College Catfighting World Cup - Tales from the Tournament

[Astrakhan]

This thread is for stories taking place in my College Catfighting World Cup universe. After the warm reception I got for the first story (I recommend reading that first if you haven't already), I decided I'll be starting a series of one-off stories, each focusing on one individual member of the four teams in the semifinals. France vs. Japan is still the next major story in the pipeline, but in the meantime I wanted to explore the characters you'll be meeting in that story a little deeper. Watch this thread for updates!

Selene

Back in the hotel room, the clock read 22:30. But outside, the whole city was lit up in neon so vivid, Selene Marchand had to ask herself if anyone in Tokyo ever slept.

She probably should've been sleeping herself, she noted. The next evening, she'd be leading the catfighting team of Paris-Saclay University in the semifinals of the College Catfighting World Cup.

And yet, here she was, leaning against the balcony of her hotel room, watching the smoke from her cigarette waft through the dark air. Selene watched as the last of the embers crumbled away from the butt, falling over the edge and descending to the alleyway seven stories below. Probably landing among all the rest of the trash thrown out by God knows how many people for God knows what reasons, left to be picked up one day by some unlucky sanitation worker. But that was whatever. It wasn't her problem.

Besides, it wasn't like she was alone. None of her teammates felt like sleeping any time soon, either.

Looking back over her shoulder, Selene could still see them through the glass of the door. Liliane sat on the mattress, bathed in the glow coming from her laptop screen; Claire sat on her knees behind her, peering over her shoulder for a closer look. She could see their mouths moving, but through the glass she couldn't make out what they were saying - she could only hear the hum of the air conditioning unit hanging halfway out the window next to her.

But Selene was at the end of her cigarette anyway. Grumbling, she pushed herself back from the balcony. Maybe it was time she stepped back into the room after all. Not that she was particularly ready for it - but then, the cigarettes never lasted for as long as she needed them to.

"So. You girls figure out the mysteries of the universe yet?"

Liliane and Claire looked back up at Selene as she walked through the door. At 5'2, the captain of Team France wasn't the biggest. Her dark brown hair hung tousled around her shoulders, stray hairs poking here and there - it was late, sure, but it wasn't like she made any particular effort to keep it combed even during the daylight hours. Her olive-skinned frame was an average one - toned and wiry, with a C-cup bosom - but it hardly showed now when she was dressed in a loose-fitting white button-up shirt. It'd belonged to one of her ex-boyfriends at one point - which one that was, she'd forgotten by now. As far as Selene was concerned, it was hers.

What did speak to her career as one of the top fighters in France's university league was the stern look in her hazel eyes that never seemed to fade, not even when she was making a joke. It was the severe perpetual scowl she wore, the gravely tone in her voice, and the world-weary slump in her stance that should've belonged on a woman older than 21. There was a reason Team France had made it as far as the semifinals. And as much as Selene recognized the talents of her teammates in getting them this far, she wasn't going to pass up a decent excuse to stoke her ego either. If you asked her, it was because she knew her fair share about fighting. This wasn't her first rodeo, and it wouldn't be her last.

As soon as she'd made that quip, Selene already knew what sort of response she was going to get.

"That's not funny, Selene." Even before Liliane said it, Selene heard that voice loud and clear in her head, spoken with the exact cadence as the words that escaped her lips now. She'd heard it plenty of times already in this tournament. "I'm trying to get work done here."

"Yeah. Work." Selene circled around the bed, peering over at the view on Liliane's screen. A buxom Asian girl, her long black hair in stark contrast to her white bikini, lay on the mats, with her firm, toned thighs wrapped tightly around the head of her struggling blonde foe in blue. "You can be honest and tell us you like watching chicks in bikinis roll around on the floor, y'know."

"Dégage!" Liliane barked in frustration. Clenching her teeth, she swung a swift backhand around in an arc - a backhand that Selene wasn't quick enough to get away from. It landed with a loud smack against her cheek, causing Selene to shrink back, rubbing at her face. Liliane might have been her teammate, but she wasn't afraid to throw hands. And when she threw hands, she hit with the same force she had shown against her opponent on Team Venezuela in the last match.

For as much as Selene liked teasing her, she had to respect Liliane Travert. Liliane was younger than Selene at 20, but, standing at 5'7, she towered over the team captain. Her build was a slim one; Selene had joked that her C cup bust was "about the only part of her with meat on it." Her light brown hair hung straight to her shoulders, and the glasses perched on her nose now almost seemed painfully trite given her role as the team's strategist.

It was Liliane who did all the work in assessing Team France's opponents, reviewing their previous matches and analyzing their every move for tells and weaknesses. She was the one who recapped how the team should approach each fight, and advised the captain on who to put up against which fighters from the opposing team. In most teams, a girl like that would be the captain. But Selene was happy to delegate the thinking part to her so that she could focus on doing the heavy lifting on the mats. There were times - like their opening round match against Team New Zealand - where Selene had to make a snap judgment partway through when it became apparent Liliane's assessments wouldn't stand up to the evolving situation on the ground. They'd bickered about Selene's deviation from the plan, but if it had gotten them to the semifinals, no one was going to suggest they do anything differently.

Pushing her glasses back up her nose, Liliane finally let out a long sigh. "Selene," she said, "this isn't just anyone. This is Yumi Sato."

Selene glanced back down at the laptop screen. The blonde - a fighter from Team Sweden - had managed to claw at her Asian opponent's thighs until she'd released her headscissor, and now the white-clad girl had the welts across her pale skin to prove it. Now they had scrambled up to their knees, their fingers tangled in each other's grip as they pushed back and forth in a test of strength.

"Watch her," Liliane noted.

The stoic look on Yumi's face never broke, even when the Swedish girl stared her dead in the eye beneath a brow that was furrowed in rage. The motion was so subtle as to be almost imperceptible - Yumi lifted her hands and tightened her shoulders, gathering force behind her grip. What happened next went by in a split-second, but the effects were undeniable. The Japanese girl directed all that gathered force in a quick thrust forward, enough to break the Swede's grip and throw her onto her back.

"That's who we're up against," Liliane emphasized. "That's their team captain."

A soft whimper came from the girl by her side. Claire Laurent was in Liliane's class, also 20; the two were roommates back in Paris, and that was how she'd discovered catfighting. But she seemed to be everything Liliane wasn't. Liliane was tall and slim; Claire was only about half a head shorter at 5'4, but she had a curvy build, with plump thighs and E-cup breasts that heaved even against the plain white t-shirt she wore now. Liliane's hair was combed straight with an almost impulsive precision even at this hour; Claire's dirty blonde hair hung in messy waves to the small of her back.

Their personalities seemed just as opposed - Liliane was analytic, insightful, and attentive to the narrowest details, so picky about their plans that she wasn't afraid even to talk back to Selene at times. But Claire was timid and soft-spoken to the point where she never seemed to be quite ready until the bell rang. When her teammates told her what to do, she was too meek to object to any of it. She'd cried when she lost her first fight in the tournament, falling into Selene's arms (without asking) and blubbering about how much of a disappointment she'd been even when there were still two rounds to go. If she and Liliane weren't friends - Selene wondered to herself if friends was even the right way to put it - she would've been dropped from the team a long time ago. But they'd made it far enough in the tournament nonetheless, so they were doing something right.

As Liliane slung an arm over her roommate's shoulder, Selene sat down on the mattress to watch the replay of Team Japan's last match. No sooner had the Swedish girl's back hit the mat that Yumi pounced. But instead of dropping on top of her opponent, she landed at her side - one arm swinging around the blonde's midsection to secure her and draw her closer; the other arm latching onto the girl's throat, trapping it in the crook of her elbow in a sleeperhold.

"Watch the grip," Liliane continued. Yumi didn't just leave it at that. With the arm holding her opponent's throat, her hand drifted lower, grasping the bicep of her other arm. "She's got a background in jiu-jitsu, and she uses it. She's all about grapples and joint control. You see what she's doing here? Bracing herself. Makes it harder for her opponent to break her grasp."

On the screen, the Swedish girl gagged and sputtered. Her legs kicked through the air in a desperate struggle to free herself, while her eyes grew wider and her face reddened. But Yumi never wavered - her grip only pulled tighter, her knuckles blanching against the force. The blonde's motions grew slower and more labored as her air supply dwindled - until at last, her eyes rolled back in her head, and with a hoarse, breathless wheeze, she fell lifelessly to the mat.

Selene shrugged, rolling her shoulders. "Alright, don't let her get near us. Got it."

Liliane looked back up at Selene, staring back at her with a narrow-eyed frown. "Now, did you notice anything else about her?"

Selene rolled her eyes, pointedly looking back out the window - away from Liliane, and away from the screen as Yumi rose to her feet with a fist held aloft in triumph. "Can't say I did, but I'm not Rain Woman here."

Liliane groaned, shaking her head. "Bordel de merde," she muttered before looking back up. "No, Selene, that's exactly the point. She's fast. And she doesn't give any clue what she's going to do until she strikes. She's unpredictable. If we're going to stand a chance against her, we need to take her down before she has a chance to get her hands on us. We need someone who can strike fast and hit hard. "

"Like me. Got it." Selene cracked her knuckles.

"Only if you know what you're getting into," Liliane shot back. "Street brawling isn't going to do any good if she can counter that into a grapple. If she does that, we're screwed."

Selene rose from the mattress, her fingers working at the buttons on her shirt. "So we don't let her. You don't know what I've done to bitches like her."

Without a look back at her teammates, she walked back over to her bed, tossing her shirt haphazardly onto the ground. Her pants followed. She was down to her black bra and panties by the time she threw herself down on the bed, leaving her clothes in a heap. She'd worry about that in the morning.

Liliane followed after her. She stood by the bed, her hands on her hips, glaring at her team captain. "I'm saying this because these are the semifinals, Selene," she continued. "We've come too far to mess up now. If we want a chance of winning the tournament, we can't make any mistakes."

Selene rolled onto her side, keeping her back to Liliane. "And if we were going to make mistakes," she said, "we wouldn't have made it to the semifinals. Just leave things to me. And keep it down. I need my sleep if we're gonna do this tomorrow."

She settled in under the covers and pulled her pillow up over her head, covering her ears. Liliane let out a long sigh. She stood there, facing Selene's bed for a few seconds more before she turned and walked back to hers.

---

Selene couldn't remember her first fight. By some metrics, she'd been fighting since the day she was born.

She'd grown up in a lower-class neighborhood on the outskirts of Lyon. Her father had been a gypsy drifter, or at least that was what the girls in her school said when they threw rocks at her. She'd never met her father, because he'd been gone from her life since before she was born.

She remembered the streets she grew up in - the trash blowing down the alleyways; the stink of cigarette smoke that clung to the bricks of the walls. The jeers from the other girls who looked down on her because she was too poor, too dark. It didn't matter if their parents made just as little as her mother did. Selene was just different enough that they could feel better than her, and that made them feel better about their own miserable lives.

She couldn't remember the first fight she'd gotten into. But she did remember the time she was 14, when a girl in her school had called her mother a whore. Selene remembered the crack of her fist against the girl's face, and the cool sensation of the blood running down her knuckles from her split lip, and the way everyone had stared back at her in silence as the girl lay whimpering on the ground.

She didn't remember what day it had been, or what that girl's name was. What she remembered was that she got sent home early that day. Selene didn't have any remorse over what she did, though. It wasn't her that started it. If the bitch didn't want a fight, she told herself, she'd have kept her mouth shut.

That hadn't been the first fight, and it wouldn't be the last. When her mother and her teachers and everyone around her tried to talk her down, Selene just ignored them. She was going to get in fights one way or another, she suspected.

She wasn't going to run away from it - it had all just become a fact of life to her. She'd come to appreciate the thrill of the fight; the rush of swerving around the punches, of working her muscles through every swing and jab and kick. The more fights she'd gotten into, the more she'd come to look forward to them. At least they'd give her something to work toward. At least they'd break up the monotony of a dull life. And at least it gave her some hope to hold onto that if the world was out to get her, she might stand a chance against it.

If she'd been fighting that long, she supposed, it was only an inevitability that one day she'd sign up for the University's catfighting team. Better that she had a constructive way to follow those urges. To do what had become just another piece of her life.

When she first joined the University's catfighting club, the other girls didn't think she had a chance. They sneered at her for being too small. She'd never be picked first for teams in intramural meets. But when the fists started flying, everyone who'd doubted her would see just how wrong they were. And it was always the teams that got stuck with her as the last pick that ended up coming out on top when they had her ferocity and determination on their side.

She'd met Liliane and Claire through the team. And even if they argued more often than any of them would care to admit, they'd become the closest friends Selene had had in her life. It was under her leadership that they began to dominate the competition against other schools in France. And that was how they'd found themselves in the finals of the national tournament - to determine what team would go on to represent France in the College Catfighting World Cup.

