Round 3 IK vs PA 1v1

[Enigmatic Immortal]

The following round will last for two weeks, and thread will open at 00:00 hours PST.

The combatants for this round is Silence Sei vs Cinderella Man!

[Enigmatic Immortal]

The Round has begun! Best of luck, and this will close in two weeks or until a PM signifying it is over is sent to me.

[The Cinderella Man]

A storm was brewing.

In the far west the sun was kissing the horizon, as large as a cartwheel and as red as burning iron, but over the ramparts of the Ixian Castle the clouds were gathering. The way they thickened overhead, encroaching upon the blue steel of the twilight and substituting it with dark gray, it seemed to Victor that they couldn't wait for the sun to disappear. Already they took reign over most of the visible sky, evicting the first stars from the dome above, and now there was only the setting sun left to defy them. This struggle between the impending storm and the demure sun gave the castle an altogether different look. Every wall that looked towards the sun was colored in the hue of dirty orange, every glass pane looked as if it was made of liquid steel, and every shadow seemed twice as thick, almost a dark world of its own. It was a realm of stark contrasts, and as such a perfect fit for the clash of Sei Orlouge and Victor Callahan.

Nothing personal, Victor thought to himself as he made his way down the length of the wall walk and past the crenellations of the outer wall of the castle. Only business. Yet it wasn't that easy. It was never that easy. Even when he was a prizefighter and his world consisted of four posts, a few lengths of rope and a canvas floor, business was always personal. You could try to take the tough crap in stride, shrug it off, wall it up, feign indifference, but at the end of the day, if you still had a soul, things got to you. And this whole deal between the Ixian Knights and the Phoenix Ascendant sure got to him. He started off with an itchy trigger finger and a determined mindset to put down some rebels, and yet now that he was here at the end of it all, all he really wanted was to be somewhere else. Because these Ixian Knights weren't bad people. They just seemed caught on the wrong side of the fence, but for the most part they were just fathers and mothers and daughters, struggling to establish their place under the sun. Just like everybody else. Victor regretted that. It would've been much easier if they were all scum.

The wind tugged with stubborn fingers at Victor's leather overcoat as he made his way towards the main tower of the castle, snapping it this way and that. The rain held back for the time being, but it was only a matter of time, the atmosphere electrified by the oncoming storm. Somewhere up in the mountains up in the north a bright light flashed amidst the peaks and a few moments later thunder rolled down those steep slopes. On the opposite side, the sun was cowering slowly, the horizon claiming more and more if it by the second. By the time Victor entered the main drum tower and made his way up the helix stairs to the top, it was halfway gone, setting the west ablaze. It was atop of the highest tower of the Ixian Castle that he found his enemy.

Silhouetted against the fiery glow of the sun, Sei Orlouge looked like some divine creature born again out of the flames, a phoenix still halfway in the fiery ashes. Compared to him, Victor was a grim shadow, the tails of his dark coat dancing the wind's dance as he walked towards the edge. If Sei noticed his arrival, he made no movement to confront him. Not that it mattered. Victor didn't want to shoot the man in the back. It would've been much easier, sure, but it wouldn't have been fitting, not for someone like him. From the glimpse of Sei's mind that he had caught down in the dungeons, the gunslinger knew that Sei Orlouge was a lot of things, but he was neither a criminal nor a tyrant as Phoenix Ascendant claimed him to be. For that at least he deserved a fair fight and a clean death. Instead of opening fire, Victor made his way to the edge, his boots clicking against the wooden boards as he approached the Hero of Radasanth and joined him in a gaze towards the dying sun. For one of them, it would be the last sundown they ever set their eyes upon.

No words were spoken as the day died around them and the orange turned to red turned to purple and finally to dusky blue. No words needed to be spoken. Words were wind, futile weak things that could bring no resolution to the bad blood between the two. In Sei's eyes, Victor was most likely still the murderer that killed the wrong man on that one night in Radasanth, a murderer that invaded the sanctity of his home and threatened his family. And in Victor's eyes, Sei was still a mark, a usurper, a name on the contract he needed to fulfill in order to pocket the money and go on with his life. They would never reconcile, never bury the hatchet and smile about the silliness of it some years in the future. The rift between them was too great. Life wasn't a sappy story where bitter enemies saw the light and became friend. In life, it had to end in blood.

"Let's end this, Orlouge," Victor finally uttered as the last traces of the sun disappeared from the world. Without waiting for confirmation, the brawny gunman turned his back towards Sei and walked away a couple of steps down the length of the battlements. Once he was some ten paces from the mystic, he turned and pushed the flap of his restless coat with his left. His right dropped to the shoulder holster where Aicha rested, his fingers finding some comfort in the coldness of the dark metal.

Somewhere ahead, gods started arguing in thundering voices, and the rain descended upon the world in a steady whisper.

[Silence Sei]

A storm was brewing.

The clouds that enveloped the sky, swirling and threatening rain upon the heads of the people was nothing compared to the typhoon within Sei Orlouge’s heart. It had only been a couple of hours ago that Anita Orlouge, Sei’s daughter, had run her sister Kyla through with the girl’s own weapon. The girl had potentially killed her relative in order to save the life of another. Once the initial shock had worn off, Sei sent Anita off to the dungeons, to be locked up as a murderer should have been. The pangs of guilt still filled every ounce of the mute as assuredly as his heart beating.

So much for ‘Time Heals All Wounds’…

Kyla had not been killed, but put into a comatose state. A similar thing had happened when Kyla herself had stabbed another person with the claw known as Sophia’s Mane. If Kyla had just explained to the telepath why she had needed Azza Ambrose so bad, the whole situation could have been avoided. Her suspicious activities had caused the mute to assume the girl had been under the influence of Cassandra Remi, a wannabe Dark Goddess.

One of his children had been influenced by evil, and the other had turned into an attempted murderer in the short span of two minutes.

