Hm. Been a bit, my intronets are working better these days, figured I would dust off the combat stuff a bit.

RULES:

Standard fare; no god-modding, no autos...blah blah.

One extra rule, Time. I WILL NOT wait weeks for a reply. If you cannot post in a timely manner you lose. I don't care about your reasons; School? Shouldn't be RPing then. Sick? Get up, type a few lines to reply..go back to bed. Dead?....well, I win. ha.

I want this to be HOR ranked, so unless you got an account...piss off. Go here to join http://www.thegrandtournament.com/games.php?mode=played

Now, for who I'll be usin; roleplay/the-multiverse/characters/noxize-deschain/

I want a standard Powered Melee battle. No magic-missile....no Time Warps. Just two inhuman things fighting.

Nox will have his Lashes, speed and agility on his side...none of his mental powers.

Hm. I'm interested. I know I have another battle going on at the moment but I was fairly impressed with your past posting here, so I'm willing to put in some more effort. It will take me a few hours to pull together a formal character sheet, but I have a few archetypes I can list off the top of my head, if you're interested.

Solrethael, cleric of Sol Invictus, uses spear and shield, plus divine spells. Since your OP describes a melee centric fight her magical abilities would possibly be too flashy for your liking, but she's a balance between melee and magic.

Garzahd, pyromancer. Pretty straightforward concept, probably out of the question.

Lord Kelvin, duelist and swashbuckler. Only special ability is swag.

Achaeron Irenaeus, knight-captain and upholder of the law, heavily armored and enjoys the smell of dead criminal scum. Minor special abilities.

Eh, I don't care who you use, as long as the rules I stated are followed; no magic. I want a Powered Melee fight, not a fireworks display.

Alright, I've registered an account on HOR, and am pulling together a character write-up as we speak. Feel free to open the fight at your leisure.

EDIT: Link to the new character profile. roleplay/the-multiverse/characters/lord-kelvin-hofbrincl/

I will do my best to post the intro tonight, but right now Im posting from my cell phone outside my lady friends work. If I get home reasonably early I'll toss it up. If not it will be up early in the day tomorrow. Setting will be a vacant lot, clear day. Evens the play I think. Any questions on my guy before we start?

Yeah, I just would like to know if he's susceptible to being hurt by standard weaponry. My character doesn't have any crazy ethereal blades or anything.

OOC:Nox's form is somewhat gelatinous in nature, he can take massive damage and rebound quite quickly. Under sustained flurry however he can lose consistency, there by dropping from the fight. Edged weaponry can cut him, but by nature he has no blood, severing limbs will take from his mass as he regenerates...eventually depleting his form, unless the parts are gathered. Honestly, standard weaponry is not going to be your best bet; Nox has been active in RP battles for well over 10 years now, and has ways of dealing with the standard 'sword and shield' weapons people use.

If you want, before begining this, you may change out. I do not see your Kelvin possessing the means to win this fight. However, you might surprise me.

IC:

The wind flowed through the open lot, brushing aside scattered papers and fallen leaves; Fall was in the air, soon Winter would rear it's ugly head. The place was empty, seemingly scrubbed of life. In truth that wasn't far off. This world had once teemed with life; cities vast and forests full. Then The Dreamer arose. What started as a plague of nightmares, leading to a drought of rest, ended in cataclysm. The old and the young were the first to fall, all seeing a black..thing in the space between sleep and awake, then they died. Exhaustion leading to simple death. The middle aged were the last to go, but the worst yet..tumors spreading through the brains of those left behind as the being grew stronger. In the end it rose from the shattered ruins, and walked the silent streets.

Standing average height, average weight, and topped with a short burr of red hair he hardly looked the part of harbinger...but you can never judge a book by it's cover. Writhing just below his flesh was a monster. Black, like the spaces between stars...light simply devoured by it's shade, it's 'flesh', covered for now by a mask of skin, with a strange mass. Soft one moment, flowing like gel..hard the next as it's weapons form, the Lashes formed from the stuff of Nightmares. Malleable and ever changing, it's true form without true detail, the Dreamer was simply incomprehensible.

In it's wake lie a thousand dead worlds, each stripped of life, left hollow and bare. Each a testament to pure silence, the being's goal. Yet here...it still felt life? Thoughts? The possibility of combat sends thrills through the being. It longed to study something new, learn how a being might survive the holocaust of it's birth. Nox was a curious being; learning of any kind was pure bliss. Combat was no different, learning your opponents' moves, defending and countering. A dance, and a lesson.

