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[Pseudonym]

Lady Serpent II
Gender: Female
Location: I don't know guys, I want a city somewhere on the North side of Khazan. I'm thinking of calling it Hono City.


Unconsciousness is not an unpleasant feeling. Instead of struggling to swim against the current, one floats down the river of time, unaware and at perfect peace with the world. That's what she told us. But paralysis is nothing like unconsciousness, though the symptoms be the same.

A-19 found Lady Serpent on the floor of her basement IV'd to an industrial sized tank of her own paralytic agent. Her eyes flashed with an impotent fury. Her makeup was perfect and untouched like a layer of smooth porcelain over her delicate, pretty face. She was like a statue, or as A-19 began to think of her, like a trophy.

Once the Kennelmaids realized she had gone missing, they had separated in order to search. A-19 found her frozen in place, submerged in the river of time, drowning but not dying. She was no longer fit to be in charge, so A-19 decided to take her position.

At first she disposed of everyone she thought dangerous to her. She joined A-22 in her search and hid her beneath the stairwell. Then she went to meet A-24, the one who had always been the smartest, and drowned her at the shore. After all her competition was dead, A-19 went back to the Kennel. She had to get ready for her debut.

The light of the bathroom's vanity shined down as A-19 decided what make up she would be using. She wanted to separate herself from her predecessor. Instead of working very complicated patterns, she applied one layer of ivory white all over her face. Then, for colour, she applied deep red lipstick. Her mask was complete and simple. Instead of hiding her face, she merely accentuated it. She was no longer herself, no longer A-19.

None dared to question her authority. There was an unspoken understanding that the previous Lady Serpent had died and a new one had come to take her place. A-19 heard from the Kennelmaids words that she herself had said countless times before, "To your service, Lady Serpent, we commit ourselves."

Thus A-19 became Lady Serpent, but not by the words of the Kennelmaids. Their mindless, perfunctory chanting was nothing but procedure. A-19 didn't become Lady Serpent when she heard other people call her that; she became Lady Serpent when she found her predecessor, alone in her basement, and seized the opportunity.

Personality

Lady Serpent sat alone in her jacuzzi, alcoholic beverage in hand, letting the warm jets of water soothe muscles sore from physical training. In the corner of her room, the Painted Trophy stared back at her. It served as an inspiration to do better and a warning as to what torture comes to losers.

All four members of Lady Serpent's personal guard entered. The Kennelmaids unit had been disbanded, the new Lady Serpent didn't much want for maids. She kept the four most competent at fighting and fired the rest, dumped them unceremoniously on the street somewhere. Those girls were pretty, Lady Serpent was sure they'd find a life doing something else: unconcerned, but sure.

Lady Serpent sighed and look at those who had intruded. "Did you find her?"

The tallest of the guard, who seemed to have become the leader either by virtue of her height or actions spoke first "No, ma'am." The other three remained silent, standing at attention.

"Then why are you here?

"We have reason to believe that people are moving in on our turf." The other three nodded in agreement.

Lady Serpent sat up straight and put down her drink on the side of the jacuzzi. "Let the goons be concerned with turf like obsolete feudal lords. My power is not in terms of land owned. I don't own land; I own people and pay rent. You know this."

One of the guard interrupted: this one had a softer voice. "No, our sea transport route into Khazan City. Someone is claiming control."

Lady Serpent rolled her eyes. "When it becomes important. We will attend to it. For now, your mission remains the same. Find her."

Superior Body,Mind,Agility

Supreme Commander (6)

"We found her"

Step One: Collecting

Kabuki was walking down the street, arms laden with groceries that she was bringing back home to her apartment. In the darkness of the street, where the spotlights couldn't reach, a van followed slowly behind her.

Kabuki bent down to tie her laces and the door to the van slid open silently. One of the members of the guard leapt out, vaulted over a car to get to the sidewalk and leaned into an elbow drop. Kabuki rolled away, making sure to keep the groceries from falling over. The guard pulled into a controlled somersault and sprang up from the ground, arms up ready to throw another punch.

Kabuki turned to outrun her aggressors. Another guard tipped off a passing truck, swung off a lamppost and kicked out at Kabuki. She didn't see the kick coming and went down. Her groceries spilled out all over the street. Kabuki rolled over and jumped to her feet, but she was surrounded by four people. She struck out with a radial, sweeping tae-kwon-do kick. One of them caught her foot and slammed her into the facade of a nearby building. The guards produced rope quickly and tied Kabuki up: feet together, arms pinioned behind her back like chicken wings, hands between her shoulders with wrist tied together and again to a rope wrapped around Kabuki's shoulders like a bear hug.

