Description: Daniel Jack, the zoot-suited bloodhound, is on the trail once more - this time seeking evidence regarding the fighters reported missing after the preliminaries of Johann Gallo's Trial of the Dragon tournament. He's found instead by a beautiful and deranged attack dog of his mysterious enemy, who proceeds to deliver a message...
Carlito Rodriguez.
Age 23. Spanish-American, first generation. Grew up in Sunshine city, took up a cross between Muay Thai and MMA fighting. 3-7-1 record. No tournament wins. Disqualified from the Rise of the Dragon's tournament for failing in the physical requirements. A no name fighter that nobody really remembered.
And another dead end for Daniel Jack.
The detective emerges from the apartment complex. The landlord kept to himself., just like the tenants. As long they paid rent, and didn't wreck up the place bad, he gave them their space. He didn't even notice him missing until a busted pipe upstairs made him check out his flat for water damage. For insurance purposes. When he didn't answer the door, he checked in. And he wasn't there. He hadn't been there for a while, if his kitchen said anything. But there was no sign of why he didn't come back, if he came back. THe door was locked still, and the lights were still out when the landlord came in. Did Carlito make it back home, and taken there? Or was he jumped on the way there.
It seemed that for now, Daniel would simply not know.
Closing his notepad, the detective coughs into his hand. 12 missing fighters, all associated with the Rise of the Dragon tournament. That was mighty suspect. With Zaki running her land army, she didn't have time to help 'adults.' Gangster did a whole lot. But kidnapping martial artists? That was bizarre. Six fighters investigated so far. Two were a pair of buddies, both disqualified for failing to meet the professional requirements. Last seen at the Noise Factory, and were well identified partying it up. Nobody saw them leave, but their tab was paid off in cash. The third lead was on his way to his hotel room. Disqualified for testing positive in the drug test. He was out of town, over from Metro City. HIs buddies were local though, and they met him halfway to his hotel room. Three city blocks. That was the distance that the third man walked, to, before getting snatched up. And the other three?
Dead ends like this.
Tucking away his notepad, Orange Zoot Suited detective slumps his shoulders. 3 weeks in, and already he was going no where. The coicidence was there; 12 fighters disappearing. He had the crime, the end result. But WHY. Why were they all disappearing? What motivations were there? Maybe they just faded out. Maybe it was a coicidence.
But there never could be coicidences, not in a city like this.
There are no coincidences in life; fates may shift and flow, but everything happens for a reason, guided by an unseen hand and a greater will to ultimately ensure that every existence leads to the proper purpose. To accept this is not to sit upon one's laurels, however, and Daniel's path would be a worthy one under any other auspice - rewards come not to those who await them with open arms, but who reach forth and claim them. Receipt lies in the giving. But a reaped reward may not be the one expected... sometimes, bad things happen.
It's to this purpose that Amy Johnson finds herself employed, a tool for a higher purpose. The Templar is a woman recently transformed as she hastens her step through the gloomy shadows of a back alley winding between the outer and inner city, bedecked in crimson silk with hair cropped above her ears following its dramatic abandonment of a former, lengthy state. With her freckled cheeks and brisk but graceful step she looks more the fated martyr than she ever has - an Anglo-Germanic Joan of Arc, reborn from the fires of Orochi.
A missing warrior herself, she has lurked thus far in shadow because she has not wished to be found. Her mission has taken many years, and led her into the service of the dark agency upon whose coiling tail the dark-skinned detective is rapidly closing. Carlito Rodriguez is a name that means very little; just another stepping stone upon the path to salvation, an unfortunately necessary sacrifice. There have been many like him-- far more than twelve, and will be many more. Amy counts herself among their number...
But she knows of at least one more. Her hands must be bloodied before they lift the cup of Christ.
Like a ghost she parts the gloom to step out onto the street behind Daniel Jack, scant yards away, gazing toward him with oceanic blue eyes at once bright and stern. He's an unimposing figure, she thinks, barely taller or larger than she, and certainly doesn't carry himself with the same brooding intensity. Even in Outer Sunshine, the fallen lady knight stands out among the oddities, her tabard no more curious than the clothing worn by her newfound brothers and sisters... but her stature, her formidable presence, and the mist that summons itself so easily at her slightest bidding mark her as a figure of import. By contrast, a detective of middling height and build clad in an orange suit just seems faintly silly. It's enough to make her smile.
"You've come far enough, Mr. Little."
She raises her voice, clear British tone carrying across the gentle hubbub of the inner city, as her smile grows to produce the gleam of her barely-dormant madness within those eyes. For there's something even more to Amy, a gift of her past year spent absorbed by an eldritch, ancient power, spent embracing it and then losing it. Her aura burns with the distant vestige of taint, disrupted and torn even without the visual apparition of the Dragon's Breath to more violently project her spirit. But it's her stare most of all. It roils and rolls.
"A dog shouldn't thrust its nose so far, or so deep, lest it be bitten off. What answers do you seek?"
Those eyes narrow, brow furrowing as she questions this man. It seems a genuine question, if off-kilter as greetings go.
Trouble always knew Daniel on a last name basis.
Daniel Jack finishes tucking away his notepad, not looking up as the presence comes slipping in. Oh, Danny was paying attention. But he was taking her in slowly. By the time he looks up, he got the general feel of this strange, dark woman. With an appearance that would even make Daniel put on the reich, the Teutonic beauty certainly was soft on the eyes. Most trouble looks like the part. But this woman?
She SMELLED crazy.
"You got it backwards, sweetheart." The detective states, adjusting his suit. "Dogs always should trust their nose, better than their eyes, their ears. Is it worth the risk of a nip?" Daniel raises an eyebrow, his face dead stern. "Well, we are going to find out, aren't we." Answers. Daniel had many questions, but not all were clear, or . "Lets start with the basics, sweetheart." Adjusting his heat, he tips it towards the beautiful young woman, bowing slightly, before flashing that winning smile.
"Your name, miss?"
"Amy."
It's so short and simple, her name, so completely mundane and normal that it even feels strange to her, now. Scattered across the seas of madness, journeying across the globe hell-bent upon an ancient relic that she's finally concluded doesn't truthfully exist, the last of the Knights Templar has been through the highest of waters and barely steered clear of hell; it seems as though she should have a grander title, or at least a more laboriously stated identity. 'Amy'. Is that enough to be carved upon a marble tomb, writ in a chapel? Stranger still that she stands upon a very normal, lower middle-class American street, conversing with this man.
