Participants:
Also Featuring:
Brenton
| Scene Title | Fighting Hurts |
|---|---|
| Synopsis | It's not a new lesson Magnes learns, but he learns it all the same at the hands of the Obliterater. |
| Date | March 1, 2009 |
| Soundtrack | Drowning Pool - 37 Stitches |
Night.
The cage never opens when the sun is up. But inside of the high-ceilinged warehouse-come-arena, the Pancratium is anything but dark. Bright floodlights suspended from the ceiling shine down amidst a dry haze of cigarette smoke that grows thicker the higher one looks. The enormous, sand-floored cage is surrounded by a seething mass of spectators; howling, shouting, hooting men and women waving money in one hand and shaking a fist that demands blood in the other.
Many nights begin as this one does, not with the bloodthirsty fighters being led out into the cage, but a wiry and old man in a black vest slowly walking out, flask in hand. His black, circular sunglasses reflecy dully the lights overhead. "Spek'taters." He raises a microphone to his mouth, voice rough, grumbling in a heavily stilted Russian accent. "Tonight, 'dis floor," he pours a few splashes of the dark liqor in his flash to the stained sand, strolling out into the center of the weapon-lined cage, raising the flask into the air, "Will't feed th' spirits of't th' fallen!//"
As Vasya Grigorovich's voice booms over the loudspeakers, horrible forms begin to claw forth from the ground, ghastly and gaunt illusory shaped, each bearing grisly, misshapen wounds on thinly drawn bodies. These too-thin, too-gangly forms crawl and drag themselves up from the sand like some horror movie monsters, limbs flailing, jaws opening to reveal crooked teeth. "Do you hunger as they do!?"
The crowd begins to shout, a chaotic jumble of voices that fill the air, roaring and cheering all in one as the ghostly forms begin to silently attack one another. As is Vasya's customs, new illusory corpses have been added to the danse macabre that opens each fight, fighters who have died in the ring, likenesses of their faces plastered upon these grisly, haunting figures that claw, strike and stab at one another in some spectral battle.
"Tonight, spek'taters, you will't witness a display of great strength, varsus great power!" Prowling the edge of the cage, Vasya walks between his horrible ghasts, each of them snarling and screaming silently as they roll on the ground, fingers pulling at wounds, stripping away flesh. Hands pry at jaws, snapping them open and breaking bones. Ghostly images of fighters who have died climb the cages, rising up into the air.
"Tonight, find pit th' meek, th' humble Gra'viton!" He waves his hand towards one door of the cage, where a young man waits with his head bowed, shackled around his wrists, a pair of armed guards on either side of him. Magnes has seen so many better days than these.
"Varsus d'power and ferocity, of't KONGA!" He knows a crowd-pleaser when there is one, and as the other end of the cage opens, the hulking form of Konga thunders in from that swinging doors, escorted by a pair of silken-clad //harlots from the Happy Dagger, dressed as scantily clad amazons. Once Konga has entered, they slip out past the near skeletal forms fighting nearby.
KONGA!
KONGA!
KONGA!
Vasya raises his hands, and the danse macabre ends as these undying warriors crumble and turn to transparent dust, falling to the floor in bones that sink into the sands. He bows his head, moving towards a side entrance of the ring, past a pair of hedge clippers hung on one of the weapon hooks scattered around the rusted iron bars.
KONGA!
KONGA!
KONGA!
It's fight night.
There's a man off to the side, a familiar lanky figure with a skinny frame, long hands and a gaunt face, a woolen cap pulled over greasy hair. He's not one of the audience, no hooting or yelling or even any betting for him - as close to the cage as he can get without, well, really going near it. Brenton lifts his head to evaluate the crowd, his scarred throat barely visible in these shadows, but should either fighter glance his way, they might see a flash of yellow teeth in a grim smile, as Magnes' manacles are removed, as the rudimentary weaponry swings from the hooks, as the fight begins.
He's just here to make sure it does.
