Black Coats: Volume 1

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Continuing to shoot bullets at the statue as it became wet and frozen, some of Rydia's bullets began to shatter bits of ice. She wasn't sure if they were actually making any real damage on the statue, but the most she could do was shoot and soak it while breaking what was on it already. She probably figured if she had more experience she could shoot water with enough pressure to slice through the statue, but that wasn't something she was able to do right now. Even the host of Seiryu beforehand was barely able to do so, and he had much more time practicing with techniques.

She began to hear as Dastgir talked about his home and stuff, and it began to turn into a long-winded story. About the third sentence in she stopped caring and gave control of her body over to Seiryu while she tucked her consciousness away and ignored what was going on. Hearing someone's personal history wasn't something she was interested in, and she really didn't care either. All she wanted was to finish up whatever they were doing so she could get back home and continue what she was doing. Though the thought made her wonder what she really was doing, since two nations were in a war and all she was doing was running around and keeping people out of harms way. It made her wonder when exactly she stopped caring about other people, but it didn't matter to her. All she wanted was to do her own thing.

As her partner turned around and apologized, Seiryu was the one to respond instead and stopped firing. "Sorry, but Rydia took off shortly after you began your speech. She wanted me to tell you she doesn't really care about your life's story; that it's your business, not hers. Don't take it personally, she does it to everyone when personal things start to come up in conversations."

 

Vallus wasn't sure as to why, but there was a faint alarm sound in the back of is mind when Aeira had mentioned his inability to fly. It was a given that he couldn't fly, so she was just stating the obvious so why would there be something off about that. The answer had made itself clear once Aeira grabbed on to his arm and launched him into the air. Uttering the words "What the hell!" As he went flying through the air, reaching the apex of his unwilling ascent, it was easier to spot the tallest building and its general direction. Despite how much of a plus that was, he didn't appreciate being tossed in the air like this.

The descend down wasn't as hazardous as it was for a certain red haired elsword character thanks to his time ability. A few consecutive uses of this and he was safety on the ground. "Never do that again." He said, then pointing off towards the direction of the building. "Its that way however."

 

Dastgir eventually stopped and stood his halberd up on it's rounded end, pointing the blade skywards. He let go of the shaft and turned to Rydia, the halberd unmoving. "I don't appreciate being let off to a third party. If she wants to be an adult, she can face her problems and not treat me like an inconvience." he spoke bluntly. "So force her to take back over and let me speak to her directly."

He waited and ended up not caring if they switched or not. "I understand not caring is a good defense, but try and at least listen to somebody. I listened to your dragon and I could just zone her out." he turned back to the statue and gave it one good, hard stab. A large crack came from the point of impact, showing their plan was working. He walked towards it again and pressed his hands back, starting to freeze the water that was soaked in. If his plan were to work, this statue would break very soon.

"It should break soon so long as you work with me." he said, staring at the dog statue. "Oh sorry,you zoned me out again, didn't you?" he scoffed.

 

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Melus was a little grateful that question was answered fairly quickly, and she liked the artwork for the cat quite a bit. It was a better scavenger hunt than looking for the word "cat" or something. Melus quickly made a note of their coordinates and listened to his question and she looked towards him and sighed, "If you want my honest opinion, we should try and take out one of the coats. Not because I think the other guy is stronger necessarily, but because I do not know anything about him or his power level. Sure, it would be easier to isolate the Echo lookalike since his partner is a Red. But the problem is that we could end up painting more of a target on our backs if he poses a challenge. We could get rid of one of the coats, oooor, we could go after some of the newbies. That still has the same complications as going after the Echo lookalike. Soooo, I either recommend we tell Luther to op-stay on the illing-kay and wait until we have a better vantage point.. we could take out one of the coats, maybe Aeira or Vallus. Or we can try and take out the lookalike now with a probability of failure. Your call at the end, I'm not exactly a run-and-gun type."
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Koa walked along with Finlay to their test. He was actually a bit curious as to what this test would entail. He hoped that Finlay would keep himself calm and collected throughout this. As they approached the park, they had seen an elderly man with a chess board in front of him. "Is this our test? A chess game huh..." Koa was actually a little interested and a bit impressed. Finlay had then spoke to the young man. "So how does this little thinkin' game work lad?" Koa looked at Finlay before looking at the chess board. "Well, your main objective is to checkmate your opponent's king before they can checkmate your king. I've played it a couple of times but I'm still learning bits and pieces." He looked at the old man before shaking his hand. "A pleasure to meet you sir." He smiled a bit before looking at Finlay. "So....who's going to be playing?" ​

