A loud and sharp beeping woke me from my nap. I grabbed my scroll and turned the alarm off. I rolled into a sitting position at the end of the bed and put my shoes on. I looked in the mirror and cringed at what I saw. My hair was a mess. I grabbed my comb and straightened that problem out. I grabbed my jacket off of the closet door and my headphones before leaving. I left Reclaimer leaning against the wall and locked the room up. It had gotten a little colder since I was last outside and I put my jacket on while starting up one of my playlists to listen to.
I walked along the road singing to myself quietly with the music. "There's a place where we'll stand outnumbered. Where the wolves and the soul-less will rise. In the time of our final moments, every dream dies." I looked up from the road and saw another figure walking my way. He had spiked back graying black hair, black pants, a collared gray dress shirt, and a tattered red cape. I nodded to him as we passed each other and kept walking to town. The stores were still pretty busy for being the slow part of the afternoon. I saw a dust shop and remembered that I had asked Orion to pick me up some refills. In some aspects I preferred Patch to Vale. The close knit communities where everyone probably knows everyone. I like that a little more than the hustle and bustle of the city but hey, what are you gonna do?
When I got to the theater, Orion, Lavender, and Amber were in line waiting to get tickets. "Told you I wouldn't be late." I got in line right behind Amber. "So what movie are we seeing?" I reached into my back pocket and pulled my wallet out as we approached the ticket booth. "We wanted to see the new Spruce Willis movie. We never got to during school." Lavender informed me. I pulled my card out of my wallet and slid it to the ticket handler.
"Four for the Spruce Willis movie please." My card was swiped and handed back to me along with four tickets. We walked up to the concession stand and looked over the menu. "How about four of your largest drinks and four extra-large popcorns with… you guys want butter and cheese salt with those?" I looked back at my team and they nodded. "Yeah all four with butter and cheese salt." The man behind the counter handed us four tall paper cups and four incredibly large buckets of popcorn. I walked over to the fountain drinks and filled my cup to the brim with a vanilla flavored soft drink. We herded ourselves into the theater and grabbed four open seats right in a row. A few minutes later the lights dimmed and the movie started.
"This movie is gonna kick ass." "Hey shut up Orion." "You shut up Lavender." "I swear I will take both of you out into the lobby if you don't quiet down." … Thank god they finally stopped tal- "Shut up Crimson." I reached over and bonked Amber lightly on the head while Lavender and Orion chuckled. "Seriously though guys." I whispered to them.
About two and a half hours later we walked out of the theater. "That was such a good movie. And that Spruce Willis though, mhm mhm." Amber blushed and nodded in agreement with Lavender. "Why are you gushing over Spruce Willis? Crimson is right there." I heard three things; Orion's laugh, a loud thump, and then Orion again. "Owwwww what the hell did you do that for!?" I turned around and Orion was grabbing his head, Lavender had her hand balled into a fist, and Amber was trying to suppress a laugh. "You know very well what that was for." I laughed and walked over, putting myself between both of them. "Hey if you want to beat the crap out of each other do it at the gym in the sparring ring." They both looked at each other and grinned. "God d-, no, no, no. We are not doing this." They looked back at me and each grabbed one of my arms. "Oh yeah we are." Orion said.
"I can't believe you're really gonna do this." We found a gym on the side of town and, lucky us, it had a sparring arena. Orion and Lavender were positioned at opposite sides of the arena. Orion had his hand on his sword and Lavender was holding her tonfa blades defensively. She had two ammo belts strapped across her chest and was dressed in her mission gear. "No live ammo, first person to have their aura hit the red loses. And for the love of god do not kill each other." Both of them nodded, waiting for my signal. "Begin!"
Lavender took off sprinting and struck at Orion with her left hand. In a flash he pulled his sword from its sheath and blocked the blow. Lavender followed up with a right which Orion easily blocked again. She gripped the handle of her tonfa and loud crack reverberated through the arena. Orion was pushed back from the force of the shot. Lavender slapped the right tonfa on one of the ammo belts, reloading a stun cartridge. Orion rushed forward, coming down hard with his sword. Lavender brought up both tonfa in defense absorbing a lot of the shock but not enough to keep her steady as she drops to one knee. She pushed up, creating enough of a gap to breakaway from Orion. With a flick of his wrist, the sword segmented and shifted to its bladed whip form. Lavender clashed her tonfa blades together and the edges started sparking with electricity. Orion smiled. "Looks like we're getting serious now."
"Yeah we are." They both charged each other. Orion's weapon gave him the advantage in ranged combat due to the distance the whip mode of his sword allowed him but Lavender clearly had the advantage close up. The segments whistled through the air as Orion swung his blade skillfully. He didn't give Lavender the chance to get in close and you could tell she was getting frustrated. She lashed out in a controlled aggression trying to offset Orion's motions by knocking the segments away into random directions. It worked for a moment, leaving a big enough gap for Lavender to get in close. I watched Orion press the switch on the hilt and the segments rapidly retracted, reforming the blade just in time to block Lavender's strike.
"You're not fast enough Lavender." She gritted her teeth and started pushing forward. "I don't need to be faster, I just need to be better." She broke away and in an instant was behind Orion, aiming a kick at his side. It connected with his ribs and sent him sliding across the ground. Before he could fully recover she was putting the pressure back on, delivering a rain of blows that he was struggling to keep up with. He swung in a long arc, forcing Lavender to back off. I watched as Orion twisted the hilt of his blade and it started to collapse into a form I've never seen. Lavender was just as surprised as stopped in pace. Orion's blade split down the middle, the two halves folding in on themselves. The handle joined the halves of the blade together and the gear filled changing mechanism slid into place just above the handle. The gears spun rapidly creating a cord of energy that connected the two ends and bent them back finalizing the new form; a bow and arrow. As she realized what was happening, Lavender charged forward determined to finish the match. He grabbed the middle of the cord and pulled back, an arrow forming. Orion leveled the bow at Lavender just as she pressed both tonfa ends into Orion's chest. "So… it seems that neither of us will win this one." Lavender nodded and gripped both tonfa tightly, firing two stun rounds into Orion. The shock of being hit but the stun rounds caused him to release the cord and the energy stored in it, which was the rough equivalent of a gunshot, against Lavender.
Both Lavender and Orion were launched backwards. I checked their aura levels and they both slid down into the red zone simultaneously. I walked over to Lavender and helped her up with Amber helped Orion to his feet. "Well you either both win or you both lose. Your auras hit red simultaneously." I turned to Orion. "Since when can your sword do that?" He grabbed the handle of the bow and twisted it causing it to start shifting and unfolding back into its sword form.
"Pretty recently. I started tinkering with the idea a couple months ago. I had to replace the main blade with a newer one that could split both into whip and bow forms. I also redesigned the changing mechanism so that way it could put off enough energy to create and hold the form of the cord. Pulling back on the cord stores energy and shapes it into an arrow, and when released… well you've seen a bow and arrow before." I was thoroughly impressed by the ingenuity Orion put into his weapon. I grabbed both of them a water.
"I want to spar too." I looked at Amber. "Sorry Amber I don't think either of them are up for another match." They laughed and cringed slightly, clearly sore from the last collision. "No, I want to spar against you, Crimson." I looked at her and smiled. "Trying to challenge me for dominance?" She laughed. "No, I'm testing you."I caught myself from smirking. "Ok," I told her, "you're on."