@Crasical's Characters: The Tournament Arc

[Crasical]

Bronze Match: Seed 4 Hivemind vs Seed 3 Tomb Spider

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The reinforced steel door of the prison cell rang like a gong as it bent and deformed under sledgehammer blows before violently exploding. The prisoner inside, 'Jane Doe', looked up calmly. One of the PPD Enforcer robots had been cracked open, the plasma manifold having been ruptured and cooking off several of its grenades, the whole twisted wreckage burning merrily, the firelight illuminating the collapsed forms of multiple Awakened Division PPD officers. 

The man outside the cell didn't exactly cut an intimidating figure. Well-worn blue-jeans, hiking boots, a black T-shirt with the red arachnos spider-legs emblem, an admittedly stylish leather jacket and a broad-brimmed hat. Backlit by flame and holding the long-handled pole-axe in one hand, a weapon that glowed with ominous red light and crackled with magical energy, he still managed to project enough power and confidence to be frightening. 

"...It's not that I didn't expect Arachnos to send someone to kill me after I was captured, but I expected a single Night Widow, or a team of Bane Spiders. Why is Sirocco's pet archaeologist here?" She raised a hand to brush a strand of white hair out of her face, her arms encased in large shackles that covered her arms from just below the elbow to just past the wrist. Dressed in prison orange, a bulky collar with a purple LED strip surrounding it encircled her neck, a psionic inhibitor. 

Tomb Spider snorted and tossed her a ring of keys. She let them land in her lap, picking the ring up and starting to try each key on her bindings in sequence. "Apparently I'm not above getting selected for odd-jobs by the high council of spiders. And you're only half right. I'm not here to kill you, I'm here to get you out of here and back to Grandville." The shackles came off with a 'click', and the woman started trying the keys on her collar.

"How gracious of you. I suppose they either plan to dissect my brain in some lab, or just want a public execution?" Tomb Spider shrugged and kicked a backpack across the floor to the nameless widow. "I'm authorized to kill you if you resist. You can die now, *maybe* die during our attempted escape, since there are a lot of cops out there, die in arachnos custody, or maybe get re-captured, get moved from this jail to the Zig, and Arachnos will arrange for you to get shivved in your sleep, and die *there*."

Opening up the backpack, the widow found a familiar outfit in blacks and greys and yellows. Tomb Spider continued. "All your options are bad. So do me a curteousy, put your costume on and get ready to fight a lot of light-spewing alien symbiotes; and at least die in the way that is the least of a headache for me." The widow sighed, standing up, making a little circular gesture with a finger. When Tomb Spider didn't move, she clarified. "Fine. Turn Around." 

That got only a raised eybrow. "...I'm going to change. Did you intend to stand there and watch? Pervert." With a long-suffering grunt of annoyance, Tomb Spider about-faced. The widow slipped out of the orange prison clothing, stripping down to nothing before starting to squeeze into her costume, the elastic, skintight material stretching over her skin. The gloves and parts of the upper torso 'clicked' subtly as they were pulled into place, magnetically locking to her skin so that the anti-gravity harness would properly nullify her weight, or that her implanted widow-blades would smoothly slide through the prepared seams in her gloves.

Pulling her mask on, she took a second to let her vision adjust to the view through her insectile, segmented goggles, the HUD kicking in after a second or two helping simplify the confusing kaleidescope of images. She ran her fingers through her hair, giving the costume's wings an experimental flick of motion. "Got a comb?" "No. But take your time. I think my arachnobots can hold the elevator for another two, three minutes."

"Long enough." She experimentally slid her blades out, examining the green-black sheen of poison on the long spike of metal. She let the bristle of spikes on her left hand retract, and turned. There was one 'clack' of high heels on concrete as Hivemind took a long step and thrust the spike towards Tomb Spider's back. 

To her surprise, he leapt to the side, his long hammer coming around in an arc that took a chunk out of the doorframe and forced her to turn her lunge into a forward roll; to carry her under the swing and to keep her from being pinned in her cell. She came up out of the roll with both blades at the ready, staring down Tomb Spider. The mercenary held up the fingers on his free hand, a tiny marble-sized scrying stone, a crystal ball, between his middle and index finger. "...If you think I'm stupid enough to turn my back on an Arachnos Widow, you've got another thing coming." Hivemind smirked. "So you *were* watching me change. Pervert."

Tomb Spider started to advance, Hivemind drifting to the side on her mechanical wings. Tomb Spider's long halberd had reach and a great deal of mass, but it was a lot slower than Hivemind's twin blades. They both wanted to bait out the first attack, Tomb Spider to ripost her claws and smite her with one heavy blow, Hivemind so she could side-dodge the long hammer and get in close to slice with her blades. Tomb Spider ended up taking the first move, the beeping of his communicator letting him know his arachnobots were being systematically destroyed by the PPD up above. The additional pressure made him feint and then bring the hammer down like he was splitting wood in a crash of red electricity. Hivemind ducked low, to the left, and came up with a poisoned spike of a widow's claw, making Tomb Spider jerk back, using his backward momentum to whirl the hammer around his back, spinning on a heel as he turned the motion into a pirouette with a sweeping horizontal swing, stymying Hivemind's advance.

