1st GBA Tourney - The Final Battle: Triam Akovin vs Vrag

[Eralam]

The candidates find themselves in a massive circular arena, over 300 meters wide. The stands are packed with hundreds of thousands of spectators, eager to see blood spilled on the grass.

The arena used to be used for some sort of ballgame or another. It's covered with short grass only a couple of inches high. Though the grass can be slippery when wet, the sun is high overhead and there's not a cloud in the sky. The contestants will find their footing firm, though attempting to turn too hard in a sprint might make them break traction.

The only thing that breaks up the uniform field of green is a circular trench. The trench has a diameter of 150 meters, and is aligned perfectly with the arena itself. It is two meters deep, three meters wide, and is the only cover available. The bottom is filled with a couple of inches of muddy water.

Our fighters will enter from opposite sides of the area. They will have ten seconds (1 post each) to enter and get into position before the fight truly begins.

[member="Vrag"]
[member="Triam Akovin"]

 

[Cassus Akovin]

Another arena.

The same old fight.

Triam stood at the gate as she entered the grassy plain with its characteristically notorious trench encircling the center of the arena. Like any other gladiatorial combat setting she's been in (surprisingly a few!), she's come fully prepared to kick major ass with 98% of her Gear, and about 202% of her clever wit and quick thinking.

As with any other time, she wore her armor in conjunction with her gloves, covering her arm which rested very near to her unique little cylinder. On her chest, which rose and fell with each breath, she had her laser, and in her hands she had her rifle... complete with its specialized scope and nine drones hovering around her. Within her belt, she hundreds of rounds of ammunition (even more than she remember putting in), and two of her pistols. Her head was plugged in to her Second Wind, and her arm was plugged into her Gatebreaker.

She was the technological David to any number of biological or mystic Goliaths. She didn't know her opponent, other than she was an infamous Sith... and as a member of the Covenant it was her duty to eradicate it. It was only appropriate for all the things they had done to her former nation, and indeed the rest of the galaxy. This wasn't just a game.

This was personal.

In ten seconds, her legs propelled her into the air, as her jets engaged, carrying her dozens of meters in fractions of moments. When they disengaged, her body free fell to the earth, as her drones tailed behind. They formed a semicircle behind her, set to stun and ready to become a miniature fire squad on command. Though such a development was unlikely. They were not good at close quarter engagements.

She landed just before the trench and immediately rolled in. It was a lot deeper than expected, it wasn't a great place to take sniper shots, but at least she had the security of a trench to operate her drones remotely without worry of interference. She engaged her drone vision, and operated them as they hovered over her. Six of them dropped into the trenches, and began traveling along the circumference, leaving only three out in the open to be fired upon or to fire upon the enemy.

Next, she pulled out a number of varied darts and equipped them to different setting, and shot them into various locations surrounding her, awaiting the proximity of an enemy combatant to come close and unleash a minefield of darts, some electrified, some with drugs infamous for putting down Jedi Knights for a nap, others with explosive heads. If they entered from either side of the trench, or entered her portion of the trench at all, they would get dozens of nasty surprises in their face.

In the meantime, she attempted to own the battlefield before ever even seeing the enemy.

[member="Vrag"]

 

[Vrag]

Vrag, unlike her opponent, didn't come into the arena holding any kind of grudge. In fact, it wouldn't matter if this was an arena, or a battlefield, or even a training room in one of the temples scattered across Sith-owned worlds in the Core. She never, ever* stepped into a fight with any sort of emotion guiding her hand. Whether it was anger, or fear, or even hatred, she would have none of it. It was where she utterly differed from her peers, a bunch of trigger-happy murderers who advocated passion and blood-thirst in engagement.

Probably why she was still around, and so many of them were eating dirt.

And this? This would be what it was, and it would end with one of them broken and bleeding on the soil. The grass looked shiny and green, and Vrag had only seen grass this shiny and green on one other planet; Selvaris. Guess what the two had in common? One tip: they sure as hell weren't watered by water.

But that was besides the point, and her opinion of the grass was insignificant in the big picture. Neither her nor her opponent gave two chits about it, and the firrerreo was rather too preoccupied with scanning the field for the opponent in question to really worry about the quality of the foliage. A quick flip through the filters revealed the enemy's briefly elusive position, and Vrag noted it along with those of the floating droids.

Mid-run, mind you. She wasn't entering this field at a stroll, no sir. Thank the dead gods for things like HUDs and thermal vision.

Anyway, Vrag was a simple woman at heart. She had no use for things like flourish and décor, and she certainly didn't utilize any as she entered the field in a near-sprint, straight out the gate and to the side. Chitin boots found ample purchase on the grass, and the woman beelined for the other side of the field, running along the wall of the arena.

With a nasty machine gun in her arms and her lightsabers cradled by the claws of Ygdris, the armored Sith Lord was ready to rumble.

