“Hand-to-hand-combat,” Safety Ed grinned wildly as he said those four words. “Hand-to-hand combat is truly the heart of warfare. It doesn’t matter how big the dragon’s talons are when you are riding it’s back slowly fileting it alive with a hunting knife until you can dig a bloody path to its hot, quick-beating heart.” The way he said it sounded like personal experience, even if Mac knew that was impossible. Dragons didn’t exist except on TV. Maybe it was one of those VR games.

  “This is a pugil stick,” Safety Ed kicked one of the padded sticks to Tiera. She caught it out of the air with a single hand while he flicked up another one from the ground into his own hand. “They’re supposed to simulate a rifle with a bayonet, but the real value comes from the aggression learned while fighting with one of these.”

  “First rule of hand-to-hand combat is “stay the aggressor”. As the attacker you can choose the pace, timing and location of your attacks. If you get caught on defense, you lose control of all those key pieces and have to predict them. Contrary to what you may have seen on TV, this is a near impossible feat. So, always stay on the attack. It’s the safest way to fight. Oh, and keep both hands on the stick. You wouldn’t want someone to take it away from you,” the instructor passed a sideways glance at the shock leader.

  “What?” Tiera failed the innocent look completely

  “Mac, you’ll pair off against Miss Sardonyx, and Miss Pardova, you’ll spar against Grist,” Safety Ed separated the sparring partners.

  “Is that fair?” Natalia questioned cautiously as she eyed the hulking troll beside her.

  “You know what, you’ve got a point,” Safety Ed acknowledged her concern drawing a faintly relieved look from her. “We wouldn’t want Grist to get hurt before you learn control. These sticks might be padded but they can pack a wallop in the right hands.”

  It appeared the safety instructor could be reasoned with. Mac smiled at the fleeting moment of sanity.

  “Okay, Mac, you’re with Grist. And the two ladies will spar, Miss Sardonyx knows what she’s doing,” the grey-eyed man decided.

  Were Tiera’s hands trembling? Mac noticed the trollip bite her lip as she changed positions to bravely stand in front of the vampire.

  “Don’t worry,” Natalia reassured the smaller trollip, “I’ll restrain myself.”

  Now Tiera just looked annoyed. The trollip was crazy. Nothing else to it, Mac decided as he glanced up at Grist. The pugil stick looked like a toy in his hands.

  “Remember to only use the stick,” Safety Ed reminded the troll. “And before we start, let’s move over here to this gravel pit between the guard rails. It will cushion your fall.”

  Mac looked up at Grist who held out his padded pugil stick in front of him like an oversize cotton swab on a stick as if wondering what to make of it. At least he hadn’t tried to put it in his ear. “Get ready,” Safety Ed called from the other side of the guard rails as Mac set his stance and prepared to be beaten half to death by a heavily padded stick. At least he had done this before at his last job and had some idea what he was doing.

  “Attack!”

  Mac went after the troll as best he could, banging away at the troll’s shoulder and scoring a hit on the troll’s chest, not that the troll was easy to miss. Grist seemed taken aback by the small human’s ferocity and surprisingly stepped back, earning him an earful of less than positive comments from the instructor. Mac rained blow after blow on the troll all the while expecting that one crushing blow from above. He did not expect the just short of gentle poke in his solar plexus, which dropped him to his knees as the wind left his lungs.

  “Can’t… breathe…” Mac grasped emptily at his chest with one hand as the troll straightened up to let him back up to his feet.

  “Mac be fine?” the troll asked almost too politely to the paralyzed human on the gravel in front of him.

  Mac shook his head ever so slightly in the affirmative and lifted a single finger as tears formed in his eyes and he struggled for breath. After the space of several heartbeats, a breath came and eventually gave way to another… and another after that. Finally, he could breathe normally and stood up. “Give me a second,” Mac requested as he cleared his mind and chanced a glance at the two sparing women.

  The vampire looked like she was having a rough time of it as both females traded ferocious looking blows on each other. It was a good thing Natalia was holding back, or that poor trollip might have gotten killed. At some point, the trollip’s hair pin had come loose and her long, glossy, black hair flowed behind her head like a curtain in the breeze as she ducked, dodged and otherwise threw her entire small body into each attack to make up for her lack of natural strength and size. The shock leader could move like a dragonfly. Mac granted her that.

  For her part, Natalia didn’t even bother to defend. She simply attempted to crush the trollip’s head with each wild swing and overhand chop. She even landed a few on Tiera’s shoulders interrupting the trollip’s various attacks, dropping her to a knee with each restrained blow.

  “Mac set?” Grist interrupted his musings and brought him back to the task at hand.

  “Yep, just about,” Mac answered as he took his stance and prepared for a beating.

  “Do it!” Safety Ed called from the side. Was that some kind of perverse joy in his voice?