 

Thrusting his halberd forward Tomb Spider fired a bolt of sizzling energy, trying to drive Hivemind back, only succeeding in keeping her on her toes as she searched for another opening. As the barrage of spell-bolts pock-marked the walls with singe marks, she ducked behind one of the large brick pillars for cover. She waited until the fire stopped, counted to three, and then chose to go right, trusting her Fortunata instincts. The correct decision, it turned out, as Tomb Spider had gone to her left, circling the pillar and swinging the Halberd. She took the opportunity to take a shot at his back, slashing at his legs with poisoned blades, hampering his mobility. Bright blood stained the mercenary archaeologist's blue jeans as he staggered, turning and managing to parry the next stab with the long haft of the halberd, throwing Hivemind onto her bakc and seamlessly moving to a lethal ripost, another huge crushing strike with the heavy two handed weapon. Hivemind kicked her wings into action at the last second and pulled herself out of range of the sledgehammer blow, but the close call made her realize just how much power that weapon held. One solid strike would be all it wold take to end her; and there was no way she could block or parry the attack. She simply couldn't let the attack connect.

So, instead, she carefully held herself at just the edge of what she estimated the polearm's reach was, letting Tomb Spider poke at her with jabs and the occasional staff-beam. Goading him into attacking, she slowly decreased the momentum of her dodges, letting it seem like the strikes were missing by sheer milimiters. Her future-sight raced, trying to pick out the ideal moment to attack. After a minute of enduring his blows, she saw it: Rather than stepping to the side to evade a blow by scant inches, she lunged forward and to the side. Tomb Spider turned to track her, but she'd dodged to the opposite side of his injured leg, and the poison-numbed, bleeding limb reacted woodenly, his turn to face her becoming a stumble. All the opening she needed to thrust her wrist blade into his neck. The mercenary's eyes widened with a spray of arterial blood and a gurgle as he stumbled back, falling, and then disappearing in a flash of light and a pop of inrushing air. Recalled back to the arachnos flyer, likely, to get some emergency medical treatment. Unimportant. 

 

Hivemind let her claws slide back into place as she faced the elevator out of the PPD lockup. Freedom beckoned.

 

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Hivemind	v	s	Tomb Spider
Deals Lethal, Toxic, and Psychic damage. Resists all damage moderately.	✔️		Deals Smashing, Energy, and Toxic damage. Resists all damage moderately.
Elusive			Elusive
Mezzes			Mez Protection
Decent AoE capability		✔️	Pets, team buffs
Fly			- Fly
Stealth, bonus Perception			Stealth, bonus Perception
It's a matter of life and death	✔️		It's just a paycheck.

 

Yeah, it's been more than a month since I updated this. Home life got interesting (housemate had open heart surgery, a quadruple bypass) and I just wasn't up for it over a hectic December and January. 

 

Tomb Spider and Hivemind are extremely well matched. The ending call was just on motivation; Tomb Spider is a supermerc who does what he does for a paycheck (and he honestly dislikes being given jobs outside of his usual artifact-hunting routine); whereas not getting captured by arachnos is a life and death struggle for Hivemind.

[Crasical]

Final Match: Seed 8 Colmilla vs. Seed 7 Ryoko Kobayashi 

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The sun was shining, burning away the lingering winter chill. The day was saved. Even the notice that the villainess, Hivemind, had been broken out of jail couldn't truly dampen Colmilla's infectious good mood. 

She folded and set aside a newspaper raving about the new gas-grenade wielding heroes taking to the streets, standing up and stretching. She'd perched atop a handy apartment building, enjoying the sunlight and gentle wind. Her hand had just touched the police radio at her belt when she heard, distantly, a yell: "Stop, Thief!". A smile flickered across her face, unseen beneath her mask. Perfect. The day was just a little *too* peaceful.

Colmilla landed in the parking lot, glancing up at the familiar green, white and red billboard with its mariachi, the banner for El Super Mexicano, the franchise popular all through Paragon City. She only had a moment before the front doors of the building smashed open, a blur in blue, black and white rushing forward. Ryoko Kobayashi, the dine-and-dash demon of the rogue isles, was zipping forward in a ninja run, both arms laden with bulging takeout bags, a third bag equally overloaded gripped in her teeth. Colmilla tensed, focused on the fast-moving target, and swung, going low with a rising, teeth-shattering uppercut. 

To her surprise, her target vanished from in front of her in a flash of light and smoke, the trio of bags hitting the asphalt of the parking lot and spilling. Not filled with cash from the register, the three bags were filled with foil-wrapped buritos, tacos, styrofoam containers of enchiladas, and tortilla chips, along with jars of the house salsa, guacamole, and queso. Stolen food, rather than money. 