Coming soon… Floating Drone Meets Speeding Bullet.​

​

​

[member="Triam Akovin"]​

​

​

*Not entirely true. See Vengeance Is a Dish Best Served... for details.

 

[Cassus Akovin]

Triam listened to familiar short quick reports of machine gun fire, just as her three little drones picked up the visual blur of the sprinting target. The spray of bullets whizzed past some of them, as they turned. Immediately one was decommissioned with a direct hit. The little drones attempted to engage in dodging, but there was little aim in a weapon like a machine gun... yet that poor accuracy was traded out for sheer volume of lead that could be poured out in a short amount of time.

The two droids launched their stun shots, firing and firing so long as they remained... or until they ran out in four to six shots... whichever came first for them. They'd last no more than a few more moments as they were plucked out of the air by rapid fire projectiles, but they had at least fired some of their stun shots... let us see how accurate those shots were before being destroyed!

Meanwhile, Triam meticulously entrenched herself in her position, carefully placing her C.H.I.T. darts in particular locations, expecting her opponent to come sooner rather than later. Additionally, given that she expected her opponent to arrive at her position rather quickly, she opted to stow her rifle away while connected to her HUD view of the drones, and instead wield one of her blaster pistols.

Closer range but less cumbersome to maneuver, which was critical in a tight spot like this. So she merely continued to wait for her opponent to be done playing, or for her to be stunned long enough for more drones to appear and finish her off...

... ending this in another pitiful sith failure. Just how she liked it.

[member="Vrag"]

 

[Vrag]

One of them exploded, which was nice, but the other two weren't so accommodating. She was moving fast, sure, but nowhere near as fast as your usual Force user on speed, and targeting computers are a queen. In a moment, she went from spraying bullets at the floating balls to having her whole right arm locked by what was probably a pair of stun shots. Long live segmented living armor!

Not that the woman spent any time analyzing it. Instinct kicked in, and the woman used her paralyzed arm to dive forward into a shoulder roll, hooefully avoiding the rest of the stun shots careening at her. Emerging back into a low sprint again with a powerful flex of her armor and muscles, Vrag came out of the roll with only one arm holding the momentarily useless machine gun. The other wrapped around a jittery pair of bugs at her side, hungry for flesh and infidel scrap metal. She flung them almost as an afterthought, knowing that the pair of beasties would find their mark in the oh-so-attractive stink of an infidel in the trench. They were small, and about as green as the grass above which they buzzed so fast that they were reduced to little more than a blur; all likely to mean that they would go unnoticed in the split second they needed to traverse the distance and descend upon the unsuspecting sitting duck. A razor bug to rip through an exposed point in armor underlay, and a blast bug to dig itself into the flesh underneath and go boom.

At least that was the plan. If not, the opponent would probably still be knocked prone from the blast, and that was all she would need to close the rest of the distance and crush the upstart who tought to stun her.


[member="Triam Akovin"]

 

[Cassus Akovin]

Another one went down from stray bullets moments before the target's arm went limp, and the other one got hit by a bullet and whizzed to the ground, but seemed to be otherwise operational enough to at least have its photoreceptors pick up what the target was doing. It gave her some subtle hint something was released, but the visual quality was poor and in the heat of adrenaline her human eyes didn't really notice.

Three of the drones were on the other side of the arena, perpendicular to her position, and parallel to Vrag's, while the other set of three drones were on the side closest to their target. Both groups remained in the trenches, humming lightly as they maintained their slow but constant speed awaiting to be called up. She was about to call the closest droid group up for another volley of stun blasts, when suddenly from above her the proximity shells of her C.H.I.T. Darts activated, launching into the air and attempting to intercept the green razor bug from above her.

"Wha- CHIT!" With her partial advanced notice, she shifted her body in a direction away from Vrag, and as the slicey-bug smashed into her head, she jet packed upwards out of her trench, avoiding the second possibly more deadly thud bug. Her Drone vision was being frazzled as the disgusting creature tried to claw through Ultrachrome, but that quickly came to an end when she raised her right arm and began to simultaneously attempt to electrocute and drug the creature with her Phantom Fingers. Regardless of the effects, she pulled the thing off and dropped it... meaning it would likely suffer a hard impact with the ground.

Disgusting creature...

Back on the ground, the thud bug fell into Triam's nested pit of C.H.I.T.-y pain... two of the explosive darts went off, and a number of other tasers went flying through the air in response. Vrag was lucky the thud bug found the darts before she did; entrenched positions were often no walk in the park.

In a few moments Triam was descending to the opposite side of the ring from Vrag, once she landed, she turned off the drone view completely, setting them to auto-target... meaning they'd stun anything that came within visual range that wasn't her, but would remain stationary. In essence, she had turned the two groups into entrenched stun mines with FFS sensors. She was glad to have her vision mostly cleared, but the razor bug had frazzled her HUD a bit, and gave her a slight pain in the side of her head and neck... likely more from the impact than from the razors. She was hopped up on adrenaline though, so it could be anyone's guess; she didn't think razor bugs could pierce through ultrachrome.

