2120/There IS a point

There IS a point
Date of Scene:	29 November 2024
Location:	Sports Pavilion
Synopsis:	Hinoiri asks Ryoko for another favor... teach her how to fence. What follows is a surprisingly kind, gentle and fun match betwen the two. They even have, dare I say it... a good time. If one filled with a lot of sweat.
Cast of Characters:	Hinoiri Kirara, Ryoko Gushiken

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Hinoiri Kirara has posed:
Hinoiri Kirara was standing outside the fencing club, waiting. Her arms crossed, glancing down the hall. She'd, well...

The reason she was here was manyfold. The primary reason? Adrien. He'd been one of her first friends when she came here and... they... had... a relationship. That was what it could be called. A relationship. She'd seen him as her lackey. She suspected he was coming to see her as a pain in the flank. She'd realized, though, that she didn't really... know much about him. At all. Naru was easy. Coffee. Boom. Done. Well, and some magical lessons from her home.

Adrien, on the other hand? She knew he fenced. It started and ended there. So she thought maybe she'd try the club, but well...

She'd never fenced before. And she felt awkward about the whole thing. She couldn't just ask him 'Hey, Adrien, teach me how to fence?'

That'd be ridiculous and basically be making him do work for the relationship she was trying to work on. No. Instead, she was waiting for Ryoko. The girl had proved to be trustworthy. Had kept her word and helped her reduce the damage the towers did. So she'd ended up sending her a message.

'Hey, I need a favor. Meet me by the sports pavilion, outside the fencing club room.'

There wasn't any practice today so she was, hopeful, that the other girl would give into her request and teach her.

Ryoko Gushiken has posed:
Ryoko Gushiken did not have very many friends. Between her very busy schedule and her being an ice queen to most everyone, it was just so difficult for her to make connections. And yet, since arriving at Radiant Heart, she had managed to not only find herself in an awkward situationship with Glimmer, an intense relationship with Sarah, and it seemed a budding friendship with Hinoiri. It was weird. She could hardly believe it.

But there was Hinoiri's text, asking her for a favor. If it was anyone else, she might suspect it was a ploy. After all, asking someone to do something for you is such a great way to earn someone's trust. But she knew that the fire-haired girl had next to no guile, and so she was pretty sure this was a genuine request. The kinds friends make. She did not know what to do with it. She texted back.

'The fencing club? Do I need to bring Sarah to protect you?'

She did not bring Sarah, but she did show up dressed in her form-fitting black athletic gear with her big leather fencing bag slung over her shoulder. She walked right up to and past Hinoiri, waving to her as she stepped to pull open the door and gestures for Hinoiri to go in first. "So what is it you want?"

Hinoiri Kirara has posed:
Hinoiri Kirara sighed and looked over at Ryoko. A part of her had, admittedly... hoped that Ryoko would have laughed at the request to meet with her. Blown her off. Told her to take a hike.

Instead, she'd shown up. Instead she'd made the EFFORT. Ugh. And now? Hinoiri felt... like an idiot. Showing weakness like this? It was dumb. The old her would never have done it.

Which was why she had to do it now. "I... want to ask you... well... you fence, right?" she asked. Then glanced towards the fencing bag... and the fact the other girl was already going into the clubroom. She, nervously, walked through the door, arms wrapped around herself. "I want you to teach me. I have another friend who fences and... for obvious reasons they've been kind of peeved at me for some of the crud I've pulled. So I'm trying to understand the things they enjoy and I don't know why I'm telling you all of this, sorry, I guess... TMI, thy name is Hinoiri, right? Eh..."

".... So yeah, I understand if you'd rather not. I've never even held one of the... things... you use. Even as a unicorn, let alone as a human. So ummmm... telling me to get lost is fine."

Ryoko Gushiken has posed:
Ryoko Gushiken stepped in after Hinoiri and walked over toward the piste in the center of the room, lowering her bag to the floor. "I honestly don't care why you want to learn fencing, Hinoiri-chan," she said with an almost sinister amusement in her voice, as she turned around. She smiled. "I'm just pleased that you do. It sounds like you care about this friend. Are they a student here?"

She leaves the bag there and approaches Hinoiri, reaching out to try and hook her hand around the other girl's upper arm, to lead her over to where the spare uniforms were. "Before we put a sword in your hands, though, let's get you into some safety gear." She pulled open a cabinet and started rifling through looking for longs-sleeved bodysuit and some trousers. All made out of a heavy woven fabric. Holding up one of each both bright white, she says with certainty, "These ought to be your size." She holds them out. "Just slip them on over your clothes."

