Fuzzy, Julian and Puppy - August 17th - Friday – Evening - Blake Island

When Fuzzy, Julian and Puppy arrived at the southwestern part of the island, there was one of the island's security waiting in the evening, hands on their pockets as the sun began to set.

"Here we are," said Julian, "I'll show you how this works. Put on your goggles."

Fuzzy's augmented reality goggles were on her head and so she slipped them over her eyes.

"Do you see the fence?" asked Julian.

Fuzzy looked around for a fence but didn't see one. Instead of immediately admitting that she couldn't she tried again. Julian sighed and motioned to her goggles.

"Are they on?" he asked.

Fuzzy tapped a button on the side of her goggles and they turned on, leaving her feeling embarrassed and annoyed. What she saw immediately was what looked like an ordinary fence, though it was green and it head scrawling text on it that she couldn't read.

"I see it," she said.

"Good," said Julian, "The southwestern part of the island is usually open, but sometimes it can be deemed off limits. Sometimes we need to teach more dangerous magic away from other students. Sometimes true isolation is what pushes someone's magic to the next level. And sometimes someone just needs a little time alone just because they do. Now normally augmented reality doesn't work because of the wireless jamming, but this does. Green means anyone is welcome. Red means stay out."

Fuzzy nodded in understanding at the picket fence that stretched out as far as she could see through the forest. Then Julian stepped over, Fuzzy followed and so did Puppy. The security guard had already stepped over. And when Fuzzy stepped over, the fence changed from green to red and the text changed as well.

"Now this is your part of the island," said Julian, "No other student will bother you. Normally we announce this so everyone else will stay out but sometimes they don't. There's nothing out here but some ruins of the once owners of the island who lived around the turn of last century, though it's only foundations now. So you have your privacy here and you can safely practice here with your weapons."

"Is that why I was told to hunt birds around here?" asked Fuzzy.

Julian nodded.

"The system normally isn't active on the weekends. We're making some allowances for you since we think that continuing to hunt would be good for you," he said, "But the AR fence is active during weekdays, even at night as some students may camp out here. If you want to leave then you will wait at the fence for a security guard who will escort you back. No student will be allowed to approach you unless they ask for our permission and then we'll get your permission and you have the final say."

"So I can say no," said Fuzzy.

Julian nodded.

"You will be monitored by security and security spirits for your safety," continued Julian, "But you'll otherwise be alone. If someone does try to violate this space then they'll be tied to the shame pole. So always remember to check if you come here. And under no circumstances are you allowed to shoot an arrow past this fence. The island isn't that large and a loose arrow is very dangerous. Access to your weapons isn't a right, it's a privilege. And it's one that I fought for on your behalf. We normally don't allow weapons at school at all. So don't be careless and lose it."

Fuzzy looked left to right but she couldn't see where the arrow was and resolved to get the lay of the land of the southwestern part of the island and understand where the fence was. Her flu-flu bird hunting arrows shouldn't be a problem because they'd drop after forty feet, but her arrows for hunting deer would fly far if she was careless.

Part of Fuzzy wanted to argue. How she often felt vulnerable without her weapons and certainly didn't trust these strange "security" people or "police" people with her safety. After all, how could someone trust anyone that they didn't know in the slightest? Especially when they were armed and she wasn't. In the barrens that was a recipe for disaster. However, she just wanted to move. She'd argue the finer points of carrying weapons with Julian later.

"I get it," said Fuzzy, "I'm going on my run now."

Julian smiled and nodded, grateful that he wasn't going to get an argument from Fuzzy. They exchanged a wave and Julian turned and left while Fuzzy briefly stretched as the security guard watched on, obviously bored.

As she stretched, she was reminded of the first night she was here two weeks ago on the dock. The lesson he'd imparted to her explaining her place and purpose here with water, juice, and the mixing of the two together. She knew she was potent like juice and that meant keeping up her skills outside of Puyallup. Not just for them, of course, but for herself. So she looked down at Puppy, grabbed his attention and they were off at a run down the wooded trail as evening continued to creep in.

The run was harder than she expected. Her stamina hadn't diminished at all, but she was sore from all that sitting on that log in Mother Bear's lodge for the better part of five days. There was also the fact that the ground wasn't ash or concrete, but dirt with rocks and slippery tree roots. Puppy was eager and kept up easily and since he'd let him off the leash he went and sniffed whatever he pleased. But overall, he stayed close to her without tripping her up and also without running away. Fuzzy had no idea that his good behavior was strange. After all, he was her first and only pet.

Three minutes later after a light jog to warm up she broke through the treeline and emerged onto the southwestern beach. There was a small drop of about five feet and she and Puppy carefully negotiated it before dropping into the sand.

