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Warhol hadn't meant to fight tonight, she really hadn't; she'd promised her sister she'd be home by ten, and she'd just meant to do a little energy draining today, take a starseed or two, the usual. Drug dealers, bullies, people who attacked those who couldn't fight back; those were her targets, usually, the scum of the earth. And there were always older teens who might hit on her -- easy prey for the Negaverse. Some behavior couldn't be corrected. Being a teenage girl did have some benefits; people took less notice of you! And being noticed would ruin everything too fast to see.

But the aura was bright and painful, halfway like a spotlight, and undeniably Order. Order was the enemy -- she could always use another starseed to look at, another target to join the right side: and on the opposite side of the scale, if this went too far, then there'd be one less terrorist in Destiny City.

Two blocks away.

One block away.

When the Squire came into sight, Warhol had already intoned her magic quietly, tossing the orb up and down. She didn't say anything -- Hyperborea would attack first, maybe, or maybe they'd close quarters; whatever happened, if the magic worked well (she hadn't quite used the new one yet, not in combat), then it'd all be good. She was good! She'd be good. It'd all work out, hopefully.

The girl looked young, was Warhol's first thought; almost half a foot shorter than her, too. Nothing more than a girl. (Not that Warhol was, either; but at least she was over five foot. She had that going for her, and the boots added about an inch...) What was she doing out patrolling? White Mooners didn't do energy drains, didn't take starseeds; there was no need for a girl to be out like this.

But she was out anyways. Then again, so was Warhol.

"I'm not aiming to hurt anyone," she said cautiously, stopping the tossing of the orb and instead holding it close, taking a small step closer to Hyperborea. She did want to hurt the Squire, wanted to rip out her soul and tear; but there was nothing wrong with a white lie, was there? Nothing wrong with making an enemy, the enemy, let down her guard. "I don't want to fight, okay...?" Another small step, and another; trying to get into grabbing range without being obvious about it, clenching the magic so white light floated out from between her fingers.

The throw caught Warhol off guard -- she'd been trained, a little, but nothing so official as actual martial arts -- and hitting the ground hurt, it jarred, and she let loose a whine of pain and slapped the magical orb into Hyperborea's bare forearm. That'd do something, that'd help, that'd work -- it'd work -- and then she felt like her skin was corroding, and she tried to kick the Squire in the leg, trying to push off and squirm away.

"This isn't a date! I'm not interested in girls!" She reached out, trying to get through the sting to grab Hyperborea's ankle and pull, yank the other girl off balance; she was wearing gloves, the burn couldn't be felt too bad through them. If her magic took effect, then she could work from there; it would help to have it be unshakeable, after all.

It worked, almost; Warhol's face went to a relieved smile when Hyperborea worried about her, but then everything promptly went to hell when she was tackled. Everywhere Hyperborea touched her with bare skin, she burned, she stung; this wasn't worth a starseed for -- all she wanted to do was to stop hurting. The gloves helped, maybe, but not enough; her arms tingled in a distinctly uncomfortable way.

So Warhol did the only thing she could really think of, attempting to push the Squire off with her arms and playing up the pain, a little. "Y-you're hurting me! Get off!" An elbow to the neck, maybe, would work for freeing her limbs from her attacker: although a tackling hug was a strange parody of an attack.

Goddamn magic.

"I used to be one of you," Warhol spit, pushing herself off the ground. She still hurt, although that was mostly from the throw; who greeted an enemy with a throw, anyway? How dare this girl preach to her, when she had no clue what was truly going on? All high-and-mighty on her silver starlight throne. "I killed for you! I thought I was doing the right thing, because that's what I was told to do!"

It wasn't all true -- Warhol didn't remember anything of her powered history. But what she'd heard about herself, what she could piece together, implied what she did say was correct.

"I fight for Earth, unlike you," she snarled at Hyperborea, taking a step back. "You don't save anyone. You don't help anyone. I take people's starseeds when they're bad people!"

"You're a monster and you just don't want to face it, you know!" Warhol hissed, face alight with rage. "Stay off of our planet. Stay off our world." Her eyes shut and she took a deep breath, and she took a step backwards -- and then Warhol disappeared with not even a sound, teleporting back to her own bedroom and powering down (not that Hyperborea would know, of course).

Her back hurt, she was tired, and mostly she wanted to go to sleep because she'd only gotten a little bit of energy out of that patrol -- patrolling together would bother people, waste their time, and she couldn't have that. There was no place for her to bother people.

And the Squire had been wrong.