"How's it going tonight, Nabatala?" called the Owl, jogging onto the plaza in front of the Louvre and pausing next to the large glass pyramid.

"Hmm?" Nabatala glanced up in surprise, closing her book and springing up to her feet as she spotted him. "Oh! Sorry; I was reading – homework."

He cocked his head to one side. "Seriously? You already started school? I don't start for a couple weeks!"

"No," she told him quickly, drawing her harpoon and giving it a twirl. "Summer homework: I was supposed to read the first chapter and write a two-page essay." She made a face. "Now I need to cram to get it all finished by the first day. And tomorrow…"

"Helping your father tomorrow?"

She nodded. "He has a bunch of paperwork from the last couple weeks, and it all needs to be filed before the weekend." She let out a breath, rubbing her forehead. "On top of that, my mom needs me to watch my brothers the day after – she's super-busy at work lately with all the stupid election events. I'll be glad when all that ridiculousness is over. If it's not one thing, it seems like it's always another."

The Owl quirked an eyebrow at her under his cowl. "You know, if you need to work on this homework right now, then we could always take a rain check on training and pick up again when you're not as busy."

She hummed pensively but shook her head. "It's tempting, but no." Clearing her throat, she looked up at him with grim determination in her eyes. "If I'm going to make this work – be a hero and go to school and help my parents and all the other stuff – I'll just… need to figure it out. I can't start blowing things off now."

"Give it a week or two?" the Owl teased. Nabatala gave him a look. He held his hands up. "Hey, no judgment here," he told her. "I didn't have any homework over the summer, but I did work a ton with M. Damocles – do you have any idea just how much stuff he has to clean? Especially Knightowl memorabilia; I've never seen so much of it in one place in my life. And that's when he's not working on 'training.' That, plus training with King Monkey… I haven't had much time to spend with my friends as it is, and now with school starting – and all of us going to difference lycées…" He shrugged. "I hope the homework isn't going to be too intense."

Nabatala groaned. "From everything I've heard, science and technology lycées give a thousand times more homework than I ever got in collège."

The Owl scoffed. "Well, good thing I'm not going to one of those…" She quirked an eyebrow at him curiously, and he let out a breath, looking away. "I'm not sure if I ever really wanted to go to a lycée technologique," he admitted. "But I couldn't have gotten in anyways; my parents could never make something like that work."

Nabatala hummed, studying his face with a knowing look. "So, are you disappointed because you're not going, or because your friends are?"

He shrugged. "I don't know. But it does feel like I might not see half my friends again after next week."

She gave him a sympathetic look. "Well, for what it's worth, you're still going to see at least a few friends," she told him firmly. "Because I'm your friend."

The Owl's eyes widened in surprise, and he smiled, thankful for the cowl to hide his reaction. "Thanks. I…" He looked away, tightness in his stomach. After everything that had happened – after the dumb things he had picked up from his father and parroted back – he was somehow friends with an immigrant – two of them, actually. "Thanks." Finally, he cleared his throat. "Well, um, should we… get to training?"

She nodded, dropping into a defensive stance and laying her harpoon along her arm, the tip pointed at him. "Let's go!"

Giving her an evaluating look, the Owl nodded to himself pensively, circling her slowly, just out of range from her harpoon. Nabatala's eyes followed him, though she remained motionless. Suddenly, when he was behind her in her blind spot, he jumped forward, aiming a kick at the back of her knee. Nabatala dove to the left, sweeping her harpoon through the space where she had been standing, batting the Owl's planted foot as he landed. The Owl's footing came out from under him, and he leaned backward with the momentum, hitting the ground on his shoulder, rolling back to his feet and spinning around on one foot to face her, dropping into a low crouch. She eyed him carefully, stalking toward him, harpoon held in both hands.

"Good!" he told her, still watching her feet. "Even if you can't see your opponent, you can still hear him!"

Nabatala's eyes crinkled in amusement. "It was your shadow," she replied. "I could see your shadow moving on the ground behind me, so I knew when you were going to attack."

His eye drifted to the light on the side of the museum behind him, and the had to resist the urge to wince. It was probably a good thing she'd had another way to know the ha was doing. He grinned, bobbing to either side, bouncing on the balls of his feet as he narrowed the distance between them. After training together all summer, he had started to grow accustomed to her style of fighting – he could see the calculating look in her eyes as she tried to figure out the best way to get close. Her fighting skills – especially unarmed – had improved significantly since they had started sparring together. His had, too, if he was being honest: to spar with a miraculous user and avoid either of them getting hurt had pushed him in a way he hadn't expected. Still, after working so much with King Monkey, he still had better technique than she did, even though her miraculous still gave her the edge in terms of raw strength. But in a straight fight, strength and endurance would eventually tell before technique could make the difference. That was what M. Damocles and King Monkey always told him: focus on ending the fight quickly.

