Kammy feels she should also compliment Gi’s attack, but instead leans more toward staying focused. As risky as it is, Crystal goes back for more of the action, but in a way that intentionally, though subtly, puts her in a bad spot between the two, thus giving them the false confidence that’s she’s trapped herself in desperation. In reality, she’s willing to take the immediate punishment if it yields the much bigger reward she’s after right now. Rather than trying to hit the two in rightly timed attacks, she makes sure her rhythm keeps an awkward pace, more specifically geared toward Gigi. While Kamron does make sure to hit where she can, and yes, she’s feeling a few stings along the way, she’s staying the course with leading Gigi’s motions astray until, finally, “OW! Watch where you’re swinging, Gigi!”
Switching back to Paul, the good news is his spirit and the cooperation with the boys is improved. The bad news is his new strategy of relying mostly on his speed is archaic for him. He knows the tactic is overused, but the bad start has really put him behind. “Well, if I’m going down, I’m gonna’ go down strong. But how to finish? If only I could tell the difference between my fire attack and my ice attack. Or…will Lady Duplica’s nanos account for that? Elfie would try it. I’ll risk it on Owan, just in case.”
That said, Paul waits for Owan to make another anticipated attack, and just the right moment, the Mercury boy takes a gamble and does whatever attack his hand feels like launching today. Cool!
“Seriously, Paul?” says a partially frozen Owan.
“Well, that went better than I thought,” Paul says. “I should’ve waited and dealt with both of them simultaneously.”
“Yep!” is Elf’s response as he takes advantage of Paul’s amazement at his own rare accuracy. For one moment, he actually had a miraculous chance of coming back, but his hesitation in marveling at his achievement is enough to secure his downfall as Elfie makes short work of him. Paul is out, but not without making a very vital contribution.
“You know, O,”’ Elfer slyly says as he approaches the captive, wielding his laser sword attack in preparation. He points to Owan’s wrist and says, “stabbing the nerves here in your wrist would send excruciating electrical pain throughout your body, ensuring a very easy win for me. You’d heal fine, but it’s great motivation to quit now. Then again, I’m not that cruel.”
“Too bad,” says his rival who simply uses his own System Swords to burst through his icy covering before engaging in the epic clash they’ve been waiting for the entire time. Yeah, this’ll be a while.
So, let’s pass the time with the girls who are now approaching a possible free-for-all, in its purest form, as Kammy’s new strategy seems to slowly be paying off with Faye starting to lose her cool until she and Gigi finally exchange expressions of frustration. Kammy makes sure to keep attacking to add to their fuel, but in a careful way to not violate their angrily distracted state. This, too, starts to pay off until Kammy gets bold enough to throw in a cutting verbal jab of her own. “Ha ha! Now, I see why she waited to help you, Faye. Were you that careless?”
Yep, Grace’s waiting game has just been exposed, and Faye voices her disgust at not catching on to this more quickly. “Good job,” Faye says. “Well done,” Faye says. “Now, learn to regret it,” Faye screams as she corrects her earlier mistake in letting Gigi off the hook.
Nova G. is not ready for Faye’s unexpected rage at being duped so easily, and it’s Gi’s ill-prepared defense that makes itself known to Kammy. Now, it is her turn to decide whether to wait or not, with her decision obviously not having the same detrimental consequence, at least as far as Kammy can tell, but she’ll be quick, just in case. She does, however, notice Paul is out and shoots him a nano-chat message saying how proud she is of him and that she’s still holding him to his promise of a chancing rematch. After this lovely message, she picks her answer, it has to be Gigi.
Rushing over, she starts helping the girl, who makes the frustrating mistake of turning on the one trying to save her. Kammy yells in her face, “Grace, think about what you’re doing! I’m helping you and you’re intentionally letting yourself lose just because you’re mad at me!”
Inner Man Theatre 