Once Hinoiri takes them, she reaches up to grab a white fencing helmet and walks back over toward the piste. Her gear is in the bag. "I've got your head protection. Come join me when you're ready." She sets the helmet down by her bag and then pulls out her own uniform and starts putting it on. Hers is all black.

Hinoiri Kirara has posed:
Hinoiri Kirara gave a small nod. "And... yeah. I guess? I mean, he's cool? Just... I was kind of a jerk to him when I came here. Only saw him as a lackey, you know? And so I kind of... want to make it up to him. Well, and his girlfriend. I was kind of a jerk to both of them. Seriously, though, I'm surprised they took so long to get together. I could see they had chemistry. Humans are weird." Pause. "No offense."

She let out a yelp when she was grabbed and dragged off. Safety gear? Oh. Right. Not getting an eye stabbed out. That sounds... smart. She nodded along, staring at the comments. Eh. White, not normally her style but... you know what? Why not? She got dressed, bit by bit, until all she needed was the helmet. She then started towards her and... Okay. Yeah. The black one definitely looked nicer. Or maybe it was because it was Ryoko's personal, and fitted for her. "So, how does this work? The idea is basically to just stab each other, right? Are any points off limits? Locations of the blade that aren't permitted? I assume only the tip is needed?" Oh, she really did intend to go into this blind...

Ryoko Gushiken has posed:
Once she's donned her own safety gear, except for her helmet, Ryoko crouches down to completely open up her fencing bag. It unfurls into a small armory of sabres, foils, and epees. "It all depends on which weapon we're fighting with," she says, gesturing to all the swords. "The foil and the epee are both thrusting weapons, whereas the sabre is also for cutting. We'll start out with the foil, though. You're new, and they're the lightest. You'll thank me later."

She grabs the two foils out of her roll with one hand, and grabs both helmets off the floor. Hers is held against her hip while the other is held out to Hinoiri along with one of the foils. "And you don't just stab at each other. There are rules. It is a sport, after all. For foils, the only valid targets are on the torso. Basically, anywhere on that top, except for the arms."

Once Hinoiri has her gear, Ryoko slips her helmet on and walks over onto the piste. She gestures with the tip of her foil to the same spot marked across the centerline from her. "You stand over there, and I want you to practice these motions." She proceeds to show Hinoiri the basic thrust and parry with the foil.

Hinoiri Kirara has posed:
Hinoiri Kirara gave a small nod, mentally locking all of that in. Foil, epee thrust, sabre is cutting. Good. She took the helmet, having to adjust her hair so it didn't get in her face and/or mouth and/or blind her. "Okay, so start with the light weapon," she mumbled, taking the foil. "Only hitting the torso? That doesn't sound so hard."

She'd then walk opposite Ryoko, slowly adapting her stance. Well, one good thing about repeatedly getting her flank kicked and tossed around like a bullied teenager by Fuyuko? She was at least good at following instructions. Adopting the stand as shown, practicing the basic thrust and parry.

And it likely wouldn't be long before Ryoko realized something that was actually POSITIVE about Hinoiri. Namely, when she practiced? She actually followed instructions. She didn't get over excited, try to go past what she was taught. She focused on the basics, as displayed, and then practiced them bit by bit, trying to get them perfect. She was a pretty good student in the end.

Ryoko Gushiken has posed:
"If you think about it, the torso is where you want to be poking with a weapon like this," Ryoko says. Her broad grin is almost audible, which is good because it is almost completely obscured by the black mesh of her helmet. "Lots of juicy organs for the foil to poke right through."

She makes several rapid thrusts right at chest level and then brings her sword back to rest against her shoulder as she holds onto it and starts to walk in a broad circle around Hinoiri, watching her and nodding. "Good form," she says as she completes that first circuit. "You were clearly paying attention. But now let's see how you do with some action."

Returning to her spot on the piste she brings her sword up in front of her pointed out directly at Hinoiri, then she tips it up right in front of her black mesh face-guard, then brings the tip of it back down the the floor. "That's a salute," she says. "You do it too."

Once she does, Ryoko brings the blade up and her free hand back behind her arced up in the classic fencing pose, and she says, "Now you do this too. En garde!"

