The Owl dropped one foot back, narrowing his eyes and watching King Monkey carefully as he gave his staff a testing spin to one side. King Monkey's eyes betrayed nothing more than calm dispassion as he slowly moved one foot forward and to the side into a stronger stance. The motion drew the Owl's eye down to King Monkey's foot, moments before King Monkey lashed out with his staff, swinging at the Owl's shoulder with lightning speed. Catching the staff in the corner of his eye at the last moment, the Owl jumped backward and spun away, his cape whipping up around his waist as he did so, and dropped to land on one knee, flicking one of his Owlets in King Monkey's direction and bringing his cape up protectively as he did so. King Monkey, his staff having frozen, quivering, a millimeter from where the Owl's shoulder had been, twirled the staff once, knocking the Owlet into the ground between them, and jabbed the bottom end of the staff into the Owl's cape.
"Not bad, kid," King Monkey told him with a nod, pulling his staff back and resting it across his shoulders, draping his arms over it. Breathing heavily, the Owl pushed himself up and brushed off his knees, resettling the cape down his back. "Just remember: you need to be paying attention to the whole opponent, not just one part. The eyes are usually a good tell on a less skilled opponent, but with someone who knows what they're doing, it can actually be a trap. And if the opponent notices you studying them, they can trick you."
The Owl nodded, gritting his teeth, and dropped into a defensive stance, focusing his attention on King Monkey. "Right." Giving him a smirk, King Monkey leaned on his staff in a show of nonchalance, raising an eyebrow at the Owl in invitation. The Owl waited a fraction of a second and feinted forward, swinging a wide punch at King Monkey's face but pulling back and spinning around, aiming a kick at King Monkey's side. His foot connected with nothing but air, and he landed where King Monkey had been standing, just as King Monkey's staff rapped him on the upper arm.
"Better." King Monkey grinned, tapping his side again and spinning his staff away to rest behind his arm. "But you kind of telegraphed what you were gonna do: your head turned the slightest bit to the left."
The Owl shook his head in frustration and let out a groan. "Am I never going to get this?"
"Calm down," a soothing voice said over the communicator in his ear. M. Damocles chuckled. "You have been a hero for two months – no one expects you to be a better fighter than Cat Noir in two months!" He hummed. "In all honesty, you may be a more adept pugilist now than I was when I first started training with King Monkey!"
The Owl nodded slowly, letting out a quiet hum, and rolled his shoulders.
"Hey." King Monkey clapped him on the shoulder. "There's a reason you train against people who are better or more experienced than you: that's the way you learn. I train with Sk8r Girl, Carapace, and Ryoku, and all of them kick my ass at least once or twice in any sparring session. But that's how I get better. And this is how you get better: fighting against someone with a couple years more experience than you. With that move, most people wouldn't have noticed something like your head moving wrong. And just because they notice it doesn't mean they would be able to counter it. Without miraculous-enhanced agility, I might not have been able to get out of the way in time. So you're doing really good – worlds better than where you started."
Letting out a breath, the Owl grimaced under his cowl and mask. "Thanks."
"And to be fair," King Monkey added, quirking an eyebrow, "you shouldn't be fighting miraculous holders too often; half the time the non-miraculous heroes end up fighting the Dark Acolytes and the like while the miraculous heroes take on Killer Bee, the Bearator, and the others. And if you do fight a miraculous user…"
The Owl nodded, twisting his wrist and glancing down at the bracer. "Got it."
"Besides," King Monkey joked, "you already have one defeated miraculous villain under your utility belt, right?"
"Yeah…" The Owl furrowed his brows. Did Sandy really count? He had barely done anything beyond trying to stop her from hurting M. Damocles. Her falling on the ground in front of him so he could take away her miraculous had been… an accident. "I don't–"
A warning beep through his communicator cut off the Owl's words, and he started, spinning in either direction in confusion. They had chosen a lightly-used side street for the evening's training, with a couple of street lights providing all the illumination they needed. A couple of cars could be seen, driving past on the main road two blocks away, and a few of the residents had come outside to watch them spar. But not a single threat to be seen.
Beside him, King Monkey tensed, his eyes narrowing and ears twitching. "What's happening?" he demanded.
"Unknown assailant," reported a robotic voice. "Three blocks directly north of your location. Coordinates incoming."
King Monkey glanced down at a screen that extended out of his staff and nodded curtly. "We're on our way." Without a second glance at the Owl, he sprinted north, putting on a burst of speed that left the Owl in the dust.
Chasing after him as fast as he could, the Owl raced up the street after King Monkey, even as he fell further and further behind. The Owl gritted his teeth, forcing himself to speed up, tearing down the street with his cape flapping wildly behind him. "What's… going on?" he wheezed.
"Don't know, but people are in danger," King Monkey called behind him without looking.
"I… huh." M. Damocles hummed pensively. "I do not see anything about this on the television. TVi must not have picked it up yet."
"Th–the Wise… Owl… doesn't know what… it is," the Owl gasped out.
Almost a full block ahead of him, King Monkey skidded to a halt. "Holy shit."
