Hold It In (RWBY/Transistor)

Votes are closed, and, at a glance, becoming the one eyed man in the land of the blind wins!

On a much less serious note, I wrote this over the course of a day and this is STUPID and I LOVE IT and you should all go LISTEN to the FIGHT KNIGHT SOUNDTRACK because it's the BEST THING

More seriously, this is kind of like if the Fist Of The North Star, Gurren Lagann and KSBD choice had a kid together. Master on an entirely unheard of level, unconventional weapon, brutal violence, not in the slightest bit serious- really, if I'd put this down and it won I'd probably be having a hell of a lot more fun writing this quest, and that's saying a lot.

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Your fists itch. You watch the blonde girl below beating Cardin black and blue and all you can think about is how much like your own fighting style hers is, and by extension, how much her fighting style is like your master's.

You wanna fight her.

"Cease!" Goodwitch calls out, throwing Cardin for a loop, trying to halt his mace mid-swing. "Stand down, Mr Winchester, your Aura is critical."

He growls in frustration but doesn't continue his assault.

"Ms Xiao Long, impressive as usual, though your reliance on your Semblance worries me. One more hit and I doubt Mr Winchester would have come out conscious, let alone unscathed, and you yourself are not invincible."

Her victory grin becomes a little more forced as Goodwitch turns to the rest of the class. "Still, you will never learn if you do not fight. Can you go another round?"

Your fellow blonde affirmed her ability and willingness to keep fighting, and Goodwitch went about the process of picking her next opponent, which as far as you can tell consists of a silent game of eenie-meenie-miney-mo.

It often went like this when you weren't split into sparring partners, according to one of the second-years. Goodwitch would make the winner fight more, allowing them to fight more, and improve more until they got too tired to keep going, and then the cycle would repeat with the next one. The rewards for winning a spar were more spars. You thought at first that that would be unfair, rewarding those who didn't need the extra credit, but you realised quickly that Goodwitch has a very... firm grasp on exactly who could do with being first on the chopping block, so to speak.

"Mr Arc, you're a pugilist yourself- perhaps you might learn something from each other."

Snapping out of your thoughts on your instructor's teaching methods, you find your fists clenching up tighter, the leather of your gloves creaking under the pressure, the metal not doing much better. A fire has been lit in your heart, and you know exactly what you need to quench it.

Battle.

Quickly standing up, you make your way to the edge of the seating area outside the arena, hopping onto the stage with perhaps just a little too much enthusiasm if the thud of your boots on the wooden floor is any indication. You make your way to centre stage while Yang does the same. Once you're there, and you both signal your readiness for this, the "Fight In Progress" klaxon buzzes out.

"Begin!"

Immediately pointing her gauntlets behind her, an explosive round propelling her forward, Yang comes for your head, aiming a punch at the space you no longer occupy. You dodge to the side as you were taught, bringing your fists up and swiftly shifting back to your starting position, getting a few punches in at her ribs.

From there, the fight never really moves- while you're both fast, you're also both close-range. Besides shifting between the same four square metres to dodge her blows and blasts, and her attempts to upset your static nature while you duck and weave and lightly strike her arms, stomach, ribs, chest, whittling her down and more annoying her than anything else, neither of you really move. You know her strategy- take big hits, give bigger hits back.

Any strategy that relies on taking a hit is not a good strategy, Semblances be damned. Annoy her into one of her soul-enabled temper tantrums, dodge, take her out when she's emptied the tank.

At least, that would be the plan against a lesser opponent- as is, you're being kept on your toes for the first time since you fought that Ursa, and it's fitting that Yang is the one to do it- deceptively fast, for such a brutal style, but straightforward and somewhat predictable, once you've learned the patterns. You note, as you block a blast with the back plates of your gauntlets, that prediction and reaction are very much not the same things, and find yourself almost as frustrated as she looks.

Except... is that...

A smile?

... She's enjoying this. She's frustrated because you're turtling up, but she's enjoying this because you're of a like mind. Of a like style. You're doing her a disservice by playing this safe.