Seeing from across the field, Triam was able to identify her combatants weapon, and took a chance it was the prefered weapon type. Thus with this information, thumbed the power setting on her shield for kinetic attacks only. Obviously this held the risk that if her opponent pulled out a blaster, she'd be taking more damage... but for now it seemed logical. Stowing away her pistol, she pulled her rifle back into her hands, as she strafed to the side and began to fire on semi-automatic. The range coupled with frazzled HUD and dual moving targets would significantly lessen her chances of actually hitting her mark, but it at least acted as suppressive fire until she could maintain a new ranged position.

"Karkin' sensors!"

[member="Vrag"]

 

[Vrag]

Vrag allowed the energy to build inside her, wind and crowd alike screaming in her ears as she raced ever-closer towards the ditch where he enemy was holding out. Pulse even and hard in the veins of her throat, muscles relaxed yet pumping at the same time, flexing in perfect unison with the Vonduun that encased her body; this was what she lived for, and how she wanted to die. Despite the armor and weapons separating them, in truth the two of them were at their most exposed, their most true in this fleeting instant. The Echani sure were onto something when they wrote that the only way to know someone is through dueling them; Vrag, who was otherwise a closed book – closed, encased in metal, and locked away in an underground vault – was always freed when she raised her hands with lethal intent, all acts of killing folding into one, if only for a moment.

Breathe in, breathe out.

As expected, the bugs did their deed, an explosion resounding from the trench not a second later. A grin would split her face, were it not for the figure that shot up from the smoke and into the sky.

Motherkar- she went to swear, then she remembered that sometimes, calling her a Sith wasn’t entirely out of place.

Greedy fingers squeezed into a vice-like grip, seemingly grasping at empty air when in fact she was weaving a lattice of Force around her foe’s neck, like a loose noose just beneath the edge of Triam's helmet. Patience dictated her movements even as she rushed ever forward, suddenly assigning new purpose to the dizzying kinetic energy contained within her dash.

Though most of her strength lay in endurance, the warrior was no stranger to explosive power, and the many benefits of its use. She employed it rarely, but when she did, it was often to a devastating end.

Like today.

Her HUD was lit like a Life Day tree, calculating height and distance of the fleeing opponent as systole passed them by. She could feel every stride travel up her flexing muscles with a light tremble, every give of soil beneath the weight of her sprinting body, every squeeze of her heart as it pushed blood through her veins.

And then, at the peak of the curve, Vrag poured all of her speed into a massive Force pull, teeth bared with strain as she acted. It started with a squeeze of her fist, drawing that noose closed before yanking it down in a snapping motion of the left arm; but it didn't end there, for the woman never stopped moving, following the arc of her arm into another roll to transfer even more of her momentum into the the brutal slam.

Like clipping a bird's wings, only… worse. Much, much worse.


[member="Triam Akovin"]

 

[Cassus Akovin]

Call it premonition, preternatural sense, or just a simple random burst of nostalgic thought, something about this reminded her of her duel with the Thronebreaker. It had been so long ago... years ago. It was her first truly humbling defeat.

Sure she lost her hand to a Jedi in her early twenties, got beat around pretty good by the Empress of Ten Thousand Worlds to the point of having almost no armor or weapons and one functional arm, and suffered a literal decrease in life to that one fox guy on Geonosis... but nothing quite compared to the almost certainly lethal experience of Mikhail Shorn.

The crushing physical power Mikhail Shorn held at a distance was simply tremendous beyond compare... and it is a literal miracle they were able to salvage her out of that wreckage he left behind of her. She still looked at those holovids and could not comprehend how she was still alive... no one could. It was a mystery that she had deigned not to investigate further.

Never look a gift horse in the mouth.

It was at this time, this random pondering that fleeted across her mind's eye that attracted her attention to that eerily noose like presence that surrounded her neck, right before a truck seemed to slam into the back of her head at the same time a baseball bat hit a homerun through her jugular. Had this been her old armor, the one she faced Mikhail with, her neck would have been more protected from this whiplashing throttle around her neck. Though offered resistance to the physical crush thanks to some but minimal armoring, on the whole she was choked quite a lot. The sudden and powerful change in directional momentum, was likely enough to rattle her brain's a bit, and cause a debilitating strain on her neck, stacked on top of a bruised windpipe.

She fell to her stomach as her HUD system glitched out from the impact, further frazzled by the kinetic energy, and found it harder to breathe inwards. Once again, it would seem that the Relentless would be silenced for the remainder of the duel... having happened only once before on that fateful day at the Cauldron. It hadn't been enough for her then, it won't be enough for her now. She was rather, stubborn, shall we say, about these sorts of things. She pushed off the ground with her hands and knees, struggling to keep her head up without wincing. That was going to be a problem.