It was obvious that the Mystic did not spend enough time with his daughters. Why else would there be such cold, evil intentions in their hearts? Kyla’s motives remained a mystery, but Anita had obviously had good intentions. Could she really be faulted for taking a life in order to save one? Was the road to hell not only paved with good intentions, but was Sei himself the mason for his child?

Even as Victor approached and talked to him, Sei Orlouge remained quiet. In his attempts to show his little girl’s all that was right in the world, he had tainted them. They had become evil, perhaps subconsciously as a way of resenting the telepath. Sei hated himself for what he had done to two beautiful women. How ironic that Victor Callahan did not realize his presence had been the only thing that kept Sei from jumping off of Ixian Castle, a fitting end to the war he had started.

He turned as Victor took several paces in the opposite direction. It seemed the prize fighter wanted to be the one to deliver divine retribution to the mute. Despite the best efforts of Phoenix Ascendant, the Ixian Knights had claimed Gisela, Serenti, and even Jadet. Claiming Radasanth would end the war; bring about a peace that had been unseen in Corone for years. Yet, here Victor Callahan was, prepared to die for the cause of the group that hired him. Money was such an influential thing.

“I’m glad it’s you, Victor,” Sei spoke, his eyes shifting back towards the disappearing sun, the storm clouds preventing the moon’s rays from shining down upon them. He could feel the rain drops upon his head, a light rain at first. The full force of the storm would make itself known soon enough. “I’m glad this ends with you and me…it’s fitting.”

Sei took a deep breath and turned back to his opponent, reaching behind him and gripping the Gemini Blades sheathed at his back. He removed the swords and tapped them against the singles of the roof, allowing Victor a chance at knowing the Mystic’s location. It was the right thing to do, and Sei Orlouge had spent so many years doing the right thing, he had caused half of his family to do the wrong thing.

He took in a breath, the sound of mucus being drowned out by the patter of droplets upon the makeshift floor. The rain that began to pelt his face merged with the tears that were once again flowing forth at the various sweet memories he had with Kyla and Anita. Sei Orlouge had decided that he would die tonight, be it by Victor’s hand or his own. He would not give the mercenary the satisfaction of knowing he killed the Dragon of Drantrak so easily.

Lightning struck, briefly illuminating the two of them. Both warriors now questioning their allegiances. Both men now with resolves much different than the ones they had at the start of the war. Either one of these fighters was leaving the pinnacle Ixian Castle, or neither of them would.

As the images of one another disappeared, Sei threw both of his Gemini Blades directly towards Victor’s form.

[The Cinderella Man]

There were people who could parry a knife mid-flight, who could snatch it out of the air as if it was a mere moth, who could even stop it in midair using their telepathetic or telekinetic or whatever-you-call-it power. Victor knew this for a fact because he had witnessed such things in one of the carnivals his father used to take him when he was a kid, the sun was shining and the world was a better place. These people, they would juggle sharp things, twirl and play around with them, and eventually toss them at each other, all with a smile on their faces as if they were playing with wooden knives and the worst case scenario was a splinter. To the eight year old Vic, they had been the masters of everything sharp and pointy, and for that whole summer he trained at becoming one of them.

But Victor Callahan never really got there, not even close. His skill with sharp stuff has always been questionable at best (he always swung swords as if they were cudgels), and his skill at throwing sharp stuff was miserable to the point where he usually struck the target with the blunt end. His prowess with magic was even worse. The best piece of wizardry he could pull off was the old coin-behind-the-ear trick and even that he did badly.

So when Sei's twin blades came swirling towards him, the gunslinger did what any normal person would've done when faced with oncoming death: he let his reflexes take over. For most people this meant getting a blade or two in the chest, but Victor Callahan was an old war dog and his muscles remembered. They threw his body sideways and away from the blades, making him land on the ground with all the grace of the wooden log. The tail of his leather overcoat followed a fraction of a second later, and one of the blades went through its fabric as if it wasn't even there. But that was all the damage Sei's opening move did.

Victor's rebuke was almost immediate, his finger pulling Aicha's trigger twice and making the pistol overrule the thunder above with its crashing sound. Sei never moved a muscle, never even blinked, didn't have to. Even as the bullets came a breath away from taking his life, they panged against the invisible that started to crack even as the echo of the gunshot still bounced amidst the walls of the Ixian Castle.

Bloody hell! was the only thought that Victor had time for, and then he was jumping back to his feet and away from Sei, ignoring the pain in his shoulder that his hard landing awoken. The last time he heard that sound of crackling glass, he got slashed to ribbons by one of these exploding barriers. But old mercs such as him lived and learned or else they didn't live long enough to be old mercs, so he leapt up between the two crenellations of the outer ramparts, pressing his back against them. And just in time. Even as the gunslinger pushed his back against the mossy stone, glass rained all around him like fragments of a shattered diamond.

"Took one of those in the face today already," Victor shouted from his cover, then followed it with a couple of blind shots by extending his arm just beyond the edge of the wall. He doubted that he would hit anything - fluke was a word whose effect Victor knew only in theory - but the bulky gunman hoped it would keep Sei at a distance for the time being. "Didn't much care for it."

He fired once more, this time overhead with his left while his right pulled out the sawed-off and readied it for his burst out of the cover. Victor knew he had to finish this battle fast, unload everything he had on Sei before the mystic could formulate a tactic and use one of his tricks. Like raining boulders. The memory alone made Victor wince and remember that his shoulder had been dislocated mere hours ago. The pain and anguish were almost enough to make him want to kill the Hero of Radasanth, but in truth it was Sei's cause that made him dangerous enough to kill. Sei Orlouge and his Ixian Knights might not be bad people, but they still planned to leech on the bleeding realm and thrive on the sorry state it was in. They needed to be stopped. Or at least that was what Victor keep telling to himself.

"I'm going to end you, Orlouge, you and your bloody rebellion!" the gunslinger shouted over the rumble of the thunder as rain pattered against his scruffy face. Then he swung out of cover and unloaded both his guns...

