thearena | A challenge [closed to Clint]

Entry tags:

✘ pruna

A challenge [closed to Clint]

Who| Pruna and Clint Barton
What| Assassination
When| Current week, after Sandy dies
Where| Candy arena, near the milkshake river
Warnings/Notes| Death, angry assassin(s)

Sandy was dead. Pruna was furious, the girl was supposed to be her ally and she had left her here. They were supposed to win and Sandy had abandoned her.

Really though she wasn't angry at Sandy just at the situation. She knew logically that for someone who was not used to fighting surviving so long with a mangled leg in a place like this was actually very good.

Pruna had thought she could be like Kant, protect Sandy and get her through this alive, but obviously she wasn't very good at being a legendary Warrior. It angered her, she didn't like not being good at things, but at least she knew there were things she was good at.

Stealing and killing. And that's why she was here, on the banks of the river, following the man she had tried to rob a week ago. He was fast, and would be difficult to kill, but Pruna was going to try anyways.

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Clint had been keeping fairly close to Peggy and Tony for the most part, still determined to get one of his people out of here alive. It wasn't going to be easy, he knew, and after watching Coulson die again, he was having a hard time thinking it would even be possible.

Which was why he was out on his own. He needed time away from the others to clear his head, remind him why he was still here. He'd left on the pretense of hunting, and he had his sword with him, and his throwing stars.

He hadn't been sleeping much. The days were too bright, and the weird day/night schedule threw him off, and the weird singing was only just too loud for him to sleep through, and he couldn't seem to shut off his brain long enough to actually sleep when he did try.

Living off sugar and sleep-deprivation meant his usually sharp senses (and no small amount of paranoia) were not as sharp as they should have been.

Something she was depending on, though the noises and the singing made Pruna's head hurt she had the luxury of the emptiness. She couldn't stay like that for long, especially exhausted and hungry, but it was enough to keep her sane.

Candy cane trees were not very useful for hiding, so she had to attack from the side, not above as she would have preferred. She waited until she was completely in his blind spot and then moved, throwing her unicorn horn dagger at him, aiming for the kidneys. She had been practicing with it, it was a different shape and weight from the knives she had learned to throw off Hyperion. A second later she rushed at him with Sandy's pocket knife in case she missed, aiming for his neck.

The dagger catches him off guard, though it is just enough off target that while it severs his renal artery, it doesn't pierce his kidney and induce shock. His instincts are still sharp enough that he moves before she reaches him with that knife, the dagger still in his back to stem the blood flow as much as possible. His right hand moves to block her knife, and his left brings the sword up to slice at her side.

The strength of his block jars her arm and his sword cuts her side as she flings herself backwards, rolling into a crouch. Her first dagger had hit though and she grinned even as she pressed her hand to her side, trying to gauge the damage by touch. She stood up into a defensive stance.

There was no way Clint was going to survive this encounter and he knew it. Even if he took her out and got back to the others, they didn't have the equipment necessary to take the dagger out and patch him up before he bled out. This was the end of it for him, but he'd be damned if he was going out without a fight, kid or not. Next time they ended up in an arena together, he wanted her to think twice before trying a surprise attack, wanted her to know it wasn't worth the risk.

He gritted his teeth against the pain, and concentrated on not moving in any way that would dislodge the weapon in his back. Shifting his sword to his right hand, his left felt at his side for the throwing stars. She had two choices, come close and get the sword, or stay back and get the stars. Either way, he wasn't letting her get out of this with just that cut to her side.

She darted closer, she was pretty sure he would die but she never left a target until they were dead, at least not unless it was a poisoning. Still even though there was no healing magic here he might have sponsors, and he might have friends.

She had to be sure, and she wasn't too keep on doing that whilst dodging throwing stars.

She wasn't exceptionally trained in hand to hand fighting, but she had practiced against Kant and his sword, she darted in, right in, aiming for his wrists with her daggers.

As she came closer, he dropped the star in his hand, moving instead to block on of hers, fingers going to curl around her wrist and pull it away, push hard enough on a pressure point to make her drop the blade. His other hand moved to block her second blade, sword curving in an arc not quite as precise as it would be if he weren't in this condition. He didn't want to take off her hand, didn't want to do anything that would outright kill her out here all alone, her friend definitely gone. He just wanted to injure her badly enough that she'd remember, slice at her arm and hopefully cut deep.

