damned_institute | Night 59: Weapons Range

Gamzee had equipped himself with no ill affect -- the suits of armor had not, as she had half-expected, sprung to life, outnumbering them a mere 3:1. Instead, the weapons languished, their dusty stains still betokening ill deeds, until he went through the door. Then they disappearified, and Rose took it as an instruction. She ran, having no convenient transportalization powers.

The light didn't bother her, being both human and acculturated to sunshine. (Having dark, secretive, and video-game-related interests meant that she did spend a great deal of time sequestered in her room; but living in a house that resembled an avant-garde temple to Gods Assorted and Sundry Skydwellers balanced it out.

"Ilia! Get in here, now!" The last thing they needed was to be separated; she fought with her hands, so weapon or not, her presence would be appreciated.

Ilia had been busy inspecting some of the more antiquated pieces of weaponry that she had hardly noticed Gamzee had picked his own out of the choices allowed them. There was a pretty nice caestus on one of the armored suits that had caught her eye. She had only started to reach out to touch it when suddenly all the armored suits melted away into nothingness. "Wha..."

She turned to see Rose rushing for the doorway. Gamzee already seemed to have moved on and it looked like Ilia was going to be left behind!

"Coming!" Ilia sprinted through the door and heard the click as it sealed itself behind her. The bright, wide space that greeted her sights was not what she had expected down here under the institute. Then again, the ballroom wasn't all that expected either.

She should have known better than to expect physics to come into play down here after that Sphinx.

The trio weren't alone for long in the range. From behind the far wall came a cacophony of roars, and with a rumbling of stone against stone, the wall drew upward to reveal the challenge of the night: three hulking black beasts with long, wickedly sharp tusks and gnashing sharp teeth. They were more like rotund masses of walking death machine than creatures, really, and they were intensely familiar to some in the room.

Regardless of familiarity, the ogres lumbered toward the challengers with more roaring, ready to smash them all into little tiny bits.

The troll's expression went from placid contentment to dull surprise, and not much beyond that. Ogres! Well, he hadn't seen any of them for a while. He'd been under the impression that this wasn't the medium anymore, but he still couldn't help but think it was about time they showed up. He flipped his clubs around in his hands and, without waiting for any of the others to react, ran in their direction.

Imps just took a little bonk to the head to knock them out or send them scampering. Ogres, being so much larger, just required a much stronger blow. Gamzee had dealt with plenty of both before. Fighting them was like second nature, and he honestly never really noticed how strong and precise his attacks were. He just made them and hoped for the best. It was the indigo blood within him that allowed the task to be as simple as it was. He might be human here, but some of that nature still remained.

The key was to get above them. He might not be as strong as he usually was, but he was still capable of gaining some air.

Gamzee wasn't alone in his strategical summation of the situation. Rose pulled out her knifewands and started running towards them, a pace behind him. She, too, was confident in her abilities; confident enough that she shunned the one Gamzee was drawing near to, and chose the second-in-command as her target.

Her jump was more bounding babe than unreal air, and she reversed the wands in her hands at the last second, wrapping her arms around a tusk and swinging from it. From here, if she could hold on, it was just another swing and a jump to the top of its head, and then it would be all downhill from there. For the ogre, at least.

The kids were moving into action and this time Ilia didn't waste time trying to worry about them. They charged in like pros. She was certain they could handle this.

Placing down her bottles of juice, Ilia rushed forward to cut off the third ogre from ganging up with another on one of the kids. The kids had taken to moving higher. That seemed to indicate that their rotund bellies were probably thick and muscular while their weakness lay in their head. That seemed about right, anyway.

Ilia skidded to a stop several feet in front of the monster and began building her ki. Once she had a good amount, she thrust her hands before her, aiming a ball of pure energy towards the monster's face. "Palm of Destruction!"

All three challengers made a rush forward, presenting themselves in orderly fashion, one human per ogre. If the creatures had been capable of appreciating fair odds, they would have done so in that moment. As it were, they were more focused on smashy-smashy, as any good mid-level boss monster would be.

Strangely, though, the first contact was made not by an ogre's fist slamming into human flesh, but by the smallest of the human girls leaping forward, grabbing on to the tusk of one of the side ogres. The thing snarled in surprise, raising up its hands and giving its head a sharp shake to the right, then the left. The plan in its head (or what could be called a plan, anyway) was to either throw the girl off or hit her against its fists on either side of her, depending on how soon she let go.

