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 Posted: Mon May 30, 2011 4:50 pm
"You choose to fight for a cause that leaves helpless, innocent people dead. I cannot sit back and watch you do it."
Camelot didn't see the tears in her eyes right away, but he did notice the tension in her body language, how deeply affected she was. Did all Negaverse warriors believed this deeply in their duties? No, he knew they weren't all this way, this, at least in his mind, blinded. Almost brainwashed. It was saddening, in a way. She might not have been as young as some of the fighters he had seen out there, but she was by no means seemed experienced enough to have lived her life for herself.
To be so dedicated to cause to abandon oneself, or more, have that duty become their whole being. He was preaching life and civilians, the innocent and those who had lacked a choice. Where was the line? Had she chosen this path, chosen to dedicate herself so wholly to her cause, or was it truly brainwashing?
The fact that Camelot did not know the answers only strengthened his resolve.
His words remained true. He would protect her should her life be in his hands. His eyes flickered as she looked down at her feet, a wave of relief and a breath escaping his lungs that he hadn't known he was holding. They burned angrily at him, and he took a slow breath to steady himself again.
When she attacked him he tensed and instead of lifting his shield to block her he pushed it out in a different kind of defense. He felt her hands on his neck and jabbed the shield forward, slamming it into her midsection when the distance between them closed. He stumbled toward the stairs but caught his footing and struggled to push her away from him, back away from the stairs.
"I am not wrong! Neither of us are wrong! But it doesn't have to be this way! This war is wrong!" He was losing his edge, devolving into a bitter argument rather than rational thought. But he was in the middle of a fight now, so that was bound to happen. "I don't have to agree with you, nor you with me, but it doesn't have to be this way!"
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Posted: Mon May 30, 2011 5:31 pm
Camelot's neck was perfectly within reach, she even felt his warm flesh under her fingertips, but suddenly, before she could savor drawing his life from him, she felt herself struck by a force in her gut that sent her stumbling backwards, clutching at her ribs. All that surprise, and for nothing but a few scratches on the man's neck. She had never been a Lieutenant fond of violent deaths, but Camelot had sparked something in her so fiery and turbulent, she wanted nothing more than to end him where he stood. His words were deceptive and poisonous, and she was going to have no more of it.
She'd heard the man's opinions, and now he was going to die for it.
"Oh, but it does have to be this way," she hissed, and with a pop she summoned her weapons to her hands, flimsy and paper as they may be. He was close to the stairs, maybe she could make him lose his footing with a distraction. "Your opinion denies me the only thing left for me in this world, and I am not to be denied." This statement was, perhaps, melodramatic: as Suri, she still had her students, her cat, and a dashing date who had no doubt left the library scared and heartbroken some time ago. Of course, these were all trifles to Zircon, who had only the Negaverse and a bitterness fostered by a deep-seeded rejection. She could not have peace: peace would not fill the dark emptiness she felt in her chest. Now that she had been tried, only blood would satisfy, preferably his.
She fired each of her paper airplanes at him, one after the other, then rushed forward a second time, hoping to topple him down the stairs with herself included if need be. In this light, he might not even realize that the projectiles were made of paper.
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Posted: Mon May 30, 2011 5:57 pm
Camelot took a breath, feeling like she had managed to take the air out of his lungs, at the very least, with her attempt to choke him. He felt stinging cuts on his neck but he could hardly pay them any mind. His heart was thundering in his chest, deafening his ears, his head feeling like it was drumming to the beat of his throbbing pulse. Fear and adrenaline coursed together through his veins, and he tensed immediately for another attack.
When the planes appeared he didn't know what they were, having run into Negas with some nasty weapons before and not wanting to let himself get surprised. So, in his efforts to defend himself from a weapon he was over estimating, he likely did himself in.
"Whatever you say, whatever you do, I still don't want to hurt you! You can be more than this! There is more than just hurting and killing, in the name of some idea!"
He was yelling at her as she rushed, though, and his words were a bit strangled by his movement to block the first plane to reach him. It bounced off his shield harmlessly and he realized too late that the weapons were made of paper. Her attack threw him off balance and there was a moment of startling clarity as he looked at her.
He saw himself falling. That part was easy. He also saw her momentum, her footfall, her balance altered by slamming into him. He realized she was falling with him, maybe even before she had seen it herself. His hand lashed out and her grabbed her, pulling her to him. He couldn't shove her backwards, not as far into the fall as he was, but he still could not deny his usual impulses.
Protect. There was no line between friend and enemy at the moment. He grabbed on to her, both arms around her by the time he slammed into the stairs, the two of them tumbling down together. He did his best to keep her from the brunt of the fall, his mind doing flips as they crashed violently down the stair well, spilling onto the floor of the entryway to the library.
He was laying on his back, with her almost on top of him, his eyes shut tightly. Pain was crackling through him, and for a moment he didn't move.
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Posted: Mon May 30, 2011 6:55 pm
Success.
There was murder in Zircon's eyes as she hurtled towards Camelot, one-minded and determined. She leapt for the man, grabbing his shoulders with a mighty push, and time seemed to slow as he felt backwards, giving her the time to shout out in victory. This blasphemer was going to pay, and Zircon would sleep well that night knowing that this Camelot Page would plague no one else on her Earth. And for that moment, she was satisfied.
