[Training] Staring at the ceiling, tryna fight the feeling

Kaisel

One foot in the ground
One foot in the grave

The wind whips fierce and wild at this height. Kaisel breathes it in with a smile, closing his eyes briefly as he steps closer to the edge, that dark pull that always comes like something known, missed. It ups his pulse, a hum of life kicking like a reminder. He laughs, content at the conditions as he turns back on his heel towards Melita.

"Right, so I made a few prototypes that I want to test out." He motions to the collection of kites he's carted up here, secured under a jacket he's tossed over them, though the edges that peek out ripple in the breeze with an insistence for freedom. "Y'know, some people do 'kite fights'! I thought maybe we could practice that, really see how they measure up when given a bit of a thrashing." It's likely they won't all survive the whole time, that's why he's got several, and he knows for a fact even the authentic fighters can end up with 'scars'. "I figured since you got a skyship and all, that maybe you'd know a thing or two about winds and sails that could translate well enough to kits." As for him, while maybe no kite flying pro, he's been running alongside the wind since he was born.

It's not the devil at your door
It's just your shadow on the floor

Melita

Eating fire is your ambition
to swallow the flame down

She could hear Kaisel talking about something with kites, but her eyes kept going to the Spyglass itself – peering along edges, nosing about on the zenith proper – because for all her travels amidst portions and pieces of Stormbreak, most of the time she’d spent her hours pissing off the locals, fighting, or being nosey as fuck. So more of the latter at present, given the state of everything.

Only thereafter he started discussing prototypes or some such did she regain her focus, brow arching. “Kite fights,” she murmured, trying to imagine it – then shrugging, game to tear apart and about with any kind of armament, even if it was a flimsy little toy. “I mean, yeah, I could try.” Or just maul the shit out of things, which was the more likelier option.

Watching briefly as Sila flew her way along a thermal nearby, she smirked, before turning back to Kaisel. “What have you got?”

to be lit up from within, vein by vein
to be the sun

Kaisel

One foot in the ground
One foot in the grave

Her agreement earns a grin and carefully he crouches down by the pile, unthreading two from the anchor of his jacket. "Alright, so, I thought I could make this work with our own training. Two birds and one stone, or whatever," he says as he passes her the red kite, keeping the blue one for himself. "You secure the main line around your waist, or to your belt, that's the one that keeps the kite steady in the air." he motions as he speaks, and starts to tie his to the front of his belt. "Then, there's two smaller strings, one that connects to either side of the kite. These you tie to your wrists. They steer the kite, allowing for sharp swerves or fancy moves. When we go to hit each other, it'll be cutting our kites in at each other too."

He nods to the area he means as he begins to faster each line to each hand, stepping back and gently letting the kite slip between his fingers and catch on the wind. It snaps up immediately, fabric rippling on the squall, and he tests out how steady it is as he casually moves each arm around, guiding it in abrupt dives or banking it back up higher by catching the sail back on the pull of the breeze.

"So, just like we wanna defend our bodies, we wanna defend our kites too, and when we attack, our kites should be going in for the hit too." A rough grin settles into place, full of challenge. "If yours breaks or snaps, you can get another one." he points at the pile still waiting under the jacket. "Ready when you are."

It's not the devil at your door
It's just your shadow on the floor

Melita

Eating fire is your ambition
to swallow the flame down

She listened to the directions, brows furrowing while she tied the kite around her waist, then placed the other portions around her wrists. Considering how little she defended herself (at least on an armor capacity; she was usually busy being a shit and hitting everything she could), the thought of the kite also being in the line of fire didn’t quite help with her propensity for assaults and sieges. More than likely she’d be needing a hoard of replacements.

But no worries there. The Honeybee watched as it whipped out against another rising thermal, maneuvering through the air on its own accord, until she turned and twisted it along her arms. “Hm. All right.” Accord and agreement, waiting for him to simply regret doing any of this.

And the moment she unfurled her magic, it turned out she’d be the one feeling the remorse; for no sooner did she end up punching herself. With a sigh, and now some sore ribs, she shrugged, pretending it hadn’t happened. “Sometimes this chaos magic is…uh, odd.”

--

1/4 Melita tries to use her wild magic and ends up punching herself.

to be lit up from within, vein by vein
to be the sun

Kaisel

One foot in the ground
One foot in the grave

After helping to secure her kite, Kaisel steps back from her swiftly, falling into his fighter's stance. One leg behind the either, legs bent, fists curled by his face, jostling the kite above him slightly. He's grinning, always happy to get in some practice, and he's especially looking forward to seeing what Mel can dish out, all on top of getting to test out his kites. So when he catches her tension building, the tell of an oncoming attack, he braces with the preparation to dip away and retaliate.

Instead, she fucking punches herself.

