Fucking Trump won! Minorities, women, minority women! Get your ass out of America while you still can! Come back in four years when someone smarter gets elected. (For the record, I am female, and I would take my own advice, but that would involve convincing my mother as well and she seemed slightly adversed to the idea because other countries don't like us.)

So, anyway... This chapter was not necessarily my idea. Okay, it kinda is. See, I'm chatting with Ikcsi, alright? So, for some reason, back in fucking October, one of our many conversations that happen all at once turned to Plague Knight and Mona because I was questioning what I should call the room you find Mona in during the main game and at the beginning of the DLC. (If anyone has a good answer to that, I would love to hear it)
And so that took an odd turn right quick, and suddenly I'm making mention of the fact that the dance at the end of the game must have happened several months after the fact. Reasoning?
I, and I quote myself, said, 'Also, as a side note that I've been forgetting to point out... just how much do you figure she weighs? I mean, Plague Knight, in the dance at the end of his story, manages to swing her downwards at such an angle to the point whereas she should be relying totally on his strength to not smash her head on the ground. But he's supposed to be one of the least physically capable characters of the game, Tinker probably taking the spot of the most wimpy. So either he's way stronger than I thought, or Mona just weighs absolutely nothing.'

Some more of our lovely conversation happened, and suddenly she's saying that either she could make a section about it for her story, or I could beat her to it with mine. Seeing as Plague Knight is a child here, I was naturally a little confused as to how I could get that to work, and so replied:
'And just where would I fit that in? In the middle?
"Come, Plaguey!"
"Wait, what?" *thud* "Ow!"
"Oh, right, you can't dance. Whoops."
*Groan*'

She said I should... so here we are. Hopefully we'll get a chance to see S is for Strength as well when S comes out.

Short 24

"Come, Plaguey!"

"Wait, what?" Plague Knight did not get a proper answer to this question as Mona, who just two seconds ago had been staring at the ceiling with the most bored expression that ever existed, stood, yelled that, and grabbed his hands, pulling him to the center of the room.

Or at least, she tried to pull him to the center of the room. Instead, surprised and confused, he tripped over his own feet and fell to the floor, his hands slipping through Mona's somewhat loose grip on him like he was a wet fish.

He hit the ground with a very audible thud. "Ow!" He whined, glancing up at Mona with annoyance.

"Oh right, you can't dance," Mona realized with mild surprise. "Whoops."

Plague Knight groaned. "That had nothing to do with dancing."

"Yes, it did."

"Keep telling yourself that."

"I will!"

"How was that a dance? You pulled me forward two feet and I fell!"

Mona was silent for a moment before conceding. "Yeah, alright. I see your point now."

Slowly, Plague Knight stood. "Why did you do that anyway?"

"I'm bored," she complained.

"I know, but you're going to hurt yourself," Plague Knight warned. "I'd rather you be bored than squirming in pain."

"I suppose that's somewhat valid thought process, but I want to do something."

Plague Knight sighed and grabbed Mona's hand, leading her back to her bed. "I don't understand why you don't have any patience anymore."

"I don't have the option to do nothing anymore, it's the only thing I can do. Before all this, if I got bored and you weren't around to entertain me, I'd dance." She sighed and whispered, "I can't do that now."

"You can dance?"

"I thought you already figured that out considering I was trying to pull you into a one just a minute ago."

"I thought you were doing that because you were just that bored."

"Well yeah, that too."

Plague Knight sighed and lazily drummed his fingers on the edge of the bed, the soft material keeping the motion from creating an obnoxious sound. "There isn't any better way to deal with your restless energy, is there?"

Mona smiled; she could see what he was doing. Rolling with it, she replied, "Nope."

Plague Knight let out an overly exaggerated sigh. "Fine, have your fun. Just remember that I'm not to blame if you get caught."

Mona smiled gratefully and grabbed his hand, trying to pull him forward.

"What are you doing?" He questioned even as he was dragged a couple feet.

"I want you to dance with me."

Plague Knight froze on the spot, pulling his hand away as he told her, "Uh, Mona, you don't want me as your dance partner. I have tripped over my own feet while walking in a straight line. You've seen me do that. Twice now, I believe."

"That I have. But do you really want me to dance without someone else?" She pouted at him.

Plague Knight looked away, afraid he'd break if he gazed upon the look on her face. 30 seconds passed, and Mona's pout was slowly turning into a look of pure sadness, and, with a soft groan, he grumbled, "Fine."

Mona brightened immediately and grabbed his hand again, bringing him to the center of the room.

"I'm warning you now; I'm probably going to hurt you," Plague Knight said as Mona took a hold of both his hand and started to sway back and forth, providing him a feel for the rhythm of the nonexistent tune in her head.

"No you won't. It's not like we're doing the tango."