Well. 'Don't disappoint a lady,' he always said.

You discard caution, throwing punches as fast as Huntsmanly possible, your arms becoming a blur of raw violence. Yang's put on the defensive quickly, dodging and blocking strikes like nobody's business, her smile slowly beginning to widen as she realises what she's provoked you into doing.

Oh but honey, you haven't even started.

You focus on your soul, and the techniques your master taught you float to the forefront of your thoughts, time slowing down by just a fraction. You discard three, keeping one, and your Semblance takes control, forcing your arms to move at speeds normally far, far beyond you.

Your fists blur in front of you, each impact a mini-crack against the sound barrier, barely controlled by your mind, powered only by your soul. The blonde Ursa can barely keep up, not really able to dodge the unending assault of steel and leather you direct at her torso. Eventually, Yang manages to block a few with her gauntlets before she begins an onslaught herself, her weapons...

Striking your own.

Every punch, met with a punch, every strike, met with a strike, not once after that moment do you hit anything other than her own fists, and you have the sinking feeling that this is exactly what she wants.

But fuck if you care, this is the most fun you've had in a spar for months! The hint of a smile on her face has grown into a sadistic grin, and you feel your own lips pulling up as well. Eventually, your Semblance begins to fade, and you both trade speed for decisiveness, properly trading jabs finally. As she dodges a nose-breaker, you notice that sadistic grin widening as her eyes go red, her hair beginning to glow an almost painful yellow.

... Ah, dammit.

Her next punch, you estimate as your gauntlets, her fist, and the front and back of your skull all have a very intimate moment together, puts you firmly in the yellow, and you're sent skidding back several feet. Working some feeling back into your nose rabbit-style, you decide it's time for another technique. She rushes forward, and you let time slow down as your Semblance begins to work its magic one more time.

Power floods your legs, and you leap high, before breaking physics over your knee and slamming back into the ground, a wave of Aura-enhanced force pulsing out from the impact point. Yang is sent flying over your head, and you just barely dodge a last-ditch effort to blow your brains out with her shotgun gauntlets.

... Shotgauntlets. Shotgunlets- you have so many more important things to do right now, like dodging her fist oh god how did she land right behind you?!

You duck low, coming back up for a brutal uppercut, snapping her head back so violently you're almost concerned you snapped her neck. It's only the slow turn back that tells you you haven't just committed a murder.

Her eyes burn through your head, and you come back to a neutral stance, silently hoping your opponent will get the message and do the same. After a moment, she does the same, and a silent accord is made.

'We end this. Now.'

... You have one last technique in you. Time slows, and you let your Semblance take over for the final time. You watch as she reels back for an attack, twisting to use her entire body behind one conclusive blow.

Funny. You're planning on doing the same.


Aura fills your legs, and you skip back, bringing up a finally unclenched fist, palm open and facing her, again, alternating palms and legs as you find yourself leaping back halfway across the stage, a feeling not unlike a rubber band around your legs and a stake just where you were, trying to pull you back as best it can-

You let it. Leaping forward ten times as fast as you leapt back, you draw a fist back and aim for her little snub nose. As you watch her fist approach your own face, you can only admit that this was a good fight, and you're gonna have to thank her for it when you get out of the infirmary.

|||

And then you woke up in bed.

Not your bed, mind, the infirmary bed. Your eye won't open, and it feels heavy, for some reason.

"Yo." You hear beside you. Turning to look, you see Yang in the bed next to you, her right eye swollen shut just like yours. "Hey, we match! You got my right, I got your left!"

Something about that makes you grin, and it's not long before she's grinning with you.

"... Thank you." You say after a moment. "I... had fun. It's been a while since I've fought with someone so... like-minded."

"Yeah? I gotta admit, it was... yeah, it was fun! It was just so..."

"Visceral?"

"I would have said freakin' awesome, but yeah, visceral works too." She looks away for a moment, hand reaching behind her head to rub her neck. "But, uh, I don't think Goodwitch is gonna be keen on a rematch."

