Neon Hearts in Derelict Futures [Briar & AlrunaRose]

[AlrunaRose]

Aolieon lackadaisically whirled the baton around, spinning it between her fingers as she lightly stepped slowly with the balls of her feet on the mats. "Perhaps you should consider keeping as many options open as you can, neh?" she flipped the baton into forwards grip and flourished it around in a flurry of what seemed to be an amalgam of feigned strikes, turning motions to parry strikes and sweeping hand motions with her free hand, but stayed out of Therrye's reach -- almost as if she was briefly reminding herself of some block of principles as she slowly circled with careful side-steps. "You never know what's gonna be a good idea, until an opponent gives you an opening for when it's a good idea, after all.." She then seemed to hip-roll egregiously awkwardly on the spot, grunting at the realization of no warm-up loosening her shoulders afterwards, all seeming like she was shaking off some rust.

When Therrye went for her shoulder, she simply flicked her own baton at her inner wrist, whacking it with a decent sting and minimal movement; in the process, Aolieon angled her elbow outwards to block the wide-arc of the baton at her own shoulder, wincing for a little bit but otherwise blocking the blow with a harder part of her arm. Once her baton found it's mark on Therrye's inner wrist, the tip of the baton thrusted outwards to prod her assertively in the crook of her right shoulder to provoke some distance gain, pulling back and gesturing like the baton was some wizard's wand playfully (while actually imitating a retreating rapier's guard). Aolieon's expression betrayed no annoyance or aversion to her attempts -- only a giggle of mirth as Therrye attempted to stay out of her range. She gestured for her to approach her with the baton, encouraging her to simply come at this like a traditional exchange of blows. "This duel ain't gonna get anywhere if you continue to play keep-away, sweetheart. I'd tell you I don't bite, but that would be lying... wouldn't it?" Aolieon jabbed at her with her words, letting her tone get low on that last bit as she licked her lips -- as of right now, it looked like Aolieon was in positive control, but that's only because for obvious reasons, melee weapons were her forte...
Once Therrye took the encouragement and began coming at her more traditionally, Aolieon would circle her slowly, turning away strikes, blocking and lightly swatting, while her free hand took turns also swatting, palming, and performing light touches. Her entire approach to this bout seemed subdued, gentle and a tad playful -- almost as if she wasn't taking this too seriously. But every now and then, there'd be a hooking motion, either with the baton finding it's way around Therrye's and going around her arm, or Aolieon's free hand lightly touching, backhanding or flowing around Therrye's own; where the outside of a wrist or a riposte of the baton would find a way to very loosely grip Therrye in what could barely be considered a grapple -- and yet simply following through with the motion would throw Therrye off her own footing. There was a couple of times where Therrye would go in for a strike, and a simple prod of the baton in the crook between her shoulder and collarbone would disrupt the movement before it could be carried to term. Other times, Aolieon would engage in a defense against an attack that barely had any measure of rigidity to it -- and Therrye would simply be allowed to overshoot her movements to where her body would otherwise be carried by Aolieon moving out of the way. There were even times when a concerted attempt to knock Aolieon off-balance would be met with a strange brick wall of internal power, where Aolieon's stance would suddenly become so grounded that she could thwart Therrye's advances with a two-handed shove or a simple hook-away from herself. After barely a minute of simply circling around, it would have seemed that Aolieon had settled comfortably into a fascimile somewhere between focus and serenity, as stances became wider and more delicately postured; movements came more gentle and more expressive -- even the baton itself seemed to settle into the ensemble of her movements and become merely an extension of Aolieon's left arm and a flowing, encircling style of martial art seemed to click into place.

Aolieon grinned from ear-to-ear, enjoying their little play-by-play into the movements, always on the lookout for any natural habits of Therrye's which might reveal a thing or two; whether a used tactic echoed the penchant of an old habit, or a tensing of restraint betrayed a feeling, emotion or quirk were included among the list of things being felt for, but still she was enjoying the exchange.
Finally, Aolieon released a quip. "So, you gonna knock me on my ass or something? I know I'm not as sturdy as a Militech turret, but c'mon -- mess me up; fold me into a pretzel, something!"

