Momentum, in Aegle's not-insignificant experience, was one of the most important things in a fight. There was plenty that could be said for being the stronger, faster or tougher combatant, and plenty more about things like range and zoning, but such things were often immaterial to Aegle. She'd learned how to fight with every conceivable disadvantage, always the weaker, more fragile and, to start with at least, slower than her opponents. She hadn't even been able to use a conventional weapon, and had been forced to engage at a range most other fighters would consider to intimate. It was only tenacity and perseverance which she had to balance her myriad shortcomings as a fighter, so it was in those two fields where she'd focused her efforts. And though she had eventually gotten faster, tougher and even a little stronger, it was her tenacity and determination which was best honed for combat. Which reflects, once again, on the subject of momentum and the maintaining there of. 

So when Aegle's fist connected with Celia's hand, which had sensibly intercepted her attempted gut punch, there was a moment where much hinged on the smaller girl's ability to remain on the offensive. Blocks and parries both were not intended simply as a means of avoiding harm, after all, but as a means of staggering one's opponent. A recoiling blade was brittle in its wielder's hand, while a turned aside axe might leave its owner open for reprisal. Aegle, however, was not about to let any such shortcoming interfere with her strike. Her caught fist continued to drive upward as Celia's confident fingers caught it, driving the taller huntress back with all the force of her upward roll and sprint, before abruptly losing all its strength as Aegle brought her haymaker down on the guarding girl. Celia was no slouch where defense was concerned, and Aegle soon felt her follow up punch forced wide by a sweep of her opponent's arm, but she did not relent. Recovering her caught fist with a savage yank, Aegle brought her forehead forward on a collision course with Celia's lower lip, then hurled a sweeping hook for her kidney. Her smaller body, meanwhile, clashed against Celia's without so much as an attempt to stop, while she recovered her other hand and swung an indelicate hook into Celia's other kidney.

All the while, Aegle forced against her opponent, tangling her up at close range and precluding any attempt at a counter by simply keeping on the offensive. Kidney punches, strictly speaking, were not the sort of punches that ended fights, but they were surprising and uncomfortable and just the kind of thing to put an unwary huntress on her heels. That was what Aegle wanted, after all, to force Celia into a defensive posture and then punish her for not being more aggressive. Such tight ranges were her specialty, after all, and few huntresses had her beat when it came to sheer and overwhelming ferocity. Celia could block and parry to her hearts content, but Aegle would always be ready to throw another punch, to push a little harder, and to force Celia back a little further. All shields eventually broke, and all guards eventually crumbled. It was just a question of persistence.

A simple matter of momentum.

Aegle was really enjoying herself. It wasn't a fact to which she was consciously aware, but one which permeated the whole of her being all the same. She'd spent a few days in contest with Lily, learning her friend's uncategorized fighting style in the roughest, meanest way possible. There was a the glimmer of some classical training to it, none so adherent as Aegle was to her own practice, but mostly it was an unrefined style that converted speed into power. It was effective, there was no doubt about that, and if you had to have one advantage on your opponent, it had best be speed. Still, there was something very satisfying about fighting against an opponent whose movements she recognized, and who didn't move with such unpredictable speed. Aegle, as a rule, did not often try to predict her opponent's movements, for doing so required actual thought, and instead made use of her muscle memory and reflexes in place of foresight. This method had proved less effective on Lily, with her wild and unfamiliar movements, but it was serving her well against Celia. Aegle actually admired Celia, whose form was really quite good for someone who didn't specialize in unarmed exchanges. It was clear that she would have been more comfortable with a weapon in her hand, but she was no where near as outclassed as others would have been, had they tried to come at Aegle with only their fists and feet. But she was outclassed; Even Aegle could see that. Her movements, while well practiced and dutifully executed, lacked much of the finer polish which could only come from earnest implementation. Aegle could tell she fought unarmed with some regularity, and against a skilled opponent too, but not with nearly enough regularity to match up against a foe whose sole expertise was in close quarters, unarmed combat. Likely enough, had Celia been armed, then the balance of power would have been much different. She was likely much more comfortable with blade in hand, and could have made use of the numerous advantages which being armed allowed. Without it, she had no choice but to face Aegle in a manner wherein the smaller girl had singular dominion. 

