On The Verge
Part 10:  Growing

The lights flickered, hummed, buzzed. Her head throbbed with the noise, with the light, and everything the customer on the phone said just seemed to make her headache worse. The workday had barely started - this boded ill.

"I assure you, Sir," Tracy said placatingly, forcing a smile into her voice, "I know what I'm talking about. Waiting for another tech to be available would take quite a while, why don't we try together to see if we can-"

The angry voice from the phone made her close her eyes and take a deep breath. As she let it out slowly, trying to exhale her frustration with it, she looked at the post-it note from her predecessor. "To whomever may follow me - remember that this is just what you're doing to keep you going till you find yourself." It brought to mind, unbidden, Lord Brin's words from Sunday. "If you can do the things we can do, if you had a world of opportunity before you, would you be satisfied doing that?"

"Of course, Sir. I'll accelerate your call as much as I'm allowed," she replied. She put him on hold, then held her finger over the button that would transfer him back to the start of the help desk queue. She hesitated, so tempted to send him back to the beginning, then shifted her hand slightly to send him to the higher-priority queue instead. It wasn't worth it, a little petty revenge.

"Another one for the board?" asked John from the next cube, his voice sympathetic. Tracy replied with a sad affirmative noise, lifting her hand to put another tick-mark on the board in her cube. Her hand trembled with anger as she made the mark, looking at the long list of a very specific type of idiot that always seemed to find her. For a moment, in her mind's eye, she was ripping the board from the wall, throwing it into the air, then shattering it with a hail of summoned icicles. She was pretty sure that with her current mindset, she'd be able to pull off at least one good attack.

Sighing, releasing the daydream along with the long exhalation, she put the whiteboard marker down slowly and carefully.

The marks piled on top of each other. So many tick marks, so many hash marks. How could there be so many sexist people still in the world, in today's world? Would human ignorance persist no matter how far civilization might advance? She sighed, doing the simple numbers quickly in her head. With normal call volume, if all those people called her, one after another, it'd take her a couple weeks with overtime to get through them all.

She paused. When had she started keeping track? When had she done the first tick? It was over three years ago, she was pretty sure... there'd been some before that, but the first tick was over three years ago. Over three years in this dead-end job, where the average length of employment was only a few months. She sighed. When had this become her career, instead of a quick stop-over?

Again, she heard it in the back of her mind. "If you can do the things we can do, if you had a world of opportunity before you, would you be satisfied doing that?"

What could she do? Go to a world of fighting? Some medieval eternal clash, right out of a children's cartoon? Was that better than how ever many useless phone calls had she done in the last three years?

It was like a door opening in her mind, and she sat there, isolated from the world around her by the realization. Two weeks of bad calls. Three years of normal or good calls where she could help people, and they were grateful. She stared at the board full of tick-marks which had come to represent everything bad about her job. She knew how white boards worked - some of those tick marks were probably permanent by now. How permanent were they in her? Was was she obsessing over? Look at that burst of anger she had just had. What kind of control did that show? How productive was that?

"All power can be used to heal," she murmured to herself. Joseph had said that, but so had Master Lee. There was nothing she could do about the bad customers. They'd be sadly sexist no matter what she could say to them ... even if she could fix their problems in moments, that wouldn't convince them that they were wrong.  

There was something she could do for herself, though.  She had the pen. She had the transfer button. These might seem weak compared to the ability to summon fire to your will or freeze an enemy's blood in his veins - but every type of power had its own specialty in healing. The pen was, after all, mightier than the sword.

With a sense of surreal awe, she picked up the eraser and, for the first time, moved to erase all those tick marks. The earliest were barely affected by the passing, but she could get some window cleaner and work at those old marks ... the most recent were gone, and that was the first step.

She sat down at her phone, picked up the receiver, and keyed for the next call.

Control. That was the key word. She mused on that through the day, as she half-listened to customers rant, question, and plead with her. What did a person have control over? What power did even someone like her have? The customers had to deal with the fact that no matter what, she had power over them. It was her help they needed. The customers were CEOs, businessmen, politicians, and doctors as well as more blue-collar workers. And yet, they were subject to the power of a lowly call-center jockey like her.