"And? Who said we needed to do it on her time?" You tell her bluntly. What goes on in Goodwitch's classroom is Goodwitch's problem, but out of it...

"... What are you suggesting?"

"You, me, dorm roof at six o'clock once or twice a week?"

She raises an eyebrow, giving you a look that suggests you just said something you're gonna regreyeaaaahhhh there it is.

Why can't you realise these things before you say them?

"Jaune Arc, it might be the concussion talking, but that almost sounded like you trying to make plans for some alone time with me."

... You know what, roll with it, roll with it, you're this deep already, no reason not to keep digging.

"I am." When the other eyebrow goes up, you continue. "Look, you said it yourself, that fight was freakin' awesome. If nothing else, we get a couple days a week where we can enjoy and improve ourselves by whaling on each other-"

"Hey. I never said I was opposed to the idea."

... O-oh.

|||
In a dark tower, Flavius Cassius Agrippa, a decorated veteran of the Mistral gladiatorial circuit, bearer of the Empty Hand, and one of only two people mad enough to chase the aformentioned Tower, is beating up a group of skeletons and goblins some childish part of his mind had come to call The Notorious R.I.B.

He had no idea why it called them that, or why it's so funny, but it is, and he can only giggle internally as he punches another skull off another set of vertebrae.

As he lifts up another goblinoid necromancer, a chill runs down his spine. He stands stock still, the small creature ineffectually batting at his hand to make him let go of its robe.

While it slowly succumbs to suffocation, Agrippa can only feel a certain sense of... pride in his apprentice.

... Hmph. The boy must have found a new sparring partner.

He hopes she's good for the lad. Now, where was he?

Ah, yes, bomb goblin- WAIT SHIT FUCKING BOMB GOBLIN-

SO IT TURNS OUT BUDGIE CLAWS HAVE VEINS IN THEM AND IF YOU CLIP TOO CLOSE TO THEM THEY CAN START BLEEDING

MY LITTLE GUY'S OK BUT MAN THAT WAS A PANIC ATTACK AND A HALF

The Oldman said:

Meh.
Ai Wo Torimodose fits better.

Click to expand...

Click to shrink...

I have a Fist of the North Star interlude planned out, which is why I avoided using the music here, and the music from the demo is a cast-iron bitch to find- I had to record it with Audacity just to get it for my own personal listening. Not that the new music is bad, it's just... a bit different. Besides, not using the Fight Knight soundtrack in an interlude inspired by Fight Knight made at least partially to shill Fight Knight doesn't feel right.

Also, guessing interesting Semblances gains Fate Points now!

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... Lumen seems like he's gonna be ok. He's gonna have fun!

He can handle himself. Probably. Anyway, you, and possibly Creme and Ada, are gonna go pick off some stragglers! Yeah, they're pretty much half-blind, and you're not, and you trust your teammates to look after themselves, and even if they can't, well, you're there.

If the one-eyed man in the land of the blind is king, what does that make the two-eyed man in the land of the Cyclopes?

{An archer?}

You snort a little.

"Come on, girls, time to mop up."

"What? Uh, Jaune, in case you haven't realised, we're half-blind. Probably more than half for Ada."

"Fuck you, Daylaw. You're right, but fuck you." Ada replies, just about managing to not sound completely venomous.

"Like I said, keep blinking, and the afterimage should clear up. Besides, I'm not taking on three people by myself, half-blind or not."

You look at your opponents and see two that you're not surprised made it this far- Haru Chinatsu, and Naia Sendoa.

Haru is cautiously moving around, hands up, palms open and faced up, eyes open but unfocused. Searching for an opponent, you suppose. Naia, by contrast, is trying to regain his eyesight as quickly as he can, blinking and rubbing his eyes as much as your own teammates are, his long, studded bat sitting on the ground next to him.

Between them, and trying her best to sneak away, is a girl you honestly cannot remember the name of for the life of you.

...

{Do you really care?}

You suppose not. She seems to at least have an idea of where the others are, considering how good a job she's doing of staying away from them, but otherwise, she doesn't seem to be in the mood for a fight.

