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A mentor decides to take her student on a special training session in the desert; but her equipment had other plans.

4.5k words

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Combat Training, By Cheese

The wind blows softly through the dunes; sun beating down relentlessly through a cloudless sky. Two figures crest a small hill upon a single-horse open carriage; which is empty apart for a battleaxe, a wooden training sword, and some supplies, including a large duffle bag. The bulky horse, a cinderwalker, possesses a light gray coat, apart from a smooth furless, bone-white head. The eyes are sunken deep into his skull, offering the illusion of nothingness.

The wooden carriage stumbles through the sand, two metal axles at the front and back. Each side of the axles have their own suspension, a simple leaf spring for each side. Even then, the wheels are still wooden. Instead of a bench seat in the front, there are two individual seats, all designed in mind of weaponry and or large tails.

“So why are we going so far out today?” Asked Anais, the smaller and younger figure sitting to the right, a deer. She’s wearing a broad straw hat, along with matching white pants and long sleeves, all in an effort against the sun’s burning glares. A leather belt is around her waist, supporting her sheathed rapier.

The beige-skinned desert-shark turned her head towards Anais, sitting on the left, holding the reins, “Something a little different for today,” Mira said with a slight gesture of the head towards the back. Mira’s sporting a similar outfit to her company, with the addition of a badge over her heart, a simple green shield with a centered yellow axehead. In place of a rapier, there is nothing.

Anais looks back at the duffle bag, still wondering what it’s for. “What if there’s a crawler or something else out here?” She continued to question, head turned back across the vast dunes, expecting the worst.

“I’m sure we could handle it.” Mira returns, looking towards the gray cinderwalker, “besides, as long as we have Burn here, we won’t get snuck up on.”

Anais’ head turns to the horse, his practiced steps leading the wagon’s sinking wheels through the sandy dunes. “I guess you’re right… But, what’s possibly out here that we need?”

Some seconds pass while Burn’s steps continue to softly thump into the sand, until Mira finally answers; “Nothing.”

“Nothing..?” The deer asked to no response from the shark. The wagon shakes in response to a rock hidden by the sand. She looks across the desert once more, watching the painfully still environment, before realization dawns; “Oh. Nothing.”

The journey continues, the sun continues to blare, Burn continues to trudge, neither making further comment. Until Anais speaks up again, unable to hide her desire to know “What are you planning?” to a delayed response.

“I’m gonna kill you,” the shark responds with a straight face.

Anais, although surprised, answers with slight disappointment; “You can say it’s a surprise.”

Silence befalls the trio for another timeless while, nothing to tell the time aside from the sun’s journey through the sky. Only the sound of hooves through sand fills the arid air, broken by the horse’s occasional huff.

A few more awkward minutes pass through the blazing dunes, The cinderwalker continues to stride faithfully. Anais, trying to keep the ride from being too quiet, decides to speak up; “I kind of want to go to Kidell some day,” she blurts out.

“Really?” Mira responds with her own surprised head turned to Anais, “What makes you want that?”

“Well- I just think it’d be cool. To see, I mean,” She corrects, her eyes lighting up, looking towards the sky as if Kidell were projected into it. “Especially their capital. I’ve seen a lot of pictures, and it seems amazing. I’ve never seen buildings so tall!”

“It’s not all that exciting,” Mira responds, “I think it’s a bit much, to be honest. All that tech - it’s overwhelming.” She shakes her head, “Way too humid as well, can’t get away from that heat.”

Anais frowns, a little upset she couldn’t get Mira to understand, “You can’t deny their cities are something else, though.” She looks back to Mira, “I feel like I’m looking at art when I see pictures of their buildings. I don’t understand how they get that high.”

Mira watches Burn’s gait for a few seconds, hesitating in her response, “They probably just build themselves or something, I don’t know.” Her mouth hangs open for a second, “They could probably make ‘em do that.”

Anais continues, still disappointed by her elder, “C’mon, you don’t think it’s cool?”

“Not really.” Mira answers, watching the dunes, sitting on her own thoughts before continuing abruptly; “They have a machine that just - makes coffee. You don’t even need any beans! It’s crazy!”

Anais’ head tilts to the side, “Seriously? How does it even do that?”

Mira just shakes her head, “I don’t know and I don’t want to know. How lazy can you be?” She says, clearly unimpressed by the mere concept.

“I mean, is it that much of a crime to make life easier?” Anais asks, intrigued by the idea, even if she doesn’t even drink coffee.

Mira raises her voice, “It’s coffee! It’s not that hard,” she nearly yells, throwing a free hand up, other holding on to the reins.