The Owl cocked his head to one side as a sound of grinding metal echoed down the street from ahead, just beyond where King Monkey had stopped. A small group of people stood in the street, staring at something in front of an apartment building. The Owl's eye was drawn upward as a trashcan flew up into the air and burst apart in a shower of garbage, and the crowd flinched, scattering in all directions. Shaking his head, King Monkey jumped forward and spun his staff in a shield, blocking the largest piece of the trashcan away from a woman with two children. Just as a newly-planted sapling burst out of the ground with a shower of dirt and flew toward a pair of older women, the Owl put on a burst of speed, crashing into the two women and knocking them to the ground, out of the sapling's path, just in time. Hitting the ground on his side, the Owl sprang up into a crouch, placing himself between them and where the tree had been.
"W–w–w–what!?" gasped one of the two women, her voice quivering. "What just happened?"
"Stay down!" the Owl ordered, turning to search for the source of the disturbance.
A boy around his own age stood in the middle of the sidewalk, his short-cropped hair standing up on end, as a swirl of leaves and twigs whipped around him in a whirlwind pattern. A bicycle rose into the air a half-meter, the wheels spinning crazily, flew around him once, and rocketed straight into the side of the building behind him. The Owl raised his cape to shield his face from a shower of brick shards, dropping lower to cover the two women, before lowering it to study the boy's face. The boy's eyes were wide, a look of terror on his face as he turned in all directions, staring at the chaos around him.
"Shut it down!" shouted King Monkey, waving a hand at the boy.
"I–I can't!" The boy shook his head, his mouth wide open and threw his hands up into the air. A shower of leaves rocketed upward, out of the whirlwind, and fluttered to the ground all around them. "I–I don't know how!"
"Whatever you just did, do the opposite!" King Monkey bellowed.
"What's that supposed to mean!?" With a rumble, a beam of rebar exposed by the crack in the side of the building peeled out of the wall, curling in on itself as it broke free. Shards of bricks ripped away from the tear in the building and joined in the maelstrom of detritus, spinning around the boy twice before ricocheting into two of the cars parked on the other side of the street. The Owl's eyes widened in shock, and he dove to one side, holding up his cape protectively as a spray of brick powder rained down on him. The boy cried out in fear, and the bench on the side of the road just a couple meters from him shook.
"We need to stop this!" the Owl called, eyeing the bench warily. "The whole place could go up!"
"What are you seeing?" M. Damocles demanded urgently.
"No idea!" the Owl retorted. "Kid moving things with his mind? How do we stop it!?"
M. Damocles hummed. "King Monkey can sort that out easily," he suggested.
"Hey!" Crouching low, the Owl edged toward King Monkey. "Do your thing!"
King Monkey's eyes shot wide open. "I can't! Not on a person! I don't know what it would do!"
"Worse than this!?" The Owl ducked lower, narrowly avoiding a flying brick.
"I–" King Monkey looked back and forth between the civilians around them and the boy at the center of the chaos. Finally, he grimaced. "Oh, fuck it – Uproar!" A toy magnet landed in his hand, and he hurled it at the boy, hitting him in the chest. Instantly, the storm of leaves, brick shards, and trash dropped to the ground in a ring at the boy's feet, and he looked up at King Monkey, his mouth hanging open. King Monkey rolled his head back, sighing in relief. "You have no idea how glad I am that that worked," he groaned.
"I… thought that's what it was supposed to do," the Owl pointed out, cocking his head.
King Monkey chuckled, shaking his head ruefully. "Let me clarify: I'm glad it stopped the madness, instead of just popping the kid like a blueberry!"
The Owl blinked. "You mean that was a possibility?"
"You–you stopped it!" The kid looked down at his hands in shock, turning them over and back, and past them at the ring of debris surrounding him, before staring up at King Monkey with wide eyes. "Th–thank you! But… how?"
King Monkey shrugged. "That's what I do: I can disrupt superpowers. Unfortunately, it's only temporary."
The kid's shoulders slumped. "You mean it will come back?"
"'Fraid so."
"What happened?" asked the Owl, looking around and gesturing to the chaos around them. "How did this start?"
"I'm… not entirely sure," the kid admitted, shrugging. "Yesterday, everything was fine but then today…" He held his hands up helplessly. "I don't know how it happened, but suddenly, things started moving around me! At first it was just one thing at a time: a leaf, a soda can. But then that bus drove past and startled me, and a bunch more things started moving. That scared me, and suddenly… everything was going crazy." He sighed heavily. "Thank you for stopping it."
King Monkey frowned. "Like I said, it will be back in 5 minutes, so we need to figure out something better in the meantime. What's your name, kid?"
"S–Sacha. What am I supposed to do?"
The Owl raised an eyebrow. "It sounds like your power – whatever it is – is connected to your emotions. When you get angry, scared, or upset, it goes nuts. Maybe try to… not get so scared?"
Sacha scoffed. "That sounds great," he retorted drily. "I'll get right on that: not being scared of my sudden and mysterious ability to move things with my mind!"
The Owl winced. "Sorry."
King Monkey placed a hand on Sacha's shoulder. "Actually, we have people who can help you with that," he told him. "And I think they might be able to help you control your ability – assuming that all you have to do is figure out your emotions."
"So… what do I do in the meantime?" He looked around nervously. "Just… go home and pretend like this never happened?"
King Monkey grimaced. "Maybe not that. We'll talk to your parents, let them know you're safe, but it might be good for you to stay somewhere we can keep an eye on you – at least until you figure out how to control… whatever this is." He sighed. "Don't worry: we'll help you out. You're not going to be alone."