Roleplay:Main Forum/General/ Bella-Laz and Alex-Benny

Catching Up

 * Laz: Laz yawned and stretched as he walked out of his cabin, he'd had a late night, partly because Fynn, a child of Hecate, had finally dropped off the enchanted item that Laz needed in order to be able to keep food in his room. Though it wasn't as permanent solution as he'd hoped for, Fynn would have to drop by once a week to recharge the enchantment so it would keep working. Just another reason to despise his god parent he supposed. After Fynn left he decided to go into town and stock up on things, but he ended up getting quite side tracked, anyone following mortal local news would be reading about female Jane Doe found in an alley way. Beaten, bloodied, mutilated, raped. No DNA evidence, her teeth pulled out, her fingers chopped off. It was his first kill since he'd killed Benny's mentor and made it look like it was from battle wounds. It had felt good, like itching a scratch that had been plaguing him for weeks. He looked around trying to decide if he should go look for Benny, it was finally really warm out, warm enough he decided to just go out in his sandals, cargo shorts and a dark red short sleeved polo shirt. His hair was still wet and messy from the shower he'd taken when he rolled out of bed. Part of him was glad that Benny was becoming more independent and less glued to him, but another part was surprisingly jealous, way more jealous than he was comfortable with. He should be more in control of his emotions, and he feared his emotions towards Benny were starting to get beyond his control. He'd just swing by and check on him, he'd act busy, like he didn't care that Benny was making all sorts of friend, yea, totally indifferent, because that's what Laz was, indifferent. With another yawn Laz set off towards the Hebe cabin.
 * Benny: He stretches. It's a bright sunny day at Camp Half-Blood. Benny had been quite busy over the past few days; making friends with Wil, Theo and Tyler, getting his first kiss, learning how to properly use a sword and develop his powers. The son of Hebe feels better than he had done in a long time, but all the exertion makes him sleep like a baby, well past his normal breakfast time. He snuggles his plush toys for some time, before he drags himself out of bed. After a quick breakfast and shower, Benny is about to go out when he forgets his dinosaur bracelet. Wrestling with the toys in his room, he eventually finds it and slips the bracelet over his arm, when he sees Lazarus walking towards his cabin door. He answers, his hair still wet. "Morning...." He yawns. "Um, should I get my practice stuff, or do you just wanna say hi?" Benny scratches the side of his head. He's dressed in his normal clothes, an orange CHB t-shirt, his bracelet, jeans and his cartoon sneakers. "Come in. Um, my room is a little messy, but I'll find it. I've been outside for the past week."
 * Laz: He raises an eyebrow, Benny always had a way of amusing him on levels he didn't know possible, anyone else and the sloppiness and disorganisation and immature moments and all that would annoy Laz. Not that he wasn't ever annoyed by Benny, but with Benny it was just different, like he was willing to tolerate more just to be with him. "Yea sure we can practise today, well presuming you find your gear." He grins and chuckles as he follows Benny into his room. "Oi mate, you do realise you'd find things quicker if you picked up once and awhile." He laughs half poking fun and half meaning it.
 * Benny: His room is fairly simple; four pastel walls, a large wooden floorspace and a sliding glass door which opens onto the courtyard. Laz should be able to hear the sound of running water and bird-song from inside the cabin gardens. "Um, sorry." Benny tramples through his toys, tossing his toys and plushies to the side. There's little organisation except a single bookshelf where some model airplanes, and a lego model of the cabin have been placed, very carefully. "I'd clean, but I've had no time. There were flying lessons, and parkour, and cleaning is boring anyways." Benny sticks his tongue out, acting like he's just been scolded by an older brother. Crawling underneath his bed, he pulls out a moderate sized gym bag with his armour and his other gym stuff. "Gotcha." He grins merrily. "Let's go. I think I'm getting better. I, even got to ride a harpy last week."
