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 Posted: Fri Nov 08, 2013 4:29 pm
Bleary eyes searched vacant streets, littered with leftover leaves long cast off. The trees, now naked monstrosities clawing buildings with their shadows, simply swayed in the breeze without a sound. People walked, and walked, and walked, constant footsteps forming a percussion against the backdrop of night. And sometimes his eyes would graze a man in a fedora, sporting five o'clock shadow and a knowing smirk that yes, he knew what you thought of him or a girl with frightened eyes and spindly legs who shot down the alleys in search of danger or safety. He couldn't discern which, not from here.
Maybe he'd remember if he saw her on the news, but he just didn't watch anymore.
Slumped forward on the bench, elbows atop knees, fingers folded between each other like bodies piled in a mass grave. He felt haggard, and probably looked the part. But the world didn't care. The world never cared. Destiny City knew his crimes in a private matter, but the remainder of its denizens simply passed him by. Maybe a second glance cast toward the skulls on his sides, but ultimately nothing surprised the masses anymore. Not even bodies cast from buildings on a warm summer night.
The general knew he'd been skirting the topic for a long time coming. A month, maybe linger. He didn't know how long he'd recognized it, as his suppression tactics worked surprisingly well. But now he swayed with exhaustion, and suffered anemia through bad diet. A diet hand-selected due to its animalistic tendencies - straight meat, cooked without salt or spice, or raw vegetables without their accompanying accoutrements. He knew it wasn't truly training for youma life, or at least he began to acknowledge it now.
No one ever became a youma through eating uncooked broccoli. He laughed sardonically, and it rang back at him through nearly empty buildings. Somehow it felt as though those haunted windows were the only reassurance that he wasn't simply a ghost now.
Strange how all that work, all those people painstakingly captured, the few that died and the few that survived, amounted to little toward making a name for himself.
He watched a beggar harangue a punk-looking young man for a dollar, a dime, a speck of dust he might trade toward food for a day. They tussled, only for a moment. A quick punch silenced the vagrant, and the punk kid left while wiping his nose.
The Negaverse didn't really need him, because the earth could manufacture its own anarchy to prime itself for Chaos.
Bischofite sat back against the wathered bench, which creaked in compliance against his back. Something must've splintered the center long ago, for the protruding slivers of wood were worn smooth from the elements. It lost its luster, too, from far too many idle souls adorning the bench with their asses. Fitting that he joined their ranks tonight.
But even as he cast his thoughts to his surroundings, a gnawing itch formed in the back of his throat, too far for his tongue to reach and too high for him to swallow. It eked into his mind, and that's when he recognized it for a senshi signature. It grew in its animosity as the senshi approached, and soon he heard the distant clack of boots high above him. The rooftops, he guessed. So with an even sigh, he closed his eyes and acknowledged his sudden guest.
"Und die Haie umkreisen mein Boot, mein Boot.... Denn ich seh' gut aus." He began, in haunting melody. "Irgendwer da draußen, gibt mir ein Zeichen," his bony index finger pointed in the nameless senshi's general direction. "Irgendwer da draußen, gibt mir einen Grund.*" He trailed off when he came to recognize something in the presence's gait. Something in the way those shoes hit the ground, in the frequency of step. In the lightness of it. His hands slowly laced together once again, and he finally half-turned to regard the one who approached him on this night.
Wings at the small of her back. Striped stockings, white boots, purple orchids, a hood. Atop a building, beneath a stage, in an alleyway not far from the street. But what is there to thwart tonight, Ida? Seenot**?
And afterward he returned his gaze toward the street, without a word in her direction.Bluefire Dragonz *And the sharks are circling my boat, my boat... Because I look good. [break] Someone out there, give me a sign. Someone out there, give me a reason. **Distress
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Posted: Fri Nov 08, 2013 6:42 pm
The corrupted signature ate at her mind like an open, festering wound, the strength of it drawing her in like moth to flame. She knew that flame could burn her alive, but she had found more confidence lately than she had once had, with the wings at her back. She knew she matched it power for power.
