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The carnival had shut down for the night, like, an hour ago? That was what Megiddo figured, anyway. The place was empty but the midway still smelled like popcorn and funnel cake and meat on a stick. Gross, but she'd worked hard for her standing invitation and she wanted to make the most of it to, like, hunt youma and peep clowns leaving the staff room.

Ys, she thought, looking around for the rubber man, was a necessary acquaintance. They were both knights of Saturn, and she reasoned that that probably meant they should stick together? Like, she valued Niflhel's opinion of her a whole lot more than she valued Babylon's and it was totally a planet thing. She was biased, but whatever, it was cool. Ys was obnoxious, but he was hers.

In, like, a platonic kind-of-wanted-to-kill-him way.

"I haven't got all night," she called, scuffing the toe of her boot against the ground. "Seriously, Jingleballs, any time you want to show up?"

And then they could proceed to beat the s**t out of each other, as promised. She was pretty sure you could will yourself into being a squire if you got punched in the face enough times, which was the theory she was here to test.

Megiddo shot Ys a sidelong glance that would probably best be described as throwing shade. She shrugged, holding out her fully-sleeved arms. "I don't know about you, Jingleballs," she said, "But I was born for this wintry hellscape. Also, ******** that. A, it's not even snowing yet. B, I've seen senshi kick a** in the dead of winter wearing less than you do when you're powered up."

Ys, after all, was likewise just as fully clothed as she was.

"So," she finished, "Point is, cut the dancing clown whiny Juggalo bullshit. You're a knight, aren't you?" Well, no, he was a page - and this whole avoiding responsibility thing was probably why he was only a page. "Power up and spar with me, or I'll come over there and beat your a** until you do."

Honestly, he'd agreed to spar with her already - and if there was one thing Megiddo couldn't stand, it was people begging off things that they'd already said they would do. Wait. No. There were a lot of things she couldn't stand and that was just, like, one. Anyway.

"Seriously," she said. "There are a bunch of super powered psychopaths going around murdering Pages and I'd hate to see your beautiful skinny guts splattered all over a wall somewhere. I am just the slightest bit fond of you, after all."

Honestly, she didn't know why she bothered with Ys, besides the fact that he'd gotten under her skin and now she felt... responsible for him, somehow. He was like a big, helpless puppy, and like a big, helpless puppy, she could not exactly throw him to the wolves. "Note the qualifier," she said sharply. "I said slightest."

But at least he was powered up now, so that was an improvement. She waved her pitcher away with a flourish, following his lead with the mask. While she would have loved to leave some lovely bruises on Ys's flesh, she had the sneaking suspicion that he probably had Marfan syndrome and didn't want to, like, pop an aneurysm or anything like that from going at him too hard. God. Life was so difficult when you were trying to follow instructions and not sucker-punch your allies, even when they frustrated you.

Especially when they frustrated you.

"But, like, getting down to business," she said, squaring off opposite him. "You're super-tall and should use that to your advantage. Practically no one's gonna go for your face because practically no one's gonna be able to reach it. 'Cept me. I'll try to go gentle on you, but I'm not making any promises."

"'Sides," she said, looking him up and down. "I thought you made your money on your body, not your pretty face." Which was a sophomoric jab if she'd ever made one, but Ys had kind of opened himself up to it. He'd shown up and tried to get out of training, and that meant that they already weren't off to a good start.

"Please," said Megiddo, curling her fingers. "Tell me you at least know how to make a fist that won't break your thumb the first time you punch someone."

She wondered what Gunn would have to say about all this - her student had finally gone and become a teacher, after all.

Megiddo waved a hand at Ys, as if to banish his lewd gyrations permanently from her field of view. "Oh my god," she said. "Oh my god, never do that again, like, ever. It's creepy and gross and I will kill you literally the deadest you have ever been." God - did he - did he like her? She'd always assumed that he was just flirting to be obnoxious, but, oh.

Oh god.

She thought she was going to be a little bit sick.

"Like seriously I think I just vomited in my mouth a little bit," she said, scowling at him as he boasted about dusting youma and keeping the circus free of vermin. That was all well and good, she thought, but that wasn't -

His hand was on her forehead. Megiddo groaned, grabbed his wrist, and twisted his arm. "Sort of, but no," she said. "Negaversers have weapons. Senshi have magic. That tactic's juvenile, but it's not gonna defend you from anyone, and if you try it on my again, well, next time, I'll break your ******** arm as demonstration of exactly how dumb a move it is."

She released her hold on his arm and took a step back. "So you can put people at an arm's length," said Megiddo. "That's really ******** useless if you don't know what to do next. I suggest you learn to snap necks. Grab people, pull them in, boom - dead before they know what hit 'em."

