driftfleet | (no subject)

Who: Coil Lenn
Broadcast: Text (and not anonymous, for once)
Action: Iskaulit, in the gym
When: Morning

[it is a rare day indeed that Coil sends out a message with his identification attached to it, but he figures it's probably hard to convince someone to fight with you when they don't know who's asking. and he takes time to write the thing up properly, like putting an ad in the paper.]

Looking for sparring partner-- hand-to-hand or melee weapons. Experienced combatants only. Iskaulit Gym.

[and he just tosses the communicator off to the side for a bit, after that. he'll return to check his messages after he's beaten the shit out of a sandbag for a while.

and whether or not they've caught his message, anyone can find him haunting the gym--either moping around like he doesn't know why he's there, or whirling a quarterstaff around and clobbering a sandbag with single-minded focus. just a combat-oriented teenager in a bad mood.]

(ooc: and for anyone who isn't really into tagging fight threads, but still wants to spar with him, we can handwave or gloss over some things.)

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

[even the twist that he'd normally follow her with--flipping his whole body to follow his shoulder around so she doesn't keep as much of an advantage--would have slowed things down too much. he doesn't care that it hurts, this time. he lets his shoulder wrench around, leaves himself open to a throw that mercifully doesn't happen, so he can step into another strike the very first moment he can.

he whips around to throw back an elbow to try and catch her before she can act after her little twist. it's a wild move, riskier than he would have normally tried, snapping it back from his blind side.

whether it connects well or not, it feels good. almost spiteful. the anger is inching its way out.]

[The elbow glances off her ribs this time, and while she doesn't feel anything break it does drive the breath from her lungs, and she knows there's going to be a bruise there tomorrow. Both of them are going to be bruised, probably dealing with small cuts--even the best fighters can split the skin over their knuckles during a fight like this--but that's part of the catharsis of the thing.

He didn't take a moment to recover, and neither does she, only backing up just a step to move with the blow and countering with a whirling kick, a block, and a punch aimed at his jaw. Sweat begins to bead along her hairline, and her hits have a particular viciousness to them, though she's still controlling the momentum of her blows. Not hard enough to stop this. That's all.]

[something he'd learned quickly when he'd first started to spar with his skullfaced partner-- if you don't walk away with bruises or blood, you didn't try hard enough. it just comes with the territory. it's one of those things you don't really even notice until later, after the adrenaline crash.

so, he takes his licks, (especially the shot to the jaw, botching his guess at depth perception with only one eye,) and uses it as fuel to continue forward with as little pause as he can get away with. the meaner she gets, the more he gives in return.

he uses the knife-edge of his hand and hard, jutting knuckles like surgical tools; he's going for strikes that weaken and hurt. striking between muscles along the bone of her upper arm, snapping a shin at the outer muscles of her thigh. even aiming for her throat, once or twice. anything to provoke her further.]

[Normally, she tries to end a fight quickly, if it's for real. Quick, efficient, vicious. He's the same, she's seen it. And normally when she's sparring, practicing a new technique, the blows are light enough that they rarely even bruise, at least not enough to last more than a day or two. But this is different. They both know it.

He uses strikes she's familiar with, blows that might be crippling against a less skilled opponent. Nerves and muscle groups, bone near the surface of the skin. A few aimed at her throat. Those at least she solidly blocks and deflects, moving with each strike to lessen its impact, but the blow to her thigh drops her to one knee. It's a vulnerable position and she knows it, quickly going for an upward kick aimed at his solar plexus that turns into a roll backwards over one shoulder as she pops back to her feet. There's a little distance between them now, but she can feel this match--fight, whatever it is--quickly beginning to spin out of control. This time she doesn't close in, just waits, eyes gone narrow and cold.]

[he catches most of that kick to the gut, and it does its job in winding him. he has to wait for a beat or two, whether he likes it or not, to drag in a breath and recenter himself. and in that time, she draws up and waits.

as he's recovering, he's automatically set up to defend against another attack, so there's an uncertain hesitation on his part when it doesn't happen.

so, then. there is a pause-- a perfect moment to back off and end the match, or at least scale it down a bit. he's tired, he can tell that he's probably a little dinged up. the smartest thing would be to stop.

but, that thought strikes him with a pang of desperation. he's not done. they can't be done yet.

whether it's a smart idea or not, once he's able to, he suddenly darts forward to make another lunge for her.]