Sight Loss Inducing Incident

It wasn't uncommon for their to be an overlap of Cohorts during War Games, at least when it wasn't all five Cohorts participating. Watching Cohort Five and One clean up wasn't usual today, however. There had been an accident, which wasn't entirely rare, Roy mused. Still, he would have killed to have gotten any details on it. His sister was the Centurion of Cohort Four, and he wasn't even sure if she had any details on it. Still, if it came to getting any information about anything, his sister wasn't going to be the one to ask. Unless it was which family to make friends with, and that didn't do him a lot of good.

Sure, Cohort Two and Cohort Four would be going head to head in war games after this, but it was more promising than asking Caelia. He approached the girl, known to be Centurion of Cohort Two. "What do you think?" He asked. It wasn't in his usual nature to reach out to other people, but it also wasn't in his nature to sit around and wait in any urgent scenario. "Think someone got seriously hurt down there?" He asked her.

Sophia looked over at the kid who had approached her, as she quickly fumbled to get her grip back on her sword. He kind of spooked her, she was giving most of her attention to her weapons and hadn't heard him come up behind her and therefore the weapon almost fell right out of her hand. Sophia knew of this kid, but couldn't think of his name at the top of her head at the moment.

"Not sure, I think there would be more of a commotion if someone was seriously injured." Sophia replied. She hadn't been told what had happened yet and was assuming that if it was something she needed to know about, then someone would come get her.

Roy's eyes shifted to her hand tightening on her sword, before fixing back onto her. Message received, he figured. Piss off the Cohort Two Centurions, you could get stabbed. He didn't know her much, but he did know her mom, Adriana, and even her partner's dad, Michael. Not necessarily their children, however, it was tough to carry out every important bond when Rome was so busy. Not that Roy minded, it wasn't like he was looking to interact with everyone all the time.

He gave a shrug, bigger than was probably called for. "I don't know, I hear Cohort Five is where they put all of the troubled kids." He explained. Really, he always wondered why that was, could it ever really be a good idea to take every trouble maker and put them in the same room? Not that Roy was ready to march into the Court House and demand Rosalind and Tiberius change the entire way Rome is run, it didn't take a genius to know the senate would always veto that bill. "I'm assuming you know a lot more people in the first Cohort." Roy mused to her, subtly. He didn't want that sword in his gut.

Sophia gave the kid an odd look. What was he, scared of her? She went back to cleaning her long sword, thinking that maybe that's all he wanted from her. She just wasn't in the mood to talk to some kid she didn't know all that well, especially when he couldn't seem to use the proper respect that he was supposed to be using when talking to someone of a higher rank. Not that Sophia was a stickler for that rule, especially for legionnaires that had been in longer than she. But she still expected it from people when they first joined, and like now. This kid had no idea of her rules, and he couldn't't possibly be much older than she.

Sophia put her sword down at the comment about cohort five. She looked back up at him, "Troubled kids?" She asked, almost sternly. "How bout you go make yourself useful, legionarie and go back to your cohort." Sophia never understood the animosity between the cohorts. Ok, she did, but she didn't like it. To her, Sophia figured that any army needs to be able to work together regardless of where they're placed. An army is only as strong as their weakest link, or so the saying goes...

Roy's eyes narrowed, but not a whole lot. It wasn't like he could take an attitude with any Centurion, otherwise he'd be starting something he couldn't win. Rome was a power structure, which meant a kid couldn't win. His mother wanted him to make bridges, not burn hers. It was pretty clear that his questions weren't amusing to the Centurion, granted, it wasn't like Roy was expecting for a Centurion to want to be chummy with him, especially when they were going to be fighting soon.

"Yes, ma'am." Roy said, he was careful to control his voice. Enough that it was firm, not willing to sound offended or defeated, but also not going as far as to be sarcastic or rude. It wasn't like snubbing her would mean he won. Even if she didn't go around and make him regret it, it still didn't mean anything. Better to just be a good Roman, and listen to orders. Roy began to walk away in formation, but only half a dozen steps later, a frantic scream came from the field of Mars.

Roy's head darted to view the field. It was impossible to see so far away, but he could hear it. He knew his sister would be looking to keep her people away from potential danger. Which meant he'd be kept from it. Which was stupid, what sense did it make to keep them away, didn't it take more Romans to help Romans? He quickly looked to see if Caelia was in sight. He didn't see her. Didn't that mean he had no orders?

Roy didn't even acknowledge the other Centurion, he figured she had her own people to deal with is, as he booked it towards the field, away from the two groups waiting for the clear to move.

