[1 v 1] Dinosaur Noises (Rep/Oliver)

[Grey Dragon]

Oliver could remember what broken bones had been like before the island. Even as a child, when recovery from such things was easiest, he recalled long hours in the hospital. Casts for what seemed like forever, many physiotherapy sessions to get things working right again, and emotional scars that lingered years after the physical damage had healed.

Yet not even a month after breaking his wrist, it was like nothing had ever happened to it. Even the initial stiffness after having the cast removed was completely gone. Perhaps the amount of emotional scarring from the event were unchanged by having a weapon bond, but the freckled young man was at least given less time to dwell on it! He had moved on quickly, and after the first couple days of resuming his regular exercise he had not been able to find those same 'strain limits' that had held him back after previous breaks.

However, it had been an easy excuse to avoid sparring, which built into guilty neglect that weighed more heavily on his mind with each passing day. So one evening after the air had cooled down, he headed out to the training field and summoned the large axe so he could reluctantly destroy some things.

Baneful

 

[Baneful]

Despite no longer being in Sun division, Rep still spent a great deal of his waking hours training. Fighting was what he had always been good at and to him it didn't matter if his division had different priorities, fighting was still very important for his continued survival. Since the time Tracey had been wounded and fractured he had been for the most part avoiding spars, too many people claimed that when he sparred them it was somehow non consensual and he was sick and tired of giving other people reasons to get up in his s**t.

Still, he couldn't help being interested in what other people did when training and found himself leaning on one of the dummies eyeing the people arriving at the fields. He spotted Oliver's weapon before he noticed the other man, raising a brow when he did.

Grey Dragon

 

[Grey Dragon]

At first Oliver hadn't noticed he was being watched, he was too focused on the large weapon. Without approaching any training dummy in particular, he let the axe swing through the air and concentrated on maintaining the flow, letting one slash slide into the next without breaking it's momentum. It didn't seem as difficult as he remembered.

But the moment he caught sight of Rep watching, that was when the impression of competency began to crack. One startled misstep and Oliver's movements were no longer in sync with the giant weapon, and the force of it's momentum nearly pulled him off his feet. It struck the ground heavily and sent up a small cloud of dust.

The freckled young man let the axe remain where it had landed, and waited cautiously to see whether Rep was going to approach, leave, or merely continue watching. He might have looked like a deer ready to bolt, but his courage had grown tremendously in the past few months. Not even a year ago he would have scurried off in a panic at the first sight of an intimidating hunter on the field.

Baneful

 

[Baneful]

Rep smirked when Oliver lost his footing and stuck his axe, but it wasn't particularly unkind, he'd been there a hundred times, all it took was a mis-step and your own momentum would throw you completely off your game.

He didn't move though, still wary of intruding on someone else's training and privately rather bitter that making comments or offering help to people sparring was technically no longer his job. It was Jordan's if anything. He crossed his arms and sighed heavily.

"You want a photo?" he asked Oliver.

Grey dragon

 

[Grey Dragon]

Oliver felt like he should have been the one asking that question, but his confidence was not quite at the level where he could sass back out loud. Instead he fell back on self-depreciation.

"S-sorry, I'm not very good at weapon handling..." His posture relaxed slightly as he apologized, and rather than wariness or defensiveness, it was a stance more suited to deference. Despite his fickle nerves, he was surprisingly calm, and even managed a little smile. Perhaps because Rep hadn't laughed at him or called him out for his stumble.

He dislodged the axe from where it had embedded in the ground. "Um, y-you have a large weapon, right?"

Baneful

 

[Baneful]

It was testament to Rep's mood that he didn't immediately take the bait and make some lewd jokes about Oliver's comments on weapon handling and the size of his weapon. As it was, he just eyed the other man, arms still crossed.

"Aye." he said, curling an implied question into the statement.

"You know I'm no a Sun hunter right?" he said. "You could go ask Jordan to talk with you about huge weapons since he's mister ******** knowledgeable. Nae c**t listens to or wants my advice."

He raised a brow. "Unless you were just making some idle ******** conversation rather than askin'."

Grey Dragon

 

[Grey Dragon]

Oliver was a little surprised at first, he had never made a distinction between divisions when it came down to weapons advice. Everyone had to know how to fight, even in his own relatively safe division there were times he could have been killed if he hadn't been able to defend himself. A few times he had almost been killed anyway. Regardless of what division Rep was in, he had survived, and that was a good enough qualifier for advice any day.

"Jordan i-isn't standing on the training field watching other people practice," the freckled boy said meekly, feeling out how honestly he could speak in front of the other. Twitter was one thing, it held a trace of the online distance he was more comfortable with, but he couldn't put the entire world behind a screen. "Um, I-I think I could use whatever advice I was given... I-if you wanted to give advice I mean, uh, i-if you didn't h-have something else you needed to do or... um..."

