trans_9 | I don't know what you're going to do, but I have work to do.

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I don't know what you're going to do, but I have work to do.

People dealt with things in different ways. In Mindy's case, she had continued severing people in the cafe. The hours were rough, her sleep patterns shifted, and she had told herself to take it easy after the ejecting from the Sensoriums by Overlord Zetta. Much like a bartender though, working in the kitchens meant hearing people's conversations, and that led to the topic most people were talking about: the Daligig, the former crew and the inevitable fight for the ship. This wasn't just gossip: it was legit information, and while she could skim over Howard's really long summary, it was Allenby's that hit home. Sure, she had that dumb phobia about tech that was irritating, but she was truthful.

And that meant training time had to happen. NOW.

She didn't waste any time either. Quick to the Sensoriums, Hit Girl costume on and the simulation began ten minutes after intense push ups, stretching and a little running.

She learned something in the past few weeks: the only way to really train yourself was to push, and that push had to keep going and going and make you better. So now she was back again against the Daleks, testing her ability to dodge and run and make things fall on them. Then came that duel with Aqua, where she got much, MUCH better with a blade. Then she was back to attacking SAINTS and the hark robots, making sure there were twice as many.

But the grand finale? Shadow Zetta, unstoppable, merciless, and constantly coming at her. Even in the aftermath of broken robots and a beaten Aqua, she couldn't come close to landing a hit on shadow Zetta that mattered. Yet here she was, going at it again and again, and somehow, the audience were smug looking members of the Daligig, looking like Ceasars at a lion feeding.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

"There's nothing inherently superior about a hard style or a soft style. I prefer soft myself just as a matter of training and experience, but if I'm fighting in my personal style you'll see me use both without caring which is which. In general, fighting defensively can be very effective, if you're willing to commit to it and give ground if necessary. And predicting your moves?"

He shrugged mildly. "If I was going all out, I'd be reading you as much as I possibly could, both mentally and physically. I wasn't here, and if it seemed like I was, that's just a factor of experience."

"Ok, so some have advantages and disadvantages to each other," Hit Girl said patiently. "So you're telling me that you can actually take me out easily if you were actually trying? Heh. I think you definitely have an advantage over a lot of people...though you practice no violence. it still boggles my mind."

She shook her head. "Man, that was invigorating though! That was better than any fight I ever had! It was better than s...well, maybe not better than that, but you get the idea!"

"Oh, I practice violence, I just prefer it as a last resort. I'll hurt or kill if it's the only solution I can see. But if that's the case, it's a failing on my part for not being able to see a better solution."

He shrugged, smiling lopsided. "Want a suggestion for a spell? It's a popular one because of its raw efficiency. I can't tell you how to do it hermetically, of course, but if I give you the idea you can probably figure it out."

"Yeah, makes sense. I dunno if being here's calmed me a little. Of course, you know that I still have lots of targets to let looser my violence. I mean robots, Ohm, cultists. I gotta admire your gumption: sometimes its hard not to want to beat the shit out of everything, with all we go through."

Now there was something she could get behind! "Yeah man, I'm all ears!"

"The common name for it is Friction Curse. You turn the kinetic energy of an opponent's muscles to heat. The harder they try to move, the more they cook themselves."

Would've made their fight a lot more one-sided, wouldn't it?

As if reading his mind, Hit Girl shook her head. "man, its a good thing you're on our side: I'd hate to see what you could do to us if we were your enemy!"

And he could have ended their fight pretty quickly that way.

"How does it work?"

"I just told you I don't know how to describe it hermetically," he said, grinning. "Doing it with martial arts is just a matter of scrambling your opponent's meridians. Ask me to chant in Latin and you get Kinetus Becomae Heaticus."

"Scrambling your opponents...ok, you lost me a little bit," Hit Girl confessed. "I'm sorta following you, but I'm trying to understand how you would do that with martial arts."

"Do you want the simple answer, or the complicated one?" he asked.

This was a trick question. Had to be.

"The simple one, then the complicated one," Hit Girl said. "Might make more sense."

"Magic," he said glibly. Didn't get much more simple than that!

"It's mainly a matter of screwing up someone's flow of chi so badly that they can no longer move their muscles properly, and all their cellular energy becomes metabolic warmth."

The first explanation? Made her want to hurt him badly, even if she now knew that was totally impossible now. The second explanation took that feeling away though, as she pondered that a moment.

"Ok, that sounds like something I would definitely use in a pinch. I'm still starting to learn how to use chi to mu advantage, so that would help."

Yes, he knew. Had she just requested the simple explanation alone, he wouldn't have been THAT simple. But he had to keep his sense of humor!

"Hermetic magic is generally somewhat more geared to manipulation of forces, so you might have more success going down that route. But nothing is set in stone. I'm better at Life magic than Mind, even though Mind is the Akashic specialty."

Ok, now was the time to really get into the bread and butter of this stuff. Sure, a lot of it went over her head, but whatever did, she at least wanted to know what was what.

"What's the difference between all those magics?"

Sheesh. Well, leave it to Hit Girl to demand he condense thousands of years of philosophy and belief into a comprehensible explanation. "At the most fundamental level, absolutely nothing. There is no difference at all, because what you're doing is altering reality through raw belief and willpower to an end. The way you do it is just trappings. But more realistically, the trappings are all that matter, because you have to believe in them thoroughly. I could chant Latin phrases till my tongue fell off and never get a spark out of it, for example."

Well excuse her for trying to find shit out! at least, that was what she thought she was doing, but it turned out Morgan was basically telling her something she should have already known: that magic doesn't come from speaking a single thing or a code of thought, but from the actual intent behind it.

"So what I'm doing, or what I was doing...its just another mode of willpower and intent, right? What sorts of stuff do you do that's different?"

"You saw how I do what I do pretty thoroughly, just now," he said, his smile veering lopside again. "Manipulations of chi, harmony with self and the cosmos... Martial arts, meditation, and occasionally music."

"Music, huh? I like the sound of that. Manipulations of chi I understand, but obviously something like harmony with the cosmos is going to be a little hard to understand."

"If you think that way, of course it will be. It's just another level of self-unity, except it's the level that acknowledges the lack of self." As if that wasn't perfectly obvious, right?

Obvious to someone who practiced that stuff? Certainly. Obvious to Hit Girl, who was always taught the blood and gut of fighting. Not so much. She was at least getting what he was saying though.

"Acknowledges the lack of self?" She looked mystified. "How do you figure?"

"It's all about breaking down divisions. Divisions within your mind, then divisions between your mind and your body... but ultimately, none of it is real," he said, tapping his temple. "The world as you believe it is all belief and perception. The more you acknowledge that, the more you stop trying to move against what is, and instead move in harmony with it."

That was at least something that made sense. It was a new way of thinking, of course, and definitely not something she was used to, but she at least understood it.

"So how do I start that? I'm pretty rooted in my ideas of hwo the world works. How would I work to flow in harmony with it?"

"Well, the first step is easy and familiar, and that's simple martial arts practice. Once you've gotten to the point where your thoughts and your actions are identical, then you move on to the next one."

"I figured that might be where I started," Hit Girl said. "Would you be willing to help me with that part?"

"Easy enough," he said, reaching inside his coat thoughtfully. After a moment of digging, he came out with a knife, which he casually tossed underhand to her. "Catch."

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