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The mystery of life isn't a problem to solve, but a reality to experience.
-attributed to Reverend Mother Gaius Helen Mohiam

They were, she realized, starting to work as a team. Tess and Katara's movements weren't just becoming more coordinated as individuals but as a pair they supported each other, distracted her on one side so the other could slip behind. This was something she realized as she sent one stumbling across the purple grass with a foot trip. The other moved to support her, instead of being simply an obstacle to be crashed into. Bonds. Solidarity. Esprit du Corps. Whatever you called it, whatever you thought of the Sisterhood's scheming and manipulations, they had it in spades.

Sheeana followed, blurring into a jumping kick...And had to scramble to keep her own balance as a presence intruded on her awareness. She looked chagrined as she signaled a halt to their sparring. That could have been an awkward pratfall.

"Duncan." She turned towards the watching figure, barely keeping the exclamation point out of her voice. The boy seemed to clutch at knowledge the way a starveling went after a ripe peach.

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"Mother Superior." But his eyes were on the other two women - the ones he had not yet met. He had never met an acolyte before, but they were undoubtedly Bene Gesserit. So young compared to most of the ones he had known. Sheeana too, had been surprising that way.

"I didn't mean to interrupt."

Arha was quiet and had been for awhile, simply watching Tess and Katara work, so still she could have been made of stone. They were definitely getting better. She blinked and finally moved, her blue-within-blue eyes soft as she peered at Duncan.

She was dressed in her white leather (http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v443/illusionarymind/whitefull.png), the buckles gleaming in the light as she turned.

"We were almost finished for today anyway." Sheeana signaled her students to come join her. "Sisters, meet Duncan Idaho, one of the few men permitted to learn our ways." This was mostly for their benefit. Since their Sharing, Arha knew everything Sheeana knew about him...

Katara had been anxious to do some training since the nightmare, and she had thrown herself into this, staying focus. It didn't mean she was perfect, but with Tess's help, they were able to be a formidable match (JUST formidable) against Sheeana. When Sheeana had them stopped, she exchanged a knowing look with Tess, happy to be with her sister again. Once she introduced the man (he looked like a boy, but if Sheeana said MAN, there was little doubt) Katara paid attention. This was the one Sheeana had talked to her about. How exactly did you react to someone like him though?

Katara just gave him a polite bow, smiling. "It's nice to meet you Duncan: I am Katara, of the Southern Water Tribe."

"Tennessee Lee, from Amontadilla," the other girl says, giving Duncan a playful little mock-salute. Her Southern Applachian accent is clear and thick, restrained just enough not to harm intelligibility. In her plain coveralls she doesn't look like much—curvaceous and attractive, but a first glance would judge her body as soft, seemingly without the dedicated buildup of core muscle needed to support the ways of prana bindu training. "But my friends call me Tess," she adds, clearly intending that Duncan be included in that group. Her manner and tone—open, caring, naive, the sort of person to think the best of everyone.

'Permitted'!

The flash of light when the fourth sister moved drew Duncan's attention (it was probably intended to, considering the source), but he kept his focus on the two acolytes to whom he was being introduced. How many Bene Gesserit were among the woken?

"Hello, Katara," Duncan copied the bow, just as politely, "And Tess." Who received a respectful nod as opposed to a playful salute. Both ~~girls~~ women seemed quite open and kind, but he easily remained wary. Kindness could be all the more dangerous for being genuine, and no less a tool.

And now he looked pointedly at the fourth, the other Reverend Mother.

"I am Arha Masaari, Duncan," she said quietly, fixing her gaze on him with a soft smile. It was an open smile, no guile, nothing just herself...even if she did have many layers. "And I am pleased to meet you."

"We..." An ambiguous pronoun. "...Are the last of this order. We are all willing participants in the dream." Keywords. Darwi would say them to his adult self...Would he know them now? Automatically remember she was referring to the mature humanity that was their goal?

"We," Katara said, and here she indicated herself and Tess, "Don't know all that much about you, but are willing to learn, now that you're here. We're actually pretty curious about the only man we've heard trained by the Bene Gesserit. That, and well, your name has a tendency to pop in the books we've ready concerning matters on Rakis."

Yes Sheeana, Katara is that nerdy.

"And we would be happy to tell you about us as well. Tess and I are both from worlds far different from yours, with pretty varied backgrounds, and we are both honored to serve as Bene Gesserit now."

Tess gives a little nod at Katara's comment. "I do hope we don't put y'off any by all the attention," she adds. "It's nice t'meet'cha, Duncan." And she means it—but then, she thinks that way about just about everybody.