They brought Kabuki back to the car and threw her in the backseat. Lady Serpent in the front seat turned around and smiled back at her captive. "It's been a long time, A-13."

Standard Creation (2)

When the Painted Trophy operated, before she was a trophy, she had a list of chemical recipes to make her various paralytic agents. Her successor took that list and added to it. Lady Serpent was deadly with her store of chemicals.

Step Two: Shipping

The four guards held Kabuki still while Lady Serpent put the sedative in her neck. Kabuki's muscles strained and flexed under the sharp pain of the needle, but soon her body went limp. Lady Serpent drove out to Dockside where a rented boat would take them to the palace up in [CITY NAME] by the north side of Khazan.

The chemical injection into Kabuki's system also included a time dilation effect. When the sedative wore off and Kabuki found herself awake in an iron storage container, the four hour long ride would feel like weeks to her.

The boat loading went splendidly. Lady Serpent paid the guys who owned the boat, plus a little extra to have him ignore the unconscious woman being carried into the storage crate. Before the boat left, Lady Serpent walked into the storage crate to talk."

The iron door cranked closed, leaving Lady Serpent alone in the darkness with a sedated Kabuki. There was no light, so she couldn't see. In the darkness, Lady Serpent let herself go.

"Why am I doing this?" she asked the body. "Why am I hunting you down and hurting you? To be honest, I'd much rather let you go but would they respect me if I do? What if I let the one person who escaped from the Kennel go?"

The room rang with silence. Lady Serpent's desperate words echoed around in her mind. Tears started to fall. "You don't know what it was like. You were the favorite." The body was unapologetic. Lady Serpent continued. "She dressed us like dolls. She made us feel like immature children. But you, she empowered you."

Lady Serpent started to feel silly with her emotional outburst. She turned away and knocked twice on the wall. One of the guards pulled it open from the other side. Lady Serpent sighed and said emotionlessly, "Let's go."

Standard Martial Arts (2)

The boat sped over the gray water west of Khazan. The trip had been going on for an hour. Lady Serpent was sitting and having her guards inform her on expansion of the Serpent Operation. There were forty women in the palace right now, all of which were regularly bought and sold. Lady Serpent was pulling in a good amount of money, enough that within a year she would be able to afford the boat she wanted, hopefully. But she still wanted to expand the operation.

Their conversation was interrupted by a grappling hook wrapping itself around the bow of the boat. Lady Serpent cocked her head to the side in confusion. She heard one of her guards say, "uh oh".

"What is happening?" Lady Serpent barked. A person climbed up the rope and onto the bow of the ship. His suit was completely dry.

"This is the problem we had mentioned," said a guard.

The man approached. "My name is Wernher, and you, madam, are in my waters. You have not paid your tax, and that is not acceptable."

His approach was so sudden, and his pitch so confident that Lady Serpent was struck dumb. After a second she spluttered, "No."

"What?"

"No, get off my boat." Lady Serpent motioned for her guards. All four stood directly behind her, ready to strike at any moment.

"I will not get off this boat," Wernher pulled a knife out of the inside pocket of his blazer. "And since you refuse to pay your tax to me. We're taking this boat and your cargo."

One of Lady Serpent's guards broke protocol and spoke, unspoken to. "We?"

Wernher snapped his fingers and a swarm of wires whizzed through the air connected to grappling hooks which anchored themselves to the railings on the side of the boat. Twenty men, armed with knives, pipes, and other assorted weapons boarded the ship.

Lady Serpent turned to her guard and barked her orders. "You guys take care of this trash on the bow, I have to make sure they aren't disturbing our cargo." The four guards leapt into the fray while Lady Serpent turned on her heel and dashed towards the back of the ship where Kabuki slept.

Superior Reflection (4)

Eleven men were standing by the door to Kabuki's box trying to cut around the lock to which Lady Serpent had the key on a necklace around her neck. She entered with a flying kick to the skull of the one holding the knife and bounced off his head landing in a defensive pose. The men stood, stunned for a second. One adventurous man charged, switchblade in hand, arm raised and ready to swing. When he did, Lady Serpent sidestepped the blow and used the man's own momentum to slam him to the wooden deck.

Two more men attacked; Lady Serpent slammed their skulls into each other. She could feel one man's nose break against the other's and it made her laugh.

The rest of the thugs hung back, watching to see what would happen. Lady Serpent looked at them and shouted, "Either fight me or get off my ship."

They charged, Lady Serpent quick dispatched seven of them. The last one, she bounced his head off of Kabuki's container. Eleven men squirmed on the deck. Lady Serpent started pushing them toward the side where she could throw them over.