"And when last I gathered my senses," her voice reaches a low murmur as she steps forward, scuffed leather boots striking with a certain, balanced weight upon the flagstones. Her pace carries her just within the length of a straightened arm, what only the fastest and most confident would truly deem striking range, before she glides to a halt, canting her chin upward to drive that crazed stare even more deeply toward this bloodhound. "I hadn't offered my heart to you, Mr. Little. You haven't had so much as the slightest taste, yet you deem it sweet? A truly cunning man would infer better, a merely clever one would do his research..."
A hand suddenly rises, darting to the level of her breast and then slowing as it continues to lift, brushing back through the cropped raven strands above one ear. It lingers just a little at the outer curve, her gaze demurely dropping and a broad smile spreading upon her lips.
"Let us suppose that makes you neither. You sniff about, yet you smell only your own lingering scent."
Incidentally, Amy would have you know she bathed in rose-scented water just last night.
"You're far from home, and further still from anything approaching an answer. It's high time you left."
"I wouldn't mind a taste of that, Amy."
Daniel Jack was taking in this woman carefully. Past that beauty, those hyponotic eyes, that sensual exterior was a snake. The scent of a madwoman as too familiar. He always ended up with the crazy ones. Why couldn't he get a nice, sane temptress that would offer to sleep with him in exchange for NOT investigating things. No, he gets Miss Amy Mesacline, who believes she is the sword of Gabrial or some other such nonsense. Still, Daniel Jack doesn't lose that smile. "You might be sour underneath that enchantiung shell. Perhaps bitter. Or rotten and foul, toxic to taste. Maybe you are poison, luring hapless men into your honeyed traps, to slowly pull them apart. You can be a million and one things, Amy.:
"But I like to treat every dame I first meet as a real peach, you dig?"
Daniel Jack moves out towards the middle of the street, away from the edges, away from the walls. He had experienced this similar things too many times before. "I'm not leaving yet, sweetheart. Glad you came out, though. It means something special to me, you dig? How about another question, right back at you." He begins, not taking his eyes off a woman fallen in so many senses of the word.
"Where are the missing fighters."
"Poison?" That single word forms the focus for the troubled woman's thoughts, a faint cant of her head carrying the first flare of outward uncertainty to mirror the turbulence in storm-wracked eyes, the roll of her neck that carries the gesture not unlike a serpent, indeed. Yet it seems natural for it, as though even these unusual movements were not rehearsed but summoned from the very shadowy pit of her being. That smile has faltered now, though her expression is neutral more than displeased, mood hung upon a pistol's trigger.
He knows not how apt the choice of wording is, how deep ran the tendrillous claws of Orochi, how well-lodged now are the carefully-chosen barbs of Johann Gallo. It goes back yet further, shrouded in the mists of her past decade, and not in the corruption of energy alone - her history's path winds through the corrupt cause of man, through lies and deceit, as the martyr's trail must surely run. This makes it no less painful.
"If misfortune is a venom, then the lady carries it in her breast," the mad-woman rejoins, matching Daniel's pace to remain within range, her stare keen upon him but never leaving his face - she judges his motions from her peripheral vision alone, bespeaking her martial prowess - and the nature of it - as she mirrors him almost perfectly. Her movements are smooth, flowing and nigh-effortless. "But no enchantment strives to behold her, nor you, Mr. Little. You look too hard for what isn't there; you ask the /wrong/ questions, of the wrong kin. Have you ever turned inward, pierced the depth of your immortal soul, truly challenged your spirit?"
Amy comes to a halt no more than a half-inch beyond their earlier proximity, a hand resting aganst her hip as the other drifts to tap against her bottom lip. She seems to consider the zoot-suited man before her more deeply, her pupils darting hither and fro as she examines each individual flecking of his cornea. Her raised digits lower, palm turning upward in what amounts to a conclusive, indicative shrug.
"If anything is missing, it can surely be found there. The rest... gone by necessity. A sad purpose we serve, those who walk the diminishing path, but your choice remains; embrace, or be crushed within coils beyond your mortal ken. I do not wish to harm my fellows, truly, and yet--"
Her faltered speech carries into a strong inhalation, her nostrils faintly flaring and modest chest swelling beneath the crimson silk of her overgarment as she appears to focus. A faint pricking in the air heralds the slow emergence of dozens of rolling, writhing tendrils, so dimly gray they seem illusive until they begin to thicken, the Dragon's Breath soon enough touching the area a dozen feet around in its misty clutch.
"I will close the trap, if I must. Allow me to ask you: are you a worthy man, or a woeful sacrifice?"
Daniel was listening.
Every word, every riddle was being plucked up by the detective, seized up, and held aloft. Daniel Jack may play the fool, but he was damn sharp. He was reading Amy like a book. Certainly, it was esperanto to him. But Daniel could think. He could learn. He could analyze. The wrong questions, the wrong answers. And yet, he was carefully pulling together an image. A burst of cold-hearted resolve. He had a reason to know what Amy had become. ANd through the swamp of false mysticism and delusions of grandeur, he cuts through the mire with one, crass word.
"Visionary."
The detective states, almost too formally. "A visionary killers suffer from psychotic breaks with reality, sometimes believing they are another person or are compelled to murder by entities such as the Devil or God. I've been reading up on your kind, since a good friend of mine was torn apart." The detective holds an air of tension, of disgust sheltered in his voice. "Embrace? Be crushed? Sweetheart, I don't know what higher power is calling you, but you better hang up. I'm not saying this out of naive misunderstanding, so I am not going to leave it at that. I hate to break it to you sweetheart."
"But you are absolutely insane."
The detective's form tenses up, the muscled body growing alight with flickers of orange energy. Piercing the night and fog, Daniel's aura struggles, building up into an intense light. The detective's own glare hardens, razor sharp in its presence now. Anger and venom were pouring from his teeth, as he focuses hard on the woman, his posture growing erect "You are not the Black Dragon Gang. 12 missing men, and a crazy dame with delusions of faith. I'm not getting off my path, sweetheart"
"No psychopath has any right to tell me what to do, to pass judgement on me, to deem me 'worthy' or prey."
