BFQ P&M Fighfic 2

	“God Dammit!”

	My shout fills the Lotus Sanctum, echoing once before being swallowed by the silence of the place. I look around sheepishly, but thankfully it's late and there are few people I can really disturb. Still, I can practically feel Sanjay's exasperated sigh 50 yards off as he attempts meditation near Carl's usual perch.

	“Relax and walk me through what happened, breathe.” the voice comes from a few feet behind me, belonging to Pavana. She asks the question without condescension, just a matter of fact inquiry.

	I turn, sullenly gripping my arm and rotating my wrist, trying to shake the feeling back into my hand as soon as I'm certain I didn't break anything. Split knuckles, nothing major. I take a breath through gritted teeth before I speak.

	“The Bow Wave wouldn't form. I think I had my feet planted right, I'm certain I had enough torque, but instead of focusing the impact the spell just shattered on the bell and my fist slid through it.” I bring my hand to my lips, fuck this stings. “Just... god dammit Pavana, this isn't clicking.” She gives me a tolerant smirk, then starts rifling through her gym bag and reaches up to offer me a bandage as focus. I concentrate for a moment and it crumbles, my knuckles sealing up as it turns to ash. I give my fingers an experimental wiggle. “Getting pretty good at that at least.” I mutter ruefully.

	Pavana sits next to her bag and continues rummaging. “Well, you've got the accuracy and your kinesthetics are all correct, you're just screwing the pooch on the execution. What's making you hesitate?” I sigh and roll my shoulders.

	“I don't know, I guess it's just that I can't seem to find the right headspace. I'm punching a bell, not some schmuck trying to kill me, you know what I mean? I can't make it seem, I don't know... Real.”

	Pavana finally finds what she was looking for, pulling a ballpoint pen and a scrap of lined notebook paper free of a tangle of headphone cables. “I thought that might be the case.” she says seriously. She starts scribbling on the page as soon as she gets the ink flowing. “We go here when we need to go all out. They call it the Pit.” she says as she scrawls a note in the corner “Carl doesn't like full contact in the Sanctum, not like this anyway, but it still needs to get done. Sometimes differences need to be settled or fights had without restraint. Sometimes things just have to be private. It's sorta like back in the day when fighter pilots would agree on a time and an altitude. They weren't supposed to practice for dogfights, but they'd meet up anyway and work through the yo-yos and rolling scissors all the same. Carl almost certainly knows, but I think he understands too.” She finishes her sketch and hands it up to me. “I'm free tonight. If what you really need is practical application practice, I'll see you there. Bring some healing Foci, we're probably going to need it.”

---

	I do as she says. I leave home that evening, bag slung over my shoulder with a towel, a bottle of painkillers and a couple israeli bandages. There's a sucking chest wound seal in there to focus for punctured lungs, but I'm really hoping she doesn't need to demonstrate bell ringing by snapping my ribs.

	The meet is a small cavern beneath a cloistered courtyard midway between the Lotus Sanctum and home. You really do need the map to get here, and a bit of physical prowess to boot. I have to do some boulder hopping on my way down to the entrance, and look for a patch of slightly discolored slate to spot the switchbacked tunnel that leads to the cave proper. I round the final turn, the air warming as I go, and the Pit opens up in front of me.

	It's about 60 feet on a side, rough hewn stone that looks part natural, part man made. It's less of a pit, more a roughly circular bowl and a similar ceiling, forming a shallow dome about 15 feet above my head. At the bottom of the bowl is a simple platform, canvas stretched over wood supports, 30 feet square. All told, it'd be a pretty underwhelming space if it weren't for all the candles. Save for a path from where I stand to the edge of the mat, every inch of the floor is covered in candles of all sorts. Glass votives of catholic saints, long tapers like the ones in fancy restaurants, big fat ones rolled out of beeswax, thin strips of pine used for wicks. Magic has to be involved, there's just no way anyone could pack this room with so many damn candles and get them all lit. Maybe there's some kind of enchanted light switch?