The rooftops were ever the favored route for senshi and so she had taken them tonight, drawing slowly, carefully closer. Was it just her imagination, or was that reek of chaos horribly familiar to her? She would have investigated anyway, but knowing what she was up against... there was something to be said for that.
There... down on the street... sitting on a bench? It was so... ordinary. So mundane, she almost couldn't believe that the monster of her nightmares could be sitting there. Just... sitting. And was that... was he singing something? The sound of his voice sent fingers of ice crawling up her spine and she shivered, her hands curling into fists. When she came to the edge of the building, she perched with cat-like balance on the lip of the roof and crouched, her elbows on her knees.
"No one's heart to rip out tonight, Bischofite?" She said, her voice floating down to him. "No children to feed to the youma? Or have I gotten lucky and you've seen the error of your ways and decided to reform?" Being catty wasn't really one of her traits, but as he sat there, doing nothing worth fighting over, it was really all she could muster towards him.
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Posted: Fri Nov 08, 2013 7:51 pm
He would've smiled if he found the mirth to do so. Instead, he watched a lone discarded Starbucks cup roll down the street, occasionally surmounting a rock that offset its original trajectory. He watched it tumble into the street where it found a rolling stream to deliver it into a storm drain, out of sight and out of mind. Nothing accomplished, nothing learned.
And he still refused to look at her, even as she baited him. Oh, and she tried so hard. But tonight he was bloodless, much to her chagrin (or so he hoped).
"Zere are always hearts, Ida. Zere are always children. Zere are always youma. Zese sings are available in innumerable quantities and always at my disposal." But you are partially right - I have seen the error in something. "Why linger here? Go find some fledgeling to trounce so you can pat yourself on ze back for your good deed of ze day. Maybe if you bust enough burglars and wipe enough asses, Destiny City might free itself from ze clutches of Chaos." Sarcasm only veiled his dejected tone so much, but it would suffice as deadpan wit.
"If you are going to banter wis' me..." He stood in the midst of his sentence, and soon no one lingered in the alley.
"Saf'e your breas'." He finished directly behind her. Though he lacked the wherewithal to draw blades on her, it didn't deter him from reminding her of his unsettling unpredictability. But even that lost its spark after a time, didn't it? "Are you bored, Ida? Do you go searching ze night for me to pass ze time? No - I sink you search ze night for anyone like me. Anyone at all."
She was fierce in her own way, firm in her convictions. Though he found her motivations disagreeable, she possessed a drive he now lacked. She could peel through fire, sustain grievous injury if it meant a life saved, some stranger or a prized friend, it didn't matter to her. In a sense, she mirrored that same dedication he possessed not long ago - before this deplorable notion of contorting himself into a monster consumed him whole. But she spit the vitriol that ate through his skin, through the sinew and through the bone, burying into the marrow and consuming him from the core.
Did she know? Did she think back to that night and consider that she won? That she might've just dispelled the monster she so loathed?
Monster. How trite. How utterly ironic. Within their ranks, he wore that name - it stripped him of the humanity he cursed himself for having. Yet he couldn't become what they called him so easily.
A clattering of metal precariously close to Ida's leg called for her attention, and he chased it with a daring statement. "Since you're so interested in seeing me rip hearts from chests, why don't you try it yourself?" As an added invitation, he unclasped the top of his coat and pulled it open, revealing thin red wrapping adorning his chest. "Find my horrible, black little heart and tear it straight from my chest, Ida. It's what you want, isn't it?" He asked with acerbic spite.
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Posted: Fri Nov 08, 2013 8:19 pm
He wouldn't look at her... did he find her so weak that he could ignore her like that? He had to have noticed the change in her... from what she knew of others, her signature shone like a beacon in the night now, the full blossom of her power. It made her reckless and she realized the error when he disappeared, his voice suddenly coming from behind her and making her skin crawl. She felt a flash of something, an ache in her chest, as though he had stuck his hand into her chest again from behind... but it was only a memory, triggered by his little teleportation trick.
