Outworld/The Infinite Library

The large hall hidden in the heart of the Infinite Library had a number of useful configurations, but ‘training hall’ was the most common. At the moment it was clear of both training drones and targets; the space had been cleared so that the two Shapers occupying it could move without hindrance. The lighter one’s weapons, after all, the more it was important to focus on mobility.

Rain Falls On The Snow spun a pair of thin knives, balanced more for throwing than for stabbing, between his fingers, rolling back and forth on the balls of his feet. “So. A few practice rounds, and then we can get down to teaching. Lets me get an idea of what you know already. You’ve been watching some of the Affronts, yes?”

The other shaper was dressed a lot simpler than she normally would, black and dark red sweats for that ease of movement. Arguably she could have gone to Talos for this but she didn’t want to rely on him for everything. Besides there was a reason she had come to Rain.

“Just a little,” Pandora smirked, swiping a knife from him and twirling it around her fingers as easily as he did, “enough of them to see you fall to Talos once or twice.”

Rain simply shrugged, producing two more knives from somewhere and tossing one of them into the floor at her feet. “True enough. That shield of his is handy. But that’s the beauty and the pain of the Affront grounds, in the end. It equalises us, makes fights… fairer. And means that those of us with a tendency to run forward and skirmish become vulnerable. You’ll face much the same troubles yourself, going in with light blades. Fortunately you can learn from my example. So. The key points, really. It takes focus, real focus, to harm a Shaper, especially in the Nexus. The ebb and flow of combat will be off from what you’re used to. The space is constricted; not much in the way of dodging, no scenery to exploit, only so far you can run before two or three of the other team corner you. On the other hand, it’s easier to distract and confuse, to draw out the other side or get in a key hit to the back if you’re fast. That’s what you need to learn. Shall we see where you’re starting from?”

Pandora reached to retrieve the other weapon, keeping her eyes on Rain as if still unsure of him. “I’m not sure. As Keystone… I’d need to stay back mostly wouldn’t I?”

“I’m a Tempest, but I move to close quarters wherever I need. Comes of seeing too many people with big heavy weapons who have no way to defend themselves when I close with them. And you’ve seen how often Crooked gets swarmed. A Keystone is a valuable part of a team, but only as long as they stay up. You’ll usually only want the one knife if you’re healing with the other hand, but it’s better to train with both; leaves you the option of dropping down to one if you’ve got a gun or a hailer in the other hand, but also lets you block on both sides if you’re hard pressed, at least long enough for someone else to buy you some breathing room. And it’s a lot easier to go from training with two knives down to one than from one knife up to two.” He twirled his own knives, checking their balance. “At some point I’ll fetch my swords, and we’ll practice dealing with enemies with a longer reach, i.e. everyone, but that’s for a later lesson, I think.”

She checked the weight of her own weapons, then nodded. “Alright, should we get started?”

Rain’s answering grin was enough for the two of them to glide forward, Rain keeping his weapons spread wide and low. A thin red line on the floor outlined a box roughly the size of the Affront grounds - not nearly as reinforced as the hard boundaries the Nexus produced, but enough to give them a sense of their footwork and the space to work with.

Pandora twirled the blades once then lowered herself to nearly mirror his position.Something in the back of her mind told her this, some half faded memory worked her muscles into correct positioning, though she was probably years out of practice. Breathing steadily she watched him like a hawk for any hint of movement, well aware she’d need to get ground before she could give any.

Rain settled into a steady rhythm, flicking his blades out occasionally for light feints, watching for any feints in return. Neither of them would commit to a full attack just yet, but he watched for any overextension or feints drifting too close to his own guard, lashing out with the precision born of long experience. Once Pandora began to learn the range of his knives and the limits of how far she could safely commit, he pulled back from their circling, raising his knives to a higher, closer guard. “Good. You’ll have to do much the same practice any time you change up what weapons you’re using, but now you have a better idea of what to look for. Remember, when dealing with Shapers, reach is key - a knife to the ribs is no good if you get your head taken off an armspan away from your target, and a massive greatsword is much less effective once you can get inside its reach - if you can. Now, targets of opportunity. As a Keystone you’ll usually be in the back lines, but that’s no reason not to take the easy shot if an enemy circles round with one of your allies and gives you his back.”