As her eyes fell shut, somewhere in a hotel room halfway across the world, Selene's thoughts drifted back to that moment.

Suddenly she was standing barefoot on the mats, hands on her hips. Her hair was tied into a half-hearted braid, and there was nothing between her skin and the cool air but a red bikini. All around her, the cheers of the crowd had fallen into a dull roar. She couldn't care less about what everyone out there thought. All she cared about was what was going to happen once that bell rang.

It was down to this. It was the finals of the national tournament. Her team was tied with Avignon University. And it was down to one last fight between the two team captains that would determine who would go on to the world championships.

But right now, the top priority on Selene's mind wasn't making it to the World Cup. It was putting Violette Dumont in her place.

The Avignon team's captain was standing in front of her right now - all 5 feet and 5 inches of everything Selene hated. Pale skin like fine china, her blonde hair in a neat ponytail. Her back straight and her arms folded at her chest with perfect poise, just below her pert D cup breasts. Her bright blue bikini wreathed her toned body - skin smooth, legs long and thighs taut. Little miss perfect, here in the flesh.

Violette was a trust fund kid, she was sure. Someone who'd had everything in life handed to her, while Selene was struggling just to get by. The brunette could feel the scorn and disdain in Violette's glare even before she opened her stupid little mouth. She was looking down on her, and that gaze fell on her shoulders like a lead weight.

She knew what that felt like. Selene had gone 21 years being judged, and even when people weren't saying the quiet part out loud, she knew.

Of course, Violette would make things clear even when she did open her mouth.

Taking one stride closer, Violette grabbed Selene by the chin and turned her head upward, staring her right in the eye with a burning glare. "Listen here, you rat," she hissed, "you can only coast by on dumb luck for so long. Only one of us is going on to the world level. And it won't be an embarrassment like you."

Selene just met that with a sneer. "Yeah, just try it, bitch. I know you're just afraid of breaking a nail."

"Salope," the blonde growled. She shoved sharply downward against Selene's face, already trying to exert force over her even before the bell rang. But it didn't break the stern, steely determination on Selene's face as she stared back at her foe. She already knew what she had to do, and nothing Violette could do was going to slow her down.

The ring of the bell was like a gunshot.

At the same moment, two hands cracked outward with lightning speed. The two girls were moving in unison, both with the same thoughts and the same purpose. Selene's palm met Violette's cheek at the same moment Violette's hand smacked across her face. The two of them turned aside from one another, each taking one step back - but the second they turned and met eyes once again, their teeth clenched in a shared, simultaneous grimace.

One of Violette's hands dropped to Selene's shoulder as she leaned in closer. Her fingers wrapped around the shoulder strap of the brunette's bikini top, pulling her closer. Her other hand flew to Selene's hair, grabbing her by the tangled braid and yanking her head to the side. A pained hiss left Selene's throat - but it was only a split-second before she responded in turn, grabbing for Violette's shoulder with one hand and her hair in the other. Every motion one girl made was mirrored as they circled around each other in a dance of mutual fury, yanking each other about by the hair.

"Salope!" the blonde cried again. To Violette, Selene was the last person France should have to represent them on the world stage. She was poor, uncouth, unseemly - nothing compared to the elegant blonde, who embodied the national ideals of culture and refinement. She wasn't just fighting for her own pride, but for her nation's - to ensure the world cup tournament would be carried by a woman who the French people could look at with pride.

But Selene didn't care about such lofty ideals. She wasn't in this for her country. She was in this because she needed to prove that she'd come a long way from her days of squabbling in back alleys. And in front of her was the exact sort of vapid rich bitch who had always turned her nose up at her and sneered whenever she passed. If there was anyone Selene needed to prove her worth to, it was Violette.

Roaring with rage, Selene yanked Violette's hair downward. The blonde tried to fight back, pulling her head in the opposite direction. She shoved her shoulders forward, battering them against Selene's own. But Selene would only meet that by exerting more force on her scalp, her fingers digging deeper into Violette's ponytail. If Violette wanted to make this a struggle, fine. Selene would just try harder!

Keeping her fingers wrapped in Selene's hair, Violette used her other hand to creep lower - this time, finding the brunette's flat, toned midsection. "Petulant little dog!" she hissed under her breath - just before she dug her nails into Selene's skin, just around her navel.

The muscles along Selene's back and shoulders tensed against the pain. But she let go of Violette's hair for long enough to throw a wicked slap straight across her face, harder than the last had been. A crack rang out, and Violette's head whipped to the side. It was a show of the exact sort of disrespect Selene held for her opponent - but it also caused the blonde's grip to loosen just a little. And that was all Selene needed.

Biting her lip, the brunette twisted her body to the side, wrenching herself free of Violette's grip on her hair. A few strands came away in the blonde's fingers, but that was fine. Selene had bigger things in mind. Like when she lifted her knee and drove it forward, straight into Violette's gut.

Violette let out a groan as she bent over forward. The air was driven out of her lungs in a hoarse wheeze, and she doubled over Selene's leg. But Selene wasn't done. She drew her leg back for just long enough to swing another kick, this one aimed at Violette's hip. Still reeling from the last impact, the blonde couldn't see it coming. She fell back off her feet, landing with a thud on the mats below.

Somewhere off in the distance, Selene heard Liliane's voice call out for her. Whatever she said, Selene didn't hear it. She had her own ideas of what to do, and no one needed to see those more than Violette Dumont.

Selene dove forward after Violette as she fell. Her knees straddled the blonde's sides, and her arm worked like a whirlwind. She threw slap after slap along Violette's sides and face, with every strike sending out the sound of a wet thud against sweat-slick skin.

The groans of pain coming from the downed blonde turned to a growl of frustration. She wouldn't dare allow herself to be bested by a cur like Selene - the very thought was an insult to everything she held dear about what she was doing for herself; for her country! "Insolent little street rat-!" she barked.

"Street rat's still kicking your ass," Selene shot back, in between smacks. "Rich girl gonna cry about it?"

At those words, Violette's whole body trembled with pent-up rage. "You-!" She gasped - but she didn't finish that sentence. Instead, she sprung. Her hand shot for the first thing she could reach - the waistband of Selene's bikini bottoms. She yanked at it hard, causing the fabric to dig into the brunette's hip. Hissing from the sensation, Selene veered to the side, which brought her just close enough for Violette to reach up and grab her hair in both hands. She threw her weight to the side, sending the two girls rolling across the mats. They tumbled a turn before Violette scrambled on top.

Now beneath her opponent, Selene's legs kicked and her hips bucked. "Chiante!" she barked. She too reached up to grab for Violette's hair, pulling at it to the side. Selene threw her weight over again; they tumbled onto their sides before the brunette rolled on top.

The whole way through, Selene never let up on her grip. Violette hissed as she felt the torque on her scalp; it was as if there were a hundred white-hot needles jabbing into her skin where Selene yanked viciously at the strands. "Let go!"

"Make me, bitch!" Selene shot back.

"Putain!" Violette roared. She swung a hard slap, cracking it across Selene's backside. The brunette reeled from the blow, her back bending into an arc as she recoiled from the strike. Still with her teeth clenched in a snarl, Violette brought her next slap down lower, onto Selene's thigh. Selene cried out in pain from the blow, and Violette seized the moment. She squeezed tighter around Selene's thigh, her nails raking along her tanned skin.

Watching from the sidelines, Claire gasped, holding her hands to her mouth. "Selene, no-!"

But Liliane shook her head. "She can't be done yet. If I know anything about her, it's that she has more in her than this."

Back on the mats, Selene's eyes squeezed shut. Her face was growing red against the strain, and her teeth were
locked in a gleaming white grimace. But it was a grimace born from rage as much as it was from pain. In Violette, Selene saw every girl who had looked down on her and scorned her; every girl who had set that fire in her back in her youth. They thought they were being superior. But all they were doing was stirring Selene all the more to fight back - and to stand up for herself.

The brunette's hand shot downward, her palm falling against Violette's face. Her fingers clamped downward, and her nails scoured the blonde's cheeks. A shrill scream lit up from Violette then. "GET OFF ME!"

"Not in the face, huh?" Selene shook her head. "You're all the same."

Beneath her, Violette's hips thrashed back and forth like the roiling of storm-tossed waves. She gave one hard buck, and then another. Her hands shot for Selene's hair, grabbing a handful in each and pulling her head straight back to try and pry the brunette away from her.

Selene's back twisted into an arc. She could feel her position on top of Violette slipping more and more. At last, she fell onto her side. But she wasn't about to go down without a fight. Not to her.

Selene rolled her shoulder, lifting an elbow up from at her side. Then, with a swift jerk, she swung it inward, where it cracked across Violette's face. Once, then twice. When that didn't work, she gave another hard shove, her palm against Violette's face. At last, the blonde was thrown backward, gasping and sputtering as she landed with a thud.

Selene wiped her brow, pushing herself up higher on the palm of one hand. She ran her forearm across her face, wiping the sweat from her brow. "Think that does your face some favors," she muttered.

The brunette began to creep forward. Violette was down, she told herself - the time was right to move in and take control. But it was just then that Violette's toned legs swung inward. Her thighs clamped like a pair of scissors around one of Selene's own thighs, holding her firm. Then, with a roll of her hips, Violette was able to roll the two of them over - sending Selene to her back, with Violette on top, her hands against Selene's shoulders.

Violette brought a hand up to rub at her temples. She tossed her head to try and shake away some stray strands of hair that had escaped from her ponytail and fallen into her line of sight. When she spoke, her words came in between hoarse gasps. "You're really stubborn...for a talentless brute," she growled. "But you have to break. Sooner or later."

"Bitch," Selene muttered in English, "I'm just getting started."

Selene's hands reached forward again, going for Violette's hair. Once again, the blonde's response was so swift and so simultaneous it appeared without any conscious thought. Her fingers wrapped in the strands of Selene's hair, trading every pull and yank Selene dished out with one of hers. But to that, Selene's teeth would only clench tighter in a grimace. She roared from behind her clenched teeth, pulling backward on Violette's hair as hard as she could.

"Gah-! Stay down!" Violette barked as Selene writhed and twisted beneath her. But even with Violette's legs wrapped around her own, Selene wasn't going to obey. With another hard buck, she threw her hips against Violette's own. The blonde's center of balance teetered, and she rolled over onto her back - giving Selene the chance to roll on top.

Selene's fingers twisted even deeper into Violette's ponytail, torquing at it with all her might. As she pulled back at it, the blonde hair finally came loose from its tie and fell free - which gave Selene the chance to grip at it even tighter. She clawed at Violette's scalp with both hands, cranking at the roots in a painful arc. The blonde screamed in pain, but her cried were swallowed up by the roar of the fans - and the cheers of Selene's teammates.

Against the raw aggression Selene was showing her, Violette couldn't keep up her grip. Her fingers began to slip backward through the tanned brunette's hair. But instead of letting go, she'd just change tactics. One hand fell lower, squeezing at Selene's backside until her nails dug into her skin through the fabric of her bikini bottom. As the pain shot through her, Selene's features contorted into a wince - and Violette met that with a smile.

"Not so fun, is it?" she snapped. With her other hand, she shoved her palm into Selene's face, pushing her backward. As Selene's back bent into an arc, Violette's hand ran down along her thigh, where her nails curled inward to rake down along the tender flesh. Another squeal left Selene as the red-hot pain shot through her nerves. With Violette already pushing back at her, she had no choice but to release her grip, falling onto her side as she rolled away from her rival.

Huffing and panting, Violette rose to her knees. Her chest and shoulders rose and fell as she tried to draw the air back into her lungs, but when her eyes fell on where Selene lay beneath her - still in a heap on her side, with her legs laying in a tangle - the corners of her lips turned up into the slightest hint of a smile. Violette's blonde hair lay in stray strands along her face, and one of her shoulder straps had slipped down around her arm in the struggle. Her face was red, and sweat beaded on her brow. But in spite of it all, she still managed to lock eyes with Selene, and that same stupid smug smile lit up across her face.

"Had enough yet, salope?" Violette teased - even between haggard breaths, her voice still lilted with that smug air of superiority. "You still think you can embarrass yourself in front of the world? There's only one team that can represent our country. And they aren't going to go with one led by a braindead rat!"

Moving an inch at a time, groaning in between each step, Violette came crawling toward the downed Selene. The brunette looked up at her as she loomed over her from above. Violette's eyes were narrowed in a glare, and she glowered down in Selene's direction. But in spite of it all, the smirk hadn't fallen from Selene's face either, even as she panted for breath herself. For as much as Violette claimed at being so high and mighty, she wasn't invincible. Her haggard, disheveled state was proof enough of that. And it was up to Selene to prove that.

