Friendly Fight

Posted on Fri May 1st, 2026 @ 1:37pm by Lieutenant Evelyn Stewart & 1st Lieutenant Kes Th’relnal

2,382 words; about a 12 minute read

Mission: Year One: The Point of No Return
Location: USS Moore - Gym
Timeline: MD: 009 - 19:30hrs

Stewart snapped a rapid combination at the Andorian marine commander—jab, cross, low kick—trying to slip inside his reach and take his balance. Nothing. “Dammit.” The word tore out of her as she broke contact, hands coming back up as she paced a half-step away, lungs burning while she recalibrated. She was faster, more agile. She knew she was. Normally that mattered. It didn’t here.

He hadn’t shifted an inch. Just stood there, solid and infuriatingly calm, antennae flicking once in a way that made her irrationally sure he was enjoying this.

"You almost had me there." Kes lied. He adjusted his gloves and took a somewhat lower stance. He was cautious now in sparing. Since the incident with Carmichael. They'd chatted and had made amends, but it still bothered him that it had happened. Kes played defense mostly, striking in measured bursts and guarded jabs.

"Try that one again. Who knows, it might work the third time." The Andorians antenna eased back and smoothed down just above his thick hair.

Stewart just sighed out her agitation through her nose as she tucked a strand of hair that had come loose from her braid behind her ear. "Condescension isn't your strong suit, Kes. Stick to smugness." She muttered sarcastically as her breathing evened out, the smallest tug of a smirk at her lips. She went back to her scanning of the man for any areas of weakness she could exploit.

"It's only condescension if it doesn't inspire you to do better." Kes replied evenly.

She decided on a different tact and intentionally went to kick him high towards his chest, leaving her guard open and exposed in the hope of drawing him in for a counter.

Kes saw the telegraphed kick and internally sighed. Instead of sweeping for an easy kick or even deflecting the incoming kick, he reached out to grab her ankle. Mistakes had to be rewarded.

For half a second Stewart let it happen—because the moment she felt his grip, she understood what he’d chosen: control, not impact. Correction, not cruelty.

Her jaw clenched.

“Yeah. Thought so.”

She didn’t fight the hold head-on. Instead she used it—pivoting on her planted foot and snapping her hips through, trying to turn his grab into a liability. She drove her free leg up in a tight, ugly arc toward his outside knee—not a full stomp, not dirty, but sharp enough to force him to move or loosen his grip.

At the same time she threw her hands up fast, not to punch, but to jam his shoulders and crowd his space—closing distance so he couldn’t just stand there and manhandle her like she was a training dummy.

“You're holding back,” she bit out through her breath, eyes narrowed, daring him to actually commit to the counter instead of playing it safe.

Kes gritted his teeth as he had to back pedal from Stewarts wild flailing attack. "And if I weren't, a move like that would have gotten you killed."

The irony of the statement hit him a second later. She knew that already and was intentionally trying to goad him on. "Fine, message received."

His antenna swiped forward as he brought his hands up and shifted his weight on his feet. Kes opened his mouth as if he was about to say something more when instead he sprung forward and took a high swipe at Steward with his left hand coming within a hair of her defense, but his whole body moved as he followed through with a kick aimed for her ribs.

Stewart took the kick hard in the ribs.

A grunt tore out of her and she recoiled on instinct, shoulders turning away as her guard dropped. It wasn’t dramatic, just automatic—pain first, pride second.

She staggered back a step and forced her hands back up, breathing shallow through her nose while her side lit up every time she tried to pull air in.

Her eyes stayed on him, jaw tight.

“…Okay.” It came out rough. No smile. No banter.

She shifted her feet, reset her stance, and came back in anyway—jab to his gloves, then another. She tried to build the rhythm back up, tried to make her body remember what it was supposed to do. But the discipline was slipping.

She wasn't sloppy. Not panicked. Just… off by enough to matter. Her right elbow floated wider than it should have. Her guard didn’t fully seal when she stepped in. She didn’t even realize she was leaving her ribs open again until she was already committing.

