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Fencing Club - Salle, After Classes Monday

Again Edmund was in early and setting up for the club. He waited for everyone to arrive before addressing them. "Using a sword rarely comes naturally. You have to put effort into it, but you also have to work at your own pace to learn the fundamentals. If you want to practice the footwork drills from last week, please move over to my left and have at it. Experienced swordsmen...women...people," he fumbled, "who wish to use the time to spar head down the back. Everyone else will be practising a few defence exercises. We'll get to the attacking part next week."

Edmund demonstrated a few defence drills. "There you have it. If you need me to run through them with you, wave me over."

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Zayne took advantage of his modified practice sword and spun the blade quickly and easily to parry Dinah's attack. "Does it happen to you often?" He took a step to the side and jabbed his sword at Dinah's stomach.

He got through her guard -- ow.-- and forced Dinah to take a few more steps back, then her eyes narrowed. "Not any more." And she aimed a feint, a low swing toward his knees, snapping her blade up to hit his, hopefully knocking it sideways.

Zayne totally fell for the feint - he wasn't any good at picking those up - and he held on tight as the sword made contact. He was forced to take a step back and reset his stance. "It still happens to me more than I care to admit."

Dinah grinned, then had to blush in embarrassment. "Okay, last time for me?" She aimed a couple blows at his sword, trying to get closer to his hand. "Was last week, sparring with Arthur. I got too enthusiastic."

Zayne retreated a couple steps while taking a shot to the back of his hand. "Ow," he said. "My last time,' Zayne took a big step forward and slashed at Dinah's wrist in a total Jedi move, "was the last time I was on Taris. It helped me duck an attack, though."

"Owwwww." Dinah had to spin with the momentum of that to keep her grip on her sword, and it stung. "It did? Whoa. A real attack? Or training?" And lunge and start to speed up, hoping she hadn't left herself open a second later.

"Training, but with real lightsabers," Zayne said, blocking the quick attack in a way that sent the sword into his left arm. "Ow." He had gotten too used to Dinah's previous speed.

"Dude," Dinah said, impressed, and grinning for a second when she landed a blow, then had to quick-foot it to get her balance back, keeping her sword up as much as possible. "But yeah, good you hit the ground, then."

"It's just part of the training," Zayne said, taking a long stride forward so he could take a strong swing at her sword. He didn't usually go for power attacks (since he didn't really have much power), but he figured it might be enough to disarm her.

And he was just about right, too. Dinah had the same reach as him, but even moving as fast as she could, the weight and intent behind those blows had her backing up, and backing up, and nooo, she didn't want to lose her sword, but one more blow---

Zayne took another step forward while spinning - the footwork part of the practice wasn't completely lost on him, clearly - to give him a little more momentum for giving the sword one more hard strike.

Then Dinah's sword went flying, darnit. "Shoot!" She wrung out her fingers, blew on them, then had to grin at Zayne. "Still better than me," she shot over her shoulder, as she went to retrieve her sword. "That last move with the-- can you show me that again?"

"Sure," Zayne said as he lined up to attack a spot a few feet away from Dinah. "If you have the right kind of sword - and lightsabers are perfect for this - you can get a really strong attack in by getting some momentum with a spin."

He took two steps forward and started to rotate his body starting with his shoulder, going as slowly as he could without messing it up. As he got halfway through his pivot, Zayne landed another step and continued pivoting on that foot. As he started to turn back towards the front, Zayne started to bring his sword up, almost like he was using a tennis racket to launch a ball.

Zayne planeted his right foot on one last step and continued his follow through with his sword. "Really, you're just trying to smack your target as hard as you can. It's not really good for aiming, but it can work pretty well if you have somebody stumbling back."

Edited 2009-09-22 02:56 (UTC)

"Okaaaaay," Dinah said, fascinated. "Got it. Like this, kind of?"

She backed up, took a step, then another, and started to spin. Her elbow was down too far, but otherwise she had a pretty good momentum going, and could feel how it would knock someone back. "Yeah, that would leave you open if they weren't already off-balance, wouldn't it?"

"Yeah, it would," Zayne said. "Especially since you take your eyes off of them for a moment. So if you're going to try something like that, you really have to make sure you turn as fast as you can. I've seen Jedi Masters do that so fast that you'd probably be dead if you blinked."

Dinah tried it again, and lost her footing, swerving a bit. "Hokay, needs practice, but wow. Okay, now I really want to see Master Skywalker fight someone, if that's the kind of thing he does."

"I'd have to guess that he does things way beyond that," Zayne said. "From everything I've heard, he's one of the best."

Dinah tried it again, and managed to keep her footing solid this time, swiiiiiing! And you're out! "Arthur's really good too. He and Zack took on Mr. Deadpool this weekend. I wish I'd gotten to see it." She shook her head. "Years and years before I get there, but you're better than you say you are."

"Well, I've been training since I was little, but I'm nowhere near where I should be considering that," Zayne said. "And I do trip over my own feet a lot, which doesn't help."

Dinah tilted her head. "Do you think it's that still-growing thing? Or not-quite-done? Or do you just get distracted?"

"Honestly?" Zayne said. "Some people might say it's more of a not-good-enough thing. But then I get into my I'm-just-going-to-try-harder thing, which, um, hasn't had the best success rate so far."

"Those people suck," Dinah said succinctly. "Nobody's born knowing this stuff. Well, unless they're a Skywalker, I guess." She shook her head, frowning. "And I don't know about success, but know from trying harder. Even if you're not improving as fast as you want, you gotta be getting better." IT just made sense!

"Those people are the people who have to judge whether or not I become a Jedi Knight after training my whole life," Zayne said without a hint of disappointment. He still had time to change their minds, of course. "And they don't suck. They're just... grading me. You're either strong in the Force and know how to use it, or you're not and you don't. I'm closer to the second one."

Dinah bit her lip, considering that, and realizing that yeah, if they valued the Force that much, and Zayne wasn't the strongest, then they might make a wrong call. "Well. I hope that things go better, either way. And you get to pass those tests."

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Fencing Club - Salle, After Classes Monday

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