The central ogre faced the dark-haired human with clubs head on, roaring again as it made a surprisingly swift swipe with its hand for a creature of its size and build. If the human were to take the hit directly, he would at the very least suffer broken bones.

The last of the ogres was just left confused, however, when the blonde came between it and the other humans and then stopped before coming further forward. The ogre hesitated, even more confused by the light growing in the blonde's palm. Eventually, it just continued its rush, only this time it took a page from the smaller girl's book and made to leap over its opponent. Ogres were not known for their swan dives, but body slams were most definitely their style.

Gamzee, dull-eyed as ever, moved with an automatic grace he probably wasn't even aware of. He backflipped off the ogre's head, neatly avoiding the swipe. The head of one of the other ogres was used as a springboard as he lunged himself back at his opponent. The troll twisted as he leapt, clubs fanned out to become a whirlwind of pain. Though he was no spinning top out of a cartoon. He was aiming for just a couple solid hits, with his momentum allowing him to propel himself back off the monster to dodge again if need be.

For someone who seemed to walk around in a constant daze, he was surprisingly well-coordinated when it came down to combat. Those simple juggling clubs dealt blows with force enough to shatter the weapons, but they remained in tact. The blows might have been stronger if not for the weakening of his abilities.

This was about as focused as he ever got, and even this was more instinct than anything.

Rose swung, and released, one perfect fucking acrobatic pirouette off the tusk. She alighted on the head of a second ogre for a second before leaping to the skull of the one diving at Ilia.

An obsessive reader or an omniscient being might have noticed that her move was, down to the poses, identical to Gamzee's. Rose, however, was too busy flying through the air to notice.

She couldn't reach its eyes from the back of its head, so she settled for driving her needlewands in its ears, making them function simultaneously as weapons and as handholds for her bucking ogrepony ride.

Her attack seemed to perplex the ogre, but it didn't seem to have much effect. Those things were just huge tubs of blubber on legs! Well, if ki energy wasn't going to work, then real physical damage might be needed.

The ogre's sudden dive at her caused Ilia to turn tail and run. She had only taken a few steps when Rose went soaring over her and started attacking Ilia's ogre. Well, if they were going to trade targets, Ilia was fine with that. She rushed Rose's discarded ogre and changed her tactic, this time aiming a punch at the thing's legs in an attempt to make it crumble. With any luck it would still be distracted enough by Rose's swinging to ignore her before she could make her move.

A voice in the back of Ilia's head complained about how she was letting children upstage her. Ilia told the voice to shut it, she was trying to concentrate on killing some giant monsters, so thank you very much.

And so began a deadly game of musical ogres. Gamzee and Rose's leaps and pirouettes as they switched ogre heads caused both their ogres to falter in confusion for a moment. For the ogre Gamzee had landed on, this indeed allowed him the opportunity he needed to land blows with his clubs. The ogre howled in pain; its thick skull might have cracked had the blows come from Gamzee's troll form. As it was, though, there was still severe disorientation and throbbing in its head as it swiped wildly above with both arms, attempting to swat Gamzee down onto one of its tusks like a shishkabob.

The position of Ilia's ogre on the ground after its body slam allowed her a successful attack with her needlewands, and the creature let out the closest thing to a shriek that an ogre could make. Dark ogre blood streamed out of its ears as the thing bucked and scrambled along the floor. It eventually rolled at a sharp and surprising speed, wrenching itself around in the hopes of crushing Rose between itself and the floor.

The remaining ogre, abandoned by Rose but soon adopted as an opponent by Ilia, did not give as big an opportunity. Its confusion did not last as long, and so it was able to see the punch to its leg coming, but not soon enough. It was only able to move such that the punch glance off the side of its knee, which still caused the thing to stumble away from Ilia for a moment. After that moment passed, it snarled, pounding a fist down in her direction.

Now this was just a joyride, right here. Gamzee was hardly acting like someone in a life threatening position. Never once did he appear worried that he'd be hit or gored or flung free. He might have been taking a literal stroll through the park for all his expression was showing. He'd actually missed some of these fights after all the sitting around he'd been doing lately.

