"Honey, I want you to get one good look at these twig arms and tell me if you think I've ever fought a day in my life." Adrien actually had a bit of muscle from the months of physical therapy he'd had to deal with after getting out of the hospital, but he'd gotten so used to being scrawny and helpless he didn't even notice it.
Alex rolled his eyes, pointing ad poking at the muscle he could see, "Those aren't twig arms as you put it. But today we're going to focus on hand to hand. You can't just constantly rely on your magic, sooner or later you'll become drained and that's no good for anyone.
Adrien frowned, backing away slightly when Alex poked him. "Alright, alright, these are baby branch arms, and they've never seen a day of combat in their lives because I prefer talking things out like a civilized person. "He crossed his arms, giving Alex a once over. "But I guess that's gonna have to change today, isn't it?"
Alex nodded, "You're going into battle. You can't just talk your way out of these. You saw those creatures, you know they won't listen to reason. So, combat it is. And you can't always use your magic soo…"
"So I'm going to learn how to use fists instead?" Adrien doubted a punch from him would even slow one of those demons down, but he was willing to humor Alex. Besides, it wasn't like the skill wouldn't be useful somewhere down the line. "By all means, teach away."
"Right, first, you need to be in the right position. Right leg forwards, let leg back, almost as if you're going into a lunge," Alex demonstrated, "Keep your right hand in front to defend, left hand back to make a punch."
Adrien nodded, doing his best to match Alex's stance. Legs apart, knees bent, hands up; it was all a lot to think about at first. He probably looked like an idiot too, but he couldn't really worry about that right now. "Alright, like this?"
Alex nodded, "Yep, try and relax your knees a little more, you need to be able to move easily so don't lock them in place," He held his hands up in front of him, "Now, use your back hand to punch first, that way if someone tries to come at you, you can use your front hand to block."
Adrien did as he was told, bouncing on the balls of his feet as the caffeine kicked in and nervous energy started to fill him up to the brim. He felt jittery almost– some strange combination of coffee and fighting and Alex leaving him tense and shaky all at once. He swung forward hard. It was a good punch. "Am I doing this right?"
Alex grinned and nodded, "That was great! Now, try punch with your back hand then front hand right after, double punch." He was surprised by how well his first punch had actually been, considering he'd never had any training or fought before.
Adrien nodded and gave it a try, managing a pretty solid combination for someone who had never done anything like this before. "This isn't that hard, actually." He gave the double punch another shot, managing to copy Alex almost exactly. "I think we did stuff like this in PT."
“That’s good then,” Alex chuckled lightly, “Okay, I want you to try and block my punch, aight? It won’t be a hard punch so if you miss them it no big deal.” He swung, lighter then he ever would have normally do.
Adrien raised his forearms instinctively, barely managing to block the punch as he pouted over at Alex. "No fair, you haven't taught me how to do this yet. Shouldn't I be the one who gets to punch you?"
"Punch me isn't going to help you block, is it? You're only going to get better at defending if you're attacked," Alex shrugged a shoulder, "Besides, I'm not punching you hard at all, and you managed to block it."
Adrien rolled his eyes. "You could at least give me an example of how you're supposed to block before you go around throwing hands willy nilly." He was still on guard despite his complaining, waiting for the next swing. "What if you managed to hit me?"
"Like I said, light punch, would barely hurt you at all," Alex went to punch again, only to fake out of it, "Keep you front hand up and in front of your face, if there's a punch coming at you, then you can easily move it in front of your face to block."
Adrien rolled his eyes, a gesture that would've been much more effective if he didn't look like he was taking every single piece of advice to heart. His hand was raised a little higher in front of his face, stance shifting into something a little easier to maintain. "You're ridiculous. Swing again."
"Not ridiculous," Alex grinned, actually swinging at Adrien this time. It was a decent punch, but not as good as he could do, "Just keeping you on your feet and making sure you're actually able to use this is a fight."
Adrien winced as he blocked this time, but the pain of getting a solid thump on the forearms really wasn't much by any measure, so he shook it off fairly quickly. "You are ridiculous," he protested playfully, settling back into his stance. "And if you keep hitting like that and you hit me in the face I'm never gonna kiss you again."
"I'm not even hitting your face!" Alex replied, "I'm trying not to hit your face!" He sighed, through made his punches lighter as he swung at Adrien again.
Adrien laughed and ducked out of the way, not bothering to block when a quick sidestep solved the problem just as well. "Sure, sugarbear. I know how roughhousing works, and someone always gets hit in the face. It's, like, one of the rules of the universe."
"Yeah well," Alex shrugged a shoulder, taking another punch at Adrien, "I'm trying my best to not hit you in the face, hopefully that counts for something."
Adrien blocked it with a grin, bouncing a little as he waited for the next strike. "It counts for a lot, Alex. I just… I wanna be careful. We've got a casino to visit soon, and I won't look too nice if I've got a busted nose or a split lip."
Alex chuckled lightly, "No one's gonna care if you had a split lip, don't you humans have like… ointment or something you can put on it to cover it?" He asked. The Walker swung again, this time he punch twice.
Adrien ducked the first one and then blocked the second, wincing at the solid thump of Alex's fist against his arms. "I can't tell if you're talking about lipstick or foundation, but that doesn't matter because I couldn't use either on a split lip. It'd hurt too bad."
Alex lowered his arms when he saw Adrien wince, "Ah right, yeah that makes sense. If you arm okay? Sorry I think I hit it a little too hard then I meant to."
Adrien gave him a grateful smile when he dropped out of his stance, taking a second to soothe the dull ache starting to spread across his skin. "It's fine. I'll probably bruise, but that you can cover with makeup so it's not too bad. You can get back to punching me if you want."
Alex shook his head, "I don't want to bruise you again, we can continue this after our little trip," He felt bad for making Adrien bruise, "Do you want to try using your powers before we leave? Just to get a little practice in."
Adrien laughed softly, dropping out of his stance and rubbing his arm again. "That's sweet and all sugar, but I'm pretty sure whoever's fighting me for realsies isn't gonna stop because of one little bruise." He walked over to Alex, grabbing his hand with a soft smile. "But I'm not gonna stop you if you wanna move on to something else. What kind of weather should I try for?"
"I get that in a real fight the opponent won't stop, but we're going out and I don't want you bruised. we can come back to hand to hand afterwards," Alex gave Adrien's hand a small squeeze, offering a small smile back, "Target practice."