fandomhighdorms | Behind the Dorms, Tuesday Afternoon

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Behind the Dorms, Tuesday Afternoon

"Okay!" Zack grinned as he bounced to the forefront of today's reserves meeting, more than happy to be able to take the reins today.

It meant that he got to be all responsible, or something. He was game for the challenge!

"Today we're going to focus on familiarizing ourselves with weapons that we might have never considered using! Because, let's face it, sometimes the unspeakable happens and we get caught in a jam without anything readily at our disposal but what we can grab from nearby. Either someone else is down for the count and you make do with their weapon, or you end up swinging around whatever you can reach. Being able to improvise is just as important as being a master of your weapon of choice."

"A broomstick can be a staff," said Arthur, who had no experience with that kind of thing. At all. Really. "Any sharp object can be thrown. Anything with an edge can be used as a dagger or a sword, provided you know how to use one, and where to look. I assume you all have eyes."

"And that's why our pile-o-stuff today is more than just the practise weapons we've been using," Zack agreed, putting his hands on his hips and grinning at the people gathered. "If you look close enough, you'll be able to find pretty much anything from bags of marbles to the kitchen sink. Grab something you'd never think of using otherwise, pair up, and put those weapons to use!"

Zack, of course, was making a grab for that random beach umbrella, there.

Arthur, meanwhile, was going for the broom. For no reason. Really.

[~~Please wait for the OCD!~~ OCD is up! This reserves meeting is officially in-session!]

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"I'm not upset or anything of that nature," Alice said, folding her hands behind her back. "I rather approve of this week's message. Sometimes, all one has is one's ingenuity, and one must discover how best to kill with four marbles, a stick, and some chewing gum. I simply meant that I don't believe it's a good idea for me to do the exercise."

"Just you in particular?" Oh, Zack was going to have to take a moment to mull that one over, as well. "Do you mind if I ask why?"

"Not at all," Alice said. She looked at the table again. "The fork could be driven straight into the throat, or an eye socket. Either would incapacitate the attacker for a short amount of time. The same goes for the garden hoe, although it might also be sturdy enough for a severe blow to the back of the head. The golf club would probably crack the skull, if swung firmly enough. The pencil could be driven straight up the nose; enough force and it might puncture the brain tissue. And the tablecloth could be used to suffocate someone, if you were strong enough to hold them in place."

She glanced at Zack to see if he had taken her point.

Oooh, yes. Zack had taken her point. Some piece of his mind was wondering why ShinRa hadn't already snapped her up and hired her to be a Turk, actually. Aside from the whole different-worlds-never-heard-of-her thing, of course.

"You go for the kill," he noted. Not seeming put off about it at all, really. It was merely an observation.

"I do," she nodded. Necessity may be the mother of invention, but it was also one hell of a fight instructor. "I'm learning how to ... spar, where you punch one another but don't go for the kill? But in improvisation, where one mustn't kill but one should incapacitate, I'm afraid I'm not sure where the line would be. I couldn't very well announce that I was using the fork to poke someone's eye out, and hope that that counted towards the match; I imagined it would go over badly if I attempted to actually do so."

Zack nodded thoughtfully, working through that in his head. Huh.

"Well, it certainly seems as though you already know how to keep yourself alive if anything happens around here," he noted. "But I wouldn't want you to have to sit this out just because you take staying alive seriously. I mean, staying alive is a good thing." Wry little grin. "You said you were working on learning sparring?"

"I am," she nodded quickly. "Though I don't quite understand it. There seem to be rules and formalities involved. I would have expected 'do not maim one another,' but certain hits are considered to be playing foul. Why do people pretend to hurt one another and then limit the ways in which they can do so?"

Alice was far too pragmatic (or ruthless, perhaps) for her own good.

Oooh. Zack could actually explain this one. Oh, the benefits of having Angeal as a teacher back home.

"Sparring serves a few purposes," Zack replied, crossing his arms over his chest. "First, it serves to keep a fighter in shape, sure. It also poses challenges when facing off against a new partner. Someone you haven't sparred with before might find a way to throw you on the ground that you'd never seen before. You deal with it when sparring with someone you can trust not to kill you, so that when it happens in a real fight, you won't be caught off-guard."

