The winner of the spar was a foregone conclusion. Any direct physical contest against Jugs was a foregone conclusion unless El had some trick ready to use.

But winning wasn't the purpose of the spar. She was hungry, and physical effort that counted as 'training' was one of the few ways for her to earn additional calories.

That didn't mean she wouldn't try to win, of course.

In contrast to Jugs' massive seven-foot, five hundred pound frame -- increased by his numerous augments -- El was whipcord thin and only five and a half feet tall, her height exactly the average for women in Hope City. Anyone underestimating her would quickly be surprised by her denser-than-average muscle, but there was still only so much muscle that could be packed into her tiny frame. If Jugs ever got a hold of her, she would quickly be overpowered.

Which meant she needed to keep herself from getting grabbed -- easier said than done when her opponent had so much more reach than her.

Luckily, she wasn't entirely without advantages. In a casual spar like this one, Jugs was only allowed to grapple. Anything that could break El's skin -- kicks, punches, scratches -- was disallowed. El healed much faster than a normal person, but she needed to be ready for a mission at any time, and a noticeable scratch on her cheek or a black eye would invalidate much of her skill set. In contrast, Jugs' entire body was practically a mass of scar tissue and badly-healed injuries, so she could attack with impunity.

Still, El didn't like her odds.

The sparring room was connected via a regular doorway to the main living area and could be endlessly customized to simulate various combat environments. For this spar, though, they left it as an open, empty sparring circle.

El hopped in place as she sized up the pile of muscle that lumbered into place across from her. One could be forgiven for thinking Jugs was slow, based on his size and how he typically moved and spoke. El was sure many people had assumed he was nothing more than a slow-moving tank when first sizing up her opponent. Those people were now dead.

Jugs was blisteringly fast -- though not nearly as fast as 1791 -- and El prepared for his movement as Anderson pressed a button that started a series of beeps counting down the start of the spar. Luckily, speed was the one area in which Jugs didn't completely outclass El, and when the final beep sounded, they both moved.

As expected, Jugs dashed with his arms wide in an attempt to wrap up his smaller opponent. It wasn't the most creative of approaches, but that didn't matter if it was effective. El took two quick steps back, buying herself an extra split-second to gauge Jugs' approach, before she dove forward under the grasping arms. She lashed out as she passed, aiming for where the nerve cluster would be in the legs of most people. Jugs didn't even flinch, pivoting and restarting his charge while El was still coming out of her roll. She immediately dove to the side again, once again dodging Jugs' charge but this time unable to score a hit of her own.

And for the next five minutes -- an eternity in any normal spar -- this continued. Jugs charged her, and she dodged, flipping and contorting across the ring. Sometimes she was able to get a hit in as she dodged away, but only rarely. If any of the attacks phased Jugs, or if he was annoyed by her constant fleeing, it didn't show on his face.

It must have been bothering him at least a little though, because after her latest dodge -- which involved a back handspring that would make a gymnast jealous -- he paused before starting his next charge.

El breathed a sigh of relief. It might have seemed as if she was 'winning' their confrontations, considering she was the only one actually landing any hits. But she could feel the slight tension that meant her muscles were tiring. In contrast, Jugs could keep up his strategy for literal days, if needed. In any contest of endurance, she would eventually lose.

But now Jugs had changed his approach. Instead of charging, he approached slowly, arms still spread wide to catch her dodges, but his slower speed allowing him to grab her if she tried to dive past.

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El hopped around just beyond the reach of his arms, throwing punches forward and backing up with each of Jugs' steps forward. But gradually El shortened the distance separating them. Her short arms were still far from actually making contact with the massive man's face, but Jugs refused to bite. He kept his arms spread wide to cut off her escape, not even blinking at her feints.

But then, when Jugs was -- El hoped -- least expecting it...El changed.

Most of El's engineered modifications were 'cosmetic' in nature, boosting her infiltration skills. But her creators recognized that she would occasionally be forced into combat, and her tiny frame could be a disadvantage in those situations. So...they attempted to mitigate that.