 * Laz: He stops to catch his breath due to the fact that the image of Benny 'riding' a harpy caused him to have uncontrollable laughter, which was very rare for Laz. Between trying to turn and follow Benny out of the room, remembering to breathe and trying to contain his laughter, he was starting to move more like a drunk guy having an asthma attack. "What....a....really..... ....a... harp.....y....." He takes a few deep breathes to try and regain his composure and almost gets there, "Please tell me someone took a picture.....!!!"
 * Benny: "Hey. That's no fair." Benny interrupts, stifling his giggles. "You taught me to use anything to my advantage." He smirks mischievously. "They're really not comfortable. She almost smacked me right into the labyrinth walls. I could have died..." He giggles. "I think I looked dashing, like a mighty knight in one of those old British storybooks..." He sticks out his tongue, deliberately playing up the spoiled brat.
 * Laz: He smiles and chuckles, far more composed now, "I don't know about a mighty knight, perhaps a squirrely squire. You may not want to tell that story too loudly though, not sure how the cleaning harpies would like the idea of a demigod riding one, even if it was something conjured during training and not a real harpy." He wonders what one of the cleaning bitches would actually do if they found out, it might be fun to try to convince Benny they were after him for it.
 * Benny: Benny seems fairly pleased with himself, until Laz drops the bombshell about the cleaning harpies. "Um, wait? We have cleaning harpies..." His expression is fairly blank, but it's evident that he is worried. Maybe that's why all my stuff goes missing. "Shall we, um...get out of here?" He scratches the back of his neck, eager for some fresh air.
 * Laz: He laughs and nods, "They like to keep to themselves, usually clean at night and when people aren't around." He starts heading out of the cabin and towards the training arenas, "Besides you're a mighty knight remember, they should tremble at the sight of you." He sticks out his tongue at Benny in a playful way, something he's not used to but something always comes over him when he's with Benny. "So did you want the regular dirt arena for training or did you want to use one of the fancy arenas?"
 * Benny: "Oh." He blushes, gently pushing Lazarus to the side. "Meanie," Benny sticks his own tongue out in response, as they head through the camp and towards the training arenas. "You're jealous because I'm a brave squire, and you're just an old man." He grins and cheekily tries to tickle Laz before he can respond. "Um, I don't mind. It's a nice day, so the normal one would be fine I guess." Benny shrugs. "I haven't been to any of the fancy arenas yet..."
 * Laz: He rolls his eyes when Benny tries to tickle him, but still can't manage to hide a grin, annoyed that Benny can always make him smile he changes the topic back to the matter at hand and tries to focus on that, "Wow, really? The god's really outdid themselves with them. I've heard some campers compare them to that bloke's blue police box in some British television show, bigger on the inside. It's bloody brilliant the detail and amount of things they crammed in to such small spaces." He shrugs, not really caring which arena they used
 * Benny: Benny seizes his victory. He grins cheekily, and walks beside Lazarus, with his hands in his jean pockets. "Yeah, I've explored the streams which lead to the arenas, but never the arenas themselves. Are they really that big?" He shrugs his shoulders, pretty easy about the whole training scenario. "Um, do you think I'm ready to train in one of the fancy arenas?" Despite his confidence boost over the past couple of weeks, he's still unsure of himself, at least around Laz. "They sound pretty awesome, but a knight has to be careful around his squire..."
 * Laz: He shrugs, "I don't really see much of a difference between there and out in the open, well...." He pauses, "I guess there's more opportunities for using powers. The regular open dirt arena some powers are limited, not for everyone, more the nature related ones I suppose, but real life fights won't generally take place in a neat little open spaced area with nothing around so it would be good to start learning to fight in situations that would be more apt to actually take place. There's the rural/city arena, a whole abandoned city crammed neatly into an arena. That's where the whole bigger on the inside happens, on the outside it's just the size of a normal arena, but then once you enter....." He pauses again, not really sure how to describe something he doesn't at all understand the science or magic behind, "Well it's magic godly shit at work I don't really get how it works, just that it is what it is." He shrugs as they near the regular dirt arena which is closer than the other arenas, "So decide now, we stop here or move on to one of the fancier ones....
