heroslayer | rp for girl_ofsecrets: can you teach me how to fight?

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rp for girl_ofsecrets: can you teach me how to fight?

Twenty years ago, the Chelsea Piers had been a disaster area of collapsing sea walls, half-destroyed warehouses, and rickety boardwalks. Ten years ago, the city of New York had restored the place to its former glory, in the wake of its failed demolition. And now? Well, it's not the best neighborhood in the world, bordered by the Meat Packing District, but for the purposes of this exercise, Sylar figures it suits. It gives him free reign to kill anyone who bothers them, without fear of guilt, after all, and well. There probably won't be anyone around in the first place; most people still avoid this section of town.

The corners of his mouth tugging upwards into a pleased, wicked smile, he meanders down the boardwalk, heading for a warehouse he knows to be abandoned. It looks relatively rickety, like it's going to fall into the bay at any given moment, but he knows better--it's held up to super powered spars before. Still, that doesn't stop him from pausing outside of it, once he reaches it, to give it a once over. Nor does it stop him from taking a look inside, just to make sure there aren't squatters hanging around.

Then, once he's satisfied, he moves to the center of the room, leaning against a crate, listening for his niece. And to his credit, he manages to stand still for all of a minute and a half before he gets restless enough to start considering very literally climbing the walls. Hopefully, Claire will show up soon.

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Claire had read about Chelsea Piers when she had wanted to learn about New York a little more after moving there. So she did know where it was and how to get there even with knowing that it wasn't the best place for a petite and seemingly harmless blond to head to. Well, she could be harmless except that she was carrying a gun and she was willing to do anything to get out of trouble if she was attacked. Whether it was someone from Primatech or Pinehearst, or even not. She didn't care, she would just shoot and run.

Of course Sylar also had that super sensitive hearing that she was banking on too and she could let out one hell of a scream if she needed to. So she told herself to not worry as she headed down to the area that he had suggested going to. Where they could train and no one would bother them. It would teach her something, get his aggression out and honestly? It would help with the trust between them.

Spotting a warehouse, she tilts her head to the side and looks around before moving forward. She could take a peek in there, see if Sylar was around or maybe she would wait there for him. It looked like a good place to train. Walking in as quietly as she can, she looks around for any sign of anyone and then she spots Sylar leaning against a crate. Offering a smile, "Seems like we had the same idea." She motions at the warehouse.

Sylar pops one shoulder in a shrug, outwardly calm for how dangerous he'd admitted to feeling earlier, and pushes away from the crate. For all he's managing to make it look like this is just another meeting and he's not half out of his mind, however, something in the way he moves towards her betrays him. Maybe it's the set of his shoulders. Maybe it's the slink in his step, more predatory than the last time she saw him, and thanks to Mohinder. Either way, though, it's there and he's not in the right state of mind to try and hide it.

"Cliche, maybe," he admits, "but it's abandoned like you wanted. And I've fought here before."

Perhaps he was trying to appear calm and like it was another meeting, but she could see it in his body. The way he walks towards her, there is something familiar about it because she has seen him walk like that towards her once before. There was a tiny knot in the pit of her stomach forming suddenly, probably from old memories but she ignores it as she undoes her jacket to shrug it off. She didn't want it wrecked after all. She thought about the gun but she decided against it, getting shot wasn't going to put him in a better mood. So she tosses her jacket and her purse on top of a crate.

"It works fine." She nods, looking around before glancing back at him. "So..."

Before she finishes whatever she might be saying, she suddenly dodges right and plunges between a couple crates to put some distance between them. She knows she can't take him head on.

He makes a small, amused noise as she dodges between the crates, genuinely and pleasantly surprised. In most of the fights he's been in, in rare cases he's let his victims have a chance to down him, there's usually macho posturing before they go at it. One circling the other, trying to find some sort of weakness, even if the odds are usually stacked in his favor. But the fact that she's just jumping into things?

"Well, that's different."

Not that it stops him from raising his hands, bringing them together in an exaggerated gesture, meant to bring the crates together and crush her.