The brunette glanced up at Violette with a chuckle. "Do you always talk so damn much?"

Snarling, Violette reached down, grabbing a hold of Selene's hair. She pulled up at it hard, dragging Selene onto her knees with a jerk that put such pressure on Selene's scalp it caused a groan to escape her. Rising higher, Selene felt the world around her blur and teeter uneasily. But when she looked ahead of her, she still saw Violette looming, her hand drawn back, ready to connect with a slap across her cheek.

A slap. Cute, she told herself. Almost too trite. The corners of her mouth turned up into a smirk at the thought of it. Violette was here wanting to put her in her place, and she was going to slap her.

No. Selene had bigger things in mind.

Suddenly, Selene lunged forward, throwing herself inward toward Violette. The sheer force with which she moved tore a clump of hair from her scalp, leaving it behind in Violette's grip, but that didn't matter - unlike some people, Selene didn't put her hair above her success. Violette's jaw dropped open in a gasp, but she didn't have time to get out of the way before Selene's skull rammed straight into her forehead.

A loud THUNK rang out. Violette shrieked as her vision blurred, and a buzzing white numbness pulsed through her head. She lifted her hands to her temples, but by then, Selene had already pulled her head back to ram it once again into Violette's skull.

Another THUNK. This time, Violette didn't scream - it was more of something between a gurgle and a gasp. When Selene leaned back, she could see her handiwork. Violette teetered on her knees in a daze. Her jaw hung slack, and her eyes stared out with a glazed-over stare. For the blonde, the world had fallen into a haze; she could hardly make out what was in front of her. She wouldn't see the way Selene's smile only grew wider as she looked Violette in the eye.

"Guess what?" she hissed. "This isn't a beauty pageant. It's a fight. And I won."

It was almost a pity that Violette wouldn't be lucid enough to appreciate what Selene had said, she thought to herself. But the victory was too satisfying all the same. With one last backward motion of her head, Selene pulled away from Violette - and then, she rammed it forward in one last hard THUNK.

Violette's eyes fluttered, then rolled back into her head. At last, the slack set into her body. Her head rolled back over her shoulder, and her shoulders slumped heavy. She began to sag backward before her weight finally gave out, and she fell to her back, her legs splayed around her in a heap.

Violette was down. The referee leaned in to check her for signs of life, but Selene could already see that she wasn't moving from where she'd landed. And already, the grin of a job well done had spread across her face. She pushed herself back up to her feet, standing as tall as her small frame would allow. And even before the bell rang, the crowd had already burst into cheers for her victory.

Selene took one step forward, standing over Violette. She leaned over her, looking her right in the glazed-over eyes. She gave a slap across Violette's cheek - the blonde didn't stir, but that didn't matter. It was one last parting show of disrespect - what showed Violette just what she deserved.

"I'm taking this," Selene said then, reaching lower to grab the band of Violette's bikini top. With a sharp RIP she pulled it back, tearing it straight off the blonde's chest. She left her laying there, dazed and bare-breasted on the mat, as she turned back to her bench, waving Violette's top over her head like a flag. And with every step she took, her fans were cheering her all the while.

France had found its champions for the World Cup. And Selene would be leading the charge.

[🍷 𝗔𝘀𝗵𝘁𝗼𝗻 𝟳𝗖 🍷]

was fun

[Rocko23]

This was superb. Liked the backstory and the fight- and can't wait to see Japan vs France. Will Selene win lol?!

[Zach4444]

Very hot backstory! I'm looking forward to learning about Japan now.

[Astrakhan]

Yumi

"Alright, girls. I think that'll be it for today."

Yumi Sato looked over the blue mats spread over the gym floor. The sky beyond the windows of the gym was dark, and the only sound came from the faint buzz of the overhead lights and the huff of haggard breaths. The gym was empty, save for her and her teammates - Team Japan in the College Catfighting World Cup, representing Ochanomizu University. No one else was going to be using the gym this late.

Some might've called it excessive if they were training at this hour. But if you asked Yumi, that was what passion looked like. It was the least she could do when her team would be taking on France in the semifinals the next day. She had made a name for herself as team captain through her careful discipline and her devotion toward excellence in the sport, and she wasn't going to let her teammates get away with anything less.

That was how Yumi found herself where she was now. Crouched on her knees on the gym mats, wiping sweat from her brow, but still feeling all the excitement from the sparring session she'd just been through. Her heart was still pounding. She still felt the metallic tang in her mouth. And she loved every second of it.

"Jeez, Yumi. You think that was enough?"

Across the mat, Sayaka Kotsuji lifted her t-shirt to wipe the sweat off her face. The team had gathered for their sparring session in workout attire rather than the bikinis that characterized collegiate catfighting. There was more than aesthetics at play behind why bikinis had been adopted as the uniform for catfighting - when clawing and scratching to inflict pain formed such an important cornerstone of the fighting style, maximizing the amount of bare and sensitive skin available to attack encouraged traditional tactics. It was for the same reason that sparring was often done in more modest attire; clothes formed more of a barrier between skin and claws, which allowed for fighters to spar without risking leaving painful welts that could impede their performance on the day of the fight. Even still, Sayaka winced when she reached down to rub at a scratch on her thigh. Yumi found a way to make it hurt regardless.

At 19, Sayaka was one year below Yumi, but she shared her passion for fighting - and her toned physique and golden-brown tan spoke to how she had trained, taking on long sessions in the gym and jogging around the streets of Tokyo to build endurance. She stood at 5'5, with a lean build and a B-cup bust, and her black hair was tied into a long ponytail, just as she kept it on match days. On the mats, Sayaka was all aggression - her strategy was to come out swinging, and not give her opponents any time to catch their breath between blows. She wouldn't let them think about what to do to fight back if she already had her fingers locked in her hair seconds from the bell.

Yumi could appreciate that sort of dedication. But even Sayaka's dedication, it seemed, was going to rub up against her strict standards for training.

"Look," Yumi muttered, shifting her weight back into a seated position as she folded her arms before her. "We're headed for the semifinals. Us, France, China, and America - they're the last four teams left, out of the 24 we started with. That's a lot of opponents, and the French girls have beaten everyone in their way so far. So we need to make sure we're better than them."

"Ughh," Sayaka groaned, looking away. "I know, I know. You've only told us this like twenty times. But you know I'm not going to fight as well tomorrow if I'm sore today."

"Skill issue," chirped the other member of the team - Natsuki Ichimura. Two sets of eyes turned toward her then. The 18-year-old freshman was one of the youngest fighters in the tournament, and had made waves in the press as a veritable wunderkind who showed potential well beyond her years. You wouldn't have been able to tell just by looking at her, though.

At 5'1, with wiry limbs and an A-cup bosom, Natsuki was also one of the smallest in the tournament, and the cheerful grin that never seemed to fall from her face wasn't that of a seasoned fighter. Her messy hair hung past her shoulders, and she had a habit of dyeing it different colors every few weeks - currently, it was a vivid green. Her tactics were just as unconventional as her appearance. Natsuki had built her strategy around eluding and outlasting her opponents. She didn't hit particularly hard, and she wasn't especially vicious, but she was quick on her feet, and she wasn't afraid to use her unassuming looks to lull her opponents into a false sense of security. Yumi had her doubts when she'd first met her - but she had made the varsity team for a reason.

"I'm sorry," Sayaka interjected, "what did you just say?"

Natsuki met that with a giggle, falling to her back with her hands behind her head. "Not gonna repeat myself. Maybe check your hearing aid?"

"I'm going to kill you," Sayaka grumbled.

"No, you won't," said Yumi, rising then to her feet. "We still need you for tomorrow. Both of you."

"She's right, y'know," Natsuki retorted. "Save the killing for the Frenchies. I'm too young and too cute to die."

Sayaka let out a long sigh. There were several things she wanted to say right now, but she couldn't imagine what the first one of those things should be, nor if this as the right time to say it. At last, though, she turned to face Yumi. "You get what I mean, though, right? We need time to rest before the big night."

Yumi nodded her head, her gaze on Sayaka never wavering. "Yeah, I know," she said. "Which is why we train hard the night before, and spend the day of the match resting. Keeps the body relaxed and the mind cleared."

"Your dad teach you that?" Natsuki asked.

Yumi nodded. "Sure did."

"Figured," said Natsuki. "Sounded like old-school philosophy crap." She giggled at her own joke, causing Sayaka to groan.

Yumi let out a sigh, too. But she kept her stance firm, her arms crossed and her back straight. "Some of that old-school philosophy crap came about for a reason," she explained. "My father had a point."

Compared to Natsuki, Yumi seemed like she belonged on a different team entirely. Their contrasts went beyond their builds - while Natsuki was short and straight-cut, Yumi was a statuesque girl, standing at 5'8 and with generous curves from her E-cup chest to her plump thighs. With her pale skin and her silky jet-black hair that hung in a straight curtain to the small of her back, Yumi Sato looked all the world like the picture of the Yamato nadeshiko - the ideal of Japanese beauty; raven-haired, demure, stoic, and composed. That spoke to her style, too. Yumi was renowned for her quick reaction time and her keen sense of transitions, able to strike without warning and without giving her opponents any tells to latch onto. And her background in jiu-jitsu had allowed her to train a hybrid style, incorporating traditional holds, grapples, and joint locks in with the typical slapping and hair-pulling.

She was the country's perfect poster girl, Yumi thought to herself. A practitioner of a traditional martial art who embodied the philosophies of Japan's most esteemed thinkers - to keep a straight face and to hit hard while keeping her emotions close to her chest.

If only they knew, she thought.

Clearing her throat, Yumi stood straighter. "Well," she cut in wryly, "if you're that concerned with not getting enough rest, I'm not going to stop you from getting back to your dorms. We've got a big day ahead of us."

Sayaka yawned. Natsuki jumped up with a nod that left her teammates looking at her with bewilderment about how she was able to conserve her energy so well. "If we win this one, I'm taking you all out for ramen, okay?" she chirped.

"I guess that's one benefit to being on our home turf for this match," Sayaka muttered, rolling out her shoulders. "I still have nightmares about the food back in Sweden."

Sayaka hobbled stiffly toward the door. Natsuki fell at her side, holding her fist high with a spring in her step that shouldn't have been possible at this hour. And even as they made their exit, Yumi hung back, watching from the mats. She was lost in her thoughts.

Yumi had long suspected that her selection for the World Cup had been a political move. Sure, in theory Ochanomizu had qualified the same way every other country's team had qualified - they'd come out on top in the national-level tournament before going on to worlds. But it seemed almost too perfect that of the varsity-level teams, it was the most traditional, the most Japanese team that had earned the chance to represent Japan.

After all, Japan had a good reason for taking such drastic measures. The island nation had been a hub of catfighting culture in the years before the adoption of catfighting as a spectator sport. When other countries were still grappling with outdated perceptions of feminine combat as a silly fetish, Japan had decided to embrace its connections with the industry and promote the new sport with pride. Catfighting, it boasted, was the new martial art, one that would stand alongside karate and judo.

Japan had already won the World Cup two times. And last year, they'd come close to winning it a third time, until their upset defeat by Team Pakistan in the finals had made the headlines. While Pakistanis celebrated their team's first-ever victory, Japanese news sources had lamented it as a humiliating defeat at the hands of a historically underperforming country.

With that in mind, Yumi had to ask herself if some strings had been pulled backstage. Did they put her up against less promising teams in the qualifiers in the name of pushing Ochanomizu to the top - all so that they could save face by having a national icon with a face for PR win the tournament and avenge their loss?

If so, it would hardly be the first time she'd had to play the part of someone she wasn't.

---

Yumi's father had been a jiu-jitsu champion in his day, and though he had long since retired after settling down, he'd opened up a prestigious dojo in Tokyo. And because of that, Yumi had practically been raised alongside his students. She'd trained the same moves - even sparred with some of them. All the while, her father had worked to instill her with mental and emotional discipline. Martial arts, as he saw it, were about more than fighting. They were a way of life - total control over one's own body and mind. And Yumi had been brought up knowing that, just as much as she knew takedowns and wristlocks.

That philosophy had been drilled into every moment of her life. Yumi had to exemplify her family's traditional values. She had to be proper, straight-laced, and obedient. She couldn't get too emotional, or else it was a shame on her family to carry the burden of someone so uncouth. Her family was a well-esteemed and upper-class one, and anything too scandalous would dishonor their name.

Her mother, too, had instilled her with the right habits. She had to be well-read and educated, and she had to take her studies seriously. She couldn't talk back. She had to show deference to her elders. When she was young, Yumi had accepted it - after all, that was just how the world worked.

