The Honor Circle Returns! (IC)

[SpottedKitty]

Despina's ears twitched, then laid flat back on her head. Had she just heard someone say that hated nickname...? Her tail lashed once from root to tuft, and a low rumbling came from deep in her chest that didn't sound friendly enough to be a purr. She turned to glare at the hedgehog, then stalked towards him, unclipping her cloak and tossing it over her shoulder as she went. Andrace sighed in bemusement as the cloak draped over her head. "An' here we thought it was Zoe had th' shortest temper o' th' lot o' us," she said from under the folds of green and gold cloth.

Despina stopped right beside the hedgehog's barstool, close enough to loom over him. She tapped her metal staff meaningfully on her shoulder. "Y' want t' say that again... half-pint? I didn't hear y' right th' first time," the lioness said with a constant snarling undertone in her voice. It was probably just a trick of the light that made her eyes appear to have a slight fiery red glow to them. Probably. It certainly would have been tricky to spot the quick gesture the lioness had made with her right hand just a few moments before.

Behind her, Andrace raised a corner of her sister's cloak, peeked out, then let it flop back over her snout. "No, officer, I've never seen th' woman b'fore in m' life," she muttered quietly. She said it several more times, apparently trying to practice an innocent tone of voice, but never quite succeeding. It didn't help that she was also trying, maybe not all that hard, not to laugh.

[Stygian]

Andrea gave the eerie sphinx-like creature a nod of confirmation, mastering her expression and straightening her jacket needlessly. She certainly had no intention of beating the Maine Coon-demon senseless either, mainly because she probably didn't even need to do in order to win. There would be no use to victory if she couldn't come out on top like that. If she couldn't...
  'Right then. My victory terms... Hm,' she chuckled, then smacked her lips once. 'If I win, you have to obey one order from me. Now, whenever you're ready.' She turned swiftly on the spot, and then stepped into a ring. Now, all there was to decide on was a battlefield. Or, rather, in her case, to wait for Dekuyaketh to decide one, and hope that he picked something at least approaching manageable. Hopefully, the fight wouldn't be played out on a too physical level, she thought, so anything but the insane would be alright.
  She flinched. For a moment Andrea replayed that last thought in her head. And then, she smirked. It would be appropriate, after all. And she was familiar with the environment, which in this case was an unfortunate fact. If only she could somehow suggest to him...
  For a very brief moment, Dekuyaketh felt a strange sense of nostalgia. Something came over him and was gone in a flash, unable to maintain any influence over him, but for a second he had a sort of tight feeling around his wrists and ankles, and could almost feel a dry and cushioning feeling that made him think of... padded walls?

- -

Calmly yet intensely, gleaming with analytical apprehension, Stygian's eyes followed Sylvie closely from their fixed position in his apparently immobile head. They seemed to narrow tiredly just a hair when he saw her slight swagger, but his face didn't give away whether if he were making an expression of appreciation or disdain. As she pulled up a chair, he felt like sighing, or possibly moving his ragged limbs a bit to catch attention. He experienced a moment's feeling of hopelessness for the people around that failed to notice how he was bleeding.
  Then, Sylvie spoke up. Her smirk gave an edge to her words, and a brief kaleidoscopic pattern of ideas and images flashed through Stygian's mind. His mouth? In particular? He could imagine all sorts of implications to that comment, most of them pleasant, but knowing Sylvie and taking into account how she had acted before, his mind, so very machine-like and logical, led the idea like a current through a circuit board, taking the simplest and most probable path without fail. She was going to have him talk about something? Divulge secrets?!
  Imperceptibly, Stygian's back muscles tensed. As the elf turned her attention elsewhere, his eyes, now quite more open and attentive, flicked their gaze over the room as he began searching for bottles and syringes, looking for sedatives or pain relievers. A couple of fingers on his damaged hand twitched, and his wounds gently began to sizzle.
  The most unpleasant mistakes were always those that one couldn't get a hunch that one was making.

[llearch n'n'daCorna]

Witt glanced over his shoulder, then turned. He noted the big lioness he'd drunk under the table - not that that narrowed it down, but she'd introduced herself as Andrace - appeared to be with this new lioness. That meant he probably shouldn't kick her tail immediately. Or maybe not - it appeared Andrace was giggling to herself at the reaction. Hmm.

He paused, looking her up and down. Or, at least, up and further up. Fortunately, the bar stool was raising his head a little from it's usual height. That meant he wasn't face-to-navel. Unfortunately, he wasn't quite face-to-face, either. More sort of... face-to-chest, which indicated, to those who might be inclined to think about it, what she might be annoyed about. Witt, sadly, was not such a person. He tilted his head to one side, and gazed briefly up at her, then responded.

"You're a long one, ain't you." He turned he had back over the bar. "Yo, keep. I think the lady is hungry. Make that two stacks." He fished out another coin, and set it spinning by the one already there, then turned back to Despina, raising one eyebrow. "Unless you're wanting something else. You prefer crepes, or waffles? Or should we stick with the pancakes? Any objections to bacon, maple syrup, and bananas?"

[Yugo]

Kaela had been enjoying the rich and frothy taste of her next beer, one hand propping up her head as she watched the ongoing fights with a mute lack of interest. Her bald companion seemed to have dissapeared without further fanfare, and her sudden companion she had found in the Kithara hadn't lived up to her promise of swapping interesting war and adventure stories quite yet. Bloody hell, but I'm bored out of my wits. The thought passed by quietly as her claws clacked against the bar's surface, and she gave a slight glance towards the dark lioness entering the bar before returning to her brooding. Somehow, her brain didn't quite make the connection.

