Dance of Two Colors (Genji x Reader)

Chapter Twenty Four

(Y/n) sat down on a step, taking a sip from her mug dutifully. My gaze lingered on the bruise on her cheek from her encounter, and she seemed to notice, as she raised an eyebrow in my direction. "What?" she asked pointedly.

"How'd you do that? Beat the men?" I pressed, walking over to her. I sat down next to her, taking this time to catch my breath from all the running around I'd been doing. 

She shrugged, looking down sadly at the middle of her coffee as she thought of the night's events. She warmed her hands my pressing them against the sides. "I don't know how to explain it. I just... danced."

"Danced?"

She nodded. "I evaded their attacks and saw their movement before they had even done it. And then I hurt them. As best I could."

She... danced? What a funny way to think of it. I had always thought of fighting as just fighting, but now that it was brought up, her ballet movement could easily be transformed into dangerous and powerful attacks.

I imagined the way I had seen her dance at Miss Mary's studio, and then pictured her dodging punching and jabs thrown her way. With her flexibility, it was no wonder they had a hard time hitting her.

But looking at her here, specifically her injuries, still demonstrated that she was inexperienced. As promising as she may be in combat right now, they were still able to hurt her. Bad.

(Y/n) may have won the battle, but she may encounter someone more competent than those men. And I didn't want her to get hurt again.

I took the mug from her hands and set it down on the step. She groaned. "You're not going to carry me back to bed, are you?"

"On the contrary... I'm going to show you something. Stand up."

"Another one of your wild ideas, I suppose?"

"If you want to call it that. I'm going to teach you some basic moves. So you can defend yourself."

"Uh, I think I already can."

"Tell that to your ankle."

Her eyes narrowed skeptically, and she crossed her arms, her signature what-the-hell-are-you-up-too-Genji pose. "What happened to 'you should be resting'?"

"This'll only take a second. And I won't push you too hard; I just want to to get the gist."

"Get the gist?"

"Stop talking and get over here already!"

(Y/n) hesitated and then strided over to me. She wasn't limping as significantly as yesterday, but it was an improvement. She stood in front of me, waiting.

I knew she was about to enjoy what was happening next. I pointed up at my face, a smug smirk making it's way on my lips. "Punch me."

She blinked. "What?" 

"Punch me. As hard as you can. On the face."

"God knows I want to, dumbass, but-"

"Uh huh. Then punch me!"

And so, after a moment's hesitation, (Y/n) swung her fist at me, fully enforced with all her strength. Shit. She really was going to hit me.

But that was the whole point. I shoved her arm to the side with my own, redirecting her punch and catching her off guard. "And now, I'd follow up with my own," I explained, simulating a punch to her face.

"That's how you dodge a punch. Now, do you think you can try it with me?"

A new kind of determination seemed to light up in her eyes, and she nodded. That was one of the reasons I was so attracted to her. This girl had so much fight in her.

I grinned briefly, and then threw a punch at her. Only, it was much slower than how I would normally do it, and I knew I could easily stop it before it hit her face if she failed to redirect it.

But she did. Flawlessly, too.

I smiled with pride. "You've got that down. You're a fast learner."

She giggled sheepishly, tossing her head back and filling the air with her sweet and innocent laughter. "That was so cool! Teach me more!"

I taught how to do a proper helicopter kick, which she mimicked just as flawlessly. Even with the injury on her ankle, her constant training in ballet made it easy for her to sweep her leg across the ground in one solid motion.

Her flexibility never failed to astound me. I taught her to do a flying side kick, and she was able to do it after only three tries. I found that she had the foundation for everything that fighting took physically. All she needed was direction as to how to use it.

Evading, kicking, and well-placed punching... she had it all down in the span of an hour. All of that was within her range of aptitude.

I was mindful not to ask her to do things that required strength out of both legs, seeing as one of hers was not at its best. But everything I tossed at her, in terms of flexibility, was solid.

The line had to be drawn somewhere, though.

I gave her a tanto and attempted to teach her to deflect ongoing projectiles like throwing knives or shurikens. But of course, I only threw measly pebbles. (Y/n) didn't have the aptitude for deflecting, as she could only deflect like one pebble out of ten. I laughed at her attempts, making her pout in anger.

I armed us with sticks for swords and tried to swordfight with her, and noticed that she couldn't really manage to "cut" me or block my attacks. So anything to do with a sword wasn't in her reach just yet.

No matter. There was plenty of time to teach her everything I know. And maybe, after a few weeks of this... she could pick a specialty. She really did seem passionate about fighting.

It came time, of course, to see how she did with my specialty: shurikens. I brought out a spare pair of gloves so she wouldn't cut her hands on the edges and handed her one of my silver stars. She looked down at it in awe.

"Shuriken throwing is my best art. Let's see how you do with that, okay?"

(Y/n) nodded in understanding. "It's much heavier than I expected."

"Of course! Well, go on... throw it at the dummy. But make sure to hold an end of the blade and send it in a spiral-like motion with all your arm strength."

She gripped the tip of the shuriken between her pointer finger and thumb, bit her lip, and hurled the shuriken towards the dummy. It didn't even manage to embed itself in the wood. It hit the wooden dummy with the wrong side, and fell the the ground with a clang.

(Y/n) seemed to cringe, hissing like she was terribly ashamed at that. She looked back at me, awaiting some kind of judgmental decree. I only patted the top of her head comfortingly, putting her at ease, a small smile playing at my lips.

"That was horrible, wasn't it?" she groaned.

I shook my head. "Shurikens are pretty fucking hard to throw, so don't feel bad. But, hey... I have an idea."

I pulled a basic throwing knife from my belt, and handed it to her. She studied it, intrigued. 

"This is one of my throwing knives. I haven't sharpened it in a while, but why don't you give it a try and throw it at the dummy? Let's see if it's any different."

"Carrot," she began in a dreadful tone. "If I wasn't able to throw the damn shuriken, tell me how I'm supposed to land a knife."

I curled her fingers around the handle, making her hold on to it adamantly. "Try it! You never know!" I cheered encouragingly. 

After a moment of staring right into my eyes with her (e/c) ones, she sighed, flipping the knife in her hand so that the tip was resting in between her fingers. Similarly to the shuriken, she took a second to aim, and then threw it forward with all her strength.

The knife landed with a thunk, dead-center in the torso of the dummy.

Looks like her specialty made its appearance sooner than I thought.