~March 5th, 140 AH~
~The Caverns, Drill Ground~
Zelen mirrored Asena’s combat-ready posture, out of obedience rather than for any real practical purpose. The bo staff felt strange and unwieldy in his hands, which told him that it hadn’t been one of the weapon masteries that were part of his proto-Reiter training.
Just yards across from him, his Kurator of a fiancée (somehow still a fiancée, after all that had happened and more) wore a confident if somewhat inscrutable smile. She’d taken on a different air as soon as she got into her stance—as if her very personality had changed. Zelen knew far too little of the ‘regular’ Asena as it was, and this was yet another veil atop a stranger he’d pretended to be his family.
Since his return from his failed mission at Korak Valley, Zelen had heard bits and pieces about Asena’s surprising prowess as an Eidolon pilot (none of them told with her own words). By all accounts, she’d managed to kill a Voras unit on her own, apparently with great skill and daring. How much of that was truth, and how much of it was Akash Varana once again overestimating the personnel upon whom his project depended?
Zelen supposed he’d soon find out.
“Will you not make the first move?” Asena called out, still faintly smiling. “If you won’t, then I will.”
“Go ahead and do your worst,” Zelen returned with what he hoped was a courteous nod. “I’ve always preferred to watch my opponents first before formulating a plan of attack.”
That, he realized, was true enough, even though he’d struggle to cite actual examples. The comment nevertheless elicited a knowing nod from his opponent, whose smile disappeared the same moment she leapt into her opener.
An overhead swing, straight down the middle. Zelen was, first and foremost, caught off guard by the speed with which Asena closed the gap between them.
He’d always pictured his fiancée as a painter first, a Kurator second, and never a fighter. But he knew that was merely his Reiter’s arrogance talking. Anyone who’d been trained through the Joint Forces system had been required to maintain a standard of physical fitness and combat proficiency. The sinewy muscles that showed beneath Asena’s rolled-up sleeves were proof enough of the former…
… And the force and precision of her strike were that of the latter. Zelen blocked the attack by turning his bo upward with both hands, sagging under its impact as he did.
Asena offered no reprieve, rapidly rotating her weapon backward to catch Zelen with the low end of the shaft. Zelen dodged out of it by pivoting to the side. The Kurator chased his movement by spinning her bo horizontally. This was met by another block, perpendicular to the arc of the swing.
Soon the fight fell into a predictable rhythm, with Asena employing all manner of cuts and angles in an attempt to find an opening. Zelen in turn rebuffed all such attempts, watching and learning all the while. What he lacked in knowledge and experience with the bo staff he made up for with battle-honed instincts. Soon, he’d seen enough of Asena’s fighting style to spot its numerous shortcomings.
She certainly was stronger and more dexterous than he’d given her credit for. She’d also obviously been diligent in revising and replicating the techniques imparted to her by instructors. But that meticulous diligence, in this case, was to her detriment. For in order to stand a chance against the seasoned killers that made up the Reiter Regiment, she needed to show them something they’d never seen before.
As the fight wore on, so too did Asena’s energy wane. Her cuts became a little slower, her angles a little less precise. Then there came a lapse in judgment that was so egregious Zelen had no choice but to punish it.
A lateral slide followed by an overhead cut. Too much lag in between. Too much of an opening. So intent was the Kurator on following through with her planned sequence that she failed to notice her opponent had already transitioned into a counter.
Zelen lowered his shoulder and bumped Asena in the chest, knocking her off-balance. Then, without knowing anything of what the proper technique might be, he dug the lower end of his bo into Asena’s midsection and pushed outward.
He hadn’t intended to put too much force behind the manoeuvre, but it proved enough to drive his opponent off her feet and send her sprawling onto the floor. He winced inwardly before dashing to her side to offer a hand.
Zelen knelt beside Asena with his hand outstretched, waiting for her to take it. The Kurator, however, merely stared up the darkness that passed for a sky inside the Caverns, clutching her weapon to her chest with both hands. Strands of hair clumped and stuck to her flushed and sweaty face. Her chest rose and fell rapidly with the effort of her ragged breaths.
And still, she refused to take his hand.
“Asena?”
With blinding quickness and a sudden burst of strength, Asena sprang to her feet, but not before knocking Zelen’s hand away with a playful tap. Then she lowered—nay, rose—into a stance, of an entirely disparate character than the one with which she’d started the sparring session.
Gone was the rigorous posture of a well-schooled martialist. Instead, Asena hopped to and fro on the balls of her feet, with shoulders relaxed and betraying nothing of intents nor methods. Hers were the looseness and agility of a performer that compelled her audience to expect the unexpected. Show them something they’d never seen before.
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And her eyes. Her eyes were the site of her most startling transformation. For they now glowed from within. An unmistakable ghostly blue hue. The Nexus heeding a Seher’s call.
Zelen blinked, utterly nonplussed. His mouth worked soundlessly, struggling to give word to the thousand questions that swirled in his mind. But his confusion quickly turned to alarm as not-Asena resumed their fight without warning.
A gap-closer, lightning quick. The Kurator dragged one end of her bo along the ground as she moved in, before driving it skyward with a vicious strike aimed at Zelen’s head.
