smash_logs | 25th bloom; Like a Dragon

Entry tags:

25th bloom; Like a Dragon

Who: Char. Vinnie.
What: Shirtless(?) fighting.
Where: On a roof.
When: Jan 14.
Warnings: Violence, swearing, as many yakuza references as I can possibly manage.

After years of animosity beginning to erode, the Venusaur could almost say that he was coming to respect and understand Char as a person. Not a single moment of it had been easy, either - even once they were past throwing fists and insults at the sight of each other, the boundary between how much either of them was willing to give and take never stopped being uncertain. Slowly, that line began to grow more blurred over time. Vulnerabilities trickled through. Secret parts of themselves that they saw mirrored in the other's life. It was never comfortable, but there was an awkward, fragile, tentative sense of trust between them.

Little by little, they changed. They grew.

And somewhere along the way, it surprised Vinnie to recognize that somehow, Char had become important to him. That the Charizard had not only helped shape who he was, but gave him back something that he didn't realize he missed: his drive, his pride, that fiery independent streak that had always burned inside the Grass-Type. On top of that, it startled Vinnie to learn that he'd also began to truly value Char as a person. That he wanted his respect and maybe, just maybe even admired him a little.

Of course, that all went to hell once he started dating Bulba. In an instant, the spark left Char entirely, and Vinnie was just... ignored. No more fights, no more anything. Just a half-hearted reception of bland apathy. The Venusaur barely existed in his eyes anymore, and Char being Char, it kept going for over a year. It wasn't until both their frustrations were brought to a head by an innocuous sprig of mistletoe that everything exploded.

In the heat of the moment, words was said that couldn't be taken back.

Whatever they even were anymore, it was all brought to ruin in an instant. Vinnie knew that if he didn't fix this somehow... hell, could it even be fixed? Even if he wasn't sure, he still had to try. It wasn't simply a matter of having his rival back anymore, or being acknowledged. No, Vinnie had hurt someone who inexplicably, pain-stakingly had become an integral part of his life.

The question was how to undo such a mistake. This was a Charizard he was dealing with here. Mere words, at this point, were useless. And hollow gestures of apology were at best pathetic, at worst insulting. There was nothing he could offer that would appease the wounded Fire Type when he'd already been figuratively burned too many times before.

Days and nights passed, with Vinnie rolling the words he'd said over and over in his head in regret. How on earth was he supposed to get Char to understand what he actually meant to him? Sure, he was a hard person to respect on the outside, but that wasn't what he thought of him anymore. That was just cheesy, wasn't it - I didn't mean what I said. Still, it was true. Then again, maybe in the end it didn't even matter that Vinnie had changed. After all, who was he to demand anything when he used to blow off the Fire Type completely? Char wasn't obligated to forgive him, and he wasn't owed anything.

Whatever Vinnie wanted, he had to fight for.

That'd always been the way things were with them, wasn't it.

As a Grass-Type though, he still couldn't fully make the leap between his way of thinking and Char's. As much as they were similar, in many regards they were still polar opposites. There had only been one time that Vinnie really felt like he was on the same wavelength as his rival, and that was when he had a fire of his own.

Maybe... if the answer eluded him as a Venusaur, then the key was not to be a Venusaur anymore.

It was a bit of a drastic measure. In hindsight, maybe he should've consulted more people about this idea than... no one at all.

===

Steam rose from his nostrils in the brisk January air. If it was cold today, then Vinnie no longer felt its chill. His preparations had been utterly minimal - but then again, planning with any degree of foresight had completely fallen off his priorities. There was only one thing he wanted right now, and he could feel the need coursing hot in his blood. It left him blind to anything else.

His wing membrane was slightly less mangled than it was the last time, but Vinnie still wasn't in any state to fly - not that he even knew how - and trying to breathe fire brought little success outside a few weak embers. None of that mattered, though. He had a Persim Berry pocketed, and more importantly, he had his pride. Whatever happened today, he was going to see through.