...and hit nothing but air.

"Not bloody likely," a voice replied. Victor couldn't tell where it was coming from - when it came to Sei Orlouge, his telepathy made you feel like the voice was coming from everywhere and nowhere. But he saw it soon enough. Flying on his gaudy butterfly wings, the mystic came scudding at him from beyond the castle walls. Metal met metal, sparks bounced between them like fireflies and the heavens responded with fireworks of their own, the gods following the tempo of the mortals far below.

[Silence Sei]

A man with nothing to lose is quite often the most dangerous foe in the type of situation such as the one the mute was in now. However, Victor Callahan was also a man fueled only by the need for closure in this battle. The outcome would be, while deadly, a most interesting affair. Perhaps that is why far below, a couple of Soldiers from Ixian Castle watched as the lightning illuminated a lethal ballet between their leader and the Phoenix Ascendant mercenary. From their eyes, the very fate of Corone hung in the balance of this battle.

Sei had withdrawn his chakrams during the distraction his Mystic Protection had provided. He had flown at Victor intending to end him with a clean cut to the neck. The boxer, realizing that Sei would go for a more lethal blow, had parried with his shotgun, the length of the weapon stopping both chakrams from finding a home at either side of Victor’s neck. The gunslinger responded in kind by placing a boot straight into the sternum of the mute, sending the winged Mystic flying backwards and gaining a few good feet between the two. Darkness once again blinded both opponents.

Victor was just as clever as Sei when presented with the heat of battle. Sei’s true power laid in the distraction, in carefully calculated plans that often found victory of the Mystic. This was not a battle of strategy, however. Corone’s fate had already been decided when General Taka had ‘taken’ Gisela from the Rangers. Victor was too engulfed in his rage to see that the Phoenix Ascendant had already lost.

This rage, combined with Sei’s own guilt of being helpless, pushed the mute forward. He allowed his wings to carry him on the gales that the storm around them wrought, gliding him towards Victor. His bladed rings were now aimed directly at the gun slinger’s own stomach; a vicious return attack in response to the throbbing Sei’s own belly felt. The lightning struck once more as Sei made his speedy approach, just enough time to see Victor’s shotgun aimed firmly into the face of the mute.

The darkness took over once more, and a loud thunder boomed in chorus with Victor’s own weapon. When the lightning struck once again, Sei could see the shocked expression on Victor’s face. The heat from the sawed off gun’s barrel warmed the shoulder of the mute, Sei’s heels planted into some turned up shingles, his wings already retracted into his back. Had he reacted a millisecond later, the shotgun’s bullets would have feasted upon the features of the hero. The flash of lightning died once more, and Sei could see that Victor’s shocked expression was now a grin.

In ‘Silence’ Sei Orlouge, Victor had found himself an opponent capable of taking the boxer’s hits, while delivering many of his own.

The chakrams fell to the roof, washed over the castle top by the rushing rain water at their feet. The rain was getting more severe, their clothes would soon slow them down. Sei ripped the top of his karate gi off as Victor pulled back his gun, the smoke from the barrels very briefly filling Sei’s nose. Another gun shot rang out, this time without the applause of the Thayne’s above. Sei had forgotten about Victor’s second firearm, Aicha, in his haste to finish the man.

He had not forgotten, however, to activate Mystic Protection as Victor withdrew his Aicha. As such, the bullet meant for Sei’s heart found nothing but glass, and Sei could hear Victor’s body dropping again to avoid the glass cascade to come. The forceful winds starting to surround them seemed to be in Victor’s favor though, as the once the crystalline shards exploded forth from Sei’s form, they were scattered over the ledge as well.

“Ironically,” Sei spoke, bringing his foot over to where he had heard Victor drop in an attempt to kick him, “Ending me will no longer end the war for Corone’s independence. In the time you were unconscious, my Generals had taken Gisela, Serenti, and Jadet…” His foot found nothing but air, his ear faintly catching the cocking of Victor’s firearm once more, this time from behind him. Sei could only assume the man must have reloaded the weapon when he dodged the telepath's kick.

“You don’t have your beloved Radasanth, ‘Hero’,” Victor spoke coolly until the last word, which dripped the venom of sarcasm with each syllable of the word, “As long as it stands, you’re not through ‘liberating’ Corone.” The gun fired once more, though nowhere near it’s intended target this time. As Victor had pulled the trigger to his shotgun, the metal was met with he hard metal of a throwing fan, one of the two Sei always kept in his pockets. The impact caused the fire arm to jerk upwards into the air, as if firing the starting shot for a race.

“You poor, misguided fool,” Sei smiled, the crashing lightning illuminating every drop of rain that caressed down his just visible abs. His right hand held in it his second throwing fan, which was thrown at Victor’s legs in an attempt to bring the titan known as Victor Callahan down. With any luck, the rain water flowing at their ankles would bring with it enough momentum to send the man toppling over the roof if he were to fall unexpectedly. As the inky night enveloped the bright bolts of the heavens, Sei smiled to himself. Anita and Kyla had been tainted, but at least the end of this war would provide a better life for the two ‘pure’ daughters Sei had left.

The darkness of a night time storm always brought with it the bright colors of a better tomorrow.

[The Cinderella Man]

Stay alive. Stay ahead. Move your feet. Reload. Keep count. Keep firing. Such simple thoughts filled Victor's world as the two danced to the tune of death that both seemed very familiar with. There were some who saw beauty in such things, in vehemence of blows and parries and dodges, but Victor Callahan wasn't doing this for its aesthetic value. It was a job, dirty and ugly and getting worse by the moment. There was seldom time for pondering, seldom time for thinking about the futility of it all and the frailty of human life, seldom time to do anything other than taking a step forward, a step back, roll, dodge, shoot, keep breathing.

