Gym Activities [OPEN]

[Roach Copeland]

[I know we did have 'Self Defense' up. I talked with Jessie about this. Since some who were in that thread are no longer in the guild, I'm throwing up another 'work out' thread.]

Roach technically knew how to throw a punch. Being a kid growing up on the streets, you learned a thing or two. Never tuck in the thumbs. Tighten a fist as much as possible. Don't throw all your gusto into one attack. And such and so on. However, knowledge didn't mean practice, and Roach had found himself at the end of far too many ass whoopings.

So that had been the reason Roach had been practicing in the gym. Or at least that is what he had told himself. A week ago, he had begun coming up to the boxing area of the gym, trying his best to remember every nugget of knowledge he had concerning attacking. He even checked out a few self defense manuals from the library.

It was a good distraction. Distraction from...

Roach closed is eyes, his energy faltering as he threw the last of it into the punch. He stumbled a bit before leaning forward, his arms resting on top of his knees. His eyes pinched shut as he took in breath. Yes, breath. He could concentrate on that. He could concentrate on that instead of the left over stress from Finals or Alice's departure.

He winced.

There he went again. He straightened up again, smacking the boxing gloves together before sending another series of blows into the bag. It swayed slightly from the impact, and Roach tried to ignore what that meant about his overall strength.

"Tighten up," he mumbled to himself as he threw another punch at the swaying bag. His fist glanced off the side of it causing him to stumble forward, smashing his face right into the bag.

He crumbled to the ground, holding his nose in pain.

"I have to be the only guy-" he began as his eyes closed once more. "- to be punched out by a boxin' bag."

[Arthur Rawlings]

"Happens more than you'd think, actually."

Ar strolled over from the glass wall and offered a hand to help Roach up. He was in his street clothes: glaringly bright print on his shirt with shoes in the one color that didn't make it onto the shirt, and pants. His pants were relatively tame color-wise, but with enough intricate stitching to keep them interesting. On the whole, very much not gym clothes.

"Having fun yet?"

[Roach Copeland]

"Oh, totes." Roach said as he took hold of the offered hand. "Tons of fun."

And with that, he pulled himself up. Dusting off his clothing, he tossed a glanced over towards Ar before looking back down over his attire. Sweat shirt with non-matching sweat pants that seemed to sag a bit too much in the ass. He tried his best to hide the wrinkling of his nose as he looked back towards Ars.

"Don't tell me you work out in that gear," he asked as he turned towards the boxing bag once more. He threw a kick into it, his foot hitting it haphazardly causing him to stumble forward.

Right, showing off wasn't possible.

He turned his focus back towards Ars before tossing a glance towards the swaying bag. "Wouldn't happen to know some kung-fu you'd be willin' to upload for me, yeah?"

[Arthur Rawlings]

Ar's face went blank, then a vague surprise flickered to insubstantial life. "... I know kung-fu," he said in a decent, though exaggerated imitation of Keanu Reeves.

He flexed his knees a couple inches, the pistons in his legs fired, and Ar was airborne. Just past the peak of the jump, one leg kicked out and landed solidly at head-height on the bag. A little stretch in a pair of pants is good for many things: comfort, flattering fit that isn't ashamed of what's underneath, and enough range of motion to engage in a little spontaneous aerial gymnastics. Since there was time--and because style points count for double--the force pushing back at his foot propelled him into a tight backflip with a gentle landing below.

That's right, showing off is always possible.

"There's a little bit up there, but I'm guessing most of it's pretty useless without the necessary upgrades." Ar grinned as he reached out to slow the swinging bag. "Not your style anyway. In the time it took me to do that, you could've groin-kicked three guys and convinced a fourth his name was Sally and his mommy was calling him home for dinner."

[Roach Copeland]

A better gentleman would have stared at the display of gymnastic calmly. He'd probably offer his comments in a serious manner, possibly after ten seconds of 'golf' clapping it up for the contender. However, Roach was neither a gentleman or a calm one at that. He was Roach. So, when the display of endurance, skill, and (Surprisingly) fashion ended, he stood there with his mouth agape.

Twenty seconds passed.

Thirty.

Finally. "Holy shit!"

Roach shook his head in astonishment before he did a few kicks and spins in order to mimic the teenager's fighting skills. To say he didn't really match up was an understatement however the enthusiasm was there. Like a kid on a playground who decided he was the ultimate ninja. Roach turned on his heels towards Ars, grinning from ear to ear.

"Might not be my style but you said it best last time we talked... I gotta learn some sort of fightin'. One punch and I'm out ain't goin' to cut it on the Isles," he spoke as he moved to the bag to stop it from sway. He peaked around it, nodding his head. "I gotta learn to bloody someone's nose while I'm screwin' their minds up. Shit, atleast learn how to dodge better, right?"

[Arthur Rawlings]

Ar just smiled at the display of ultimate ninja power. Smiled and suppressed the twitch-response to record it for later. Not having that on film would be one of his biggest regrets of the day.