Claire thought about doing the whole macho posturing and dancing around but she knew that she was outmatched. He could easily send her flying, cut her open and do any number of things to kill her. She just barely clears the crates when they crash together and she's fairly sure that she's missing a little bit of hair somewhere but she doesn't stop moving.

Instead she pulls out her cellphone, remembering his hearing as she makes one of the ringers go off full blast and leaves it on a crate before darting behind another one. Trying to control her breathing as best as she can remember, she crouches down and looks for some kind of weapon while listening for him.

Crawling forward, she finds a lead bar and then holds it tightly in her hands while waiting.

Sylar snaps his head in the direction of the cell phone, not pained--it's not loud enough--but taken by surprise, this time in a much less pleasant way. He grits his teeth, flicking his fingers at the phone with enough force to stop it ringing as it hits the wall. It's not broken--he has just enough of a handle on himself to keep from destroying someone else's things--but it's silent, now. And, hopefully, too much of an inconvenience to try and get to, to use against him again.

Turning his attentions back to where she was, he frowns when he notes she's moved, before cocking his head to one side, listening. His ears may still be buzzing from the ring tone, but he can still make out the sound of her breathing. And silently, smirking, he heads in that direction, a hand held out in front of him, just in case she gets the bright idea to try and jump him.

Claire winces a little as she hears her cellphone hit the wall and she grits her teeth, hoping to God that he hadn't broken it or else he would have to replace it. Wetting her lips with a nervous flick of her tongue, she can hear him walking towards where she was hiding and she knew that he knew exactly where she was. Reaching over to grab a box that was near her, she gave it a violent push to send it scraping across the floor as she ducked around the other side of the crate.

That's when she notices another box and she moves quickly, climbing up a little and that's when she spots him. So she doesn't try and jump him from the front but kind of over head. She knows there's a good chance that she's not even going to get close but she can't keep ducking and hiding.

The box, he sees coming, and with a twist of his wrist, it goes the same way as Claire's phone. Where he'd been able to restrain himself for just long enough not to shatter her cell, however, he's not as kind with the box, and it explodes into a shower of jagged splinters.

Keeping that in mind as something he can use later--he's so very fond of breaking things just to impale regenerators on what's left behind--he turns, fluid, trying to track her movement. He's either not fast enough, however, or not expecting her to stop turning tail to run, because the next thing he knows, she's crashing into him. To his credit, at least, he manages to stay on his feet, but he can't help but stumble a bit, half-sideways and awkward, before he regains his center of balance.

"Battering ram," he mumbles wryly, before reaching out for the mess he made of the box, shards rising up from the ground on their own, like angry birds.

Splinters, not good.

She can tell that he was a little surprised by her sudden attack since she had been running quite a bit but that had been her plan. She knew she shouldn't have hesitated with swinging the bar at him but she was still not sure she wanted to hurt him. Already she could hear a voice whispering in her head that she needed to get past that, she needed to always be ready to fight because a hesitation was going to cause a lot of problems. Yes, she could die and come back but that didn't mean she should rely on it.

Hitting the ground and nearly falling, she manages to catch herself as she stumbles to the side a bit. Then she tightens her grip on the bar, seeing the shards and so she swings the bar right at a smaller box to send it flying at him. Hopefully distracting him and maybe causing a small shield if he lets those shards fly.

He throws up his other hand, near immediately, box stopping mid-air. A brief moment of hesitation follows, as he puts his thoughts in order, multi-tasking like no other, and then he sends the splinters flying at her, mindful of her head. He may be in a mood, but he's still not sure how Peter survived, the last time he did something like this, and he's not particularly keen on the idea of killing his niece. Not when this is meant as a lesson--a release--rather than an actual life or death battle.

She could see the second or two that he hesitates and she knows the splinters are coming at her. So she twists around just as the splinters fly at her, most of them hitting her side and her back all the way from her shoulder to her thigh. She stumbled, falling forward and hitting the ground with a grunt as she felt them sliding into her skin. She felt the burn as they buried themselves into her body, some of them very sharp and long. Blood was already welling up to stain her top and her jeans but she doesn't let it stop her.

