Welcome to Gaia! ::

It had been several days since Parker and Dani had reconciled, and things were going well. There were still moments where he remembered his anger, but they were nothing compared to the happiness of just being with her again. It might be unhealthy, but Parker was in too deep to do anything about that now. Dani made him happy. Without her, he was sad. Hopefully she just wouldn't go anywhere.

That night, Parker had taken her to see his new apartment with Tate in East Heights. At first, Dani seemed a little surprised by it. So much had happened in their time apart: his collegiate rejection, his new job with GeekSquad, his new place. She seemed sad at first, but quickly recovered, begging to go see it. Tate and Parker hadn't moved anything in or painted. The cleaners had come by after their checks cleared, as promised by Mr. James, and everything looked fresher. He took her out on the fire escape, let her walk around his bedroom, listened to her go on and on about how he should decorate and arrange the place. Parker just smiled and pulled her into his arms, happy to have the little ball of sunshine bouncing around in his life again.

Then he walked her home, which he insisted upon, even though it was 10:00PM, which meant he wouldn't be back at Hillworth until 10:30PM. (This also meant crawling in through his bedroom window, but he warned Jaimie about that ahead of time.) Dani objected at first, but Parker wouldn't hear it. It was dangerous out there; Parker knew that first time. Besides, he'd be fine. It wasn't even 11:00 yet.

The night was quiet and still. Parker got off the subway closest to Hillworth and was walking along the sidewalk, kicking a pine cone. The air was chilly, but Parker could feel spring approaching. It would warm up soon, not that he cared much. He preferred sticking indoors anyway.

It had been a beautiful day, and now it was a beautiful night. In spite of himself, Parker actually felt a little lucky.

Crap.

Random stranger on the sidewalk.

Asking a random question.

Parker blinked at the girl with the long braid and the brown outfit. She looked a little out of place. Kind of like the redheaded girl who attacked him outside of the bus station. That girl had been evil. Was this girl evil too? Parker tended to assume the worst about people, and given his multiple run-ins with the Negaverse, that distrust of strangers had only grown deeper.

He did not stop walking, despite the stranger's question. "It's 10:27," he shouted over his shoulder. Hillworth was close, just two streets up. Maybe this girl was harmless. She wasn't holding jumper cables or a bow and arrow. That meant she was benign, right?

Parker kept walking.

Parker liked to walk Dani home because he felt better knowing she was safe. It was because she cared, and she appreciated him for it. Things were better between them, not quite back to the way they had been, but they were moving forward as well. It had been quite a shock to learn that he was moving in with Tate, but she'd wrapped her mind around the idea and decided that she was all right with it. He could work for a while and decide what he wanted to do with his future, and that would give her time to catch up a little. She wasn't sure how many years he intended to take before he went back to school, but there was a possibility that they could attend university together, and that was a cool thought.

She did appreciate that he cared, but that didn't mean that she listened to him. Dani had promised to be better about meddling, and she was, but the moment Parker had turned to leave, she'd reached into her pocket for her henshin pen. She cared about him, after all, and she wanted to see him home safely just as much as he wanted to see her home safely. He was around the corner and so was she, and within moments, she was no longer Dani Rymner, but Sailor Magellan, senshi of powder, about to stalk her boyfriend until he got home.

It was dangerous, sure. But Parker had the kind of epic bad luck that you usually only saw in movies, and they'd only just reconciled. She wasn't going to let something bad happen to him on the way home if she could help it.

So, she trailed behind him, a little impressed with herself for being so adept at stalking. He didn't even notice her! He was almost home, and she was slowing, when someone appeared behind him. It was no cause for alarm, not yet, but Magellan narrowed her eyes, decided not to back off entirely until she saw him safely inside Hillworth.

Besides, it was kind of funny to watch him climb through the window.

She waited, but the other figure didn't leave -- it seemed to be talking to him -- and then she began to run, not liking the way the encounter was shaping up. Thankfully she was a fast sprinter -- thankfully she was a senshi, really -- the moonlight illuminated a girl in strange clothes, a girl that Magellan had never met before, but her posture was obviously aggressive.

Obviously, this girl was about to attack Parker.

She didn't have a plan, had never really gone into a battle with a plan, so she just did what she always did: balled her hands into fists and lunged right at the enemy. She was good at taking hits and staying up, so she wasn't too worried about herself. She was definitely, definitely more worried about Parker.

The girl was punching, and just as she was, Magellan slammed into her from behind, twisting their bodies to keep them from colliding with Parker. Wildly, she screamed, "RUN!" remembering the last time Magellan had showed herself to Parker, hoping that he'd learned his lesson and would run.

Her lunge had done little but momentarily distract the girl from her attack, and Magellan was already bracing herself for the inevitable retaliation.

"YOU...STUPID..." she snarled twisting and squirming to turn to attack the wretch whom had just tackled her. "SHEEP!! When I get my hands on you I'll..."

Senshi.

