Interesting Weapon... I Shall Beat You Up Now (Attn: Mara)

[Quibby]

Two days had passed into the voyage before the crew's gossip revealed something that Mehrin could work with.  "A strange weapon, you say?  Tell me more."  The man, one of the crewmen who had chosen to take advantage of Mehrin's offered training regimen, replied hesitantly.  "Well, we found the- ouch!- weapon on an, err, derelict sh- yeowch!- derelict ship off the coast of- bloody hell!  Would you stop it?!"

 

With a sigh that sounded more of disappointment than consent, Mehrin replaced the small object he held into a thick leather sack.  It was one of his most effective training tools, but an unpopular one.  Glancing back at the man, Mehrin surveyed his handiwork.  The man was balanced on two wooden blocks; working on a boat provided quite a bit of balance to the men and women of the crew, but the extra touch would give them an advantage over the average water brigand.  More telling were the small steel balls, each with tiny spikes on them; some were still dangling from the crewman's clothing.  "What's the point of this... exercise?" the man asked, wincing as he dislodged one of the balls.

 

"Partially to train more balance, partially to learn how to shunt aside pain and ignore distraction.  Mostly for my entertainment."  The man glared openly at Mehrin, who simply raised an eyebrow in return.  The glare became a perfect mask of meekness.  It had only taken one demonstration of his full prowess against an upstart to show that he was not to be trifled with; Mehrin was told that the cut on the man's face would heal eventually.  The knife tactic was clever, but there were consequences for failure.  Ignoring the previous topic of discussion, Mehrin said, "I want a description of this weapon of the captain's."

 

******

 

"I understand you have a rather interesting weapon, Captain Novares," Mehrin said without preamble.  He was abrupt in nature, and there was no point in bandying words.  Late afternoon was starting to become evening on the ship, and with the clearness of the day, the descending sun was particularly lovely.  Mehrin didn't care.  "I'm intrigued; curious weapons have always been something of a habit for me.  If you'll loan it to me for the night, I'll try to come up with a way to work with you on using it.  Now, before you get excited, I can't make you an expert.  What I'd teach you would be a rudimentary style, at best, probably not even how the weapon is intended to be used.  However, whatever I puzzle out of the weapon will allow you a way to train yourself.  I'd just be showing you a way."

[Jehaine]

Though she hadn't been there to witness it, Mara raised an eyebrow in much the same way Mehrin had used against the sailor earlier that day. It seemed they were starting to talk about things they shouldn't be, she'd need to have a small chat with the one responsable for it to ensure it wouldn't happen again. If word leaked out about the weapon to the wrong people she'd have half the thief-catchers of Tear on her back...

 

- "Aye, ah do. Normally ah dun keep ta havin' it in full view tho."

 

She weighed her options carefully. Having the weapon on board was good enough in itself, but if she'd find a way to master it... Add to that that Mehrin was doing a great job beating the crap out of her crew -- she hadn't seen them that energetic since a Trollocs tried to board the ship! -- and she figured he'd earned her granting his request. She knew the thing to be fairly unique though, maybe she'd even consider watching him figure it out.

 

Telling Mehrin to wait there, she headed into her cabin, and it took her a minute or two to come out with the weapon again. Made from steel with a leather grip in the middle to keep its wielder's grip from slipping, it looked much like a quarterstaff... if a quarterstaff had double sided axe blades on either end, that was. Due to the added weight from the axe heads, the entire thing was about as heavy as a halberd, though the fact that it was symmetrical made it oddly well-balanced as well. If anything, it resembled something a master weaponsmith would make to practise his skills.

 

Handing the weapon over after a slight twirl of the blades, she took a few steps back to sit on the ship's rail, a small grin appearing on her face in anticipation of watching Mehrin try to make sense of the weapon.

 

 

Mara

About to have a lesson in improvised weaponry

 

OOC:

[Quibby]

OOC: Sorry, it took me a lot longer to imagine a plausible method of use than I thought.

