Fly High

Nasturtium's ice spells fired off first at Hyacinth, trying to knock her out of the sky. Hyacinth flew, weaving through the ice spells, dodging and knocking away attacks with her staff til she was free. At least of the first salvo. The second came from Scabius who launched bottle rockets filled with god knows what at her. Knowing Scabius' tricks all too well, Hyacinth decided to go low, flying low to ground at Scabius before he can prepare his next attack. Nasturtium summoned a wall of ice to block Hyacinth, the dark elf turning around and landing feet first on top of the ice to avoid a complete crash. Flipping off of the shelf of ice, Borage had already moved into position to swing his broadsword and demolishing the ice with a single swing. With the obstacle cleared, Hyacinth spun around in midair and flew forward to tackle Scabius, carrying him off the ground and away to another part of the city.

Hyacinth dropped her old friend quite literally onto a pile of crates, destroying them as she landed on the ground not far from him. Scabius groaned as he pushed himself off out of the wreck and dusted the detritus off him.

"You're like a completely different person when you're fighting."

"And you're as talkative as always. I wonder how you get any fighting done with that mouth."

"Hey, distractions are a valid tactic."

"...Just in case..." Hyacinth turned around to face Scabius, "You aren't being controlled are you?"

"Has your trust in the king really plummeted so low?"

"Yes."

"Yikes. Are you sure you used to be part of his personal guards?"

"Answer the question, Scabius."

Scabius stared at Hyacinth who waited seriously for his answer. He sighed as he drew a small vial from a pouch,

"This is Veritas Gravitas. A potent truth serum. You want a taste to confirm?"

"No thanks."

"Suit yourself."

And to Hyacinth's shock, Scabius popped the cork off the vial and downed the small amount of liquid in seconds, casually throwing the glass aside.

"I'm not being mind controlled or coerced by the king. And neither is Nasturtium. I chose this of my own volition. There. Happy?"

Hyacinth blinked once, still a bit stunned before answering, "You didn't have to do that."

"Well, I couldn't think of any other way to prove I'm not lying."

"Well...I appreciate it."

"Hey, I'll do anything for a pretty woman."

"Gross."

"Aw dammit. The truth serum's screwing with me."

"Is it now?"

"Yeah, well...I mean...I did always find you kind of cute though."

"Honestly, you were always a bit creepy with how you hovered over your medicines and stuff."

"Well...guess I never really had a chance then."

"I mean...you seem to be taking this well."

"I can't lie, part of me is devastated but like...I kind of knew this was going to happen. I mean you always were more interested in humans."

"I was NOT!"

"You were reading a lot of those human novels though. And you really wanted a family when you...you know...couldn't have a child."

"It's called a dream for a reason, Scabius."

"Yeah I guess that's the difference between you and me. You're a dreamer while me...I was always more of a realist."

"...Are you saying this was bound to happen?"

"No, just that it probably would've never worked out between us."

"...Probably."

Scabius and Hyacinth both raised their weapons as the tension returned to their fight.

"One more thing." Hyacinth said.

"Yeah?"

"Isn't Veritas Gravitas supposed to be injected?"

"Oh, you remember that?"

"I remember the one time we used it, yes."

"Well, it's more potent injected but it has a lesser effect when ingested."

"...Uh huh..."

"You don't believe me?"

"I don't see a reason to."

"Aw come on, you know I wouldn't lie about things like this. Plus, I'm still under the effects of the drug."

"Yeah-huh."

"Okay fine, I guess that one's on me."