The icy growl was building under his throat as he slowly winds back into the defensive stance of Todoh-Ryuu Kobojutsu. One palm forward, the other back. Stance utterly balanced. It seems he chose to let Amy close the trap. Hissing he asks another question, his form utterly prepared for battle.
"Who do you follow, sweetheart."
Analyzing the deranged is like reading a book written entirely in anagrams, the letters scattered to form words either alien or merely confounding; but the message is there, shrouded within layers of insensibility. Between babbling and flashes of dubious insight the truth can be discerned. His conclusions are apt enough, so far as the Templar knows, though the trickiest part remains that the mad do not know the full detail of their own circumstance - treading a strange line between blindness and wisdom. Still, his words derive a pursing of the lips, and a snorted hiss of breath through Amy's nostrils.
"The same 'higher power' calls to you; that you do no listen bespeaks ignorance. But He forgives." Her head shakes as she says that, a shivering side-to-side motion accompanied by a trembling of suddenly paled lips. As though she were far from convinced in her own words, terrified that she may not be worthy of the certainty she preaches - and this is the case. A trail of blood has led her here, footsteps clad in gore the price for her own enlightenment. For her awakening unto the fate that awaits. What cost is enough? And where too much?
Daniel's conviction only shakes her further, and that composure is gone, madness consuming Amy such that a broad shudder runs the length of her spine, sending her frame quivering as she stands there in the billowing fronds of her own summoned mist. It loops about her pretty face, sweeping over that abyssal gaze as it searches for the meaning it so sorely needs, and then she focuses upon it; the reason for his anger. His confrontation.
"I am sorry for your loss," It comes out in a near-whisper, the woman's stormy eyes briefly lidding as she clasps a hand toward her throat, fingers grasping and slipping as they seek for something that's no longer there. When they still, it's with a gentle settling, and a cooling outbreath that sees her gaze unveil with a renewed intensity. "But it's natural to lose. We mourn, we celebrate the achievement of destiny, and we move on-- no one freed soul is worth derailing a material existence. There are billions of people in this world."
Suddenly her hand darts outward, sweeping a rapid yet somehow still almost languid arc through the air, her palm bared between fingers curling inward like the talons of a wary beast. It seems an odd, throwaway gesture ill-matching with the piercing stare fixated upon the detective, at least until he feels the tightening of the woman's outlying aura, the mist resonating at her command to suddenly roll inward and solidify about Daniel's legs. From calf to thigh, it will feel as though the very air constricted muscle and bone with crushing force; a downward glance confirming that billowing tendrils of chi have fastened tight, like ropes.
"I fight for all and none. My goals are greater than an individual; who I 'follow' has no bearing."
She told him already: he's asking the wrong questions.
COMBATSYS: Amy has started a fight here.
COMBATSYS: Daniel has joined the fight here.
COMBATSYS: Amy successfully hits Daniel with Ophidian Snare.
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Amy 0/-------/------=|=------\-------\0 Daniel
Healing the mentally sick was a trying process.
It took years of therapy, years of reflection, years of medication. Sometimes it was a chemical imbalance, sometimes it is an active derangement of the mind, built from trauma. Other times, it was a poisoning of chi itself, a tainting of pure power. Daniel was no healer, not doctor of the psyche. Crazy was a sad illness that ended up hurting everyone around the victim, before burning out to dim embers. Daniel Jack knew that whatever this creature was, as long as she kept her conviction, he would be fighting someone who was a winning combination of crazy, talented, and dangerous. Daniel could fight talent. But in order to get rid of danger and crazy, he could not stop it by curing her. No, Daniel only saw one way he was going to overcome a madwoman.
Denying her of her power.
"I follow only the Lord Jesus Christ!" Was the howl as she darts out. The alien reach, the odd directions. The mist, the choking mist comes upon him though. Struggling against it, he tries to endure the strange power. "Wh-what?" He stammers, as the detective finds himself ensnared by the constricting fog. Choking, he could feel the power crush against his body, tear into his own aura. The detective inhales hard before the crush comes. Just struggling, fighting against it. This sort of stuff would have taken out Carlito.
But Daniel was not some wayward statistic on the street.
"Goals." The detective spits to the ground, choking against the power. "You make it sound so clinical, like a damned office presentation. Is this where you are, after all your wisdom, Amy?" Daniel keeps repeating the name. To make her real, to make her personal. To make her human, with a human name. "Have you truly hurt, truly suffered, Amy?!" He roars as he begins to fight off the mist. His own energy was building to a head, his own fury. Growing more and more frantic, he finally reaches his breaking point. "Have you lost so much PURPOSE that you rely on those stronger than you?! You think I will follow path?!"
And he surges back with frightful, furious force.
Daniel explodes from the mist with an intense palm strike, beginning the endless chain of his Todoh Ryuu Kobojutsu. The handchop comes, but it was no ordinary cut. Burning with chi,.Daniel Jack was alight with the light of Todoh, orange energy that cuts to the bone. Lashing out again, an arc of energy roars out as Daniel nearly screams the name. "KASANE ATE! KASANE ATE!" was the cry as the pile cutter comes. The combo comes to a close as Daniel, breaking away from the alien mist, simply steps into the scarlet knight's circle, and attempts to seize her. Should he get a grip, he will pibot hard, slamming her on her back, with a question lingering in the air.
"Is this really better than before, Amy?"
COMBATSYS: Amy fails to interrupt Bring Down the House from Daniel with Martyr's Stride.
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Amy 0/-------/-----==|=------\-------\0 Daniel
There's no cure for what Amy Johnson has. It runs deep in her veins, true, that vestigial taint from her brush with Orochi's maddening fury, with the rage that consumes and burns - but it was something she embraced, drawing her own blood to welcome in the demon. Religion is a part of it, her belief in the Lord coupled with the more esoteric faith in an old and nigh-forgotten mythos to accompany it fuelling not only her passage across the scorced earth but her desire to keep that journey going. Whatever the cost. And therein lies the horror of it; this isn't an insanity brought on the well-meaning, there's no tragedy here. This is something that the Templar - an intelligent, wilful and philosophical woman - has chosen for herself.
That self-same will empowers her energies, clutching to Daniel as he moves forward, so obedient and effective that she makes her first mistake in this confrontation; remaining still, with no particular stance raised, body loose and relaxed as he approaches, until the last instant. When his hand lashes out she begins to flow like water, drawing back her clawing hand to the fore of her body, seeking to interpose a gentle guard between her torso and that striking palm. It's enough not to stop, but to divert and seize control. She misjudges.