A blank-faced training drone rose from a hole in the floor, already armed with a featureless sword and shield. It stepped towards them, raising its arms, and Rain moved to engage it, dancing back and forth and skipping just out of range of each sword swing, slowly circling around to one side and watching it turn to match him, its shield moving in time with his feints.

Taking her cue she did her best to keep out of range of any sword swings while Rain engaged it, creeping closer till she was in range to land a hit then doubled back out of the way when it turned to get at her. She repeated this when Rain had regained its attention.

Rain grinned, taking advantage of the drone’s twisting and turning to take a few shots at its side and knees as it tried to keep up with both opponents. “And this is why it’s important to try and distract more than one person on the other side when skirmishing, but not to be caught between them. The Affronts insist on a relatively even fight, but if you know what you’re doing you can shift the odds. Now, what would you be doing, if you were the drone, pressed on both sides?”

“Try to get to my team, or find a place where I could push for an advantage.” She suggested unsurely. Tactics were a new, or again a half remembered thing to her.

Rain nodded. “Essentially, yes. If you’ve split off for a reason, hope that your team took care of the others while you were being distracting. If you’ve simply been separated, get back behind the shields as soon as you can. Or if you see a teammate going in for a strike, use the distraction to slip round them and then make it two on two. A lot of it is experience and practice, but I may as well give you a good base to start from. Aside from anything else, well, it makes the Affronts much more interesting to watch and fight in.”

“This is different than what I’m used to doing.” She admitted coolly. “Especially with knives. They tend to get used as… well tools rather than weapons.”

“Mm. Unfortunately, in the Nexus, well... “ He shrugged. “It’s a lot more difficult to do things the way we’re used to doing them. No knives in the dark. No poison. No sniper rifles or tripwires. If I want to kill someone, they have to be facing me in broad daylight, aware of it, and armed. Distinctly unpleasant. Still, we can but adapt.”

“That’s the other thing. Methods for gaining information in the Nexus are limited. Mostly to talking. I can’t decide if I prefer it or not. It’s more of a challenge but it’s deeply frustrating.” Pandora sighed then took that opportunity to throw one of the blades at Rain. She knew he’d block it. It was an obvious shot. Didn’t stop her from having a little fun though.

Rain tossed both of his own knives in the air, snatching the incoming blade between his fingers, and began to juggle them casually, still talking. “More of a challenge, yes, exactly. The Nexus makes a point of equalising many things.” A trio of fresh training drones rose up on the other side of the hall, and without even having a chance to raise their swords fell backwards with knives hilt-deep in the centre of their masked faces. “It’s frustrating, but it does make things interesting sometimes. And provides a chance to test one’s skills against one’s peers.” He produced a fifth knife from somewhere on his person, idly testing the point. “To keep us sharp, perhaps. We’ll see.”

Pandora made a noise of agreement as she moved closer but not too close even if she wanted to. “Thank you, for helping me with this by the way.”

“You’re welcome,” he replied, tucking the knife away again. “It was… well, not the least I could do, but certainly much less than I could be doing.”

She held up the other knife for him to take, holding his eyes with her own. There were a variety of thoughts running through her mind right now. “I’m not really sure what I’m supposed to be doing.”

Rain waved away the knife. “Keep it - I Shape a fresh one every time I need one anyway. Keeps me in practice. As for what you’re supposed to be doing… well. You could be doing a lot worse than this, right now. In general… that’s trickier. A few months ago I thought I knew for sure what we were all meant to be doing here. Now I’m… less sure. The next time the Nexus opens, even more new things are going to come to light. I suppose the only thing to do is to put those skills to work finding out what there is to do, and making sure that what needs to happen, happens.” He paused, holding her gaze for a moment. “For a better world to come.”

Pandora put the knife away as he spoke then paused at his final words. “...for a better world to come.”

“Well then. We have plenty to do. Let’s get to work.”

“Right.” Pandora nodded with a smirk before walking back towards her first position again.

Arsenal

Authors: Rain Falls On The Snow and "Pandora" Morozov

“Do you really need this one?” Pandora teased incredulously as she picked up the weapon and began to play with it. “Where did you even get it?”

