trans_9 | Damn Paperclip [Open]

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Damn Paperclip [Open]

Julian glared at the paperclip. Or, rather, the charred shard of metal that used to be a paperclip, which was sitting on the floor of an otherwise empty sensorium.

He had tried to pick it up and move it, something that should be a simple task for a telekinetic like him, but his precision control was still shot to hell. He ended up using too much energy in too small a space, which resulted in an explosion.

For the fifth time in a row.

It was getting annoying. He used to have perfect control. Hell, he was on the verge of learning how to disassemble molecules. Now, thanks to Emma unleashing him into overdrive, he can move a mountain through sheer force of will, but can't pick up anything smaller than an SUV without exploding it.

He was getting better at it with practice, but it was slow and frustrating. But damn it all to hell if he was going to ask for help. He could do this on his own. He'd just have to try again.

Which he did, having the sensoriums make another paperclip for him. All he had to do was concentrate, focus, grab hold of it, lift it and then.... then shield his eyes from shrapnel as that one exploded too.

"Dammit..."

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"Na-no-ha," she corrected Julian. "That's my name. And you don't need to worry about me." She ignored his statement about doing things with her as best as she could, though the frown on her face deepened just a bit. "I can handle myself."

"And that goes for you too, Fate-chan." Nanoha glanced over at the blonde girl. "I'll rest all day after this, okay?"

"Yes I do," Nanoha retorted mentally. "I think he needs to learn a bit of a lesson, don't you? You can handle yourself, but what if he did it to some girl who wasn't strong like you? I just don't like it. I'll be fine."

"... Fine." Fate said, after thinking it over for a few minutes. She could brush off her own discomfort, but she did not like it when his comments were directed towards Nanoha. She was sure none of the other girls on the ship would appreciate being hit on like that, too, so... Nanoha was right. Maybe he does need to be taught a lesson.

"But if things start getting bad, I'm stepping in, okay?"

Julian shook his head. "You know, I really don't get why some girls get all hung up on the name thing," he said to himself. But that was neither here nor there. "But, if you really want to... well, how can I say no to such a pretty face?"

Julian stepped back further into the Sensorium, which suddenly transformed the room until they were standing in the middle of the Golden Gate Bridge, which itself was littered with a few abandoned cars. Oddly, the sky was red, initially, and for some reason, Julian was quietly unsettled by that. He looked at his hands for a moment, flexing them, having this odd feeling like there was a memory in the back of his mind that was gnawing its way to the surface.

He pushed the feeling aside, and the red sky changed to a bright and sunny blue one quickly enough. He just shook the whole thing off. "Must've been a glitch..." But, that too was beside the point.

"Alright, Dollface," he spoke up, "here are the rules." Yes, there would be rules. They were sparring, not having a deathmatch. "The field of battle is on or over the Bridge itself, or over the water, for about a hundred meters in each direction. If you get knocked outside of the field, you lose. If you hit the water, you lose. If you hit the land on either side of the bridge, you lose. And all knockdowns are subject to a standing eight count. And if your friend thinks you've gone too far, Sweetheart can step in and call an end to this." So far, nothing unreasonable.

"Any stipulations you want to argue or add?"

"Nope," Nanoha shook her head. "That seems fine to me. Although... how about if I win, you'll call us by our actual names, okay?" A pause. "And maybe rethink your approach to how you treat the female members of the crew, too." Nanoha had no problem with gentle flirting or teasing, really, but there was something about Julian's casual and aggressive approach that rubbed her the wrong way - especially when it was aimed at her lover.

She closed her eyes as the world changed around her - San Francisco on Earth, wasn't it? - reaching down to the jewel that she wore around her neck, and brought it to her lips. "Are you ready, Raising Heart? Set Up."

"I am ready, my master. Raising Heart Excelion, Stand By. Barrier Jacket: Aggressive Mode."

The familiar pink light enveloped the mage, and when it cleared she was in her blue-and-white battle outfit, holding the golden-tipped spear that was her weapon in her good hand. Nanoha frowned to herself, knowing that Raising Heart would be difficult to use with one hand - and reached up to remove the sling on her arm and toss it aside, stretching the injured limb a few times before grabbing the staff with both hands like she was used to.

