the Rift


Gotcha bitch [HOTARU CHALLENGE]

Ampere The Mother of Companions Posts: 719
Dragon's Throat Sultana atk: 9 | def: 11 | dam: 4.5
Mare :: Pegasus :: 14 hh :: 6 years HP: 73 | Buff: DANCE
Kygo :: Green Cheek Conure :: None Blu
#1


A M P E R E


She flew fast and furious, dragging bird and blade behind her, casting her tempestuous gaze upon the silver visions to assure herself that she was going the right way. She could not afford to lose her now, not after all the mindless searching Ampere had done already, not when she needed this fight, or this win, or whatever it would prove to be - just the opportunity for it even.
A questioning flare of mud brown coated the thoughts tumbling through her mind, a gentle prodding from Kygo as to just what the hell Ampere was going on about.
Just what is this? she asked for him. The question hung empty inside herself for a moment, and it seemed Ampere was trying to figure it out just as much as he was. The same way she tried to understand or to determine what lent her heart to beat so quickly in Gaucho's vicinity, what flushed her cheeks around Mesec, what bid her ears to pin when she saw a bond.
What is this? she whispered to herself again, wings beating up the storm inside of her as she bulleted towards the frozen north.

This is a reminder that stormlight only lasts so long. That darkness can be eroded. That I am still me.
And there it was, the truth of the matter. Since bonding to the parrot Ampere had felt as if she'd been falling, unable to catch her breath, unable to see anything but glimpses of something better, of her precious light among a siege of descending night. It felt like it did when the world was trapped in the caves, only worse, because she was the only one stuck and it was in the caverns of her own being and the network of betrayal ran deep.

Could she be someone better by doing just this one good deed?
At the very least, could she be herself again?
Too many names, too many jobs, too many wrongs. Ampere had too much, and yet she cradled an emptiness to her chest all the same, because none of it fulfilled her perceived notion of her purpose. Maybe she was too stubborn to see that her purpose had never changed, that her means had merely shifted, grown slower as she surrounded herself with love. It was difficult to see anything right now when all she could manage was a hatred for herself, when all she noticed were the chains that she laid on herself without ever taking off.
Not today she swore. Today she would break one, or break herself trying if need be.

That was doubtful though, given her opponent was none other than the stupid fucking pink bitch! Ampere's gaze spotted her among the first, recognizing the blue cloak from her dagger's eye, knowing that glitter of gold and pink was no trick of the light. Grinning a wolf's grin, wild and eager and hungry Ampere descended towards the ground, moving fast.

She aimed to swoop low over Hotaru, to intimidate, to promise more. Yet she didn't strike, as much as she wanted to, she'd give the stupid bitch a chance to redeem herself in some small way.
Ampere cut down and to the side in a sudden landing. It was so hard it rattled into her bones, set the cold of the land immediately into the soul of her being, but she felt numb already to all of it as something hot and violent blazed within her.

Like a snake Ampere's head coiled on her neck, motion whipping her hair around her poll like a halo of darkness. From her side her blade dropped, and the bird circled far above in anxious interest. "You have something that doesn't belong to you," Ampere offered by way of greeting, her stare and her lips edged with an immovable hardness. "Give back the armor and we can walk away from this. It belongs in the desert."

Though she said as much, her body was coiled in preparation to act. If her past knowledge of this mare held true, she like to give up things, but she was also a stupid bitch, and might think to try Ampere in a fight.
One way or another, Ampere would take it back.


0/4
W: /800

Ampere is challenging for Destry's stolen armor


GOT THE DREAMER'S DISEASE

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@Hotaru

Tag me only if starting a new thread.
Magic or force permitted any time, aside from death.

Hotaru the Valkyrie Posts: 295
Outcast atk: 7 | def: 10.5 | dam: 3
Mare :: Unicorn :: 15.3hh :: 6 Years 3 Months HP: 67 | Buff: NOVICE
Alice :: Royal Hellhound :: Acid Brit
#2
Hotaru

Their eyes are drawn heavenwards, even in the Lady’s exhaustion. They may be huddled, driven to the earth and humbled by their own mortal frailty, but they are not prey. And their eyes flash, hell and sea foam and the white of the moon, to see the blue bitch descending roughly before them. Like some foal with no coordination, thinking herself imposing as she slams upon the earth. And Hotaru sees now why her kind have developed such hatred for these beasts, and revels in the ancient animosity that sings in her blood. This is her namesake, her title and crown. This evil, this disgust, is hers to own. It bolsters her weakness, for she may lay broken but she is not defeated. There is no intimidation here, for Hotaru has felt the caress of feathers in the light of love. There is nothing in Ampere that frightens her, not when she has seen, felt, and done so much worse than what this mare offers. Phaedra is there at her shoulder, heralding the bloodlust that builds, whispering sordid advice. We are queens and serpents, she can hear her mother saying, eyes like flint and a mountain of bone crumbling beneath her capable hooves. So strike, Hotaru.
 
And as the bitch speaks, Hotaru lifts obediently to her knees, as bloodied and broken as a body can be. And she laughs. Loud, mocking, and hysterical. Her teeth are stained with crimson and her eyes are wild. Alice bristles and snarls like the depths of hell beside her, and they are one in their righteous hatred. She levies herself to her hooves, a herculean effort. Hotaru shoulders the mantle of her kingdom, her people, and her pride. For her pride is the heaviest of all. And she turns her blood-soaked grin towards Ampere, standing on limbs that seek to shatter, and realizes that the outcome of this fight does not matter. She is a QUEEN. And lips curl back from her teeth with the grandeur of the damned, hysterical in her deep, perverse pleasure. A Lady did not cower from a fight.
 
