damned_institute | Nightshift 44: The Coliseum

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Nightshift 44: The Coliseum

[Warped in from here.]

When Guy's eyes opened, it was almost as if he was waking up, and yet he knew that wasn't the case; he was standing, with a weapon in his hand, and somehow feeling far more comfortable than he had in weeks.

His gaze was on his feet, and it took him a few seconds to let everything sink in. He was wearing boots. His boots. And while being back in familiar clothing wasn't so new to some people, it was definitely a big change for him.

His head then snapped up and he realized just what he was holding. It wasn't Ashton's sword, but his own, the Jewel of Gardios -- and on top of that, Guy realized that he felt more powerful somehow. Did he have access to fonons? He had been working without them for so long, but it was almost as if he could feel them in the air now.

All of those changes didn't matter as much when he took in his location. The sphinx had warned them, of course, but the huge coliseum still impressed him, and what was even stranger was the way sunlight seemed to be filtering in from overhead. Was it actually day? This almost felt like he was in some sort of dream.

But that theory was torn into shreds when he eyed Sync, also in full form, standing across the arena from him. So what, they were supposed to fight? Guy didn't have a problem with that (it was what he'd come down here intending to do, after all), but he knew there had to be some kind of catch.

As he glanced to the side, he saw that Claude and Dias were in similar positions, except facing each other. "Wait," he muttered under his breath. No way were those two going to fight each other except in a sparring capacity, so what was going on? He wasn't sure where Anise and that other girl had gotten off to, but maybe it was for the best that they weren't here...

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See, Dahlia Hawthorne usually considered herself too classy to swear. Yes, she may have not been the perfect little flower she made herself out to be, but she wasn't totally crude. But right now, there was only one phrase dancing around her head once the sun was suddenly blaring in her eyes and she found herself being a cheerleader in the bleachers of a huge goddamn stadium.

What the fuck is this?!

Was this what Sync had been chasing after for the past two nights? What he had dragged her to hell and back for? This? What the hell could he possible get out of this aside from being able to start a fight without consequence? Why was it morning now? When did they get here? What was the point to this stupidity?

And who was that bitch?

"I-I don't know where we are," she answered the new-comer in her frightened kitten voice. She really didn't care if Anise knew how she really was - she was the minority there and if she knew what was good for her, it'd stay that way.

What a loser.

But from the looks of things bellow (and... she had no idea how to classify the looks of those things, so she just chalked it up to the paranormal and calmly left it at that), Syncie was giving himself a headstart. Well. At least she knew who she was cheering for.

For a few moments, Anise stood frozen at the edge of the stands, but as soon as Guy reacted she breathed a sigh of relief, and she found herself able to move again. Right; if Sync was at full power, then Guy was too. Even though Guy was in a dangerous situation, he wasn't defenseless.

There were voices behind her, and Anise whirled around to see Dahlia, and... who was that!?

"Who are we? I should be asking you that! Where did you come from!?" the girl sputtered in surprise at the woman. She was positive that nobody else followed them into that hallway before the door closed behind them. Then again, she wasn't even sure how they got from the hallway to the arena. Maybe the woman came in during the time she blacked out... but it was still kind of suspicious.

"Good evening, patients."

The bewildered, suspicious look vanished from the girl's face in an instant. "It can't be..." Anise looked out across the coliseum once again, eyes searching until they finally zeroed in on a figure emerging from the south end of the room. The man had a face she'd never seen before, but his voice was one she'd never forget. This was the man who made her friends and her family suffer. He was finally showing himself.

"Martin Landel!" she hissed, a look of hatred on her face.

There were more important things to discuss than Celes's sudden appearance (which, incidentally, she did not have an answer for). Like that man in the stands sitting so serenely. It felt as though her blood had started a slow boil. Him. It was his fault, his fault that suddenly Gabranth and Lord Larsa had vanished. His fault that she'd been visited by that odious clown, Kefka.