Had she been paying attention, she might have seen the incident coming. As it was, with her senses completely oblivious to the world, it could not have fared much worse for her. As the two sisters embraced one another happily, spinning in their mutual bar stool, something clipped Kaela's leg and sent her wildly off balance. As with most frequent patrons of various bars, the older wolf had the sense of mind to keep her alcohol from spilling all over herself despite her own lack of control. A loud thud bounced off of the walls of the establishment. Kaela opened her eyes to the sight of a particularly irritated lioness striding by to threaten the short hedgehog nearby and quietly clambered back up onto her stool. "What's gotten up her dress?" One hand rubbed the back of her skull as she took a drink of her miraculously unspilled beverage.

[Stygian]

Practically walking into the door of the infirmary, as though expecting it to get out of her way out of deference to her irritation, Sahlena emerged back into the bar with a most un-machine-like desire to drink, be rude and meddle with things. She stopped by the table on which still lay the scattered components of the upgrade kit from before and took a scathing look at them. She picked up a little gleaming composite plate, studded on the backside with a carpet of carefully soldered little fibrous rods, and turned it over in her fingers, then tossed it back into the pile carelessly.
   The machine was stewing with frustration. She knew Stygian. It was the same thing as always. He got nowhere, dug himself down in things, and expected her to put up with him as he did. And when this was all over, when this clumsy attempt to hook up with the elf he'd made had failed and next the inevitable unsuccessful distractions were over, he was going to take it out on whatever he could, quite probably her to some part. And she wouldn't even get an upgrade, or any of that time to enjoy herself that she'd hoped for. What joy.
   The machine's multi-attentive mind picked up on something. She cast one look at the door down into the cellar, where that great dark storeroom still lay, and a few calculations flashed through her processors and settled into her RAM as she picked up on the way some of the light and heat 'curved' around the door downstairs. Then she turned her sensors toward the bar, where the most recent conflict was developing, and in her irritation she just didn't care to stay out of things. She strode over to the bar, suggesting her way in next to Witt and smacking down a note on the counter.
   ':i'll just help myself here...' she said, as she quite literally extended one arm and rummaged around among the bottles behind the counter. She then looked over Witt's spiky head, placing all the gazes of her seven eyes on the newly arrived lioness.
   ':don't reward him. his type likes the attention,' she said, pouring herself a generous shot of vodka and reaching for the tomato juice next. ':my advice, if you're not hungry, is to keep him hanging.' Next came the sauces, and then, with record speed, the machine was sipping on a rather dirty Mary. ':eventually, he'll just have blueberries...' she said.

[SpottedKitty]

Something in the right place for an ear twitched under the draped cloak. Andrace pulled the cloth off her head and ran her fingers through her hair to tidy it up... as much as it ever was, anyway. Keeping one eye and ear on her sister, she leaned towards Kaela with a wry smile. "Ah, that's m' little sister Despina," she said, "I left th' rest o' th' Pride in a bit o' a mood th' other day, an' she usually follows on a bit later t' see if I need cheerin' up — she's a good kid. Well, I say little, she's near my height, but she ain't got it... not like me an' th' girls have, knowhatimean?" The lioness winked, and let a sensuous wriggle run down her spine, from the base of her skull to the tip of her tail, undulating all points in between and leaving little doubt as to the identity of "the girls".

"Anyway," Andrace continued, "that's th' problem, she's just a leetle bit sensitive 'bout it, even m' baby sister Eugenia's got more o' a figure. An' then Zoe... o' course, it had t' be her... came up wi' that silly nickname. Y'know, pancake, as in "flat as a" — an' now she kinda blows her stack every time she hears it. We're not sure how serious she is 'bout it, though. I mean, she gets kinda loud, but she never hurts anyone that don't d'serve it... too bad, an' she hasn't even blasted any holes in th' walls or ceilin'... yet."

[Boog]

Boog watched Sahlena engage in the most sedate "storming off" he'd ever seen, but a storming off he was pretty sure it was. Girl was pissed. He looked down at Stygian in the bed.
"Wonder what you're after this time...?" He mused, turning away as Dr. Holic entered the room. "Wouldn't worry about the punctured lung, kiddo. I'm pretty sure I've seen him grow the whole thing back before anyway. Then a spare, for laughs."
Holic nodded though, listening carefully to Sylvie's testimony of the man's damages. "We'll do everything we can for-" When Stygian's wounds started sizzling, though, he took a step back and set his sutures aside. "... As I was saying, everything we can for him after that stops happening. Or after I finish getting my heavy duty gloves, one moment please."

--

Boog was back in time to receive Witt's order. Or had he left that room at all? Regardless, picking up on the man's thoughts on the newcomer (another lion chick), he grinned and starting making his way toward the small "kitchen" behind the bar. "Want 'em with blueberries on 'em?" The newcomer looked annoyed, but hell, she'd keep for a minute.

--

"Nah, not a concept, I think it's like I ate a- whoops!" Big Bad jumped out of the way of the blade, stepping up into the rubble of the suburban two bedroom home, next to a fireplace that still had pictures of grandchildren on it. "I think I ate a concept. Or it ate me. And now I'm this." He laughed, humorlessly, "An office dork, always was. Don't think I don't know, saw it in your eyes when you first met me. You think so too. But I didn't feel so weak because if I ever really got mad, ever really got sick of how they treated me, well, at home I've got a gun..." He laughed once. Or did he bark? "God made men." The gun snapped up, barrel zeroing in on Dani. "Sam Colt made them equal."

