<div class="floatleft">(http://i.imgur.com/70QCU.jpg)</div><hr/><br/><span class="bbc_font" style="font-family: arial;"><span class="bbc_size" style="font-size: 14pt;"><strong>  Name:</strong>         Eric Brooks<br/>  <strong>Title:</strong>            Blade<br/>  <strong>Affiliation:</strong>  Resistance<br/>  <strong>Location:</strong>   Tokyo, Ground level of Mori Tower<br/>  <strong>Tags:</strong>          No one yet<br/><br/></span></span><hr/><br/>It had been a long time since Blade could remember a world without the smell of copper, the sight of dust and the sound of explosions and gunfire. He had forgotten how it felt to sit down and have a conversation, forgotten voices, save for screams and shouts. Leather gloved hands held his customary sunglasses. Blade was leaning against an alley wall, the cold leather of his sheath resting against the ground, the hilt of his sword resting against the wall next to him. It was an odd feeling that had taken him, not unlike his time spent hunting vampires, avoiding authorities and vengeful supernaturals. But this time, he didn't have any fellow slayers, didn't have a mentor. He didn't have joy. At the thought of his long lost, a little mote of nostalgia and grief crept into his chest, but tears didn't reach his eyes. The thoughts of the past were banished along with his sorrow as his hands guided the sunglasses around his head, hiding his eyes behind the glossy obsidian surface. One hand reached to his right and gripped the sword by the sheath, gripping intensely. That little fount of pain had given rise to his rage. Blade was angry at everything. He was angry at the giant open wound that was his life. At the agony of loss, at the injustice of it all. Behind glass lenses, his eyes blazed, his muscles tensed, his teeth bared. It was like someone had lit a fire in his abdomen. The world started to turn a bright shade of red, the walls giving way to the crimson haze of sheer, unreasoning hatred. He focused hard, imagining all of his sorrow, all of his loss as the fault of Apocalypse and whoever worked for him. Blade broke his lean on the wall and replaced his katana into the loop on his back, beneath his trenchcoat, his fists clenched hard enough to bend steel, his sharp fangs bared in the throes of his passion. This was the most recent form that Blade's slaying had taken. When he wasn't out slaying, he was sitting, thinking, festering. His rage would build and then he would be off, angrier than the last time, gripped by the claws of an unshakeable bloodlust.<br/><br/>The tough rubber soles of Blade's boots struck the ground as he thundered out of the alleyway and burst out onto the street. The sound of gunfire rang clearly in his ears, the smell of blood and the sight of the relatively clean streets and sheer buildings. His long legs powered him forward, thudding against the concrete heavily, perfectly in concert with his pumping arms and rising chest. It took a great deal to reach his anaerobic threshold, just some sprinting wouldn't do it, especially considering the adrenaline and raw fury pumping it's way through his veins. It was hard to kill these soldiers though. They wore thick metal suits, spat flame, sundered earth or projected pure energy from their palms. They were all superhuman and fanatical in their devotion to Apocalypse, to find and dispatch the resistance fell neatly within their directive. Blade had been forced to use hit and run tactics, forced to be quick, silent and efficient, with no room to go berserk. The erratic nature of his foe was frustrating, never knowing if the next will be a telepath or a super strong energy projector. So far he had only been able to kill three, all on separate occasions, all with some sort of wound to accompany his hurried escape. The gunfire was near deafening now that he approached the block where the tower was, shards of glass and explosions becoming more and more frequent as he approached the building. The front door, lobby entrance, there was a group of four, all heavily armed and armoured entering, the sounds of gunfire coming from far above. He focused hard and darted into an alleyway parallel to the entrance. He smashed his fist into the wall and grabbed a small piece of the concrete, weighing it in his hand for the throw. He ducked behind a trash container and popped up long enough to throw the piece of rubble at the anchor position of the four. It clinked off his suit without even a scratch, but he turned and scanned the street behind him for any signs of movement. The clanging of his boots could be heard as he approached, the other three advancing into the building. Clearly this one wasn't experienced, he had waved his compatriots on ahead to join the others, confident in his own abilities.<br/><br/>Blade listened intently to divine where the soldier's squad mates were, trying to tell whether it would be alright to try and pick off this one, as hard as that may be. The clanging of the other three grew distant, even to Blade's sensitive ears, whereas the sound of the lone soldier's boots grew ever louder. He was about halfway across the street when Blade exploded into motion, his legs straightening beneath him, his right hand sending a throwing glaive out in a wide arc while the other threw a dagger straight at the chest of the exosuit. Blade had developed this to test the projectile deflecting or reflex capabilities of the superhumans, some being able to intercept, deflect or dodge both, despite the asymmetric flight paths. This one appeared to be an energy projector, with good enough reflexes. His hands shot out and little concussive waves of air rolled over the alternating projectiles, sending them spinning away, to clang against the concrete. Though the motion took him barely a second, Blade was already chewing up the ground between them, now only a mere fifteen feet away, right hand reaching up and drawing his sword, his left reaching in to grasp hold of a dagger, another more flexible adaptation for testing their capabilities. Blade already knew that he would need a strong thrust to get through that tough suit, and only in a few places, the armpit, the collarbone, the neck and the small of the back. He had discovered these to be the best places to hit, through trial and error and much pain. The soldier raised his hands and fired off a quick, poorly aimed concussion blast, but he aimed low, so it slammed into the concrete, the rippling air spraying flecks of asphalt into the air. Though he was still inexperienced, he knew that to try and do another blast would be folly, so he spaced his feet in a stance for fighting, his arms moving up to react, to Blade's first swings. Blade swung down his longer blade in a weak overhead blow and swung the dagger in from the side, trying to stab into the weak armour beneath his opponent's arm. His enemy wasn't unskilled however, and brought one wrist up to ward off the sword blow, deflecting it to the side, his other hand brushing Blade's wrist away. There was hardly any energy behind the sword swing however, so rather than a dangerous overbalance, Blade retracted his sword arm and turned to accomodate the arm that was thrown wide. The soldier threw a heavy, gauntleted fist towards Eric's head, but a quick dodge on Blade's part had him doing exactly what Blade had avoided earlier, an overbalance. The fist swung wide, and the broad shoulders turned, taking his hips and back with him. Blade stepped in and threw a savage kick to the inside of his opponent's knee, buckling it, before reversing his grip on the wickedly sharp dagger and driving it into the armpit of the soldier as fast as a snake might strike. There was the momentary catch and resistance, before the<em>shnict</em>and thud of the blade going in. He stepped away and let the inexperienced fighter's other leg drop, before holding his sword in both hands and thrusting downwards, sparing his opponent any more pain than necessary. He slid his dagger out and flicked the blood off of both his blades, before seeking out the two projectiles he had thrown earlier. He replaced them, not pausing, wishing so badly to let out a roar, to vent his rage and focus, but knowing that to do such would be a death warrant with so many other soldiers, most likely some more experienced than the first around. His eyes turned upward, to the floor that was being currently levelled, wondering what could attract such attention.