She kicked out even as the blade slipped from her fingers, feeling the jar as her dagger was blocked and the pain as her arm was cut, deeper than her side. She didn't stop though, she could keep fighting through pain, she twisted around to try and release her other hand and kicked out again.

Even with the dagger still in his back, Clint was starting to lose a lot of blood, and it was difficult to focus over the pain. Ordinarily, when dealing with a tiny person trying to kick him to death, he'd pull the 'hand on the head, hold her at arm's length' trick, but his reactions were just a bit slowed, and her second kick caught him firmly in the ribs, doubling him over as he let go of her wrist. The motion made the dagger shift, and he could practically feel the moment when it stopped acting to stem the flow of blood and instead actively encouraged it.

He still held his sword, though, even as his vision started to blur, lashing out at her with it to keep her at bay. He was going to die, he'd accepted that, didn't mean he had to lie back and take it.

She jumped back as he fell and stepped forward again, to try and finish it. His sword caught her though, slicing her leg and making her fall back, yelping in pain.

It didn't stop her though, there would be time to focus on her injuries once her target was dead. That was all that mattered.

She darted forwards again, aiming her knife for his stomach, gritting her teeth as her leg, arm and side throbbed in pain.

If there was one part of his body he wasn't leaving exposed to attack, it was his stomach. Still slightly curled over it from the force of her kick and shielding it from further damage, he kept his sword mostly in that vicinity as well, though he was starting, now, to lose feeling in his fingers, making his hold on the weapon weaker.

She kicked out again, this time at his legs, and instead aimed her knife at the side of his neck, eyes glinting. In pain and wanting to get this over with.

His legs easily gave out by this time, but he still swung the sword in a wobbly arc toward her hand.

Truthfully, he didn't need any other wounds to help him bleed out, he was just about there already. When his legs were knocked from under him, he fell onto his side, dislodging the dagger completely. He had minutes to live, if that, seconds were far more likely, as he was already starting to fade from consciousness.

She skittered back, and crouched out of range watching him in case he tried any final movements.

"I did be promising, and I do never be breaking my promises." She blinked at him sadly. "May the gods be watching over you until the stupid people do be waking you up again."

Clint didn't even register her speaking. Nothing seemed to work at all, and in just a few seconds there was nothing more. A moment later a cannon boomed.

When it sounded Pruna grinned, and skittered forwards to take what she could, watching to make sure no one else snuck up on her.

Shepard had been watching and had seen the change, when Pruna saw the target and moved into position. It was a little like watching a cat hunt, and it called for similar tactics; sit back, and watch. Well, mostly she was watching not the fight, but Pruna's back. It wasn't the best engagement she'd seen, but it was the kid's call, and if she wanted to pick a target then Shepard wasn't going to stop her.

After all, it was killing as well as living that kept the audiences entertained and that might mean their lives, eventually. But when she looked back, all had settled into stillness and blood, and Pruna's stance altered, so she stepped off and came to survey the damage.

"Nice work," she said, though it was anything but; it'd been a brief, brutal, messy fight that owed little to what she knew of Thane's trade. Well, what did it matter? Even a master assassin had to start off short. The scene was a bloody mess that was already making a putrid, sugary salt-soup for Clint's head to sink into as it decayed. For a moment she watched it spread and crystallize, suddenly just a bit too tired, too many consecutive hours without sleep, without real safety or silence.

The moment passed, just a heartbeat of weakness, and she tapped the kid on her shoulder, "C'mon, kid. Let's get done with this before he attracts a crowd. Get you patched up."

Pruna span round, but relaxed when she saw it was just Shepard. "It did be being messy." She said wrinkling her nose, her guardians would have been disappointed in her.

"But he do be being dead." And dead was dead. She grabbed the rest of his things, and pressed her hand to her side. "I do be being fine."

She was still suspicious, and wary of Shepard even if she really did seem like she was trying to help.

"Bullshit," she replied, but didn't press it further. So long as the kid wasn't bleeding badly enough to attract predators, her injuries were her own business. After all, there was only one stubborn assassin she actually owed any loyalty to, and he wasn't here.

Still, Pruna was a good enough kid that she didn't mind it, and in the morning, she'd offer again, for what good it'd do.

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A challenge [closed to Clint]

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