[SpottedKitty]

Despina's immediate response to the hedgehog — perhaps "helped" by the robot's snide comment — was a deepening of her rumbling growl. She didn't seem to be really listening to anyone, though: with her ears flat back and her tailtip making abrupt twitches from side to side, the girl appeared lost in a wash of fury. Her right hand dipped behind her back for a moment, then came back up in a quick movement. She grabbed the front of the hedgehog's jacket and lifted him with little apparent effort until his face was level with hers. This also gave him a closer view of her muzzleful of long, sharp pointy fangs — all of which were revealed by her expression — and the heavy metal staff still propped against her shoulder, held in her other hand. "Think y're talkin' tough, do y', shorty?" she snarled, quietly but in a convincing display of near-berserk wrath. "Think y' c'n just shoot y' big mouth off at any delicate little girl that happens along, do y'?"

Andrace had tensed for a moment as she watched her sister, but now she grinned and leaned back against the bar in a much more relaxed posture. "Now I know she's just been playin' it up all along," she muttered in an aside to Kaela. "She might be fumin' a bit, but if she really felt as spittin' mad as she's actin', she'd have grabbed 'is throat, not 'is jacket — an' got a nice firm grip wi' 'er claws." The lioness had also noticed that quick gesture Despina had made behind her back. She wasn't sure of Witt's exact weight, but she knew to within ten pounds what her next-younger sister could lift one-handed. That grab shouldn't have looked so easy... unless there was a thumb on the scales somewhere.

"So, wanna make a bet, Kaela?" she said to the old wolf, just loud enough to be heard the full length of the bar. "Th' next round o' drinks on whether m' little sister c'n beat Spike there."

[llearch n'n'daCorna]

Witt raised one eyebrow as he was lifted off the floor, apparently without effort, but his expression didn't change, even as his feet dangled above the floor. Neither did he flinch from the growl, nor the claws in his jacket, nor yet even the teeth. He turned his head to the side, keeping one eye locked on Despina's gaze, and raised the bottle in his other paw to his lips, draining it with aplomb.

He lowered it from his lips, and spoke to the thing behind the bar, making a vague circling motion with his other paw. "Hey, is this enough of a damned circle for you?"

With that, he flipped the bottle, caught it by the neck, and paused for a moment. He glanced at the bottle, looked over at the lioness, then the other way at the barthing. He muttered something unprintable, spun the bottle in his paw and placed it neatly down on the bar. He then turned his attention back to Despina, raised his spines, and went on. "Fuck, yes."

With that, he gripped her wrist in one paw, and slammed both steel-toed boots into her solar plexus, twisting in her grip to stand one foot on her chest, and kick her in the chin with his other, riding the collapsing body like a surfboard. As he did so, his hand twisted her wrist, using the leverage of her paw to pop it free from his jacket. As the two of them landed on the bar floor with a thump, his foot kicked back off her chest and he rolled backwards, spines out over her legs, and back up to his feet. Resting one elbow on a barstool, the other on his hip, he enquired "Shall we take this bloody party outside?"

[Angel]

Sylvie nodded, almost glancing at Stygian as Boog referenced him but not long enough to notice where his eyes were. She wasn't sure if he was still capable of healing himself, though. If so, why hadn't he upon completion of the fight? Of course, it was probably a much more difficult task to purge one's body of a poison than it was to heal physical injuries, depending on who and what you were.

That thought drew her mind back out of itself, and she finally looked at Stygian again. But this time, she noticed where his eyes were looking.

"Oh, will you calm down?! You act like I just asked you to summon a Fiend via sacrifice!" Summoning a Fiend was a pain in the ass unless you were used to killing. But of course, there was the problem of having no-one available to sacrifice. The captain had lost a leg, and arm, and an eye that way during battles where they'd needed more help.

"I'm not going to ask you where any bodies are hidden, or whether you've killed any political rulers, or any of that. Why would I want to know any of that anyway? I'm not interested in things like that." She sat back in her chair. She wasn't going to say exactly what she wanted of him, but he at least deserved to know what she didn't want to hear.

----

Dani's confusion steadily turned into a glare as she missed, and then listened to what Big Bad had to say. She knew his type, and she'd never, ever liked them. Cowards were the ones who resorted to guns to solve problems instead of just slugging it out or better yet, just talking, but of course it was useless telling that to this one. Her teeth gritted in frustration. She knew he'd come from some sort of story beyond her world, she recognized it deep at the back of her mind, but she just couldn't externalize the thought...

Then, it occurred to her. She didn't need to know the story he'd come from to know how to deal with this type. She'd had to, all too often, in the workplace. As long as she could keeep in mind that this one seemed a wordier, more cunning sort than them, she could pull something off...

"My, what a misguided theory you have," she said softly, with a weird smile on her face. "I've only met a few people like you. Most office dorks regret their actions the moment they see the inside of a prison. Whatever concept you bonded with must have been a hell of a bad guy." As she spoke, she slowly drew her blade up to guard her chest and vital organs, every muscle tense and her eyes on the gun in his hands.

[Stygian]

