A Secluded Part of the Beach, Saturday Afternoon

[intraspective]

If Ino had to summarize the weekend so far, it'd be with words that were not really along the lines of 'amazing' and 'heartbreaking', no.

Her words were more along the lines of 'complicated' and 'awkward' and the constant feeling of being in the way. Which would be why she'd gotten very very good at excusing herself from—conversations where she felt like she was intruding. Zack didn't have much time with Angeal, after all.

She wasn't going to impinge or expect him to spend the time with her in that case. It was a little lonely, if she was honest. And more than a little depressing, since no one had shown up for her and she'd thought, maybe—

Well.

There was no use thinking about it. She'd been thinking about it too much as it was between drifting around the island and feeling peculiarly at odds with everything.

Which was why, when she'd gotten antsy enough for the third time that even her plants couldn't distract her, Ino had tracked down her spear and headed for a secluded area of the beach. Stepping out onto the water, she brought her weapon down and flung herself into a pattern dance.

Training. When in doubt, more training was always a good thing.

[Open for one, maybe two. And massive SP is seriously likely. ^^;]

Comments

[intraspective]

The spear was simply a spear—and not a weapon she was fantastic at. It was one that she came back to fairly frequently, however, as it was completely unlike most of her weapons and excellent for training that let her focus everything she had on staying above the water (though little waves did tend to soak her feet) and keeping the spear accurate through the patterns.

She was getting better. She knew that, as she dipped and spun the weapon, the metal gleaming as it caught a bit of the water and brought it flying up.

It didn't take her that long to realize she was being watched. Zack's presence she knew like the back of her hand, so it couldn't be him. Which meant that she had to deliberately check to see who it was.

And that led to her abruptly trying to not drop the spear in the ocean. That would be bad as she'd have to go in after it. What was he doing here?

"Is Zack okay?" she asked, swinging the spear up so it could rest against her shoulder—it probably looked a bit silly, a tiny girl with a spear technically too large for her—and taking a few steps on the ocean towards Angeal.

[firstclasshonor.livejournal.com]

"He's sleeping," Angeal said calmly. "He fought it as long as he could, but it won."

Angeal hadn't had the heart to wake him. He'd been exhausted.

"I thought I'd see the sights." The beach, especially. It was soothing. And intriguing, if this Ino-girl was here.

"What kind of weapon is that?"

Besides the obvious, which was that it seemed to be a spear. He could only go so long without talking shop.

[intraspective]

She bounced lightly off the water to land on the sand and gave a half-shrug of sorts. That was an answer she could tolerate. Zack sleeping. Perfectly normal. No need to panic.

"Just an ordinary spear," she said sheepishly. "It's not my normal sort of weapon so it works well when I want to focus on nothing but my training." Ino tilted her head at him before offering him the spear to look at, should he want to. "See?"

[firstclasshonor.livejournal.com]

Angeal glanced at it, but refrained from taking it. Nothing against this girl or her spear; more that his time as a SOLDIER was finished, and it would feel odd to handle a weapon again.

"I would have thought your most familiar weapon would work better, for a training exercise," he said. "Or does the unfamiliar weight balance make you adjust the form?"

[intraspective]

"It makes me focus more," she said, smiling slightly as she leaned the spear back on her shoulder. "I started training young, so I can think while training with my usual weapons--and none of them are really good for this sort of training. Too long range."

[firstclasshonor.livejournal.com]

"So you use the spear close-up?" he asked. "You could probably get a little range on that, but then you'd have to chase it down again."

Which would be impractical, as a weapon.

[intraspective]

She arched an eyebrow at him.

"I don't use the spear in real combat. I'd get my ass killed if I tried that. It's something I do for practice only."

[firstclasshonor.livejournal.com]

"Never hurts to add a weapon to your repertoire," Angeal said. "If you know you can fight with something -- not well, but well enough -- it could make the difference in a critical moment."

He'd trained with the Buster Sword, despite his decision not to use it. Because he had known there would be occasions where he would choose to, and he wanted to know the weapon inside and out for those times.

[intraspective]

Her smile twisted slightly.

"The spear is too obvious for me," she glanced down at herself in amusement. "Where would I hide it?"

[firstclasshonor.livejournal.com]

"I wasn't suggesting you hide it," Angeal smiled, and this time, he held his hand out to request the spear. It was demonstrating a point; that felt different than wielding just to wield. "I was suggesting, should you find yourself in a room with an approximation, you improvise."

[intraspective]

... Oh.

Ino handed the spear over to him. "I can probably do that," she admitted. "Least until I tracked down an improvised weapon I'm better at."

[firstclasshonor.livejournal.com]

"Which is smart," Angeal said, testing the weight of the spear in his hands. "A familiar weapon will always beat an unfamiliar one, but it's also good to have some experience with a range, just in case. You never know when it might come in handy."

Sometimes, all you had was a crowbar, or a wrench. Neither of which required any skill to use, but they'd beat hands alone for most people.

He considered swinging it, but thought better of it, handing it back to her. "What are your typical weapons, then?"

[intraspective]

"Kunai," she said, wrapping her arms around the spear. "Knives with triangle blades and a long handle with a ring at the end of them. Shuriken. Wire. Explosives."

She chewed on her lip, then added: "I'm more of a saboteur than a straight out fighter, though I'm not bad at hand-to-hand either."

[firstclasshonor.livejournal.com]

"Interesting," Angeal said. "Do you and Zack cross-train? You teach him how to best counteract a saboteur, and he buffs up your hand-to-hand?"

Learning new specialties was every bit as useful as knowing more weapons. Possibly more so.

[intraspective]

"Not a whole lot," she said, wrinkling her nose. "He doesn't like the idea of taking a shot at me."

He tried, she'd give him credit for that. But Ino knew his fighting well enough to tell the difference between him against her and him against everyone else.