Description: Whoever imagined these two would get along? Aranha, the Dancing Spider, and Wing, Queen of the Streets, each have their own reasons for being unsettled by the environment of Taizhou and its Sanctum, but they remain united in their shared experience of the deadly wastelands that surround it. The morning before her first official match, Wing seeks to face her fears -- something she has always been, and remains, not very good at. Does she, for all her insecurities, have the fortitude and werewithal to pull out the stops when necessary? And when Aranha acts with trust and open-heartedness-- can she, for once, reciprocate?
"At least the food's alright, right?"
Wing Xiaoping, erstwhile Queen of the Streets, is almost unrecognizable. Her treasured hoodie has been traded in for a white and black jumpsuit, form-fitting -- not that this is particularly flattering for her -- and sleek, and her dark hair, rather than obscured beneath a gray hood, is bound behind her head in an unusually sporty ponytail. Heaven knows where she found a scrunchy -- it is a pleasant peach color -- but it may have been from one of the many vending machines with which she has had all too embarrassing recent altercations. It turns out that her usual habit of punching vending machines until they dispense her desired product is an unwise methodology in a high-security base run and designed by deadly ninjas.
But the mere fact that Wing heeded the terrifying security system's cease-and-desist order seems a sign that, at least while she is here, a sort of change is beginning to come over her-- if only because she is forced to reconcile herself to being afraid. Unwilling and unready to meet whoever her roommate (and teammate, apparently) happens to be, Wing spent the night after she and Aranha made their way into the city outside, on the streets where she is, for better or worse, most comfortable. She discovered that the people here, for all their glassy-eyed welcomes, seem to live in terror of unseen foes -- and, more importantly, that there seems little crime on the streets not because there is no crime, but because crime seems to be institutionalized. Wing, dope as she can be, is at least clever enough to pick that up just from walking past the nightclub and its bouncers. She came here to profit off being among the best, and prove herself to the mighty. She hasn't lost sight of that motive, nor has it been shaken. But that same simplistic pride has begun to demand she find out just /who/ she is proving herself to -- and the wasteland she traveled through, and the fear she sees, exacerbates that need, in a manner she cannot explain.
Wing hates fear, when it's not directed toward her.
Now, maybe in other circumstances, forced to live in a state of constant fear and stress would just make Wing go insane with indignation and humiliation. But her trip to Taizhou has shifted her perspective in subtle ways that she herself has not noticed but that would be obvious to anyone: she's oddly cheerful, her aggressive and confrontational demeanor replaced by a less threatening devil-may-care. So long as this mysterious Big Brother remains, so to speak, the ultimate bully, Wing intuitively feels she's not going to get anything out of pushing people around -- and she's genuinely afraid of the consequences. So, though she'd never admit it, running into Aranha in the cafeteria (she was in the middle of punching a vending machine) after that unsettling night out was a great relief.
his is no place to be alone. And--
"How'd you sleep, man? That hell we went through give you nightmares?"
She wants to test her strength again.
For all that, the young girl is grinning over her shoulder at Aranha as she marches into one of the designated sparring areas, seemingly unpreturbed by the eerie and stark cleanliness of this place. Though she hasn't stopped giving him shit since the minute she saw him, this may be the most friendly Wing's ever been in her entire life, mostly likely because she hasn't yet realized she's being friendly, or that it's because of her lurking unease.
"I hope you got /some/ rest. I don't want to embarrass you too bad."
Nightmares? No. He has looked Marise in the eye and has lived to tell the tale. He has faced down Rugal Bernstein multiple times and has lived through each one. No nightmares come from fighting for his life in warzones. He had been through the Metro City war and had been through the Southtown battlezone. He has seen death up close and personal. Trouble dealing with the warzone of Taizhou aside, he doesn't have much to fear from it. This isn't to say that he isn't without fear. It's just that the ordeals he had dealt with in attempting to get to the Sanctum do not register as one of them.