Nimbly, the troll hopped up to avoid the flailing arms. He grabbed one around the wrist and held on tight with one hand, using a downward swing to propel him feet first toward the ogre's face. The hand not holding on to the arm held both of his clubs, and he went in for an extra swing with those while he was at it.

Then he let go and landed in a roll on the ground.

Rose bounced and swerved; she could avoid the flailing ogre with youthful enthusiasm, but it was keeping her from closing in for the kill.

And then she had it. Like a stroke of lightning. Literally, a stroke of lightning. Blood had been steadily pouring from its ear, and she blasted the crimson waterfall with a tiny spark. Small, but enough to startle it. She hoped. It had to work, since she was already mid-air, aiming for its eyes this time.

Ilia rolled to the side, just out of reach of the ogre's fist. Now she was getting mad. None of her attacks seemed to be working. Gamzee's attempts to bludgeon his to death seemed to be doing better than she, but what she had trouble accepting was just how high the kids could jump. It was just unnatural, like something out of a video game. Well, if getting sweet air was required for fights then Ilia was just going to have to pick up the pace.

She attempted to race around the ogre a few times, trying to find any sort of weak spot. Her best bet was their eyes, since they at least didn't seem to be made of the same grit and blubber the rest of the creature was made of, but how to get there...

Ilia took a chance. She jumped at the ogre's back, attempting to get a grip on its shoulders or around its throat. She would strangle it to death if she had to, but her objective was somehow gaining a good hold and attempting to beat it in the face with her elbows and fists if she had to.

By some oafish miracle of flailing, the ogre's free arm crossed in front of its face in enough time to block Gamzee's blow. Mostly, anyway. The momentum from the blow still transferred into the ogre's arm and caused the back of its blubberous hand to smack into its face; the monster scrunched its eyes shut briefly at that and took a few steps back. Beyond that, however, the side effect of the ogre smacking itself in the face — aside from pain, of course — ended up being the return of some its alertness. It was a desperate kind of alertness, but it was enough to allow the ogre to keep a closer eye on Gamzee once its eyes reopened. The piercing pain in its head kept its mind sharp (as its dull mind could be, anyway) as it aimed a few more rapid punches in Gamzee's direction.

Rose fared better with her ogre. Just as it was about to hit the tipping point where it could crush its unwanted rider, the spark did its job, startling the beast and causing it to roll back the other way, away from the source of the pain. It lay prone, howling still and giving the girl the opportunity she needed. Still, a blind ogre would not necessarily be a dead ogre, or a less dangerous one.

Ilia's grip took hold, allowing her to gain ground on the thing's back, just on the edge of one shoulder. The ogre growled in frustration, its target out of easy reach. With a low snarl, it grabbed blindly over its shoulder, crushing hands blindly seeking the point at which the blonde held on.

"Shit." Gamzee did his best to dodge the incoming punches. If he'd still been a troll, such movements would have been natural. He would have been far speedier without even realizing it. But here? His speed was dampened just enough that he took a couple hits. One was particularly dizzying, and he fell backwards for a few moments to collect himself.

Some part of him realized that his pause wouldn't stop the ogre from coming at him, but he wasn't ready to move just yet.

The blow had shaken up something, though. As his got a hold of himself, something in his eyes sharpened, if only briefly. There was a clarity there for a moment that he usually lacked.

Edited 2011-12-20 03:31 (UTC)

Rose's blows landed true, and she was rewarded with the familiar, if squelchy, sound of exploding Ogre eyeballs. She slammed down to the ground, landing feet first, and wrenched her needlewands back out of the sockets.

This ogre was more resilient than the last one; it was still alive. Though not being face-down in a river might have something to do with that.

This one, being unprototyped, lacked any accessories of dubious utility which she could exploit. Instead, she went with repeating an already-successful gambit. She stabbed her wands back down in its eyes, whispering consonant-laden phrases in a doomed tongue, and hoping her magic would continue to cooperate and reach the Stygian depths of its cranial casing.

Ilia growled in triumph when she managed to take hold. She was in more danger here, but at this point she didn't much care. Her adrenaline was shooting off the scales now and she wasn't backing down.

The ogre's fist managd to knock her shoulder, but she only gripped harder, her gloved fingers digging into the ogre's dark skin. Unless it actually yanked her off or broke her arm she wasn't going to let go. Using her other fist, she started pounding the oger at the base of the back of its head. If she didn't start scoring some points, she was going to have to give herself a zero for this performance. And Ilia Silvestri did not make zeroes.

