Morning Exercise (open)

[8wings.livejournal.com]

Anwei was jumping around the Hub - literally. With firm strokes of her arms and legs, she leaped from tentacle-base to tentacle-base, circling the vast room. Her hair fluttered wildly around her head in the anti-grav field, and she was sweating a little with the exertion.

She'd kept up a running commentary to Stacy about what she was doing in the back of her throat – the same way she used to talk to Horanckk. When Stacy suggested she try the Sensoriums for exercise, though, she demurred. The idea of rooms that could take things out of her mind and make them real made her shiver.

After three complete circuits of the Hub, she came to a halt and consulted her omnicom, which had been filming the whole time. Carefully, she marked the tunnels that were never entered by passers-by, the tentacles that hung limp rather than undulating. Someday, maybe soon, she would want to see if she could get into those unused tunnels, and see what might be in there. But for now, she rolled up her denim shirt and tied it to a tentacle with some blue string (making extra certain that all the pockets were sealed), marked out a large triangle on the wall with that same string, and began something that looked like dancing.

It was not dancing. It was drill for free-fall unarmed combat. Her arms and legs moved in long coordinated scything motions, her fingers grabbing and clawing at imaginary opponents (she was not grabbing with her toes because of the binding material of her plantsuit). In her ears she remembered her drill instructor bellowing as it criticized every falter and hesitation. She deliberately did not think of her first dance instructor and his tiny, cutting whip.

When she drifted out into the flow of traffic, she used her tie-line to move back against the wall and start again. It would be pretty obvious to anyone watching that she was doing some sort of structured exercise.

Comments

[fireforger]

Daja herself was out for a walk, although not for exercise. As she came to the hub, she recognised the woman she had met recently at the meet and greet.

"Good day, Anwei," she said politely. "I hope you've been settling in well?"

[8wings.livejournal.com]

Anwei heard Daja speak, and without even thinking her entire body snapped like a whip, shoulders and hips pivoting. In an instant she was drifting in place, facing Daja.

"Yes, thank you," she said with a wide (but not too wide) smile. "I feel like I'm actually starting to get a schedule worked out. Once I'm all set up in Engineering I can really start to figure out where I want to go from here."

[fireforger]

"See, you are settling in quickly," Daja said, with a hint of amusement. "And already putting your skills to use - I knew they would not be as redundant as you feared."

[8wings.livejournal.com]

"Well," she shrugged, "I am trying, I am trying. In the absence of orders from the Fleet, it would be best for me to share what I know, for a good cause."

She rolled her eyes - outwards rather than upwards. "But I don't think I should teach zero-gee combat. You can't teach the dangerous moves without risking someone getting hurt, and besides, my drill instructor would return from its afterlife to tongue-lash me raw for trying!"

[fireforger]

"Have you spoken to Billy Cranston? He is the young man in charge of the Engineering Department. He's very good at helping people settle in, and he could help you figure out how your knowledge might be applied."

Daja watched Anwei curiously. "You are a warrior?" she said. "I know with the threat of the Ohm, they are always in need of more capable fighters."

[8wings.livejournal.com]

"I've spoken to Kaylee; I am to talk to either her, Angie or Billy before I set up down there. That seems fair, there's certain to be equipment I don't recognize."

"I serve - served - with warriors, the Vizsnunishne Mercenaries. But I wasn't often in battle. Either I stayed with the Fleet and helped keep track of who went where, and what was needed, and how to get everyone paid on time - or I was on AI drop missions. Which were, ah, lots of soldiers protecting me while I walked up to an AI - like Stacy or Tron - and persuaded it to give up information. Or just to come with me."

[fireforger]

Daja nodded, "Yes, I don't beleive anyone arrives knowing what everything does. And with so many devices from different worlds, there are still many that no one knows the true purpose of yet."

"Perhaps you could speak to the Captain, or Security? I imagine they are just as in need of organisation as the warriors from your world."

[8wings.livejournal.com]

"That's something I can do of value right now," Anwei nodded. "I can look at the equipment that nobody else understands, and see if I know what it is. When you travel between dimensions, you tend to pick up all sorts of little bits and pieces of information about what does what."

"I actually spoke to Matt Olsen about doing some accounting work, which I confess is a lot more to my taste and abilities than fighting insects many times my size."

[fireforger]

"Just promise me that you'll be careful?" Daja said, worried. "Some of the things on the ship are dangerous."

"That is good to hear! I know not everyone realises it, but a good accountant is always highly appreciated."

[8wings.livejournal.com]

"Oh believe me, I know." The good thing was that hopefully this little universe-hopping side trip would mean no assassins. "I am very, very proactive when it comes to safety arrangements."

"Nobody knows how useful someone is who can just sit down and pound numbers until they squeak. We are like air," Anwei said, waving her own hand as though to demonstrate. "You don't notice we are even here - until we are gone."

She clutched her throat and mimed a moment of suffocation, and then giggled.

[fireforger]

"I am glad to hear that," Daja said, with a smile.

"And then when it is gone, everyone discovers that they cannot live without it," Daja said wryly.