“Kinda feels like you’re just jealous.” Anais replies, somewhat teasing.

“I’m not.” The shark barks back.

The two go silent again, hot sun continuing to glare, feeling like the sand was about to melt into glass. Anais tries to think of something more to say, looking back into the cargo area of the carriage, until finally turning around and asking “Is there anything about Kidell you like?”

Mira pauses for a moment, her brow furrowing as she tries to answer, “Hmm, I don’t know.” She hesitates to continue, debating with herself on whether or not she wants to give any praise, “They hold good festivals.” She answers finally, “There was this one celebrating some anniversary, I forget what exactly, but they really went all out on it. They had some of those planes with like…fire out the back - jets I think they were called - fly through the gaps between buildings. I thought it was incredible. Terrifying, too.”

“That sounds…” Anais pauses for a while, trying to decide her opinion, and also trying to remember what a plane looks like, “That just seems really dangerous.”

“It looked dangerous.” Mira responds simply, with a shrug.

The deer frowns somewhat, “Maybe if I do have a chance to go I should avoid the festivals.”

“No, no. You have to go, they’ve gotta be the best part,” Mira urges.

Anais frowns, “I don’t know, it just sounds reckless to me.”

“You fence,” she replies with a slight smile.

Anais sighs, staring at Burn before eventually replying; “Fair point.”

Some more silence follows, but Anais gets curious, deciding to ask “Where would you want to go?”

Mira hesitates again, head tilted in thought, “Huh, never thought of that.” A little more time passes, a faint clunk can be heard from behind, before she declares “I like it here. I don’t really want to go anywhere.”
“Maybe just for a few days?” She presses.

The shark lets herself think on the subject for a little longer, running through the various possibilities in her mind, “Well…” She starts, “As much as I hate the place…Ostarath would be interesting to visit.”
“Wha-” Anais starts, sitting in surprise for a moment, “You’re crazy.”

Mira sits back in her seat looking back to the deer, “Well, think about it: they’ve been public enemy #1 since…you know what. Don’t you want to see what they’re like to their own people?”

The two sit in a moment of comparative silence, another faint clunk, “Hm.. A little, I guess,” Anais concedes. “Like you could ever get in, though.”

“Legally, probably not.” Mira agrees, “But now that I think about it, I’ve always been a little curious to know what it’d be like to live there.”

Anais responds quickly, shaking her head, “It’s probably awful.”

Mira watches Burn for a moment, “Maybe.”

The two go silent, not having much more to say on the topic. Mira looks around, watching the still dunes for a moment, then she pulls on the reins, bringing the cinderwalker to slow his gait with a neigh that could only come off as an agreement. “This should be far enough.” She said, reaching into the back and rummaging through a sack, before hopping off the wagon, having to wiggle slightly to unstuck her tail, arriving at the sand below, bare paws landing softly. The shark walks to the horse, offering him a carrot, along with a “Good job, Burn,” while she pats his neck.

Anais soon climbs onto the ground herself, landing on the other side of the carriage, following Mira’s new path to the rear of the wagon. “So are you gonna tell me what we’re doing way out here?”

“It’ll be easier to show you,” Mira responds, reaching into the wagon’s cargo area and dragging the duffel bag to the edge. Her fingers grab onto the zipper, which holds on tight, until sharply snapping open. She reaches in with both hands, struggling with a torso-sized metallic box, one that took some grunting in order to lower it to the sandy ground, roughly shoving sand aside as it lands.

“What is that?” Anais asks, prematurely, as Mira presses a button on the box for it to unfold and contort into the form of an anthro wolf, eyes glowing green while it stands motionless in front of the two.

“It’s a robot. I thought it’d be fun to test it out.” Mira finally answers, disregarding Anais’ shock.

“How did you get this? Isn’t this illegal?” With extra pause, she continues, quieter, as if there were someone that could hear, “and sacrilegious?”

“No one has to know. C’mon, it’ll be fine.” Mira replies, shrugging off the valid worries of her partner. “Besides, you don’t have to hold back against this guy.”

“Okay,” she starts, “but, seriously, how did you get this?”

Mira shrugs, putting a hand on the metallic wolf’s shoulder, “Just knew a guy who knows a guy.”

Anais decides to give up on getting any proper answers, and chooses to go along with it. “Okay, fine. How does it work?”

“Well, it’s got this screen on the back.” The shark turns the robot around roughly, forcing it to stumble as it tries to remain standing, “I think this is how everything is controlled.”

“You think?” Anais responds, uncertain about this odd contraption.

