Survival Of The Fittest

The kiss was good. Quince smiled into it, savouring the taste of Felicia. As their lips moved together, he felt his partner giggle. She was enjoying herself. That was good. Maybe they would work out for a while.

As he broke the kiss and moved back, he looked at Felicia and smiled. "You know. I could get used to this." He moved back in to kiss her again, allowing his hands to roam a bit down her back, stroking her gently.

Coming up for air again, he stepped back. This felt good, felt right. He sorta knew that it was just a high school crush, a brief fling, but that didn't have to stop him from enjoying it. After all, whatever this relationship ended up being, he didn't want to get too attached. When it ended, as it inevitably would, probably around graduation, if not sooner, he'd rather that they parted as friends, and without anyone getting too hurt.

"So, ‘Licia, whaddya think? You wanna be my girl?"

"Do you wanna be my girl?"

Felicia could have sworn her heartbeat was now attempting to match the rhythym of the song. Again, maybe all the euphoria wasn't from the romanticism of the situation, but any of it that wasn't derived from that certainly came from the rush that was being held and kissed by a guy, and sort of a cute one at that.

Being legitimately stirred up by such a serious situation didn't mean that Felicia had to be serious about it, though. This was already bound to be a wild ride as it was, so there was no point in sitting back and just watching everything. No, Felicia could already tell that if there was any depth in the relationship she developed with Quincy, it'd be the kind that required her to hang on to the edge of her seat and make sure her hair wasn't ripped out by the roots.

"Hell yeah, I already said that!" She grinned. It was just another high school relationship getting started, and most people knew how long those lasted.

"Buzz!!!"
"Dorian..."
Miss Buzz had apprehended the murder just moments before the stinger could be driven into Dorian Drone's thorax, and the busy detective bee had collapsed directly over the one that she saved. The offending honey bee that nearly ran Dorian through was slumped against the desk, knocked unconcious. The same shove that defeated the assaulter had thrust Miss Buzz into Dorian, knocking them over into an apiary heap.

"N... now what, Buzz?" Dorian asked in a method of appreciating the awkwardness of the situation. For the next few moments, neither bee said anything, their wings folded all around the other...

Quince breathed a sigh of relief as Felicia agreed. He smiled at her. "I just like to make sure, sometimes." They were now a couple. He liked that. Quincy and Felicia. Felicia and Quincy. Q & F. F & Q. Well, maybe not that last one.

He grabbed her and kissed her again, hard. After a short while, he broke the kiss. Smiling at her, he said. "I'd better get back to my workout before you distract me totally." He picked her up by the waist and carried her back to a bench at the edge of the gym. Kissing her on the forehead, he placed her down gently, and walked over to the punching bag, breathing slightly heavier for the exertion.

Looking back at ‘Licia, he began to dance around the bag on his tiptoes. This required full concentration, especially when he wasn't using gloves. 10 minutes at this, and he'd be all set, he figured. He began to adopt his boxing stance, placing his torso side on to the bag, raising his fists up to protect his head and upper chest. He began with a few simple jabs, shoving his left hand deep into the bag so that it rocked slightly. Then, a few one-two combinations, using both hands at approximately head height. He quickly pirouetted to his left and unleashed three punches at kidney level, aiming for below an opponents offence.

He shouted back at his new girlfriend. "Enjoying the show, ‘Licia? If you want to come and hold the bag, you're more than welcome. Just make sure you're careful."

There would've been another smile and another giggle directed at Quincy's apparent insecurity, only there seemed hardly the time for it. Before she could react to him saying he liked to make sure, Felicia was pulled into another kiss. Might take a little while to get fully used to, but I kinda like this... just enough roughness, it's enough to tingle the senses. Of course, from time to time I might have to jerk him around as well. Hee hee... Felicia had a playful thought about handcuffs as she locked lips with Quincy once more, making sure not to click teeth with him. There was a good chance that would hurt, or maybe even turn Quincy off. Great... now I'm insecure. It's like some kind of virus! He hasn't bitten me, but maybe kissing counts. I'd know if anybody was ever stupid enough to kiss a zombie...