	Pavana is sitting in the middle of the mat, cross legged, eyes closed, arms resting outwards with her elbows balanced on her knees. She's wearing a simple navy blue sports bra and a pair of track pants that look like they belong on some Latvian arms dealer. The flickering light in here diffuses warmly into her skin. She is taking slow, even breaths. Her firm bust rises on the inhale, diaphragm expanding, and here toned stomach ripples inwards on the exhale, her body pushing out the spent air completely. The girl knows how to breathe, I think. Most people go the other way around, cheat themselves of extra space on the inhale, leave space for dead air to hang around on the out. I shake my head, her trance is infectious it seems. I drop my bag next to hers at the edge of the mat and shed my hoody, dumping my gear belt and guns on top of the pile. Se opens her eyes and gives me a friendly smile. “Good, I was hoping you wouldn’t chicken out me.” There's good humor in her voice, the sort of familial joviality that gets carried so easily by her accent. She rises from her pose and starts stretching out her legs. I step onto the mat and follow suit. “Your job is simple. We're going to spar, you need to knock me off the mat. Any blow that could do so could ring the bell.”

	“Simple enough.” I say, swing my arms behind my back and straightening out my back. Pavana chuckles at that.

	“We'll see. I'm not going to hold back Max. If you fail, it will hurt. Now let's get to it.” Without much fanfare we square off and begin to circle. We match pace, working our way around in stable, fluid strides. I smother an adrenaline spike in its crib. There might be a use for that beast later, in the clinch or on the ground, but right now I need to be clear headed. Pavana has a couple inches of reach on me and I need to be careful on the approach.

	I start to advance, closing the distance cautiously. Watching, waiting, there. A twitch of her trailing shoulder, she's about to give me a hook at head height as I close. I lunge forward to clear the swing and she vanishes. In a blink she drops her stance, plants palms flat on the mat and scythes out with a leg. She catches me mid lunge, only one foot on the mat, and the impact my ankle turns my advance into a bad tumble. I roll out to find her circling again, arms slack at her side.

	Pavana drawls, “Oooh, sweep the leg Johnny. Come on Max, I know you aren't this bad. Give me your speed, let me see some ANGER!” She extends a hand and beckons as she strolls. “Again.”

	The beast is done listening to the voice of reason. Getting my ass knocked to the mat in the first three second exchange, to a feint no less, has got it good and riled. Bitter adrenaline floods me. I resume my pace for a moment more and then break into a charge. Her stance comes back instantly. She cocks back that same hook, but lets it fly this time. Too damn late, I'm already inside the arc of the swing. I plant my right foot and turn all my forward momentum into a tight spiraling knee, screaming right up into the ribs beneath her outstretched arm. I connect, but instead of the sickening crack of broken bones I'm greeted with the sensation that I've just slammed my knee into a sack of wet cement. She just rolls through the blow, letting my imparted momentum reverse her extension. As she comes back around her tattoos pulse. Green light spreads from where my knee struck, rippling across her body  before crashing back together at her elbow, which she promptly snaps down into the meat of my right shoulder.

	She may as well have dropped a refrigerator full of tractor parts on me. I slam ass first into the mat and bounce. She greets me on the way back up with a curt, inhumanly fast snap kick that I catch in the solar plexus. All of my air is blasted from my lungs in a ragged shout and I skid across the platform, crumpled and gasping. Pavana stands for a moment more, leg tucked under her, before resuming her lazy pace. “Sorry, couldn't resist putting that force loop to work. You've got the anger, now you need control.” Her hand beckons once more, “Again.”

	I stagger to my feet, and let my mind clear enough to pull some dirty tricks of my own. At the base of my spine a subtle tattoo, a ring of words unknown to any human tongue flares. I suddenly feel refreshed, wind returns to my lungs and my senses sharpen. I mutter semi-incoherently under my breath.

	“Really Max? It's been fun so far, but after a while I want more than just a soft style. One kick to the chest and your brain's scrambled? That wasn't even full speed.”

	I lock eyes with her, settle back into my stance and smile. “And that wasn't gibberish.”

	Her eyes widen, and she charges, sprinting to close the distance so quickly her feet stretch the canvas as she takes off. Not fast enough. Harsh white light limes my body, shining out from otherwise invisible script covering my chest and arms. It's a momentary many-fold increase in strength, endurance and perception. I hope it's enough. Time dilates, Pavana's run goes from too fast to track to a slow motion action movie sprint. The frenzy of blows, blocks and counters erupts. I'm actually keeping up now, hammering at any opening, putting her off balance. I just need a little more room and I should be able to unload a hit that will take her clear off the mat. Suddenly she snatches my right arm and clinches it against her body. She starts raining ballistic punches into my gut, aiming right under the ribs. If I let her keep going, I'm going to piss blood for a week. The Word induced fight time is wearing off, so I use the last of the amplification to launch my head forward. My brow connects with her jaw with sufficient force to jerk me free and I stagger out of the clinch. I look up just in time to avoid being killed.