With his dragon instincts reawakened, he walked himself up to the school roof, high enough to see any part of the campus. There was absolutely no way Char would back down from anyone laying a claim on his turf here. Vinnie parked himself dead center and shifted back into Pokemon form. Wings at full span, flame burning bright, neck stretched up towards the sky, he breathed deep and roared.

A challenge. Charizard to Charizard.

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No matter what sort of mood Char had been in since he'd fought with Vinnie, it was still Charizard blood running in his veins. No amount of gloom or regret could shake off the instinctual pull of another Charizard's challenging roar echoing in the winter air. Vinnie didn't need to wait long for an answer: clear across campus, Char shot into the sky, spitting a furious stream of flame towards the clouds. The wind was good and he was spurred on by an age-old instinct: he came at the roof like an arrow, claws sliding on the snowy rooftop and rapidly-working wings scattering powder as he skidded to a halt.

His answer was immediate and resolute: wings arched to their fullest, he roared in response, tail hitting the ground as he...

It stopped on the ground, roar dying off as his eyes landed on his opponent's soul flame. It was burning hot and proud, everything he'd expect from a challenger, but there was no mistaking one soul flame for another: no matter how different he looked, Char absolutely knew who this was, from the tattered wing to the scarred patch on his forehead to the bold laid-bare flame.

His challenging snarl died down to a look of confusion and wariness, absolutely unsure what to make of this. Did it just happen by accident? Was Vinnie mocking him somehow? Stubborn instinct refused to let him back up even a single step, no matter how uncertain he was what this was even supposed to be.

"What're you playin' at?" Char demanded, tail twitching restlessly behind him.

There was no way for Vinnie to suppress the surge of excitement that welled up in his chest when he saw Char take flight. His heart was already going wild, and that blood raced through every part of him with anticipation. Maybe as a Venusaur he might've described the feeling within himself as recklessness or aggression, but as a Charizard, he couldn't help but see it as a burning sense of joy. What else could make him feel that kind of heat inside? And even on the outside, his tail flame danced with hot exhilaration.

Vinnie snorted a puff of black smoke from his nostrils as he began, "I was thinking... 'bout what t'say to you. How I could possibly get what I feel through that skull've yours. But I couldn't come up with anything you'd possibly listen to."

Those blue eyes brightened up as he continued, "Then I realized, I was goin' at it all wrong. I didn't understand what t'do cuz I didn't understand you - so first I had to find a way."

Then he grinned toothily, laying bare his jagged fangs in the process. "I asked a Kid for a favour. The magic kind. Only now that I'm like this, I finally figured out... I don't wanna talk at all." As if his intentions weren't clear enough, the newly minted Charizard slammed his tail against the roof, daring Char to answer in kind.

That was his game, huh? Did Vinnie actually think growing a few scales was going to change everything? Char had spent the last year refusing to show even the tiniest hint of willingness to throw a punch Vinnie's way. Surely Vinnie didn't actually believe that Char was gonna jump at the chance to drag a half-dead Vinnizard back to his boyfriend and proclaim that somehow made everything cool again, right?

I mean, sure, a male Charizard barging right into his territory was harder to ignore. A lot harder. So much so, in fact, that Char almost didn't notice his own tail jerking up in sync with Vinnie's, only halting itself an inch or two away from hitting the floor. Charizard tails always did make exceptionally poor liars; no matter how much Char was struggling to keep it too-cool-to-care immobile and neutral, his tail still trembled, the flame on the end spitting with the kind of competitive heat no amount of sulking or self-pitying had managed to stamp out.

"Don't flatter yourself. What makes you think I got the time to waste watchin' you bash your own head in again?" It came out a bit more like goading than like a refusal; it wasn't like Char had no idea what his own tail flame was screaming, but he was stubborn. Even if his claws were already flexing, he still had to put on the last little bit of "too aloof for you" show.

Vinnie was all too aware of the embarrassment that was their last fight as Charizards, but he wasn't going to let that overshadow this rematch. The heat of Char's flame completely gave his competitive instinct away - no matter how much he wanted to dress it off as indifference, both of them knew he wasn't about to just walk away. And that fact only made Vinnie's heart beat faster.

