Hourly Challenge: Red

a/n: "Waiting for the day Lin removes the little Monado pins from her hair and proves disturbingly competent at using them like tiny versions of the weapon they were based on." Luxin tweeted this concept, and I had to write something.

Swears? Shhhh, don't tell Elma.

Absolutely all the good stuff belongs to Monolith Soft, although maybe not this.

Lin almost had to admire Tatsu's stoicism. He muttered and meh'ed, but he wasn't a slobbering mess, not even after one of the Prone shoved him so hard he bounced ahead of the party by several meters. He just wobbled upright and adjusted his increasingly deflated green hat. His glasses had been lost early in their captivity, so his squinting glance was inexact. "Linly not worry," he chirped at her when she'd rushed to help him. "Tatsu has plan."

Lin Lee wasn't worried at all about Tatsu's plan, because she knew there was absolutely no possibility of it existing. She, on the other hand, had been paying attention once her head had cleared from the explosions that had landed them in trouble. The exhaust system; she was pretty sure that had made the skell ... not the point, really. She knew roughly where they were, with only a large lagoon and an awkwardly placed ancient ring blocking them from a BLADE encampment. It wouldn't take more than half a day to get to safety, provided they could get away.

But the party of Cavern Prone that had scooped them up weren't simple enough to let them just edge their way to safety. Whenever the group rested, they made sure to keep her chained to a rock. Tatsu was lucky to remain free, if you considered being teased and tormented by giant blue meanies lucky. Lin fumed and waited for an opportunity.

At the end of the second day, she realized she couldn't wait much longer. Tatsu was battered from all the amusement. Soon he'd be too tired to keep up. Meanwhile, the Prone were growing hungry. The Turnip was being brave, she really had to respect it, but she'd learned enough about Nopon to know where they ranked on Mira's food chain. Higher than ovis, but not by much.

As they settled in for the night, Tatsu whispered tiredly, "Maybe Linlee can do the cooking. Tatsu trust friend to do gentle job."

"The h..., er, heck I will. I'm not cooking anything until I'm back in my own kitchen. And certainly not anyone."

"It okay. Linly can swear."

"I am not getting Elma on my case about teaching you bad words, dopey. Now shut up. But do me a favor and stay the heck awake."

Tatsu muttered in despair, something about no more time to learn and proper temperatures for stewing Nopon. Lin ignored him and watch the Prone drop off to sleep. When everyone but the guard on duty was snoring, she hissed at Tatsu. "Psst. Pass me the cord from your vest."

"Lin want keepsake," Tatsu said solemnly.

"I need it to keep the hair out of my eyes." She reached for the golden twist of cord impatiently, the chain keeping her from stretching out her arm. As soon as she had it in her hands, she tied it into a band and slipped it around her head. It was tight, and the chains were really making movement awkward, but it worked to keep her hair out of her eyes. She'd had to remove her hair clips to pull it past her ears.

Tatsu leaned against her. "Not recognize Linly without tuft decorations."

"Yeah, I always wear them, don't I?" She bounced them lightly in her palm. They were cherry red and shaped like tiny fantasy swords about the length of her thumb. "Nagi gave them to me, before you met me. Told me, 'Miss Koo, please always to keep them near.'" She grinned at Tatsu and carefully shifted them so she held one in each hand, delicately, like tiny paintbrushes. She tilted her head to one side and twinkled at her friend. Then she pinched their miniature hilts ever so slightly. Each hair clip split a fraction along its length, and a pair of miniature shining pink beam swords erupted from her hands.

One. Chains were sliced off, landing neatly in the sand at her feet. Two. The closest sleeper slept in a more permanent way. Three. Lin didn't wait to see if the guard noticed. After a small backwards jump, she spun in the air and sent the surprised guard to join the sleeper with a double slash.

Four. The last and beefiest of Prone was awake and bearing down on her slight figure. To Tatsu's surprise, she passed one hair clip over, so that she was holding both clips in her left hand. Their light combined to make a sword of almost standard length. The Prone was almost on top of her when she made the first downward slash, diagonally. The next slash started to retrace back along the path of the first, but at the last moment, she twirled the blade behind her, so that the Prone was surprised by a upward thrust. Two more horizontal slashes brought the Prone into a crouch.

It wouldn't be enough, Tatsu thought. Lin wasn't big enough to stop an enemy twice her height and a hundred times heavier. She was only stabbing him in the shins. Except she spun around like a dancer, lifting into the air and slashing brutally straight down onto the staggered Prone. The pink ether traces left a flurry of triangular specks floating in Tatsu's vision. When the blur cleared, he saw the Prone slumped on the ground and his friend, his hero, grinning smugly over at him.

"Nagi and Elma taught me how to use them too."

a/n: I had to rewatch a lot of Xeno and Xeno X videos to get the descriptions close to right. Kingddd has Black Tar playing in the background of the all signature arts video, oh no I had to listen to that a lot (I love that music). Many thanks to the heropon of the Tube of You and to Luxin for saying that yes, I could write this nonsense.