Sophia watched as the kid walked away and rolled her eyes. Then she went back to cleaning her weapons, but not before giving a quick head count of her cohort, to check if any more had arrived while she was talking to the cohort four kid. She was happy to find that only three more were still walking over from barracks, her co-centurion couldn't make it today because Liam had finally woken up and that meant the lawyers were pushing for the court date to be today. It meant that she was on her own, except for her two Opitos.

After a few minutes of giving orders and answering questions Sophia went back to cleaning her sword. However not even a few seconds after she had sat down there was a loud and frantic screaming coming from the field of mars. Sophia stood up, and gave a few orders to her opitio to keep the cohort back, then before she could hear an affirmative response she had already taken off half walking, and half jigging down the slope to the main field. She needed to be told what was going on.

It was fair to assume Roy would get spoken to for this. By Marina, as a sister, then Caelia, as a Centurion, then Cora, as a mother, then Tiberius as a Praetor. It was weird, Roy typically didn't get into trouble for good reasons. The few times he did get into trouble, it was treated like a big affair. He'd always take his scolding the way his family taught him, but was it really fair? The head of Davenports could literally beat his son into a coma with few consequences. Roy digressed, life wasn't really fair in a nutshell. He'd be getting a smack to the face later, but at least he could make a difference right now.

The supervisors hadn't been kidding when they said an evacuation was happening of the field. Well, they said "soft evacuation." But it looked like they'd cleared the field pretty well. That was when Roy spotted them, three dark figures in human shapes. It was like looking at a human silhouette in broad daylight. They had the shape and features of a human, but their entire form was just one single shade of pitch black, with menacing red eyes. They didn't have shadows of their own cast on the ground.

Roy had left his gear behind when he approached Sophia, and didn't take the time to grab it again. He threw a fireball at the middle one, it burned through his flesh like a ray of light through a dark room. Then, just like that, the pitch black flesh regenerated like it was just water refilling an glass that had lost some.

Sophia was the only centurion present. Meaning she was in charge of everyone at the current moment. After giving the command to evacuate, Sophia had run down the side of the hill as silently as possible, as to not startle the dark shadowy people into attacking her. Sophia actually had no idea what to do for this situation, she had no idea what these creatures/people were. She gathered that they might be part-human, or at least they looked human. They had faces, she could see that, but she couldn't actually see their faces. They also had red eyes.

At this point Sophia had hid herself in a spot where she could easily see the intruders, and see her Opito. She glanced over to her Opito, who was waiting for her signal to go get another few Centurions or something. She still had no idea what to do in this type of situation, usually she'd just call for an attack, but they would have no idea how to defeat it. But she gave a quick flip of her hand, and watched as he ran back up the hill.

When Sophia looked back over to the three shadowy figures, she found herself watching the kid from earlier throwing fireballs at one of them. She watched as the fireballs, went right through the figures, seeming as they didn't even feel the attack. 'Damnit... Damnit... Damnit... Was this kid that dumb? What part of evacuation did he not understand?!' She thought to herself. Sophia groaned in annoyance, and unsheathing her sword from her belt and running forward to help. She could yell at him and report his disobedience later. Right now, beating these things would have to take priority. "You dumbass. What part of evacuation do you not understand?!" She said, as she came up behind Roy. She ran in front of him, as the closest shadowy figure attempted to grab at him. She brought her sword up and swung at its neck. However, her sword only got half way through the figure before all the metal of her sword disintegrated. "Well, shit." She commented, before taking a step back and dropping the hilt of her sword, since it wouldn't do her much good now. She watched as the damage she had managed to do, grew back. This wasn't going to be fun, or easy.

Roy wanted to focus on a battle plan, but even now, he felt a certain sense of anger rise when, of course, a certain Centurion showed up. She talked down to him, which caused a dark pull of Roy's thoughts. Surely the Virgo family had some expectation of honor? Even amidst his thoughts, Roy knew the destruction of Sophia, or her sword, wasn't a victory for him. He didn't say anything, what was there to say? If whatever was going to come out of his mouth didn't help the team in some way, it wasn't worth saying right now. He held his tongue, instead taking a defensive position. He didn't want to be too close to these things.

The stomach didn't work, apparently neither did the neck. That was assuming these things even could be wounded. He figured the eyes were a good place to start, but it was a little hard to nail the accuracy. Roy raised his hand once more, forming dozens of tiny, jagged ice crystals from his fingertips, and letting his own winds fling them toward the direct face of the being closest to him. His goal was the eyes, and surely enough, after a few cutting straight through the face without any reaction, some began to make contact with the glaring red eyes.