 * Benny: "Um sure...." Benny shrugs his shoulders, and carefully listens. He's already pretty well trained for his age, but it couldn't hurt him to do more training with someone like Laz who had years of experience fighting monsters. "That sounds awesome! Is it a model city like the town in the Indiana Jones movie where he gets trapped and has to jump into the fridge to survive?" He asks, his curiosity getting the better of him. "Yeah, I suppose I'll have a go." He says, trying to boost his own confidence. Please mom, let me do a good job and make you proud. "Thanks for teaching me. It means a lot that you're happy to take over Alex's training." I hope I make him proud too, wherever his soul now resides.
 * Laz: He nods and smiles, "It's the least I could do, and you're a good student, you pick up things fairly quickly, I like that." When they reach the entrance to the urban arena Laz checks to make sure it's open to use and that no one has the time reserved, "Looks good to go, I think you'll find it's a bit more vast than the tiny little fake town in Indiana Jones, it probably looks more like Atlanta after an apocalypse when it's abandoned and nature has taken hold on things."
 * Benny: Blushing, Benny follows Lazarus along. He wants to give his friend a hug, but it feels awkward for some reason. He resolves to do well in the arena instead. "Cool. Maybe I'll find a toy store or get to go scavenger hunting on the way..." His eyes are lit with enthusiasm, as they enter the outskirts of the Urban Arena.
 * Laz: He chuckles, it was just like Benny to somehow turn this into toy hunting, "Well the gods spared no details so you may just find that and more. So how do you want to start out, I could give you a head start, close my eyes, count to 50, let you set up a defensive position somewhere..." He looks around taking note of all the areas, he'd only been in this arena once before. It had everything an urban area might have, outskirts that were more spread out with homes and parks, an industrial area with warehouses and work sites, a downtown area with tall skyscraper buildings and abandoned businesses, it even had an abandoned subway station under the ground. Then of course there was all the overgrowth, abandoned cars, garbage and all sorts of things that dotted the area.
 * Benny: "Basically you want to play a game of hide and seek...?" Benny looks around. The arena is truly bigger in comparison to anything that he's ever seen before. There are skyscrapers in the near distance, covered with ivy. The streets are littered with burnt out cars and whatever people forgot to clear away. "Whoa....." He gasps, getting distracted for a moment. "They really weren't messing around when they made this place..." He paces around Lazarus. "Sure, but no cheating." Benny giggles, making note of the zones around him. His light blue eyes glance around, looking for somewhere to hide.
 * Laz: He grins, "it's not like I can fly or see through walls so, you should be good, let's just hope you ate before you left, wouldn't want you to be suddenly excruciatingly hungry out there." He winks at Benny and then walks over to an old rusty junked Chevy Lumina car and plops himself down on the hood, "Ok I'm closing my eyes now." He closes his eyes. "better make it counting to 100, you have short legs, wouldn't want to start too soon." He grins and starts counting....."1.........2..........3.......etc"
 * Benny: "Hey! My legs aren't that short...." Benny yells, giggling as he runs away. His enhanced youth means that he should be able to cover a large distance in the time allotted. He heads towards one of the more residential areas of the map, where the estates are more spread out. The son of Hebe spots a series of large mansions nearby, and crawls under a nearby fence to gain rudimentary access. He climbs through an open window on the ground floor and looks for a defensible position.
 * Laz: "....97....98......*yawns*......fuck what was I on......93.....94.......95......96......*slaps at a fly*.....95.....96.....97.....98......*yawns* .....96....97.....98.....99.....100." He yawns again and stands up, realising he hadn't geared up yet, he opens up his gym bag and tosses on his gear. He has his twin swords at his back, 3 throwing daggers strapped to each thigh and a mechanical hand crossbow on his left wrist. He walked around the area where Benny had started from, normally it would be impossible to track anyone at all on city streets, but with all the over growth and vegetation Laz was about to make out feint signs enough to tell that Benny had gone towards a residential area, though the signs of his passing were few and far between so it made tracking rather slow, but Laz made sure to keep his attention equally focused on listening just in case Benny had laid a trap for him. He finally came to a street with very long driveways leading to rather beautiful mansions, at least they probably were beautiful before they were made to look dilapidated. Knowing Benny he'd probably gone into one of them to find a defensible position, the question was, which one.....
