He jerked himself off the bed and stood in a Krav Maga stance. Looking down at himself with feet spaced apart on the floor he felt stupid. He flopped down on the bed and ripped off his socks. He stood back up and took his stance. He could just make out his profile in the glossed wall of his room. He slid his lead foot forward, pointing with his toes straight ahead of him. He shifted his back foot perpendicular to his lead foot and rebalanced himself between the two. He raised his arms in front of him, one extended past the other. He took a deep breath and closed his eyes.
He had seen enough Martial Arts films to know that he had no idea what he was doing but that didn’t stop him. The combination of mind and body and Chi, whatever that was, was the key to being a successful martial artist. What he had learned here in Krav Maga didn’t stress any of that though and he could see how it was effective. But he needed something more than just effectiveness. He needed something that he could believe in.
Keeping his eyes shut he let his arms start to move. Trying to recreate moves that he had seen in a dozen Kung Fu movies he let his body do what it wanted to. He focused on fluidity of motion. Letting his arms move and resituate themselves in strange designs and patterns. Sometimes his arms got crossed and he had to reset and start over again. He found a simple pattern that he could repeat. His arms would explode outward then come back together as his hands moved around each other in a figure eight pattern. His fingers came together in a fist and shot forward, then both shot forward in open handed thrusts. His arms moved violently outward in two forearm blocks for his shoulders then his hands came back together and dove under one another back into the ready stance he had taken at the beginning.
He moved his arms faster and faster keeping his movements as close to the original form as he could. He kept his eyes closed and let his body move around him. He started to visualize the pattern of his body, how it could be used in combat. He smiled to himself as a familiar piece of music kept repeating itself in his head.
He moved his body faster. Sweat was trickling down his back and neck. He could feel the slick wetness as he moved his arms, brushing up with his torso. His chest was coated and the sweat ran freely down into his pants. His well-muscled chest and his ripped abs flexed and moved with his arms. Soon he started moving his legs as he repeated the form over and over again. His body moved as he visualized the movement in his head. Keeping his eyes closed and forcing himself to move more of his body with every repeat of the exercise.
He saw the pattern play out in his mind. The music kept him in time and rhythm. His arms moved as his feet moved. For the first time in his life, he felt like his mind and body were actually working together. It was a deep feeling, not just his mind telling his body what to do, but both feeding off of each other. It was a rush and he moved faster. Punch, double thrust, block, all the movements repeated in his mind seconds before his body followed seamlessly. Mind and body as one.
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“Am I interrupting anything?”
William almost fell over and lost where he had been in the form. Feeling his cheeks warm slightly with the embarrassment of being caught, he stuttered in his movements and awkwardly finished his form. Panting heavily, he rotated his body toward the sound of the noise and slowly opened his eyes.
Standing in the doorway leaning against one side with her arms crossed in front of her chest was his Alpha, Aceso. Her tall black furred ears were bent forward in curiosity and if he wasn’t mistaken, she had a smile on her face, a small one, but a smile nonetheless.
“How long… have you… been standing there?” William heaved as he silently wished that he looked half as good in reality as he had in his mind, but he wasn’t stupid. She had probably just seen her enforcer flailing his arms around like a crazy person, shadow boxing the air. He ran his hands through his sweat coated hair as his stomach flexed as he breathed deep shallow breaths, trying to calm down after the exertion.
Aceso stood there calmly, that small smile still on her lips, “Long enough to see that my enforcer is at least taking his training seriously or at least I think it was serious. Sometimes human born behavior does confuse me.” She heaved her six-foot ten-inch frame off the doorway and walked into his room. She looked around the place in an absentminded kind of way. “What were you doing?”
William put his hands on his hips and moved his head from side to side as if he was looking for something as well. “Well… I uh… was working on a form… something similar to a martial arts form… At least that’s what I was hoping to do.”
Aceso nodded, “And just what is that supposed to accomplish?” There was genuine interest in her eyes.
William scratched at the back of his neck suddenly self-conscious. “I think it is supposed to increase speed. And I hope it gives me a better understanding of how my …” he trailed off into mumbles. He looked up at her, “Look it’s stupid. I was just fooling around. I have no idea what I was doing.” He turned around and sat down heavily on his bed. “What brings you here to my humble dwelling?”
Aceso looked like she wanted to say something more but closed her eyes and nodded her head in understanding. She heaved a very human sounding sigh and lifter her eyes toward William once more. “I came by to tell you that tomorrow we will not be training with Efraim.”
That took William by surprise. “What do you mean, ‘not train’ tomorrow?” He looked at Aceso with confusion in his eyes. “Isn’t Charles going to rejoin us tomorrow? What’s going on?”
Aceso leveled her eyes at William, “Huan Li told me that no pack will be training tomorrow.”