  Mac went in swinging again, mostly landing hits on the troll’s arms and thighs. He switched his grip and reached down for a spinning uppercut, but when he was just into the movement, he felt the impact of his padded stick against the guard rail which sent an inconvenient jolt through his body. The troll naturally swung at his unprotected head with a powerful swing that sailed above it by nearly a foot. Mac regained his composure in time to adjust his position in the gravel and land a renewed upper cut on the troll’s extended jaw. The solid blow added to the momentum of the troll’s last missed swing and cartwheeled Mac’s opponent into the gravel in an explosion of pebbles.

  Safety Ed’s jaw hung open in amazement. His gaze shifted from the troll fruitlessly shaking his head in an attempt to clear the cobwebs to the panting human with the look of triumph… or possibly murder in his eyes. “That was… uh… quite the hit there, Mac.” Then, to Grist, “You alright there, big guy?”

  “Grist flip,” the troll explained to himself as he slowly stood back up. “Use more care next time. Not miss.”

  “You try that,” Safety Ed agreed. “But use some power. That’s your natural advantage.”

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  Grist nodded and set his stance in front of Mac. There was ferocity in the troll’s eyes, but also some respect that hadn’t been there before. Mac barely dodged the first attack when it came. It wasn’t the highly overpowered swing the troll had tried before, but something half strength and better aimed. It still missed Mac’s head by an inch or two.

  Mac jabbed the troll in the side of his stomach then ducked the wild reverse swing. He rewarded Grist for his inaccuracy with another jab to the opposite side of the gut and cuffed him on the side of the head. Mac felt his muscle memory coming back to him except he had to extend a bit more to reach the troll.

  He continued to duck and dodge more wild swings by the increasingly frustrated troll until he was able to cut the troll’s over-extended foot out from underneath him. Grist dropped on his back, frustrated at himself for failing to land a single blow on the slippery human.

  Mac dropped the troll again… and again over the next hour as Grist continued to miss blow after blow and only catching at best a glancing hit when he did finally connect a few times. Safety Ed looked a bit concerned by the end of it and stopped the sparring between them when Grist found himself on his back yet again. Mac took the moment to catch a much-needed breath. He half wondered if he should tell the troll that he was closing his eyes each time he swung. Probably not. Well, not yet at least.

  The high-pitched grunt of the ladies trying to fell each other continued like a background soundtrack to some martial arts movie as Safety Ed stepped over to Grist where he sat on the gravel from the last fall. The instructor pulled a small flashlight from his sleeve and checked the troll’s pupils. Mac’s last hit had been a solid connection if ever there was one.

  “How many fingers am I holding up?” the grey-eyed human asked as he raised his index finger in front of the troll.

  “A lot…” Grist answered.

  Safety Ed looked back questioningly at Mac, back to the troll and then back at Mac, “A little lighter on those head shots, okay. Actually, I like those shots, but Grist can’t take them just now. Let’s take a pause and figure out what he’s doing wrong besides completely missing you.”

  Rest was good. Mac smiled and took a seat on the middle guard rail letting his legs dangle over the gravel. The two ladies were now staring viciously at each other, but not actually trying to swing.

  “You two take a break, too,” Safety Ed instructed the exhausted ladies.

  “Go ahead… sit down,” Natalia offered generously from her stance.

  “By all means… you… first,” Miss Sardonyx countered.

  “No… I insist,” the vampire offered again between breaths.

  “Both of you, sit!” Safety Ed looked up from where he continued to examine Grist.

  “You can’t… move either… can you?” Natalia challenged the trollip.

  “I could… if I… wanted to,” Tiera responded from her stance.

  “Your knees… freeze up?” Natalia questioned sympathetically.

  “So what… if they did,” she responded between breaths. “Your hands… freeze to the stick? They look… kind of pale.”

  “It’s possible,” Natalia granted. “You… can’t move… can you?”

  “You… can’t either.”

  “Will both of you just sit down and rest already,” Safety Ed sounded a bit annoyed. This time he finally looked over at them. A faint smile passed his lips before he shook his head in wonderment. “You just can’t pass up taking down a fearsome opponent, can you, Tiera?”

  “That’s Shock Leader… Sardonyx… to you,” the trollip protested.

  “And what are you going to do about it… Tiera?” Safety Ed challenged the frozen combatant.

  “You’ll be… back in… my realm… soon.”

  “Of course, Miss Sardonyx,” Safety Ed saluted. “Now if you don’t mind, I need to get you both to the ground so your muscles can relax.”

  “You can take care of Miss Pardova, first,” the Shock Leader insisted.

  “I’m afraid that as the higher-ranking person, you will be first,” Safety Ed insisted as he stepped behind her and gently pulled her shoulders back to him, rocking her off of her feet and gently lowering her stiffened frame to the gravel. He even took a moment’s care to pile up a few pebbles under her head.