Sylvie's words didn't seem to calm the man though. His eyes were practically sizzling, and his formerly placid expression seemed to be slowly coming alive once more. He wasn't quite glaring, but he was giving the elf a solid stare so filled with unuttered dislike that it would have been hard for anyone to sit still. The room seemed to be getting hotter, and it wasn't all because of how the man's flesh seemed to be starting to char slowly.
  'Hmnld,' Stygian suggested, head wobbling just a hair, giving the impression he was struggling to lift it off the cardboard-like slab that passed for a cushion which was standard to beds in anything that wasn't strictly a hospital. Slowly, and with a few false starts, his face screwed up and hardened. 'Nghu...' he groaned, as he had another go at it, which only seemed to make him more frustrated. He made an exasperated face and let his head slump back down.
  Truthfully, considering that he had some difficulty reading the elf due to her lack of a heartbeat and her almost eukalyptus-like scent, Stygian had far less to affirm his feeling that he was going to seriously dislike what was to come. But it was still there. And there was the fact that in addition, he could sense the elf's thoughts. Not strongly, nor clearly - he was still puzzling out the relevance of the movements and expressions of her alien mind, and there also seemed to be something obscuring his perception of it; a haze that might have been his own momentary fatigue and pain - but still with a careful closeness, like the shifting heat and texture of the swirling surface of a steaming cup of tea, which gave him at least some clue of the deeper movements. And what he felt, of frustration and reluctance and what might have been attempts at planning or dissembling, suggested that she would be inquiring into something emotional. Again, not quite visibly, he tensed a bit. Then, he reached out.
  Fine. Shoot then. The voice that arrived in Sylvie's head, somewhere behind her and still not quite, was at the same time a whisper and a harsh, clear call from far off. It growled and crackled somehow as it hit her neurons without going through her ears, calling up a sensation that she could only call 'heat', though that wasn't the half of it. It was as though one had taken away the actual searing of the sun or the burning of fire and merely placed the feeling of it in her head. Part of it was as smooth as the movement of air, and its warmth was like the sun on one's skin. But behind it, radiating that warmth, was something as hard as iron, and burning with... what? Something that, whatever it was, made Sylvie's wounds and exhaustion seem to want to insist on their presence all that more, and made a pit in her stomach.
  What reason is there to hesitate? You have me, Stygian spoke up again, somewhere in between the elf's ears and her brain. I'm not the sort that likes laying around without anything to do, so getting this over with right now would be a courtesy.

[SpottedKitty]

Despina might have been on the verge — apparently — of berserk fury, but her training still made her divert part of her attention on the hedgehog's bottle-wielding hand, just in case he tried to stab her with the bottle, after smashing it across her muzzle to get some nice sharp points. It was her sister Zoe's favourite bar-fighting technique, after all. The double kick in the gut therefore took her completely by surprise: her eyes bulging, she croaked breathlessly and started to lean forward, her grip on the hedgehog's jacket loosening, just in time to catch the toe of his boot on the underside of her muzzle. She flopped backwards, half dazed, and crashed to the floor, spitting blood from a bitten lip. Adding injury to insult, the hedgehog's heavy boots thumped into a not so well padded part of her chest as he came down on top of her. Andrace covered her eyes with one hand, leaned over to lay her muzzle on Kaela's shoulder, and whimpered quietly. Although it did sound suspiciously like she was trying not to laugh out loud...

Unlike her sister's more rugged adventuring outfits, Despina's favourite type of clothes were lightweight, not to mention scanty, so when the hedgehog rolled back off of her, his spines went right through her skirt. Thick fur gave the lioness some protection, but she still hissed from the pain when he rolled away leaving a dozen or so small bloodstains tracking down her thighs. Gathering her wits, her breath, and her dropped staff, she rose to a crouch and glared at her opponent, almost visibly radiating anger from bristling whiskers to lashing tail. "Outside, yeah, that suits me fine," she snarled, blood dripping from her muzzle and running along her whiskers. "Y' got th' first cheap shot in, now it's my turn." As she stalked towards the door, Despina noticed the pinprick puncture wounds hurt a lot more. By the time she was outside, her thighs were a solid red-hot bar of agony and itching from hips to knees, although the only outward sign she let show at first was a slight limp and an irregular twitch in her ears and whiskers.

Inside, Andrace peeked through her fingers. "Deary, deary me," she sighed with a wry grin. "Despina, m' darlin' sister, when we get home I'm gonna chase y' round th' trainin' arena a few times, an' give y' a good thumpin' if y' deserve it."

[llearch n'n'daCorna]

Witt smirked at Despina's comment. "Yeah, yeah."

As she left, he turned back to the barthing, flipping out another coin and placing it on the bar. "Hold the fucking pancakes, I'll be back soon. And another damned 307 ale, to go."

H grabbed the bottle, and swaggered towards the door, muttering something about it being entirely too damn early for explanations, and him entirely too fucking sober for this...

Once he reached the door, he sauntered straight past Despina, and over to a spare circle, taking a drink as he did so. As he reached the edge of the circle, he paused, and turned back to her. "No killing." With that, he took another drink, and stepped into the circle. As he did so, the light flickered for a moment; when it returned, he was stepping through the door back into the bar. And yet, not the bar...

[Angel]

The voice in her head wasn't like Andrea's speech, or like the spell of another mage infecting her with words. It was ... hot. It was like the feeling of the forest around her, inside her head. But it was hardened by something. Something cold, and exhausting, that made her feel as though her injuries were far from healing and someone had dropped ice into her stomach. She hadn't expected it to be this unpleasant, but all she wanted to know was this. As long as she could know one thing, it would make the end decision easier.

"Okay, then," she said, shifting a bit so she wasn't looking down her nose at him. "I like you. You're smart, cool, powerful, and the closest I've ever come to falling in love. But you're right about what you said earlier. I need to know about you before I really know what my interest is. So I'll be frank. What are you, exactly? Please tell me."

[SpottedKitty]

Despina snorted disdainfully as she concentrated on not showing how much her legs were hurting. "Who said anythin' 'bout killin' y'?" she said. "Y'd make a lousy rug f'r curlin' up on in front o' th' fire. B'sides, if I did, Irene an' Andrace'd nail my pelt t' the wall." She followed the hedgehog into one of the circles she'd noticed earlier, and paused when a convincing lookalike of the bar's interior appeared around them. The lioness had to admit grudgingly that it was an impressive performance, she hadn't noticed him casting any sort of illusion spell, and here they were in one of the best all-senses illusions she'd ever seen, complete with sounds, smells, and people.

