The Inaugural Brawl of Cosmic Bob

Characters in this scene: Justin, Zachary, Levi, Condor, Cosmic Bob, Lady Lim

Location: Sanctuary

Justin had spent the entire day laboring - first finding Bob, then convincing him to be bound, and then setting up a massive ward in Sanctuary's brand-new basement. All while having gotten caught by the Lady and a guest at step #5 instead of getting to unveil it after step #18.

No matter. It was finished, and he and Condor were ready for step #18, which was - of course - *playtesting*.

Three knocks on Seafoam's door. A quick glance into the Lounge, and then ten minutes of resigned waiting for Zachary's match to be over. He'd collected their playtesters, and now...

Justin would have loved to get to throw open the doors dramatically, but the only entrance to the basement was via elevator. The doors slid apart at their usual pace, revealing a large basement space - mostly empty, but with incredibly intricate wards in an area around a lone, battered pinball machine and many empty coffee mugs.

"We're working on the presentation. But come try it out!"

Zachary stepped into the the basement space, slowly stretching out his arms and legs as he did so. He placed a lump of cloth and his knife on one side of the area, and then turned to Seafoam.

"Ready to lose? I won't blame you if you back out now."

Levi, maskless and dressed again in the black tank top and baggy pants she'd first met Zachary in, responded with a raised eyebrow and a half-smile. "Bold words! Let's see if you live up to them." Truthfully, she was rather nervous about how this would go, given her opponent's prowess with direct combat, but a deal was a deal.

*And besides, a fight with no risk isn't any fun.*

"Ready when you are."

The pinball machine came to life with seemingly no provocation, tinny music blaring, lights flashing, something mechanical clicking deep within - and then suddenly Condor stumbled out of the air next to it, shedding pixellated glitches as they became fully corporeal.

"Haha, WOO!" they laughed, slightly delirious from caffeine, "I think it's working, Inky! Just went over the oath with Bob one last time to- oh, hi! Uh, wow, is it that time already? Cool!"

They continued to speak as they adjusted something on the back of the machine.

"Yeah so uh, basically, I'm going to write this up in a sec, but the deal is that if you give the Arena a tiny bit of self - like, uh, the amount that you'd use for little elemental diagrams, I guess - and you all press this 'join arena' button here, Bob can schloooop you into their Nex realm thing, which is this rad junkyard situation, and any wounds and stuff that happen while you're fighting in there disappear when you come out again."

"Like, when anyone declares the match over you all just appear out here in the same condition as you were when you entered, no matter what happens in there. Like - oh my god, Inky, it's like a reverse Alabaster, that's *hilarious*, anyway - you uh, don't get any power or divine favors or Self or anything back if you spend it in there, that stuff is gone for real. Questions?"

"Nope," Zachary says. He cracks his knuckles and looks Seafoam directly in the eyes. "You know the rules. Best of three, each match to first major blood or surrender. If you don't want to get stabbed, this is the time to stop. Last chance for you to surrender."

At that, Levi laughs and cracks her neck, shaking hair out of her face as she looks back at Zachary. "My man, if you think I can't handle being stabbed a bit, you've got another thing coming." Then, to Condor - "Is there a way for people outside the realm to see what's going on? I wanna make sure more people than just us get to see me kicking his ass."

"Oh, yeah! Thank for reminding me. Anyone outside should be able to look into the pinball machine itself while there's a bout going on, and it'll be like looking at the scene from above. I'm trying to bind some more camera echoes in there to get a live feed on the upper screen, and uhh, that's not tested but it should work!"

"Cool. That's the only question we've got."

Zachary picked up his items. In his right hand, he carried a small karambit knife, with a claw-shaped blade and rings on the handle for him to fit his fingers through. In his left hand, he held a dress that he picked up from the Scavenger's Shrine. Lacy frills decorated the ends of it, but it was a fearsome shade of red, and most importantly, the fabric of it was thick and heavy. This was going to serve as his sidearm to protect him from Seafoam's claws.

The pinball machine had a quarter slot marked out as a suggested receptacle for the initial payment of Self. Now, how was he supposed to do this? Confidence was key. He brought the knife up, spinning it in his fingers, and then slammed it into the small quarter slot. Ice crystals rippled outwards from the knife, and then melted away.

Zachary felt a sudden moment of lightheadedness, but stayed strong on his feet. Now wasn't the right time to look weak.

"See you on the other side," he said to Seafoam with a wink. Then his form flickered, like a TV that had lost signal, and he vanished from the basement.

