Bringing the Pain: Wyvern vs. Angelina Tarrant

[Hills]

Match Type
B.Y.O.W. (Bring Your Own Weapon)

Match Conditions
Each competitor brings one weapon with them to the ring. Match ends via pinfall or submission. All weapons are allowed.

Wyvern's Entrance Music

Darkness falls over the arena, every source of light extinguished apart from a few pinpricks in the crowd from open phones and recording cameras. Wyvern's music begins to play, letters appearing on the titantron in time with the beat to spell her name three times, spread sporadically over the screens. A wave of subdued cheers echoes out, the audience lukewarm on the wrestler announced but eager for the blood that they knew would be spilled in the upcoming battle. This was not going to be a display of technical prowess or skill; this was going to be a violent brawl for supremacy. The audience's taste for death had faded since ancient times. Their lust for blood had, if it had changed at all, increased.

Crooked red spotlights flare into existence across the stage, strobing on and off to make their illumination barely more useful than the pitch blackness that they had replaced. With her dark attire and subdued movements, Wyvern is only barely visible as she passes out of the back and into the open. She stops briefly at the edge of the ramp, pausing as the strobes give way to a mixture of red and yellow light that covers the entire arena. After taking a moment to survey the crowd, the Irish wrestler begins walking down the ramp. Clear for the first time, a length of black chain ending in a spiked ball dangles from a steel grip in her hands, obviously her weapon of choice for this event. As she walks, she begins spinning the weapon at her side, sending the ball in lazy circles.

"The following contest is set for one fall, and is a Bring Your Own Weapon match! Now making her way to the ring, from Drogheda, Ireland, weighing in at 137 lbs...WYVERN!"

Even the announcer's best efforts to hype the crowd can only produce a moderate response, but this is still a marked improvement over where she had been even a few months ago. Wyvern is momentarily pleased by this discovery; she doesn't care what the crowd thinks, per se, but more popularity meant a more stable position in the company. She wasn't about to complain if they liked what they saw. Reaching the ring, Wyvern grabs the ropes and hops onto the apron before stepping between them and making her way out to the middle of the squared circle. After rolling her shoulders and neck to loosen up, she rests the head of her flail over one shoulder and turns back to the entrance, awaiting her opponent.

[Monsy]

Tonight is a saw the LAW in half kinda night. A hella fuckin’ amazeballs of a match, yo! And it’s three of her favourite things too to add on. A bigger bitch. A big COOL bitch. And, weapons. Oh thank-fuck for the weapons. Her little toy was ready yesterday and jerry-rigged into a makeshift sheath. A cardboard tube, with holes that had a rope loop to saddle on her shoulder. And with her board in hand, it was go time. None of the producers could believe she actually showed up in time! Goes to show when it's time to make an impression. Don’t get comfortable with that.

Song

Her music hit a nice send on on pedals, guitar and the drums that carry you on. The hard hitting thumps of the music. It's a turbulent wave, but consistent and draws the nods of fellow pirates. A small but expanding clique ever since last summer in the Shimmerlace showdown. You can tell them by the dark shirts and the trademark emblems. ZERO, in sketchy font with a skull O. Then the trademark horned skull in white over black. The same thing front and centre on the titantron.

COME ON.

"And her opponent, from New York City! Weighing in at one-hundred-and-eight pounds! The Marauder -- Angelina Tarrant!"

Gal

The lyric is the cue. She comes cruising across the stage on her board, then powerslides at the ramp to a stop. Both hands form circles and go in front of her one open eye. Like a spyglass. And this pirate spies a human crow with a sexy-ass toy. Just imagining that piercing her skin had her palms sweating. One good crack, and she’ll be on her knees and flogged like Henry the Second of England. But that’s what made it neat to beat. So she kick-turned and rode down in earnest, picking up speed and carving to the first set of stairs, poppin’ an ollie and tailslide before landing, pushing and going around, then hitting the next steps where she bailed a laser flip to climb up the steps. Her one service to the fans was flipping them off as she ran towards the corner from the apron, with one hand on the top rope, she kicked off the middle pad and entered a backflip and twist, going over the rope and landing square in the ring, facing Wyvern.

She unsheathed her pirate cutlass from the cardboard cylinder scabbard. A pink bat, wrapped up in razor wire. It bears creases and etch marks of use all over, with white tape and a sketchy name plastered underneath all that devil teeth. Nutcracka. She gave it a brief point at Wyvern, like an immediate en garde that the crowd could sink their teeth into. But, Angelina had strafed away from Wyvern directly and then planted the bat’s tip on the ground, piling her hands on the pommel. “Nice whip-toy, yo. Do ya use it on bad girls and boys? Or do well-behaved ones get the spike too?”