"Oh, by all means, bloody and dodge things. Just have to remember to use all the tools in your kit. I used about..." he paused to run through a rather long mental checklist, "five different systems to do what I did. There's no such thing as a clean fight. They're gonna cheat every way they can, and the only way to make it fair is to cheat better."

Ar lazily circled Roach and the bag while he talked, finally coming to rest against the wall beside them. In his experience, there were two ways to physically assume control of a conversation: move or stay perfectly still. How well they worked depended on raw confidence, and which one worked better depended the other person talking. If they were a mover, stillness--from foot to head and even to the eyes--forced them to limit their motion to your field of vision. If they held still, a little wandering demonstrated your freedom and forced them to follow or be left behind. Ar played the little game almost without thinking anymore.

"Fact: Your punch barely qualifies as a love tap. Fact: You've got all the agility of a particularly sluggish corpse. Fact: You've got a brain that can launch a robot at the ceiling on a whim and read every thought in the area. Why not augment the, frankly, pathetic with the plainly awesome?"

[Roach Copeland]

Roach realized at a young age that sometimes you just gotta laugh. Sometimes, when something hurts badly, you gotta laugh. Or when someone betrays you; you gotta laugh! Or some comments were so harsh yet so true, you just gotta toss back your head and laugh.

So, that's what Roach did. He laughed. He wrapped his arms around the punching bag, hugging it too his chest as he let the amusement of the comment run its course. This was why he liked Ars. No bullshit. No lie. Truth, truth, beautifully painful truth. Where most would try to lessen the damage, Ars was just so brutally honest one couldn't helped but be taken by surprise.

It took Roach a moment before finally looking back towards the fashion-clad ninja. "You, sir, speak like a wise asshole. I totes dig on that."

Roach pushed away from the bag, turning on his heels once more to face it before bringing back his arm. Normally, Roach let his telekineses run wild. More of a wave instead of a battering ram. But Ars had brought up a point. If he was hoping to do damage with muscle alone, he might as well switch to trying to tickle folks to death.

Energy built up as he stared at the bag, a small crackle escaping up his arm as the energy there tried to push through the psionic shielding, trying to go into a wave like it was always allowed to do. Free, no focus, no hesitation. However, Roach held it this time, letting the 'water' slosh around in the shielding, torrenting into a storm before finally punching forward. He dropped the psionic hold of the energy at the base of his knuckles, the energy there exploding outward like air escaping a balloon.

Second lesson of the day: Plant your feet.

The energy smashed into the boxing bag, the chain barely holding onto the object. It swayed loudly in place. Roach, on the other hand, let out a squeel as he was launched from his feet. The energy release... had been to high. He flew back, feet over his head, and slammed painfully back onto the mat.

Okay... so he'd been knocked down twice by that frickin' boxin' bag.

[Arthur Rawlings]

Ar hit the floor shortly after Roach, laughing hard enough to bring tears to his eyes. He laughed a little harder when he thought about the scandal that would surely sweep the school if word got out that he was capable of producing tears.

Not having that on film would surely be his single biggest regret of the day.

Ar sprawled back against the wall as he recovered, eyes tracking the wild swing of the bag, lopsided grin beaming from his face. "Least we know you can do some damage. Everything up to throwing your own ass on the floor was exceedingly awesome. The rest of it was still awesome, of course, but probably not the brand you're going for. A little less psychic powerhouse brawler and a little more puppy with his nose stuck in something cute."

Ar's eyes twinkled--not the electronic glow of activating cameras and accessing youtube, but an entirely biological gleam. "Do it again."

[Roach Copeland]

Roach was used to ridicule.

That wasn't an emo statement, it was just a fact. During his entire life on the streets, that was how he was taught. You'd screw up, you'd get laughed at, and then you got back up. Hell, that's what he did to other people. So, the comment from Ars was met with a smirk before Roach pulled himself to his feet.

He hopped about, trying to loosen the muscles in his arms by rolling his shoulders back some before taking a stance in front of the bag. He planted his feet, securing his balance, and then concentrated again.

Energy began running through his body, those psionic reserves slowly getting depleted as the energy crackled over his arms. He took aim for the center of the bag, prepared himself, and then threw another punch. The energy released outside his knuckles, smashing into the bag sending it rocking back. The force wasn't as heavy as the first one but it was still a solid hit!

Plus, extra points for keeping his balance.

He remained still for a moment, arms locked in a defense stance before he dropped them to shake them out. He tossed a glance towards Ars, flashing a grin before punching his fists together. "It's a start... drainin', though."

[Arthur Rawlings]

Ar smiled right back, "Awesome start." And it really was, not that Ar would ever lie about something like awesomeness. Roach had gone from butterfly-kissing the bag to actually testing the strength of the chain in a matter of minutes. He earned bonus points for massive improvement on top of the points already earned for throwing not one, but two psychic punches hard enough to knock a guy off his feet. "Don't recommend picking any fist fights until you can swing more than one punch a minute, but if they're patient enough and don't fight back, you're a sure win."

The cyborg cocked his head and looked the psychic over once more appraisingly. "What do you plan to do when they hit back?