 

[Blood Briar]

She certainly has the skills to back up that sass. "That  does sound like something you'd suggest," she remarked, with something else in mind entirely. Her gaze swallowed up the details of Aolieon's movements in their totality, however; while she was not a genius like the other Liandri, her intuitive grasp of fighting outpaced her own knowledge of it. It was one of the leading reasons for how she survived the imbalanced matches she'd been set up to die against.

"Tell me all about openings, dancer," she smiled, with more teeth than perhaps either of them expected. Therrye gave her own wince at the strike on her wrist, but avoiding pain ranked low on her priorities. Reading how, where and when she was struck told her precious information, and the pain itself was instructive when matched with the rest. This sort of behavior probably wasn't much of a surprise, all told. Aolieon had well seen her propensity for treating bullets as things one can block with their body.

The woman's playfulness reminded her of painfully fond, not-so-distant memories. Pretending otherwise was what most of her adopted.

Chuckling at her barb, her violets went partially lidded while she replied. "Shame you were too distracted to bite me for very long." Refusing to give her immediate satisfaction, the bruiser led with a series of feints and provocations to see if she'd actually dive into offense instead of offensively countering.

But then she did launch into active series of strikes. Therrye wanted to start pressing her guard and leaned more into power and speed. She would have preferred to make it a trifecta with technique, yet that was her largest weak spot. For all she lacked in offensive capability here, this nevertheless remained a profound lesson in defense. Every turn of her baton, every flaw in her guard, every push on her stance told her what she needed to know to improve. At some points, her grin overshadowed the pain delivered by the blows entirely, reveling in the dance that clearly favored her opponent.

The longer this went on, the more her stance adjusted. By degrees, she was assimilating these lessons and turning them into alterations of action. That wasn't all she was learning, though; the language of how she fought whispered hints of her past, personality and education. "Dancer describes you so well," she mused, almost as if a thought had escaped into speech unbidden.

Beyond her minimal tendencies for self-preservation (which communicated something deeper than an appetite for pain), Therrye traded off which hand wielded the baton on occasion. Her right hand was dominant, but her left wasn't terribly neglected, either. Echoes of two weapon fighting lingered in how she held her body and came into swings with just the one baton. Several times an opportunity came to try a kick, but she hesitated, however briefly, and passed it up. Extra tension lingered in the shoulder with her old plates, though its effects were mild at most.

In all of it, she remained more concerned with watching and interpreting Aolieon's movements than actually trying to hurt her. She didn't simply restrain herself - and could hardly see the samurai work for defense in enlightening ways if she gave it no effort - but Therrye became far more invested in provoking her responses than expecting blows to land.

"Are you always so eager for punishment?" While it rolled off her tongue easily, she wasn't much thinking of their spar when she said it.  That caused a flicker of conflicted emotion that was quickly pushed to the side. Shaking loose her arms and stretching her neck, she smirked softly as she adjusted her stance to something more restrained. "Let's find out if I can." Therrye still had no intention to aim for truly injurious blows, but she stopped holding back on force.

Unlike her previous aims of bodying or provoking Aolieon to school her, her attacks moved her much less afield from where she grounded her stance. It was more like a porcupine than a badger, applying constant threat within her reach without lunging away from it. She still took steps to follow and push, of course, yet they were much more restrained. Trading away more considered blows and placing, she embraced a flowing flurry of assault. Having seen more of how the woman defeated her, she shifted her angles or changed her follow-through to put more pressure onto attempts at defense. With the amount of force she was applying now, successful hits would be much less 'fun'.