The senshi on the ledge stiffened and slowly rose to her full height, her hands by her sides and her head only half turned, most of her face still hidden by her hood and the flowers that decorated it. She was ready for an attack that never came, only words drifting to her as he answered her and more.
"You're right... I search for people like you all night, every night. I don't stop, because you don't. No rest for the wicked, right?" Why hadn't he attacked her? She'd had her back to him... he'd had the opportunity. Was it because they were alone? Because he didn't have some grand scheme in progress? Was that the only way he operated?
The senshi flinched as she heard metal clatter beside her, reminding her he had weapons he could call up at will, ones she had felt personally. Her hand ran over her hip where he had cut her, though she couldn't feel the scabbed up wound through her leggings and skirts. Slowly, so as not to startle him into attacking her if he didn't mean to, she turned to face him, still perched delicately on the ledge of the building, outlined against the sky.
"I get the impression you would almost enjoy having your heart ripped out..." She said as she studied him, all his general trapping pulled away to bare his chest. He... looked younger than she had thought. Not much older than she was. It hadn't occurred to her before, when he was all done up in his ominous outfit. Easy to ignore.
Lifting a hand, she spread the fingers, showing him her palm. "Senshi hands aren't made to go through flesh, Bischofite. And I don't want your blood staining my hands... I don't want to keep any part of you with me. You stink of corruption... I wonder if the level of corruption in a person corresponds to the horrible things they do? Your heart, if you have one, is probably black as pitch..."
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Posted: Fri Nov 08, 2013 8:57 pm
Bischofite did not answer for quite some time. He simply watched her, face partially obscured through the low lighting - only her mouth moved, and he read her lips as well as the meaning behind them. Strangely she reminded him of an acolyte - a woman in the service of the church, charged with spreading the holy word and saving sinners from themselves. She must've fashioned herself as such, albeit she touted no religion. No, she spoke the word of the White Moon Court in perfect pitch, as if she'd been born with their agenda stenciled across her vocal cords. Maybe she had - maybe humans inherited the spirit of the senshi across timeless generations. After all, Persephone had spoken of her ancestors before.
Finally, when she'd finished her demeaning assessment of the general standing before her, he resigned himself to speak. Only when he was sure he could mete out those words evenly, with little inflection and devoid of tremble, did he follow up her analysis. "You're not terribly bright, are you?" He sighed and relinquished his grasp on his coat. Instead he stooped toward the ground and seized one of the chakrams that lay discarded at her feet. With a stern glance he usurped her hand as well, and forced her fingers around the grip of his weapon. Afterward he pulled her single armed hand toward his chest, where the coat now slackened toward his shoulders and pulled near his sternum.
When he was certain the beat of his heart forced his skin to touch metal, he continued. "I would enjoy it just ze same as you would enjoy my permanent surrender. But zis isn't so far from what you're looking for, is it? If I'm dead, who's going to barbecue civilians wis' a livewire and a rooftop pool? Who's going to hang zem from bridges? And who will gif' you a reason to leaf' your warm bed and go out into ze night, desperate for you next pat on ze back? If your beliefs are strong enough, you will kill for zem. I do." He waited for a jolting pain to bury itself straight into his heart, but only her unfaltering gaze remained.
He lacked the patience for her complacency.
"If you detest me so, zen srow my heart into ze street. Let ze rats eat it. Let ze birds dine on it. I will lif' in zem bos'. And when a snake eats ze rat, and a cat eats ze bird, I will lif' in zose too. I will taint everysing it touches. I will lif' in ways zat you could not, and you will curse yourself eternally for balking at ze sought of having a permanent reminder of corruption wis' you. Is zat what you want instead? Come on, Ida, you'f never backed down before!" He watched her in cold fury, searching for the very spark he found when he'd reduced a civilian to a youma visage before her. She possessed spite enough to kill him then, but she relented.
