thehometree | (no subject)

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| characters | Fuu and anyone who wants to fight a viper.

| date/time | Thursday morning

| location | Outside

| rating | PG? There's gonna be violence.

| summary | Fuu discovers the viper.

Fuu inspected the new stream. She had already dropped a fragment of leaf in it, watching as it was borne into the mist, and was currently pondering if the same would happen to a person who tried floating in it. It would be a risky experiment--they'd need some kind of raft, and to be a strong swimmer since the tree hadn't been equipped with safety gear like lifevests. (Unless they found that on the next level. Which reminded her, they really needed to sort out that riddle.)

She heard the slithering behind her just in time. Instinct took control and she drew her sword even as she shouted in alarm at the sight of the huge black snake. The massive blade struck its snout and it drew back from its strike with a hiss. Were those fangs?! Fuu hurriedly shoved the gem on its ribbon down her shirt and sprang into the air once her wings appeared. Fenris probably had a point about not overusing their magic equipment, but better that than trying to outrun it or fight it off on her own.

She didn't slow down until she was sure she was too high to reach. The snake flicked its tongue and turned away, but it didn't go back out through the mist. Letting her sword disappear into her glove jewel, Fuu pulled out her amber slice to warn the others of today's danger.

[amber]

[Fuu is looking quite harried and flustered. The background is moving as though she's flying, because that's what she's doing.

In spite of that, she puts on a big smile.]

Good morning, everyone! I hate to give alarming news, but there's a very large snake visiting us today. It might be poisonous. I think I saw fangs when it tried to eat me... oh, but I'm all right. I was able to give it quite a cut on its nose--hold on.

[The amber flips around to show the snake on the ground.]

I think we should really do something about this before one of us becomes Mr. Snake's breakfast.

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Stealth? What's stealth? Is it a food? Does it taste good?

Eren charges from a high branch on the tree, flapping his gaudy green moth wings and clutching a sharpened stick. He uses the stream to gauge where the snake is, then, once he's in sight of it, folds his wings and dives toward the viper with a loud yell.

As long as it didn't move, his spear (which was more like a longer, thicker toothpick than anything else) would pierce the snake's body. And he'd go tumbling to one side, but, hey, he'd survived worse.

Edited 2015-05-18 03:32 (UTC)

Fuu breathed a small sigh of relief when Arno appeared and dove towards the snake, keeping an eagle eye on him. What were the weak spots on a snake? The eyes and perhaps the belly--the eyes would be insanely dangerous to attack up close, and getting it to rear and expose its underside would also be unacceptably dangerous.

Then a second person arrived, and it took a moment for Fuu to realize that it was Fenris, mostly due to the fact that he was on the ground. No wonder he didn't think he needed the gem! She was about to act herself when a third person arrived on the scene.

"EREN!" What was he doing--what kind of attack was that! He was even more reckless than Hikaru! She dove down to see if he was hurt. Whether he was or not, he still needed a moment to get up. She swiveled to face the snake's head. "Binding Wind!" The green breezes wrapped around its jaws, holding them shut. Judging from the way it worked its jaws, this would be temporary, but she wouldn't let go of the spell until it was broken. "Try the eyes!" she shouted to Arno or Fenris, whoever could get there.

Hey, they'd started without him! Ah well... Owain couldn't bring himself to be terribly upset about it. Heroes were supposed to show up at the last minute and save everyone, after all. It made for much more thrilling tales afterwards.

And this had all the makings of a very thrilling tale indeed; the snake couldn't compare to Grima size-wise, he noted as he flew in close and drew his sword, but it was still nothing to laugh at. This... did not stop Owain from laughing in delight at Eren's reckless strike. That had all the showmanship of a critical hit! Surely it must have weakened the creature considerably, leaving it wide open for the glorious final blow! And who better to deliver said blow?

"BRACE YOURSELF, FIEND!" ...Yes, he was yelling at the snake. And pointing dramatically at it with his sword. "Your evil reign of darkness is at an end! Now face the righteous wrath of my mighty fang, the demon blade Mystletainn!"

...At this rate, Fuu's spell might break before he actually got around to attacking.

When Saber arrived, she realized there were too many people gathered for her to utilize her greater attacks. Even if the snake would be vanish against Excalibur might, the others would be trapped in the crossfire. She almost felt regret of waiting for Shirou to make himself a bracelet to join her, though she did not dwell upon it. Not when the beast still lived and lives were in danger. She made no dramatic exclamations or shouting when she flew down, wings fluttering speedily strengthened by her prana burst that made her path difficult to follow with normal eyes. It was like a shooting star, glowing as her magical silver armor began to partly cover her body, leaving her back exposed so her wings could remain spread.