"I'm ready," she called out to Julian, and sent a quick telepathic message to Fate: "Don't worry, Fate-chan. I'll be fine." Mainly, she hoped that the girl wouldn't get too upset over her discarding of the sling. Her arm was mostly healed, anyway.

Edited 2010-07-08 01:14 (UTC)

Oh, Fate was was going to protest, but... it really was hard to wield a device one-handed, even if it was for mainly long-range combat. So, again, she'll let it slide for now. Only for now.

"... If you say so."

And with that, she floated back, just outside the perimeter of the battlefield. Bardiche was already clutched in her hand; she didn't think things would get bad right from the start, but she wanted to be on alert. Just in case.

"And if I win..." he rolled that thought around for a moment, but decided to be nice and let her off the hook. "You keep the nicknames, without complaint. Sound fair?" Not like he was going to lose anyway. She really was only working with one arm.

Nanoha sighed - she really didn't like those nicknames. "...all right, I can agree to that." Even if she only had one good arm, it should be all right. She could still fly, after all.

"Axel Fin."

The translucent wings on the back of her heels shimmered to life, lifting her a good two or so feet off the ground where she hovered. Nanoha tightened her grip on Raising Heart. "Ready when you are."

And a few seconds later, she'd learn that wouldn't give her much of an advantage, as Julian floated into the air with ease.

"Stacy, count it off."

||3... 2... 1... FIGHT!||

And no sooner had the word been given, had he launched himself straight towards Nanoha.

An advantage, perhaps not - but Nanoha had always considered herself a person of the sky. It set her at ease just to be able to fly, and she knew that she was good at it. However, this wasn't a match she thought she could win just by the straight application of overwhelming force (at least, not yet) - her Linker Core was still recovering from the use of the Blaster System, and she didn't want to overwhelm it. So she'd have to play smart.

As Julian flew forward, Nanoha flew backwards and up, leaving three small magenta orbs the size of softballs in her path - if Julian wanted to continue pursuing her, he'd have to either change course or run head-on into them. And the moment he changed course, she'd just send them homing in on his position.

He did change course, and he noticed the orbs following him as he did. He decided to take a detour and zip around and through the suspension cables holding up the bridge, trying to see if he could shake them, or at least delay them, then he made a beeline straight for her.

No such luck, Julian. The orbs aren't following you automatically, Nanoha's controlling them manually - and she has a lot of practice leading targets. With a thought, she sent one of them flying on a path that would take it directly between the two of them and automatically detonate in a burst of energy the moment Julian got too close.

The other two would be coming around in a pincer movement from the top and bottom, to hopefully catch him if he dodged either way.

If he couldn't lose them by out maneuvering them, brute force would have to do. He broke off pursuit, and fired an energy blast at the orb that was coming between them, then he quickly located and fired on the other two.

He then headed to the left, not wanting to give her a fixed target to aim at, and tried to locate her again.

All right, so he had ranged capabilities, too - she'd have to keep that in mind. Slowly but surely, she'd figure her opponent out, and hopefully she'd be able to figure out how best to deal with him before too long.

He could fly, and he could take out her shots one at a time. The combat instructor inside of Nanoha decided that it was time for a more difficult test. The moment Julian broke off his attack approach, Raising Heart spoke at Nanoha's mental command: "Axel Shooter."

Where you had only been dealing with three orbs before, Julian, there were a good deal more sparking to life all around Nanoha - at least eight or nine, probably more. "Shoot!" The mage flung her non-injured arm out, and the barrage sliced through the air at her opponent, all of them curving on slightly different trajectories to make it much harder to dodge. Quantity had a quality all of its own.

Granted, Julian wasn't good at multi-directional targeting yet, but that was only where precision counted. Rather than even attempt to dodge, he flew right into the middle of the whole cluster. He then let out a short burst of energy from his body that went out in every direction.

Somewhat wasteful, yes. But when you're aiming at all directions at once, it's rather hard to miss.

Hm. She'd have to remember that he could do that for next time. But right now, he was closing fast, and so Nanoha went on the defensive - a flat disc of hard magenta light sprung to life at the palm of her hand.

"Round Shield."