Flipping her shield to absorb both energy and deflect projectiles, Triam began to roll/scramble to the ditch near her, abandoning her weapon as she raised her dart launcher loaded with explosive heads, firing a volley in the general proximity of where Vrag rose from her roll. Falling with a grunt and thud, she grasped the silver cylinder at her belt, and ran wounded towards her stun droid mine.

[member="Vrag"]

 

[Vrag]

Vrag felt a rush of energizing thrill intermingle with the bloodlust at the tip of her tongue, and a hungry growl crawled out of her throat as she stumbled somewhat awkwardly back to her feet. The Vonduun on her right arm was beginning to come to, but not quite quickly enough to facilitate in roll recovery. Just as well; she had bigger things to worry about.

Banking on the fact that it might hurt just a little bit less, the Sith threw herself to the side and away from the trajectory of the darts, but their spread was solid, and while the aim wasn't all that great, well… who needs aim when you've got explosives?

The darts went off in a series of bursts, and if the grass weren't still slick from the morning dew, it might've even caught fire. As it was, it only caught a Hand of the Dark Lord sliding across it in a messy swath of green and brown, cutting an undignified path nearly halfway back to the wall of the arena.

With some choice curses replacing the taste of blood on her tongue, Vrag coiled back to her feet, quickly assessing the damage to her left side as she locked on [member="Triam Akovin"]'s position again. The schuta hopefully picked up a nice limp from that accelerated fall, but she was taking no chances on this one. If there more darts like these, the firrerreo would much rather not come close until she was sure her ammo had run out.

Taking a somewhat diagonal route, Vrag dropped into a sprint again, thankful for the exact assessments of the trajectory and height involved as she made her jump. Skerr Ygdris and its owner both pushed off the ground, boots digging into the soil for a split second before the woman vaulted over the wall and into the mess of spectators. That would teach them to expect fairness from a Sith. Ha! Fools.

In but a few breaths, the Hand disappeared into the crowd, ignoring the screams of excitement, shock, and abject fear surrounding her and beelining straight for the fattest, slowest Coruscanti she could spot.

He would make for a truly fine meat shield.

 

[Cassus Akovin]

Perhaps it was the adrenaline, but now that she was standing up and no longer lying on the ground, Triam's neck seemed to be in much better condition than she initially believed. Don't misunderstand, it still hurt like hell and would require immediate medical attention as soon as possible, but at least it wasn't swelling to the point of forcing her to drool like an idiot and drown in her own saliva mid-duel.

It did pose a tough decision for her, because her throat was not her biggest problem. She suffered some traumatic whiplash, and rapid acceleration followed by equally rapid stops wrecked havoc on people's brains. She could feel the confusion breaking through her massive headache, her ears ringing as she stumbled into the ring of floating droid remotes.

She was very likely concussed, and not in a good medical situation. The pain assaulting her neck and shoulders she could deal with... the disconnect of coordination was very dangerous for her. One wrong move and it could give her opponent the upper hand.

Luckily, there was a solution to all of her current woes... but the problem was in deciding whether or not to use it. It could only be used once, and it came under the condition that after 30 minutes were up, she would desperately require a 12 hour nap. If she did it now, and needed it later... she wouldn't have to worry about taking a nap, because she'd be dead. But if she didn't use it now, she risked making a mistake, like spending so much time pondering whether or not to activate her implant while her opponent vaulted over the audience walls.

Perhaps it was her reckless determination to continue no matter what, or the possibility of her concussion affecting her general judgement, but as she sat there debating in the nest of drones, that is when she decided to suck it up and press on the attack. Activating her drone vision, she sent the drone nest on the other side of the ring to fly through the trenches to her position, and then rise up and above her scanning for their target in the audience stands. It wasn't too hard to find... for a concussed person aided by frazzled computer indicators, that is. Just look to the one place where everyone was dispersing.

It probably would have been more time-conservative to just use the drone mine she was resting in, or more logical, but her sense of judgement was slightly hampered, and she felt safer with the softly humming drones around her, as improbable as that idea may seem.

The tiny little micro-targets proceeded to stay as low to the ground and stadium as possible as they hovered their way to surround Vrag in a triangle, hoping the seats and other obstacles would prove ample cover from whatever it was she was attempting. The three drones once in a fair position or were attacked upon would launch a volley of stun shots at Vrag who now opted to lug around literally the heaviest living being she could find...

... so hopefully temporarily stationary.

[member="Vrag"]

 

[Vrag]

Her foe's plan had one crucial flaw, however; in order to make it all the way to Vrag and her unwilling meat-shield, they would have to cross the considerable expanse of dreadfully open ground between the trenches and the wall, and if that weren't enough, float over the wall itself in their attempt to surround her.

While the Sith was patient, she had not the slightest intention of letting the floating balls come even close to boxing her in. She could make a dash for it, of course, but the woman opted for the simplest of two options; she opened fire.

