect seems only have been to make her more furious.
"I-- what!?"
With a surge of renewed vigor, Wing slips a foot forward and windmills her arms in a graceful shift into a Liuhe Quan low stance, glaring threateningly up at her abused opponent. "Whatever, freak!"
She lurches forward, looking almost as though she's about to leap up in /another/ headbutt -- and she'd do it, too, no mercy man -- but instead she lowers herself and twists into a sweeping low kick, aiming to take his feet out from under him.
"Meet the street!"
COMBATSYS: Ter interrupts Light Kick from Wing with Go Havoc.
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Wing 0/-------/=======|=======\-------\1 Ter
But he jumps.
It's not an elegant jump. He's no Yao Ming. He's more of a Michael Jordan.
Michael Jordan the /golfer/.
Still, though, it's -enough- of a jump. His legs go up, leaving the concrete. Bending at the knees, skin showing through the ragged rips in his denim pants. Rubber sneaker soles flap in the wind, barely held on by strips of duct-tape.
Wing's kick smashes into one shin, her heel glancing off the bone. But all it does is spin him a little. It doesn't knock him down. And it doesn't stop his arm snaking out - his left arm, the one engulfed and constantly blazing with angry blood-red power. He smashes his glowing palm into the girl's face, his fingers gripping her cheeks, mouth, nose, eyes, all the way to the broad expanse of her big forehead.
A crackling HISS splits the air as he ramps the energy upwards. Then he slams her forcefully into the pavement, down, down, down.
"You want STREET?! The STREET is my KAKI, OKAY! WE BLOOD BROTHERS, YOU KNOW!"
"Mmnnnnrgh!"
Wing's cry of pain and surprise is rather muffled by Ter's grip, but fortunately whatever disgusting smell -- or, god forbid, taste -- his hand might have is rather superceded in her senses by the excruciating burning. Struggling and kicking wildly, the girl wriggles free, looking rather singed for her troubles; gritting her teeth in frustration and indignation, she rolls backward and away.
"D, dammit..."
She's not going to lose to /this/ guy!
"That was pretty cute, loser--"
Especially if he's claiming to know the street!
"--but I'm just getting warmed up!"
Undaunted by flames to her face, Wing summons the wind again, the raw intensity of her tightened body and stance amplifying her power with every moment that passes. She'll push herself however hard she needs to. All that matters is that this guy, at the end of it all, lies broken at her feet.
Maybe she can get him to say 'Queen of the Streets', too.
COMBATSYS: Wing gathers her will.
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Wing 1/---====/=======|=======\-------\1 Ter
Yeah, sure he will. Getting Ter to say -anything- coherent is clearly an uphill battle. Much less something with proper grammar like that.
But a girl can dream. And apparently a girl can also summon power to her body, great power, great energy, rushing into her. Somehow, that fact soaks through Ter's beer-drenched brain, sparking something inside his slow-firing neurons. Maybe it's whatever vestigal speck of fighter's instinct he has. Maybe it's just that, as a somewhat stupid man, he knows when to panic when the female species gets a look like /that/.
Either way, Ter releases his grip. He lands, sliding back a step. His battered running shoes screeching over the asphalt of the street. Cars honk, traffic stalls. But it doesn't make much of a difference, because all of Chinatown's already grinding to a slow and steady halt.
You can almost hear the radio stations reporting now - slow moving traffic in the Chinatown district, due to a street fight at the intersection of...
Business as usual.
Ter's attention is entirely on Wing, though. His red-streaked eyes twitching.
Then he stops, all of a sudden. Incredibly, unnaturally still.
"Yeaaaaaahhh, warm...can lah," he drawls, "I -suppose- you a liiiiitle bit /hot/."
He leers. Wait, wait, first he hits her, then he hits -on- her?
Yeap.
He thrusting out his burning arm, the waves of swirling, sparking energies spiking up to a whole new intensity. He swings it round, his open hand pointing directly at Wing.
And now he hits her more.
Furious bolts of pure soul-forged power leap from Ter's hand. Blast after blast. His -other- hand grips his firing arm near the elbow, but even that doesn't keep his forearm jerking around as blast after blast rips free.
COMBATSYS: Wing blocks Ter's Die Die Die.
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Wing 1/=======/=======|-------\-------\0 Ter
Whatever Wing might have said in response to this disgusting guy's constant commentary is lost in the storm of power he promptly unleashes upon her, the girl little more than a silhouette and for some time not even that as her form is obscured in the welter of flame.
But when the dust clears and the light fades, she still stands.
What really bugs her is not the pain she feels from the flame, honestly. It's just-- well, it's just gross, that's all. She doesn't want him shooting anything at her. Especially when he's gripping it with his other hand and-- aww, man, now she just /has/ to kick his ass.
The expression on her face as the dust clears, however, seems to indicate that she has been planning on doing just that for quite some time.
Beyond words now, the Queen of the Streets cricks her neck quietly, taking a theatric little moment to display how her vitality remains, before running forward, slowly at first and picking up speed.