"Purpose is what I am," she speaks through the pain as she stumbles back, clutching at her chest, the energy burning at her breast, setting her spirit aflame. In response, the hanging fronds of the Dragon's Breath sweep about her then dive inward, meeting the incoming swathes of Daniel's energy with her own. The mist parts with a sighing breath, but it does its job well-- shielding its mistress long enough that though Todoh's inherited technique strikes, and twice, she has time to prepare for what follows. "Would you take it from me?"
Her words come harsh and heavy as she's swung through the air, her back straightening completely to take the impact not on her spine - as would be most damaging - but neatly spread, mitigating the worst, allowing her to use the gathered momentum to flip and roll, bounding off a shoulder and an outflung palm to spring vigourously to her feet. Only now does she take a stance, wide and low, palms down and fingers outspread, gently curved inward to form a defensive posture that lends itself to free and easy motion; but solidity, too.
Above, her storm-wracked eyes blaze, not just with madness but conviction. With her very soul.
"You speak a woman's name, but you see a /villain/ to be redeemed. Purport not to tell me where my loyalties ought to lie, when you flail in search of your own. What is this, then? Vengeance? Or one man's misguided attempt to be a 'hero' in his turn? Speak when you understand..."
Her hands shift fluidly, exchanging places in a smooth circle begun at her centre. The mist moves in sympathy.
"Until then, hold your foolish tongue. You know nothing."
"I speak your name, Amy."
Daniel's technique was incredibly simple, and diabolically narrow. In a nutshell, Daniel's entire technique was revealed in that single combination strike. The power wasn't in the style though, nor the flourish. Every strike was rehearsed, executed with exceptional accuracy and skill. Daniel Jack might have a small library, but he uses those tools truly as a martial art. And as he sends Amy rolling, he is chasing after her.
That same intense passion on his otherwise stony face.
"Redemption?" The detective rumbles as he rolls in towards Amy at a professional, balanced pace. "What makes you think you're redeemed of anything? You aren't a person who has been saved, you aren't some damned evanglist. You are a person who WANTS to be saved, WANTS to be justified! How about this, Amy. How about you look at where you are without your purpose, your higher calling, your so-called strength!" He announces, before dropping his voice a bit.
"As for where my loyalities lie..."
The detective mulls on this. Daniel had many endearing traits. But loyalty? He was a damned wild card in many ways, and not out of pure whimsy. He was driven by a sense of right and wrong, that was true. But he simply refused to be beholden to anyone, outside of a contract. Saving the life of a Shadaloo Doll? Right up his alley. In the end, that was the root of it all. He was a do-gooder, a wannabe hero in action... but never in outcomes. And to that, he admits "Well, I don't have a damn standing to talk to you on loyalities. I guess I ultimately stand for one person: Myself. That's all I'll preach to you, then. After all, who else is going to always look out for your best interests...
"Other than yourself?
Daniel Jack's doesn't give Amy a great deal of time. He is already surging in, faster than before, moving with incredible speed. With the leading palm strike, he continues to rattle off. "Throughout your entire spiel, you have been playing yourself up as some wisewomen." The follow up hand chop comes crashing down, followed by the graceful, rising palm strike, lifting it high. "Do you honestly see yourself as that? Wise beyond your years? A truly enlightened person." Caustic words flow from his mouth, the detective's personality clearly going for the full offense, attempting to cut through Amy's own zealous presence. As the finishing elbow jab comes from the same upper cutting hand, he finishes."You know, I bet underneath all that crazy, under that makebelieve shell, let me ask you."
"Do you stand for yourself?"
COMBATSYS: Amy blocks Daniel's Zoot Suit Riot.
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Amy 0/-------/----===|==-----\-------\0 Daniel
There's nothing likewise 'rehearsed' in the style that Amy presents in counterpoint to the detective's own, rather every motion she makes seems to come from not just the centre of her physical form - which by necessity it does, whole-body movement empowering everything - but from the deepest, most nuanced instincts. Many claim to be prodigious in various ways, and it's clear that in her younger years the Templar would have been called the same; in truth, far more besides. Hailed in messianic prose, subjected to speech after enthused speech from a zealot of the utmost order, she has since infused her style into an art form. A private, personal language.
Like her literal speech, it's hard for others to fully discern the subtleties, as Daniel displays. With scant space to respond to his soliloquy, without interrupting crudely and forming a distraction to them both, the stormy-eyed Englishwoman instead prepares for the inevitable onslaught. There's no shifting in stance as he rushes in, no attempt to mount a fresh guard, because she has all she needs. His lead hand is met by her own, a deft twist of the wrist rolling the strike aside with just a faint tinge of bruising pain. The chop is met with a circling motion, bringing her forearms inward to brace high against it, and then the elbow...
"Ngh!" Her teeth grit as she draws her arms close to her body, the first movement not to be entirely circular in nature; a simple, effective defensive posture to soak the worst of the crashing elbow. It jolts her back, and she allows it, turning her feet inward to slide a foot away. "Beyond my years?" She echoes him then, tossing her head - a gesture that once would have sent long, sleek waves of raven hair billowing. Another facet of her past she has left behind. "How young do you believe me to be? I've spent long enough searching--!!"
Suddenly she surges forward with an outward hiss, flooding back toward the detective in what seems a collision course, but the mist is still ebbing and curling around them. Ever a factor, it presents itself now with a rush to match the Templar's own, dragged inward to conceal her from view for a fleeting, confusing instant. When the looping tendrils shift away once more, she's nowhere to be seen, but her voice calls clarion from behind.
"I am far from wise. Further from enlightened."
So calm is her tone that it belies the fury of what's to follow. If Daniel is tempted to look, he'll meet the flashing of that stormy-eyed gaze directed back over her shoulder, the dark-haired woman's aura prickling once more before suddenly that mounted energy is hauled toward her at silent bidding. From what was the detective's front it comes, as though magnetized, tendril after solidifying, brutally impactful tendril seeking to lash clear /through/ him en route to the mistress of the Dragon's Breath. It's a hard, dizzying assault, not so rapid as it seems - but to the unwary, it appears to come from nowhere, defying their best efforts to defend.