Rain flicked his eyes over the wall of swords and guns for a moment, spotting the gap, then gently reached out and plucked a small crystal from the top of the device. “I don’t, strictly speaking, need anything any more, but the reminders of what can be achieved are convenient. That one… picked up from someone in Protean Dynamics, if I recall correctly. Sends out a blinding laser pulse in five directions at once. Best used with mirrorshades - far too many of their weapons are designed around fashion choices. Goes back up here, next to the laser bird and the Combine anti-air laser. That section of the wall is sorted by type.” He plucked a long knife from the lower section and began to sharpen it carefully.

“Mm.” She put it back carefully. “I thought I recognised the design. It’s old though. Out of date by at least a century. So by now it’s probably retro… Oh you have glaives?”

Striding quickly to that section she pulled one with damascus steel in the blade and a lot of intricate work in the staff part. “This one is gorgeous. Where did you steal this one from? Valtaria?”

“Now, now, it doesn’t count as stealing if they’re already dead. And while it’s Valtarian originally, I actually took that from a Walker warrior who’d been stirring up a bit too much trouble on the borders. It’s been refitted from a fire reservoir behind the main blade to a poison reservoir. You have to pull the head apart to refill it though, so it’s not marvellously practical.”

“Pretty though. Did you refit it or was that the Walker?” Pandora gave it a spin, doing a pattern dance around her.

“Oh, he refitted it. Blade venoms are generally too slow for my liking - if I want to poison someone I’ll just poison them, if I want to stab them I’ll stab them. You’re doing very well with that, actually - want me to break out the scythes?”

“That might be fun later. But at the moment I want to see what else you’ve sto-acquired.” She pushed it into his hands then continued exploring. She recognised some of these weapons as ones she’d been asked for track down by the sigils and symbols on them. Old family relics and prototypes that people had desperately sought after that it pained her to say she couldn’t track down. “You realise you’re a complete magpie, right?”

“Hey, I don’t question the whole ‘buying’ thing you do in Opportunity, do I? Well… actually, I suppose I do. Not the point. Trophies are perfectly legitimate. If I’m killing someone they’re probably someone interesting, and hence, they probably have something interesting, and that something is then mine. Right of conquest, etc. Besides.” He plucked a pair of disparate pistols from the wall, resting the glaive in the crook of his arm as he balanced them. “Look at this. Smooth wood, brass firing chamber, triple barrels. Combine boarding pistol, energy bolt type, 50 years New Calendar. Good spread at short range, loses accuracy fast as it goes. This one, all crystals and purple circuits? Concord phased disruptor array, interferes with its own wave packet to maintain stability at long ranges, has points of cancellation along the way - judge your distance just wrong, nothing happens. Two totally different ways of doing basically the same thing, with different strengths and weaknesses. And I can learn from both. Pick the best of both and meld them together. Adapt, learn, grow. That’s the point, right?”

Pandora laughed at his defensive reaction. “Alright fine, that doesn’t negate the fact that you are a magpie who likes shiny things to make his nest pretty.”

She wasn’t really one to talk, the amount of books and information she’d stolen during her own ‘conquests’ was impressive by anyone’s standards. Though she could argue that it was important in her line of work to collect as much data as possible.

Rain laughed, setting the pistols back in their place and twirling the glaive quickly around his arms. “Something along those lines. I don't exactly decorate the place, but they do make the Library feel a little more like home. Even with the restrictions the Nexus places on us, it's just more comforting to have arms and armour to hand. And if I'm going to have weapons, it's only appropriate they be ones with stories behind them.”

“So tell me the story about… those knives.” She indicated a twin set of obsidian looking ones with a silvery sheen up to the right of them after glancing around with intrigue. There were plenty of other weapons she could ask about but that set stood out to her right now. “Where did you rescue those from?”

“Ah… good eye. Those are some of my oldest, actually. In a city that no longer exists, but that looked and functioned a fair bit like a less refined version of Opportunity - the prototype, if you will, for the Visions - there was a rather skilled pit fighter with a pair of truly elegant swords that his patrons had custom-made. Self-sharpening monomolecular edges, a power cell in each hilt to deliver stunning shocks to his foes, and an integrated force-field that let him dramatically shake the blood off his swords after a kill. Flashy, but in a more sleek, understated way that’s not as fashionable these days. Think Trojan Force, but with Spider’s dress sense. At any rate, this fighter, Ares, he was… something of a figurehead. It became necessary to take him down in an appropriate fashion. A dramatic televised duel on the arena floor between the champion and a mysterious masked competitor. I cheated, naturally. Got him so drunk the night before his biomods couldn’t keep up, then stuck him with a number of slow-acting poisons and swapped the power cells in his swords for faulty ones. It was still a good fight, though.” He reached up and took the daggers down, balancing them and carefully feeling the weight. “I snapped both his swords in half at the climax of the fight - tragic, but suitably symbolic. Turned the remains into these daggers. I lent them to a friend for a while, but they turned up again shortly before I came through the Breach. Here, feel the weight. Light as anything.”