The vacant lot it stood in would do. In order to make this battle last longer, as most of it's bouts ended far to soon to enjoy, Nox would lock away it's mental powers. This would be a simple melee; the Lashes would serve. Right arm bending up, hand held before the being's face, fist clenching it lets the skin shift. With a wet sound, the fake skin parts, and two of the pseudopodia emerge. Writhing and twisting like worms, the appendages glisten wetly, their edges studded with razor sharp 'teeth'. Satisfied with his weapons Nox lets out the only Psionic ability of the match; a summoning.

'Come, come and dance. Come and die.' It sent outward in a wave, summoning it's opponent from wherever they may be, projecting an image of the lot and a map on how to reach it. Nox was a monster, but he was helpful.

OOC: I am going to opt to use Kelvin, regardless. However, taking into account what you have said, and using a bit of liberty with his general concept, whenever he appears in a new timeline or world his abilities and equipment tend to change in a way to better fit in. Seeing as this is sort of a post-apocalyptic wasteland (albeit one that your character caused) I will make Kelvin's equipment somewhat futuristic to compensate. I always liked the idea of tech versus the eldritch monstrosity, anyway. :) May the best combatant win.

IC:

Kelvin awoke to the acrid smell of smoke wafting into his nostrils. Opening his eyes, he blinked once or twice to try and clear the haze clouding his vision. The sky overhead was blue, tinged with white, wispy clouds, hurried along by a brisk wind. He shuddered out of reflex. Once again, I see I have managed to die... he thought to himself. His last recollection was of some brawl atop a high building, and being kicked off. Evidently, he hadn't survived the impact. With a groan he hoisted himself into a sitting position, and looked around him. He was situated amongst the ghostly ruins of iron and steel buildings, long abandoned vehicles, and the ever-present carpet of cement everywhere. Some loose papers tumbled past in the wind.

Kelvin reached up to scratch his head and was surprised to find his signature plumed hat missing. Instead, his hand met the cold steel of a combat helmet. For the first time, he looked at himself, and realized he was outfitted in something totally unlike his usual attire. The gaudy tunic, the bracers, the noble cloak, his favorite hat... gone. In their place, a full suit of high-impact ceramic-tungsten amalgam combat armor glistened jet black, form fitting and surprisingly fluid and lightweight to move around in. He flexed an arm to test it's movement range, resigned to familiarize himself with this new equipment. Reaching to his waist to where he kept his weapons, he found that his wheellock pistols had been replaced with sleek, silver-finished machine pistols. Damn, I really enjoyed the handiwork of those pistols. These don't look too shabby though, I wonder what they can do. Raising himself upright, he unholstered one of them, inspecting it. Experimentally, he pulled a small lever on the side of the grip. The weapon's clip slid open to reveal 20 hollow pointed bullets of depleted uranium, each filled with a small amount of strange bluish-white liquid. Sliding it back in with a satisfying click, Kelvin pondered whether or not to test it out on some nearby wall, but thought better of it, figuring that whatever it did, it was most likely vastly superior to his flashy, but largely inaccurate wheellocks.

The inspection continued with him searching to find his trusty sabre. It too, was gone, along with its scabbard. Looking around, he caught sight of something in the corner of his eye, as if there were something hovering behind his back. Reaching back his arm, Kelvin was delighted to find the familiar grip of a sword. However, as he drew it from the scabbard on his back, his eyes widened once again in amazement. Instead of steel, the blade was made of honed diamond, set into a grip of titanium. It had some heft to it, and Kelvin was concerned that its extra weight would outweigh the improved cutting power when he noticed a small button set into the side of the weapon grip. He pressed it. Immediately, the blade was filled with a mryiad of thin light beams of various shades of color, giving it the appearance of a shining rainbow prism. What was even more curious, the air near the edge of the blade began to shimmer and give off tangible heat. Kelvin swung it at the ground at his feet, overtaken completely by curiosity. He expected the blade to strike the cement and rebound, gouging some of it out. Instead, the blade struck the cement and cleaved into it a good 3 inches deep. A split second later the cement immediately around the blade vaporized, causing a small explosion that blew out a good basketball sized chunk of cement into the air in a million tiny shards, and left deep cracks running along the pavement for several feet. "Well, that was unexpected. Grand." The armor had protected him from the blast effortlessly, with a previously un-noticed visor reflexively flipping down over his face to shield it. With a satisfied nod, Kelvin turned off the blade and after waving it around a little bit to cool it off, sheathed it.

Looking around him at the deserted street, the next question formed on his lips... "Now what?"

As if on cue, a eeire voice in his mind answered him. Come, come and dance. Come and die. For a moment his vision blurred again, the cityscape before him transforming into a deserted lot, with a redhaired figure standing alone. A sort of cold certainty crept into his mind, before the vision passed and his eyes refocused. "Splendid. I'm scarcely here for five minutes and someone already wants to kill me. What in the nine hells did I do to deserve this? Where are the beautiful women and luxurious inns? Unbelieveable."