Of course, in training that was easier said than done – at least if he didn't want to hurt Nabatala.

If this were a real fight, the Owl would flick out the concealed Owlets in his sleeves, throw them to either side to arc toward her head, and shoot his grappling hook around her legs while she was distracted. And while he could do that in training, was Nabatala ready yet to deal with those kinds of distractions? No; for now, he would stick to his feet and hands. In a way, fighting without equipment was good training for him, just as much as it was for her.

Nabatala's eyes narrowed in concentration, pursuing him across the pavement as he weaved around, always moving out of her way at the last second. "Stay still!" she grunted, jabbing at him with the butt end of her harpoon.

He smirked. "And if I did that, you'd skewer me no problem," he pointed out. "That's the key to fighting someone bigger or stronger than you: you need to stay out of their way when they are in control, and only engage when you have the advantage."

"Are you saying I'm stronger than you?" she teased, lunging forward and sweeping her harpoon through his space.

"With a miraculous," he grunted, leaning back to avoid the harpoon and pushing off the ground to throw himself a couple meters away from her, "you are."

"It's still not fair!" she growled, chasing after him and swinging her harpoon wildly at his head.

Seeing the attack coming, the Owl ducked below the sweeping harpoon and threw himself forward, slamming his shoulder into her chest and knocking her backward. Nabatala let out a yelp of surprise as her heel bumped against the edge of a paving stone and she tipped over, falling on her back. The Owl's eyes widened. He tried to catch himself, but too late – he landed on top of her and she grunted. Flushing under his cowl, the Owl rolled off of her and scrambled back on his knees. "S–sorry!" he gasped, before hesitantly approaching her and holding out a hand.

Nabatala groaned, rubbing the back of her head and blinking several times. She held her hand out and grabbed his hand, letting him pull her up into a sitting position. "Ohh…" she groaned, cradling her stomach. "I wasn't expecting that to hurt so much – maybe I need to talk to Kheaa about some padding…"

"I'm sorry," he apologized again, grimacing. "I didn't expect you to fall like that – I should have suggested that we move onto the grass for our sparring. Then you wouldn't have gotten hurt."

She shrugged, coughing. "It's fine – I'm pretty sure my suit at least took off the edge… Though my chest didn't appreciate that!"

He grimaced, glancing down. "Um… I hope you don't think I was trying to…" His voice trailed off, and he watched her face nervously.

"Hmm?" Nabatala cocked her head at him for a moment, and suddenly her face started turning red. "Oh! N–no; I didn't think that at all… until you said it," she added under her breath, before clearing her throat awkwardly.

"Because I really wouldn't do something like that," he told her. "Not to one of my friends."

"Besides," she mused, quirking an eyebrow at him as her face returned to its normal color, "what would your girlfriend think if she found out you were doing something like that to another girl?"

He scoffed. "Well, considering that I don't technically have a girlfriend…"

She furrowed her brows, her head cocked to one side. "But – the other week. I mean, didn't you say…?"

"We went on a date," he explained. "But that's it – at least so far. I mean, I like her an all, but… I don't know…" He chuckled humorlessly, shrugging one shoulder. "How am I supposed to explain this to her?"

She hummed. "I can imagine that would cause some trouble," she admitted. "Honestly, I'm glad I don't have to worry about that at the moment."

"Because your parents won't let you date?"

She laughed. "Because I don't have anyone I really want to date. Although I think that if I introduced a boy to my father, he might threaten him with surgery…"

The Owl paled, his eyes widening nervously. "Remind me not to get on your father's bad side…"

She quirked an eyebrow at him. "Shouldn't be too difficult."

He glanced down at her hand, still rubbing her stomach where he had hit her. "I mean, I did just knock you to the ground, maybe give you a concussion…"

She shook her head roughly. "Not a concussion; I wouldn't be able to shake my head like that if I had a concussion. And if it were too severe, I wouldn't be able to stand the streetlights around us. So, we're all good!"

"Still…" he began, grimacing. "I really am sorry for knocking you down the way I did. You might be the one with the miraculous, but I'm the one who's supposed to know what I'm doing. I should have been more careful to look out for you so you wouldn't get hurt."

Her eyes widened for a moment before she gave him a firm look. "You don't need to feel guilty: it's not your fault. I could have suggested moving to the grass, just as easily as you could have. I shouldn't have overextended myself the way I did. And you're just trying to help me prepare for if I have to fight someone who knows what they're doing and we're fighting for real. And in that situation, they wouldn't be concerned at all for my safety. So if I can't take a punch – or a hard landing – in training, then how am I supposed to do it if it's the real thing?"