fandomtownies | The beach, Friday afternoon

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The beach, Friday afternoon

Dinah had snagged an umbrella and made her way out to the beach after lunch, not sure if she and Azula would be sparring or not, with the syrup raining down. By the time she got there, though, it was mostly just sprinkling, so she settled down under her umbrella and practiced her meditation while she waited for Azula.

Dinah. Not-Dinah. Shields go up. Shields go down. Me. Not-me. Nervous. Not-nervous. ... okay, so that last one needed work.

[for

azuldragon, but open to spectators/gawkers afterward for each.]

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"Weird rain," Azula said, she was behind Dinah again, sitting on a rock. She had a red umbrella.

Dinah's "gaaaah!" stayed internal this time, but the full-body freeze-and-relax had to be noticeable. She turned around to give Azula a raised eyebrow and a, "Yeah, it is. Better than pop-tarts, though. We're still on, right?" She stuck her hand out from under her umbrella, and squinted upwards.

See, she could do nonchalant.

Azula smirked a little at Dinah's bravado. It was sprinkling and soon it would be over. She put her left hand out of the umbrella, palm up. The sticky rain fell on her hand and began to smoke when it hit her skin.

"We're still on," Azula confirmed.

...not that that was intimidating or anything. Noooo.

Dinah folded her umbrella shut, stuck it in the sand at the edge of the beach, and got to her feet. The sand was still sticky with syrup swirls, so she decided to leave her shoes on as she approached the surf. "So. How do we want to do this? Just go?"

And she turned to look at Azula warily, half-expecting her to start that instant.

Azula did the same and placed her umbrella next to where she sat and stood-up. Her boots were designed to adapt to any situation but she could feel the stickiness every time she moved. It was something to consider during the fight.

"This is a spar, albeit informal, there are some forms to be followed." She moved forward, closing the distance between them but stopped at the appropriate distance. "We bow to each other first, as a sign of respect and then we begin."

Dinah relaxed a little, then tensed and gave Azula a careful bow from the waist, like Helena had taught her, then straightened, and felt into her ready stance, smile starting to lurk around the corners of her face. "Ready when you are."

Strange bow. Azula stubbornly kept to her traditions, brought her hands up and placed her right fist a little below her left palm then bowed.

Soon after Azula fell into a Firebending crouch, hands up. She was in a state of readiness and yet she was completely relaxed.

"You can come at me anytime."

Dinah knew better. Really, she did. But she only had so much patience, no matter how hard she tried.

Not a lot to throw at Azula here, so she simply grabbed the nearest piece of driftwood with her TK and hurled it at her from the side, eyes already scanning the area for other potential weapons.

Azula ducked the oncoming driftwood, slip sliding out of its way and waited some more. She was infinitely patient and she wanted to see what Dinah could do given the chance to fight back.

Now after that, Dinah could wait, and start circling, seeing if she could lure Azula into doing something if she got closer.

And if she saw an opening, she was throwing a punch.

Seeing there were no more attacks coming Azula decided to press the issue, she leapt forward in a roll and delivered a devastating kick, fire sprang from Azula's feet but instead of blue fire, the fire was orange.

She had dialed down the intensity but the fire was still powerful.

The fire and the kick was a feint and soon Azula sprang to the left, hand chambered to the side ready for a punch.

Holy crap!

Dinah dodged the kick, then swerved when she felt the heat from the flames, eyes wide and hello, what did you think you were getting into? She tried to push the fire away, although without being able to focus it only seemed to gutter, not actually move; air had probably passed by it with that attempt.

And instinctively kicked out toward Azula with her other foot, frantically trying to think strategy.

Azula was no longer where Dinah had kicked out, flowing around, Azula released the punch she had chambered to the side, she had her other hand ready should Dinah strike too.

Now that, Dinah could manage to block, albeit clumsily, since Azula was so practiced and fast. Stumbling backward, she re-centered herself, and then punched forward, hard, one-two-three combination, and spotted more driftwood and a bunch of shells behind Azula. A-ha.

The punch surprised Azula, not for its combination but that Dinah could strike hard. One punch hit her arm and she compensated by falling into another crouch and striking upward.

Arthur's insistence on her using weights for the sword training had paid off; she could hit as hard as most guys by now.

"Ow!" Okay, that strike connected, knifing pain into her side, and Dinah pulled the double-handful of debris behind Azula, sticky with syrup and wet from the ocean, towards her back, doing a diving roll away.

Edited 2009-09-04 23:44 (UTC)

Azula glanced behind, saw the debris head straight for her and launched herself in a back flip, ending in a crouch. The momentum allowed her hand to swing forward and as she completed her arc, she made a stabbing motion with two fingers towards Dinah, orange fire flashed towards the other girl.

Why had she thought this was a good idea again?

"Agh!" Dinah was diving away, but one arm still felt the heat enough to singe the sking on her arm as bad as a sunburn, hot and tight, ow ow ow and she cartwheeled toward the water, diving in. Cold! But the burn hurt less, and she felt more confident, and stupid for not having started this standing in the water.

Maybe she should quit. Maybe she should just call it off now.

Azula didn't move to the water but she was at the edge and with a high inside Crescent kick followed by another Crescent kick, more fire headed for Dinah.

"You really should be more aggressive," Azula said conversationally, as she did this.

"Bite me," was Dinah's response, and there went any chance of her quitting.

Being in the water gave her enough of an idea, and she slammed her TK into the knee-depth water, aiming an arm-sized splash at each bolt of fire headed toward her.

"You're not my type," she returned, sweetly.

Using water, was she? It wasn't waterbending but it was annoying. Azula charged her fire up a little, increasing the intensity this time she didn't focus the fire with two fingers but concentrated it on her fist.

She punched forward, the fire slowly powering through.

"Good thing," Dinah bitched back. "Hate to disappoint--"

Damnit, Azula was strong, and really good at this, and her own experience wasn't enough to make it so she could manipulate water any better than this, or build up a TK shield like Karla had tried to show her. She dived away again, under the water, letting the flames shoot over her head, and looked upward, think, damnit!

Can't fight fire with fire when you have none. Water wasn't enough. Earth--

Yes!

Dinah burst out of the water at the side, and slammed another TK blast at the sand in front of Azula, sending up a huge spray of swirling dust and silicon in front of the flames.

Edited 2009-09-05 00:15 (UTC)

Azula was surprised when the sand exploded in front of her, driving the Firebender back in surprise. Since the fire she'd been throwing was only a low powered regular fire, it didn't have the concussive effect her blue fire had.

The fires gutted a little before dissipating.

As for Azula... she dropped back into the sand and brought up a foot to shoot more flames.

Or she would have. She'd fallen into the part of the beach where a puddle of sticky syrup collected instead of the smooth flow of her kick, Azula suddenly found herself off balanced.

Which had Dinah rushing her from the water, hair streaming, shoulder down for a tackle-and-flip to follow up the wave of sand.

Azula threw out her arms, spinning them around hoping to catch her balance then she saw Dinah rushing for her.

She was going to take the battle to the ground. Azula smiled, well then, she'll let her. She no longer struggled against gravity and just as Dinah was close enough, Azula dropped into a split.

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