Life in Kamar-Taj is…weird. Yeah, Katy could sugar-coat it, but it's really freaking weird, and not in an occasional, intermittent, once-in-a-blue-moon kind of way. No. It's weird, all the damn time. And you'd think that would help, if you needed to acclimate to the weirdness faster, but it doesn't. Because it's weird in different ways, every damn time.

People levitate down the hallways, some dude looks right through you even though he doesn't have any actual eyes, and there are muffled explosions at all hours of the day and night which no one seems to either notice or bother about. An astral projection can float through walls, robes and hair restless in a spectral wind no one on their physical plane can feel, before making some cryptic pronouncement in a dead (or even alien) language, and the most anyone does is make a note before carrying on with breakfast.

Shaun blends in perfectly—okay, so his magical rings are a tiny bit stranger than the monks are used to, since no one can tell where they came from or what their actual capabilities are—but no one bats an eye when, during a sparring match with Wong, he launches himself over the temple bell tower, hooks it, and swings onto the arched roof like Spider-man. He blooms here, more confident and brash every day, because for once he's not the standout, not the outcast, not any weirder than anyone else around him.

Katy watches him, watches him grow, watches him smile with the monks and joke with Wong and stand on equal footing with Strange, and tries to smother the flames of envy she feels burning in her stomach. Because as he's stepped into the sun, she's sunk backwards into shadow.

She's not used to being unnoticed. As the black sheep of her family, the scapegoat of her academic class, and an ABC kid who made no use of her prestigious degree and instead went into decidedly blue-collar work, Katy's always been a subject of juicy gossip and fiery debate to nearly everyone she knows. Hell, she's encouraged that. She's never liked feeling invisible, or a match with everyone else.

But none of that matters here. If anyone sees anything about her, it's just that her portals are unstable and shaky, her summoning is rubbish, and she can barely hold a strong enough shield to withstand a light breeze. The only thing that's improving is her archery, and even that's not enough, because she can't focus on both aiming and arming her arrow with any kind of spell at the same time. If she does the first, yeah, she'll hit, but do no damage. If she does the other, well…

Some of the explosions around Kamar-Taj are her doing, is all she wants to say about that.

But the shittiest, the absolute worst, most embarrassing thing about all this is that she's trying. She's giving this whole superhero thing everything she's got and more than she thought she had. Katy spends hours in the library, taking longer, more detailed notes than she took for her goddamn honors thesis. She asks questions in class, dogs her mentors after practice, and drills her forms in front of a mirror when normally she'd be starting fights on Reddit.

None of it seems to help.

She's never tried so hard at failing.

Normally when she fails, it's because she couldn't give a shit about success. And, let's face it, and no bragging, but Katy's smart. She's intuitive, has a great memory, is good with patterns, and even better with people. Understanding the theory of magic is easy. Memorizing an incantation is nothing. Getting her fingers into the right patterns is a cakewalk. And if you add one to one, you should get two. Incantation plus manifestation equals spell, right? But for some reason, in her specific case, it doesn't.

This shouldn't be so difficult.

But it is.

Katy stomps out of the courtyard after another failed lesson, when she's only managed to pull her target stone halfway across the sand—while standing next to a trembling old lady who can both push and pull a boulder in any direction she pleases—bypasses the refectory, and heads right back to her bedroom. 'Bedroom', ha! It's a broom closet, and this is even by her lower-middle-class San Francisco standards. There's literally space enough only for her futon and a foot-square side table. She can't even leave her suitcase open, or it'll block the damn door.

Still, it has a door, which is more than she can say for most of the rest of the monastery. And it does slam shut very satisfyingly, though Katy has to stop it from bouncing back from how hard she slides it to.

From the front pocket of her luggage, she takes a bag of Hershey's miniatures, a stock that she was trying to ration out, but this time the situation is so dire that she doesn't even count how many candies she has in her fist before unwrapping them and shoving them down her throat.

She flops onto the futon, chewing furiously. Insult to injury, it doesn't help that she's on the rag right now and the only pads she'd been able to find in the local corner store had some strange kind of menthol treatment to them. She doesn't know how to explain it, but her nethers are tingling and smell like she's just squirted toothpaste into her underwear.

How was she to know that the sprig of mint on the packaging wasn't just ornamental? It's not like she can read the Chinese, either, to find out if this sensation is normal or if she's dying. And she will die before she asks anyone about it.

She takes another chocolate and pops it into her mouth. No, it's definitely not a time to ration.

There's a knock at the door. She unglues her teeth and snaps, "What?"

"It's me."

Katy's first reaction is a silent ugh, which is not the way you want to greet your fledgling boyfriend, but she swipes her tongue over her teeth, runs a hand through her hair, and sits upright.

"Not really in the mood for guests, but come in if you want."

Shaun's hand cracks the door and he peers around the wooden frame. "I'm still a guest?"

"We don't live together yet," she grumbles, but it's hard to sustain her bad attitude when he looks so good: windswept, a bit sunburnt, with the collar on his red robe slipping a little.

"We could fix that," he slides into the room and tosses her something. On instinct, she catches the little bottle and smiles at the rattle of pills inside.

"You sure know how to charm a girl," she pops the bottle open and shakes two Ibuprofen into her hand. "I forgot."

"Don't beat yourself up," he kneels down on the futon beside her and before she can slap his hand away, steals two chocolates in exchange, "You remembered the important stuff: chocolate, flamin' hot Cheetos, and Funyuns. Speaking of Funyuns, got any more left?"