Despina smiled toothily, and her ears and whiskers perked forwards. "Hey, we've not been intr'duced yet," she said cheerfully. "I'm Despina Kithara — if y' talked t' m' sister Andrace back in th' bar, she prob'ly mentioned me. Th' big lump can't keep 'er muzzle shut sometimes. An' who've I got th' pleasure o' poundin' int' a tent peg...?" Her posture, her smile, and the lazy side-to-side swishing of her tail all said that it would indeed be a pleasure. She twirled her staff flamboyantly, almost like a drum-majorette, and flexed the claws on her free hand, looking ready to leap into a fight at a moment's notice. Her legs were moving a little stiffly, though, and her smile was becoming strained: the wounds in her thighs weren't bleeding much, but the pain and itching was getting steadily worse.

Inside the real bar, Andrace sat up straight, her ears semaphoring back and forth. "Ah... did anyone tell m' sister th' rules o' th' Circles?" she said, "or that there are rules? Don't want her t' hurt Witt too bad..."

[llearch n'n'daCorna]

Witt raised one eyebrow, briefly, at the description of Andrace. "Sister? Oh, the big softy couldn't even handle her fucking drink." He lowered the eyebrow, and raised the bottle in his hand, taking a hefty gulp; nearly half the contents of the curiously shaped bottle vanished before he lowered it, and placed it, the remaining contents vaporising steadily, neatly on the bar she'd followed him to.

He then smiled sweetly, and took her paw in his own, in a firm, solid, and, unfortunately for her, nearly unbreakable grip. "You can call me Witt, if you like."

With that, he yanked her towards himself, off balance, and spun on one foot, aiming to bounce her off his back, and send her flying across the bar. With any luck, thoroughly pincushioning her on his spines.

If that landed, he could go get his damned drink again.

[Stygian]

One would have thought that Stygian couldn't have gone more still, but as Sylvie's hasty explanation ended, a whole new level of chilly calm emanated out into the room from the man. His eyes fixed at some point far, far in the distance. Thoughts passed, and there was a feeling of... tension. A feeling of stress. The pressing silence of someone listening, but reaching into one's very mind. Like an echo of that voice, but directed the other way. She could feel that gut-clenching presence, hard and hollow, absorbing the sound of her words and thoughts.
  Something seemed to shudder, as if something had struck it. And like a piece of hot metal under a hammer, that hollow feeling went a little bit harder.
  I am a man, the voice rang out, cold and callous even in spite of its other qualities. I am what you get when you take a man, and you wound and harden his soul so long that it turns into diamond. His stare remained fixed somewhere beyond the ceiling. It stayed there in a silence that went on for too long.
  They call people like me "Furies" back home. It's to do with an old myth, about these vengeful female spirits, who would possess or haunt people who had committed terrible sins, driving them insane by... exaggerating them. Turning them into more of themselves than they could cope with. And much like those people, we who have been influenced become more than we are. More powerful. More outstanding. Larger than life, if you will. More human than human. He paused, drawing breath and then letting out a long sigh, muscles in his jaw clenching for a moment. Of course, some have taken up other nicknames - Saints, Daemons, Djinn... - but that's the research term, and those are just names. We are... people. Just people, driven to an edge, and then given power. Touched by the Aether. The potential was always there, it seems. We simply needed to understand it, needed the technology to bring it around. And now, we are.
  There was another pause, solid as stone. The sounds of voices and scuffling from the bar seemed miles away.
  It's something with the mind, you see, the man's voice sizzled on, cooling even further as it took on a note of thoughtfulness. To even attain the power, it seems that one needs a very special mindset. Hence the name "Furies". Because we're all, quite frankly, driven past what normal people should be. The man's eyes narrowed and the edges of his mouth quirked into a wry smirk. We... break, somewhere on the inside. And I guess that's what opens up the crack necessary to let the influence in. And then, slowly, one turns. Each in their own way. They let it flow out and take hold, express their pain. They give themselves up, and become something that surpasses the merely human. Once you feel it, you can't stop. You can't stop yourself from feeling or doing something that defines you, after all. Slowly, he turned his head on the square pillow.
  'I used to be an electrical engineer,' he said, in a tone so emotionless it stung. 'I used to be a simple person. I had dreams and a sense of duty. I worked harder than I ought to have, I demanded much less than I deserved, and got far, far worse from life than any of it warranted. And through it all I held out, hoping for just one thing, to break through. I am just a man,' he said. His eyes settled slowly on her. 'And I am the death of a man.'
  It was the most empty expression the elf had ever seen. It was nothing so simple as disconcern or dejection or disdain that filled the man's gaze as it bored through her. No word came readily to mind. He had spoken, with his own voice, and not in her head.
  'Now you have your answer. You have all that I'm good for. You've beaten me, laid me bare. You have your satisfaction,' he said, his voice once more clean of any strange modulation. The next words he uttered were like acid nevertheless.
  'That seems to be your interest. Why would you take any other words into your mouth?'

[SpottedKitty]

Despina flicked her ears back suspiciously when Witt reached out to shake her hand, but she was still taken by surprise when he pulled her off-balance and turned to give her a far from soft landing pad on his back. She yowled in outrage and cast a quick spell, the only thing she could think of that might keep her unperforated. Her tail slapped the floor, then she slammed her paws down and bounced into the air. Witt still held her hand, so she didn't go as high as she might have done. Just to make sure, she grabbed his hand just as hard so he couldn't just let go.

The lioness was still moving forward, though, so she didn't escape completely: her right arm brushed against his spines, leaving a row of cuts along her sleeve and a few scratches on her upper arm. As she sailed over the hedgehog, she swung her staff as hard as she could and brought it down towards his head. The rounded, flattened end was nice and heavy, just right to make a good impression on his thick skull, she thought.