Pain could only serve as an alertness booster for so long before it just started functioning as pain again. Blood coursed down the thing's head, and the loss of the precious liquid was starting to cause some faintness. The ogre kept its punches coming, encouraged by the hits it had score so far, but it was becoming noticeably more loose in its movements despite its efforts, as compared to Gamzee's more focused ones.

Yet more blood flowed freely from the eyes of Rose's yowling ogre, which now flailed even more wildly and fiercly, like a malfunctioning death machine. The needle wands went into its eyes and out and back in again, but it didn't make a difference after the first time. Pain was still pain, and blindness was still blindness. The ogre lashed out with its hands where it could feel Rose above it, desperate to land any kind of retaliation — unaware of the magic spell about to befall it.

Ilia finally experienced some success as her fist hit true, pounding into the base of the ogre's skull and leaving a fist-sized dent in the rubbery skin over the cracked skull. The ogre cried out in its booming, vile scream, barely able to turn its head for the pain it was in. Still it grabbed at its tiny assailant, trying to swat her off like a giant wasp now.

Suddenly Gamzee's eyes narrowed, the dopey look gone. There were few enough drugs in his system at this point in the day, coupled with his current predicament, that this ogre was privy to a side of the clown rarely seen up until now.

He rolled further out of the way, easily avoiding the punches, until he was back on his feet again. Fast steps took him around the beast and he raised both clubs to slam them hard into the back of the beast's knees. If he could be brought to the ground, the process of reuniting his clubs with its head would be all that much simpler. The troll meant business now, and this ogre was going down.

It was a shame he'd forget most of this after the fact.

Rose's spell zapped true, just as one of the ogre's wild blows finally landed. Its tree-sized black armtrunk imparted sufficient momentum to fling her across the room, where she thunked into the wall and slid down it.

That was going to leave a bruise. One, if one could count her entire back as a single surface. Still, she wasn't about to let it slow her down. As soon as she landed, she scrambled to her feet and ran after the ogre that held Ilia's attention, tugging her pillow out as she ran. Not to hold under Ilia; that would take the passive-aggressive response to a level not appropriate to the middle of a fight.

Wait. Was there a level that was ever inappropriate? Well, maybe she would hang onto the pillow. But what she was after right now was the pillowcase, which she dug her knives into and started cutting it into a long ribbon, which she started weaving between the ogre's feet in a figure eight. If it came down, then she might use the pillow.

The resounding howls and thuds from the other ogres sounded miles away to Ilia. Still caught up by her own giant opponent, Ilia was fighting like a mad woman to stay in her vantage point. The ogre's scrambling blows were now more frequent but lacked aim. As a result, Ilia was hit with more glancing blows. Quantity but less quality. Still enough to rip a few pained grunts from her and there was definitely a few more dark spots taking up residence on her back and shoulders.

"I won't lose!" Ilia hissed. She threw another punch where her first had landed, focusing all her power again into her fist.

Her other arm was weakening. She knew she couldn't hold on much longer but Ilia didn't want to let go until she completed the job. Whether her wish came true of not was still up in the air. Oblivious to all other things, she didn't even notice Rose's involvement with the ogre. Her thoughts were strictly on her goals.

Sadly, the ogre didn't have the presence of mind or familiarity with Landel's Friendly Neighbourhood Troll to appreciate what it was seeing. What it did have was continued ogre rage despite its injuries and increasing faintness, however. Rage, at least, had a never-ending supply. It continued to pound its fists at Gamzee, faster and more furious as its opponent continued to dodge.

There was nothing it could do to improve its situation with its vision becoming blurred, though. It couldn't stop Gamzee as he dashed around behind, and it couldn't turn fast enough to avoid his next blows. One leg cleared out of the way of a club, but the leg the ogre pivoted on took a direct hit, sending it down onto one knee with a great boom against the stone floor.

With the brain of Rose's ogre fried, the thing finally stopped moving, leaving Rose free to focus on Ilia's ogre. As she started cutting up her pillowcase, the ogre in question was focused on getting Ilia off its back still. It kept up its attacks, yowling again when punched and staggering as the damage to that sensitive area of its head started to pile up. While the thing might have been big and heavy enough to shred through the pillowcase ribbon had it not been suffering brain damage, as it was, the thing was suffering brain damage. It didn't think to kick out at the ribbon as it encircled its ankles, and combined with the staggering Ilia's attacks were causing, the ogre finally toppled, crashing to its stomach on the ground.