Like that she raced toward the snake's head without hesitation, brandishing her invisible sword with her two hands. It was not a rash action, but a precise strike she had in mind, following Fuu's instructions. With a powerful slash of her Noble Phantasm, Arturia took the right eye. Blood poured and the animal hissed in pain, trying to lunge at her in retaliation, but its mouth was still bounded by Fuu's spell. Even so, a hit could have gravely injured her if she had not dodged, picturing the attack before it took place by her precognitive ability.

"Kuh—!"

She grunted while sidestepped and cart-wheeled midair to escape the viper's wrath. She used the snake’s motion on her favor to kick at the base of the skull; she had miscalculated the strength she needed for this, that hit would not fracture or break the cranium, but it would make the animal tumble, at least, at the sharp and waiting weapons of another.

It seemed like the battle had already started without them. Above all else, however, Shirou was invested in making sure that everyone involved made it out alive. He knew his role (and what he wanted to do), but kept his promise for the time being all the same. Reinforcing his vision, he kept a surprisingly long distance back from the group as they did battle, even as Saber charged forth and took the right eye with her invisible sword. If it weren't for what he was prepared to do, he wouldn't have blamed anyone for not being able to notice him.

"Trace...on."

Having already reinforced and altered a twig along the way into an imperfect bow, Shirou only had a couple of shaped arrows to use. But he would make it count; if he couldn't even do that, what was the point of him being here? The way that Eren fell from his diving assault and the way that the other girl had bound the beast's mouth shut, it was wild and unpredictable. Even the way that Owain so bravely challenged the viper was something he had to take into consideration. They wouldn't let anyone fall here... He took no pleasure in what he did, but he wouldn't stand idly by. Pouring prana through the arrow so that it was more solid and straight, he took a calm, slow breath as he took his stance.

When was the last time that he did this? He never thought that he would take up archery again, but as he stood in the far distance, back behind the front quarters battle that took place, he drew it back, adjusting himself accordingly as Saber kicked the serpent.

He wouldn't miss. With a soft exhale, the arrow flew, a long whistle as it soared over the heads of the other combatants as he lined his shot accordingly. Shirou Emiya's origins lied within the sword, and yet...it seemed that this would suit him just fine also as it penetrated the snake's left eye, sinking through it with a clean blow that drew little blood. Falling out of stance, Shirou decided to move closer seeing his target land, not taking the front lines as he flew low across the ground so that he'd remain behind the others.

Edited 2015-05-18 05:25 (UTC)

With the eyes surely incapacitated, Arno made another dive while the snake was distracted. He ran his sword closer to the head this time, hoping to knock it further into submission. It suffered a lot of wounds as it was.

He drove the sword in and made sure it went a bit deep to cause some damage to it.

Any thoughts he had about the difficulty of the fight was quickly erased at the onslaught of powers. The snake might be big enough to wrap around the Gallows back home, but with everyone attacking it, it seemed it would go down fairly quickly.

Swinging the sword in an arc while empowered by the lyrium, he sliced it deep into the scaled beast, blood splattering everywhere. Used to ending up with gore all over, the elf didn't even care and instead stepped back quickly as the snake blindly failed at the wound. A slam of a spirit pulse didn't do much to push the beast back, but it was disoriented enough already.

"Finish it!" He called up at the flying people. "Spine or brain!"

"I'm fine, I'm fine!" Eren says, swatting Fuu away (gently) with the arm that is still in its shoulder socket. The other had managed to worm its way out when he'd landed on it. But if nothing else, Eren was trained well in the art of "attack fast, then get out of the way", and he quickly scrambles out of striking range and gets back into the air, leaving his spear in the snake's body, for now.

The others' attacks seem to be working, and the constant onslaught is sure to catch the snake offguard. With so many targets, and so many sources of pain, it would be difficult for it to target just one of them.

Eren is also willing to let others have the finishing blow; his little spear isn't quite strong enough to pith the snake's skull. So he flutters midair, hangs back, and pops his shoulder back into place with naught but a grimace.

"Hurry up and kill it!! Then I can skin it!"

The snake's eyes were destroyed, but it thrashed around in agony. Fuu gritted her teeth as she tried to hold her spell, but it was a big animal and she was just a touch distracted trying to keep an eye on everyone--particularly Owain, who was behaving like Owain, and Eren, who had dislocated his shoulder. Before she could try to help him, he had pushed her away and escaped on his own power. Was he so used to that kind of injury that he could shrug--er, brush it off?