One guard keeps a gun trained on Magnes as the other unchains him, pushing him through the door, which is promptly slammed behind him. He looks around, face rather lifeless as the crowd chants. His second fight, once again he has to dance for the amusement of these people hurting Abby, once again, potentially fighting someone who choses to be here. He's strong, he can protect Abby, he knows he can, but… he didn't, she was shot, she had her tongue… oh God… "A-a…" he suddenly grabs his stomach, throwing up on the floor.
What an entrance!
//She stalks forward, the beast from Uganda who has been eating crow after last encounter, which ended in a draw against Gerard and she isn't about to let that happen again. She is already adding layer after layer of skin, her epidermis thickening — and adding weight — to her already bulky form. She turns and slams her gloved hands against the cage wrapping her finger in and giving it a shake as she screams out.
"KONGA!" To which the crowd responds in kind. "KONGA!" She walks around shaking each section of caging doing the call and response to the crowd, getting them all hyped up and rabid now.
She turns to face her opponent. While he doesn't look that strong, or necessarily all that capable, she isn't going to take another lightly. He does look angry, which could motivate him. She narrows her eyes and scrunches her face into a dark scowl as she slams her hands together. "FIGHT!" she demands. "FIGHT KONGA!" she snarls and spits onto the ground. There is actual surprise in her eyes when she sees him spew up on the ground and her eyes almost question him. Surely, this is some sort of joke. She demands it now. "FIGHT KONGA!"//
"You're not a prisoner…" Magnes notes as he wipes his mouth on his long sleeved black shirt, walking over to the weapons as he drags his feet, stepping on the back of his blood encrusted blue jeans, black sneakers equally bloody. "You're here because you wanna be here, you work for the people that hurt Abby…" he continues, in that tone simmering with quiet rage. He stops at one of the weapons, reaching over, then yanks down a long four foot hooked chain from the cage.
"Fine, I'll fight, I'll show Logan what I'm gonna do to him! You're all monsters, I won't let you get away with Abby!" he yells, then starts running toward Konga, swinging and slamming the hook into the ground once, which makes a thunderous sound, far louder than a simple light-weight piece of metal should be able to make.
//Sure. Find her only weakness and use it against her. Speech. She has no clue what he means, but she knows he's upset. She keeps her eyes on the chain and as it hits the ground she charges forward hoping to take advantage of the chain being down to get in the first hard blow.
Her fist, swollen from the extra layers of skin she added, is pulled back and she swings it forward towards him hoping to end this fight with a single punch. She's quick for her size, though not as quick with the added weight. Each step shakes the caging around them and is loud as she stomps forward like a charging elephant. She'll just run him over if she has to.//
Oh hell, huge woman is charging him, and she's fast. What's the hook gonna do? He should have grabbed the flail, damn… "Crap!" he yells, spending so much time thinking, she's already on him. He reaches out, the only thing he can do, trying to grab her arm and make them both at least three times their weight, and flip gravity upside down so they'll fall up into the cage's ceiling.
His most logical thoughts at the moment are probably along the lines of 'Please don't fall on me, please don't fall on me…'.
There's a startled yelp when her body begins to fall upward. It's definitely not a float, but a hard fall. Putting her at three times her weight would get her near 800 pounds and all of it crashes into the top of the cage, and well.. if he's underneath her, then the cage just became a meat grinder. She rolls over onto her hands and knees and pushes herself up to a standing position on the top of the cage, still a little surprised to be here. Each step she takes threatens to push her form through the cage as it bows under her weight. She looks at Magnes and reaches for his throat, when she suddenly falls again, this time back down to the floor, landing with a crushing thud right on her back. She lies there unmoving for several moments before her eyes blink open again.
A wave of 'ohhh' courses from the crowd as suddenly the two fighters are hurled upwards due to the skinnier contender's power, breaking through the scattered cheering and demands from the rowdy group of people waving money in their fists. From the back of the floor level, a chant begins, and it ripples up through to the foremost rows, becoming easy to discern.
KONGA CRUSH. KONGA CRUSH. KONGA CRUSH.
One two three, almost a waltz rhythm to the bloodthirsty chanting, blood boiling, trying to urge her to get up and from where Brenton can feel it, he shuts his eyes as the waves of energy pour from the crowd. Magnes and Konga will be able to feel it too, the faintest beginnings of an andrenaline-pumping dangerous thrumming in their veins from the sheer energy of these people. He channels it directly into their hearts, calling up that want to fight, to tear, to howl at the moon. Primal.
