This Is Absolution (Seth Calloway)

[Darren Blayne]

((No one ever REALLY spectates fights, so this should be unnecessary, but I feel the need to say that this fight, for, y'know, epic-ness purposes, needs to stay un-spectated. Thanks and sorry. This takes place more or less soon after the Let It Bleed thread. Also, control of Seth was authorized, incase you care.))

The day was long over. The fights had been fought, the battles had been won, and the Watchers, it seemed, would soon be gone. For all intents and purposes, Darren had won. Unfortunately for the Captain, though, he did not feel like it at all.

They say the cost of war rarely balances the outcome, and this sentiment was no better personified than in Darren. The Watchers and MacMillan had been ousted, yes, but only thanks to Revelation staging yet another riot, resulting in just as many students hurt and injured as were Watchers, if not more. What's more, if what Darren had seen on the tape was true...

There was little time for more thought, though, for at that moment, the man Darren had been waiting for walked through the back door from the Hircine High main building.

Seth didn't notice Darren at first, considering the Captain was leaning against the wall next to the doors. That is, until, Darren spoke.

"So you killed the Principal."

Seth turned around to view the source of the voice. Whether he was surprised or not that Darren already knew MacMillan's fate, he didn't show it. He said nothing, and Darren followed his own words by simply reaching into his coat and removing a small Mini-DV tape. He held it between his thumb and forefinger, wiggling it a bit to catch the Revelation leader's attention.

"I suppose you really thought we would defeat MacMillan without something to take home from it?"

FLASHBACK

Darren had opened the casing protecting the central wiring system of Hircine High's security system. "You see here, Warren," he spoke as he worked. "This will reverse the indicator diode on the camera in MacMillan's office. Usually it blinks red when the camera is active. Now, it'll do just the opposite."

END FLASHBACK

"I can only imagine what utterly incriminating evidence to murder would be worth to you, Seth," he said again, using Seth's first name for, perhaps, the first time ever. Seth's eyebrows raised slightly, whether or not he was shocked, worried, or simply calculating the odds of Darren bluffing, Darren neither knew, nor cared. The Captain let the tape drop a tiny bit, making a fist around it to catch it as he slipped it back into his inner coat pocket. For the second time today, then, Darren's coat dropped from his shoulders and to the ground, out of the way of the doors.

No one was around, except Seth and Darren. Likely few people would be, either. The police, if they even came, would be crowding around the gymnasium, and if they even bothered to enter the main building at all, they would go through the front doors.

"It is inconsequential, too," Darren spoke again, in reference to the tape's worth to Calloway. "You can have it. As I said, it was to be merely a trophy to me and Tiao. I suspect it is much more to you. However..."

Darren paused, his eyes narrowing at Seth as he stared him down. "This school year has not yet ended, and I am still the School Captain. You attacked and incapacitated two of my Pillars. I cannot allow you to get away with that unpunished."

Darren raised his arms into a fighting stance, his left arm held at mid-torso height, his right stretched out, and bent at the elbow, both hands open and ready. "As per my rules, you have the right to defend yourself, and commence the fight, if you so desire."

Darren pushed his glasses further up on his nose with his left hand, and waited for Seth to make a move or speak. He had spoken all the words he needed to for the day. This was all that was left. A small grin formed on the corner of Darren's mouth. These two fighters had been dancing around this since Seth first stepped foot into this school. Calloway represented nearly everything in opposite of what Darren did. It was only due to MacMillan that it had taken their paths this long to finally cross.

This battle was long awaited, likely by the both of them.

[Seth Calloway]

Still thrilled with his victory, Seth stepped through the back doors of the school with his backpack over his left shoulder, his cigarette hanging out of the right side of his mouth at a jaunty angle. All things considered, everything had gone smoothly, he'd even had time to place the fake bomb back in his pack before leaving. Once he heard the School Captain speak from behind him, however, Seth was forced to stop in his tracks, slowly turning around to face the older boy.

He knows.

The Sophomore said nothing, listening intently to every word Darren said, and purposefully not focusing on the tape that was being waved about. Mentally, he made a note as to where the tape was placed, though what the School Captain said afterwards made it irrelevant. Calmly, Seth waited until Darren was finished, the fighting stance making it clear that there would be few words, if any, left for him to say. The dark-haired leader of Revelation, however, felt it necessary to reply, first.

"To be honest, I'm surprised you're still so eager to go through with this, after what I've done. I'd imagine you either believe you can defeat me, or believe you have an insight into how I am."

