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And so came day again, on and on, on and on, on and on.

Everything changed, all that was once had not been and would eventually cease to be itself again. It was forever, eternity in a line, and it would wait for none.

The cycle started from the top again. A new beginning just like each of those before, beginning with a crack of light showing through a dark too deep to be, from nothing into life.

Gloved palms pressed against either door, taking pause as day streamed in through the crack.

Just like everytime before. Just like everytime to come. The begginning is the same.

With a tremendous creak they heaved themselves open, letting the light come in like a wave upon the form almost celestial by appearance, graceful white folds glimmering bright and waving with the flow of air into the open doors.

It's just that imbetween that changes on us, that will sometimes pitch you into 'heaven' or into 'hell'.

Forward, either foot moved, taking a full step into the ring. White fingers from a black glove raised, casting shadow over his eyes, giving him a view of the crowd, coming to life with excitement as the second of this match's two far-progressing contestants came to view.

It's that imbetween that's told me when to let go and fade and when to hold my ground and fight for what I've been giving, something worth the time.

So fair, the pale skin and eyes gentle blue as the sky cast up in silent appreciation upon the cheering masses and open sky. The white hair and long sheet coat stirred in the moving air, as he leaned his head back and took a deep breath, taking it all in. Black boots planted themselves shoulder width, chain about the waist clinging in joyous note as he let something flood into him, something new that perhaps made the whole of this repeated endeavor into danger for nothing but meaningless glory suddenly worth so much to him, something he could take back to his heaven and add a peice to.

Hope.

I will not lose this life. Not before, not now, not later. I have my heaven.


It's time I learn how to stand and fight the tide.



The man miraculously alive and well enough to stand in this ring again so soon cast his head down, taking several long steps forward, stirring sand, while the right fingers twined in long locks of hair and pulled them back behind an ear.

And turning upward, those fair orbs opened once more.

It wasn't natural, wasn't normal, was perhaps a far reach for him, but even so soon as now there was something right about this; for once in his life, he had a sense that there was simply nothing wrong that came not from some treasured source without, a flickering memory of what he would hold to him through the eternity no matter what he must to bring it, but from himself.

"My name is Rivven Dilys LeFaye; I'll be standing as your opposition this day. Let's make this something everyone here can remember fondly, shall we?" he spoke as he brought the left fist with a small thud against the right palm, and bent at the waist, keeping his legs and back straight, and bowed his head to the armored man opposite.

"Life's too short to do otherwise, no?"

Already leaned forward, Rivven let it keep going, until one palm struck the ground, and pushed off, into a full tilt sprint across the limited distance left between them, pumping arms and legs.

And then the boom off the gunshots reached him, and almost incredulously, he took note of a large number of small black objects hanging in air.
Together, it suggested something he did not want to deal with directly.

Rivven threw his weight backward, swinging his shoulders to turn his body partially around, taking one foot up and digging the left heel in hard as his body and foot turned onto their side. He slid along the ground covering the last several feet practically prone, hugging the ground putting him out of the trajectory of the bullets, booming a second time as they suddenly shot off at full speed. He winced, but didn't stop in slamming his right forarm and right knee into the ground, spinning his body full around, small hips not ideal but still plenty capable for delivering a powerful spinning kick from the ground below the man into the side of his lower ribs, striking with an armored heel, turning Rivven face up on the ground.

With the kinetic energy just eaten up, Rivven's heel would not bounce, making it easy for the rapid snap of the arm to catch the boot around it's ankle, lightly protected but largely left flexible, more than any usual footwear rising above the ankle.

He pulled with the leg, which would have one of three results.

He'd pull loose of the grip, leg continuing to come upward as he turned the backward momentum into a backward summersault, landing roughly on both palms and ball of one foot, swinging the left leg through at an attempted leg sweep.

He'd pull the man forward toward him and down, as well as himself partially up, and flip his torso's weight over onto the left arm, turning his body through to bring the right foot to follow in a kick to the downward coming head, striking the back and following through to drag him to the ground even if the initial kinetic force that would make it into a blow was interrupted.

Or Tacitus would remain stone-solid and Rivven would haul himself up with the pull of the leg, left forearm braced around the knee to help his leg and stomach flip him up together, right fist flashing up into a blow to the bone between the eyes with intended to stun breifly, since that side was left open with the hand holding Rivven's heel. He'd continue to pull his body up beyond that as the right leg hooked around Tac's left (Rivven's right side) and around the knee, pulling the knee forward as Rivven's body wieght struck up against Tacitus' shoulder, carrying both to the ground with Rivven on top assumably.

The bullets, with no clear target chosen besides Rivven, would go for the main target on any person, the torso. The bullets, fired at their massive speed but assumably simply pistol shot size by the mass they had formerly been used at, were going to be unpleasant but not fatal.

