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Her mother had caught her going out the door, wrested the information that she was leaving to meet a boy, and then dragged her back inside to 'doll her up'.

So Tate actually looked nice for once. Which sucked, because she really didn't want to. She wanted to kick this 'Luver Under Cover' in the ballsack and then leave. Only that would be rude, and she didn't need to get a reputation as a sore loser on the circuit. Then people wouldn't join the LAN tournaments in the hopes of kicking her a**. Which made her wonder, why in the world hadn't she seen his handle in the local Soul Calibur tournaments? He might just like to play games like Team Fortress 2. In which case, she should challenge him to a game on her home turf and kick his a** then. Then they'd be even and she could leave.

Not like she wanted to leave the gaming cafe. At least he'd picked someplace fun. If it had been in a cafe or something she might have bailed.

Sigh. First she had to find him. Purple hair. There, in the back. Awkwardly, she waved at the woman behind the desk, membership card in hand. She came here when she didn't want to go across town to her normal internet cafe near Hillworth.

Skinny jeans and boots might look nice, but they did not make comfortable leg or footwear. Especially not here, where people were already staring. Tkonstantin did not dress like a girl in clingy sweaters. She just didn't.

Tate knew that as she threw herself onto the couch, an unhappy look on her face as she said, "Luver Under Cover, right?"

Far from setting her at ease, her expression just went closer to deadpan and displeasure as he made his comment about her appearance. She wanted to try and smother him with the couch cushions or something, but then people would stare harder. Oh, this guy was such an a*****e - of course, after the message she'd gotten from him, he was pretty doomed to be labelled 'a*****e' until such a time as she found reason to change her mind. "It's November," she said, voice as chilly as the water at the pool probably was, "and I don't swim."

Tate gingerly touched knuckles with him (she would have preferred a handshake, honestly, or maybe punching him in the face) and resettled herself, still clearly uncomfortable and wary of the eyes riveted her on her back. She made a face, and said, "I think just maybe I will take Lucas instead." There were about twenty innuendos to come from saying something like that, but if she was aware of them her face gave no indication. "I'm Tatiana."

She paused, as if considering it. "Call me Tate," she said grudgingly. Tatiana was such a prissy name and she hated it.

"I looked you up," she said after a short silence. Her expression was a little more comfortable now, less disagreeable and more mildly irritated. That was normal, though. "Usually I only play Soul Calibur, and that only in local tournaments." It was poor luck that led me to play Team Fortress that day, she wanted to say, but that would be... Well, she wouldn't. "Third in the Cyber Gaming competition. That's an achievement." Especially for someone about my age. Grudging respect, greenish eyes looking off somewhere else, Tate was happily pretending that this wasn't a date of any kind.

She curled her hands into fists at the 'exotic' comment. Sure, you could take it as a compliment, but exotic was a word for dogs and other animals. Maybe a pattern on a dress. "You're modest," she said instead, light irony in her voice. At least the subject was something she could care about; Tate was absolutely shitty at pretending she was interested when she wasn't. "What sort of-"

Hand. On her knee. Her head whipped around, green eyes wide with shock. She froze up, staring at him like he had just startled a witch and she'd forgotten the trigger buttons for her shotgun. "Ch-challenge," she said, trying for incredulous but coming up with extremely discomfited. "You won because of a lucky shot."

Personal mythos, go!

"Soul Calibur IV," she said, turning red as his hand inched a little higher. Her voice was tight, like a thread about to snap, but for all that she seemed remarkably well put-together, more like I'm not going to comment than I am considering how hard to punch you in the face.

She got up, ignoring his hand; probably he would have taken it as an invitation for something more, which it wouldn't have been. Tate tossed her hair, straightened her shirt, and said, "Yes, it was. You don't have to be a surgeon to win with a Pyro."

It became pretty clear which platform she preferred when she stopped in front of an Xbox, memory card already in hand; she bent over to plug it in, rifled through the games and put in the Soul Calibur IV game disc. Picking up two controllers, she tossed one to Lucas (no point in taking the risk of him missing it and having it break) and carried hers back to the couch, where she sat down on the left side of the couch.

"You're second player," was all the explanation she offered, skipping the intro and navigating to the two-player screen. She picked out her favorite custom character - a golden-haired girl in an outfit Lucas would imagine deliciously skimpy. The character was dancer-class. "Fifty percent starting health," said Tate, "Random stage. Best out of three, character changes between battles allowed. Sound fair?"

Common tournament rules, at least in Destiny City and environs.

"What are you betting?" Tate glanced at Lucas while waiting for him to choose a character. "Is it worth my while?"

Ugh, strip poker sounded so much better. Tate made a face, but wouldn't take back her rules. That would make her seem less confident - weaken her position. Giselle had taught her that. And besides, she was rather body-shy. "Since you'll lose, that's fine," she said flatly.

Two minutes wasn't so long, anyway.

Seeing his choice, she smiled - for a few seconds, it lit up her entire face and made her genuinely beautiful. Then it turned vicious. Oh he was going down. Still, she couldn't think of a single thing she wanted from him, except... Well, no, there was nothing. "I'll let you know when I think of something," she said.

The battle began and the character on the screen lunged. Apparently, when it came to Soul Calibur, Tate didn't like to waste time.

[Hey, Iris, Talim is the soul used for "dancer" classes in SCIV. PS: let's chat, do you have AIM?]

The battle wasn't long, of course not; the time alloted for each battle was seventy seconds. This battle in particular lasted until about six seconds were left. And though Lucas played Ivy well, Tate had excellent skills with her custom character and knew her inside-and-out. She chained combo after combo, and utilized guard-breaking skills with unsettling ease.

Soul Calibur was her game, man.

Wasn't to say that it might not be Lucas's game. Tate frowned, though she had a few hit points on him; what if he was just luring her into a false sense of security? Hmph, well... Take victories where you could, kick a** everywhere else. Like hell would she lose.

"Yes yes yes YES YES!" So it was that with six seconds of gameplay to go, Tate's custom dancer knocked out Ivy. A superior smirk to Lucas, and then they were back to the character select screen, where she changed over to Ashlotte - another one of her strong characters. "Ready to get your a** kicked again, Lucas?"

It was weird, but she seemed to almost like him when she was kicking his a**.

She tossed her hair to get it out of her eyes. Pft, that was why she tied the longer section off into a ponytail; it was already sliding out of the clip and right into her face. And, if asked, she would answer that that was why she wasn't playing so well in this round--the hitpoints were going pretty evenly.

Probably it was a tactical error. Lucas clearly learned fast, and Ashlotte was not the speediest character in existence, while Ivy was capable of lightning-quick attacks. That would probably be why he was winning

Next battle, she would totally not be the one to lose, she swore; "Fffffuck," she snapped as Ivy KO'd Ashlotte. (Tate tended to talk a lot while playing Soul Calibur.)

Tate's potty mouth was just as bad, a never-ending stream of "********", the most vehement right after he said groping. It continued into the game itself, at varying values - this one was going to be close. And, in fact, they were both at less than five percent of health when --

"Holy god," Tate practically shrieked, and her fingers slipped on the controller. Her heart leapt into her throat, a disturbing feeling. No no no no no--instead of doing a throw, she---

The game was out of their hands now - it had turned to a cutscene, in fact. Somehow, someway, Tate had accidentally pulled off a Critical Finish. Her anguished face slowly absorbed the victory screen displaying Ashlotte, and grew into a huge grin. "YES," she shouted, tone emphatic, hands up in the air. "Yes yes yes!"

She smirked at Lucas, green eyes narrow. "You lose," she announced smugly.