Kaisel is stunned, to say the least, because in all the fights and spars he's ever been in, that has never happened. Oh, sure, Koa has asked him why he's hitting himself before while in full control of his arm, but no one's got ahold of Mel's fist but herself, and well, the kite. Kaisel bursts out laughing, not even able to act concerned, though the shock of it is quite plain in the high pitch of his humor. "Uh, the fuck is chaos magic?" he asks on a subsiding chuckle. "You good?" he can finally ask, though she seems relatively unphased, so he sinks back into the fighting stance his fit shook him out of.

With an upward glance to watch his kite, which will prove an ongoing distraction in a fight, Kaisel rushes her with a telegraphed jab, hoping to make her dodge into the uppercut his other fist throws out. Above him, his kite whips forward with his motion, arching towards hers with the jab, the nose like a bird's beak.

---

1/4

Obvious jab and sneaky uppercut

It's not the devil at your door
It's just your shadow on the floor

Melita

Eating fire is your ambition
to swallow the flame down

“It’s part of my demi magic,” she started to explain as he laughed, shrugging her shoulders, par for the course with the act of being Ludo’s. Would she have preferred the water cannon? Sure. “I’m fine,” and she shook it off, ready for another go.

She watched as he returned to his stance, already well versed in hand-to-hand combat. Even with a kite attached, which she now didn’t currently give a shit about, she’d be able to take some swings and punches and dish out her own. So the Honeybee snorted and evaded the first, and ducked away from the second, sticking her tongue out rather immaturely and immediately aiming for a fist right towards his ribcage, just to see what he’d do.

And the kites fumbled around one another, slipping by and around, looking like a very stupid dance.

--

2/4. Mel dodges and tries to punch him in the ribs.

to be lit up from within, vein by vein
to be the sun

Kaisel

One foot in the ground
One foot in the grave

She doesn't elaborate, like having demi-god magic that makes you punch yourself, and choosing to use it, is well known and common. "I expected a duck!" he admits with a tilted smile, still not entirely sure what to make of it all, though the thoughts fade into the muscle memory of attack!

She's quicker than him, stronger too, and she knows her way around the maneuvering he can tell immediately. She dodges, adding the flourish of a tease that he scoffs at, but he doesn't have the time to manage more than a playful bluster before the arm blocking his face has to sweep down to deflect her punch, while his other curls back to his head from the space where it'd missed her. All the flurry of attacks however, entangles the kites, and the strong drive of his arm sends his into a nose dive to the side where it snags on the string of hers. The forces tugging it two ways ends up splitting the fabric, and now without a full sail, the kite deflates from the sky. "Damn," Kaisel muttered as he reached to pick it up, a sudden mischievous gleam entering his gaze as he flicks it to the edge, catching the outline of Mel. He snaps the cords off his arm and waist and spins towards her from his crouch.

He tosses the kite remnants at her like a misshapen spear, laughing as he darts away, running towards the pile of kites and hastily fishing one out from under the jacket. He doesn't have time to tie it, so he holds onto the cords and the handles their tied to, like a marionette being controlled by the wind. He lets the breeze catch it, then yanks his new kite down and towards her like a bird's aerial divebomb, stance sweeping back into place as he readies to dodge from her counter while trying to keep his new purple kite aloft and alive.

---

2/4 blocks her punch, loses his kite. Throws its corpse at her and grabs a new one which he angles to dive at her.

It's not the devil at your door
It's just your shadow on the floor

Melita

Eating fire is your ambition
to swallow the flame down

Melita very nearly went into the notions of the cycle of possibilities of her demigod magic, and that yeah, ducks could’ve happened too and that’s how she once knocked out his cousin –

But then it scarcely mattered because they were maneuvering. Kites collapsing and dying, enough to ignite a feral grin across her face, before his new one was moving at her. It slammed her in the face, though not with any force, but enough of a distraction that she had to duck away from its ridiculous shit, and her kite got tangled in the mess. “These are stupid,” she announced, before deciding she was going to kick at him instead, using the length of her limbs and balanced stance to see if he’d duck away from the incoming blow towards his shins.

--

3/4. Mel gets hit in the face with Kaisel’s kite and her kite gets tangled up, so she decides to kick at his shins instead.

to be lit up from within, vein by vein
to be the sun

Kaisel

One foot in the ground
One foot in the grave

He barks out a laugh as she's forced to grapple with the kite's limp body, her own kite diving down with a sad spin of defeat as it swirls and tangles. "STUPID!?" he echoes with a grin as he moves, tutting obnoxiously as he yanks his arm back to keep his newest sail from crashing too deeply into the ground. "Sounds like loser talk," he goads, satisfaction blooming as the wind catches under the fabric and snaps it back into the air with cheer.