[llearch n'n'daCorna]

As Despina left the ground, Witt realised he wasn't going to get to cuddle up to the lioness; if she was jumping over him, the only thing he could do was make sure she didn't land neatly. So he pulled down on the arms they had latched together, his and hers, aiming to slam her down into the ground. If possible, head-first.

The result was to bring her staff slamming down on the back of his picklehaube with a clang that resonated through the walls, clearly audible back in the (real) bar. Witt dropped to the floor as if he'd been poleaxed. Despina spun like a top from the resultant forces, pivoting around their clasped paws, and landed neatly on the floor on the other side of him. Unfortunately, neatly did not include actually on her feet - she landed flat on her back, with a hefty thwack.

At which point, Witt let her paw go. With a groan, he pushed himself back to his feet, eyes slightly crossed, and reached up, and back, to the back of his head. He hooked his fingers in under the edge of the spiked helmet, set his teeth, and pulled, hard. With an ugly sucking sound, followed by a loud pop, like the cork being pulled from a bottle, the heavily dented head covering came free. He moved it in front of his head, then back and forth, in and out, trying to get it to focus. Finally, he covered one of his eyes with his other paw, and stared at the hat. His eye narrowed, his spines stood out, and he took a deep breath, and let it out.

Slowly.

And then, he looked at Despina, who had just regained her breath, and her feet, and spoke, in a gentle, unhurried tone.

"You bitch." He placed the sadly uneven helmet on a table, where it rocked gently before falling over. "You gods-forsaken candy-arsed dog-chasing slit-eyed bitch. Do you damned well know how fucking long I've gods-damned had that bloody hat? It's on, now, bitch. You're fucking dead."

And with that, he grabbed the table next to him, one-handed, and swept it across where she was standing. Missing completely due to his still-blurry vision, but the thought was there.

[SpottedKitty]

Despina grunted in satisfaction as she heard and felt her swing connect with Witt's head. Not hard enough to kill him... probably. She'd promised, after all. Besides, the helmet ought to protect him enough. Probably. Still, the recoil of the impact swung her round, and she didn't have time to shift her posture before she slammed into the floor on her back, knocking the wind out of her.

Even half-stunned, though, she followed her training. Roll over. Crouch on all fours if that's all you can do. Find your weapon if you let go of it. Get your breathing under control and get back to your feet. The lioness had just managed the last of that when Witt spoke. He sounded upset. The table he tossed almost in her direction was no danger to her, but it was too good an opportunity to pass up to get this little fight past the warm-up stage. She raised a shield with a quick gesture and rammed it outwards as the table skittered past, the impact shattering it into kindling that flew in all directions. That should do nicely for a dramatic gesture.

As the debris clattered to the floor, Despina took a stance slightly turned to one side, striking a pose with her left leg forward, looking down at Witt with her eyes narrowed. She raised her right arm high behind her head and snapped her fingers. A bolt of lightning cast inky shadows as it ripped through the space between ceiling and floor right behind the lioness, outlining her body in dazzling light for a brief moment. Her skirt billowed and her hair and fur ruffled in the sudden blast of wind, and for several seconds electric sparks crackled among her hair, whiskers and tail-tuft. Less blinding, fat blue sparks crawled over her exposed pelt, and her eyes seemed to be made of white fire. "Silly me," she said with a husky purr and a wide, toothy grin, "I forgot t' intr'duce m'self properly. I'm Despina Kithara. Mage o' th' Kithara Pride. I've seen y' c'n do pretty good illusions, like this place here, let's see what else y' got..."

[llearch n'n'daCorna]

Witt paused, and shook his head to clear it, wincing. Nope, she definitely had sparks running all over her. Not caterpillars. He closed his eyes, shook his head again, muttering to himself "Oh, no, not again." Then he looked up at her, and sauntered closer. "Cute. You want to see what I fucking got? Right."

He shook his shoulders, settling his sleeveless jacket, and flexed his fingers out, then back into fists. Then he walked right up to her, an evil smile settling on his face. "See the hands? Nothing in my fucking hands, right?" He did the stereotypical magician's display, showing her both sides of his paws, the three tattooed letters across each set of knuckles standing out. "Nothing up my bloody sleeves." He pushed the sleeves he didn't have up, to demonstrate the lack of hidden tools or tricks. "Watch damned closely."

By this time, he was close enough to reach out and touch her. Still smiling, he laid his paws out, palms upwards, gently closed them into fists, then drove them forward like a steam hammer, both together, directly into her solar plexus. As the strike landed, the fat blue sparks congregated rapidly, sank their teeth into his paws, and roared up his arms before dissipating as she flew away from him; hardly suppressing a curse at all, he snagged a bar stool and leapt after her, intent on continuing the hammering.

What he hadn't counted on, of course, was the drinkers at the table she landed on leaping up, grabbing their chairs, tables, companions, or whatever came to hand, and laying about themselves with abandon, amid calls of "Hey, Mimo, watch zis!", "Dimo! Duck!", "That wasn't a weapon, that was a chair!" and the sound of shattering furniture, the chaos and confusion spreading wildly across the bar in all directions. A handful of mimmoths skittered under a table, causing Keaton and Basilisk to jump backwards, sending their chairs over and knocking drinks to the floor at the next table, the customers of which promptly roared to their feet in fury. On the other side, a thrown chair missed it's target, a large coat-wearing cat, and flew over to the bar, shattering on Kaela's backplate and sending Andrace ducking, the remaining splinters splashing into drinks at three different tables; the patrons at those tables promptly engaged Andrace in a heated discussion.

And heading directly towards the centre of the melee, barstool swinging, ran Witt, various denizens flying away from his advance.