In the moment before Zachary entered the realm, he might have seen Levi roll its eyes, with an expression not unlike fond exasperation. After he disappeared into the arena, Levi sauntered casually up to the pinball machine, extended a claw, and inserted it into the coin slot, calling over its shoulder as it did, "Make sure to pay attention, you two~! You're not gonna want to miss this." The expenditure of Self was certainly felt - something akin to hitting your funny bone on something, but with your soul - but with its head turned away, it's unlikely Justin or Condor noticed the grimace that briefly crossed Levi's face.

And with that, it followed Zachary into the arena.

Justin and Condor leaned over the glass to spectate. Towering piles of scrap filled the Arena, separated by tire-scarred dirt. On the screen, the spectators could see that the sky was a technicolor nebula starscape, nearly washed out by the floodlights lighting the Arena itself. They saw Zachary spawn in, landing with a confident *clang* on top of a rusted school bus; a second later, Levi appeared, perched expertly on a girder sticking out of the ground on the other side of the space.

"Oh shit, popcorn, good idea," Condor said as they noticed that Justin had made some.

Justin holds his big bucket of popcorn so Condor can take some.

Zachary scanned the arena with his Sight. He found Seafoam on a girder on the other side, and updated her marker from neutral to enemy. His minimap updated to reflect the change, showing up as a red pie slice instead of a yellow one.

He dropped down to the ground behind the school bus, keeping line of sight on Seafoam without straying too far from cover. For a moment, he felt a tremor of nervousness. He'd never actually fought a Practitioner before, and he still didn't know much of Seafoam's capabilities. What was she going to do?

From her perch, Levi watched Zachary drop behind the school bus he'd spawned on, but didn't move yet. She had an idea for how this first round would go, and putting it into practice - ha - required her to put on a bit of a show. And the spirits did ever adore a show.

She pitched her voice to carry throughout the arena. "By the way, Zachary, if you thought this was going to be a straightforward fight...\*"

She lifted a hand, fingers poised to snap, and grinned widely. "Think again.\*"

She snapped - and promptly disappeared from Zachary's sight. Justin and Condor, however, could see her then nimbly moving down the girder to ground level, quietly cutting through stacks of junk as she moved towards Zachary's location.

Seafoam vanished, both from sight and from Zachary's minimap. Out of instinct, he jumped backwards, once, twice into the air, onto the top of another pile of trash backed up against a giant wall.

Let her try to sneak around invisibly. Unless she could fly, there was only one way up here, and he'd see the footprints as she climbed up.

"You wanna play hardball, let's play hardball!" He shouted.

Ah, shit, where'd he go?\* Levi came to a halt near Zachary's spawn point, looking around briefly before sighting him atop a mountain of refuse not too far away. It eyed him, evaluating how easy it'd be to get to his position. He'd picked a good place to hold out, with the wall covering most of his blind spot. *Still,* it thought, *that doesn't mean a whole lot when your opponent's invisible.* This was gonna be a cinch.

Levi headed right for him, darting around bits of garbage littered about and scaling the pile of trash with acrobatic ease, occasionally skewing its climb left or right to try and throw him off. *Almost... almost... there!*

It leapt, swiping at Zachary's less-protected right side. The Glamour coating its skin and clothes flickered and wavered briefly, but seemed to hold for the moment.

Zachary's minimap flashed in the innermost circle. 5 meters or less. He flung out his left arm, which was holding the dress, and watched it catch onto a humanoid form. Then he lunged forward and struck.

Seafoam's Glamour shattered, revealing her still trying to get the dress off. Zachary had lightly scraped her on her midsection. A little more force, and he would've cut into an important organ. First blood.

"Yield," he said.

A long litany of grumbling and swearing could be heard as Levi wrestled with the dress, finally pulling it off. Oddly enough, she was grinning and laughing aloud, eyes sparkling with adrenaline. "Hahah, damn, alright! Looks like I underestimated you. Sure as hell won't be making that mistake again."

She held up her hands in the universal gesture of surrender, still smiling. "I yield."

With that, the two of them immediately discorporated, forms flickering and buzzing until they winked out entirely and returned to the room they entered from, where Justin and Condor were waiting.

Justin grins, one hand holding a large tub of popcorn (half-empty) and the other holding his pen poised over a pad of paper. "So, round one to Zachary! How do you feel? Any residual damage or pain, Levi? And you, Zachary - how was the realism?"

He gestures back at the machine, as if to say, *whenever you're ready for round two*.