“Well, it came with a remote but I couldn’t get it to do anything,” she says, reaching back into the bag and pulling out a similarly coloured remote, with three unlabeled buttons. “Guy said it stopped working, so it’s probably just broken.”

While Mira is tossing the remote back into the bag, Anais speaks; “So, we’re going to use this to train instead? I guess that’s safer, at least.”

“Yeah, it does have a sparring mode..” Mira responds, fiddling with the touch screen for a moment before finding the ‘training’ mode. “Yeah, so I just need to give it something to fight with, and it’ll get ready.” Leaving it on the default style settings, she reaches into the wagon’s cargo area again, climbing inside in order to reach the training sword, and slides back out, turning the robot back around as she does.

“So, will it learn as we go?” Anais asks, looking the robot up and down, inspecting its every feature.

It’s about 6’ tall, the norm for a wolf, roughly a few inches shorter than Mira, over a foot taller than the smaller deer. The faux fur was entirely dark gray, no room left for patterns; the small screen on the back being the only exception. The green glow of the eyes were unblinking, unwavering. Shining brightly even through the intense stare of the sun. Its tail is its fluffiest part, though slightly bent to the right in the middle.

“Yeah, probably.” Mira answers, forcing the sword into the robot’s hand. The eyes shift from green to a blinking yellow. “Okay, it just needs to calibrate now,” she pulls the robot away from the wagon, its internal stabilization forcing the legs to step along with the movement, “just give it some room.”

Both characters step back, Anais still looks on concerned and confused. She’s about to question further when the metallic wolf begins moving the sword around, inspecting it with its uncanny, robotic visage. It takes a slow, methodical attack at the air, followed by a quick, vicious slice, an audible ‘whoosh’ being forced as the wooden sword travels through the air. It continues its assault on the non-existent foe, mimicking blocks and feints in between uncaring slashes, before abruptly returning to a resting position, the blinking of its eyes going a solid yellow blare.

A few seconds pass, both observers in surprise, “you want me to fight that?” Anais asks, clearly intimidated by the mass of metal and faux fur.

“Well… Didn’t think it would be that fast.” The shark responds, staring at the now motionless robot. “It’s probably just for calibration. The guy said it was supposed to feel like it was real.”

Anais continues to stare, deciding that “If I fight this thing and the next thing I know is a hospital room, you owe me.” She says, her voice firm for the first time since they left.

“Guess I’m not taking you to the hospital then.” Mira says, grabbing the robot by the arm and walking it further away from the wagon, leaving her battleaxe behind.

Anais walks behind, keeping her distance, “How does it know when to start?” she questions, unsheathing her rapier. The thin metallic blade shines in the harsh sun, a golden cross and loop guard nearly blending into the sand.

Mira looks back towards Anais, and the wagon, finding the 2 wagons worth of distance to be far enough. “I think that’s what the remote was for, but the guy said you can also just count down from three. Once you say fight it should start.” She responds, “It should also stop if it’s about to hit you.”

The deer stays back from the robot, still unsure of its abilities and her own safety, but nods, “Alright.” She responds. While Mira is putting distance between herself and the soon to be one-person duel, Anais has to confirm “You’re going to help me if something goes wrong, right?”

“Of course.” The shark responds, without hesitation, “You know that.” She walks a few more meters, before turning around to watch. “Countdown when you’re ready.”

Anais nods, falling into her stance. She takes a second to pause, closing her eyes for a moment, silently praying that nothing goes wrong. Her eyes open, staring down the motionless robot, the so-called wolf standing there, blindingly yellow eyes boring into her very being. Mira’s eyes focus on her stance, silently approving.

Her countdown begins; “Three…” The robot slips into position, battle ready. She hesitates. “Two…” It stands there, silently. “One…” The robot does not move. “Fight!” She finally announces, her nerves showing through her voice. The robot’s eyes go red.

The robot doesn’t wait much time in making its first movements. Its earlier robotic and forced movements have been traded for a scarily accurate representation of an opponent, its footwork is smooth, even with the sand, following Anais’ own movement as she tries to find her target.

But the robot moves first, sloppily. The jab at Anais’ waist is quickly deflected by a rapier, the owner of which rapidly redirecting the existing momentum to strike the robot’s chest, instinctually stopping herself before it can hit with any real force. Just like that it’s over, one slow jab and the winner has been decided. The robot’s eyes have turned yellow, and it walks backwards exactly into its starting position.

“Ya’ could have been quicker.” Mira says, watching the robot back away.