[SpottedKitty]

Despina knew it was probably a mistake, but her feline curiosity got the better of her: she just stood there watching, the scratches on her arm beginning to sting more than a little, as Witt approached. Not for long, though, as the sucker punch folded her up like wet cardboard and sent her sailing backwards across the bar. A table broke her fall, and very nearly her tail. She sprawled in the middle of the wreckage for a moment, with all her wind knocked out of her. Again. She came back to her senses just in time to see and hear the chaos breaking out all around the room.

The lioness snarled and scrambled back to her feet. At least this time she'd kept a firm grip on her staff. Enough was enough: her stomach felt badly bruised, her muzzle still hurt where Witt had kicked her, and the increasing burning itch in her thighs would soon become a dangerous distraction. Almost as much of a distraction was the sight of her sister Andrace leaping from the top of the bar with a cheerfully bloodthirsty scream, right into the middle of a seething crowd of fighters.

Wait, wasn't she back in the real bar? Or was she an illusion, like all the other people in here? If it really was her sister, she could look after herself. Despina caught sight of Witt running towards her through the crowd — sometimes literally — waving a barstool. She bared her fangs in a vicious snarl and charged to meet him. She didn't completely forget her training, though, this time she had a shield spell active, one-way so she could still strike out through it.

Just as she raised her staff to aim a swipe at the hedgehog's makeshift weapon, and she took a deep breath to roar in his face, her stomach rumbled loudly.

[Angel]

Sylvie blinked, jarred by the void she saw in Stygian's eyes and the pain spitting in his voice. Those eyes were empty, not hurt, not disappointed, but...blank. Blank in such a way that it pained her to look at them. They were the eyes of a man who could never believe that something or someone good could come easily into his life – especially, she realized with a mental wince, after that one had been too hesitant to start anything earlier and had been acting rather on-and-off toward him ever since. But how could she make him see that all that hadn't been for some cruel, twisted reason? It was hard enough expressing even simple fear in words for her, but affection? After she left the forest and saw what her world was like, she thought she'd never have to speak about affection, especially not to a human. But if he was this untrusting of her, and she'd misled him so much already with her confusion, her only hope was to be honest, and nothing more. So, with a small breath and a steady face, she spoke.

"I wanted to know for exactly the reason I told you. I care about you, even though you confuse the hell out of me," she said simply, not mincing words or covering anything. "I'm sorry that such awful things happened to you, and I understand if all I've done convinces you not to believe me now. But it's true. You fascinate me, and while I may not be able to say for sure that I love you, I feel like you're the first person outside of my species and the gods who understands me. And even if I'm hesitant about some things, that's something I don't want to lose. I want to understand you better as well, not for some sort of closure or satisfaction, but because I want to know more about you. That's my interest."

With that, she looked over and directed a few words at Dr. Holic. "Haven't you found those gloves yet? Just because he can burn your equipment doesn't mean you can ignore him and hope he goes away."

[Stygian]

Stygian's gaze lingered once more, not altering the slightest for a couple of moments. And then, silently, he turned his head back and laid it down against the cushion once more. One hand's fingers moved and drummed against the side of the bed slowly, and he closed his eyes for a while. The elf had enough time to get uncomfortable once more and note the sounds from the bar, before, first only at the edge of her hearing but getting clearer, she heard him hum.
  'I want you... I need you... But there ain't no way I'm ever gonna love you~...' he sang, after a few pace-setting notes, his voice hoarse and faint. The tune was slow and mournfully ironic in its very melody, even without the lyrics. The reappearance of the bitter smile on the man's face wound up the tension once more, so that the elf barely needed to hear the words to know what was coming. It was like staring into rapidly approaching headlights with one's feet chained down in the road.
  'And that's exactly the same thing,' Stygian said. His tone could have made mist form. He opened his eyes and stared out into nothing. Then, slowly and with a momentary start of pain, he pushed himself up to a seated position. He felt with a hand at the wound in his side, but merely absentmindedly. Then he swung his legs over the side of the gurney-like bed.
  'Your care is noted, but it simply does not matter to me,' he went on. 'It does me about as much good as does pity. Or hatred. Or the momentary feeling of togetherness or pain.' He looked up into her eyes. 'Because of what I do... No, because of the way I am - the way I've been forced to become - I do not have the privilege of friends or close ones. I do not have the will for any. And absolutely no use for them. "Friends" can't help me. They couldn't give me anything that wouldn't fall apart in no time. And you...'
  In a rather unnerving gesture, Stygian held up his damaged hand in front of him, visibly comparing it to the elf's own. It sizzled and charred at the edges, and his bony fingers flexed in ghastly, awkward motion.
  'We are worlds apart. There is... a tremendous distance. But that is nothing I'd hesitate to cross for a cause. For an end. Even only the hope of one. It's been long since I felt hope. But you say you care?' His eyes hardened once again, and that emptiness stared through once more. 'I could care less for "caring". But not much.'
  For a few moments, Stygian averted his eyes, his gaze traveling over the tray table next to the bed, then the cabinet beside it, searching for... something. His glare returned to the elf reluctantly.
  'And then you say that you care because you've not met anyone who understands you before? That you're merely holding on to something for fear of losing that?' He shook his head. 'That's just the fear of losing something. It's not compassion, and it certainly isn't love. Which is why I advise you to stop caring, and walk away.' He stared at her blankly. 'And consider yourself fortunate that you don't have to feel for me.'

[Lisky]

Real Bas's gaze slowly moved down keaton's shoulder, to the view of the rest of the bar.  Patrons of all sizes were gathered around and seeming to be having a good time.  Something, a orb-like spell suddenly caught his attention.  Inside, appeared to be a perfect recreation of the bar they were standing in, with everyone who was in here, as well as several additions.

