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Post by Linx Exotic on Mar 14, 2008 21:09:46 GMT -5
Even though Dengoro wanted to quit... It was still his job to serve as a warrior. That meant he had an obligation to be a good one, and that meant... Practicing. Now that the training grounds were open to him, the skunk used it whenever he could as opposed to practicing alone. Then again, that might have been a bad thing...
He'd never before won a battle in sparring, and the only engagement outside the walls entailed himself being held at swordpoint. Determined to do his job and thus change that, Dengoro now waited in the grounds with a sheathed longsword at his belt, waiting for... Someone.
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Post by briala on Mar 14, 2008 22:04:34 GMT -5
Briala really had nothing better to do than train. At the moment, her skills as a warrior weren't being called upon, and she needed to keep in shape. And for that, she needed...
"The training grounds!" she exclaimed enthusiastically, seeing the clearing ahead. "How perfect!" She bounded forward, her paws already on the hilts of her curved daggers and ready to fight! To battle and train and fight for honor! Now she just need a someone to fight against....
What luck! Someone was already at the grounds, a sword hanging at his belt. An unrecognized someone, but a someone nonetheless!
"Hello!" Briala greeted cheerfully, skipping over to the grounds. She eyed his sword. Niceties first... "I'm Briala. You?"
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Post by Linx Exotic on Mar 14, 2008 22:07:20 GMT -5
"I'm... I'm Dengoro," the skunk faltered. He eyed Briala's daggers nervously. Those things could slash me right open. It was still hard for him to deal with the possibility of weapons being used against him. It was also hard for him to trust in his ability to defend himself, possibly because it had been proven that he couldn't do just that at many critical moments.
Now he was faced with this otter he didn't know and all he had was a longsword that was one poorly angled strike from snapping in half, anyway. It didn't do much to soothe the skunk's nerves to reflect on this.
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Post by briala on Mar 14, 2008 22:14:26 GMT -5
Briala grinned. "Hello Dengoro!" She paused, trying to think of something else to say before asking her question. But she couldn't. "Do you want to spar? I assume that's why you're out here," she added, looking around the training ground. She glanced at his sword again. "Oh, a long sword! Are you any good with it?" She twirled her daggers in her hand, proud of her skill with them. Of course, give her any other weapon, and she was useless. Oh well, the price of perfection.
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Post by Linx Exotic on Mar 14, 2008 22:16:33 GMT -5
After a moment's lack of thought, Dengoro decided it would be better to be honest than to humor Briala. "Not really," he admitted, looking down at his sheathed weapon. "Enough to get in the fort?" Of course, the requirements for sword work weren't that high. Trainees were expected to develop it after becoming actual recruits, or... Something like that. "So I guess we'll be sparring now."
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Post by briala on Mar 14, 2008 22:27:24 GMT -5
"Well, the only way to get better is to practice," Briala said, as usual being tenaciously cheerful. "After all, that's how anyone gets good." She rolled her shoulders to quickly loosen them, then strode over to the center of the clearing, instantly assuming a ready-to-fight stance. "Are you ready?"
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Post by Linx Exotic on Mar 14, 2008 22:29:24 GMT -5
"I guess," Dengoro offered halfheartedly while walking over to about ten feet away from Briala, carefully drawing his sword and hefting it with one paw. How anyone ever managed to wield one of these with two paws was beyond him... As was the idea of having two different weapons in each paw. How do you coordinate that?
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Post by briala on Mar 14, 2008 22:39:10 GMT -5
Briala could see Dengoro wasn't very enthusiastic about sparring. Maybe he though she would kill him? She wished she could use a sword; then maybe she could help him. But alas, all she had were her lovely daggers.
"No worries, I won't kill you," she said cheerily, before attacking. Twirling the daggers around her waist and over her head, she cleared the space between her and the skunk. She held her wrists together and brought the daggers down together towards Dengoro's head....
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Post by Linx Exotic on Mar 14, 2008 22:44:16 GMT -5
Dengoro's reaction time absolutely failed him. Not expecting Briala to advance so quickly, he expected a straight-in stabbing attack and moved his sword to parry one of those. Of course, that attack never came, and he didn't see the daggers descending until it was far too late. ...To block with his sword, at any rate.
