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Volterra didn't normally care about things like social pressure. This, however, was not normal. The whole... magical girl thing. Ne didn't like having to deal with any weird social pressure here, but there seemed to be a certain level of pretense ne needed to keep up so that ne didn't land in some kind of hot water for not doing a good enough job. A few of these people did, after all, know who ne was in nis day-to-day life, and ne refused to let any harm be done to nis family because of it.

So here ne was, keeping up some pretense despite hating it, and doing a little training with one of nis fellow mirror senshi.

"Hey," ne greeted. "Thanks for, uh, takin' me on. It'll be nice to get the chance to see how well I might fare in a more super-powered fight."

Volterra felt rather put off immediately by the extreme perkiness—that just really wasn't nis style, and ne didn't usually get along with too-perky people... Except for the fact that apparently this particular senshi had "creepy horror" magic. The senshi of Onryo... Volterra smiled a little.

"Yeah? That sounds pretty cool," ne said, then shrugged. "Mine is, uh, deflection, basically. I think it'll only work in places where there's a lot of stuff around to distract people with. In some kind of barren wasteland... Well. I guess a few specific grains of dirt will become incredibly interesting. You'll probably be able to fight mine off, since you're stronger. What's yours like? Or are we going with the whole element of surprise thing to make the fight more realistic?"

Volterra pondered that for a long moment, then shook nis head. "No, I don't think so," ne said slowly. Nothing was popping up in nis head, anyway.

Welp, ne supposed they'd find out shortly, ne thought wryly. "You wanna go first or me? Or, I guess, if your magic actually does do something to me, I can cast mine after yours. Might help."

Volterra hummed a bit—fascinating spell name, ne noted, before the magic smacked nem in the face. Oh, no. Ne backed away quickly, urged on by the apparent need for revenge in the thing that taken Asuka's spot. Prominent in the front of Volterra's mind was the time ne had made Reiki cry, when they were kids, because ne was being vicious about how weird Reiki was and called him a freak. Little five year old Haruhi hadn't known how terribly mean it was at the time, but that didn't change the impact it had had on nis cousin.

Ne still felt bad about that, sometimes, just like now.

But ne knew that had been righted long ago, and Reiki would never hold it against nem. So ne reached for nis magic.

"Sunny Day!"

Once Volterra's magic distracted Asuka, ne shuddered a bit and relaxed, looking over the way she appeared now with a more interested eye than scared one. Ne's childhood wrongs kept trying to push forward, force nem to be intimidated, but ne focused on the way that Rieki would absolutely lose his mind if he could see how this magic worked. Asuka was.... Wow, beautiful.

Ne looked to what had actually taken Asuka's attention and tilted nis head. Huh. Cracks in the pavement—but with the ray of sunshine highlighting it, it did... seem kinda important. Pretty.

Something monstrous and something ugly. Both finding beauty. Ugh, Volterra hated poetry like that. But... it felt good for a reason, probably.

"Cool," ne said, looking back to Asuka and the creepy, beautiful appearance she had.

As Asuka's magic faded, Volterra finally relaxed fully, the effects dissipating.

"Oh, yeah. That wasn't exactly fun," ne remarked with a short laugh. "But your magic is pretty good at getting someone to run away, whereas mine is for me to run away. Almost makes us a good team, huh?"