It wasn't a good reason, perhaps, but it was more of a reason than she'd thought of before. And it suggested she needed to be more conscious of the power she wielded every day. As a customer, she had power - she could make someone's day better or worse, depending on how she treated them. As a service representative, she had power - she could stretch out someone's time waiting online, or she could help them make everything right again. No matter what she did, she had some sort of power that she could wield to harm or to heal.

That thought sustained her through the day, and the bus ride home, lost in the consideration of what might be power that she took for granted. She barely noticed things happening around her, the standard rituals passing without notice. The only thing that distracted her from time to time was the pressure of another nearby wielder on her mind, a pressure that passed by quickly as the bus drove along, but she was starting to get used to even that, as it had been happening all week. Considering how people's lives tended to run the same on a day to day basis, she would wager that those wielders she felt on the bus ride home were all the same wielders she'd felt yesterday, and the day before. Probably some office worker or waitress who would look up as she went past and go, "Yup, that's the new 4:12 one. Must be on a bus, I could set my watch by that one."

The obstinant, rusty old lock on the front door brought her back to reality as it stubbornly refused to submit to her key. She sighed and wriggled her key back and forth, paying more attention to the act of opening a door than she should really have to, till finally it gave way and she was through.

She walked up to her apartment, smelling the scents of various dinners and apartments. Lots of people were having tacos, tonight. It was nice to have a day like things used to be. Take the bus, get home, smell the hallway, get to the apartment, prepare to have dinner with friends. The last several days, Joseph had picked her up directly from work and they rode his motorbike to the arena for practice. They stopped off for fast food on the way there, and after a few days she was already sick of it. As soon as she got home from practice, she'd shower and fall into bed, getting nothing else done.

Tonight, though, she was taking a break from practice and going out to eat with her friends. Joseph hadn't been happy about the idea, but she'd put her foot down. She needed to rest her mind, she needed something normal, and she needed to think about something else. It wouldn't do her any good to burn out, and she needed time to rest and absorb her lessons before she went back to practice, anyway.

Reaching her apartment and locking the door behind her, Tracy went first to the kitchen to whip up some dinner. It was as she was staring into the freezer for inspiration that she remembered - Sing wanted to buy her dinner, today. It was going to be a little bit odd, four days in a row she hadn't eaten her own dinner. And she wasn't going to do so the next few days, either. She was going to be really queasy about fast food by the time this was done.

It wasn't something the storybooks had ever mentioned - become a wizard, eat more fast food. Well, at least Joseph had been amenable to sub sandwiches. If she had to endure several weeks worth of McDonald's, she'd be positively ill.

She opened the freezer again, looking into it for inspiration for dinner. It was only a second before she closed it once more, laughing at herself for how much she was used to the normal pattern. In this case, she didn't need magic to break out of that pattern. Instead, she just tossed a slice of bread into the toaster oven so she'd be able to enjoy some more of the preserves Sing had brought.

While the toast was browning, she sat down at the dining room table and booted up her laptop to check her personal email. It'd been several days since she'd checked it, and no doubt she'd have several emails she should respond to. Nameless jumped up on the table to peer at the laptop as it started to whirr, his tail flicking idly.

Tracy shook her finger at the smokey cat. "You're not supposed to be up there," she said. "Down." Nameless, of course, ignored her. With a sigh, Tracy picked him up and put him down on the floor. "Stay down," she said. "No going on the table. That's hardwood."

She knew it was futile, but she felt some small, minor need to assert her dominance over the newcomer to her territory. After all, she was the human, she wanted to at least pretend she was the dominant race in this apartment. She might know better, but she wanted to pretend.

Nameless then jumped up on one of the chairs and stared at her while delivering a quiet, plaintive mew. Tracy gave a laugh at the adorable sound and look and slipped off the chair to sit on her heels so that she could be about eye-level with the cat. Lightly, she played her fingers over his velvety ears. "There you go," she said softly, "I'm paying attention to you. Does that make you happy?"