  “I won’t forget this, Ed,” She warned him from where she lay on the ground while he very carefully maneuvered Natalia to the ground as well.

  “All tensed up from restraining your blows?” Safety Ed asked as he lowered her stiff body.

  “Something like that,” she replied with a faint smile that would have been cute had it not revealed a pale white fang. Her hair was now a complete mess and gravel dust covered her near completely. She could have been easily mistaken for the fallen statue of an ancient warrior queen.

  “We’ve still got two hours of practice left before our time is up,” Safety Ed announced. “I don’t think you ladies will be able to continue, but I think you both more than made up for the quantity with your efforts. I’ll just work with Grist, here, while you two recover your…. Humanity?”

  “Ha… ha,” Tiera responded sarcastically from where she lay like a fallen statue in the gravel pit.

  Safety Ed turned his attention back to Grist. “Talk to me. What seems to be the trouble.”

  “Grist not good with club,” the troll explained with quite a bit of frustration evident in his voice. “Not in past, not now, not soon to be.”

  “Really?” Safety Ed asked. “But you dropped Mr. MacDonald on your very first try. Why did that work?”

  “Not know,” the troll answered. “Grist aim with care. Hit right spot on chest.”

  “Hmmm…” the instructor rubbed at his handsome scruff as he thought. An idea seemed to strike him and his grey eyes sparkled as he asked, “are there other right spots?”

  Grist nodded and began pointing at himself, “Here, here, here, here, here, and here.”

  “Good, good. How do you… no never mind,” the instructor waved away the thought. “I have an idea. Just humor me, here.”

  “Grist laugh at you?”

  “So, you do have a sense of humor.”

  “Grist kill it long ago, keep in old trunk. Pull out for show when want. Most girls not like much,” the troll replied with what sounded like complete sincerity. Only the faint sparkle in his eye betrayed his words.

  “Here hold this,” Safety Ed passed the troll his pugil stick. “I trained another troll with a similar issue some years ago. Works in the R&D department last I checked. Now, very gently, stand up and hit me on those places where you were aiming on Mac.”

  Grist did as he was told and poked Safety Ed in his elbow forcing the grey-eyed human to drop his own pugil stick.

  “Wait, wait, wa…” Safety Ed tried to raise his stick to stop the next quick tap which took him in the temple and knocked his lights out.

  XXXXX

  Safety Ed opened his eyes a few minutes later with a pounding headache. Mac was hovering over him and someone had kindly piled some gravel underneath his head to support it. “Oh… owww,” he mumbled as he raised his hand to rub his throbbing temple.

  “Grist hurt Ed, feel not good,” the troll apologized sincerely.

  “No, no,” Safety Ed waved him off, “I asked you to do that, didn’t I? I think I did. It’s a bit fuzzy.” The instructor rubbed his temple some more and wiped his face with his other hand attempting to wipe away the grogginess. “Just how hard did you hit me?”

  “Light tap,” Grist explained with an apologetic grimace on his face.

  “Feels like I got hit by a mag train,” Safety Ed blinked purposefully in a vain attempt to clear the cobwebs. “There’s something to be gained from this, but I can’t focus long enough to grasp it.”

  “Grist no spar with you more times,” the troll insisted.

  “Maybe if I’m ready. I don’t think I was ready when you hit me. Yeah, that was it. I wasn’t ready… Where are we?”

  Mac traded a concerned glance with Grist. It looked like they were taking everyone back to the barracks again. On the bright side, they would have an early evening off.

  “Think you can carry the ladies, Grist?” Mac asked, “I think I can support the instructor.

  “I’m a battle suit pilot,” Safety Ed voiced from where he lay on the ground pointing up at the lights.

  “Yes, you are,” Mac agreed with a worried look in his eyes, then to Grist, “Here, I’ll help you pick up the ladies.”

  “Careful with those hands Mac,” the vampire warned him.

  “I will be the utmost gentlemen,” Mac assured the dust-covered female. “Besides, have you looked at yourself lately?” Then he bent down and used his back to lever her up so Grist could collect her in the cradle of one arm. The pugil stick was still locked in her hands and the troll had to adjust his grip to get it out of his face.

  Mac was able to lift up the equally dusty Miss Sardonyx much easier as she seemed to hardly weigh anything. Grist collected her in the cradle of his other arm looking like a work troll carrying two statues. “You know where to take them?” Mac asked.

  “Rooms both,” Grist answered.

  “Good, just know that I’ll be by to check on them after I deposit our instructor, here,” Mac advised as he helped Safety Ed off the ground.

  “Sounds good,” Grist answered before striding off ahead of Mac with the ladies in his arms.

  “Such nice boys,” Safety Ed mumbled. Then, a look of terror blitzed across his face and he grabbed Mac’s collar, “Don’t let Akari find me.”