Anais drops her guard, rapier falling to her side. “Sorry, I just don’t know what to expect.”

“Forget it’s a robot.” The shark responds, “Try and think of it as another tournament.” Mira stares at the robot, somewhat disappointed, “But I was talking about the robot. You’re warming up.”

“Oh.” Anais responds, feeling embarrassed.

Mira walks behind the robot, an index finger fiddling with the screen, “Maybe…” she mutters, switching the skill level from ‘amateur’ to ‘intermediate.’ “That might be better?” she says, unsure.

“Did you make it harder?” Anais asks, unable to see the screen from her spot.

Mira begins to put distance between herself and the two fighters, “Yeah, just a little, hopefully.” She gives a thumbs up once far enough away, and watches as Anais assumes her fighting stance.

She’s more focused this time. She’s not fighting some dumb robot, she’s fighting that jerk of a snake from a few years ago, who denied her ‘good match’ for a laugh at her skill. “Three,” she starts, the robot takes its stance, “Two,” she continues, “One, Fight!” The robot’s eyes go red.

The robot launches again, similarly to last time, both opponents circling each other, one staring at her opponent expectantly, the other’s processors comparing its inputs to countless hours of training data.
Anais’ footwork is based on years of personal, felt experience; The robot’s based on the footage of practiced masters’ long perfected movements, stolen.

The robot lunges, much quicker than before, falling for Anais’ quick jab of a feint. Anais attempts to take her opening, but the robot moves with unexpected, uncanny speed, moving out of the attack’s range. It moves in for another stab, to which Anais easily deflects, used to the attempts.

It doesn’t let Anais take advantage though, with unnatural recovery, it attacks again, taking a slash at her side. Anais maneuvers her blade to block it before jumping out of reach to avoid a further onslaught. The fight continues for the next few minutes, neither making much progress towards victory, before Anais deflects the robot’s attack again, timing it well enough to break the bot’s balance, hitting a jab to the stomach.

The robot, however, does not care anymore. The eyes continue to shine brightly, but the right corner of each eye is cut out; like a missing slice of pizza. In the center is a dot of green. Its status now is indeterminable.

The robot recovers, ruthlessly taking a swing at the deer’s now off-guard head. Anais is surprised to see it still fighting, but she still ducks under the strike just in time, taking advantage of its now wide open side to go for a quick slice.

A knee is raised, stopping her plans in their tracks, connecting harshly with Anais’ stomach. The robot grabs the base of her rapier’s blade with inhuman strength, ripping it off the hilt. The wooden sword is discarded, tossed to the ground; the robot has found a better instrument. Anais stumbles back, finding her weapon lighter, and her own blade raised high.

She jumps further away, mostly in surprise, just in time for the blade to pierce the brim of her hat. The hat is flicked off the blade, harshly landing into the sand. She attempts to put more distance between herself and the robot, but the robot is quicker. It charges forward again, planting a hard kick to her chest. She lands hard into the ground, soft sand being thrown out from under her, the remainder of her rapier finally lost in the impact.

The cloud of sand forces her to close her eyes; when she opens them her focus is immediately directed at the blade coming right for her. She quickly attempts to roll away from the impact, but it proves useless. Mira steps in, using her tail to side-swipe the robot, sending it stumbling away. Positioning the robot unfortunately between them and the wagon; their only way out. Mira winces at the pain, but she can’t dwell on that.

The robot, unfamiliar with this new fighter, keeps its distance, blade at the ready. “Should’ve expected that to hurt…” Mira mumbles, shaking off the pain, trying to discern whether or not that did any damage. Besides the bent tail, the robot still seems undamaged. “You okay, Anais?”

Her question of empathy is quickly forgotten however, as the robot has taken the shark’s moment of weakness to its advantage, charging forward. Mira’s mind refocuses, watching the robot approach, and she’s ready. The robot takes a forceful slash, moreso intended to cause unbalance in the shark; but Mira raises an arm, the skin swiftly turning metallic, shining brightly under the hot sun.

The blade clashes against her now metallic skin, scraping uselessly until her other fist rotates and makes contact with the robot’s, sending the blade flying away. The robot immediately takes notes, its own mechanical fist driving itself through her guard and into her stomach. Forcing Mira to fold over, but she quickly recovers, kicking herself off the robot.

Anais forces herself back onto her feet, she wants to help, but there isn’t much she can do against a target like this on her own. She feels useless. “Stay back!” Mira yells towards Anais. She doesn’t want to, but what she fears more is proving her mentor’s judgement right by going against it.