The beach was covered in rocks that were the size of chickens eggs or even larger, rubbed smooth by the Puget Sound and tightly packed. She doubted that she could have walked across it, much less ran, though there was a cleared space on the beach that was rock free. Her muscles ached in a good way and she looked at her spear that was currently in its sheathed form on her belt and thought about all of the new possibilities that she had at her fingertips.

She was lighter, yes and not needing to run with her spear in her hand was fantastic as well. However, the difference in weight meant something to her both good because she was lighter and bad because it'd take getting used to. The weapons didn't feel like a part of her yet and tonight she was going to test them.

Fuzzy pulled off her bow and quiver off her body and setting them carefully to one side but kept the boot knife on her. Emergency weapons were no good if one got into the habit of removing them. Fuzzy had used her spearknife, but this was not some demonstration room. This was the world. Kenji's knife, now Fuzzy's spear and spearknife were still untested and that made her somewhat nervous. She was sure that Kenji tested his own knife, but she needed to know for herself. Though how she tested a tool would be different than how she tested a weapon. That would be for another day.

So she grasped her spearknife in her hand and with a command she'd learned and the memory metal weapon rippled in her hands. The "sheathed" knife lost its bluntness and created a keen edge, roughly the size and shape and weight of a Ka-Bar fighting knife, one of the heavier kinds as it was two pounds.

Before she readied the knife, she looked around for Puppy, who sat quietly a dozen feet away. She willed him to stay there and so he would stay there. Now, ready, she raised the knife to her hip and kept it near her body like Rat Man taught her. A knife held in an outstretched hand is a knife waiting to be taken or knocked away. Her slashes were slow at first, which made her frown. After all, it was more than twice the weight of her previous knife.

"Hmm," said Fuzzy, with a frown.

She'd just have to learn how to use it, she resolved. A heavier knife meant she'd be slower, but maybe she could compensate with magic in time. So she went through her normal routine. One, two, three strikes. A quick thrust, a flick upwards, a slash downwards and then back to her body all in less than a second. She did so again, three flicks. Then a slash and a single flick. A single stab. One to three strikes, never repeated in the same way so she'd be difficult to anticipate. Learning how not to fall into a predictable rhythm while fighting had been one of the hardest things she'd ever learned but Rat Man had been firm on this point. Unpredictability over style. Ruthlessness over grace. Be quick, efficient and decisive.

After a minute of practicing with her knife, she touched the knife in just the right way, manually activating it instead of with the wireless app. She was careful to angle it away from her and it grew outwards as if it was magic and the knife lengthened into a six foot short spear. She noticed the way the center of gravity shifted and adjusted her grip as she added her left hand, her non-dominant one, to the front and her dominant to the back.

Again, like Rat Man taught her, she began to thrust with the spear. She used her body as a guide to keep it steady and the spear shaft slid along her hunting leathers near noiselessly. She moved the shaft across her stomach as a pivot to strike with the butt end before reversing the motion to strike with the sharper end and her clothing and the wind both softly snapped with each quick motion. Now she imagined an enemy before her. She struck out twice at the imaginary foe’s feet before she thrust once at the middle. She quickly pulled it back. Just like the knife, a spear that was held too close to an enemy for too long could easily be grabbed or taken.

Finally, and this was important, she made it a staff. She paid close attention to how the weight shifted as the spear tip disappeared. She knew in her bones that the tip didn't simply recess into the tip of the staff to make the tip heavier for striking or simply become longer which would unbalance the weapon in a way she would not like. The spear didn't become thicker, it simply become more compact. Compact like Fuzzy's own body. Solid and like the staff, often underestimated.

She appreciated that the weight was evenly distributed. This was important and so she ran through the spear drills again and paid close attention to the distribution of the weapon's weight. She couldn't feel it yet because it was so small, but it matter to her. A weapon that was not fully understood was a weapon that would remain untested in the hunt and especially in combat if it came to that.

As waves crashed against the beach and her dog watched, she ran through her staff strikes but wondered idly about the salesman when she was done. He knew his business, and he had a grace that had been mixed with efficiency, which she'd appreciated. He’d thrown the weapon even though it was heavy for a thrown blade, though Fuzzy was not used to throwing her weapons. A thrown weapon was a weapon that would be lost in the ash. From the way that the man's body had moved she knew he was better than her with this weapon in all of its forms. She wondered idly if she should find him and talk to him to ask him about his dance-like moves and understanding of her spearknife.

