Sage's High Pressure Situation

"Whoo, Sage," muttered Enma as he knocked another one of the incoming bounty hunters aside, "don't scare me like that! I seriously thought we may have lost you there!" Sage was barely standing up on her feet as she looked over at Jacques. Enma was starting to panic a bit as he noticed the large distance in their strength. There was nowhere those two were any where close in fighting strength or experience. He would just have to put his faith in her for a few more seconds...until he finished off the remaining insane bounty hunters for the next few moments.

"Pathetic," said Jacques as he took another few steps towards Sage. He rubbed his two fists together, checking the gauntlets. "You got a Devil Fruit power, don't you? That's how you hit me before, but that's nothing...I figured out your ability so now I'm going to take you down in a few minutes. Another couple of my punches should do it."

Sage quickly brought her two hands back up and began to form a circle to fire another deadly blast, but she stopped. The shot wouldn't do her any good if he just negated it again with another blow, however, he did it last time. Not to mention that she was nearly knocked out, the punch was incredibly strong in comparison to most of her previous fighters. Normally their punches were only about one-tenth of that punch. She didn't understand how he did, was it just his normal strength or was there a second trick to it, something she couldn't possibly know from just the first strike.

Jacques quickly closed the distance between them with a charge. His two fists were right in front of his face, blocking his mouth from view. It was reminiscence of one of the boxing's stances. It made sense since with those gauntlets and no other weapon it would make sense that he relied heavily on punches and nothing else. Sage didn't know much about boxing other than the basics...she never paid much attention to many of the fights. She had no idea about his style at all. Jacques brought his fist forward and upwards aiming for her chin, a powerful uppercut. Sage rolled off to the side, her legs were too weak from his first punch to do any running from him, these small rolls was her best shot.

Jacques spun about and brought his punch around in a wide arcing swing...she believed that was called a hook in boxing. She quickly raised the pressure in his ear. Jacques was about to take another step forward, but paused. He brought his fist up to his ear, he felt his balance shift from her power. He was just lucky that he didn't collapse onto the ground, if he had taken that step there would be no doubt that that was what would've happened. He slid his front foot back to his back foot and regained his stance and his balance. Sage's face showed her distress. Her best bet had just been upset, this man had a technique to destroy her Pressure Ball and now he could even overcome her ability to make him lose his balance. Her tricks were slowly being whittled down in this fight.

Another fluctuation in pressure caused Jacques to bend over and empty his stomach of his dinner right there onto the sandy beach in front of everyone. A quick, collective moan of disgust was heard from all of the bounty hunters. Jacques let out his own disgusted moan as he wiped the remaining vomit from his lips and stared at the young girl. "Just some cheap tricks right now is that it? Come on, why don't you try to finish me off with another one of those little girlie blasts of yours? Maybe this time it'll actually work?"

Sage's only answer was a very determined glare at the large man. She was going to win this on her own. She managed to bring herself back up onto her feet. So, far she really didn't feel all too great. Her fights so far were nothing to brag about. Oz was weak, Marx was a pervert, and she wouldn't have beat Kentan if Zesiro hadn't interfered. Jacques' lost would be her victory and her victory only. She just needed to stall him for a few seconds to figure out his trick and then break through it and hit him...one more hit should be all that it would take.

Jacques charged in again, bringing his hulking body closer to Sage. Sage rolled to the side avoiding his incoming punch. Sage quickly formed her small circle with her hands and prepared to fire another Pressure Ball. She let it loose directly at Jacques. Jacques pivoted and once more brought his left hand forward and into the Pressure Ball, once more the blast dispersed. Jacques didn't even bat an eyelash as the bast disappeared. Jacques laughed as he fired a downwards punch with his gauntlet and into the ground. There was a large explosion around his fist as rocks and dirt blew around him.

Sage was blown back along with the force, the stone shards digging into her skin as she collapsed onto the ground. She willed herself back to her feet, only to see Jacques still smiling and walking towards her. "Upset, little girlie?" he stated as he walked towards her, "My fists embody my family's motto! Return all favors halved! And return all pain doubled! In both of my gauntlets is an Impact Dial! Anytime my gauntlets get hit for any reason, they negate all damage and even better I can then shoot it back out and directly into my opponent. In other words, you can't hurt me! I'm invincible!"

Sage quickly increased the pressure in his lower left thigh. Jacques' leg started to hurt, but he ignored the pain and continued to charge at Sage. He brought his fist around firing a simplistic straight for Sage's head. Sage once more dropped to the ground avoiding the powerful forward punch. While his Impact Dials may not have a charge in them as it currently stood, his punches were still nothing to laugh at.

Jacques moved in closer to her, not in the mood to charge and have his charge fail again due to another simple one of her tricks, if he was going to kill her, he'd have to take his time and do this right. She was holding back as well. She was avoiding using the Pressure Ball of hers in order to avoid having Jacques absorb the blast. Only thing she was doing was stretching the fight out. And with Jacques' men being knocked aside by that other fellow, a longer fight wasn't really beneficial to him.

Whenever Jacques stepped closer to Sage, Sage stepped away. They were move in near perfect unison, both of them waiting for the other to drop their guard. Sage lifted her hand up and formed a smaller hole. Jacques prepared to fire a punch and meet her ball head-on. He was waiting to see the slightest change in her movement that would hint on her shooting him, but she didn't do anything. She didn't flinch or blink as she stared at him. Jacques was about to move forward and take her down, when he paused and quickly dodged to the side.