When the kiss was finally broken off, Felicia leaned against a butterfly machine (though she really had no idea of what it was for at the time) and watched with some mild amusement at Quincy doing what looked to be a strange dance around the punching bag. Heh.. is this guy in boxing or ballet? Felicia joked to herself, just anxious to see him finally start punching stuff. She finally got her wish, watching a jab here, a jab there. While the dodging and punching did get a bit flashy, Felicia couldn't help but feel underwhelmed. Man, I was hoping for something that resembled a shoryuken. Some crazy combos maybe? I don't-

"Enjoying the show, ‘Licia? If you want to come and hold the bag, you're more than welcome. Just make sure you're careful."

Now, this was more like it! Felicia liked to 'get down and dirty' in so many words, even if the phrase was ironically meant to be taken in the cleanest way possible. Without actually giving Quince a yes or no answer, Felicia stepped up to the bag and got around behind it, grinning. "Okay, big fellah, what exactly am I supposed to be doing here? And don't worry about hitting lil' ol' me, I'm a tough girl!"

As Felicia move forward and grabbed the bag, Quince hesitated briefly. Sure, it was easier with somebody to steady the bag, but he didn't want to hurt her. Don't be an idiot boy. There's a massive bag to protect her. Just hit the damn thing

"It's fairly simple. I just want you to stand there and keep the bag steady. It's fairly heavy, so if I punch it too hard, it can sometimes bounce about in strange ways. If somebody's there to hold it, I can go a bit stronger. I promise it won't hurt"

He moved round the bag, and took hold of her arms, to better position her on the bag. "You'll need to stand in close, like this." He moved his footing to a broad stance for her to copy, and inhaled deeply. "You know, you smell really good."

"Oh, uh... well, these little handles mean you won't be punching anywhere near my hands, right? I don't know a lot about boxing, but... I'm guessing that would hurt juuuuuuuuuust a little bit!" Felicia said in her usual carefree manner, gripping at each side of the bag and pressing herself into it. She turned her face to the side with her eye closest to the bag shut, breathing lowly. "Don't you worry one bit! It can't be all that hard to hold, right?"

She got an answer in the most interesting way she could have imagined, even though she didn't think Quincy would really do this. It reminded her of one of those cheesy scenes in a teenage romance flick where the guy gets behind the girl in a pool hall and teaches her how to shoot, only... this wasn't cheesy at all. "Hm, smell good?" Felicia asked in a hint of confusion as she imitated the stance Quince was showing to her. "Might the shampoo, who knows..." she was aiming for a non-chalant air as she said that, pretending to stretch her back with the sole purpose of pressing her backside against Quincy's... 'frontside'. "Alright, let's do this thing!"

Wow. It's like I'm taking lessons from Rosa or something.

((Rosa continued from Looking for 'Company'))

The gym wasn't Rosa's favourite place around school, at least if you considered the excercising part of the whole deal. Rosa wasn't out of shape, not majorly anyway, but she definitely couldn't be considered fit. What the gym was good for though, was an excuse to flaunt a little, not that Rosa needed one... but at least she could do it there within dress code.

Sort of.

However, no sooner had Rosa started to enter than she made an abrupt about face and ducked straight back behind the door. Where others might have blushed, Rosa's face merely broke out into a grin. Seemed as though her... 'friend' Felicia and that jockish guy Quincy Jones were up to some business. Her kind of business...

The slight infatuation Rosa had had with Felicia since the start of the year came to the fore once again. It had never really been a serious kind of feeling, yet, well, it was more attraction than she usually felt. Besides, messing with her all those months ago had been so much fun. Prom was coming up soon, and given how familiar those two seemed with one another, well...

It didn't matter if you wrecked somebody else's night if you made your own, that's how she saw it.

Rosa smiled and took off before somebody spotted her lurking outside, looking forward to prom now more than ever.

