I stepped into the training room and stopped, taking it all in. The WildCards shared a training room with several other teams, and now was our allotted time to use it. The training room was an entire floor of the Guild hall. To my left were a series of weight rooms, from machines to free weight stations. To my right was a swimming pool on steroids, as it appeared to be much deeper than a normal pool and was easily olympic-sized. I idly wondered how the building could support the pool's weight. The entryway had some benches and lockers for our gear, and beyond that was the main sparring room, a room armored and enclosed with heavy metal and glass walls. Beyond that I saw firing ranges.

"It's about time you got here," a voice came from behind one set of lockers. Shank stepped out from behind the lockers. She was wearing her uniform, but all but a few of the knives had been taken out of their sheaths and it looked like she'd replaced them with rubber knives. "Come and get your weapons and we can see about getting you up to speed."

"Uh, sure," I said, putting my backpack into a locker. I followed her around the armored training room to the armory. Armored crates were stationed between the firing range and the armored training room, and I saw a newish looking crate with 'Switcher' stenciled on it. I used my thumb print on the lock and opened the crate to find my uniform and the weapons Mags and Goodie Bag had helped choose for me. Slotted next to each actual weapon, I saw a 'training' version.

"What exactly did the armorers choose for you?" Shank asked.

"Well, for my Class A weapons, they chose a ballistic tonfa and a shield, and for my Class B weapons they chose dual stun tonfas," I replied. "I'm not sure what Class A and Class B stand for though."

"Class A weapons are your dungeon loadout," Shank said. "We aren't too worried about collateral damage in a dungeon, so we all have much more lethal armaments and more destructive techniques to use in those. In cities and where innocents may be hit, we have our Class B weapons which are less lethal and set up for minimal destruction of the environment. Your ballistic tonfa, for example, looks like a standard police nightstick, right? But when you press the trigger, the shotgun shell fires and someone's going to get hit. We tend to call that variety of weapon a 'boomstick'. There are several varieties."

"And what do you call my Class B weapons?" I asked curiously.

"Oh, those are tazer batons," she said offhandedly.

"Oh, spicy clubs!" Hyper said as he walked past, covered in sweat. "Nice! Especially if you don't hit hard enough to break them when you use them."

"Go ahead and grab your training versions and put on your uniform," Shank directed me. "Since we are just starting out, I'm using rubber knives and you'll be using padded tonfas. I'll meet you in the sparring room." She gestured at the armored training room and walked over to it.

I pulled on the uniform that Seven had made for me. The generic uniform was a dark blue color with an oval on the chest that was half gold, half silver. It had a red arrow pointing from the gold to the silver and a blue arrow from the silver to the gold. The close-fitting uniform came with knee-high boots and elbow length gauntlets and a thick belt. There was also a chest piece that looked a lot like nylon strapping that slid over the head and fastened under the arms. The uniform came with a backpack that attached to the chest piece, but I left that off for the moment. The domino mask I had been given was on my face from the moment I'd entered the elevator, so that part was already taken care of. I picked up two of the practice tonfas and the shield (which I assumed needed no practice version) before following Shank to the training room.

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Shank waiting in the training room, a rubber knife in each hand. She looked quite different with most of her knives missing, and I realized how small she looked without them. She nodded when she saw my weapons.

"Good, you came prepared," she said approvingly. "Since I never specified whether you were supposed to use your A or B weapons, you can take your choice. Today will be about evaluating you. All you need to do is hit me and we'll be done for the day."

"Do I have to hit you with the weapons, or can I use my fists and feet and head, too?" I asked politely.

"Use everything and anything," Shank said, shrugging. "It won't change anything."

I dropped my extra nightstick by the door I'd entered by and put on my shield. The nightstick felt right, especially when I held it by the T-handle and had most of it along my forearm, providing protection for my arms.

"Alright, Switcher," she said, adopting a fighting pose. "Bring it."

Whatever I brought, it most definitely was not 'it'. I quickly learned that Shank was on a whole other level above me. I struck at her with shield and nightstick and she dodged way faster than I was capable of moving. For the first half, she didn't even fight back, letting me swing and kick and charge and just effortlessly floating out of the way of my blows. I thought about engaging in banter or trash talk, but she wasn't talking, and after a few minutes, I didn't have the breath to talk. The rhythmic sounds of the first part were mostly me breathing and her dodging.

The second half of the session, she decided to fight back. The sounds of the second half were much more violent.

Huff-huff-huff

Thwack

"OW!"

Thump

Huuuuuuu.

Eventually, I got the impression that I was being watched.

Swack!

"Your weapons have longer reach than hers, attack from outside her range."

Thump

"Keep your shield up! Rotate with the blow to rob it of its power!"

Whack

"That's it, dude! Wear her knives out with your head! Oh, good call! Feign writhing on the floor with pain and surprise attack her! Perfect! Pretend to stagger back to your feet and catch her off guard!"

No guesses needed as to what teammate said what.

Finally, a musical tone went off, and when I slowly climbed back to my feet, I saw that Shank had stood upright and put her knives away. Huh. Session over, I guess. The rest of the team filed into the training room.

"That was pathetic," she said. "I can't believe you passed the five trial dungeons."

"What dungeons?" I asked.

"What dungeons? The five trial dungeons! You mean...." Shank trailed off.

"Yeah, Shank," Hyper said. "He never did the trial dungeons. And he never actually had to fight anyone before today. I've been looking into his background. He's never been in a physical fight before. You've been beating on someone who has had exactly zero combat training."

"Great," she groused. "Of all the candidates we get the one trainee who never even finished the training."

"That would be incorrect," BrightGold piped up. "None of the candidates in the trial program have had any combat training. He is neither ahead nor behind them."

"That's not the point, BrightGold," Shank snapped. "I can cover somewhat for a weaker teammate, but I cannot cover for a useless one."

"He isn't useless," Eco piped up. "And he'll be more useful once he has some combat training. So how about this. You give him a week. Bring him here every day for a week and do nothing but teach him to fight. At the end of it, I'll escort him through the beginner dungeons. You know the power evolutions from the beginner dungeons boost combat capability."

"Even the beginner dungeons are dangerous," Shank protested. "And they count against our dungeon allotment."

"Then we'll do one beginner dungeon per period," Eco said. "He gets experience and we'll not take too much of a loss."

"What do you think?" Shank asked the other two.

"I"m fine with it," BrightGold shrugged. "It's not Switcher's fault he's so far behind."

"Yeah, it'll be okay," Hyper said. "I'll even volunteer to escort him through a dungeon or two. Sounds like it could be fun."

"Fine, fine," Shank said, waving the subject away. "One dungeon per period, y'all can decide for yourselves who babysits him."

"As for you," Shank said, turning to me. "Here. 8 AM. Every day until I tell you to stop. If you're going to learn to fight, I'm going to make sure you're good at it."