[Hills]

Wyvern, (for now) blissfully unaware of Angelina's colorful internal monologue and even more colorful personality, spends the marauder's long introduction sizing her future opponent up. A few moments is all it takes for her initial impression. Loud, flashy, gaudy, most likely flirtatious; this was going to be another of those matches. Only the match's premise saves her from annoyed despair; at least here, she could pound her opponent bloody without worrying about crossing the referee. The familiar weight of the heavy flail over her shoulder also bolsters her morale. The weapon was almost as old as her career, and she had been using it for years. Knowing that she finally had the chance to use it in LAW was going a long ways towards mitigating her dread of what would no doubt be another trying set of interactions with her foe.

None of this shows on the stoic Irishwoman's face. She keeps her expression blank as Angelina makes her way into the ring, moving only to keep her eyes trained on the modern-day pirate. The bat draws her attention. It would give Angelina a reach advantage in the matchup, her own weapon designed more for power than length. Could she goad the American in closer? All signs indicated yes. The individual bat itself was well-used, sharp, no doubt tough. If it had survived long enough to get all those scars, it wouldn't be a simple matter of just breaking it as she often did with wooden tools her opponents tried to wield against her. It even had a name. Mispelled, of course. That was going to bother her for the rest of the day at minimum.

Wyvern's analytical reverie is shattered when Angelina points the tip of the weapon at her. She considers batting it away with her flail or otherwise making a counter-gesture, but decides against it. If this was just a challenge, she couldn't rise to it. If it was a sneak attack before the match, that would still be useful information. Her patience is rewarded when Angelina immediately dances away, provoking nothing more than a raised eyebrow from the Irish wrestler. While Angelina talks, Wyvern brings the flail down, beginning to spin it in slow circles at her side.

"I'm not picky. Keep standing up and you'll get to feel every part of it."

She shifts her stance a bit, readying for the upcoming fight. She turns her body, presenting a narrower profile while still spinning the flail behind her.

"What about you? Ever crack any actual nuts with that, or did you just pick the name out of a hat?"

[Monsy]

Oh-hoh. A misses serious.
All strapped up in gauntlets, a leather somethin’ on the chest and simple wear underneath. The pants were a bit of a throw-off. Talk about cyborg, then switchin’ it up to MCR. Not that it sucked by any means. LAW can use a modern-day terminatah. And two things about Miss Terminatah: she’s hot and scary as fuck. Those eyes did a spell. Red like her hair. Second, is that flail. She didn’t have much meat as armour to buffer her bones. Just thinking of the wedges in her side, legs, a good catch on the collar or face. Fuckin’ heebie-jeebies.

“Well.” Her head tilted to the side and nudged to concede. “Yeah, to both.”
Then she smiled a little more, “Fun name, takes care of business and keeps me in business.”

Angelina studied their narrow profile. The weapon behind. Good call.
She matched it by dragging one leg until the toes were tucked to her opposite heel. “Speakin’ of. That whip-toy--” Her brows popped to emphasize, “--that shit is mine when this is done. Pirate policy.” While, truthfully, she hoped this inspired some added grit -- but she didn’t have many doubts with the whispers that float around.

And now…
The bell rang.

The crowd stirs with a bit of opening enthusiasm. Angelina keeps herself fixed and picks her Nutcracka’ off the ground, rolling her shoulders. She flipped it once to change hands, rose to her tippy-toes and took a deep breath. The heart was already punchin' just thinkin' of the post-match bruises and cuts. She's always a little scared of the pain to come. So she focuses on keeping her bat steady and pointed straight up with the handle at her gut and the tip by her forehead. Primed and ready to go, she looked to Wyvern after a lick across her teeth, grinning. "Ya ready for this?"

[Hills]

It's a struggle to take her opponent seriously, between her facetious actions and relaxed attitude. Wyvern just wants to dismiss the so-called Marauder outright, assume she's more flair than substance, but she's learned more than one harsh lesson in LAW about what happens when she underestimates her opponents based on their appearances, even seemingly weak or inattentive ones. A showman could still be strong. A flirt could still be vicious. Even as her conscious mind attempts to discard Angelina as a threat, her instincts tell her to pay attention. This opponent is not one to be ignored if she values her safety. Of course, that's just how she likes it. If the redhead planned to keep up her unserious front, Wyvern would just have to drag out the darker parts of her personality. If not, she wouldn't need to bother. Either way, it was something she could look forward to.