By now, the Vonduun had recovered enough that she was able to move her trigger finger and rotate her shoulder, and that was all she needed. Honestly, it was quite therapeutic, nocking the machinegun in the nook of her elbow as she slung the barrel onto her meat-shield's shoulder… and squeezed. With the assistance of the AR, her heavy and stable human bipod, and the really, really fast bullets pouring out of the gun, the Hand was reasonably convinced the drones would be reduced to flickering circuitry and metal before they made it even halfway across the open arena. While she was no deadshot, Vrag had been wielding a gun of some sort for the better part of a decade and a half, and the One Sith were renowned as a devastating military force for a couple of very good reasons, among which extensive training sat at the very top.

These few moments of respite would allow her to recuperate from the stress of the previous moments, and she was indeed confident that she was in a much better state than [member="Triam Akovin"]. Part of that was owed to her regeneration, and the rest to the fact that she hadn't been slammed into the ground from a considerable height.

And after the drones were dispatched – well, hopefully – Vrag would begin to seek out the rest of them whose heat signatures were hovering around her enemy… only this time, with the Force.

 

[Cassus Akovin]

The one advantage the drones had that Vrag probably hadn't taken into account was the fact of their quite compact size, they were no easy targets especially at a distance. Even with the stability afforded by her meat bag, the effectiveness of that increased accuracy-range would be questionable for moving targets of that size. Additionally when you consider the fact of a rapid fire projectile weapon hoisted directly over the shoulder of an unwilling living hostage. The heat that would be radiating out of the barrel would make holding her hostage as the barrel fused with his skin no easy matter, even with her ability. At the very least, attempting to contain the writhing pain of her hostage to combat the unstable barrel support would at least distract her from her main objective - firing at the drones.

To her credit, even with the circumstances that would arise from her strategy and her lack of "deadshot" accuracy, she was able to eliminate one almost immediately before her problems began to occur. How she adjusted to the situation would depend on whether or not she struck down a second one before a final drone made it over the wall and began to zip between seats towards its target, using the cover to get close enough to take stun shots. It would attempt to fire six stun shots to ensure it did not miss, and to have enough room to adjust around the hostage, assuming it can do that before being destroyed.


Back in the Akovin trench, the situation remained not so good. Likely nursing a concussion and whiplash, along with an injured trachea, the only good thing she had going for her at the moment was the temporary coverage of the trench and the reassuring hum of protective drones.

She needed to think, to act, do something.

Making sure her shield was set to kinetic projectiles, she took an irrational risk while her opponent was hopefully distracted momentarily. There was a blur into the sky out of the trench, abd what remained of an audience identified that blur as the silver clad woman rapidly falling towards Vrag. While the sith was hopefully occupied/distracted, her dual set of blaster pistols would be rapidly firing at her on her descent.

[member="Vrag"]

 

[Vrag]

One of the little karkers exploded, then maybe another, but she was too busy dealing with the third to really know whether the shower of bullets had turned it to smoldering smithereens or not. The Sith's focus shifted on the drone that had made it over the wall, which wasn't all the difficult when it was highlighted on her HUD. Damn, did she love that thing; not the least because it allowed her to employ the Force in other way instead of expending precious time and energy trying to seek the damned thing out in first place.

Now, Vrag wasn't particularly strong when it came to physical applications of space magic – especially when juxtaposed with the feats some Masters could pull off – but she was no slouch either, and knew a thing or ten about precision. In fact, it was almost the only way she ever used the Force, and so she did it this time, too.

She'd try nothing more than to latch onto that last drone for a few breaths, use its forward momentum to lift it out of cover in order to shoot it down with a quick burst of fire. Either way, it'd certainly keep her occupied while [member="Triam Akovin"] shot skyward from her trench.

Before she'd managed to mow down the last drone, the bastard had managed to land at least one stun bolt in the soft, pudgy flesh of her meatshield, and as blaster fire rained down on the molded pair, Vrag felt herself being pulled forward. A second later, one of the bolts burned clean through the already stunned man, and the woman found herself clinging to what felt like a tonne of dead weight.

Kark.

Apparently there'd been a second stun bolt from that drone piece of chit, and guess what? You know it; it had hit the Vonduun of her left arm, which now remained helpfully coiled around the corpse as it began picking up speed in its descent towards the ground. Gravity, taking its toll.

She bucked and ground her teeth, hissing as the heat of the occasional blaster bolt punched through, but most of her attention went to the rapidly approaching wall.

Then down to her dead meatbag, and how she was indeed doomed to follow him down.

Then back to the schuta in the sky.

If I go down, you go down with me.

And she reached out as she tumbled over the edge, and tried to slip that noose around the bruised neck once more, draw it nice and tight, and aid the falling foe in her descent. Just a bit of a speed boost, nothing more; enough to facilitate a very rough landing in the middle of some uncomfortable-looking ferrocrete seats.