He flapped his wings with a loud clap of air, goading the other Charizard to try and do something about the utterly unrepentant presence in front of him. "What, you think you can't take someone who's actually ready t'fight you?"

It didn't take much to tip the scales. Charizard egos and tempers both being the remarkably fragile things they were, he'd have a hard time ignoring that remark from anyone. Coming from Vinnie in particular, it grated twice as hard. It might have taken a while, but Vinnie was rewarded with the solid thwack of Char's tail whipping against the ground.

"One transformation and suddenly you think you're king shit, huh?" He still knew this was a bad idea. The rational, responsible part of him, atrophied though it might have been, was still screaming to back off, to reconsider this, to please for the love of god don't do anything that'll upset Bulba. The far louder part, however, was still an idiot dragon. One who needed to prove far more than ever that he was worth Vinnie's respect. One who was long overdue to make his actions toward his rival about Vinnie and Vinnie alone.

The fire started to rise in the back of his throat, his breaths coming out in thick, smokelike trails of steam in the cold winter air. With his tail held high and blazing like a spitfire, he began to lumber forward. "If that's the bed you're determined to make, you can fuckin' lay in it."

Vinnie's eyes lit up with a triumphant flash of red as he crowed, "That's what I've been waiting t'hear!"

Right off the bat, that familiar red glow surrounded his body - an aura that burned as furiously as his fighting spirit. There would be no slow start here. If he wanted to stand a chance, he had to stay on the offensive for as long as possible. He launched himself at Char in full Outrage, intent on striking first blood.

Was it reckless and totally leaving himself open? Oh yes. But the berserker mindset that overtook him was blind to reason. Besides, Vinnie got what he wanted - Char was finally coming at him as a rival, and nothing else. He'd been yearning so long for this that whatever happened now, he was eager to meet - even if this was inevitably a losing battle.

After all, Char had considerably more experience fighting as a Charizard than Vinnie did. For one thing, he could actually fly and breathe fire. But that didn't mean Vinnie was going to make this easy on him.

At least this time, he knew what that red aura meant. The last time, he'd been taken totally by surprise, and had been more or less shitstomped for it. The only reason he'd pulled through was because he'd gotten away long enough for the confusion to throw Vinnie off.

The wise thing to do, then, would be to do that again. An Outrage that soon was a big gamble, and if he acted right away, there would still be enough distance between the two of them for Char to get into the air.

The Charizard thing to do, however, was not necessarily the wise thing. That blood-red glow excited him. The question burned hot inside him: can I beat that this time? Reckless though it might have been, he met that Outrage head-on. He surrounded himself in the all-out heat of a Flare Blitz, falling back on the strongest he had in hopes of holding his ground.

The initial rush went about as well as expected. Against a Venusaur, Flare Blitz might have been enough, but against another Charizard, fire alone didn't have enough oomph to stand up to the potency of a dragon on a rampage. Claws caught him across the head, scoring first blood right between his horns and dissipating the Flare Blitz like a candle in a strong wind. Char might have had the advantage of experience and versatility, but when it came to short-term firepower, few things beat an Outrage.

Everything was a blur of rage-tinted violence. Vinnie's body was ripping and tearing of its own accord - if he had even a fraction of control, his instinct would've been to pin his opponent down and dominate him, to take Char by the horns. That was the Charizard blood talking. But even that was washed away in the fiery typhoon that was the fury of a pure dragon. Nothing short of obliterating everything in front of him would satiate him now.

In the heat of it, the rampage seemed to last forever: claws slashing, teeth biting, wings throttling, tail lashing, blood pumping so loud that it drowned out all other sound. But all too soon, his berserker aura faded, and suddenly it felt like all that power had been there and gone in an instant. All that red vanished from Vinnie's body, save for the splatter of blood on his hands.

There was only a split second of lucid awareness before the dizziness began. Just like before, as the overwhelming rage lifted from his spirit, confusion flooded into the empty space it once occupied - both lost from the emotional whiplash, and the dizzying amount of thrashing. Vinnie only had enough sense to revert back into human form before he stumbled onto one knee, clumsily trying to regain enough balance so he wouldn't topple over completely.

