Clash of Metal

Posted on Wed Oct 12th, 2022 @ 11:04am by Chief Petty Officer Julius Law & Lieutenant Commander Lyra Cassiel

Mission: In-Between (S1:E3-S1:E4)
Location: Holodeck 1
Timeline: Mission Day 24 at 2230
4216 words - 8.4 OF Standard Post Measure

Hitting the gym was a good way to train muscles and to pull each part of the body together into the whole, but nothing beat a good fight to get the blood pumping and to truly exhaust a man. As the faint sound of cheering grew more loud, Jules approached the gate through which the golden light of day was pouring in, and stepped out into the grand stadium. The sky was cloudless and clear and the sun shone brightly in the sky, casting a reflective glow off of his silky brown skin. The stands were filled with thousands and thousands of screaming spectators sitting around the large oval of compact dirt, their pristine rows ascending forever into the sky until it reached the massive glass ceiling which left the day outside visible. Beside him was the royal box where important people would no doubt be gathered. His eyes, however, were ahead.

Julius Law loved the rush of battle. He loved the feeling of being close to his end and fighting, tooth and nail, with a man, life against life. He didn't know why he loved it so much; he was not a philosophical man. All he understood is that his drive was real, and his need to trade steel and phaser-fire couldn't only be ignored for short bursts before he started getting jumpy. The Royal Stadium at Abu Dhabi was one of his favorite venues when he ran gladiators, and he loved to pretend he was one of them when time permitted.

It was natural that the department was - once again - going through the pains of adjustment. The past couple of months had resulted in a near constant revolving door of security chiefs and assistant chiefs that when Lyra had found out about the betting pool of how long she would last as their chief. Lyra, however, knew that the door had finally stopped spinning and locked. They were stuck with her now for better or worse. Today presented a problem that was far from unique for security, but a problem that had to be handled nonetheless. She stepped into the holodeck and was briefly deafened by the sheer volume of the cheers around her. She immediately knew where she was, however, this had been one of his favorites.

She moved down the steps and headed for the royal box given it was her right to be there if she wished so she could get a better view of the action and be away from the bulk of the noise thanks to the dampeners installed there. Julius Law did fancy himself quite the popular gladiator. Once she was under the canopy of the box, she moved down and leaned against the railing. They needed to have a conversation regarding his current methods, but she wasn't going to interrupt him unduly.

Jules looked menacingly down the white line that ran toward the gate on the other wall. There stood his opponent, small because of the distance, but he knew they would be quite capable, as the program was constantly adapting on a fight-by-fight basis to test him and challenge his skills. His wife teeth were bared and his thick lips opened as he anticipated the thrill of whatever would come next. He wore a a thick metal belt with a sparse leather-armor skirt. He was bare chested, except that his right arm was covered in a metal-scale mail which made him look part machine, but there was nothing enhanced about it. Just plain unpowered armor, the way he truly preferred it. To say he was sculpted was an understatement. It looked as if every muscle in his body had been molded one by one.

"In this corner," came the voice of an announcer echoing across the building, "the undefeated champion, Julius Law!"

The crowd erupted into cheers and many of them stood up and clapped. The program was designed to remember both his victories and defeats and to respond accordingly. He didn't show any sign of care, but his intense dagger-stare was directed down the way at his opponent.

"Booooo." Lyra smirked, knowing her voice would be completely drowned out as she contented herself to watch the show he was so intent on putting on. The holograms didn't even register her being there of course.

"And in this corner, the returning undefeated champion, the Lion of Mars!" The crowd erupted into even louder cheers. Julius wouldn't be able to see his opponent clearly from the distance, but the glint of gold he was wearing did catch and reflect the light. He wore a red loin cloth, the majority of the gold on the thick belt holding it, and he was wearing a single shoulder piece of armor that went fully down his arm, the pauldron shaped like a lion.

"Wooo!" Lyra cheered and laughed to herself.

"Prepare for the spectacle of the century!" The announcer boomed out.

Beside the two opponents, on the nearby walls, weapons panels opened up revealing melee weapons of all kind. They were sharp, and blunt, and big, and small, but all were low tech. Julius looked over the options placed before him, thinking how he might win today. He reached for two scimitars, the designs of which were not special, but which were sharp as any swords could be. They would slice through flesh like butter, and he intended to use them thoroughly.

His opponent had also moved to examine the options before settling on a sword and mid sized shield. The crowd was chanting, but because it was split between the two it simply sounded a grating mess. The announcer cut in.

“Gladiators, salute!” He commanded them to look to the royal box and salute their sponsor. Lyra ducked below the rail quickly so Julius wouldn’t see her.

Julius turned toward the royal box and offered a salute, the shadowy visage of a royal figure was all he could really see. He wasn't looking for more, however. His mind was on the fight to come. He looked down the line at his opponent, his heart pounding like a drum in his chest.