And with that, the fight resumed at breakneck speed, Hyacinth flying forward with wind magic at her back and Scabius raised his knife in defense, hiding a few more vials between the fingers of his free hand. With a slight movement, he tossed four vials up in the air and into the path of Hyacinth, leaving them to for her to crash into them. Hyacinth smirked and made a sudden stop in front of the vials, the back draft from her wind spell blowing past her and pushing the vials and their contents back towards their owner. Scabius cried out in shock and quickly turned around as the vials now cracked over his back, dousing him in various liquids but seeming to have no real effect on him. The elf turned to face the dark elf once again but Hyacinth was already barreling down on him, staff raised to whack him in the head. Scabius raised his free arm to try and block the attack as he swing with his knife at Hyacinth in a preemptive counterattack. But the moment his arm came in close to the staff, powerful gales threw him into the air and away from the dark elf. Scabius twisted and turned his body in mid air to ready his legs for landing but also released another volley of vials to rain down on Hyacinth. Hyacinth raised a hand and simply called out,

"Gravity."

And an immense force slammed down on the vials, plummeting and smashing them onto the ground before they could reach Hyacinth. The two elves glared at each other from across the gravity field, both trying to out predict the other but only one was thinking of offense. With a snap of her fingers, Hyacinth dispelled the gravity spell and charged right at Scabius again. Scabius drew a small circle from his hip that unfolded into a small buckler along with another small vial that he threw into the air then smashed with his shield. The liquid in the vial oxidized in the open air into a thick mist that spread out around Scabius, slowly starting to cloak him. Hyacinth swung her staff once more, creating a tornado that blew away not only the mist but lifted Scabius into the air, leaving him stranded in the air as Hyacinth looked up at him from below. Swinging her staff several more times, Hyacinth sent a volley of blades of wind up at the Scabius who could only hide behind his small shield to protect his body as his armor and face were ruthlessly cut into. With the updraft leaving and Scabius starting his decent down, Hyacinth waved her staff around her, summoning up a gust of wind that wrapped around her in the shape of a dragon.

"Storming Dragon."

Pointing her spell at the midair Scabius, the storm dragon lunged forward and buffeted Scabius as he was once again lifted into the air, forcing Scabius even further behind his shield as he was forced through a storming, slicing tunnel. Just as the worst of it seemed to be over, Scabius could see the dragon reforming behind him. With a roar the dragon of wind slammed into his back, knocking the buckler from his hand and driving him back down towards the earth in terrifying pace. As he descended, Scabius withdrew more vials and threw them down at the ground. These concoctions smashed into the ground and mixed with each other, creating a lump of purple slime that caught Scabius as he was was driven into the ground by the dragon. Once Scabius was safe, he sneaked opened another bottle that dribbled onto the slime and immediately turned into a noxious mist that quickly spread from the impact of the wind dragon, blowing it right towards Hyacinth. With barely any time, Hyacinth quickly brought her arms up and formed a bubble of wind around her to protect herself but not before inhaling a bit of the fumes. She quickly covered her mouth but it didn't seem like whatever she inhaled was having any negative effect on her though you never know with Scabius. Speaking of Scabius, he had since disappeared in the smog. She doubted that using her wind magic would reveal him. Though hiding in this fog with her wind bubble as defense wasn't ideal either. But Hyacinth didn't have the time to let things drag on either so she threw out her gales to blow away the clouds of chemical around her. Like she expected, Scabius wasn't where she left him though she knew where to look.

"Gravity."

Forcing a gravitational field around herself, her quick thinking had managed to stop Scabius from attacking behind her. Unused to bearing the pressure of her own spell, with a little bit of quick thinking, Hyacinth inverted the gravity, lifting them in air as she nimbly swung herself upside down, aiming her staff at Scabius with a strong blast of wind. But where she had expected Scabius to attack her with a knife, Scabius was instead aiming a spray gun equipped with a bottle of another strange concoction. With no time left to think the two traded blows, Scabius' bottle spraying mist that covered up most of Hyacinth and her wind blast smashing him in the stomach and sending him flying backwards through the window of a building.