Looking back at your teammates, you see they're left squinting, but otherwise seem to be able to focus on you.

"... I guess Lumen can handle himself." Creme admits after a minute.

You look over at Lumen and see Saff barely managing to bring up walls in time to block a volley of blue spikes and red blobs. Arrows and bolts litter the green armour, sprouting out like pin feathers on a bird, but apparently not doing anything to Lumen Aura-wise.

"I can't see shit yet, but Saff is seven different types of fucked, isn't he?" Ada asks nobody in particular.

"Oh yeah."
"MY EYES!" DC 15, Roll: 8. Failure!
With that, you lead the girls, verbally guiding Ada when she got a little too off-course, to your opponents. Fortunately, or unfortunately, neither group seems to have completely regained their sight.

... God, this is gonna be like shooting fish in a barrel. With a grenade launcher.

You walk right up to Haru, and queue up a Crash()-

"ATA!"

His leg snaps out in a high kick which you just about lean back to dodge-

WARNING: NUCLEAR FISSION DETECTED. EMERGENCY JAUNT() QUEUED.

Before you can even ask for an explanation for that, you've been placed in front of the nameless girl instead, and you turn around in time to see a gout of raw plasma burst from a point directly in front of his foot, raising something by several units. You... don't think you've seen that symbol before.

Um. Nuclear whatnow?

{Ok, you know atoms? Well, those can be split apart, and the energy let out is... nasty, to say the least. We can talk about it later.}

... Moving along from the fact that you're now privy to an entirely unexplored field of science, You turn to the girl in question, calling out to your own girls at the same time.
"Time to Custer the fuck out of this shit." DC 13, +1 bonus from Tactics, Roll: 18. Major Success!
"Focus on Naia, don't get near Haru!" You yell at Ada and Creme, prompting a yell of fright from the girl. You still don't care enough to remember her name, though you admire her choice to attack you half-blindly with her electrified baton.

You wonder, as you step out of her way and give her the good old Crash()-Breach() one-two, if 'admire' is the right word. She's sent rolling, and you wonder on the word. Respect? No, no, it's like... you find it kind of cute, almoaaaaaarghfuckthathurts!

Your left leg locks up in spasms as the once-rigid baton turns into a whip and wraps around your calf, quickly paralysing you. You fall to the ground in a twitching mess, your Aura dropping rapidly-

Activating automatic defences.

The Transistor snaps out of your still locked up hand, and flies towards the girl at blinding speeds, catching her-

Ooh.

Oooohhhh. Ouch.

… You really hope that wasn't a tooth you just saw. She's whisked away, and you're left rubbing some feeling back into your legs while watching Ada and Creme deal with Naia. The answer is, really quite well. He's still kind of blind, you think, because his swings are wild, and wide, only coming near either of the girls through sheer luck. They're running circles around him, whittling down his Aura as best they can through his armour.

Aura: 85/150. Approaching 50% threshold- suggest caution.

By the time you're back on your feet, knees knocking together like a newborn colt, Haru's decided to join the fray, putting his Semblance to work on Ada, splitting the girls between them.

Ada is a blur, dodging unarmed strikes and jabbing at him with her ridiculously proportioned sabre with more speed and a certain frenzy that seemed to shore up whatever weaknesses there were in her technique.

Creme, however, seems to take a different approach now that Ada is out of the way- whenever Naia's club came near her, she would simply reach up and tap it, arresting its movement entirely while she shoots him with the tiny pistol hidden in the handle of her hammer, each round punching a fist sized dent in Naia's armour.

... Is... is she stealing his momentum for her bullets?

{Looks like it.}

WARNING: NUCLEAR FISSION DETECTED- ADA AT RISK. ALERT IMMEDIATELY.

Haru strikes out with an open palm and a yell, drawing it back from Ada's face at the last second.

"Ada! Duck!"

It's too late. Now that you know what you're looking for, you see the slight twinkle before the gout of plasma hits Ada in the face...

