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'Patrols' such as they were, were becoming a less and less frequent thing for the errant Knight of Mercury. There were more interesting things to do with her evenings like harass Zac, sass Kess playfully, or just dabble in one of several video games that she had running current at any given time. People weren't really dying anymore though the cases of fatigue in the city were high on the rise...but that wasn't really so bad was it? Fingers reached up to scrub at gold eyes as Lina lept with the ease of boundless experience over a rooftop ledge down onto a lower, more industrial one.

It was then that she heard the sound of someone toying with their prey. The remnant general inside of Lina sighed in exasperation, something that the bluenette decided to indulge as she dropped down into what was really a prime alley, tapping the idiot lieutenant on the shoulder. "You must be really new because not only did I feel you as soon as I got on this street, your toy here's a little loud." Blue curls jerked in the direction of the quivering young woman who looked poised to run. Lina flicked a finger at her and snorted. "Girl, get running." The hand which had turned him around held firmly to the Negaverse officer as he tried to struggle away, pinning him against the wall by the wrists a moment later.

It was really easy, effortless almost, and that more than anything should have given her pause. But he felt so damn new, really. "Listen kid, you don't know who I am but you should know WHAT I am and be on the lookout for it. Geez. Someone less nice than me and you'd be lucky to make it out alive. Tell your trainer, whomever they are, to get their s**t together, okay?" Releasing him, the kid took a swing.

Idiot.

General? Well she felt a power inside of her head though there was still that minor discord between being able to tell immediately if it was good or bad. Thankfully for Lina Knight, this general had terrified the s**t out of her(?) lieutenant thus revealing rank and that armor could leave no doubt as to the allegiance of the wearer. This wasn't someone that Lina was familiar with at all...had she been gone that long? Or was this general simply one of the more promising candidates who'd flown through the ranks because she had a knack for obeying the right people at the right time and got things done.

Judging from the reaction of the poor idiot who'd just run off it was more likely it was the latter with a penchant for delicious violence. Bittersweet came the memory of a time when Obsidian and Tanzanite were the most loose canons the Negaverse could boast and while one still remained, she hadn't seen the other in quite some time. Were they all so dedicated to violence now or was that simply the perspective that being outside the grasp of Chaos gave her? Lina thought about things too much.

Curious as to who this general was the bluenette raised an eyebrow at the smiling officer. "The right way? I'm doing you all a favor by interrupting them when they're obviously doing it wrong. Maybe if they get beaten down enough times they'll learn how to subdue their target without her screaming herself hoarse and alerting everyone in a half-mile radius that something bad is happening. At least you seem to be hammering home that he's stupid to try and take me on alone." Now it was Lina's turn to grin though it wasn't entirely friendly.

"Negative reinforcement, right? You guys are all about that. I remember."

Would it be bad to roll her eyes? Probably but Lina couldn't quite manage to be scared of this unnamed general after having tangled with a General-King, a General-Queen more often than she would have liked to admit, and survived the personal attentions of Queen Beryl before she'd even left the Negaverse. They were fairly equal in power, was she supposed to display the same level of fear as someone who hadn't spent the better part of the past three years kicking a** (and getting kicked) from one side of this city to another? Not likely.

So her eyes rolled just a little bit to the side instead of the full dramatic response, but that didn't mean that Lina was going to leave her guard fully down. The glow-edged black boots found purchase against the pavement as her muscles stiffened to move at a moment's notice if it were required. Move away, was the niggling little voice in her head; it wasn't her job to get into pissing contests with generals that she'd never even met before.

"Listen, I'm really not interested in the whole 'banter playfully until you try to grind my face into the pavement' song and dance that seems to come built-in to every Negaverse officer. I did that for long enough that I recognize it, it's a predatory instinct, and it's really annoying. Almost as annoying as those holier-than-thou speeches you get from senshi." Lina definitely was not unprejudiced on both sides of that wobbly line she was walking, not at all.

Well that wasn't the result she'd been wanting! Lina had hoped that by cutting to the chase with this general that they could have perhaps agreed to go their separate ways; it wasn't like she'd been trying to hurt the lieutenant! Hell she'd been trying to help him! You didn't get to keep your siphoned energy when you were being an idiot, you couldn't get a reward from being a ******** moron, so on and so forth. Instead now she was eating smoke and fury from a pair of bombs tossed into her face, scrambling the image from behind her scouter.

Thankfully, at least, only some of the force from the kick connected as Lina was already jumping back from the force of the explosion. "********! Alright, we don't have to talk then!" Really a fight was the last thing she wanted and the reasons were painfully obvious: nobody was going to want to join you if you spent all your time beating up their friends. Then again this woman didn't know her, she didn't know this woman, so stories were going to be just a little bit limited in the interim which could probably work in her favor.

Considering all things that had been happening lately from getting blown off while helping Kess and other interactions that had been less than fun, Lina Knight was starting to think she should be smothering any altruistic urge whatsoever. Nobody gave a s**t. Landing on her good leg the knight swung out with a kick of her own aimed straight for the general's midsection.

Never don't aim for the ribs!

Oh that was completely bullshit! Yes, okay, so she'd been a little blind at the time but how could you miss the only person in the alleyway? Lina hadn't missed though she'd simply kicked far too high for the person she was fighting, putting her foot in the perfect cradle position to be grabbed and...oh that was even worse. When fingers squeezed around her leg with that light stroke Lina's mind went places that it absolutely should have not, making her angrier than she probably had a right to be. How old did you have to be before certain things stopped affecting you at inopportune moments?

However old it was the knight hoped that part of her life was soon because this was just absurd.

Then, undignity of undignities, a knee went hard into her stomach so that the knight couldn't keep her footing at all. You couldn't really stop the momentum of a forward pull when all the breath had gone out of your lungs while your stomach crawled itself from your torso into your throat. At least she'd never been one to eat much before going out for the night so that when she retched it was totally dry; nothing was more embarrassing than the alternative.

"Out of...practice." Gulping in air she tried to scramble back, wishing her vision would clear, wishing she could hear something more than the ringing in her ears, out of her depth for the first time in a very long time. That was almost scary but Lina wasn't entirely sure she knew how to be fully afraid anymore. Cautious, wary, concerned but truly afraid? Only of one thing and one person that wasn't here.

You could be upset though and that she was in spades. Mostly about the fact that she'd gotten emotionally snagged by something that she shouldn't have been. "Shouldn'ta got involved yanno."