But then was not now. He needed her to match him in derision now.
Finally he snaked his fingers around her throat and threatened her with his grip. "Ida, du käufliche Hure! Kill me or I will bury you." He would've maintained his scathing anger were it not for a single, resounding fact nestled within her soft words: the corruption. Corruption and the inevitable destruction caused by those who carry it. "You sink corruption drives me to break people? Serial killers don't need corruption, Ida. And your kind isn't any cleaner. But if you're so convinced zat my heart is ze color of charcoal, zen cut it out and see for yourself. You'f climbed ze ranks of your own little court, so you should know by now what stains your name. Don't disappoint me." With his final words, he tightened his grip - more as a warning than an actual assault.
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Posted: Fri Nov 08, 2013 9:26 pm
She felt a flash of anger as he challenged her intelligence, but she didn't rise to the bait, staring him down with a frown. Brown eyes widened though when he stepped forward through her imaginary defenses and put his hands on her... her skin crawled as he held her wrist and pushed his weapon into her palm. It felt cold and... evil in her hand. This was a weapon that took lives, that drank blood... and one of the people she feared most had a hold of her.
She shuddered as the metal touched skin, visibly shaking in his grip. Gods above, she was so weak... he could see that, he knew it... and she hated herself for it. Anyone else... Chaonis, or Tsui... Acubens or Persephone... maybe they could have summoned up the courage to use his own weapon against him and end it right then and there. She was not nearly so strong and all her bluster left her. All she could think about was that he had a hold of her and suddenly his hand was around her throat again, his fingers finding the grooves he'd sunk into her flesh last time, as though they were still there.
"Let me go!" She shouted, barely keeping the tremor out of her voice as fear and anger mixed. "Don't TOUCH ME." Drawing back her arm, she punched him, hard and right in the chest next to the chakram he had forced into her hand. She jerked back when she did it, hoping to break his grip.
"I have NEVER killed anyone." Ida hissed. "I don't plan on making you my first. I won't sink to your level, even if it means I have to fight you for the rest of my natural life. If you want to die, then FINE, but it won't be like this."
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Posted: Fri Nov 08, 2013 10:08 pm
The punch was enough to force the wind from his chest and send him staggering backward. The pain felt dull and localized, not far from the stinging sensation where his own chakram bit into his skin. And as the blood cooled in the night air, he recognized its trail down into his coat without chancing a glance toward the damage.
Not that he could've torn his gaze from her.
His gaze spoke of tired disappointment, fueled by sheer desperation. "Ida. Ida Ida Ida. You don't know what it's like to despise being human. And zat... is a sickness zat you inspired in me. Zat is your burden to own. Ever since your words on zat rooftop, I haf' searched ceaselessly for a way to become ze very sing you curse me as: a monster. And you know what came of it? A glimmer of hope. And hope is a poison far worse zan ricin, zan hemlock, zan cyanide. Hope is fatal.
"From it, I learned zat my fellow officers could grant me zat wish, but my search determined zat not even my own allies can tolerate me, and I was met wis' resounding derision for my choice. No one wanted to be a part of it, and after an example was made of someone who completed ze act by accident, no one wanted to knowingly partake." He didn't even know why he was explaining it to her. To watch satisfaction spread across her face? To grace her with the acknowledgement that she might best him in the art of manipulation? He'd spent many a night formulating vicious means by which he might change lives, yet she did so with a simple quip to herald her departure.
She could do what he could not.
"I was left wis' one choice: pray. Pray zat ze higher ups, ze ones who elected me for promotion, might somehow ******** up and splinter my starseed and reduce me to one of zose voracious beasts so zat I might finally find some relief. But I couldn't haf' been zat lucky, right Ida? I couldn't haf' been zat ******** lucky." He laughed, a choking, whistling rasp. The black humor in his recount finally caught up with him.
