Sparrow didn't miss the way Alejo's shoulders tensed up. Mentally, he dared Alejo to say something. To voice a concern for the firebird's safety. But he stayed quiet, digging through the rubble. No contest. Maybe he'd judged this a point Sparrow wouldn't back off of. Whatever the case, his hands stayed busy and his mouth stayed shut.
Sufficiently convinced that Alejo wouldn't object, Sparrow stood. He frowned down at the rubble for just a moment. There weren't any fucking oranges there.
Beating someone didn't come out of nowhere for Sparrow. There was a certain code of conduct that he followed, although to an outsider, it hardly looked like one. He still did unspeakably horrible things. Good and honest men did not consume human flesh. Not even under duress. Survivors did that. Good and honest men were not survivors.
But his rules prohibited beating for no reason. (His code did have excessive permissiveness about what constituted "reason", though.)
Once he'd made the formal connection to "for the good of the whole cartel", which he'd done well before Marina had arrived, he'd have no trouble. He could have even invented a reason to be angry to this point with her. Too clingy. Cuddled too much. Too fucking mouthy. Whatever. His self-imposed rules weren't getting the way regardless, and at least this way he wouldn't spend her entire time away being pissed off at her for an imagined grievance.
He turned to face her, assessing in the span of about three seconds all the possible attacks. What would look right to a Hellhound, for an abuse victim.
He finally picked the best route and began to move. He crossed the floor and swung his left fist at her. Aimed for the gut. Knock the wind out of her, and she'd be feeling that for a while. Something to remember him by.