After all, the dead guy, the Sith, and the Sith's personality likely amounted to at least a tonne yanking Triam down, plus the added anger and frustration threaded into that noose of the Force?

It wasn't going to be pretty.

 

[Cassus Akovin]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RgFiB3Kcnrs&channel=park0urfreak1​

A noose nice and tight,​

Invisible and wretched,​

Relentless lost flight.​

Vision haze thoughts slow,​

Poor decision thoughts hasty,​

Painful dreams below.​

​

One last thought to think,​

"Could this be the end of me?",​

Quick death in a blink.​

​

- Haiku Syllables Counted Here -​

​

"Insanity: doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results." Would be a good quote to use in chiding Triam Akovin for her folly maneuver... but can you blame her for trying? The true fool would have stayed in the confines of her trench, but the Relentless had moved, and moved to attack when the target was in a position more vulnerable than she was. Yet still, taking to the sky and not expecting to be brought down without her own accord, was rather silly of her.

The noose tightened, Triam choked, blood rushed, the ground rose to her feet, shattering impact, lost breathe, missing vision... pain. Dust rose to the air, ferrocrete broken along with bone... silver gleam cutting through the cloud at the sun's penetrating glare. A body seemed still and silent within rubble.

The Relentless... was stilled.



Then was not.

Blood raced within her skull, light poured into her eyes, purpose filled her muscles, wounds sealed, thought returned, and infuriation encapsulated her entire being. A wind so strong, in an instance her beaten form had become the standing iconic image of everlasting triumph.

Shattered glass across her vision was discarded, as those blonde locks were exposed to the charged air with the drop of a helmet, as diamond-eyed vision cut through the haze to the lackadaisical falling Sith Lord. With a warrior's roar, a silver-yellow thread erupted from the confines of a silver cylinder in Triam's right hand, sending her into a forward charge with her left hand occupied with a blaster firing at the momentarily succumbed Sith Lord.

Leaping over the wall, Triam, blood charged with a Second Wind, was ready to finish the battle here and now.

She's coming for you [member="Vrag"]...

 

[Vrag]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0deA1JUUZFQ​

The green ground rushed up to meet her – and her rapidly cooling meatshield/cushion – followed not a breath later by the sound of an armored body crashing into ferrocrete chairs from a considerable height, with considerable speed.

Don't ask how Vrag knew what that sounded like. Too long of a flashback to include in the middle of a dueling scene.

In any case, her left arm was now well and truly pinned beneath some odd hundred kilos of muscle and fat (mostly fat), and when something stirred in the ruins of the stands above her, her first instincts was to let loose a rich, colorful string of expletives collected in her many travels.

She suppressed it – rather violently, too – and did the only thing she had the time and ability to do.

Her trusty machine gun lay abandoned in the rubble somewhere, but it certainly wasn't in hand's reach, and the pinned Sith had no choice but to scramble for her deceptively powerful sidearm.

Or, rather, it would have been her only choice, had she been your run-of-the-mill Sith. And Force knew she wasn't – on both counts – but the general implications of that mattered little in the moment.

The only thing that mattered was that Ygdris was alive, pissed off, and quite sick of the blaster bolts searing at its shell. And were it only Ygdris, well… [member="Triam Akovin"] might've stood a chance. But enraging Dhaladii?

Lammie (short for Lamashtu), an intimidating, two-metre long amphistaff specimen would burst forth from the darkness of the skull's mouth, a spit of her deadly venom preceding her equally deadly strike as she sought to burrow herself into the exposed flesh of the attacker. Gravity and a forward lunge would do Vrag's rushing, reckless foe one last disfavor as they rendered evasion nearly impossible, delivering the inviting holes of the eyes and mouth to the sharp, flexible beast on a silver platter.

My, what a tasty morsel.

 

[Cassus Akovin]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2UeA9Nus9Eg&channel=Yumishadow100​

​

A bite without teeth,​

Boiling the skin without heat
A treacherous scream.

Furious eye opens,
She resists contorted pain,
Hand rises to face.

Silver thread gleams bright,
Blade passes serpent's spine,
Lammie numb to sense.

She stands above her,
Her eye judges petty gods,
The Relentless slays.

​

- Haiku Syllables Counted Here -​

​

The sensation of falling.

There was something intriguing about falling that said something about Triam, and it seemed that when she was at her most vulnerable... her sense of time allowed for her great leverage to react to things few did. This sort of reaction surpassed quick thinking... because these sorts of things were without thought.

They were reckless even.

Yet even with the dramatics of falling, she was always at her most focused. Was it because it was necessary to survive? That was likely part of it. Though it most likely had most to do with her sheer will to keep fighting, and keep fighting the same old fights. It was a perverse love of danger and thrill and yes, death, that drove her to such extreme ends. The reason why the woman was always prepared for war...

... was because for her the war never ends.