"Plunder is the right of the victor, 'pirate.' It stays with me."

When the bell rings, Wyvern expects her opponent to open with aggression right out the gate. Instead, the Marauder wastes time on more banter, something the Irishwoman has no intention of humoring. If Angelina doesn't want to take the lead, Wyvern is just fine going first. None of her martial arts training had included weapons, requiring her to completely rework her fighting style while wielding the flail. What she lost in precision, though, she more than made up for with raw power. Concluding the loop behind her, Wyvern lunges forward, swinging the lowered flail in a powerful upward arc, aiming to bring the dull spikes of the weapon straight at Angelina's chin!

[Monsy]

She couldn’t stop thinking about that fuckin’ weapon. Spiked knob on a chain and stick. There were a thousand better options to do the same fuckin’ thing as that, isn’t there? Like a flog. Maybe the thing going zoom-zoom was supposed to be hypnotic. Kinda sexy. This girl probably has all sorts of weird fetishes to carry these tools around.

She wanted to say somethin’ back, like. Yeah, of course, there’s a right to plunder. We’re all honourable guys and gals down here. Stupid.

But the bell was done, and she made her bed, waiting to see how screwed she was against the flail. That thing spins around and acts like a whip. Way easier to be quick. One bat swing is like two flicks from that thing, so ain’t no way was she testing the waters til she saw how this girl handled it. And the marvellous thing about bein’ a coward was her opponent is absolutely fuckin’ not.

“WOA-”

She didn’t even think before taking action. Her body dropped, legs split. A bonafide pirate split on command. Her back leg immediately came around, and Angelina rolled up her shoulders, knees into her chest, one hand on the bat’s handle, face-down with the tip by her armpit. She shot her boot soles for Wyvern’s mid-section -- and at the same time, performed a kip-up with a little help from the bat. And if she got just a CRUMB of ground, Angelina would drag the tip of her Nutcracka across the ground and swing with a twist of the shoulder and flick of the wrist. She aimed low and wide -- right for the kneecap.

[Hills]

It would have been disappointing if that opening swing had actually worked. The earliest part of a match like this was usually devoted to sizing each other up, particularly when it came to new opponents. If Angelina had been stupid or incompetent enough to actually take the hit head-on, that would have been it. No worse way for a match to end. Even the worst opponents she had faced in LAW could have avoided that. Regardless, she wasn't expecting the sheer speed and agility her opponent demonstrated in her evasion; not just dropping into a split, but then immediately converting that into a kip-up and counter attack. This would be harder than expected.

Good.

The flail is heavy, her swings heavier. The miss momentarily unbalances her, prevents her from getting her dominant arm down in time or dodging properly as Angelina's boots fire towards her midriff. Sliding her foot back to stabilize her stance, she brings her left arm across to block the two boots. The impact should be enough to blast through such a weak guard, but Wyvern's absurd strength proves sufficient to ward off the attack. This is only the beginning, however. With her kip-up finished, the Marauder swings her bat forward with vicious intent, looking to cripple Wyvern with a strike to the knee! In response, the Irishwoman snaps her leg off the ground, causing the bat to instead impact her shin with a *CRACK* audible even over the audience's calls for blood.

Her face impassive despite what should be all accounts be an excruciating blow to her leg, Wyvern flicks a quick swipe with her flail horizontally in front of her in an effort to make Angelina back off for a moment before cautiously placing her foot back on the ground. The barbed wire wrapped around "Nutcracka" has shredded part of her pants, and blood from the punctured skin below causes the tears to cling to her leg. She spares the injury only a glance before locking eyes with her opponent once more. A half-smile twists her lips.

"Not bad."

Contrary to her previous aggression, she doesn't even try to engage this time, perhaps waiting to see if her leg can fully support her still.

[Monsy]

A bullet dodged, and two returned. She didn’t expect the kip-up kick to go cleanly. The cautious back up and the strong eat it like a brick wall. Though, it wasn’t the biggest brow raise of the minute. That came when they ate her bat straight on the shin. It felt like striking a wooden log, where it rattled, and some bits of bark flew. The vibrations hurt her hand, and she finishes her swing, arm now across her chest, bat pointed at her opposite foot.

She leaned back, retreated two paces and had the flail zip right by her chest. In her head, she cursed, thinking about how close that was. Her chest tightens like one notch on a studded belt. They didn’t press it. Instead, Wyvern’s half-smile makes her whistle. She stared, trying and failing to detect a waver or any clear sign of struggle after the knock. It takes her aback.