With a resigned sigh, he took one last look around to get a sense of his whereabouts, and set off at a brisk walk, following the mental path that had been mapped for him.

-----------

He found the lot exactly as he had seen it in his mind's eye. The relief of discovery was quickly extinguished by the ominous presence of the red haired figure before him. Though a tremendous uneasiness had suddenly settled into the pit of his stomach, Kelvin fought to maintain his composure. Stepping onto the edge of the asphalt lot, he came to a halt and flipped up his helmet visor.

Summoning from within himself the cheeky bravado that always managed to prevail even in the most dire of circumstances, Kelvin called out to the figure that had summoned him: "Greetings, you sniveling knave! Is this your idea of a warm welcome, inviting me to fight and die? You are most presumptuous and unspeakably rude! And ugly to boot! I've come to teach you some manners!"

To punctuate his statement, and hide his countenance for fear of betraying his unease, Kelvin resealed the visor and heard a small, almost inaudible hiss as the helmet closed and sealed itself against the rest of his body armor. He did not expect the strange person on the opposite side of the lot to respond in a friendly way, given his summons. Thus, he was committed and ready to fight. Reaching down, he unholstered the machine pistol from his left hip and raised it to point at the figure's chest, but did not fire, his finger simply held at the ready to pull the trigger at the first sign of trouble. His right hand stayed open, ready for a myriad of possible responses. His ring finger twitched slightly.

"Your move, peasant."

The red-headed being simply cocks its head at the other, green eyes narrowing slightly. This one was a strange one, he gave off strange vibrations, his mind was unlike the others of this dead world. He simply didn't seem like he belonged here. It was something in the way he moved, the way he spoke; the natives had been a fairly advanced species, a rigid structured society. This man seemed like he was from another place, another time even. It was perplexing to The Dreamer. Was this being some form of time-traveler? A Planeswalker?

No matter, the fleshy-ones all bled the same.

"You speak oddly." Nox began, moving slowly to the right, keeping distance between the two about thirty feet. "You use words and slang of a different place, a far distant time. What are you, flesh-one? Are you a walker, like those blood-drinkers? Or some other of the timeless-ones? I wish to know what I am dissecting." Words calmly spoken, oddly devoid of emotional tone. If one didn't know better they would assume Nox was simply a robot, or some other soulless automaton. But the truth was far worse. Emotions were something the being tried to remove from itself, but it was a futile effort..as all dreams were based in emotion.

With a crack, pop sound, the twin lashes clashed together, as would two fingers in a snap. The flesh of the hand bubbles back up, once again hiding Nox's true form from view. Watching the lashes move below the flesh was disturbing to most, as if his body was home to snakes, or large worms. A grin splits the features as a lash travels under one cheek. Kelvin would know by know that he faced something inhuman. Most never got the warning in time, simply seeing a slight red-headed man and going in for the easy kill. It never ended well for them. Nox was a breed apart.

Eyes on the weapons, firearms tended to be rather loud, and for the most part ineffective against The Dreamer, but it was never wise to simply discount a weapon. The unknown factor of ammunition alone could cause for a surprise; they made all kinds of bullets these days. It would be unwise to simply charge in, risking counter strike from the unknown weapon. "I hardly think a pistol is fair, as you can see I hold no projectile weapons myself...unless it's to compensate for some...lacking." Nox goaded the man, taking from the vocabulary used and the cocky mannerisms the opponent displayed that this tactic may cause the other to react. Insulting the male flesh-one's manly-ness seemed to be an easy enough task. The poor creatures cared so much for the small flaps of flesh between their legs, it was a wonder they got anything done in a given day.

Kelvin kept the pistol in his left hand trained on the being some thirty feet away as it began to circle him. Turning slightly to follow, Kelvin's eyes narrowed as he tried to make out the features of his opponent, and frowning in annoyance at the string of questions. It had become a disturbing trend of late that noone payed him the respect he was due. This instance differed in some ways however... the most obvious being that most of Kelvin's adversaries were mortal and generally easily dispatched. This... thing, for lack of a better term, clearly wasn't. Kelvin opened his mouth to speak, but stopped short. Is that... Is that a parasite moving under his skin? Kelvin shuddered despite himself. Now he was absolutely certain this thing wasn't human.