"But I am not /selfish/. What I do, I do at my own cost, to secure a future where others may find that wisdom that eluded me; where man possesses control of his faculties and is master of his fate. This is my destiny, and I embrace it because I must. If that means staining my hand further, if it means doing unspeakable things in the name of a greater good then I willingly accept the consequences. Come what may. As He sees fit." Her chin rises and she finally turns to face the detective, still guarding, but still loose and light.
"There's no salvation for me. No respite. Death will be my only gift."
COMBATSYS: Amy successfully hits Daniel with Stormwitch.
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Amy 0/-------/----===|====---\-------\0 Daniel
"You're not a damned hag, that's for sure"
The presence of mist was elusive, an alien opponent for the detective. One thing WAS for certain for the man: Amy was competent in close quarters. Unleashing the final elbow jab, he recovers steadily, keeping his center. But the fallen knight had more tricks up her sleeves. Scanning the surroundings for the missing woman, trying to track her. Just like Munin, working the smoke and mirrors to her advantage. A voice of his shoulder. He turns to look... and feels the counter surge.
Just like Munin.
The tendrils lashes him hard from behind. The detective tries to keep his footing, trying to endure it through as he already readies to follow through with the endless combinations of punches. But he isn't steady enough... and she is too popwerful. Daniel is sent smashing into the asphalt, tumbling across the street into the side of a Toyota Tacoma. Hat falling off, he grunts, rolling off the side of the truck. Rising back up, his grimace boiling out. Gripping his porkpie hat, he fixes it back on his head, eyes glaring towards the woman as he struggles a breath. One broken rib. Ignoring the pain with bitter words, he surges back. "Well, it sounds like you a real matyr, right?"
"But that's not true now, is it."
"You just gave up." Daniel Jack declares with unyielding force. Tearing away from the truck he advances. "You just gave up, and made it your religion. You don't think there is nothing easier than giving up, and utterly believing it is the right thing to do" Daniel Jack burns. Giving up was easy. Daniel Jack would know first hand on that. But Daniel Jack was working hard not to reflect on the mad ramblings of a woman. The introspective and the sage would be consumed by madness. But the mindless and direct would utterly destroy it. As long as Daniel did not reflect, he would not succumb to this woman. "Is this really all you want, Amy? To kidnap, to murder, to maim, and utterly disavow yourself of owning up to it to some greater good?" Drawing back an arm, he flares up with orange energy a second time.
"You don't even know where it ends, Amy."
As Daniel finally closes back in, he readies to slash the energy forward into a shockwave. "Nothing is sadder than false faith. But you got the checks don't you. I'm not enlightened like him, I haven't been in his presence to see the truth. So many god damn sugar pills, so many damn placebos. Strip away your =empty idealism, and what do you have?"
"That you are a damned, selfish loser, Amy."
Daniel Jack finally unleashes the wave of energy. Cutting before him, the energy comes roaring downwards in a long slash. Hitting the ground, it surges back up into a small shockwave, arcing forward in a short distance. As a projectile, Kasane Ate was shameful in distance when compared to a fireball or even her mist. But there was a simple fact of matter when it came to the Pile Cutter. It was fast, simple, and highly practical for an expert like Daniel.
"KASANE ATE!"
COMBATSYS: Daniel successfully hits Amy with Kasane Ate.
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Amy 0/-------/-======|====---\-------\0 Daniel
Few people in this world truly embody the convictions they purport to maintain; rarely is a 'driven' individual anything more than a lost, damaged soul in search of some desperate meaning. Redemption is open to the majority of these people, the best possible reward for their condition a chance to prove their own status as victims, to transcend it through admitting that yes... they were wrong. This might be true of Amy Johnson, were she not so long set upon her path, and had she not plunged too deep along her own, hubritic path.
"You're wrong," she assures him, a single shake of her head sending a cold flash through those storm-wracked eyes, an imagined sheet of ice water pouring from the crimson-clad Templar as she allows his insults to sluice from her back. She's so long broken as to be unbreakable now, assured in her eventual self-destruction; a proof within that very fact, that Daniel Jack is utterly correct in spite of her assurance. Behind the pretty words and the confident delirium, she has given up. She's given herself away. "I know where this ends."
With the downward sweep of the detective's arms, the woman draws herself up, limbs all tensing as one though she turns not to face him-- rather she begins to twist, a leg darting out to draw an unseen line from her toe to his right shoulder. A thrust from the now-rear leg would see her thrust past and almost through the legendary technique of Todoh, but she misjudges - at least, she's a fraction too slow, the driving pylon of energy smashing into her own right shoulder, driving her to a knee with a pained grunt. He's strong.
But of course he he is; he'd never have gotten so far without some measure of strength.
"It ends, as I've spoken before," she continues speaking as she pushes herself to her feet with a surge of effort that seems to take so little of the same - again, it merely sluices from her, leaving her standing for an instant in the most relaxed possible posture, light and energetic amid the toiling mists. A smile flares on her lips then, and she takes off in a tightly controlled leap, the flexion of her limbs carrying her five feet up with a grace that turns nigh-instantly to brutality, the Dragon's Breath drawing inward with a dramatic hiss as her right leg launches upward in a high-angled kick. "With my death!"
The mist surges around her boot, coalescing into the form of a spreading, many-feathered wing roaring across the space between them with all the speed and momentum of Daniel's own chi assault. As it travels, the outlying mist parts to let it through, the tapering, dissipating ends of the unusual, gothic projectile spinning off into billowing tendrils in its wake. For all the speed and power, it's almost dreamlike, in apt kind with the landing of the Templar behind, flowing back into that ready stance with a gentle intake of breath.
"Whatever it takes; /that/ is my creed. And you call me selfish? When black wings unfurl about the desperate wreckage of this world, I'll not be left to feel their embrace. That's the price I pay for those who remain behind, that they might feel His love. You say wanting a better world damns me?"
Her lips purse, a frown brushing her brow for a fleeting instant before she's smiling once more. Calm.
"Then so be it. I'll be your damned loser, Daniel Little."
COMBATSYS: Daniel fails to slow Raven's Wing from Amy with Chou Kasane Ate.
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Amy 0/-------/=======|======-\-------\0 Daniel
Truly, that Kasane was Ate'd.
Daniel Jack's wave of energy tears into her, while the detective refinds his center.
While Danny just keeps on charging.