“I stole it fair and square,” she cackles, her sides heaving with malice more so than the pain. “It’s not my fault your stupid bitch of an underling couldn’t keep her guard up.” Even in her state of disrepair, she lets the cloak flutter to the ground beside her, safe. Inclines her head – she is so far above this whelp of a wolf that does not know the power of teeth – to proudly display the crown the woman seeks. Smirks like death and discordance, and embraces the cruel, brittle hatred that was her mother’s legacy. For all mares would envy those born of Phaedra’s blood, because it was her birthright to be unstoppable. “She tried to fight me for it you know. She failed, and so the desert sends another pitiful fighter,” a casual sort of offhand comment, eyes gleaming with sadism. Even if she loses here, it is not an honorable battle. And she will wait in the shadows, a viper, until Ampere steps one foot in the wrong direction. Then Hotaru’s fangs would taste that tainted blood, and the lightning bitch would be felled. In time, she soothed herself. In time.
 
“But here you are…so far away from your stud. This is what Gaucho finds pride in? You? Dishonorable, disgusting, preying upon me where no eyes can see how weak and pathetic you are,” and she spits her own blood to the snow in mockery of Ampere’s toted pride. Grins like a skull facing its burial rites. “You hail yourself Guardian, and yet you fight me when I am already damaged. You are nothing but a coward pretending to be a savior.” And then she simpers and coos, eyes mockingly sympathetic. “But it’s okay, I won’t tell your little secret. I’ll let you fight and beat me, let you nurse your pathetic attempt at triumph. I’ll even let your herd keep their petty alliance, unlike your wounded Sultan. But when the time comes? When I am strong, and my pack is behind me?” Alice snarls like death at her heels, and Hotaru lets the armor Ampere sought slide across her skin. A twist of the dagger, mocking what Ampere sought, and her pitiful crusade. “We will rip your throat out,” and she lunges, on screaming bone and wounded pride, horn lancing straight for Ampere’s throat. Alice darts through the snow in tandem, eyes sharply tracking the glint of metal, and her acid-laced teeth seek to find purchase on Ampere’s right hind leg, hoping for devastation - especially if Hotaru’s attack forced Ampere to rear onto her hind legs. They will fight here, even if they lose. They couldn’t win if they didn’t try.



Attack: {1/4}
Words: {800/800}

Image Credit
[Image: 515265280ffff]

::Strong like the sea is stormy::

Please only tag starting posts, spars, and threads collecting dust!
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Ampere The Mother of Companions Posts: 719
Dragon's Throat Sultana atk: 9 | def: 11 | dam: 4.5
Mare :: Pegasus :: 14 hh :: 6 years HP: 73 | Buff: DANCE
Kygo :: Green Cheek Conure :: None Blu
#3


A M P E R E


She found what she expected in Hotaru's facade- stupidity.

Ampere was glad for it too, because that meant salvation sung in her sweet song of war. A tune which Hotaru invited her to sing so hastily, too eagerly, as if she had been waiting for the music to start long before this day. Let it not be forgotten though, as Hotaru slung vapid insults with such fervor she was practically spitting like a rabid dog, that Ampere did not start the song. She made a point to be diplomatic, to graciously offer the pink queen a clear and easy out for a wrong she had committed. That she slapped it away with her bravado and a sneer was not on Ampere. If a song she wanted to sing, then so be it.

Ampere was ready, but Hotaru dawdled with her tongue. Try as she might to slip her ears into the folds of her mane, Ampere could still hear the addling drone of the unrighteous cunt. Fortunately it was so idiotic it only distracted in so much as it annoyed. That she tried to belittle Ampere's efforts here simply because she was weak, only drew a playful simper to dark lips, because that proved Hotaru's imprudence, not Ampere's ethics.
Her threats sounded empty, a lone phrase searching through a dark cavern for comfort, echoing back on itself and holding onto its ghosts for shaky strength. She is afraid Ampere thought with a touch of arrogance and humor. She should be.

Yet Hotaru wasn't afraid. That knowledge was reflected in the metal that encased her and all her audacity. Ampere's teeth glimmered beneath the curl of her lips.
Hotaru moved suddenly then, betraying the weakened condition she seemed to nurse beneath the cloak, which she cast away as fearlessly as her rationale. There was no time for anything else, because they were coming- they.

A flash of blue was Ampere's gaze towards the wolf that ran in tandem beside Hotaru. The sneer already on Ampere's face deepened into a snarl. This bitch, this bitch not only stole from them, slung mud, responded to diplomacy with a sword, but was also fighting with her companion. Yeah, fuck her.

Silver flashed as Ampere's collapsed shield was pulled from her backside, humming with an electric pulse granted by magic. Like a flower under a Tallsun day the metal bloomed into a broad barrier, exalting the sun with it's engravings. It sunk, heavy, into the snow on Ampere's right side, just managing to block the wolf's bite.

Ampere was out of time.

A wiser horse might have chosen to shield themselves from the sword. That was where her training flaked off like dried paint to reveal the ugly color underneath. Titles and practice painted Ampere a warrior, but she was a bundle of emotional wreckage underneath, too rough around the edges to dry evenly. She refused to harm a hair on that unfortunate creature's head, even if she risked her own hide in doing so.

