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And now for a quiet, perfectly normal evening of patrol (or as quiet and perfectly normal an evening of patrol could possibly be). All in all it had been a good day - a party with friends, nice presents, good cake... It hadn't been the greatest turn out, but it hadn't been a terrible one, either. Europa liked to think that everyone involved had had a good time. She assured herself of this as she jumped between rooftops - insecurity had no place in her Senshi duties. As Sailor Europa, she had to be calm and collected, a guardian of justice, a pretty-skirted warrior!

Well, minus the whole skirt part. Sailor Europa, otherwise known as "Shorts" to certain members of the populace, crouched at the edge of the roof and looked down into the alley. Not a soul moved, nor any number of possible soulless things. She let out a long breath and got to her feet again. Just a quiet night. Nothing out of the ordinary.

she paced across the rooftop to check the other alley and ran a hand through her hair - was there still cake in it?

Tallulah stopped, pulled the offending lock out of formation, and squinted to examine it in the dim light.

No, it was just her imagination. Europa frowned once more at the offending strands, tucked them back behind her ear and--

Castor. Europa spun around to face him, crossing her arms over her chest instinctively as she did so. Past experience (limited as it was) indicated that this was a good strategy. It didn't make him less obnoxious, or seem to discourage him any for that matter, but at least she could give him a hard time about it.

"And I was having such a nice night, too," she said dryly. Tallulah, as differentiated from Europa, liked to think that as Europa she could get away with saying things in a tone of voice she though of as dry.

If he thought he was going to get a replay of their last meeting, he was dead wrong. Europa was on to Castor's tricks. She fixed her face into her best steely glare (which was not very steely at all). "I hardly think we're on hugging terms," she said, and did not even stop to think about whether or not there was even such thing as "hugging terms." It was, at any rate, probably closer than first name basis, and first name basis was difficult to determine when you were superheroes (of all things!)

She stepped neatly away from his attempted embrace. "We have to stop meeting like this, Sailor Castor," she said, and earnestly meant it without any of the James Bond-like connotations it could possibly have. Note to self, next time you go on patrol, bring Pyxis.

Not that the senshi of fireflies would probably be much good against this creep, but it was worth a try.

"I was having a good birthday until you showed up," she said. "Now you've gone and ruined it."

At first, she had found the nickname "Shorts" even the slightest bit endearing, but now it felt a bit condescending and uncomfortable. Actually, a lot condescending and uncomfortable. Then again, he had said anything. The slightest hint of a smile crossed Europa's lips, and she hoped she hadn't gotten his hopes up too high since she was about to crush them.

"As my birthday present," she said, feeling quite clever as she said it, "I would like you to treat me as a teammate and a human being in my own right, rather than as a sex object. This treatment will continue indefinitely."

She looked at him, trying the steely glare again. (Still not quite steely.) "Got it?" she asked.

Clearly, Europa had not factored in that the male of the species was capable of logic. Clearly, this had been left out of any of her brilliant plans. Clearly.

She rolled her eyes at Castor, determined to not let this phase her, even though it pretty clearly was. She was Sailor Europa, she reminded herself. She was cool and collected in the face of danger, hundred-foot drops, and chauvinists. "That wasn't what I meant," she said lamely, because it was the most calm and collected thing she could come up with. (It was not very calm and collected at all.)

"What I meant was- ugh!" There really was no good way to explain it, now that he'd twisted her logic so much. Europa stomped away to the other side of the roof. So much for calm and collected. So much for personal dignity. "Why is it," she demanded, "That whenever I run into someone on patrol, it's always you?"

Europa still had enough control over the situation to know that once he got his hands on her, things would swiftly move in a very bad direction. She pushed his hand away from her chest and shrugged the offending arm off of her shoulder.

"Clearly," she pronounced, her voice shaking (it took all her composure to remain in her slightly icy senshi persona). "Clearly you were absent the day in kindergarden when they taught everyone about keeping their hands to themselves." If how tonight was unfolding was any evidence, it was a lot more difficult to keep her civilian and working identities separate than she had previously thought.

"So I'm a special case?" she asked, in a way that fell just a bit short of deadpan. "I'm flattered." She wasn't. Not really. But she was trying to work herself back into that witty sweet spot and this was the best way she could come up with to do so.

If Europa had devoted more of the time she spent studying to reading comic books, her line of thought would go like this: Batman and the Joker. Superman and Lex Luthor. The Green Lantern and the color yellow. Betty and Veronica. All heroes had an adversary they could never overcome lest the story become boring and lacking in conflict, and hers, apparently, was to be Castor. That was a great big if, though, and Europa had not read a great many comic books. So her thought process went more like this:

She really, really, really hated Castor right now.

"I really think I'll be fine without it," she said, her resolve wavering again. His determination would have been admirable under any other circumstances, but right now it was just frustrating.

"You're a jerk," she added, at wit's end. Gosh, this was embarrassing. No one in her civilian life ever needed to know about this. Ever.

Europa made it her mission to keep as far away from him as she could. "Not on your life," she replied to his suggestion, taking a few more steps away. Kiss him? Who did he think he was? (Of course, she had done it before. But not on purpose.)

One of the primary disadvantages of having uncomfortable conversations on rooftops, and hence walking backwards on rooftops, was that if you were not careful you were likely to fall off. As Europa continued backing away, she became momentarily distracted from this definite fact of gravity. Her heel hit air.

She wobbled for a moment and then lost her balance completely. She couldn't even find words under these circumstances - just stood there for a moment, wavering between solid ground and a several-story drop, her eyes wide and her mouth formed into a perfect 'O' of surprise -

And then she fell.