"I am neither vampyre nor other undead abberration, that stalk the dark and wretched places of the world. I am Lord Kelvin Hofbrincl, noble of a house which time itself hath forgotten. I would tell you where I hail from, if I knew it myself. I doubt it would be of import to you, however..." Kelvin paused, the internal circuitry of the helmet broadcasting his voice clearly across the lot. "Know this: Though I cannot fathom what realm I have stumbled upon, I, as always, have come in peace and tranquility. On the other hand, your brutish and base desire to destroy me begs a violent reprisal." Kelvin paused again, turning over in his mind the absurdity of the whole situation, before finishing the verbal exchange with a final statement, ignoring the presumed jab at his manhood. He'd heard that one countless times before, it was almost absurdly comical that even an eldritch horror would resort to such petty name calling. "As such, your plea for fairness is wasted upon uncaring ears. Vile abominations such as yourself do not merit the courtesy of a fair fight."

Kelvin continued to follow the being in its lazy circle around him with the pistol still raised. He was acutely aware that for the moment he held the advantage of distance, however slight it may be. He was determined not to relinquish it. His left index finger curled more firmly around the trigger, ready to fire at any moment. If the creature spoke the truth, that it had no weapon with which to rule the gap, and truly wanted to kill him, it would have to act on that impulse of it's own accord and close the distance itself.

When the talk failed to remove the weapon from Kelvin's grasp it was onto plan-b.

The gun was an unknown factor, it's bullets could pose a threat, or they could be simple lead and in nature harmless, it was a risk. Nox had lived this long by knowing what risks were worth taking. A smile crosses it's face, as with a simple bow..the floor below it's feet shatters. A simple stab downward with it's lashes, through the thick blacktop below, and with a sound like a cannon going off, a set of small craters are formed. The lashes kept going, drawing Nox's mass with them...below the ground. However..the skin shell remains standing, a distraction.

Using the sharp crack of splitting ground and the cast off shell to draw whatever fire Kelvin might release, a small series of lines within the shell left behind to control it...like a puppet. The shell would lean forward and step out of the crater, trailing black slime. Kelvin might not know what had happened fully, but he seemed smart enough to figure out that things just got interesting. How he would face an opponent who could slide along under the blacktop would be entertaining.

The shell kept moving towards Kelvin, enough of Nox's mass left behind to simply move it and act as a speaker. "How interesting..nobility. This will be fun, I have not killed a Lord in a few years, not since Calnth." the shell was closing the gap faster now, about 15 feet and closing, while the true beast slithers about under the ground, watching through it's satalite eyes, waiting to see how Kelvin would react to this turn of events. It had been a while since Nox last used this trick, lurking below the opponent and striking when least expected. Impalement was the typical end result.

The blast and ensuing crater caught Kelvin by surprise. Before the dust had settled, he saw the figure rise out of it and begin walking towards him, leaving a sort of blackish slime smeared under it's feet. Thoughts of various possibilities streamed through his mind. Did it hurt itself? Was that an attack? Or is it some sort of entropic beast, subject to chaotic discharges? Or perhaps it is... Kelvin cut himself short. His reaction time and window of opportunity were dwindling with every step of that walking... no, shambling figure. Its gait was unnatural, slightly lopsided, reminiscent of the mindless undead. Kelvin half expected it to start slavering for brains... or maybe, it already was.

It was now or never, so Kelvin squeezed the trigger twice in succession, aiming at the center of the oncoming horror. With a percussive whirr, the gun spat out two bursts of 4 slugs, each bullet a small holocaust of destruction. The depleted uranium slugs had enough mass and velocity to tear through a foot of masonry with ease, while it's incendiary core would coat the impact surface with a self-igniting mixture of white phosphorus and kerosene, burning hot enough to melt steel and stubbornly resistant to being extinguished.

((OOC: I would write more but the flight time of bullets doesn't leave much in the way of being able to perform additional actions, so I'm going to wait and see what happens.))

And with a panic..the human lost whatever advantage it had, as Nox's plan worked perfectly.

The first two rounds punch through the mostly hollow skin shell, and pass harmlessly through. A flicker of flame in the distance signaling impact with some rubble or something, unimportant. The next two rounds were snagged by the lightning quick reflexes and a bit of careful weaving. Remaining within the shell was a slim armature of gel, acting as both skeleton (support) and muscles (locomotion), controlled by the main mass of Nox, using the thin trail of slime as a lead. When the first batch of bullets passed through, it was through the shell's stomach, an area with few of the 'wires', the second burst however caught the ribs perfectly.

The 'ribs', a complex weave of the gel, snagged the first round perfectly. It was wrapped neatly in a small cocoon and dissected in seconds. Nox now understood the nature of the weapon's projectiles. They were mean little buggers, and he had done well to avoid them as he did. Fire wasn't a force anything simply ignored, it was painful...damaging. So, when the other round was caught messily..well...it ended badly.