 

[AlrunaRose]

"Ohh, I could try to tell you about all the infinite possibilities of how you could turn a fight around..." Aolieon giggled, fending off more strikes as she could, but she leered as she sent out another tongue-in-cheek quip. "...but hearing me go on and on like that might be too much trouble for you! I'd get bored, you'd get tired; you might have to take me home again..." she chuckled teasingly, betraying the probability of a scenario she wouldnt be opposed to -- however, she pressed it so casually that it could have quite easily been taken as a simple jest. She continued slapping the baton away and at one moment, she followed through which a riposte that whiffed over her head with a powerful whoosh through the air -- she left a split-second opening in doing this lofty attempt at intimidation, but if Therrye didnt capitalize on it; she'd bring the baton handle down and surprisingly go into a two-handed wushu push to make her stumble. Whether or not she was bludgeoning decently and given the chance to marvel at bit at the pain or the push followed through and enabled a little detente between their dance; Aolieon would chuff and lick her lips. "I could go for days, if I really wanted to. Not so sure about you, though," she concluded with her sass, winking at Therrye sardonically. She twirled the baton a little more, then gestured for her to come again -- resets weren't at all demanded by Aolieon; the sparring simply went through ever so brief lulls before they were encouraged to resume. She didn't seem to put much stock in resetting to work on poses, and that facet seemed to lend itself to not only continued learning, but a practical approach to combat that wasn't necessarily life or death, but fun in its own way.

Slowly but assuredly as Aolieon kept her loving game of baton patticake up -- Therrye began to adjust her technique and start to apply pressure. She started getting closer into her guard; she switched weapon hands and for awhile it just seemed like she was evening the playing field to rise to the occasion -- the decision to switch from her dominant hand was a strange one indeed, but it didn't seem at all like her skills had depreciated all that much, which was interesting to note for sure. There were some echoes of being generally familiar similarly with the weapon in her hand -- had she been practicing with escrima sticks or something, lately? Aolieon switched hands to respond in kind, electing to keep her opponent's focus one-sided, but it wasn't a definitive answer to this change-up and it wouldn't last long... Therrye had started to switch to tanking some of Aolieon's blows, rather than letting her defense be entirely occupied with Aolieon's give-and-take. Therrye started getting a few successful hits in, due to her ability to now keep Aolieon fully occupied on defense. Aolieon's eyes dilated and she grinned -- even she was beginning to get excited.

Aolieon started changing it up, including some simple and intermediate knife drills into her martial-arts mix-ups, allowing for quicker, snapper hits that ended up being a bit unconventional and hard to spot due to said drills being made for use with a significantly shorter weapon held in reverse grip. The baton began fluttering about in upright figure-eights, reverse figure-eights and other shapes, making it harder to tell which way the baton was going to go in deflection, or come from in attack -- it looked like something a strike force operator might do when backed up against the wall, or out of bullets.

Paul Hertzog -- "Bloodsport Theme Suite"

Still, Therrye pressed back and accepted her challenge -- no longer holding back on force, she started getting some decent, even heavier strikes in. This made Aolieon begin to grunt and hiss in pain, as she intensified her whirling flurry in an attempt to keep parrying. Grip tensed, allowing harder blows to be turned away, but she still kept closing, applying pressure -- her eyes began to sharpen. She started stepping back, baiting with her own faints, moving as if she was lowering her guard a bit -- when the fated swing near the head would finally come, Aolieon would weave backwards and suddenly fling her upper body to the side, tucking into an impromptu side-flip -- barely enough to be entirely gymnastic in form, but enough for her to bring her heel behind her and right across Therrye's face... an unexpected change-up into something altogether different from fighting in its entirety, and with enough force to at least to daze her target and send her reeling. Had Aolieon been caught in the throes of her own emotion and that kick had been delivered with intention -- there is no doubt in the world that it would have broken Therrye's nose or knocked some teeth loose, because no matter how benevolent one's intentions are in sparring; there's a special something to be said about full-body momentum attacks that come more naturally to someone and out of left field at the opponent...