Finally he approached her. Bischofite understood that he had to push her beyond the limits he'd set before, if he aimed for some kind of catharsis on this night. It didn't matter what it took anymore. "Tell me, Ida - what is an acceptable way to die? Do I haf' to beg? Do I haf' to fight you? Or do I haf' to rape you for you to muster up ze guts to finally kill me?" A single, idle thought caused him to falter - to pause in his relentless verbal assault.
Maybe she could cut the plague out.
"You haf' a habit of ruining my life, child. At least make up for it now."
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Posted: Fri Nov 08, 2013 10:56 pm
Relief flooded her system like a euphoric high when he let go of her and she gasped in air, coughing with a hand to her throat. Oh thank the gods... There was a primal, gut-wrenching fear in having him touch her. If she never let him get that close again, she could die happy no matter what happened, it seemed.
His words, when they came, didn't register at first. When they did, she was shocked and appalled, her brown eyes wide.
"You despise being a human being?" She gasped out, not comprehending what he was trying to tell her. He had gone looking for a way to become a youma? Her words had so scored on him that he had sought a way to end his life? It seemed impossible... but it was apparently true. It would have been so easy for the both of them if he had succeeded. There would not have been so much trepidation in putting him down like a diseased dog, then. And she had never feared a youma the way she feared him...
She was a loss as to what to say to him. She could tout morality and justice, love and protection at him, and he had proved that it meant nothing and he would just throw it back in her face. The only thing that ever seemed to break through to him, to pull out whatever man lay behind the monster, was when. he broke her and she struck out at him in anger and pain.
"There isn't a good way to die!" She finally cried out, trying to back away from him and feeling the tip of her boot only find open air. The fall wouldn't be so bad, but she had to remember she was on a building, she was already as far as she could go. "No... no, there are good ways to die, but you wouldn't call them that. You'd just laugh at me if I said dying to save someone else. Dying, just to end your pain, is NOT a good way to die. Selfish... all you do is strike out at others, I can see that now. Striking out to cover up your own pain and weakness. What hurt you so badly that all you can do is spread your own poison to relieve it?"
Ruining his life, was she? What did he want from her? Did he think she could wave her fingers and make everything perfect? Did he think he could goad her into killing him, for no better reason than because he wanted to die? She was starting to see that so much of her anger, so much of her violence lately was influenced by him. Her hate and fear stemmed from him, fueled by the others of his kind she had met. Ruin his life? He was ruining hers. They were going to drag each other down into hell if they kept on the way they were.
The eternal senshi threw her arms out, the jewelry on her wrists jingling. She let go... let go of all the pain and fear and loathing as it peaked inside of her, feeling as through her chest was expanding with some airy substance as the negative emotions drained away. She felt a laugh bubble up and she let it out, the girlish sound out of place in the dark mood they had been creating.
"Do what you please, but I'm not going to let you escape your pain through death at my hand." She said. "I'm not going to make you the first life I take, I'm not going to let you ruin me like that! All this time, you've been poisoning me... dragging me down till I was no better than the monster you try to be. Now I know... you can kill me, maim me, destroy me... but you can't touch me, not really."
Oh, this was a freeing feeling... there was nothing he could do to her so bad as what she had almost done to herself. If she had killed him... if she had let him do that to her, she would have been lost forever. Now, she felt like she glowed inside, almost weightless with letting go of the anger she had been harboring.
"I can't make everything better for you." Ida finally said as she let the smile fall from her face, replacing it with something almost serene as her arms fell to her sides. "You're the only one that can, you know. Stand up, get a spine, man. Go ahead and hate me, think me stupid, whatever, if it makes you feel better. That pool of misery you're drowning in is your own making and if you want out of it, you're going to have to crawl out on your own. You know what purification is, right? Go find someone who can do it and maybe you can flush all that corruption out of your system and finally find some kind of peace with yourself."