Hyacinth fell to the ground coughing, trying to force as much of this new aerosol from her body. With no immediate effects to be felt, Hyacinth turned her efforts to blowing away the lingering mist around her. But no matter how many times she tried to blow it away, more mist would float off from her body. Even trying to wash her body with wind didn't stop the fog from leaking. She could set up a constant stream of wind to counteract its effects but this mist was heavy. It hindered her movements ever so slightly and using wind magic to continually wash it away would take more energy than before. So with the remaining time she had, Hyacinth decided to finally play Scabius' game.

The mist rolling off her had combined with the larger fog around her. Scabius had dropped his spray gun and the bottle had smashed, throwing its contents onto the ground and leaking a larger smokescreen around her. Hyacinth spun around in her space cautiously. There was no telling where or when he'd attack from but Hyacinth knew Scabius wouldn't just run. He'd never put this much effort into running away. This was Scabius' usual modus operandi. He excelled in covert work, though they rarely had to employ such tactics in the war. With no subterfuge to hide under, Scabius tended to lag behind the other members of their group. But in the rare occasions where he would go all out, this was the result. If there was no sophistry to utilize, he'd create chaos on the battlefield, turning it into something he could utilize.

The crunching of footsteps drew Hyacinth's attention to behind her as Scabius calmly walked through the smoke, casually picking up the fallen spray gun.

There it was. The mask he'd so rarely put on. The figure that many saw standing so terrifying alone on a bloodless battlefield. The mask that had earned him the nickname of The Ailing Crow. Scabius looked through his plague doctor like mask at Hyacinth, the dark elf unable to tell what her old companion was thinking anymore. Hyacinth readied her staff for any potential attack. Scabius ejected the remains of the broken bottle before holstering the mundane weapon on his tool belt. With his tool retrieved, Hyacinth expected Scabius to retreat into the fog again to launch a real sneak attack this time but he stayed there, the two looking wordlessly at each other. Until he removed a can of another mysterious mixture from his belt and lobbed it gently towards Hyacinth. The can soared over Hyacinth's head who fully expected something to happen to it. And something did as a throwing dagger suddenly impacted the side of the aerosol and the pressurized liquid began spraying all over Hyacinth. Hyacinth ducked her head as this new liquid sprayed all over her. Once again there seemed to no effect to her but she quickly noticed her wooden staff starting to give off smoke and collapse in her hands. Hyacinth jumped back, flying as far as she could away from the spraying liquid as the can landed on the ground and continued to roll around while spraying it's contents. Checking on her staff, Hyacinth could see there was some minor damage all over it but it didn't seem like it was getting any worse. The staff was still intact enough to cast magic with thankfully. While Hyacinth was perfectly capable of casting magic without it, they wouldn't be nearly as powerful and there were even some spells she hadn't yet learned how to cast without it. The crunching of earth drew Hyacinth back to the battlefield where Scabius had moved to where the fallen can was still spewing out chemicals. He casually picked up the can and removed the knife from it, the can spraying its content over his mask. Holding this can over the smokescreen, Scabius brought out a matchstick, lit it and attached it to the back of the can. This new weapon was then thrown at Hyacinth again. The spinning can sent chemicals all around that met the match on the back and lit the very flammable concoction, becoming a spiraling molotov that headed towards Hyacinth's location. A cold dread seized Hyacinth and she summoned her wind magic to fly away as fast as possible. The fire entered the smokescreen and immediately set it ablaze, spreading uncontrollably across the entire field and following the smoke trail that Hyacinth was letting out, relentlessly chasing down the dark elf. Hyacinth did her best to speed up, to keep some distance away from her and the emerging fireball but it was almost impossible. Flying around Scabius, she could see him extinguishing the fire heading towards him with his spray gun so Hyacinth decided to bring the fire to him, lowering her velocity and flying right towards Scabius. But with barely a glance towards her, Scabius threw a sphere in her direction. A sphere with several nozzles all over it. Hyacinth instinctively slowed down to bring her guard up and that was what sealed her fate. The sphere sprayed more chemical over her and the fireball caught up with her, causing a great explosion right in front of the Ailing Crow.