Pushing back to her feet as she stumbles a little, she tightens the hold on her bar and turns back to him. Lifting it, she grits her teeth a little as she rushes at him with a hard swing of the metal bar in her hands. Knowing that the fact that she was attacking after being hit like that would throw most people off but not him.

Sylar takes a step to the side, trying to get out of her way, but he doesn't move fast enough. He's still not used to relying on pure reflex rather than telekinetic-aided celerity to get around, so it's a simple case of he waited too long to move. But even though he doesn't avoid the pipe in its entirety, he's still far enough out of her reach that he catches the pipe in the side, rather than somewhere more vital, like say, his face.

He's winded for a moment, pain riding up his side in waves, sure she's broken one of his ribs, and then it passes. Healing is a wonderful thing, really. And suddenly sneering, he raises a hand, twisting the slivers of wood that she hasn't bothered pulling out of her back just yet, viciously.

"Lesson one," he hisses. "If you're going to hit me, hit harder."

Claire pushes down the flash of dual emotions caught between guilt and satisfaction as she hits him in the side with the metal bar. She is sure that she has broken a rib or two and she knew that if he didn't have her power, then he would be a lot worse than he is when he heals seconds later.

Then she can feel the slivers twisting inside of her, her breath catching as her knees go a little weak and she is sure that a couple slivers are cutting into something they shouldn't. She can feel her body struggling to fight to push out the wood pieces, just like when she had smashed her hand through a window or when her body pushed out a bullet.

"Swing harder, you mean?" Her eyes narrow and so she pulls back, swinging the bar once more. This time she swings a little harder at him.

He sees the swing coming this time, and holds up a hand, catching the bar, telekinetically, stopping her from hitting him again. It's a double-edge sword, though--or at least it is from his perspective--as he has to stop pushing the splinters further into her, to stop her.

"No. I mean hit harder." As she can see, swinging harder did a fat lot of good, after all. "And while you're at it. Don't let a telekinetic see you coming." Then he's pushing his palm out, to throw her back.

She loses her hold on the bar as he sends her flying back, a grunt exploding out of her as she hit the floor and skidded just a little. She's winded and every time she takes a breath in, it burns. Shifting her weight onto her back, she sits up slowly and reaches back to curl her fingers around the thick end of a splinter. As she pulls it out, she winces a little because it's long and it's jagged. Other pieces of splinters are hitting the floor as she removes the splinter and looks at the bloodied thing. Tossing it aside, she looks back at Sylar.

"So pretty much do that with everyone, right? Because most don't have an ability that's visible right away." She pushes to her feet as she looks at him, wetting her lips as she tries to assess the environment to find a better way to attack him.

"It's good to keep in mind. If they don't see you coming, they can't hit you."

Sylar shrugs, padding over to pick up the bar where she dropped it. He slings it over his shoulder, testing the weight of it--not a parking meter, but it'll do--in order to give her a moment to breathe. Giving himself a moment to breathe, as he's teetering on the edge of out of control, and the smell of her blood in the air isn't helping things. It's like throwing a steak at a panther; luckily, he's better at reigning himself in.

"But don't try to hide, when you move," he adds after a moment. "It draws attention to you."

There's a very fine line between staying out of sight and obviously trying to keep people from seeing you. He's always walked it well--it's why he can overwhelm people with his presence or be the last thing people notice, when he wants to--but it's hard to teach.

Looking at him, she nods her head as she watches him pick up the bar that she had dropped. Now he had the weapon and she was defenseless once more. "So, just keep running or something?" She wonders if that is a good idea, she figures someone can hear her running then.

Her side is healed and she can breath easier which is a nice change from a few seconds before. "Well, maybe not running but moving quietly." The whole place could be a weapon, right? She just needed to learn how to treat the place that way.

Drawing in a breath, she tries to calm her heart down and focus a little more than getting worked up. "So what would you suggest doing?"

He offers her a small, sick smile at the race of her heart, and then sobers, forcing himself to focus on the question and not the near overwhelming desire to take a swing at her with the pipe. Revenge is great, but he's already had it, in twisting the shards in her back, a few minutes ago. He doesn't need more. He needs to remember that.

