Poor Form
✧ Nebarra x human!LDB, ft. Xelzaz & Khash
✧ Fluff, maybe angst (if you squint), slow-burn with tension; 2k+ word count
✧ Mentions of blood, (poorly written) fantasy violence
♫ "Ritual" - AWAY, Echos
✒ @dalishthunder come take responsibility for this
It was the grey hour when you woke, the quiet lull between full night and the oncoming dawn. From where you lay in the tent, the only sounds you could hear were the steady breaths of your companions, the breeze rustling by outside, and the lone call of a bird, faint and dim in the distance.
Slowly, you sat up, grimacing at your sore neck and shoulders – though you had long since grown accustomed to sleeping on the ground, that didn't mean you, or your body, appreciated it. You'd have to look into getting some bed cots instead. Until then, though...
At least we stay warm through the night. The oiled leather tent kept out most of the wind, and the beasts you'd felled along the journey had long since become the bedding everyone slept on.
A sudden snore drew your attention to where Khash lay, bundled in her sleeping bag beside you, red eyes shut tight and jaw slightly parted, her sharp little teeth on display. Across from her was Xelzaz, sleeping quietly on his side with his back turned towards you; you could just make out the lump of his tail beneath the blankets. And next to him...
...was an empty bed roll, the fur still fluffed, apparently untouched through the night.
Frowning, you pushed back the blankets, habitually reaching for your sword as you rose – just in case, always just in case – and, taking care not to wake Khash, crawled quietly out of the tent.
The morning had teeth. You felt it the moment you stepped outside, the cold biting into your bare arms, gnawing through the fabric of your tunic and raising goosebumps across your skin. Your breath plumed white amidst the grey, and the dirt underfoot was cold and hard; not even the morning dew had loosened it. You found yourself wanting retreat back into the tent and burrow under your furs once more, pulling them all the way over your head and falling asleep beneath their warmth. Any other morning, you might have done just that. But...
The empty, untouched bedroll.
You squinted into the mist, eyes searching, searching... there. A figure, seated on a rock several metres away, smudged and blurred in the gloom, but glinting a familiar gold.
As you lowered your sword, a sigh slipped from your lips, drawn from some strange mix of frustration, concern, and relief.
"...How long have you been out here, Nebarra?"
"Morning to you too, guar-face," the elf drawled, and though he didn't rise, his helmeted head turned towards you. A thin layer of condensation covered the metal, droplets falling at his movement; his bangs, escaping through the visor, were damp and plastered to his helm. "And all night, to answer your question. Somebody has to keep watch."
"Obviously. But you volunteered for the first shift last night." Frowning, you looked him up and down, not bothering to mask your concerned displeasure. "Why didn't you wake me or Xelzaz? We could have relieved you. We were supposed to relieve you."
"Oh yes, a human and a lizard! I'm certain I'd feel very safe with you two on watch. Your species' eyesight is so much better than an Altmer's, after all."
Your frown deepened, brow furrowing as you stared him down. It was too early in the morning for his snark.
Wordlessly, you brought up your sword and levelled it at his throat. "I can see that gap in your armor just fine. I could kill you right now – and the same goes for whatever may have come up on us in the night."
Nebarra gave a disdainful snort, gloved hand clamping down on your blade and giving a sharp tug. Unprepared, reflexes still sluggish from sleep, you stumbled a whole two steps forward before managing to check yourself.
"Poor form," the elf sneered. "You won't be killing anything like that."
Your nostrils flared, a dozen retorts surging to your lips, but you held them all in.
He's right, and you both know it.
"I wasn't ready", "I'm still waking up", "I wasn't serious" – excuses that could get you, and maybe the others, killed. How long had Nebarra seen this in you? Why was he only mentioning it now? Why hadn't you realised it on your own, that despite your confidence, your skills, your strength – you were still very much mortal? And when had that confidence become something more dangerous – arrogance?
"...What?" Nebarra asked suddenly, drawing you from your reverie. "You have that expression again. The one where you're about to do something stupid."
"Spar with me."
"Terrible idea, absolu... wait. What?"
"Spar with me," you repeated, staring into the black of his visor. "I'm getting rusty, fighting nothing but bandits and mindless undead. This just proved it."
Nebarra was silent for a beat, his head tilting to the side. Something about the motion reminded you of a bird; the eagle-shaped helm only added to the effect. You waited patiently for his answer, wondering what exactly he had to consider –
Metal, arcing toward your sword arm.
You barely managed a dodge and a weak parry with the flat of your blade – you'd been holding it low, unready. Stupid, stupid, stupid.
Clearly, Nebarra was done thinking – the two of you were sparring now.
Fair enough. Enemies wouldn't be so polite as to give you time to gear up, either. And now, for once, the odds weren't in your favour: a fully-armoured Altmer veteran with decades of experience, versus you, young, disoriented, and unarmored, only a single blade in hand.
