The Smith vs. The World, Episode 1

[Kroom]

Closed to BlackAndBlueEyes.

On a cool day, early in the year, Jak Roth Rute was standing in The Citadel, in Radasanth. His moccasins dug down into the sand that covered the arena floor, seeking the parts untouched by sunlight and still chilled by the night. It was a pleasant contrast to the warmth of sunlight on his shoulders. The day was actually quite beautiful: a sapphire sky stretching from horizon to horizon, and the spring sun beaming down, shedding its wintery impotence in favor of vernal radiance.

In any other circumstance, Jak would have thought this a good day to work his forge, or maybe to simply sit and absorb the sunlight, if there were no jobs to be done. He was not in any other circumstance, however; he was in this circumstance, the inescapable present, the proverbial 'here-and-now.' He was standing on the sandy floor of an arena with a modest crowd cheering at him, wondering why he had agreed to take that idiot bodyguard's place in this ring. He was carrying his sword, his knives, his bow, his arrows, and his armor, wishing he could be pounding away at a blade for some client rather than expecting to pound away at some gladiator. Even with the sun warming his bare head, and the comfortingly solid oak of his bow clasped in his left hand, the only verdict Jak could pass on this circumstance was that it was...

“...shit.”

He sniffed and rubbed his itching nose on the leather palm of his half-glove. It stank. He frowned slightly. The rancid smell of humanity was mundane to him, but every now and then some rank instance would remind him of just how atrocious humans and their belongings could smell. On reflection, Jak assured himself that he was likely rank, what with the heat of the day, and his leather armor, and his unwashed clothes, and his unwashed body. Maybe he'd visit the baths when this was over.

If it ever started. The smith's eyes, narrowed against the sun, turned once more towards the gateway opposite him, and for the dozenth time, searched for any sign of an opponent. His anticipation had skewed his perception of time, and Jak wasn't sure if he'd been standing here for one minute or ten. His calloused fingers stroked the fletching on one of his arrows.

Though he understood that this fight was a deathmatch, Jak was unconcerned. He'd fought life-or-death struggles many times, and those fights had, quite obviously, never ended badly for Jak. Some part of him, buried by mental callouses and the armor of years, told him that he should be nervous and unsettled by the prospect of taking another life, and that he should be more unsettled by how calm he was at that thought.

There was, however, a reason that that part of him was buried.

The gate rumbled, and Jak tensed, reflexively nocking an arrow to his bowstring. His eyes widened in spite of the sun, and the smith put up his hood. Now he was searching, staring past the bright and into the dark, looking for any sight of his opponent.

“Let's get this over with,” he muttered, testing the pull of his bow.

[BlackAndBlueEyes]

The wooden crossbar gate's gears clanked as chains tore it up from its resting position. Back straightened and with an air of superiority, I continued my leisurely stroll through the torch-lit stone tunnel that led into the sun-drenched arena before me. I did a quick mental check of my inventory--twin delyn daggers strapped to my backside, the twin holsters holding my six throwing knives strapped to my upper thighs where I could easily reach them, rune-written cable wrapped around my upper arms hidden by blouse top sleeves, twin steel knuckle dusters gripped tightly in one vine-braided hand, and the drakescale corset that would protect me from any particularly tricksy maneuvers... Yep, everything useful was present and accounted for.

As if I needed any additional help, I crossed the threshold from darkness into light and immediately felt the effects of the briarheart buried deep within my chest absorbing the sunlight through my skin. I closed my eyes and breathed deeply. I felt my body drink up the sun's rays. My muscles tightened; I was ready to run faster, dodge quicker, hit harder, and end this poor sod's life with just a bit more finality. I exhaled, opening my eyes slowly.

Before me in the sand stood a man. Nothing out of the ordinary; heavily-scarred, muscled, intimidating individuals were seven a silver here in the Citadel. He had your basic set of leather armor and under clothes, both of which seemed to be doing a poor job absorbing his sweat in the heat of the midday sun. Tall and well-built, he had a messy head of black hair and a few days' worth of stubble. Pretty unremarkable, like I said. I knew better than to underestimate someone with such a generic appearance, though--I had made the very same mistake with a little brat named Erikar several weeks prior and nearly paid for it (before eventually bashing his brains in with a lead pipe).

On my opponent, I saw a smattering of weapons--a sword, a dagger, a couple of throwing knives to match my own, a quiver full of arrows slung over his shoulder...

And in his hands, an oaken bow. The man had an arrow already knocked, with one tanned finger absentmindedly playing with the feather fletching.

Right. Well, this might be a little bit more difficult than I was hoping. I just wanted an easy little jaunt in the Citadel to relax; not a battle that I was going to actually have to think and strategize my way through. Seriously--if I bitch out because of a lucky shot from thirty feet away, I'm going to be pissed.