Die for the wolf? Maybe, but not today.

Being much shorter than Hotaru it was easy for Ampere to duck her head, offering only the dark swell of her curled nape and the tide of mane that crested it for Hotaru's violent drink. Her thirst was deep, her blade sliding through muscle and hair with a ragged ease. Agony trumpeted from Ampere as her body writhed against the hot flare of pain. Blood pooled against the horn's base where it entered, and spilled from where the force had caused the horn to also exit, though the blade had had yet to leave.
The momentum came too on Hotaru's hooves, her body colliding against Ampere's bowed head. Ampere's senses, nearly useless under the siren of pain, were jostled by the impact. Muscles in her neck were strained and she scrabbled in the snow for purchase. Luckily the distance between them hadn't been great, so Hotaru hadn't the room to garner enough might to knock Ampere over.

Somewhere amid the cacophony of destruction that was Ampere, a tendril of fevered rage swung freely, like an electrical line gone loose in a storm and floating like a life raft. This physical torture, this assumed misstep so early, was fuel for her fire. Teeth grit together, biting back the anguished shrieking still outpouring. The movement renewed determination, her striking jaws sending a reverberation of sanity along the panels of her skull. Furiously Ampere reached for her blade, down in the snow where she'd dropped it at landing. Ampere's magic pulled on the metal, whipping it up and forward in an attempt to puncture Hotaru's right side. Near the elbow, where the skin was thin against ribs that caged vital organs. Hotaru didn't need two lungs, one would suffice.



1/4
799/800
SORRY I GOT TOO EXCITED I GUESS AND HIT ENTER BEFORE, meant to say in my OP this setting is Orangemoon in Frostbreath Steppe, either during/directly after Hotaru's thread with Mesec in the same location. The day is drawing to a close.

CHRIST HAD TO CUT OUT SO MUCH x.x


GOT THE DREAMER'S DISEASE

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Tag me only if starting a new thread.
Magic or force permitted any time, aside from death.

Hotaru the Valkyrie Posts: 295
Outcast atk: 7 | def: 10.5 | dam: 3
Mare :: Unicorn :: 15.3hh :: 6 Years 3 Months HP: 67 | Buff: NOVICE
Alice :: Royal Hellhound :: Acid Brit
#4
Hotaru

She’s given the ultimatum of weakness (to throw the crown at the blue’s hooves, to give up) or shame (to fight and bleed ever further, and lose even so). There’s no eternity of triumph, no way to traverse life – even as a queen – without losing to a more formidable opponent. And here, she has no power to rely upon. Here, she's a caged animal. She’s broken and beaten long before the fight begins. But as she throws herself forward in her fury, as her horn slices satisfyingly through something solid and resistant, she’s fierce with the taste of satisfaction on her tongue. Ampere could call her weak or stupid, pretend to offer politics…but she could never say that Hotaru walked away from this fight. She revels in it, just as she revels in the satisfaction of hot blood against her forehead. The horns of the armor are too short to have been useful in penetrating Ampere’s flesh, but she doesn’t care because her body created this wound. Even in her weakness she’s strong enough to do this. Even alone and without her pack to support her, she’s still standing.
 
Except she’s not alone.
 
Alice snarls as the shield descends before her, spraying her with snow as it embeds itself into the ground. She twists to instead crash upon it with her shoulder, rebounds stiltedly and whirls to find Hotaru and a new target. Meanwhile Hotaru wrenches her head away from Ampere’s crest, her head pounding with impact even as the beast inside her howls with satisfaction to have drawn first blood. Do you still see a coward, Ampere?
 
She hisses as blood drips from the base of her horn into her left eye, blinding her as she shuts it tight. Even in her triumph she hates; hates Ampere for attacking while she’s beaten, for her solitude, for Tingal ruining her so thoroughly. And she takes it out on the mare before her, a convenient scapegoat for her fury. She doesn’t retreat as her horn is freed. Her teeth lunge for any dark shape she can see out of her right eye, Ampere luckily stark against the white backdrop. Blunt fangs seek to grab hold of left shoulder or withers, wanting to wrestle Ampere down like the wolf Hotaru was, until the blue was screaming like a dying elk and her legs kicked uselessly at the skies. Until the wolf queen drank down her blood and pulverized her jugular to silence her, make it known that while she’d lost everything else, she wouldn’t lose this.
 
It doesn’t change the fact that Ampere has every advantage. Hotaru has never fought someone shorter than herself, nor anyone with weapons. Hotaru had only ever towered over others in her rightful imperiousness, had always developed her strategies from the leverage point of smaller stature. But she knew not to linger at least, to let Ampere’s teeth seek revenge. Goes to wrench away, whether teeth land or not, when –
 
RU! It shatters in her head and she jerks automatically to the right, fearing Ampere is trying to bite at her and that she can’t see it through the blackness of her left eye. But Alice has no such impairments, and she sees the dagger lurch out of the snow, her emotions making the image flicker against Hotaru’s lids. But magic moves faster than Hotaru can, and it slots neatly – mockingly – in the one open space between the gaps of her armor between her seventh and eighth ribs. Hotaru jolts, the pain so pervasive that she stumbles in the snow, catching herself on her fractured right leg and howling as the real agony of the stab finally hits her. The pain follows her, the blade caught momentarily by her traitorous body as both punctured and broken ribs cry out on either side of her. Immediately she reaches for Alice, swamped by this agony that threatens to tear her apart. She calls for her wordlessly, and Alice comes.
 