Mira quickly understands that she needs to find a proper solution. The robot has kept itself between the wagon and the two fighters, and she can’t keep punching and expect it to suddenly work; that’s just insanity. She tail slams the robot again, knocking it back and successfully knocking it over, buying her time.

She brings up her hand, snapping her fingers, letting sparks fly. Maybe she doesn’t have to do anything. She snaps again, hoping for a stronger flame that she can maintain, but can’t find it within herself to make anything other than sparks.

She braces herself, watching the robot charge once more, its previous life-like movements traded for pure brutality. It gets close enough, urging for a punch. Mira blocks the punch again with her hardened skin, having to grab on in order to stay stable, then plants a reckless punch of her own into the chest of the robot, taking a brief moment to let sparks fly as she jumps back. The robot has burst into flames; it’s faux fur proving to be magnificently flammable. She’s forced to keep on her toes to avoid the robot’s continued assaults, now turned nightmarish from the flames.

The robot never seems to slow. The flames keep eating away at its outer shell, but it doesn’t care. After what feels like hours of letting it burn, the robot has yet to back down. The flames have died out, all that’s left of the faux fur is the charred surface of the metallic, armour-like skin of theirs. Only now, the previously bent tail now dangles limply in the middle, nothing but a flesh wound.

She needs to get her axe. Looking back at the wagon, it’s much farther now. Burn hasn’t bothered to come closer at any of her previous attempts to whistle, but she has to try something. The robot can probably run faster than she can, so that won’t work either.

With one reckless plan left in her mind, she has to try it. She feints a punch to the abdomen, then hooks the robot’s head, just barely dodging the robot’s retaliation to her waist, then she kicks the robot back. With distance between her and the robot, she charges, tackling the robot to the ground.

On top of the robot, the robot attempts to rip her off without getting up, Mira’s repeated punching at its neck proving to do little else other than to tire her. Realizing the neck is clearly not the weak point, she uses the robot’s body and own attempts to rip her off in order to launch herself off, towards the carriage, and the awaiting battleaxe.

She sprints at full speed, running faster than she’s ever ran before; but the robot has already gotten up. The wagon is getting closer, but so is the robot. She whistles for Burn to bring the wagon closer, but he looks at the danger, and decides it can wait, standing still.

Mira can’t think about the pain coursing through her body, she can only think of the cruel death that would come to her out here to this robot. Her battleaxe’s handle is sticking out of the wagon’s cargo area; she can reach it. The robot continues to close in, driving her pre-existing will to live even harder.

But as if fate itself had chosen her to live, the robot trips. Its damaged, dangling tail has traveled in front of its own legs. One step on its tail, and it dives headfirst into the sand. Sand plumes like an explosion, while its sensors and cameras try to make sense of what just happened. This is her chance.

Her sprint continues, finally reaching her battleaxe in the wagon, desperately dragging it out of the cruel grasp of the wagon. She turns around to see the robot finally getting up. It seems from the force of the impact, that sand has gotten where it shouldn’t; unseen seams have been infiltrated. It still charges towards her, but with less vigor; less assured.

She stands firm; battleaxe in her hands. The robot continues to approach, and when it’s time, her battleaxe swings; taking the impaired robot by surprise. It quickly slices into the robot’s leg, sending it down to the ground. Although the leg only dented, Mira recovers the weight, and then sends the battleaxe’s blade directly into the back of the downed robot, cutting into metal.

She raises her battleaxe again, and brings it upon the robot’s back again. Ruthlessly, uncaringly, she raises it high once more, and slams it down once more, finally cutting through to components. The robot twitches, and she slams it down again, and another.

She finally lets go of her weapon, letting it drop to the side, and flops down to the ground, sitting tiredly. It’s over.

Anais walks over, having found her hat and her rapier’s hilt.

“You okay?” Mira asks, looking up at Anais before she has the chance to ask it herself.

“I’ll be fine,” she answers, “but are you?” Anais asks, the shark having taken more hits than she did.

“Don’t worry about me.” Mira responds, looking at the wagon behind her, specifically the metal axles under the carriage. “Could you check the axles over? ‘Thought I heard a clunk when we got here.”

Anais doesn’t really believe her response, but she may as well help. “Oh, sure. ‘You need anything first?”

“Nah.” Mira spits out, still calming herself down. “I just need a minute.”

Anais walks closer and crouches, dragging herself under the wagon to take a look at its underside.

“Oh and,” Mira continues, pausing for a breath, “If anyone asks, there was a worm.”

“Of course.” Anais responds quickly, trying to tell what’s going on the underside, but she’s probably going to need a lantern.