Duel Galactic Kaggath Round 1: Mercy vs Vyn Daldoure

[Mauve]

x

The arena floor rumbled and shook, the entire surface sliding open like a missile silo to reveal… an enormous Wroshyr tree rising up from the lower levels. It towered so high that its upper branches crested the arena and stood nearly eye level with the skybox. It sat upon a grassy, fern littered field. Amid the ferns, shapes prowled. Dangerous predators. Vornskrs. Force hunting beasts.

The boughs of the Wroshyr tree criss-crossed, forming limbs as wide as Coruscanti skywalks that the combatants could duel upon.

Droids hovered in the air around the tree, some with cameras, but many projecting interlinking rayshields so that the duelists could not interfere with the duels of the others. Of course… ray shields could always fail.

If any of the combatants fell to the ground far below, they risked being set upon by the vornskrs.

The announcers’ disembodied voice cut through as the combatants took their places on the boughs of the tree. “Honoring those who fell in the Battle of Kashyyyk between the One Sith and Republic, so many years ago, I give you the FIRST ROUND of the GALACTIC Kaggath!”

“She’s bad, she’s mad, and she’s here to make your champion sad. The Leviathan Slayer. The Mercenary’s Mercenary. The one, the ONLY, MEEEEERCYYYYYY.”

“And her opponent. The Iridonian Eagle-Eye. Here to do some business with a BIG IRON on his hip. It’s VYN DALDOUUUREEEEE.”

“CHALLENGERS! BEGIN!”

Mercy | Vyn Daldoure

 

[Vyn Daldoure]

Vyn walked along the Wroshyr tree's massive limb, boots tapped along the wood as he mentally drowned out the sound of the arena that surrounded them. Shouting, screaming, yet the only thing he heard was the blood rushing to his head. Sure he could play the Valachord, sure he could dance better than most at balls and make a good impression. Yet this. This is what he was good at. This was his spice, raw, unforgiving, and while he recognized it probably wasn't healthy, he do it until the day his body broke. Today was not that day.

He had no sponsor, he didn't need one, In fact, once he'd seen a Hutt was fighting the only thing driving him was rage. Memory of love lost to those who desired too much power, now he had at least one goal, make it to the slug. If he had the force his eyes would have been a bright yellow. Instead he looked calm, complacent, focused.

Vyn thought back to a few minutes ago, hearing over the speaker when Aether Verd , The Mand'alor, mentioned fighting gorillas. The Iridonian didn't think he was serious... this woman however was probably the closest he'd get outside of fighting the Hutt. "Great- that's just my luck."

In contrast to Mercy 's large frame, Vyn was slender, however when he reached up to the collar of the cloth shirt he wore and pulled it off, the sight was contradicting. Muscle, dense and covered in scars. Many from a blaster and blade, a good amount from sabers, some from beasts, and the rest were surgical. He pulled the vibroknife from it's sheath as blue plasma shot out from behind him, the thrusters in his boost pack warming themselves.

His knees bent, Vyn got low, his center of gravity was perfectly in line for a fight. He looked at the woman. "I wont kill you if you don't want to die, however if you fail to yield, don't say I didn't warn you." His voice was certain, that was not mercy that was an ultimatum.

Vyn's implants hit him with a burst of epinephrine- his pupils dilated, he began towards her.

 

[Mercy]

Mercy's head tilted at Mauve 's announcement. She liked her lips, clearly happy with how she was addressed. Older, slightly wiser, Mercy was still easily pleased as long as her ego was properly polished. So it was no surprise to anyone that she'd snap her fist up to the sky, basking in the roar of the crowd and the thrill of the moment.

This is what Mercy lived for.

"I wont kill you if you don't want to die, however if you fail to yield, don't say I didn't warn you."

That got a hearty laugh out of her. Her whole body shaking with mirth.

"Boy, I have torn through burgers more impressive than you." She rolled her shoulders, shifting her neck here and fro, stretching lightly while her eyes kept a light focus on the figure in front of her. Words and laughter put aside, Mercy didn't underestimate the soldier. Just one breath in told Mercy he didn't reek of the lightside nor smelled of the dark. So either he was suppressing his signature in the Force or he was supremely confident in his abilities.

She didn't rush towards the soldier. In the past she would have. No thought, no reason, just lung towards the man and try to crush him with her strength alone.

Mercy was smarter (ish) than that now.

While Vyn rushed in towards her, Mercy stayed put, a little smile playing on her expression. Then her shape suddenly blurred, moving faster than a creature of her size had any right to move. Her boot slammed into the tree trunk they were standing on. The Wroshyr was a tree of impressive size, each branch strong and sizeable. But her eyes burned amber and the force she used to slam into the tree was beyond that of regular men. It immediately caused a shockwave that crushed through the branch, creating cracks and making it shudder in distress.

Suddenly the surface that Vyn was running on began to shatter, creating rends in the thick bark and crevices. It would take more to completely snap the branch they were fighting on, but all that Mercy was aiming to do was disrupt Vyn's focus and force him to reposition his footwork as to not fall on his face.

Her form blurred again and now Mercy was upon him, attempting to take advantage of the moment she created. She had no weapons except for her fists, glowing a strange blue light as one fist the size of a shovel launched at his head.

