Once We Were Friends: Now We Are Not -- Will You Accept My Fists as Tokens of My Frandship???

[tank_rockarms]

Who: Max, Char
What: Max and Char punch each other into frandship
Where: THE STADIUM
When: Afternoon, Tues. Oct. 28th
Warnings: Vulgarity and Panching.

Max was in the stadium to get a few pieces of equipment for class. Class is more fun when there's a giant man with blue hair yelling at students to block the Mr. Saturns that they're tossing at each other.

It was odd, keeping Mr. Saturns around to throw at each other, but life has its little idiosyncrasies.

And so, Max was rooting around, looking for spare giant-nosed, oddly speaking, bewhiskered creatures.

What he wasn't looking for, dear reader... was a challenge.

Comments

[rivalkidneypunch]

Which was a shame, because it was a challenge he would get. One that probably did not involve any Mr. Saturns at all.

You see, Char was headed to the Stadium, hoping to vent some steam by chewing up a Sandbag or two. When he got there, he instead found Max. He stopped, considering whether to immediately leave or not, but it had been a long time since they'd fallen out. Not long enough for Char to completely forgive Max -- forgiving was not really something that was in his nature -- but enough that he no longer felt the sting of his subjugation so keenly.

After a moment of standing there in silence, Char made up his mind.

His wings snapped open, flaring as big as he could make them, and he announced his presence with a resounding roar. There it was. The Challenge.

[tank_rockarms]

Max turned around when he heard the roar, a solitary Mr. Saturn in his hands.

"Char," said Max, the Mr. Saturn wiggling sort of adorably in his hands. This was officially the first time Char had done or said anything to him in over two years without Max initiating it, so this was certainly an unexpected experience.

And yet, Max was perfectly well aware of what that stance and that call meant. He'd spent a week in getting those stupid challenges every morning at dawn, and having to fight a certain nettlesome douchelizard off.

He set the Mr. Saturn down on the ground. It started to slowly waddle away -- ZOOM, BOING -- from where he'd set it. "You want me to grab a hammer, or do you want this just fists?"

[rivalkidneypunch]

"Fists," Char answered, "unless you think you really need the hammer."

Which was a pretty cocky response, considering his record against Max thus far was approximately 0 wins to eighteen zillion losses and all. Still, Char was nothing if not fearless to the point of stupidity when it came to instigating fights.

And also he had secretly bribed that Mr. Saturn to rig the fight. It stealthily readied the syringe of horse tranquilizers. Okay, not really, it just continued to feel groove over yonder.

[bluetanker]

"You know I don't need nothin' but my fists to kick your ass," answered Max bluntly. This wasn't a boast, it was simple fact.

He sauntered over to the stage selection -- one of the few pieces of non-heavy-demolitions machinery Max felt confident in operating. "Any preferences for the stage, or do you just want me to hit random and you pray you don't end up with a stage covered in water?"

Little did the Mr. Saturn know, that we've secretly replaced the fine horse tranquilizers usually served here with Folger's-brand horse steroids. Let's see if anyone can tell the difference!

[rivalkidneypunch]

Stupid facts. Stupid smug-ass facts.

"Just hit Final Destination. I ain't in the mood for no gimmicks." Also, no items. Fox only.

There was also the fact he wanted an arena with open skies -- flying had become a big part of how Char fought, after all, and he knew Max plenty well enough to tell that staying out of arm's reach definitely was a good plan.

[tank_rockarms]

Max punched the stage in per Char's request. Final Destination. The destination where things were definitive.

The stadium shimmered and reshaped itself into the simplistic, flat stage. Nowhere to run and hide, but Max was fine with that. He figured that Char would be using the skies to his best advantage.

For whatever reason, on the stage, the fire didn't actually... kill you... like fire was supposed to. Not right away, anyway. He could stand a couple of blasts from whatever Char would throw at him, and go in for the kill when needed.

"I ain't gonna hold back." Max didn't know how to. He stomped up onto the stage on one end, and waited for Char, and the subsequent countdown to begin.

[rivalkidneypunch]

"When've I ever needed or wanted you to hold back?" Char snapped back, irritated that Max even needed to say anything. He might have lost a few times -- well, okay, he might have lost every single time, but he still had no interest in a win that only came because Max felt bad for him.

He took his place as the countdown started. Once it ticked down, he wasted no time: he got into the air. If Max wanted to get at him, then he was gonna hafta close the distance himself. Wings working furiously to keep him in the sky, Char spat a Focus Blast down at Max. If his strategy was transparent, what did he care? It was solid enough: snipe at Max from outside his range until he's worn down, plain and simple.

[tank_rockarms]

Oh, my beautiful, beautiful, starchild lizardman. Max teaches the class about combat basics. He was going to consider this to be a practice in the essentials of combat. The blocks, the grabs, the basic punches and kicks. Max was going to win this one on the fundamentals. Fun-da-mentals.

Max dropped and rolled to the side. The focus blast buzzed passed his shoulder. The poor Mr. Saturn off in the corner took the brunt of it; boing on, you brilliant diamond; boing on. Max rolled back into a standing position.

"Come on, like you mean it," shouted the man who was actually egging on a charizard. Max's plan also revolved around 'make the Charizard mad, so he'll make stupid mistakes.'

Max is a brilliant military strategist.

[rivalkidneypunch]

Okay, Focus Blast? Not so great accuracy. No problem. Char had several other ranged options at his disposal. He wasn't going to ditch his plan that easily -- experience had made it very painfully clear that he couldn't outmuscle Max, so his best bets were to hope that he could beat Max when it came to brains or agility, at least.

But even if the protein mountain standing before him was actually lighter on his feet and tricksier, then at the very least, he'd maybe be able to wear Max out a bit with a game of flaming dodgeball. Flying was easy. He could keep this up for a good long while.

So Char decided to try it like he meant it, swooping by overhead and spitting a Flamethrower down at Max.

[tank_rockarms]

And now that Max had demonstrated the art of moving slightly to one side, he was going to show another artful art -- blocking.

An adorable bubble appeared around Max He put the slab of beef he called his forearm up in front of his face to block the brunt of the fire. It was hot, it was forceful, but Max was heavy, and wasn't about to be shoved around by one little flamethrower, not this early in the fight. His forearms had spent months, entire seasons, in front of his blacksmith's forge. His arms were inured to flames hot enough to melt iron.

He couldn't do this forever, of course. But he could do it for a moment while he figured out just how long Char could both fly around and breathe flames down at the same spot before he had to readjust thanks to his flight pattern.