[hack-rat.livejournal.com]

Alex had his laptop and was on his way to Engineering when he saw someone leaping across the Hub. Ever the master of decorum, he stood, staring slack-jawed at the woman that was all but flying.

[8wings.livejournal.com]

Anwei noticed the boy gawking at her, and somehow she spun in mid-air and kicked off from the wall and jinked across the Hub. She came to a halt right in front of him, fingertips just caught in the finest tip of one of Stacy's tentacles.

"Hey, hello I'm new here, but where did you find the laptop?" she asked. "I'm looking for one."

[hack-rat.livejournal.com]

He took a few moments to recover from shock. He was pretty sure he had never seen someone quite so agile outside of video games. Maybe she was from a video game in someone's reality.

Finally he realized that he had been asked a question. "O-oh, l-laptop, it c-came with me, th-though there's a g-good chance s-someone c-could make another, o-or f-find a datapad f-from the ship."

He patted his laptop fondly, and from behind it, Alice, a black rat, poked her head out to see who it was that Alex was talking to.

[8wings.livejournal.com]

Anwei was stronger than a human woman her size, but not by much. However, practicing how to maneuver in zero-gee with the lights off does tend to make one nimble.

"They saved your laptop for you? That must be some machine," Anwei said. "I'm planning on looking for one - or probably a couple so that I can swap parts - down in the City."

She saw the motion of Alice's head and immediately came to the wrong conclusion. "Is that your child?" she asked, pointing to the rat.

[hack-rat.livejournal.com]

Alex tried to hold back laughter, and failed. Miserably. "A-Alice? N-no, sh-she's m-my pet. F-friend too. W-we're not the same s-species." He loved Alice, deeply, but she was not his child.

He picked her up carefully and lifted her onto his shoulder, gently kissing her head. "Sh-she's still precious t-to me."

[8wings.livejournal.com]

Anwei gave an elaborate zero-gee curtsy. "I apologize if I offended you. Children of my species are rather, er, small and hairy." And dangerous, but she saw no need to mention that."

"Hello, Alice," she smiled. "I'm Anwei Ayles. And your humanoid friend is...?"

[hack-rat.livejournal.com]

"Alex." He smiled back and offered a rather scarred hand. "N-no offense t-taken, I know how d-different the p-people on the sh-ship c-can be." For someone not human, she looked very human.

Hope this is OK

[8wings.livejournal.com]

Anwei didn't even notice the scars; she certainly had enough of her own here and there, and she was used to mercenaries who were slathered with the marks of their battles.

The name did catch her attention. "Excuse me, but are you the Alex I was discussing chocolate and AI motivation with earlier? On the internal ship channel?"

A-OK!

[hack-rat.livejournal.com]

Alex nodded, "O-one in the s-same. O-on my way to e-engineering, p-probably t-to work o-on some of th-those AIs, actually." He looked up into the rest of the hub with a smile and raised an eyebrow, "C-code monkeys i-in my world a-aren't usually s-so athletic."

Re: A-OK!

[8wings.livejournal.com]

"Well, it's a small ship after all. Mind if I trail along? I need to get to Engineering anyway, and if you could show me the way I'd appreciate it."

She snorted amusement. "I can hardly be a code monkey. Maybe a code mammal? And it pays be athletic when there's always the chance that a bunch of enemy soldiers will pop out a bulkhead and come in after you. Besides, living in low gravity weakens your bones. You have to exercise or you end up too weak for regular gravity."

[nanochist.livejournal.com]

He'd been out exploring when he came across the vast room called the Hub. Stepping out of one of the tunnels, Kai stared up at the strange, alien structure. He was far from used to this place.

It was a moment before he spotted the figure moving around in the air. Kai pulled his sunglasses down his nose to get a clearer look. It wasn't random movement, that much was obvious even to his untrained eyes. Kai knew fighting movements when he saw them. But what conditions was she training to fight in? It looked like she was pretending to fall</i... He watched, interested, for a long minute. When she'd finished, he clapped twice.

[8wings.livejournal.com]

Anwei twisted to see him and grinned. "Applause?" she called across the Hub. "Or does that mean something else in your culture?"

Unselfconsciously, she hunched her neck and pulled the collar of her plantsuit over her face for an instant, wiping off the sweat and feeling it be absorbed into the not-fabric. So far as she was concerned, clothing that kept you clean was a real bonus to being here.

apologies for the HTML fail. PRETEND IT'S NOT THERE.

[nanochist.livejournal.com]

"Applause," Kai confirmed. He didn't quite return her grin, but there was interest in his eyes. "I've never seen anyone train to fight in midair before."

Re: no problem

[8wings.livejournal.com]

"Probably because it's damn hard," she answered dryly. "You have to throw out everything you know about strikes and recoils and footwork, and concentrate on joint locks and gouges. Even then, whoever gets a hold of a solid surface first is usually the winner."

She bowed, spinning end over end in midair, her hair flopping around her head like seaweed in water. "I was rated Merely Proficient against Humanoids by my combat instructor, who often told me that I was taking up space for someone who'd be actually fighting rather than hiding behind a computer. But it was part of the standard training package, so I took it."