Ida had a feeling he wasn't going to like anything she had said, and if she knew him, she knew he would probably throw it all back in her face... but it didn't matter any more. The catharsis he had been seeking had come to her instead and she had purged all of that negativity from herself. She didn't even hate him any more... she pitied him. She respected how dangerous he was, and maybe she still feared him a little, but it wasn't destroying her like it had been before. Instead, she watched him closely for any signs he was going to attack her, preparing to flee if need be.Strickenized hoshit... he broke her so bad she came back around the other way. Whoops. Not what I was expecting to happen. Sorry she stole your epiphany, Bish!
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Posted: Sat Nov 09, 2013 6:56 pm
The general was so wholly fixated on her that he moved nary a muscle. All of his focus remained on the eternal senshi before him, the one who first retaliated with as much anger and despair as he had manifested himself, and then at once, dispelled it. The vultures no longer encircled her, the rot no longer ate her from the inside out. Mind and viscera intact, she changed her tune. Changed her stance. Changed the way she viewed him and everything he stood for. All the blood and death he'd amassed into his own private necropolis.
And nothing but the dead loomed in those halls.
During his time he'd endured a great many verbal lashings, largely over the same subjects - his lack of humanity, his remorseless crimes, his insidious nature. As always, they claimed him a monster as a means of rendering his thoughts and ideals nothing more than banal drivel. He'd come to expect it, and from what he surmised, it stood as a defense mechanism to halt the raw truths he'd ascertained so easily. He came to understand it as a means of capitulation, as if to say they acknowledged that he discerned more of the world and its true workings than they have, though they lack the mental fortitude to withstand such life-altering revelations.
But, as he listened to Ida and her sudden shift in demeanor, he was wrong. He was wholly, irrevocably wrong. Those weren't methods of capitulation, and calling him a monster wasn't a manifestation of denial for his truths. No - he read far too much into those situations to discern the reality behind it: that he simply lacked all concept for his absolute uselessness in his actions, in the war, in life. He was completely and utterly extraneous both as a civilian and as a Negaverse general.
It was pointless to try anymore.
Pointless to power up.
Pointless to go out.
Pointless to wake up in the morning.
Bischofite had no words to greet hers. There wasn't anything he could say that would've precipitated a change - not now. She already discovered what meager alterations he had to offer, and seized upon them in a positive manner he never predicted. She wasn't reduced to a downtrodden mess, or a loose cannon far too immersed in her own wretched hate to truly understand the damage she wrought on her own psyche. She didn't destroy the White Moon Court through dissent.
There was nothing. Absolutely nothing. No reason to maintain a charade. No reason to respond, to goad her, to retain the visage of Bischofite.
It wasn't like he had much of a reputation.
Silence unspooled around them, and he watched her until his eyes threatened to glisten and blur while he drowned in the stark reality of his pointless career.
Finally he scraped together enough burning, wretched hate for the girl standing before him that he lashed out at her with a punch to the chest. Surprisingly she took it, and descended from the building with far more grace than she manifested when she fell through that trap door. He half-suspected that she expected it, but he had little reason to trust himself anymore.
Instead, he followed her with the determination that, even if he was completely extraneous, he could still beat the living s**t out of her. And so he tried - he tried with every hate-fueled, corruption-filled fiber he could muster. He didn't care if she could read his every move. It didn't matter.
He just wanted her dead. For no reason. No purpose.
Just another body for his dwindling necropolis.
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Posted: Sat Nov 09, 2013 7:08 pm
She had known the attack would come, so when it did she took the punch with her arms raised over her chest, letting the force of it push her over the edge of the roof where she had been precariously perched. She might have purged his poison and bile from her soul, but that didn't mean his chakram's weren't sharp or his strength far greater than hers. He could still hurt her badly, even kill her, and he had proven before that he was not afraid to go for the kill shot like she was. Any weakness, and he would be there to exploit it.