“I’ll be fucked.” Angelina shakes her head, “Ya really ate that shit on the leg.”

How she wished she could match that cold face. Looks so damn cool.
And telling how they were standing, it seemed like it was her turn to bring it. Then again. And again. One-two-three.

Angelina winded up her bat, applied the second hand, and telegraphed her swing like an honest batter. She stepped half her usual stride, taking a swing. But she never intended that one to land. She just wanted them to move. The swing’s momentum was channelled into her arms, going up and overhead, then down with two hands towards Wyvern’s skull. She made another half-step, and her arms froze momentarily when parallel to her chest. The bat pointed straight, then dipped down. She switched grips and released a hand.

She lunged and placed the bat tip on the ground at a slight angle before herself, then lunged again, this time with a leap forward. A second hand placed itself on the bat pommel, using it as a crutch as Angelina attempted to shoot her entire body at Wyvern’s lower half, boots together, then thrust for the same leg she had hit before. Right for the kneecap.

[Hills]

Angelina's acknowledgement keeps Wyvern's smile going for a few moments longer than it usually lasts before fading back into her more neutral default expression. Her leg hurt like hell; she definitely couldn't take another hit like that and shrug it off. The fact that she could take even one without lasting injury was a testament to the years spent forging her body into a weapon, and a validation of all her previous struggles. Still, she would need to be more careful. The Marauder is fast, and highly unpredictable. She couldn't just throw herself at Angelina and rely on strength and endurance to win, as she could in many matches. Not with an opponent like this, especially with weapons in play. Even untrained, an armed opponent could be dangerous. Angelina wielded hers with both experience and ingenuity.

"You were 'fucked' the moment you accepted this match."

Despite the arrogant bravado in her words, Wyvern is stuck playing defense against Angelina's barrage of attacks. As soon as the first swing is telegraphed, Wyvern knows something is up. Such a conventional attack was completely out of line with everything she'd seen so far. Getting out of the way with a quick backstep is easy enough, but Wyvern isn't foolish enough to go for a counter afterward. The following overhead is more what she expected. Sudden, dangerous, and flowing from a bluff. Still, her instincts warn her that this isn't all there is to the Marauder's plan. They're proven right quickly enough as Angelina once again uses the bat as a springboard, stopping mid swing to hurl herself bodily at the Irish wrestler.

"Kch!"

Caution is the only thing that saves Wyvern. As soon as she sees Angelina going low, she whips her leg up and back. With her other, she hops out of the way, throwing herself away from the Marauder's trajectory. An imbalanced, retaliatory swing of the flail goes wide. Even after she lands, momentum sends her back a few more unsteady steps, ending only when her back presses up against the ring ropes. Regaining her balance using them, she pushes off and back into a more ready stance.

[Monsy]

Chapter eleven in Pirate-Fu Doctrine: Keep ya ass movin'.
The opening stages were prime time to throw up a nice smokescreen and strike. See what they're made of, with any cracks in the defence. Get that early advantage and drive the gold home. But don't just keep at them, go at them smart, deliberately, jauntily and totally malevolently in all the places that sucked. The kneecaps. Ankles. Leg muscles. Ribs. Elbows. Wrists. Fingers. The mouth. The fuckin’ spine. Weakness had its own gold-like scent like that. She just needed her moment, and she plotted it, carefully, one-two, then flung herself.

No cigar. Angelina landed on her thighs and slid another foot. Her hand was flat, face-down, keeping her upper body supported. She looked ahead, and spotted Wyvern on the ropes, coming off quickly. This girl... Had GREAT instincts. IT made her think. Her strategy looked to be swingin' duds. They were too prepared for a frontal attack. She needed a new angle -- but wasn't about to waste a second lookin' stumped. “I bet, ya fuckin’ Spartan.”

Instead of charging directly for them, Angelina had a different idea. The corner. The sweet-sweet airtime.
She ran to the turnbuckle pads adjacent to Wyvern, came in on a slight curve, then used her early-match adrenaline to jump, hit her boot on the top turnbuckle pad and launch herself at Wyvern once more! THIS TIME, Nutcrakca was in the backseat. Hell, it was still in a downward grip. THIS TIME, Angelina whipped her leg like a one-handed sword swipe, straight for Wyvern’s head. Those who knew the move called it a Showtime Kick. For the Marauder, it was one of her absolute favourite movies she pulled out anytime and anywhere -- Off the Wall!