With acid burning her mouth as strong as her hatred, the beast lunges from the earth, determined to protect her Alpha. She remembers her coordination with Hotaru against Sialia, the way they’d killed the elk with Deimos, and tries the same maneuver. She lunges from the earth in a shower of snow, teeth aiming for Ampere’s lower throat, hoping her advancement from where Ampere’s right shoulder had been would keep her from getting kicked. Blesses Ampere’s shortness too, for Alice can reach vital parts easier that way. Blind with blood and pain, Hotaru thrusts her magic forth in aid, a ball of lightning arcing towards Ampere’s left wing joint and exploding loudly. She needs distance for her cyclone magic to work, to shred Ampere like she’d lacerated Ashamin and grounded Shadow…and to avoid injuries she can’t weather. 



Attack: {2/4}
Words: {800/800}

DON'T WORRY BLU I HAD TO CUT OUT A LOT TOO

Image Credit
[Image: 515265280ffff]

::Strong like the sea is stormy::

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Ampere The Mother of Companions Posts: 719
Dragon's Throat Sultana atk: 9 | def: 11 | dam: 4.5
Mare :: Pegasus :: 14 hh :: 6 years HP: 73 | Buff: DANCE
Kygo :: Green Cheek Conure :: None Blu
#5


A M P E R E


She had never seen Hotaru as a coward, just a fool.
Takes one to know one though, supposedly.

The sensation of the horn lurching out of the hole it left inside her was not a soothing one. Ampere instinctively jerked away from it, her neck like a whip that hauled the front of her body to the right, another outraged bellow rumbling from her throat as the fire of agony consumed her, inflamed by the absence of the foreign pressure and the abrupt use of damaged muscles. Hooves knocked against the shield at her feet with a metallic clang as she moved into it. She fought for her balance as she stumbled over it, unaided by the sleek snow underfoot and the fog of her assaulted senses within. Anger was the only clarity for her, but it was more like mud than glass, eliciting a furious cow-kick from her left hind in response to Hotaru's nip. In turning away from the horn Ampere stood perpendicular to Hotaru, her left side exposed for those teeth which twisted at the skin near her left flank, but did little more than piss her off.

Ampere had always been her own worst enemy. By rebuking Hotaru's touch with such an immediate retaliation, she lost her struggle for footing with the shield and the frost, too competitive and enraged to bother saving herself above crushing her opponent.
The shield knocked around between her front legs, bruises kissed everywhere it touched, until finally she floundered into it when her body shifted for the kick. Her right foreleg hit into it's concave lip and the smooth curve of its exterior skid like a sled across the tundra. Ampere's limbs spread in all directions as her haunches tried to ground her while her front feet jerked forward swiftly until finally tipping off the shield (which continued on several feet). Her wings flared for control and saved him from a complete fall, while her neck slung up to try and halt the unwanted forward movement. The entire ordeal left her aching, every nerve screaming in pain as her legs were stretched beyond their limits and her damaged neck pushed into further disrepair. Her body trembled like disturbed water as spasms wracked the length of her; her eyes rolled in white, and her nostrils flared for breaths like a dry fish.

It was Ampere's endurance that would save her in this travesty of a fight. She had the determination to keep going; not just the physical means, but a mental fortitude as well. It was there in the way she grit her teeth against the torment quivering through her, in the way she ignored the sticky residue of the blood still dribbling from the gouge in her crest. It was there, in the unrelenting grip on her blade, its course set even as she staggered.

In the wake of the chaos that was Ampere's stubbornness, she finally heard a howling that was neither wolf nor herself. Armor always had a weakness. It was not born of flesh, but laid upon it, and thus existed gaps into which she could thrust her hungry dagger. So she had, and now she reveled in the power unicorns felt as a birthright.

In the sledding debacle Ampere had ended up with her rump towards where Hotaru had been last. Still quivering with twinged muscles, she nonetheless had the hauteur to turn and look back, smiling. She looked mad then, with her unsymmetrical markings and her blood mussied mane. She looked injured too, having had to rotate her body when otherwise she'd have the neck to simply toss it over her shoulder. Despite her obvious wounds, there was a stalwart pride that gave her a dangerous fringe - something Hotaru echoed.

The moment of calm was short; a few blinks before the fight resumed its awful splendor.

The wolf came and her shield was too far gone, as was her body. Grunting, Ampere willed her legs to move, to get out of the standing routine so she'd be harder to target, even if she limped heavily on her right foreleg. She needed something now though, so she reached for the electricity in Alice, simultaneously trying to snuff out the bond that linked the two, and redirect the impulses that governed her body so that she would stop attacking, or veer to the side. With that and her initiated motion Ampere evaded the bite. Lighting cracked around them, but Ampere didn't even flinch. One of her spark amulets broke, splinters of it glittering down with each stride. The lightning arc should be flung back onto Hotaru instead. Did she think she could fight Ampere with such an element?

Simpering, if only to keep from wincing, Ampere drew her dagger and shield back towards her.


A: 2/4
W: 799/800


GOT THE DREAMER'S DISEASE

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Tag me only if starting a new thread.
Magic or force permitted any time, aside from death.

Hotaru the Valkyrie Posts: 295
Outcast atk: 7 | def: 10.5 | dam: 3
Mare :: Unicorn :: 15.3hh :: 6 Years 3 Months HP: 67 | Buff: NOVICE
Alice :: Royal Hellhound :: Acid Brit
#6
Hotaru

Everything hurts. The blood is burning in her eye, her fractured right leg is quivering at the knee in threat of collapse from all her lunging in such thick, cumbersome snow. But above all…
 
The dagger is still in her side.
 