Sei seemed to have time, though, time enough to gloat, the pretentious prick. Words could rarely rattle Victor Callahan these days, but there was something in the condescending manner in which all these quasi-heroes talked that made him want to shoot the mystic all the more. He didn't have time to care for all those cities Sei mentioned while he dodged blows like raindrops, but even if he had time, it didn't matter. It was a small victory in the grander scheme of things, one that was bound to backfire on these vigilantes sooner or later. Still, the smug tone in which it was said irked the gunslinger. Perhaps it was that ire that made him miss a beat of the battle drums.

When the throwing fan came flying at him through the curtain of rain, Victor saw it a moment too late, his nervous system sending a jolt to dodge with just enough delay for the damn thing to hit its mark. It caught Victor's calf even as he tried to sidestep, making his right knee buckle. He was faintly aware of the ledge a couple of feet behind him, and the long drop to the castle grounds some fifty feet below. He became significantly more aware of it, though, once Sei came charging at his kneeling form, emei piercer aimed for Victor's chest. Victor blocked it at the last moment, bringing both of his firearms and locking them against the strange slim weapon of his opponent. The clash made his body skid backwards, though, so much so that the foot of his back foot dangled over the edge. He pushed upwards against Sei, his muscles doing what they were honed for and stopping further sliding. Inches in front, the mystic breathed down on him, blue eyes oddly wistful.

"Doesn't... matter," Victor managed to squeeze out before he pushed upwards and against the strength of his foe. Though Sei had the upper hand, the ex-con still had advantage when it came to bulk and muscle, and the push bought him a couple of feet and about half a second. Just enough to roll away from the edge and rise, Aicha at the ready. He could feel his leg throbbing with pain as the warmth of his own blood poured down the side of his leg and into his boots. Sei was again nowhere to be seen, probably fluttering around concealed behind the thick sheet of rain.

"You can't hold those cities, not with your numbers!" he shouted into the rain. His head swung this way and that, his pistol always following his eyes, the shotgun facing in the opposite direction. With the heavy rain, he couldn't see more than ten feet in front of himself and between the howling of the wind, the rumble of the thunder and the constant buzz of pattering rain, he could hear no better either. "And with you dead and your troops stretched so thin, your little band of merry rebels will fall like a house of cards! We both know this!"

For what seemed like ages (and was closer to seconds) there was no response other than the sound of the storm and the moan of the leather of his coat as he turned this way and that, calm, precise. But he kept his eyes mostly on the outer edge of the ramparts, from where the last attack came. Instead, Sei sprung up from the other side, darted towards the gunslinger, spun away from the shotgun blast and ended his charge in a ferocious tackle. There might've been some words pushed into his head, something that sounded like "wrong again", but Victor had neither time nor sense to acknowledge them. The tackle sent them both tumbling down the length of the steps that led down towards the castle ground. However, where the stairs zagged back onto itself, the pair didn't and went flying off the landing, plummeting some twenty feet and landing in a splash of mud. Somewhere in the tumble down the stairs, Victor had lost his shotgun, but his left was still tight around Aicha's grip. As he fished his body out of the ankle-deep mud and reloaded his trusty dark mistress, he had every intention to unload it into the mystic.

[Silence Sei]

Their bodies tumbled down the stairs. A jolting pain surged through Sei as they wrestled with one another during the plunger, only to find the cool relief of mud splattered across his bare chest and back. He planted his hands into the mud, prepared to get up when he heard the sloshing of water just a few feet from him. Victor Callahan moved to his feet a lot quicker than Sei had, the boxer grabbing his firearm and pointing it towards the mud. The mute closed his eyes and prepared for the end.

One shot, then two. Three. Four. Sei opened his eyes, relieved to find he was still looking at Victor’s smoking gun and not the Grim Reaper himself. He looked to his sides, finding several small shapes slowly sinking into the earth. Four shots had been fired, and four shots had missed. The Thaynes, it seemed, truly were in the Mystic’s favor after all. Victor could not see Sei, probably due to the fact the mute was covered head to toe in the same mud that threatened to envelope him now. The perfect camouflage had saved his life. For the second time of the night, Sei cursed his good luck.

He placed each hand on the ground, preparing to push himself up. As he did so, there was an aching pain within his right shoulder, causing him to fall back to the ground. He grimaced a bit, reaching down around his waist with his left hand. During the scuffle, the ring that helped form his emei piercer slipped off of his finger, leaving the mute with limited options in dealing with his foe.

He carefully unwrapped the chair of the kusari-gama, his makeshift belt. And began to push himself up with his legs alone. The soreness in his legs was a great indication of the workout his opponent was delivering so far. Lightning flashed once more around the time Sei regained his footing, the mud below soaking through his socks and into his shoes. The mute scowled at the feeling, wondering if his body would have suffered the same indignities if he had followed through with his suicide attempt, and found himself splattered upon this same ground.

The lightning gave Victor enough time to lock his eyes on his target, and smile. As the light faded from their vision, the man fired his fifth shot, an echoed sound returned with a symphony of shattered glass. The mute knew at this point that Victor would dodge his Mystic Protection; he had, after all, seen it in action four times in one week now. He could hear Victor’s swearing in the distance over the rain, an instinctual gesture that gave Sei the opportunity he needed to end the fight.

He grabbed the chain of his kusari-gama with his left hand, swinging the scythe end of the weapon around faster and faster. He released once the blade had reached optimum speed, and grinned when he heard the deep yelp of the man known as Victor Callahan. Lightning struck the ground just feet from the two, the booming thunder synonymous with its natural brother. Sei’s grin became more sadistic as he looked at the kusari-gama’s new home.

