Grindhouse Rpg (by Audition Only) (Page 3 of 6)

Dracmus Kleysik sat at the Blue Sun’s main bar, scant meters from the fighter’s cage entrance. He dipped his muzzle into the wide-brimmed glass of water in front of him, ignoring the snickers thrown his way by the nearby bar patrons – those cradling hard liquor between their dirty palms. Drac ignored them, feeling the reassuring weight of his discblades resting on the harness he wore beneath his cloak. Drac tightened that cloak closer around his body, and pulled the hood down further past his furred snout.

    Without warning, a human who’d been too confident in his own fighting abilities came sailing out of the fighters’ area with such force that his airborne body resisted the effects of gravity for a full two meters and came to a violent stop on the bar in front of Drac’s seat. Glass shattered, nearby bottles of various alcoholic drinks came up in a spray of rainbow colors, and the human’s well-muscled body dropped down onto the bar stool, then to the floor, bleeding heavily.

    Drac was not there.

    The Selonian stood off to the side, well out of range as the spray of liquids fell back down on the open-mouthed patrons. He sighed beneath his hood, now observing the awestruck look that each of the spectating bar flies wore upon their dumb faces. In the time it took for the man to fly less than seven feet, after catching him completely unaware, Drac had spun on his stool, stood, and stepped to a reasonable distance with such speed that the half-drunk alcoholics couldn’t follow it with their glazed eyes.

    Quite an accomplishment. He thought sarcastically to himself, taking another sip from the glass of water he still held in his black paw. And now I’ve made a scene.

    But he was wrong. The men went back to their drinks after a few moments’ pause, and life in the bar returned to normal. Too drunk to dwell on the abnormal speed or just plain give a frack – lucky him. Forcing his spiked heart rate to drop back to normal, Drac turned his head slowly to survey the chaos of the arena. Fighting for money and attention, something he’d never do if his very life required it. Vanity and greed were not the way of the Zeison Sha.

    Live to fight, fight to live. 

    The old, powerful words came to him clearly, for it had been not two years since he still lived and learned with his kin on Yanibar. That was done now, though. Now it was him, just him and his; all else was stripped of him. The Selonian slowly shook his head and willed the depressing events to flee his mind. His quavering head, and the eyes within it, came to rest on the fighters’ cage again as he shook his past away. With quick eyes he surmised that two men (well, one man, he corrected himself, the other is....something else) dominated the ring, each dropping men with casual and confident simplicity in their quasi-tag-team. Honorable warriors all said, if not more than mildly insane, this he could tell.

    As he moved to a different seat, intending to finish his water and perhaps seeing if they offered something edible to eat, Drac noticed one of the two drop a Nikto with a single heavy punch to the skull, staring in wonder at his bleeding knuckles after the feat was done. As he stood there, perplexed by something even Drac’s magic couldn’t unveil, an enormous Whiphid bore down on him, meaning to kill the pale fighter while his guard was down and his attention elsewhere. The beast creature grasped a massive, studded steel cudgel in one gigantic hand, and it swung the ponderous weapon with vicious strength into the orange-haired humanoid’s floating ribcage. The effect was extremely predictable.

    The albino brawler was hurled against the arena cage with such force that the wire mesh of the makeshift cage quivered along its entire length, causing a caterwaul offensive enough to make the nearby barflies flinch at its reverberating clap. It was at this point that Drac began to move. His powerful, Force-amplified legs sprang off the beer-sticky floor without a single command from the calm and convictive mind between his keen ears. His clawed toes dug divots out of the floor tiles, and the black hood fell back from his visage, revealing a long, black-hued, majestic and noble Selonian face. The eyes buried in that skull possessed the same bleak ebony as both his cloak and his fur, and shone with the quiet image of purpose that mirrored the same feeling in his heart. One hand loosened the Shyarn in its sheath.

    A creature such as this would not take the pale one’s life by mere chance. No, if he wished to show his own prowess, he would do it by fighting the orange-haired man at his best. Acting violently and unreasonably was against his policy, but tendencies and habits are but a shack in the storm when conflicting with principles so ingrained into one’s mind that they have become his very nature. The ways of the Zeison Sha are not so easily forgotten.

    The Zeltron was on his knees now, gazing with glazed eyes at the titanic creature raising its war club for another blow. He had no breath in his lungs, and there was little he could do but watch. Little he could do. The pale alien fought well, incredible for a man against so many his superior in both size and armaments. For such a warrior to be sent to the clearing at the end of the path on his knees, blind-sided in a moment of unexplained awe by a surprisingly but assuredly lesser opponent, rivaled on sin. Drac believed he was many things, but sinner was a title he hoped to fend off for a good time more.