 

IC:  Taking the weapon from the captain, Mehrin found himself pleasantly surprised.  The balance on the weapon was wonderful, and the blades were most definitely tempered and functional.  It was also heavy.  Giving an experimental twist to the haft of the weapon, Mehrin found that it spun wonderfully.  As the haft completed its last twist around his wrist and back into his hand, Mehrin muttered, "It's a good weapon, expertly made.  I'm going to be blunt and say that there's a lot that I can do with this that you won't be able to do.  It's pretty simple to tell, though.  Sudden stops of the weapon or reversal of its momentum, for instance.  I have the size and strength to do it; if you did it wrong, you'd probably cut your own head off."

 

Again, Mehrin set the weapon moving, settling into one of the most basic quarterstaff routines that he knew.  Learning the basics of the quarterstaff had been essential in developing his own weapon's style.  The weapon began cutting a circle in the air in front of Mehrin, both of his hands spinning the weapon.  Immediately, Mehrin could feel the momentum building.  Similar to his claymore, this weapon felt as if it would be suited to momentum combat.  The weapon spun up Mehrin's left arm and around his elbows.  The blades sung in the air.  It moved a little slower than a quarterstaff, but a weapon like this didn't need to move fast.  Pivoting on his heel, Mehrin's hands slid down the haft of the weapon, catching just above one of the axe heads.  He brought the other head around as if swinging a battle axe, twisting his wrists at the last minute to bring the flat of the blade against the deck.  The edge peeled a thin layer of wood off the deck as Mehrin spun a circle, stepping towards the grounded blade.  Again, the weapon spun in his hands.

 

A feeling of pressure against Mehrin's arm was all that he felt.  With a brief flurry of motion, one of the two axe heads bit into the deck, where Mehrin let it fall with a wooden thunk.  A long cut ran through his left shirtsleeve, the white linen turning crimson.  A quick tear, and Mehrin saw what he was expecting.  A cut ran neatly from elbow to wrist, not dangerously deep, but he was going to be sewing it up soon enough.  "This weapon, if learned properly, is dangerous.  If not, it's deadly to anybody near it, especially the wielder.  To start, I think that learning the quarterstaff would be best.  I can teach you the basics, and a little bit of the intermediate.  From there, you'll need to find somebody who can teach you how to use a battle axe."  The pain of the cut was finally starting to reach Mehrin's brain.  Clamping his teeth, Mehrin continued, "I'll tell you what.  If you have something that will serve as a quarterstaff on board, I'll start you working with that, then when you've mastered a basic set of movements there, you'll try it with your double-axe-thing.  Starting tomorrow, that is."

[Jehaine]

Mara stepped back when Mehrin started going through a couple of forms. To be honest, she had to admit he wasn't even doing half bad... up until the point where he cut himself in the arm. No, scratch that, he was still doing good by letting the weapon go the instant he felt it hit him; a less experienced fighter would have rigidly kept hold of the weapon, likely making the wound much deeper. At his request however, she rubbed her chin in thought. She could see where he was getting at, and the moves he had used were rather similar to staveworks, after all...

 

- "Ah'll do ya one be'er. Ah've got ae few staves 'n weapons 'ere case we run inta trouble. Ain't no armory, but it'll do."

 

She called the medic over to stitch up Mehrin's arm, and went into the crew cabins again only to emerge with two quarterstaves a couple of minutes later. They looked a bit old as most of her crew preferred blades like every other person on the continent, but they were simple and cheap, and unlike her double axe had a large tolerance for mistakes in training. For the purposes of getting someone familiar with the basics, staves were definitely the way to go, moreso since unlike the other weapons they did not need a training version.

 

- "Did some fightin' wi' these as a kid, nowadays ah'm mostly using mah cutlass so i's been a while."

 

She tossed one of the quarterstaves at Mehrin, and waited with the other in hand for what she had a feeling would be part two of the sparring match they had had when he had come on board.

 

 

Mara

Ready, set...