Oliver's composure faded slightly with the nervous stammers, but at least he looked earnest about wanting to learn something, anything, that could help him stay alive.

Baneful

 

[Baneful]

Rep sighed. "I can ********, like, spar you and point out whatever I can. But I'm nothing special, most of what I learned I just.. Tracey knew it, I just learned to listen to him."

Regardless of this less than optimistic outlook, he summoned the weapon, the vast black axe twisting into reality like a shadow slithering into view, the edges solidifying razor sharp and the red runes lighting up across his surface. He was still wrapped tightly in the coils of a long green and yellow whip that did not seem to be part of the axe itself. Rep picked him up as if he weighed very little (which he of course did), and turned to Oliver.

"Ready?" he asked.
 

[Grey Dragon]

"W-wait, um, just like that?" Oliver asked in surprise, his weapon lowering slightly. For a second he felt as though he had gotten in over his head, not just sparring with any regular hunter, but one who was known for literally hunting things, and fighting, and not pulling any punches. The boy was going to get his a** kicked.

But at least there were shields in place to keep him from getting slaughtered outright, and once he saw that giant weapon he was doubly thankful. You had better not end up that large, he thought to Jökul, I wouldn't be able to even pick you up!  

[Grey Dragon]

His surprised stalling didn't last long. This spar would be safe enough, and a bit of pain was well worth the practice and knowledge he would earn from it. That was what he was out there for, wasn't it?

Despite the sudden rise of nervous energy twisting in his stomach, Oliver quickly stepped forward, and used that speed to pull the axe into a two-handed, horizontal slash. He couldn't let himself get scared off.

HP: 50/50
DMG: 4

Baneful

 

[Baneful]

Oliver's strike was stronger than Rep had thought it was be, imagining nothing but a feeble little love tap from the other man. At the very least he was somewhat used to fighting against larger weapons thanks to Jordan and recovered quickly, twisting Tracey around to interlock his blades with Oliver's axe, throwing his weight against the handle to shove the other man back.

"No half bad for a wee ******** runt." he said.

HP: 57/60
DMG: 9

Grey Dragon

 

[Grey Dragon]

Oliver yelped as he was easily pushed back, but his stagger didn't last long. He used the momentum from the recovery to power his next swing, striking more fiercely. There was some level of determination in the boy's movements, for all the timid self-depreciation he accepted as a part of himself, there was also a desire to survive.

"Ah, th-thanks... I-I think," he stammered a little belatedly. Even though it was also a jab at his unimposing physique and even smaller confidence, Oliver was willing to take whatever compliment he was given and be grateful for it.

HP: 51/50
DMG: 7

Baneful

 

[Baneful]

Rep's fighting style on the other hand seemed to for the moment be lazy and without an enormous amount of co-ordination or direction. He fought best when he was angry, projecting all of his hatreds and issues onto his opponent. Right now Oliver was just Oliver, an inoffensive young man who just so happened to have a similar weapon, there was no reason to harm him or otherwise step up his attacks.

But still, for the first time in a long time there was fear coursing through him on the sparring field, the old thrill slithering into his thoughts and into the voice of Tracey as the fallen angel crooned his approval of their respective freedom. They could fight again, they could do whatever they wanted again and Marie couldn't hurt them.

The follow up strike hurt, it always did, but pain was a satisfying and welcomed thing for Rep, something simultaneously deserved and embraced and he struck back with the faintest hint of a smirk, getting into the fight more and more as it went on.

HP: 50/60
DMG: 9
Charge 2/3

Grey Dragon

 

[Grey Dragon]

As casually as the axe had been swung, Oliver was still staggered by the blow. He couldn't deflect it with his own weapon, the clash cut into his Fear shield and sent reverberations up his arm.

The size of his opponent's axe might have been intimidating on it's own, but it was the skill and experience Rep wielded it with that really gave Oliver pause. It didn't matter how Rep came across on Twitter, or face to face, you could not for a second doubt his combat experience. The kid couldn't imagine the kinds of things the older man must have faced, and survived.

When he noticed the beginning of a fierce smile, the shy kid's first instinct was to turn and run. Oliver forced himself to strike again instead, bringing the axe downwards in a long, vertical slash.


HP: 32/50
DMG: 6

Baneful

 

[Baneful]

Fighting was one of the few times when Rep actually shut up, concentrating on what he was doing rather than what he was saying. He took the brunt of the vertical slash, showing a distinct disregard for dodging, eating a lot of the damage with his shield in order to immediately twist his own blade around for maximum damage while Oliver was close by. He was used to having Harrison a lot of the time to mop up the damage he disregarded, in a spar it didn't matter so much.

He swept Tracey in irritatingly low, aiming to strike with he hook most of all.

The clash of blade against shield made Tracey let out an involuntary sound of delight and pleasure as the rush of fear metaphorically took his breath away.

<> he stammered, Rep just laughed internally he said.

HP: 44/60
DMG: 6
Charge 3/3

Grey Dragon