Aranha doesn't see fit to tell the Chinese girl all of that but instead, he says, "Actually I had a pretty good night's sleep. No explosions."
When he sees Wing moving to the sparring area, he finishes off his bottle of water and tosses it in to a can before turning at the sound of Wing saying she doesn't want to embarass him too bad. He shakes his head, an amused smile appearing on his face. "Is that a challenge?" He damn well knows it is. With her close proximity to the sparring area, how can it not be?
The traceur/capoeirista rises to his feet and joins her. Where before he probably would've treated her trashtalk with distain both her new tone and the fact that a brother/sisterhood through battle has formed between them has allowed him to treat is as just friendly banter. "I'd like to see you /try./"
"Yeah... yeah, that's true."
If there's any evidence that Wing is, deep down, still a bit unnerved, Aranha's reference to explosions seems to bring it out of her: for a moment she becomes subdued, not even bothering to reach for some ridiculous snarky comment. While Aranha is able to say it in the nonchalant manner of one with real battlefield experience, Wing's memories of their dangerous journey elicit a bit of genuine gratefulness. It /is/ nice that the explosions could stop for a night. And there's no telling when they'll start again.
"Good thing you will," she chortles, turning to face him, her mood quickly reverting back to brash cheer at his last comment. Now that she's not sneering for once, the sparkle of endless confidence in her eyes is definitely less irritating. "You're not even ready for the beast that I've become." In fact, this is a lie, as Wing has neither particularly practiced nor improved upon her latent talent during the time that she's been on the down-low in Southtown. "I'm like eighty times stronger than I was the last time we fought."
Apparently, that previous lie was not nearly bald-faced enough.
"Of course, I can't show you my secret ultimate techniques," she says blithely, even as she begins to loosen up by hopping lightly from foot to foot, "but I'm not going to hold back either. Get ready to see the girl who's going to win this tournament."
She then sweeps into her Liuhe Quan stance, and there is a moment of rather elegant poise, if only because Wing no longer entirely looks like her normally inelegant self. But it only takes a second or two for her to get antsy, and it doesn't seem like it's easy for her to do something like, say, wait for another person to get ready. "Hurry up!" she shouts abruptly. "I'm, like, attacking!"
And so she does, twisting in a brief feint toward her no-longer-nemesis before she lunges out with a fierce double-palmed strike, aiming to slam all that gathered force into Aranha's abdomen to take the wind out of him before the fight even truly begins.
COMBATSYS: Wing has started a fight here.
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Wing 0/-------/-------|
COMBATSYS: Aranha has joined the fight here.
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Aranha 0/-------/-------|-------\-------\0 Wing
COMBATSYS: Aranha dodges Wing's Strong Punch.
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Aranha 0/-------/-------|-------\-------\0 Wing
And where Wing has a stance full of poise before the moment of antsiness. Aranha seems absolutely at ease. He hasn't even gone into ginga. Instead he waits for her body to coil up before bursting forward at him before he leans back in a matrix styled dodge letting the paired palms pass over him before reaching back with one hand.
With that one hand planted on the he swing his hips up and over his shoulder as he attempts to lash a foot upwards between the palms and at the chin, before landing back on his feet.
Then and only then will he begin his own dance.
COMBATSYS: Wing blocks Aranha's Medium Kick.
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Aranha 0/-------/-------|=------\-------\0 Wing
Wing may be antsy, but she remains swift: though she wiffs with her full-force strike, she nevertheless is able to recoil in time to bring up her guard and deflect the lashing kick, stepping back for a moment as Aranha begins his distinctive movements. In their previous encounters, she had fared poorly attempting to simply power through his rhythmic style. Now she seems more cautious, if not necessarily hesitant. She gauges him for a moment, seeking to get a sense of his motions, but without wasting too much time she soon attacks again, seeking to keep on the offensive in an effort to imbalance him -- and, probably, because she's not so good at containing herself, even when /not/ entirely berserk.