It burns with every breath and minuscule motion. She can’t think beyond it. Hotaru can’t run from this pain, it’s embedded in her body, and she’s stumbling about in the snow in blind panic. This isn’t a pain that she’s familiar with, and she’s instinctually frightened by her inability to get away. She doesn’t know that the more she moves the more likely it is that the dagger will find internal organs, that this fight could end with her dead in the snow from something she cannot see or hope to stop. Wild eyes roll to try and keep an eye on her opponent, searches desperately for Alice where she blends into the tundra. Her heart lurches as Alice is thrown off her target, and in her distraction feels the unexpected sting of her own magic exploding against the right side of her breast to sear and shock as she stumbles back beneath the blow, leg screaming in defiance. Every heartbeat seems to hurt and her skin is blistering, but her pride is more wounded by the use of her own talent against her. But she doesn’t care, she doesn’t care, because Alice - and her lips are moving to form her sister’s name, and then –
 
For the second time in her life, the bond goes utterly silent.
 
A desperation like no other swells immediately upon her in a tidal wave, threatening to drown her, to drag her beneath the waves until she cannot feel this agonizing loss. But she has borne this recently, when Alice had disappeared to the north to find Thranduil. She had suffered in her solitude, and she knew the intimacy of it now, the dark cragged edges of her own inadequacy. This time, she will not drown, clings desperately to her anger instead of succumbing to her mounting fear. Because now she knows, she knows who did this at the god battle. Hotaru doesn’t even register one of her amulets shattering when Ampere tries to pull the dagger back, too blindsided by the sudden rage that chokes her. Rage that she can use to keep fighting.
 
However the magic rebounds doesn’t matter because all she can see, all she can remember, is how Alice could’ve been killed in that battle. Because of Ampere.
 
Hotaru’s vocals tear into a scream, and she lets her magic expand with her fury, wind screaming past her and slicing lovingly into her skin. She flinches, but in her anger there’s madness. Her leg won’t support her through the deep snow, but she doesn’t try. Just feeds the magic, lets it shred through snow and dirt. All she can feel is her fury, and she doesn’t spare a single thought for anything else. Hotaru fiercely urges her hurricane to life, unaware of Kygo’s existence or if he was anywhere near enough to be harmed by the manifestation of her emotions. And through the winds she’s screaming, knee locked tight just to remain standing, trying not to grope helplessly for the place where Alice is supposed to be in her soul. But they don’t need their bond to know one another, and Alice is running back towards her - come, come back, please - on the outskirts of the storm Hotaru is building between her and Ampere.
 
“YOU COULD’VE KILLED HER DURING THAT GOD BATTLE!” her words like a valiant sword bearing down upon Ampere’s neck. Mother of Companions. It’s a mockery, an undeserved, blasphemous lie of a title. “YOU DON’T CARE FOR COMPANIONS AT ALL! YOU COULD HAVE KILLED HER! YOU COULD HAVE KILLED HER! There’s no rationality, her head pounding as blood trickles from every deep laceration on her right side. Hysterical, she turns - craning her neck and prodding herself with her own horn, grasping blindly – she can’t see the hilt through the blood but she’ll be damned if she lets Ampere get it back. She sinks her teeth into it, fueled by the fear of losing the one good thing she’s ever had in this godforsaken world, and rips it out of her own body.
 
Hotaru sags beneath the agony, clenches her teeth into the hilt just to remain standing, and blood gushes freely from her side. She’d ripped it out at an angle, and it feels like she’s being slowly gutted by an enormous claw. But she holds it between her teeth, watching as snow is vacuumed into the monstrosity she’s creating, and vows that she will bring Ampere down. Alice snarls at her side, and Hotaru doesn’t need the bond to hear the unspoken agreement.



Attack: {3/4}
Word Count: {800/800}

This is not a very good post, really struggled on it x___x my apologies Blu. 

Hotaru uses one Spark Amulet to rebound Ampere's magical attempt to draw her dagger back from Hotaru.

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[Image: 515265280ffff]

::Strong like the sea is stormy::

Please only tag starting posts, spars, and threads collecting dust!
Plot with me here!

Ampere The Mother of Companions Posts: 719
Dragon's Throat Sultana atk: 9 | def: 11 | dam: 4.5
Mare :: Pegasus :: 14 hh :: 6 years HP: 73 | Buff: DANCE
Kygo :: Green Cheek Conure :: None Blu
#7


A M P E R E


There was a resistance that Ampere was not familiar with when she called upon the metal. Her shield obliged well enough, but her dagger was stuck, still thrust inside Hotaru. That was fine, but Ampere didn't intend to leave one of her prized daggers wedged in the bitch's ribs, except it was... unresponsive. That realization drew upon Ampere in the sharp press of a confused 'brow. She might have given it more thought if not for the dozens of other concerns she already carried, so when an electric snap came back at her, the force of the amulet pushing her ability back, she didn't put it all together. Like static in Orangemoon air the sensation snarled against her, more startling than painful, but it caused her head to jerk up which thrust another bout of fire against the musculature there. She swore under her breath, defensively lowering and faintly tucking her head.

She would have reached again, might have tried to yank the damn armor off Hotaru's backside out of sheer frustration and mounting exhaustion, but suddenly there was a storm, and not just the metaphorical kind.