Nameless ignored her question, just sitting there nobly for as long as he could till finally he broke down and got that goofy look on his face as he started to purr, pressing into Tracy's light touch.

Tracy smiled in amusement, then took off her charm bracelet and fastened it around Nameless's neck like a collar. "There we go," she said cheerfully. "Now you're the all-powerful weather wizard for the evening, and I'm just your pet human!"

Nameless twisted his head this way and that, as if trying to catch a glimpse at what was around his neck, then gave her thumb a small lick as if acknowledging her fealty. Tracy laughed and went to the kitchen to get her toast and spread some of the delicious raspberry preserves over it.

By the time Sing arrived, she wasn't only ready, she actually had free time on her hands, which was a nice change from the norm. She had briefly toyed with the idea of doing something productive, but decided she just wasn't up to it, and instead settled down in the pile of pillows to read the book she'd started the past weekend.

The fantasy novel read differently than normal, after the training of the last several days. Every magical effect she read about, she wondered if it was possible. She wondered what mindset she'd need to bring it about. On one hand, it sparked ideas in her mind, but on the other, it seemed so surreal. This was fantasy, a fictional novel, but she was looking at it in terms of a whole new look on life. It made the last several days seem unreal, as if she'd just imagined them, had just gotten really hooked on a good book and had found it hard to pull her mind out of it.

At some level, she wondered if she should find fantasy books as enjoyable anymore. If she'd lose her taste for them as her own life turned more fantastical - but she'd always enjoyed books for the characters more than the world, anyway. She'd always wished she could do the things in the books - and now she could - but it was the personalities she wanted to emulate more. Determined people, strong people, who never seemed to give up no matter the odds arrayed against them. It gave her strength, these stories, and she was almost disappointed when the buzzer sounded to pull her away from them.

More so than her own apartment, being stuffed into the back of the car, wedged into a too-small area amongst the chatter and talk, was like coming home. She wondered how cold it was - just last week she was shivering and freezing in this position. Now it was just a little bit brisk, but still comfortable. She leaned up and gave Sing a lil' kiss, then, shivering as if she were colder than she actually was, she ducked her head under Sing's arm and pulled it around her, curling up into his side. She kept her eyes closed and the movement casual, but she peeked out through cracked lids, past her lashes, to see Jill's reaction.

Jill's eyes had gone wide as an excited expression sprung into life on her face, but then she paused and looked reserved, as if she was trying to determine whether or not Jill and Sing were putting her on.

"Are you two serious?" Jill finally asked, her voice straining with contained excitement, "Or are you just teasing me?"

"Oohhhh," Tracy purred, enjoying Jill's reaction, "I mmmight have asked Sing out on a date last weekend..."

Most of the car winced at Jill's excited squee. "How did it happen?" she demanded. "What did you do?"

"Well," Tracy said, "First we went to a nice little restaurant-"

"First I came over," Sing interrupted, grinning, "With several bags worth of ... " his voice dropped dramatically, "Mystery items." He chuckled softly. "It was driving her nuts that I wouldn't let her see what was in them."

Tracy felt a brief twinge of annoyance at the interruption, but knew that it was just because Sing was as excited as she was about the date, so she just settled into his chest and let him tell the story with his usual flair for the dramatic.

It was a slightly longer car trip today. They only went to IHOP every other week - on the in-between weeks, each person was responsible for picking a restaurant to go to. Today, they were going to Chili's, and that was a good fifteen or twenty minutes away. Sing talked most of the time, and everyone ooooed softly over his description of Schrodinger's, vowing that in two weeks, they'd go as a group to check the place out, and harassing Tracy for not having told them of it before. Tracy felt a little uneasy about that - Schrodinger's had always been her little hole-in-the-wall place, and while she did want to bring more business to Hans, it had been nice having her own secret little magical diner - even before she had realized it was literally magic instead of figuratively.