"Okay," Megiddo said dismissively. At least Ys was willing to fight, which was better than some people she could think of. "You should probably learn anyway, like, in case you need it?" Ys was helpless, she thought, and she couldn't leave him to go get slaughtered by some maniac with a sword. She felt responsible for him, so that would be blood on her hands, and she had enough of that as it was.

She shrugged, wiping her hands against the front of her dress. "We can come back to it later," said Megiddo, taking up a position beside Ys. "Here," she said, gesturing. "These are some really basic blocks. They won't protect you against a bladed weapon, but they might save your a** in a fight. You can try them on me in a second."

Finishing the demonstration, Megiddo moved away again, stepping easily into a ready stance. This wouldn't be anything like sparring with Gunn, she thought, but for the moment it might be the closest she would get. "You want to avoid the blow or turn in away, use your opponent's momentum against them," she said. "And if you try anything weird, I will rip your balls off with my teeth and call it a night."

She chomped at him once, for emphasis.

"I'm going to try hitting you now," said Megiddo, and threw a half-hearted punch at Ys.

Megiddo couldn't help but roll her eyes at the thought of Ys making a clean escape. "Yeah," she scoffed, "And you'll disappear real well in that getup." She'd seen a lot of impractical uniforms over the years, but Ys's bells sure took the cake. "I can hear you coming and going from like a whole city block away. You're the definition of noise pollution."

At some point she had passed her point and was just talking to talk, because she liked the jokes she was telling.

At least he managed a decent dodge. Megiddo smirked and took a step back to recoup. "I don't, FYI," she said. Well, if he was so keen to move further into the lesson then she wasn't about to stop him. "Next time, you won't know it's coming."

But perhaps it would be better to lay down some ground rules, since she'd given him a pretty clear threat? Ys might have been the kind of person who flirted every time he exhaled, but Megiddo was going to draw a line in the ******** sand and she was going to do it now. "I'm sure that this walking sexual harassment lawsuit shtick of yours gets you a lot of yuks," she said, "but between you and me, things are strictly platonic and they're gonna remain strictly platonic and if you continue to hit on me, you're gonna have a really bad time. That easy enough? Also, I'm guessing you're like, twenty. Older than me, but not by, like, a ton."

Not old enough that the unwanted sexual advances were creepy, just off-putting.

"Anyway," said Megiddo. "Think fast."

She aimed a punch for his solar plexus.

If she'd known it would be that easy to get him to stop, thought Megiddo, smirking crookedly, she would have done it ages ago. Perhaps she'd had Ys pegged wrong - he only seemed like a guy who wouldn't take no for an answer. Still, his justification - I like you two and it makes you get all huffy rubbed her the wrong way.

She backed off, watching him double over. "Okay, so being an a*****e to people because they're your friends has never really made sense to me," she said, crossing her arms over her chest. "I mean, all that does is say hey, now that we're friends, I value your feelings less than I would if you were some random lady on the street! Now, does that seem right to you? Because it doesn't to me."

But anyway, he ought to get over her sucker punch sooner or later. She hadn't hit him that hard. "Anyway," she said, "I suppose if you stop now, we can call it even." The bells were still stupid, she thought. Gunn was always ripping off her ribbons in the name of utility - maybe she could get Ys to agree to something similar? Probably not. It looked like they were attached to his hair pretty firmly.

"Any time you're ready," she drawled, "We can start back up." She should have just hit him again - Negaversers wouldn't let up when they had you on the ropes. She'd gotten in trouble once before for sucker punching, though. It would be best to avoid a repeat of that experience.

"Huh," said Megiddo. She hadn't considered it that way - only that she'd been teasing him in self defense - but now that Ys was pointing it out, yeah, she was kind of a b***h to him, and only a little bit in the funny way. "Well," she said, sticking a hand out to shake. "You've got a point. Truce? I'll call you your actual name and lay off the maiming threats, you stop hitting on me and call me Megiddo, not Megs or Meg or whatever other cute nicknames you can think of?"

It seemed like a fair deal to her.

Anyway, moving on.

"I have," she said fiercely. Megiddo had waved Horizon Institute goodbye at the end of the last school year, and good riddance. "I go to DCU. Pre-med." She wore her major like a badge of honor, a testament to her intelligence. "I'm eighteen. I can buy cigarettes. But I don't."

She reckoned that she had another three years until twenty-one and then it was all down hill from there and she had no birthdays to look forward to ever again.

He seemed like he'd mostly recovered from her hit to his gut, so Megiddo repositioned herself and went after him again. This time, she didn't get a hit in. - in fact, he seemed to have actually picked up the technique. "Ha!" she panted, stepping back. "By Jove, I think he's actually got it."