And here was Celes, all this space and little more than a paring knife at her disposal. "We can discuss that later, child," Celes hissed.

Well, well, well. If it wasn't Martin Landel. The other girls might have flailed or seethed in their seats, but Dahlia just gave him a cheery little smile and a wave while the other brats were distracted. Is this the man everyone was quaking in their boots for? Ha! He was the one everyone wanted to kill for trapping them here?

He looked like one of those handsome little trolls who paraded around drunk at socialite parties, the type of man who flirted with the girls and boasted to the men about his conquests in both women and fortune. He looked like one of those easily duped tools who couldn't tell his bottom from a hole in the ground if you sprinkled enough glitter on it. And more than that? Right now he looked like a mess, no matter how much he smiled and tried to toot his own horn over it.

Funny. She would have thought everyone's mortal enemy would have been easier to figure out than that, but you just couldn't con a conman.

Whatever. If he was going to put on a free show, who was she to deny him? Dollie slouched back into her seat and kept her eyes on Syncie. He was doing such a good job without any prompting!

As badly as Anise wanted to know who that lady was and why she was there, she couldn't focus on anything but the Head Doctor. She stared up at the man, trying to burn his image into her memory. For almost three weeks she and her friends had been pushed around by some unseen bastard. She was going to make damn sure she never forgot his face.

Claude started asking questions, which was probably a good thing, since he got them out more intelligibly than Anise probably could. The Guardian was trembling with anger and fear, and she knew that if she talked to the Head Doctor instead, she wouldn't stop until she finished screaming every last one of her complaints to him.

The man gave a response that was fairly typical, going by the way he acted on the intercom. But when he swept his arm upward...

Anise felt a piercing pain in her left shoulder. Just below her collar bone, it felt like something sharp had dug its way deep below her skin. With a gasp, the girl stumbled backwards, her leg catching on one of the seats, making her fall down onto it in a sitting position. Her fingers brushed across the afflicted area, searching for the weapon that was hurting her - a knife, she thought - but there was nothing there. Just a deep wound, and a growing stain of dark red on the front of her shirt.

"What's happening!?" she cried, her voice strained with panic.

Celes nearly answered Anise, when something sharp and cold slid into her abdomen. She breathed in sharply and went to feel for the weapon that had wounded her, but there was nothing. A sword stab, and a lot of blood welling from the wound, spreading darkly across the violet fabric of her corslet, but nothing to indicate what had caused it.

"We're being attacked!" Celes replied and covered the wound with her hand. She had to stop it, she had to keep her wits about her and bloodloss would not help that in the least. What was attacking them, she had no idea, but she did have a clue to the cause. "It's something that fool," she ground out and glared daggers at Landel, "something he must be doing!"

Edited 2009-10-26 06:09 (UTC)

"Hm?" Oh! Oh no! Annie and the stranger were bleeding! But- but nothing had happened to them! And Dahlia certainly hadn't raised a hand to cause this! What if it happened to her next?! What would she do?!

If any of those fears were real, Marty allayed them. The patient closest to you, huh? So those were the rules? Kill, be killed, or have your sweethearts die in your place? Well, wasn't Dahlia special? She wasn't close to any of these morons and even if Sync counted, he obviously was having a ball with this! Ha! None of those rules applied to her then! All she had to do was sit back and watch while everyone else had all the fun for her.

This could only be better if she had some popcorn on her. And if those moralistic tools down there refused to fight until their girlies here bled to death? All the better; why cast stones upon the birds when the other fowls were doing a fine job of it on their own? Dahlia hid her smile with a hand and she put on her best scaredy-cat face as she kept watching Syncie do his thing. How exciting!

With a hand pressed firmly over the wound in an effort to slow the bleeding, Anise pulled herself back to her feet. The movement caused pain to shoot through her arm and upper chest, but the girl just grit her teeth and endured it without making a sound. She didn't want the others to see how much she was hurting - not her friends, nor her enemies.

