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Salle | Morning | Thursday | June 30

Percy hadn't been able to shake the bad feeling he'd had ever since Luke had left. There was just somethings stirring in the pit of his stomach that was telling him that Luke's trip home wasn't just a normal trip home. He tried to ignore it, forget about it, and trust that this Luke wasn't his Luke but it was getting harder and harder as the days passed. He couldn't really talk to Grover about it and he definitely couldn't mention it to Annabeth so instead, he was down in the salle, trying to stab the hell out of a practice dummy.

If all of this crap lately was doing anything, it was improving his work with Riptide. He was quicker, sharper and he even thought he could take Luke right now if the other boy happened to stride in, all cocky and self assured. Really though, Percy would have liked Luke to just appear and help him get rid of this stupid feeling.

But, Luke didn't show up and Percy was starting to work up a good sweat while he went through his exercises. He would have thought his focus would be shot to hell but hey, apparently it was fine tuned and aimed straight ahead.

The bad feeling was still there though.

[Open, of course]

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Having gone without practicing fencing for a while, Wesley decided that today was the day to give it a shot. That was what brought him to the salle early Thursday morning, all energized and ready to practice.

He had barely stepped in the room before he noticed Percy there. Who was better than him on a good day. He stood there for a moment, watching him practice and feeling the niggle of irritation that always accompanied watching someone do a better job than he could.

"Bugger."

Percy managed to run his sword through the practice dummy and left it there before leaning against it and catching his breath. That allowed him to glance over at Wesley from the corner of his eye.

"Impressed?" Hey, he knew he was good.

"Feverishly," he said dryly, though there was real admiration there. Damnit. The one day he knew he wouldn't be any good, he happened upon... this.

He couldn't exactly practice his room, could he? Alex might not be the biggest fan of that... and Wesley did need the practice.

Reluctantly, he inquired, "I... I don't suppose you could show me how you did that, er, that last exercise there?"

Well, that was surprising. Percy pushed himself away from the practice dummy and yanked Riptide out of the poor thing's chest. He twirled it around before letting it rest on his shoulder.

"You want me to teach you?" He'd never been a real trainer back at camp. That had been Luke's thing first and then Quintus. "Yeah?"

Yeah, yeah, rub it in, Percy.

"Well... if you're not terribly busy," Wesley offered, shifting a bit awkwardly.

What? The exercise had looked cool, and Percy was really good. Shut up.

Percy was actually kind of grateful for the distraction. Maybe he'd stop thinking about what Luke was doing or not doing. He gave it some thought and then nodded.

"All right, yeah," he said, pointing to the practice swords with Riptide. "Grab a sword and let's see what we can do. My schedule's nice and open."

The sword racks never quite matched the practice swords he had to choose from at home, but Wesley eventually selected a heavy, thick-hilted broadsword that would serve its purpose well enough. As a rule, he preferred lighter, more flexible weapons, but if he was already going to practice and learn new things today...

"All right," he said, coming back to stand next to Percy with the sword in his hand. "What's next?"

The irony of having been taught fencing by dozens of world-reknowned Watchers and still having to take a lesson from a sixteen-year-old? Not lost on him.

Hey, Percy was a sixteen year old demigod! That totally made a difference. He had divine DNA in him which probably didn't help the fact that he looked twelve, though. Oh well.

"Let's see your stance," Percy requested, gesturing with his hand. "I think we probably stand a little differently so let me see it before I show you what to do."

His stance. Right. That was something he'd taken a whole class on, back at the Academy. It was an awkward sort of stance, with his right foot in front and his left in back at an angle, with his knees bent just a bit too much to allow fluid movement. He held his sword supinated, palm up -- again, just a little too rigidly.

"Like... like that, I suppose," he guessed, once he was in position. Normally he was fairly confident about his fencing style, but, you know. Sixteen-year-old demigod who could probably kick his ass, here.

Percy squinted at that stance and then rubbed his forehead. "Is that even comfortable, man?"

It didn't look very comfortable to him.

Huh?

"It -- it's not meant to be comfortable," he protested, parroting what he'd been taught at the Watchers' Academy. "It's meant to be effective!"
One kind of relied on the other, though, Wes.

"Didn't answer my question," Percy said, shaking his head, "which I'm gonna take as meaning no, that's not comfortable. Seriously, you look like some old windbag of a teacher with a literal stick up the rear."

...Well. He had had teachers at the Academy who would probably take that as a compliment.

Wesley processed this bit of news. "Oh," he said, puzzled. "Er. Then. How, ah... how should I, er, stand?"

"Let's try it this way," Percy said and brought Riptide up in front of him. He stretched his other arm out, keeping it up to help him guide his opponent's movements and shield himself if necessary.

"This is how I feel comfortable," he said, shrugging. It was a basic stance, sword up and in front of him, knees loose and feet spread apart. "How do you think you'd feel comfortable?"

"Er."

Wesley tried to imitate that stance and found it a lot... roomier. More loose. It was definitely comfortable, sure, but he'd never actually been comfortable while fencing. Those were two totally different things.

"That's... fine, I suppose," he answered, looking a bit perplexedly at his feet.

"Yeah, looks better," Percy said, nodding. "So basically, what you want to do is aim for my chest and then drive the sword forward to try and run me through. It's a simple thing but you've gotta be quick about it because it's easily predicted too. You don't want the other guy to step out of the way so you're eating dirt and getting laughed at. Keep the sword steady and just...don't try anything tricky. Run me through."

He'd make sure Wesley missed, don't worry.

Uh. Okay?

"All right," he said skeptically.

The ridiculous of having all that training to no effect started to hit him again, but he did as he was told anyway. He took two steps forward -- two very careful, practiced steps that involved angling his feet just so -- and then kept his eyes on the point of his sword as he brought it forward toward Percy's chest.

Percy batted the sword down roughly, intending for it to know Wesley off balance. "You are telegraphing it, man! If you did that any slower, I would have grown a beard and died of old age. That or you're gonna get stabbed in the eye."

Wes' sword was shoved to the side and he stumbled slightly, but caught himself before he could fall.

"All right, all right," he conceded. Okay. Faster. He could do faster.

He tried it again, this time speeding up the same footwork, but cut himself off before he could actually get to the lifting-the-sword part. "Wait, no," he interrupted himself. "Let me just -- "

Then he tried it another time, but moved his feet differently and came at Percy's chest from a different angle. There. That felt better. Easier, even.

That definitely looked better to Percy and he even had to make a step back before he got Riptide up to defend the blow. Metal clanged against metal as the blocked the shot.

"That was better," Percy said, giving credit where credit was due. Wesley didn't look like some stiff suit that time. "Nothing fancy about that and there doesn't need to be. If you're fighting someone, you wanna beat them, not impress them."

Huh.

"Well, thank you," Wesley said, momentarily pleased with himself. "I'll, ah, keep that in mind."

Percy snorted and rested Riptide back over his shoulder. "Have you ever killed anything before?"

Wesley didn't look the type but maybe Percy was wrong.

"Why, yes, actually," he replied, still with a trace of that puffed-up pride. "Numerous things, in fact."

Including roughly two vampires and one demon, but who was counting?

"Which probably means you're not gonna freeze up and totally wimp out when you're faced with something you have to kill," Percy said, smirking. "Don't pass out at the sight of blood?"

"No, actually, I don't," Wesley replied. With a sarcastic little smile, he added, "Thank you for that profound leap of faith."

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