Vyn Daldoure

 

[Vyn Daldoure]

Vyn kept onwards, his pace was steady. He wasn't in a dead sprint towards her, but a steadied run, his cybernetic retinas flashed as she moved. Her leg lifting and falling like it jumped into hyperspace for a moment, his eyebrows raised, this was one fast gorilla. The nervous system installed in him fed the information to and from his head faster than most people could blink.

As the ground cracked towards him, Vyn instead picked up speed. Force users. They were all the same in Vyn's head. Sure ideology differed between each individual, yet the way they fought with the force practically mimed one another, controlling external objects with a power they believed to be superior to anything tangible.

As the shattered ground of the tree branch reached him, he almost seemed to glide over it. His J.A.M.R was releasing a steady low-powered burst of plasma that changed his center of gravity with each step, the jet nozzles articulating to account for each error in his own missteps. What followed however, was a bit more surprising. She was fast, to much even for him to track fully, and yet while Vyn couldn't follow her movement from place to place. It was the little things that his eyes picked up which gave her away, a flex in a muscle, a shift in stance. Those he had been picking up on since he was a child.

Her fist came down like a meteorite, Vyn however was the lightning bolt. His pack expanded the last of its primary charge in a violent burst. His torso twisted violently. He rocketed up and over her arm. Vyn was now inverted hovering inches from her face, the crown of his Zabraki horns angled downwards. The burst of plasma which died out with an electronic beep mid air

"Eating razors is a health hazard." He landed on the other side of her, low to the ground, and in a flash thrusted himself upwards, not driving his knife, but his closed fist towards her ribs in a body focused upper cut. One consisting of bones reinforced with metal and backed by a body full of artificial muscle.

Mercy

 

[Mercy]

Vyn Daldoure

His fist impacted flesh, thick muscle, bones beneath. It crunched under the force of his punch and he could clearly feel bones snapping in response to the force.

Mercy did not cry out or even grunt in pain, but the feeling was unmistakable.

Perhaps it should have felt odd that a woman this large who could move that quickly allowed him to close the distance. The reason became clear the moment his fist hit her mass. She whirred around immediately, eyes burning bright with joy, as her shovel-sized hand grabbed for his wrist to lock him in place and trap him in her direct vicinity.

Her skin suddenly shone bright blue just as her fist had a moment ago.

This close, Mercy took full advantage of her speed, her strength and weight, attempting to hammer him with her fist from multiple angles. Whatever was exposed, she'd try and smash. An open face, an exposed throat, solar plexus. It felt indiscriminate, but the hits were targeted and precise. Trying to hit multiple points in a row to do as much damage as possible while having him this close to her.

Usually people made that mistake only once with Mercy.

They didn't live to make it again.

 

[Vyn Daldoure]

This was good, as his fist sunk inwards it confirmed what he needed to know. He could produce enough force to break her bones.

Pride however usually came before a fall, and while Vyn would take the first tumble feeling her paw wrap around his wrist. A smile tugged at his lips, he'd taken that fall thousands of times as a boy. Humbled by a father who beat him to death on a daily basis, not cause he was a drunk, and not because he hated his son, no these beatings happened in a private combat arena, meant to forge a war machine.

Vyn got used it. The epinephrine flooded body again. Being a Zabraki was perfect, he had two hearts, and after having the implants longer than he could physically remember, those hearts built up a resistance to the natural enzyme. Those dual beating organs funneled the endorphins like a combat stimulant, and he could run on the stuff for hours.

He went to block the first blow, but didn't fully make it as Vyn felt her fist connect with his orbital, his head shot backwards, however the grin didn't fade as blood pooled from a cut that formed near his brow exposing the metal lined bone which he figured had to suck punching on her bare knuckles. He made a strained look when he once again failed to block her fist driving into his abdomen.

Yet that stupid grin didn't fade. This wasn't confidence, this was fun, and the force behind her blows? Well that kinetic energy didn't exactly all go to waste.

Vyn then grabbed his own forearm and shut his jaw as tight as possible. She wanted to hold on to the lighting, that was her choice. His gauntlet whirred and whined, Then in a crack he unleashed thousands of volts of electricity into his own body, it would be like getting hit by a Sith Lords force lighting at full ramp. However on the nape of his neck steam funneled out of his body. Another implant dissipated a majority of the electricity that reached his hearts.

Mercy

 

[Mercy]

Vyn Daldoure

Her hand was the perfect bridge for the lightning to jump from Vyn's body onto her.

A scream tore out of her throat as it surged through her.

It took a moment to register. It wasn't a howl of despair. Mercy was laughing. Maniacal, ragged laughter, her amber eyes burning hotter as the pain built inside her. The electricity met the blue barrier wrapped around her body, the one that let her tank blows that would kill most sentients. But the heat build up, causing her skin to sizzle, to burn. The smell of burned flesh putrid in the air around them. And still Mercy did not let go of Vyn.

The tattoos on her arm began to crawl. Years ago, a Force-wielding tattooist had etched them into her skin, binding her to something else. Somewhere else.

Since then, her arm had sometimes moved with a will not her own.

Apparently all it took to be unleashed was lighting powerful enough to rival that of a Sith Lord's lightning. The area immediately around them began to shift slightly. The bark of the Wroshyr tree, already rend and ripped in places, began to rot. The laughter emanating from Mercy was muted and moved to the background, almost as if pitch itself shifted to a different tune.