Taking a deep breath, he tightens his hold on the pipe, metal giving slightly beneath his fingers, finding an outlet for his need for violence before answering. "Don't telegraph how you're going to move. Just decide where you're going and go. Don't hesitate. Don't look in that direction before you move. Don't stop, once you've started. If you do, anyone who's had as much experience reading people as I do will know where you're going." A pause, and then, "Or if you're not in a fight, they'll know you don't belong there."

It's about confidence. When they say in movies that looking like you belong somewhere when you're sneaking around helps, they're right. And, that in mind, without even really thinking about it, he moves behind a stack of crates. Without Suresh's speed. Without his telekinesis. And it's still frightening casual, nevertheless.

Edited 2008-12-14 02:15 (UTC)

She draws in a slow breath again as she takes his words and tries to commit them to memory like a little mantra. Don't telegraph, don't telegraph, don't telegraph. She mutters in her head as she tries to remember that certain piece of advice. She must have really telegraphed her movements before, people always seemed to know what she was going to do.

Looking at him, she wonders how he is feeling. She can see his hand tightening on the metal bar, can hear the groaning and the creak as the metal gives way under his hold. Watching as he suddenly moves casually behind some crates, she shakes her head as she moves forward as though to look for him. "Okay, that's creepy how you do that."

She could see the top of his head over the crates though not as clearly as she got closer. Then, without warning, she places her hand on the crates and gives them a hard push to send them toppling over. Hopefully onto him.

"I've had a lot of practice," he answers, listening as she moves. He tenses a little, expecting an attack to come and to have to dart out of the way, and while it does come, well. He wasn't expecting her to actually take his advice to heart.

He stumbles forward as the boxes come down on top of him. They're not entirely heavy, but he's caught off guard--off balance--and it takes him more than a moment to find his balance. Or it would, if he doesn't decide to roll with it, hitting the ground at what looks to be an odd angle, crates crashing down on top of him. He stays there, unmoving, holding his breath with his eyes closed, waiting to see if she'll take the bait. If she'll think she's hurt him and check on him.

Claire watches as the boxes come down on top of him, surprising her as he actually falls because she wasn't really expecting that and for a second she steps forward but then she stops. She knew he was fine, he didn't have anything shoved into his head and well, he had her power. He couldn't stay down for long and so she narrows her eyes a little as she figures then that he's probably trying to trick her.

Instead she lifts a hand, making a little gun and pretends to pull a trigger, "So here I'd shoot you with a tranq or a taser if I have either one." She stays out of reach even if he does have telekinesis.

He rolls over, pushing the crates away with a combination of physical force and telekinesis, and looks up at her, darkly amused. "You would, yes. But tell me something." There's a pause, as he pulls himself up into a sit, and then, "Would you have checked to see if I was alright, if I didn't have your ability?"

Looking down at him, she considers it for a second as she tilts her head and then gives it a shake. "You, yes but no one else. Not one of them." She brushes a lock of hair from her face, "Tranq them first and have someone else look at them because it's a chance that they're trying to trick me, just like you were." She gives a little smirk at him.

"Very good."

That's lesson two, and he gives her a small, genuine smile for knowing it without him having to teach her. Now comes lesson three--never let your guard down. And, that in mind, he tilts his head to one side, eyes still fixed on her, though his focus is elsewhere, on the pipe where it fell when he did.

Without so much as a gesture, he pushes it across the floor with vicious thoughts, fast and hard enough to trip her up, hopefully. He could do a lot worse, he knows, but again he's managed to keep in mind that this is a lesson, rather than anything else.

Claire flashes a small, genuine smile for at least knowing that lesson as well. The whole lesson three bit, she's been getting better with that since she started taking her classes in self defense. She's better at noticing things around her most of the time and this time she's not caught so off guard.

She hears the scrape of metal against the floor and she looks down to see the bar flying at her. She tries to jump out of the way but the bar still clips her, causing her to grunt as it knocks one foot out from under her and she stumbles.

So she doesn't quite go down like she would have if she hadn't tried to jump out of the way but she still goes down about half way before catching herself on a crate. "Damnit." She mutters, taking a couple limping steps as her body heals itself.

rp for girl_ofsecrets: can you teach me how to fight?

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