damned_institute | Nightshift 27: M61

He'd expected Greed to grab him, or at least punch him and send him backwards, when the blind fuck shoved him forward. Instead, Kimbley found himself pitching face-first onto the floor, only barely able to stop himself from breaking his nose by catching himself on his arms.

One threat out of the way, one threat newly acquired. Great.

Kimbley barely acknowledged Greed's words, or the nudge at his side, as he got up off the floor and brushed the dirt off his sleeves. He glanced down at his shirt once - the cuts stung, but they didn't hurt badly enough to bother him. And this place treated wounds by morning.

That blind idiot could have done a lot better. Like broken his arms or something. Or just come up and stabbed him right in the neck. Leave it to people to try and draw things out.

"Or you could get lost and find other freaks to fuck around with." He spoke as if Greed hadn't even made a threat. "I'm sure you'd get along with some of the monsters just fine."

"You're one to talk like you're better than me, psycho." Greed sneered, taking a step towards the man and grabbing the front of his shirt for emphasis. "At least I don't kill and backstab for fun."

And as Greed looked into the man's yellow eyes, he knew nothing about that truth would change in this place, even if Kimbley might prove himself useful. The homunculus found it weird, maybe even downright disturbing, that he was still considering teaming up an option, but he was pretty damn desperate for allies, and... shit, Roy. He'd almost forgotten, though if he played his cards right, he'd come with a prize.

Greed growled and moved his grip to Kimbley's shoulder, where he dug his claws in.

"You're coming with me."

Ow.

"No, you just fuck everything that moves and lose fights to fifteen-year-old boys." Or so the rumor had gone. The former he could prove from past experience; the latter, the last time he'd seen Greed. (Well, back when he was alive. And he assumed the fight was a loss because, after all, the Elric kid was a determined and moral brat, and had gone after Greed, and then Greed had died ... it was just a matter of connecting the dots.)

When Greed dug his claws into Kimbley shoulder, the bomber sneered and tugged experimentally against the grip. No, he wouldn't be getting out of that without losing a good chunk of flesh.

"Depends on where we're going," he said anyway, fingering the pens resting in one of his pockets. Maybe if he was fast enough ...

Greed's grip tightened and broke Kimbley's skin at the slight, but he didn't satisfy the man with an answer. After all, he'd let himself be killed by the Elric kid, which was a damn sight bette than being re-sealed by Dante, and he didn't see anything wrong with enjoying life, even if life sometimes bit back.

That last thought, along with the bomber's attitude, reminded him how easy in both fighting skills and conscience it would be to kill the bastard, and he wondered if he really wanted to share that satisfaction with the colonel. So invested was the homunculus in his conflicted thoughts, in fact, that he didn't notice Kimbley's moving hand, and he merely grunted in response to the alchemist's retorts.

"We might not be going far if you keep that up."

"If you were going to kill me," Kimbley said, fingers wrapping around the pen in his pocket, "you could have done so the first night here. Or let that blind fuck do it." He let his sneer move into a smirk. "If you haven't already done it, you're not going to."

He considered where the pen would fit best. In the hand on his shoulder? It might go through and he'd wind up hurting himself. The eye? If he missed, he'd just get Greed's face - a good enough target as it was, but he wanted to either kill or cripple the bastard, not just tear him up a little. The heart? That would be a little too quick ...

Kimbley slipped the pen out of his pocket with a speed he hadn't shown since getting here (no use for it quite yet) and brought his hand up, aiming to bring the sharp tip down on Greed's nearest extended elbow. Not an eye for an eye, but more effective if he hit. And if the bastard moved it out of the way, he was going to have to let go of Kimbley's shoulder.

Win-win situation.

As it got later into the night, the hallways lost their status as safe havens. The fiends of nightshift almost seemed to know that some patients lingered in the halls, and some weren't content to let perfectly good prey get away.

The fact that the two were fighting made them more appealing targets. They were distracted, and one might even be injured by the time the scorpion got to them. Unlike some of the other monsters, this particular one seemed to know where to pick its battles.

It wasn't one for stealth, however, and the sound of it clicking against the floor would be easy to hear. The fact that it was much larger than any scorpion should be, a little bigger than a cat, made its approach even more obvious. It moved quickly, though, stinger raised so that it could strike the first chance it got. It wasn't easy for it to see its targets, but that hopefully wouldn't be a problem.

"Maybe I'm just taking my sweet time," Greed retorted with a sneer, though whatever mirth he had in him disappeared with the sudden movement of Kimbley's hand. Though he tried to jerk away, his inhuman perception of movement and his ability to move himself were both painfully lacking, and he grimaced as he felt something sharp pierce the flesh of his forearm.

"SHIT!" He yelled, forced to let go of Kimbley as he pulled one hand to his opposite arm and yanked what looked to be a pen out of his skin. Greed breathed hard, glaring upwards and about to retaliate with a kick to the bomber's gut when he heard the clicking down the hallway. The homunculus' eyes darted upwards, and he found himself thinking how the damn monsters were probably crawling out and towards them because of the scent of blood, which made this turn of events all the more inconvenient. His eyes shot back towards Kimbley and he glared murder at him.

"Now look what you fucking did!"

Greed at least took consolation in the fact that the thing didn't sound too big, unless there were more of them...