((Rosa continued in Don't Tell And We Won't Ask))

He was growing uncomfortable with the way things were headed. He wasn't sure at all where Felicia was trying to take things. She had to have felt his boner when she shoved her ass into his crotch. Not that that made things any easier. Quite the opposite, in fact. He coughed, slightly embarrassed, took a step back and recovered his breath.

Had he been leading her on with that move? He certainly hadn't meant to. He thought they were both clear that neither was looking for that in the relationship just yet. Sure, at some point, if they got that far. But right now, he didn't want her to think that that was all he was after from her. Besides, he had a workout to complete.

A sudden noise from the doors made him look round. "Mik? You still there?" He motioned for Felicia to keep still as he went over to check out the sound. A quick look through the doors showed that if Mikaela or anybody had been there, they were long gone. "Nothin'." You're just being paranoid. Don't let it get to you. Relax. Everything will work out, like always.

He took up a stance on the other side of the bad from ‘Licia. "Sorry about that. I'm just a bit jumpy. Must be the adrenalin from the workout. You ready for this?" He did a little shadow boxing towards the bag to loosen up as he waited for a signal to start.

Felicia shut her eyes and let out a mental groan when Quince backed up like that. Okay... so imitating Rosa is a BAD idea. I don't know how she pulls that off and gets the guys to like it, though... oh well, I just get to Quince another way. Maybe lay off him for a bit, just have some clean fun.... A smirk made a brief appearance on her face, regardless; she had certainly felt Quince's 'excitement'.

For the next few moments, she concentrated on trying to set aside those thoughts and get back to just holding the bag in the stance that Quince had showed her (and that she had surprisingly remembered). Her job would be done for her, however, when Quince mentioned something about Mikaela. "... Huh? Why would she still be here?" Maybe Quince had seen Mikaela's face when he turned away or something. Wouldn't put it past that girl, actually... but that's a really mean thing to think, huh? Felicia handn't heard a thing herself, but things made a good amount of sense when Quincy played it off as jumpy... "Loosen up a bit, then!" She grinned. "That's what this is supposed to do, isn't it?"

Felicia braced herself and reset her legs in the proper position, slapping the edge of the bag once with her palm before gripping it. "Come on big boy, I'm ready!"

As Felicia gripped the bag, Quince took a deep breath and tried to calm down. He really was nervous. What was this girl doing to him? He knew what he wanted, but wasn't sure what she wanted. Talk about mixed signals. Yeah, maybe he needed this workout.

He took up a stance round the other side of the bag, and looked up at Felicia. Come on big boy, I'm ready!. Well, that wasn't making things any easier for him. More in frustration than anything else, he began to hit the bag. A few light punches at first, just to see how well she stood up to it. He grinned at her, noting that she seemed comfortable there. Slowly, he found his pace, begging a few flurries, dancing back and forward on the balls of his feet.

As his confidence grew at the bag, his punches grew harder and harder. He was really sweating now, grunting with every blow. His breathing heavy, he was putting his full weight behind the blows, letting all his tension, all his emotions and frustrations about Felicia and Mikaela flow into the bag. With one last final roundhouse, he screamed as he punched the bag hard.

His breathing slowing, his composure recovering, he came back to himself. Smiling slightly sheepishly, he looked over at Felicia to see her reaction to his workout.

Huh... he's pretty damn quick, Mac doesn't have shit on this guy! Felicia thought with a smirk. At first there was nothing to be impressed about, since she hadn't realized Quincy was starting with a few warmup punches. It didn't take long for the hands to warm up at all and strike the bag at speeds she hadn't expected. The strength of each punch wasn't too bad, allowing the less-than-athletic gamer chick to hold onto the bag, even if it took an amount of exertion she didn't often care to use.

To her dismay, the punches did increase in force, causing Felicia to press her chest and stomach to the bag and grip the handles until her knuckles were white. In whatever way this was possible, she wasn't expecting the punches to get so powerful and to push her back, jerking the bag in her grasp. She had some horrible mental image of her grip slipping and Quincy launching a fist into her gut (complete with an imagined 'FALCON PAWNCH'), making her job even harder. The very last hit nearly knocked her backwards with the bag pushing into her, which resulted in Felicia losing her footing and swaying back and forth with the bag until her weight pulled it to a stop.

