Pete harrumphed and rolled his eyes. "Just don't teach 'em any of that Samurai bullshit. We want 'em to stay behind their shields, not run around flailing their swords in all directions. All that'll do is confuse 'em."
Shinya chuckled. "I'm a better fencer than I ever was a practitioner of Master Musashi's teachings. I learned enough not to shame my father. He was very insistent. But I doubt he was proud of my skill." His smile faded, and he looked at Alden, expressionless. "You see, the Way is very spiritual," he explained. "Regrettably, I am not."
"Yeah, well. Mmm. Closest thing I ever came to, looked like a sword, is this," Alden said, grasping the long bayonet at his side, next to the .45 holster. "Unless you count my granddaddy's Civil War sword over the fireplace." Teeth flashed in his bearded face. "I'm not much for this swords and shields shit, but bayonets I can do. And I think it's time to stir things up."
He retrieved one of the six-foot, bronze-bladed spears. "You do the swords. Teach 'em ways to use 'em in the open—we'll need that too, and maybe first. But also behind shields when they've got 'em locked. Ask the captain. He seems to know about that. C'mon, Chack." He gestured for the Lemurian to follow. "I need your mouth."
"What are you going to do?" Shinya asked.
"Pick a fight." He motioned toward the middle of the field, where a group of warriors from one of the ships gathered, taunting the recruits.
"I'm going to show those Navy cat-monkey types they ain't as tough as they think they are. No offense, Chack."
Chack blinked amused approval. He'd experienced Alden's "bayonet drills" himself. Together, they waded through the play-fighting troops, and Alden knocked some aside as they went. That got their attention, and some followed in his wake to see what he would do. Eventually they reached the knot of warriors, a group from Fristar. Alden was surprised to see them, since all their High Chief talked about was taking off.
They hadn't done it yet, but it was plain that all these showed up for was trouble.
They'd formed a rough circle and were pushing and shoving any land folk who came within reach. They were enjoying their game immensely and seemed to think it was at least as effective as the training going on around them. One reached for Alden as he came close, but pulled back when he saw he'd nearly grabbed one of the "Amer-i-caan Wizards."
"Go ahead," Pete said, grinning pleasantly. "I'm a Grik. Kill me." Chack translated. The Fristar, a wing runner, looked aside at his fellows. One, easily the largest Lemurian Pete had seen, dipped his head. The shorter 'cat gave a high-pitched cry. He leaped at Alden with arms outstretched.
The sergeant's spear blurred. With a yelping, breathless grunt, the wing runner was on his back, looking cross-eyed at the spearpoint inches from his face.
"You're dead," Alden said. "Next?"
Another troublemaker stepped forward at a nod from the "leader."
This one had a few white hairs lacing his amber coat. His tail twitched back and forth. He accepted a real spear from a companion and assumed a more cautious stance.
An experienced warrior this time, Alden thought to himself. Good.
The 'cat held the spearpoint forward, left hand grasping near the blade. His right arm was fully extended behind him, holding the shaft like a harpoon. He crouched and took a step to his right. Lightning-fast, he lunged with the spear. Pete stepped inside the thrust, knocking it aside as he turned and drove the butt of his own spear into his opponent's midriff.
Somehow the Lemurian's face showed surprise as he doubled over with a "woof!" Pete reversed the spear and made a classic thrust, ending just short of the chest. Then he turned and looked at the gathering crowd. The point he'd made was obvious. One down, one gasping for air, and Pete Alden wasn't even breathing hard.
Some of the land folk cheered in their curious high-pitched, chittering way, but Pete knew it was more who he'd bested than how he'd done it.
That wasn't what he wanted to get across. "Chack, speak for me," he said.
He walked in a circle, scowling. Gradually, the cheering faded and he started to speak. Before he could, the big Fristar Lemurian stepped forward. He was tall enough to look Alden in the eye. He wasn't as heavily built as the Marine, but Pete had to concede that he was probably stronger. Muscle rippled under the dark fur as he drove his spear into the ground in formal challenge. There was a sudden hush.
"Why do you humiliate the Fristar clan in front of these mud-treaders, Tail-less One? You who is a person of the Great Sea?" Chack translated as he spoke. Pete took a step closer to him and returned his glare.
"If you're humiliated it's not because of anything I've done. Your pride makes you believe you're a better warrior than you are. Besides, among my people, I'm a mud-treader too. Walker has clans, just like you, and we're all ruled by our High Chief. For us, that's Captain Reddy. I obey him, but I'm chief of my own clan. The Marines." He turned and looked at the gathering sea of faces. All training stopped as more recruits pressed forward to hear, and maybe see a fight.
"Among my people, Marines are the warrior clan. All they do is fight.
Sometimes they fight at sea and sometimes on land." He grinned. "Sometimes they even fight in the sky. To Marines it makes no difference. We fight the enemies of our people wherever they are." He paused, considering. "We've made alliance with your people and we've seen the Grik for what they are. Your enemy is now the enemy of my people. That makes 'em my enemy and I'll fight 'em because that's what I do. In the meantime, it's my duty to train you to be better fighters. To fight like Marines.
That means fighting them anytime, anywhere, at sea or on land. That's what it'll take to defeat them.
"They aren't coming to steal your things, just to loot and plunder. If the history of your Scrolls is true, they're coming to wipe you out!Walker's people are your allies, and that puts them in danger as well. So anything less than your very best makes you my personal enemy! Do I make myself clear?" He turned, snatched the spear out of the ground, and flung it down, accepting the challenge—the formal challenge—that meant blood could be spilled.
"There! We can fight if you want, and I promise you'll be dead so fast you won't even know how it happened." He looked at Chack. "Or you can fight him, if you're afraid of me, but he'll kill you just as fast. Because I taught him how!" He looked at the tall leader of the Fristar group.
"So what'll it be? You want to die? Or do you want to learn how to really kill?"
The Lemurian returned his stare. Around them, all were silent, expectant . . . afraid. The formal challenge was rarely made, and when it was, there was almost always only one outcome. All were nervous about the political ramifications. Fristar, at least, would leave the fragile alliance that had been forged at the council. No one really expected the American to lose, and there was always bad blood after a formal challenge was met.
The big Lemurian looked down at the spear. He put his foot beside it and, with a grunt, kicked it away, withdrawing the challenge. There was an audible sigh of relief.
"Then show me, Maa-reen. Show me how to kill."
After securing Risa's laughing promise not to fly to join her "mate," Chack left her at the parade ground to continue her studies and headed back to Walker. His Home. He didn't really know when it had occurred, but at some point all the ambitions of his previous life were supplanted by what he'd become. He was no longer a wing runner on Salissa Home. He was a bosun's mate, in charge of the Lemurian deck division on USS Walker, duly sworn into the Navy of the United States, just as all the accepted "cadets" had been. He had only a vague idea what the United States were, but that made no difference. He'd become a warrior and now he was a destroyerman. He loved Salissa and always would, but he'd changed clans just as surely as if he'd become fas chief of another Home like he once aspired to do. That was an ambition for who he'd been before. He giggled at the irony of his outrage over Silva joining his clan. Now he'd joined Silva's. That didn't mean he wanted him for a brother.