    The Whiphid’s cudgel, now at its peak, began to fall, propelled by the durasteel bands of muscle beneath the titan’s rippling fur. The pale Zeltron just stared breathlessly, mayhap wondering if the fun could possibly end here so abruptly, so boringly.

    It couldn’t.

    A resounding clash of metal on metal shattered the air. Drac stood between the Whiphid and its might-be prey (he was unsure that he even had to be doing this at all, from what he’d seen of the Zeltron thus far), his Shyarn looking ridiculous as it parried a weapon dozens of times its own weight. The metal in that blade was a smithing secret of the Cereans, and they alone – he hadn’t yet found a material to match it. Backed by the incredible muscles of a Force-sensitive creature, that emaciated dueling sword stopped the Whiphid’s power-bomb of momentum, weight, and strength as it descended upon the kneeling figure of the orange-haired fighter.

    “Yield.” He growled in a quiet, but deeply powerful tone, “Ye’ll not slay this one on his knees.”

    The Whiphid’s responsorial roar drew shudders from passersby walking the street outside the cantina; Drac’s fur rippled with the bellow’s intensity; he moved not a single muscle. The massive alien drew the club back again, raising it for another strike against the being who dared interrupt his fight.

     Don’t use the gift. This is drawing enough attention as it is.

    The Selonian, unable to dodge lest the blow land on the Zeltron’s skull and render his entire involvement pointless, turned it aside with a heavy swipe from his scimitar. Before the Whiphid could so much as begin to move his burdensome weapon, Drac’s Shyarn had drawn a long gash across its shaggy chest, summoning forth another deep roar of fury. His idle offhand followed with an uppercut, striking his opponent under the long snout that might be like his own were it smaller and without tusks. His performance until now had been fast, efficient, deft.

    It became abnormal when the Whiphid was lifted off its feet and driven backwards by the blow. It looked up at Drac with a very confused expression on its face, obviously unaccustomed to staring up at an enemy.

    Dracmus resumed his fighting stance, and patiently waited for the Whiphid to regain its feet. He glanced over his shoulder, feeling uncomfortable protecting a person he very well knew didn’t need it. The voice he used was neither soft nor hard, and smooth as flowing water.

    “Perhaps you’d prefer to take over, if your moment of weakness has passed.”

Zenth leaned forward and coughed once. Orange blood splattered onto the dirty and stained floor. The he looked up at the strange darkness of the Selonian standing over him, his head angling up at him limply.

He smiled, "I'd love to,"

The Zeltron couldn't stand at first, his body protesting from a dozen injuries he couldn't feel. He wasn't exactly sure if the broken ribs were from his speeder ride earlier. He gave a haggard cough between smiling teeth, and still idly clutching his chest he used his legs to stand up.

The sounds of the spreading Free-For-All flooded Zenth's limited senses as stepped forward, free of the normal physical constraints of pain. The raging Whipid roared in it's alien tongue and charged.The unusual Zeltron sprinted to meet him, and launched a powerful kick into the open gash across it's chest and redirected the huge force of the being to send him flying into the side cage mesh. The entire cage shook and the mesh hung limp and bent as the Whipid clawed himself upright, but before he turn around Zenth had balled his fists together and brought them crashing down on the back of the Whipid's head.

Then he brought his knee into the creature's side, twice. Feeling inspired, and avoiding the swelling mass of abundant brawlers, Zenth grabbed up the Whipid's own heavy weapon. He struggled with the weight of the thing only at first, until in a final blow he brought the steel cudgel full-forced into the side of the creature's head. Broken pieces of tusks went flying with flesh and fluid. Then the enormous fur-covered beast fell, limp.

The pale-orange skinned humanoid let go of the heavy club and turned, he flexed the stiff and swollen fingers of his right hand then gave yet another empty smile. he could almost feel the adrenaline surging like fire through his veins, almost.

Suddenly the sound of a high-pitched beep-beep-beep cut through the furious uproar. Dodging underneath a stray blow from a pair of quarreling Gotals the Zeltron quickly dug into the neck of his shirt and pulled out a small timer on a chain. Zenth turned it off then moved over toward the cloaked Selonian.

"Hey!" He called over the commotion, "I have to go eat now. Let me buy you something!"

((Well look who finally decided to show up. ))

((With great pleasure, lady-sai.))
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    Drac paused for a moment, his well-disciplined mind halting as it tried to process what exactly had just happened. The albino Zeltron had been fighting, injured, recovered, and crushed a Whiphid’s skull with a war club; now his clock was telling him it was time for dinner. The Selonian kicked his mind back into drive, reminded himself that this man was at best less-than-sane, and then slowly began to nod.

    “Very well, lead the way.”