"Hyaaah!"
The girl seeks this time to overcome Aranha's battle dance with a series of blows instead of one focused strike, lunging into two blurring jabs and a quick step kick in an effort to jam one of his legs and cause him to stumble before hammering out with her right leg to aim a crushing blow into his side, a fierce blow that, while it wouldn't take him off his feet, may serve to weaken him if it connects.
But only time will tell if Wing is now fighting smart enough.
COMBATSYS: Aranha blocks Wing's Combo Attack.
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Aranha 0/-------/------=|-------\-------\0 Wing
It's a rare moment where Aranha finds himself on the defensive. In most of his encounters, Aranha tends to favor a more aggressive style by either attacking weaknesses the moment he sees them or picking his opponents apart and slowly creating a weakness for him to exploit. Wing's cautious offense here, has at this point, kept him from doing those things because Wing's attempts to power through his style created a situation he could easily take advantage of. It forces him to change his strategy a bit and he decides to respond to her offense with offense of his own.
First, he raises an arm to intercept the first jab before using a sweeping arm motion to deflect the second jab. He then moves with the step kick allowing him to spin around the kick to the side before going into another spin. With this spin, he swings a glowing blue foot to the side of her head before letting the momentum of the spin carry him into a spinning jump kick laced with blue chi before spinning his back to her to launch a blue glowing back flip kick at her and drive his foot down upon her head. "Heh. Not bad!"
COMBATSYS: Wing endures Aranha's Aggressive Dance.
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Aranha 0/-------/----===|===----\-------\0 Wing
Some things never change.
She might be a little more artful than usual right now, if only because the fury she previously felt whenever she faced Aranha, at his imagined slights and her own embarrassments, no longer confuses her; she might have put Aranha on the defensive for the moment. But when his counterattack comes swift and fierce, there's one thing she can always rely on--
"Uuuaahhh!"
Because Wing is hard-headed.
She takes the kick like a champ, twisting to deflect it off her surprisingly thick forehead. While this sends echoes ringing through her skull, it prevents her from being driven back, such that she can plunge into Aranha as he attacks rather than being pushed away, and makes her less vulnerable for the follow-up. Indeed, even as his second kick, laced with blue chi, lashes down at her, Wing is dropping low, spinning herself into an attack of her own. The second strike catches her anyway, albeit not in the head, but it doesn't halt her low twirling advance, a brisk series of kicks that rise up as she braces her palms against the ground, into which she puts all her considerable -- appearances aside -- force.
The end result might put her in an awkward position, but if she can catch him before he recovers, the sacrifice will have been worth it-- not that she could have done it any other way. He's fast, of course, but really--
Sometimes she can't think to do anything except run into the hit.
She's, you know, into it, that's all.
COMBATSYS: Aranha dodges Wing's Crane Kickin' It Old Skool.
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Aranha 0/-------/----===|===----\-------\0 Wing
And when Aranha sees Wing actively move into the kick combo, warning alarms go off in his head. He knows it hurt and he knows that he doesn't want to be on the receiving end of anything that would make getting hit by that attack worth it. As a result Aranha goes into self preservation mode where before he would just expect and accept that he would be punished for such a brazen move.
The flurry of kicks come and Aranha dives forward which, as a result of having his back still facing Wing, carries him further away from her and out of the way of the kicks and lands on his hands with his elbow pressed into his side in a break dancer-esque pose before pushing himself out of it and quickly eating up the ground between them and then swinging out a powerful spinning back heel to the chin.
COMBATSYS: Wing interrupts Fierce Kick from Aranha with Shaolin Worldwide.
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Aranha 0/-------/-======|=====--\-------\0 Wing
Wing Xiaoping, quite frankly, outdoes herself.
To be fair, she absorbed the previous kick in an effort to take Aranha by surprise, pushing up onto her palms in a spiral of kicks only to be avoided completely -- and, for the most part, she takes this next hit too, a powerful kick that impacts heavily into her side rather than her chin. At the end of all this, she will be wincing and holding her at her abdomen while trying to pretend she's not -- as if anything Aranha could do could hurt her! -- and will certainly be the worse for wear.