Inside the "fake" bar, "fake" Bas watched as the brawl broke out, starting with a lioness, similar to one of the girls at the bar, and some rather stout and spiky fellow.  Suddenly his eyes caught something fly under the table, small, fuzzy and strange, it caused him to jump back, flailing his wings in an attempt to catch his balance.  Once under control, the demon regained his focus.  He brought a large and hardened fist into the face of the rather enraged customer who's drink his flailing wing had tipped.  Looking around for any type of threat to him or keaton, something caught his eye at the very edge of his peripheral vision. One of the brown fuzzies that caused his momentary panic tried to skitter by.  Bas promptly delivered a powerful punt, sending the little creature in a lower, flat, arc. straight towards the bar... and towards the face of a rather large lioness.

[Boog]

"I never planned to USE it! Not at first, until she showed up." Big Bad replied indignantly, for all the world sounding like a man wronged, "And she wasn't. She had her faults, yeah, but she FREED me!" He was getting more worked up, but there was still this disconnect between him and the weapon. If he just tucked it behind his back he's look like he was just having a tiff. The gun snapped back and forth to the machette a few times, as if he was trying to make up his mind...
"I'm just a sign of the times."
And then there was a woman in his place.
It was just like the change between the gun and the knife. First he was there, then there was someone else looking for all the world like a soccer mom, sweatpants and all. She blinked, once.
"What on-?"
Across the street a window slammed open. Big Bad leaned out and opened fire.

--

Boog blinked once at Andrace's concern about her sister knowing the rules.
"Oh..." He blinked again and grinned sheepishly, "Oops? I'm sure things will be fine..." He finished setting out Witt's pancakes on a tray behind the counter, for when he got back. "Seems like a capable girl."

"Wish I was in there, myself." Marya sighed from a nearby table. "I've only gotten to hit one person since I got here, I'm feelin' gypped. I mean yeah, I got shot, but that's hardly a damn substitute..."

[SpottedKitty]

Back in the real bar, Andrace peeked out from between her fingers at the viewer again, just in time to see her sister get punched in the gut and go flying through a table. She winced and looked away. Further along the bar, a canine Demon of some sort was sitting at Keaton's table, watching the viewer in fascination. She glanced back into the viewer, and saw in the background... another Keaton, and another canine Demon, beginning to get involved in the growing bar brawl. The lioness looked more closely, and spotted a few other familiar muzzles. Suddenly she snorted a laugh: was that herself in there?

In the Circle-created fake bar, the copy of her sister that Despina had spotted shook her hand and winced: those green-skinned guys with the funny hats were good brawlers, but hit them often enough, and hard enough, and they'd go down just like anyone else. It was fun, but hard on the knuckles. Just as she turned and opened her mouth to shout, a small brown hairy critter of some sort flew through the air towards her and bounced off her snout. It made an odd squeaking noise that sounded a bit like a tiny soprano elephant trumpet. The not-Andrace roared in outrage and looked back along the path the hairy ping-pong ball had taken. A couple of inches lower and that thing would have gone right down her gullet! She snarled as she spotted a guilty-looking canine Demon, then she bared her fangs and charged straight at him, running right over a couple of the smaller fighters who failed to get out of the way in time.

[Lisky]

Inside the "fake" bar Basilisk watch in amusement as the little brown fuzz ball smacked into the face of Andrace, a big smirk appeared across the demon's face as the fuzzball bounced away like a fluffy brown dodge ball.  However, one thing he hadn't planned on was the reaction of the recipient of his little punt.  She looked rather pissed, claws exposed, teeth bared, and heading straight for him.

Bas flared his wings while hardening his skin, he, however didn't grow his claws.  He circled away from Keaton, lowering himself slightly, and proceeding forward in a slow stalk. He continued to circle and let Andrace close the distance while bringing his wings back in. His hands formed loose fists and he began planning his moves. Waiting for her to come into range, Bas took a full body spin while flaring his wings, aiming the hardened, bony edge for her shin, and the hardened tip second wing for about her belly.  A grin of delight parted his lips, and the demon said in a sing-song voice, "Here kitty kitty kitty, it's play time."

[Arroyo Milori]

The door to the fight club quickly opened and closed as a femimine-looking figured made her way to the bar, where the barkeep dwelled. The girl had odd looking ears, a small triangluar piece of skin drooped over the tip of the ears. Her eyes had a warm brown look to them as she stared at the barkeep. "Sign me up for the next fight and quickly give me a brief description of the rules." a small smirk ran across her mouth as she stars back at the ring.

She quickly started to wrap her hands in bandages firmly then her feet. It was a custom for her to wear them in the ring, but she tends to wear them no matter what. "You got some creepy looking people around here, at least I'm sure I'm in the right place. I just hope your customers don't let me down." She sat back on a stool, her eyes attracted to the fight in the circle.

[SpottedKitty]

Andrace (the real one) was fascinated at the antics of her "double" in the Circle-created bar. She had all the right moves, she could fight as well as anyone Kithara-trained, but some things just seemed a little bit off.

In the fake bar, "Andrace" spotted the beginning of the canine Demon's counterattack. A mischievous gleam came into her eyes, and as the Demon's wings swept out to chop at her legs and body, her charging pace seemed to change almost to a skip, then she jumped straight up. She drew her knees up to her chest, and as the higher wing passed below her, she thust both legs out, her heavy paws (and all of her considerable weight) stamping on the wing's wrist joint. Bouncing up from that, she leaped forward with a deafening roar — slightly to one side of the Demon's head. As her pounce took her past him in what seemed to be a clumsy miss, her right arm shot out, at just the right height to catch his throat in the angle of her bent elbow.