If the stranger was right, and they were under attack, she wasn't going to take it sitting down. But it wasn't long until the Head Doctor spoke again, explaining the cause of the sudden injury, as well as the rules of his twisted game. So she was hurt because Guy didn't hurt Sync? And that woman was hurt because she was close to one of the others? And Dahlia... Anise took a quick glance behind her, seeing the young woman sitting around in no obvious pain, putting on what could only be another frightened act.

It figured. The few people in the room who deserved to get hurt were completely unharmed.

Damn it! First she was Sync's hostage, and now she was Landel's? Not that Guy really needed the extra incentive to fight Sync, but...

Guy! Anise looked back to the fight just in time to see Guy take a painful-looking hit to the face. That blood all over his chest... Even though she heard what the Head Doctor said, it was only then that it really sunk in. If that bastard got his way, then between Guy, Sync, and herself... one of them would die.

She couldn't accept that. Those couldn't be their only options!

[heading down here for a minute]

A cursory examination with her fingers told her what she already knew: a belly wound, deep enough to bleed, but not deep enough to stop her from staying conscious. She could still fight through this, then, Celes thought with a grim line. It was incredibly unforgivable that Landel had dragged a child into this, even if that little girl was at least a semi-competent magician.

Even if that child was incredibly foolish in attacking him. Celes shrugged off her vest and moved her hand, groaning when she felt the blood pool out. Her fingers were sticky, but it didn't stop her from folding her vest and pressing it against the wound. Three tries. She only had three tries for Cure to work. First the child, then herself, and then...? Celes's eyes strayed to watch Dias and Claude battle.

She wanted to be impressed, she did, but... it was quite a bit difficult to be rapt when one was trying to stop bleeding.

First things first then, she looked at Anise and quitely began her spell.

Edited 2009-11-01 05:34 (UTC)

Ahahahaha, now this was a show! Not only did she have Idiot Wonder here throwing herself at poor tired Marty, but also Syncie and his boyfriend and the do-gooders down there killing themselves like the lambs they were. Dahlia was on the edge of her seat!

She scooted back a little. She had enough room.

But even now, she couldn't lose herself, no matter how much she wanted to taunt Annie, wave some pompoms for Sy-Sweetie, or congratulate Marty on being a withered ring-leader (he at least knew how to throw a party). She just let the tears flow as she watched the spectacle, hands still firmly closed over her mouth in "shock."

Edited 2009-11-01 06:18 (UTC)

[back from below]

Looking back to the fights, Anise was relieved to see that the metal clanging and clattering wasn't from anybody's sword, but from the shattered mask that Sync wore. That was the only thing she had to be relieved about, though. Both Guy and Sync were covered in blood. At the rate they were going, one of them was going to...

Anise gasped when she saw a familiar purple glow at Guy's chest. That technique... the curse slot? It was hard to be sure from a distance, but she couldn't imagine what else it would be. If Guy was afflicted with one of those, then what was going to happen to him?

The girl was so immersed in watching the duel that she was completely unaware of what the other spectators were doing.

The spell took longer to cast than she'd anticipated, owing to her wounds, her weakness, and her eye on the battle as Dias and Claude's fight stacked early in Claude's favor and stayed there.

Warring Triad, please... please... Celes sucked in a harsh breath and cast, "Cure!". The white light that shone from her body and fell upon Anise made her dizzy, bloodloss, you hardly ate, you stupid fool, but she stumbled to the edge of the spectator seats anyway. Watching, watching, watching...

Dias!

[skipping by request!]

Guy was still up and fighting, but he was in bad shape. Sync was taking a beating too. If this didn't end soon...

Before Anise could complete her thought, she suddenly found herself bathed in light. She released her grip on the rail and took a step back, startled, but she relaxed somewhat when she felt the warmth that came with the spell. It was a healing arte, she realized, though it was different from the ones she was used to. She could feel the soreness leaving her body - in her arms, her shoulders, and her neck...