In tempo with Hotaru's voice, snow and ground whirled in a violent vortex. Ampere gasped, then grunted as her surprise slowed her and jammed her injured foreleg. Her momentum lurched, and hastily she tugged on the electrical strings of her shield, pulling it up to protect her head and neck from the biting hurricane. The shield's lack of weight upon her body didn't make it any easier to hold with magic, and she knew she couldn't hide behind it for long.

It didn't save her anyway, not all the way at least. All around her exposed body she felt the wind tear into her, literally. Cuts of all various length and depths criss-crossed against her flesh, tearing away hair at the best, spilling out blood at the worst. It was terrible, inescapable, and with a rising sort of panic that came from not having control or even options, Ampere bolted. The abrupt movement jarred her neck and her leg which slowed her considerably, but the scream of those wounds was lost beneath the shrill cries of each new laceration, the small individual sensations merging into one overwhelming chorus of despair and torture that deafened her to everything else (though somewhere Hotaru was shouting). Running, ducked behind her shield, flinching at the unrelenting pain of the encompassing foe, Ampere was blind by all accounts. Out of her mind, without her senses, she was just a freight train barreling off course. She ran the same direction she had been going originally, just because that was easiest more than from any sort of tactic, but it should still be towards Hotaru.

Each stride was a drum of pain, beating to the pulse of the battle that raged like the storm. It threatened to blow her over with its cruel gales, but her stocky body and low center of gravity kept Ampere on course. She led with her shield, and like a battering ram it and she were likely to collide with Hotaru's front side. It lacked any real vigor though, and the snow was tough to get good traction on. Fear was certainly a strong and capable motivator, but already worn and weary from Hotaru's past blows, and too distracted by the current assault, Ampere hardly put strength into it. With luck though it might knock Hotaru off balance enough to rip her concentration and dissolve the tempest, and maybe a stray hoof or two from Ampere's stampede would knock or scrape on Hotaru's forelimbs. The impact would probably send the shield to the ground; as it was Ampere was doing her best to just hold its protective barrier up, self preservation giving her that shred of sanity.

Luckily Kygo didn't have to deal with this. Although she'd never have permitted him to fight, he was far too much a chicken to even bother trying, much less to disobey her. Maybe it was the difference of him being prey rather than predator in life's circle, but Kygo was more keen on mischief than war. He was tucked well away in safety, accustomed to Ampere leaving him on his own. Alice however, was not so lucky.

"Her blood would be on YOUR hide," Ampere hissed, the voice that was a dull moan in the background of the storm registering louder and clearer as Ampere pressed in closer; Hotaru's shrieking. "Don't blame me for the result of war. You thrust her into it, unnaturally and unfairly. Have the strength to account for it!" she seethed. She reached electrically for her blade again in a hasty desire to stab Hotaru for her ignorance. Probably still between her teeth, it would hopefully shred her loud mouth.



A: 3/4
W: 798/800



GOT THE DREAMER'S DISEASE

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Tag me only if starting a new thread.
Magic or force permitted any time, aside from death.

Hotaru the Valkyrie Posts: 295
Outcast atk: 7 | def: 10.5 | dam: 3
Mare :: Unicorn :: 15.3hh :: 6 Years 3 Months HP: 67 | Buff: NOVICE
Alice :: Royal Hellhound :: Acid Brit
#8
Hotaru

The winds are buffeting her even as she stands cradled in her isolated misery, clawing at the silent walls that surround her. It’s too far from her to cut her any longer but she’s left with the remnants of the devastation, blood so thick upon her hide that she resembles her father. The storm howls so loud she can hardly hear her own thoughts, and she welcomes it, because it washes away the horrible silence from Alice’s end. It feels wrong, to feel the hound warm and soft against her left foreleg, but not hear her or feel her inside her head and soul. Alice is the contrast to every evil on this battlefield – all for a singular piece of armor. Because Gaucho apparently couldn’t accept that there were ways to conquer independent of the physical body, because he and Ampere believed in survival of the fittest - but not when it meant their own flock was not fit. She hated them for their prejudice, for their muscle-headed idiocy, for their eternal pissing contest with her herd. A burden that had fallen to her shoulders when Ophelia had abandoned her – and Hotaru had never been able to find her, to beg why, why did you pick me? She’d never asked for any of this, but she bears it resolutely, grim and violent in the face of unfairness. 
 
She’s given peace as the storm cuts Ampere from her, lets Hotaru try and replenish as much strength as she can. She can’t afford to move with how much blood she’s losing from the knife wound and the lacerations. It stains the snow, burns through her like fire, and every breath hurts worse than the last, especially with the broken rib on her right side from Tingal. The mare’s teeth clench upon the dagger’s hilt to try and distract herself, grinding her molars hatefully into the blade as she bides her time. Instinct tells her to keep moving, to fight against the slowing power of the snow, because there was a reason the term sitting duck had been created.
 
Except Hotaru can’t move, she’s far too exhausted. She knows her right foreleg cannot withstand much more, lest she risks snapping the bone completely. If it breaks, I’m dead. I won’t get home. I need to get home, she thinks, feeling gutted with the sudden loneliness she feels. It compounds on top of Alice’s silence until she feels she’s going to go mad. Hotaru’s tempted to throw the crown to the earth and let Ampere have her twisted idea of triumph, because she just wants to go home. She needs her pack; needs them to lick her wounds, remind her that while she’s righteous and powerful on her own, she’s capable of weakness. That Tingal didn’t break her, that Ampere won’t either, and that they still love her.
 