Colmilla didn't have time to do more than register this, as the ninja girl landed, sliding back towards the door before her sneakers found purchase. Her katana slipped from its sheathe in a single smooth motion, assuming a basic kendo stance. "...Out of my way." Was the only thing the schoolgirl said before launching herself forward. Colmilla found herself ducking and weaving through the rain of blows, occasionally parrying a blow with the impervium wire inserts in her gloves, the frenzied rain of blows intensifing as Colmilla began to counterattack, throwing punches, kicks, knee and elbow strikes at the elusive foe. 

Ryoko was the first to break off, realizing her attacks weren't working. skipping back, she slid her sword back into its sheathe with a flourish. Colmilla hesitated for only a second, thinking the girl was surrendering, but instead her hands came up holding glittering metal, throwing stars. Colmilla flipped and tumbled acrobatically through the hail of metal, but though her own reflexes meant that the stars and throwing knives weren't getting close enough to be a threat, the girl was effectively zoning her out, keeping her distance and safely attacking where Colmilla couldn't easily counterattack, flashing away in that arm-trailing ninja stance or disappearing with a smoke bomb anytime Colmilla tried to get close. It was now a race to see if Colmilla would tire or Ryoko would run out of ammunition first. 

Colmilla wasn't sure she liked the odds on that; the tiny ninja seemed to have an inexhaustible supply of pointed metal. Worse, as the battle roved over the parking lot, Ryoko was starting to pick up and throw some of the shuriken for a second time, extending her supply by ripping the knives out of the cars or asphalt they'd stuck into and re-using them. This required some lateral thinking... Diving into the line of parked cars, she prayed that the unlucky vehicle's insurance was paid up and punched through the glass, unlocking the door from the inside, and then tearing it off its hinges. Holding the door as an improvised shield, she rolled out, caught a fusilade of thrown knives with the door and rushed forward, turning the charge into a slide at the last moment. Crashing into the ninja girl's legs, she swept them out from under her, discarding the car door to keep up the momentum: Her knee hit the girl in the stomach, launching her into the air. Colmilla followed her up with a leap, snagging Ryoko by the neck in a headlock and bringing her back to the ground, the two crashing to the pavement together and jolted out of the hold, both doing rapid kip-ups to return to their feet as quickly as possible.

Ryoko spat out some blood, wiping her mouth with her sleeve. "...Guess I gotta get serious..." She brought her hand back to her sword. Colmilla took a defensive stance, ready to grapple her out of any charge, but she wasn't ready for the sheer speed the draw came out at. The girl just vanished, leaving behind brief impressions, afterimages, leaving gleaming white lines in the air as her sword ripped through her opponent, and the arena itself: The cars in the parking lot were reduced to chunks of metal in her path, and the large sign outside the super-mexicano was bisected diagonally, falling from its mounting in two halves. Comilla couldn't defend against all the lightning fast strikes, not coming like they did in rapid succession. All she could do was try and reduce the impact 

When the storm finally, mercilessly ended, Ryoko was visibly exhausted, panting as she slid to a stop. The shattered cars went up in simultaneously thunderclaps of explosion, as Colmilla sank to her knees, bleeding from hundreds of shallow cuts all over her body. 

"...Surrender. You're beat." The girl threatened. Colmilla defiantly picked up and hucked a car's bumper at her, which the girl cut in half as it sailed towards her. 
"Why would I do that? I'm having a *fantastic* time." "...Tsk. Alright. I avoided your vitals, but this next strike will trigger your mediporter." Walking closer, she raised her sword. "...Consider it payment for your stubbornn-AGH?" 

Colmilla waited until that sword had started to defend before striking like a cobra. Both hands snapped up to grab the wrists holding the sword, while wrenching and pulling them down. Her feet left the ground as she spun herself around the ninja's sword arm, snatching the girl's neck between her knees as she yanked ther arms up. The blade's edge was something to consider, but pulled up into an arm bar, while choking her out with her thighs, she only had to hold the agile ninja until she ran out of breath. 
"Hehe. No fancy tricks to escaping a hold! It's just strength and stamina! 
Ryoko struggled until the end, popping several smoke bombs, kicking and squirming, but there wasn't any escape. Despite her injuries, Colmilla's grapple had locked her in tight. Eventually, the blackness crept in at the edges of her vision, and she lost consciousness. 

Colmilla felt the 'pop!' as the girl vanished, mediported to safety. SHe rolled to her feet, scanning the surroundings. "...Still undefeated...But that girl was dangerous." Surveying the carnage, she folded her arms. "...all this for a bag of tacos...?"

 

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Colmilla	v	s	Ryoko Kobayashi
Deals smashing damage, resists lethal damage	✔️		Deals Lethal damage, somewhat resists smashing damage.
Strong self heal			Strong self heal
Bonus perception			Stealth
Elusive			Elusive
Mez Protection			Mez: Immob, Confuse

 

I feel bad about how this project fully ran out of momentum at the end, but it's at least complete now. Colmilla is our winner, Ryoko our second place finisher, and Hivemind our 3rd place.

 

The tournament's now complete! It was a neat writing exercise. I wish I'd finished it back in 2023 like I'd originally intended, but life had other ideas. Oh well.

 

With the event complete, I'll open up the thread to any questions, comments, or feedback. Thank you for reading along.