But there was an error in her plans, too hastily made for wisdom to come into play, and where there had been carpet to catch her once, now there were only hard, dark stairs. The laws of momentum would not allow her to backpedal as she had done before, and had she been in a clearer state of mind she might have even drawn out the vector arrows in her mind to show why it could never happen. She nevertheless tried to pull herself away from the inevitable, but like her opponent, she was falling, falling, and the world rushed up at her with such alacrity that all at once she realized she had gone too far.
She expected bruises and blood, but felt instead a strong pair of arms, a pained series of grunts that jarred her body and mind. When she found herself at the bottom of the staircase, it was relatively unharmed, but nevertheless under the protection of the one she was supposed to be busy killing. She fumbled free of his unwanted touch, her breathing ragged like a frightened animal as she stared at him with a bewildered, feral look.
He was hurt, weakened at her feet, and yet she didn't strike, not yet. "What," she asked, her voice low and broken, "...Why did you do that? Why?" His chivalrous deed didn't seem to be helping the woman's psyche, but it at least kept her at bay for the moment.
"That's not how this is supposed to work."
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Posted: Mon May 30, 2011 7:12 pm
Camelot groaned as he moved, looking at her with a beleaguered, pained expression on his face. But determination swam behind the pain, even pushing it back and steeling his expression. He shook his head and tried to push himself up to his knees.
His arm trembled with agony shooting through it and he collapsed in a heap, thrown off by the unexpected lance of pain. He cradled his wound arm, his shield arm, to him, grimacing but trying to get back to his knees without the aid of his arm this time.
"I told you," he said, with a heavy breath and a slow tone, his voice thick with pain and slight bewilderment from the jarring fall, "if your life is in danger, I will defend it. I won't let you die, and I will not be responsible for killing you."
He slowly struggled to his feet, but slipped back to his knees. There he was, kneeling beside her, looking at her with dark, pained eyes that glistened with determination and his own brand of righteousness.
"You give yourself over to these... conventions of fighting. What you should and shouldn't do. What you're told to do. Ughh," he got to his feet again, wobbling, "but it doesn't have to be this way. You should live for yourself. It's your life," he realized he didn't know her name, "officer. Your cause doesn't have a life to lose in this. You do. Don't you think there is more for you than dying because you pushed some enemy down the stairs?"
He was not in a position to defend himself or, what was more, stop her if she tried to make a break for it.
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Posted: Mon May 30, 2011 7:39 pm
It would have been easier if he'd tried to attack her, reached up and tried to wring out her throat and put her down while she was still frozen in place. Then she could have batten him away and killed him right there on the library floor, a testament to anyone who tried to trespass on her lands ever again. This was her library, and she had just paid for it in broken ribs and blood. No one would ever take it from her again.
But it's Tony's library, it always was.
The tendrils of chaotic energy seemed to ebb away from her consciousness as she calmed her breathing, and only then did she realize how much the dark energy had taken control of her thoughts, honed them into sharp murderous musings that would have killed the broken man before her. He knelt before her with such sad green eyes that Zircon had to take time to pause, her heart pounding and her hands shaking. She could have ripped his starseed from his chest at any moment, but there was no longer any sport in that. She needed to hear what he had to say, why he felt compelled to such madness as saving his own enemy.
"...Zircon," she completed for him, in the softest voice she'd used since she'd sensed his presence in the library. "My name is Lieutenant Zircon. And this," she murmured, glancing around the lobby, though by her tone she seemed to be referencing something bigger, something greater, "is worth everything I have."
The chime of a bell was distant, but in the silence it tolled nine times uninterrupted, breaking the silence of the empty hall. It was then that Zircon realized she was late for her date, and with pursed lips she glanced down at herself, testing her ribcage with a slight nudge and wincing. There was no way she could go anywhere tonight: she had to patch herself up, cover the bruises. She wouldn't want Tony to see her this way.
"Think about where your loyalties lie, Camelot," she continued softly, her words almost tender as she gently touched his shoulder. "I owe you for the stairs, but the next time we meet, I will kill you." She nodded her head, a signal of modest respect, and then she walked for the door, slow and almost limping. She continued on at that pace until she was at her car, and then, with a heavy sigh, Zircon powered down under the protection of night's heavy shadows.
It was not befitting of a Negaverse Lieutenant to cry. But in that dark parking lot the skin of a soft, broken science teacher, the woman known as Suri Ellis wept bitter, cold tears.
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Posted: Mon May 30, 2011 7:54 pm
Camelot watched her as she spoke, his muscles still tense, his body telling him to defend himself. He did not move, his eyes on hers, noting the way her expression changed. No longer that deadly glare, though she was certainly not happy. Not a friend.
Her words confused him, but he did not take the moment to look around the library as she looked around. He assumed she meant more than the obvious library lobby, of course, and he nodded his head slowly. Zircon. He would remember that name.
As her hand met his shoulder his expression softened, and he nodded his head sadly. Enemies they had to be, and he would not let her kill him when it came down to it. But with every fiber in his being he felt he knew exactly where his loyalties were. She might want to harm him, but he would save her yet.
When she left he stumbled to the front desk, collapsing behind it. Dogby came out from her hiding place to lick at his face. He didn't have the energy to shoo her off, powering down. There was no one left in the library, and he was going to have to sit up and get himself to the hospital.
He was going to miss his date.
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