A Very Busy Day (Private Between Morgan Landry and redline2400)

In the span of just over an hour, Ryan had made new connection with his kinda-but-not-really-French half-sister Chiara, had a pathetic shootout with her in the archery range, apologized for being an a**hole to one of the biggest a**holes at camp, and was now about to go train with her for tonight's CTF match. Oh joy.

So here Ryan was, leaning against the entrance to the arena, still wearing the Oakley glasses from before, holding the carbon fiber bow that he had plans to sell, and was waiting for angry cripple b**** to arrive. Given his last conversation with Chiara, Ryan wasn't entierly sure how this was going to go. Well, besides the unspoken fact that she would beat him 9.9 times out of 10. But regardless, Ryan just leaned there nonchalant, sporting a serious face while hoping Chiara didn't decide to kick him in the nuts the moment she arrived.

OOC: Sorry for taking so long to get to this.

Well, she didn't literally take a shot at his nuts, but Chiara might as well have with a request like the one she gave him. Push-ups he could do. On his knuckles was a possibility. But everything else? No way. He could see at least a few reasons as to why she would put forth such an unorthodox challenge; but none of them made complete sense. Maybe she was testing him, maybe this was some sort of "initiation" hazing for the Ares cabin, maybe she just had high expectations for someone she didn't know very well. Or maybe she wanted another chance to show off. Regardless, Ryan said "Alright, I'll see what I can do.", got down in the prescribed position, and managed to crank out 8 (8!) of the convoluted push-ups. Under his breath, Ryan couldn't help but let up a frustrated "S***..." at his failure to pull off the full 12.

Getting up off the ground, Ryan decided to quip "That moral support of yours just brightens my f***ing day." Upon getting up and dusting himself off, Ryan pulled out his xiphos and got into stance. "So you want me to just take a swing at you? I don't think this will be easy, but aren't you kinda out of commission with your leg all messed up?"

A bit of a harsh, but not unexpected, reply from the aggressive peanut gallery, but so aggressive that it turned out sounding silly. Taking note of that, Ryan decided it was time to kill Chiara the only way he could: with saracasm. "Why only 3am? I hear 2:45 is a way better time for yeop chagiing."

He could see the lack of delight in Chiara. He saw her send her sword right towards his vitals. But what Ryan didn't see coming was him moving his sword up in time to become an obstacle in her swords path.

With the wind knocked out of him, Ryan landed flat on the dirt floor of the arena, courtesy of Chiara's non-crippled leg. While down and trying to draw the air back in, Rysn said "F*** me." in a hushed tone, berating himself over his failure at battle.

A moment or two passes, and Ryan gets himself back up and into a combat pose, all without any side remarks or smartass quips.

Chiara held up the fight for a good ten minutes. She kicked and punched, using elbows and knees as well in an aggressive and unfair style of fight. No body part was off-limits: throat, groin, eyes, everything was a target in her eyes.

However her leg hurt more and more. She wasn't going to give up though, gritting her teeth as sweat trickled into her eyes. But after about ten minutes, her knee simply gave out and she toppled to the ground, bruised, one eye black.
Rolling onto her back, she spat out sand, panting loudly. "What're you looking at?" She growled at a young kid.

(Er...what just happened?)

(I time skipped)

(So Ryan just kicked Chiara's rear?)

(No, her knee simply gave out. But he landed good hits on her anyway, like I said, bruises and black eye.)

(I'll agree with that. Ryan is a far cry from "a**-kicking bada***" anyway.)

Ryan, also quite bruised up, took notice of the same kid Chiara was getting all hostile at. While he wasn't so keen on making some youngster cry, he felt it was his duty as half-brother to at least not totally embarrass Chiara. Yelling out to the kid, Ryan said "She's right pal! Move along, nothing to see! Just go while you still can!"

"Oh shut it will you," she snapped at Ryan as she got up on one knee, trying to push herself back to her feet. But her knee had simply gotten limp, uselessly hanging down. "Gods fcking dammit." She bit down on the inside of her cheek, tasting blood and loose flesh as she managed to get back up, all her weight on her good leg. "Right. Back to business."

"Are you really sure you want to continue?" asked Ryan in a concerned tone. "You don't really seem like you're in the best shape to do...well...anything right now, with your leg and all."

"You kidding? I could punch your teeth out even if I were tetraplegic, now get your @ss back in the ring."


Big words, but deep down she didn't know if she could back them up. The pain had become unsustainable and her leg was giving little jolts. But she didn't wanna give up, especially now he was talking in a concerned way. She didn't want that. No one could be concerned for her. That was condescending.

"Ok, ok, par for the course response. Can't say I wasn't t expecting that." Ryan got back in a compatible pose. "En guard, I guess."

Chiara tried to put as little weight on her leg as possible but quickly realized trying kicks was hopeless. She couldn't kick with her bad leg and she couldn't do kicks with her good leg either cause that meant leaning on her injured one. So she stayed with the fists, letting her boxing training come back to her -- crossjabs, uppercuts, whatever came to her mind. Her knuckles were calloused from years of doing press ups on them in TKD. But even for boxing you need your whole body and she tripped several times only to fall on her back a minute later. "Hades' underpants," she cussed, trying to get back on her feet, her lower lip swollen and bleeding.