She ran through a few more drills until it was nearly full dark. Sweating hard and feeling good, she returned her staff to its sheathed knife form with a touch. It shrank back into its smaller, compact form and she patted it before securing it to her belt. Soon she would lavish even more attention upon it but for the moment she was satisfied. For a time she considered practicing with her bow, but she eventually decided against it. There was simply nothing she was interested in shooting at, though she thought she might try and fashion some sort of archery target later.

She drank her juice. It was sweet and slightly tart. She liked apple juice. She reached for the app Mother Bear installed on her commlink and after a full minute of wrangling with it she came back with what it was.

"Wow! Apple Juice," she remarked, after her commlink had repeated that to her, "Not bad. I wonder what a wow apple is."

She had another quick run with Puppy through the forest and found the security guard, who turned on a flashlight and led the girl and her dog back to Julian's just as it became it back just as it became full dark. Reluctantly, she returned to Julian's cabin to return her weapons. He stowed them carefully back in their box soon after he opened his door, already ready to accept them and therefore not waste her time which she appreciated. Minutes later he came outside and they sat on a bench together while Puppy lay at her feet and intently watched the odd passerby.

"How was your run?" he asked.

Fuzzy sighed and shook her head as they both took a seat on the chairs on Julian's porch.

"Finished learning my spell too late in the day," she complained, "Two short runs, a few drills with the spearknife, but I didn't have time with my bow. That's it. I'm going to need a lot more practice."

"Your spear knife?" he asked, breaking the chosen name of her weapon into two words.

Fuzzy only shrugged.

"It's a spear that's also a knife," she said, simply.

"I see, I see," he said, as he stroked his chin in thought, "Well, your weapons are all stored and I'm glad that you got the exercise."

Technically she still had a weapon. Sort of. She carefully thought of the book of stun bolt that Sasha had given to her. It was forbidden to her, but technically not a weapon. It was like the scrap Rat Man cobbled together to make her first bow. That scrap was like a formula. That book was a weapon in waiting. The formula was made up of parts. Rationalization done, she didn't feel guilty for hiding a potential weapon from Julian. In fact, when she learned the spell, maybe she'd feel better about constantly being disarmed if she were secretly armed. Like a kind of magical boot knife, except it would put you to sleep instead of cutting you.

"I'm sorry that I haven't been around much," said Julian, "The beginning of the school year is always hectic and I've been focusing more on Julie because I think that she needs the most help out of the three of you."

"That makes sense," said Fuzzy.

"I think you'll do okay," he praised, "After all, you're like the juice. Remember our conversation on the dock?"

Fuzzy did and she nodded in agreement. Potent. Powerful. She felt like juice described her quite well.

"Yes. I am juice," she said, proudly.

"And I think I've found you a suitable tutor," he said, "It'll take me some time to get them through all that red tape, but we'll get an early start on your education. You won't be taking normal classes at first because right now you're very far behind. It'd just be a waste of your time. I will get you into some magical classes though. Do you think you'll be developing the adept side of your powers into something physical or do you want something more social?"

Fuzzy flexed one of her biceps.

"Definitely physical," she said, "Can adept magic make me stronger or quicker?"

"Yes it can," said Julian, "And it's permanent, so it's not like a spell that you need to cast before it works. I'd actually been hoping you'd say physical. Coach Bolt runs a gym class and he prefers pushups to written tests. Though don't be too eager to learn all of your adept magic all at once. You can't unlearn it. If you want to take all four years here before you finalize what you want to learn, we can help you delay the development of your adept powers."

Fuzzy didn't really want to, but she might take her time.

"And we can get you Mother Bear's first year class on spellcasting," said Julian, "She'll work around the fact that you can't read and do her best to cover for you while you learn with a tutor. We'll do one or both of the classes depending on what you want to do. Though in future I wouldn't advertise the fact that you can't read to anyone else."

"Why not?" asked Fuzzy, "I thought half of Seattle can't read."

"Well, that's them, not us," said Julian, "No one here is part of that half. Not even close. I just don't want you to get teased. It's not something that I think we'll be able to totally avoid but the faster you learn the less they'll be able to tease you.

Fuzzy frowned, but nodded slowly. Puppy, who'd been a good boy long enough and wanted some attention, shoved his cold, wet nose at her hand and deftly flipped her hand onto his head. The young woman idly scratched his head and nodded.

"I'm not afraid of work," said Fuzzy.

Julian smiled.

"I didn't think so," he replied.

Then Fuzzy grinned.

"I'm not afraid of new ends either," she said.

"You're already getting paid to be here and you're getting a good education," said Julian, "Don't push it. Good things will come with time."

Fuzzy suddenly grumbled and she felt like Julian wasn't going to negotiate on this point. So much for that.