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Post by Blahsadfeguie on Aug 19, 2015 2:34:06 GMT -5
Doyen dropped to one knee. The surge of aura faded, leaving far less around him than before he had expended that technique. He took this as a sign that all of his targets had been eradicated. Which was good, because he threw just about all he had left into the attack. Winning by a hair was not the way this Guard liked to do things, but it was almost cathartic to have finished off a long-time enemy in such a way. He certainly had a story to tell when he got back to the--
fwip
Just as he instinctively reached for his pills, a feather blocked his route. "What...?" he muttered as he pulled at the feather. It did not budge. His futile attempts were cut short when Vito's voice reached his ears. "No... not now..." He twisted around dizzily, flopping unceremoniously onto the dirt. The stacked pills' side-effects were finally starting to slam into him like a wrecking ball, and without being able to reach for more, there was no way he could quell the feeling and continue the fight.
But he couldn't clue Vito in on his weakness. He jumped to his feet, but did so in such a reckless manner that he fell flat on his face. At that point, he had difficulty even moving. How could he let himself make such a careless mistake? He had no confirmation that the real Vito was in range of his Aura Burst. Perhaps he had put too much faith in an experimental drug, and let it cloud his judgment...
Whatever the case, hindsight could not change the fact that the once-proud leader of the Dimensional Guard was now lying prone on his stomach after an embarrassing pratfall. His only hope at this point was that the Weavile would finish him off quickly.
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Post by Digizel on Aug 19, 2015 11:44:54 GMT -5
Haru had looked up toward the action once more, his body still refusing to let him stand up for now. But what he saw made his eyes widen with surprise. He could sense he Aura surrounding Doyen beginning to build and swirl around in an aggressive way. He could tell exactly what this member of the Dimensional Guard was doing, and he was not going to like it. He opened his mouth to warn the others, but even his voice failed him. He quickly gave up the attempt, though, surrendering to the idea that it would be better for them if he remained unconscious as far as this leader of the Dimensional Guard still held as much power as he did. However, he did raise his arms above his head, shielding his eyes from the blast that was sure to come. He could only hope that he was still out of range of the Burst attack, despite the Lucario's obvious huge reservoir of Aura energy, which he'd likely be emptying all at once.
Finally, here it was. He put his head back down and his paws gripped the earth beneath him as tightly as he could. A burst of Aura energy that practically blinded his own Aura senses for a moment. Thankfully, it seemed that he had been on the very edge of the blast radius, leaving him mostly unharmed. Although he definitely felt the force of the attack, even from outside its range. The Aura energy, manifested into a physical force akin to an Aura Sphere, was able to physically blast everything nearby, and it still had its own shockwave. The shockwave caused no actual damage itself, but it would have still enough to send him flying had he been unprepared, due to being so close to the blast radius. His ears, the sensors on the back of his head as well as his tail fluttered for a moment in the shockwave until everything finally settled down.
Now that everything was cleared up, Haru could look up again. The Aura Burst attack had blasted away everything...included every Vito that had been standing nearby. And there was no sign of them. The Lucario could only hope that the real Vito hadn't been among them. A quick glance told him that Ansgar was okay, albeit knocked cleanly out cold. Not that he particularly cared; he never liked that stuck-up know-it-all anyway.
However, just as Haru had expected, Doyen had put everything he had into that last blast. Unfortunately, he could see the Mega Lucario reaching for another one of those pills that he had seen him take earlier. But that plan was quickly but to a stop when a feather came flying at him, stopping him from accessing those pills. And he knew immediately what that meant. And sure enough, Vito emerged from the trees...or at least, Vito clones. Whether the real one was among them or not was something Haru had long-since given up trying to detect.
Even Doyen seemed genuinely shocked by Vito's survival. But Haru certainly was not. He knew by now that you NEVER put everything you have into one attack when dealing with Vito. And the sight of this mistake caused him to smirk slightly. This leader of the Dimensional Guard had been rather humbled...a story to throw back into the Dimensional Guard's face if he ever had another chance. Once Doyen had taken his extremely graceful spill, Haru finally figured that now was his chance to move. He placed his paws beside his chest and began to push, forcing himself up and onto his feet, his body protesting all the way.
"By the way, you might not want to count me out so soon next time," Haru taunted, finally speaking up as he started stepping forward himself, approaching the downed Doyen. "But I guess you're not as strong as you thought you were, huh? Even with all those Power-Up Punches, you still failed to knock me out." Even if Vito had been taken down, Haru would have been ready and waiting to finish him off with a move like Quick Attack, a fact that Doyen had probably already figured out by now. Even still, though, he remembered to not approach too closely to Doyen. After all, it would probably take just one Metal Claw or something would probably be enough to knock him out. Or not even that, given his condition; one kick might be enough. So he didn't dare step within Doyen's melee range, stopping a good two arm lengths away from him.
