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Quality Time... Playing Tag

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[Some of the language has been toned down for these forums. Mods, If it needs to be toned down further or have a warning in the title, just let me know. These characters are vampires, so their "games" are much more violent than normal be forewarned.]


Niko looked over the detailed instructions once more as he hammered an iron plate over one of the joints to add strength. Several books lay spread out on the floor near him. Their pages showed intricate diagrams, detailed instructions as well as small handwritten notes along the pages' edge. He grinned as he worked, remembering how he had personally aquired the materials and new books the evening before from the home of a minocian tinker. The tinker and his family were murdered in their sleep by the assassin... it had been child's play.

"What -are- you doing?" Portia asked as the looked at the construct that bore an uncanny resemblence to a large, standing crossbow. It had two heavily reinforced front legs that were heavily weighted with stone blocks to help steady it. On the rear was an adjustable set of legs that allowed the weapon to be angled to achieve the desire distance and projectory of the loaded ammunition. Leaning against a nearby wall was the golden crown of the device. It was a long javelin nearly as thick as a man's arm with a iron multi-barbed tip that stone dully in the low light of the shadowed haven.

Portia stepped gracefully over a small pile of wood planks, ropes and gears that lay in front of the door to the haven. Without turning to look at his sire, he responded with an underlying mischieviousness, "Playing tag with sis. " Portia smirked, but said nothing further as she made her way upstairs to attend to some private matters.

Within the hour, he stood and took a careful step back to admire his hours worth of work. A rope ran from the front door to the triggering mechanism to the side. The javelin was nestled almost lovingly in the oiled slit and ****ed back to nearly the last iron-reinforced notch. He ran his hands over each part once again to make sure he hadn't missed anything crucial that would prevent it from firing when triggered. He stooped carefully under the rope and went to the living room to wait for the sound of success.

He didn't have to wait too long. The faint click of the door caught his attention and he grinned with excitement of what noises the next few seconds would bring to his waiting ears.

Tick. Tock. Tick. Toc-Schlock.

The recoil of the ballista as it fired thundered throughout the haven as it seemed to reverberate to shake the foundation itself. An inhuman scream pierced the night air before it was abruptly silenced by the sound of flesh being ripped apart, bones shattering and then punctuated with the sound of wood splitting.

Niko grinned and sprang to his feet, racing to the front door much as a child might race down the stairs on yuletide morning. The ballista lay cracked and in pieces from the strength of the recoil against the solid stone wall behind it. He didn't care in the slightest. From the sound he was sure it had done its job and that was all that mattered.

He skitted to a halt and looked outside with expectant eyes before the excitement drained from his face. On the porch, stood Cirilia in perfect health. She smirked at him as he looked her up and down in disbelief. Her demeanor dripped with a tinge of annoyance; her arms crossed and one of her feet tapping in slow rhythm against the cobblestones. Dangling from her right hand was... someone else's severed arm still dripping blood from fleshless bone that had once held to some poor soul's shoulder.

He looked from her to the tree just beyond the front clearing. There suspended against the trunk by the javelin was a man. A bloody hole where his left arm that Cirilia now held used to be attached. The barbed tip had dislodged completely from his back with the force of the impact against the tree and the man balanced lifeless on the thick wooden shaft.

She uncrossed her arms and extended her right arm to Niko accusingly. The severed arm bounced dramatically as she used it almost casually as an extension of herself to emphasize her movements. "You -so- owe me dinner now, " she stated with the continuing smirk. Blood splattered in droplets as if to excentuate each syllabelle of her words in gorey clarity.

Niko put his hand to the back of his head, scratching casually at the nape of his hair and then nodded once, "Yeah, I guess I do."

"Damn right, you do. How the hell am I supposed to use that?" she asked as she flung the bloody arm to point to the tree and its previous owner. As if relieved of his mortal duties by her words, the body fell to the ground as the shaft finally cracked under the strain. The man's intestines spiraled up from the large hole in his back like a perverse ladder to the sharp, splintered end about six inches behind the iron barbs.

Cirilia smirked even bigger as the man dropped and then looked back to Niko expectantly. "Fine. Let's go find some dinner, " he said. He kicked a few pieces of the ballista inside the haven and closed the door. Cirilia turned and moved to his side, casually discarding the arm into the nearby flowerbed.

As they stepped onto the grass, behind them the door opened again and revealed their sire, Portia. She looked mildly irritated as they both turned around and almost in unison murmured the words "Uh oh" under their breath.