    A very familiar sensation shrieked a warning into Drac’s mind, and the Selonian twirled gracefully to face the Herglic charging him from behind. He had no stomach for this, and he’d decided that his role in this fight had come to a close for now. Drac’s head dipped an instant before a hopeful punch swept through empty air, then side-stepped the follow-up strike with the same liquid alacrity. He ducked past the large creature’s defense with swift ease, and placed his open palm gently upon the Herglic’s solid chest. It paused, confused.

    A moment later it was soaring through the air.

    The Selonian stood, his pose unaltered, palm still held outward. The black paw hadn’t moved. Lowering his eyes and pulling his hood up once again, Drac turned and followed the orange-haired fighter cautiously, already unsure of his mental stability. He could always trust his freakish danger-sense for protection, but to rely on his gift too much would weaken his body and his conventional mind; and more horribly, it would mark him as
different.

    Just as they were about to leave the arena Drac heard a roar tear through the fighters’ cage. To his chagrin, it was undoubtedly directed at him; even more so, it was from the other fighter, the second one that the Selonian had marked as he observed the ring. The other top dog.

    Trouble. Drac thought, his paws wrapping themselves around a pair of discblades beneath his cloak. His mind linked with the weapons effortlessly, so familiar was the routine to any Zeison Sha worth his blades. To his relief a Wookie intercepted the mismatched monstrosity, diverting his attention for at least a few seconds. Drac took the opportunity, and bound after the Zeltron before he was challenged again and forced to draw attention to himself. He’d not fight for personal pride.

    Once outside the arena, the albino pulled out a chair at a random table, stretching his neck from side to side as he took a seat in it. The black-furred Selonian followed, moving his tail to the side of the chair and doing the same. The Zeltron quickly summoned a waitress (there was a serious lack of male wait-staff in the bar), ordered something Drac wouldn’t bother trying to pronounce, and a glass of straight whiskey to wash it down.

    Shaking away images of what the bar would look like if this being were drunk, Drac asked for what looked like some type of cooked meat (as long as it was cooked and clean, he could bear the taste), and another glass of water. The Twi’lek waitress eyed him strangely, too used to serving large amounts of alcohol, and then set off in a walk that purposely involved too much motion of the hips, as he would innocently describe it. Drac looked away in quiet disdain, bringing his attention to the exceedingly odd individual seated across from him.

    “Zenth.” He said simply, extending a blood-stained hand with an equally bloody smile. He ran his tongue over the orange-tinged teeth, and his eyes rose thoughtfully with the strange taste.

    “Drac.” The Selonian returned just as briefly, gripping Zenth’s hand unflinchingly and retaining his look of stoic thoughtfulness. He still couldn’t wrap his mind around just how strange this Zenth was. It defied all logic, all common sense, all sentient thought at all. Drac decided he was crazy.

    “So now, what brings you to the...Blue Sun is it?” Zenth asked, cracking his ravaged knuckles. Drac checked a shudder threatening to run down his spine.

    “Thirst, hunger, convenience.” He talked in his preferred fashion; short, direct, nondescript. “You?”

    “I fell off a speeder. Well, got thrown off a speeder. Well, the speeder crashed. Well, the speeder crashed and I got thrown off right around hereabouts.” Zenth replied, gesturing to the ruckus taking place in all sects of the cantina.

    “I see.” The Selonian lied, in actuality having little idea what the pale man was talking about. With this one however, he decided it would be better to say little and question less.

    “Taking a chance on that cage prize?” Zenth asked, probably wondering if he’d have to kill or cripple Drac in addition to everyone else.

    “No.”

    Zenth waited for him to elaborate, and when he saw that the beast man had no intention to, asked the question himself:

    “Why not? You look handy enough with that little sword there.”

    “I do alright when I have to.” Drac responded, keeping his eyes down.

    It was obvious that Zenth was becoming amused by the Selonian’s quiet and serious tone, and he quickly copied the voice with eerie accuracy.

    “I do too.” He murmured, lowering both his head and the pitch of his voice. In an instant the loud, insane demeanor was back again, along with a burst of self-amused laughter, “But I always believe you could do a lot better with a pocket full of prize money. Besides, it’s fun. Really fun.”

    “I’ll take your word for it.” Drac answered, seeing the result of Zenth’s ‘fun’ seeping from his knuckles and staining his teeth. He wondered just how much pain the Zeltron had to be in – he was sure the Whiphid must have broken some ribs – and yet he talked and acted so ridiculously normal. Curiosity got the better of him.

    Drac reached out with his gift, focusing on the Zeltron’s body and trying to tap into his feelings without alerting him of the mental intruder. He succeeded, or thought he did, but what he found posed more questions than it answered. The Selonian’s face suddenly contorted in pain, and his arms gripped his stomach tightly as if he were hurt. It took a good deal of his will to keep from doubling over and falling from his chair.