She does not give Hinoiri much time before she's lunging with her first attack, right at her forward shoulder.

Hinoiri Kirara has posed:
Hinoiri Kirara gave a small nod, trying not to think too hard about why you'd want to make sure to stab them in the torso. Yup, lots of organs. That made sense. It did not mean she liked the idea of it. A lot of blood. A lot of violence. Hurting people just... really was not something she liked thinking about, let alone actually doing. But she tried not to think about that. Instead, focusing on the actions themselves.

The praise made her stand up just a little straighter, something she obviously enjoyed. And the salute, well... she pulled that off well enough. Blade out, then blade up, finally... blade towards the ground. "Like so?" she asked. Then adopted the stance she was shown. Arm behind back, keep it out of the way. Even if the torso is the only target, in some cases the arm is a valid hit. "If the arm if over the chest and hit, does it block the hit, or is it counted as still hitting the torso?" she asked.

And then, after that question, they were off!

And Ryoko would see that while Hinoiri was good at following instructions and did have good reactions... all of this WAS really new to her. The first time she was hit? It was easy. Second? Easy. Third? Hinoiri managed to hit her torso... about a second or two too late. Shoulder, stomach, shoulder, picking Hinoiri apart wasn't too hard. Until the fourth, where she parried, but still lost... And then, finally, in the sixth round? She did manage to get a quick, sudden strike in. Right on the collarbone, just to the left of the shoulder.

Hinoiri was already sweating and lightly panting, but it was a good one. She certainly felt like she was learning something.

Ryoko Gushiken has posed:
"The arm is not a valid target for foil," Ryoko reiterates as they start to move back and forth along the piste. "And if you think about it, you want to provide your opponent the most narrow target possible, so why would your free arm be anywhere near your chest?" She demonstrates by bringing her rear hand forward as she steps back between exchanges. "If my arm is in front of my torso, my shoulders are turned toward you and providing you a bigger target."

After their sixth exchange, Ryoko walks over to her bag and gently drops her foil down onto the cushioned interior where it normally goes. She doff's her helmet and sets it down next to her, pulling a big reusable water bottle out of her bag which she walks over and extends to Hinoiri. "Here. Have some water, catch your breath. You're doing pretty good for a complete beginner."

Hinoiri Kirara has posed:
Hinoiri Kirara gave a small nod. "I see. So... you keep it back, behind you, to make it harder for them to reach the shoulder. They'd be unlikely to hit the torso otherwise..." she mumbled, re-iterating what she learned. An attempt to memorize it, it seemed.

And then a small break! When she took off her helmet and put it on one of the chairs, a little bit of sweat rained down around her. Whew. When she was offered the water, she stared at it for a few moments. And Ryoko could see that moment of waryness, the hesitation. But then she did take it and drink from it. She was suspicious... but there came a point when you just needed to trust other people, and well, she was lucky to have so many people give her faith. The least she could do was offer the same in kind.

"Thanks. I'm lucky in some ways, I don't have to unlearn a bunch of bad behaviors, since it's all pretty new to me. That and well... I was pretty active back home. I really liked to get my hands deep in the magic and sometimes that meant running out of the cave before the dragon wakes up and realizes you stole one of his scales," she said with a small grin.

"Still, you're really fast. It's like watching a bolt of lightning sometimes. I'm not even always sure what happened until I feel the little poke on the uniform."

Ryoko Gushiken has posed:
Ryoko Gushiken did not seem to have broken much of a sweat herself, and she did not seem to be concerning herself overly much with the water either. The water she'd most likely brought for herself. She just smirked. "I have been practicing for a long time," she said. That much was true. It's just that not all of her swordplay was officially sanctioned fencing. "Can't help but get good."

She reaches up above her head, grasping her hands together to stretch, and then rests them both behind her head, fingers laced as she just looks at Hinoiri. "I like it because it's less chaotic than a real swordfight. Lets you focus on the particular technique better." She says it as if that's a perfectly normal thing for a teenaged girl to be saying.

Hinoiri Kirara has posed:
Hinoiri Kirara was lucky, in that case. She'd need to start bringing her own water bottle so she didn't end up stealing all of Ryoko's. As it was? She'd already drunk about a third of it. And, sheepishly, held it out to her.