There was more, yes, but he was going to make sure that she was following what he was saying thus far.

Alice was nodding, trying to sort through the logic.

"Except," she said, turning the idea over in her mind, "except when one spars, there is always that particular barrier in place. Don't hit too hard, don't go for the obvious weaknesses, don't maim, don't kill. So if I were in that situation against an enemy, I might react the way I did while sparring -- a measured response, but not a killing blow. Isn't that counterproductive?"

Zack smiled a little, giving his head a shake.

"When your life is in real danger, it's easy enough to turn off the restraint enough to stay alive, trust me. I do it all of the time, myself."

Activating combat mode. Respect and mercy were pretty overrated when there were monsters breathing down your neck.

"That's kind of what sparring is about, though. Restraint. Self-control. If you can keep a cool enough head on your shoulders in order to limit the damage you do to a sparring partner, you'll have just as cool a head when it comes to working through ways to do serious, lasting damage when it matters the most."

Alice turned that over in her mind, this way and that again, and realized that was terribly sensible, indeed, and that she couldn't see any obvious flaws in it.

Which was mildly disappointing, to the tiny part of Alice which enjoyed a good argument. The larger part of Alice was relieved to finally understand the point of all this play-acting.

"All right," she nodded. "Learning control and restraint, which can easily be shed if need be, and that's presumably far easier than the opposite, trying to impose control and restraint in time of need. I do believe I'm following. So ... I wouldn't take a fork and jab it at someone's eye. I would ... turn it, perhaps? Strike the cheek with the flat part of the tines?"

Zack chuckled and nodded.

"That's right. You could have taken out their eye, and smacking them on the face with it illustrates that point clearly enough. You both know that you could have done it, and now it's time for the other guy to figure out what to do about it, so that he doesn't really end up looking like he was on the menu that night."

"Wonderful," Alice said, nodding again. Finally, some of this was making sense. "So then, what is considered foul in a spar? I mean, obvious things such as removing someone's eye, that's somewhat permanent and therefore hardly sporting."

"I think the rules they give out at Fight Club sum it up nicely enough," Zack decided. "I mean, they're different all over, so the Fandom ones are probably the best to learn while you're on Fandom Island, right? Keep going until someone isn't able to anymore, or until they tell you that they've quit. Don't go for permanent damage. I think for the most part, anything beyond that seems like pretty fair game around these parts."

"I don't have any magical powers," Alice announced. "But I'm used to using my blade. A knife is terribly useful, in a fight, but it doesn't have a safety setting to it."

"Neither does my sword," Zack agreed, grinning again. "Which just means that you have to practise that much more self-control. You get close enough to cut even clothing, if you can. If you can stop just shy of actually cutting someone open, then you know you can stop that blade anywhere you want it when it counts the most."

"You could ..." Alice's eyes were alight. "You could use a blade that well? Remove someone's clothes without harming them?"

There had to be boys who would be willing to play that game with her. That sounded like the most wonderful foreplay ever.

It was very fortunate that Zack couldn't read narrative. His own UST typically came in the form of accidental innuendo. The word 'foreplay' probably would have broken his brain.

Especially when that word alluded to kink and edgeplay as well. Whoa.

"Well, I don't think that I can. But I'm sure there are people who could."

Zack bet that Sephiroth could. And probably Angeal, too. Heck, he had no doubt in his mind that Angeal could do anything.

"I want to try that," Alice decided. "Getting so skilled with a blade that you can penetrate clothing and not scratch the skin. That would be amazing."

Partly for reasons that Zack didn't want to know about.

~~(Sephiroth probably has.)~~

Edited 2009-06-10 21:28 (UTC)

"I'm sure there are plenty of people on the island who really are that good," Zack noted. "Deadpool might be. And Himura seemed really skilled with a sword too, if you've ever met him."

He pursed his lips for a little, thinking that over. "Or you and I could train together sometime. I'm not half bad with a sword, and if either of us happens to get carried away, I have plenty of potions to heal up any injuries with."

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Behind the Dorms, Tuesday Afternoon

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