The Ella Chamber

[Roht Mirage]

“Roht! Roht!” Raylene screamed as she ran the circumference of the dome. Her eyes snapped back and forth, her brown hair flipping in turns to cover her burn scar like wind-blown curtains. Audience members parted before her. They didn't offer any direction, but the nauseous swell in their faces indicated that her friend lay in the spot they looked away from. “Roht!” she squawked one last time in confirmation, then drew in breath sharpy.

A few running paces behind her, Master Kotra slowed and sighed. “Tabin, keep the others back,” he commanded while turning his head just enough for the lanky teenager to see the morbid cast in his face.

Tabin, glaring over his master's shoulder, caught a glimpse of the submerged body. It bobbed, misshapen and lifeless, like the remains in an untended aquarium. Above it, a splatter of blood ran down the inside of the dome. He could almost make out the shape of her striking it. “Horseshit,” he whispered so quietly that it was lost in the muffled roar of the rain. He had worn a scowl the whole match, straining it tighter and more bitterly every time he had seen Roht falter. Now, his face was slack and unbelieving.

“I want to see,” little round-faced Dahvim shouted as he broke from the remaining students and darted past Tabin. He radiated excitement, his childish enthusiasm so opposed to the Cell's reality that some of the patrons balked and started to move away.

“Brother! He said stop,” Tabin scolded, grabbing his younger sibling just below the shoulder.

“But, she said she'd wi-”

“Sit your ass down!”

A narrow-eyed Akashiman sword-woman stepped away from her entourage among the trees to help him restrain the boy.

Kotra turned back to Raylene. One of her small hands was pressed to the dome, fingers spread, as if the body might kick back into life and reach out for help. “We should go to where they'll be reviving her,” he said with a sternly-measured dose of sympathy as he gripped her wrist and eased it down.

“She's going to be so mad when she wakes up,” Raylene said with a small smile. The humor didn't reach her wet eyes.

The master shook his head. “No, I don't think she will,” he said, his voice hopeful but very hesitant.

One week ago, she had appeared on the doorstep of his school, all fury and bloodlust. She never did say what drew her there. Perhaps the sign, “The Hawk of Zaileya - Martial Arts Training”, had appealed to something; a yearning for Fallien, or just an opportunity to fight. He doubted she was there because of the school's reputation as a collector and protector of strays. Roht Mirage was no stray, not in her own eyes.

What she had been... was dangerous. He knew with absolute certainty that her affliction was the very same he had seen in his youth, when his tribe went to war and “unbound” their strongest -and most dispensable- warriors for the slaughter. Fate, it seemed, had brought her to the one place where the most broken of society's chaff could find a home, and the one man who knew enough to temper the force of a soul so wildly uninhibited. That, he had been willing to take on faith; a chance to, in some measure, right an ancient and irrevocable wrong. He could not bring himself to feel the same joy for her sudden change, which he saw not in the loss of skill, but in the loss of ego. She had appealed for sympathy. She had taken another's aid in combat. She had been cured by... a miracle?

It was too kind of fate, and he had never known a font of kindness that did not have a dark, scheming mechanism at its core.

“Let's go,” he said softly as he placed a hand on Raylene's back. She nodded, patted her cheeks, and turned from the body that, in more ways than one, was no longer Roht Mirage.

End

[Warpath]

There was no pain.

He felt cold all the way through his torso, beginning where the blade entered him and stopping where it left him. He felt the severed muscle, incapable of tightening though he commanded it to. He felt the heat of his life’s blood seeping out of him, swirling and spiraling in the water, adding to its brackish murk. He felt one lung deflate. He felt his body stopping and starting, just like the mechanics in his vambraces, hesitating heartbeats and wheezing attempts to drag in air where there was only water.

But there was no pain, only knowledge and sensation.

Flint Skovik was dying, and all that made the man - all the artificial things he’d built up around himself - was stripped away. In that moment he was just Rauk, devoid of all the stoic bravado and hate. He was just a man, looking back on a storied life and wondering at the point of it all. He found that he regretted nothing, but that he also felt no triumph. He did not wish he’d killed Joshua Cronen, or any of his other enemies. He did not inwardly sigh, and he did not lament the fact that so many he’d hated were still breathing.

He only wished he weren’t alone.

Somewhere, distantly, he knew that this wasn’t really the end. All he had to do was let go and then he’d wake up with some robed greybeard prodding at him. He would still go home, and he could still retreat to a warm bed and friendly faces. His body did not share that certainty, and it flooded him with Swaysong and it refused.

Impossibly his fingers twitched, and curled in the bloody water. His stomach convulsed, struggling to expel the fluid in his lungs. His remaining eye opened, and perceived a warped, quivering world, ringed in red. His veins strained against his skin, threatening to erupt from his neck and his forehead. He reached down – only one arm would obey - and wrapped his fingers around the blade, and pushed. The edge cut into his fingers to saw at the bone, injecting a fresh spurt of red into the water. He slid up along the bloodied sword, quaking with the effort.