It, for the record, had absolutely been a stupid idea to take it head-on. He knew full-well that in any other fight, he'd be pinned by his horns by now. It was nothing short of luck to be getting claws raking his face and a tail slamming into his side instead of a fight-ending grip around his horns.

Outrage was still the ass-kicking Char remembered it to be, but thank god, it was also just as short-lived as he remembered. There'd barely been time to breathe between the blows of Vinnie's furious assault, but it didn't take long for it to falter. Vinnie might have lost his head too much to think to go for the horns, but Char still had his wits about him. Vinnie'd probably be able to recover from the post-Outrage wooziness if he were given enough time, but Char fully expected him to be out of it long enough to make the rest of the fight a cake walk.

He shifted back to his human self as well -- even shallow head wounds bled like a motherfucker, and at least hair would keep it out of his eyes for a little bit. Human Vinnie didn't have the luxury of horns to grab, either. Powerful claws might have worked well for keeping a grip on solid-bone horns, but fingers were better for not ripping ears off entirely.

Expecting Vinnie to be in no state to attack, Char stepped in, grabbing a fistful of hair, ear, whatever he could get -- if it hurt, it was Vinnie's fault for not having any damn horns. As long as he could grab it hard enough to yank Vinnie further off balance, that was what mattered.

With a grunt, Vinnie felt his head get jerked up. There was a burst of vertigo as his blurry vision struggled to adjust. The sky spun and his brain seemed to be tumbling around in some kind of spin cycle inside his skull, but even in the haze, there was no doubt it was Char's bloodied face staring down at him.

There was only one thought that pierced through with utter clarity: not yet.

No. He wasn't done. Not yet.

With that determination guiding his hand, Vinnie reached into his pocket, grabbed the Persim Berry he'd prepared and shoved it into his mouth. The moment he bit down, the taste of the fruit's juices flooded his senses and drove out all his confusion. The two were so close, and Char's guard was momentarily down - with sharp defiance rushing back in his veins, Vinnie got to his feet and punched his opponent as hard as he could, right in the face.

Okay, yeah, as unprepared as he'd been, Char hadn't planned on Vinnie coming prepared. There wasn't any time to backpedal; the punch was a direct hit. He staggered back, blood oozing from a split lip, utter surprise written all over his stupid punched face.

But not for long.

"Shoulda fuckin' known." This close-up, Vinnie's fists hadn't missed, but Char's wings didn't have much room for error. It was certainly a move Vinnie must have known well by now: only the split-second flaring of wings gave warning before they snapped forward, firing off a point-blank Air Slash. He might be off to a rough start, but Char was far from giving up that easily.

Shit. Even if Vinnie was no longer weak against Flying moves, he still dreaded the Air Slash. And at such a close range, he might as well have just walked himself into a blade. There was barely enough time to try and bring his arms up to shield himself, but even then, trying to block the wind was a futile exercise. The attack cut open his forearm and blew past this meager defense to slice away at him with what felt like a myriad of invisible razors. Hot blood seeped from his arms, shoulders, chest, even his face.

If Vinnie was smart, he would've thrown up a Smokescreen to try and hide himself, like he did in the first battle. But instead, what ran through his head was the singular desire to try and make Char pay for the attack in kind.

With a snarl, the once-Venusaur threw himself at Char with a wide sweep of his claws, trying to Slash him open in one long swipe.

In his human form, Char wasn't nearly as strong, but their close quarters didn't really afford much time for getting out of the way, and a Charizard looking to sink his claws into something wasn't easy to shake off. Rather than backing off, Char stepped in once he saw Vinnie bringing his hand back for that massively telegraphed Slash.

He didn't have the brute force required to stop Vinnie's arm completely, but he did have one thing: he caught Vinnie's wrist, arm trembling with the exertion needed to even slow down a much-stronger arm, but sparks immediately crackled around his hand. It wasn't a full and proper Thunder Punch, lacking the whole punching part, but as long as Vinnie was a temporary Flying-type, being able to discharge any amount of electricity at all was a boon.