As the 'ribs' snagged the last round, it was still tumbling. This made a precise capture more difficult, add to that Nox was already paying more attention to the secure round..and what resulted was a blast of fire as the round cooked off. Deep within the torso of the shell, in the heart of the webs controlling it, the round exploded with a simple pop. And all hell broke loose. A scream, to Kelvin it would come from everywhere..because it did would split the air, as the shell caught fire and blazed.

The singed web of gel would crumble off, severed from the main mass by the fire. It hurt, quite a bit more than Nox had expected. Pain was something Nox was not used to, he hardly ever ran into an enemy actually smart enough to hurt it. But this...flesh covered sack of shit had done it. And he would pay.

With a pop, almost as loud as the shot of Kelvin's gun, a single lash explodes from the ground at Kelvin's feet. Nox had slid towards the opponent in a slick surge of liquid movement. The extending lash acted as a spike, aimed at the groin of the man, seeking to stab into a weakened joint located between the legs. It was a common fault of armor; the joints needed mobility, thus they were weak. Yet most joints also held the most important blood-flow points, in this case Kelvin's Femoral Artery. Should Nox's spike reach it's objective, severing the artery, Kelvin would have less than a minute of life left as his vital fluid would gush out.

However, Nox was not one to strike without a back-up plan in place. The spike could be dodged, or slashed at by Kelvin's sword, in either case there was a plan in motion. The strike would serve both as an attack, and a test. Should Kelvin survive this, he would realize Nox was below him, the result would be fire from his pistol. It's armor penetrating rounds would easily pass through the blacktop, reaching where Nox's mass was. But this was a fact already known to the being. What it didn't know was the nature of the sword, a fact that could easily lead to more pain. But as with all gambles...some pay off, some don't.

Within the space of a few seconds, dismay turned to joy... and then to a odd slurry of both emotions. Kelvin had watched as the bullets ripped through the now-evidently hollow form, seemingly without effect.. until the final round hit something. Something vital, it seemed, as a sharp keening scream assaulted his ears even through the helmet dampeners. And for a brief moment, Kelvin's mouth broke into a smile. But as the puppet body caught fire and collapsed into a meaningless sack of burning flesh, the scream continued. Confused, Kelvin began to lower the gun when he noticed that the asphalt below him was moving... a subtle ripple in the surface, moving towards him like a seismic wave, leaving little hairline cracks behind it.

Before he had a chance to fully react, the ripple reached him, and the ground below him opened explosively. In this moment, truly, it was the mere confluence of circumstance that he was not instantly impaled from the groin to his head, for the armor he was wearing would have made little difference in this case. The blacktop they were fighting on was old and brittle, baked by years of sun and frozen by countless desolate winters without repair. In the act of moving underneath it, the abomination had deepened these cracks. Thus, as it's spear-like pseudopod exploded out from underneath the surface, it violently fractured the surrounding asphalt into large slabs that tipped outward from the blast. Coupled with the entirely human reflex to shrink away from danger, Kelvin recoiled away, his weight shifting back as the black appendage struck out, the effect being that one of these slabs lifted him up and then dumped him backwards just out of harm's way. Even so, the lash had grazed him, scraping against and scoring a half-centimeter deep groove up the front of the armor all the way to his chest. Holographic warnings popped up on the inside of the visor detailing the damage, but Kelvin was too busy falling on his ass to notice.

The momentum from the forceful attack and backwards tumble sent him sprawling backwards, rolling over his own head once before sliding to a halt a few feet away in a half-kneeling position, his right arm thrown out to stop him from going further. His immediate reaction was to light up the ground where he had been standing with bullets, keenly aware for the first time that the initial crater had been the 'thing' burrowing under the asphalt. This brilliant plan was cut short as Kelvin realized that his inelegant spill had made him lose his grasp on the gun, which was now glinting in the sunlight a good ten feet away. He cursed under his breath, springing up from his position on the ground. For the third time in about as many seconds, Kelvin was surprised, but pleasantly so. The armor's inner hydraulics, which he had thought up until now served simply to ensure that the joints moved seamlessly, responded to a sudden movement by amplifying it's force. As such, his otherwise rather mediocre springing motion turned into a powerful piston, driving him upright and standing and almost on the verge of not being able to control his momentum. He used the initiative to sprint towards the inadvertently discarded firearm. At the same time, he reached his right hand back, drawing the diamond sword from it sheath, his eyes darting around the ground to watch for the next sign of the foul creature. This time, he would be prepared for it's subterranean assault.

Yet the next strike did not come from below.

It was from behind.