So she fell, knowing the distance to the ground was child's play for her senshi strength. She all but jumped from the height and with the controlled fall, landed easily on her feet and danced backwards, light as a feather in her white boots. Ida kept her mahogany eyes on the dark figure that followed her and kept backing up, refusing to stand to truly face him. If he wanted to attack her with fists, then he was going to have to work for it... stretch to reach her, follow her when she retreated.
His face was a twisted mask of hate and while it made her shiver at the raw emotion, she wasn't going to let it distract her. Her forearms took his punches, winces crossing her mobile mouth when he managed to strike her somewhere soft... and when he let himself open, she swept her leg up and smacked her shin into his side, hoping maybe she could knock him away, or even off his feet long enough for her to break and run for it. If she could just get out of sight, or into a crowd, she could power down and he would never find her.
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Posted: Sun Nov 10, 2013 6:54 pm
Bischofite jumped the ledge with little difficulty. He landed directly after her, and continued his onslaught with little pause. But through each missed punch, every dodge and pass and simple misdirection, another dismal realization crept into his furious mind. And it cooled what rage still pervaded him, soon filling his thoughts with algid truths.
And her kick to his side finally clarified that fact. It sent him staggering, but perhaps more importantly, he no longer had that pool of resentful hate to draw upon. He could blame her for everything in the world - for his father dying prematurely, for his faulty childhood, for the register not quite balancing last time he worked. He could offset all that blame onto her, onto Ida the senshi of betrayal, of hatred and malice and ungodly revelations. But... What would come of it? What would change?
Nothing.
Nothing ever changed. He knew this. He knew this for years.
For longer than he could ever remember.
Bischofite failed a thousand times over, and how many accomplishments did he have? How many against Ida?
Ida Ida Ida Ida Ida Ida ******** Ida.
Slowly his feet found ground behind him, and he slipped both hands through his tousled, decorated hair. A bird skull fell out and clattered to the ground, with its feathers helicoptering down toward the pavement. For a moment he regarded it - splintered down the front, where the thin bone around the eye sockets broke away. The chip skittered a few feet away, but it broke the skull's harrowing gaze. Now it simply looked empty. Empty and pointless, just another marker on the ground with nary a story behind it.
Finally he shifted his gaze toward Ida, though he continued his slow retreat. Once he'd managed a fair twenty feet between the two, he stopped. Hands slipped from his hair, hanging loosely at his sides. Uselessly.
A breeze unspooled between them, and their clothes responded accordingly. "Fine, Ida. You won." His voice betrayed little emotion, as if completely devoid of affect. He needn't explain why or how - she should know this, given how she brought it about. As much as he hated to admit it, she was the better manipulator. She earned this victory. And she would receive her spoils - to never see Bischofite walk the streets again, because his presence was entirely extraneous. And even Alois found little pleasure in his nightly forays anymore. Why linger? Why stay, when the wind blows the other way?
The general watched her for one final moment before fading altogether.
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Posted: Sun Nov 10, 2013 8:00 pm
As he stumbled away from her, Ida watched him carefully, her hands slowly falling from the ready position and her body straightening up. She watched as his slender hands ran through dark hair and knocked loose something that clattered on the concrete. It was like a thousand thoughts ran across his face and she couldn't tell what any of them were.
She blinked, her eyes widening, when he finally spoke. She had... won? Ida wasn't entirely sure what he meant by that... but it seemed to involve not getting hit by general fists or weapons. Confused, she watched as he disappeared, using his ability to teleport to escape from what it was he suddenly couldn't face.
Ida was left standing in the street looking a little lost, but not entirely unhappy about this turn of events. Whatever this night had been leading to, this was not what she would have expected. She had overcome her fear and hate, something she had been holding on to for so long. He had left her standing here with nothing worse than some bruises from their fight. Had she finally, truly overcome the monster of her nightmares?
The lightness inside of her made her feel like she was floating, her mind a jumble of thoughts and emotions she couldn't sort out. Was this hope? Was it, just a little, disappointment? What would happen if she ever saw him again? Would she ever see him again? Why did that bother her, when she had finally beaten him?
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