(Condor grins and fist-bumps both participants if they so desire)

"Feels real enough," Zachary said, as he fist bumps Condor. "I was more focused on trying to figure out what she was doing."

He turns to Seafoam. "By the way, can I have my dress back? Or -- not my dress, the dress I'm using as a cloak, you know what I mean."

"If you claimed it from the shrine, isn't it your dress?" Justin asks.

"It's a sidearm. Would've used one of the bath towels instead, but I thought it might get cut up from the fight."

Levi laughs and tosses him the "sidearm". "Sure thing, man. Here's your dress."

"It felt pretty real, yeah. Doesn't hurt anymore, though. As for damage..." She lifts up her shirt to check. There's a long scar, almost surgical in appearance, running horizontally across her stomach and bisecting her belly button, but she doesn't seem to react to it and drops her shirt again. "Nope, nothing!" Then, as an afterthought, "Don't worry about that other scar. It was there beforehand."

"Alright, ready for round two?"

Seafoam was... different than he expected. Had the potential to be good in a fight, at least. Not that he'd tell her that while they were still dueling. It was never a good idea to give the enemy free morale.

Levi shot him another grin, all eagerness. "Fuck yeah, let's get it!"

Gods, how long had it been since it'd had a really good fight? For years, its opponents had been tiny Others who could barely put up a struggle, and the only people around who were any challenge were either uninterested or way ahead of its power level. But this? This was *perfect.*

*@ Cool, collected. "Don't get too wrapped up in the adrenaline. Remember that you're here to win, too, not just have fun." @*

Levi sighed and rolled its eyes, but nonetheless sent a small pulse of gratitude towards Keira for the advice. It headed for the pinball machine, waving cheerily at the others as it went. "See ya there." And then it was gone.

Zachary paid his tribute of Self to the machine again, making a face now that he didn't have to try to look confident before Seafoam. He, too, vanished into the machine.

The display flickered back to life as the combatants entered the arena, showing a similar scene to last time - this time, it looked like several cranes had collapsed into the junkyard, turning it into a sort of jungle gym of crisscrossing steel struts. The combatants spawned atop opposite ends of a fallen crane arm.

This time, Levi decided to hold her ground, taking up a ready stance, but otherwise not moving from her spawn point. Last round, she had tried to take the fight to Zachary, and that had backfired, though she still didn't really know how or why. *So if that's not gonna work... Let's change things up a bit.*

She smirked at Zachary and made a beckoning motion with one hand; it was clear she wasn't going anywhere.

The elevator *dings*, and the next round of popcorn is delivered. This time, Justin ordered two bowls - one for him and one for Condor.

Zachary shuffled closer, guarding his face with his left arm and the dress. He made a quick swipe, testing Seafoam's reactions, and noted how easily she moved out of the way.

Levi fluidly dodged his first strike, another laugh bubbling out of its throat as it made a retaliatory swipe at his knife hand. "Awww, c'mon, you can do better than that!"

Its strike went nowhere, and it quickly hopped backwards in anticipation of a counterattack. An idea blinked into focus, and it put it into play right away, riding the tides of adrenaline that said it was definitely, *definitely* a good idea. "What's up, Zachary? Thought you knew how to show a girl a good time." It winked at him to punctuate the only intentional flirtation it'd ever aimed his way.

In the back of Levi's head, Dream perked up, and had a very quick exchange of emotions/impulses/images with Levi that went something like this:

*! Teasing interest? !*

*"not on your life."*

*! "Bah. Fine." !*

Zachary's heart skipped a beat, but -- argh, focus, focus, focus!

"I fucking dare you," he muttered. Not the best retort, but the important battle here was physical, not verbal. Except for where it mattered in Practice, of course.

He feinted left, and then went for a low strike on the leg. Somehow Seafoam managed to step out of the way just so fast. She was so much faster than a normal person! How?

("Oof\*," Condor murmured to Justin, eyes fixed on the scene, "Absolutely brutal tactic.")

("Not very kind," Justin responds, also watching Levi. "But - it looks like it worked. See? Just for a moment.")

(Condor leaned into Justin a bit to get a better angle on the action, and suddenly realized how very long it had been since they slept, and how comfortable Justin's shoulder might be. But no - they couldn't look away from this.)

"Indeed, it did work on Master Zachary." Lady says, having appeared behind Condor and Justin at some point in time with her own bag of popcorn in hand. She gave Condor just a gentle, playful shove towards Justin before focusing more on the match)

(Condor stumbled a bit and shot Lady a *look* behind Justin's back)

Justin had just gotten over the initial freeze of *what is happening* and started to lean into Condor so the two of them were balanced when he heard the Lady's voice behind him. Immediately, he stiffened and glanced back.