"Well..... well damn!"

His smile faded quickly as he saw Felicia stumble from the force of the blow. He hadn't realised just how hard he'd hit the bag. No, that wasn't right at all. He'd known what he was going for. He just hadn't thought what it was going to do to the girl holding on for him. He swiftly scuttled round to help her regain her footing by grasping her arms and helping bring the swinging bag to a halt.

"Sorry, ‘Licia. I really didn't mean to hurt you at all. Are you okay?" He swore at himself under his breath. Was this what it came down to? He was nothing more than a mindless thug, at the end of the day. Good for hitting people, heavy lifting, but little else. And any time he tried to let himself have a little joy, something for himself, he destroyed it without thinking?

"'Licia?"

"Whoooo shit..." Felicia held onto Quincy just as tightly as he had held onto her. She wasn't overly dizzy, she wasn't naseous, and she wasn't ready to keel over and die. The way that bag was being forced around in her arms, though, and how she had to hold onto it... it was a fair deal greater of a challenge than what the pizza-fueled Felicia was used to.

"Buzz.... BUZZ!?" The injured detective could just barely hear over a loud ringing in her ears. On the case of her life, she had just made a stupid mistake... she threw away her only opportunity to catch the bad guy by growing passionate about her job, taking things too personally.

The light was fading in and out, and so was Miss Buzz's eyesight, but a familiar shape slowly came into focus. "D... Dorian?" she whispered...

"'Licia?"

The inflection in Quincy's voice was unmistakable; it was filled with nervousness, maybe even fear. That hit Felicia in the gut pretty hard... she had been messing around with Quincy, making him feel uncomfortable, and the feelings he had to return? This seemed pretty damned close to true concern, worriment if she wasn't mistaken. "Hey... I'm alright, just a bit woozy! Heh..." she said with the beginnings of a sheepish smile, righting herself and taking one pronounced breath.

"My arms are just a bit sore for a sec, that's all. Reminds me of this one time I went tubing and it killed my arms... you're a real bruiser, you can protect me any day!" She gave him an assuring smile. A serious, assuring smile, not one of her previous mischevious grins.

As Felicia smiled at him, Quincy finally let go. He was relieved that she was aright, but even more so that she wasn't upset by what he had done. He had expected shouting, screaming, swearing at him for hurting her. Instead, he got understanding, reassurance. This was more than he was expecting.

"You're a real bruiser, you can protect me any day!"

As Felicia steadied herself, he thought about her comment. Protection. It was something he was used to dealing with. He'd often act as lookout, or bodyguard, whenever he was involved in one of Rudy's schemes. But that had always seemed a bit more thuggish than he thought ‘Licia was talking about. This was more in line with the idea of the knight, protecting his lady. Damn, he really should look into horse riding.

Smiling at himself, he massaged his hands. That he hadn't been wearing gloves had hurt slightly, but nothing too serious. He cracked his knuckles, and winced slightly. Maybe a slight bruise or two, but nothing he couldn't handle. He saw ‘Licia's smile, and his grin widened, in spite of himself. This was more like the girl he'd asked out in the first place, over this sexed up thing she'd been trying to be.

"Ok, ‘Licia. I think I'm done here. I don't need to do any weights today. I've bored you here long enough. I'm all your and open to suggestions. What do you want to do?"

"Oh, please. It's practically orgasmic," she said with that half-giggle and an eyeroll. "But yeah, I guess we should probably leave here before the sweat starts to get all funky... or even worse, the radio starts playing A-Ha." She laughed once more, a very common habit of hers, and gave a quick glance to the door once. "I don't know if big burly men like you would like a good movie..." She pressed a finger to her chin at the thought. "But how would you like to check into that later? I gotta run home and take care of a few things, but later tonight I'm free. How's that sound?"

Felicia stepped right into Quincy's bubble, putting her arms around him under his own arms. "And don't think we're leaving here before you kiss me again... nu-uh, no way, I need to feel that again and make sure it's real."