Portia's eyes surveyed the scene and then turned to look at her childer with a raised eyebrow. "You are going to clean up this mess before your grandmother comes home, right?"

The siblings looked at each and then turned their faces back to her with instant smiles of sweetness and innocence. "Of course, Mother."

"Good." She looked at the smiles and rolled her eyes. She turned around and went back inside, accentuating her departure with a firm slam of the front door.

Niko looked to Cirilia and said as they turned back around to leave, "Are you going to clean this up?"

"Hell no. Are you? " Cirilia replied.

"Nah. Its like all-natural, right? It'll decompose eventually, " Niko stated as he offered her the crook of his arm.

"Good point, " she said with a grin as she slipped her arm into his.

They walked out into the woods and towards town. Pausing only in their steps so the Niko could launch a firm kick at the man's head. "Idiot, "he growled at the corpse as the head rolled a few feet away to look back at him silently.
 
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[Written by Niko: ]http://onyx.uocommunity.com/forums/]

After two weeks of construction it was finally complete and the options included a "squirrel-cage" winch mechanism, block-trolley system and working trigger, frame-ladder (for re-****ing), half-lap and mortise and tenon joinery, this is the most highly accurate trebuchet you can get. This trebuchet hurls its projectiles 800 to 1200 feet and uses projectiles that weigh 100 lbs. - 350 lbs.. The Trebuchet was carefully aimed at maximum range and pointed directly at the Haven's front door.

Niko stands admiring this virtually unknown mastadon of destruction rarely used by only the richest of armies to break down castle wall's during siege's. He puts the finishing touches on the trebuchet when Cirilia comes up to him.

"What's this brother?"

"A lifting mechanism. It takes objects from ground level and hoists them to higher ground. Problem is I don't know if it works. One person needs to man the controls and a light person rides the hoist. I'm afraid I'm to heavy."

Narrowing her eye's suspicious of her brothers intentions she tries to read his face which is expressionless.

"If it works it will make the family a lot of gold as an invention, which I will of course sell at a very high price." he says with a smile.

Knowing her brothers love of wealth she volunteers to step into the cage.

"Ok, now in order to keep your hands from being smashed during the lift it'll probably be a good idea if you kept your hands on your chest."

"Ok." She says as she places her hands on her breasts.

She then looks over at Niko who has his hands on a large lever with an even larger smile on his face.

"[censored]." Is her immediate thought as a loud clank is heard. A huge counter weight drops and before she can give a reaction she is hurled summersaulting through the air at a speed of nearly 150 mph. The bottom of the cage drops out as the force of the toss throws her clear of the trebuchet, Cirilia is now flying at face pulling speed in a long high arch directly at the Haven at 1,200 ft and closing fast.

As she flies flies through the air she yells out something but the sound is warbly from her flight.

Niko think's to himself amused. "I wonder what a pruther mucker is."

Trying instinctively to correct herself in flight, Cirilia makes a running motion as well as flapping her arms. She sees the Haven closing in as she spins facing her back to the building.

"This is gonna hurt." She thinks to herself as her body slams into the Haven wall missing the door by 3 feet. Her legs are nearly crushed by the impact as they snap like twigs. Her hips break in half, her spine is mangled, jaw cracked, left hand, arm and elbow are crushed. The whole building shakes from the impact. Her body bounces off of the wall and hits the ground in a twisted mangled heap of broken bones and torn flesh.

With a look of disappointment Niko starts walking toward the Haven pushing a wheelbarrell. He was hoping she would fly through the door. Instead....she made a new one.

Portia sitting inside growls to herself and goes outside to see what is going on. Observing the scene before her she yells out. "You better clean this up before your Grandmother gets back! You know she'll throw a fit if she has to hire more contractors..." And with that she heads back inside, slamming the door.

Niko arrives to Cirilia and tosses her in the Wheelbarrel. "I'm not cleaning up sh...."

Portia sticks her head back out the door. "What was that?!"

"Uhhh......I'm.....cleaning up Sis...."

Without responding Portia again slams the door.
Through gritted teeth Cirilia laughs at Niko "You got yelled at."

Niko takes his thumb and drives it into Cirilia's right eye. She responds with. "You think you've won?"

"Tonight I have. Oh, by the way........you're it."

He takes her to a safe location to begin her healing process....and plotting.
 
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[Cirilia "Playing Catch"]

It had been weeks since Cirilia's flight at her brother's hand and now it was time for her to continue their game. Cirilia stood at on the upper balcony of the haven. In her arms was a heavy smithing anvil. She closed one eye as if to help her judge the projected descent and held it over the edge right in front of the door to the Haven and waited motionlessly.