Lady waves at Justin, not a 'hello' and more like 'you're not on the job.'

"Sanctuary is in the hands of the Alabaster right now, so I'm just Christine for at least one more day." Christine said. She focused, letting her 'Sight' loose. The synesthesia-like effect unveiled itself and the ward around Cosmic Bob sang to her ears. It was surprisingly, very very finely in tune. Condor and Justin had done good work.

"It looks like everything is in order here. Enjoy yourselves." Christine says, before turning on her heel. She takes the empty popcorn bags from Condor and Justin and leaves her half-finished one on a nearby table for them to have before heading back into the elevator.

Meanwhile, back in the arena, Levi snorted as she casually moved her leg out of the way and went for another strike, keeping her distance. "Dare me to what? Someone ain't very coherent today, is he?" A low blow, perhaps, but all's fair in love and war.

"Fuck you, Seafoam -- "

It's at this moment that Zachary wishes that he had never given up his ability to lie, because a lot of his standard responses to this sort of thing just don't work in this situation. He hangs back, waiting for her to make a mistake.

Levi's only response was a scoff before she suddenly surged forward, claws flashing in the glare of the floodlights as she sprang at Zachary. He moved to parry, bringing up the dress as a shield-

And was immediately tackled by a large, furry form, slamming past the dress with little issue and colliding head-on with his stomach. The impact pushed him backwards, and he stumbled, falling off of the crane with a shout - only to suddenly jerk to a stop with the sound of tearing cloth, suspended above the ground of the junkyard quite a ways below.

A large, black bobcat was sitting atop the crane they'd been fighting on, all four paws braced against the edge of the arm to keep it from being pulled over as well. It had caught Zachary by the edge of his shirt, and he was currently dangling from its mouth like an overgrown kitten.

The bobcat tilted its head slightly, and began to purr, the sound vibrating through the air. The message was clear.

Zachary looked at the distance between the ground and him. Maybe he could make this drop, if he timed his jump just right -- no, the debris underneath was sharp and rusted. Even if he broke his fall, he'd be skewered when landing.

He slowly brought his hands up. "Fine, I yield. For this round."

With that acknowledgment, they both left the arena.

As they reappeared into the real world, they see Justin jotting down notes before glancing at Zachary and then down at the bobcat. "Good! Glamour seems to work well for you, Levi - was the change any easier or more difficult in Bob's world than in ours? Zachary, do you feel all right?"

"I never got hurt. Just surprised, that's all," Zachary said, unable to suppress a grimace.

He shook himself out, trying to regain the confidence he had earlier. He felt much shakier than he was when he started, tired both mentally and physically.

"Feels weird spending this much Self," he said. "I'm not used to Practice like this."

The bobcat meowed at Justin, then appeared to realize something and flicked an ear irritably, before its form *flowed* upwards and became Levi again... Mostly.

"Nope, felt just as fluid as it does here." Levi moved to stretch its shoulders, only to realize that its hands had yet to change back, and were still paws. "Ugh. And this is the same, too."

It looked over at Zachary with concern. "We can break for a bit between rounds if you want. We'll have to wait a bit anyway for this to revert, it tends to take a minute or two." It waved a paw to illustrate.

"No, I can keep going," Zachary insisted. "We're going to best of three, not best of two and then one."

Levi shrugged. "Suit yourself."

Condor nods. There are dark shadows under their eyes but energy in their voice. "Okay, cool! I wasn't going to say anything, but I'm dyi- erm, I'm very excited to see who takes the victory here. Thanks for helping test this."

"Yeah, no problem! Honestly, we'd'a volunteered even without any prior commitments, this thing is *really* cool!"

By now, Levi's hands had reverted back to their usual appearance, and she cracked her knuckles. "So, Zachary! Ready to get your shit metaphorically kicked in again?"

"Hah, like you're going to win. That was just a one time thing, Seafoam," Zachary said as he glared into her eyes. There was something entrancing about the deep brown of them -- but no, that wasn't the point of this! The point was to intimidate her and win!

He jabbed his knife into the quarter slot without looking, and let himself be transported away into the arena.

Levi rolled its eyes. "Whatever you say.~"

It followed Zachary into the arena, one hand fiddling with the hem of its shirt.

This time, Levi and Zachary appeared on opposite sides of an open space in the center of the junkyard. The arena-within-Arena was defined by a roughly circular ring of crushed automobiles; broken glass from their windows glinted in the spotlights.