Daniel Jack was building up the energy, using both hands now instead of his quick, easy one-handed energy cuts. Both hands wound back high, he focuses dead on. Reaching an apex of strength, the energy surge finally reaches the peak. Roaring up with orange energy, he fully charges the attack. Dropping his arms forward, he ready to unleash the full force of the attacks "KASANE-"
But Amy hits first.
The energy fizzles out as Daniel is knocked clean out of the charge. Off-balanced, he hits the floor. Despite her lack of applebottom jeans and boots with the fur; it was likely that Daniel was looking at her. When she hit his flow, hit his flow, next thing you know, Danny was low, low, low, low. Them gaudy orange slacks, and the suspenders with the straps, (with the straps,) Daniel Jack got off his booty and on track. Next thing you know, he was moving in low, low, low, low.
The detective groans as he hammered back into a fire hydrant. The burst of water firing up is only secondary to the stabbing pain running through his torso. Theeeeere goes a second rib. Teeth tensing, he inspects the soaked tatters of his suit. Every damn time, they mess up the suit. Still on the ground, he shudders for a moment, staring at the sidewalk. "Not gonna lie, Amy," The detective begins with a cold, sardonic air.
"You being dead is feeling pretty idealistic to me right now too."
Very slowly, he begins to rise, first up on one knee. For a moment, it seemed that his relentless assault was finally neutered. "I'm sure the black wings will be very nice to us, in unconvential ways. What a load of bull. You are worse than those Mormons!" He exclaims. It was clear that Daniel would be hard pressed to be voting for Romney this upcoming election cycle. "I'm a damned fool for aruging with a zealot." The detective pauses, still not yet up on his feet.
""What are you going to do with me?"
There's nothing about Daniel that ought to be taken lightly, despite Amy's overwhelming first impressions. Such command as she possesses over the Dragon's Breath speaks of the deep sensitivity the damaged woman has not just to the workings of chi, but to the spirits that empower them; a curious kind of insight granted in swift peeks beyond the veil that all men and women wear. Watching with a distant dispassion, detached from pain and the dealing of it, she gains a glimmer of insight into the detective's character.
It's hard, gauging the innermost in those who claim to be 'good' - something she, even in her madness, does not do. Like a willing leader, those who claim the title of hero are so often tainted by the filthy stain of ambition, rarely more than arrogant naïfs seeking glory and recognition. Those who were bullied at school but chose to turn not away from society, but toward the retribution of it. Amy knows a thing or two about that-- they used to call her a witch, shunning her for her alarming power and her sarcastic, brooding outlook.
But she's never once taken a single action because of it. She's reacted to the present circumstance alone.
An odd duality, to be at once utterly insane and yet firmly-rooted in logic and reason, albeit of a twisted sort; yet here it lends the last of the Knights Templar the enviable ability to laugh as she's dismissed, threatened even. Her raised hands twitch againt the air, curling and unfurling slowly several times as she shakes her head to and fro, never once removing those stormy eyes from her quarry as he rises. "Then our ideals align, little hero," she murmurs in a faint sing-song, freckled cheeks dimpling with a broadened smile.
And then he asks the question. It tells so much about him, that he asks that, now. Is he truly so defeated that he needs to confront his impending death? No. She saw him in the moment of his swelling chi, and realizes what this is; a diversionary ploy, an attempt to wrangle her 'secrets'. She thinks for a moment anyway, but does so as she advances in a measured step, her gait bringing her to battle range only once she's good and ready-- and, out of some strange sense of sportsmanship or honour, likely when he is too. Then she's blurring forward as though she always was, wind dragging at her cropped hair, the mist parting even as it floods toward her outstretched palm. "Sou--!!" The kiai is so brief, barely more than an outbreath...
Scant little warning for the reversal of stance as she lands from her lunge, the opposite hand hammering out as that formerly leading braces against the wrist. The Dragon's Breath spirals inward in an instant, tendrils gaining such rapidity that the surreal nature of the mist is revealed for what it is; it's nothing more than simple chi, the looping ebb of grayish fronds only a reflection of what's already there. Unfortunately for Daniel, in this instant 'what's already there' includes a thunderous palm strike to the gut, her palm's heel grinding deep enough to draw nausea, driving the coalescing tendrils of that mist clear through his centre.
Her teeth grit as energy explodes forth, the culmination of the strike not only threatening to blast Daniel Jack backward once more, but to impact upon Amy herself, setting her arm to a disturbing tremor that finally reveals the purpose of that bracing hand. This technique, it leaves her vulnerable.
And only then, between gasps, does she answer his question.
"I'm going to keep hitting you... until you stay down."
COMBATSYS: Amy successfully hits Daniel with Trembling Palm.
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Amy 0/-------/=======|=======\-------\1 Daniel
Hero?
Daniel was never much of a hero. He knew that. He was just a man on the job, a man with some hopes, some morals, and the willingness to act on them. But he wasn't never much of a hero. The detective was being backed into the corner, pinned down by Amy. As she lunges, he rises. He tries to deflect the rush, moving it aside as he keeps his center. By redirecting the force, he could place himself in a key position to follow through.
But he couldn't get away.
Amy may have been gifted, a natural prodigy. But Daniel had never been so lucky. His early beginnings we much as they were now, getting beaten. Everything that placed Daniel where he was now was pure grit and experience. Gasping, she drives hard into his organs, trying to screw him up. Just like Zach, with his liver strikes. She makes it clear what she wanted. As the chi winds tighter and tighter within him, he grunts hard, groaning in pain.
But Daniel refuses to stay down.
The detective's spirit was wounded, but hardly quashed. Surging back up, he stands up into a palm strike, advancing deep into the woman. Instead of the classic hand chop follow up, he swiftly slashes down with a weak arc of energy, another weak Kasane Ate. But Daniel does not call out the obvious title: Instead, he seems to be drawing back his other palm, drawing away the energy. "Fantastic! TODOH!" The detective begins, as his other hand builds with orange energy. Exhaustion was seizing him, weakening him. But he was not slowing down, never slowing down. Finally, Daniel breaks out, finishing the combo with a single, powerful punch right to her center.
"PAAAAUNCH!"
COMBATSYS: Amy blocks Daniel's Fantastic Todoh Punch.
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Amy 1/------=/=======|=======\=------\1 Daniel
"Still you rise..."