Edited (guess who forgot to icon) 2015-02-28 21:54 (UTC)

An involuntary, startled cry of pain slipped out between Vinnie's gritted teeth as contact with Char's electrified hand caused his arm to seize up, from his hand all the way up to his shoulder. And oh, it hurt like a motherfucker. That throbbing agony in his muscles seemed to burn white hot with the voltage he was in contact with. It had barely even been a second, and he was already losing feeling in his fingers.

It was all Vinnie could do to stagger back, tearing himself away from Char's touch. But residual crackles of static lingered, and his arm fell stiffly to his side. The whole limb was completely locked up, paralyzed. No matter how hard Vinnie tried to will his fingers to form a fist, the nerves were too fried to respond.

There was definitely some alarm in his voice as Vinnie hissed, "Fuck ...!"

The seconds that Vinnie spent realizing the trouble his arm was in gave Char enough breathing room to hastily swipe an arm over his face, keeping the blood out of his eyes a little longer. Charizards might have had plenty of limbs to spare, but an arm out of commission definitely tipped the scales in his favour. No chance he was letting that go to waste.

The sparks around his hand dissipated, but no sooner were they gone than Char was stepping in again, this time twisting sharply. Not to kick, (for he had skipped too many leg days,) but to lash out with the bulk of his tail, aiming for the side left vulnerable by Vinnie's paralyzed arm. There was risk inherent in using his tail -- not only because of the precious soul-flame on its end, but because it exposed his back and side in the process. That he'd choose to use it now was a deliberate, overconfident cherry on top, toying with Vinnie's newly weakened defenses instead of exploiting them to the utmost.

Charizard logic at its finest: the more ticked off Vinnie got, the more fun this would be. Maybe Char wanted to make this match last after all.

Char's tail smacked into Vinnie hard enough that he was nearly knocked to the ground. As was probably the intention, his paralyzed arm had caught the brunt of the blow, sending a blinding stab of pain through his whole body as his strained nerves started screaming once more. He barely managed to catch himself with his one good arm to keep from falling over completely, but it was as ungraceful and stumbling as a Venusaur who wasn't accustomed to three extra limbs was going to be.

But in that window of opportunity where Char's back was to him, Vinnie's instincts couldn't help but take the bait. The problem was, his choices for attacks were few. He had no fire at his disposal. Outrage worked once, but with a useless limb, going wild was probably going to do more damage to himself than the opponent. And Slash had just backfired on him.

So, perhaps even more recklessly, Vinnie pushed himself off the ground and lunged at the other dragon with a fullbody tackle, intent on knocking the other Charizard down.

In hindsight, he ought to have expected his showboating to bite him in the ass. He hadn't been expecting anything as desperate as a tackle, though: with no time to turn around, Vinnie crashed into his back, sending Char toppling forward onto the roof. Snow scattered as he threw his arms out in a wild attempt to catch himself, wings unable to do a thing for his balance as long as they were pinned between him and Vinnie.

Even before he had properly processed what had happened, his instincts knew right away how vulnerable this left his horns -- his most-of-him, in fact -- and fell back on the only weapon available. His tail thrashed blindly, desperate to sweep Vinnie away from him before the tables got turned too horrifically.

The downside of only having one usable arm - well, one of many downsides - happened to be that when you were trying to pin someone down, it didn't really work all that well, especially when the person under you happened to be a thrashing dragon with way too many limbs to control.

Char's tail thwacked against Vinnie's wings several times before managing to whip the novice Charizard against the temple in the midst of their struggle. With the tailflame dangerously close to searing Vinnie's eye and sending a stab of pain through his skull, coupled with Vinnie's poor sense of balance with his flailing wings, it managed to knock him off Char and rolling onto the snow beside him. "Ungh--!"

And to think, there were people who thought having a bunch of extra lizardy bits was inconvenient.