She couldn't stay annoyed for long, thought, and looked forward to everyone's reaction to the place, though she wished she could have presented it on her terms. Her chance to do it on her terms had passed, she supposed.

The warm comfort of friends buoyed her spirits from the frustration and stress of all the training of the past week, which was fading quickly to the sense of an unreal dream. That warm bubble of dream-like comfort kept getting intruded upon, however, by the sensation that always happened now as she rode down the street - the constant waxing and waning of small points of pressure in her mind. She was amazed at how many people of magic lived in the city, though she supposed that with the population density, even a tiny percent of people added up to a lot. Every so often, she glanced out at a pedestrian hurrying through the cold, or a driver stopped at a red light, and a look of acknowledgment passed between them. They knew what each other were, even if not whom.

The restaurant was crowded, and they had to wait for a while before there was a table available for them. They sat pressed together in the dark corner of the waiting area, talking to each other in loud voices to be heard over the hubbub of the restaurant. The topic often came back to Tracy and Sing, as Jill pressed for more details, but Tracy didn't get to talk much.  Sing kept breaking in to add his own embellishments to the story, or correct some small detail. Tracy laughed softly at his excitement, so different than his normal quiet demeanor.

After they were led to their table and placed their order, Stephen shifted the topic to work. He shared a story with them about how his boss, that week, had come to him with a project idea about generating a search engine for the document database, which hadn't been that worrisome till Stephen realized that the boss wanted the search to find all the documents on every computer in the office, not just those on the document server. Tracy matched that with a story about someone who had called in complaining that installing some software had caused the cat to become scared of his computer, and had become especially concerned when the computer started complaining about daemons.

Ted laughed and demurred that his story wasn't as good, but everyone encouraged him to share it anyway, as they always had to. He quietly told about someone who'd come up to him in the store and started demanding she get her money back for the product she'd purchased, claiming it didn't work, but who hadn't wanted to say what she had purchased, where it was, or, in fact, give any details about it whatsoever. She'd called him a little pervert when he'd pressed that he'd need details, a receipt, or the object back, and then she stormed out of the store. The rest of them spent the time till their food came trying increasingly absurd guesses about what it was she'd purchased and how she'd misused it.

Tracy enjoyed her sizzling skillet full of meat, and idly tried to figure out what spices they were using. Less garlic than she usually would use, and while she couldn't identify all the flavors, it gave her ideas of stuff to try while she was cooking her own food. The meal was surprisingly quiet, once the food arrived, with everyone tucking in happily. Tracy thought of the old Norse saying, "Eat your fill before a feast, if you're hungry you have no time to talk at the table."

Today, though, everyone was digging in, Tracy included, and while that always made it get a little quieter for a couple minutes, today that quiet stretched on and on. She'd never realized how much she had led the conversation after the food arrived. She slowly finished her current bite, then paused for a bit to smile to Alex. "So!" she chirped, cheerfully, "You haven't told us your big event of the week!"

Tracy was never a big eater, and while the past week had her much hungrier than usual, she still didn't eat more than half of the huge serving that restaurants always brought. She nibbled on dinner while she guided conversation, poking into everyone's lives and finding out what everyone had been up to. In a way, she was glad she was more aware of the conversation than normal and could guide it where she wanted. If anyone had tried to pry into her own week, she would have felt very awkward, but she reveled in the everyday lives of her friends, happy that the world was going on as it always had, despite her own experience.

It seemed all too soon that she was climbing out of the car on her own doorstep, Alex and Jill already having been dropped off, a lingering brush of Sing's fingers over her hand still leaving her skin tingling, his light kiss still warm on her cheek.

The weekend had seemed quite far enough away, before that evening with her friends, but come the next afternoon it seemed entirely too close.  Friday she was so nervous that she called into work sick, and practiced for most of the day.  Finally, Saturday Morning had come.