An insanely loud shriek came out from the thing, as though it was a human screaming. "Figures." Roy muttered to himself. He wasn't even risking his own life for another human being. The thing that screamed was probably this thing.

Sophia was glad that Roy decided not to talk back right now, at least he knew when and where to fight. She took a quick step back, as the thing swung its arm at her, singing her shirt as it barely missed her stomach. Sophia watched as Roy's ice crystals didn't do anything but anger it. She glared the being right in its glowing red eyes, she knew it had to come from the underworld, no known mythical creature that walked on earth looked like this. Keyword being, known.

She had a fleeting idea of what could work, after all everything had a weakness, you just had to be capable of figuring it out. But she would only get two tries at it. If her imperial bronze sword wouldn't work... then maybe a different type of metal would. She held her hand out as a stygian iron sword materialized in her open hand. She rushed forward, and slashed downwards at it. The thing shrieked, but the sword didn't burst into ashes, and as Sophia stepped back she watched as the wound she inflicted wasn't healing.

Sophia quickly materialized a second Stygian Iron weapon. "Use it!" She said, as she tossed the newly made weapon to Roy.

Loud screams were good, Roy figured. It meant you were either hurt or really pissed off, probably both in most instances. He kept his footing, calculating how far away from these things he wanted to be. One thrust from them, and he could be blind if he was lucky, much worse if he wasn't. Keep a few steps away and keep blasting fire on a humid Summer day. Roy mentally rolled his eyes at himself. What a great plan, he sarcastically praised himself, while his palms began to heat once more.

Roy's head tilted at the Centurion's orders. She'd tossed him a long-sword. Not Roman, not good. His mother had always steered him to put as little training into non-Roman weaponry as possible. He still knew how to use the thing, but he'd have been more lucky to get a Roman weapon. "Thanks!" He called back, his tone was serious, it was probably the right thing to do. Either way, win or lose, Roy was so dead either way. He slashed at the one closest to him, leaving a large gash in what seemed like an ethereal body.

The thing shrieked, and Roy didn't waste a moment before pumping it full of fire. He had to admit, the only thing more scary than these things were these things while engulfed in flames. Surely enough, the thing bursted, almost like he was evaporating in fast motion. That was one down, two to go. He felt exhausted from the extensive amount of magic he was using.

Sophia barely acknowledged his answer, she was solely focused on the task at hand. One of the monster things brought its hand up to slash its claws at her face, she barely had time to block the blow and felt a burning claw just managed to scratch her right cheek. It was probably the most painful thing she's ever felt, but she forced herself to ignore it so she could swing her sword down on the things face, and watched as the first of three monsters burst into a cloud of black dust.

Once she had convinced herself that the thing would not materialize again, Sophia spun around on her heel to help Roy with the other two. Though for the moment, he seemed to have control over his situation. But he also seemed to be weakening, and that wasn't good, Sophia rushed forward to attack the closest one to her.

Roy felt pleased with himself, that he'd ended one of them. He was starting to get why his mother didn't like underworld gods; surely if Stygian metals worked on them, that's where these things were from. Roy backed way the hell away from the last one, taking note that Sophia had killed one of the two. Now there was only one left, and two of them to fight it. Roy wasn't looking to take any calculus classes, but he figured the math on that was pretty easy.

Roy took position behind the thing, thinking he could get the jump on it. It seemed like the right moment, but fate wasn't on Roy's side. The thing tilted to him, throwing a disc of shade at his right side. He was quick, his training consistent, but not wise enough in the moment. His dodge wasn't calm, it was forced, throwing him offsides. When a new disc came to his left side, he knew there was no dodging. He slashed upwards, nailing the creature, and praying to the gods the fragments of the shadow disc wouldn't hit him. Then, he felt one small spec unleash the most unbearable pain in his eye. His free hand instinctively went to cover it as he shrieked out in pain.

Sophia had just slashed down on the last shadow monster, making it burst into black dust when she heard Roy scream. 'Shit, damnit, f*ck!' Sophia repeated in her head, as she turned to watch as Roy recoiled away from the monster. Luckily, she was close enough that she could jump in front of the thing before it had time to attack a second time. She once again brought her sword up to protect her head from getting cut into two by the things claws. Once she had a free spot, she didn't waste anytime before she swung her sword towards the weird beings neck, effectively killing the monster. She waited untill the thing had burst into dust, and just long enough to assure herself that no more were going to pop out of the ground or anything.