After that little exchange, a single look at Aolieon would reveal just the beginnings of a sweat broken and a light pant; her eyes widened in surprise at her own instincts with maybe a tinge of remorse. Aolieon grinned with mirth, shrugging with the baton still in her hands. "... heh. Sorry," she offered, collapsing the baton into her free hand and flinging it to the side like discarded trash. "Still not giving those luscious legs the limelight they deserve, I see..." she managed to follow up, trying to play her instinctive brutality off as something that was relevant to their sparring lesson. She giggled lightly, however; not entirely sorry after a few strong whacks from Therrye's baton... then, Aolieon began to move in a way that Therrye probably had never seen before...

Even in such a diversified and nuanced field of practice such as mixed Martial arts -- Capoiera was a largely uncommon sight. It is said that this martial art found it's origin centuries ago in less developed countries, having migrated to others in the minds of plantation slaves, who would practice it in their free time in preparation of escape designs, as well as to teach themselves a method of self-defense. Many masters would ignorantly shrug it off as 'cultural dancing' in its observation, and so Capoiera would end up being mastered by those who practiced it among their shackled companions, much in the same way that Tai Chi could be mastered in complete isolation and with minimal living space. That being said, for such a niche and outlandish fighting style heralding from Latin America; it was both an unconventional and largely underrated martial art, as even though it appeared to present glaring weaknesses at first sight -- not only could a Master of Capoiera curb these weaknesses decently, but it kept an opponent at a range largely uncomfortable for many fighters to engage... as the legs more often than not have more reach than one's fists; the usage of full body momentum made strikes devastating if projected with worth, and fighting in an element that was somewhere between half-standing and prone was not something many martial arts and fighting styles lent themselves well to...

"Youre right about one thing -- Im a dancer through and through, bruiser. One thing I hope you'll realize though, is that your legs have the potential to be weapons just as devastating as those strapping gorilla arms of yours, baby. You should learn to get your whole body engaged in a fight; after all, in the same way that you miss every shot you don't take -- what you don't use, is something people can just use against you..."
Aolieon crouched down and began stepping side to side; her back foot pronouncing itself far behind her as the arm on the same side as the leg going backwards came up to sway in front of her face -- Aolieon's "Ginga", as the default fighting "stance" for Capoiera was known, carried a little something with it -- her hips sauntered backwards with her steps, and her upper body seemed to meander in its own figure eights, creating a highly active "stance" that gave way to infinite possibilities... after a few moments of doing this side to side dance and even circling her a bit -- Aolieon postured her hands in front of her with a mischievous grinning leer and beckoned Therrye forwards... Alerting the bruiser that this wasn't just some theatrical little skit she was doing in the middle of a match.

 

[Blood Briar]

Therrye gave a soft chuff to her leer and tease. Part of her very much responded to the notion, and her eyes dilated momentarily. That wasn't the part currently in charge, though. "You're no fainting damsel in distress; you can bed yourself, can't you?" she retorted, clipping the samurai's thigh with a downward swipe before getting pushed back. Taking the breath and swishing unthreateningly with the baton, she smirked unimpressed. "Big words from the gal who fell asleep on me."

Aolieon certainly got more hits in with the change up, and made some quiet noises at the impacts. Watching her figure eights for a couple moments, she just doubled down on pressing the assault, turning blows to follow parries and make them struggle to release, and hooking her own baton following blocks to unsteady the dancer. The switch to her gymnastic-lite heel strike did get a good retort in, and all Therrye could do in response was turn her head slightly to spread out the impact on her jaw instead of take it straight to the teeth.

Regarding her with a grin, she stretched her jaw and imagined what level of bruise her cheek would be left with. Rather than deter her, it only made her more interested in what would follow. "Feisty," she said lowly, narrowing her focus with the discarding of the baton and the inevitable shift in approach that would follow. A nasal exhale was her only response to the legs comment; even though it was something she'd made the decision to remedy, she wasn't going to give her the satisfaction of telling her that. Then she'd definitely know she was the motivation for doing so.