"Arha Masaari," Duncan acknowledged. Sheeana's words didn't mean anything to him for now, although he was troubled (certainly surprised) to think of the entire sisterhood of the Known Universe - so far as the Mother Superior knew - reduced to so few. These new students must have begun their study recently, and thus relatively late. Still witches.

Duncan really couldn't help it - he liked them. All the while certain that he was meant to.

"You're from different worlds?" Duncan repeated, interested not only in said other worlds but also in the fact that Katara had told him. Need-to-know? "From my point in time," addressing Sheeana (who didn't need to be told, but), "I've mostly remained on... Gammu."

"I may not be the one to ask, in the case of the Duncan Idahos you've read about. The events in those records either weren't of my life, or they aren't of my life yet. For that..." He shrugs. (His nonchalance. Let him show you it.) "I have heard that there's another Duncan Idaho aboard, but I've yet to come across him."

The Duncans always respond to women with such honest natures. Ever since he and the God-Emperor had fought over "the gentle Hwi Noree" that had been known. At least this one doesn't think of me as 'that little twit from Rakis'.

"That one is the first ghola, from the time of Muad'dib. We've incorporated a number of new abilities with our new members. Katara is a master waterbender, a way of manipulating the elements. Tess is a grasshopper...think of a loosely organized tribe of social reformers moving from place to place and liberating societies with the help of portable Holtzman drives. And Sister Masaari is also training under Master Je'dai Ohi Uan Qehnobi." The Fremen accent was very faint but still there. The way to keep him happy? Keep feeding him knowledge.

"I am from the time of the first Duncan," Arha murmured. "And of Paul Muad'dib. I remember well the first battles on Arrakis and the time of the Harkonnen purge by Muad'dib and his desert power. Such things are recent for me, though my part to play in them was small." Arha frowned slightly, glancing at her hands before folding them across her knee.

"I was healer to the Fremen forces," she said quietly. "And a quiet desert mouse." But this was not really the place for her own history and she was quiet once more.

Katara nodded, smiling. "We'd love to demonstrate what we can do later on if you like, but for now we're just here to serve, so the ball is in your court to use a phrase. We've heard the stories of the worlds Arha and Sheeana made as their home, and we would love to hear more about where you are from, if you don't mind."

Katara was upfront, and eager to hear his stories. He seemed like a very knowledgeable guy, and it helped that he was VERY easy on the eyes.

"Y'forgot the info-sharin' part," Tess says pleasantly to Sheeana. She's not going to be blunt about it—but if there's anything like core pillars to what the grasshoppers do, anarcho-communist charity is only one of them. To be an explorer, in ways no twentieth-century person could have considered—that's the other.

"And Katara's got it right," she says more directly to Duncan. And in more than one says. A nudge young, maybe, but...

Sheeana had gotten the measure of him; Duncan was very very interested in everything everyone had to say. Especially in what Arha had mentioned, about being from the time of Paul (the image of a boy his age in his mind's eye, there and then gone) Maud'dib and the Freman, even before the reign of the God-Emperor. The stuff of ancient history.

He wanted to ~~interrogate~~ ask her of her time, but something warned him away. ("Harkonnen" - like the no-globe. A spark of raw emotion flared at the name before it was subconsciously packaged away.) He could always ask her another time. Or find his other self!

"I'll certainly tell you what I know, but I doubt it will be all that interesting. Your Mother Superior," he glanced at Sheeana, then back to her students, "must have better knowledge of my own time. I was kept for most of my life in one fortress on a single planet, and by my time, hadn't even been to Rakis." To serve purposes he oh-so-subtly wanted revealed.

"Our basic lessons in training were likely similar, too." Although his body language said that he was game to find out. What do you say, ladies? Not too tired from your session with your mentor?

Sheeana gave a nod, giving them license. After all, they hadn't yet had a chance to match with a man using the
Weirding Way. There were subtle differences, an increased reliance on the upper body. And Duncan wasn't arrogant like most men were, thinking a woman, even a witch, could never defeat him.

She watched them watch him. Definite mutual interest...But she would have to make sure it stayed out of the realm teenagers had a tendency to enter at a moment's notice. Otherwise it could be unsafe for everyone, him most of all. Look at me, thinking of safety. I've become a true Mother Superior.

Katara listened to what wasn't said, and understood that what she and Tess were going to do was show Duncan what they learned, and he would do the same. Of course, considering that he had actually been schooled in a Bene Gesserit environment (whatever that meant) he had the upper hand. She looked over at Tess, and gave her a playful grin that said looks like we're being fed to the dogs on this one. Not that she minded. A fight was a fight.

"Let's show him what we've been taught Tess," Katara said, and got into stance. She took a breath, and came at Duncan with a forward flip, her arms extended to come at him with forward force at her fingertips.