"…What's the tango?"

Mona stopped and stared at him blankly. "You don't… you haven't even heard of… uh, it's, uh… it's a dance, a convoluted one at that."

Plague Knight cocked his head to the side, confused. "That's not very descriptive."

"I don't know how to explain it."

"Clearly."

Mona rolled her eyes and resumed her swaying, with Plague Knight hesitantly copying her.

"So what is it that we're doing?"

"Nothing special. You're too short and inexperienced, while I'm hurt, so we can't do anything particularly interesting."

Not giving Plague Knight time to figure out how to keep their banter going, Mona took a step, watching Plague Knight hurriedly attempt to follow her. After providing him a moment to gather his bearings, she took another. This time, he was more prepared and was able to move more smoothly.

Slowly, Mona turned them in a small circle, keeping it almost too simple for her partner's sake. He was unnaturally interested in his feet, and she couldn't tell if he was afraid of stepping on her, or if he was trying to hide his face, of which was slowly turning a bright red as he overthought the situation that he had somehow found himself in.

"Relax," she felt the need to tell him. He glanced up to her; seemingly unsure if he should actually do so. "You aren't going to hurt me, and even if you do, it won't be that bad. So calm down."

"I don't think I believe that."

"Okay, I know that you have virtually no self esteem outside of when you're running around exploding people, but you need to at least pretend that you do."

"How do I act like that's a thing? It's not like I can grow it on a tree, you know. Even if it were possible, I'd probably kill the poor plant before it could have a chance to give me any."

"Plaguey, you don't have a black thumb. You would not kill it."

"I thought we concluded you were the only one with a green thumb. Literally, in fact."

"While my thumbs are indeed green, I don't make a good horticulturist, and you know it. Remember that one time the Magicist asked me to take care of a cactus…?"

"Somewhat. Didn't she say not to water it, you didn't, and it still somehow died?"

Mona groaned. "Yeah. Still not sure how I did that."

"It was probably the soil. I think it had too many nutrients."

Mona blinked when she realized that Plague Knight, who looked equally confused, was not the one who said this. She looked up and realized that the Magicist had at one point or another popped in and had probably been watching for the past 30 seconds.

"When did you come in…?" Plague Knight asked slowly, completely halting his movements.

"Just now. The door was open and I heard you talking about killing my cactus, so I figured I'd tell you what it probably was. Too much Nitrogen and not enough Potassium. Or was it Phosphorus that counteracted the Nitrogen…? Or did I conclude I had too much Phosphorus? Or it could have been one of the micronutrients…"

Plague Knight slowly turned his gaze up to Mona, an eyebrow raised in confusion. Sadly for him, she looked just as lost.

Looking once again at the magician, he said, "Magicist, we aren't into the agriculture mumbo-jumbo. I have no idea what Nitrogen, Potassium, or Phosphorus has to do with dirt."

"It's not dirt; it's called soil if it has nutrients in it! Honestly." She huffed, seemingly offended. "And NPK has everything to do with it! They are the-" She stopped when Plague Knight repeatedly yelled for her to stop.

"I don't care. I really don't. So please shut up."

The Magicist rolled her eyes. "You don't see me telling you two to shut up whenever you get into your mini-speeches."

"Well, yeah, and I suppose we should appreciate that, but you understand what we're talking about. However, we don't know anything about horticulture, nor do we care."

In response, the Magicist merely stuck out her tongue. Changing topics, she asked, "So, what is it you two were doing?"

Mona let out a small sigh and released Plague Knight's hands. "I was trying to get my restless energy out."

The Magicist laughed. "That's an odd way of achieving that."

Mona frowned, crossing her arms. "All other options are too physically demanding."

The Magicist cocked her head to the side as she thought about that. "Yeah, alright. But you couldn't just play a board game or something?"

Mona shook her head in confusion. "We don't have board games."

The Magicist raised an eyebrow. "I could have sworn that we did."

"Not unless you brought one in," Plague Knight said.

"We have one somewhere."

"Why are you convinced we have a children's game stored away somewhere in a lab filled with highly dangerous chemicals?"

"Because I know we do. You'll see. I'll find it." The Magicist then turned and left the room.

Plague Knight, a positively befuddled expression on his face, looked up to Mona, who stared back with a similar confusion.

"Do you want to just pretend that the last… oh, 10 minutes or so simply didn't happen?"

"…That's probably one of the better ideas you've had."

"Was that an insult?"

I hope that satisfies you, if only just a little, Ikcsi dear.

Sorry about the Hort shit, though. We just did the nutrient section, and, since I just type whatever comes to mind and just kinda roll with it like I would a real conversation might work, that kinda flowed in there. So yeah. Magicist's a Hort nut in this AU. That's kinda weird.