Welcome to Gaia! ::

"Well... we fight. Fight to get out.. to keep on fighting out there. Always fighting, no matter what. Sad huh?"

He allowed himself the sheer guilty pleasure of staring up at the clouds just a little longer. Taking hold of his cigarette, he smashed it against the ground, putting it out, and mixing ashes with earth.

Standing up soon after, he brushes his hands along his thighs and his rear, wiping any dirt off. Lifting his left arm up, a finger stroked along the length of his gorget, before a simple click was heard. It seperated in half, bringing chains and scabbard down to the ground in a heap.

"It's not my first time here after all... So I have to keep on....fighting."

With that said, he had already turned around, allowing himself to look upon the other man.

His facial features easily discernible from this distance, the one thing that stood out, was the scar running down the length of the middle of his face.

The short jacket he wore soon joined the scabbard, even as he bent over and began undoing the straps to his right greave.

He didn't have any extra auditory, perceptual, or spiritual senses, or something ridiculous of the sort, but it was a good assumption on his part that this man was human. Of course, when one lived in Gaia, not everything was what it at first appeared to be.

Regardless, he set about removing his greaves.

Why, you might ask?

Well, for one thing, he wanted to feel the grass under his toes. He always liked that feeling, a childish one at best, but another guilty pleasure. Another reason was simply that he didn't want to have any considerable advantages over someone.... It wasn't like this guy was out to eat him whole or something. So why bother with the flaming boots?

There were always other days.

"I'm older than I look by the way...." The wayward comment left his lips, even as he stared the man up and down. The sole thing he wore on his body were his briefs, and jeans, along with the charm necklace and wristlet.

He'd have to remember to buy handwraps at some point.

And he relaxed himself. Just really let himself go. At first he was tense, a little clench in his stomach, but it went away. Butterflies in the stomach, nothing more.

He placed his right side forward, with his dominant(read right) hand lifted up so that it lined up with his left shoulder. His chin and shoulder met about halfway, giving slight protection. The right side of his chin was tucked into his lead shoulder. Left hand in close, to protect the midsection.

His body was like that of a car with its engine idling; he's ready to go- with as much power as he would need- as soon as he engages the transmission, which in this case, is his legs and hips.

And he throttled it, with an exhalation of air.

Pointing towards the "older" man's head, his right hand started the motion straight and unswerving. Following the hand, his front foot lifted ever so slightly off the ground. Just as quickly, the muscles of the rear leg pushed him forward, propelling the body weight behind the punch with great momentum.

The right arm would travel completely straight throughout the entire motion. Upon impact, the fist will land first, having been relaxed all the way through, clenching at the last moment with a final snap three inches past the point of impact. All energy and momentum are focused on the bottom three knuckles, the fist being held vertically. Followed by the fist is the front foot, and then the rear. The shoulder extends, and the hips snap, thrusting through the target. With the arm, shoulder, and hips in action the body forms a straight line at the final destination, the man's head. Thisin turn would grant a minimum amount of wasted energy. The entire body weight would collide with the target.

"No...not really." He frowned slightly, not knowing if he was being made fun of or not, and for that was losing his concentration. He bit his lower lip, and his arm was pulled back by the hips as quickly as it was launched. The body recovers into its original position smoothly, without loss of balance. With a clean recovery, he was ready for another attack.

He knew from the start the guy wasn't a push over. Chalk it up to a gut feeling. But he needed to fight to get out of here, so fight is what he would do. The moment this man stole his attention, was the moment he would end up losing the fight.

He resumed the same stance, but this time began moving his hands around, in an effort to hide where he would strike from, and when. An opponent like this would easily be able to catch telegraphed movements.

"Your move."

He wouldn't leave things to chance.

His elbows remained in pretty much the same position throughout the movements, his eyes watching for anything, any single thing that would mean a hit was coming. As he started up the arm motions, he pushed with his front foot while stepping backward with his rear foot. Feeling it touch, he would shuffle the lead foot back again to resume his "stance".

There wasn't much to say at this point.

Seeing the left fist come in, his lead leg was quickly drawn back to where his rear leg ess, while simultaneously withdrawing his rear leg backwards. The entire weight of his body would be resting on the lead leg at this point, with the rear foot barely touching the ground for counter-balance purposes.