She threw a cross and followed with a low kick, trying to take his base and force him to move, pushing the pace like she could outwork the frustration out of her system.

“Stop looking at me like that,” she snapped through her breath, eyes narrowed. “Either hit me again or say what you’re actually thinking.”

The words were barely out of her mouth before Kes came in hard and fast. He wasn't a precision instrument, he was a hammer. While sometimes that was a detriment, nailing someone in the same spot on their ribs was a decent job for a hammer.

"You're distracted by something and I'm holding back." He said firmly. "That's not fair from either of us. You're not learning and I'm not seeing you at your best."

"What's your problem Stewart? You've got a better than what you're showing, and if you didn't that mouth would have gotten beaten off you by now."

Kes relaxed his stance, or appeared to at least. His antenna were still on high alert waiting for her to do something other than be honest.

Stewart took the second hit in the same place.

It landed deep enough to make her suck in a sharp breath and turn away, shoulders hunching just slightly as the air left her. She didn’t go down, but she didn’t push back in either.

She stopped.

Her hands lowered a fraction as she angled off, pressing her palm into her ribs. She dragged it once along the sore spot, more irritation than panic, then gave her shoulder a short shake like she could dislodge the lingering nerve pain.

Kes’s words stuck.

Distracted. Holding back.

She let out a slow breath through her nose and didn’t look at him right away.

“…Yeah,” she said finally. “I am.”

That was all she gave him at first.

She straightened, forced her guard back up out of habit, then let it fall again when she realized there was no point. Her fingers lingered at her side, thumb rubbing once at the ache before she dropped her hand.

“This Anjar business,” she said instead, clipped. “The way Command’s handling it. The timing.”

A pause. Fractional. Controlled.

“They want it neat,” she added. “Contained. Like it’s just procedure.”

Her jaw set, irritation sharpening—not outward, but inward.

“That doesn’t sit well,” she finished, and left it there.

No confession.
No admission.

Just a reason that sounded acceptable, even if it wasn't the whole truth.

Kes nodded. "Ah yes, the clinical detachment of Starfleet to expect everyone to follow orders and not follow their gut. Rules and regulations without the empathy of the common soul." He chuckled a little. "I swear the vulcans wrote the book and no one wanted to argue with them."

Kes lowered his arms a little as his antenna curled forward. "So what are you going to do about it?" He shrugged. "I can keep poking holes in your defenses and beat you down, but I don't think that's what you need right now."

Stewart let her hands drop—no guard, no pretense she was about to step back in. She shifted her weight carefully, one palm pressing briefly into her ribs before she straightened again.

She didn’t look away this time.

“Don’t reframe it,” she said evenly. “You’re not correcting my mistakes. You’re choosing not to capitalize on them.”

Her gaze stayed fixed on him, calm and unflinching.

“I could say the same thing about you.”

A pause.

“All this discipline. All this control.” Her mouth twitched, not amused. “Didn’t see much of that the night you punched Carmichael out in front of half the crew.”

She let the silence stretch just long enough to register.

“That wasn’t about him,” Stewart continued, voice low and precise. “You were wound tight and itching for a fight—and he just happened to be the one in the ring.”

Her eyes tracked the subtle tells now, antennae, shoulders, the way he was holding himself.

“And now you’re overcorrecting,” she added. “Playing defense. Pulling your shots. Because you don’t trust where that line actually is.”

She shifted her stance again, careful, controlled—but still disengaged.

“So don’t tell me this is about me being distracted,” she finished quietly. “You’re holding back because you already crossed it once.”

She didn’t say anything more, just simply watched him.

"It was bad form." Kes replied. "He didn't deserve that and I didn't show the leadership and restraint I should have in that situation."

"So now I'm faced with not only Carmichael hesitating around me, but half the crew. That's trouble in a fight where split seconds matter. So I need to rebuild that. And I don't do that by knocking out the next mouthy Lieutenant who steps foot in my shop."