That lucky hit had bought Char a chance, and there were two things he needed to keep his advantage now: reach and muscle. He transformed back to his full Charizard bulk as he rose up on his hands, but without hair to slow the bleeding on his scalp wound, there was nothing keeping it from oozing down onto his face. He closed one eye against the blinding trickle of red, so it was with compromised aim that he put that long neck and the jaws attached to it to use: he struck out, viperlike, aiming to sink his teeth into whatever vulnerable flesh he could reach.

Now facing the bulk of a whole dragon coming at him, Vinnie barely had any time to react as Char's jaws clamped down on his only good arm. Like knives, those fangs cut into his flesh, with enough power behind those jaws to tear the meat off of his prey's bones. Vinnie's scream of pain transformed itself into a roar as he forced himself back into a Charizard's body as well, in a vain attempt to defend himself. But while dragon scale may have been more resilient than human skin, it did little to undo the damage when Char's teeth had already sunk into him.

Thanks to the Fire Type's physiology, however, he could still fight back. Vinnie lashed out as well, biting down on the long, thick neck that had graciously put itself in range of his teeth.

The feeling of sharp teeth sinking into his vulnerable throat was enough to tear a pained shriek from Char as well, albeit a much more strangled one, thanks to the pressure on his windpipe and the mouthful of scales he refused to release. Instinct spurred him to cling on gamely, even in the face of this precarious position -- letting go of Vinnie didn't guarantee he would do the same. Even if this was Vinnie he was facing, this was also a fellow male Charizard in his prime; the panicked adrenaline surged through him like it knew those jaws could crush the life right out of him any moment.

With another strangled noise of anguish, Char flew into a flurry of struggling so desperate one might mistake it for an Outrage of his own, if it hadn't lacked the blood-red aura or the fearsome draconic might. He dug in his feet and frantically beat his wings, trying to pull back, while claws lashed out, trying to score whatever part of Vinnie's torso they could get at in hopes of weakening his grip.

Claws cutting bloody streaks across his own neck and chest, wings beating against his sides, Vinnie was still determined to hold on, matching Char for the stubborn instinct to clamp down and never let go. It wasn't until Char's blind clawing nearly took out an eye that he lost his grip and was thrown back again. Vinnie's teeth raked a short trail over the other Charizard's neck before it was pulled out of his grasp and he crumpled back onto the snow.

As the sensation of cold hit him, it took a moment for Vinnie to register the blood pooling in his mouth, his nose, and dying the snow bright red. The gash was drawn across the mouth, over the snout - but at the very least, his eyes were fine. Small mercies, considering the pain that wracked the rest of his body.

One arm paralyzed and another one cut to ribbons in the jaws of his opponent. That left him with barely enough power to even push himself off his back, much less claw back in retaliation. His wings beat uselessly against the ground and he could barely control his own tail that its trashing made for a piddling weapon.

As a last ditch attempt at an attack, he forced his head off the ground and swung his neck into Char's. Kinda like when giraffes fight. It was about just as elegant. Turning your own neck and head into a blunt hitting implement had that distinct grace.

It took Char a moment to recover -- never mind the damage the fangs themselves had done, the pressure of Vinnie's jaws had been so great that it took some doing to coax his airway to open enough to allow a precious lifegiving breath in. While the precious carotid artery had been spared, the blood still flowed freely from the wounds Vinnie's teeth had left. He swayed momentarily, struggling to get the oxygen into his system and gather his focus enough to strike, not even aware that the return of air had fuelled his soul-flame up to a dire Blaze.

Not like he had much of a chance to do anything with it, anyway, before Vinnie's neck slammed solidly into his, sending another wave of stinging pain through his battered throat. His strength gave out for that moment, his neck falling limply against Vinnie's scratched up chest. Aching as he was, though, Char didn't dare stay that vulnerable for long. Even with his arms out of commission, Vinnie could still do plenty with those teeth of his.