Of course, he'd had no way of foreseeing it was a fake, but either way he'd begun the motion with intent to avoid the blow, and the fake gave him just as much time to complete the pendulum motion backwards, safe from even the uppercut.

As soon as this happenned, he immediately reversed the movement, with the rear foot moving back to its former position and the lead leg becoming an offensive weapon of attack by returning fire with a direct lowline side kick to the man's knee.

He shot his lead hand down to counterbalance the motion of his kick, and make for a quick return.

There! He wasted no time in thrusting up and forward with the lead knee.

With the back leg raised on the ball of his foot he then pushed forward and twisted his hips, while elaning far back, with a fulyl extended knee. Both his hands would be up, protecting his head from any strikes, making it more difficult to land a blow.

His elbows remained in pretty much the same position throughout the movements, his eyes watching intently. As he started up the arm motions, he pushed with his front foot while stepping backward with his rear foot. Feeling it touch, he would shuffle the lead foot back again to resume his "stance". He resumed the same stance, but this time began moving his hands around, in an effort to hide where he would strike from, and when.

Stupid...stupid, stupid.. It was his own fault for disturbing himself, but then again-- not everything was lost.

Back hitting the floor, his elbows came up, tucked against his head and pointed outwards. Effectively guarding either side of his face, and making the front of his face, a narrow hitbox. With luck, the old man would bust his fists up on his elbows alone.

But lady luck was such a fickle mistress.

And so, as he fell backwards, he also hooked both legs about the man's waist, locking his ankles together, and tightening the grapple hold. He'd need just one opening...

::Theres no need to take long walk down memory lane, so we'll just skip to one of the highlights. Jacks trip to china at age 6. He watched an old Shaolin Monk punching a block of steel, apparently he punched that block of steel exactly one thousand times each day, in the belief that doing so would make his hands as hard as steel. ((The Monk truly exist, and truly practices this. He infact leads the Shaolin Temple.))

Now Jack was five and his mind was impressionable so he started practicing this, needless to say, between age 6 and age 9 when his parents were killed their insurance bill rose due to all the broken fists. BUT, here 53 years later after several years, his hands didnt break, or bleed quite as much. But, he wasnt anywhere near a thousand punches on this mans elbows, but the mans arms werent exactly steel, and his hands were doing A'Ok. He kept up his pummeling never pausing for a moment. He was a boxer, in his training he beat those small punching bags until his arm couldnt move anymore and so he had some time to think while ignoring the mans legs. He needed a new target.

Got it.

While still punching his right leg leaned back. Since he was already kneeling, another leg fully extended back would be a nice brace to hold himself in place should someone try to toss push him back, his stance was sort of similar to a runner, waiting for the starter pistol. He was protected against flying back...but not much else.

He didnt know how much his opponent could see, his left arm went slack down by his side and for a moment the punching stopped. Jack turned at the hips leaning to the right as his right fist reached up and back until it was aligned with his shoulder, as if he was about to come screeching down with a doozy of a punch. Granted, he had left himself quite open, while he reached back for the punch, and it took quite a bit of time. All of one whole second and a half. Now thats not sarcasm, in a fight, a second is a lifetime.

But as could be predicted by blind psychic, if it hadnt been interupted by a certain wise fighter laying on the ground, his right fist came careening down towards his opponents elbow defense. Like a Mean Bullet, cept no where near as fast.::

Gotcha!

::He started saying it, but it really wouldnt finish until after the fist had struck. Yes, fist had struck.

You see the tricky thing about fists, is that they come in two. And there was really no sane reason why Jack would leave himself so wide open by leaning so far back...unless there was more to this trick. Especially with the way he left his left fist so slack.

The Red Haired Head peeked out from behind those arms like a kid poking out from the pillows shouting "Peekaboo!". It swung forward at him with skill and speed to bust his face right up. But Jack was ready.

Half way between the ground and Jacks face there would be an interuptiong. Remember that left arm? They was it was so loose, well there was a reason behind that. That right fist was never really meant to strike in the first place, but as he leaned his right shoulder back to prep the fist, he would have to push his left shoulder forward giving him enough time to sending a first thawking hook toward the side of the oncoming face from his left fist. That was the real strike in all this.

That right fist? Way too obvious. Nothing but a fake. Jack really didnt see any means of defense for a headbutting head from a oncoming fist from out left field. But then again, looks were always decieving.::