Something began to reach through Mercy- a corpse like image with a face like a hollow star. It screeched, it clawed around them. It changed the very fabric of reality right around it. But most importantly... it wanted to step out into the world. The Force writhed. It whispered. And every bone in the arena felt like it had been knocked out of tune.

Mercy's arm exploded, right towards Vyn, not just with the energy from his own lightning, but with the kind of heat that belonged in the void between realities. All that stolen electricity, warped by something beyond, came crashing back through her fist. The air cracked. A pulse of power slammed out towards him, raw and writhing, howling through whatever it could reach. Circuits and servos. Meat and bone. Wanting to rip and tear, and grow inside this reality it didn't belong to.

Then it all but vanished.

The branch creaked beneath them. Steam curled from Mercy's skin, hissing out from burned and crisp skin. Her lips split into a slow grin as she exhaled smoke from between her teeth.

She took one step forward, boots grinding against scorched bark. The bark beneath her heel gave slightly, soft with decay. The air hadn't cooled. The Force hadn't settled. Whatever had reached out was still watching. The skin on her right arm blistered, peeled, half-cooked from the heat trapped inside it. She flexed the hand anyway. Her eyes glowed with something more than fury now.

"Keep feeding me, razor boy." She said low. Voice cracked and ragged. "See what else wakes up."

 

[Vyn Daldoure]

That chit eating grin didn't exactly fade, one of the corners of his mouth dropped, but the other one seemed to be hung up by a wire in his jaw. His eyes tracked the force horror that clambered out of her. His strength lies in the fact most people underestimated him, and he'd use that to come out swinging. Yet he realized that his blow to her ribs earlier should have been led by the blade of the Vibroknife, the handle of which he used instead like a make shift knuckle brace.

Vyn made the mistake of not trying to kill her immediately and it gave her room to move, something else stepped in. Though if that would be all it took to scare the young man he wouldn't have crawled out of a hallway with three Tuk'ata. His free arm, the one with the gauntlet came up, the energy that was headed for him, on a base level, was just energy. The unseeable singularity in his palm swallowed what it could, all of the power he'd expended electrocuting the two of them replenished, what wasn't absorbed cascaded away like he was using force deflection, directing it away from his most important parts.

His finger tips singed, his pants burned as he felt his legs warm to an uncomfortable degree, his shoulder split with with burnt skin. Then when the torrent of energy ended, His eyes darted around her body before slowly crawling back to meet hers. What he saw? Flesh, skin, and muscle, all structurally compromised from the burns.

Vyn let out a sigh. "You're holding on too tight." He stepped forward once into her space. Then his free hand snapped forward trying to grab her free wrist, his HUD was giving him warnings about his severe burns and possible bone structure failure. He ignored them. If he could manage to latch on, the sound of his metallic joints would sing as he clamped down on her wrist. If he couldn't find purchase, then the one hand Mercy still held onto him with would do.

In a flash Vyn would drop his center of gravity, twist the wrist she still held onto, as his flesh rendered beneath her grasp, and jump. His boots coming up to the height of her own torso, then he'd kick outwards attempting to plant his feet against her chest/ribcage.

The impact would be a bonus but not the focus. What Vyn was trying to do was anchor himself with her own torso as a base. He would drive every muscle in his legs, back, and arms to extended if his feet landed. Using the damage he'd caused alongside she'd done to herself as a failure point. He was trying to tear her arm off or at the very least dislocate it.

"Things crawl out of the dark all the time, clambering for a host. I just have to break the vessel."

Sure, going airborne while another fighter had their opponent in a clinch was never Ideal. Vyn however, wasn't just any opponent. He blew hot air as his body lifted off the ground trying to enact his plan.

Mercy

 

[Mercy]

Vyn Daldoure

Mercy probably should have taken offense.

Break the vessel, he said.

As if the powerful physique she had crafted over the years was nothing more than a shell of something more potent. But Mercy was too far gone into battle-mania now. At the very essence of her being she was a predator, one that had learned over the years how to control herself and became more dangerous for it. In these moments the witty back and forth was discarded for something else entirely. But she was still grinning. Smoke still trickled from the rents in her skin. Her arm was cracked and cooked but already knitting itself back together, muscles crawling over bone in slow, determined reconstruction.

Then he launched himself at her, wanting to grab at her, which managed to surprise Mercy a touch.

Fool. He'd come back for more.

His boots slammed into her chest right as she stepped in to take away some of his momentum. She didn't try to dodge it. Because the moment he left the ground, she saw the opening. That jetpack rig humming with power, struggling to account for its own user's weight. The J.A.M.R. system, with all its clever articulation and compensation, made to keep him dancing even when gravity didn't want him to. Welded to a spine even. Mercy would never understand why you'd ruin perfect flesh with metal and wires.

Mercy's arm blurred. Her right hand, raw and blistered, still infused with the remnants of unspent energy. She slammed it in with full-body torque behind the strike. She opted to crush the jetpack where it sat and take away some of his mobility that let him stay in the game for far too long already. She'd crush it into him. Against him. Into his vertebrae if it came to that. Whatever it took to rip away his wings. Not out of spite, no. All this time Mercy had been weakening the structure of the branch they were on.

All for this moment. It was time to snap this branch and end it once and for-

Then it happened. Far above, the crown of the tree began to fall. Another fighter's directed chaos. But now it was their shared problem.