The cold spear left him and his impalement ended. He pushed until his body twisted, and then he fell into the water, arms spreading outward to keep him afloat, fingers twitching, curling. He tried to moan but there was no air in him, only water, and the weight of it dragged him downward. The rain fell onto his face until it didn’t anymore, though he could still see it, tapping the surface of the water and spreading a hundred thousand circles stretching outward from one another, crossing and impacting and distorting one another like lives.

The mechanics in his bracers finally hummed to sluggish life, and began slurping a dwindling supply of blood from his wrists again. He continued to sink, and the red light at the edges of his vision closed inward and the color faded. The water and the dark embraced him until there was nothing left to see, so he closed what was left of his eyes. The grass swayed beneath him, caressing his back and comforting him in his loneliness. He left his body behind, and with it his isolation.

He told himself not to forget when he woke up, but knew he would anyway.

[Breaker]

Breaker regained his breath as he watched Skovic slide off the sword and float away. I spent my afternoon teaching the defiant to die. He lifted a boot from sucking muck and stomped on the thick roots trapping his sword's pommel beneath the surface. The blade fell over with a small splash, Flint's blood trailing around it. Cronen untied the tattered and stained jacket from his waist and fashioned a shoulder sling from its remaining stitching. He picked up the bastard sword and slid it home on his back - the scabbard was long lost, but the cool metal hanging between his shoulders felt right.

The storm raged on, seeming to grow stronger. Raindrops fell with such speed and frequency he could spot any shape he sought in their patterns... as if the stars themselves were falling.

She was there.

The form of a woman rose before him, standing atop the water as Fae had, but barefoot. She shone crystalline, translucent as the dome, an opalescent blue emanating from her skin. The rain did not strike her but became her, and as droplets grouped dimples showed in her smiling cheeks, hair as light as air blossomed and trailed between her breasts. She wore no clothing and had no navel, no solidity and no body rooting her in the physical realm. But she had come to him, and she reached out a shimmering hand.

She touched the Y-shaped scar on his cheek and stroked the gash opposite it soothingly, thumb pausing on the contusion left my Flint's elbow. She trapped the ends of the neckerchief between liquid fingers and tugged the sodden blue silk snug. Patience and love radiated from eyes deeper than any ocean. She brushed the bruise on his chest left by Roht's kick and blew her calming breath over the Coralian dagger's handiwork.

Breaker stood still, breathing as if he'd woken from a long nap, not finished a half-dozen combatants. Every grace of her light on his skin left goosebumps and endless hope.

Finally she kissed the tips of those vibrant fingers and pressed them to his lips. Nectar like no other washed over his tongue.

Her taste. Salty but sweet and mysterious at the end. He remembered the first time they had met. Not long after the last Cell he'd been lost, a junkie trailing from rooftop to mountain range with an iron rod and a thirst for lightning. And one day he had decided to end it.

He'd stolen a skiff and sailed into a storm that made the inside of the Ella Chamber seem like drizzle. The boat had been torn to splinters and he sank himself to the crushing depths with hundred pound black boots. As he'd walked along an underwater canyon and considered dropping in, she appeared. Not in her legendary form. That was for the sailors and the seamen who fell overboard or found themselves deserted on spits of land. She'd shown her true self to him, and inspired him to release the weight in his boots and swim skyward with her aid. Let go of the past and all your troubles. Do what you know is right, were the words she'd left him with, but she'd also shared a vision. A vision of Joshua Cronen overcoming the realm of mortals and ascending that celestial ladder... to sit by her side in eternity.

It would start when he won the Cell.

"My Lady," he said, and the words filled him with joy. "Your kiss likes me better than all the lightning in the heavens."

Her laugh lightened the rain, and weak sunlight broke between clouds above. It shone through her, and rainbows swelled beneath her skin.

Let go.

She faded, and the storm blinked and slackened, as if shocked by her sudden departure.

Josh felt no surprise and no loss; she had come to give encouragement and love and left him to make his own decisions. Such was the way with his Lady of the Water.

Clouds compressed within the dome and folded upon themselves like fluffy winter garments. The rain ran out and water sizzled all around as it rose and evaporated without heat. As the storm and all its tears vanished the dome opened from the top down. Sun spilled across a muddy battlefield showing shattered stumps and broken bodies, bits of wood and soggy loam. The corpses faded, following their souls to the Ai'Brone infirmary.

Breaker could not find his hammer. The crater he'd made was gone, filled in by mud and water as the arena flooded and covered over when it dried. That leather wrapped handle was lodged deep beneath the dirt, a memento of the afternoon massacre.

The Mystics who had maintained the shield strode across the battlefield, finding discarded weapons and drying leftover puddles. The might of their combined power astounded Josh. They had reduced the storm to memory in less than a minute.