When she began to grow older, it was different. She saw her friends laughing and going out to cafes, sipping bubble tea while she had her nose in a book studying for a test that was a week away. There were other people in this world, she knew - people who didn't live like this; people who had lives and passions. But she had always been taught that they weren't doing things right. That they were worthy of being looked down on. And yet, Yumi couldn't help but wonder what that life was like - were they happier?

Even if she wondered from time to time, it wasn't enough to change the course of Yumi's life. After all, her way of life seemed to be working out well enough for her. By her final year of high school, she had been named class representative in the student council. She had blossomed into a beauty who all the boys yearned for, and who all the girls wanted to be. Her family's fortune and prestige was a point of pride, and it had elevated her status among the ranks of the student body. She achieved perfect scores on her tests, and everyone believed she was on track to get accepted into a prestigious university. And all that success, she thought, was owed to how disciplined she had been raised.

It was that last year, when she was 18, that Yumi first discovered what a catfight was.

Shoya. It had all started with Shoya.

Shoya had been a boy in her class. A boy who Yumi hadn't paid much heed to before, but, after coming back from summer vacation, she suddenly found herself fascinated by. It was a sensation she wasn't familiar with - she'd pushed all of those personal feelings aside so that she could put the whole of her heart into what really mattered. Into her studies; into her personal advancements. She didn't have the time to speak to anyone as a peer when she was too used to thinking of herself as someone above them. But Shoya was different. And when he looked in her direction - suddenly, Yumi felt like she was being seen.

Maybe, she thought, after closing herself off from the world for so long, her heart just couldn't take it any more. Maybe she just needed someone. Maybe it could've been any boy, and she just gravitated toward the one who sat behind her in class. But all of a sudden, Yumi couldn't stop thinking of him, more than anyone else.

Of course, that wasn't to be. Shoya was taken. Everyone knew that. He was dating Seiko Moriya - that soft-spoken girl with the shoulder-length brown hair who sat toward the back of the class. Yumi knew that. But she didn't understand it. Seiko's family wasn't wealthy. She wasn't successful. She wasn't prestigious like her. Why would Shoya want to settle for her? Why, when he could do so much better?

But then, Yumi was Yumi. She was the queen of the class. She could have whatever she wanted. She just needed to convince Shoya that she was the one who was really worth his time.

And to do that, she needed to prove she was better than Seiko.

She didn't say a word, but she began to make herself known to Shoya. When he dropped his pen in class, she handed it to him, shooting him a cloying smile as they locked eyes. In gym class, she had to outdo Seiko, keeping ahead of her in sprints and always staying ahead of her time. One day, in the hallway, she drifted close enough to Shoya to let her arm brush up against his, and when he looked back at her, she met his eyes with a grin. And when she looked back at Seiko, she saw her standing behind them, eyes wide in shock, with a glare that narrowed on Yumi as her eyes drifted to her direction.

When Yumi saw that, the corners of her lips crept up into a knowing grin. She still didn't say a word. But she knew Seiko was aware of how Yumi threatened her standing, and that sensation gave her a rush - a feeling of power, of control, that felt almost intoxicating.

She never suspected Seiko would ever strike back. There was no way a shy, timid girl like her was ever going to contest Yumi - the class representative; the one who had outdone her at every turn. So it came as a surprise to Yumi when she found a note in her locker. It was a simple one - Meet me on the roof. After class - without any signature. But Yumi knew exactly who had sent it.

And she met that with a chuckle. Foolish little Seiko, really thinking she could talk her down? Yumi would set that matter straight.

The sun had begun to sink lower in the sky by the time Yumi found herself on the rooftop, surrounded by a chain-link fence. The horizon was bathed in warm, orange hues, broken by the distant clouds turned dark against the sun. It was quiet - everyone had gone home at this point. And it was just Yumi, leaning back against the fence, as she waited for Seiko to arrive.

She hadn't gone home or changed out of her school uniform - a navy blue sailor blouse tied with a red neckerchief, and a skirt that fluttered in the breeze just shy of her thigh-high black stockings. As a matter of fact, her heart was pumping faster in her chest at the thought of confronting Seiko face to face.

The girl had been a distant presence for so long, but Yumi knew just how much she made Seiko's skin crawl. It was an exciting feeling to hold that sort of power over others - to influence their thoughts just by being there. Now, to see that on her face? To have Seiko in front of her, and to watch the confidence melt away as she realized how hopelessly outmatched she really was? The notion was a tantalizing one.

At last, the door to the rooftop swung open. Yumi lifted her head to the sound, and a smirk crossed her face. Seiko stepped forward, onto the rooftop. She was dressed in the same uniform Yumi was - the only difference was her white knee-length stockings, and brown loafers to Yumi's black. She hadn't wasted any time in coming here either. Impressive, Yumi thought to herself. Knowing Seiko, she wouldn't have been surprised if she chickened out. But no. Seiko had bought front-row seats to her own humiliation.

"You made it," Yumi purred, her lips twisting into a foxish grin as she stared straight through her rival. "Something on your mind?"

Seiko stood stock-still, glaring back at Yumi. "I'm only going to say this once," she said - in a voice that made Yumi's eyebrow raise. Instead of the meek, wavering voice Yumi was expecting, Seiko's threat was curt and stoic. "Stay away from my boyfriend."

Yumi was intrigued - such a defiance was a side of Seiko she never thought she'd see. Nevertheless, she stepped off the fence, taking a step closer to Seiko and crossing her arms under her generous chest. "Oh, really? What makes you think I should do that?"

Seiko's jaw dropped open in a gasp at the raw nerve she was hearing in Yumi's voice. "Don't play dumb!" she barked. "I know you. I've seen the way you look at him! You think that just because you're richer than me, and more popular than me, that you can just take whatever you want? Is that it?"

Yumi didn't think she'd ever heard such fervor in Seiko's voice. But in spite of her rival's defiance, she didn't back down - no, if anything, this only left her all the more intrigued. Was she truly so threatening - so commanding a force in Seiko's life - that she was capable of bringing such a change out of her? That was a feeling that made her feel more powerful than any academic honors, or any training at her father's dojo, ever had.

"I don't think you understand," Yumi continued. "You think this is about me?" She shook her head. "Oh, Sei-chan. Did you really think he would stoop to such a level? Let's face it, you don't have much to offer anyone. You think he'd rather give you the time of day, when he could have me?"

"Shut UP!" Seiko's furious voice split the calm air, her fists balling tight at her sides. "He wouldn't even pay any attention to you if you didn't shove those fat tits in his face all the time!"

"Oh, how vulgar," Yumi chuckled mockingly. "You think Shoya wants a girl with a mouth like that? If you couldn't keep him in check, I think that's your problem."

Seiko's eyes narrowed into a deathly glare, and her teeth clenched in a grimace. "You bitch."

The smile on Yumi's face never broke. "Now, tell me, is there anything you're going to do here, or-"

Yumi didn't get a chance to finish that statement. In those few seconds, Seiko's palm flew through the air. Her slap connected across Yumi's cheek with a SMACK that resounded across the rooftop. A white-hot flash of pain shot through Yumi's face, and her jaw dropped in a gasp as she held a hand to her reddening cheek.

"You...hit me. You actually hit me."

As soon as the blow hit, Seiko jerked her hand closer. Her own eyes went wide. Had she actually hit her? She was just as shocked as Yumi had been. She had just come up here to talk, and she never expected things to escalate this far. For her anger to get the better of her. The world around her fell away into a drone of white noise.

It felt like an eternity, in those few short seconds, before Yumi spoke again. "Do you think Shoya would ever want a brute like you?"

That was all Seiko needed. In an instant, all her anger was reawakened. Her eyes narrowed, and her teeth were locked in a snarl. She lunged, suddenly, her fists jutting outward to grab two handfuls of Yumi's raven hair before she cranked back hard at her head.

As Seiko's weight fell against her, Yumi let out a pained squeal. "Abazure!" she cried. But her instincts kicked in. If Seiko wanted a fight, she'd get a fight. Bringing up her palm, she planted it against the brunette's face, shoving her away.

The two girls staggered back from each other, panting for breath. Yumi straightened the front of her blouse before her eyes narrowed on Seiko. "What's your problem!?" she barked. "Do you even know that my father's a jiu-jitsu champ?"

But Seiko wouldn't even dignify that with a response. She threw another hard slap clear across Yumi's face, this one making her stagger back another step. This time, Seiko didn't falter. She charged right after Yumi as she stumbled, throwing her shoulder against the raven-haired girl. Driven by the force of the blow, Yumi was pushed back up against the fence, the cold links of the metal pressing against her skin through the fabric of her blouse.

"Get off me!" Yumi cried. She grabbed for Seiko's hair with both hands, twisting her fingers deep into the roots. In response, Seiko latched onto Yumi's raven tresses. Hissing and groaning through clenched teeth, the two of them ripped at each other's scalps. It was Yumi who took the edge, twisting back hard on Seiko's hair as she tried to bend the girl backward. Her chest and shoulders battered against Seiko's own, forcing her to stumble back.

"I hate you!" Seiko cried out. "I've always hated you! Ever since this class started - you just act like you're better than everyone!" Her voice was choked with all the pent-up rage she had bottled inside of her up to this point - only now could all that rage come erupting to the surface.

"I'm not the one who started this!" Yumi shot back.

"Uwaki-onna! You're the one who couldn't keep your hands to yourself!"

Letting go of Yumi's hair with one hand, Seiko threw a slap against her rival's side, landing with a thud. She kicked up her knee, driving it again and again into Yumi's thigh. The raven-haired girl winced, her knees knocking as she sank lower against the blow. Then, Seiko drove her free hand against Yumi's sternum, shoving herself away.

The two girls drifted apart, but neither released the grip they held on each other's hair. The force they exerted on each other's scalps only caused them to bend forward, leaning in closer to one another. There they stood bent over horizontally at the waist - Yumi with two fists balled in Seiko's hair; Seiko with one fist in Yumi's. Groaning and gagging, they yanked each other's heads back and forth.

"Dirty cur!" Yumi snarled.

"Cheating slut!" Seiko shot back.

The deadlock would be broken when Seiko's free hand grabbed for Yumi's neckerchief, pulling it tighter around her throat. She jerked the raven-haired girl a step closer, narrowing the gap between their scowling, contorted faces. Yumi wheezed from the pressure closing in on her neck - but her hands would shoot to Seiko's shoulders, grabbing hold of them before she bent at the knees and lunged forward to tackle Seiko to the ground.

The two of them landed with a thump and a gasp against the concrete rooftop. Seiko's back hit the ground, her legs kicking in the air with enough force to throw the loafers from her feet and send them sailing across the rooftop. But in an instant, those same legs were thrown around Yumi's, their thighs grappling like pythons as they tried to ensnare one another. Again they grabbed each other's hair, going rolling across the concrete. At every turn their legs kicked and twisted, their skirts riding up around their pale thighs. With a sharp buck of her hips, Seiko managed to flip Yumi over. The raven-haired girl's leg jerked upward with a jolt as she landed on her back, kicking one of her own shoes off.

"Let go of my hair!" Seiko shrieked. Her hands flew to Yumi's wrists where her fingers were entangled in her brown locks. The two girls fought a desperate tug-of-war - Yumi grabbing Seiko's hair, Seiko grabbing Yumi's wrists, and all the while their hips ground and their legs writhed as Seiko desperately struggled for balance atop her wriggling, kicking foe. At last, though, Seiko was able to twist Yumi's grip free of her hair, shoving her wrists to the ground to pin them in place.

For a time, they lay there, their chests heaving with every breath they took. Seiko shook some stray strands of hair from her face, looking down at Yumi with a glare. "Say you're sorry!" she barked. "Say you'll never touch him again!"

"You think this is over, baka?" Yumi shot back. "You don't know who you're dealing with!" With an arch of her back, Yumi broke her legs free from Seiko's embrace. Then she threw them higher, encircling the brunette's waist. Her jiu-jitsu training had told her all about the right application of force to control a situation, even from down on her back - in fact, that was where she was perhaps the most dangerous.

"Manko!" Seiko squealed as she was tipped over onto her side. Yumi's thighs tensed, causing her skirt to ride dangerously high around her hips, and contorting Seiko's sides in her grip. With another twist of Yumi's hips, the raven-haired girl took control, rolling Seiko onto her back with the sound of a wheeze.

"Submit!" Yumi cried. She jerked her hands free from Seiko's grip, attempting to pin down her shoulders. But the brunette proved quicker. Just then, Seiko grabbed for the collar of Yumi's blouse with one hand and pulled downward, causing the fabric to pull taut against her neck. With her other hand, she clawed at Yumi's face, her nails scouring her rival's cheeks!

Yumi screamed in pain from the sensation of Seiko's claws digging into her skin. She twisted and turned, grabbing for the wrist attached to that grasping hand to try and pull it off of her. "Let go!"