Cosmic Bob himself made an appearance for this match: a large man in a stained undershirt, jowls like a bulldog, grinning wickedly around his cigar. He was manning the controls of a crane, dangling a large metal plate over the center of the arena. A powerful electromagnet, ostensibly for moving scrapped cars. The electromagnet already had bits of scrap clinging to it. Cosmic Bob seemed to be content to let it hang over the center of the arena for now. *"RRROUUUUND THREE!*" he howled.

Zachary landed in the arena with a graceless roll, but one that protected all of his vital parts anyways. He stood up, looked around, and got into the classic ready position with one foot instead of another and brandishing the dress-sidearm in front of himself.

Whatever happened, he was *not* going to make this easy.

Levi appeared just a moment later, unexpectedly spawning a little ways off the ground, but she managed to land on her feet. She took up a ready position too, and began carefully circling around Zachary, claws at the ready. Perhaps it was a side-effect of her recent transformation, but her gait and her gaze had a disconcerting element of *stalking* to them, like a predator hunting prey.

She didn't say anything yet, but an expression that was somewhere between a smile and a baring of teeth tugged at the corners of her mouth.

Cosmic Bob moved the crane to one side of the arena, the rusted metal screeching loudly in protest. Then, the electromagnet flashed a bright blue beam of light, and a stream of debris seemed to come out of nowhere and cut between Zachary and Seafoam.

Zachary jumped backwards, barely in time to avoid a large Camry hurtling his way. The knife in his hand twitched towards the magnet, but as he got further away from the blue beam, the draw decreased back to nothing.

"Oh *fuck*-" Levi threw itself to the side, just barely keeping its glasses from flying off and joining the torrent of metallic mayhem. It looked at Zachary through the stream of debris, stance somewhat relaxed as it considered its options. It consulted with the rest of Seafoam, who had mostly been letting Levi do its thing, and after several evaluated and discarded ideas, Keira drew their body's attention to the crane itself.

To Zachary, it would appear that Levi's eyes flicked from him, to the crane, and then back to him. A smile crossed its face, and though it was hard to hear over the constant clatter of junk, it might have been laughing.

And then it sprinted off towards the crane, shouting as it went. "Hey Bob, scoot over, I need that crane for a sec!"

What was she doing? Whatever it was, it couldn't be good.

Zachary double jumped to the top of the stream of debris, stepping onto a signpost flying towards the crane. It dropped as he put his weight onto it, but the brief contact was enough to reset his jump counter so that he could leap to the next bit of trash. He slashed his knife forward, and a line of ice peeled off the edge of the blade and hurtled towards Seafoam.

The Nex-Goblin's eyes met Levi's for a second, grin increasing fractionally as he processed her words. And then, with a howl of barking laughter, he glitched out of the space entirely, leaving the crane's control car empty.

Levi grinned. *Perfect.*

It was about then that she noticed the wave of ice headed for her, and she stopped grinning quite as widely. She threw herself forward and to the left, and mostly managed to juke behind the ice. However, a piece of it clipped her cheek, and a wave of numbing cold spread over the left side of her face. She winced, but kept running, determined not to let Zachary get there first.

By the time she reached the control car, Zachary had almost gotten there himself, and none of the myriad buttons and switches that presumably controlled the crane were labelled. "Uhhh, oh fuck, what the shit- Uh, you!"

She lunged for a large dial labelled 1 to 10 that was currently pointed at 4, and cranked it up to 8, hoping that it did what she thought it did.

The blue beam of light suddenly magnified. It *yanked* on Zachary's knife, hard enough that it felt like his arm was being pulled out of its socket. He struggled to hold on, but a moment later the knife was torn out of his grasp.

*Shit!*

A moment later, a piece of scaffolding crashed into him from behind, knocking him to the ground. He tumbled head over heels and came to a stop with his back against the dirt.

Levi pumped her fist. "Perfect!" She turned the dial back down to its original strength, hopped down from the crane car, and began walking over to the downed Zachary, every bit of her demeanor *radiating* smugness. "Y'know, we've never really liked knives. They always felt like they'd just... slip right out of our hand. 'S why we went for claws instead. Because now, poor little you doesn't have a weapon, and *I* have several."

She came to a stop next to her prone opponent and planted a foot on his stomach, leaning on it with one elbow and resting a cheek on that hand. "So, what d'you say? Care to surrender, or do you wanna drag this out? 'Cause I'm happy either way."