They could wait until he was out cold before searching him for whatever item it was that had attracted Haru's attention in the first place.
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Willy
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Post by Willy on Aug 19, 2015 19:10:53 GMT -5
After Haru had revealed that he had been conscious the entire time, one of the Vito clones broke into a sprint. "There's only one real way to deal with a stupid mistake like that." The clone quickly closed the gap, stopping right before he had nearly run over the Lucario. "Let's give it everything we've got!" The clone raised his leg behind him and swung it down, attempting to punt Doyen in the gut. "IT'S PUNISHMENT TIIIME!"
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Post by Blahsadfeguie on Aug 23, 2015 15:59:00 GMT -5
A grating voice snapped Doyen back into reality. He glanced up to see Haru, the Lucario that he had assumed was well past down for the count, approaching and taunting him. Of course, it was so obvious now... how could he have forgotten his own species' most basic of battle survival techniques? But even if he tried that now, there was no way he would have the energy to retaliate.
At this point, Doyen was too exhausted and out of it to feel any sort of rage at the other Lucario's banter. The failure was entirely his own. Insisting on seeking his targets alone, and failing to use his resources wisely to accommodate his numerical disadvantage. He was certainly experienced enough to recognize his mistakes and resolve not to repeat them. But after such a catastrophic defeat, would he even get the chance to try again...?
He could not contemplate this further before he felt a powerful kick to his gut. Unable to stifle a loud grunt of pain, Doyen flipped into the air from the force. While airborne, his body glowed a bright white for a brief moment. When it faded, his form was that of a normal Lucario again. A round object fell under him from an ambiguous source. He hit the ground, sprawled out on his back.
"Brother... I'm sorry..."
His movement ceased. The Captain of the Dimensional Guard had been knocked out.
Not long after, a beam of yellow light shone down from the sky and enveloped his unconscious body. There was a flash, and both he and the light were gone. The only thing left of their encounter was the strange, colorful marble laying on the ruined earth.
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Post by Digizel on Aug 23, 2015 16:32:55 GMT -5
Haru had a paw raised, poised to strike and finish this. But before he could do anything, one of the Vitos was already rushing in, closing the distance. And unfortunately, this Vito took it upon himself to finish the job. However, the Lucario raised a brow at the phrase the Weavile shouted. There was something about those words...he couldn't quite put his paw on it but for some reason, he suddenly pictured Vito as much fluffier and with a higher-pitched voice.
Haru quickly shook his head, though, dismissing the thought. He had more pressing matters to tend to; starting with the satisfying grunt that Doyen had let out. When Doyen began to glow, however, he had a feeling that this rough battle was finished for sure. But what caught Haru's attention was the small, round object that had fallen as his body crashed back to the earth below. He immediately took an instinctive step toward it, almost feeling like he was being drawn to it, but stopped when his ears twitched. "...Brother...?" the Lucario repeated under his breath, looking at the defeated Dimensional Guard captain. He then took another step forward, this time toward Doyen...only to be stopped by the sudden beam of light that enveloped the fallen Lucario. His eyes widened as he watched both the light and Doyen disappear a moment later.
A moment of silenced passed then. "Tch...dammit," he muttered. "I was hoping we could question him or...something." As the Lucario spoke, he began stepping back toward the strange sphere that had been dropped earlier. "M-maybe we could've...c-could've...urngh...." His eyes drooped slightly as he suddenly sank to his knees leaning forward and using his arms to keep himself up. Now that there was nobody to show off to, his exhaustion caught up with him again. Now that he was feeling his injuries again, he could only think about how he had gotten them. The only thing he had done that entire fight was one punch before getting captured, struck by his ally's attack, and then pounded into near unconsciousness by one punch. Some performance he had managed to put up....
When his gaze refocused again, however, Haru realized what was laying on the ground before his eyes. A small, amber orb lay in the grass before him. In the sphere was a small, helix-like shape on the inside. The helix itself was blue with a red streak through its center. He reached down and grasped hold of the orb, lifting it into his own grasp. He certainly didn't need his Aura powers to sense that this thing held some significance to him. He threw his body backward, allowing himself to fall onto his tail so that he wasn't on is knees, and looked into the orb.
Was this thing what he had been attracted to this whole time? It looked like it was nothing more than a large marble, roughly the size of his palm. Was this all they had fought for this whole time...? But just what was it, exactly? Apart from marbles back in the human world, he'd never seen anything like it before. He held it up to the light and allowed the sunshine to gleam off of it. This whole battle had been so that he could get his paws on this thing, right...? Well, that left just one question on his mind.