As pieces of the crown fell down, their branch gave out in an instant. Snapped like a bone through old meat. The force of the impact and the collapsing treetop above were too much. Everything dropped at once. Bark. Leaves. Dust. Two fighters. To the ground below where the monsters laid in wait.

Mercy fell like a comet. A blur of copper and blood and fire. The air screamed past her ears and still she laughed, wind-whipped and wild.

She twisted her body mid-fall, aiming to take the brunt of it shoulder-first. The impact would have killed a normal person, but Mercy was far from normal. She had punched a leviathan straight in the face and walked away with only a few broken bones and that was in her youth. She was a monster herself now and that blue hue wrapped itself around her right at impact. The ground shook where she landed, creating a Mercy-sized crater. In other words, it was big and obvious, and already attracting the attention of dark predatory hunters let loose by their hosts.

They howled and Mercy smiled, this was exactly her element.

 

[Vyn Daldoure]

Great... She had brawns and brain, or at least enough to keep his combat effectiveness manageable, her stepping inwards was a clever touch, but one that let him get a better foothold, the metal cuff of his boots digging into her chest. Then he noticed it the muscle in her neck twitching right near the shoulder, neurons fired, she was trying to rip his jetpack away. Vyn was going to let her, his spine could take the trauma, even if she broke it he had an implant that would right the damage long enough to get in a bacta tank.

Vyn was going to let mercy hit him, sure the J.A.M.R had guided screws that locked it into his bone. But the guy didn't live with the thing on and could bail it off at any time, he'd give the J.A.M.R one last command, dump both charges, the primary and the safety, launch her off the stage, let the dogs feast. That's when he snapped back to the moment before a second had passed, unfortunately, his own call was overridden by the detection system of the pack which was working on an electronic level instead of a nervous one. It detected her movement for him before even his augmented systems had had informed his brain, the jets were already angled, he received a warning in his display.

[Kill Vector Detected]
[Prioritize Safety of Primary Function]
[Brace for Automatic Compensation]

"Chit." He didn't even have time to get the words out before the thing worked against him. Thrusters firing off their safety charge. The jump into her, wasted movement. His plan, foiled by his own tech. His footing against her, well lets just say there was no footing.

Vyn's thruster had launched him upwards into they sky even further, putting him zero-G inches from her, clean off the ground, clean off Mercy as he felt the air underneath him bend from the force of her strike. He didn't know whether to be miffed he lost his leverage, or thankful his tech was faster than the both of them.

Screw it, time to work with the chaos. He was going to try and mount her shoulders, flipping the vibroblade into reverse grip. The plan, drive it into the top of her head. Good old fashioned Zabraki Lobotomy. That was until the leaves entered the picture. It took Vyn a micro second longer than it usually does to figure out what was going on. He was still in zero-G, and it only click when he felt himself go even higher, no that was just his own sense of perception. She was sinking. Groundward, hell the whole fething tree was, some saber jockey or another decided it would be fun to knock down a mighty Wroshyr.

Branches screamed past him, his thruster cut out and he fell, twisting his torso, he'd jumped out of plenty of ships and freefall was always a fun time. His gaze centered on her as she wrapped herself in that blue energy, and much like his earlier analysis slammed into the ground like a meteorite. Unfazed.

"Ughhh- What is it going to take." Vyn was still falling, his eyes locked onto the Vornskr, and for the first time he formed a full smile and left out a laugh.

The J.A.M.R kicked in slowing his decent into the beasts as he landed with a thud, some of them turned to him. Vyn got low on all fours, one of the Vornskr approached, snarling. He just growled back bearing his sharpened canines. "Oh don't look at me... your favorite snack just landed a few feet away." His hand snapped outwards grabbing the beast by the nape with a constricted grip. The others around him halted their advance. He angled it's head in the direction of Mercy but kept watching the beast with his eyes. Then it worked with him, looked right towards her. He let go, and stood.

He chuckled and gazed at her, his eyes probably looked just like the Vornskr, he was an apex predator, and he just found a pack. "Vornskr... we fell into a pit of the one animal I have experience with, training, to hunt people like you. Just me, I'd be dead, but." He shrugged towards her and then gestures to the beasts around him barking, no hissing and moving forward. "I can't exactly control them like some of you saber jockey's, but, the force is so Intune with these creatures, they know what they want. They hunger for one thing: flesh, coursing with the force. And that ink of yours? I'd venture to say it's overflowing."

That animal smile of his held firm as he looked over at the beats

"So much so, I wonder" He glanced back up to her "Would they take a force-laden command from you?"

Mercy

 

[Mercy]

Vyn Daldoure

Mercy... blinked slowly.

For some reason the soldier got on all fours and barked at the predators surrounding them both. Now she was concerned that she had misjudged the the fall and had actually hurt her head. But no, there he was, going at them like he spoke their language. It was so out of the blue, so utterly from the left field that Mercy couldn't do more than stare for a moment.

"Hey, pal, if this is like... your thing or something, don't involve me, okay?"

The beasts growled at her and that was enough to get her head back in the game. Eyebrow raised at the animals slowly shuffling towards her as if she was a tasty chew toy just ready to be devoured.

She sighed.

"And here I thought we were kin." Sigh turned back into a smirk as she glanced towards him. "Training is nice, great really. But lad, you are either born with it... or you ain't." She had been inspired by Avalore and her antics with the Akure beast years ago. With just her mind and a touch Avalore had managed to take control of it after she had softened it up.