CW: You know that Wildbow thing for violence? Yeah, the following few posts take a quick dip into that

He reached out with his arm, trying to find something, anything. Knife, sword, staff. Nothing.

*Oh God oh fuck oh fuck.*

She laughed, and for a moment, it wasn't Seafoam standing over him, but another figure.

With an inarticulate cry of rage, Zachary brought his leg up between hers and kicked. It was weak, at the wrong angle for any real damage, but the motion was enough for him to call down a flash of lightning to blind her.

He rolled out from her foot, and then crashed into her from the side, throwing her into a sharp piece of wall. A few seconds later, and a boom reverberated around the arena. Tripling the damage done in between the lightning and the thunder. Scarlet bloomed across the wall.

She said something. He didn't pay attention. Had to keep going. If he didn't finish this he was screwed.

He drew his foot across the ground in a line, and fire sprung with this. The beginning of a binding.

Had to keep going. Had to finish this.

Condor looked at Justin, suddenly alarmed. "Um - that's a bit much - should we-"

Justin frowns, leaning in. "What is he... is that going to work?" He stands, watching intently and ready to dive in, but not going yet.

From within Zachary's in-progress circle, a pained, reedy voice gasps, "Y... Yield!\*" It pauses to take a couple of panting breaths. "Zachary, please, I yield!\*"

He finished the circle with a quick sweep. Then, slowly, never taking his eyes off of her, he bent down and picked up a sharp fragment of a pole.

A sharp intake of breath from Condor. They dashed around to the back of the pinball machine, stumbling in their haste, and threw a bright red switch. The pinball machine's lights flickered out, and both Levi and Zachary were suddenly back in the room.

Instantly, Levi, who was lying prone on the floor, sucked in a deep gasping breath, followed by several more as it scrabbled backwards against the wall and patted itself down, making sure it was uninjured. "Fuck, fuck, fuck, Jesus, fuck, shit, fuck, fuck..."

It looked up at Zachary, the remnants of mortal fear mixing with the beginnings of storm-cloud anger. "...Zachary," it panted. "What the fuck *was* that?"

The world glitched out -- and then they were back in the basement.

Zachary blinked, taking stock of his new surroundings. A moment later, and --

He's safe now. It wasn't real. It was a duel.

He looks between everybody in the basement, realization crashing onto him. "Oh God. Oh *God."*

Justin looks concerned as they both appear, his head immediately turning to Levi. "Are you all right? And Zachary, what about you? What *was* that?"

"I -- I am so sorry. That -- are you okay?"

The words sound hollow, even to him.

Levi's eyes flashed with anger, and she got unsteadily to her feet. "Are we *okay?* Motherfucker, do we LOOK okay?! You nearly killed us! You scared us out of our fucking minds! There was a second there when we came back and it still hurt, and we were terrified, like 'This is it, guess we're fucked!' And because, what, you couldn't handle some godsdamned taunting, you limp-dicked, thin-skinned shitstain?"

Her hands flexed and gnarled, claws still extended, and it was clear she was holding back from leaping at him. "We want you to tell us what in the *hell* was going through your head, Zachary Wong. And you better have a *damn* good reason."

"I," he started. He sat down and found that he was still breathing hard. Reached out for his fire sword and felt the connection, there to be summoned if needed. That... was good. The arena must have repressed it.

He looked off into the walls, away from Seafoam. "Thought you were someone else."

Octane held their hands out in a placating gesture, although with their hands shaking a little it came off more as pleading. "Now- friends. Friends. We're not in the Arena anymore. No breaking hospitality." They swallowed hard. "Please."

Levi glared mutinously at Condor, but complied, taking a deep breath and retracting its claws with a clear effort of will. "...Yeah. You're right."

It sat back down against the wall, turning its glare back to Zachary. "But we still want those answers. You owe us that much, I'd think."

The elevator dings as the owner of Sanctuary comes back into the room. Unlike before there is no levity in her motions, whether she's Christine or Lady right now. Something in her face tells you it's both.

She sits down on the ground next to both Levi and Zach, exactly in the middle.

When she does speak, her voice is soothing but serious: "Take your time Zach, and know that you're not the only human being who has ever made a mistake. But I do believe you owe Levi and explanation, like it asked for. Take a couple breaths and slow down before you talk - remember how open you were with me the other night?"

The presence of *yet another* person makes him close up upon himself. "I -- there --"

He's not sure what to say. Hell, he's not even entirely sure what happened. The events of it blur together in his mind.

