Welcome to Gaia! ::

It hadn't been a full week since Hiro had first met Painite. He'd been busy exploring the city and familiarising himself with the neighbourhoods since then. Once or twice he'd run into other Negaverse agents (no senshi so far, thankfully) and made himself known. Being the helpful kind of cat that he was, he offered comments and critique to those he met. He generally walked away satisfied that improvements were being made. The Negaverse here wasn't a write-off, despite being less successful than the branches on other continents. Well, less successful so far. Hiro knew it was only a matter of time before they reigned supreme here as well.

He was leaping across rooftops when he spied movement in any alleyway below. Slowing to a trot, his ears pricked up, catching the muted sounds of bad music and rowdy drunks. A bar, hmm?

Recalling that the bars were a favourite haunt of Fluorite, he peered over the edge of the roof, down into the alley. Girl with a weapon, check. Not Fluorite, though. Someone with a spear? This warranted investigation!

After a careful eyeing off of the items in the alley, Hiro leapt from the roof to a fire escape. From there, an instant jump down to the dumpster, then to a small fort of cardboard boxes (a hobo hotel?), down to the ground.

Soft pawpadding filled the air and Hiro walked over to the girl. "Nice evening for it," he greeted the Negaverse agent as he walked into the faint light cast from the half-broken neon lighting above the bar's emergency exit door. He blinked as the girl's face was finally in view.

"Well, this is a surprise," he said, blinking repeatedly. One ear twitched backwards in shock. "I didn't recognise you. Congratulations on your promotion, Captain."

Clearly that was the only way that the girl had swapped her horsehead weapon for something much more... violent. Hiro felt almost proud. (Despite the fact that it had nothing to do with him.) Little Painite, all grown up.

He kitty-smiled back at Painite. She was understandably proud of her accomplishment. He wasn't sure how levelling up felt for a Lieutenant (only being familiar with how things worked for senshi), but if it didn't involve a cat at all, perhaps there was no one around to say 'good job'. Or they simply just didn't hear it enough. It wasn't like they got their own personal cheer squad, after all.

Hiro decided it couldn't hurt to cheer Painite on every so often. "Nicely done," he praised her. "Especially given how many senshi there are out there, and how violent they're getting."

It was what his Alkaid was still so worried over, after all. Missing Negaverse agents, kidnapped by senshi. And given that Lieutenants would make the easiest targets, it wasn't an easy feat to ensure one levelled up to Captain these days.

He sniffed obligingly at the new Mr Saddles, rubbing his head against a non-pointy bit. Just so any other animal out there knew that the weapon and its owner belonged to him. Painite was his ear-scritcher, not theirs!

"Very sharp," he said, eyeing the keen edge of the spear. "This'll be a new change for you, working with that. How are you handling it so far?"

He didn't see any self-inflected scratches on the girl. That was always good.

"Exactly right," Hiro grinned as best a cat could. It mostly involved dropping his mouth open a little to show his teeth. Though maybe that just made him look like a panting dog... he would need to check this in a mirror, later. "They're no match for us. We'll kick their asses."

Even if they were senshi, Hiro felt no sympathy for them. If they couldn't work out which side was the better one to be one, too bad for them. His Alkaid was his main priority, though he'd spare some concern for the other corrupt senshi of Destiny City once he actually met them. Other than that, he didn't have a problem prioritising the corrupted humans of the Negaverse over the 'white' senshi. Losers and fools deserved to die.

A familiar gleam entered Hiro's eye as Painite spoke of her difficulties in handling the new spear. "Of course. Your center of balance will need to be readjusted," he said, half to himself, with a narrowed eye. It was quite annoying, to learn proper form for one weapon, then have it change on you. "Hmm. We'll have to make you a training dummy that doesn't involve Mister Saddles. Until then, there are still other ways you can practice." He gave an evil little chuckle.

And here came training-mode Hiro...

Painite was always so enthusastic. Hiro appreciated that. So many people out there not only wanted to ignore their flaws but blamed the person pointing them out. Hmph! And Hiro was just trying to help them out. So Painite was a refreshing change of 'student' for him.

And her eagerness seemed to extend to hurting the senshi, if that shiver was anything to go by. Excellent. Hiro approved entirely. There was no use being a warrior if you couldn't enjoy it or at least take pride in your skills. Reluctant fighters never did anyone any good.

"The first thing you should learn are how to move that weapon without hitting yourself or falling over. We could devise a series of exercises to that effect..." A bit like spear-aerobics, Hiro thought. Or so might be the best way to explain it to someone who wasn't familiar with kata for poleweapons like spears or naginatas.

"We could, at the same time, have your work on being able to hit a desired target without spearing yourself in the progress." Normally that would require a dummy, but Hiro thought something like a tree could help in this situation. All Painite would have to do would be to hit one mark then another without taking a tumble or losing a limb. And Hiro would be there to prevent the latter.

"What do you think?" he asked Painite. Unlike some, Hiro believed students should have a say in their education. (At least until they proved themselves too stupid to deserve one, which Hiro didn't think Painite would be doing.)

For his part, Hiro kind of wanted to pat Painite on the head. She was such a good little soldier. It almost made him feel mushy, listening to her talk about the training she did on her own, and how her last weapon had felt so natural.

"That's how a good weapon should feel," he beamed. "Like an extension of your own body. Hopefully that will come with practise."

He was sure it would. It was technically the same weapon, after all, just a little more evolved. The more Painite used it, the more natural it would start to feel.

... Though of course that left Hiro wondering if she'd have exactly the same problem the next time she was promoted. Hmm, it appeared that regular Negaverse officers came with their own set of 'level up' problems.

"Alright, let's find a good place to train, then," he said abruptly. No sense worrying over the future when they had enough problems right now. "Know a good place with trees that won't have people around this time of night?"

Hiro trotted along at Painite's side. He was glad she knew where to go - he was still learning Destiny City. Exploration time was cut into by the fact he didn't like to leave Alkaid alone, if he could help it. But sometimes she needed her alone time, so Hiro explored while he was free.

The park was somewhere he had yet to visit. Mostly because everyone was walking dogs there during the day and that just made him want to smack them all around... It was better to conserve his energy for Negaverse purposes.

"Not for this," he answered Painite's question about being carried. He wasn't some skittish housecat, abvout to go racing off the moment someone made a loud noise.

Painite's description of people's views on nature earned a squint. Dirt and trees were scary? Since when? Eventually he just decided, "Humans are weird. Present company excluded." As were Negaverse members in general.

Hiro held back at a smile at Painite's enthusiasm. He couldn't quite keep the humor out of his voice as he said, "Let's start off with one tree and see how you go."

She'd be a fun one to watch in giant, all-out battles. Always ready to attack everything by herself, he bet.

"Alright," he trotted over to one tree and sat beneath it, facing Painite. "We'll start out. Pick two easily identifiable points on the tree - bark discolourations, whorls, where a low branch meets a trunk, whatever. Then, you want to get used to swinging your staff about to hit only those points."

He eyed Painite to see if she was following. "The idea is that on a human, those spots would be vital points. This should get you used to hitting only what you aim for, and how to string your swings and jabs together."

Hopefully without knocking herself over and whacking herself with the spear. But it was early days, so those kind of mistakes were kinda expected. At least here it was only the tree and Hiro that would see any of those errors, and not the enemy in battle.

Just to make sure Painite was still motivated, he made the same offer as last time. "Scritches if you do well." For him, of course, not for Painite. Much as he wanted to pat her on the head, his claws weren't the sort good for gentle touches. Just... clawing.