The roar of the dozens in the stands fell into a quieted hush as I entered the arena fully, preparing themselves for the bloodbath they so desired. I held my arms out in a sarcastic manner. "Come on, really? You brought a bow to a knife fight? Kinda' unfair, don't you think?" I clicked my tongue in a mocking manner. I had no doubt in my mind that with my sun-boosted speed, I could just barely avoid any arrow he fired at me before rushing him with a flurry of fists and vines that would quickly end this match.

If only he'll fire the damn thing, of course.

[Kroom]

Jak hesitated a moment as his opponent came into view. The breath he didn't realize he'd been holding slowly hissed out, escaping between teeth now clenched in frustration and indecision.

A woman. A fucking woman. Not a particularly attractive woman, sure, but... a woman? Jak tried to be cold-blooded, and gods below knew that he'd killed plenty of women before, but for some reason a pair of tits marching out from that gate pissed him off and set him on edge. He could see bits of blade and armor glinting about her body here and there, and she carried herself like she knew what she was doing. Her very presence, the way she sauntered - all of it just irritated Jak more with each passing instant. He resented the surprise of her appearance in that gateway.

And he was going to kill her, one way or another.

Even as all these thoughts whirled, Jak aimed his arrow, narrowing his eyes and drawing the string to its full.

"Come on, really? You brought a bow to a knife fight? Kinda' unfair, don't you think?"

Her words paused him, just as his fingers were slipping free of the string.

Jak's mouth quirked. Maybe he had less to be worried about, if she was walking in and expecting a fair fight. He remembered the first time he'd learned that lesson, as a boy squaring off against Kellan, wooden sword in hand and sand under his clumsy feet.

"What are we going to do?" the boy asked, adolescent voice quavering slightly. Kellan, wielding his own waster, gave a taut smile and flourished his weapon, taking two steps forward. Jak shifted backwards, nervously attempting to maintain distance between himself and the caravan's brawny master-at-arms.

"We're going to fight, and we're each going to try to beat the shit out of each other," he drawled. Without further explanation, Kellan swung two expert strokes at the boy. The first knocked the sword from Jak's hand, and the second cracked against his shoulder. Tears started in his eyes and he yelped, the force of the stroke knocking him to the dust. Biting back angry words, he was about to climb back to his feet when a terrific impact landed on his ribs, and he was sent flying again. This time, the boy felt his ribs crack, and he screamed in pain as he bit the dust once again. Nearby he heard Teiran's bark.

"Kellan! Enough for now." Jak couldn't manage the breath from his sobbing lungs to thank the half-elf, gingerly picking himself up out the dirt, standing like a half-axed tree in a windstorm.

"The fuck was that?!" he howled, attempting to prop himself on his sword. Kellan stood impassive, staring at Jak like a statue to a mouse for a moment before he began to turn away. "How was that a fair fight?!"

Kellan stopped and turned back to the boy, an amused and patronizing look on his face. "Boy," he chuckled, "first lesson to learn. If you find yourself in a fair fight..."

"...you're doing it wrong."

The bow twanged, and the arrow cut through the air towards Madison even as Jak was reaching for another.

[BlackAndBlueEyes]

My adversary muttered something to himself that I couldn't hear over the din of the blood-hungry crowd, but I took that as my cue. I dropped my right leg behind me, ready to burst forth like cannon fire. The twin knuckledusters slipped onto my vine-braided fingers with ease. I took a deep breath and felt my lungs fill with a vicious cloud of poison. I was ready for his opening salvo; ready to dodge it, ready to close the distance, and ready to punish him.

His right forefinger twitched, releasing the arrow. As I heard the bowstring's twang, I tapped into the extra speed that the sun's energy provided me and exploded towards the combatant at an angle. His arrow whizzed past me, nearly clipping me in the shoulder as it continued its path uninterrupted into the coliseum's darkened entryway. Clouds of sand kicked up behind me as I rapidly closed the gap.

I briefly considered several options to destroy this poor, unfortunate soul. I could've easily intercepted the arrow mid-flight with an airborne dagger directed by one of my vines; but that would've given him time to nock a second arrow. I could've returned fire with a volley of throwing knives, but my aim isn't the greatest--and it would do nothing to get that wretched weapon out of his hands.

No; a more direct approach was necessary. If I get in close and keep up the pressure, he'd be forced to switch to one of his swords. Swords I can handle, assuming I would even leave him an opening for a good strike or two.

I clenched my fists tightly as I continued my mad dash. The leather-clad archer reached behind him and grabbed another arrow. I was roughly ten feet away from him when I exhaled a thick, focused jet of plague at him. A wave of gasps rippled through the crowd at the dirty trick. I fully expected the jet to miss my opponent; what I was hoping for, really, was that he would react by dodging to either side and be too distracted to ready his second arrow. No matter which way he turned away from the poison, I would be ready and waiting to catch him off-guard with a solid right hook to his jaw.