It was met head-on by a shield of his own, and the two energy barriers were engaged in a classic push-off.

"What's wrong, Dallface? Don't want to settle this up close and personal?"

The mouthing off was just a distraction, though. If she was paying attention to the details, she might have noted that he hadn't looked directly at her the whole time. She also might have heard, over the sound of their shields clashing, the brief sound of metal wrenching and tearing from the bridge below, somewhere behind her. That would be Julian yanking out one of the street lamps and pulling it at her from behind, hoping to catch her of guard.

It wouldn't be the first time an opponent had tried that trick on her. Nanoha's head whipped around as she caught the sound of the groaning metal, and extended her other hand - on her injured arm, which made her fight a wince - to create a second shield to hold the impact off.

"Why do you talk to women like that, anyway?" Nanoha's tone seemed conversational, a little grit in her voice the only indication that she was managing two shields at the same time. In the next instant, before Julian could respond, she squeezed the hand operating the shield facing him into a fist. "Barrier Burst!"

The shield detonated in a point-blank explosion of magical energy aimed directly at Julian and his own barrier.

"Becaus-ahh!!" The explosion caught him of guard, and while his shield took the worst of it, it was still more than enough to drive him back and put some distance between them.

"Cute," he remarked, briefly pondering his next move. He decided to land back on the bridge, hoping to make her come down towards him. He'd have the advantage at that level.

Oh, no. Nanoha remained in the air about six feet above the ground, slowly moving around Julian in a circle to prevent him from easily planning anything based on the terrain. "You can think about your answer if you want."

She held out a hand again, pointing one slender finger at her opponent. Teana's move really was a useful one, come to think of it. "Crossfire... Shoot!"

Three beams of sparkling magenta light shot from her finger, spiraling around each other in a triple helix as they closed the distance between the two of them very, very quickly - and they were accompanied by another trio of the magical orbs from before, which Nanoha intended to send off following Julian the moment he dodged.

Except Julian was a telekinetic. The entire terrain is both his weapon and his shield.

Julian didn't dodge. Instead, a large piece of the asphalt in front of him was quickly and violently uprooted, and it took the hit from the crossfire that was meant for him.

"I talk that way to women because it doesn't waste time." And neither did he, as he went straight to what he did best, being offensive. He fired several more energy blasts at her, those these behaved differently than any he fired before. None went straight at her, instead, some arced overhead before coming down at her, and a trio went wide at either side, then closed back in on her.

Above her and to the sides. But not in front of her. "Flash Move."

Nanoha vanished. Or, rather, appeared to vanish as the spell temporarily boosted her speed to levels far beyond what the naked eye could catch - and as the wind rushed past her ears, she flew forward through Julian's barrage, reappearing behind him.

As she flickered back into view, Nanoha was already in the middle of swinging her staff down at her opponent's back, the head of the weapon glowing with power that would unleash itself in a large explosion once it made contact. "Flash Impact."

A teleporter of some kind? That, he wasn't expecting. The explosion caught him full on and sent him reeling.

First knockdown goes to you, Dollface.

Nanoha exhaled as she flew back, feeling beads of sweat begin to dot her forehead. So far, so good - she had some more breathing room now, so she leveled Raising Heart at Julian and waited for him to get to his feet. "It doesn't waste time doing what? Finding out what they actually want, or what's important to them?"

There was a scoff from Julian as he picked himself up. "Like I need to know any of that.

"I let them know what I want, and if they want the same thing, great. If they don't? Hey, that's cool, but now I'm not gonna waste any more of my time and I think I'll go talk to that other hot chick over there."

He noticed her pointing her staff at him, but hell if he was going to give her a chance to use it. Once he was ready for the fight to continue, he used his powers to try to yank Rising Heart out of her hands.

"But you didn't here. Here, you just started forcefully and didn't back off even when it was clear that she didn't want--" Nanoha was cut off as she felt an invisible force suddenly give her Device a sharp tug. Though she tried to hold on to it, her injured arm couldn't quite withstand Julian's telekinetic mind, and the staff flew from her hands.

But she was quick, and no sooner had it left her grasp than she was already pointing at Julian for a repeat attack. "Crossfire Shoot!"

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