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Damrius felt the tug on the pole, and did the simplest thing - he let go. As for the knee coming at his face? Well... COnsidering he was already in a somewhat crouched position, he merely rolled forward, under the poll, and once his feet made contact with the ground again, he leap-frogged into a pile of dead humans, still not completely decomposed. In the process of his role, he saw something he could most likely use to his advantage in this.

As he landed in the corpse pile, his hand landed on a pole that was slightly elevated at somewhat of a 45 degree angle, and he twisted mid air to slow himself, and then dropped to his feet, pulling the pole-arm up with him. And what came up was not a halberd, spear, or other normal form of pole arm. Instead, it was a battle scythe, with a decomposing head attached to it.

"mmmm...." He made the noise like it was orgasmic, and then brought the head up to his face, eye level. And then he did probably the most disgusting thing - He kissed it upon it's cold, decomposing lips. And it wasn't just a peck - it was a long, almost romantic looking kiss.

It ended abruptly, as though he just seemed to realize that the being he had been fighting was still there. And the look in his eyes.... It was as though he wasn't there. Not entirely, anyway. Either that, or someone else was there with him...........

That was all damrius needed. HIs left hand shot up, and pulled the decaying head from the blade of the scythe, while also breaking into a run. As he moved forward, loping and sprinting mixed together, he threw the head directly towards the angled body of Sun. He just recognized him, now.

Damrius wasn't far behind, though - he flipped the scythe in his hand, so that the end of the polearm was upwards and the blade downwards, and angled his run to the right.

As he reached the point he wanted - just outside the reach of Sun's stick - he buried his feet into the ground in a skid, using the blade of the scythe to help slow him down as it was dug into the ground as well, he brought said blade up from the ground, and whirled it upwards, as though trying to cut through the air.

However, the air seemed to come alive with crackling lightning as he threw a slash of electrical energy in the direction of the being he knew next to nothing about.

*crunch* *crunch* *crunch* *crunch*

The sound of feet traversing over sand could be heard as a platinum blond man in a red jacket approached his opponent. In his hand was a simple longsword, gripped comfortably. He continued to approach the other man until they were about 30 feet apart. He shifted his weight into a side stance, blade forward and revealing the backup dagger sheathed at his upper chest just beneath the signature crimson garb that the man wore so proudly.

"Hello again! Seeing how I didn't get thrown through time and space for a change, I'm thinking this shall be a fun fight."

Stephen called out across the sands, real or illusory as they may be. He smiled and watched Damion as he stood there. Why they had been brought to the void was off no concern. There was only one reason for them to be there.

Battle.

"Well then. Your opening or mine?"

If he got close enough. Such a big if. There were a lot of things that could come in between Damion and his prey. The sword, for one would be a problem. Energy blasts would be another issue. Still, both were something that Damion had dealt with first hand in one form or another, and it was something that could be predicted and countered.

Unfortunately for him, Stephen had a few new tricks up his sleeve for those foolish enough to come charging recklessly towards him.



As soon as Damion was within 10 feet of Stephen, he would suddenly find himself charging headlong into a surging wall of water that would most likely send him sprawling. Should the man somehow manage to force his way through, he'd find himself running onto the very blade he was attempting to avoid - Stephen had the weapon held forward ready to react in case Damion was capable of such a feat, but presumably anyone who could break through the surge wouldn't be able to react in time to not impale themselves.

Oh yeah, he'd thought this one through a bit.

The blond smiled and waited to see how Damion handled this new move - he had faith in his opponent's capability, and thus he was a good test subject for the attack.

"Dude. Bitchin' trick mate."

He raised his guard, not entirely sure where Damion was hiding or even the extent of it - cloaking? Camouflage? Not that it mattered, it put the opponent at an advantage (and unknown to Stephen, it was entirely his own fault.)

So he stood, still and quiet, and listened to the sounds around him. When he entered, he heard his footsteps making loud crunching noises - if Damion wanted to play Solid Snake, he was going to have to deal with the fact that sand wasn't the easiest thing to sneak around in.

At the moment, they were at an impasse. Who would break first? The hunter or the prey? As far as Stephen knew, at the moment, Damion needed to get in fairly close to attack.