There's a terrible cry of pain, trickles of blood raining briefly down to Konga's body as he dislodges his back from the cage. The back of his shirt is heavily shredded, cuts covering him as blood begins to clot. "I'm hurt, this hurts, fighting hurts so much!" he yells, still sitting on the ceiling, reaching behind himself to try and feel how bad it is, but then there's a wave… that Barbaric primal energy… "Abby, you hurt Abby, you monsters hurt her! I'm strong, damnit, you hear me? I'm strong!" He just drops now, ignoring the pain, keeping both feet held tightly together as he dramatically increases his weight.
He's looking to crush the crusher.
//Granted, she has no clue that he's increasing his weight. The rage that builds up inside her only serves to cause her see red. Red. He's coming for her and she's not yet ready to move. Still stunned, a scream ripples through her body as her body begins to sprout spikes. They push up through her outfit, some short.. some long, depending on the location of the spike. The shorter ones are on her arms, where there's less skin.. the longer ones on her chest and belly. It's not a pleasant experience for her, but used only out of necessity. Some are sharp enough to pierce skin, others will just be extremely painful if he lands on her. But it'll buy her some time, one way or the other.
She doesn't move otherwise, allowing her defensive posture to become offensive if he chooses to land on her.//
Magnes lands, hard. Longer spikes shred through his pants, making long bloody cuts all over his legs as he yells in pain again, so much pain, this is a hell of a lot worse than the blood woman. Even the smaller spikes have done quite a bit of damage to his sneakers, but they're not completely ruined. He stands there for only a few seconds, straining hard to weaken gravity and jump about ten feet away from her, his bloody knees buckling when he lands. "What the hell, so much pain, I can't protect Abby this way…" he strains, trailing off as his whole body just shakes and bleeds, approaching the large woman again.
She is protected only a little by the spikes and the thick layers of skin that protect her like a rhino. Her spikes retract as she rolls over onto her hands and knees and spits up a pool of blood. She pushes herself up onto her hands and knees, eyes still wild with rage and even more so at the site of her own blood. She holds up her bloody palm, having been smeared in her blood and she roars as she wipes a large streak of blood across her face and torso, as if now preparing for a war. She pulls the gloves off her hands now, the swollen shape of her fist almost comically large, though the thickened skin that covers her fist looks to be nothing to be messing with right now as she lunges forward and begins to swing wildly. Each step forward is painful for her, but she can only feel the chanting of the crowd and see the red of blood in her head. She presses towards him, each fist swung wildly, but her movement forward gets faster and more urgent with each step taken.
The crowd cheers, the feelings of rage are there, but Magnes is not a fighter. He doesn't think to change gravity again, far to much pain right now to think, he just holds his arms up, taking an incredibly powerful pounding. "W-wait, stop, I don't wanna fight anymor—!" He gets a fist to the face, then another, and another, then he just falls back with a light thump, laying there bloody and limp.
It passes, finally, he can't keep up the tide of blood-hot primal energy directed from the savage crowd and into the two fighters. Not unless he wants this to dissolve into a riot, which is so easy to do. Brenton slumps back against the wall as he lets go of this psychic current, a hand up to remove his cap, wipe his brow with the back of his hand. Good timing, seeing as the urge might have driven Konga further than it should, even with Magnes lying bloody. With a rat's sneer, Brenton moves on to collect his money for a show well done.
When he falls and goes limp, the rage still inside the beast seems to be released. She leans over him and pulls back her fist for one final blow as the crowd continues to chant for death. She starts to throw the final blow when something stops her. She kicks at his limp body and narrows her eyes. Blood continues to run from her mouth and drool to the floor as she finally turns around and raises her hands in the air, taking one more chance to glance back at her fallen foe in a final show of respect as the chant of "KONGA! KONGA!" echoes inside the building. She heads for the exit of the cage.
 March 1st: Finding The Rotten Egg |
 March 1st: The Only Hero... |