The snake managed to force its jaws open, and Fuu gasped at the backlash, stumbling back. She glanced at Saber and her friend Shirou, Arno and Fenris near its head, and Eren relocating his own shoulder before she shot up into the air. "My spell broke! Watch out!" she yelled. The snake was going to bite someone, and all that being blinded meant was that it wouldn't care who.

"H-Hey! I wasn't finished striking fear into its reptilian heart!" Good grief, didn't anyone else know anything about proper dramatic build-up? Apparently not, but they certainly knew a thing or two about fighting... at this rate their foe would be dead before Owain got a single special attack in! "C'mon, leave some for me!"

He flew swiftly into the fray, sword held ready. Brain or spine, the glowing guy had said... ah, of course! The base of the neck! That had been Grima's weak point, and snakes weren't all that different from dragons, right? They had a lot more neck, sure, but the base of it was still in the same spot. Owain swooped down, effortlessly dodging a sudden thrash of the creature's head--you didn't last long as a Swordmaster without being very good at dodging--and circled around it, touching down just long enough to embed his sword into the back of its neck with a shout of "Binding BLAAAADE!"

The snake writhed violently, and Owain was knocked aside before he could get clear. He hit the ground hard, grunting and rolling a short distance before pushing himself up with a grimace. Nothing broken... but he'd have his share of scrapes and bruises to show for this. Fortunately he'd lost his grip on his sword, and had thus avoided impaling himself when he landed. He cast his gaze about frantically, finally spotting the gleam of metal in the tall grass and scrambling towards it; this battle wasn't over yet, after all. Their foe was dying, to be sure, but it was taking its sweet time, and its agonized thrashing only made it that much more dangerous.

The calls to finish the beast off rang clear through Shirou's head as he clenched his free fist. His magic circuits were at the ready, prepared for if he needed to obtain a new weapon to do his job. Just when he was ready to do that however, he grit his teeth and dug his heel in (metaphorically speaking). In this fight, he was her support; the support of everyone that would need someone to back them up while they finished the job. If Shirou forgot about that, what would happen if there wasn't anyone left to watch over them while the others took the finishing blows? This wasn't about glory for the redhead, this was about saving as many people as he could, his faith put into the fighters that assembled here and especially his former Servant. Saber wasn't the only amazing person here. That blonde-haired girl who cast the binding spell over the serpent's mouth, the swift actions of those that slashed deep into it, and perhaps (while he raised a brow at first) even Owain's own heroic nature.

So he stayed back, witheld the compulsion to use another projection to take aim and finish the job. It wasn't that this level of magecraft was beyond him (so he would tell himself and deny Archer) anymore, it was that he had little practice in this act. After all, while he could play the part, he truly did favor the sword just like many others here did. Much like the swordmaster that circled the beast and embedded the sword into its neck- much like the shooting star that was Saber who took one of its eyes...

That was what Shirou Emiya continued to believe that he was, and yet he stood here, keeping his distance and waiting for any opportunity to intervene or play the role of defense. If he could, he wouldn't need to do anything beyond his last act, but as Owain was violently thrown from the snake, the redhead's vision sharpened on the scene before him. It was out of control and thrashing violently now, long forked tongue tasting the air in a bid to try and compensate for its loss of sight.

"!"

It wasn't very accurate as Owain scrambled towards his weapon within the tall grass, but its head turned. It had no sight anymore, but it blindly lashed out. This wasn't about obtaining its next meal anymore. It was a means of defending itself, but it came at the expense of one of their allies. With surprisingly rapid speed, the snake moved to strike where it thought one of its attackers laid.

Soaring fast off the ground with a leap and buzz of his dragonfly wings, Shirou raced up to meet the snake's lunge halfway. There was a good chance it would have missed its intended target anyway, but that was a chance that he refused to take. He would support those that could defeat this thing!

"I am the bone of my sword."

The words flowed naturally from his lips as he raised his open palm at the serpent. There was less than a split's moment remaining before it would reach him, but he wouldn't let it reach anyone else here. There was no time to think. Instead, he reaches out for his greatest defense, prepares to project it and...!

"...?"

He couldn't see it clearly- no, that wasn't true. It was more like he couldn't even pull it out no matter how clearly he could see it. Nothing came but the sight of a young man with a massive fang piercing through the boy's midsection, its mouth closing the moment it felt contact with something. It bit down hard as it effortlessly pierced through Shirou's body, but much like most strikes, it was swift to retreat as it opened its jaws shortly afterwards as Shirou slipped out of its mouth and began the hard descent towards the unforgiving ground.