The crowd very suddenly hushed and the air was pregnant with possibility in the moment. Everyone was waiting, looking to the royal box. A different voice than the announcer, presumably that of the sponsor of the games, rang out in the arena.

"Begin!"

Immediately the crowd began to cheer again with renewed vigor. The Lion spun his sword in his hand and began striding toward Julius with purpose, but it was not a reckless run. As he drew closer, Julius would finally be able to see that his opponent was a very large man probably coming in somewhere around six-six and was built like a brick house. He wore no helmet, which allowed Julius to clock the cranial ridges and the long tightly waved black hair of the Klingon man coming toward him.

Lyra had stood back up, leaning on the rail again and putting her chin in her hand.

As the Klingon came into view, Julius smiled. He too strode confidently toward the center of the stadium, his hands clasped tightly around his swords. He was getting more excited by the minute. As they drew close enough that combat could effectively begin, he stopped and squared up, his swords out and ready. He would let the bigger man come to him and observe his moves in the progress of his attack.

The Lion didn't stop when Julius squared himself, not immediately at least. He got close and immediately kicked sand up toward Julius' eyes followed by a strike with his sword. This wasn't about fighting fair or with honor, this was about fighting to survive. Nothing was off limits. He stepped in immediately following the swing, to bash with his shield, to attempt to stun him out of his defenses immediately and make this a quick fight.

The sand trick was old hat and Julius had stopped teaching it to his gladiators years ago. It rarely worked because it was so often done. He turned his head and took a step back and that was all that was needed to avoid the dirt storm. When the lion swung his sword, Julius leaned back and avoided the slash with seemingly no effort. When the shield came forward, he ducked to the side and avoided it as well, moving and landing a blow on the Klingon's head with the butt of one of his swords, stepping toward his undefended body and then stepping back. He gave a cocky grin.

"Is that all you got, you Klingon fuck?!" he asked, his arms spread wide in a 'come and get me' stance. His voice was strong and deep and it echoed through the microphones into the stands. His supporters cheered at his words. "You're gonna have to move quicker, Bubba, or this is going to be a one-minute masterpiece."

"I'm going to gut you, little man!" The Klingon replied with a toothy grin, seeing this one was smarter than most. He stepped in to attack again, deflecting with his shield while striking low on the human man toward the backs of his legs.

Though he was a man of considerable bulk, Julius managed to jump over the sword swipe and land on his feet again. He laughed mockingly, showing more joy than he ever showed outside of a fight.

"You fight like a Ferengi woman." Julius said, and swiped his own swords at the man in a patterned blow meant to catch him non-lethally on his arm.

"Little Ferengi women can be fierce!" He laughed and easily deflected the blows toward his arm before striking again. "At least I don't look like one."

"Gods... so much talking... more fighting!" Lyra called from the stands.

"Ferengi bitches don't wear clothes!" Julius said, swinging the blade in his right hand quickly and landing on the Klingon's shoulder, cutting him deep and severing the strap that held up his lion arm guard. It slumped off of him as the Klingon winced in pain. Julius gave him a hard kick to the gut to remove the sword from his shoulder and watched as he went reeling back. "There. That's more like it!"

The crowd cheered again, but it wasn't as loud and now there was some audible booing happening. They obviously weren't getting a proper spectacle of it all. The crowds quickly grew bored. Lyra too was already bored. "Computer, panel." She ordered and one appeared on the railing in front of her. Tapping the panel, she brought up the safety protocol settings and gave a long, drawn out sigh. What a dumbass. She set the safeties back down to minimal, which would only prevent lethal damage, and then proceeded to rescind his ability from fighting with the safety protocols off ever again. She looked back out to the fight to see if anything entertaining was happening.

The klingon retaliated by slapping his shield across Julius' face, knocking him to the side a few feet. "Alright, little man, you want to fight then let's fight. I'm tired of games." He spun his sword in his hand and took up a more aggressive stance.

Instead of responding verbally, Julius charged his bloodied opponent with all the speed he could. He cared nothing for the opinions of crowds. All he was concerned with was the fight. He swung his swords in quick succession, landing one and, just when the Klingon moved to block it, biting him with the other one and decorating his flesh with red strips which were non-lethal but searing. Julius then came in close, lodging his swords in the dirt, and took hold of the Klingon’s shield with both hands. The move was quick and surprising. He yanked it from the man’s hand, smacked him over the head with it, and cast it into the distance. Picking up his swords again, he twirled them.

“I want to fuck you up raw-dog.” He said, preparing to kill this Klingon and go to bed.

The Klingon reeled and fell into the dirt, stunned from Julius hitting him just right in the head that it had smacked against his cranial ridges; the blow there even more effective by causing reverberations in his skull. Groaning, Lion pushed himself up off of the sand and grabbed his sword. He struggled to get up to his feet but slowly began pulling himself up.