Murmuring her unsettled surprise as she retracts her arm, muscles still visibly popping beneath the skin, trembling to the very hilt that it is her shoulder, Amy straightens up with a gentle windmilling of both raised limbs, bringing them to rest before her in that same relaxed guard. She's well aware of the physical destruction reaped by the technique she once associated best with her style, before broadening out and discovering her truer talents; but even disregarded in favour of others, it remains a formidable weapon. Lashing at the centre, where warriors such as she and Daniel draw and focus their energies. It's difficult to even stand when so deprived of equilibrium, driven to the point of breaking-- it's worse than mere pain.
Some small salvation, then, that a flagging spirit compares unfavourably to a broken body; Daniel has something greater than mere strength and vigour as he comes forward, displaying the shining shards of conviction. These transcend the power of man and earth, lifting the faithful to new heights. He makes no mistake in his approach, presenting that forceful blow with more than enough to devastate the woman's defences...
"But you'll not test my resolve."
Her promise falls heavy against the air, harsh in spite of her clear, crisp tone as her forearms shift. One drags through the air a fraction before the other, though they soon begin to move in tandem, deflecting neatly the opening palm strike then circling overhead to draw upon the Dragon's Breath, looping mist sweeping about Amy's pale flesh to assist in bracing against the man's own energies. Then, ultimately, she captures the incoming wrist between both forearms, pressing as tight as she can to keep it from breaking through. It's hard to stop it completely-- his moral strength, his drive is too great, but it glances from taut abdominals as the Templar twists at the waist and steps in close, releasing his arm in favour of lashing out with her own.
"Stay down, Daniel Little, stay away..." Her words ebb to silence as she drives a shoulder forward, seeking to penetrate his own guard with a forceful, lunging step, the opposite hand raised and snatching out to grasp a solidifying tendril of the mist, drawing it through the air like a needle through cloth. If she can gain the proximity she desires - and she should, she knows it - then the following strike is academic. Swung like a lashing, curvèd blade straight for the delicate, yielding flesh of the throat, the Templar strives to sweep it across as an assassin draws their dirk, continuing her momentum into a sudden pirouette.
"And we'll not need to confront one another /again/!!"
If she's quick enough, she'll end up behind him, the Dragon's Breath billowing away as she relinquishes her command and clamps her striking arm instead across the same throat already bludgeoned inward by the surprisingly blunt opening blow. And if she's quick enough, this is not the end...
COMBATSYS: Daniel blocks Amy's Hound of Avalon.
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Amy 0/-------/-----==|=======\==-----\1 Daniel
Amy's opposite arm - the one that led her initial charge - is suddenly sliding through the crook of Daniel's armpit, insidiously forceful as it interposes up and across the muscular limb already clamped to his throat. A hold familiar to thousands of practicioners across the world, a staple of jiu jitsu, judo and so many other, similar arts; a naked choke, placing horrible pressure upon the Adam's apple. On a normal man it could be a killing manuever by itself, but Daniel Little... is no normal man.
Daniel always rises to the occasion.
The combo is drawing out the detective greater and greater, the endless vigor of the detective being stretched to its extremes. Daniel Jack's final punch is caught, and the woman, with stunning agility, comes surging right back into him. The initial blow comes with frightening power and speed, the detective overwhelmed. The energy and force left the slowly ground down detective by surprise. She was behind him, moving in position for the finishing chokeout. Normally, this was the point where Daniel was meant to be at a disadvantage on the best of terms. Amy was in his circle, well past the guard of countless fighters.
The difference with Daniel, of course, being that his circle was meant for grappling.
The detective's relentless offense finally breaks. For some fighters, this might mean the desperate end. But Daniel, despite the grey tunnel that was filling his vision, was only changing tactics. A rear naked choke, one of the core martial art techniques. As Amy comes in, the detective hurls up his own hands to grip the arm, to give him space. Fighting to keep the lock from coming in. Daniel Jack struggles to a stalemate, the detective's technical skill in grapples and throws coming to a head.
The reversal.
The detective's center lowers, the detective reaching for above Amy's elbow in the choking arm. From there, as he continues to drop, he attempts to take control of the Templar's offense.With a sharp, simple twist, he attempts to wrench the entire grip out from the base of Amy's arm. Taking his other hand, would guide it around in place, regaining control of the grapple by gripping her by her wrist and above the elbow. Should he successfully break, he would finish the combination by stepping into her center, using the same momentum to finally flip her facedown to the ground to a painful, wrenching pin by her arm. "Test your resolve, Amy?"
"I'm going to beat it senseless.
COMBATSYS: Amy interrupts Crushing Throw from Daniel with Rebound Throw.
-* CRITICAL HIT! *-
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Amy 0/-------/-----==|=======\====---\1 Daniel
These two warriors, for all their differing beliefs and the raging conflict in which they find themselves upon radically opposed sides, are closely matched indeed. Amy's style finds a root in the modern art of kinomichi, bearing an internalized philosophy and a focus on grappling not entirely unlike Daniel's own aikido variant. Like the hero he claims not to be, his skill shines through when the going is toughest, a mortally deadly test bringing forth the iron pumping through his veins, forcing instinct and honed skill to combine-- as they are supposed to, as they do in every action that the Templar herself takes. The only difference between them...
Has been that she began the fight this way, was never once unsure of her intentions. She had faith.
Johann Gallo possesses a like belief in her, and it would empower the woman to keep on fighting even if she were to falter - which here, and now, she does not, a scathing outbreath marking but passing frustration as her punishing hold is prevented full purchase. The subsequent motions are as familiar to she as he, and the raven-haired beauty allows herself to be led through the dance, knowing how little choice she has. Focused entirely on the task at hand, she more rolls than is flipped, arching her athletic frame through the air and twisting against the pinning attempt, arm limp enough to slither free with only a mild wrench of the socket.
It ends up underneath as she turns onto her flank, bracing the escaped palm flat to the sidewalk for an instant during which Daniel might actually realize he's been outgrappled; but he has /only/ that instant, before she springs upward, another flexion of those powerful legs bringing them around in a rising, scissoring manouevre. They're grapevined around his arm before he can even draw breath, the same momentum he used against her being transferred into the bucking of her frame. Another twist sends her full boy weight spinning sidelong, dragging him back down with her to slam him brutally into the ground at nearly precisely the point she was falling a moment before. But where she rebounded, he'll find his skull cracking against the unyielding surface.