The fact that he hit was enough to put a smirk back on Kimbley's face. As soon as Greed let him go, he pulled back - retaliation was definitely coming up soon - but the fact that there was a sudden clicking not too far down the hallway seemed to distract Greed from that fact. Something was coming - another monster, something small and probably not a threat.

He couldn't see it, considering that his flashlight was halfway down the hall and probably in pieces, but there was definitely something there. With more than two legs. Drawn by the smell of blood or the sound of a fight ...

"Good," Kimbley said, keeping his distance and snatching another pen from his pocket. (This time, he'd get him in the eye.) "Monsters would prefer monster blood, I bet."

They were barely moving, they weren't even trying to run. Perhaps they underestimated, but it didn't really matter. If they stayed put, it would be easy to get a hit in. Its venom would incapacitate them (or at least one of the two--there was no guarantee that it could get both), and then they would have no hope of getting away...

One was injured now, attacked by its own kind. That could make matters a good deal simpler, and the scorpion knew for certain which patient it was going to attempt to attack first. Always aim for the weak.

Perhaps it wasn't big, but it was much bigger than it was supposed to be--and its stinger was more than large enough.

It was closing in, near enough that it would be visible.

"Yeah, real funny, jackass." Greed retorted, and though the scorpion that approached them wasn't too intimidating in size, the homunculus wasn't sure what kind of nasty poison it was secreting in its all-too-big stinger. After all, he'd never had to worry about the prospect of deathly injury before, and he wasn't too keen on finding out what it entailed.

The fact that this whole turn of events would probably end with Kimbley getting away was far too clear. Greed grit his teeth as he saw the bomber grabbing for another pen, and though his arm hurt with the same kind of human pain that he had felt when those dogs ripped a chunk out of his shoulder, he knew he couldn't let the Kimbley best him and get away. He'd have to tackle this head on, literally, and Greed never had a problem with that.

He glanced at the scorpion heading their way and then lunged at Kimbley, throwing a punch at his face with his good hand.

Because Greed struck with his fist instead of just flat-out charging him, Kimbley couldn't just jerk his arm forward and ram the pen through the bastard's skull. Still didn't make much difference; he was far enough away that he saw the punch coming and was able to shift down and to the side enough to avoid it.

As he did so, he caught sight of the clicking thing that was approaching them.

He'd been in Ishbal. He'd seen the scorpions and tarantulas there, crawling across the desert sands and getting into fights with each other and the lizards that sometimes appeared out from under the sand dunes. They'd all been warned upon arrival about checking their gear every morning to make sure nothing had crawled in during the night. Those things were lethal, they'd been told, or at least excruciatingly painful and often resulted in amputation.

Lovely how many people had always failed to do those checks.

He had never been particularly afraid of the damn things - they were annoying as fuck, but squished pretty well if you got the tails or fangs out of the way first - but even he was a little perturbed by the sight of one bigger than a feral cat. If the ones the size of his fist were lethal, then this thing probably had poison that could kill him in seconds.

Or maybe kill Greed in seconds.

Even though they were now aware of its presence, they were making no effort to run away? Too concerned with their own fight, perhaps. The reasoning didn't matter -- all the scorpion cared about was that they were close now, and open to attack.

There wasn't much thought put into which one to go after, except that one was smaller than the other, which meant that its venom would be more potent if it struck. If it missed, then it would just go after the other.

Stinger standing high and poised to jolt forward as fast as a snake struck, the scorpion made a beeline for the smaller human.

Greed grit his teeth as Kimbley dodged, though as he turned around and saw that the bomber was off-balance and the scorpion was heading their way, he grinned instead.

"Think fast!" He smirked as he shoved the other's back towards the thing approaching them with his good hand. He wasn't going to waste any more time on this shit if he could ditch Kimbley with some monster, and if he didn't get to Roy soon, he and the others would probably rush off without him.

So, holding his shoulder tightly and dashing a wide perimeter around the scorpion and his new prey, he disappeared down the dark end of the hall.

Kimbley always thought fast, but he'd been expecting a fist headed for his face again, not a plam flat against the already agitated wounds on his chest.

With a snarl of irritation and pain (that stung), Kimbley pitched backwards, already off-balance because of his shift and the distraction of the damn scorpion. He hit the ground, rolled over onto his knees, and looked up just in time to see Greed darting away down into the darkening hallway and the scorpion getting closer, tail twitching in anticipation.

"And you called me a chickenshit?!" he yelled down the hall after Greed, eyes fixed on the mottled shell of the monster before him. This night was just getting better and better.

One was getting away, but the scorpion wasn't greedy. These humans were so loud-- the yelling made it hold back for a moment, but once he was sure that one of them was gone, he had the remaining one to focus on.

It had been the one it had been going off in the first place, so it didn't have to shift itself too much. Without much more hesitation, it scuttled forward, stinger poised threateningly in the air. In a few seconds' time, it would be close enough to swipe the stinger down and finally hurt something.

Fuck. Fuck. Kimbley braced himself against the floor, staring the monster down even as it crept closer. That tail was ready to strike, and if he didn't move fast - because these little fuckers moved really damn fast - it was going to hit him. And there was no goddamn way he was going to die now.

So, as the little bastard came within a few feet of striking distance, Kimbley lunged backwards. It was kind of awkward, being that he was on his hands and knees and all, but fucked if he was going to just stand up and try to get around it. It was fast, he was fast - now he just had to determine which one of them was faster.

Nightshift 27: M61 - M70 Hallway

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