The switch to Capoiera was not one the bruiser expected and it consumed her focus. Vague tickles at the back of her mind told her it reminded her of  something in the halls of memory, but there was a large difference between fighting against someone who knew an art vs someone who had learned from someone who'd been inspired by some old vid. "Then show me what that body of yours can do."

Given how their first exchange went, Therrye knew charging in would give her opponent the definitive advantage. Tossing aside the baton with more intention than the other woman's carelessness, she dredged through the murk of her past to pull her footing toward a more kick-forward footing.

Not because she thought it would provide her with any edge (and it wouldn't, given the minimal development there over grappling moves), but all to provoke Aolieon toward offense. Using her slightly superior reach, she threw some kicks at the woman's shins. Really, the more she could focus herself on dodging and parrying, the faster she could start to get a read on what this form brought to the arena.

Either which way, though, she fully expected to take a beating from it before she'd make any meaningful progress in responding to it.

 

[AlrunaRose]

"I think I'd rather play Russian Roulette," she stated -- of course the reference was quite literal, because the fact of the matter was home was not a place she wanted to be. Echoes flashed through her mind of thoughts she had attacked herself with only a handful of hours ago, but she brushed them aside. "And I had been awake five days prior, i think -- you were comfy. What can I say?" she jabbed, deciding that brazen honesty was a potentially more beneficial approach to getting inside her head.

When the bruiser flung her first kick at one of her shins; she had sensed the waters being tested -- using her momentum from kicking backwards, she twirled her body, pulling what was originally her forwards leg out of range as the leg originally behind her slid to whirl her about to the side... but she didnt stop there. Allowing her body to drop, the stepping leg continued on its whirling path; her hands behind her, they switchec up to support weight as she swept the first leg forwards in a left arc... then the right leg swept opposite; there was plenty of time to slip out of the way, but before Therrye knew it, Aolieon's legs had left the ground as both came up in a sort of cartwheel, coming at her like a sword threatening to split her in two -- even if she stepped out of the way, the cartwheel would complete itself, and with additional carried momentum -- her body would tuck into a sideways handspring. As the legs came up above her again, it would look like the same movement would come again... but her legs would turn to the side, swinging them in an overhead blow as momentum was canceled and she would go for additional head blows by twirling upside down.

Finally, shed back-handspring away from Therrye a couple of times, landing on her hands in a handstand. Her legs would point skyward -- her waist bent them forwards, then to the side, then backwards, almost allowing her back to nearly form an L-shape with her body. She'd then return to neutral and bring her knees in, assuming this particular handstanding pose.
"Well, don't just stand there -- show me whatcha got, bruiser." She'd smile from upside down, giving her time to figure this all out.

 

[Blood Briar]

"That would explain a lot," she murmured. As much as Therrye felt inclined toward empathy and caretaking, Aolieon had already told her to fuck off in clear terms and there was nothing one could do for the unwilling. When the scorpion tells you its nature, you listen, and the bruiser took the words to heart. "You can say whatever you want, dancer. You're already saying plenty," she smirked, the honesty of her footwork more clear and forward than anything she'd ever expect from the Liandri's lips.

True to the form, it was hard to follow and predict. She'd already committed to the defensive, but these sharp blows rewarded her parries with continued strikes, and some painful impacts were her rewards. Shifting more toward dodging, she found herself getting pushed harder toward the lines on the mat.

Then she drew back into a stand that looked far more like a performance piece than a fighting stance. It was puzzling, it was threatening, and it was fascinating. This style seemed perfectly suited to her agility and grace, and she was already getting an inkling of how much she could get hurt by it.

That, of course, did little to deter the bruiser.

Suspecting that her fists were more of a liability here, she edged forward then swept with a palm toward a shin again, already readying to lean her upper body backwards and dodge a kick to the head.

Coming at this from a hand-centric approach would do her few favors, but she kept at it, striking with the side of hand and pushing at her swinging legs with open palms while she observed the fresh hell coming down on her. Focusing on her so intently, she didn't bother replying to her sass yet.