Lyra rolled her eyes, already seeing the ending coming. "Computer..."

Julius stepped forward, swinging his sword simply as the man sat up and watched as his ugly head rolled off his shoulders and onto the dirt. Blood oozed out everywhere and Julius stepped back, raising his fists in the air and looking to the royal box, a challenging expression on his face. When his eyes found a female figure at the rail with an interface in front of her and a Starfleet uniform, he scowled. At this distance, he found it hard to make out her face well, but the male variant uniform made it clear.

"Lieutenant Cassiel?" he asked, his brow furrowing.

She was obviously much too far away to hear him especially over the din of the crowd. Julius also wouldn’t have much time to dwell on it either as six copies of the Lion suddenly shimmered into existence all charging in from different angles and equipped with swords, though lacked the shield Lion had. They came at Julius at unnatural, unfair speed and all began swinging down on him. Had Lyra not adjusted the safeties again, he would likely be cut to ribbons, as they began striking him while he fought back, but the most he felt on his skin was a sting that would likely leave a nasty bruise and small cuts.

Julius removed his swords from the dirt and started to fight, his speed lagging behind that of the Klingon's but his irritation with his program being tampered with gave him additional adrenaline. He used both swords to deflect several swinging strikes and felt the sting of a cut on his arm. He lashed out at the one who had done it, speeding a sword straight through his eye. With it still lodged in the socket, he block a blow from another and quickly abandoned the sword lodged into the Klingon's head.

He backed up quickly, allowing himself a brief respite from fighting, but his opponents advanced together, their expressions hungry. He decided to surprise them by surging forward and and kicking into the air, landing a solid boot strike to one of their faces, causing him to stumble back. When he landed, he through a punch squarely at another's jaw and swung his sword quickly, landing the tip between the ribs and pushing through quickly.

The Klingons that hadn’t been injured quickly grabbed Julius and threw him down to the ground, resuming their assault on him relentlessly, beating at him with their swords all along his body. Suddenly though, they froze in place. The shadow of a person fell over Julius’ face, and when he looked up, he would see Lyra standing over him looking at him with her arms crossed. “Not fun, is it?”

He frowned up at the Lieutenant, irritated she had invaded his program and even more irritated she had altered the programming with what seemed like the expressed purpose of embarrassing him. He growled, pulling himself to his feet and pushing past the Klingons into the open air.

"Getting your ass kicked is the first step in learning to kick ass." he said, shaking his head. "I taught you lesson one myself. Now, tell me what the hell you're doing in here, Lieutenant."

"Yeah, but I knew that one already." Lyra followed after him slowly and easily. "You're going to say you have no idea why I'm here?" She asked, quirking a brow. While Julius wasn't the quickest on the uptake at times, he wasn't completely stupid.

"I'm assuming you're bored." he said, clearly irritated. "Maybe your boyfriend is a bit lackluster now that you caught him."

It was very rude but he didn't care. He didn't want to be here anyway. He was meant to be on Terra right now, building his gladiatorial empire. Now he was standing here in a holodeck on the other side of the galaxy, his dreams laying tattered on the floor.

"I'm sure you'd like to hope that he would be, but no, unfortunately for you, he isn't." Lyra replied simply, not rising to anger at the rude comment and taking it in stride. She kept things simple, down on his level. "In fact, I'd very much rather be in his quarters getting railed right now, so let's keep this brief, shall we?"

He looked at her squarely, his dark eyes intense. He took a deep breath which could be seen in the movement of his glistening and slightly bloodied chest. He clenched his jaw but said nothing. Chewing out a superior officer was just the thing he would like to do, but something in him decided to just shut up for once.

Lyra didn't speak for a few beats, just looked into his dark eyes with a cool and collected calm. She could see the intensity there and it wasn't a great leap to figure out what was going on in his mind at the moment. When he kept his resolve to silence, she finally spoke. "You're being too rough with your training of the security officers - especially the younger ones. When I asked you to assist on the training, it wasn't for you to make them your personal punching bags. There have been a multitude of complaints in a very short time and now I have medical biting at my ankles over it."

"Tell them to go fuck themselves." He said suddenly; aggressively, his eyes full of the same malice he'd just shared. "Do you want a department full of soft, comfortable kids or do you want one full of warriors? You asked me to make them stronger. I'm just teaching them lesson one: take an ass beating. Looks like they decided to complain instead. Weakness."

Despite his aggression and malicious expression leveled at her, Lyra still didn't react. Controlled. He was annoyed at this, sure, but the current level of his bitterness didn't really match the situation, so she figured there was more fueling this. "You are perfectly capable of handing out an ass beating that would resound through the coming generations of their families without injuring them enough that they have to go to sickbay instead of just rubbing some dirt in it, so what is the deal? Why do I have to be standing here having this conversation with you?"