Scabius watched the fire for a moment, letting the horrible feeling of doing this to his friend eat away at him. He moved to extinguish the flames but the flames went out on its own. And in the black smoke, Scabius could see a slightly charred and frizzled Hyacinth, against all odds, standing in front of him. She let out a sharp gasp as if she had been holding her breath and Scabius understood immediately. She had removed as much of the oxygen around her as possible so the fire wouldn't be quite as effective. Even with the chemicals adding different molecules to the flames, the flames failed to penetrate her armor though he couldn't imagine it was entirely painless. And it wasn't like the coordinated attack was entirely ineffective. Her staff was now completely gone, having been completely burned away after she dropped it to escape the brunt of the explosion. In contrast, extinguishing the fire meant that the noxious mist he had sprayed on Hyacinth hadn't entirely burned away. Combined with the new layer he had sprayed on her with his grenade, there was still a soft gentle mist rolling off her. And most of all, she seemed utterly exhausted from the ordeal, the debilitating gas he had forced on her probably not helping much. He couldn't imagine her putting up much of a resistance again so drew his knife and approached her, ready to end her suffering. Reaching out to slit her throat, Hyacinth's hand suddenly grabbed onto his wrist as he glared up at him with a manic look in her eyes. Scabius tried to pull away but Hyacinth held on tight as she grabbed his arm with both hands and using wind magic, she lifted him and slammed him over her shoulder.

Scabius cried out in pain but aimed his spray gun at Hyacinth, spraying her with the extinguishing spray until she was forced to let go and stumble back. Stumbling back on his feet, he quickly dropped his extinguisher canister and equipped another Stillwind canister. He was running out of this substance but it was near essential in fighting Hyacinth. From shackling her magic skills to sticking to the crevices of her armor to continuously emit itself, it was tailor made to counter Hyacinth. Not to mention that without her staff to assist her, the scale and range of magic she could use was already greatly diminished. The Fairy's wings had been clipped. But Hyacinth wasn't one to just give up. He knew that.

Scabius pointed the spray gun at Hyacinth and sprayed a cloud of the concoction at her. The cloud coated her weak body with ease but it wasn't sticking around long as waves of wind drew it away to wrap around her arm. She was forming an attack but it was so weak that Scabius wouldn't even have noticed it if the mist hadn't been drawn into its currents. But he knew better to underestimate her. So he braced himself for an attack as it seemed like she was fully prepared to launch one now. And launch she did as she thrust her arm forward. Scabius flinched, expecting a punch but instead the wind flew out and surrounded him in a tunnel of wind. And Scabius recognized this technique. This wasn't wind magic. This was water magic. Well I mean...it WAS wind magic but this tactic, this utilization was more reminiscent of water magic. He had never seen wind utilized like this, especially from Hyacinth. Was this a desperate idea or did she always have this tactic in her pocket? Hyacinth strolled to the sides of the wind tunnel she created and touched the side, letting her entire body get lifted by the wind and sent flying along its current towards Scabius. Scabius holstered his spray gun and prepped his knife for close combat but this was the problem with this style of magic, he didn't know where the attack was going to come. Above? Below? He needed to limit the possibilities. So he sneakily lifted a bottle of lycopodium powder and threw it's contents to the wind. With a special flint he had fashioned to the lip of the bottle, he started a spark that flew down the line of powder in a sizable fireball. But to Scabius' surprise, the tunnel pinched inward, wrapping the fire back into itself, containing it before extinguishing it. But it wasn't just extinguishing the fire. The entire tunnel was collapsing, flowing into the same spot and drawing Scabius closer with it's vacuum. Scabius scowled as he dug his heels into the dirt to pull against the vacuum. This wasn't water or wind magic. This is almost closer to high level spatial magic. But unlike high level space magic that would try to collapse space using gravity, wind had little mass on its own. It was impossible for her to create a black hole with her magic. It was impossible...so she did the unthinkable. She flew forward and threw a kick right into the collapsing winds. She didn't kick it at him, she threw her own foot in the middle of that dense ball of wind and carried it straight into Scabius' chest. He felt slashes of wind cutting his body. His chest armor heating up from the friction of the gales and once again he was thrown back.