In the event of the opening strike missing it's mark, something Nox had expected fully..who died from the opening strike anyway, a plan was in place. As the human tumbled backwards...Nox surged out of the small hole. The spike widened, as it flowed from the ground, until the full mass of the being was launching into the air. As Kelvin would be rising to stand, his suit altering his speed, Nox would be landing behind him. Revealed now, a black humanoid form, Nox would snap out one hand sending a lash outward in a spearlike thrust aimed for the center of Kelvin's back, using the whip-like qualities of the lash to 'snap' out.

The lashes themselves are comprised of Nox's own mass, flexable pseudopods with a great many uses. Much like the tail of a monkey these weapons are fully articulated, and function as extra appendages. In most cases however Nox simply uses them as weapons. The outer layer of the lash's mass was a matrix of razor sharp 'teeth', far to small to be seen by the naked eye. Normally these teeth would only add a slight degree of ripping to the lash's strike, but due to the fluid like structure of Nox's body they gained a further bonus due to vibrations. The gel-like body of the being was able to vibrate, causing the 'teeth' to 'chew', allowing the lashes to rip through steel like it was paper.

Should Kelvin realise Nox had landed just behind him in time to react he would be faced with a daunting task; dodge a strike from near point blank range, or defend against a slashing whip of chewing blackness. Should the blade be brought into play, if time permits Kelvin to do so, the flexability of the lash's nature would soon be evident. Should a dodge work, Kelvin escaping from the strike, the lash would follow through and impact into the gun, laying just slightly further.

In it's mind, Nox's most powerful weapon, it saw the man dive away and roll, comming up with the gun in hand; a possible outcome, just one of many. If this happens, which Nox's brain calculates it as one of the highest possibility, action would be required. Already Nox was allowing his body to become softer, more fluid. Control over it's mass allowed Nox to move and flow as it did, also granting more ways to avoid attacks.

But all of this comes after the strike. If it hits as planned the lash will spear through Kelvin's torso, shearing through his body armor like a wet paper sack. If partialy dodged the damage will still be quite impressive; deep tissue wound and armor damage, possible spinal damage. All of this from just one lash, Nox still had three held in reserve. Counter strikes from the opponent would not be left to chance.

((OOC: I just wanted to note to you that depleted uranium by itself is also pyrophiric, that is, it spontaneously ignites upon contact with air, that is why DU armor piercing rounds glow and cause fires to erupt on their targets, so I'm not sure you would have been able to 'catch' them like you did earlier. They are also mildly radioactive. However, because I didn't immediately take issue with it I'm not going to try and press for a retcon or anything, I should have brought it to your attention/noticed it sooner. Just keep it in mind for the rest of the fight. Cheers.))

In the confusion of the creature bursting forth from the ground, Kelvin had not seen that in fact the entire figure had taken to the air in its leap, landing behind him. It was only at the vaguest periphery of his vision that he saw a flicker of movement, having continued to look in the direction of the exit crater. It was accompanied by a faint, but wet, rubbery snapping sound, that Kelvin now realized was the sound of the creature's sudden movements.

So it was that he moreso heard rather than saw the lethal spear of ectoplasm hell-bent on eviscerating him. However, he was more prepared this time than he had been for the initial attack, despite it not coming from the expected angle. Thankfully the hydraulics of the armor were still in full power, they would help him execute the only maneuver he could come up with in those precious few milliseconds he had available to react in time. As his right foot came down on the pavement in the middle of his running stride, he sharply twisted his ankle to the left, while continuing to throw his weight forward and to the left. Amplified by the armor, Kelvin used the torque on his foot, the upwards reactive force of his foot hitting the pavement, and the momentum of his body to propel himself into a diving corkscrew maneuver that took him momentarily airborne. He had tucked his arms in to begin the maneuver, but as he passed the 90 degree part of the corkscrew, he turned the spin into a simultaneous swing with the diamond sword, extending his arm to take full advantage of the centrifugal force to amplify the swing. As the turn neared completion he thumbed the switch on the grip of the sword, it's edge flaring to life with a superheated laser running down its length. That laser burned at a searing 3500 degrees Celsius, hot enough to vaporize everything short of the diamond blade itself, although because of the tremendous heat conductivity of diamond, the entire blade would be heated to near that temperature in it's entirety, and shortly thereafter, it's grip as well. Fortunately, this would be offset by the ceramic plating in Kelvin's armored gloves.

The completed swing was aimed at the surging tentacle spear that was currently passing over him as he rolled. Then, whether he hit or not, Kelvin's momentum would carry him further in the turn and downward, smacking into the ground on his chest and half rolling, half sliding in reach of the lost firearm, from whence Kelvin hoped to be able to go back on the offensive.

