Xu and Darya sparring

Xu waited outside the Seoul training facility, tapping his foot. Rather than his normal face, he appeared to have narrower and sharper features than normal, using the face he referred to as "Xun Yu".

As Darya came into sight, he straightened and walked over.

"Thanks for agreeing to do this. I've been meaning to get some more practice in and Han's a good enough sparring partner, but he's a little out of my league. No offence to you, or anything."

Darya smiled as she walked over to him, a bag on her back filled with her sparring clothes.
"No offense taken. I'm a ranged specalist, Han's a close quarter combat specalist. Slightly different MOs there."

She began heading towards the door of dojo, before spinning around.
"Ah, that's right, I forgot. I promised you a cut of the profits for that factory mission." She said, pulling out her PDA. "30,000 credits sound okay? It was a pretty good haul."

Xu blinked in momentary surprise.

"Oh, yes, the money. I'd forgotten about that, to tell the truth. I've got enough of the stuff sloshing around that it just feels weird. I've never had this kind of amount before. Still, not like I'm going to say no. Thanks." With that, he pulled out his own PDA and let Darya make the transfer. "Shall we go in? I hear this is meant to be a pretty good place," he said, turning and gesturing towards the door.

Darya walked through to the lounge, the automatic doors opening to let her through. "I dare say it is." She said as she looked around the lobby, decorated to look like a cut price Shaolin monastery, and headed over to the front desk. "Two for a 6 hour session please." She said to one of the two men behind the counter, who looked at her suspiciously, since she was quite clearly an agent and it was strange to have one not use their own training facilities, but they shrugged it off. She was still paying after all.

As the two walked to the hall they had booked, Darya looked around. "Huh. It's weird training in this stuff again." She scuffed her foot on the ground, slightly. "Used to rely on hand to hand much more when I was in Lanzas. Saved on the cost of ammo. Nice not to have to worry about that anymore."

As they reached the room, she turned around. "I'll just go get changed, then we'll start."

"Whereas I never used to use it at all. No need. I'll get changed myself - meet you back here."

When Darya returned, Xu was wearing what appeared to be loose white clothing with loose, trailing sleeves, and was looking pensively at the doors.

Darya's training clothes were far more simple, a slightly tattered tank top and tracksuit bottom pairing. She bounced up and down on the balls of her feet, stretching a bit, before noticing that Xu was looking away. "Something wrong?" She asked, looking at him.

Xu turned his gaze from the door to her. "No, nothing. Just...the decor reminds me of the Shi Yukiro. They always liked their mystic martial arts crap. Shall we make a start, then?"

He turned, pushed the doors open and walked through.

Darya didn't think that it reminded her that much of a Japanese dojo, but said nothing as she walked into the room behind Xu. It was more functional than the other rooms, merely a large area to train in with some carvings on the wall.

She took a stance in front of Xu, a slightly weird one that seemed to leave bits of her body open to attack. "Ready?" she asked, looking at him.

Xu settled into a stance of his own - one that Darya recognised as one that Han tended to use a lot. She had to notice this very quickly, though, as Xu immediately attacked, dodging to one side and lunging. (Agility+Close Combat is a fail by 1 - AT=12, before defence, roll=13)

The reason the stance became clear as Xu threw his punch towards one of Darya's openings in her defence. Her hand moved up and grabbed Xu's arm, before she twisted it and pulled him closer to her, bringing her foot up to trip him. Xu put up a good effort, but Darya was just a bit too strong, and she forced him onto the floor, holding his arms together and placing her knee on his back to hold him.

She held the position for a moment before letting go and taking up a different stance, this one much tighter and more serious looking.

Xu clambered back onto his feet and took up the same stance again.

"Not bad," he said, cautiously, "but I'm guessing that you're doing this to train against Cult, and I don't think that Cult are going to just let you grapple them like that. How about you try something that isn't trying to immobilise?"

With that, he took a couple of steps back, waiting for Darya to move.

Darya stepped forward, her face having become stern at the mention of the cult, before she flew off a series of blows towards Xu. Against a cultist, each would have been aimed at some weak spot, some badly made piece of cybernetics she could damage, but Xu, lacking these, actually took much less damage than a cultist would.