Victor’s right bicep flowed forth a river of crimson blood, the stream falling into the mud and creating an awkward color at his feet. Sei tugged on his weapon once, then twice, but found that the blade of the kusari-gama was planted firmly into his opponent’s arm. Victor yelled with each tug, but realized that the weapon would give no quarter at the same time as his strategist foe. He grabbed at the chain, pulling as hard as he could and sending Sei straight towards the former boxer. He attempted a sixth shot as Sei sped towards him, only to find the bullet whizzing just over the head of the telepath as he stumbled forward. Sei stopped just an inch before the merc, close enough to smell Victor’s hot breath even in the chilling rain. Aicha was now planted firmly into Sei’s temple, pushed a bit harder than necessary. Sei dropped his weapon, the weighted tip of the kusari-gama slamming into the mud with an odd splooshing sound.

“Game over, Mystic,” Victor smiled, pressing the gun harder to Sei’s head, “You lose. I’ve beaten you. Now the Empire and the Rangers can go back to killing each other without your self-righteous bull interfering. One bullet left, and I can promise you that it will not miss this time.”

“Funny you should mention them, the Corone Rangers,” Sei spoke, his face still holding the stupid sadistic grin of moments before. “Did you not find it odd we were able to claim their territories so quickly? Underwood I could understand, but places as heavily fortified as Gisela and Serenti, claimed within a week? It seems almost…impossible.” The last word was spoken with such sarcasm to it that Victor could not help but take the bait.

“What are you getting at, Orlouge?” his eyebrow was cocked. Genuine curiosity. Sei could hear the footsteps of his soldiers surrounding the two, knowing full well they would not get involved in his affairs unless ordered to. They were good troops after all; every one of them had kept quiet about the true winning move to this continental game of chess.

“The Rangers only feigned a fight against us, Victor,” Sei spoke, his grin widening to proportions the Mystic himself did not think possible, “They put up a small fight, but let us walk right in the front door and ‘liberate’ them. I had been in talks with them for weeks before I even declared war. They’ve never been against us. Are you seeing the picture now, ‘friend’?”

Lightning struck, and Victor shifted his eyes to the troops that surrounded them. They wore not the crest of Ixian upon their chest plates, but those of the Corone Rangers. Only a true fool would involve himself in a fight against two large warring powers with only a small personal army. When Victor’s eyes went back to Sei, there was a somewhat feral growl in his voice as he spoke. “You son of a bitch. The Rangers have been with you since this war began!”

“And now you see…” Sei rose both of his arms into the air in a ‘who cares’ fashion. Maybe he was trying to provoke the gunslinger into killing him; assisted suicide was starting to become a popular fad with this war. Maybe he just wanted to enrage his worthy opponent one last time before the fight ended. Either way, Sei spoke as if Victor’s fight with him was as insignificant as the mute getting an ant bite. “…That no matter what the outcome here, Phoenix Ascendant has lost.”

[The Cinderella Man]

It made sense the way things always did in hindsight. The Ixian Knights were too few, the Rangers too many, and the Empire loomed over all with its superior numbers. Only a fool would've went against one of two so superior opponents without befriending the other. And Sei Orlouge was no fool. The truth of it was all around Victor Callahan, in the solemn faces and keen eyes that looked down on the mud-spattered pair. Unless it's all a trick, a misdirection. Sei was just the type who would attempt such a ruse, dress a bunch of his yokels in Rangers garb for some scheme he had in the works. But it sure as hell didn't feel like a ruse to the gunslinger. If anything, it was possibly the first thing that made sense in this entire mess. How else would such a ragtag bunch of vigilantes gain footholds throughout Corone in such a short time?

Victor's eyes were firmly set on Sei, just like his gun, while the cogs spun in his head with a rusty whine. Did this change things? Did he care about this cloak-and-dagger bullshit? Or was he just there to fulfill his contract? Inches from him, the Hero of Radasanth smiled his content I-am-better-than-you smile, winning despite the gun to his temple and death breathing down his neck like so many raindrops. There was nothing Victor wanted to do more that wipe that smirk with a pull of Aicha's trigger. He'd probably die within seconds of doing so, but maybe he was fine with that. His life hasn't amounted to much in the last couple of years, an endless string of wild goose chases and blood stains, his days filled with the echo of gunfire, his head filled with the echo of the past, of better times. This at least would be a memorable end to a less than memorable life. He would be the one who brought down the famous Sei Orlouge. It was so close, this ending, within his grasp, and what it boiled down was what kind of a person did he came to be. Did he care for something - anything - these days, or was he just out to go down in flames, guns-blazing?

It didn't take much mulling to figure it out. Victor Callahan was a simple man, not one to get lost in endless strings of thought on existence and his purpose. And he knew exactly what he had to do. He returned the grin to Sei and pulled the trigger...

...but not before his thumb was pressed against the cocked hammer of the pistol. There was a faint metallic click as it fell slowly back in position, the sound lost amidst the patter of the fat raindrops against the world around them. He wasn't going to splatter Sei's brains all over the ditch for a fistful of coins. There wasn't much that Victor cared about these days, but Corone was home and his home had been burning for years now. If it meant sparing one pretentious asshole in order to douse the flames, it was something that the ex-con could swallow. A collective sigh seemed to spread throughout the compound at this conclusion, but it lasted only a moment. Because as soon as Victor returned Aicha to her holster, he buried his fist deep into Sei's gut, sending the man staggering backwards.

"I'm not going to shoot you, Orlouge," Victor said. He yanked the hook blade from his bicep, grunting and barely withstanding the flash of pain without falling down on his knees as he did so. But his old creaky knees held and he was finally free of the wretched thing. He started to shrug his way out of the leather overcoat while Sei still struggled to catch his breath.

"Don't get me wrong," he continued, tossing his coat away once he was free of it. It left him in just his used-to-be-white undershirt and the leather shoulder holsters. He ripped the bottom of the shirt and started to wrap it around his arm. "I didn't like the way Corone was, with its bureaucratic bullshit and slick politicians and corrupted officials chosen by the people, for the people. It didn't work. Not when it mattered."