OOC: One flaw however with this type of ammo; it's meant for hard targets. The fact that DU rounds can punch through just about anything is the main reason why one chooses to use them, they excel at armor-negation. On a soft target however..it just makes a hole. By nature Uranium only ignites in air when powdered, as it would be after impacting into something suitably hard. While I was serving overseas I had the chance to work with DU 25mm rounds, they are quite nice, but useless against soft targets..It's like using a rocket to shoot a dog. As long as Nox stopped the bullet, using his mass to slow it's kinetic force, rather than impact against it, he would be fine.

IC:

Enhanced tech versus ancient evolution. The suit gave Kelvin an edge as far as speed and agility went, it was unknown if it boosted his strength yet. But he was facing a being that had been killing far before he was born. A hunter and fighter with uncounted worlds left dead in it's wake. If Nox was to be stopped..it would take more than a fancy twisting strike. The move was graceful however, and quite nice for the situation. Kelvin was a quick thinker it seemed, a quality that had no doubt carried him far.

The lash reacts to Nox's will, adjusting it's path like a cat's tail would, simply rolling along it's length to avoid the glowing sword. It looked like a wave, rippling up and over the man as it slashed through the air. It's mass was less than that of Kelvin; it had less drag against the air, add to that it was snapped out with the force and speed of a whip-crack, it would reach the gun first. With Kelvin in the air, twisting as he was, there was no way to add speed. The impact would cover the weapon with Nox's darkness, absorbing it and hardening to contain the weapon as it used the impact to burrow.

It's task done, the lash would detach from Nox, forming a shell over the gun as smaller lashes burrow down. The end result would be the weapon being pulled underground by the detached lash as it impacts into it. What Kelvin wouldn't know was that as Nox moved about he left behind a residue, slime-like. This residue was scattered about underground where he had passed, and allowed some remote control over the severed parts, limited of course, but of use when gathering the discarded lash.

Nox itself, still standing some feet behind Kelvin's last position, would lower it's arm. The hand would close..and a crunch would be heard from below the surface; the gun being crushed. Kelvin was now one weapon down. What he wouldn't know was the fate of those strange bullets, there was a lack of 'bang' as the gun was crushed. A leg would rise..then smash into the ground, it's surface extending a new lash to drive it into the pitted blacktop. Now standing with one foot in the ground..Nox grins and waits. It's mass still shifting closer to fluid, though it would be impossible to tell that from looks alone.

"Come now, you thought I was without any way to reach a ranged foe?" the being would call to Kelvin. "Draw that other toy you carry...or come at me with your glowing sword. I grow bored of you." Nox would mime a yawn, while taunting with the other hand. His foot below the ground already seeking out the rest of it's mass, drawing the discarded lash to it though the soft soil hidden farther below the blacktop.

As Kelvin hit the ground, he slid much like a baseball player trying to desperately reach home plate before he is tagged out. The gun was within a few inches of his grasp, but the agile pseudopod of the creature beat him to it, unimpeded by friction or loss of momentum, unlike himself. He watched in dismay as the black mass enveloped the gun and drew it down below the blacktop.

As Kelvin scrambled to his feet he heard the crunching sound of the weapon being crushed, the groan and snap of metal. The expected conflagration he associated with such a thing did not follow, however, and his eyes darted between the small crater and the figure standing some ways away. It speared it's foot under the blacktop... and suddenly everything clicked into place in his mind. The nightmarish creature, for all it's eldritch power and agility, seemed to be a one trick pony. Create distraction, burrow underneath the ground. In this case, the creature's main mass was serving as the distraction... it was trying to get him to ignore the fact that it was making off with his precious ammunition. The gun might have been destroyed, but the lack of pyrotechnic explosion afterward was enough basis for suspicion to infer that the creature meant to take his bullets intact. The next logical progression of thought led to the very real possibility that it could spit those bullets back at him just as it had fired it's rubbery arms.

That was not an acceptable outcome, if Kelvin hoped to survive the encounter. Half-ignoring the taunts of the figure who was out of range anyway, he tossed the diamond sword to his left hand and switched it off, drawing the second pistol from his right hip. Keenly watching the ground for the initial ripple beneath it of the oncoming foot-lash, and the entry point of the previous discarded lash, Kelvin realized that although he couldn't pinpoint exactly where they would meet, he had a fairly good estimate of it. It would have to do. He lifted the pistol, aiming at where he expected the parts to meet, and fired 3 consecutive bursts of 4 bullets into that area, the rounds punching through the asphalt with ease in small spurts of sparks and flame. Even if he didn't score a direct hit, the bullets would create a patch of intensely burning pockets under the surface, which might possibly intercept the stolen ammunition, hopefully detonating it and permanently severing or incinerating that part of the beast's body.

