Lt. JG Natasha Cole - Pressure, Not Form
Natasha Schell
((Security Training Facilities - Combat Mat Room - USS Artemis-A))
She made a mental note that Vitor’s smile might be hiding something of his own thought process. She couldn’t help but think she was about to find out exactly why he was the CTO.
Silveira: But of course Lieutenant. ::Smirking and winking at her as he bent down:: I would never do that.
The corner of her mouth twitched faintly. So that was the tone of it. Good. Now she knew what kind of mat she was standing on.
Cole: I’m assuming you want this treated like a proper evaluation, not just a friendly reminder that the deck can, in fact, hit back.
She stepped closer to the edge of the mat and began rolling her sleeves with neat, methodical precision.
Cole: How would you like to begin, sir?
Natasha finished with her sleeves and clasped her hands briefly behind her back. Not defensive. Just containing some of the excess energy that always came with being assessed.
Silveira: As with any hand to hand combat.
He stood straight and bowed towards her, the grin fading away as he raised his right hand towards her.
Cole: ::bows:: Fair enough.
As she moved to tap Vitor’s hand, he snapped a left hook toward her, closing the distance in the same motion. Had she not already been on alert he would have likely knocked her off her balance. While she managed to avoid his first strike, he pivoted towards attacking her legs.
Silveira: C’MON LIEUTENANT… Are you expecting a fair fight?
It was as if Vitor had become someone else the moment he stepped onto the mat. He wasn’t holding back anymore. If she didn’t know any better, she’d swear he was possessed by a darkling.
Cole: ::jumping back, grunting on the block:: Right. Straight to violence.
Nat was too busy defending to strike back. She had to remind herself in spite of Vitor’s youthful appearance, he was about a decade more experienced, and a lifetime of lived experiences.
He had managed to land a few glancing hits, and she was going to feel every one of them later. He wasn’t that much larger than her in height or weight, but that experience was his advantage. Hers was a lifetime of being underestimated.
Sometimes that had been a wound. Sometimes it had been a weapon.
Silveira: You disappoint me… I was expecting better…
oO Really, mind games? Oo
Vitor shifted from punches to a low kick aimed at her left knee, which she leaned into, forcing the strike to land higher on her thigh where she could recover from it.
Cole: You’re starting to sound like the Commander.
Silveira: Response
He wanted her off-balance, not just physically. Talking was part of the attack. Fine. He could try to unsettle her. Plenty of people had tried. Some of them had even gotten close.
This wasn’t cruelty. It was worse. It was deliberate. He was showing her exactly how easily technique fell apart when emotion got invited onto the mat.
It was irritating how quickly the old instinct surfaced — prove it, prove it, prove it — as if every hard voice still needed surviving.
Natasha gave ground on purpose for the first time, not retreating so much as widening the space enough to read his movements, how his shoulders shifted slightly before committing to a strike.
Cole: So the lesson’s pressure, not form… noted.
Silveira: Response
This time when he came in, Natasha didn’t just block. She caught the line of his shoulder turning and stepped inside the arc of the strike, forcing the exchange closer than he had intended. Her forearm drove sharply into his centerline as she pivoted off her back foot, testing whether she had finally found the rhythm beneath his pressure.
Cole: Underestimate me properly, sir.
At that moment, Vitor stopped being her interim boss, her mentor, or even her friend. On the mat, he was only the problem in front of her. Whether she won or not had stopped being the point. If he wanted pressure, she could be pressure too.
Silveira: Response
Tags/TBC
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Lt. JG Natasha Cole
Security Officer
USS Artemis-A
A240205NC4