A/N: School and jobs have been throttling the life outta me. But, I managed to squeeze in this little (incredibly overdue) one-shot through all of the pain. Isao Pierce-Okamoto belongs to kjd1022 and chavemora (I used hir deviantart url because her tumblr url is a bit confusing in this context), Parvathi Verma belongs to me. This still counts as the ex-members of Choten's Army, right? And before anyone asks, no, Ray and Alakshmi are not supposed to be a couple in this.


"No, no. You were doing it right the first time! Try again!"

"Well, you told me the first time I was doing it wrong!"

"So I made a mistake, big deal! I'm not really good at this."

"Then why are you teaching me?!"

"I'm older than you!"

Raiden watched his younger brother and Alakshmi's daughter argue amongst themselves, while the poor Skullcutter she'd summoned helplessly toddled around, unsure of what to do or where to strike. Isao Jr had always wanted to be like his namesake, but had a slight difficulty in keeping his 'students' to pay attention to him. Then again, he was only 10 years old, and she 9, so that may also have been a reason for the slight setback in his teachings.

"If it gets any more heated down there, I'm going to break up his 'lesson' myself," Alakshmi entered the seating arrangement in the arena, and sat down next to Ray. "But he might be a good shoo-in for the next Darkness duel master. Jaha does need to retire soon." Ray chuckled a little bit at her joke, but didn't do much else to acknowledge her person, nor she to his.

Parvathi stormed off from him, and practically punched her creature in the face commanding it to attack. The Dread Mask seemed to get the memo, and ran at full speed at the training targets, slashing them to kindling. The two kids were frozen in shock, and Alakshmi stood up and cheered for her a bit louder then what was completely necessary. Ray whooped and laughed to in her honor, as the two acolytes to be beamed with pride.

Ray always liked seeing Alakshmi beam over Parvathi, especially when it came to the sappier aspects. Three years ago, finding out she was adopting her had been a pretty big surprise for everyone, but Alakshmi had her mind firmly set. The first few months had been a little hectic, but the duel masters and their families were glad to give her a helping hand in raising Parvathi with all they could do. Dueling had been one of those rougher patches, but Alakshmi deemed that what her kid wanted to do was fine by her, allowing that the masters could keep her out of danger.

After the cheering and the short burst of celebration, the arena was silent. Parvathi looked down at the creature with wide eyes full of glee. And then, turning to Isao Jr, she proceeded to ask a question in quite possibly one of the most adorable pangs of confusion possible.

"How do I get rid of it?"

"And that's my cue," Ray said, standing up and making his way down to the arena. Alakshmi laughed again, though quitter this time, and more out of second-hand embarrassment. "She was doing pretty, well though. Takes after you." Alakshmi shrugged and grinned a bit, and Ray hopped into the arena as a sort of secondary teacher for his little brother. From now on, he decided, these lessons would be a group effort.