"...Now what?" he murmured.
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Willy
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Post by Willy on Aug 23, 2015 20:20:23 GMT -5
Once Doyen had disappeared the remaining clones poofed into nothing. It was a few minutes before another Vito emerged from the treeline; presumably the real one.
Vito made his way over to where Haru was examining the strange marble and collapsed onto his back, finally letting the exhaustion of maintaining so many clones get to him.
"That better have been worth it," Vito said, breathing heavily. "There's a good chance we just handed the Guard a lot more information than we should have, so we shouldn't hang around too long. We give Ansgar an hour before we wake him up one way or another and then we move out. I'd suggest we move him immediately, but I don't think either of us are up for that. We would just be asking for trouble. I just got word on a very promising lead. Promising enough for us to investigate personally, anyway."
Vito trailed off, struggling to keep his eyes open.
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Post by Digizel on Aug 23, 2015 21:26:02 GMT -5
Haru turned the strange object over in his paw and continued looking at it. He had no idea what this was or what it did. All he knew was that it was a very important object. Otherwise, Doyen probably would not have kept it with him. "Not sure why," he muttered lowly, still completely exhausted. "...But I think it must be. It's...it's got some weird Aura signature. But it just looks like a rock or something, and I can usually only get readings off of things that are living." After a moment longer, he finally just let out a defeated sigh. "Ugh...I'll just see if Ansgar knows. He's the smart one."
Haru then allowed himself to fall onto his back. Doyen was extremely powerful. Sure, he was the leader of the Dimensional Guard, so a struggle was to be expected. But he hadn't stood even a ghost of a chance against him. How close to Doyen's strength was the second strongest member? Could they also transform, or was that some unique property that only Doyen had? One thing was for sure, though. He was powerless before the might of the Dimensional Guard.
Through these thoughts, he almost missed he last thing Vito had said. But thanks to his abnormally sensitive hearing, he still managed to catch it. "...So you going to keep me in suspense or are you actually going to tell me the plan for once?" he said, somewhat bitterly.
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Willy
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Post by Willy on Aug 24, 2015 9:47:40 GMT -5
"Ha, you should know the drill by now. I don't give you or Ansgar any more of the plan than I need to. The difference between you and him is that he usually has the plan figured out anyway. It means you get the bum deal of being the only one who doesn't have any idea what's going on, but thems the breaks. If you really want to deal some huge blows to the Guard, then this is how we do it. And seeing as we just wiped the floor with their leader, I'm gonna assume I'm keeping my end of the bargain here."
Of course, Vito didn't remember the exact circumstances under which he had managed to negotiate Haru's help, but he at least knew Haru hated the guard. Hopefully taking on Doyen was enough to placate Haru. At least for a little while. It wouldn't be smart to talk about the real plan right after a showdown with the guard anyway.
"But the general plan involves fucking shit up. And we can't do that if we're half dead. So I'm gonna get some shut eye. You probably should to. You can figure out what's up with that stupid marble on the way."
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Post by Digizel on Aug 24, 2015 11:20:09 GMT -5
Haru scowled slightly at Vito's words. Just as he had expected. That damn Weavile still had that usual air of superiority about him. If it weren't for the fact that he hated the Dimensional Guard more than he hated Vito, he would have stomped Vito and gone off on his own long ago. But if their struggles since the Wish Festival had proven anything to him, it was that he was still not strong enough to fight the Guard by himself. He thought about his old friend, long-since separated in an incident with the Guard. If it hadn't been for him, he would have been captured long ago. As much as he hated to admit it, he needed the help of somebody. But people openly willing to screw with the Guard were rare. And Vito was the only one he could find for now. That one Floatzel that had partnered with Deb came to mind, but for some reason, that Floazel pissed him off even more than Vito did.
His thoughts momentarily went back to the Wish Festival tournament. He thought about every match he ever fought back then. He would either barely survive to pull off his win or he lost. He hadn't improved in the slightest since then. Even Vito had managed to defeat that Zangoose that he couldn't. He was still just a joke to everybody else.
But no more. He was going to become stronger; stronger than anybody else involved in this mess. He looked back at the orb in his hands. And maybe figuring this thing out would be a good way to go about it. Otherwise, their desperate struggle against the leader of the Dimensional Guard had been for nothing.
"...Whatever," he muttered. "As long as we're getting these stupid diamond things and stomping the Guard, I'm good." He then shot a glare at the Weavile. "But eventually, I'm not going to need you anymore."
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