Soon Portia and Niko appeared just on the edge of the clearing, walking towards the Haven. Portia's keen eye caught Cirilia's statuesque presence on the roof and she slowed a bit in her walk. Niko continued on unaware, not having any notice of his sire's slowing.

Portia called out just as Niko reached the front door, "A little to the left, dear." Niko blinked and looked back at his sire's voice confused at such an out of place remark. Cirilia shifted a foot to the left with a mischievious grin. Niko ****ed his head upward to follow the Portia's gaze just as Cirilia released her sisterly package of love on its descent to her brother.

Niko's eyes widened at the very brief sight of the dark, metallic object with his sister's grinning face haloed by moonlight just to its edge. He hears the words, "Catch" and then sees her purse her lips together as if to blow him a loving kiss. His expression fades into a blank stare as realisation of what is about to happen enters his mind, "[censored]..."

The anvil hits the mark perfectly, crumpling his body to the stones with the force of the impact. Cirilia grins and happily skips away from the roof's edge to go scrape her brother's body from the cobblestones.

Portia who only slowed but never stopped in her walking, reaches the door to the Haven. She steps over her childer's broken body with the anvil sitting squarely on top of the bloodied heap. "Still alive?..." she says as she opens the door. A disgruntled unintelligible murmur comes from Niko. As if satisifed her childer isn't dead she makes her way inside to hear the pleased humming of her daughter as she skips down the stairs on her way to the front door.
 
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"Chicken Chuckin' Childer"

[[Written by Cirilia AND Niko]]

In the small clearing south of the Haven, Niko and Cirilia stood next to a small catapult and a heap of hog-tied animals. The wriggling heap consisted of small, generally-accepted adorable animals; kittens, puppies, bunnies, chickens and a couple of unsheared, young sheep.

"You sure they aren't home?" Cirilia asked as she surveyed the darkened windows of the Haven.

"Sure, " Niko replied as he hoisted a bleating sheep into the basket on the end of the catapult.

Cirilia turned the makeshift hand that pulled the basket back into a further ****ed position. Niko closed one eye and made a few adjustments for the weight of the sheep and the targeted distance. Satisified, he confidently pulled the handle and the basket propelled itself and slung the terrified lamb at the wall of the haven. They watched it arch and land against the solid stone wall of the second floor, "Baaaaaaaaaa..." Splat.

Almost like clockwork, Cirilia ****ed the catapult again as Niko grabbed a kitten and a puppy in each hand by the scruff of their necks and tossed them into the basket. After a few seconds of adjustments, those two were hurled in the direction of the Haven. They landed just above the door this time in a cloud of fur that floated down to the ground like snow.

They grinned at each other. This was fun... and educational.

Cirilia reset the catapult as Niko grabbed a large hen from the ammunition pile and dropped it uncerimoniously into the basket. He was making the delicate calculations when the door to the Haven was flung open with a loud crack as it smacked the stone sidewall. Portia looked at the unnatural animal snow and glared in their direction.

Cirilia murmured under her breath, "I thought you said you were sure..."

"So I made a mistake..." Niko answered, also under his breath.

Portia shouted in their direction, "What the [censored] are you kids doing?"

In unison, they said, "Noooothing......"

"Well, you better knock this 'nothing' [censored] off, " she shouted angrily back and grabbed the door slamming it behind her.

They smirked, each internally debating the seriousness of their mother's tone. "You better knock this nothing [censored] off, "Cirilia said in a hushed manner, her tone significantly higher as if to mock their mother's voice. Niko grinned and looked at Cirilia's eyes and in that instant she knew what he was going to do. He pulled the lever.

Like most mothers, Portia seemed to have the power to hear every muttered, murmured word of her children and she had flung the door back open to the Haven and started to shout, "What did you... " when the chicken hit her full in the face. It almost seemed to explode in a halo of feathers and blood that hid the seething expression of their mother before it began to float to the ground.

Mental "Oh [censored]'s.." reverberated silently in the two childers' minds as they comprehended the scene before them. Instantly, both japped a pointing finger towards the other in a last ditch effort to frame each other and redirect their mother's anger.

Portia growled low and spat out a feather to one side and began stalking towards both childer. They looked at each other a brief moment and practicely tripped on their own feet as they turned and sped off into the night. They raced through the forest zig-zagging, each attempting anything they could think of to slow the other one down to get the initial effect of their mother's rage before the other could be found.
 
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