 

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Rydia continued to stay out of the conversation with Dastgir as he got angry about her ignoring his personal tale. She didn't really care if he got upset, since she wasn't around to get all buddy-buddy with these people. In fact, she wasn't even sure why the guy started sharing that story of his in the first place. If it was because Rydia had told him about her world, that was only to clear up a misunderstanding about Seiryu, nothing more. It seemed pointless to her to learn about people's pasts, since it didn't really effect the present situation.

Hey, Seiryu, get this guy to stop complaining already, I'm tired of listening to it. Rydia wasn't interested in coming out right now, so she just spoke to Seiryu in her head.

Outwardly, Seiryu began to sigh as she dealt with her host's immaturity. "I don't think she'll be coming out right now. She doesn't like to deal with people in general, and keeps away, for the most part. When you started that story of yours it just made her uninterested and she didn't want to hear it is all. Like I said, you shouldn't take it personally."

 

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Aeira watched as Vallus soared in the air, waiting patiently as he began his descent. When the man had finally come down, he seemed less then pleased about her method of giving him flight, simply saying, "I cannot promise that. But,"she nodded as he pointed towards the building they had to go to. As the two of them made their way in that direction, Aeira said, "once we get there, I'll do the climbing. Just make sure nothing stops me." As the challenge was incredibly simple, she was positive there was something more to it then just climbing. Which was annoying. But climbing was simple. So, she decided she'd much rather deal with just the climbing part and leave the annoying part to Vallus.

 

Koa looked over as Finlay immediately sat down across from the elderly man. He took some deep breaths to calm himself down. He needed to trust that his partner could handle this calmly and rationally. Before he could take another deep breath, he heard Finlay's voice ring out. "Yer goin' down yah ol' fart makin' waste o' meat!" Koa immediately face-palmed as he let out a sigh. "Greeaaatt....." He let out another sigh before opening his eyes to look at the board. Finlay had then asked for his partner's assistance. "Alright. Since yah no the most about this here game, I'll let you be mah eyes and ears. If the main goal is to checkmate the king, This should be over real quick." He scratched his head a little bit before responding. "Alright that's-" Finlay had then immediately asked his first question. "Right...Now which one's the king?" Koa face-palmed once again. The elderly man had then pointed out the King's piece to his partner. Finlay had then looked over to the old man's king and picked it up. "Oh no.." Finlay had inspected the piece and then opened his mouth. "Well, I consider that to be 'checked' well enough. So... We win then?" Koa picked up his hand and once again...face-palmed. "This is going to be a looongg test..." He walked up to Finlay, immediately took the piece out of his hand, and placed it back on the man's side of the board. "That is not the way you play. Now apologize to him." He pointed to the elder as he scolded Finlay. ​

 

Koa rubbed his temples a little bit before whispering to himself. "It's progress at least." Finlay had started to complain about the game for a little bit. Koa sighed before speaking. "Strategy doesn't have to be all brawn. Sometimes strategy can be laid out simply just like a game board." As Finlay rummaged through the other games, Koa sighed before thinking to himself. He needs to be able to calm down and realize that using brawns won't always be able to solve the problem. Koa closed his eyes as he was deep in thought before re-opening his eyes. He had then heard Finlay speak to him. "I'd like to gracefully and incredibally humbly, allow mah partner here to take over." Koa couldn't understand what was happening. "Abadawha now?" Before Koa could interject, a demonic voice had reached his ears. "You have chosen your champion. Select your challenge or face erasure!" He turned to the old man with a slightly shocked expression on his face. "Uhhh....okay then....h-how about some checkers?..Haha...ha..." Koa awkwardly laughed as he chose the next game.
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"If she....didn't want....to talk to people.....she should have....stayed away from.....the gathering of....people!" he said this sentence with each stab of his halberd. The stabs were now causing damage tot he statue and chipping away at it, little by little. The last one caused a giant crack to form down the side of the statue, pieces crumbling down and laying at his feet. He let his weapon go and stood back, watching it disappear into sparkles while he tried to catch his breath.

