Shabaka's Pride - Round 2: Match 1

             Vitoroy was in pain, but he wasn’t hurt, Smalls knew how to pull his punches. Bard was correct in stopping the match, at least to make sure Vito was alright. After Bard had confirmed Vito was going to be able and compete, he gave everyone five minutes to rest before the next round started.

            When they had rested, Bard revealed the next round matchups. “In this second round, the match ups will be first, Shabaka vs Vitoroy, and then Amare vs Tilian, with Smallblade acting as timekeeper and getting the bye.”

            “Hey, that’s not fair,” groaned Vito, pointing an accusatory finger at his father. “I have to fight twice in a row.”

            “Unfortunately, due to this tournament only having two matches each round, it mathematically has to be this way,” said Bard with a soft tone. “You Vitoroy, just had the bad luck in drawing the first double-header.”

            “Fine, let’s go,” grumbled Vito.

Not four seconds later, Shabaka stood face to face with him. The cold morning air forced her to breathe heavily, and the sun in her eyes made her squint. On her left was her father, pointing his fan down towards the ground, off to her right was Smalls, holding the pocket watch in his massive hand. Shabaka took the moments before Smalls started the match to decide about her opponent. Vito had been easily crushed in the last bout, but she also knew he was crafty and rushing in to attack him without a plan would spell disaster. Smalls rushing in at full force just so happened to be the exception to that rule. She decided she would wait for Vito to make the first move.

“Start!” shouted Smalls. Neither combatant moved a muscle. Not until Vito spoke.

“When one can’t win the war, it becomes prudent to secure victory in the key battles. I know I can’t win this tournament, so I just want to earn one win,” said Vito, almost like a shadow of grief had befallen him.

“Well then fight,” Shabaka replied, totally baffled.

“That is just the issue I can’t,” said Vito, clenching his fists.  “For you and Smallblade, it is easy. But I know I will need to rely on my wits but yet, I do not know how. So just tell me what I did wrong in that last fight I had with Smallblade, and I will lay down for you.”

Shabaka considered it for a moment, at first, she wanted to call him a coward disgracing the honor of combat. But this wasn’t a fight, just a series of sparing matches to give them all a chance to learn a grow. Furthermore, Shabaka knew that sometimes to win a battle, one must use every dirty advantage they can get.

“Alright,” said Shabaka “You didn’t have a backup plan. You thought your plan was so perfect that there was no need to have another one. If you want to win any fight without raw power, you must always be several steps ahead of your opponent. Omakaze once told me about a saying from her homeland, ‘battles are decided before they ever begin.’”

“So just have more than one strategy. Okay that makes sense,” said Vito. He scratched the back of his head. “In hindsight it is kind of obvious, but hey, we are all still learning here.”

“And thank you for the experience of using negotiation to end a conflict,” said Shabaka. Bard looked confused but also proud, she knew he never intended something like this to happen, but Vito wasn’t giving up, he was retreating to fight gain an advantage later.

“Now if you will excuse me, I must lose this match,” said Vito making a bowing motion, his left arm in front of him and reaching to the ground, his right behind his back. Then Shabaka saw it, at the last possible moment she could, the Smith’s Cube was in Vito’s right hand. With a simple tap of his finger, a large javelin extended from it and came flying towards Shabaka, she just barely dodged out of the way. Then with one huge stride, she came to Vito. She smacked him on the back of the head. And that was just enough for his hand to touch the ground.

Bard pointed his fan to Shabaka as she gently helped Vito up to his feet.

“It was worth a shot,” sighed Vito, out of breath.

“Yeah, you almost got me, you made me unprepared for you to attack. Try that lull your opponent into safety thing again during your next match. It might just be your key to victory,” said Shabaka, giving her big brother a cute little sister smile. He smiled back, and all hostility vanished.

 

 

Amare

Vitoroy

Tilian

Smallblade

Shabaka

Points

Amare

~

 

 

 

 

0.0

Vitoroy

 

~

 

L

L

0.0

Tilian

 

 

~

 

L

0.0

Smallblade

 

W

 

~

 

1.0

Shabaka

 

W

W

 

~

2.0

Vitoroy vs Shabaka: Winner, Shabaka Bin Asa’um. Match time, 1:23.

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