Solo Spark of Life

[Belugnir]

Joy mixed with anger at the notion that Rastmo was dead, and the ferocious ecstasy of murder drove his killer on from there. In the lengthy breath it took him to snap the old slaver's neck, three of Rastmo's lackeys had already piled around him and contorted a fruitless flurry of kicking and stabbing Ein, one even attempting to pull his arms free of the slaver just before the bones in the old man's neck gave in.

With the four functional fingers left in his right hand, Ein grabbed hold of the man who'd attempted to remove himself from reach an instant too late. Grabbing onto the collar of a shirt, Ein pulled upon its bearer's body as leverage, bringing his own legs forth into a crouch and causing the man he grabbed by garments to loose balance and fall over meanwhile the young mercenary sprung to his feet, almost delivering an elbow strike to one of the thugs who was able to duck away in the nick of time.

And so Ein's momentum ended up propelling him forward, first with a tumble, before getting to his feet proper and breaking into a right sprint. A fiendish grin bubbled up on his face. The knife stuck in his hip, the broken-off blade that stuck out from above his clavicle, his broken fingers and arms that threatened to fracture under the cramped djed he locked within them... none of it seemed to matter. Not an ounce.

What mattered were the blurred shapes of men who followed Rastmo this far North to hunt him down. With lethal blood loss and tethering on the edge of overgiving, he could not see their faces, their hesitant, if not outright terrified expressions as they looked upon a corpse that refused to stop moving. What Einar did see was the shape of a man as it approached, brandishing forth the shine of steel upon the blur of a sword.

The notion that someone in this world would fight or risk their life for the memory of a filthy whore's son like Rastmo overtook the last ounce of sense which told Ein to try and make a run for it. It was not that he was a mindless beast, he could think plenty well.

And the one thought on his mind was murder.

WC: 386

[Belugnir]

Rather than attempt to duck or dodge under the blade lunged at him, Einar pounced, bringing himself down on all fours like some starved hound, before leaping forth at the fellow. Once again pain was an alien memory, in its place only the afterthought that a worked hunk of steel had pierced through his belly and came out his back. Only at that point did it also occur to him that he no longer wore his armor... yet still, it didn't matter.

Ein felt his hands come clasping about the man's shoulders, feet coming down as if into a crouch, pushing against the poor sod's belly, the momentum of Ein's leap driving the man that skewered him to fall upon his back with Einar on top. As Rastmo's lackey bounced the back of his head painfully off of the ground, Ein saw fit to expand upon it by smashing his own forehead into the blur that was his foe's face. Then he lunged in, baring a breath thick with blood, and even over the crossbow bolt still lodged in his mouth, Ein's jaw clenched about the lackey's throat, and a sickening sound of wetness and gnashing teeth came to grace the newest victim's comrades.

Rising up from his kill, Ein flailed about his arms, as if trying to bat off the fellow's head just for good measure. An unnatural, chortling laughter crept forth from his maimed gut. Yet before he rose to his feet fully, he felt something heavy strike at the back of his head, sending him to roll over forwards, sword, knives and all still stuck inside his body.

When the ground was properly beneath his feet he was on all fours again, growling at the vague image of a man that held a polearm with which he'd just struck him, and sure enough, that figure was swiftly joined by another pair of armed fellows. Though, with an axe finding its way down into his exposed back, Ein's attention was swiftly drawn from those three to the side, where he got to take note of a trembling figure, frightfully letting go of the long weapon when the man whom it should have killed responded only by turning his head.

WC: 371

[Belugnir]

An attempt to grasp the sword in his gut and pull it forth only ended in the weapon dully falling onto the ground, denying him proper grip, with the gaping wound left in his belly at its wake forcing him to remain hunched over like a beaten hound. Letting the djed cramped in his arms discharge, Ein used what flare of additional strength it granted him to reach for the weapon lodged in his back, grab hold of its long handle with the three good fingers of his right hand, tear it from his back, nearly digging out his own shoulder blade in the process. He continued that single motion into a wild, senseless swing after the man who struck the poleaxe into his back to begin with, and who, at that point, had moved well out of reach, fleeing for the hills.

It was long since all the yells and shouts of the stunned men surrounding him had faded into a continuous, nonsensical buzz, yet Ein had enough awareness left to notice and flaunt his regained weapon over at the three armed fellows as they attempted an approach, halting their advance. As he flailed the poleaxe anew, Ein almost... scurried away to set a distance between himself and the three.

Just barely did he recognize their shapes as those of men at this point... yet what he did see, what he could sense, was some odd wreckage of satisfaction. Of joy. He could just barely see it with his eyes, but he knew they were trembling, shaken and hesitant. By all rights and reason, he ought to have been a corpse five and some times over by now. And even in his murderous trance, somewhere within, Ein was well aware of the fact as well.

Heaving breaths that he had not a right to breathe, he could only guess at how many of Rastmo's band had still remained in the encampment, how many may have turned tail completely. How many hadn't the guts of those three to even approach him. It made him feel powerful. Unstoppable. It made him laugh, albeit the only sound that escaped him in earnest was the shrill, raspy titter befitting of the horrid monstrosity that he'd degraded to. Crippled, on the edge of deafness and blindness... yet still self aware and with naught but murderous intent.

Then something... odd came to pass, putting to rest the brief stalemate between fear and waning wrath. A gentle, unnatural light crept up at the edges of his ruined sight, and from the rumbling silence he made out a frightful yell.

''--and just bloody finish the gods-damn fiend!'', a desperate voice demanded, and between the three figures ahead, he noticed the man in the middle shoving the other two forward, spearheads baring at Ein's hunched frame.


WC: 468