Well that just figured, and yet, how much better was that than just another civilian starseed, and how much more infuriating, surely someone could have done this when Charonite had... oh forget it..

She reached to grab a hank of the powdery blue hair and YANKED for all she was worth. She was far from above fighting dirty when it came down to it.
Her eyes blazed with a strange sort of conflicted joy.

As far as nights went, Derpraline was having a fairly good one. She'd awoken no less than three senshi lately, and was feeling quite proud of herself. So proud, in fact, that she'd decided begging outside the ice cream parlor was absolutely worth her time. And it had been! The kitten was sporting a brand-new homemade hat made from the paper wrappers the parlor put around their ice cream cones, obtained when she had made a friend among the pretty girls on staff with a weakness for fluffy, wall-eyed kittens.

So when the boy all but fell on top of her as she was heading back to Mags, her fluffy little body puffed up as big as it could and she hissed in surprise, suddenly aware of what was going on around her. The puff greatened even more as without touch, her senshi sense started blaring loud and clear, causing her eyes to focus some and head to tilt. "Senshi? Senshi find Derp! Good senshi, good senshi!" Obviously things were going better than she'd even dreamed. If they were finding her now, this job was going to be easier and easer! Astraea had never mentioned that the senshi could find them!

Elated, the itty bitty kitty even managed to spit out cell phone and henshin pen on the third try! Really, she was improving more and more, and didn't even have to hop off the curb! At least, not as often! She might have been practicing in her spare time, but it was hard when all that came out were hats. You could never quite be sure until it was the real deal! All but bouncing on her tiny pads, Derp picked up the pen in her mouth, and walked over to lightly drop it on top of his hand. "Pen for senshi! You fight now?" It would take a guardian cat much dumber than Derpraline to figure out that there was another senshi in trouble, even through her joy at finding someone new to join their team.

After all, isn't that why this one had fallen all over himself to find her?

It was a little much to be told that she hit like a girl -- she was trying, damn it, and kept forgetting to take those boxing lessons she told herself she'd take -- but Magellan did her best to ignore the taunts. Acknowledging someone taunting you was giving them exactly what they wanted; it split your focus, made you lose your temper and your cool, and you got sloppy. Magellan couldn't afford to get any sloppier than she already was, especially considering she was still half-worried about Parker, and afraid to look to see if he'd gotten away, because that would be paying too much attention to him. The last thing she wanted to do was give this Negaverse b***h a reason to chase after him.

Of course, she could think, rationally, that she shouldn't give into taunts, but that didn't stop her temper from bubbling up. It didn't stop her from giving in at all, really, as she snarled and grappled with her. She thought it was working, really did, until a hand closed around her neck, and she suddenly found it profoundly difficult to breathe.

Even though she shouldn't, it was instinct, and her hands came up, gloved fingers clawing at the one around her throat. Her eyes stung, and though she didn't know it, tears formed at the corners of her eyes, slid down her cheeks.

She'd never been choked before.

She didn't like it.

Unable to do much else, she lashed out with her knee, hands still clawing at the one on her throat, aiming for the other girl's stomach. Anything to get her to let go.

Attempted was kind. Attempted meant that Magellan might have had a chance, but unfortunately, she was too busy attempting to breathe again to properly dodge the fist coming at her. Thankfully, it didn't hit her center in the face, which meant she didn't have to deal with a broken nose. Not so thankfully, her head snapped to the side with the force of it, bright lights exploding behind her eyes as pain exploded on one side of her face.

She swore, loudly, and it wasn't elegant or ladylike. She stumbled back, bleeding freely from the corner of her mouth, though whether it was from a split lip or where she'd bit her tongue, it was hard to tell. She spat, a long, uneven line of blood, and took a moment to wipe her hand across her mouth.

At this point, she didn't even care where Parker was. Now it was about getting even, and even though she didn't have the magical powers to slam the girl into ground, she was going to give it her all anyway.

So, without warning, she threw herself at her again, following her philosophy of "your entire body is a weapon" and putting all her weight behind fists, legs, and whatever else she could throw at her.

((Meta-ed with permission <3))

Moonstone lunged for her mask, fingers scraping free skin as she struggled hastily to lift the mask free from the pavement.
She'd just hooked her fingers under it when the senshi SLAMMED into her again, punching and kicking, even clawing at her.
Moonstone somehow... SOMEHOW managed to keep her grip on the mask and, though she considered a side grip much poorer, it was still better than no grip at all. She swung it with as much force as she could muster, anticipating the shock up her hand and fingers, the glorious shock that meant impact, she HOPED for it...
But what happened with her other hand delighted her perhaps far more, that odd sensation of moving past where one's hand should have, the electric warmth of a starseed under her fingers.

Quite by accident she'd shoved her hand forward to block and ended up with something far better. She 'tickled' it with her fingertips grinning even as they crashed back down to the pavement. If she could disentangle long enough to rip it free she'd have her, she'd have IT.

Even with what she knew must have been incredible pain the girl struggled against it. It was admirable really...