For a moment Scabius was unconscious. But only for the briefest of seconds as he woke back up on the ground. His chest armor was completely shattered and there was a deep aching in his chest as if someone had punched it with the force of a wrecking ball. But if he didn't had his armor he would most certainly be dead right now. Just looking at Hyacinth's condition was enough evidence to see. Her leg had been twisted and rended from the forces of her own attack. Her charred armor had did little to protect her. There was no way her leg was going to be fine after all that even if she survived this rebellion. It was almost a mercy to kill her now. Fumbling into his bag, he pulled a special capsule with a port meant directly for stabbing and injecting a liquid forcibly into its target. This thing was filled with a lethal but gentle poison. It should cause no pain in the process. Scabius never imagined he'd have to use it on Hyacinth of all people but she must be suffering pretty badly. She couldn't even walk properly anymore much less fly. This was just...a final service to his friend… Scabius stumbled forward, that last hit knocking his body out of whack more than he thought. But he slowly pulled himself together and ran towards her, pushing himself to finish the battle, his pain and distress coming out in the form of a scream. Hyacinth, who had been kneeling there with her busted leg also began to rise. Her wind magic pulling her up and with a sonicboom she disappeared. Scabius could barely register his hand being sliced off before Hyacinth tackled into his body, pushing him up off the ground and into the air. Hyacinth screamed as she arced around in midair and dove back towards the ground, towards the great tree, crashing the two of them into the side in a giant impact.

Scabius coughed up a bit of blood, his mask slipping off his face as he laid there looking up at the false sky.

"Goddammit..." Scabius croaked, "When did I drop my knife?"

"...When I kicked you."

Hyacinth held Scabius' knife deep into its owner's guts. Though it was perhaps the only actual wound she had inflicted on him it was enough. Scabius was well aware of what poison he had equipped his customized knife with and it was one that he had no ready cure of. He was as good as dead.

"Dammit..." Scabius sighed, "What was with that last burst in speed? I thought you definitely couldn't reach speeds like that anymore without your staff while under Stillwind."

"It might not seem like but Stillwind is a poison. One whose effects are inhaled. So I formed an air bubble around my mouth and nose to ward it off while I waited for its initial effects to wear off on me."

"Goddammit..."

"You should have never put your mask on, Crow."

"Shut it Fairy. Dammit, I guess that means you win."

"No." Hyacinth's body slumped over Scabius', "The match was won the moment you nicked me with your knife while I was flying you over. I wasn't going to win so I did my best to make us tie."

"Then how the hell did you fight for so long? I swear I used a more potent poison than that."

"Sheer force of will, I guess."

"When the hell did you have something like that? If it was Borage I could've believed it, but I always figured you were more agile than tough."

"And you're more crafty than I ever imagined."

"Thanks, I try."

"Hey..." Scabius spoke up again, "Do you have any regrets?"

"Do you?"

"Nah. Not when I get to die next to a girl as cute as you."

"Gross."

"It's the truth serum, I swear."

"Right." Hyacinth sighed, "Well I have a boatload of regrets."

"Yeah?"

"I wish things could have turned out differently. I wish I could have done more. I wish we could have avoided all this."

"Did you put all that on your Christmas list?"

"I wish I could have died next to literally anyone else."

"Hey come on, we're both dying here. It's okay to be honest now."

"Just shut up...and let me die...in peace..."

Hyacinth's body left go of the knife and fell to the side. Despite all her troubles her face was like she had just fallen asleep, as peaceful and content as could be. Scabius touched the wound on his stomach and looked up.

"What am I supposed to do now if you die first?"

And with that he leaned back and closed his eyes.