But, despite all that, her reaction is really something else: for in a highly precarious situation, unbalanced and upside-down of all things, the Queen of the Streets finds a way out. Pushing away from the ground with all of her strength, legs still spinning wildly, Wing literally seems to /helicopter/ off the ground, and even as Aranha scores a fierce but glancing blow, her spiralling kicks continue and this time impact, tearing into Aranha as best she can even as his own attack is knocking her away.
She'll flip into a crouch before hitting the ground, for good measure, landing on her feet.
She's smirking somewhat smugly to herself, clearly feeling good about it--
But she's a little too winded to try to say something snarky.
The spiralling kicks caught the Dancing Spider by surprise especially seeing as one of the kicks slipped into the inside of his own and another took out the foot he had planted on the ground. The end result is Aranha ends up spiralling out of control before landing on his back.
He quickly picks himself up off the ground and quickly returns her smug smile with a relaxed smile of his own. A smile that acknowledges that he did get caught, it also seemed to give off a sense that he knew something that his opponent might not have picked up on.
Whatever he knows though isn't voiced but he lets the action he takes next speak for him. Launching himself forward as he places one hand on the ground, he throws his hips over his body as he comes down with a leg extended. His goal? To use all that momentum to drop his heel hard upon Wing's head.
COMBATSYS: Aranha successfully hits Wing with Colossal Kick.
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Aranha 0/-------/=======|=======\=------\1 Wing
Wing feels decidedly less cool now.
She thought she had him figured out, and had a better grasp of his rhythm now. But the reality is growing on her: Aranha seems even stronger than the last time they faced each other. And she, whatever her claims to the contrary, is well aware: she hasn't grown at all.
A faintly hollow feeling in the pit of her stomach suggests she change that.
Natural talent and childhood practice can only take one so far, even with the grit of an original gangster. Wing just doesn't time Aranha's attack properly. The kick isn't fast, particularly by comparison to the man's other strikes, but it still demands the same careful awareness to his unique rhythm that all his movements do. She dodges a moment too late, and a moment is all he needs. The kick slams heavily into her shoulder, and with a gasp, she drops to her knees before him, utterly floored by the sheer weight of the blow -- her eyes begin to water, as she blinks rapidly against the numbing pain.
But she doesn't stop for a moment, even if out of desperation. She lashes out immediately with her other arm -- the impact against her shoulder having temporarily paralyzed the other -- in a fierce palm strike, putting everything she has into what she hopes is a stunning blow to his abdomen.
At the very least, she needs to drive him back.
COMBATSYS: Aranha dodges Wing's Strong Punch.
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Aranha 0/-------/=======|=======\=------\1 Wing
The capoeirista probably had more recovery time than he probably ought to have after performing that move. It was one of those moves that if he performed it in a roda, it would automatically draw aggro. In a street fight... In this particular street fight it does the same. Wing comes after him in an attempt to punish his aggressiveness with a powerful palm strike. In the moments before the palm strike, he sees the muscles tighten, he sees the adjustments in her stance, he sees her agony, desperation, and focus reflected in her eyes. And in Aranha's? A look that could only be accurately described as a look of 'Oh shit!' He knows the amount of power that Wing is packing within that small body and he knows that even letting this one land may completely undue his advantage. He does what any logical person would do. He weaves out of the way, ducking under the palm strike as if it was a rope.
The moment he pops up, he swings a couple of quick elbows before dropping low to grab the back of the knees of the self-styled Queen of the Streets and pulling her legs from under her assisting said pull with a shoulder thrust to her abdomen.
COMBATSYS: Wing blocks Aranha's Bad Beat.
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Aranha 0/-------/-======|=======\==-----\1 Wing
Wing may be on her last legs, but she yet stands.