It was thrilling.
You sidestepped another swing of Nebarra's blade – only to connect with it a moment later, coming out of the feint you had failed to read.
Sharp, stinging pain. Scarlet, dripping from your arm.
He was trying to hurt you. And you were giving him ample opportunity.
You needed to ground yourself, regain your rhythm – something you couldn't do without an opening, and Nebarra wasn't giving you any.
A glint of metal on the left – block, step back. Movement overhead, an oncoming blow – raise your sword, throw your weight behind it, disrupt his momentum.
At least, you tried. Fully armoured as he was, Nebarra had an extra thousand angaids of weight behind his swing, if not more. The sheer force of his blow knock your sword out of your hands, sending you staggering back. But the grass underfoot was slick with the morning's dew, and you were moving too fast, too unsteadily. Before you knew it, your back was colliding with the ground, and all you could see was grey sky overhead – and a golden sword coming down.
Careless.
But there was still a chance.
Contorting violently, you grabbed Nebarra's arm as the blade sailed by, nicking your face as it passed. You didn't let go of his arm just yet, though. Instead, you pulled, leveraging your weight against his, abdomen taut as you used him to haul yourself upright. Nebarra, clearly not expecting such a move, found himself betrayed by his own momentum, drawing him forward and down, aided by your weight. Gravity took care of the rest, and he crashed towards the earth, twisting even as he fell to avoid face-planting into the ground.
As he struggled to right himself, you rushed to retrieve your sword; Nebarra was already rising by the time you turned back to him.
"No you don't," you growled, charging the mer, sword raised.
His hand shot out, a ward rippling to life, though it buckled slightly under your sword's impact. Nebarra staggered, his half-risen stance precarious, unbalanced.
Now. Now. Now.
Once, twice, thrice more your sword glanced off the ward – and on the fourth blow, it shattered, leaving the Altmer open to your assault.
Metal clanged as you brought your sword down, colliding with his gauntlet as he struggled to block with it, not given enough time to raise his own sword in defense. You let the blade slide off, intending to follow up with its momentum, but Nebarra didn't give you a chance. The moment the sword glanced off his gauntlet, he lunged, catching you in the abdomen and bringing the both of you to the ground.
The tussle that followed was a blur.
His sword arcing down, yours blocking. Hilts catching, blades flying, yanked out of your grasp and his.
Panted breaths, heaving chests, grappling and rolling across the grass.
A glint caught your eye – your sword and Nebarra's, just within reach.
He saw it too, the both of you reaching out in unison for your weapons, desperate to be faster than the other.
Leather-bound metal brushed against your palm – the hilt. Your hand closed around it, drawing it in close. Brought it swiftly upwards, blade against Nebarra's neck.
At its touch, he froze – and so did you. Because resting against your own neck, biting into the tender flesh, was the edge of Nebarra's blade.
Stalemate.
Ears ringing, heart racing, you shift your gaze from the sword to the one holding it.
Hunched over and straddling you, a leg to either side of your waist, there was hardly any distance between your bodies. The beak of his helm was close enough to brush your nose; your breath fogged on the metal. His gasping breaths may has well have been your own – you could feel them, swift and hot, slipping through the gold feathers that covered his face, carrying the faint scent of wine.
Of course, he'd been drinking. It had probably kept him warm through the night – and he'd still managed to keep you off-balanced for most of the fight.
You were in worse shape than you'd thought.
That, or... maybe Nebarra was better than he'd ever let on.
"...Tonight," you breathed, staring up at him. "Let's... spar again tonight."
Nebarra grunted; you could hear the sound echo faintly in his helmet. "Fine. Don't expect me to go easy on you."
A smile tugged at your mouth – you could feel your lips crack and stretch at the motion, dried out in the cold; you gave them a brief lick before answering. "What, and this was?"
Another affirmative grunt. "I'll be sober by tonight. Unfortunately."
You snorted, then fell silent once more. With your eyes, you found yourself tracing the curves of his helm, pausing at the sight of his bangs peeking through, dark and tangled threads of gold. Something about them was like an itch you couldn't scratch, and you had the sudden urge to brush them aside, or at least tuck them back into his helm.
As your gaze drifted upward, toward the visor, a glint in its shadows caught your eye. Again, you paused, staring intently into the dark.
A reflective sheen, a gleam of crimson –
"Are you done breathing on one another, yet?"
Xelzaz's voice shattered your focus, and both you and Nebarra snapped your heads toward the sound.
The Argonian stood just outside the tent, arms crossed, head bare of its usual hood, scales shimmering in the pale light. Beside him was Khash, a shadowy smudge in the mist; her wide red eyes seemed to float amidst the grey.
"Good morning," you said stupidly, even as Nebarra scrambled to get off you.
"Why were you fighting?" Khash asked. "Did something happen?"