Quick as lightning, a blot of debilitating poison erupted from the frightening helm of Vrag while Triam aimed and fired her weapon forward. As she fell, the deadly accurate poison, to her horror, struck against her face all along her left side. Immediately, the pain was evident and excruciating, shutting her away from vision and opening her mind up to the pain of dying. As if in death throes, her body writhed to her new found focus, dropping her blaster as her left hand was brought to the place of hurt, and her right tensed with muscles about to lash out.


A single, intensely ice blue eye opened and cut through the Chaos of the moment into the heart of Vrag, as her right hand brought with it a thread of silvery-yellow down and through the spine of Lamashtu... circumventing whatever natural armor it possessed to deliver its paralyzing grace. Her arm wildly swung, her vision while present unreliable as it tunneled with red hatred and a tinge of fear.

Dust surrounded the feet of Triam, with one hand she rested as a Relentless Blade. It was an iconic moment, the organic hatred that mingled with the dirt as the Sith, Vrag, and the mechanical precision of retribution and justice stood tall above it, Triam.

If time froze at the moment, an eternity between them... one would wonder what each might think...

... what might come next.

[member="Vrag"]

 

[Vrag]

Pain and anger and Yun'O, so much anger lanced down her spine the instant Triam's blade connected with Lamashtu. There was nothing to process, because it was simply too much; Vrag fell back to pure, unadulterated instinct, unaware even of the fact that Ygdris was clenching too tightly around the length of her outstretched left arm. The shot her foe had fired off mid-fall must have hit something soft, something fleshy and vulnerable, but that was her left arm.

Her right arm persevered undeterred, moving with a determination set in her very genes. Vrag was a killer, a survivor, and a predator, above all.

A cornered one.

What would happen next was that her wrist would angle up, completing the motion it had started even as her faithful amphistaff had lunged to her aid, and she would squeeze the trigger of the LeMat, emptying the shotgun barrel into [member="Triam Akovin"] at what was without a shred of doubt the feared point-blank range.

To make matters worse for her adversary, the woman was blinded by Lammie's poison – for her trusty companion had not gone out without getting her licks in – and so she would be hard pressed to notice the minute movement of the hand required to pull of the shot.

And because there was no kill like overkill, the firrerreo would follow with a vicious kick to the mercenary's groin, chitin-clad boot poised to break the pelvic bone and cause her foe excruciating pain as the splinters sliced up every precious artery that managed to escape the wrath of her shotgun.

Provided the tough schutta was even still alive, of course.

 

[Cassus Akovin]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eQljdwFuvEg​

​

When time was frozen,​

It was shattered.​

​

The Relentless Blade swung swiftly down across Triam's body, the silver-yellow thread of energy humming violently as it burned through the air, charging it with the electricity of her motivational spirit. The blade sparked against the earth as it slid towards her opponent to pass through the organic tissues of her armor, to render all beneath it numb to sensation and command. It would rupture the link between her spinal column and her legs upon passing through, and while Akovin roared with her painful battle cry, a cacophony of a single thunderous wave ruptured all sensation within her arm.

A scattering concussive wave transferred the kinetic energies of many projectiles into her shoulder while it underwent the movement of wielding her blade through her enemy, crushing it against the mass of her torso. A sickening pop and crack, and the accompanied sudden pain followed by numbness, granted her the knowledge that numerous bones had just been simultaneously broken and her shoulder utterly dislocated. She fell through the air, pushed back half by the force of the weapon and half by her inability to stand. The back of her neck impacted the wall behind her, and she was slumped against the wall, bloodied and blind in one eye as the pain slowly spread through her face in torturous discomfort.

Pain permeated her body, overwhelming her sense of being with nothing more than fear and pure aggression, yet a will to fight remained, a will to survive at any cost remained, a will to avenge what she may soon lose, remained.

Even if that risked killing herself.

Her mechanical arm responded quickly and nimbly, having a lack of fatigue, re-activating her shield belt in a motion before it reached into her magick ammunition pouches, and pulled out a Thermal Detonator. What spectators remained on the other end of the Arena, gasped at the footage. It was not strong enough to bring down the building like some detonators... but they knew now that Triam Akovin did not expect to survive her next course of action. This was the end, for one or both of them. That much was certain.

The silver sphere was rolled across the dewy grass, beeping rapidly, before finally the area within four meters diameter were engulfed in the fireball of a nuclear fission reaction, often famed for approaching 2500 degrees centigrade. It was sure to vaporize one them, and it was Triam's hope that she could trust her technology to save her...

... though ultimately, these were Triam's last conscious moments; the poison seeping into her blood, and the shock of her injuries, surviving the explosion would only give her time to die.

[member="Vrag"]

 

[Vrag]

Her world was on fire. Everything burned for a wild, seemingly eternal instant, and then it went out. It left in its wake a blinding emptiness, as if she’d suddenly stepped into the daylight of Tattooine from the darkness of a Sith temple.

But at least the pain was gone.