El's shoulders disconnected from her collarbone, folding outward as just another joint, an extra length of arm now connected to the unnamed extra set of bones that protected her heart and lungs halfway down her chest. It made her look like a spider, a hideous parody of normal humanity, and she lost some of her arms' strength -- but it gave her an extra six inches of range. Long enough to just barely reach Jugs' face.

Jugs obviously knew about her modifications. In the hundreds of times they'd previously sparred, he'd seen absolutely everything El was capable of. But Jugs sparred thousands of times every year, more than any of the rest of them -- the vast majority of those against base or only mechanically augmented humans. Even knowing her abilities, the sudden extra range caught him by surprise, and El smacked him in the side of the face before snaking a thumb inside his mouth and grabbing onto his cheek with everything she had.

Pulling herself close past the suddenly closing arms of the juggernaut opposing her, El swung around Jugs' neck like a monkey, grabbing onto his opposite ear with her other arm and pulling.

It was similar to the maneuver she'd pulled only a few hours earlier. She should have been able to break his neck easily -- with her legs now propped over his shoulders, one hand grabbing his cheek and the other his ear, she had plenty of leverage to overpower even the strongest of base humans. But Jugs was no base human, and El had no illusions that her acrobatics would be able to do more than cause a bit of pain. In a second, Jugs would grab her arm and yank her off of his shoulders, and she'd tap out before he twisted her body into a pretzel. It would still be a 'loss' for her, but about as close to a win as was possible in a spar against jugs without weapons. A psychological victory, if nothing else.

She may have underestimated how painful her yanking on Jugs' ear and cheek was, however. He let out a grunt as she swung around -- practically a scream, coming from him -- and his aim as he reached back for her arm was just slightly off. Instead of grabbing her at her lowered shoulder, and he evidently intended, he overshot and his meaty hand collided with her face, instead.

Blood flew.

A loud beep sounded through the Nest, deeper and much more urgent than the earlier beeping signaling the start of the match. From their room connected to the main living area, four armored men sporting stun guns burst forth and sprinted toward the sparring room.

And Jugs writhed on the floor as his inhibitor punished him for the sin of marring El's skin.

A moment later three of the men charged into the sparring chamber, the fourth monitoring the still-catatonic spider at the table in the living area. They waved their stun guns around as El stepped back, her arms retracted back into her shoulders as she held her hands above her head. Blood dripped from her split lip, and she hurried to manipulate the skin to close as she pushed a small amount of fat into her upper lip to mimic the slight swelling of the lower. "I'm okay!" she yelled, drawing the attention of one of the men, the other two directing their guns to where Jugs was silently convulsing on the ground.

"EL-742, stand down!" one man yelled, pointlessly, at the incapacitated Jugs.

"It was an accident!" Handler Anderson yelled from the attached room where she'd been monitoring the spar, rushing through the process to disable the automatic punishment from the inhibitor. "Stand down, there's no danger. I repeat, stand down."

"I'm okay..." El said again, slowly stepping away from both Jugs and the men.

It took longer than it should have -- much longer than what was actually necessary -- but eventually Anderson was able to override Jugs' inhibitor, and his convulsions ceased. He remained silent, his eyes closed as he breathed heavily, laying back on the mats. El mimicked him, staying silent with her hands raised, until another handler entered through a side entrance. With two handlers verifying the situation was under control, the four guards finally lowered their weapons and retreated back inside their room.

El finally put her hands down and moved to help Jugs up. She wouldn't blame him if he refused the assistance, but there was no sign of anger or any lingering pain on his face as he accepted her hand, a single grunt the only sign he'd suffered what El knew to be debilitating shocks. Without a word he walked back to his bench in the main living area, sitting down and resuming his meal as if nothing had happened.

El sat across from him, accepting the tiny portion of nutrient paste their spar had earned her from Anderson a few moments later. 1791 appeared next to her from wherever he'd been hiding, a wide smile stretching across his face as he looked between his two fellow experiments.

El ignored him as she ate her paste.

It was even more tasteless than usual.