He remembered the way he had been treated when he came to report that Aicha had been murdered by Walter Jimes. Nobody cared about a hooker shot by her panderer. They buried him with a bunch of forms and useless people that asked the same questions and didn't listen to the same answers before they dismissed him with a false promise and a pat on the back. And the higher up the food chain he got, the less people gave a damn. It was a flawed system, and for a long while he thought that the tyranny of the Empire would put an end to it, rule with an iron fist that brought justice where justice was due. But after living under Empire's thumb for a couple of years, he came to realize it was just more of the same, same kind of useless people vying for power and stomping on all those around them. It wasn't the system that was flawed, it was the people, not just people in Corone, but folk in general. But there was no fixing that, not without a well timed bubonic plague or something and Victor had no control over that. What he had control was here and now, and right now reverting back to the Republic seemed like a better option than the slaughter the Empire brought upon the realm.

"But I like the current state even less. And you're trying to get that fixed. So I can't take you out of the game, not without coming off as a bloody hypocrite," Victor spoke, his voice almost a yell as it fought with the shower and the whistling wind. He put one end of the rag between his teeth, then pulled on the other one, tightening the makeshift bandage around his arm. It was a shabby fix, but it would suffice for what he had in mind. He gave the arm a testing swing, winced at the pain and the blossom of red that soaked the rag, but grinned in spite of it. Sei was back on his feet, and these people still wanted a show.

"But that doesn't mean I can't still beat the snot out of your self-righteous face," he said, bringing his arms in a boxing guard and looking at Sei between two clenched fists. "Because I don't like you, Orlouge. All you hero wannabes are the same, with your high-and-mighty attitudes and content smirks, thinking you're head above the rest. Pisses me off. So come, we still have a score to settle."

[Silence Sei]

Sei had felt Victor Callahan’s vicious blows before, but he had no idea the hit to his stomach would feel just as painful as the vicious blows to the face the boxer had punished him with earlier. The air felt as if it had been pulled out of his lungs with that single punch. As he got up, he heard the splashing of feet in the wet mud. Apparently, the Rangers were not too happy about their ally being struck by such a cheap shot.

“Stop,” Sei ‘spoke’ to the men, his body still trying to catch its breath, “This is between me and him…”

These men could not understand Sei’s personal vendetta against Victor, but their respect for the Mystic caused them to step back and sheath their weapons. As the breath finally returned to his form, Sei dusted himself off, his grin now replaced with the features of a man devoid of emotions. Very rarely did Sei get into this focused mode (he actually attempted to actively avoid it), but Victor had left the mute no choice. The time for strategy was over, as was the time for death blows.

Now, Sei Orlouge and Victor Callahan stood against each other to prove who was the stronger of the two.

Sei planted his feet into the ground, the toes of his left foot pointing towards Victor, while the toes of his other foot were shifted ninety degrees to the right. The mute closed his eyes, took and deep breath, and tried to close his ears to the natural symphony of Mother Nature. The Mystic knew he could not take many of his opponent’s brutal body blows, so he would have to keep his distance if he hoped to remain conscious.

The boxer came at him in a run, quickly closing the gap between them. Sei could hear Victor’s feet slamming against the mud, the sludge making odd slurping sounds with each step the man took. The mute opened his eyes only to feel the impact of Callahan’s hard left hook. Sei planted his feet into the ground, through his head attempted to jolt to his right side thanks to the forcefulness of the hit. The telepath’s eyes shot downward in time to see Victor’s right hand formed into a fist and heading straight back towards the Mystic’s abdomen.

Sei acted quickly, his right hand grabbing Victor’s left leg, while the left hand gripped hard on the wounded part of Victor’s bicep. His foe screamed in pain as the Mystic tightened his grip, leaning backwards and using just the slightest bit of force to throw the bulk of Victor Callahan a good ten feet from the fight. He could hear the man’s body as it rolled around in the dirt. Breathing a bit heavy, Sei turned back towards Victor.

He reached up to his mouth, spitting into it and looking at the blue splatters that now covered his palm. If it were not for the adrenaline now pumping through him as if it were replacing his blood, the strategist was certain he would feel the blood oozing forth from the deep gash in his mouth. Callahan’s hit had grinded the mutes lips against his teeth, creating a saw-like effect. He could feel the throbbing of his lip as it began to swell.

Victor Callahan, two, Sei thought to himself, his breathing steadying once more, “Sei Orlouge, two.

“I’m afraid that the feeling is mutual, Mister Callahan,” Sei spoke with such composure, the surrounding soldiers began to wonder if the tactician was taking this fight seriously,. “I know your type. Mercenaries with a personal vendetta. You can not help but blame everybody else for your own short comings. Whenever an opportunity for happiness if presented to you now, you shun it away just to get some closure on petty vengeance. I’ve been down that road, Victor Callahan, and trust me, it is not a path Aicha would want for you.”

“You son of a bitch! You don’t deserve to speak her name!” Victor’s anger came from the left, and while it gave away the man’s position, it was too late for Sei to react. Luckily, Victor started with his right fist this time, planting it firmly into Sei’s ribs. The Mystic groaned, strange sounds gurgled from his mute lips. He turned to face his foe, tucking his head down just in time to avoid a swipe with the stronger left hand. He once again grabbed Victor by the right bicep, in the same fashion he hand down before.

Victor caught this, and planted his feet into the ground, attempting to avoid being thrown again. When Sei’s arm grabbed Victor’s left shoulder, however, the boxer quickly found his entire body once again forced down hard into the mud. The lightning provided just enough light for the telepath to see his foe’s head bouncing onto the ground several times. The throw had used more force this time, and it showed in Victor Callahan’s slower movements as he began to push himself up.

Sei turned, attempted to garner some distance between them. He soon found himself face down in the mud, however, as Victor’s hand had quickly grabbed at the ankle of the warrior, tripping him. The prize fighter began to climb on top on Sei’s body, delivering a bone shattering haymaker into the back of Sei’s head. The mute was able to shift himself just enough to see Victor’s face once again as lightning struck, a look of victory on the man’s face.

Then, a scream that would remain in the hearts of every person who witnessed that day.