 * Benny: While Lazarus put on his gear, Benny also takes out his gear out of the gym bag. He puts on his light CHB armour, tucks his slingshot in the back of his jeans and slips on his dinosaur bracelet which would transform into a sword when needed. His ambrosia and a bag of marbles are held in another pocket. He scours the mansion briefly. Knowing Lazarus, he's likely to gain entry with relative ease. In response, Benny decides to prepare as best he can. He's currently in a dining room, where there's a large Steinway piano. He activates his sword and takes a look inside. Carefully cutting out enough piano wire, he sets a near invisible tripwire near the open window and rigs a couple of low-hanging chandeliers to fall, if the link between the wire and the chain that held them were severed. Heading for the front door, he finds a couple of empty paint-cans. Seems like they were renovating the place. Knowing that Laz could gain entry by rotting or eating his way through the door, he strings up the paint-cans to the opening mechanism. Hopefully, if the door's tampered with, in any way, they would drop onto Lazarus or at least fall to the ground and give Benny further time to prepare. Thanks Dad for making me watch Home Alone every Christmas. It may just pay off.
 * Laz: He scans one of the places and decides that there's no visible way under and he knew the fence would be impossible for Benny to climb so he moves on to the next place. After a few minutes he notices a place in the fence that looked like it had been recently crawled under, fresh dirt turned over and some grass moved. It didn't look big enough for him to get under, so he opted to do the hard climb over the fence. In the process he ends up getting a small cut on his hand from the sharp metal at the top. Finally landing on the other side, he crouches and looks around the property, checking to see the best way to go to the house. Seeing a large climbable oak tree on the right side of the house giving access to a third floor balcony. He heads that way, trying to avoid being seen by keeping to the tall grass and bushes. Once at the tree he climbs up and over to the third floor balcony. He debates breaking the glass doors that lead in to a master bedroom, but doesn't want to make any noise so instead he pulls a lock picking set that he always carries in his pockets and picks the lock open. Sliding his set back into his pockets he enters the room and looks around. It was a nice room, way nicer than what he had at the Limos cabin, he wondered if anyone would notice if he started living in the Arena. Casting those thoughts aside he makes his way across the room and peers quietly out the door, from there he could see the top of a staircase and bannister leading down to the second floor, he tries to listen for any sounds that Benny might make to gauge where in the house he is.
 * Benny: The son of Hebe is quiet as a mouse, as he continues to search the rest of the house. He heads straight upwards to the second floor. He's searching through a playroom which appears to have belonged to a young boy. Leftover toys are scattered across the floor. He finds some fire-crackers, and a lighter in a nearby toolbox. "Cool...." He whispers to himself. He peers quietly out the door to check if Lazarus is there, as he hasn't had the chance to check out the upper bedrooms. Spotting Lazarus for a brief second, Benny quickly takes another door to the attached bedroom. This appears to have been his bedroom. He lights a couple of the firecrackers as a distraction and tosses them across the hall to create a distraction. Running as fast as possible, he heads down the stairs once again, trying to stay out of sight as he heads towards the foyer.
 * Laz: Hearing the sudden movement below him, he actually felt a bit relieved cuz at least he knew he'd picked the correct mansion. He creeps to the edge of the bannister and peers down just in time to see Benny darting out of sight on the first floor. He grins, it was nice not to have to really put effort into a fight, Benny was good but not good enough that Laz could go full on yet. He moves down to the second floor and peers down cautiously towards the first floor. He wouldn't put it past Benny to have traps, he had quite a bit of time here before Laz showed up, so he wasn't willing to go barrelling in guns blazing. As he nears the first floor landing he peers carefully around the corner and decides to project the power that causes a person to see whatever foods they desire the most, which if he knew Benny at all, was probably going to be piles and piles of candy all around him. "Hey Benny, did you remember to eat before we came out?" He calls out toying with Benny.