After all the preliminaries, the match had started.  She wore her keiko gi, the billowing pants and snug jacket of Aikido Practice, her white belt snugged tightly around her waist.  As much as she'd tried to take care of it, she'd had to replace the keiko gi several times over the years, but the white belt was the dirty and worn original, stained with sweat, dirt, and with one dark splotch where a mistake during practice had splashed her blood onto it.  As neat and tidy as she liked to be, she was proud of that grimy old belt, testament to the work she'd put in.

She stood opposite Grandmaster Lee on the mat, his dark-skinned face grinning with its shockingly white smile, unable to hide his pride of her.  Four other local grandmasters were seated on folding chairs along one wall, the only wall that didn't have black-belt students packed along it, watching solemnly as she sparred.  White-belt students weren't allowed to the black-belt test, nor were family.  This was only for the black-belts, and the hopeful.

She'd finished with everything else - all the katas, the stances, the freeform demonstration, and now all that was left was the sparring.  She didn't have to defeat Grandmaster Lee - thank goodness - all she had to do was put up a good showing, and she was feeling much more comfortable now, because this was something old and familiar.  Grandmaster Lee and she had danced this dance a hundred times.

"Begin," said the old, strong voice of one of the Grandmasters, and the two started slowly circling each other, watching each other carefully.

They stood lightly on their toes, each step careful and balanced. In this, Tracy was satisfied with herself - she felt balanced, her movements felt like smooth dancing. And this, too, was familiar - the rest of the room faded out of her awareness, there was only the mats and her opponent. He was good, she knew that, but he seemed a little clumsier than usual today. His steps were as smooth and balanced, but he kept stepping a little too far, leaving just the smallest of openings. She watched him carefully, making certain, and on the third opening she started forward.

He shifted lightly in reaction to her movement, and she dropped back, as did he. Small movements, small shifting motions. For several minutes, they moved on like this without making a single attack, circling and shifting their weight to look for a sure advantage. It was the longest they'd ever gone like this, and Tracy was starting to be a little surprised that Grandmaster Lee hadn't attacked her yet. She knew her defense wasn't that unbreakable, he always found an opening to exploit or was just too fast for he. Today he seemed to be holding back.

"Hold!" came a voice, and the grandmasters, then the rest of the room, snapped back into Tracy's awareness. She bowed to Grandmaster Lee, as he did to her, then they turned to face the others.

The grandmaster second from the left - Tracy couldn't remember his name - had a slightly condescending air to him. "Does the kyu understand what a spar is? One generally does something during a spar other than walk around each other."

Tracy flushed and pulled in on herself, looking at the floor. "Yes, sir," she replied, embarassedly. She wouldn't explain herself - she knew better than to say too much.

"Well," said another voice, sounding slightly amused. "Would the kyu like to share with us why she has not done anything yet?"

Tracy nodded, smiling, and brought her gaze back up. She thought that would be Grandmaster Ito, the only one of the four grandmasters that actually liked Grandmaster Lee. "Thank you, Sir," she said respectfully. "There are two reasons. First, Grandmaster Lee and I have sparred many times. I am familiar with him, and I know that if I had attacked him at any of those times, he would be able to defeat me easily." She paused slightly after this, trying to think of the best way to express the second reason.

"And the second?" asked the one on the far left - she thought that was Grandmaster Yoshida, and the tone of his voice left unsaid what she was sure he wanted to say - can the kyu count to two?

"I'm not good at attacking," Tracy said flat out, not trying to cushion it. "I'm only good at reacting to attackers. The attacks just don't feel comfortable to me."

Grandmaster Yoshida make a rude noise. "Not that old complaint," he snapped. "There's nothing wrong with Aikido attacks, and this kyu will tell us differently?" Tracy cringed inwardly, trying to keep a calm exterior.

"That's not fair," said Grandmaster Ito, reproachfully. "She was telling us her strengths and weaknesses, honestly and openly, and you took it as a challenge against Aikido. Can none of us say that there is something we were not struggling with when we took the Dan? It is not the end of lessons, after all."

Grandmaster Yoshida and the one next to him looked a little sour at that, but the other nodded in agreement.