Sei’s nails dug deep into the gash at Victor’s arm. The mixture of white, brown, and crimson provided just enough color for Sei’s fading vision to focus on. Even as he felt the cloth began to tear under his nails and feel Victor’s blood flow freely between his fingers, the telepath did not relent. Victor, the physically stronger of the two, finally managed to push himself away, Sei’s nails raking across the rest of the man’s arm as he stumbled away.

Sei took a heavy gulp, his head bobbing as he willed himself back up. His body was bobbing and weaving now, though not by his own desire. He could not see Victor, as the man had distanced himself enough to once again disappear into the darkness. How ironic that Sei’s greatest asset in this fight had now become Victors. It was a new spin on a classic proverb.

The war was over, but the battle had yet to be won….

[The Cinderella Man]

There was no real point to this fight anymore, nothing to be won but personal satisfaction and nothing to be lost but a few mouthfuls of blood and maybe a tooth or two, and yet they both went at it as if the fate of the world hinged upon this battle. Part of it was simple male bravado, that chest-puffing pride that made men enter pissing contests and women roll their eyes at the stupidity of it. But mostly it was about getting the poison out of the system, settling their differences one blow at a time. It wasn't about righting some great wrongs, wasn't about revenge or payback, wasn't even about the War for Corone in which they were both deeply involved. It was just about two guys with genuine dislike of what the other represented, trying to get their point across with their fists. And doing a piss-poor job at it.

By the time darkness of the night descended upon them, bringing a biting chill borne on the rain-laden wind gusts, both the gunslinger and the Hero of Radasanth were breathing laboriously and dragging their feet through the mud. Victor Callahan couldn't decide what hurt most on his ravaged body. His calf flared up every time he made a step, his wounded arm was growing numb with pain from shoulder to fingertips, and his head thudded with throbbing pain from a swollen lump on the back of his skull where he hit a rock when Sei brought him down. The mystic wasn't particularly fast or strong, but he was cunning and slippery like an eel. Every time Victor made a misstep - and with his entire body crying out in pain, he certainly made a fair few - Sei looked to take advantage of it, use the gunman's own momentum against him and flip him over like a half-done pancake. And every time he did, it was harder to get up.

But Victor wouldn't give up. His legs were getting heavy and his left arm wasn't good for much other than blocking, but he went at the mystic again. His feet splashed loudly through the waters of the ditch as he came at Sei from the flank, driving his right in forceful straight aimed at mystic's ribs. But even as his opponent reacted to dodge, he followed it up with a quick jab with his left, weak but just enough of a distraction to keep Sei from evading the half-uppercut from his right that landed a glancing blow on Sei's plexus. It didn't do much damage, but it did put the Hero of Radasanth on his back foot, and Victor pressed the attack, bombarding the mystic with a barrage of blows from half-distance. One-one-two, one-two-one, his fists did their dirty work like in the old days when life was simpler and bouts were fought for money and the entertainment of the masses. A few punches landed, one of them knocking Sei's head sideways, and for a moment Victor was certain he would go down.

But then Sei's head snapped back, and those blue eyes were clear and determined, and his hand shot up to trap the gradually slowing jab of Victor's left. And already he was twisting his body, burying his shoulder into the gunslinger's chest and yanking on his left, trying to flip him over. But even as he made his move, Victor's right shot out and grabbed the mystic by his neck, sending them both sprawling in the mud. There was no countdown, but by the time the counter in ex-con's head counted six, he was up on his knees. Victor would've made it fully back to his feet, but then Sei lashed out at him from where he lay in the mud, his foot crashing against the side of Victor's face, sending it back to the ground and filling his mouth with earthy muck.

That's it, a thought of surrender flashed in the blur of his mind's eye. It's done. His muscles were quivering from fatigue, a chill passing down his spine as he tried to move them. Combined with the blood loss, it made him feel a hundred years old and broken in more places than one, made him feel like his body weighed a ton. He almost made peace with the defeat, but then Sei's face loomed over him, the smug man kneeling next to him, ready to deliver the final blow. And then something clicked inside of him, a scream of some soul long forgotten, awakening new strength in the gunslinger. And when Sei's punch came, it was Victor's right hand that trapped it, caught the incoming fist by the wrist.

"Not out yet," he growled at the man, his face a muddy horror. In one swift motion he tugged on Sei's arm hard enough to pivot the mystic's torso around and, still holding to the wrist, he shoved his shoulder at Sei's back. There was a dull, meaty pop as Sei's shoulder was pushed out of its socket, and then a scream that echoed in the head of every person that looked down on the two fools duking it out in the mud. The mystic lashed out with his elbow in one last desperate move and sent it crashing against Victor's face, then toppled forward, cradling his arm even as his foe fell backwards, enjoying his little revenge not at all. The collision brought the pain in Victor's left arm to new heights and the vehement move sapped most of his remaining energy, making him content to just lay in the soggy bed of muck with rain washing down his face.

For the longest time, nothing moved save the clouds overhead and the raindrops that washed over the world in a ceaseless, tireless torrent, making every face weep and every color dark gray. It was Victor who put an end to the silence, first coughing out some brown sludge from his mouth that could've been mud or could've been blood or could've been both. But eventually words came. "You know," he said, his voice raspy and low. He wasn't entirely certain that Sei could hear him, but it was the most he could manage at this point. "for a guy with butterfly wings, you sure pack a mean punch, Orlouge."

"For a guy who claims he doesn't care, you sure fight like you do," came the response, and Victor couldn't help but smirk at the remark. This wasn't a beginning of a beautiful friendship, but perhaps it was a beginning of the end of enmity between the two.

Victor tried to push himself up on his elbows, but his left was a bloody ruin, so he only managed to prop himself up on his right. But it was enough to have a look at his opponent, currently in no better position than he was. "So, I don't suppose that job offer is still up for grabs."

