"It seems to be working out for me," I say, but I take his hand anyway and accept the hand up while I use the other to check that I still have all my ribs.
Yup, they all seem to be there. None of them have punched through my body with the force with which I hit the ground. Kind of a surprise.
"Again? Really? No helpful hints beforehand? And don't say, 'your enemies won't give you helpful hints beforehand.'"
My Barnes impression could use some work. Mostly it just sounds like a thinned down version of my Batman impression.
"I don't sound like that," Bucky replies, biting back a laugh, though when he replays it in his head, the impression gives him pause. Frowning a little as he steps back to give Jessica some space, he crosses his arms again, and gives her a sideways look.
"I'll never tell," I say, dusting myself off. Then I decide that's kind of futile and I should be concentrating on what I did wrong. I think mostly it's the part where I got knocked down, that was definitely not the right thing to do.
"But why wouldn't you want to? That sounded badass."
Though Bucky realizes he's somewhat behind on modern slang, he's familiar enough with badass to wonder if Jessica's universe doesn't have a different definition for the word.
"Then I guess that fall of yours was pretty badass, too."
"I kind of tucked into it," I say with pride, making karate chop hands, before it occurs to me that he's making fun of me.
Okay, maybe it occurred a little earlier, I was running with it. "Fine. Less than badass on both fronts." I exhale, psyching myself up, and then launch myself at him with the aim of sweeping his legs, declaring, "Whereas this-"
"Was telegraphed," says Bucky, jumping up to avoid her attack, and maybe it's out of an effort to not conflate this training with what he did for the Soviets, but he indulges in a flip that finds him out of her immediate reach. He lands like a cat, with barely a sound to announce his feet's return to solid ground.
"You need to stop announcing when you're going to hit me. And I'm not talking about the quips -- it was written all over your body language. You're prepping yourself to make a simple attack, working up to it. Don't. Just do it."
"Pop culture lesson," I say, double-stepping after him and trying to catch him with a kick to the mid-section before he's done getting his balance.
This is probably in vain. I'm pretty certain he had his balance firmly in hand the entire time. "That's the slogan for a brand of shoes."
But he may have a point. It might be like when people were fighting, well... me, with spider-sense intact. If you can tell when the attack's coming, you get a lot of options.
Not that I ever thought of it as that, so much as 'oh god someone's trying to kill me, better punch them in the face post-haste.'
He lets her get in close, her foot just barely making contact before he moves to seize her ankle, intent on twisting her leg, and sending her back to the ground.
Oh, no, I am not meeting up with the ground again this quickly. Only, I don't seem to have a lot of options, so instead I twist as I fall, so I can catch myself in my hands and try to use my other leg to kick loose.
"What does a red mutant bunny thing have to do with pizza? It's marketing."
"Marketing made more sense when I was your age," he says, releasing her leg, though not without a bit of a push in the hopes of throwing her off her balance. It's little more than nostalgia fueling his opinion -- and a part of him knows that -- but for all the advances in technology that have been made over the decades, there are still aspects of his time period he prefers over their modern equivalents.
Yup, they all seem to be there. None of them have punched through my body with the force with which I hit the ground. Kind of a surprise.
"Again? Really? No helpful hints beforehand? And don't say, 'your enemies won't give you helpful hints beforehand.'"
My Barnes impression could use some work. Mostly it just sounds like a thinned down version of my Batman impression.
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"...right?"
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"But why wouldn't you want to? That sounded badass."
That sounded like I had a chest cold.
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"Then I guess that fall of yours was pretty badass, too."
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Okay, maybe it occurred a little earlier, I was running with it. "Fine. Less than badass on both fronts." I exhale, psyching myself up, and then launch myself at him with the aim of sweeping his legs, declaring, "Whereas this-"
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"You need to stop announcing when you're going to hit me. And I'm not talking about the quips -- it was written all over your body language. You're prepping yourself to make a simple attack, working up to it. Don't. Just do it."
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This is probably in vain. I'm pretty certain he had his balance firmly in hand the entire time. "That's the slogan for a brand of shoes."
But he may have a point. It might be like when people were fighting, well... me, with spider-sense intact. If you can tell when the attack's coming, you get a lot of options.
Not that I ever thought of it as that, so much as 'oh god someone's trying to kill me, better punch them in the face post-haste.'
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"What the hell does that have to do with shoes?"
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"What does a red mutant bunny thing have to do with pizza? It's marketing."
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"More... linear."
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