Grandmaster Ito then turned back to Tracy and Grandmaster Lee. "Tracy," he said gently, "The purpose of the spar is not actually to spar. In that, I approve - the perfect Aikido match is one without an attack. However, we need you to show us that you understand more than theory and form, we need to know that you can react to attacks as they come."

Tracy nodded. "Thank you," she said softly, and meant it for more than just the explanation. Most of the Grandmasters didn't like Grandmaster Lee, she knew - thought he should not have been given the title Grandmaster. She didn't know the details. She banished the thought quickly from her mind, however, as she and Grandmaster Lee faced each other once more, giving each other the ritual bow, then striking ready poses.

This time, When Grandmaster Lee left an opening, she took it. He shifted his weight lightly, and she automatically twitched to draw back, then pushed herself forward, changing her attack into an advancing block. He tried to grab her wrist, and she pushed his hand away, rolling to his side and trying to trip him up with a hooked ankle. He hopped lightly over her foot, spinning to a defensive posture quickly, as did she, the two of them grinning broadly at each other.

She attacked him a second time, then a third, each time turning her attack into a block and trying to find a grapple with him, and failing. The fourth time, she double-feinted, the block disappearing as soon as he started reacting to the grapple, and the halted punch suddenly struck forward into a weaker but still stinging attack against his breastbone, knocking him back a step. Tracy immediately followed up with a quick series of blows, but Grandmaster Lee had already recovered his balance enough to guide them away with the backs of his hands. Before he could recover any further, Tracy fell back and took up her ready stance again.

Suddenly, Grandmaster Lee was on top of her, his fists and feet coming in a quick series of attacks. Tracy had all she could do just turning them away, her limbs often reacting before she had even realized the attack was coming. She barely had time to concoct a plan before one foot hooked behind the other, and she tripped over herself, falling backwards. Grandmaster Lee pressed his advantage, which she had hoped he would, and her legs untangled themselves instantly to hook around his ankle as she rolled to the side, one hand finding his elbow as he fell. She almost had him, but then he twisted just before she set the hold and was away, both of them rolling to their feet in a ready stance once again.

Once they had gotten into the flow of attack and defense, Tracy was much more comfortable. These spars were her favorite part of Aikido, like dancing with a partner. She only really enjoyed it with Grandmaster Lee, because she knew he was so good she didn't have to worry about hurting him. Heck, till a few months ago she never had gotten him in a hold even once, but that was when she had started practicing turning one attack into another mid-stance.

She hadn't gotten him the first time, but he had been surprised and given her a rare compliment. She hadn't gotten him the second time, or the third time, either. She had started out not catching him more than one time in a thousand, and now she could catch him perhaps one time out of a hundred. Today, she was in the zone - she couldn't say what it was, but everything just fell into place, everything was balanced, and it wasn't long before she found herself sitting on top of him, his leg twisted painfully, and his hand slapping a surrender against the mat. She only had to suffer a dozen pins, herself, before she had gotten him.

It was a shock when the voice intruded on their match, because she had long since forgotten that she was being tested. When they fought, it wasn't focus that turned off the rest of the world - it was just fun, and the challenge, of putting everything you had into that one goal. She leapt to her feet, as did Grandmaster Lee, and they turned to the other five Grandmasters.

"What is this?" snapped Grandmaster Yoshida. "You've been teaching her dan techniques before she has taken the test?"

Grandmaster Lee straightened up stiffly. "I have not!" he retorted, his teeth gritted. "I have taught her no more than any other kyu ready for the dan."

With a snort of derision and a look of contempt at Tracy, Grandmaster Yoshida replied, "I suppose you teach all your kyu how to attack in combination, then?" The sarcasm lay heavy on his voice.

She saw the broad white smile from Grandmaster Lee out of the corner of her eye, and it startled her because she didn't quite understand why it was there.  His stance shifted a little, his face, his very being radiating a fierce pride. "No," he replied, his voice intent. "She figured it out herself."