"Nah. They ran out two weeks ago."

"Damn. I haven't seen any in Nepal yet and I'm jonesing."

"Why not just ask Wong to pop down to China and get you some?"

"They're not sold in China. He'd have to go to Hong Kong."

"So, Hong Kong then. Does it make a difference?"

"What if," Shaun swipes another chocolate and bats his pretty eyes at her; hardly a fair exchange, "you went? We haven't been out of here in awhile; might be nice to have a date night."

Katy swallows and folds a candy wrapper down to a hard little square, creasing the edges with her fingers. "You know I can't do that."

"I do?"

"Yeah. I'm sure everyone's talking about me, the useless girl who can't get the simplest spells right."

Shaun fixes her with a look; a soft one, melting with pity and understanding. She wants to slap him. "No one's saying that. Wong says you're coming along pretty well, considering it's only been six weeks."

"Oh, come on. You may buy that bullshit but I don't. Look at you! You're flying all over the place, launching halfway to the moon…you could probably ring your way down to Hong Kong before I could figure out how to open that door with a spell."

He takes her hand in his, rubbing it soothingly—she assumes he means it that way, but it burns her like sandpaper—and says, "Are we using 'ring' as a verb, now?"

"It's already a verb, moron," she spits back, snatching her hand away. "At least in England or some shit like that. Means to make a phone call."

"Oh, yeah. And I guess we use it too, right? Ring in the New Year?"

"Great. Now that we're settled on the etymology, why don't you fuck off to Hong Kong and get me some Funyuns?" Normally this is where she'd storm out or fling herself dramatically into a corner, but to do either of those things she'd have to step on Shaun first. Which, you know, is not a totally unappealing idea, but might be a little harsh considering he's just trying to cheer her up. It's not his fault that she's a helpless failure who sucks at everything.

She settles for crossing her arms and burying her head in them, but has to stop because the smell of mint from her crotch is just so damn strong it makes her cough. God, she can't even sulk properly.

"Katy. You're doing fine."

"No, I'm not," now tears are rising in her eyes, because she doesn't need anyone to lie to her and tell her she's not as useless as she's secretly always worried she is, "I just don't know what's wrong! I'm trying, I swear I am, but nothing's going right!"

"You're just used to doing everything right from the start. You're too smart for your own good. Do you know how many times as a kid I got flattened by my masters because I couldn't remember how to block them fast enough? Some things take years to figure out, and you're already doing that," one hand reaches out, but at her bitten-lipped frown, he reconsiders and places it on the mat between them. "I know I don't say it enough, but babe, you're amazing."

"You say it kind of every—" she stops. "Wait, did you just call me 'babe'?"

"Um," she can see the mental tape winding back in his head, "Yes?"

"Huh."

"I mean, is that okay?"

Is it? Katy's never seen herself as a 'babe' before. Her previous boyfriends hadn't gone in for pet names, so Katy assumed she just wasn't soft enough or feminine enough or whatever enough for them either. After all, she's loud and brash and has a trash mouth; hardly the thing anyone thinks of when they think of a traditionally sweet girlfriend. Not that it mattered; her boyfriends liked her and she liked them.

But now…

"Say it again."

Shaun's voice drops, deep, velvet, and intimate. The low register shudders against her bones. "You're amazing, babe."

She breathes. "Wow. When'd you learn how to do that?"

"Do what?"

Magic, Katy thinks, but doesn't say. She's had enough of magic to last a lifetime; or at least, enough of magic until she drags her ass out of bed to work on it all over again. Shaun's right; she is amazing, and she is going to nail this thing, nail it right to the wall. But for now, Shaun's right in front of her and they haven't been alone like this in days, and there are so many things she wants to do with that mouth in this moment than listen to it talk.

Which, rude. But true.

She ducks across the space between them, quicker than thought, and swallows Shaun's startled gasp when she presses her lips to his. But he's a fighter; she's seen how quick his reflexes are firsthand, and he's not off-guard for long. The only thing she can do is change tactics, which she does; darting away from the flick of his tongue to plant kisses along his jawline towards where his pulse hammers away just underneath. He hasn't shaved recently, and his stubble chafes a bit, but the ragged breath he takes as she sucks gently at his throat makes it all worthwhile.

"Katy," he sighs, strong hands around her back and guiding her closer. She bites, feeling his heart throb between her teeth. "God—"

"Now that's a name I could get used to," her voice has gone harsh, throaty, and she pulls away with a laugh, though she can't escape from his hands. "Forget all this 'honey' and 'baby' shit."

"Nope," he sighs, mouthing at the collar of her robe. "It was 'babe' that got me this far. Admit it," the point of his tongue trails up her throat, and Katy flinches in his grip, caught between laughter and dizziness. She can't get a full breath into her lungs. "You liked that."

"Mmm," she won't debate him, not when he's being so unreasonable and not when she can't breathe properly, so she lets her head fall back in silent acquiescence. He takes her meaning and hitches upright on his knees, supporting her while he finds her lips again. It's a bit awkward to kneel like this, kissing him, but Katy can't process the discomfort when her head is spinning and the only thing she can feel is his mouth on hers.

This is magic. She's already worked it, somehow, unknowing. And if she can do this, bring Shaun even farther into her life than he already was, have him kneeling for her, and to her, she can do anything.

For the first time since coming to Kamar-Taj, Katy feels power light under her fingertips as she pulls Shaun closer and hears him moan helplessly in her grip. Behind her tightly-closed eyes, sparks fly.