Mercy doubted she'd ever be as good as that. But a pack of vornskrs who operated on the same 'eat or be eaten' principle? Child's play.

Her presence raged through their animal minds like a thunderstorm. It was too much. Too aggressive, too violent. Half of them just collapsed where they were, eyes blank, brains melted from her unsubtle intrusion.

Three remained.

There was no hesitation in them as they suddenly whirled around and immediately leaped at Vyn to tear him apart limb to limb. They moved as if possessed. There was no subtlety to it or even real domination. If they somehow managed to end Vyn they would not revert back or wait for more commands. They would just keep clawing at each other, the stone, the ground, anything to satisfy that raging beast that had invaded their minds and left nothing but fury in her wake.

Mercy didn't join the carnage. Not because she was feeling generous. She just didn't want to miss the show.

 

[Vyn Daldoure]

Vyn looked at the beast next to him as the rest dropped. It was barbaric. She wasn't influencing them to attack him, she was breaking them. By nature they were great for hunting force users, their desire to hunt force sensitives was their primary and highest function, so when he was in the Navy one or two would be brought along and used as an equivalent to hunting hounds. Then caged again once they broke their prey.

Mercy however seemed to snap that crucial function, they weren't hunters anymore, they were just killers, for the fun of it.

Vyn brought his leg up before the first could even turn, and slammed it downwards. Crushing it's head under his foot. It sucked he had to put them down, but at this point it was a courtesy.

The second lunged, he jumped over it and landed on the third. Plunging his vibroknife into the top of its skull with surgical efficiency.

Then he snapped his head back to the last before he even touched the ground. The last beast was circling back, snarling. His hand wrapped around the muzzle of the mutt he'd just stabbed and as his feet found purchase, Vyn picked up the limp body and swung.

The sound was blood curdling, bone snapping against bone, the second yelped under the impact of it's packmate being used as a cudgel. It wasn't dead though.

Vyn had stopped the swinging the corpse, and removed his blade before he pointed to her with the blood slicked edge. "Born to throw a tantrum maybe..." He let the blade hang there, almost to drive the sting further. "That wasn't power, that was desperation. You took the one thing that made them dangerous. Focus. And you broke it."

He stepped over the last beast who was laying there still alive, petting its head. Blood was tricking from the flesh around his wrist that had been wrung by Mercy's grip. The Vornskr tried to nip at him but Vyn just pushed the jaw away and shook his head. "Sorry about this." He whispered to the mutt. Then looking to her, the sun was setting behind her head. A plan. It was bad... he didn't like it. It would probably work. His mind became clear. The only image in his head. Her death, the rest faded. Vyn was running on instinct now.

His hand wrapped around it's muzzle as he lifted it much like the other. Its appendages had been broken, but that jaw would still pack a punch. He picked up the animal, then his eyes dilated again, overwriting the pain he felt from the injuries he'd been experiencing.

Then he ran towards her full sprint. Picking up speed. As he got close Vyn dug his heel in. Placing his gauntleted hand against the beast's sternum, spun, and launched the Vornskr towards her.

Assisted by the function of his gauntlet, it wasn't a throw, he used the repulsor tech to create the equivalent of a force push sending it towards her. Vyn followed it. He began running as soon as the beast left his grip. Picking speed up instantly, then he slid. Coiled, changing direction again slightly, and as he and his dog got close to mercy.

It flew past the woman's side.

He'd angled it to not hit her, but fly slightly past her side

And Vyn? He'd been hidden the whole time, trailing the Vornskr like a shadow, he jumped, his J.A.M.R kicked in mid air. He vaulted over the beast.

For her, she'd probably see the beast coming, but the thing was so large Vyn could use it like a wall for hiding his movement, then, he'd shoot up from the blind spot the Vornskr created, mere inches from her side. And launch his Vibroblade downwards towards her carotid artery, and this wasn't just muscle and gravity assisted. He'd used his Jump pack to not only provide upwards, but rotated his hips mid air for it to then provide downward thrust.

To add insult to injury, his gauntleted palm was braced against the hilt of the blade, and with a Thwump he propelled his own hand forward with the repulsor. It would have made blocking a blaster round with a light saber look like hitting a ball with a stick.

Mercy

 

[Mercy]

Vyn Daldoure

Mercy finally realized what annoyed her about this guy as he spoke up once more while patting the last dying Vornskr.

Every time he opened his mouth it was like being transported back to her days as a young princess at the Tionese court. Where soft young boys tried to make themselves look bigger by putting down a girl who, even then, was already taller, larger, and fiercer than they were. Making jokes. Quipping about how she did this or that wrong. Telling everyone how experienced and wise they were.

They got the same lesson that Vyn was getting right now. Mercy was not one to be cowed and she taught it by smashing their pretty prince teeth in and ruining their chances of ever finding a consort.

Back then it was just their chance at the marriage market. Now the stakes were different and Mercy was thriving. Her body was aching, the burn of the earlier fires still coursing across neurons and nerves forcibly stitching themselves back together. Even the Zabrak soldier was incapable of ruining the moment for her.

Vyn moved quick. Maybe the words were a feint, maybe just a snap decision in the heat of the moment. Before Mercy could blink the Vornskr body was already flying at her.

Here's where the soldier made the miscalculation. He assumed that Mercy would just stand there and take it in the face, or perhaps try to create a bit of distance. That wasn't what happened. As before the mountain did its slide rather than stay put. Mercy pushed forward and rather than allow the body to slide harmlessly by her, she grabbed hold of it.