"Doesn't this ship have a therapist? Or are you planning on applying for the position with all this talk?" Kes growled.

Stewart didn’t answer.

She just moved.

Jab—cross—fast enough to snap against his guard before he could fully settle. She stepped in on it, driving a hard kick toward his thigh, then another toward his ribs, forcing him to give ground whether he wanted to or not.

No warning.
No words.

Just motion.

Her breathing came tight through her nose as she pressed forward again—hook toward his head, elbow inside his guard, shoulders crowding his space before snapping a quick front kick toward his midsection.

The word lingered in the back of her mind—therapist—sharp in a way it shouldn’t have been.

And then she changed levels.

Her foot hooked behind his ankle in a sudden sweep while her shoulder drove forward into his chest, turning the motion into a hard takedown meant to dump him flat onto the mat.

Only after the movement committed did the rest of it catch up with her.

The adrenaline.
The impulse.

Stewart stopped the follow-through before it turned into anything more, stepping back as the moment broke. Her chest rose and fell once as she forced the spike of aggression back down.

Her hand brushed briefly against her sore ribs before dropping again.

“…Don’t do that,” she said finally, voice low.

Her eyes stayed on him.

“Don’t get defensive and pretend it’s insight.” She said before offering to help the Andorian to his feet.

"Where was that determination ten minutes ago?" Kes asked as he got to his feet, the hint of a grin peeking through his dour expression.

"Besides, you call it defensive but it's true. I can't go around knocking heads at the drop of a hat. Right now, I need trust, not force." Kes shrugged. "Unless you can think of a better way."

Stewart let out a quiet breath through her nose, not quite a laugh, not quite a release.

She didn’t take the reset position this time. Didn’t bring her hands back up.

Instead, she shifted her weight off her ribs and stood there—looser now, but not relaxed. Just… done with the exercise.

“For you?” she said, tone even. “Yeah. I can.”

A small pause. Not for effect—just long enough to make it clear she wasn’t reacting anymore.

“You stop trying to control how people see you,” she continued, eyes steady on him. “You just show up the same way every time. Consistent. Predictable where it matters.” A slight tilt of her head. “People don’t trust restraint because you say you have it. They trust it because they see where you draw the line.”

Her gaze flicked briefly to where he’d taken the hit, then back up.

“And you don’t figure that out by pulling every punch.” A beat. “You figure it out by knowing exactly when you won’t.”

Silence settled for a second—this time not tense. Just… finished.

“As for me…” Stewart added, more clipped now, like she was closing a door on the conversation before it wandered somewhere else.

“I’ll deal with it.”

Not fix. Not solve. Just—deal.

Her jaw set faintly, something sharper underneath that she wasn’t offering up for discussion.

“Command can keep it neat,” she went on. “Doesn’t mean I have to like it.”

A small exhale.

She glanced toward the exit, then back to him, one brow lifting just slightly.

“We’re done here?” she asked, already shifting like she was stepping off the mat whether he agreed or not. A faint, wry pull at the corner of her mouth followed. “Come on. Let’s go grab a drink.”

She turned—

—and immediately sucked in a sharp breath as her ribs protested.

Her hand came up on instinct, pressing into the spot as she paused, eyes squeezing shut for half a second.

“…Though,” she muttered, a quiet, breathless huff of a laugh slipping out despite herself. “I see your point.”

She shook her head once, more resigned than annoyed, then glanced back at him just enough to make sure he was following.

“Come on.”

Kes tilted his head to one side and then the other, stretching the tension from his neck as he did. His antenna perked up instantly at the thought of a good drink. "Only 'a' drink? Figured I'd have worked up more of a thirst in you."

The Andorian grinned as he noticed her wince before his own bruises began to ache. "Lead the way."

Stewart didn’t slow as she headed for the door. “I said one drink,” she tossed over her shoulder. A beat. “That’s just to start.”

 

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