Then an idea hit him. It was worth a shot, and it depended on a few things, but compared to just waiting, it was the best thing going for him.



Stephen focused on the energies of the earth beneath his feet and started causing the ground around him "ripple" outwards. It was a bit of a water users touch to earth, but seeing as Damion was the one who taught him how to manipulate the earth in the first place, it was rather fitting. He would glance around, watching the ripple spread out in a radius, pushing it as far as he could (though after about 20 feet it began to falter due to the fact that he wasn't a master at the art by any means. He could have probably made if farther if he had focused in one direction, but due to the circumstances it was a small sacrifice.)

The idea was to watch closely for any discrepancies in the earth - namely one cloaked or camouflaged Damion Hedley. Since he was certainly not going to ripple with the earth, his cover would be blown were he within the radius of the ripples. And this would allow Stephen to make his attack and end the impasse.

Tactics, clever tactics, and a** kicking. Man, he loved this job.

Movement! Footprints! Clearly Damion had given up his stealth tactics in favor for a head on assault!

...yeah, right.

Damion was good at what he did, and Stephen had to give the man credit. But being a fighter who also used the ******** tactic in battle, he knew better than to drop his guard to attack what was presumably a decoy.

Indeed, it was a good time to show that two could play at this game.



Stephen turned and launched an attack at the incoming steps, a gambit that had two purposes. The first was to launch an attack at the footsteps in the off chance that it was indeed Damion instead of a decoy - better safe than sorry. The second, however, was to give his opponent the illusion that the trick worked, opening himself up for just a split second - long enough for Damion to go in for the attack.

At the moment the Flash Bomb was released, Stephen spun his body right, inverting himself 180 and slashing with the weapon in hand in front of him. If Damion were indeed charging at him from any direction other than the one the Flash Bomb was going in, he'd have to deal with the blade. The bomb would erupt on contact with the sand where the footsteps had been, and would burst with light. Stephen would be protected from the blinding effects due to his back being to the burst, but Damion would still have to deal with the bright light - even if he wasn't in the blast radius, a sudden flash of light wasn't exactly easy on the eyes.

There were a number of things that could go wrong with this gambit, most due to how Damion reacted to it all. But Stephen wasn't worried. This gambit was a solid example of one of his personal philosophies -

When all else fails, fake it!

Damion's cover was dropped, and inward came a punch! Stephen moved his head out of the way of the punch and brought up his left hand. Because of the blade he couldn't particularly grab Damion's wrist for a throw, but he could at the very least grasp the hand as it came in him.

Simultaneously, he would bring his sword in his right hand and slash at the opponent's left knee. Damion was taller that Stephen, so it would be fairly easy to hit his target. Or near it at any rate. The idea was the same - maim the ******** thing so that Sneaky McNinjawitz couldn't move around as easily. And if he removed the leg entirely? Hey, it was the Void.

After the attack, he would shove the fist back, and remove the sword. This would be followed by a side thrust kick (for power), a rear thrust kick (for extra knockback) and spin around finish with a vertical slash down.

Damion was going to have a hard time avoiding the attacks on a gimped knee, and Stephen seemed raring to go. Perhaps it was because of this fight was in the Void, but at any rate, he seemed to be following a technique from the Maximos School of Brutal Efficiency.

What the ******** is this, Cirque du Soleil?

Guess it was time to see if a certain Earth Elemental knew how to fly.

Stephen dropped his weapon and rapidly slammed his now free hand into Damion's unmentionables. If the vice grip wasn't good enough to give the opponent pause, then what followed next would.



At point blank, Damion's junk (and coincidentally the rest of him) would be hit with the full explosive force of the shockwave. Stephen's hand would be ripped off of the groin from the sheer force of the blow, and both members of the, er, "intimate moment" would be sent sprawling in opposite directions.

Oh the things Stephen did for battle.

After he picked himself up off of the ground a fair distance away, he coughed, gathered himself, and drew the knife at his chest to keep himself armed until he could retrieve his main weapon that had gone off in another direction from the both of them.

"Sorry for being a power whore, but that was just too tempting to pass up." said the man with a cocky smile on his face. Good thing he was wielding the knife in his left hand, because his right was STINGING from that blast.