Ogre rage was one thing. Gamzee? He was the motherfuckin' Bard of Rage... for whatever that meant. He couldn't tell you himself. Whatever the real meaning, right now it meant he was one dangerous little troll. (Or former troll, given the circumstances.)

If he hadn't been shackled by the current limitations on his abilities, he would have been a blur or less around the ogre's arms. The monster wouldn't have stood a chance. As it was, he had to be a little more careful about how he hopped about, avoiding the swinging arms. Those trunks of flesh could be deadly of they hit him the wrong way. He was at least aware of that.

At least it was somewhat crippled now. Once he could find an opening between flails, he'd be leaping toward the beast's head, intent on cracking both clubs down on top of it.

Rose hopped up beside Ilia on the back of the fallen tyrant, and extended a hand. "Ilia. Are you injured?"

Gamzee was still pummeling his ogre, but he seemed to have it well in hand. It more than made up for his inability to contribute earlier -- a good team took all types, and his was obvious.

"I wonder if this is it. And if not, what's next?"

The fall was inevitable. Ilia let go right at the last moment, pulling her arm back just before the beast crashed to the ground. She lay across it's broad back, panting. Then she heard the little voice of Rose behind her.

Turning a little on her side, she saw the extended hand and the strung-out pillowcase wrapped around her opponents legs. She really owed the girl a lot. Smiling, Ilia reached out with her less-pained hand and took Rose's offered one, standing up upon their defeated ogre. "Thanks, Rose. Really."

Gamzee was still going at it, but whoa, could that kid move! "He's really... that's something, isn't it?" Still panting, Ilia wiped some sweat and her bangs out of her face. "I sure hope that was it."

If another monster appeared, Ilia was going to have to really step-up her game. But could she manage that with the power block back in place? Ilia couldn't say with confidence that she could anymore. Not after this fight.

The three all seemed to find their victories around this point. Gamzee's clubs hit true, bringing darkness to the beast's brain and permanent stillness to its limbs. Likewise, the head trauma of Ilia's ogre became too much for it very quickly, and its own weak flailing ceased as well.

When no new monsters appeared to take the ogres' places, the sound of stone shifting against stone emanated from across the room once more. A marble pedestal, elegantly carved, rose from the ground against the wall, and atop it sat an ornate miniature sword, ripe for the taking.

Gamzee landed and glanced around for more enemies. When none were forthcoming, his whole stance gradually shifted back into his more typical lazy one. His expression mellowed out, and he stood in a daze for a few moments as the adrenaline wore off.

Only after a bit of this did he blink and the fallen ogres around them. Well shit, that had been easy, hadn't it? Searching out the other two, he gave both a double thumbs up and a goofy grin. Nothing remained of the dangerous ogre-slayer from before. It was back to being regular old Gamzee.

Oh hey, had they won something?

"He is." Left unsaid in her smirk was that he had to have been good for something. Combat, it seemed, was his forte. Which might explain why he hadn't ever bothered trolling her. She watched him pummel the final opponent into ogremush, which was, when she thought about it, incredibly disgusting. Eventually he seemed to emerge from his trance, just as a pedestal did the same from the ground.

They'd won? Really? That was all there was? Rose hopped down from the now-quiescent ogre and approached the dais. A small sword. Very clever. She picked it up and examined their trophy. Certainly not big enough to be very useful, even for one used to small, pointy arsenals.

She did nothing so crude as to hold it aloft or to dance in triumph, merely turned around with it in her hands and nodded to Gamzee and Ilia. "It looks like our work here is done."

When Gamzee's ogre hit the ground, Ilia let out a cheer. "Way to go, Gamzee!" Talk about power! Ilia could really get behind strength like that. He was still a kid, but with the right training he could really go far in combat. 'Impressed' would have been an understatement.

When the sword appeared, Ilia sighed in relief. That meant this trial was over. So now what?

"Where to now, kids?" Ilia asked, smiling tiredly as she stepped down from the ogre carcass.

Night 59: Weapons Range

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