What's more, Xu was a much smaller target than a cultist, and he was a pretty good fighter himself. The first three attacks didn't even land, while the fourth blow caught him in the chest. (2 damage after armor).

As Darya's attacks came in, Xu dodged and blocked with surprising competence, before taking the blow to the chest. From the impact, Darya could tell that he was obviously wearing reinforced clothing underneath the white clothes.

He flashed Darya a quick smile before murmuring "That's more like it," and launching some strikes of his own. He seemed to concentrating on dodging, though, and both punches were well clear of the mark.

Darya launched another volley of punches, before stepping back and going onto the defensive herself, keeping herself well back from Xu. After another half hour of attempts on both sides to hit each other, she dropped back, and straightened up. "Xu, do you mind if we switch to weapons now?" She asked, holding up her hands. "There's something I want to test out."

"Sure thing," Xu replied, straightening up. "I've not got that much to work with, though - just an ossi-knife. Still, it's what I'm likely to have on missions, so I guess I need to cope with just that." He reached round to his leg and pulled the knife from under his clothing. "What are you testing?" he asked, as he settled back into a combat stance.

"This." Said Darya, reaching into her bag and pulling out one of her knock out rifles, twirling it in her hand. With her other hand, she reached into the bag and pulled out a bayonet, and affixed it to her rifle, before pulling out a second KO rifle and holding it in her other hand.

"Cult...are fond of hand to hand combat." She said, moving into her normal firing position. "I want to try out using this to defend myself in close combat, see if it works."

"I suppose that makes sense," Xu said. "Though...are you really going to be using knock-out weaponry on cult? Never mind, I'm happy to help test."

With that, he lunged forwards, stabbing repeatedly with the ossi-knife. Darya was able to block the first thrust without too much difficulty, the second went wide anyway, and the third was parried by one of the bayonets.

Darya smiled. "This is more so that I'm not tempted to shoot you while training my defense...although I do have some passifier clips in my van, do you want me to get those and use them instead? Give you some training as well?"

She was still holding back, having modified her stance slightly to adjust for Xu's attacks.

"Oh, don't worry. It's my attack that really needs the training. If I'm doing my job right, hopefully I shouldn't be making more than one attack, and shouldn't need defence at all."

Xu continued to press the offensive, now bringing the knife back and forward in a series of sharp jabs. The first attack slithered past Darya's defences (9 damage before armour), and the second followed up on the same gap in the defence (another 9, before armour), but the third was easily blockable.

Darya frowned as the knife slipped through her defenses, before swinging up her gun and catching the third blow. "And if you do things wrongly?" she asked, raising her bayoneted weapon and stabbing towards Xu. (Rolled a double 2, hits, 8 damage before armor.)

Xu winced as the bayonet caught him.

"Oh, don't get me wrong, I'm not saying I'm going to ignore the defensive. But the attack is what should be really significant. There's no way an agent kitted out like me is going to win a long, protracted combat against an agent built for combat, so the most important thing is to ensure that it doesn't get to that stage wherever possible."

As he spoke, he twisted, the bayonet still in chest, to try and throw Darya off balance (no mechanical effect, just flavour), and launched another series of stabbing attacks. The first was blocked, the second dodged and the third hissed a hair's breadth by Darya's side.

"I...know how you feel on that one." Said Darya, ducking out the way of one of Xu's strikes and bringing up her rifle for another attack. "I...wasn't that good at combat when I first started bounty hunting." She lunged, still talking (Pass by 1, 8 damage). "I started using knock out stuff when I found how useful it was...taking out people easily...except the cult, of course. And agents, though I can do that now."

"Well...you've certainly made some progress since then," Xu replied, shifting his grip on the knife and bringing it around in a series of slashes. "Most of the team seems to consider you one of the most dangerous agents we have. And I can't say I disagree." The first slash was well wide, the second required a hasty block and the third could then be parried without too much trouble.

The attack finished with Xu's left side apparently open to attack, the agent seeming to overextend himself. (Rolled Presence + Lying and Acting to see how much like an accident it seems - pass by 4 (AT=17, roll=13). If Darya attempts to attack that side, she will get no bonuses.)