Condor looks at Levi, at Zachary... they feel like they're three seconds from a heart attack and two seconds from falling asleep, but... they remember their interaction with Lane, a few days ago, and how good it felt at the end. "Hey, um, Levi. You, uh, lost a lot of Self, it looks like. Do you... um. Want some trail mix?" They're not really sure they're making sense, even to themself. Mostly they're just trying to get Levi to stop *glaring* at Zachary, as much as Condor also wants to glare at Zachary.

"That's a good idea Condor - would you mind grabbing some from the kitchen and maybe taking Justin with you for a bit?" Lady raises an eyebrow at him that is a signal there's a bit more going on than what she's saying.

Levi takes a shaky breath, then lets it out. "Yeah, that... That sounds good. Thanks." It sounds like it's gone from being pissed to trying not to cry.

Lady looks at Levi and lets it know that she's acknowledging its presence too, and not just Zachary's. She doesn't say anything, though.

"Yeah, I can... go get a pot of tea, and Condor can get the trail mix," Justin says, looking at Condor as he says it before heading over to the elevators and getting on.

Condor takes a second longer to process, then hurries after Justin, casting a worried glance back at the people in the room.

For what it's worth, Lady gives Condor and Justin a firm but real smile. The message is clear *this isn't good, it's not gonna be easy, but you did your part and it's okay for you to leave right now*

Zachary let out a breath.

"Last time I was disarmed..." He stopped. "Last time I was fully disarmed like that, nothing to use, it didn't, it didn't go well."

Levi looked at him, but said nothing. She wasn't glaring, anymore, just... looking.

Lady just looks nonjudgemental as well. Giving space for Zachary to talk.

"There was a Hangmaiden," he said. He felt for his belt, and found only leather, and an empty sheath. Then he reached out again for his fire sword -- but no, that would hardly make things better.

"Different situation. I don't know how I thought..."

"A... Hangmaiden?"

"Go with your gut, Zachary. If you're thinking of the Hangmaiden, start there."

"She... that was a thing. You probably know all about it from Jess's post -- fuck, no, Jess doesn't know what happened, right. Wasn't one of my better misdirections, but I just wasn't sure what to tell her..."

"Jess isn't here right now. Please, if you can, focus on Levi and what she's been asking you about. Take a breath, it can be okay."

Levi does its best to look nonthreatening.

Zachary keeps staring ahead at the wall. "What do you even want to know?"

Levi's silent for a moment. Then, in a voice that's not quite a whisper, "...Did she attack you?"

"That, yeah, yeah she did. You could say that."

More silence for a time. "...We're sorry that happened to you. It... We know how it is, kinda." Levi's hand moves to her scarred shoulder, and rests there.

"We, uh. Some of us are sorry for... for shouting at you earlier. I don't know that I can find it in me to be sorry, right now. But I'm not mad anymore. Not... in a way that feels reasonable, anyway."

"No, it. It wasn't the same situation. I shouldn't have done that." He snorts bitterly. "I guess -- does this make me a domestic abuser twice over?"

"...If she attacked you first, I think that makes you a domestic abuse victim."

Zachary shrugs. "Not supposed to hurt women, you know?"

"Real quick, if you don't mind me interjecting."

"Zachary has indicated some of his beliefs have come from how he was raised. He seems to have absorbed a lot of opinions many of us may find...dated," Lady used the word gently, but Seafoam could likely guess what word she might replace it with, "Compared to those of us who didn't grow up in the same environment. Not to excuse his behavior, mind you, but to hopefully add clarity to this conversation."

"Dated? It's not -- I mean, yes, I believe in the things my parents raised me to value, but *what?*"

Lady explains, "I don't want to get derailed, but there's sometimes where I think you hurt your opportunities with relating to other people with some of the things you repeat that you may find you believe or you may not actually."

Lady waves her hand in the general vicinity, "Take this whole fight, for example. Do you remember why it is you got into it? What you said on Oh Em Oh?"

Lady shot a look at Seafoam, acknowleding it and making clear that she knew that it was still in the room and that it would get its turn.

"I...I mean I guess. Aren't you supposed to challenge people to keep your karma or whatever though?"

This was, at least, less uncomfortable ground. He could even turn this into an argument somehow, if he wanted. He stood up from the chair and started pacing.

"You know I have little to no desire to argue with you. So I'll just simply say - from my viewpoint, this whole fight started with a belief that women are less capable than men. While this has been the viewpoint of the entire world in many cultures - especially in the West - for a while now, for many this has been proven false and seen as a grave insult."