"Thanks. And... yeah. I'll admit, that is pretty nice. When I learned hand-to-hand with Lacuna, it was pretty nice just having one girl trying to kill me. Knowing the blow can only come from one direction really helps you get the precision you need for when you have to deal with four or five of them coming at you at once."

She glanced to the helmet. "Think you'd be able to go a bit more? And... think you'd be interested in meeting up a few times a week to practice? If it doesn't interfere with your actual club, of course. I know I'm asking a lot already as it is."

Ryoko Gushiken has posed:
Ryoko Gushiken unfurls her arms and takes the bottle from Hinoiri, bringing it up to her mouth for a long drink. Some people might say that was an indirect kiss. Ryoko was just thirsty. After she drained her third of the bottle, she squatted down to drop it in her bag and grab her helmet and foil. "Sure," she says. "Let's see if you can score any more points."

Dropping the helmet back on her head, she returned to the piste. When Hinoiri was in place she made her salute and then went en garde. "You could just join the club, unless you're trying to keep it secret that you're learning how to fence," she said. But then with a shrug she acceded, "I could probably meet once or twice a week for a little while. I do also have a job, though."

Lifting her foil up to gesture with the tip, moving it up and back toward her a couple times rapidly, as if to say, 'come at me'.

Hinoiri Kirara has posed:
Hinoiri Kirara gave a small smile as she adjusted her hair, then slid her own helmet on. Moving opposite Ryoko, she once again did her salute, then positioned herself into the en garde stance. "I might, but it's a little late in the school term to start joining a new club and I'd like to avoid seeming like a total rookie if I'm trying to bond with my friend, you know?"

"Besides... I'll be honest? I've been known to get a little... intense. Most people just really tend to not take things like this seriously. I'd like to be good enough that I'm not forced to hang with the kids who aren't even trying. I'd much rather get ground into the dirt and learn a ton than be someone's pity sack who they coddle and 'protect'. That's just annoying."

She had a long way to go, but she was learning. Parry. Parry. Strike, miss, get stabbed.

Parry, parry, lunge, point... if she'd been a bit quicker.

Parry, guard too open.

Parry, parry, lunge, dodge, strike, miss, get poked.

Parry, parry, parry, dodge back, lunge, strike, miss, parry the counter, strike, HIT!

Sure, she had a long way to go... but at least she was taking it seriously.

"But I do understand. I know how demanding Obsidian can be, so don't be afraid to tell me no if something comes up. but, while you're willing, you're a pretty good teacher. I've never much enjoyed being the big fish in the little pond, a good rival can push you ever further."

Ryoko Gushiken has posed:
Back and forth. Give and take. Sure, Ryoko was taking a lot more than she was giving, at least in terms of points, but in the end it was just a couple of friends having an educational workout. Ryoko barely even broke a sweat.

"Hokori-sama was very demanding even before we joined Obsidian," Ryoko said with a shrug. "It's really all I've ever known. Before it was her it was my stepmother. You get used to it. At least here I get the satisfaction of seeing peons scurry away when I walk down the halls at the office." There was that mean girl that everyone else saw.

As they got out of their gear and Ryoko packed up her equipment, she said, "I don't really have a rival here. Not yet. The Kendo club is unsurprisingly more popular. Though that Agreste kid is pretty decent. We're due for a rematch one of these days where he's not fighting me handicapped."

Once they were all packed up and ready to go, Ryoko hoisted her bag over her shoulder and gave Hinoiri a pat on the back. "If we're going to make a habit of this, we'll need to pick a time. How early do you usually get up?" The time she suggested? It was earlier than that.

Hinoiri Kirara has posed:
Hinoiri Kirara gave a light snort and nodded. "Yeah, I know how that is. Always having someone demanding from you," she said. "And yeah. I'll admit, I do kind of miss that a bit. People running because they're worried about getting in your way and they know that if you wanted, you'd destroy them with a snap of your hoof. Fingers," Hinoiri corrected quickly.

She did quirk an eye at the comment about Adrien. He'd fought her with a handicap? Interesting. He must be good... she'd definitely need to get better, lest she make an utter ass of herself. What was the point of training to play with a friend if she looked like an idiot when she did it?

As for the time... well... Hinoiri was an early bird, it seemed. Up at the crack of dawn... it came from having a mentor who raised the sun. But a bit before that? She could do it. She might not like it... but she'd do it. Besides... Ryoko didn't have a rival yet.

Hinoiri would need to change that. After all, she HATED to lose...