"What was that?" asked Jacques breathing heavily. His hand went to his shoulder...it was only slight, but something was happening to his body. It was as if the pressure was building up and nearing its time to explode...a close call, he was focusing so heavily on her that he ignored his own body's signal to move out of the way. He had to guess it was something similar to the Pressure Ball, but rather then the Pressure Ball that intensifies the pressure in a single area and then uses that intense pressure to slam your opponent, this one creates a pressures so intense that it explodes and destroys it surrounding. If it were to occur in his body like she was trying, his head would've been ripped from his shoulders.

Jacques charged forward, apparently holding back was no longer an option for him. Either way he would be in trouble of getting killed! The girl's only strength was the stupid Devil Fruit...the fact that unlike him she could launch any attack from any stance and any distance. Unlike Jacques who had to be in a specific stance, do a specific movement with his arms and body, and then even be a specific distance away to launch any attack. Jacques did a quick look over at his remaining men, many of them were knocked down and the numbers were so far dwindled, it would only be a few more minutes until the 'White Devil' Enma came over and joined his friend to beat him up...in other words Jacques needed to end this and fast.

"I'm going to end this with my secret technique," Jacques brought his right fist sailing down into the ground. The Impact Dial hissed as the it absorbed the force. Jacques brought his right fist up and into the air, "right now this fist has the power of one of my punches, but if I go like this!" Jacques brought his two fists colliding into each other, once more there was an audible hiss as the Impact Dial absorbed the blow. "The charge from the right Impact Dial is transferred to the left, but that's not all! There is the additional damage from my two fists colliding so its more like its has the power of three of my punches rather then one! And I can keep doing it!" Jacques brought his two fists together again and again and again. There was a nonstop hissing as the damage kept increasing and transferring from one hand to another. "Best of all, all of the power is focused into one hand...right now it is my right! So, that leaves my left open for defense."

Jacques charged in. His left fist primed for battle. Sage once more tried her regular tricks. She increased the pressure in his leg, trying to make him stop due to the pain in it, but Jacques ignored the pain and kept coming. Sage backed up and quickly changed her target to his stomach. Jacques turned his head to the side and let his lunch spill out of his mouth, but he still didn't stop his charge. Jacques brought the brunt of his shoulder into her, knocking her down. Jacques jumped on top of her and brought his right fist into the air.

Sage flinched, she put all of her bets on this one move. Just one simple increase in pressure. Jacques brought his fist down upon her with immense speed and power. The Impact Dial exploded as it came in made contact. A large dust cloud covered the two of them. Jacques was laughing, he felt his gauntlet hit home. He won!

He felt a light prodding in his chest. He looked down to see what it was. Sage was laying on the ground with a smile on her face. Her two hands forming another circle placed directly against Jacques' body. Jacques' fist had slammed into the ground next to her. While some debris and dirt came up and cut into Sage's face, she had avoided any fatal blows. "How...how did you?" stuttered Jacques as he looked down at the girl.

"Same trick I used before, I stole your balance," said Sage, "with your balance gone your aim was ruined and you missed. Of course, it was a very slim chance of it actually working, but I guess Mikoto's luck finally rubbed off on me! Now to finish it...Pressure Ball!" The ball formed once more in between Sage's fingers and right against Jacques' body, while his left hand may be able to absorb the force from the blast at this close distance, there was no way he could bring his fist around in time. Sage fired.

Jacques gritted his teeth as the blast lifted him from his feet and off of the ground. He was taken high into the air. Jacques screamed as he fell back into the ground, landing awkwardly, knocking himself out. Sage breathed quietly as she laid on the ground for a few more seconds scared to death of the blow that had just barely missed her head. Enma came over and extended his hand to her and helped her up on her feet, "how long were you standing there?" asked Sage as she noticed the large amount of bounty hunters all lying about unconscious.

"When he began to brag about his Impact Dials and the ability to transfer force from one hand to another...in all honesty he kind of lost me when he began rambling," said Enma with a smile as he looked over at Sage, "but as you said...I stayed out of your fight until the very end."

(-with Ridley-)

Ridley lugged Melanie closer and closer. He just barely managed to lift his feet up and onto the ship as he continued to walk up the plank and onto the wooden floorboards. She may have been a Shichibukai, but he wasn't about to leave her lying out there with the psychopath Trevor running loose. She was on his back, kept up due to his two crossed hands. He was hoping Enma would rush to his side to take her, but he didn't.

Ridley headed down into the infirmary and dropped Melanie off onto on the beds. He was breathing heavily. He had just walked from one dock to another while carrying Melanie with him. He was tired and he felt like collapsing. "Hey," said Mikoto as he tried to lift his head from the table. Ridley jumped back as he saw Mikoto chained to the table. "Who is she?"

"Just a friend," muttered Ridley as he forced himself to his feet, "sort of...Anyways! What the heck happened to you? You and Sage got a little bit too drunk and decided to have some sort of fun?" He snapped one of the straps up and back down against the table, "I'm not one to judge though."

Mikoto lifted his head up and looked over to Melanie, "you came onto the ship carrying a girl who I never seen before and she's unconscious. I'm sure that me getting shot isn't as interesting as to what you did to her." Ridley shrugged. Mikoto looked up at Ridley, since he was strapped down to the table he had nothing better to do then here one of Ridley's ridiculous tales.

Prey to Predator!

Zesiro, Ready for Action!

Sage took down and finished off Jacques and Enma stayed out of it. Sage is proving herself to be one heck of a pirate as the time goes on. And now Ridley is back with Melanie, one of the people out to kill them.