Day 7
Evening
“You were right to call me.” Logan had since recovered from his embarrassment, and returned to his more authoritative behaviour. “In all likelihood the DN are holding your teacher hostage until Erin arrives.”
“So what do we do then? We can’t leave him there!” Zack wasn’t quite as hysterical as earlier, but it was a narrow thing.
“Well, let’s wargame this out.” Logan said, “If we go now, best case scenario we’ve got, what, two deputies, a handful of guns, no intel or recon on their numbers or the environment.” He shook his head, “We would walk in blind and it would be suicide, especially if we’re the aggressors.”
“But…but you’ve got Erin!” Zack tried to counter, “She took on those other guys in seconds!”
“First and foremost, Erin is a civilian. It’s not her job.” Logan was firm, almost aggressively so on that point, “Secondly, she has pointed out to us that the System AI seems to think the abilities she manifested were some kind of…glitch…and that it won’t let her do that again.”
“Not until tomorrow.” It was a quiet comment by Erin, but everyone was near enough to hear, “Tomorrow my powers unlock and I can be a force multiplier, that’s what you call it, right?”
“Let’s wargame that scenario, Erin.” Logan sounded even less happy than when Zack showed up, “Your powers unlock, we all potentially get some powers. Including the bad guys. We walk in there with no idea what they can do. We’re lucky if we walk out, and luckier still if they don’t retaliate against your mom, or Noah’s.”
This time Erin’s comment was barely audible as words, “I can’t lose another person I care about.”
“Sorry, I didn’t catch that?” Logan asked.
“Nothing.” Erin was mad now, “If you’re not going to help then go back to the station and do whatever it is the police do when they can’t do their damn job.” Erin stormed out of the room, leaving Logan speechless.
“That’s unfair,” Eun-ha said to Logan, “She knows you and Deputy Cade are working hard to help where you can. This situation brings up bad memories for her.”
Logan dropped his head, partly out of shame, and partly out of helplessness, “I understand. I’ve read your file. I can’t imagine what she’s feeling, and I never hope to.” Getting up to leave, Logan turned back to the group one last time, “I’ll talk to Sydney, see if we can come up with a plan. Zack, I promise if I can figure out a way to save Mr. Ryu, I will.”
Zack just looked resigned at this point. Like someone who had lost all hope and given up. He knew that he wasn’t half the martial artist Erin was. The system took forever to register his Taekwondo skill, whereas other more skilled practitioners got the notification quickly. With or without Erin, if he confronted the gang he would probably die.
Erin’s anger flared repeatedly, like a pulsing light inside her. She knew it was unfair to accuse Logan of doing nothing. She was really just angry with herself. She couldn’t deal with being too weak to save another person she cared about. If they wouldn’t do anything, she would take action herself.
The impotent feeling trying to take hold in Erin made her even angrier. Heading to the garage, Erin went looking for some things to use as punching surfaces. Old winter tires that weren’t mounted to rims were a good start, but she found some wood, a couple pieces of sheet metal, some hand and power tools, plus some screws and assorted hardware.
The wood was various lengths of two-by-four and four-by-four. Cutting the sidewalls off of the tires, she cut the tread into strips. She wrapped the sheet metal around one of the four-by-fours, and nailed it down. Next, she used a two-by-four to reinforce the backside of the wood overtop of the sheet metal seam. Then she screwed strips of tires into the wood on the front and sides at different heights.
Stolen novel; please report.
Taking her faux training dummy to the backyard, she used a gardening spade to dig a foot deep hole, planted the training dummy, then used more wood to brace it at the top and bottom against the fence. Not perfect, but it would have to do.
Erin didn’t bother cleaning the dirt off her hands. She threw a couple tentative punches and kicks to test her makeshift solution, then started going at it half-speed and quarter strength. It didn’t take her long to realize a few things. First was that she missed having something to actually hit. Forms were great practice to refine your technique, but it didn’t help nearly as much with her anger.
The second thing she noticed was that her knuckles and shins didn’t react to the impacts the way she expected. Normally after a week without conditioning the striking surfaces of her body, she would notice it more. If she had to guess, this was the Refined Body ability she had received. Useful, but she wished it had a more detailed entry in the help menu.
Her practice dummy started to wobble after a short bit, so she added reinforcing braces in the corners to keep it from separating. She had to add side braces dug into the dirt as well before it felt solid enough to not keep shifting or loosening on her, but she finally reached a point where she could go three-quarters speed and half strength.
Even with Refined Body, after long enough she finally started feeling the burning sensation building on her striking surfaces. When that started, she shifted to sprinting the length of the yard. She did push-ups, sit-ups, burpees, squats, anything to burn energy and focus her anger. When the burn on her knuckles, shins, and other striking surfaces dissipated she would go back to her striking dummy.
Erin was vaguely aware at times that people would observe her through the window, or from the back door, but she ignored them lest they take it as an invitation to talk. The last thing she wanted right now was to talk. The darkness slowly seeped into the sky, someone turned on the porch light for the backyard, but Erin just kept hammering the dummy, drilling her body, hammering the dummy, drilling her body.
At some point the lights inside the house turned off, but she kept going. She was breathing hard for so long she started to forget what normal breathing felt like, but she never exhausted. The anger barely abated, a source of fuel for her body that never ran dry.
When the sky started to brighten, Erin finally stopped to take stock of her surroundings. There were sections of tread on the training dummy that were noticeably thinner, and various divots where she had worn down parts of the grass to the dirt. Her clothes were so soaked, anyone observing her would think she just took a swim in them. She wondered how she could sweat so much without replenishing water, which was about the time her stomach cried out at the neglect it had experienced.
Day 8
Heading into the house, Erin tried her best to wipe her feet off on the mat just inside the door, but it was a useless gesture. Nothing short of a bath or shower would get that much dirt off. Tracking dirty footprints through the dining room and into the kitchen, she found her mother, Mrs. McGibbons, Noah, and to her surprise, Zack sitting at the kitchen table eating breakfast. No one said a word to her, but they all stared as she grabbed a plate, sat at the table, and started piling food from the serving plates in the middle onto her own.
After building a mountain of eggs, bacon, pancakes, home fries, and breakfast sausage onto her plate, Erin started digging in, heedless of the attention she was garnering.
It was Noah who broke the silence first with a quiet. “Bakemono…”
Zack and Mrs. McGibbons snickered, Eun-ha gave Noah a disapproving motherly stare before she joined the tittering, and they returned to their food.
“So, three hours until the assessment phase ends.” Noah had a note of excitement in his voice. “Hopefully we’ll get some information about what the hell is going on.”
“Language, young man!” Eun-ha said.
“Umm…yes, ma’am.” Just like that, Noah’s confidence disappeared with three words.
“Just…try not to make a habit. I’m sure your mom doesn’t want you picking up any bad habits from strangers. Speaking of which, message her after breakfast. Mothers worry.”
Noah’s reply was a bit more upbeat, though still shy, “Yes, ma’am.”
Despite the massive plate of food, Erin devoured everything before the others finished. Bussing her plate, she said, “I’m going to shower and sleep until the system message.”
“Okay, love you, Ttarai.” Eun-ha said, while the others just nodded.
“Love you too, Eomma.”
The shower was very welcoming, but also very messy. The amount of dirt caked on Erin’s body could have built a small hill, and the dried salt felt like it could be sold by the pound. Once showered and in clean clothes, Erin face planted in one of the spare rooms she had taken over, her consciousness switching off almost before her head hit the pillow.