Still kneeling, Zelen managed to block the blow in the nick of time. His whole body shook from the impact, and he quickly jumped to his feet to ready himself for the ensuing barrage.
If this was still Asena Shiranui, she’d done a remarkable job of hitherto hiding her claws. The young woman showed no sign of fatigue as she unleashed a flowing flurry of attacks. Cuts, jabs, jumps, and pirouettes. Each move merged with another with no break in between, leaving no breathing room for her reeling opponent.
The biggest change to the dynamic—more marked even than her increased power and agility—was her formlessness. Zelen still watched but no longer learned, finding it difficult if not downright impossible to pin down his adversary’s movements, to predict the next step in her sequence.
For there was no sequence. Only the whims of an artist in the throes of a surrealist bliss. All was chaos, yet everything was under Asena’s control. Zelen saw himself as an unwilling pupil, led and shepherded through the steps of a violent dance. With no choreography nor end in sight. No music save for the arrhythmic beating of the combatants’ hearts.
Only… Zelen discovered, more and more, that he could be persuaded to match his partner’s enthusiasm. Instead of purely reacting, he began to pepper in techniques of his own. A questioning slide here and an incursive cut there. Soon, he attuned to the chaos of his own attacks, which in turn informed his understanding of his opponent’s.
He heard and felt every drag and release of Asena’s laboured breaths. He saw the laughter that blended with every ripple of her gleaming muscles. And he relished the same joy that was reflected in his own chest—rays of heat that vaporized the blackness therein.
Yet, for all the passion that flew between the dancers, their bodies couldn’t keep up with their own frenetic pace. Asena was the first to lose her footing, tumbling into Zelen as she did.
The Reiter, for his part, reacted without thinking. He let go of his bo to catch Asena, then promptly lost his own balance. He fell backwards and onto the floor, with his dance partner held firmly in his arms.
The pain further clarified his senses and heightened his awareness. For several fraught moments, Asena’s grinning face was inches away from his. Teeth bared in delight, nostrils flared in excitement, and wild eyes shining with possibilities she herself hadn’t even conceived of.
Without warning, the Kurator ripped her arms free of Zelen’s grasp and shot her hands to his throat. Zelen helplessly—or willingly—allowed the heat of Asena’s skin to wrap around the taut muscles of his neck and compress his racing carotids.
Not-Asena’s grin widened. Her grip tightened, with gradual yet steady pressure. And her parted lips drew closer, until they were the only things Zelen could see and anticipate.
Then a loud gasp escaped those lips. She let go of his throat, almost as suddenly as she’d first grabbed it. Then she pushed herself into a sitting position, looking down at her supine companion with an expression of sheer horror.
Gone completely was the ghostly blue hue of her eyes. Even in his own alarm and confusion, Zelen muddled his way to a semblance of understanding. This was the ‘real’ Asena. She of the rigid techniques and restrained manners.
Dream and reality. Lies and truth. Rolled into one yet ever divided. Zelen felt the heat recede from his chest—though not completely. Something of his earlier rapt self lingered, along with the stirring of a strangely familiar emotion that pulled at the edges of his blackness.
“Oh, for fuck’s sake!”
Two pairs of eyes swivelled toward the interruption. The stocky figure of Feray Geyik shuffled toward them at speed, with her face caught between urgent duty and the beginning of a smirk.
“When I said you shouldn’t let these things fester, I didn’t mean for you to take a blazing torch to the whole mess! But never mind that, right now. We’ve got a situation, lover boy, and we need your expertise on the war end of the spectrum.”
Only then did Asena seem to realize that she was still straddling Zelen by the waist. Her features disappeared into pure red as she jumped off and took several backward steps for good measure. Now unencumbered, Zelen too rose and dusted himself off as he addressed the timely Jaeger.
“What happened?”
“Graeme and a couple other Panzers are on the surface right now, conducting a check on the perimeter defenses. He just radioed in to say he and his team have been spotted by a hostile and are now being pursued.”
“Syntropy?”
“No,” Feray said, her face now set in an uneasy frown. “The other kind of hostiles.”
Zelen nodded. “How many?”
“One.”
“Just one? Did Graeme provide any identifying features? Paintwork and decals?”
“Oh, he identified him, alright.”
Feray glanced sidelong at a dazed Asena as she said this, and Zelen understood immediately. He nodded again and broke into a brisk walk, beckoning for Feray to follow suit. As soon as the two of them were out of earshot, he leaned in to give out instructions in a lowered voice.
“I’m heading directly to the hangar now. I want you to round up a handful of reinforcements and sortie once you’re all ready. But only as back-up. Hang back, observe, assist Graeme and his team if the opportunity presents itself, but do not engage the hostile. Do I make myself clear? No one is to provoke Spindrift in any way, shape, or form, unless I give a direct order to do so.”
He paused to look back over his shoulder. The lone figure of Asena Shiranui—and not her dancing alter ego—still stood in the middle of the drill ground, with eyes downcast. She was apparently lost in thought, having not moved an inch since she debulked herself from Zelen’s person.
Zelen hesitated, but only for a moment, before he added for Feray’s ears only, “And whatever you do, don’t let Asena out onto the surface.”