[ 1v1 ] can never keep my eyes off this ( kostya v stormy )

[medigel]

Not dying, she almost said. Walking. Breathing. Looking like I care if I live.

"I don't," the sentence was split by the blast, a grunt of effort and pain breaking it, "have one. I just do Deathish stuff from time to time more than anything else." Stormy struck back and closed the distance again. "Mostly work on shadowing people, see if they notice me. Most don't."

lurks beneath

hp: 36
damage: 14

 

[its me debz]

"Stealth," Kostya grunted, reeling from the impact of Stormy's weapon, sent sprawling onto his back in a heap, like a puppet with cut strings, "has many uses. Take care not to disappear entirely, da?"

With a shaking arm, he raised his weapon, pointing Syntax to the sky.

He had thought it might work, this time.

He thought wrong.

A rain of energy came down-- on his head entirely. He burst into a snarling fit entirely in Russian, struggling to his feet. Syntax whined a siren that implied his shield was running low, low, low.

hp 8
dmg potato
charge 0/3

medigel

i always make bad GC life choices

 

[medigel]

Knowing full well what the backlash of a charge could be like, Stormy backed off and gave Kostya a chance to get his bearings again.

"It's tempting," she said softly. "I've made a lot of mistakes too. It's easier to disappear than to face them."

lurks beneath

hp: 36
damage: defending for 2

 

[its me debz]

Kostya barked with a grim laugh.

"I think if I had not turned back, I vould have vaded into dark, never to return. It vould have killed me, that much is certain. I saw it in his agents before they perished. Dark machinations are just that. I vas a cog. And vhen I stopped being useful, it vas going to force me in place or kill me in the process."

His fired shot glanced off of the bulk of her weapon. "There is no solution. Ve go on because ve must. That is vhat being a hunter is. Ve are tools to be used, by the faction ve align vith. Or ve--opt out, as Thompson did. The best ve can hope to do is fill in the blanks vith meaning."


hp 8
dmg 5-2=3
charge 1/3

medigel

 

[medigel]

The strike was solid, but as she pulled away she faltered. Opt out? Stormy squeezed her eyes closed until her ears rumbled, a mistake in battle but a knee-jerk reaction she couldn't stop.

"What if we're having trouble?"

lurks beneath

hp: 33
damage: 6

 

[its me debz]

Kostya desummoned his weapon.

"Do you not have anything to live for?" he asked, and sometimes it rang true. His personal connections had dwindled, his self care had dwindled-- everything had.

"I don't know," he said. "If I had known, maybe I vould not have lost everything." He stared out to the direction of the bluffs, wherehe knew tthe sea rolled against the rocks. "But if I give up, I have lost. I have no desire to lose."

medigel

 

[medigel]

She kept her eyes closed but knew to desummon her weapon as well, hands curling in the absence of something to hold.

"I do," Stormy replied quietly, almost mournfully. Almost bitterly.

When she opened her eyes a few moments later, having had to wrestle with herself in that interim over something, she asked, "How's your arm doing? Did the practice help?"

lurks beneath

 

[its me debz]

Kostya moved his arm about, and nodded. "Sore, but alvays is. I hope vhen he changes again, he gets some vay to secure himself to me. Vhat did yours look like, before?"

He politely did not comment on her internal demons. He had his own, too.

medigel

 

[medigel]

"Still big, but more manageable. Less monstrous looking. I wish he wasn't so difficult..." She was lightfooted otherwise; Thane's weight tended to throw that off despite her strength, forcing her to develop several different combat methods of varying degrees.

Wiping some sweat from her brow, Stormy offered, "I can walk you back to your place if you want." She didn't want to be alone so soon after that conversational brush with danger.

lurks beneath

 

[its me debz]

"He is very impressive, however," Kostya said, and nodded to her request.

And led them back towards the dorms, rather than further out to the towns. He'd just moved his bed back to the basement room, after clearing out the dust and cobwebs in his months of absence.

They all had their own demons to wrestle, and Stormy was no exception to the rule.

"Do you have many regrets?" Kostya asked, still beneath the clear blue sky, not sliding his eyes to hers.

medigel

 

[medigel]

"He is cruel. It only fits."

Pocketing her hands, Stormy followed just a smidge behind and beside, curious. She could have sworn Kostya had a house in town. Her head ducked as if the question alone was enough to remind her of the weight of those demons.

"Enough of them," she replied, her gaze lowering. "Maybe. I don't know if they're mistakes or just the natural byproducts of who I am. I don't know if they're the same. I used to laugh and tell them it's just 'Stormy Crazy'--the kind that stands in the rain without a better reason than to feel it happen--but maybe...maybe it was just 'Stormy'."

lurks beneath

 

[its me debz]

"Syntax Error is careless. Not malicious, but not kind. He does not know how to be."

At her confession, Kostya cast her a glance, almost bemused. "I can sympathize, to some degree. Vith everything gone, I find I am hollowed out. Gut, like a fish. Vhat is left, then? Is there anything but vhat caused it all to begin?"

He put his hands in his pockets. " There is a reason I vas chosen. I must take care not to invite it in again. Because it vas me. It vas just Konstantin, at first."

medigel