Chapter Six: The Qualification to Fight!
“How are you going?” asked Will
“I’ve nearly finished filling out the final form” replied Autumn who had her head down scribbling stuff on a piece of paper sitting at an outdoor table. She then raised her head and handed Will a handful of papers. He briefly read over them and smiled.
“Your good to go buddy” he said. Autumn’s face lit up with an even bigger smile. “But first thing’s first okay” he said scratching his blue hair.
“And first thing is…?” asked Autumn who had a puzzled look about her.
“Dress code, unless you’re a Motavian you can’t hunt wearing a robe. I know its kind of silly but rules are rules. So here take this” Will extended his hand with a closed fist tightly holding something. Autumn automatically put her hand below his. Will then dropped a hand full of messeta into her palm.
“What, I’ve never seen so much messeta in my life” she said staring at the many shining diamond shaped coins in her hand.
“There’s a clothes shop two blocks from here. Go pick a few things out and make sure your back here in half an hour. I’m going to go hand your forms in so I can begin training you today” commanded Will.
Will then stood up from the chair he was siting at. “We’ll meet back here in half okay” he said repeating himself.
“Sure thing” replied Autumn. Just as Will started walking away Autumn shouted to him. “Hey, Will!”
Will automatically turned and took a few steps over toward Autumn again.
“Thanks for, uh, thanks for let-letting me stay with you and Hank” she quietly said with her head down.
Will put his hand on her shoulder. “Don’t mention it kiddo, us broken families, we gotta stick together okay. Now go treat yourself to a wardrobe. Later” Will made a peace sign with his two fingers and then turned and walked away.
“Yeah later” Autumn shouted back. Autumn opened her palm again and looked at the messeta Will handed her there was at least five-hundred dollars she was holding. So she shoved it all into her pocket and headed down the street a bit looking for that clothes shop.
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Will was sitting back at the outdoor table and chairs in the shopping district where the two were half an hour ago. He pulled out a small handheld device from his pocket. He flipped it open and the time read 10.35am. “Your five minutes late” he said to himself. Then he looked up and seen Autumn walking. She was walking toward the table holding a bag in her left hand. She was now wearing a plain dark blue singlet and equally dark blue board shorts with a bright yellow lightning bolt design on them.
When she arrived at the table she was greeted by Will’s compliment. “Nice taste in clothes girl, you look like a pro surfer” he said laughing a bit.
“Thanks” she replied. “Here it’s your messeta I never needed as much as you gave me” she said handing him back the money.
“Keep it” Will said bluntly.
“Huh, but…”
“I’m serious it’s all yours, being a hunter we make more than that on just one mission some days. That money is for you; buy what you want with it. But for now we’re going training okay. Follow me”
Autumn shoved the remaining currency into her pocket and followed Will. As they made they’re way to the Hunter’s Guild she looked around her and seen busy streets full of Motavians and Humans. There really was no Numans on this planet.
Then Will stopped in front of a large building. Autumn who was still checking everything out walked straight into the back of Will.
“Oh, sorry I was sidetracked” she replied embarrassed stepping back a bit.
“Well now you need to focus, follow me” replied Will sounding quite serious.
The two entered the building. Inside it was like busy street. Hunters were everywhere both Human and Motavian. This made Autumn feel a little left out being the only one with long pointy ears. As she gazed around a bit more she seen a hug notice board with many hunts hanging up on it. Several hunters were looking at the available requests. There was also a large poster of what appeared to be a huge dragon hanging up. It read: Wanted! 100,000 messeta. Another poster of a large Locusta was hanging next to it. Its reward was much smaller only 3,000 messeta. Then as Autumn gazed to the right side of all this she saw a feature fountain. But it wasn’t just any feature fountain with a statue it was very same make as the one she saw at the spaceport. It was Alis Landale again.
“Well you ready?” asked Will.
Suddenly Autumn snapped back into reality. “Uh, of course” she stammered.
“Great follow me kiddo”
Autumn obediently followed him as the two went out back to what appeared to be a room full of weapons and shields.
“What do you want?” asked Will picking up a large shiny sword checking it out.
“You…you mean I can chose my own weapon?” Autumn sounded quite excited about this.
“You bet, once you fill out all those forms you did the weapons and armour room is available for you. These weapons here are shared but you can request to have your own customised weapons if you want. The Guild also pays for all our equipment so we don’t have to worry about buying anything hunting related unless we so desire” replied Will putting the sword down and turning toward Autumn.
“Hmmm” Autumn scanned the room and then a pair of claws in the corner grabbed her attention. She walked over to them and picked them up. She put them on over her hands they sat on like a set of gloves. She then flung her wrist a bit and three very long nasty glowing claws launched out the top of the glove.
“I choose these” she said with a smile. Then the claws retracted as though they had their own mind.
“Nice” replied Will. “I’ve had a bit of experience with claws myself. Follow me to the training room. I’ll teach you something life-saving that can only be done with claws.”
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“This is it” Will said. The two entered a dark room it was almost too hard to make out anything. Will then walked over and ran his hand down a wall until he felt a switch. He then flicked it and the room lit up. Most of the room was empty but in the back end was a large computer terminal it seemed it was turned off.