Also gone was the shadow of her foe, now slumped broken and bleeding against the far wall. If she’d had more time to look, Vrag would probably have noticed the uneven shape of [member="Triam Akovin"]’s shoulder, and the dents in the metal, and the foreboding stream of red leaking out the cracks… but she didn’t.

In fact, she had time to only do one thing, when she felt more than saw their doom roll out on the grass.

Her fingers, still alive and kicking, blinked to the nooks of her restless armor, and in an instant, her palm was occupied by a pair of bugs instead of the butt of LeMat. Until it wasn’t.

The pair would cut the air with a short buzz that to this day made many a Republic soldier fall to the ground in a catatonic state, their eyes blank save for the traumatized stare. Little did they know, however, just how useful the little monstrosities were beyond their most basic application in warfare.

They were alive, unlike the ominous ball of metal and death. And, being alive, they weren’t bound by the same rules as your conventional grenades; it was the sole reason why the Hand favored them over conventional technology. She was hopelessly on the hunt for whatever could give her the greatest edge.

And today… today, it might just save her life.

You see, the two beasts would sweep up the thermal detonator with the flash of speed typical of their kind, and courteously return the package whence it came.

Well, almost. The blur of bug and grenade flew up at an impressive curve at the last moment, heading straight into the patch of battered and bruised wall above her enemy, right at the edge where the wear and tear of the day was already showing.

And they were blast bugs, too.

 

[Eralam]

Alright, lemme start out by saying that this was one Hell of a duel. Both of you guys performed well, and it was really nice to see something like this go off, more or less, without a hitch.

Before I start breaking things down in detail, lemme get the suspenseful part out of the way:

Vrag wins. Congratulations. As per Factory rules, you've now earned the right to use impervium in a submission by way of winning a tournament.

For roughly the first two thirds of the fight, momentum went back and forth pretty evenly. You guys did an excellent job of adapting and overcoming, and that did wonders for the flow of the duel. These things are infinitely easier to judge when both sides are working maybe not together, but at least towards a common goal. That common goal was creating a badass fight, and y'all knocked it out of the park.

The deciding factor, in the end, came down to damage. You both got some good blows in, but towards the end, Vrag landed the more crippling blows. Both of you were pretty beat up towards the end, but I think Triam's venom-induced blindness would have been a deciding factor.

And now for the individual breakdown:

Triam:

• It might just be that I'm not privy to the backstory behind the drones, but controlling that many in a fight seems a bit much. While undoubtedly useful, one would think that after a certain point, they'd be more a distraction than anything.
• Excellent use of technology overall. Fighting Force Users is never easy, and taking advantage of tech to make up the shortfall is a smart move on your part. While it is easy to go overboard, aside from the drones I don't think you crossed that line. Well done.
• My one big complaint is that the Force choke/slam thing should have been a lot more debilitating. Crushing a trachea beyond repair is not all that difficult. It takes no more effort than one would need to crush a beer can. Even if it wasn't fatal, air chokes hurt. I would honestly rather get kicked in the family jewels than have someone get a hand on my windpipe. It's painful, and even if you know it's coming, panic is nearly inevitable. I can buy ignoring the whiplash through sheer adrenaline, having been in my share of car wrecks and not feeling the damage til later, but choking is possibly one of the least pleasant things you can do to someone.

Vrag:

• Speaking of chokes, the wording of your first one came very, very close to calling a hit.

Greedy fingers squeezed into a vice-like grip, seemingly grasping at empty air when in fact she was weaving a lattice of Force around her foe’s neck,

• I know it sounds like I'm splitting hairs here, and I kinda am, but not without reason. Directly stating that you're doing anything in relation to your opponent is a bad idea, and had Triam decided to raise a fuss about the wording, that might have been reason enough to penalize you, or at the very least ask for an edit. It's a seemingly small mistake that can have disastrous consequences under the wrong circumstances.
• I also thought you kinda undersold the stun bolt strikes. The vonduun armor is hardy as hell, but stun bolts are area of effect weapons in many ways. If the energy had found a gap in your armor, it probably would have put you down.
• Ducking into the crowd was an excellent move on your part, and one I didn't anticipate. Congratulations, I'll have to make it clear that leaving the designated fighting area is a no go in the future. I'm not busting your metaphorical balls here, that was the sort of move that judges like to see. Partly because it's a reminder that we can't think of everything, but also because it builds a sense of history for the GBA. That move will be referenced time and time again in the future.
• It might be a good idea to be a bit more prosaic in the future. While your posts are entertaining, the imagery can, at times, muddle your intent. While the extra effort is always appreciated, laying out exactly what you're doing in plain language will make it easier for both your opponent and the judge to understand what you're trying to do.

Again, you both did an excellent job, and I look forward to seeing both of you around in the future. With that in mind, you both have earned a custom weapon or piece of armor from RCFC, on the house, for whatever character you desire.

[member="Vrag"]
[member="Triam Akovin"]