Pandora accepted them and did as he said. “They’re very good. Though I can’t imagine anyone like Trojan… I’m not sure I want to. Have you ever used them or do they just serve as decoration these days?”

She hoped not, it seemed a complete waste. Pandora understood he couldn’t possibly use each and every weapon in this chamber but at least some must still get a little play or what would be the point.

“I used to use them quite a bit - leave the force-field on all the time instead of flicking it on and off as dramatically appropriate, and they’re whisper-silent and self-cleaning, which makes them excellent for assassination - but the Affront grounds more or less demand that I stick to longer blades these days. Perhaps when all this is over, but for now, well... They really should be used for more than decoration, though. Do you like them?”

“Yeah, they’re old but still useful looking.” She mused and tried to balance one on her palm. “Which are your favourites?”

“Well, that depends on what I’m doing… for the Affronts, I’ve gotten plenty of use out of the Sword of Dawn and Sword of Dusk. Valtarian paired blades, one gold hilted and one black hilted, used by a Monarch-Victor and Monarch-in-Shadow pair that were particularly obsessed with each other. And there’s a venom crossbow I keep meaning to fix up as a heavier ranged weapon. If I could cut loose properly, though?” He pulled a long gold-barrelled Combine pistol from his belt, smoothly cocking the hammer and rolling the wooden stock into his palm. “Boarding pistol, heavy laser variant. With a few of my own tweaks to the barrel and the focusing crystal for extra long range accuracy. Slower firing than the modern multi-chambered version, but that doesn’t matter for an ambush, and it has enough firepower to punch clean through Valtarian heavy plate. Plus, in a pinch, the grip is heavy and sturdy enough to break bones with. Maximum lethality, minimum fuss.”

“Have to give the Combine and Valtarians this, they have gorgeous designs for weapons.” She said admiringly. “Less neon and lights. Less mass production too. I’m sure you’d be hard pushed to find two exact copies.”

Pandora looked at Rain, examining him quietly for a moment or two in the same manner she did the knives in her hands. “I mean the Walkers push out some pretty nice weaponry too on occasion.”

“Valtaria, only when they’re made as an exact pair, generally, and then it’s effectively one item in the first place. The Combine actually do a good line in mass production, but their tolerances are higher than Opportunity’s, so there’s more variance in the end product.” He paused and grinned, spinning the boarding pistol and then returning it to his belt. “Why thank you. And really, I wouldn’t sell your fellows so short either. Opportunity does turn out a few uniquely and beautifully lethal things, if one’s lucky enough to encounter them.”

“I’ll be sure to let Ten-Count know that.” She teased sidling in closer to give him back his knives. “He’d appreciate the compliment.”

“Now, now, if I was trying to compliment Ten Count I’d… hmm.” He paused. “You know, I don’t actually know, but I’m sure it’ll never be relevant in the first place.” Rain picked up the knives, considered them for a second, then flipped them around until the handles were pointing back at Pandora. “You were right about the knives. They do need to see more use. And they are, like you, one of the more unique things here. You’ve done well enough so far in sparring that I don’t think you’ll misuse them or damage them. Would you like to put them to good use in the Affront grounds?”

Pandora laughed at his snipe towards Ten Count. “Harsh, dear.”

“Are you sure?” She asked, still taking them. “I mean is it really a good idea to be arming someone who’s technically from another faction?”

He shrugged. “Perhaps not. But it makes things more interesting. And really, what’s the point of god-like powers if we’re just going to be bored?”

“I suppose. Thank you.” She smiled and put them away. “Show me some more?”

“Of course. Let’s see, where to start… up here, I think. You see that long golden rifle? Let me tell you a story…”

Outworld/The Infinite Library

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The Choices We Make

Knife Practice

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