He watched her as she spoke. She was a spooky bitch, the kind that smiled when it wasn't right and was stoical when she should have been afraid. He wasn't trying to scare her, but the absence of fear was noted. He knew who he was and how he came off.

"I'm tired of sparing with Ensigns and Crewmen on the mat." he said, still standing square with her. "I'm tired of teaching the kind of damn people who complain to mommy when they get hurt. The ones who are the best? They aren't like that. They rise above. So get me back to the Alpha Quadrant and I'll be out of your hair. Until then, take me or leave me. Fighting in the fucking holodeck is the most purpose I've had in months."

Lyra was quiet for a moment, just looking at him with those cold dark eyes. Finally, she took several steps toward him, closing the distance and most definitely putting herself in his range. Despite the slight height advantage and the much more skewed weight advantage, she didn't show any fear being this close; she just stared at him, and then finally...

"Get the fuck over it." There should have been a scowl, something, but there was nothing but ice. "You think you have no purpose now, what happens when I take you off duty because you're being a cunt and you have nothing to do but waste oxygen? I've never known you to sit there and piss and moan about difficult students. I get that your life has been ruined by this whole Delta quadrant bullshit, but news flash, so have the lives of every single other person on this ship."

"I'm not pissing and moaning. They are pissing and moaning to you and now you're pissing and moaning to me." he said, his anger increasing at her challenge. She stepped into his range and he narrowed his eyes. To be honest, he wanted to smack her in that pretty face. "And sideline me if you want, Lieutenant. Maybe your bitching crewmen will stop talking shit about you behind your back if you save them from a few good sparing lessons."

He was being an asshole, he knew. He also knew he should cut it out, but he just didn't see a good reason to do so. Being threatened tended only to harden his resolve and, as he saw it, there was nothing to fight for except fighting itself.

"Oh no, they're talking shit behind my back?" She brought a hand up to her cheek as if she were surprised and raised her eyebrows, but her eyes and mouth didn't change at all. "You think you're not pissing and moaning? You're standing there bitching about how you're tired of sparring ensigns and crewmen. They aren't the best, of course not. You are perfectly capable of turning them into the best and doing it in a way where I wouldn't have to be standing here. If you weren't, they wouldn't have kept you at the Academy either. You have plenty of purpose, you're just turning your nose up at it. You're acting like a child - I'm not getting what I want so I'm going to throw a tantrum and break things until I get what I want or feel better."

"Do you make a habit of asking people how they feel and then complaining about them telling you how they feel?" he asked, and then kicked dust into the air. "Fine, fuck it, whatever. I'll go easy on these little cunts. And, hey, if I fail and the races of the Delta quadrant are too much for them, they can always file a complaint with your office and you'll tell them to lighten up."

“What, you want me to coddle you? Tell you that your feelings are valid, give you a hug and a pat on the head and tell you everything is fine? You are hurting people, Chief. That isn’t going to fly on a ship and you know that damn good and well. Breaking arms and legs and fingers just because you feel like it is a waste of ships resources. Do your godsdamned job like I know you are capable of doing. That’s the unfortunate thing for you - I know exactly what you are capable of accomplishing. I’m not telling you to go easy on them, I’m telling you to stop breaking them. If you can’t do that you’ve lost your touch, and I don’t think that’s true. If I find you’re actually going easy on them, that will be just as problematic. I don’t want to have another one of these conversations again.”

“Yeah. I heard you.” He said, looking at her with that same irritated expression. “Just don’t play fucking games with me like this again. He said, gesturing to the Klingons behind him. “Your boyfriend might like it, but I don’t. Just come and talk to me one on one. I don’t need to be taught lessons like a child.”

"Then stop behaving like one." Lyra replied icily, again not rising to his bait about her relationship with Andrei and his obvious jabs. "Until you grow up, I've removed your access to setting the holodeck safeties to anything lower than medium."

"Gods fucking damnit." he said, balling up his fists. He said nothing else. He was beyond angry with her. Instead of responding he turned and walked toward the nearest wall. "Computer, arch!"

He shouted the command harshly, and when it appeared on the wall, he stepped through it without bothering to end the program. He was concerned, if he stayed around her any longer, he would mess up that face of hers for real. For now, a trip to Sickbay would have to suffice to heal him.

Lyra just watched him go and shook her head. He'd either pull his head out of his ass or not, but she hoped he did. He was a good teacher and officer. Obviously, however, he hadn't really dealt with their move to the Delta quadrant in any way. She could have submitted him to discipline inspection, but she wasn't going to do that. Instead she would see what happened when he cooled off a bit and had time to separate the content of the conversation from his own anger.

If he was capable.

They'd just have to see. "Computer, end program."

END