"Never, slut!" Seiko's wrist spasmed against Yumi's grip, her fingers still grasping and gouging at Yumi's face. With her hips jerking and twisting against Yumi's entangling legs, she threw her weight over, sending the two girls toppling onto their sides once again. In the process, her fingers dug deeper into the fabric of Yumi's blouse, twisting at it. Still wailing in pain, Yumi tried to pull herself away from Seiko, but at the same time, Seiko pulled back with all her might. At last, with the sound of a loud RIIIIIIIP, the fabric came loose. Yumi's blouse split open, revealing her ample cleavage and the black bra trimmed in delicate lace that sheathed her bosom.

Yumi let out a gasp, jumping back from Seiko. She threw an arm across her chest to cover herself as her face flushed red. "My uniform! You ruined my uniform!"

"Is that all you care about, you stuck-up bitch?" Seiko shot back. She scrambled up onto her hands and knees. Her face was still slick with sweat, and her shoulders heaved up and down with each inhale and exhale, but when she fixed a glare on Yumi, it was a glare that pierced straight through her. "You're all the same! All talk, and nothing to back it up!"

Any embarrassment Yumi might have felt swiftly turned to fury as she heard Seiko's taunts. Pushing herself back onto her knees, she leaned in closer to her, her brows narrowed and her teeth bared in a snarl. "You're going to regret saying that," she hissed - just before she lunged.

Yumi raised her hands and threw herself forward, prepared to tackle Seiko. But Seiko met her head-on, her hands flying to grab for Yumi's own. Their chests pressed together in a deadlock as their fingers entwined in an ironclad grip, both of them rising on their knees, trying to push and shove at one another. Yumi released one of Seiko's hands to grab for her hair, pulling back hard at her scalp. That made Seiko squeal out in pain, and her grip eased just long enough for Yumi to tear her other hand free, taking a fistful of Seiko's hair in the other hand.

But that also left Seiko's hands free, and she was going to put them to good use. She swept out a slap that cracked across Yumi's cheek, causing her to twist to the side. Seiko hissed as the motion jerked at her hair, but she wouldn't stop. With both hands, she grabbed for the dangling side of Yumi's torn blouse, pulling it hard toward her. The raven-haired girl's balance teetered and she fell forward, just as Seiko yanked harder. A long, loud riiiiiip split the air as another tear ran up the seam of Yumi's blouse. The remains of the garment peeled away from Yumi's torso and slithered down her arm, coming away in Seiko's grasp.

The two girls broke away from each other as Seiko tossed what was left of Yumi's blouse to the concrete beneath them. Now with her bra fully exposed to the cool air, Yumi shot a piercing glare back at Seiko, her teeth clenched in a snarl. "You'll pay for that," she hissed, lunging again for Seiko. Once again, though, the brunette caught her in mid-charge, grabbing hold of Yumi's biceps as she came near.

"I will?" Seiko teased. "I thought daddy's money would be enough for you."

With her one shod foot, Yumi pushed up off the ground, lifting the two girls to their feet. Seiko grabbed for Yumi's hair with one hand as they rose to an unsteady footing, her other hand throwing a slap across her rival's bare waist. But if Seiko was focused on dealing out as much pain as possible, Yumi was going to get even. She took the hem of Seiko's blouse and pulled. With one tug, she dragged Seiko a step closer. With the next, the fabric began to stretch, the seams and fibers popping. And with a third, the blouse at last split up the side with a RIIIIP. The fabric fluttered to the ground, leaving Seiko in a simple white bra.

"You-!" The brunette hissed. Her cheeks flushed red for only a brief moment, from rage as much as from embarrassment. She released Yumi's hair, only to throw a slap straight across her rival's face. As Yumi went staggering to the side, Seiko grabbed her skirt and yanked, sending another riiip up along the side. It tore free just as Yumi fell to the ground in nothing but her bra, panties, and stockings, her last remaining shoe skidding across the rooftop.

Roaring in a battle cry, Seiko lunged, throwing herself down on top of Yumi. Their sweaty skin met with a wet slap, and their arms and legs kicked into a frenzy, once again going rolling. Yumi wasted no time in digging her fingers into the waistband of Seiko's skirt and pulling downward, yanking it around the brunette's thighs. But Seiko was already going after Yumi's bared, sensitive flesh. With one hand, she dug her nails deep into Yumi's back; with the other, she smacked and slapped along her thighs.

Yumi howled from the pain, but she would respond in kind, scoring her nails down along the brunette's side. Any strategic thought or eye to elegance had fallen away - now, there was only a raw, bestial frenzy; the smell of sweat and the heat of bodies in motion. She knew one thing, and only one thing: she couldn't lose to Seiko.

One hand smacked Seiko across her ass, Yumi's palm coming down against her skin through the thin fabric of her white panties. Seiko's body twisted and writhed against Yumi's own; as her legs tossed and turned she wriggled her skirt down her legs until she kicked it free completely. Screaming in a rage, Seiko's nails clawed at whatever bare skin she could find - along Yumi's arms, her back, and across her belly. All the while, the two girls tossed their weight from one side to the other, rolling across the rooftop. Neither one of them could stay on top for long, lost in a frenzy of frantic kicking, tangling limbs.

Seiko's hips bucked against Yumi's as she locked her legs around the raven-haired girl's knee. She reached behind her rival's head, her fingers digging into her black hair and pulling hard with both hands. But even as Yumi howled from the pain piercing through her scalp, and the rough concrete scratching against her bare skin as the two of them fell onto their sides, the burning passion wouldn't be silenced. She had to win this - she had to prove to Seiko she was better than her! In the midst of that fervor, Yumi lunged inward and bit down on Seiko's shoulder, digging her teeth into her skin!

Seiko screamed, her head reeling backward as pain erupted through her body. "Stop! Get off! GET OFF!" she wailed. In a desperate frenzy to survive, her hands grasped Yumi's shoulders, and she shoved as hard as she could in an effort to force the raven-haired girl away from her. But Yumi would only grab Seiko's hair, twisting her head back and forth from the pressure on her scalp!

Seiko soon followed suit - digging her nails into Yumi's bare shoulder with one hand; clutching her hair in a desperate grasp with the other. With their bodies pressing tight against each other, they half-pushed, half-pulled each other up onto their knees. They never left close quarters. Their bodies pressed and massaged against each other with every push and pull they exerted; every roll of their hips and and every jerk of their shoulders. Their skin stuck together wherever it touched from the sweat that covered both of their bodies - but it wasn't going to stop either of them down.

Yumi released one hand from Seiko's hair and swung it across her cheek, connecting a backhand that caused her to turn to the side with a gasp. Only seconds later, though, Seiko glared back at her. She balled a fist and swung a jab straight into Yumi's ample breast, the soft flesh mushrooming against the force. "Fat cow!" she barked.

Yumi's teeth clenched in a grimace as she reeled backward from the strike. But she wasn't going to let this stop her. She had set out to prove she was better than Seiko - that she could get whatever she wanted from her. If Seiko was outperforming her, that was a mark against all Yumi held herself to be. And she wouldn't have that! She lunged then - and swung her head straight down in an arc, slamming her forehead against Seiko's nose!

At once, a numbing pain exploded through the brunette's head. She was forced to let go of Yumi, falling to her back and clutching her face. She writhed aimlessly on her back, twisting and turning - and that left Yumi with an opening she wasn't about to pass up.

Yumi pounced, following through on the momentum. She lunged on top of Seiko, drawing a squeal from the girl's lungs as Yumi suddenly fell on top of her. Seiko reached up, her nails raking at Yumi's back, but even in her frenzied state, Yumi could tell that her strength was beginning to slip away - she wasn't gripping as hard, or moving as quickly. And that thought was one that brought a smile to Yumi's face. At last, everything she knew about herself was coming true.

With a shuffle of her hips, Yumi slid into place, her body gliding across Seiko's own. She could feel her opponent's stomach flattened under her hips. Behind them, Seiko's legs kicked up and tangled around Yumi's in another effort to try and overpower her, but nothing would slow the raven-haired girl down. Seiko's teeth clenched in a frustrated grimace. She had to do something!

As Yumi came crawling closer, Seiko's hand shot up to grab at the strap of Yumi's black bra. She pulled, the fabric going taut against Yumi's skin; the delicate lace digging into her flesh. Snarling against the strain, Yumi's teeth snapped at the air. With her other hand, Seiko reached up and grabbed for her hair, twisting a handful of it to try and yank her head to the side!

"You...whore-!" Yumi spat, her eyes piercing through Seiko with a smoldering glower.

"Go to hell!" Seiko shot back. Her hand twisted even tighter around Yumi's bra strap, tangling it in her grasp. Guided by the tension, Yumi fell forward, her body falling down on top of Seiko's own. But just as quickly, she planted a hand against the concrete to try and push herself back up. And then, she shoved her free hand straight down into Seiko's face, her nails raking across her eyes!

A shrill shriek split the air then. Seiko abruptly released Yumi's hair and bra, her hands shooting down to try and shield her face. But that wouldn't stop Yumi from pressing her weight down over Seiko's. Their bodies met in a tight stack of skin against skin, Yumi's chest flattening Seiko's more modest bust as her forehead grazed her rival's. Their faces hovered mere millimeters from one another - enough for Yumi to feel the warmth of Seiko's haggard breaths against her face; enough for the dangling strands of hair from Yumi's scalp to tickle Seiko's cheeks. And their eyes were locked, never so much as glancing aside.

"Say it," Yumi huffed in between pants. "Say I won. Say I beat you!"

Seiko shook her head. "Kusoama!"

But Yumi's teeth ground tighter in a grimace - she hadn't fought this hard to take no for an answer. Her hands shot again for Seiko's brown hair, taking a handful in each and twisting it as hard as she could. Seiko screamed. She tried to twist and turn and buck - but Yumi held the position through it all. She didn't budge.

And that made Yumi's smile grow even wider. She knew then that she had won.

But that wasn't enough for her. She needed Seiko to tell her that.

"Say it!" Yumi roared again. She dug her fingers even deeper into the roots of Seiko's hair, ripping a few strands loose. Seiko's screams grew even higher. Her face was contorted in pain, and tears ran down her cheeks. At last, she couldn't take it any more.

"FINE! YOU WON!" she cried.

"That's more like it," Yumi hissed, shoving Seiko back down. She rolled to her side, off of her rival.

Seiko was left right where she had fallen, burying her face in her hands and sobbing. And, at that moment, Yumi rose onto her hands and knees. Her shoulders rose and fell with haggard huffs. She looked all around her - at the deeper shades of red and orange crossing the early evening skies; at the grounds of the school below that had been buzzing with activity that morning, but now sat starkly dead and silent.

And she and Seiko were there in the middle. On the rooftop. Both of them panting, both of them reduced to their underwear amidst scattered clumps of hair and scraps of their shredded uniforms. Yumi could feel the coolness of the air tickling across her bare flesh, and the sting of the welts Seiko's nails had left on her body was just now starting to tingle over her skin as the adrenaline died down. But in spite of it all, the grin never fell from Yumi's face.

After all, she'd won. No amount of sparring in the dojo quite compared to the sensation she had just felt. And no amount of victories in jiu-jitsu tournaments quite reached the highs she felt now.

---

The two girls never spoke a word to each other again. But even still, the word got out.

It was bound to when they showed up to school the next day with scratch marks on their faces. When Seiko's sister found the ruined school uniform in the trash when emptying the garbage the next day. When the other students found clumps of black and brown hair scattered around the rooftop.

Yumi and Seiko didn't intend to share the story with anyone. Their business was settled, and they kept their distance from then on. But it was inevitable that their friends would have questions. And when they explained the story, those friends told their friends, who told their friends. Soon, everyone knew what had happened.

Everyone, including Yumi's father.

Mr. Sato was furious. He had seen the martial arts as a way to cultivate the mind as well as the body; to train patience and observation and strength of will. And here, his daughter - his star pupil; the heiress to the dojo - she had been the one scrapping with another girl like they were stray dogs in the gutter.

In the world of martial arts - a world steeped in tradition - old habits died hard. Japan might have been on the cutting edge in industry and technology, but socially, the old ways still reigned supreme. And the Sato family name was blemished by the knowledge that their daughter had lost control, and given in to her aggression.

Yumi was forbidden from taking part in classes at the dojo. At school, even the classmates who had respected her and looked up to her didn't want to talk to her. She was quietly stripped of her position on the student council. The next time she ran into Shoya in the hallway, the boy said nothing - he just looked at her in disgust and stormed away. Seiko, she knew, had told him everything about what happened. When he looked at Yumi now, all he saw was a cruel, merciless, bloodthirsty monster.

But none of that mattered to Yumi. She didn't care about what they thought. She didn't even care about Shoya any more.