Dastgir ran his fingers through his hair and scratched his head while he thought about things going on. He pressed his free hand to his chest and rubbed the design on his chestplate. "I can understand not wanting to care for other people, but as it is, I'm her partner for this mission. We were merely talking of our worlds and she suddenly shut me out, even after talking to me of her own. That is just disrespectful to speak of yourself but care not for others." he spoke, looking to Seiryu. "I at least appreciate that you are speaking to me. At least you have some degree of respect for others."

Dastgir pulled his hood back up as his eyes let off a slight glow. He held his hands out and did a small movement with them before he placed them back onto the broken statue. He focused his ice into the crack, hoping the water had done it's magic and was making the stone part brittle. The metal that was coming forward as a means to give support was looking bent and warped from things. However, it was still holding strong. "Get her to focus her bullets onto the metal and see if she can shoot straight through. I'm sure with some focus she can do this."

 

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As Rydia was about ready to come back from her little shut-away of the world, she noticed that the statue was getting fairly brittle by this point. Seiryu had been firing the guns for the past while, and Rydia figured she'd just let Seiryu finished the job herself. They shared the same body after all, so it was somewhat like she was helping, plus hearing Dastgir complain, she kind of wanted to stay back even more.

"Alright, give me a chance to line this shot in," Seiryu steadied her guns and began firing at some of the metal that Dastgir pointed at. "And it wasn't like we came here of our own choice. We were just minding our business when a storm hit and we ended up here. I'm sure all Rydia cares about is getting back to her world and dealing with whatever she was dealing with. Plus, I can tell you for a fact, she wasn't telling you about our world as info about her, she was telling you for you to understand me. Trust me, she won't tell you anything about herself personally."

Rydia was getting annoyed with how chatty Seiryu had gotten in the past few minutes and got control of one of her hands and used it to slap herself in the face. She had hoped that a smack would get her chatterbox partner to shut up and leave her out of the conversation.

"Move over Seiryu, I need to make one thing clear." Wresting control from Seiryu, Rydia pointed her gun at Dastgir. "Just so you know, I don't care what you think of me. My only concern is getting what I need to do done, and that's the only reason we're partners in the first place. Right now the only thing in common between us is our goals, that's it. Working together is fine, but don't expect me to get all buddy-buddy. And if you got that impression of me for telling you about Seiryu, then get that out of your head right now."

Rydia stopped there and gave back control to Seiryu, waiting for what happens next.

"Well, it seems she had a bit on her mind to get out." Seiryu chuckled slightly and began firing again. "I wonder if maybe you touched a sore spot."

 

Dastgir stopped and looked at Rydia, the tint to his eyes fading. "Hm..." he listened to her. He was fine until a gun was pointed at him. He twirled his halberd and pointed the blade mere inches from the girl. "Buddy-buddy may not be what will happen, but you can't go idly threatening those around you." he spoke, a smile spreading on his face, revealing sharp teeth. "Partner's are supposed to get along, now. Find things we've got in common. Luckily for you, we already have one thing in common. We both want to get home. So let's give up on this fighting and get back to our task at hand. We're pretty close to our goal, I'd say."

It was true. The statue was nearly destroyed by now and just needed a few more good shots and stabs before the stone crumbled away and left metal. Dastgir pulled his weapon away from Rydia and smirked a sharp-toothed grin towards her. "Also, it seems we have some special eyes, hm?" he chuckled. "Though mine come and go. Yours are due to Seiryu, right?" he spoke.