Once again, Char switched to his human form, this time with a protracted hiss of agony as his wounded neck shrank down to a more compact version. Painful as that shift was, it at least meant less real estate for desperate jaws to grab at. With Vinnie on his back and his arms that badly damaged, the imbalance in strength between a human and a dragon mattered less -- he pushed off the ground enough to straddle Vinnie, reaching out to try and pin Vinnie's own neck to the blood-spattered ground before he could do any more damage.

Among the considerable drawbacks of using your own neck as a battering ram was this: it hurt you just as much. Plus another hard blow to the skull as Vinnie's head collapsed back into the snow, dazed. He felt numb and exhausted at the same time, and everything seemed to spin as though he'd just gone on another Outraged spree. With the bleeding all over his body showing no sign of stopping, the light-headed feeling was only growing stronger with every passing moment. Panting hard from exhaustion, Vinnie couldn't help but lay there in the snow for a second longer to try and pull himself together.

But before he knew it, a pair of hands were on his neck, pushing down on it and pinning him to the ground. It snapped him out of his stupor almost instantly - roaring, Vinnie tried to crane his head to snap back at Char, but it was no use. On its own, the neck didn't have enough muscle to push off the ground when someone was pushing down on it with their full strength. And it wasn't flexible enough to reach Char's arms from this angle - something his rival probably knew full well. It wouldn't take much for Char to just grab his horns like this either... But no matter how much Vinnie squirmed or writhed, he couldn't unpin himself.

Was this it? Was it really going to end so pathetically? Getting held down, not even by another Charizard's claws but by a humanized form? Vinnie knew, coming into this confrontation that the likelihood of losing to Char like this was high, and yet...

And yet he still wanted to win.

While the feeling of his own tail in a Blaze wasn't unfamiliar, Vinnie had never been able to tap into that power before. But now, his chest heaving with a glowing heat, there was a sensation that was clawing at him from the inside, needing release like a scream, or an explosion.

He wanted Char to know exactly what he was capable of and how far he'd come. He wanted to be able to hold his head up proudly.

Sucking in as deep a breath as he could, Vinnie opened his bleeding jaws and roared, letting loose a huge, pent-up jet of flame into the sky above.

Flames, it might have seemed, weren't that big of a deal to a Charizard. Charmanders barely a few battles into their lives quickly learned to spit little wisps of flame and scatter sparks from the their tails. They made their homes in volcanoes without a thought, melted boulders with the force of their heat, very literally lived and breathed fire.

That said, the searing burst of flame Vinnie spat out got Char to pause. In spite of the blistering heat and brightness that came with being so close to such intense fire, he didn't look away from it. Tail-flames weren't the only ones that talked, and this was the first time he'd seen Vinnie spit a proper, concentrated flame, not an erratic haphazard spray of sparks.

Half-blinded though he was by the sticky blood that matted down his hair and streaked down his face, aching though he may have been from all the cuts and bruises that Outrage had brought, strained though his breath was in wake of the damage left on his throat, he didn't interrupt -- this was the sort of thing a Charizard lived for. The raw and singular focus of striving for strength, the electric adrenaline rush of life singing through his nerves, the ever-willing spirit only being held back by the fragility of flesh. Like they both would have been eager to keep going at it forever, if they were capable of it. As he looked down at Vinnie, the corner of his mouth twitched up briefly in a strange sort of half-there smile that was infinitely more honest than all the smirks and sneers he had to offer.

He lifted one hand free and leaned forward, stretching up the length of Vinnie's pinned neck. His hand, however, came to rest on the snow next to Vinnie's head, not to either of his horns. Ending a fight with a grip on the horns was a statement of victory, yes, but also one of superiority. Be things as they may between the two of them, a Charizard could be just as stubborn about pride and honour as anything else; whether Char still stung too much to claim rank or he felt Vinnie didn't deserve the humiliation of a horn-pinning, he kept his hand firmly planted right where it was.

"You've had enough." Telling, not asking, because neither of them would ever say yes to that question -- dragons never quite knew when to quit.

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25th bloom; Like a Dragon

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only if you're laying on it too /suggestive eye waggle

spends 3 weeks getting ready for bed

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might as well just keep using this icon

truly an appropriate choice

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