That fight on the rooftop had taught her something. It taught her what a catfight truly was. And it excited her far more than anything else in her life ever could.

She'd think back on that fight, late at night in her bed. About the way their limbs had tangled; the weight of her body against Seiko's. Her heart pounded faster in her chest at how she had fought with all of her passions, whipping herself in a brutal frenzy. And at the end of it all came her dominating her rival - pressing down against her body, staring her dead in the face, listening to her cry. In that moment, Yumi meant something to Seiko. She commanded every second of her attention. She had earned her respect - her fear.

Yumi had never experienced anything like that before - to have another woman begging her for mercy; to be cowed into submission all because of her. It wasn't anything like the icy composure of jiu-jitsu - catfighting was something more, something rawer, something real. And it made her feel alive.

Just thinking back on that evening sent a tingle up her spine. Her breaths deepened and her heart fluttered. She'd think back on the fight as her fingers caressed the contours of her body, remembering every move and motion; every pain and every triumph - every sensation.

Yumi pulled through the last few months of high school despite all the scowls and sneers. It didn't matter what they thought of her. They didn't know how that fight had been the moment that changed her life.

And when she graduated, that meant the doors were open to her. When she was accepted to Ochanomizu University, that meant she could make a new life for herself - away from her family; surrounded by people who didn't know her past. She could start over. She could be the person she truly was, without the baggage of how she'd dishonored her family name breathing down her shoulders. And now that she knew what truly made her feel alive - more than any boy, more than anyone's adoration - she could reach out and take it.

When Yumi learned that Ochanomizu University had one of Japan's top-rated catfighting teams, she knew exactly what she was doing with her life.

[Zach4444]

I really enjoyed reading both of these entries on the French and Japanese teams, and their respective captains. I'll definitely be cheering on the Japanese team to make it to the Finals and then to win it all

[Astrakhan]

Taylor

"Taylor? I just wanted to say, I saw your match against Team China. You did great out there, and your mother and I are proud of you. Give us a call back whenever you have the chance. We miss talking to you."

Taylor sighed, looking down at the phone in her hands. She leaned over the side of the bridge, watching the Putah Creek flow by below.

She'd been here for the past hour, alone with her thoughts. The air was cool for this time of year, and the skies were cloudy. But even in better weather, no one else was going to be out at the UC Davis Arboretum at 6 in the morning, especially not when there was an exam next week.

This had started out with an early morning jog - she always went for one first thing, in order to keep up with her cardio. The lessons instilled by her years of track training hadn't left her, and her catfighting coach had emphasized the value of endurance. And maybe, she thought, if she put her body to work, maybe it would clear the unwelcome thoughts in her head.

But even after making a lap around the park, and even with the familiar soreness still lingering in her muscles, Taylor's thoughts hadn't calmed down at all.

She didn't know why she'd listened for the fourth time to that same damn voicemail her father had left her, as though that was somehow going to change anything. She knew that if she really felt bad enough about not calling her parents, she should just dial their number and return their call like they told her to.

Hell, if she really felt that bad, she should've answered last night, when her phone started ringing on the way back to the dorms.

But she didn't do that then. Just like why she didn't do that now. Just like why she found her feet rooted to the bridge, right where she stood, staring down at the water for the last ten minutes straight.

She wanted to tell herself it was that she was too tired from the run and needed to catch her breath, or that she was mentally going through her notes from her economics lecture. But no matter what excuses Taylor wanted to make, she knew the real reason why she was staying here, doing nothing. Because she didn't feel like moving.

Some days, honestly, she didn't feel like doing anything.

It didn't always make sense. It didn't have to make sense. That was just what happened, some times. But if there was ever a time for Taylor to feel this depressed, it definitely wasn't now.

Not even 24 hours ago, she had led her team to victory against Team China in the semifinals of the College Catfighting World Cup. It had been a close match - even now, thinking about it, she winced as the phantom pain of Lin's nails against her breasts came back to her. She rubbed where the red welts still crossed her skin - faded now, but it would still be a day or two until they were fully gone. But in the end, she had narrowly pulled out a victory. And it was because of that success that the UC Davis varsity catfighting team had earned its spot in the World Cup finals - the chance to prove they were the best in the world.

She should've been happy. She should've been thrilled. She should've seen that this was proof that her struggles weren't in vain - that all the trials and tribulations it had taken to get her here were worth something. That there was a vindication for all the doubts she'd had.

But then, that only made it all the more frustrating as to why she didn't feel that relief now. Why now, when she had so much in life to be proud of, was she not feeling any of it?

Taylor shook herself. She couldn't just stand here and think about these things. If she wanted those nagging thoughts to stop, she had to actually take that action. At the very least, if she opened up to her parents about the feelings she was having - maybe that would help set things straight.

She opened up the list of contacts. She started scrolling through names and numbers. But then, she stopped, staring down at one name that caught her eye. Emily Torres.

Taylor blinked a few times, trying to remember why she had the contact information for the team captain from Washington and Lee University in Virginia - the same team captain she had faced off against in the final round of the United States Nationals three months earlier. In all the time since she'd met Emily, they hadn't spoken since match day. Taylor had forgotten the very fact she had her number saved at all.

But, in thinking about it, she remembered what had been feeding the depression that was bogging her down right here and now.

Taylor sucked in a deep breath as she pushed herself back from the bridge. Maybe her parents weren't the people she needed to talk to right now.

She pressed the button. The ringtone blared four times - just long enough for Taylor to briefly consider whether or not Emily would actually pick up at all, before her voice came through the other end.

"Yo, Tay! 'sup? Never thought you'd call back."

Taylor sucked in a breath before she continued. "I just...needed someone to talk to, right now. This isn't a bad time, is it?"

Emily chuckled. "You're more interesting than Advanced Geometry class notes. Saw you showed that girl from China last night. Honestly, I had their team pegged to win, so if you took 'em down? Yeah, just confirms my thoughts. You're a badass, Taylor."

Taylor glanced off at the horizon, watching a few birds fly over the cloud-streaked sky. "Thanks...I guess."

"Hey, no 'I guess' about it. I mean it. And you should too. Take a little pride in yourself once in a while, 'kay? Really. It looks good on you."

Taylor turned, pressing her back up against the railing of the bridge as she watched the creek meander in the opposite direction. "Look, Em, it's just...sometimes, I think it should've been you in that spot."

Taylor's eyes drifted down toward the surface of the water, watching the ripples as they passed. And, as she did, her memories drifted back toward that day.

Even months later, she could remember everything she'd felt at that moment. The final round of the Nationals. The match that would determine which school would go on to represent the USA in the College Catfighting World Cup.

---

It was down to the top picks from the Eastern and Western Conferences - Washington and Lee and UC Davis. Both teams had been rated by analysts as among the best in the country, but the fact they had crushed the competition and made it to this point had proven that fact to whatever doubters might have been left. Now, it was down to this - to determine which one of them deserved their spot as the national champions. The team that would carry the banner on the world stage.

Things had started well for the Aggies. As Taylor's first pick, Nicole had utterly dominated in the opening round, winning a submission from her opponent within seven minutes when she ended up sitting proudly on the unfortunate girl's face. Her opponent - a redhead by the name of Rianne - had talked about the unbreakable strength of her chokeholds in interviews, but Nicole hadn't even let her get her hands on her long enough to set one up.

The brunette's upset victory had won plenty of cheers from the crowd, and she was riding high on that hype, carrying her back straight with a grin on her face on her way back to the bench. "Piece of cake," she said to her teammates, flashing Taylor a wink as she slid in at her side.

"Okay." Taylor nodded her head. "That wasn't so bad."

"Psshaw, wasn't so bad? C'mooon, Taylor," Nikki retorted, elbowing the blonde in the side. "I crushed her. Didn't even hurt."

"Right. Yeah, that's right." Taylor reached down to take a sip from her water bottle, but when she set it down it was with a grin on her face. Maybe this wasn't so intimidating after all. Maybe, if they could keep up that momentum, they could turn this into an easy win.

Nicole launched into an eager recap, but Taylor tuned most of it out. It wasn't like she even needed to go into the gory details - Taylor had seen them just as much as anyone else had. But that wasn't going to dissuade the brunette at all. Giggling to herself, Nikki leaned around Taylor's shoulders to whisper to Chloe. "I must've ripped a chunk of hair out of her scalp that was like-"

"Round Two is about to begin," came the referee's voice - a sound that made Nicole jump back with a less-than-dignified yelp as she was cut off. "Team captains Emily Torres and Taylor Kensington, please come to the mat."

Without skipping a beat, Taylor pushed herself out of her seat. At the same time, across the mat from her, rose the opposing team captain, dressed in a black track jacket. Her skin was a light tan, and her hair - cut choppily and hanging to her shoulders - was a bleached blonde that would've made the average passer-by question her Latin origins, with only the fringe of her heavy bangs dyed with black highlights. When her green eyes caught Taylor's, the corners of her mouth curled up into a wry smile.

"Call?" the referee asked.

"Heads," Emily chimed in without a moment's hesitation. The ref flipped the coin in the air - only to come down as tails.

Taylor stood a little taller, her hands resting on her hips. "I nominate myself."

A gasp went through the crowd at Taylor's call. Though they were allowed to take the mats at any time, it wasn't typical for a team captain to take such an active role until the final round. If the captain was nominating herself as the next round's fighter, it was usually a sign that she had enough confidence in her team as to be assured that they could win it in two rounds. But after Nicole had so thoroughly trounced the competition in the last round, Taylor figured it couldn't be too hard.

Emily's eyebrow rose - then, a smirk broke over her face. "Ooh, ballsy. But I like it. You're on."

Taylor blinked. "Huh? Wait, what are you-"

Emily didn't say anything else. Her intentions were clear enough when she unzipped her jacket and threw it aside. There, Taylor's eyes wandered over her toned frame. Emily was fairly average in terms of curves, with a C cup bust and lean hips, but her body was lithe and fit. It was on full display, too - the string bikini she wore didn't do much to conceal her. Her top consisted of two triangles of fabric with thick black and white horizonal stripes, stretched over her breasts and tied with a knot in the middle, and her matching bottoms were held together by thin strings tied over her hips. It also didn't do anything to cover the number of tattoos that graced her body - a ring of barbed wire encircling her left bicep; a cluster of three roses on her left hip; a flying raven on the back of her right shoulderblade, and three black stars on the side of her right breast.

The moment Emily's jacket hit the mats, the crowd broke out into cheers and wolf-whistles. Taylor even saw a sign reading "MARRY ME EMILY" somewhere in the stands. She bit her lip at that thought. Emily was beautiful, there was no doubt about that - but she knew that her good looks weren't the only reason she was getting the reception she was.

When it came to fans of college catfighting, most people rooted for their home team - either the town closest to them, or their country in international bouts. But there were some catfighters that stood out among the rest and attracted cult followings of their own - and Emily was one of those fighters. As a senior like Taylor, she had been fighting for the last four years - her whole college career. She was in it "for the love of the game," as she had said in an interview. And that had given her plenty of time to make her mark on the public - and the public had taken note.

It wasn't just her mat skills and her dominant record that had made her a media darling. She had a personality that shone through, above and beyond even her teammates - she was well known as a fun-loving party girl who was open about the fact that she was here for a good time, no matter what happened. And even if she was the type to celebrate her victories with drunken benders that gave the tabloids plenty of material, she also brought a sense of edge with her defiant, take-no-prisoners attitude and her willingness to speak her mind. In the leadup to the finals, she'd gone viral when an appearance on a talk show devolved into a profane rant about how the media was "all bullshit" - something that, whether it was her intention or not, ensured more viewers were tuning into her match than ever.

If varsity catfighting had its golden girl, it was Emily Torres. She had the looks, the skills, and the attitude to make her the face of the sport. And now, more than ever before, the realization dawned on Taylor that she was on a collision course with that very same woman.

"Well?" Emily set one hand on her hip, raising the other and making a clawing motion with her fingers curled inward. The lights overhead glinted off her nails - long, pointed, and painted a shiny black. "You're the one who put yourself up to it."

Taylor gulped. She had been feeling that surge of confidence a moment before, borne on by the successes her team had just enjoyed - now, she was reminded of the fact that she was up against a national-level catfighting team with a storied reputation, and in particular, its captain, who had been at the center of a media frenzy. Suddenly, the cameras closing in on the mats seemed closer than ever. If Taylor didn't do this right, she thought to herself, everyone would see exactly how she'd set herself up for failure. The world would see her hubris blow up right in her face, live.

Nevertheless, for as intimidating as the thought of choking on her aspirations might have been, it would be just as much of a disaster if she backed down now - that would prove she didn't think she was World Cup material. And she hadn't gotten this far to back down.