"The senseless one here is /you/," she enunicates fiercely with the impact, her own landing much easier this time; though no doubt they both know how to tumble at will, another aspect of training the styles share. Getting free is simple, and she springs to a three-point crouch then seamlessly, gracefully rises to her feet. Her breathing is scant heavier than when she first began speaking. "How many times must I tell you to stay down, before your heroic delusions still themselves? Before you realize how wrong you are?"
Her head shakes, stormy eyes almost coloured with a sudden sadness as she looks down upon her prey. Amy is aware how close they are to a finish - but she does not savour this. As he observed earlier, it's business; just something she must do. But nothing in her posture speaks of hesitance. She is steeled and ready, the conviction within her breast driving her to cause this man until he relents. Until her work is done.
"You'll have one more chance to walk away, Mr. Little. I implore you, let me not stain my hand further."
As in sympathy with her underlying emotion, the mists surrounding them thicken and intensify.
His move.
Daniel does, in fact, admit that he is outgrappled by the time he is counter-slammed to the ground.
Amy has to be wrong though, since Mr. Gallo was on DANIELS side. That's why Daniel had done all this. Thanks to Johann's inspiring nature. As Daniel is slammed hard headfirst into the pavement, that was the end. That was a knock-out head injury, from which no man could recover from.
Well, no normal man.
"I haven't got a lick of sense, Amy." He groans, blood pouring from his forehead. Failing to rise up, he crawls around, still fighting to rise back up."This is just like the Neo Development Project. You are just a girl, just another fight. I'm not going to dig any of Ayame's sing-song about cynicism. You aren't gonna kill me. You don't wanna kill me. You aren't a serial killer. You are... You are a warning. Someone wants to stop me from learning the truth." He grumbles, crawling towards the fallen templar. "Don't worry about giving me a chance. Anything you do to me, it won't stop me. My name is Jack. Daniel Jack."
"And I have the spirit of Todoh running through me.."
Daniel Jack rises up, and that's it. He is already passing out as he attempts to lift up the woman up by her legs....
COMBATSYS: Daniel can no longer fight.
COMBATSYS: Amy just-defends Daniel's You Got Jacked!!
[ \\\\\\\\\\\\\\ <
Amy 0/-------/-----==|
A final chance. It's all any man deserves, and the most he should have.
Watching the detective begin to pull himself aright, Amy Johnson releases a slow breath, heavy with the weight of that same conviction lacing her words. Her warning. He's right in what he says, the conclusions he has drawn entirely apt - she's no killer despite the blood upon her hands and the messy trail leading from the convent at Lazi. Her footsteps are shrouded in death now, but no, she's not a murderer at heart. How could she count among the faithful if she were? Shaken as her beliefs have been, they remain firm and true to her tainted soul. That's worth more than the spirit this man professes to have, and she's no longer impressed.
"It's worthless," she murmurs, distant now rather than harsh and commanding, though quite the opposite may be said of the sudden downward swing of both arms, palms rigid as they chop to either side. Bending at the knees, rooted so completely that Daniel could not shift her if he tried, she ensures his absolute failure with the countering strike. The Dragon's Breath soars at her subconscious willing to collide against his scattered limbs an instant after her own, driving them apart and leaving the detective to fall...
Or he would, if the mist did not loop around to smash him upward. He's launched a couple of feet in the air by the rushing energies, buoyed there for long enough that Amy can rather nonchalantly reach out to grip him by the throat, the combined strength of a lifetime's training - and her madness - allowing her to keep him raised, feet kicking above the ground, choking him in a manner almost gentle. There's nothing brusque or brutal in her motions at all now, storm-wracked eyes watching him with a cool neutrality as she reaches beneath her tabard.
"Your spirit breaks, like your body, because it's too weak." It's a simple statement, not touched by cruelty, the Templar remaining detached as she withdraws in her other hand a narrow-bladed stiletto, the hilt fashioned beautifully into the form of a rose. That gives the weapon its name; a rosette, her old friend called it, when he gifted it to her former, sane self upon the slopes of a Tibetan temple. "I gave you a choice, and you chose poorly. You've paid for that. Now pay me for my mercy. There's a man who seeks me; who seeks Amy Johnson."
She states the name carefully, as though it were not her own, enunciating each syllable with a strange and ponderous care before she shifts abruptly to slam the sharp dagger deep into Daniel's gut. It takes a small twist to get it through properly, no doubt sending a flare of near-crippling pain through the beaten fighter. Once the blade is embedded to its hilt, she withdraws her hand and lifts it to near the other, gripping a wad of the man's shirt and hauling him in close, perilously near to her freckled cheeks and that abyssal stare.
"If you find him, this is /his/ message. Neither you, nor he, comes after me. I'm going to finish this."
Her voice still disturbingly calm, she finishes with a twitch of her lips and a casual wrinkling of her nose, before thrusting Daniel away from her with both arms, releasing him to crash down once more upon the pavement. She pays him no more heed as she turns and stalks through the dissipating mist. He'll lie there until he's found, blood dripping onto the street, still alive in spite of what she may have done; and could have done.
"Perhaps one day you'll understand why, Daniel Little."
COMBATSYS: Amy has ended the fight here.
Worthless.
Daniel Jack's body was broken. Before, his mind might be in shambles too. But the detective's spirit was still burning bright, still enduring. His eyes were shut as Amy stops him cold, the attempt to grab bringing him to his knees briefly. Amy, naturally, lets him rise as she holds him up to look at him. Her words were heard, and would be his meal as he is helpless. He was helpless now, easily beaten further. But the moment she says her name, Amy Johnson, he does not speak.
He just opens his eyes again, an inner fire burning.
Tossed to the ground in a sickening heap, he curls up in a ball. The fight was out of him. But his eyes, those terrible eyes were burning. Focused upon her. He was quiet. He had not the strength to speak. But those eyes would not take off the back of Amy. Burning resolve, swirling in a pool of blood, held him together. It was the same strength that kept him together in the Siege of Southtown, when El Gado broke his body and left him dead in a dumpster. Daniel Jack would not fall so easy, as long as his spirit remained. A purpose was felt, blind to reason, a undying resolve that still burned when the landlord emerged from the apartment complex, finding the beaten body of the detective.
Amy Johnson.
A name he would be growing familiar too all too soon.
Log created on 20:30:31 06/29/2012 by Amy, and last modified on 10:40:05 07/01/2012.