Smirking, Seth pulled his cigarette out of his mouth, holding it between his index and middle finger on his right hand and flicking the ashes onto the ground. He rolled his left shoulder, allowing the backpack to fall to the ground, before kicking it back further away from the two of them.

"If it's the former, you would be mistaken. But rest assured, I only do what's necessary. However, if you're intent on standing in my way, I won't hesitate to show you the difference in our skills, as well."

Truth be told, Seth had always hoped it would come down to this, his own battle against the School Captain. If... no, when he won this battle, he would legitimize his own claim to the Captainship. Still smirking, Seth put the cigarette back in his mouth, placing his feet shoulderwidth apart and bending his knees slightly, while his hands were at his sides, palms facing towards Darren, the fingers unfurled in a relaxed pose.

"You're welcome to start us off, Darren. It's only fitting that you perform the first attack, since I'll be using the last."

[Darren Blayne]

Darren listened with little real regard for his opponent's words. Both men were full up enough with arrogance to know the uselessness of attempting to spout it to each other. Seth was simply more verbal about his than Darren.

"You and I both know exactly why we are about to do this, Seth," Darren said in response to the younger student's first remark, and completely passed over the second. As stated before, Darren was never much for a pre-fight banter. To him, he always felt that arrogance needed no such precursor. If you truly were good enough, you wouldn't just talk about it, you would show it. Whether or not Seth embodied this ideal or not, however, Darren was slightly frustrated about not knowing. No matter who he spoke with, or what channels he dug up, all he could find out was that Seth had been in one short fight with one William Fletcher, a generally chaos-driven Irishman who was simply up for a fight. Whether through loyal gang members, or simply a lact of details due to its brevity, Darren knew nothing past that. He allowed one simple sigh to escape his lips.

And then he charged.

Eschewing the general rule of many seasoned fighters to not rush in as fast as possible, Darren burst forth, closing the distance between the two quickly. At about halfway between his original point and his opponent, Darren broke another rule of conventional combat: He took to the air, jumping up and forward to come at Seth from an upward angle. His body coiled up as he rose, but as soon as he began to drop towards his opponent, Darren twisted his body in mid-air and kicked out his left foot, turning his head to face the boy as he opened with a grandiose flying kick to Seth's head.

[Seth Calloway]

"But you and I both know you're far from invincible."

Seth's response seemed to imply that he himself did not share that same weakness, and was spoken during Darren's short sigh of what appeared to be frustration. The younger male remained where he was, silently watching his opponent for the expected slow approach, where the task would begin of analyzing and breaking down each others defenses.

In an explosion of movement, Darren began to charge, causing Seth's fingers to reflexively clench slightly in anticipation, his adrenaline beginning to flow from the prospect of the fight beginning. Once Darren took to the air, the Sophomore would pull his left foot back and towards his right side, turning his body to the left and pulling his head back from the oncoming kick. It was an odd thing to do for an opening move, as an aerial attack was not the most subtle of moves, and Seth was no fool. The thought occured to him that Darren was setting a trap, but the opportunity presented to the younger male was too good to pass up.

While the attacking foot flew past his face, Seth would swing his left hand upwards, clenching his fingers into a fist in a straightforward uppercut, aimed directly between Darren's legs, while his right hand would lift up towards Seth's chest, remaining open. From Darren's vantage point, he would be hard pressed to see the attack coming, as his own body would block his view of Seth's hands until it was far too late.

[Darren Blayne]

As Darren would come down, Seth, rather perceivably, simply moved out of the way. Whether or not he was making a counter-attack at the time or not, Darren could not fully see; however, at this point, it would hopefully be of no importance either way.

While his left leg was extended in kicking fashion, his right leg was chambered, pulled up at the knee and held tightly there to decrease drag through the air. However, as his kick would miss, he would snap out his right leg in a kick from the knee, popping Seth directly in the forehead with his shin, as it was, at the moment, at point-blank range. This would circumvent Calloway's punch, causing it to hit Darren's inner right thigh instead.

As far as his own kick was concerned, it was going opposite of Darren's momentum, and hadn't enough movement for a full swing; however, it would still be likely to disorient the Captain's opponent, and send him stumbling backwards. Regardless, as he landed, crouching down onto his left foot, Darren would shoot out his right foot again, hooking it outwards in an attempt to capitalize on the disorientation he had predicted in his opponent, to catch the inside of his left leg and pull it out from under him.