 * Benny: As Lazarus speaks, piles and piles of candy appear all over the mansion. There's even a giant churn, filled with what looks like neapolitan ice-cream. Knowing that Laz was a son of Limos, Benny grits his teeth. "Hey, that's not fair! Come out and fight, or are you scared old man?" He says, having a miniature tantrum as the lack of sugar becomes pretty clear. He takes out his slingshot, and draws his CB ammunition. He pulls back, and spotting a high-rise window above the stairwell, aims a couple of shots to try smash it. If successful the broken glass should fall near Lazarus, and distract him for some time. "Catch me if you can..." He giggles, passing the piles of candy as he runs down the hallway, searching for another exit.
 * Laz: He laughs at Benny's Frustration, but then cringes and covers his head as the shattered window rains glass down on him, "Oi, you could put an eye out...." He calls out while laughing at the same time. Once he was sure there was no more glass, he steps out into the foyer and brushes a few flakes of glass out off his clothes. Still seeing Benny as an easy target, he takes his time and just slowly jobs in the direction that Benny went, he continues to taunt Benny verbally and calls out, "I thought you liked candy, don't you want to stop and try some?"
 * Benny: “I'm not a stupid kid. It's know it's not real candy...” Benny pokes his head around the corner, as Lazarus slowly walks down the hallway, and sticks his tongue out. He reaches in his pocket for his bag of marbles, and scatters them across the floor. Afterwards, Benny sends a curse to make Laz's bones and muscles ache and lock together, hopefully buying him some more time, as he looks for an exit. Finding a small cubbyhole in one of the master bedrooms, he figures out that it’s a dumb-waiter of some sort. Maybe this will get me out. Tossing out the owner’s best Ming Dynasty china, the son of Hebe crowds into the small space instead and activates the pulleys which would make him descend towards the kitchen. He holds one of the ropes, and grits his teeth. "Here goes nothing..."
 * Laz: Laz just laughs at Benny as the marbles scatter across the floor ahead, his lack of focus and effort finally kicks him in the arse because he wasn't at all prepared for Benny's sudden curse, it hits Laz the hardest just as he starts taking his first steps through the now marble scattered mine field. As his right foot hits the floor and starts taking his weight, he can suddenly feel the joints in his leg creak and wobble. His eyes grow wide with surprise and when his left foot comes down in what feels like an eternity but in reality is just seconds, the pain that surges up his sciatic nerve causes his entire body to jolt in pain and his back to arch as the pain ends in his lower back. This causes him to not even look where his next step falls, which of course is right on top of a lonely little marble, before he could even gasp out in pain, he found himself flat on his backside with another marble jabbing into his arse, "Oi bloody bastard, I'll get you for this." He calls out, half impressed, half annoyed and partly laughing as well. By the time he finally gets back on his feet and into the room that Benny went in to, the dumb waiter was long on its way down to the ground floor. Grumbling to himself as he rubs out some of his muscles, partly praying for the pain to subside already, knowing he can't fit in the dumb waiter to follow that way, he heads back out of the room and looks for the stairs.
 * Benny: The dumb waiter safely brings him to the kitchen. As he slides open the door, Benny hears a loud bang upstairs, followed by several cuss words. Benny giggles. "Gotcha," Doing an arm pump, he crawls out and scours the kitchen. It's fairly big, and connects with the dining room and the hall, which shows the architect's thankfully followed some kind of logic. I've gotta be quick. The curse should've worn off by now. Scrambling around the kitchen, Benny is able to catch his breath. Surprisingly the water pipes still work, and he's able to take a quick drink. The water tastes metallic, and he makes a face in response. Running to the foyer, Benny quickly ties another tripwire across the bottom of the stairs, using the last of his piano wire. His nimble fingers allow him to do the job without much trouble. Then, he runs behind one of the dining room walls for cover, and draws his slingshot. "You're not gonna be able to catch me...." Peeking out towards the stairwell, he waits for any sign of movement, glancing briefly behind him to check his exits and make sure his traps were still in place, just like Alex taught him. Always know your exits.
