fandomhigh | Defending Yourself [Monday, Period 1]

"We've talked about fight or flight responses, and I mentioned that one of the things we'll want to do is begin to adjust your instinctive reactions so that those automatic responses don't get you into trouble if you need to defend yourself. Today we'll be taking the first step with that."

Max grinned and looked around the room at his students. "Today's lesson is that sometimes the 'fight or flight' response is actually the wrong approach. In fact, in a lot of cases, you actually want some combination of the two. Stomp someone's foot, and then run; or running until you find a better position to fight from. After all, there are plenty of situations where just running, or just fighting, are not optimal. I mean, chances are you couldn't outrun a tiger chasing you, and you certainly don't want to fight one in the open."

"Today's exercise is pretty simple. Everyone's going to get some distance from each other, and then the Danger Shop is going to begin cycling through localized scenarios. They'll all be still scenes, so you have as much time to think about your responses as you need. You can even get a bit of practice in with your proposed solution, though since everything will be frozen it won't be all that realistic. Still, I'm hoping it'll help you think about some of this stuff in advance."

"Well, that's it. Let's get to it." He paused. "Oh, and Surreal, I'd like to speak to you after class, if you have a moment."

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"Great!" Kenzi burbled.

Then she shoved a dumpster at him and sprinted for the fire escape.

The big guy was apparently as dumb as he looked because he just stared stupidly as the dumpster crashed into him, sending him stumbling backwards. Which gave Kenzi a nice head start.

But the big guy was already pushing himself to his feet.

Kenzi was already climbing like a monkey, fast and up, and looking for a window to duck into or break open, and knowing that the person who goes *up* in the horror movie always gets it if they don't figure out how to get back down.

There might have been screaming. "FIIIIIIIIRE!"

Fortunately for Kenzi, the big guy wasn't nearly agile enough to reach the elevated fire escape. And it didn't occur to him to climb on top of something.

So he just stared up after Kenzi angrily.

That was the good part. The less good part was that all the windows seemed to be 1) dark, and 2) barred.

"Not good not good--" Kenzi dug out her phone as she kept climbing, and hit 911. Would that work inside a Danger Shop? Maybe there'd be somewhere to go to, once she was on the roof?

Sadly the Danger Shop was not answering emergency calls at that moment. But there was a nice open roof at the top of the fire escape, at least?

Kenzi would be up there looking around for another way down. Or someplace to leap to. Or someone to help. "HEEEY ANYBODY!" .... Gah.

Well, at least the roof seemed to be empty of threats? And there was even one of those doors that led back into the building itself.

Hey, when faced with no other exits, Kenzi would go with the obvious.

Very, very carefully.

Obvious wasn't a bad plan. Except the door was locked.

Oh, like that was going to slow her down for longer than a minute. Pfft.

When she finally got the door open, there was someone standing, leaning against the wall at the top of the stairs.

"AHHH!" Without even looking to see who it was.

Slam. Re-lock. "NOT my day. Damnit."

Kenzi looked up and tried to think if she could signal a satellite.

The door opened, followed by Max's amused chuckle. "I think you passed," he said from where he stood in the doorway.

"..ah!" Okay, Kenzi was just going to be permanently jumpy for today. "Jeeeez. Uh, thank you? Yay."

The scene faded back to the classroom where Max was leaning casually against the wall. "Nice job with the door, by the way."

"Um... also thank you. Gotta know how to get back in if you lock yourself out, you know?" Kenzi tilted her head, and pointed out, "Of course, in real life, I would never go down an alley like that by myself in the first place. Nope. But you never know where you might get herded to, I guess."

"Yeah. In case you get locked out." That's why Max could do that sort of thing, too. "And, yeah, you strike me as the sort who knows how to keep out of stupid situations." When she felt like it.

A very fine distinction! And one that should always be remembered.

"Coolness. Although now? I'm really wishing I was a Kung Fu master or something."

"I hear that's a lot of work," Max pointed out.

"Yeeeeeeah." Kenzi was kind of allergic to that. In theory. Or at least focused, disciplined work. Unfocused all over the place work was just a byproduct of being Kenzi. "I hear some people get magic powers that include that." She'll have to look into that.

"That's probably a lot of work, too. You know, figuring out how to use them and stuff."

At least they were for Max.

"Or, maybe I'll stick with guns. And knives. Since I'm already started on those."

"Guns and knives, huh?" Max nodded thoughtfully. "Might as well stick with what you know," he decided. He hadn't ever really gotten around to picking up guns, but a good knife? He could appreciate that.

"Yup. Picked up the knife thing a few years ago, and my big sib here helped me get familiar with guns. This isn't the island to not know this crap, you know?"

Re: The activity

furious-maximus.livejournal.com - 2012-01-24 05:29 (UTC) - Expand