Rat-Queen to Street-Rat (Closed, Backdated)

[earthborn]

Who| Shepard (earthborn) and Rat (saveswithsong)
What| A swift drop with an abrupt stop, from the mezzanine to the ground floor
Where| the Mezzaine balconies, briefly, and then the first floor lobby.
When| Approximately Wednesday, perhaps earlier, week five.
Warnings/Notes| Crush Injuries, cursing

She was not in the habit of losing people. It happened, of course, that was just the way life was in the Alliance. You made friends and they were moved to new posts, and you didn't see them until years had passed and they were no longer really friends. Or, they were removed from their posts in a more final way, and you never saw them at all.

It was war. It was life. Shit happens.

Garrus Vakarian was not supposed to die. Thane was...well, she'd expected that. Should have expected to lose them, really. But all the same, it still hit her gut like a Krogan brew, roiling and hot, heavy, but growing lighter as it leeched into her blood stream and tried to kill her. She wasn't so easily subdued. But she was angry, stalking among the displays like a prowling Varren, and just the same she was on the hunt. Somewhere in this damn bloody paradise there still stood forty-one warm bodies between her and her goal. She would have liked to make them a run a bit colder.

Comments

Apologies for the way late! Perhaps a bit of a scuffle before he takes a bow?

[saveswithsong]

In another context, Rat might actually commiserate with Shepard on this point. But for now, he was only concerned with playing the game as it was meant to be played, how he could best play it. He found himself one of the few hiding spots, up on top of one of the displays. Laid flat on his stomach, he couldn't be seen. He had a knife in his hand.

Once the woman moved under him, or as near to it as he expected her to, he pushed himself up onto his knees. He grimaced at the pain, but he reached behind thigh and dragged his wounded leg forcibly into place. Nothing more than a cane to balance on. Even as well-conditioned as his body was, he was starting to feel the ache in his body from favoring it so much over these weeks. Weeks? They felt like months, at this point.

He didn't so much leap onto her for the tackle as he did just use gravity to his advantage. He snapped the blade out in air, and went for the quick slice to the throat, planning to use twisting his fingers into her hair for leverage.

If you're late, I'm ancient. Never fear!

[earthborn]

A sudden weight around her neck, the cold slide of steel, a strangled shout. It was instinct to lean forward against the strain, to lift and throw, but that was death. She knew this dance, and instead threw herself backwards, away from the cutting surface. Wet, blood-borne heat bloomed along scar and scab across one cheek as Rat's blade found purchase wide of the mark.

"Mother-fucker," snarled against the scrape between blade and jawbone as she got her hands on his wrist and wrenched, hoping to break his bones, to break free, or both.

Re: If you're late, I'm ancient. Never fear!

[saveswithsong]

There were a great number of reasons why Rat was aptly named, and not the least of which were his battle strategies. She could do what she liked with his wrist, he pulled his leg up, balancing on his wounded one. He shoved his knee into her back. He then lowered it to try to trip her legs out from under her. He wasn't stable in the least, but he had to do what he had to do.

[earthborn]

What do you do when someone wants to put you on your back? Shepard arched her back as hard as she could, bent her knees and thrust herself backwards until Rat hit the floor behind her as hard as she could. Now they were on the floor, but she still didn't have the advantage— except, that wasn't true. She bit him, on the joint of his thumb, not as children bit, or animals, but with the intention to separate his joint from his hand, if he didn't let go. Maybe she'd do it even if he did.

Blood was bitter and salty, but she swallowed it without a thought. After all, every little bit helped, for what she was about to do. For as soon as Shepard had a hand free, she finished the work momentum had half-started for her, and pulled the mask on her head down over her face.

[saveswithsong]

He hit the floor hard, and cracked his head on the floor. Her teeth came down hard on his knuckles, but he jerked on her hair to get himself free. When that didn't work, he complied and dropped the knife. He still had another, after all.

He had somehow gone this long without seeing the effects of the masks, and had just considered it a trophy, or a method of getting kills without having to deal with reprisals in later arenas or in the Capitol. Thus, he hadn't considered it a threat as of yet. This was about to change, too little too late.

I hope this is alright.

[earthborn]

Every time she put on a mask it was the same. The rush of power, a heady, hormonal whirl. It was an adrenaline high like nothing else, and she'd always been a sucker for that kind of thing. Plus, now Rat had made her mad.

Shepard stood and inhaled, took a step back and made her decision. No easy death for you, peaches. You've earned this beat-down.

Power flared around her in a blue corona, clouds of biotic fire flickering in and out of existence as the eezo in Shepard's body drew charge from her nerves and acted on the invisible Dark Matter all around them. She flung out a hand in a careless gesture, like skipping an invisible stone across a pretend lake, and the power flared out from her in a cascade-wave that skipped along much like a skipping stone. It lifted up priceless vases, antique chairs, glass cases, and flung them violently aside, an unstoppable locomotive of barely-visible force, wreathed in blue-white light.

It picked up Rat and threw him violently against the marble facade of the wall. It did it again as the followup-wake rushed past him as an undertow. It gained her time, and space, and made it easy to reach for the other Mnemonic. This time, nobody got to run away.

It's flawless. It is what we came here for, after all!

[saveswithsong]

Rat had seen and dealt with a lot in his young life. Even some things that might stretch the imagination of others here. But this, this he had never seen before. This was not natural. This was caused by that mask. But this realization would be coming too late for him.

He cried out on the first impact, cracking ribs and folding an arm under him in a direction it hadn't been designed to go. His vision swam, and on the second blow he crumpled like a doll. He was still alive though. His breathing ragged and painful, his body shaking with pain. He knew he was going to die here. He'd pushed it too far. Picked the wrong fight.

But he wasn't about to just give it up. He slowly shifted, as though he were trying to get back on his feet. He wasn't going to die in a heap.

[earthborn]

He was tough. A survivor, someone who, no matter how badly broken they were, would try to stand up and die on his feet. Good.

She wanted him to fight. When Shepard lifted her arm and lifted him like a ragdoll in a loose, shearing arc over her head towards the balcony, she wanted to see him writhe. When she made a fist and jerked it forward, the mnemonic of a shadow-punch that forced a minor singularity to briefly avert gravitational forces laterally, she wanted him to know it.

To feel the sudden, dizzy weightlessness as he arced gracefully from mezzanine to the first floor and land with a slide and a crunch against the brassy feet of this fine nation's boldest president. His blood painted a ragged stripe across the floor, and Rat's landing was not gentle— it has a sound, wet and faintly crunchy, and for a moment, Shepard stood with one foot on the balcony railing, looking for movement, listening for breath or a groan.