Instead, she summons the last vestiges of her strength, and she closes her eyes. She envisions her people, their faces turned towards her, trusting in her abilities. Bicolored eyes open and she can feel them all behind her, giving her an emotional strength that she holds close as Ampere comes barreling towards her past the dying storm. She cannot carry on to the end of this fight on her own, but perhaps they can carry her. Even if they’re not with her.
 
And finally the silence breaks, and Alice must have been repeating the words as a mantra, because they flood instantly into Hotaru’s head. I am here.
 
It startles Hotaru, and she swings her head towards Alice to try and see her form her right eye, joy bubbling up in her heart. But then her name is shattering through the bond a second time, and Hotaru realizes she’d looked away from Ampere. She lurches forward instinctively, not sure where Ampere is aiming, and feels the weight of the solid mare slam into her injured right side. The shield presses her armor into her, and Hotaru howls as she feels a secondary rib snap beneath the pressure. Her lacerations are ripped open by the jostling and she goes stumbling away, the blade dropping from her mouth freely as Ampere rips it back. Alice darts between her flailing legs, going for Ampere’s right knee beneath the shield, trying to cripple her while she’s distracted, hoping to hide her own approach by going through Hotaru’s legs.
 
Hotaru's wheezing, can’t catch her breath as she tries not to slip and fall in the snow, but she hoarsely spits back words. “Only monsters would kill innocents to try and hurt the guilty,” Hotaru wheezes, horn lowered defensively as she hobbles to try and face Ampere. She has nothing left to give, no other attack to initiate, but she’d not go down without trying to spear the bitch one last time. 



Attack: {4/4}
Words: {800/800}

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::Strong like the sea is stormy::

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Ampere The Mother of Companions Posts: 719
Dragon's Throat Sultana atk: 9 | def: 11 | dam: 4.5
Mare :: Pegasus :: 14 hh :: 6 years HP: 73 | Buff: DANCE
Kygo :: Green Cheek Conure :: None Blu
#9


A M P E R E


TEXT HERE TEXT HERE TEXT HERE TEXT HERE TEXT HERE TEXT HERE TEXT HERE TEXT
Ampere had never upheld the mantra survival of the fittest. What Ampere found valuable in others was a willingness to fight, something which in the very least she could respect Hotaru for (although it didn't change the fact this fight was stupid). In her youth Ampere had naturally taken fighting for face value, but time and experience had demonstrated to her that battles were waged in many different forms. Like it or not life turned everyone into a fighter, in their own way, and the desert enhanced this with its daily challenges. This didn't mean that the unfit couldn't participate, it just meant the unwilling couldn't. What did it even mean to be fit? It was the mortal design to have faults, an expected existence of imperfection, which was only helped to its demise among death when those flaws couldn't be overcome. Survival was what the Throat took pride in, fit or not. Only together, as family, could they wage war against their own nature, their own limitations, their own unfitness. It meant supporting each other, creating strength rather than taking it, as Hotaru chose to with her thievery and her deceit.
This wasn't hypocrisy, this was Ampere having her sister's back, which was decidedly bare after her armor was stolen.

It was that right in a world of wrongs that sustained Ampere's strength through this fiasco of a fight. By the Sun she hadn't come here to kill the stupid bitch! Hotaru was at fault, and Ampere blamed her for succumbing to the weaknesses of her spirit, but she did not deem death a worthy punishment for this crime.

It was not a realization that came immediately to Ampere, who was fighting tooth and nail against a storm encased in mare's flesh, but it was there in the back of her mind. It rung as their bodies collided, a chime of weariness that seemed to drone through them both. Though, Ampere would be relentless in her cause if needed, her excellence for endurance not just applicable to the battlefield (after all she had chased gaucho for years). If Hotaru got away today it would not end, she would not end - she was always whatching.

It didn't expunge the exhaustion that plagued Ampere now however. As assumed, the shield fell when they clashed, Ampere's concentration rattled. She pulled back instantly, her neck too jostled, her foreleg too weak, her body too achey from sores and cuts literally everywhere. As the circle of metal fell and her body lurched a half-step backwards, she was saved unintentionally from the retaliation of the wolf, though she was not blind to it. Tired as she was in body, thin as she was in mind, Ampere seemed to have bottomless wells of rage when it came to the topic of companions. As if she drew from the very source of her soul, the chamber for companions, she always found the ability to champion them. That Hotaru continued to fight with Alice kept Ampere in arms.

The snow around them crackled and snapped with this fury as blue sparks leapt into existence, leaving the husk of decayed material bodies to subsist as pure, raw energy - mirroring the way Ampere felt. The little balls of electricity gathered in a whirling, vicious hub of lightning. It was a quick manifestation, from snow, to sparks, to electric wolf on the opposing side of Ampere and Hotaru. Unleashed it charged, lightning snapping out in arcs which blurred the vague outline of the beast. The cold quickened it, and Ampere's mounting frustration and exasperation fed it. With a silent snarl it aimed to bite and explode alongside Hotaru's left flank. If it touched her metal armor, the material would surely help conduct its jolts all against her body.

"Then you must be a monster," Ampere said tightly, her lips thin with tired anger, her words worn out after all these years trying to explain. "Silence doesn't kill her. It frees her from the chains you've placed, from the battles you throw her into." Ampere spat at the ground, a harsh snort ripping in a visible cloud from her flared nostrils.

