Pairing

"Stand there."

Wild Ace moved to the indicated spot.

It had been a day since he had taken the... deal, he supposed. Camolot had led him home, as if he had known every step of the way where he was going, had not even hesitated once. Ace's house, a small cottage on the edge of a small forest and quite far from any civilization, was relatively well-hidden. Thus, Camolot had known exactly where it was beforehand, which had made Ace a little paranoid at least. He had tentatively offered Camolot the guest bed, but he had gently refused, saying just one thing.

"I don't sleep."

Ace had simply shaken his head, had dinner, gone to bed. The next morning he had hoped that it was a dream, but those hopes had been dashed when he had walked into the dining room and found the strange biped checking reference documents and making notes at the table. Almost as soon as Ace had finished his breakfast, Camolot had dragged him out of the house, and had now indicated that he stand on a relatively nondescript pile of dirt. Camolot made eye contact, his gaze flickering out from beneath the brim of his ever-present hat before being concealed again.

"Yesterday, when I made that offer of power, of speed and ability, I was telling the truth. I can give you what you desire, fill in what you lack. However, it will be a long process, and it will cost you." Camolot stretched, joints cracking as they loosened. He didn't really need to, but he had spent the night on the roof of the pony's house observing the stars and was at least a little sore from it: the small bursts of pleasure were well worth it. "Starting today, I have thirty days to bring you up to speed, to train you in the abilities that you now have access to. Fortunately, there is a jumping-off point, as it were: the ability is known as quickstep, the most basic version of a something known as 'flash step', a quick movement technique that allows the user to close distances, dodge strikes, confuse enemies, and many more things besides." He adjusted his hat slightly lower, hiding his eyes, and moved around to Ace's side. While the pony's head followed the movement, his body did not. Perfect. "While flash step is longer ranged and faster, quickstep is useful for dodging strikes in close-quarters while staying near the target, as it only takes one several feet in any direction."

Ace blinked, a single eyebrow raised. He, frankly, had no idea what was being taught to him: really, it sounded like something out of those weird magazines from Japony that had creatures of the various sentient species of Equus wielding strange powers and abilities, as well as announcing their attacks in loud voices and generally being ridiculous. He had never really been interested in such things, but his sister-

He shunted the memory aside. Now was not the time to think about such things: besides, Camolot was speaking again.

"Unfortunately, one can only learn quickstep after they first use it accidentally, and using it accidentally requires me to go-" and then he was gone, disappearing so quickly that a slight afterimage was left behind, accompanied by a sound that was somewhere inbetween a crack and somepony sucking in a breath through their teeth. The same sound rang out from Ace's left side, and, in surprise, he jerked his head over and managed to look- "SURPRISE, BITCH!"

The next thing Ace knew, he was crumpled at the base of a tree, with both him and the unfortunate plant the worse for wear. Nothing had broken- he had no idea how he had been that fortunate- but now he was covered in small nicks and scratches. He got to his hooves, wondering what the hell Camolot was thinking- and then he stared incredulously as the scratches stopped bleeding, sealing themselves over.

"Ah, your cellular regeneration has kicked in.." Ace jerked in surprise: the biped was standing right next to him, and hadn't even made a sound. "This will make it easier for the both of us." And then the asshole had kicked Ace right in the barrel.

Then came hours of what, had Ace had the processing power to spare, he would have called hell. He tried desperately to gain some distance, to react or block or retaliate, but Camolot had been right on top of him the entire time, letting loose hammering blows. Ace suspected that the only reasons he hadn't died from the physical abuse were that Cam seemed to be pulling his punches, for the most part, and his newfound regenerative abilities were keeping him in one piece.

It had happened about three hours in. Cam had come straight at him, fist swinging in an arc, and Ace had been tired of being hit so he had stepped, then there was this twisting, pulling sensation. Next he knew, he had been several feet to the left, easily dodging the blow. Camolot had come to a complete halt, beaming like a madpony. It hadn't helped at all that he was clapping like an over-excited colt, either.

"Fantastic!" He stuck his hands in the pockets of his coat, his expression still ecstatic. "Now, do you remember exactly what that felt like?"

Ace poked his memory, and was surprised to find that he remembered exactly what he had felt. In fact, looking at the memories, he was beginning to discern a sort of pattern to what he had done: he had concentrated something- it hadn't been magic, that was for sure- around his hooves and wings, and then there had been a moment where everything had blended together when he had expressed his wish to not be where he had been at that moment. He had, in essence, told reality what he had wanted, and reality had obliged.

"It felt like..." Ace frowned. "It felt like I... bent the air?"

Cam nodded. "Accurate enough, I suppose: more of..." he paused, licking his lips as he tried to marshal the words. He had never really expressed how his abilities worked to others. "Your abilities- for reasons that we won't get into, not now- are based around mine. When I do something-" here, he disappeared, appearing several feet to one side. "I am telling the universe what I want, then bending space to make it happen. While I do pass through the intervening space, I do so in such a way that, from both your perspective and mine, I am simply moving extremely quickly between two points. While I can do that without bending space in that way, it is less tiring than doing it normally, especially if I must repeat the same motion several times in quick succession." Here, he removed his hands from his pockets once again, shifting into a fighting stance. "Now that you have access to the ability, the best way to improve it is experience. Namely-" Ace saw him do it this time, saw him blaze through the air, appearing right in front of the Pegasus. "DODGE!"

Some good thing about Ace's new healing factor: he didn't bruise, didn't tire as quickly, his minor wounds never stuck around for long and he kept going long after the point where he should have collapsed. The downside was that Cam was pushing him harder than he'd ever been pushed.

"No breaks, and no brakes!"

Of course, eventually, Camolot had relented and allowed him to quit for a little while and retreat to his cottage for lunch, though he had expressed exactly why something like this was important.

"The ability of your cells to regenerate is based on the chemical reserves your body has stored. Your metabolism is such that, within a few seconds, fat is consumed and turned into the proper building blocks for cells as well as the energy to power the regeneration, and then new cells fill in your wounds." Cam took a bite out of a brick of brown material coated with red sauce, savoring the taste a moment before swallowing. "Of course, this is eating through your body's reserves like crazy, because you haven't had time or material to develop the hyperdense energy reserves that I have, which take quite a bit of fuel to make. Thus, over the next few days, you'll feel incredibly hungry almost constantly as your body fills in the blanks and builds up the fat, as well as increasing your over-all cellular density. You'll get progressively stronger, faster, as your body slowly becomes more and more dense, and eventually you'll be able to punch through brick walls and shrug off bullets." Cam grinned at Ace like this was the best thing that had ever happened to anypony.

Ace nearly responded with an aneurysm.