"For your – obviously necessary – information," Nebarra sniffed, dusting off his armour, "we were sparring. And you had better get used to it. Our dear Dragonborn and I will continue to do so, apparently, starting today."
As you sat up, you distinctly heard Xelzaz mutter, "By the Hist." When he turned his head to you once more, there was something incredibly deadpan about his gaze, an unspoken, "Really?" in his eyes.
"What?" you mouthed back, blinking at him in confusion. He only shook his head, and have no answer.
"Right... Well, let's get the fire going again, and I'll see about getting us all breakfast."
At that, Khash's gaze snapped towards him. "Ohh, Xelzaz, can I have some Hackle-lo with it?"
"Khash, you've eaten almost my whole stock."
"Oh..."
"...I'll see if I can't spare a few more."
"Yay! Heh."
"Horker stew for you, Nebarra?"
"I'm too tired to say no... but I'll watch you every moment of its making."
"Yes, yes, as usual. And what of you, friend?" Xelzaz turned towards you, and for a moment, you couldn't answer him – you'd been too distracted watching the scene unfold, a smile on your face.
"Ah... it doesn't matter to me, I suppose. Surprise me."
And so, thirty minutes later, as the sun climbed through the sky and burned away the mist, breakfast was served.
But for some strange reason, all throughout the meal, you found your gaze drawn... repeatedly...
...to Nebarra.
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Honestly, every single time the whole 'poppy playtime is a bendy rip-off' stuff ever shows up I find it all extremely unconvincing and silly.
For one thing, rip-off usually is meant to imply that it's a cheap lazy copy of a better more polished thing, and uh. Sorry but even from chapter 1? Poppy Playtime is a better game than Bendy, it has a simple but understandable story, the game manages to be thrilling, creepy, and very intense at times... I mean that Huggy chase in the vents ALONE puts it way above Batim for me.
I mean BATDR had the most slow stupid chase I've ever seen [and every other encounter with the ink demon is text telling u he's there and then a timer goes down and u get jumpscared] and batim's chases were either silly or just not nearly as theatric or terrifying as that.
When making the vent sequence I mean not only is it absolutely horrifying to realize how fast Huggy is in there but also it's so theatric and cool? The fact that you round a corner after thinking you escaped only to see a terrifying animation of that thing crawling toward you is awesome! I wish Bendy had stuff like that!
And all the stuff it shares with Bendy are generic things Bendy ripped from other horror games/media anyways. I'm not saying Poppy Playtime isn't inspired by Bendy I for sure think it is but Bendy is such a generic story that somehow fails to do tropes 100 other horror games have done any comparison only makes Poppy Playtime look better.
"It has employees being sacrificed for their company" That is not a concept Bendy invented, literally look at any of the sci-fi horror series Bendy is very inspired by. This is literally a twist in the original Alien.
"It has a scary woman forcing you to do tasks for her" Once again, not a concept Bendy invented, a scary mysterious person forcing you to do fetch-quests is a concept found in tons of horror media. And at least Poppy Playtime gave you a chase with her and let you defeat her, look at poor malice. She's barely on screen for more than 10 minutes before she gets stabbed.
"It has a cult worshipping the monster" This is something tons of horror games and media have done too. I mean In The Tall Grass has a guy who worships a giant magical rock in the middle of a grass maze, Bioshock [which Bendy has only been taking more and more direct inspiration from while failing to grab any of the compelling parts] also had a lot of themes of religion and cult-ish behavior, almost every horror media franchise has at one point done a cult thing.
Bendy couldn't even come up with a reason Sammy worships the ink demon, the best motivation we've ever gotten is just that 'he's crazzyyyy the ink made him insaneeee'. Who is the cheap rip-off here?
At least Poppy Playtime gave their cultist a motive for worshipping the monster + a proper boss fight that feels intense and looks awesome! Bendy didn't even let you kill Malice [she got stabbed in front of you and then just collapsed on the floor how thrilling] meanwhile you get to kill three of the villains in Poppy Playtime and the gameplay and action in those scenes have only gotten better as the game went on.
I mean Sammy walks into a room and goes "AAA SCARY I'M BEING MURDERED" then later shows up and for NO REASON sees a normal human man and assumes it's the ink demon before once again someone else kills him for you. In Poppy Playtime you defeat Catnap as he floods the world with this horrible nightmare-inducing gas that intensifies the color palette and his design. Fight off versions of him that are illusions that you need your flare gun for, then watch in a wonderful animation as he mistakes the monster for his savior before getting killed by it, in a brutal way I might add, which game are we accusing of being cheap, lazy garbage again?
I just find this argument to be people who Really Really need to find a reason to hate Poppy Playtime which I think is silly. The devs being weird, shady people is already enough reason to dislike the game, you don't need to invent reasons why secretly every part of the game is malicious or bad. But esp when I see Bendy fans saying they don't support Poppy Playtime or dislike it bc of its devs or even saying its cringe ummmm.
