Sell you a Bridge chapter 6 (Patreon)

When we got up to the roof Artemis sat down on one of the milk crates and just looked at me skeptically. “A ninja? Seriously?” She was less impressed than I expected, but I still had some tricks up my sleeves to show off my skills. She seemed more bored than disbelieving though, like she knew tons of ninjas. “I mean, you could have learned normal martial arts or even magic if you wanted to go that way and you learned how to what, throw sharp stuff and hide in a corner?”

I scowled at that, feeling oddly defensive about my choice in how to use my own ability “Hey! I don’t hide in a corner. I vanish into the shadows. Besides I’m a master at throwing shuriken now. I bet my aim is even better than yours is with that bow of yours.” I buffed my nails against my shirt and arched an eyebrow at her in challenge. The resulting scowl was more extreme than I had expected. She clearly really did not like being challenged on her archery skills.

Her tone was arch as she stalked over to one side of the roof to start setting up targets shooting back over her shoulder “Oh that’s it. You’re going down moneybags. Fine then, since you’re so confident, it just so happens that I have some shuriken downstairs. I’m going to go get them and my bow and we’re going to have a little contest. If I win you have to take me shopping.” She completely glossed over the fact that she just happened to have shuriken lying around her house, and I felt it best not to ask about it.

There was one other glaring flaw in her little competition though “You seem pretty confident. But you’re ignoring a crucial detail. What if I win?” I was pretty confident, I was a master of shuriken now. Limited as that single weapon mastery may be it was mastery nonetheless. I knew Artemis was a genius with the bow but I was pretty sure I could beat her. Plus if not buying clothes or weapons or whatever for a pretty girl wasn’t the end of the world.

Artemis turned around, already heading for the fire escape to go get the shuriken but she paused. She looked pretty stumped. “I don’t really know? What do you want?” Her eyes narrowed in warning “And in case you were going to ask I’m not going to suck your dick or anything. Regardless of how much fun a shopping spree would be I’m not that easy.” I tried not to focus on the slight hesitation before she made that condition and just considered what I wanted.

I had to address one thing though “I wasn’t going to ask you to blow me for losing a bet. We’re friends. Not that you should take that to mean I wouldn’t definitely have sex with you, but I wouldn’t leverage you into it like that. That’s skeezy. No, if I win...I want you to make me lunch on school days and feed it to me by hand in front of everyone. It has to be decent food and you can’t rush it.” I figured a bit of teasing would be something she could handle.

Her suspicious face actually split into a grin “Humiliation huh? Not bad, I didn’t know you had it in you. Having to hand feed you in front of the whole student body is pretty much a nightmare. Fine, but I want a limit of at least ten grand on that shopping trip. Deal?” I shot her a grin and nodded and she headed down the fire escape to go grab her bow and arrows and the shuriken I was going to be using for this. I wondered what other weapons she had down there, I had a sneaking suspicion it was not a small number.

She was back within a few minutes and she tossed me a small black pouch that was a bit heavier than it looked. I opened the thing up to find a set of fairly well worn but excellently maintained shuriken. I paused for a moment at that thought, apparently I now knew how to maintain shuriken, which I suppose made sense what with the whole mastery thing. Regardless though these things were properly sharpened to a razors edge and would work perfectly for my purposes.

Artemis meanwhile had a dark green recurve bow. It looked worn from use much like the shuriken but equally well cared for, and the quiver on her back was made of excellent leather and bristling with arrows. Artemis was testing the string as she sighted on the makeshift targets on the other side of the roof. I knew enough about archery from school to know that you only kept a recurve strung like that if you used it regularly, so she was obviously in practice.

The targets were basic stuff, empy milk jugs and soda bottles she had placed at different elevations and at odd angles to make them more of a challenge to hit. Artemis drew an arrow from her quiver and checked to make sure the shaft was straight before stringing the arrow and drawing. The motion was smooth and quick, and expert three finger grip with one above the arrow and two below on the string and I could see the play of the muscles in her back as she pulled the string.

I tried not notice the way her archery stance tightened her ass in those tiny shorts but luckily she was entirely focused on the target clearly having decided to go first. She held the strong for a few seconds and then between breaths she released. Before the arrow was even a foot from the bow she had drawn and knocked another one firing off ten shots rapid fire and nailing ten different targets with about as much suspense as flipping a trick coin with two heads.