But not in the wound just below her shoulder. The one that needed healing. Anise pressed her hand against it to see, and sure enough, it hadn't healed even a little bit. The girl winced, then turned her head to face the blonde who was now standing close by.

"It's no good," she said quietly. "There's something weird about these wounds..." Another clatter of metal, louder than before, silenced the girl and forced her to look back to the fights. It wasn't from Guy or Sync, so it had to be...

Claude's opponent. The long-haired man's sword had been thrown aside, and the man himself was...

"...N, no way..."

Celes's breath left her in a rush of air. It... Celes had heard what the price of the Head Doctor's game was, she wasn't stupid. Men in wars died everyday, sometimes at her behest. But this wasn't a war, not like she was used to. And single combat...

"Can he be any more barbaric..." she murmured. Stupid. Dias was stupid for that half-second pause that she knew he should have seen coming. He wasn't some greenhorn with a blade. The Lady General did not weep, or cry out in alarm.

Men died. It was the way of the world.

But this. Yet another man she nearly called friend was gone, and that smarmy, weak bastard in the box was to blame for it. She would kill him. Slowly. Perhaps with a fruit knife, skinning him from the ankles upward. Each wrong, each death, each wound would be paid for in kind, in agonizingly slow detail.

Celes drew in a slow breath to calm her wicked thoughts before answering the girl, "A pity, that. Then there is no point in casting it again."

Edited 2009-11-05 03:11 (UTC)

Oooh... That had to hurt.

On one hand? This was disgusting. It was messy and crude and, really? Dahlia didn't give two shits about who these people were. She didn't know them, aside from Syncy-poo. So when one keeled over by his boyfriend's sword, she just shrugged her shoulders with an little inward "Well, that's life."

On the other? This could mean so many birds out of her way. If she was lucky, the rest of them would kill each other too and she could be the last one standing, whether it be from pure nonattendance or not. So, again, when the guy keeled over and the two whimps next to her continued bleeding out? Dahlia smiled.

Maybe for just a second, an actual laugh left her throat. Haha, whoopsie. She made sure to cover it up with a few sobs and went back to covering her face with her hands. Getting a little too excited there, Dollie...

Ah, what the hell, it didn't matter anyway. What were they gonna do to her, add more to the death count? What a bunch a losers!

Anise felt a chill run down her spine as the man on the arena floor breathed his last breaths, and fell limp in Claude's arms. She didn't really know the guy, but he had come here to save her from Sync, hadn't he? All three of those swordsmen had, and now they were being forced to decide between killing and dying.

If Anise hadn't gone along with Sync, this wouldn't have happened. If she hadn't bought Dahlia's victim act, nobody would have come here, and nobody would be dying...

From behind her, Anise heard a brief snicker. It was hastily followed up by sobbing, but Anise knew what she heard.

"You...!"

Full of anger and frustration, and only now realizing she had someone nearby to take it out on, Anise whirled around, stomped over to where Dahlia sat, and grabbed her wrist, pulling one of her hands away from her face. "You think this is funny!? This is where all your stupid acting got us!"

Oh, great! Just what she needed! That brat yanking at her hand like an angry dog. Oh, Annie... And she liked you so much! How could ever trust you again...?

Hmph.

Her smile died the instant someone touched her, so she didn't have to worry about that. All they'd see when her hand was removed was a teary-eyed girl sobbing hysterically (that poor man! Poor Annie and the strangers! Poor her!), one that became even more scared when some cruel, insane girl started roughhousing with her! "A-Annie? What are you doing?!"

Cruel world! Someone save her!

Celes pulled herself together and glared at the girl who had dared to laugh while a man died. "Probably something you deserve," she intoned coldly. She didn't have the whole story, of course, but Dahlia's behavior was ignoble, disgraceful, and sickening.

"Shut up!"