Determined as ever, the Queen of the Streets rises with heat in her eyes -- but there is none of the rage she has always shown in previous fights with Aranha. Inconstant and unreliable though she may be, among many other things, Wing's heart has clearly changed in some permanent way since their experience traveling through Taizhou. Her ferocity is purely internal, a natural intensity with which she seeks to drive herself to greater heights. Clearly -- her own earlier posturing forgotten -- it is the only way she will be able to match him now.
Parrying the elbow strikes, Wing hops over Aranha's attempt to grab her legs, absorbing the first impacts and narrowing avoiding the follow-up grapple. In mid-air, she lashes out with a quick side kick, aiming to tag him in the head before he can recover and retract -- and, if she connects, she'll follow up with two blurring jabs to his face. But she's retreating as she moves. Again, unlike her usual reckless approach, and despite how her injuries are wearing on her, she's biding her time a bit -- seeking to create some space.
She'll understand his rhythm, even if it kills her.
COMBATSYS: Aranha blocks Wing's Combo Attack.
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Aranha 0/-------/=======|=======\==-----\1 Wing
When Aranha's hands fail to gain purchase on Wing's legs. He moves back anticipating immediate retaliation. Wing lives up to his expectations and then some.
The mid air kick instantly forces the capoeirista to lean back, catching the shot on his forearm as his other hand plants on the ground in what looks to be a move out of matrix. It's when he pulls out of that move and goes back into standing position that the jabs come in rapid succession which in turn make the capoeirista cover up and protect his face which force him to retreat as he does so which in turn gives Wing more room to breathe than she probably intended.
Oddly enough though, the usually aggressive capoeirista doesn't come back in to close the range. No, he walks in a circle around the sparring area as he watches his opponent, and studies the nuances of the sparring mat for ways of exploiting both to maintain his advantage.
COMBATSYS: Aranha focuses on his next action.
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Aranha 0/-------/=======|=======\==-----\1 Wing
Not... quite... yet.
She may be overextending herself; she may be only giving Aranha more of an advantage by waiting. But the only way to find out if Wing can, in fact, grasp the nuances of Aranha's style is to try -- and she will be facing, she is certain, plenty tough opponents along the way. She's going to have to learn all over again not just how to fight dirty, but how to fight start.
She steps forward, not hesitating, but careful.
"Hyaaaaah!"
And then, with a fierce cry, she steps into a swift step kick, aiming to jam his knee with a quick blow, and then twist into a snap into his side, aiming to knock the breath from him with a cutting blow below his ribs.
COMBATSYS: Aranha fails to counter Light Kick from Wing with Malicia.
- Power fail! -
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Aranha 0/-------/-----==|=======\===----\1 Wing
Aranha factored in the speed that Wing had shown all fight, he took into account the path that she would have to take to make an attack on him. He looked at limb length and the whole nine yards. It was just one thing that Aranha failed to take into account. The fact that she moved just a centimeter farther than he had expected on the initial step.
So when she moved in to catch him with that swift step kick, he planned on kicking the mat next to the one he was standing on to create just enough of a gap that Wing's foot would get caught right before she went to kick. That extra centimeter had placed her safely on the same mat that Aranha was standing on and that in turn set the capoeirista up to get caught in the rib cage with a loud thud before sending him flying as well as taking the breath out of him and completely shattering the rhythm he had.
On the upside, Aranha doesn't seem to be taking it badly. In fact, he finds himself laughing as he rises to his feet.
An adrenaline rush hits Wing all at once.
Maybe it was a fluke. Maybe it was her own careful calculations. Maybe she did, finally, overcome Aranha's rhythm, with all that effort. But time will tell: for she seeks to seize advantage of the opportunity at once, her eyes widening as she sees her opponent hit the ground. She doesn't quite grasp what happened, entirely -- she knows he tried something and it was foiled, though she doesn't notice the mat behind her having been slid back, or how close her own foot is to it, and thus how close she came to a spill of her own -- but she's not going to let up because of it.