Her muscles bulged under her skin. They turned to iron rods as they were forced into action. It was in that moment as her fingers dug into the hot flesh of the dying creature that she practically felt the vibrations left by the man's wake towards her. Someone green or someone who hadn't been in a fight might have flinched at the new revelation. Hesitated at a crucial junction. But Mercy was all instinct and reflex. She pivoted hard, whipping around her own axis... and rather than throw the body back as planned, she slung it around herself like a baseball bat. Its weight was immense, it was an apex predator with thick muscle and bone to match to hunt dangerous predators. Even for someone like Mercy, enhanced by the Force and with a body build only to kill, she could only feel awe at its weight in her hands.

Up until she rammed it straight into the man as he surged right upon her.

This was the fatal mistake. He had assumed he'd be able to get in close and end her, worth taking the big risk. At that speed Vyn would have had to over-commit, put everything he had into it. If Mercy had hesitated even a fraction his blade would have slid right into her neck and perhaps even take her out of the fight. Instead, there was nowhere to run, nowhere to fly. She used all that stolen momentum, every ounce of fury, and drove it into him: to break his body once and for all.

 

[Vyn Daldoure]

Unfortunately, for mercy, she once again treated him like everyone else. Everyone else that was killed by him at least. His eyes kicked over to the Vornskr as it barreled towards him.
He saw a flash back.

The first person he'd killed. A convict that was given a chance. Kill a nine year old and go free- Or.
Vyn remembered the taste of blood in his mouth. The sound and feeling of another persons wind pipe snapping under the weight of his jaw. His bones broken, sternum shattered. Cleary the convict didn't get his freedom.

This was that same fight thirty years later. Different people now. Yet the same lesson. How to fight a bigger foe.

The beast came at him like a war hammer, his HUD gave him enough warnings that Vyn turned it off with a twitch of his eye, he felt his left arm dislocate at the elbow, he felt his ribs buckle, he felt the skin of his burnt shoulder split. Vyn had overcommitted.

That was right. Overcommitment. As the Vornskr came in to bludgeoned him, he just let go, his body went limp. He left go of the twist of his hip, of the muscles through his body. Vyn let go of everything it would take to see him through, to go limp and soften himself for the impact against the fallen branch of the tree. Then he impacted.

In fact. He'd let go of so much he barely noticed the nasty noise of his arm buckling while he propped himself up. But she might. And she might notice the Vibroblade was missing from his hand.

He stood and raised it, showing his empty palm to her. He didn't want to, but he'd let go of fething vibroknife right before she struck him.

His finger raised- Pointing at her chest.

"Oh... that sucks." Setting his shoulder with a grunt. His hand raised to brace his ribs. Then he angled his other finger to his Vibroblade again, with a bloodied smile. It was embedded and it's placement was still perfect In his mind. Vyn knew anatomy, he knew she could keep fighting, but if the knife shifted, or he got ahold of the handle, that wouldn't be good. And if that blade stuck exactly as Vyn expected it. She'd be a stuck pig that hadn't started to bleed.

He'd committed so much momentum to the attack, that when Mercy swung the Vornskr, she'd recognized him as the whole threat. It was smart of her. He was a weapon. Unfortunately he was a weapon that was also a borderline genius, that had beaten Moff's at Cubikahd before he had hair on his chest, like it was a waste of his time. The blade was also a weapon. And much like the Vornskr, with focus, it was lethal on it's own. Vyn had demonstrated it with the beast. He was good at throwing things.

All that momentum, the downward thrust, the physics. It turned a blade into a payload. One that delivered.

His pupils shrunk to normal as he grimaced
"You hit like a rancor."
Vyn leaned back against the tree branch where he'd impacted. Taking a second to find a deep painful breath, still quite dazed from being rag dolled.
"But In an endurance game- one that I've been playing that one since I was a kid. You gave me time to raise the blade."

Mercy

 

[Mercy]

Vyn Daldoure

She had to give it to him. He was a stubborn bastard who just refused to quit and admit defeat.

No matter how much Mercy punished him, he had another quip ready, another reason why he wasn't the victim that Mercy had grown used to leaving in her wake, another plan to keep himself in the running.

Mercy didn't respect him. She couldn't respect anyone that reminded her of those soft noble boys playing their games at court. But she had to give it to him regardless. She wasn't delusional after all and could see reality for what it was. Her head tilted at the self-satisfied mumble. She glanced down and that was when she noticed the knife sticking out of her.

Eyebrow rose a fraction up.

"It's like you haven't been paying attention, boy." She yanked the vibro-knife out of her thigh. Blood welled up and if it kept on going she would bleed out. Her tattoos flared up and the blade of the knife super-heated as it forcibly received a portion of the kinetic strength still stored from the earlier clashes. The scent of burned flesh ran through the area again as she burned the wound shut with only a soft hiss. Casually she snapped the vibro-knife, using the sudden heat change in the handle, and discarded it.

Her fingers lifted up.

Around them shards, larger and smaller pieces, of the Wroshyr tree began to lift into the air.

She was hardly a telekinesis expert. Her mastery laid in the physical, enhancing her body and strengthening it past even the limits of a Firrerreo. But this was not difficult. It was not trying to lift up a whole branch or stopping a huge boulder. It was just raising a dozen sharpened broken pieces of thick wood and having them all aimed at the weakened, clinging shape of Vyn.