Anise raised her hand into the air, bringing it down on Dahlia's face in an open-handed slap.

"Knock it off already! Everybody knows you're faking!" the girl snapped, furious. She knew it wasn't exactly true; she and Sync were the only ones who had seen Dahlia's deceit for what it was. But it looked like that blonde was on Anise's side, so hopefully Dahlia would drop the hysterical act already.

It was sickening. Those men came along to rescue the two of them, and she didn't even care that they were suffering!

It was unclear if Anise planned to scream at her some more, or if she planned to strike her again, but she wound up doing neither. Behind her, she heard the loud roar of flames, and within them, an agonized scream. The girl froze, dropped the other girl's arm, and whirled around to look back to the fight.

Both of the fighters looked like they were inches away from death. There was some relief at seeing Guy still on his feet, but that feeling was overwhelmed with the dread she felt as he approached the fallen God-General.

Sync was going to die, here and now.

Anise felt her eyes welling up with tears, and she lowered her head to hopefully hide them. She didn't want Sync to die. Even though he was twisted, he was so much like Ion... But Guy had no choice but to do this. No, even if he had a choice, maybe this was the right thing to do. Anise hated it, but it was the only way to stop Sync from hurting more people.

Even though Anise tried to accept that, she couldn't stop wishing there was some other way, though.

Oh.

Oh.

Oh.

Oh, that idiot. No, both of them were idiots. Who did they think they were, ganging up on her like that? The sting of that slap to her face spread in little pinpricks across her skin as the red welled up below it and by god if she couldn't feel her anger rising by its side. She was certain she got out a pitiful "Sto-... Stop it!" in an effort to keep acting, but from the look in her eyes, it was obvious she didn't want to play anymore.

Oh, Annie. Stupid, stupid, little brat. Her and blonde-bimbo both here were going to have to watch their backs from now on if they knew what was good for them because Dahlia Hawthorne? Didn't take that.

But what could she do right now? Annie turned her back to her and let her go to watch poor Syncie failing and Dahlia curled back into her seat, tears still streaming down her face. Goddamn it, Sync! You were supposed to win! What the hell was she supposed to do now, shove Annie from the balcony and hope Sandbags over there didn't put up a fight? Mad? Maybe. But not dumb enough to pick a fight she was outnumbered in. But with Sync being a drowning hamster over--

...well. Look at that.

Really? She didn't have to say anything right now. That plan to kick back and relax while everything played out like it should have? That was a good plan. She went back to it, eyes on the fight and smile in her heart.

Celes lowered her head, but caught the look that Dahlia shot her. She snorted derisively in reply Typical female, always saying one thing with her lips and another with her eyes. There was a reason Celes didn't bother with them on a regular basis, especially the ones that looked like Dahlia - they were delicate as glass on the surface, and cut like razors when a rival's back was turned.

The cold look Celes returned to her said one thing, as simply as it could: Attempt it, and I can and will break every bone in your body. And I'll enjoy it.

Now with Dias dead, and Guy apparently well on his way, Celes closed her eyes. She didn't know him well, and it felt somewhat dishonorable to watch. This was not a field of honor, anyway.

Forcing herself to look away from the fight, Anise didn't realize what was happening until she heard Sync shouting. Her head shot up, and she saw the God-General, who she thought was done for just a moment ago, on his feet and delivering blow after devastating blow to Guy.

Anise dashed back to the edge of the seats, her hands gripping the railing once again. Her heart sank when she saw Guy fall to the floor, and a cold, dreadful feeling washed over her. It looked like his arm was broken... no, both of them were? She couldn't tell.

...He wasn't getting up.

Anise's heart started pounding hard. He managed to roll over, but he didn't move for the sword. He didn't climb up to his feet. Part of Anise knew it was because he couldn't, but another part of her wouldn't accept that. Guy couldn't be losing. He couldn't lose here!

[to here]

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Nightshift 44: The Coliseum

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