A hot retort by Grandmaster Yoshida was instantly cut off by the bark of laughter from Grandmaster Ito, who looked over at his fellow Grandmasters. "Well," he exclaimed, "Our choice is obvious, isn't it? We'd best grant this young lady the dan before she decides we're just useless old men that she doesn't need anymore!"

Grandmaster Yoshida was not so easily mollified. "I suppose that's inevitable, when she's taken as long as she has to get to the test," he grumbled. He turned to Tracy. "Why haven't you taken it before?"

Tracy stood up straight. "Sir!" she started, and her brain flailed for a half a second before she settled on her conversation with Grandmaster Lee last week. "I was afraid of the power that would come with advanced techniques. As a kyu, if I make a mistake, I break someone's arm. In the dan, if I make a mistake, I could very well kill someone."

He snorted again. "So you no longer care if you kill someone?" he said caustically.

Tracy felt that angry sensation welling in her chest, and closed her eyes as she controlled it. "That's not it at all, Sir," she replied, feeling something very close to the same gritting tone that Grandmaster Lee used every time he talked to Yoshida coming out of her own mouth. "It's just that I have come to realize I should more fear lacking the control that the dan will teach me."

Grandmaster Yoshida made a noise as if he was spitting. "Ridiculous," he said to his fellow grandmasters. "I will not approve of granting the dan to a little girl who's being ruled by her fears. My vote is decided - I say no."

Tracy was crushed, but stood there, eyes closed, her chest hollow, tears sparking in the corner of her eyes.

Grandmaster Ito immediately responded. "Well, I say she's the finest kyu I've seen before me in twenty years - while that may be because she had an extra two years to learn, I'd say that nonetheless, she's earned the right to move on to dan. It makes no sense, after all, to deny someone the dan just because they should have had it a long time ago."

The other two grandmasters agreed, though the one sitting next to Grandmaster Yoshida sounded a little reluctant. Her heart swelled with joy just as much as she had felt the fierce pain welling not moments before, the tears in her eye now tears of pride that slipped down her cheeks as she stood there stock-straight while Grandmaster Lee removed her white belt and replaced it with a brand new, crisp, stiff black belt. She bowed to Grandmaster Lee, then to the grandmasters, and then to the watching dan around her, and then she was surrounded by friends who were clapping her on the back and loudly congratulating her, and she didn't care that she wept as she hugged them and laughed happily.

Congratulations were many, as she found herself in the middle of her old circle of students, all of them delighted for her. It was good to be back with them, she realized, and she had missed them a lot. It was something of a blur - they seemed a crowd, even though it was only a few people, but all their attention was focused solely on her. She laughed, but sadly had to decline hanging out for a bit, or be able to go to a celebratory lunch.

"I'm sorry," she said, backing towards the changing room, "But I really do have something already scheduled that I just don't have the option of missing... Next weekend, though!" she promised, "After practice!"

She rushed through the shower - no more than a quick rinse, really, as it wasn't going to matter soon enough - and got dressed. Loose jeans, t-shirt, a tough denim jacket, and leather gloves. She'd been starting to get into the tougher fabrics as she rode more on Joseph's bike, because there always lived the possibility of a tumble, and she preferred leaving her skin intact.

Her friends were first surprised, then laughed, at seeing her wearing something other than skirts as she came out. They followed her out to see Joseph waiting for her on his bike, and a few snide comments were made that Tracy laughed at and shook her head, but didn't bother dignifying with a formal rejection. She strapped her sports bag snug against her back, accepted the helmet from Joseph, slipped onto the bike behind him, and they were off.

"How'd you do?" he asked, cheerfully, as they drove down the street.

"I passed!" she said, giddy joy leaping up in her chest.

"Congratulations!" he replied merrily. "Let's hope that's a good omen for our fight!"

The giddy joy settled itself into a wary nervousness, as she remembered that the black belt test was the easiest thing she had to look forward to, today. She took a deep breath and nodded solemnly, gathering her mind together for the match ahead.