"A-Augh..." It wasn't a cry for pain, the hole in his abdomen was far too large and looked decisively fatal; it was more of a gutteral response as blood spilt up from his mouth and flowed without relent from his wound. In a blink, it felt hot, and whether someone caught him before he hit the ground or not, he wouldn't feel any of it anymore as he faded into unconsciousness.

She had presumed the battle was over by the swordsman’s assault at the viper's head. They should stay at the distance and wait for it to die, perhaps give a last merciful strike to spare it from agony. She was about to fly at Shirou's side when, in her lapse, she made the mistake to underestimate not the dying animal, but the boy’s lack of self-preservation by throwing himself into the snake’s path so needlessly. Because of her mistake, she could only stare in horror at the sight of the pierced body of her Master falling to the ground with a gaping hole in his abdomen.

"MASTER!"

Was this enough dramatic build-up, but the sheer fury at a fallen companion? Wind raged from the hilt of her invisible weapon, sharpening the hood made of compressed air that concealed Excalibur timeless glow. Saber did not need to flap her wings to dive down, but they aided to her speed. She did not mind to burn her prana off to reach for Shirou before he hit the ground, but the snake was on the way, about to expire its last breath, but still potentially dangerous to the unconscious boy. She brandished her Noble Phantasm and pushed forward through the snake, her arms were engulfed by a violent typhoon, cleaving most of its neck with that vicious charge. She did not turn to stop and finish the decapitation, Saber had another target. The squirming and writhing beast whose life was expiring ceased to be her main concern. Her gaze was fixed only on the redhead boy who was about to hit the ground, she clenched her teeth and fell faster.

Guh—! Her silver armor was gone, scattered in thousands of silver fragments, her sword had also disappeared to increase her speed; her arms stretched to catch Shirou… She drew closer and closer… Arturia extended hands until she grasped him and brought him close to her as they hit the ground together. Her landing was not graceful because she had no time to stop and steer around; the spot they had fallen had opened a small fissure on the earth, testament of the speed she had employed. During the fall, she embraced the boy and rolled him over, utilizing her own body as cushion to absorb the impact. She did not have time to catch her breath after this, her priority to corroborate if Shirou lived. She placed him gently on the ground to check the damage done. She was disheveled, covered in dirt and blood, and breathing heavenly, but there were no bruises in her body. She was a Servant, the mundane did not injure her. Had the snake been a magical creature, it would have been a different tale, but it was a snake. Large and monstrous, yet still an animal.

"Shirou!" shouted Saber again in desperation, placing an ear on the left side of his chest to corroborate his heart still beat. It did. He was breathing too. He was alive and this filled her with relief. She had to stop the bleeding, but how—

Fuu reached out as Owain scrambled for his sword, reading to cast Binding Wind again to whisk him out of the way. But before she could form the spell, Shirou was in front of the snake, raising a hand to do something, a shield of his own maybe--

--no.

"No!" Fuu raced towards the stricken boy, but Saber was much too fast. In an instant, the snake's head was halfway off its neck and the two of them were a distance away. Fuu followed them and landed next to them. Could her magic heal poison? It didn't heal sickness... but it had healed Umi's clothes. This wasn't Cephiro, where the believing heart shaped the world, but it was better than watching him bleed to death. She would give it all she could.

There was no time to ask permission, either. "Healing Wind!"

It was all so dull to him... He thought he could hear something, but it was drowned out by his body forcing him to not wake up. If he woke up, the trauma would be too much for his mind to handle. Though Shirou wouldn't wake up for some time, it seemed that Fuu's intervention seemed to work in time. It wasn't pleasant, but the hole that was previously gaping now was beginning to show signs of life. The bleeding soon stopped too, flesh beginning to overwrite the previous inflicted injury. It was slow, one could look away and look back and not notice the difference immediately due to how terrible the wound was before.

Whatever soothing feeling that overcame Shirou, his gargled breathing after having spilt blood eventually settled. It was a miracle- but was it by Fuu's intervention alone? Or was there something else at play here?

Unbeknownst to everyone...or perhaps it didn't really matter, Shirou was breathing softly now, unaware of anything anymore.

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SIE SIND DAS ESSEN AND WIR SIND DIE COMBOBREAKER

OH MY GOD EREN

I think you mean THAT WAS AWESOME EREN

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don't mess with shirou man

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