Goes... through Ada's face.

Phasic shift detected. Ally currently occupying perpendicular physical plane. Effect is similar to theoretical 4-dimensional creature.

As the stream dissolves into a harmless ionised gas, Ada stumbles back, flickering in and out of view like a bad TV signal. Eventually, she solidifies, and you can hear her breathing heavily from here, sword clenched hard enough to turn her knuckles white.

Before Haru can do anything more than stare at what just happened, your teammate screams her own rage out, raising her blade and slashing him across the chest, across the face, ending with a brutal stab to the jugular that sends him to the ground, thrown off-balance by her sudden fury. Creme, sensing her partner's wrath and deciding not to take the chance of her pulling a Lumen, dodges Naia and takes a low swing at Haru's face, snapping his head to the side and putting him below whatever threshold was set, because he flickers out of existence, this time in a much more permanent fashion than Ada.

Ada collapses to her knees, and you can see her shaking from here.

Extreme heart palpitations detected- possibly physical strain of Semblance, but the combination of tremors and shortness of breath points to panic attack. Vocals detected- amplify?

Y

Almost immediately, you hear her voice as if she's speaking right into your ear, and you don't like what you hear.

"I'm ok, I'm ok, it's just my Semblance, this is all real, I'm fine, I'm ok, and I can't do this fucking shit right now, I need to focus-"

{... Geez. Wonder what that's about.}

So do you, but at the same time it's not really your business, is it?

{... Guess not.}

Creme rushes to Ada's side, asking her what's wrong, and only gets breathing in response. Ada seems to... become more aware of where she is and tries to force her panic down as a result. Creme seems to be at a loss for what to do, poor girl.

Naia takes the moment to try and attempt stealth, shifting his club underarm, the end opening and the whole affair widening into a carried cannon. Neither of them is paying enough attention to notice the seven-foot guy with the handheld artillery gun pointed at them.

No, no, no- queue Spin()!

Spin() currently locked. One more data cycle required to free enough RAM to run the program.

Shit.

Er, queue Jaunt()!

{On your legs? What are you gonna do, cartwheel him into submission?}

SHIT.
"Time to be relevant again!" DC 10, roll: 20. Crit success! For someone else! But it works for you! Success for everyone!
Before you can say anything to warn them, the friendly neighbourhood mole-man appears. Salem shoots out of the ground, eye set against the sights of his rifle, aiming it directly at the back of the giant's head. The shot rings out, deafening, and Naia is on the ground not a second later, the back of his helmet dented straight in, Moss disappearing into the ground as soon as he hits it. And he's still not been taken away.

Or getting up.

... Medscan, now.

No medical complications detected, Aura unbroken, above the critical threshold, and still reading as conscious. No reason for him not to be moving.

{So he's taking a minute.}

... That's fair. You imagine you wouldn't be in much of a mood for moving if you just took a bullet to the back of the head.

... Well. You guess you're... just, kind of waiting for Lumen to finish up Saff and Naia to get off his fat ass and face you, then it's Moss, then... you're done.

Status Effect gained- Bambi Legs- like the infant colt, your legs aren't quite working like what they're supposed to, and it'll take a while before you can become the majestic beast of the forest you were always meant to be. All movement rolls will be rolled by you, and suffer a -3 penalty without doing anything to mitigate it, and failure will result in your legs giving out, ceasing movement for a turn. The DC for the winning vote will be decided, well, when it wins.

System Restore() Throttling Disengaged- Spin() Queueable!

... Now what?

Aura: 85/150.

Current Loadout: Crash(), Breach(), Jaunt(), Spin().

Turn() Available.

[] Write-in. Yep. Entirely up to you for once. Naia's down, but not out, you can barely walk, Ada sounds like she's having a breakdown that's just about winding down, the moleman can't decide what side he's on, and Saff really needs a mouthful of soap. Have fun!

[] Character Switch
-[] Creme
-[] The Green Goblin Lumen
-[] Ada
-[] Someone Completely Separate From This Bullshit (Interlude Only) (D2)