He's a bit too focused on the flying though, to fully catch the sweep of her legs. By the time he's got the sense to nab the movement, all he can really manage is a yelp as he struggles to step back, the wallop against his shins loud and GODS it's fucking unnaturally crippling due to the lack of buffer between bone and nerves. He sucks air in through his teeth as he finishes darting back, legs feeling on fire and in bad need of rapid rubbing, the only thing that feels like it'd help, but sadly he did not build in any timeouts to their little spar and he doesn't think she's the type to let him get away with it. "I liked it better when you punched yourself! Do that one again," he calls out instead, his grin messy as he grits his teeth against the throb of pain that pulses in tempo with his heart, like he's got a small one now in each leg.

Rushing back towards her with a yell, he yanks his new kite back towards her, the shape cutting in from her right side. He pushes off his left leg, swinging his right towards her thigh, hands balancing around him with complete abandon for the toy now.

---

3/4 Kaisel is hit in the shins and attacks with his kite again to her right side, kicking at her left side.

It's not the devil at your door
It's just your shadow on the floor

Melita

Eating fire is your ambition
to swallow the flame down

“I liked it better when you shut the fuck up,” she pantomimed back, rolling her eyes at the punching comment. She could do monumental damage to the ingrate, and he didn’t seem to realize it. Wondering if her next move should be pushing him directly into the wide-open world below, she swallowed down some feral inhibitions instead, narrowing her eyes and focusing.

Not giving a fuck about the kites any longer, she batted his away from her sight with one hand, but not enough to ward away the impending kick. Hissing as it pummeled at her ankle, she wound up a following punch, intending to place multitudes of power behind the assault, straight towards his face.

--

4/4. Fed up, Mel bats away his kite, but not fast enough to avoid his kick. She winds up and tries to punch him in the face.

to be lit up from within, vein by vein
to be the sun

Kaisel

One foot in the ground
One foot in the grave

His laugh breaks out again at the bite of her words, the edge of her ire growing apparent, although that only seems to fuel his boundless energy to tease and terrorize her further. For him, this is fun, the chaos of the kites wheeling around only adding to it all, the wind's roar as it winds around them just another element driving up the adrenaline, steps stuttering occasionally in an abrupt gale. Maybe it's not quite so exciting for her though, the flap of the toy more like a poor mimicry of an irritating bird, the relentless pummel of an unseen force a tireless frustration.

That only becomes clear to him after his hit lands, lower than he meant, more along a region that'd sting much like his shins. He winces with apology when he feels the connection, though it quickly twists into a grimace as he's force to dip out of the way of her fist, thankful only for his training that he dodged it at all. The quick slip back to his right side has the force of her jab just whizzing past his cheek, catching on the edge of his hand as he brings it up protectively, too slow to have stopped it if it did land. "WHOA! Chill Mel!" he grits out, throwing out a jab-cross combo towards her arm just to try and force some distance, his kite whipping wildly overhead with the movement. "If you give me a black eye how will I be able to see you properly when we play charades!" Her answer, likely, will be not to get the black eye, which is a fair retort to be honest. There's no real training if the stakes aren't a bit high, but he had hoped not to have to squint at Caly when he planned to see her next.

---

4/4 dodges the face punch and does a jab-cross combo to her arm.

It's not the devil at your door
It's just your shadow on the floor

Melita

Eating fire is your ambition
to swallow the flame down

Melita, who probably had never once been chill in her entire life, furrowed her brows at his words and then as he angled away from her punch. With a kite still flailing around on her wrist, her attention had to deviate to only Kaisel’s movements, and she took a big, deep breath, and tried to institute some calm that she was sorely lacking. “I think you’ll be just fine,” she murmured, cracking a grin at the thought of some swollen ass eye while they were trying to play a stupid game.

Then she had to dodge, ducking downwards and maneuvering to the right, to avoid the incoming barrage. Contemplating other endeavors, like tossing the kite at his face and seeing if that would give him a black eye (or poke it, which was probably the only actual alternative). “Have you had enough of the bullshit or you wanna keep going?” Because now she had a goal in mind and he probably wouldn’t like it.

to be lit up from within, vein by vein
to be the sun

Kaisel

One foot in the ground
One foot in the grave

Breathing hard from the work out and definitely not wanting to run the risk of a bruised face after that close call, Kaisel is more than happy to end this here and pick up an actual game. "I'm always game for bullshit," he grins lopsided in response to her, rolling one shoulder back. "However, I am done harassing you with kites, yes." He glances up at the one he's still got a hold of, the edges a bit beat up and limp now from all the sharp motions. Hers fared pretty well though, and it proved he'd made them somewhat decently after all.

"Alright, gimme your kite. I'll meet you at the White Hart for dinner and games?" He goes to gather his jacket and bundle of other creations while she untangles herself from hers. The dead one he'd chucked at her had since been whipped off the edge and flung into the abyss, and hers isn't in the best shape after all the beatings, but it's knowledge he can use to fortify the others. "Thanks for your help, I think these held up okay!"

[FIN]

It's not the devil at your door
It's just your shadow on the floor