I heard a series of thunks as the arrows all found their marks and the fire rate was so fast it sounded like fucking rain pattering down. I wasn’t looking at her ass anymore, I was gaping at the obvious mastery of the bow she had shown off. I’d seen her shoot at school sure, but it was always single shots at big stuffed targets down a small range. This was...like olympic level shit. It was a good thing I was confident in my powers or there was no chance in hell I would be able to avoid that shopping spree.

Not that I definitely would even with the master level skills, Artemis was a certified badass, I might still lose but at least it should be close. Still Artemis was a fifteen year old girl, being able to learn that kind of skill through actual training instead of cheating like I did was crazy. I couldn’t help but let out a low whistle at the display. “That was pretty nuts, I have to admit. I can’t say for sure I’m going to be able to top that, but I’m sure going to try.”

She rolled her eyes at my bravado “Big talk, go ahead and show me what you’ve got moneybags.” She gestured grandly at the wall of the storage shed on the roof that she had pinned the targets against within only a bit less than a single breath of time. “ Even if you’re a master of shuriken now you won’t be able to do much better than that, I hit every target perfectly. The best you can do is tie with me, and I don’t believe we set and draw conditions.”

She sounded smug about that but she had missed one crucial point. My shuriken mastery came from a fictional style of ninjutsu that included crazy things like walking on walls and vanishing into shadows. Even the parts that didn’t require me to use my points were still crazy compared to normal human beings. I opened up the pouch, feeling the rough untanned leather whisper against the razor thin shards of metal inside. The pouch was folded over itself five times and each side had the room for four shuriken. All in all there was twenty of the things. I withdrew enough of them that I could hold them between each finger and tested the weight.

It was a strange feeling, knowing something somehow but never having learned it. I understood every subtle nuance of the shuriken just by picking them up and I knew the exact arc they would travel when I threw them. This mastery thing was the real deal, and I couldn’t wait for more of the ninja stuff I would be learning. I lashed out with one hand, four of the deadly metal stars whirling out into the air and then my second hand came up even faster and threw the other four with twice the speed.

The second group hit the first group changing their trajectory and deflecting off them to sink into a different set of targets than they had been aimed at, the second group meanwhile had been deflected directly into the original targets of the first group. I drew eight more and did the same trick again. Much like Artemis my shots had all been perfectly aimed, but I’d added an extra layer of showing off she hadn’t.

As expected she knew that I’d won and was scowling at me. “That’s so fucking cheap. You watched a video! But fine, a deal is a deal. I’ll make you lunches on school days and...” She scrunched up her face like she’d bitten into a lemon “Hand feed you in the cafeteria in front of everyone.” She raised a finger at me in warning “But don’t you dare use that stupid power of yours to learn archery. I WILL kick your ass if you do.”

I threw my hands up in supplication “Whoa, don’t shoot. I won’t learn archery, I promise.” I decided mentioning that archery seemed kind of pointless in the modern world when I could just take a thirty day sniper seminar or something was needlessly combative. But I did mean what I said, I had zero intentions of learning her craft. “Anyway with that out of the way what do you want to do? We could train again but even if my body feels better I don’t think I’d learn as much if I don’t take breaks.”

She gave a grudging nod, clearly having hoped to kick my ass a little to air her grievances for losing on her home turf. “Yeah, you aren’t wrong.” She looked pensively at me. “Well maybe we can go get you some gear. Not necessarily a costume or anything if you weren’t looking to get into that life, but your own set of shuriken would be helpful.” She left me to think about it as she walked over to start pulling out the arrows and shuriken.

The broadheads she’d been using had stuck pretty deep into the targets so it took her a minute to work them all free, but it was clear she had plenty of practice doing just that. As for the shuriken before she could even try I was there, my mastery included retrieving the weapons so I was less likely to cut myself on the razor sharp metal. She shrugged and let me get the weapons out and put them back in the pouch which I handed back to her.

She ran downstairs to put the weapons away and change before returning to the roof in jeans and a t-shirt under a beat up grey hoodie. She looked excited to go “Alright so, weapons for you, I think our best bet would be the Narrows. You can get anything down there if you know where to look. Teague’s is one of the best places to get metal weapons, the only still active Blacksmith in Gotham. Plus we can pick you up a sword. No way that won’t be covered in your ninja lessons.” I had to grin at that. She was speaking my language.