Sei, now up to his knees and with enough mud on his body to fill a small wheelbarrow, cast what might've been a puzzled look. "What?" Victor responded. He tried to shrug, but even the attempt made him grunt in pain. He smirked despite it, showing a couple of bloody teeth. "I'm still a bloody merc and there are still people to shoot before this war is over. And since there's no point working against you, might as well work with you."

He let himself fall back in the mud. The cold of the rain felt good on his aching muscles, cooling them down after the abuse. "I'd rather work for someone I can respect. And anyone who can fight me to a stalemate is worth a bit of respect, I reckon. So what say you?"

[Silence Sei]

The fight had ended. Oddly enough, the conclusion of the fight hinged on a choice to be made by Sei himself. He could still extend his offer to Victor Callahan and place him in the Ixian Knights, forging at least a mutual agreement between the two warriors to not kill one another just yet. The other choice was to order Victor’s capture, though this choice seemed to be the tyrannical choice that matched up with the libel that the Phoenix Ascendant was spreading. The mute looked up towards the sky, as if expecting a sign from the Thaynes themselves on where they casted their lot. They had, in Sei’s mind anyways, been involved in this battle from the start.

His sign came in the form of a drizzle where there had once been a torrent of rain water. He could see the beams of light piercing through the black clouds above. It seemed that time itself had hastened around Victor and Sei, which would explain why so many Corone Rangers had begun pouring into Ixian Castle. The fight, while feeling as if it happened in a matter of minutes, took an entire night’s time to finish. Two titans whose tussle transcended the passage of time itself. The Gods could not have made their intentions any clearer.

“Daddy!” A young girl’s voice called out, her feet splashing quickly through the mud as the Ranger forces stepped aside for Ella Orlouge. The little girl, no older than seven years of age, ran quickly to her father’s side, wrapping her arms around his neck and sending a surge of pain coursing through the Mystic’s entire body. When the girl realized that her father’s body tensed at the embrace, she released her grip and looked at her muddied patriarch, ignoring the own brown colors that now smeared her green dress.

Emma Orlouge, another of Sei’s daughters, joined her sister rather quickly, looking at the beaten up state of her father and eyeing the dirty Victor as well. Emma could tell that the scuffle was over, and as such, kneeled down to Sei, wrapping his good arm around her neck. Sei winced as he forced himself up, his soldiers quickly surrounding Victor and prepared to draw their weapons upon him.

“Stand down, men,” Sei spoke into their minds, drawing their attention upon his brutalized form, “Have more respect for the one of the Nine Generals of the Ixian Knights..” Sei looked to Victor, who nodded to the telepath. He read the message loud and clear. Victor Callahan had earned Sei’s respect to the degree that the mute trusted him with one of the highest titles one could earn in his ranks. The mute looked to his daughter as they turned, attempting to make their way to the medical ward. “How is Kyla?”

“That’s why we came to get you, Father,” Emma spoke with a sense of urgency in her voice, “We went to the medical ward to find her bed empty, and reports that she had gone back to the front line…” As Emma finished speaking, Sei felt as if his body were ten times lighter. The fact that Kyla had suffered such a wound, and been able to not only walk it off, but go back into battle spoke volumes about the girl’s determination. Perhaps Sei and Anita had been wrong about what her intentions had been. Anita had meant well by hurting her sister, but obviously Kyla had no malice over the situation, or there would have been reports of Anita’s death.

It was in this moment that Sei finally realized it; Anita was saving Azza Ambrose from a possible abduction. Kyla, despite possibly being brainwashed by Cassandra Remi, was still trying to fight on behalf of the Ixian Knights in this war. Emma was helping a helpless man get medical treatment, and even little Ella had searched out and found the shotgun of Victor Callahan, returning it to its master. There was no taint in the Orlouge clan, but an unseen strength. Sei Orlouge was the epicenter of that strength that passed down to each of his children.

“One more thing, General Callahan,” Sei managed a wry grin as he limped his way to the ward with his daughter’s assistance, “You start tomorrow, -after- you clean yourself up. You look like hell.”

The darkness of a storm never brought a rainbow that day, because there had been two warriors whose true colors shined brighter and more grandiose than anything the Thaynes could have created.

[The Cinderella Man]

***

The storm was passing.

Fleeing before the might of the newly risen sun, the clouds took their ominous grayness farther south, leaving behind them a day as fresh and bright as a new gold piece. A more poetic soul would’ve mused about things like the circle of life or life being a wheel, but Victor Callahan never put much stock in poetry and metaphors and allegories and all the other bullshit fancy folk used to say what they wanted to say without actually saying it. He stood in front of an open window, healthy right shoulder against the wall, observing the comings and goings within his new home. Up from the fourth level of one of castle’s high towers, he had quite a good view.

Only was this ever really going to be his home? Victor doubted it. These people looked at him with suspicion and distrust, and while that was understandable given his involvement in this war, he wasn’t certain it would ever really abate. Sei might’ve given him a position amidst his most trusted advisors, but the gunslinger had a feeling that even if he went and won the war for the Ixian Knights singlehandedly, he would still be the odd man out. People had the tendency to remember the bad things far better than the good ones, and Victor figured he would always be the man who nearly killed the Hero of Radasanth rather than the man who helped him with the war.

And in all honesty, Victor Callahan was fine with that. Families were great, but in times of war and struggle, they were a liability, just another target the enemy could – and would – gun for. Sei found that out the hard way over the course of the last couple of days. So Victor decided that while he would fight with these people, maybe even die with these people, he wouldn’t allow himself to care for them overmuch. After all, this whole mess wasn’t about settling personal issues (even though last night it seemed to be exactly about that). It was a war for the realm, and while wartime made for strange bedfellows, that didn’t mean they had to get frisky underneath the sheets.

So instead of going out and trying to get to know these people, Victor Callahan sat behind a desk, rolled out his cleaning kit, and started to ready his death-dealers for those who still threatened the stability of Corone.

The storm was passing, but there were clouds on the horizon still.