Still, rather than her usual triumphant sneer, there is a, albeit somewhat wild, wide grin lighting up Wing's youthful features. Perhaps it is simply a response to Aranha's own good attitude, a natural reciprocity. But even in the midst of her height of intensity, Wing doesn't seem intent on hurting or humiliating her adversary, for the most part her only two modes. In this moment, she's pushing herself to the limit. It's not on principle or anything; it's just what she needs to do if she has any hope of winning this tournament.
But it may still be a first.
"OkaaAAAAAY!"
Her battle cry, as she lunges forward in a blur, seeking to exploit, if she can, Aranha's moment of weakness. This may be the deciding moment: she puts her all, with every iota of power and speed, just to tag him with a single, blurring, stunning blow -- and if she can, an endless rain of punches will follow, to hammer home and drive her opponent back, a final strike blasting him against the wall.
But if she fails, it may mean the end of her momentum.
Wing seizes the moment, with all the determination she possessess.
COMBATSYS: Aranha blocks Wing's Wing Dynasty.
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Aranha 0/-------/--=====|-------\-------\0 Wing
It would appear that Aranha's moment of weakness was exactly that. A moment. The Dancing Spider realizes that he can't afford to make any more mistakes. It's that realization that pushes his reflexes to move faster than they have any right to move.
That initial strike moves almost faster than his eye can catch. Almost being the operative word here. He just barely manages to turn to catch the impact on his shoulder, the impact causing a meaty smack that echos in the room and causes the capoeirista to cringe in pain just slightly. Then his movements go in as much of a blur as he attempts to match punch for deflection. Wing's speed and power forces the capoeirista back and threatens to overwhelm him and then the final punch slips through his guard, sliding him back in to the wall forcing a grunt from his lips.
With him backed into a corner by the Queen of the Street's assault he only has one way to go. Forward.
His lips curl into a smile once more as he hops up and launches himself at Wing putting entire his body into launching off the wall in the hopes of bowling her over.
COMBATSYS: Aranha successfully hits Wing with Sky's the Limit.
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Aranha 0/-------/--=====|===----\-------\0 Wing
Wing forgot entirely--
"Unnghhh!"
Walls aren't such an obstacle for Aranha.
Weightless. She's weightless, her vision blurring. But the lingering vestiges of consciousness seem to imply, yes, she's in the air, and that is her opponent before her-- and she clings to what little understanding she has. Though the only sensations she can latch onto are the pounding in her skull and the pain of blunt trauma, Wing is good at grasping at straws. Sometimes -- okay, most of the time -- it puts her in reckless and ridiculous situations.
Sometimes, it keeps her alive.
"Ghurraaahhh!"
She'll be bowled over alright, tucking weakly into a roll backward. But almost immediately after the impact, driven by instinct and sheer defiance, Wing lashes out with all the force remaining to her, a surprisingly fierce snapping blow to the first target she sees: Aranha's face above her, as the Dancing Spider slams into her. She punches out straight at his nose, before being sent sprawling onto the mat--
"Grrrr!"
--and rising to a crouch, coughing once, before standing again.
Her eyes are pained, but--
"...Heh!"
That grin is back.
Looks like, for all her ferocity, she's managing to have fun too.
Who knew fighting could be about something other than humiliating others?
COMBATSYS: Wing successfully hits Aranha with Quick Punch.
- Power hit! -
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Aranha 1/-------/=======|===----\-------\0 Wing
In pushing so hard for his freedom away from the wall leaves him very very open. He can't cover his face up. He can't plant his hand and then swing himself out of the way. All he can do is grit his teeth and take it.
After getting picked off out of the air, the capoeirista manages to peel himself off of the ground in spite of the fact that his vision is swimming. It takes all of his willpower to simply focus in on his opponent. It'll have to be enough.