Nodding, Taylor unzipped her jacket, hanging it off to the ref. Now in her white bikini, she stepped up to Emily, looking her in the eye. "Yeah. I'm ready," she said, sucking in a breath. Whether or not she really meant it - she didn't have time to deliberate that. There was only time to act.

And when that bell rang, Taylor couldn't hold back.

The moment the fight began, the two girls were on each other. Both swept closer in a single simultaneous motion. Both sets of hands swung inward, poised to grab for each other. But they met in the middle, with Taylor catching hold of Emily's wrists. They pushed and pulled at one another, the balance between them teetering tenuously as each tried to win the upper hand. Emily hissed in frustration as she saw that her opportunity to claim a favorable position from the outset of the match had been denied - but she wasn't going to accept defeat for long.

The Latina released one of Taylor's hands, using her free hand to throw a few slaps along her side. Each smack of skin against skin rang out through the air with a meaty THWAP. By the fourth slap, Taylor winced from the pain radiating through her side. But that pain wasn't going to stop her. She let go with a hand of her own - this time, sinking her fingers into Emily's hair and giving it a sharp yank to the side.

"Bitch-!" Emily hissed under her breath. Her head jerked in the direction of Taylor's grip as her opponent secured a hold on her, her scalp straining against the pressure. As Emily began to shrink back against the pain, she let go of Taylor's other hand. The moment the Californian blonde found her hand free, she shot it into Emily's hair, now torquing at her scalp with a double-fisted grip!

With a hard shove, Taylor jerked Emily's head backward. The Virginian girl screamed from the pain, but as she twisted Taylor's hair harder, her other hand would shoot into her opponent's face. Taylor barely had time to react before Emily's palm pressed up against her nose and mouth, stifling her breath - let alone when her fingers raked in a vicious clawing motion along her cheeks!

The pain was too much for Taylor to bear. Reflexively, she let go of Emily, stumbling back to rub at her face. Her eyes were still stinging, and her vision was blurred with tears. She only realized that she was leaving herself unguarded a moment later. Shit, she thought to herself. The match had just begun, and already she was letting her opponent run away with the advantage.

Taylor realized that fact a little too late. Emily took one step back from Taylor - getting some distance, right before she charged, throwing herself forward with a shoulder tackle aimed right at the Californian's unprotected midsection. Letting out a choked gasp as the air was driven from her lungs, Taylor was thrown onto her back, with Emily landing on top of her.

Taylor was still clutching her face. But through her fingers, she could see the satisfied smirk cross Emily's face as she settled on top of her foe. No, she told herself - she wasn't going to let Emily get away with things that easily. She still needed to bring the fight to her! Taylor's teeth clenched into a grimace - and then, she shoved her hand up, right into Emily's face!

Emily let out a yelp as Taylor's palm met her chin, pushing her backward. As the girl's center of balance shifted, Taylor kicked up one of her legs, managing to swing it inward and planting the sole of her foot against Emily's belly. Then, with a sharp thrust, she shoved the Latina away from her, sending Emily rolling backward across the mat.

Panting for breath, Taylor slowly pushed herself back up into a seated position. She shook some hair out of her eyes, biting her lip as she felt the rhythmic pounding of her heart inside her chest. Had she just done that? Had she just narrowly escaped ending up underneath a star catfighter?

Across the mat, Emily rolled onto her side, propping herself up on her hip and elbow. When she caught sight of Taylor, that smirk came back to her face. "Not bad," she muttered. "Can you keep it up, though?" Shifting her weight, Emily pushed herself back up to her feet, taking a moment to roll out her shoulders.

"Yeah. Watch me," Taylor muttered, getting back to her feet to follow. She didn't fully believe it. She didn't really have that much of a plan, as a matter of fact. But she wasn't going to let Emily know that she was worried - she knew enough to realize that if that happened, it'd all be over.

Emily stood straighter, shifting her hands to her hips as she watched Taylor step up to her. Taylor could hear the cheers breaking out from the stands around her, chanting "EM-I-LY! EM-I-LY!" She took in a gulp - it was rare for an individual catfighter to make such an impact above her teammates that the crowd would cheer for them, not just their country or their school. But Emily Torres was a girl with just that sort of cult following - and Taylor didn't want to find out the hard way how she lived up to it.

Right as Taylor came into range, Emily lashed out with a punch aimed straight for her chest. Acting on instinct, the Californian veered to the side, making a narrow dodge. She let out a yelp as she did - and immediately blushed at the thought she wasn't able to hold it together. But she shook that thought out of her head a moment later. This was no time for getting lost in thought.

Unfortunately for Taylor, Emily had already made her move. She sent a quick palm strike toward Taylor - this time, aiming for the girl's hefty breasts. A loud SMACK rang out as Emily's hand cracked against the side of Taylor's breast, causing it to jiggle as the tanned Californian veered back. And a moment later, Emily's nails curled inward, squeezing and mauling at Taylor's boob!

Taylor let out a loud scream as a sharp pain shot through her. Hissing through her teeth, she shoved her weight closer against Emily - she drove her shoulder against the tattooed girl's own, causing Emily to veer back half a step, but she held firm. The two of them were pressed close together, feeling the warmth of each other's skin and the hot breath that came from every pant and shudder they made.

Emily didn't let go of Taylor's breast. She would only snarl against the mounting pressure, digging her nails even deeper through the thin fabric of Taylor's white bikini top. Taylor hissed under her breath, her face only growing a deeper red under the strain. But she would slip one hand behind Emily's back, sinking her nails into the Latina's skin and dragging them downward!

A pained yelp escaped Emily's throat as her back arched - a thought that brough Taylor the slightest hint of a smile, knowing she wasn't the only one taking damage. But she knew it wouldn't be long until Emily struck. Pulling herself in so close against Emily left Taylor in range to focus her fire on the Virginian, but she herself was just as open - and she could feel every shift of the muscles beneath Emily's skin as the two girls circled each other, body pressed tightly against body.

The two of them adjusted their grips now, each grabbing the other by the hair with one hand while the others exchanged slaps and jabs against sides and backs. Occasionally one of them would try and muscle their way inward, chests and shoulders pressing together - but for every push and shove one girl made, her opponent met her in turn, evening out the pressure.

It was Emily who finally broke the stalemate. As she dug her fingers even deeper into Taylor's blonde hair, she kicked her knee up, driving it into Taylor's hip once, then twice. The girl squealed as she buckled forward, bent over at the waist - where Emily swung another knee right up into her ribs! This time, one of Taylor's feet slipped, and she dropped to one knee with a hoarse wheeze.

"That all ya got, chica?" Emily taunted her from above.

But right at that moment, Taylor got an idea. Bellowing in defiance, she threw herself forward! Her shoulders slammed into Emily's waist with a surge of her body, driving all her weight up against her opponent in a hard-hitting tackle. If Emily wanted to take her down, Taylor was going to take her down with her!

Emily gasped as Taylor's lunge swept her back off her feet. The Californian's arms latched into place around Emily's hips, pulling herself close as the two girls fell to the mat.

At once, Emily began kicking her legs around Taylor. Taylor veered from one side to the other as Emily knocked her from one direction to the other, threatening to struggle free. But Taylor wouldn't have that, and for whatever direction Emily tried to push her, Taylor swung her hips back the other way!

"Get...off-!" Emily hissed. When kicking Taylor away from her didn't work, the Latina reached up to grab two fistfuls of Taylor's hair, pulling back at it. Taylor hissed against the pressure on her scalp, but her hands shot for whatever purchase she could get. Her first grip went wide, her nails scratching across Emily's skin in an empty grab against her shoulder. But her hand shot out a second time, this time latching onto the narrow band of Emily's bikini top.

The two girls went rolling over, onto their sides. "EM-I-LY!!" the crowd roared. But from Taylor's corner, her own teammates had rallied to her defense. "YOU GOT HER, TAYLOR!" Chloe called, rising from her seat with her hands cupped to her mouth.

"I'm not...letting go-!" Taylor snapped. Her face contorted in a pained wince as Emily ripped at her hair, the blonde strands wrapped tightly between her fingers. With her free hand, she sunk her nails into Emily's side, dragging a claw down along her tanned hip. At the same time, her other hand tightened around Emily's top, pulling back with enough force to make the fabric strain. She could feel the knotted string beginning to unravel beneath her fingers from the sheer tension.

Hissing, Emily swung out a kick then, driving her knee into Taylor's gut. Coughing, the Californian was knocked off of her; she went tumbling over, onto her back. Her grip broke away from Emily's top, but the knot in the front unraveled. Now, as Emily rolled up onto her knees, her top gaped open, her bare breasts heaving against every breath she took.

Taylor pushed herself back onto her hip in turn, flashing a smirk to her foe. "Your fans must like what they see," she teased.

The grin on Emily's face would only grow wider. "Like that's gonna stop me." With that, she grabbed the bikini top dangling around her neck and yanked it straight off, tossing it back into the cheering crowd. She sat straighter on her knees, the beads of sweat glistening against her breasts under the lights. There, she beckoned to Taylor with a finger. "You done yet?"

In an instant, the smirk on Taylor's face turned to a cold, stony scowl. "Never." There was still work to be done. She rolled up onto her knees, lunging toward Emily. Her hands shot for the Virginian's bleach-blonde hair, yanking her head in all directions - but Emily would only respond in turn. She dug her fingers deep into Taylor's hair, trying to pull her straight down!

Taylor shoved her chest and shoulders forward, mashing her larger breasts against Emily's own. Their bodies met with a wet slap as Emily teetered backward and fell, and the Californian was close behind her, scrambling on top. But Emily threw her legs around one of Taylor's own, scissoring it between her thighs. With a swift jerk of her hips, the Latina took control, rolling the girls over onto their sides.

"Gah-! Bitch, let go!" Taylor hissed. She grabbed for one of Emily's thighs where it encircled her own, her nails raking and clawing desperately at the flesh.

Emily let out a pained hiss as Taylor tore red trails along her skin, but swung a hard slap across Taylor's face, causing it to crack to the side. "Puta!" she snapped. Taylor veered, gagging from the blow - which gave Emily the opportunity. She grabbed for Taylor's top in both hands, pulling back hard - and, with a loud RIIIP, tore it straight off the Californian's body.

Rolling with the momentum, Emily broke away from Taylor. She rolled onto her back, then her other side - and then, she rose to her feet, proudly holding Taylor's bikini top over her head like it was a championship belt. Cheers and wolf whistles, and more cries of "EM-I-LY!!" came down from the stands - a gesture Emily met, as she tossed Taylor's top to the crowd as well before blowing a kiss in their direction.

Nicole leaned in closer to the mats, her focus trained on the match with laser precision. "Come on, Tay! Don't let her win like that!" she cried.

"Looks like we're even," Emily said, extending a hand toward Taylor. The Californian took one look down at Emily's hand, then shot a glare back up at her.

"Won't be necessary," she said. Suddenly taken by a surge of adrenaline, Taylor shoved herself back up to her feet - and swung a backhand clear across Emily's bare breasts!

A WAP rang out. The Virginian veered to the side, her breasts swaying from the blow. A few cheers broke out in Taylor's favor, which brought a smile to the Californian's face for a few fleeting seconds. For as much as Emily had won the crowd's favor, maybe she was helping to turn the tides.

Of course, it was going to take more than that to bring Emily down. She swiftly retaliated with a slap of her own, swinging a palm across Taylor's bust. The Californian captain yelped as she turned aside from the blow - right before Emily reached out with two hands, grabbing for Taylor's hair before she lunged toward her with a tackle of her own!

Emily's weight came crashing into Taylor, their bare skin meeting with a wet THWACK before they collapsed to the mats. Taylor landed on her back, with Emily on top of her. But just a moment later, her hand reached out to grab Emily by the hair, anchoring her as she rolled her weight over. Their legs kicked and flailed at the air as they went toppling across the mat - Emily on top of Taylor, then Taylor on top of Emily. At every turn, they exchanged slaps against each other's backs and thighs. Any hit one of them suffered had to be avenged.

In the midst of their rolling, the Latina suddenly reached out and grabbed hold of one of Taylor's breasts, squeezing it tight! At once, a piercing pain shot through Taylor's body. She screamed as Emily's nails raked across her breast, their points sinking deep into the soft, sensitive skin.

But it wasn't the pain that truly sparked something in Taylor as much as what she heard next - when Emily leaned a little closer, her green eyes staring into Taylor's own. "That all you got? C'mon! Impress me, cap!"

Impress her. That thought crossed Taylor's mind as her gaze narrowed. She'd impress her, all right.

Gritting her teeth through the pain, Taylor cried out with a roar of defiance. She threw a hand upward into Emily's face. Two of her nails raked across the tattooed girl's eyes, while her other three scoured down her cheeks. Emily threw her head back with a loud, pained screech that made a fair few in the crowd wince.

