Always Towards The Fight

Posted on Sat Sep 23rd, 2017 @ 2:16pm by Staff Sergeant Nyx'e'Trixe Valentine

Mission: https://wellington.pegasusfleet.site/index.php/sim/missions/id/3
Location: Holodeck 4

Nyx's eyes flicked across the five men standing in the middle of the bloodsoaked street across the tip of her sword. She was in a combat crouch, weight towards the back of her center of balance as they slowly started towards her. A rivulet of blood tricked down her left bicep, a mark of where one of the previous enemies had stuck her a rather rough blow. Her arm there HURT. She ignored most of the pain and shunted the rest to the back of her mind as she contemplated what to do. These five weren't the real problem. She'd faced far worse odds in the past and come out on top, no, the problem were the two in the buildings with some sort of ranged weapons. She didn't know what they were, but the flickers of movement she'd seen told her they were there.

She braced in the toes of her boots with no perceptible movement and the three seconds she'd allocated to her decision making was over. The sword she had in her right hand wasn't quite a longsword, but wasn't a shortsword either. It had a slender blade and a bare inch and a half of a crossguard that flared out past a composite grip. In her left hand, at a right angle to her primary weapon, was a shorter blade, merely a foot and a half of the same material, same handle, but only an inch of a crossguard that was angled forward. Se threw herself forward into a roll, an arrow and a bullet kicking up dust as their users fired at her first movement. The smaller weapon sprouted from the chest of one of the five in front of her and she pushed off from the ground as she came out of it.

Of her four remaining grounded opponents, the first having started to fall forward, three were armed with swords of their own, the fourth with a mace, and they reacted quickly. The Tialan merely acted faster. Sword One had his weapon parried aside as he thrust it and her sword came up to deflect the second sword even as she twisted to avoid the mace's swing towards her gut. She rammed right into Sword One, throwing him into the ground, her atop him, but she didn't stop moving. Sword Three swung down on top of her, expecting her to be momentarily stopped,but she rolled off her left shoulder, a spike of pain from her prior wound, and came up. She made a flinging motion with her left hand as a loose section of hair flared out behind her. From one of the windows, where she'd seen a flash just as she'd started her motion, a larger flash resounded and the entire window frame blew out, the roofing above caving in.

She didn't bother to watch, already moving again, right by a wall and pushed off it with a foot, gaining speed back towards the four men in the street. An arrow stuck in the wall where she'd been a half second before. She caught one of the blades from the two standing swordsmen, the third trying to get to his feet, then swept one of his legs out and forced forwards, sending him to his back on the ground. She caught the other blade on her left bracer and deflected it away, another, larger spike of pain from the left arm, and stepped back to avoid the mace again.

One sword, one mace standing, one sword getting up, one sword on the ground, one arrow in the building. She went back on the assault. She traded a pair of slashes with the standing swordsman, Sword Three, she called him mentally, then parried the mace into a larger swing that caught Sword One in the chest and crumpled him back to the ground. A particular flex of her left wrist brought a knife into it, barely six inches long. She deflected another slash from Sword Three, then took a nine inch step into his guard, just far enough to force him to have to step back to swing again, and in a flash of motion, released her sword, reversed her hand grip and brought it across his throat with the last few inches of the blade to the tip, then finished that motion in another parry of the mace.

Sword Three dropped his weapon and clutched at his throat which was resembling an overflowing water basin as Sword Two grunted in rage and threw himself back into the fight. Sword One was trying to catch a breath, any breath while prying himself back up. Another arrow flew by, grazing Nyx's cheek and she felt a warm liquid start to drip down it. She parried the sword, but half her breath was knocked out of her as she couldn't get out of Sword Two's rushing charge in time. Her back slammed into the building and both sword and knife dropped from her grip in that moment. His word couldn't get to her, but she was briefly pinned. Her right hand reached for the knife she'd seen on his belt and grabbing it, brought it in a slash upwards, scoring his skin, then shoved it into his stomach.

Sword Two howled in agony and reflexively pulled back to try to get off the blade. Nyx let him go, then let herself fall to the ground as yet another arrow stuck into the wall next to her. She grabbed for her sword and her fingers closed around the hilt. She had to start again with no momentum, but she reached out and grabbed the leg of Mace as he closed in on the vulnerable Tialan. She yanked up on it, her weight going backward, then undulated her back to bring her at least partly upright, but not quite on balance. She reached back with a leg and pushed off the wall again into a forward roll, which she punctuated by puncturing Mace through the chest with her sword on the forward arc. An arrow sprouted from Mace's body as well.

With another, major flash of pain from her left arm, she reached to her right chest area and grabbed a throwing knife and flung it at Sword Two, hitting him in the chest and ensuring he was going to stay down for the count, barring a miracle on his part. That meant that there were two left. Arrow and Sword One, who had finally gotten to his feet and was heaving breaths in and out, obviously the worse for wear. Meanwhile, arrows had stopped flying at her, so she made the most of that and charged towards the remaining sword. A motion from her left in a doorway caught her eye, a person bracing on the doorway, bow drawing and Nyx made the instant decision to drop her sword, but kept moving towards the swordsman. An arrow flew at her and she stutter-stepped in that same moment, coming to four feet from the swordsman and reached out for the arrow. Pain came from her right hand as the arrowhead sliced into her palm, but she caught the shaft and gripped hard, swinging upwards and in perfect timing brought the arrow up through Sword One's jaw and through his mouth into his brain.

A loud curse from the bowman was followed by another hasty arrow flittering past Nyx as she again bowled over Sword One's falling corpse. She came up with his sword in her protesting right hand in time to deflect an arrow and it was down to the two of them. This was something Nyx could deal with, something she HAD dealt with in the past. Then fire burned in her back as a bullet drilled into her spine. She fell forward and her vision went dark.

A few moments later, she pushed herself to her knees and pounded the gridded floor of the holodeck with a fist as it brought lights back on with a dissolved scene. Three blades littered the ground and she pushed herself to her feet to retrieve them, glancing first at her hand, which was bleeding lightly, then at her shoulder, still with blood running down the arm. She'd removed several of the safety protocols, the ones regarding minor injuries, but preventing major ones. She brushed her cheek with the back of her right hand and looked at the crimson wetness on the it before shaking her head and continuing to retrieve her weapons. Once they were back in place on herself, she reached up and brushed back the hair that had come loose. That part she couldn't retrieve, the explosive hairpin was well... Exploded.

"Tsivath." She cursed to herself, walking over to the holodeck entrance, where a medkit was waiting for her. She wasn't that skilled with medicine, but patching up such minor wounds was childs play in itself. She plunked herself on the ground and thought as she stopped the bleeding and put away the equipment. "Right." She said, then brought herself to her feet.

Walking back to the middle of the holodeck, she stood there, feet shoulder length apart, then closed her eyes, "Computer, begin Scenario Seven again, and randomize." A few seconds later, she opened her eyes to the desert cityscape she'd just 'died' in, pristine ground, and the four people in front of her. Another smile crossed her face as her hands went for her swords again, starting to move forward, towards the fight. Always towards the fight.