I have bad news about the fact Bendy's devs are worse and it took not one, but TWO over an hour long videos to cover it all. Plus the Bendy games are just the worse games in every aspect, if I could sell my batim copy for a copy of Poppy Playtime I wouldn't hesitate at all.
Saying this as a bendy fan, we have no right to be super judgy towards Poppy Playtime. If Poppy Playtime is embarrassing cringe, Bendy is too and is way more embarrassing of an interest. We shouldn't spread misinformation just because we all want to hate Poppy Playtime, you can dislike Poppy Playtime without making up a bunch of nonsense to justify it.
Honestly seeing people just blatantly be unfairly mean to Poppy Playtime only makes its critics look worse and makes it hard to take any backlash to the games seriously. Because surprise surprise if you spread misinformation to make a point people will quickly stop listening to Anything you have to say bc they won't trust you're telling the truth anymore.
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NINNAAAA WHATS SPCD STAND FOR??
oh, it's not that exciting, it's actualy awful. i mentioned it towards the tail end of chapter five of rm. it's basically what cartman used to call kyle when they were growing up. a really cruel fucked up nickname.
the s.p.c.d,
or rather,
the south park city dump. :(
the sp boys used to be fucking horrible to kyle because cartman ruled their elementary/middle school. and when cartman and the boys saw kyle in the hallway they were like "what are you doing here, broflovski? trash day's tomorrow" or omg whenever he walked ANYWHERE they made the "Beep! Beep! Beep!" trash truck noises, but worst of all was that they used to dump out...Full Trashcans On Him. like spoiled milk, rotted food stuffs, glass bottles that werent put in recycling, crushed aluminum cans that cut his cheeks, all kinds of awful, foul smelling sludge...sigh. :/ ily so much baby jersey.
also, if you want to cry extra hard, i think that being covered in all that disgusting lunchroom trash, feeling it soak thru his shirt, stink down to the skin, pool around his shoes, get buried in his hair -- just feeling that dirty and disgusting and Unclean was one of the factors that made his ocd so severe and it's a large part as to why he takes scorching showers and rubs his skin raw bc especially if he smells something weird or its trash day, he gets triggered & has to SCRUB.
but anygays! you bet your ass that tiny lil stan was giving them ALL the business rippin around on his bike brandishing his hockey stick like a big sword, running them out of town and back to their mommas crying and screaming bloody murder all in that giant wayne gretsky *ravenstan vc* yersey...they were SCARED, lolllll!!!
which is a very interesting juxtaposition to sweet, gentle stan very lovingly picking all the food debris out of his kyles beautiful curly whirly hair before marching him over to the bathroom where while kyle showers, stan always sits on the toliet bc their running joke is that kyle might drown ( yes yersey also can't swim ) while stan listens to rock n colors his nails in w/ sharpie or stolen nail polish from shell.
and he's just like "dude, Fuck them, kyle! those fkn gilipollas are just mad because theyre all total perros and you're the most handsome guy in school, hands down." wHICH? AAA??? tbf stan does say shit like that all the time & Means It bc ravenstan has loved jers from the moment he Heard him but kyle thinks he's fuckin w/ him
bc haha!
very fun joke, stan! hit on the weird, overweight, clunky, awkward, nerdy loser boy to make him feel better about himself! great joke, bro!
bUT ITS NOT A JOKE, BESTIE!!!!
HE WANTS TO KISS YOU SO BAD!!!!!!!!
not them both bein secretly and painfully in love with each other but convinced that acting on their feelings would ruin their friendship/be unrequited and both of them being like "he is perfect, what would he want with a fuckin Loser like me?" :/ </3 WERE IN HELL!!!
regardless of thinking it was a joke, it totally made kyle blush, my rosecea king and stan was sooo nervous like oh my god, you are SO stupid, stanley marsh!!!!! guapo??? gUAPO BITCH??!!!! ARE U ACTUALLY INSANE!!! WHAT THE FUCK IS WRONG WITH YOU??!!!
i love nervous ass tiny stan with his massive universe sized crush on kyle broflovski that he carries around in his black jansport backpack at all times...along with the weight of the world, ofc. we know this.
but anyways..off topic.
closing thoughts?
fuck you fartman.
-uncle nina, tiny but big baby jersey kyle defense club
( don't touch my sweet son!!! MY BABY!!!!! )
p.s. i'm sorry i just started making new sections without warning. i wanted a way to post about what the boys looked or acted like during different periods of their lives -- so like, satana ( which is what stans mom called him ) refers to the period of time before the fire and kyle's 'the s.p.c.d.' section also refers to that period of time.
it's cool you guys are so perceptive tho! i hope you like them <333 you're always welcome to ask me questions about them xx
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