	It's perfect. A simple straight arm punch executed with every ounce of force her body can impart behind it. As her hand comes forward, the air literally ripples from the compression. A Bow Wave builds up in front of the blow. The whole thing is so exquisite that I almost forget to move out of the way. I come off axis from the hit, dropping to my knees. The Bow Wave explodes outwards at the apex of the punch and blows out a five foot swath of candles from the edge of the mat to the back of the cavern. I get desperate, and at the worst possible moment I decide to try something stupid. I don't know Capoeira, but I've played Tekken. I figure what the hell, let's try to end this thing. I fling myself upwards, hurling my entire body into a spin pivoting on my right hand. I pump sorcery into the kick, and the Bow Wave starts to form along my shin.

	It's too little, too late. She steps back during the wind up, snatches my foot as it nearly takes off her face, and turns my kick into a hammer throw. I go completely airborne and soar across mat. I land hard, senses jumbled.

	I feel myself getting rolled into a triangle choke. I try to slip my arm but she's just so damn fast. Still, a burst of torque from my core gets my arm free of the lock, and I find myself with my chin pressed into her groin, her legs locked around my back. My eyes pop back open at last and she's over me, right arm cocked back for another one of those jackhammer punches, left scrabbling to pin my free hand. I know where this is going, I've slipped the lock and she's not about to let me start throwing hits at her kidneys from down here. I'm about to get hit in the face and throat until the gurgling stops. After all, that's what I'd do.

	I also feel the heat of her. Right there in front of my face, radiating out of her track pants. I act on instinct, desperate to buy myself time and delay the incoming head trauma. I lurch my head forward, clamp my mouth over her pubic bone, and give her a long, hard lick.

	Oh who the fuck am I kidding? I've been wanting to do this since I walked into the Lotus Sanctum three months ago, and this fight is giving me a hard on.

I can taste her, I can feel her. She's not wearing anything else under those pants. It's not just perspiration on my tongue either, she's wet. She finds my free arm, pins it to the mat and stares into my eyes with an expression I can't read very well. Her right fist is still poised, ready to piston into the top of my head in an instant.

	“Max...” She pants for a moment, then clinches her legs down tighter, squeezing my other arm out from behind my back and vicing my face into the crux of her thighs. The raised fist snaps down, turning into a claw that snatches up my other arm and holds it to the mat as well. The look in her eyes finally clicks. I realize why it took so long to read. I've never seen this expression, as I'm usually the one wearing it. It's the face I wear when I throw Liz' legs over her shoulders and play rough. It's the hungry eyes staring out of my own skull as a plant a hand on Lin's back and bury myself in her ass. It's the look of a predator, squarely in control of its prey. She pants a little more, her breath still ragged, and presses her hips forward firmly into my mouth.“Anger and arousal are isomorphic in the brain Max. Fighting and Fucking, it's all the same. Now if you learn one lesson from this ...you had better finish what you start.”

	I don't need much more encouragement than that. I minister to her lips with a will. It's a pain finding her clit through these pants, but judging by the look on her face I think I've zeroed in on it. I work the button relentlessly, using the stitching of her pants to give me a little more purchase. Pavana bites her bottom lip, letting out a little moan.

	“Alright, enough foreplay.” She releases my arms, loosens the grip of her legs and reverses her stance. She lowers her head to my groin and draws her hands up along my thighs. Then my cock pokes her in the chin. She halts for a moment, a puzzled expression on her face. She looks back over her shoulder. “Max... have you been playing with self-alchemy?”

	I respond with a pained smirk. I'm still sore from the beating that put me down here. “Nope.”

	Pavana ponders for a moment more, and then simply shrugs. She sits astride my chest, giving me a lovely view of her toned back, muscles shimmering with sweat in the candlelight. She reaches a hand back and pries off her sports bra. Her other hand takes a handful of my shorts and then tears them clean off of my body. She looks at me, amusement dancing behind the hunger in her eyes. “Oh, oh I think I need that inside me. Stay put.”

