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The death thread didn't earn much of a reaction from Kirin. He was too busy moving into his next move as his punch was blocked. A foot lifted out and kicked downwards at the side of Foramen's knee with surprising force.

His mind flagged the comment as unusual, something for later persursal. Sure, they'd kept starseeds that should have gone back into civilians to save their lives. That did make them killers, in a secondary round-about way. Foramen made it sound like they were about to go kill people themselves, which was untrue. Maybe he was just mouthing off, Kirin thought, trying to sound more deadly than he actually was.

"And what the hell is your goal?" Kirin snapped, focusing on that instead of the killing remark. Foramen's goal should have been the same as Kirin's - Kirin was in charge, after all. Although his senshi side did have that other stupid goal, that silly loyalty-worship of Queen Serenity that had overtaken Kirin's own desires when he'd met the ghost of the dead Queen. No doubt Kirin could be considered a road block on the path to that particular goal, since Kirin couldn't give a flying ******** about dead or missing royalty. "What the ******** do you want from me?"

Kirin hissed at the response. So this was the senshi instinct to search out the Moon Princess was trying to take over? After all the logical reasoning they'd come up with for why that was a stupid idea?

"You are an unbelievable piece of work," he sneered. "Mouthy brat, too, aren't you? Let me help you with that!"

Sick of the stalemate, even his strategic side admitting that Foramen wasn't going to attack if Kirin didn't, Kirin ran back in. Once again a fist aimed for Foramen's jaw - at the last second proving to be a feint, the other fist following through instead.

"********!" Kirin cursed as Foramen disappeared. Goddamn rift powers. He didn't have time to ponder the fact that Foramen hadn't spoken the attack, and there had been no actual rift appear for the senshi to move through. The sudden burning pain on his back left no room for such thoughts.

It took all his mental fortitude to fight past the pain. Even better, he found his tongue. "No thanks. That sounds a bit too date-rape for me," he rasped.

The only point he was being held was the now-torn jacket. Kirin's mind flickered to some often-watched kung fu movies. Well, if it worked for Jackie Chan... One arm was free enough to unzip the front of the jacket, then he dropped down and forward, arms back so that he slipped out of the jacket. It wasn't as smooth as the kung-fu master made it seem, and he didn't use the material to somehow kick the other guy's a**, but it did free Kirin from the horrible sensation of something trying to reach into his chest.

Foramen was left with the tattered remains of a bulky jacket, and there was nothing left to hid Kirin's flat chest from view. Looking down, he tsked at the state of his skirt. Chiffon tore so easily - that must have been from back when Foramen punched Kirin to the ground. He tore the scraps away.

Worn jeans, a plain white button-down shirt, his hair half-falling out of a low ponytail... This Kirin looked nothing like the girl that Zac had met. In fact, this Kirin looked nothing like a girl, period.

One hand flew to press at that very flat, male chest. "What the ******** was that?" Kirin demanded, eyes wide and wild. In his shock, his voice dropped back down into it's normal tenor range. It wasn't like Kirin thought he had anything to hide from his opponent. "Were you aiming for my starseed or for my heart? I can assure you that you will never possess either."

Something was wrong here. Very wrong. Foramen did not have the ability to gank starseeds. That was why they had to stalk the Nega agents and steal the crystals. ... Was this really Kirin's senshi side?

Despite the witty repartee, there was something in "Foramen's" face that was decidedly off. It didn't escape Kirin's golden glare. That was... shock. Kirin didn't think he'd said anything that startling. Except, he'd dropped his voice, he realised. He looked down. A flat chest greeted him. He looked back at Foramen. That shock... was shock that Kirin was male?

All the tiny pieces that hadn't added up rushed back into Kirin's mind. Things he'd ignored in favour of the fighting, all ignored because of the stupid assumption that he was fighting himself. But if there was anything Foramen would be aware of, it was that they were both male.

This was not Foramen.

Anger, at himself and the doppelganger, flooded Kirin. Taking advantage of the fake senshi's shock, Kirin sprinted forward and slammed one fist towards the senshi's gut.

"What the hell?" Kirin growled, as the doppelganger continued to insult him. It was highly effective: not only was Kirin angry that he'd just revealed himself to someone completely unknown, that person didn't seem to realise that Kirin was all too aware of the doppelganger's own deceit.

"You're one to talk! Who the hell are you, anyway!?"

A bit belated, but possibly something that Kirin should have asked at the beginning of their encounter.

Kirin grunted as his own damn heels slammed into one knee. As that knee gave out, he lashed out with his uninjured leg, sweeping it quickly round to try and knock the fake senshi down.

"What do I see?" he icily asked, golden gaze raking over the familiar yet oh-so-wrong figure before him. "Someone trying very hard to be something they're not."

It was quite a charade. The 'evil senshi' - surely that must be what this fake was intending. After all... "No one ever sees themselves as the villain," Kirin explained. "Only the hero of their own tale. So why are you trying so hard to prove yourself otherwise?"

Even the Negaverse thought of themselves as the good guys. Or at least that Zinkenite guy had, and Europa had mentioned others making the same claim. So who was this person, and what was their goal in not only impersonating a senshi, but making one seem evil?

Kirin's eyebrow twitched. Of course he'd gone and given this doppelganger ammunition to use against himself. Dammit, if only he'd been more careful. He clenched his teeth and tried to reign it in.

"Yeah, I would be the expert," he said bitterly. "Like you said, at deceiving others and myself. So I can spot someone doing the same." Even if it had taken him this long. "And I can safely tell them it won't work for long."

The fake!Foramen's head games would have been highly effective if Kirin was just a civilian. But he was a senshi. And more than that, he had grudges against the Negaverse that not even this tricky b*****d could talk his way around.

"Saviours? Those ******** military bastards? Are you shitting me!?" snarled Kirin. In an instant he was back on his feet, fists swinging at the fake's face. "Say whatever the hell you want about the senshi. I bet most of them are shitheads, killers, total wastes of space. But I saw one of those military bastards put someone I c-cared about into a ******** coma." Kirin's voice broke in the middle of 'cared': a testament to his reluctance to admit to the emotion, or his torment over the fact that he still felt that way? Who knew? "They beat him to a bloody pulp and left him to die. For nothing. Just because they thought it was ******** fun."

Under loosened bangs, golden eyes glared into 'Foramen' as though they could laser into his heart. "So don't you ******** tell me they're the good guys, here. I'd kill every last one of them myself, if I could."

Kirin frowned as the fake Foramen continued his diatribe. "I just told you I don't give a s**t about the senshi-" Kirin broke off as the doppelganger kept talking.

Blood drained from Kirin's face. His heart sped up til it was pounding in his ears. "How the ******** do you know my name?"

He hadn't mentioned it. Names hadn't seemed necessary when he'd thought he was fighting some manifestation of his own ******** psyche. But the fake Foramen had brought that illusion crashing down. In which case, this mystery attacker shouldn't know Kirin's name.

Unless this was someone he already knew. He tried to make a list of suspects. The only senshi he was sure knew Kirin-the-civilian were the Zodiacs, but even if the Geminis had a 'mirror/twin' power, their idea of a joke didn't go so far as to try for his starseed. Only the cats knew Kirin as Foramen, and clearly the guy hadn't realised the reason why Kirin knew that this Foramen was a fake one. That left someone he knew as a civilian, and only as a civilian, was a corrupted senshi or a Nega agent or some other kind of powered-up being (like Kurma, who was not either, but something wildly different).

Wide eyes stared at the senshi. In little more than whisper, he demanded, "Who the ******** are you?"