[Kroom]

The woman moved like an elf. Jak did not like elves, and had not for some time, but they had disliked him first. His opinion was that the rougher trades tended to leave a bad taste in their delicate feckin' mouths. Or maybe they just didn't like Jak himself, didn't like something about how he smelled or the way he talked. He'd killed a few for the way they tried to talk to him. Elves hated him, and he hated them, and she was moving like an elf, and that only served to piss Jak off even more.

From the moment it left the string, Jak knew his second arrow would miss. He'd been unable to sufficiently track the angle of the woman's advance, and the shaft buzzed away behind her. She was coming on too quickly. Jak turned and began to bolt to his right, tossing his bow towards the woman's feet in the hope that she would trip, toes snared in the wood and gutstring. From the corner of his eye, the smith saw something foul rippling through the air, just past his back. His instinct screamed, and the smith tucked forward and rolled.

He twisted through the roll, coming to his feet with a cloud of dust and a ringing of steel and leather, and he faced the woman with his sword in his right hand and knife in his left.

Jak was on edge. He was good at killing people, but this woman wasn't people. Whatever the hell that... thing had been, he was certain it had been her doing, and nobody normal could do things like that. There was a bitter taste in his mouth, and sudden sweat on his brow. He was nervous. This was no time for thought, words, ethics, reservations, or any hesitation. This was the killing time.

[BlackAndBlueEyes]

The boy moved as I predicted, deftly avoiding the thick jet of disease that burst through the air in his direction. However, he didn't move into the path of my waiting haymaker; rather, he rolled off to at an angle, trying to put some more distance between the two of us. As he tucked into his maneuver, he threw his bow at my feet, in an attempt to trip me up. The weapon bounced off my shin, sending a small but easily ignored jolt of pain up my right leg before hitting the dusty arena ground with a dull knock.

I relaxed my briar-woven fists and stood up to my full height as the man in leather and rags rose to his feet, producing two lengths of steel as he slipped into a defensive stance. The burst of oily dark purple gas slowly began dissipating in the air off to my right as I turned to face him. Several of the screaming onlookers began speaking in hush tones about my opening salvo, muttering nonsense about witchcraft or demonic possession, the incorrect fucks.

My partner in this deadly dance tightened his gloved grips on his weapons, readying himself for whatever was next. A small length of vine sprouted from my wrist as a crooked smile crossed my lips. The vine snaked its way down towards the hard-packed dirt and the bow that was tossed at my feet. The briar cord sleepily wrapped around the lower limb of the wooden weapon, and with a single thought, picked it up and tossed it a good ten or fifteen feet off to the side, away from its owner.

"That's much better," I said with a smirk. "Now... Shall we..?"

I took a deep breath. The energy of the sun's rays flowed through me, giving me a sense of superhuman strength and speed that, until my transformation, I had not experienced the likes of before. I honestly felt like I could punch out a god. It felt liberating; it felt good.

I dropped my right leg behind me, ignoring the dull, throbbing ache in my shin as it protested my sudden movements. I slipped on my mythril-spiked knuckledusters and squeezed my fists into forces of nature. The sun glinted off the silvered steel beauties as I brought my fists up in front of me. With a hard push against the ground, I burst forward, kicking up dust clouds with each step as I closed the gap between the boy and I. I readied myself for whatever may come--a swing at his face if I caught him with his pants down, or a swift dodge if he was as good as his extensive arsenal suggested.

[Kroom]

"Get fucked on a cactus," Jak hissed, backing as the woman dripped her words. He'd seen the vine, and it only unnerved him more. He didn't want to know what it meant for where this was going. This bitch was nothing but trouble. She looked happy, and annoyingly confident. Jak wanted to destroy that.

He'd fought confident opponents before. They didn't like to wait, they wanted to show off, they wanted to scare their enemy before they finished them, and nine out of ten always attacked first. Jak's eyes flickered, noting how the bitch led herself. Battle-haze was settling, turning conscious thought processes into a fluid reactionary instinct. This microcosm of the world was his entire focus; there was no money, no smith-work, no people, nothing apart from Jak and this woman.

Then she moved, closing quickly and expertly. Her raised fists glinted, and her back leg was gimped. Jak remembered the sound as his bow had cracked against her leg. Maybe he'd stung her shin? He would have grinned, had he time for that sort of luxury. Despite the injury, she moved precisely, smoothly, the way somebody moved when they had spent a life in formal training. Jak had fought plenty of those types, too. He was still alive.

As she closed, Jak slid to his right and swung wide. Her choice for knuckledusters limited her effective range, while Jak's sword improved his. With the knife his left hand raised in a guard, the sword in his right hand stung downwards, jabbing for the woman's right hamstring. He had timed it so that his targeted limb was planted, carrying her weight as she moved to take another step. It was a trick he'd used before, practiced and honed by experience and instinct.

It was one of the reasons Jak was still alive.