shatterverse | (no subject)

"Hey, Sonia" Dinah says, giving her a friendly grin. "How're you?"

"Pretty good!" Almost chirping. Yeah. "Guess whatever was goin' on with me, I got over it. Maybe I'll get back to bein' my old size, too...

"Anyway, what's on for today?"

"Anything you want," Dinah admits. It's really good to see Sonia in a better mood.

"It depends who shows up."

Having a choice in training situations is somewhat novel. Despite having had to train on her own for a little while.

"I was wonderin'... if maybe I could get some practice with... y'know, not hittin' too hard. Sort of." Since it looks like she will be stuck around people that will easily go squish!

"Pulling your punches?"

Dinah nods. "We can go with that, definitely."

"Oh, good." Because she actually WANTS TO NOT BE KICKED OUT HERE. And, y'know, help other people who aren't Slayers train.

Dinah draws one foot back, raising her hands.

"Of course, If you break more than four of my ribs we're calling it off and I get to use you as a punching bag next time."

Eep.

"Y- yeah, sure." Of course, Sonia has the advantage of 1) self-healing powers and 2) an ability to become invincible, but fair's fair.

She adjusts her stance carefully and breathes. This is somewhat more nerve-wracking than fighting monsters. She's not worried about killing monsters so much as not killing them adequately.

Anyway.

...

Anyway.

Um.

Yes.

Okayfineshe'lljustruninandhopeforthebest!

Dinah's deliberately standing still to take the the hit, but she does roll with it once it arrives, flipping backwards and ending in a crouch.

"OK, that might have knocked me out if I wasn't used to taking hits. I want you to try and not knock me down."

"s- sorry!"

The next hit is... awkward. What started as a kick veers suddenly and turns into a very off-balance tackle. If a tackle involves hitting someone with one's rear end.

"Sorry!" fjdkfl!

"Grandfather always taught me t'put everythin' behind a hit, so..."

Dinah covers her mouth with her hand, and nods as she stands up again.

"But you want to learn to apprehend normal people? Lots of my friends had to pull punches on a regular basis.

"Here, just do it feather light. Here, on my hand."

"I... just want t'not hurt folks."

Feather light... She does a fairly slow punch, tapping the knuckles against Dinah's palm.

"You know other folks... like me? Strong?"

"There are a few here," Dinah says, "Mel, for one. But I've known people stronger. A man I used to work with could punch a building into orbit."

"Where's that?" Still, even with ignorance of scientific terminology, punching a building anywhere is an impressive feat. Not even werewolves or vampires can do that. At least, that she's heard.

"Sounds like one scary guy!"

Dinah just points up. Straight up.

"Space," she says. "And Superman? No, he's a pussycat, really. It's the guys that don't have powers you have to watch for. They'll find your weak spot."

WOW. Sonia is definitely impressed.

"Sure wish we had someone like him back in Warakiya. Bet you he'd be able t'take care of Dracula easy." Like by PUNCHING THE WHOLE CASTLE INTO THE HEAVENS.

"Yeah... and there's more of 'em."

"Probably," Dinah agrees. "You'd still be surprised at the volume of work the rest of us need to do, though.

"Your technique is good. Step up, a little harder. I want you to get a feel of what a normal punch feels like."

"Harder?" eep. Um... OK, so, something between this and "Sonia's normal punch." That's a wide range.

She errs on the safe side, just scaling it to "slightly faster, though with a kind of jerky awkwardness."

"There's a lot of y'all?"

"Lots," Dinah agrees, smiling at the punch. "Your technique is suffering. Keep it like that until you're moving smoothly.

"My Mom was a member of a group called the Justice Society of America. I grew up with about half a dozen uncles who all fought the bad guys as a calling."

"I just... don't wanna really hurt you. I MEAN not that like I don't think-"

Well, especially not now, what with the badguy-fighting uncles. Surely she'd have picked something up from that.

She slows it down for a few practice punches before trying it again. It's less jerky, at least, though somewhere in the range of what one of Mel's kids might manage as far as power goes.

"Man, that sounds great... it was just me an' Papa an' Grandfather, back home..."

"I know," Dinah says. "Just keep it this lightly, and we'll go up slowly. But technique's always more important than how hard you hit."

She learned that from the uncles.

"That's good though - family. Where you all strong?"

"Technique. Right." Grandfather termed it things like "not screwing up," but the gist seems to be the same.

"I- I'm- was- the strongest. I could do things they couldn't. 'swhy folks don't like me much. Back home." And why she's doing this!

"That happened in our world, too," Dinah says, shifting her weight and keeping her hands up, smiling encouragement at a few good punches.

"Do you know the source of it?"

Of course! "God."

Oh hey, smiling! That's certainly encouraging. She turns it up a couple of notches, still slow but smoother and a bit more powerful.

"My folks an' the priests, they all said I was given what I got so I could do somethin' great for everyone. I almost got there, too. Then..."

"Keep it at this level for a bit." It's still too gentle, but Dinah wants her to work up slowly.

"God's the course of everything, of course. And He probably decided you had something more important to do over here."

Dinah is, at best, agnostic, but she has an idea.