Aegle wooped breathlessly as her punch connected, sinking deep into Celia's stomach with the satisfying give of unfortified flesh, before she quickly redirected her gathered momentum into a similar punch on the other side. She saw, almost immediately, that it wasn't going to land as intended, saw that Celia's had drawn out of position, and spotted the incoming shoulder tackle just as her taller opponent came forward. It was an inelegant tactic, which spread the impact out too wide to be of any real concern, so Aegle remained committed to her punch. She would hurt Celia far more with a pinpointed punch to the guts than Celia might hurt her with a broad shoulder-shove. In this split-second rationalization, Aegle was quickly proven correct. She felt her knuckles plunge into the taller girl's stomach, only slightly off the mark, before any of the power in her punch could be muted by the responding shoulder. It was a clean, satisfying hit. Said impact did steal some of her momentum, and even forced Aegle to give up some ground. For as determined and ferocious as she was, she was still the lighter of the two, and considerably lighter at that. Then again, Aegle was used to being pushed around, and rallied with singular immediacy. Her posture shifted, her body swayed, and all that unwanted force was redirected before she could be forced off balance. Before she could put it to good use, however, Aegle watched as Celia followed through, dropped down and swept low with one outstretched leg. A well executed combo, Aegle would think on later reflection, and one she might have even implemented herself if her legs could be trusted. At present, her thoughts were much less admiring. Absorbing the impact had meant rooting her feet, and rooted feet were notoriously unwilling to move, which rather precluded any hope of avoiding the sweep. So instead, Aegle determined to accept the blow with as much solidity as she could muster.

As Celia's leg, implemented like a club, crashed into the side of Aegle's knee, the smaller girl reflexively tried to move with the blow, lessening its impact by spreading it out over a greater timespan. She twisted her footing and let her knee buckle ever so slightly, but it was no use. Celia was the heavier, after all, and Aegle's best option had always been simply getting out of the way. With a grunt of protest, Aegle felt her foot leave the ground, right before her knee, complete with the electric motor reinforcing, gave out spectacularly. Her grunt rose up into a shocked yelp, as her overbalanced body tipped back on her remaining leg, just before Celia's foot crashed into the back of that as well. The rest was simply physics. Her upperbody, already falling, and her uprooted feet, both still rising, rendered her nearly perfectly horizontal with the ground. Aegle had been knocked from her feet enough times to know precisely how much this was going to hurt, and was already preparing to recovery roll they way she had following her first uprooting. At least, until Celia's palm unexpectedly bashed her in the chest. There was bad, there was worse, and then there was being punched into the ground while hovering two and a half feet above it. Aegle's surprised yelp terminated suddenly in an equally surprised cough, and all thoughts of instantaneous recovery were sent cartwheeling from her head.

She struck ground a bit harder than she would have without Celia's helping hand, but then no unceremonious impact on one's back could be considered a positive one. If Celia's objective had been a moment of respite from Aegle's ferocious assault, she got just that. The smaller girl rolled quickly away the very second she had something to roll off of, but the motion wasn't nearly so fine and and practiced as the clumsy affair she'd shown before. A ragged, breath starved wheeze accompanied her unsteady resumption of her feet, followed by the kind of cough only those who've had the wind punched out of them can affect. 
Aegle grunted, heart pounding in her ears, deflated lungs burning in her chest, all while the sour-salty taste of blood filled her mouth. She wondered, distantly as she lurched back into motion, if she had bitten her tongue. Then, just as distantly, she wondered if she had enough oxygen in her blood to keep from passing out.
Swaying in at top speed, having reached a full sprint in only the couple of strides separating them, Aegle lashed out once more with her sweeping back hand. So too, did she line up the jab that was meant to follow behind it, though she made a poorer job of concealing it this time. The corners of her vision were going dark, and she let out a strangled wheeze as she swung, her body not yet willing to take in air. Yet the jab did not come. It stopped short, and then tucked back, redirecting all its momentum into Aegle's other arm. Only then did her ploy become apparent, as she loaded the same fist which had swung the back-handed slash for a rising swing, using the false jab to conceal the movement. Then she stepped in, trusting more to practice and training than her own failing vision, and launched a mighty uppercut at the region approximately surrounding Celia's jaw and throat. 