“Come” commanded Will who walked to the centre of the room. He then pulled a set of gloves from his pocket they were all scrunched up but he then stretched them over his hands they fit quite well. “These here are my claws, custom created by the way.” He explained.
Autumn nodded.
“Do you believe in ki?” he asked.
“What spiritual energy” Autumn threw back at Will.
“Exactly, because if you don’t you better start” he told her. “I’m going to teach you a skill. It’s called the Disrupt Skill.” He explained.
“Disrupt?” replied Autumn sounding confused.
“Imagine your surrounded by several foes, okay just visualise it. Your outmatched the only way you could take them all on is if you had a few more of yourself to equal things up”
“I don’t understand” she exclaimed.
“Just watch” Suddenly Will seemed to split apart another two Wills stood on either side of him. It was easy to tell the real Will from the rest his clones seemed slightly washed out. Autumn’s eyes widened she was in awe, never did she believe all these things she’d seen in the last three days to really exist. Watching a man she only recently met create clones of himself was a real eye opener that anything is possible.
“Now when your in this state, just follow through with any basic claw slashing attack you wish” all three Wills said this at once. “Like so” Will then performed a simple double slash his clones performed the exact same move at the exact same time and stopped when he did. They then vanished. Will retracted his claws.
“How on earth did you do that?”
“You just gotta believe, become one with your instincts, anyone can do it its just practice that makes perfect” he said “You try it”
“Okay then” Autumn stepped back a bit she looked at both her claws and extracted them. “Okay” she took a big breath in and slowly breathed out through her mouth.
Will just watched he was clearly examining her every move.
Autumn then opened her eyes she had a tense look on her face. “Ha!!!” she yelled but nothing happened. “What but I…” she was cut short.
“Your doubting yourself” Will told her. “You’ve got the weapons, now combine your energy into them. Anybody can do a simple slash. But…I know you can handle mastering a skill.”
“Your right” replied Autumn. She then readied herself again for a second try. Still nothing. “Hmmm third time’s the charm I guess” she told herself. Again nothing.
After about twenty minutes of the two just standing in the room with no success Will piped up with an idea.
“Stay there okay I’m going to turn on the battle simulator” Will then headed for the computer terminal at the back of the room. He fiddled with a few things then some lights in the room lit up and the floor underneath Autumn lit up blue. Suddenly a virtual wall started rising separating Autumn from the rest of the room she was confined in a rectangular battle field. She cold no longer see Will as the blue wall had now set itself into position. But she could clearly hear him.
“Keep your guard up!” he shouted.
She was kind of confused nothing was in here besides herself or was something else in there…?
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A huge gold metallic arm swiped past Autumn’s face. “Huh” she yelled stepping back but as she turned around nothing was there. Another gold arm ran past her face. What ever it was it was taking big swings towards Autumn’s head .
“Hey try to keep up with it kiddo” she heard Will shout.
“I can’t find it it’s too fast!” she yelled back in an annoyed voice.
“If you can’t defeat a virtual enemy I can’t take you out hunting in the real deal” he replied.
(“The real deal”) she thought to herself. Then Elisa flashed in her mind again. That monster was walking around using her as a shield in the dangerous wide world. Will was right if she couldn’t defeat this thing how could she free Elisa and destroy the Profound Darkness.
Then another swing was thrown Autumn’s way. Autumn shot out her claws and stopped the enemy from connecting with her head, by knocking the thing’s arm back. She turned and saw it was a large gold robot it looked like some kind of security robot to be exact, a Dominator.
“Okay” she told herself. “Heeyaa” She yelled running at the robot she was madly slashing at it. Because it was a virtual enemy each attack that connected with the robot she could hear a chime kind of sound being made. Then the robot began taking large hits again throwing its arms straight toward Autumn. But she was to fast for it and now more determined than ever. She continued to slash it and then she performed a very powerful double slash motion. This bought the Dominator to its knees.
“Now, the Disrupt skill” shouted Will.
“Right” Autumn then closed her eyes and visualised an army of herself. All of a sudden everything went bright. She opened her eyes and looked next to her she spawned three copies of herself each holding out their claws like she was. “Lets finish this sucker!” the four said at once. Autumn and her clones charged at the weakened Dominator and performed several very powerful slashes. Suddenly the chiming sounds starting going crazy. The Dominator then dematerialised into binary code and vanished from the battlefield. Autumn’s clones vanished as the field itself also disappeared. She turned and saw Will who then winked at her; he had a smile across his face. He was leaning back against the computer terminal. Autumn walked toward him and held up her hand. She retracted her claws.
“I did it” she said in an exhausted voice. Will then slapped her a high-five on her raised hand.
“Some people just need a good adrenalin rush” he told her.
“I guess I was one of those people” she replied followed by a small laugh.
“Yeah looks like it. Well Autumn you impressed me today. How about I get you a drink.”
“What you mean alcohol?” she asked him.
“Yeah right, I wouldn’t put that crap in my body. Us hunter’s have a reputation to keep up you know. How about a Cola?” Will asked.
“Sure” she replied. Autumn hadn’t had soft drink for a long time it was a well-deserved treat.
The two of them left the training room and were making their way back to the shopping district. Both of them were quite satisfied about what today brought with it.
But things had hardly begun…
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