 * Laz: He finds the stairs that lead to the ground floor and slowly starts making his way down them, by the time he nears the bottom the aching muscles has worn off. He stops a few steps from the bottom and rubs his left knee a bit and notices that his hand is bleeding again from when he where he cut it on the fence, apparently falling had reopened the cut a bit. From where he stands he can see the foyer and that no one is in it, he can't hear anything but he assumes Benny is in one of the rooms off the foyer, or perhaps deeper. He takes the next few steps so slowly that when he comes to the trip wire it only partially throws him off balance, he's able to keep from completely falling on his arse but does manage to turn his neck awkwardly pulling the muscles a bit in the attempt to keep himself from falling. "Oi you and your bloody traps." He draws his swords, deciding to stop with the funny business and storms across the foyer and towards the dining room.
 * Benny: As Lazarus stops part way down the stairs, Benny sees him through the gaps in the stairs. He briefly channels his youth to make himself quicker and stronger for a short amount of time. Taking a deep breath like he was taught, he quickly fires a couple of CB balls straight for Lazarus' head, hoping to further disorient him. "Um, maybe if you were quicker, you'd be able to catch me." Benny knows that he can't take the son of Limos head on, and backtracks down the ballroom. As he runs away, the son of Hebe deliberately triggers several of the traps he has lain. If Lazarus is following him, several glass chandeliers should come crashing towards the ground and distract him, or at least cause some more trouble while he found another exit. There were a couple of choices, he could take the basement in the kitchen or escape through a nearby window towards the mansion gardens. Stay calm. You can do this.
 * Laz: He chuckles to himself, it was always more fun when he didn't actually care about winning the fight, especially when it was Benny who needed to learn, "Just remember who buys you lots of candy...." He calls out as he manages to use his swords to strike the projectiles away from his face. Swords had always come naturally to Laz, but that's probably part to his upbringing in the 1800s and his preference for knives and swords, they always made the kill more personal, and he liked that. As he makes his way across the Ballroom, back at a slightly slower pace allowing Benny to get some distance on him, he suddenly feels his leg pull at a wire of some sort but not trip him, he only had enough time to duck and cover his head before the chandelier came crashing down, glass shattering, brushing himself off he continued on but even slower, so that this time the next trap he triggers he's faster and able to do a forward roll away from the falling second chandelier. He stands and manages to avoid the last trap all together, he calls out again, "Benny lad, you realise you can't run and hide forever right, one of these days you're going to have to learn hand to hand combat." He grins enjoying the chase.
 * Benny: "Yeah I do, my dad...." Benny teases. He uses the last of his enhanced speed to avoid the glass chandeliers as they crash to the ground. As he knows their precise location, he's able to dash across the ballroom/dining room without much incident. He knows that he can't keep running forever, but he also knows Lazarus has at least a century of experience on him. C'mon give me a break... He heads towards the bay windows at the other side of the room. He quickly launches and fires a few CB balls to smash the nearest window and jumps through. Miscalculating the landing, he stumbles, and falls down a grassy verge nearby. The kid picks up momentum, ending up halfway down the field. He takes a few scrapes and bruises, but his accelerated healing has already started to seal the minor wounds. He stands up, dusts himself off and looks for any sign of Lazarus. The son of Hebe was near the edges of the estate. Okay, I'm sorry. I'll figure something out... His blue eyes glance towards his surroundings. Overgrown trees and bushes overlook the road, and there are several fancy houses adjacent to his location. He begins to climb up one of the bushes, trying to get a better read on his location.