    “Alright there?” Zenth asked casually, not sounding as if he were particularly concerned.

    “Fine.” Drac said. He’d severed the connection as quickly as he could, and even so the pain lingered in his nerves. Gods how could he be conscious? Let alone sitting, talking, eating, drinking?

    What is this man? Drac thought, feeling the pads of his hands starting to sweat. He refused to let his curiosity guide him again though, and left the thought unanswered.

    Their food arrived, and the Selonian dug in wordlessly, suddenly aware of the hunger twisting his stomach. The meat wasn’t as bad as he’d expected, and he ate quickly, chasing each bite with a swallow of water. It was the best meal he’d had in a long time. His eyes flickered across the table as Zenth chomped on his own meal, knocking back mouthfuls of whiskey with not so much as a grimace.

Kin had packed up his cards a few minutes before, keeping the small amount of credits he'd earned to himself. Enough to buy a case of Orange Riots, enough to make a fellow happy. But this bit of drama only slightly bettered that. Kin stood up hastily. Walking behind the ex, getting his head right next to his left ear. Whispering.
"You should sit down, these fellows are playing a friendly card game. It's rude to interrupt."
The man's grip had loosened, surprised to have someone else caught so close to the action. An inch from face contact, Kin taking the advantage. Slamming a claw shaped fist into his chest(This does work depending on how much you've studied in a Martial Art that teaches it). Sending him spiraling to the floor. Annoyed but for the most part unhurt.
The man picked himself up ruefully, Kin turning to Ace. Watching the Twi'lek from a corner of his eye, just waiting to see if she'd run. See if she'd give him a chance to go hunting. Tracking her through Ord Mantell in the dark of night. Always a few steps behind, better never far away. Step by step as the game went on, a fever pitch of emotion, screaming...wait, where was he again? Right, the cantina, of course...
"You might as well keep playing. Somebody needs to simmer down before he has his talk."
Kin walked off to the bar, placing an order for a couple of Orange Riots. Dropping the extra into the new guy's hand. The bubbling liquid near a waterfall over the top. Kin sat down in his empty spot. Trying to catch up to the game. Tapping a couple of collar buttons, reseting the flow. His glass nearly empty already.
Governor Telk...Kin couldn't wait to get to work.

"What the-" Firlov ducked down as Helgon pulled the blaster on him, the bolt missed by near inches. "Die." Firlov sat back up and gave the man a double-barrel blast from the gun previously sitting in his lap.

The bar went silent for a few seconds, then returned to It's normal hustle-and-bustle. The smoking body fell back and hit the ground with a thud.

"You want some?" Firlov looked at Nathu with a psycoticly evil stare. "No? Too bad."  He replaced the two spent shells with new ones, closed the breach, and set the gun down in front of him.

"Well, He shot first." Orsusk sighed. "I can't do nothin to ya."

It's okay, I said he could.

((As soon as Fetter and Dravage get a post in I'll open up to the next plot point. Lookin' good so far everybody!))

((I've been asked to draw a scene of the pazaak game, but I can't do that until I get concept renderings of the characters there done.  So, whoever's character's at the pazaak game, please fill out a detailed outline of your character's appearance as you want it, in the BalanceArt thread of the Creative section.  Thanks!))

HUN-90

((You already did a great rendering of him.    If you want someone drawn, just ask for it.))

((Yeah, nice to see your back. At this stage it's mainly been brawling and gambling, so you haven't missed much. There's a four hundred thousand credit bounty on Governor Telk that no one's particularly keen to take etc. Hope that helps))

Faintly amused, HUN lifted his head as if viewing the Trandoshan for the first time.

"Few have been---so bold as to ask."

He carefully laid his card hand face down, and removed his playing mask, revealing the dark expanse beneath.  A void where a face should have been.

"You assume, Orsusk---that I can see at all.  Rather, I feel....the reptilian blood that courses through your cold veins---the tension rising, the cresending opus of a bloodbath---here, in this very room."

Orsusk shifted uncomfortably in his seat.  "a bloodbath...well, thanks for the tip.  You a Force user, I take it?" A slow look of realization crossed his face.  "...you haven't been kriffing us with Jedi tricks, have you?"  He reached for his sidearm once again. 

HUN laughed...a cold, ancient sound, mirthless and echoing.  "I do not need---the Force to win a game I've played for centuries.   You are hard to read, Trandoshan.  But you stink of secrets...half truths....you ask me how I can see, I tell you I see not at all.  Tell me then;  Who are YOU?"

Edit: Orsusk Jerricko

(Still here but slightly busy, if someone could please write me into a story in anyway possible. If not I'll just tune in when I get a break.)