The crowd had grown considerably larger since he entered the arena, and it broke and took a collective step back as Cronen walked toward the trees.

Stacia and Jake embraced him as one, the petite woman burying her face in his purpling chest, the half elf pounding his back like a drum. They spoke of his deeds as stories that would spread and become legend. He caught a Dwarven word in their rapid-fire recitation of the battle, and halted them with gentle hands on their shoulders.

"Amiroth?" He asked, searching for Aleraran root words in his limitless mind. "That translates to meteor hammer... where's Bodorson?"

"Spreading the news of how Breaker buried Amiroth in the first round of the Cell," Jake smirked, "he intends to make you a God, I think." The half elf chuckled and Stacia laughed along.

Cronen smiled. "And do you have news for me?" He asked.

Jake went red from nose to ears and Stacia swelled with pride.

"Indeed," the young woman answered, "Some Coronian louts who were watching the other chambers joined us when they ended early. They spoke much of the powers shown in Emma and Anita." Stacia's eyes twinkled and a soft breeze lifted her golden-cherry locks. "We know of the winners, and their skills."

"Don't bloody know if it's all true," Jake muttered into the collar of his jacket.

"Well," Josh replied, draping his arms around both pairs of slender shoulders, "let's adjourn to the Castle and discuss what you've heard. I have yet to see my office." Quarters were prepared in Ixian Castle, a sign of respect for the new Chief Investigator. "Tomorrow," Josh told them, "I'd like to introduce you both to one of the Founders of Chronicle. Luned needs help running her library in Radasanth, and she'll teach you things I never could." Four young eyes swam with questions. "You've both graduated from being my pupils, but I would still like to be a friend." He'd been afraid they would protest, but they took it in stride.

"So long as we keep training together," Jake stated, "no one else in Underwood can hit me."

"And you must promise to take proper care of yourself," Stacia added, aglow with thoughts of the Capital city.

"Of course," Josh said, smiling so hard the gash on his cheek stung, "I'd not have it any other way."

They passed the twisted yew and the shattered oak along Concordia's fringe, arms around each other as they strode to the distant castle.

"Now, if Bodorson brings me some bullets," Josh joked, "I'll have everything I need."

Josh may have been hallucinating up until the Mystics brought down the dome. His skill "fractured memory" allows him to comprehend most major Althanas dialects to some extent.

Sei approved my use of the Mystics containing the storm and removing the shield. This is my concluding post.

Ability request: according to the defintion of his ability "Lightning Rod" Cronen can only discharge a shock once per day unless he is subsequently electrocuted. Requesting that since he was severely electrocuted when using the attack, he will still be able to use it once across any following rounds. (The ability does not have a provision for this situation because I never imagined him using it in water).

Canon request: I'm removing the sledgehammer from Cronen's inventory and I'd like to make a wiki entry regarding its placement. Any player may claim it as spoils in a quest so long as they unearth it, to keep the legend of Amiroth alive. It was the first item Josh received in his Chronology on Althanas, as a token for aiding the Rangers.

Enjoy the EXP everyone! It pays to fight the Breaker...

Many thanks to all tournament officials. This was a blast!

[Silence Sei]

Okie dokie. Congratulations on completing the first round of The Cell within a week, guys. Now, because of the large volume of participants, commentary is only given in private, and only via PM. I will say that there was some powergaming, as well as some bunnying that shold not have been allowed. Please note that when someone gives bunnying permissions, this does not mean you're allowed to keep them in the same spot while your character wastes a good 30-45 seconds on dialogue/internal thought/conjuring/whatever. Anyways, onto the scores!

	Reine	Tourneymant	Hoytti	Breaker	Roht	Dead	Warpath	blackshadow
Story	6	1	2	7	8	2	8	3
Setting	6	1	4	7	5	1	6	2
Pacing	6	1	2	9	5	1	7	4
Communication	6	1	2	7	7	1	8	4
Action	4	1	1	7	5	1	7	5
Persona	5	1	3	7	5	4	8	3
Mechanics	4	1	1	7	4	1	7	4
Clarity	7	1	1	7	6	5	7	5
Technique	5	2	2	8	6	2	7	4
Wildcard	8	1	1	9	6	3	8	4
Total	57/100	11/100	19/100	75/100	57/100	21/100	73/100	38/100

Breaker, Warpath, Reine, and Roht Mirage all go on to Round 2!

Breaker gains 4000 Exp
Warpath gains 4000 exp
Roht Mirage gains 3500 exp
Reine Gains 3500 exp
Hoytti gains 350 Exp
Blackshadow gains 350 exp
Tourneymant gains 350 exp
Dead & Walking gains 350 exp.

Everyone gets 100 GP

Experience will be calculated shortly. Thank you for your time, and attention!

[Mordelain]

Experience and gold added.