"You impressed yet?" Taylor huffed. Their weight rolled over to the side, sending them toppling down onto the mats. The whole way through, though, Taylor never let go of her opponent's face. Emily couldn't see a thing through the stinging pain in her eyes. But her hips still bucked and her leg kicked, coiling around Taylor's own to try and exert her grip. She shoved blindly at Taylor's shoulders a few times, trying to get her to let go - but Taylor held firm. It was only then that Emily's grip drifted lower, finding something else to grab hold of - the strap of the Californian's bikini bottoms.

Twisting the strap around her fingers, Emily pulled back with all her might. Taylor could feel the fabric of her bottoms pulling tight against the most sensitive regions of her body, and she turned her head aside with a scream of pain as the latex dug into her flesh. With another yank, and the sound of a ping, the strap snapped. Taylor's bottoms came away in Emily's hand as the Latina fell onto her back, sending the now-naked Californian sprawling onto her face.

"EM-I-LY! EM-I-LY!" the fans cheered. Taylor lay on her face, her shoulders rising and falling as she sucked in breaths. But despite being stripped bare by her opponent, Taylor wasn't the least bit afraid or ashamed. Any sense of shame had left her now. She wasn't going to slow down now - she had to win! She rolled herself up onto all fours, facing Emily with a snarl. The Latina barely had the time to throw Taylor's torn bikini bottoms aside before Taylor sprung toward her, tackling her to her back.

Once again they went rolling in a tangle of writhing limbs. One of Taylor's hands balled in Emily's hair, while her other hand raked her nails along her side. Emily hissed from the pain as Taylor's nails left red trails in their wake, but she responded in turn, grabbing the girl's hair in one hand as she landed a hard slap against her thigh with the other.

As Taylor rolled her hips over to clamor on top of Emily, the Virginian gave a hard buck, trying to shake her off. Taylor's grip began to slip through Emily's hair as her opponent writhed and twisted with a defiant fury, her legs cutting through the air with frantic kicks. At last, Taylor had to release Emily's hair and fell forward, but as she did, her nails slipped from the Latina's hip to the tie on the side of her bikini bottoms.
There, Taylor's nails dug into Emily's skin - less to hurt, at this point, and more to anchor herself so she couldn't go far from her foe. She yanked her body back up with enough force to tear the tie loose, leaving Emily's bottoms attached only on one side.

With another kick of Emily's leg, she flipped herself over to roll on top of Taylor. But Taylor kept rolling, clawing at her Emily's sides and chest and belly at every turn. Their legs grasped at each other like entwined serpents. As Emily twisted and turned, her bottoms slid down further along her leg until another kick sent them flying across the mats.

Now both girls were naked, and neither was going to stop for the sake of modesty. Emily wasn't even paying heed to the cheers calling her name from the stands. She told Taylor to do her worst - and Taylor was bringing just the sort of intensity she was hoping for. Now, the Californian had fallen into a state of raw instinct. She didn't need to think about what she was doing - she just knew she had to win.

Their bare skin only left a target for their nails as they kept rolling, raking wicked scratches across each other's bodies wherever they could reach. Their toenails clawed at each other's shins and calves as they struggled in a desperate duel for dominance, marking each other with red trails. Emily dragged her nails down Taylor's back; Taylor dug hers into the flesh of Emily's ass and squeezed. They toppled over once, then twice before they let go of each other's skin to go after their hair instead - in a single moment, so perfect as to have been coordinated, each girl grabbed each other by their blonde locks in unison and yanked hard. Taylor and Emily were of the same mind - both of them fully devoted to victory, both of them forgetting all hesitations and inhibitions they might've had.

In the heat of the moment - driven like a wild beast - Taylor threw her head down and sank her teeth into the flesh of Emily's breast. The Latina howled from the pain, rolling over onto her back underneath Taylor. But she responded by shoving her hand hard into the Californian's face, her nails scouring at her eyes.

The white-hot pain of Emily's eye rake flooded Taylor's senses. She fell down onto her side, just as Emily pushed herself up onto her knees and rolled her weight over. Taylor fell to her back, with Emily straddling her hips - and it was with a grimace that Emily looked down on her foe, her shoulders tense like a cat's raised hackles. With both hands, she reached down and grabbed Taylor's nipples, pinching them between her nails and torquing them hard.

Taylor's screams would only grow louder. They drowned out the roar of the crowd, and the encouragement her teammates were yelling to her from their bench - she could only focus on one thing, and that was outlasting Emily and standing up against her even in the face of an unstoppable onslaught. A burning pain was piercing through her - but even still, she reached up and grabbed two fistfuls of Emily's hair, pulling at it as hard as she could. She let out another scream - less one of pain, and more one of defiance.

Hauling Emily backward, Taylor was able to force the Virginia captain off of her. She clamored up to her knees as Emily fell to a seated position in front of her. Their shoulders rose and fell as they sucked in breaths, and their skin glistened with sweat under the lights - but neither girl was willing to give in any time soon. They would keep fighting until they couldn't any more, if it came to that. Both of them knew that, without having to exchange a single word.

But Emily did speak up, her words coming in between pants. "You're...good..."

When Taylor heard that, it was enough to shock her out of her fury for just a few fleeting seconds. After how savagely she and Emily had been tearing into one another, she wasn't expecting the Latina to actually have praise for anything she did. Emily's words weren't those of a hated enemy. They weren't tinged with any scorn. For as hard as they had fought, what mattered to Emily was that Taylor even had it in her to fight this hard.

Emily continued, a grin flashing across her face. "I'm really gonna have to work to take you down, huh?"

Taylor barely had time to blink before Emily struck again. She called out a loud battle cry, swiping a slap clean across Taylor's face that made her lurch to the side. As the Californian was reeling, Emily scrambled behind her - and then, she tackled her from behind, shoving her full weight up against her and knocking Taylor to the floor.

Taylor gasped and gagged, her feet paddling at the air behind her as she tried to shake Emily off her back, but the tattooed girl remained right where she was. It was then that a cold realization set in for Taylor - she had used up much of her stamina in her burst of raw aggression earlier; that aggession that had carried the two of them through a relentless catball. Now that the adrenaline was dying down, the aches and pains and heaviness were all settling back into her muscles - right when she needed them most.

And it was right then that Emily sprung. She clamored higher along Taylor's back, her hips pressing down against the Californian's spine as her thighs wrapped around her sides. With the last of her strength, Taylor tried to twist and buck, but Emily remained firm. "Nope!" she cried in defiance - and then, she threw her arm around Taylor's throat, leaning down to put her in a chokehold.

Taylor's eyes went wide against the pressure. She gagged as Emily's forearm pressed tighter against her neck, flattening the air out of her windpipe. She could feel the heat of Emily's exhale against her skin, and how the Virginian captain's bare breasts pressed against her shoulderblades. She tried to twist her hips from side to side, but Emily dug her footing deeper into the mats at her sides. "Not happening!" she cried. No matter how hard Taylor tried, she couldn't get her to budge.

"EM-I-LY!! EM-I-LY!!" the cheers were reaching their crescendo now. All around her, Taylor could hear a thousand voices all calling out in unison - all calling out her opponent's name. Her opponent, who now had her trapped beneath her weight, pressing her against the floor in a grip too ironclad to break. Tayor tried to shake her head, just to find some means of resistance - but she couldn't even do that. With how firmly Emily had her neck, she could barely bring her head to move. And with each moment that passed in Emily's embrace, with the air being squashed out of her lungs beneath her weight and every breath drowned out in her stifling grip, Taylor could feel herself growing more and more light-headed from lack of oxygen.

Emily's voice came again in a whisper. "What's it gonna be, cap? You gonna give, or am I gonna have to choke you out?"

Taylor's eyes squeezed shut as her face contorted in a pained grimace. She didn't want to face the truth of what was happening - but she had to. The burst of raw animal aggression had carried her forward long enough to even the odds with Emily, but in the end, the Latina had taken back control - and now, this was where she was left. Trapped against the mat, unable to move, naked, while everyone around her chanted her opponent's name. Taylor had been outmanuevered. And now, she realized, she had never felt so small.

She had no other choice. She lifted her hand and tapped it against the mat.

At that, the arena broke into cheers again. With a burst of energy that shouldn't have been possible after such a grueling match, Emily jumped up to her feet, victorious. "YEAH!" she cried, throwing her fists to the sky as her teammates cheered from their bench. And that left Taylor to rise to her knees, her arms wrapped around her body to cover herself as she panted for breath. Every muscle in her body felt sore and heavy, and she felt clammy from the cool air against her sweat-damp skin.

The referee handed her a towel and guided her back to her bench, while Emily strutted back to hers with her chest thrust forward and her chin held high. And even as Taylor's teammates tried to greet her with encouragement and praise, Taylor couldn't take any of it to heart. Not when her mind was still focused on her loss.

Taylor's defeat had left the score tied. In the end, it would all be up to Chloe to win UC Davis their spot in the World Cup - which Chloe did, after a long and closely-matched battle. Taylor wasn't paying any attention to the specifics. She couldn't even remember what had happened, besides the outcome. She couldn't even remember the name of Chloe's opponent. When Chloe sauntered her way back to the bench, greeting them with high-fives before Nicole pulled her into a hug, Taylor wanted to have that same sort of enthusiasm to show her in return. She wanted to be proud of her - she knew Chloe deserved it.

But she couldn't. Because her mind was stuck on one thing. Taylor had gotten too cocky in trying to finish this match in two rounds, and she had paid the price for it. If she'd been so short-sighted, did her team even deserve to make it this far?

---

Taylor's thoughts were broken by a loud peal of laughter from over the phone. "You think it should've been me?"

Taylor winced a little at the sound of Emily's response. "I mean...can you blame me? You're a fan favorite, Em. Nobody would've complained if it was you in the World Cup finals. Fuck, they'd probably be paying your tuition. And you beat me, fair and square."

"Yeah, but your team still won. It's not just you, Taylor. It's the whole team."

Taylor let out a long sigh. "Yeah, well...that's what I was worried about. I've been thinking a lot about our match. I got ahead of myself and volunteered myself in round two. I figured I could end it there. And you kicked my ass. I wonder sometimes how my team even made it this far if it's me calling the shots. What if I blow it in the finals? Emily, do you think I'm the weak link?"

"You? The weak link?" Another chuckle came over the phone. "Tay. Seriously. You're a catfighter, not a comedian. I mean, if the whole catfighting thing doesn't work out, maybe you've got a new career path, but I can't see that happening. I didn't kick your ass."

"You won!"

"Maybe I did. But I damn well had to try for it."

Taylor was silent.

"You say I 'kicked your ass' like it wasn't close. Look at it this way," Emily continued. "Yeah, I won. But you still gave me the fight of my life. Like, shit, Tay, I don't know if I've met another girl who fought as hard as you did back then."

"Wait, you really think that..?"

"Anyone would think that. You went the distance against a top fighter. And you've got my respect for that. So take it in stride, okay?"

Taylor paused, thinking back on what happened later that night.

It was after the match, when everyone was back in their locker room. Nicole and Chloe were still eagerly discussing their victories, but Taylor had pulled her clothes back on without a word, eager to get out of there as soon as possible and forget that her defeat had ever happened. She was trying to tune out their words so that she could just get this over with once they decided to get back on the bus to their hotel room, and then she could move on with their life.

But then, she heard a voice coming from behind her. "Yo, Taylor!"

Taylor spun back around to the noise. Emily was standing there in the locker room - still naked; she hadn't even bothered putting her track jacket back on. Taylor could see the scratch marks and bruises blooming across her bare skin, but it didn't seem to do anything to slow her down. Instead, Emily stood tall with a smile across her face, beaming with pride.

For a moment, Taylor went tense - half-expecting Emily to gloat, or to taunt her over her loss. But she only said one word. "Catch!"

"Huh?"

The next thing she knew, Emily had tossed a beer can at her; Taylor narrowly caught it before looking back at her with a bewildered stare.

"Just wanted to congratulate you for a job well done," Emily explained. Then she picked up her phone. "I wanna stay in touch. Give you my number if you give me yours."

After a moment's thought, Taylor nodded her head. "Er...alright," she said, taking her phone out of her pocket to type Emily's number into her contacts.

"Nice, nice," Emily replied. "Hey, good luck out there. And keep up the good work!"

Maybe, to Taylor, it had been a devastating, humiliating defeat. But then...who was she to judge it that way, just because the finish wasn't what she hoped for? Back on the bridge, Taylor could feel her smile growing a little wider. No. Emily was right.

"Thanks, Em," she said. "I will."

[Horny-Jew]

Rip her top off. Oh hell yeah !!!

[Horny-Jew]