"Hey Roy, you alright?" Sophia asked, the kids name finally coming to mind, as she asked the question. He was holding his hand over his eye, and there was a lot of blood, but Sophia couldn't tell if whether it was the skin near his eye that had been cut into, or his actual eye. Sophia prayed to the gods it was the latter.

The sharp pain began to dull moments after it was at its sharpest. That wasn't to say it didn't hurt, it still hurt like hell. Roy layed there on the ground, still in battle stance. He was ready to do something. Even if that something was to try to roll away before blasting the thing with fire. Then, before Roy's instincts could even kick in, the thing was gone, Sophia Virgo standing over the remains of the monsters. The weapon in his hand vanished, and he didn't even consider the fact that he probably wasn't going to be able to see out of his left eye again. He certainly wasn't going to voice his concern to Sophia; she just couldn't relate. When Sophia went to fight, alone or in formation, these things never happened. Warm blood began trickling down Roy's fingers covering his eyes.

Not winning a fight on your own. What a stupid thing to have to be ashamed of.

Roy sat up, his own human body had began work on his wound, rushing chemicals and endorphins to numb the pain. Despite all of the adrenaline pumping through his veins, he did simply that; sit up and sit still. He wanted to express that he was angry, and scared his eye was gone, but that just wasn't the Roman thing to do. "Yeah, I'm good." He finally replied after a long pause. He braced himself with his free hand, looking to stand on his own two feet.

Sophia sighed, and crouched down next to him. "Look, the monster things are gone, and I can tell you're lying. Want me to look at it?" She asked, she knew he was lying because the tiny cut on her face caused by the shadow monsters was barely bleeding, however it felt like it was on fire, so if she was in pain and on the verge of possibly shedding a tear or two from what should have been the equivalent of a paper cut, she could only imagine what his eye felt like right now. "I have some healing powers, I can keep it from getting any worse, while we wait for a medic..." She offered. This was not the time to act tough, they had no idea about these monsters. For all they knew they had been poisoned.

Roy knelt where he was, Sophia now next to him. It was the strangest mix of embarrassment and shame he'd witnessed so far in life. He knew that a busted eye didn't look good on a resume. His mother stood with her kids at a lot of speech events, he knew how bad he'd make her and his sister's look if he had to wear an eye-patch or gauze over his eye. Reluctantly, he accepted Sophia's offer. He knew it was his best chance to give the eye a chance to recover.

"Okay, that sounds like it's for the best." Roy kept his breathing in check, he kept calm. Panicking never helped anyone, in or out of combat. Regretfully, he lifted his hand from his eye, and it felt like it was hurting all over again. He tilted his head up slightly, waiting for her to do her stuff. "Are you okay? I saw you get hit too."

Sophia very awkwardly, moved his face up a bit so she could see better. It didn't look good, the eye lid was swollen shut and when she carefully pulled his lid down a bit to check on the actual eye she was met with a blood. She couldn't even tell for sure what his actual eye looked like, which was concerning. But who knows, maybe the actual eye wasn't that badly damaged, its common knowledge that wounds on the face bleed more than any other part of the body. Sophia closed his eye lid again, and held her hand over it to add a bit of pressure to help stop the bleeding, as she also began to heal the injury.

"I'm fine. Just a scratch. Don't talk, I need to concentrate. Healing is not my specialty." She said, glancing over at the hill, hoping to see her Opito leading a medic and Roy's Centurion over to them, however there was no one. She bit her lip.

Roy stayed knelt, what else was he to do? There were other things he wanted to say, but she was right. If there was ever a time to shut up, and shut up for real, it was right now. He didn't know exactly what call was the right one, he let Sophia work her magic. She was trained for these situations. He didn't like having to trust her, but at the moment, who was he to judge her? He didn't save her; she saved him. He hadn't even thanked her for it yet. He was busy worrying about himself, which only made him kick himself.

It was at that moment, Roy began to consider what would happen if no one came soon enough. He knew he wasn't supposed to talk, but he could feel the blood loss kicking in as he began to feel dizzy and light headed. His hand slowly rose, away from himself and Sophia. "I can... I can make my hand more than hot enough to cauterize." He said.

Sophia gave Roy an odd look, he was pale which meant he was still losing to much blood, even though the flow had definitely slowed down a bit. "I don't think that cauterization is needed, but thanks for the suggestion." She told him, trying to sound a bit light-hearted about the situation. Sophia did not want to be the one to tell him that his eye was probably not going to survive this. She looked over again at the top of the hill, she let out a sigh of relief as she watched her Opito and Joan the medic made their way down the hill towards them.