She heard a creak behind her and stopped. The door to Kabuki's crate had opened slightly when Lady Serpent pounded the thug's head against it. She stumbled out, panic on her face, looking back and forth from her left hand to her right. She looked up and bellowed, "Why is everything moving so slow?"

Superior Combat Supremacy (4)

The sedative had worn off. Now there was a pissed off, drugged up martial arts master on the boat along with almost fifty thugs. There was no indication as to how the guards were doing with Wernher who might have been some kind of wizard judging by his unblemished suit.

Kabuki caught sight of Lady Serpent and charged. She struck out with fists and elbows, doing her best to do damage. Lady Serpent weaved around the blows, filling in the spaces between the punches, making sure not to get hit. Kabuki was similarly nimble enough to evade all of Lady Serpent's blows. Neither of them was able to hurt the other.

"Face it, there's nothing you can do," taunted Lady Serpent, "This boat is taking us far away from here and there's nothing you can do about it. Once my guards get over here, we're gonna put you down again and this time, for good."

"This boat is going away from Khazan." Kabuki repeated to herself. She broke away from the combat and ran to the back of the boat. Lady Serpent realized her mistake too late and gave chase with just enough time to hear the splash of Kabuki jumping off the boat and into the water. In the moonlight, Lady Serpent could see the ripples moving out from where she landed.

Lady Serpent sighed and turned around to see her four guards were watching. She stood silent,waiting for them to comment on her failure. The tallest one cleared her throat and said, "We've dispatched the intruders. What shall we do with them?"

"Throw'em overboard. Let's just go home."

[deojusto]

I like it, the character is engrossing because throughout I'm trying to figure out what exactly drives her and how she'll tie into the larger scheme of things. The part where she speaks to Kabuki's body is a little creepy, but good creepy. I'm guessing we'll also be seeing this werner guy later on as well. I did kind of feel like for a Global level character Kabuki got taken down very quickly. She's supposed to be a badass but she doesn't land so much as a punch. Maybe if the fight was extended so that she takes a few guards out then gets sedated from behind, maybe by like a dart or something, then it wouldn't seem like such a beatdown. Another option I'd suggest is maybe skip the fight scene and have LS see Kabuki in the crate and have some guard relate the story, mentioning whether they lost any fighters or how much of a challenge they encountered.

If you feel like adding things, you might want to go into more detail regarding A-19's rise to power. Did the old organization fracture in any way, is there a civil war, does the new LS do things noticeably differently, who is the 'they' she mentions when she says they wouldn't respect her if she let Kabuki go? What does the room in the personality section look like? Since they moved to Khazan are they still doing the asian theme?

typing wise, in the creation section you write "when the sedative woke up" and in the final section you write " She broke away from the Khazan and ran to the back of the boat" when I think you mean she ran away from the cargo hold, or bridge, or something.

(Also why can't Werhner's guys have guns? The assassins could still probably take them out)

[Pseudonym]

Thanks for the typing critique. That always happens when I think faster than I type. I supplant similar sounding words. "Woke up" was supposed to be "wears off" and "Khazan" was supposed to be combat. I fixed them.

The Wernher guys were supposed to have guns. I don't know why I forgot to write that in but eh. I don't know if it's much worth changing. I don't know if I'm gonna actually write Wernher. Maybe someone else will pick him up later.

They are still doing the asian theme, hence Lady Serpent.

I wanted the fight with Kabuki to feel like a beatdown. When four people add up to Supreme Commander, those four people have to be legitimately amazing. Also, Kabuki was holding groceries and surprised. In a fair fight, she would probably take out one or two. I had to have her job a bit to show off how impressively good Lady Serpent's guard is.

I will add more to Lady Serpent's room in the Personality section. But man, I'm bad at settings. I just don't know how to write them convincingly and interestingly.

Thanks for the critique. How many pandas do I get?

[deojusto]

I get what you're saying about commander, but Kabuki has about the same amount of points loaded into martial arts, acrobat, and combat supremacy. They don't seem too challenged. Maybe its just because it's my character. I'm sure someone else will chime in eventually.


Four pandas out of five (very good).

[Darkender]

The only thing I don't like about this character, and it's similar to what Deo brought out, is she seems too unstoppable in her sheet. I think a longer fight scene to catch Kabuki is needed along with a longer end fight scene when the two finally fight. She doesn't seem real to me because, other than the crying scene, she really shows no faults or has any problems. I think adding these things will solidify her character a bit more.

[Pseudonym]

I fixed all the stuff I had feedback on and then FILDI submitted it. Thanks for the feedback, guys. Now I have to work for a Fallen for Treach's tournament.

[treacherous]

I never read it. You guys move too quickly. Whippersnappers.