Any movement he made, the wooden shrapnel would track it... and without warning suddenly they all surged at him at once. To impale him and finally put him out of his misery.

"You don't belong here. Your plans don't belong here. Your layers of tech don't belong here. You were only ever kidding yourself."

 

[Vyn Daldoure]

Vyn just stared at her. It finally clicked what was wrong with this chick. One too many blows to the head must have dislodged something critical to her reasoning.

As the wood splinters floated up, he bucked his hip with a grunt as blood trailed down his brow and his shoulder. Taking several steps forward. See that was the issue with most people, they saw the things he used as tech. Vyn had lived with a majority of these implants since before his memory center developed. There was no learning curve. No "on-switch". They were his own limbs, his instincts. It came to him as easily as using the force came to her.

He was getting tired of that "boy" thing she'd been doing. Sure physically he was in his early twenties, but that was thanks to another parting gift from his family. A device that slowed the division of his cells. Decelerated aging. In all actuality. Vyn had probably been alive longer than Mercy.

She was a child playing with a now frayed live wire.

His foot came forward and slammed into the ground. His back leg braced. And he stood there. His left arm came up and with a crackle of heat and thunder. A deflector shield projected from the outer edge of his gauntlet. Bigger than a Mando shield. Full torse coverage. Hip to shoulder. His front leg buckled as he dropped to his knee, head tucked under the rim.

The first shard hit- and shattered, the next glanced off the edge burning away. The rest slammed into the barrier in rapid succession, Vyn slid back as his boots carved through the dirt of the arena, and his gauntlet drank up the energy she provided him.
Ballistakinesis. A neat trick. Seen it before. Learned from that mistake ages ago.

The edges of the shield flickered with a violent restraint. His head came up from behind it. And he clicked his tongue. "Really? I've seen padawans with more punch." Funny enough Vyn was never much of a talker. But the more he did it during this fight, the more he saw her rise to the occasion. Rage, anger aggression. They were good emotions to fight with- Well until they steered you.

The shield held. If anything it looked ready to explode.

Then his right arm dipped to his side like a sprinter, and he charged.

Ground thumping beneath his sprint. Epinephrine flooding through his system like it had replaced the blood in his veins. Dirt kicked up behind each placement of his foot. Vyn wasn't running to test her defense or ability to counter. He was running with the intent of going through her.

She might feel the charge building. Hell anyone watching could probably smell the ozone curling off of the Equal Handshake. It was howling with the stored energy from her splinters. The singularity bending the air around his palm as the point narrowed.

And still he came, shield up like a warrior who grew up in an arena. Five meters, then three, and as he got within a comfortable distance, his ankle buckled. His center of gravity shifted of off the fight line. Downwards.

The shield collapsed, his palm thrusted outwards and with a Thwummp. He expelled all of the energy towards her waist Not a wave, not a warning to to confuse her. A wall-shattering explosion of kinetic force, fueled by the energy he'd stored when she rained splinters at him. His padawan quip was a lie, she was a brute. Enough of one that Vyn had felt the energy stores in his gauntlet slowly bleeding off excess power after she'd attacked him.

He learned long ago that precision wasn't the only way to beat a force user. Sometimes you just had to hit them so hard the force started to ask questions.

But that wasn't all. As soon as the energy expelled, the sound of a metallic shriek followed by a guttural WHUMP expelled from behind him.

And Vyn took off like a rocket that had reached exit velocity. His body whipped upwards, thrusters roaring like angry beasts, driving his knee like a metal lined piston. No subtly, no rage. Just raw violence aimed for her jaw.

Split her focus. That was the idea. Brace for the repulsor, block his knee, Or contend with the next item on his list.

His shield reformed mid-air. Then Vyn's right elbow cocked up, ready to drive down into the top of her skull like a battering ram of alloy reinforced bone.

He'd seen that blue shimmer of hers. A shield? The plan was to overwhelm it.
Maybe she could stop the repulsor blast with it.
Maybe it would save her face.
Just maybe it would stop him from caving her skull in.

But as fast as she was and as strong as that shimmer had been. He doubted she could block all three. Miss the timing on the repulsor and that organ shattering blast would probably fold her down into his knee. If she blocked that, then he'd cave her head in like a Meiloorun, Block the repulsor first and he'd drive his knee into her head, and still crash down into her brainstem.
It was a triple triad of. What do I do.
And he gave her the choice. How do I want to die.

Mercy

 

[Mercy]

Vyn Daldoure

Mercy knew when her chain was being yanked because usually she was the one doing the yanking.

She allowed it though.

The fury balling up in her body was fueling her the same way the pain was. Placidness and serenity had never been Mercy's way. The trick for her had been how to weaponize her short fuse and make it work for her. How to think straight even when she saw red. It involved allowing herself to feel the full spectrum of it- from the simmering annoyance to the white-hot rage, letting it pass through her and only absorb what was useful.

Once more the boy managed to escape her kill shot. It would have been annoying if she hadn't been expecting him to pull something out of his sleeve or in this case his gauntlet. It was proving practically impossible to destroy his gear, overloading his gauntlet had as much effect as trying to crush his movement rig. But that was for the best. It meant she'd be able to pry it from his corpse and hang it up on her wall as trophies.