In spite of his lungs burning from pushing himself so hard during this fight, he runs shooting past Wing as he launches himself off of the same wall he launched himself off of to free himself but this time his body is covered with blue chi and it's trailed by blue afterimages. He then bounces from wall to Wing to wall again, repeating the process over and over from different angles before launching himself off of Wing one last time and rolling away from her and coming up in a three point stance as he gasps for air.
COMBATSYS: Wing dodges Aranha's Joker's Wild.
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Aranha 0/-------/-------|===----\-------\0 Wing
Wing pulls out all the stops.
In what may be one of her best performances yet, the weakened girl's eyes narrow with a sudden sharpness and a heightening of intensity. She cries out purely to summon her own will, stepping swiftly-- again and again. Just barely she dodges the first leap, scrambling out of the way; she almost trips over herself in her fatigue as she ducks under the second; even so, she hurls herself to the side to avoid the third. Each of Aranha's blurring lunges she narrowly avoids, and after each evasion it seems as though she will stumble, and the next assault will catch her.
But it never does.
As Aranha rolls away from his final strike, one that whipped Wing's hair into her eyes but just barely missed her head, the would-be thugette cries out again, turning like lightning in an effort to catch the Dancing Spider before he can again assume that stance: lashing out with a side-swiping punch, sheathed in shimmering gold, to slam into Aranha's side before it blurs into a series of continuing, crushing punches, that single arm making a continuous flurry that seeks to pulverize Aranha before he can fully escape.
"Ghrraaahhh!"
But will this burst of passion be enough?
COMBATSYS: Wing successfully hits Aranha with Phoenix Flurry.
- Power hit! -
[ < > /// ]
Aranha 0/-------/----===|===----\-------\0 Wing
The fatigue, and wear and tear finally gets to the capoeirista and he ends up finding that his body just isn't responding to him anymore. The fist move in ablur and his body just pretty much stays there and takes the punishment in spite of his desperate mental pleading to move. It isn't successful.
While his mind and heart is determined to see the fight to the end, his body just gives up the ghost.
There is a temptation for Aranha to give one last effort to take the other martial artist with him. He decides against it. As far as he's concerned, Wing sweated for this victory, she bled for this victory, she proved beyond a shadow of doubt to him that she was a warrior worthy of respect and because of it, he lets her have this victory. She deserved it. He'll take a deep breath and laugh. He had fun with this fight and it shows.
COMBATSYS: Aranha takes no action.
[ \\\ <
Wing 0/-------/----===|
COMBATSYS: Aranha can no longer fight.
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Wing 0/-------/----===|
Before, Wing might have resented Aranha's laughter.
"...Aha..."
Maybe from anyone else, she would. ...No, definitely, she would.
"...Hahaha!"
Instead, slumping exhausted to her knees, the girl in the black and white jumpsuit laughs too, a light and relieved sound, highly unlike the kinds of laughter Aranha has heard from her before. "Oh, man," she murmurs, "I'm exhausted." For her, right now, there's a strange exhiliration in even mentioning it: even the obvious truth that she is tired -- though, to be fair, Wing doesn't recognize it as an obvious truth -- seems a kind of self-betrayal to mention, as though she is exposing herself, foolishly making herself vulnerable to ridicule or attack. Why take such a risk?
"Thanks for the match, dude."
She trusts him.
She never would have, if she weren't so afraid.
But looking upon the man now, Wing, one eye squinted shut from fatigue, slumped upon her little knees, continues to grin, thinking only that maybe -- if she really does put her all into it -- she'll make it out of this tournament a champion -- or at least, her most secret thoughts whisper, alive.
She needs someone to rely on. For the first time, she can't deny it.
"...We both better stay sharp here, huh."
It doesn't feel so bad, really.
Maybe when she starts her gang, Aranha can be her chief subordinate.
COMBATSYS: Wing has ended the fight here.
Log created on 20:28:58 04/18/2010 by Wing, and last modified on 22:56:10 04/27/2010.