	She stands and kicks free of her pants without ceremony. She's like a statue. An artful vision of human physical perfection. The flickering shadows play over the curves of every perfectly tuned muscle group. Her skin is smooth, broken only by gooseflesh along her arms and legs. Her pert breasts are topped with neat brown nipples, hard with arousal.

	She mounts me once more, lowering her sex towards the head of my cock. She holds it there for a moment, the head just barely pressed against her lips, and rolls her hips, teasing. Her knees are on either side of me, I can't escape this even if I want to. She draws her fingernails across my taught stomach, hard enough to scratch even through my reinforced flesh. I wince, but I'd be lying if I said I didn't like it. The tiny part of my mind that isn't hopped up on fight drugs and hormones manages to steal control of my vocal chords despite the protests of my brain stem. “Pavana, wait. Why?”

	She just smiles at me. It's downright predatory. The part that spoke retreats into a chill down my spine. The rest of me, the suicidally hypersexual idiot part of my brain, sends a pulse up through my dick, making it twitch along her labia. “Because Max, everybody has an itch, and every nice girl secretly wants to switch.” she wraps one hand round my shoulder, hooking her thumb under my collar bone. The other locks around my throat. She doesn't squeeze, but the message is clear. “Now grab a fistful of my hair and hold on.”

	She slams herself down onto my cock. Her pussy swallows the whole shaft in one violent stroke. She hits my pelvis so hard it hurts. She lets out a shout of pleasure and then does it again, drawing herself up slowly and then plummeting back down again. It hurts, and it feels so damn good. I follow her request and yank her head back, grabbing a handful of her short cropped hair. I take hold of her left hip with my free hand, pushing my thumb into the soft spot right next to arch of her pelvis. She responds with another lusty exhale and starts to build a rhythm.

	She bucks her hips as she leans over me, alternating short, vertical strokes with slow, luxurious rolls. The slick walls of her pussy grip me as she does so, pulling at my cock as if unwilling to let it go. When I say every muscle group toned, I mean it. I push back, arching my back into her striving and  meeting her downward motion with equal force. This goes on for minutes, the grunts of our exertion echoing off the cavern walls.

	Pavana leans back, grinding circuits around my pelvis. Her hand relinquishes its grip on my shoulder and slips under my bra, she gives my nipple a squeeze and a twist. She mutters something under her breath, it sounds like pleading. “Hm?” I ask, thrusting myself to the hilt beneath her.

	She speaks more clearly this time, looking into my eyes with perfect sincerity, with need. “Hit me Max.”

	“What?”

	“I said HIT ME.”

	I do, a hard smack across her cheek bone. Hard enough to have dazed Liz or annoyed the hell out of Lin. Pavana just looks at me with something like disdain. The hand around my throat clenches and she pushes my head into the mat.

	“God dammit Max, I need this. Hit me, please.”

	I gasp for breath and throw a right hook. Her had snaps to the side and she yells, pain and ecstasy in her voice. “Again!” I oblige, striking her in the ribs, then her face once more. She matches my blows with her passion, hammering me into her dripping hole with such fury that I'm certain I'll have deep bruises on my pelvis. “Again, dammit, Again!” I feel something creep up, like a taste for this. A kind of love. A kind of lustmord. I move from her hip to her throat and return the choke.

	She screams through an orgasm, her lips quivering and walls clenching. I thrust one last time and lose control. I'm pretty sure I come in her brain. She holds me there inside of her, working her muscles and pulling rope after rope out of me. I drop my back to the mat, drained.

	We lay there for a while. A tired, tangled pile of fluids and bruises, happy and a little confused. Pavana finally speaks, caressing my face and putting a loose strand of hair behind my ear. “Well, we made a lot of progress tonight.” I nod, pleased with how things sorted out in general. “That last kick you threw, it worked.” She points and I glance over, another swathe of candles sit extinguished behind her. I break into a smile. She laughs softly and pulls herself up to sit. “I even solved a mystery of my own tonight.”

	“Oh?” I say, brow knit with confusion.

	“Yes. I've always wondered why you stand like a boy.” then she looks at me with evil mischief in her eyes, “and I think I've finally figured out what kind of weirdo leaves a dickprint on my bells.”