Tess isn't quite as quick to rush to the attack—but she does move forward, flanking Katara. Her steps are smoother and more graceful than she looks like she should be able to manage. Her expression stays pleasant and peaceful despite the situation—but her stance is wary, tilted more towards active defense than offense.

Duncan was well aware of the deadly accuracy and skills the women of the Bene Gesserit were trained in as a matter of course. Not as sure of the outcome of this fight as Katara, he hoped more find out a bit more about those other abilities to which Sheeana had alluded. A spar might explain "waterbender" and "grasshopper" better than words.

At least this early on, he chose to keep to an older pattern; standard series of blocks and strikes at a maintainable speed. His movements were quick enough to be challenging, but not so quick that they could not be followed, or interfere with his own observations. A good pace to draw out the match. He admired Tess's grace and Katara's playful spirit, and relaxed into the familiar non-rhythms of training-play. It was a lot more fun with other people.

Katara could tell something off the bat, despite Duncan's attempts to hide it: he wasn't just sparring with them. He was studying their movements too, and she understood now that this might be an opportunity to show Duncan HOW a bender accomplished their craft. She glanced over at Tess and nodded. They had become fairly good at nonverbal communication: it wasn't affordable to use words all that much when you were fighting.

The speed increased slowly, until Katara was certain that she could still maintain her change in martial arts. When she looked as if she were going to lunge forward she back-flipped instead, her pouch open and at the ready. The water became a stream that became a whip, and she lashed at Duncan, brandishing the water fueled weapon as she would a mace: not nearly as dangerous, but still quite able to sting.

Tess, she knew, would have the ability to come at him with her own sort of attack now as she, too, evaluated how Duncan would make use of his fighting knowledge.

And—now. Katara serves as enough of a distraction, and Tess rocket forward from the other direction. The movement is strange—guided by Bene Gesserit teaching, but the way her feet slam against the ground to propel her forward is not the clever lightness of prana-bindu but, rather, the disproportionate raw force of something else hidden under her soft appearance. Intuitively—there, she comes in a hair's width under the lash of the water-whip, striking forward with one hand, with her midfinger knuckles forward.

Duncan wasn't so lax as to laugh out loud in the middle of the fight, but his happiness, a physical, motion-bound pleasure, still sang in the twist of his torso and the impossible arch of his spine as he dodged both strange new attacks at startling speed. They were playing along! And still so fast, even after their session with Sheeana.

Their styles and techniques were often unlike many of the things he'd tried before, and that was why this was so valuable, so useful. A block became a jab and a kick became a throw, and he took his damage and dealt it. Saved the marveling for after, and tried still to keep an eye on Sheeana and Arha.

He improvised as he went along - had to - to adapt to Katara's unusual range and Tess's sharp instinct. This wasn't a teaching fight, not exactly, but he could (try to) pace it as one and ... maybe show off just a little bit.

Katara blinked. He was...fast, really fast. She had guessed as much anyway, but while she knew that would be to his advantage, she had no reason to play this any less than she usually would. This was a test of all three of their abilities, and if that meant that she had to step it up a notch, so be it. Another glance at Tess let her partner know that they were going to have to play this a little closer to the teeth.

So she would start by giving them a little bit of an advantage. The water that had previously been used to attack she pulled back, and suddenly the water was used for another purpose entirely: it landed a mist via thermokinesis, and for a moment Katara closed her eyes, breathing in a moment. Hopefully, Tess had enough cover to land a closer attack, because Katara was going to continue attacking at mid range.

There was still water left in the pouch (it was still in the air, but that was needed for their cover anyway) and she attacked with ice bullets now that she knew that Duncan had the speed to try and dodge them. Part of this was a study for Katara too: she wanted to see exactly how quick Duncan was, and how much would be gained as far as offense/defense went in their sparring with him.

Tess takes a hit or two or three, trying to flow with the movements but not quite keeping up, glad that this isn't a real fight. But it's strange—at each impact her flesh stiffens, (un)naturally spreading the impact like some artificial armor. It explains her explosive motions. Were she to land with one of those knuckle-edge hits, she would hit like a rock—but it adds a certain jerkiness, wielding her body like a geometric figure instead of a smooth pattern, needing to focus on bursts of speed to try and make up for it.

The mist enfolds them... she closes her eyes and sucks in her breath. Steps, staccato against the ground, and then she discards her shoes. Step, step, step, an incoherent pattern—and then her stance changes and the exaggerated footsteps do too. Breath still, body still—for a long moment, but for her heartbeat, she could as nearly have vanished.

And then she slams forward again, all at once, breaking through the mist just under the spray of Katara's ice projectiles...

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