What ended up happening was that the skunk half-jumped, half-fell backwards in order to try and avoid the daggers which would otherwise probably impale his skull. With luck typical of a beast like Dengoro, he didn't get stabbed... But as he descended, Dengoro felt something tearing down his face, starting at the forehead, skipping over his eye and running down one cheek. By the time he hit the ground, the sword had clattered out of his paw, all vision to his left was blocked by a murky red wall, and his face was on fire. The skunk promptly screamed at the top of his lungs in pain, clutching the relatively shallow but extremely long wound inflicted on his forehead and cheek with both paws.
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Post by briala on Mar 14, 2008 22:56:32 GMT -5
Briala frowned as her blade met some resistance. The next thing she knew, her left blade was covered in blood, and Dengoro was screaming. She paled under her fur, dropping her daggers from nerveless hands. She hadn't know he was that bad at sword fighting; she didn't think she was even moving that fast.
She came to her senses as Dengoro continued to bleed. I need to stop the bleeding...now. She ripped the sleeve of her tunic and pressed it to Dengoro's face, firmly applying pressure so the bleeding would stop.
"Ssh, it's okay, don't worry," she murmured, unconsciously saying the words to comfort the skunk. "It missed your eye, and it's not that deep...It'll be fine." Briala felt terrible! It was one thing to be in a battle against a well armed enemy, and quite another to wound an ally in a mock battle.
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Post by Linx Exotic on Mar 14, 2008 23:02:20 GMT -5
If Dengoro's heart wasn't hammering from nerves before, the sheer terror of the situation forced his cardiac muscle to beat like a jackhammer against his aching ribcage. Of course, this pain was completely ignored by the skunk, who could feel every minute detail of the pattern of his own blood as it soaked into his fur and even dripped down off his chin onto his shirt. The unnerving feeling of faintness set in within seconds and it was beyond Dengoro's comprehension whether it was due to his going into shock or simply from blood loss. Hopefully not blood loss...
He couldn't even tell if he was screaming anymore. All the skunk could see was dark, murky red and pitch black, he couldn't hear anything, all he could feel was the searing pain of the gash in his face... Oddly enough, through all the horror of the event, he could acutely taste the salty-iron flavor that told him he was actually bleeding into his own wide-open mouth.
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Post by briala on Mar 14, 2008 23:12:21 GMT -5
Her sleeve wasn't doing enough to stem the blood flow. Briala looked around desperately for something else to use. Duh! I'm stupid! Briala thought desperately, shrugging off her jacket. It was a nice jacket, but worrying about it getting covered in blood wasn't an issue now.
Briala was fairly good at dealing with injuries, enough that she could have been a medic. After a few minutes of applying pressure to the wound, she cautiously lifted up the jacket to look at the wound.
"It's okay, it's not that bad," she said soothingly, putting the jacket over Dengoro's face. "The bleeding is already slowing down, and if we heal this right, it won't even leave a scar." Briala decided she would apologize later. Apologize a lot.
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Post by Linx Exotic on Mar 14, 2008 23:16:37 GMT -5
Despite Briala's good intentions and well-assembled assurances, Dengoro's ears were ringing too much for him to take any of her words in. The blood welling in his mouth was becoming a breathing issue, and he gagged on it, promptly coughing the warm mass of fluid out onto his shirt, which, by now, had soaked through and was wetting his fur with bright crimson blood, not that you could tell on black fur.
Feeling increasingly faint, Dengoro let his head fall back and closed his mercifully intact eyes. Everything was going dark... Spiraling out of control. Even if it wasn't a life-threatening or permanently scarring wound, it was enough to render him unconscious in just a couple of minutes.
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Post by briala on Mar 14, 2008 23:24:05 GMT -5
Oh crap! He's swallowing blood! Briala desperately propped Dengoro up, patting his back and trying to get him to cough up the blood he had swallowed. If it got in his lungs, that could be fatal.
Great, now he's unconscious, Briala thought wryly. She didn't know if this was better or worse for the situation. She glanced around desperately, hoping there would be someone else around. But no luck. She cursed under her breath, trying to think of something else to do to help. It didn't seem there was anything else, except for sitting and waiting for Dengoro to wake up.
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Post by Linx Exotic on Mar 15, 2008 8:04:36 GMT -5
Dengoro did wake up just seconds after he passed out. He was bleeding so much into his mouth that it was impossible to breathe at all and the feeling of choking was enough to bring him back. Once getting back to a conscious state, the skunk spat out all of the blood... Again, and started coughing profusely. It felt like someone was pouring a viscous, smothering syrup down his throat and it was hardening on the way down, blocking his larynx and making it impossible to breathe through.
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