Swinging her hand upward at last, Aegle barely even felt the familiar jarring as her knuckles connected. Her squinting eyes barely saw Celia, tossed bodily backwards and only the floor, and her ringing ears barely heard the resulting thud. She remained like that, fist upraised, free hand in mid guard, and stared at the spot where her opponent had collapsed, until, at last, the ringing in her ears grew to a crescendo. Dropping both her arms, Aegle hacked in a ragged breath, the very first she'd taken since Celia had knocked the wind out of her. It inevitably devolved into a fit of coughing, as her starved lungs struggled to inflate after nearly as long as thirty seconds completely without air. Finally, but by small degrees, some color started to come back into the world. The sound of her own hammering heart finally subsided, letting her hear the words that passed between her opponent and her opponent's clone, while her vision grew to once again encompass everything further than a foot from where she stood. 

Reaching up shakily, not even waiting for her own coughing to subside, Aegle smeared her bloodied lip across the back of her bandaged hand, which she then drew before her dazed eyes to confirm its bloody leavings. She rubbed her jaw testingly, rolled both shoulders with difficulty, the will some unsteady regularity back into her breathing. She was still feeling light headed, but no longer like she was one false step away from collapsing. She had been on the very verge of unconsciousness, she realized. Good to know where her limit was, as far as getting the breath smacked out of her went. Something solid and warm slapped into her chest a moment later, knocking Aegle out of her brief reverie as she scrambled to catch it. A water bottle. She regarded it, then the clone who'd tossed it at her, then turned her attention thoughtfully on Celia, who'd adopted a cross-legged pose on the spot where she'd fallen

"Y'alright?" Aegle asked, popping the top on the water bottle and taking a swig. Then, ignoring the clone's words for the moment, she took a lumbering, uncertain step past the clone towards the seated girl. She didn't look so great herself, if someone had only told her. Her mouth was bloody, her shoulders slumped, and her face a deathly pallor the likes of which might directly precede unconsciousness. Even her voice was shaky and unsteady. Still her eyes were unaccountably bright and alert, as thought they alone belonged to a fighter who hadn't nearly pushed herself until her oxygen starved brain gave out. 
"I was hittin' you for real, then?" She asked in a dopey drawl, like she'd just gotten up from a nap. Kneeling down, seemingly as much for her own benefit as to get on an even level with Celia, Aegle proffered the water bottle. Color was starting to come back into her own face, beginning as a pinkness around her cheeks and then spreading out into a much healthier hue than the chalky whiteness which it proceeded. 
"I wish ya'd have told me ya weren't gonna use aura..." She muttered, though unable to recall if Celia had actually told her. Unable to really recall anything preceding the last thirty seconds or so.  "I wouldn't have gone for ya face."
That seemed as close to an apology as Celia was likely to get, and Aegle swayed unsteadily back to full standing and turned to regard the fiery clone. 
"D'ya reckon you can do any better n'her, then?" She asked, nodding at Celia and raising her guard. She hardly looked in any state to fight anyone, but that didn't stop her from curling two fists. Nevermind that she'd just been in a fight that had nearly ended in a self-inflicted knock out, directly following only the gods knew how many hours of self-destructive endurance training. 
"I'll even let ya use your sword, since ya seem so certain you'd have done a better job with it."
It was hard to tell through the obvious exhaustion that Aegle was only just barely beginning to recover from, but she was actually fairly upset with that clone. So far as Aegle was concerned, you had no right telling someone they had embarrassed you unless you figured you could do better. Not to mention all the sardonic remarks at Celia's expense. She'd just had a very good, if short, match with Celia, and wasn't about to listen to someone else put her opponent down. Nevermind the fact that, as Celia's clone, she presumably knew what Celia was capable, and nevermind that, as her clone, she probably somehow reflected her creator's personality and opinion in some way.
"What d'ya reckon, huh? Wanna put your money where your mouth is? I got a second round with your name on it."


Celia Abbott