She kept throwing the wooden shrapnel, even after the first vanished into his gauntlet. It was only committing him further to whatever plan was forming inside of him. True mastery was to shape your opponent's direction, eliminating potential options, until he committed himself fully to a course of action you could control. Ideally without him realizing it.

That last part wasn't too hard. He didn't have to say it out loud for Mercy to practically smell his self-assurance and belief he was the smartest guy in every room.

In fairness to him, he might be, because Mercy certainly wasn't a genius. She was a brawler, a mountain slide waiting to happen, an animal with barely restrained fury that operated on chained instinct. But that instinct served her well. It always had. Instead of coming up with fancy plans herself, she just beat on her prey so they were too distracted to come up with an idea. When that didn't work, she just allowed her targets to exhaust themselves until they ran ragged.

He did two things in quick succession- blast out all that absorbed energy at her mid-section and then immediately follow it up by chasing towards her for a second time. In that fraction of a moment Mercy reacted on educated instinct. She had been tanking him this entire time, from grabbing the thrown vornskr to grabbing him while he tried to douse her in electricity.

She did something she rarely did.

She dropped to the ground.

By not relinquishing her onslaught of shrapnel, he'd committed to his plan as she had hoped. In return Mercy didn't commit to any plan, she was only committed to a goal. Putting him in the ground by any means necessary. It gave her flexibility to ride that live wire and being grounded in the moment. Whatever needed to happen, her body was already moving on its own, because she was completely in sync with the moment.

The blast wave swept just above her as she touched grass. He was coming right after that blast, assuming she'd be standing rooted, locked into tanking that hit like every other time. His attempt to take her out would leave him severely exposed, he didn't have his shield up, his rig was entirely focused on the forward trajectory. There would be little Vyn could do to prevent Mercy from yanking him down and at the same time slide one of those sharp pieces of wood straight into his gut as many times was necessary to set his life-water free.

The piece would feel wrong, twisted, spiritually rotten. It was a piece that had been corrupted by their earlier clash. When an eldritch creature had pressed through the boundary and almost escaped into the world. Each jab would steal essence, drawing away strength and vitality from its victim.

 

[Vyn Daldoure]

She dropped, getting right under the blast as he rocketed forward. Vyn thought he'd lost the exchange, and then? She grabbed him again.

Switching the chambered arms midair, he raised his left arm high, the one with the gauntlet. And extended his right out like he was trying to fly. Oh no. That wasn't it.

Yes. Mercy in Vyn's head was immediately cemented as someone who thrived in chaos. However Vyn was a clinic fighter, with years of training, and a guy who literally grew up fighting cage matches to prove his life was worth it. He was a product of abuse, control, and pain focused into purpose. She had tried to stop him overcommitting once before and that was one of the few times he got a meaningful blow in. He just had to grit through it.

She was a brawler. But when you're like Vyn, a child forced to fight fully grown adults to survive, you adapt to a certain fighting style. He loved being in a grapple, even if it breaks some parts. From a good grapple, he could throw elbows and knees into organs all day long until they rupture. Sure he could throw a hook or a jab, but he was a grappler to the core. He was afraid that his flying knee, or when he tried to tear her arm off would have given that away. Yet here he was, with his opponent putting him in the position he thrived in.

And the best part? In a clinch was where brawlers suffered the most. They have no range to swing, no space to build up momentum. And while Vyn saw that pulling, dragging, and throwing punches was clearly her strong suit. Other brawlers fit that category too, he also guessed pushing away from her core would be a weak spot as well, especially from where he was positioning himself.

He increased the thrust behind his hip, burning out the rest of the charge. Biting down as hard as he could. He pushed forward even though she had his foot wrapped up. He felt his ankle pull out of its socket with a snap, tendons tearing If this didn't work, he'd be in trouble. But Vyn?

His chest slammed against her back. Once again finding himself inverted. His right arm wrapped around her waist. His fingers dug into her abs, and that arm squeezed like a tension rod around her core, focusing his force where he'd broken her ribs earlier in the fight.

Free leg kicking out and wrapping around her throat, using the leg she was holding in the perfect position as an anchor. For a leg lock around her neck.

He strained and pulled both his legs leg as tight as he could, the one with the busted ankle making a horrid popping noise. Artificial muscles enhancing his natural ones as he locked into the choke.

Then his left hand, the one with the gauntlet? Well, he'd used all the stored energy he could. So instead, he raised as far behind his head as he could, then he drove his elbow towards her back anyway. Targeting her kidney/ thoracic spine/ lower back. Whatever he could hit. This would put her in a bind. If she let go, he was still locked into the choke. To top it off he'd latched on like a viper to her core and was trying to strike her back.

He hated admitting this to himself, but she was a lot like he was. Pain became focus for her. But even as the focus increased, it could still divide attention.

Again, his hope was that this would go one of three ways.
He'd squeeze her ribs hard enough to drive one of the broken shard of bone into her lung.
She'd tried to rip his legs away from his neck, which would be next to improbable, but not impossible. Giving Vyn the time to squeeze harder around her waist and still strike her in the back enough to either burst a kidney, and/or break her spine.
Or
She'd try to stop his back blows, and he'd just choke her out.

Then. Maybe just to be an ass, or possibly for making him break his ankle to get into position. Vyn pressed his head into her hip, and drove the crown of his head inwards. He was a Zabraki after all, and those horns weren't just for show.

Mercy