They struck the coat, burrowing through the tight interwoven top layer of tough fabric, through a thin layer of padding, and hit the interlocking plates inserted for just this purpose. Their incredible speed would cause the rounds to puncture, but not go all the way through, the plates. The result on Rivven himself was like recieving a very hard punch in the chest from a very small fist.

Coughing hard from the impact, he recovered his wits quickly, pulling the leg back off of the back of the man's head, slamming it onto the ground to remove himself from the twisted position, putting his back to the bent over man, the one leg still held. As the foot landed to keep him in place, he grabbed the weighted end of the chain around his waist, and the chain leading to with the other, pulling at it to draw the slack to that end, and tossed a loop around the man's head and down over his neck with his left arm while the right slammed the weight into the opening in the helm's front, whether that opening be a full face or just one or more bars in the vizor for sight.

Only he wouldn't.

Rivven twisted the weight in his right arm around the end of the loop he'd tossed around the man's neck, wrapping the weight around and pulling to synch it tight like a noose around the other man's neck, and turned, now with his leg released, to stand with his right shoulder forward and left back, legs spread wide for stability. Already pulling forward, his left hand had no longer been needed on that loop since the right took over, and he had plucked the line of the other end of the chain, run under the rest that circled his waist to let it all come loose at once, no longer wrapped around him.

Thus allowing him to twisted either hand into the chain and pull hard.

Which would go from a second delaying Tacitus' retreat with the pull of one hand to tugging him down face first into the dirt.

Given a moment's respite from the pressure, Rivven mentally began his standard combat procedure as his body stepped forward and took motion, locating the nearby taps of whater between low clouds, drinks of spectators, sweat of anyone and everyone- who was human and didn't have crazy non water-and-salt sweat- underground taps, and leaky pipes anywhere around or under the arena. It'd take time, but he wasn't shorted of any material to work with in this match either; just a bit tardier to be receiving it.

Perhaps not so bad though, as the time-slow would make it all the longer until Tacitus hit the ground, settled, and started to rise, the mind naturally wanting to take that two-second span and double it in estimate of the progression.

What Tacitus would find though, raising his face to look ahead of himself, was not a chain, but rather a very large, slow moving black textured thing nearing him, so large it obscured all vision. Or, wait a moment, perhaps it wasn't big, just something close looming in the time-slow-

A boot with light internal armoring struck his face forcefully, then pressed the toe forward on the helm, putting the weight ontop of the head and using his body weight to press it down, face into the sand. Poor guy.

Where this left Rivven was above Tacitus with a very good opportunity to see how the back of his armor was put together, a heavy blade and small weight in hand. To figure out exactly how best to peel it off this man, or how to hit the joints best until the thing dented into a pretty statue holding the man hostage inside. Natural thought, though it mightn't work with the armor shifting and all.

((Go ahead and put it in the OOC instead of here or whatever, Tac. But I want real details please, not how pretty it is. Stuff I can work with. Describe the armor's build, jointing, plating, whatever it has, the relevent stuff.))

Rivven would have seen more than useless cosmetics of the armor. Joints. How the shoulder peices were constructed, the waist, ect. How it was plated. Where the joints where. The layering. Having seen it from front and back, he could understand the build of the armor quite well. And thus, how, were it normal, to harm it and or the man within, as well as what limit it might place on him.

The blade came up, cutting through the sole of the shoe, the metal plating, leather, the padding and fitted bits inside, and then reach the foot. Thanks to slowed motion, Rivven had time to start pulling back, just leaning his torso backward to come away. As time increased, he'd start to fall quicker, upper part having already leaned further back due to it's being out of the time-slow. Thus, while the hand would catch his foot with a wide swing of the arm at it, it wouldn't have a blade sticking up through it. But the pull would bring the two to fighting with pulls, Tacitus' arm pulling the foot down to where the blade sliced at the boot just a bit, threatening to peirce deep with any slip on Rivven's part.

Which was about the point thath the idea of leaving himself open for such a dehibilitating wound looked quite unnappealing. It was time to end the little struggle.

As Tacitus' twisted, slowed by Rivven's resistance but pulling him off balance to fall on his side with him, the ground beneath the two exploded upward.

A forceful surge of brown and muddied water split the stone with it's rush and flung the stone in bits and chunks upward, slinging Rivven and his opponent apart. And introducing a good handful of his own sort of tricks to the game. Unfortunate that he'd lost his chain when the grip had been broken and them slung apart, but it was better than taking the rest of the match on one foot.

Rivven had known to have his arms tucked up around his head, and rolled on his side, gritting his teeth as he bounced along the ground to a stop and small bits of stone struck his skin, leaving stinging openings, or larger peices bruised through his coat. It wasn't going to be enough to stop him when the rolling quit, a good eight feet from where it'd started, and he began to right himself.

Strength and grit may not have been his specialties, but he certainly had some of each.