As she stood she could feel the chill of the north setting into her wounds. What had seemed a helpful numbing at first, a reduction of swelling, was now a dangerous stiffening that threatened to prolong the healing process. Neither of them could should go on, clearly Hotaru saw that? Was armor, was vengeance, was pride, really worth this much to Hotaru?

"Her life isn't yours. I'd have you give that up too, but let's start with mending just one of your mistakes, something easy to start with." Ampere leveled her with a steely stare. "Give back the armor," or keep fighting.



A: 4/4
W: 800/800

Awesome fight Brit!


GOT THE DREAMER'S DISEASE

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Tag me only if starting a new thread.
Magic or force permitted any time, aside from death.

Hotaru the Valkyrie Posts: 295
Outcast atk: 7 | def: 10.5 | dam: 3
Mare :: Unicorn :: 15.3hh :: 6 Years 3 Months HP: 67 | Buff: NOVICE
Alice :: Royal Hellhound :: Acid Brit
#10
Hotaru

Even in all her efforts, she’s wounded. She’s nothing more than a scared, cornered animal. She’s not the Lady she tries to be, she cannot summon the elegance and restraint of her station. She does not feel worthy of her title, but it has no place here anyways. Not here on the edge of the world she’s always known, horribly alone, horribly young. They are both mere children playing in the big leagues, and Hotaru wonders once more why Ophelia ever thought she was ready for this. Maybe she had played the game too well, too convincingly. Tingal had broken apart every piece of armor she’d managed to clasp around herself, and Ampere had swooped down to feast upon the raw and aching parts left visible beneath the shattered façade. It wasn’t fair. But Hotaru had never played any fair games, and it was perhaps time that it came back to bite her. She went to her defeat quietly, for she’d never held any illusions of winning this battle. She had gone into it knowing she would lose, but she could not accept her name being slandered – Ampere would not be able to say that Hotaru had backed down from this fight, even when she was as close to dead as a living thing could be.
 
That was enough.
 
So when the lightning falls upon her she doesn't try to avoid it. There was nothing left for her to give. And as she stumbles upon the impact her hoof slips in the snow and the resounding snap of her foreleg sounds like a death knoll in her ears. Everything hurts all at once, an all-encompassing inferno that threatens to consume her entirely. Hotaru falls into it screaming, as her skin blisters where the armor kept contact and her body folds beneath the weight of her broken limb. Alice’s howl reaches screeching, demonic levels that were more befitting her hellhound nature than any wolf could produce, abandoning Ampere immediately in favor of her bonded. Hotaru’s face was wet with tears within moments, the armor retreating to leave her blistered skin untouched. She leans immediately against her sister, her entire body shaking with the pain.
 
I’m going to die here, she thought quietly, and Alice set up a long, grief-struck howl. It went on endlessly, and Hotaru sagged against her. “It’s okay, Alice,” she gasps pitifully with her thick tongue, vision swimming beneath pain and tears. The hound makes an awful, pained noise. No, no, no, Alice cries in her head, seemingly incapable of remaining silent with this terror in her heart. But Hotaru lifts her head weakly towards Ampere, hearing words and only vaguely sorting through them for meaning.
 
“You’re right,” she says quietly, trying to focus her black-spotted vision, voice hoarse and broken from her screaming. “It does free her from me. But she stays anyway.” Alice snarls hatefully at the blue, and while Hotaru may forgive her for the sake of her herd if nothing else, the bitch never would. Her hatred would run eternal, and she would envision the blue’s demise for the rest of her years. “Her life isn’t mine. But we are bound anyways. She fights with me, not for me. If you had a child –" her voice breaks here, a telling sign, one she’s too exhausted to conceal because all she can imagine is Arya’s face when she hears of her mother’s death “- would you not run to them on the battlefield to save them? You throw yourself at their adversary out of love, not because they have any command over you.” She silences Alice’s snarls by pressing the side of her face into the fur of her neck, tries to draw strength in what she sees as her last moments. Because she couldn’t get home on a broken leg, and she knew she would die here.
 
“I would prove it to you. I will, if you want to experiment on those you do not understand. If we meet again Ampere…you may silence our bond willingly, you may ask Alice any question that I will translate. I have loved a companion not my own, you know I have,” for Ampere had been there when Hotaru had been grieving, when Stella and Phaedra had paid the price for her greed, and another tear slips down her cheek. “But I won’t apologize for our bond.” Instead she tips her head, lets the crown fall to the snow. “You’ve won it. And I forgive you. Now please, leave.” And her voice breaks in her tears even as she begs, glancing away. She doesn’t want Ampere to see her like this, not when she can taste death on her tongue. Tingal may have broken her, but Ampere had at least been kind enough to end it.



Blu, thank you for giving me not only the first finished challenge I've ever had, but for giving me such a great thread and opportunity to develop her <3 this was the most fun I've had in a long time!


Hotaru gives up the armor willingly!

Defense: {1/1}
Words: {799/800}

Image Credit
[Image: 515265280ffff]

::Strong like the sea is stormy::

Please only tag starting posts, spars, and threads collecting dust!
Plot with me here!

Time the Dice Queen Posts: 144
OOC Account atk: 50 | def: 50 | dam: 50
Mare :: Other :: 5'7 :: 22 HP: 5050 | Buff: DROPKICK
Time
#11
20+ HP gap, Hotaru defaults to Ampere. Ampere earns 1 VP for winning, 1 VP for Hotaru being lead; Hotaru earns 1 EXP.

Ampere wins Destry's stolen armor.


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