Silent, without even a war cry, she slips and lurches, closing in deftly, doing her best to fake him out-- before she leaps up, launching her left foot at his gut, and aiming to jam it in there to give her extra leverage as she brings her right foot up in a fierce snap kick at his brutally injured face...
COMBATSYS: Wing successfully hits Ter with Crane Kickin' It Old Skool.
- Power hit! -
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Wing 0/-------/=======|=====--\-------\0 Ter
...and after sending him staggering backwards from the force of her right kick, Wing flips forward, planting her palms on the ground in a handstand before her reeling opponent...
"AAAAAAATATATATATATATA!"
...and breakdances.
Which is to say, she kicks him repeatedly and relentlessly, forcing him back step by step with a vicious barrage of spinning kicks, using her hands to twist constantly and pursue him, her body a blur with the sustained intensity of the assault.
After having planted at least ten more kicks on his legs and lower torso, Wing Xiaoping rolls back to her feet and regards him impassively-- before busting out in a savage grin.
"Toldya you should've run, punk."
The girl slams her little fists together fiercely.
"Queen of the Streets!!"
Respect.
Ter stumbles round and round, his legs staggering in a roughly circular path. Arms flailing hither and yon, eyes crossed, his entire body and spine rotating like a corkscrew. He's still TECHNICALLY upright, but only in the broadest of terms. He eventually comes to a halt. Still on his feet, if barely. His head goes forward, his mouth opens - and he retches, emptying his guts of phlegm, bile, and other substances best not speculated on.
"Nnnnngghhhh," he mumbles, looking down at the freshly splattered concrete, "run ah, you want me run, is it?!"
He lifts his bloody head. One eye looks like it'll be swollen shut quite soon. The other just barely cracks open, eyelid spasming. But it's enough for him to glare at the girl, through a blurred haze.
"I," he declares, "RUN AT YOU! THEN YOU KNOW!"
And so he runs.
More of a semiconscious drunken stagger, really. It takes him forward, one step, two. Before he begins to fall.
But he never hits the ground. Because that's when a new burst of power surges from his arm. Engulfing it from fist to forearm - and actually beyond. Energy shoots out /behind/ his elbow, a long and fiery trail. Like the end of a rocket. And like a rocket, the force throws Ter straight ahead, dragging his entire limp body behind him. Just flat out /dragging/ him in its wake. He shoots towards Wing, his feet hardly even touching the ground, just driven forward by the sheer relentless force of his blazing arm.
COMBATSYS: Ter can no longer fight.
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Wing 0/-------/=======|
COMBATSYS: Wing interrupts 888 from Ter with Phoenix Cross.
[ \\\\\\\\ <
Wing 1/-----==/=======|
Wing is not yet satisfied.
Seeing the man rocketing toward her like this awakens her primal fury once again. She could just, like, get out of the way. The drunk has clearly lost control of himself. If she sidestepped he'd probably just fly down the street and into a car or something. But no. That wouldn't be enough.
"You are..."
He was talking about her boobs, man!
"...BIG FOOL!"
It's painful to slam his flaming fist aside with her palm, but she barely feels it now. She'll feel it later, but right now all she feels is the pleasure of slamming a final vicious right cross into his head as he goes careening by, her grin now positively feral.
"And I pity the fool."
Wing turns around to watch his progress, hands on her narrow hips.
"You're not street," she mutters. "You're gutter."
She slips her hands into her pockets.
"With an arm like that... kind of a shame."
COMBATSYS: Wing has ended the fight here.
It is. Really.
She's right. He's a loser.
But that's nothing to do with his fighting ability. Or his potential. No, he just...
...fails.
Case in point.
That final solid PUNCH from Ter knocks him almost completely unconscious. /Almost/. But even that doesn't extinguish the massive blaze of force streaming from his arm. It doesn't. Even with the rest of Ter passed out, there's still enough power there that it keeps flaring from his arm and elbow, still scorching a trail in the air. Still enough power to keep im rocketing forward.
Now, with his consciousness shutting down, he can't stop.
Or steer.
And that one vicious cross from Wing was enough to not only put him out cold - but also change his trajectory.
Such that, burning arm leading, he smashes through the front of a nearby shophouse. A restaurant. Blasting through the big plate glass window in a massive hail of lacerating glass shards. Overturning tables, rampaging through hapless customers... and he keeps going, all the way into the kitchen, until he breaks halfway through the back wall with a terrible crunch of plaster and brick.
Man.
He's gonna have a headache when he wakes up.
And a lot more debt.
"I..."
Wing watches, stunned.
"...I take that back."
Yeah, maybe that arm is right where it should be.
On the body of someone equally useless and out of control.
"Well, it wasn't /my/ fault," she murmurs to herself, surveying the damage.
Saying so makes her feel a little better... but doesn't prevent her from quickening her pace as she turns in the opposite direction, hands still slipped nonchalantly in her pockets. But it's only about a block before she has a spring in her step again.
This's what happens when suckas cross the Queen!
Log created on 03:30:10 08/17/2007 by Wing, and last modified on 02:53:24 08/22/2007.