Kelvin whipped up the gun and fired the remaining 2 bursts at where the figure's foot had speared into the ground. It seemed like the area where it had least mobility, since it was speared into the ground and committed already to retrieving the stolen payload. Furthermore, the low angle of the shots would shatter the core of the bullets before they totally penetrated, showering the entire immediate area with intensely burning pseudo-napalm.

It was only then that he deigned to respond, ejecting the empty clip from the weapon as he did so. "My only thought is that you are a stubborn nuisance of a beast. You speak of bringing death, but do you know what death is? Have you ever died, knave? How can someone, or something that has never died, truly understand death?"

It was a good plan, if the ammo was being dragged back to the main mass it would have caused Nox some pain and damage. Unfortunately for Kelvin it was never Nox's intent to bring the highly explosive/flamable rounds into it's main body, Nox was far from suicidal. The rounds had been moved however, into a place Kelvin would never have guessed, until the blast ripped upwards.

The cast off lash was returning, but not as a whole. As it traveled through the soil it sent ahead one thin stream, this connected with Nox's mass well before the rest of the lash would reach the foot. As contact was made Nox sent a signal, it needed the detail provided by direct linking, it had to be perfect. Just as Kelvin was raising his second pistol, having to draw it and aim before firing, Nox's signal reached the clump of lash left with the bullets.

Positionined just below Kelvin's body, spaced for maximum coverage, the rounds were pointed upwards. Each bullet a mini missile, aimed up at Kelvin's weakest points; the gap in the crotch, the knees, and directly below his center mass. As the signal hit, roughly the speed it takes your brain to make your eye blink, small spikes of lash pierce the shell's blast-caps, as small tube-like silos of Mass direct the uranium tipped bullets upward. There would be no real warning, unlike the lashes traveling. Just bam. Death from below. Point black range, it was like a sawn-off shotgun was blasting the remaning 12 bullets upwards, using the armor piercing property to work both on the blacktop and the opponent's armor.

Interupted now, Kelvin would have to deal with the threat coming from below before attempting to attack Nox again. Kelvin would learn, if he survived, that Nox was far from a one-trick kind of being. While the loss of the cast off mass was both painful and unfortunate, it was needed. Having weathered the pain of fire already and expecting it this time, Nox takes the burn in silence. Most of the lash would return still, only about half lost to the improvised land-mine.

((I'm not entirely clear on the timing of this attack... are you saying that my previous action was interrupted? If that's the case then I still have 8 bullets in the clip, having never gotten a chance to fire them. ))

Totally absorbed in his own plan, there was absolutely no way in which Kelvin could avoid the grouped blast of his own bullets firing up from the ground beneath him. Though the armor was plated specifically to stop high-impact rounds, at this range the tungsten ceramic plates were naught but a speed bump at best, and in some places the bullets found their mark where there was no armor at all. His face contorted in surprise, as seven of the twelve depleted uranium slugs tore through his legs and pelvis, and exited on the far side, coating the inside of the shrapnel filled wounds with intensely burning white phosphorus. Kelvin teetered on the edge of awareness for a moment, the shock and scale of his injuries not registering fully. Then he looked down, and the pain hit him like a thousand tons of stone, so unspeakably excruciating that he could barely even find breath to scream.

The armor suit's inner computer, however, was built to preserve it's wearer's life by every means at its disposal. The horrific burning caused by the white phosphorus actually momentarily cauterized the wounds, preventing Kelvin from immediately bleeding out. The suit, though compromised in several places, swiftly rushed antiseptic, morphine-laced liquid foam sealant via a thin inner capillary layer to the wounds and injected it into them. The liquid blossomed into a thick, dense foam that quickly filled and adhered to the inside of the wound, cutting off the oxygen and moisture from the burning phosphorus,extinguishing it, and cleansing the injured tissues from contamination. The on-site morphine acted within seconds, deadening the pain to a degree that was bearable, although it could not eliminate it entirely. The hydraulic pumps present, though slightly damaged and leaking fluid in places, tightened around the affected area, restricting blood flow to a bare minimum, and supporting Kelvin's leg muscle and bone structure so that he could stay upright.

Kelvin's vision browned out for a moment, then returned. He blinked, his entire body violently shaking from the shock, his legs held upright but profoundly restricted in their range of movement. He focused on the shadowy figure, still biding its time some 15 feet away, for the first time feeling genuine anger... no, utter hatred towards it. Kelvin shakily replaced the gun into its magnetic holster, and passed the diamond blade back to his right hand, his thumb hovering over the activation switch. Unafraid, he raised the blade, ready before him, a feeling of calm resolve mastering his pain. He had come to terms now with death, it was not a thing that frightened him, but he had resolved in that solemn moment that, at the very least, he would make sure this being never visited another world.