"I do not wish to litigate this information, please take it simply as me trying to explain the situation you find yourself in."

Zachary throws up his hands. "Ugh, fine! Thought I was dating someone and then went to where she lived and I had to kill her with my bare hands, is that what you want to hear?! Do you want me to describe it in detail? Give you a blow by blow of everything that happened? Maybe tell you what exactly it felt like to have my hands around her neck, and the exact shade of purple her face turned? I remember it well enough. It was kill or be killed, and I tried everything else that I could!"

"I don't want to hear it, Zachary - but I care about you and your well being - as I care about Levi and I believe in my heart you needed to say it to someone. Ideally someone you could trust, but even if you don't feel that way about us...I for one am glad you said it. I don't judge you for what happened and I think many Practitioners would have done the same in your place and I wouldn't judge them, either."

"I really care about you and your emotions, but I don't want to just focus on you tonight. It doesn't seem fair. If you need it Zachary, I will make more time for you later. Levi, do you have anything you'd like to talk about or share?"

"I can leave, if that makes it easier," Zachary says. "Actually -- maybe I should, maybe that would make it better."

"I actually think it would make things worse - but you may go if you need to. Please consider staying though - I think the only way things get better in the long run for you is if you see other people have their own issues, too and that they're rich in humanity as well."

After Lady responded to Zach, she set her attention back to Levi. Letting her know she had Lady's full attention.

"Yeah, no, it- it's all right. I... Christ. That... is really fucked up. We're sorry that happened to you, Zachary."

Levi's quiet for another moment. She'd drawn her knees up to her chest at some point while Zachary and Lady Lim were talking, and isn't looking at either of them. "Something like that... happened to us, too. A few years ago. So. We sort of get what happened. How it feels when something... reminds you of it so viscerally."

Zachary grimaced. "I still shouldn't have... um. Attacked you."

Levi laughed, at that, a quiet thing that was closer to a series of breaths. "Aheh. Yeah, that. That's definitely true, still. Um. ...Yeah. Trying not to, like. Deflect any. I don't... have to do that anymore."

Levi looked like it didn't mean that last part to be said out loud, but also like it didn't much care, at this point.

"I'm sorry about the thing that happened to you," Zachary said. "And, um. Did I remind you of that?"

"I... we don't think so? Hard to tell. Lots of stuff going on."

She was quiet for a minute or two, then began to speak. "It was our ex-parents. They're Heartless. Body-snatchers. Wanted us to scout out a potential target, like a job interview. We... we'd done it before, and never really thought much about it. Just... how we grew up, y'know? But this time... We'd been thinking independently, more and more. And kinda realized how fucked up it was. So we told the guy to run. And he did. Hope he's okay."

She took a deep, shuddering breath, then continued. "They found out, of course. Got... *really* pissed. Decided to- to take one of our hands. As punishment. A-and we argued, fought back, but it didn't work, and they took the whole arm instead."

She swallowed hard. "They put it back, after a couple days. But it hurt. Both times. Really, really, *really* bad. That... I think that did remind us of that, talking about it. It... felt like that again."

Lady nods just listening and letting Levi and Zachary speak.

"Jesus Christ\_ that's messed up."

That comment broke the tension some, and Levi gave a teary giggle, for perhaps a bit longer than that comment warranted. "You're telling us."

"That's just... God, some Practitioners are just so fucked up," Zachary said, shaking his head.

"Yeah. Glad we ditched 'em. They're... farther away, now. Physically and emotionally. ...Doesn't mean it doesn't still hurt, though."

"If it's alright with you both, how about we take this back to my office? There's comfy couches and lots of tea - and if you both like, we can see where Condor and Justin are with the snacks and invite them, too."

"Yeah, that sounds nice." Levi sounded better already, for having gotten that off its chest. "Lot more comfortable than the floor." It stood, wincing, and rolled its shoulders.

Zachary reached for his belt. "Yeah, I want to talk to Condor and Justin too. That machine ate my knife and never gave it back."

With that, the three of them left for Lady's office.

"Oh yeah, heh. Whoops."

"We'll try to get it sorted." Lady offers. She lets the two younger Practitioners take the lead, staying behind with the pinball machine. For a moment, she puts her hand on it and offers it just a little bit of her Self - not enough to power the machine, but as an offering.

She whispers, "I know you've been here too and I don't know if that was traumatic for you either, but after I see to these two I'll make some time to listen to you, if you want, also. Thank you for making tonight's healing possible, Cosmic Bob."

And with that, she joins the others to the elevator.