[u]Chapter Sixteen: Reunion[/u] Part Eight "Where is the strength I saw that first mission?" Crag huffed, struggling to hold my arms back as we grappled for dominance. "This is," I grunted as Crag tried using my distracted moment to shove his knife at me, "All I've got." "No it's NOT," Crag's last word was emphasized with the exertion of pushing me off of him with a kick. He held his ground a couple steps away and held his free hand up, signaling that he would speak more, "You've torn apart a Walker and gone toe to toe with a Baron, you are stronger." "How in the world could I-?" I began to ask. "I don't know! I've seen Strikers do similar things, but never anything like you did!" Crag interrupted, frustrated with me, "I know you used your Light; you enhanced your strength with it somehow!" "I know I can do that!" I retorted under his pressure, "But a Walker? I can't even lift a Pike like Drew!" "Because you won't quit stopping yourself," Crag stepped forward and shoved his finger against my chest accusingly, "What did Veronica teach you about Voidwalkers? Something about not forcing or restricting your Light but instead drawing on the exact amount you wanted?" I opened my mouth to answer but Crag kept going, knowing he had hit the mark. "And I've seen you when you're playing Defender," Crag spat that last part as if I was a child pretending to be a Guardian, "You block it all off, don't you? You keep everything restricted?" "Because I can't hurt anyone again!" I took my chance to get a word in. "If you don't learn to control more of your Light then next time you WILL hurt us!" Crag's cold voice never grew louder, but his words delivered all the more anger as his own irritation grew. We stood there for a few moments, breathing heavily while I contemplated his words. "How would you do it?" I eventually dragged my eyes back up to Crag, knowing he would understand the question. "I don't know," Crag's voice was back to icy calm, "Keep calling out your Light, but don't try to cut the flow short because you start to think it's dangerous. Go until your body tells you that's all it can sputter out." I would never understand Crag's genius or how he came up with these ideas without even being the one experiencing the difficulties, but I trusted his judgement. "Okay," I resumed my fighting stance and breathed in deeply, focusing on Crag's words and my Light. Crag's blade began coming upward to his rest stance, but this time I didn't give Crag time to prepare. I slammed into him, pressing him back against the cliff again, but he had yet again gotten his blade up in time to hold me back. This time I used my Light, focusing it in my arms, and it resulted in a sudden surge of force. Crag was again prepared and moved his head so both of our blades burried into the stone, but then he held out his left hand and his second knife reappeared in his grasp. Eyes widening in surprise, I yanked myself backwards, getting away with a slash through just my armor and pulling Crag's first knife out of his hand. The blade clattered to the ground, but we continued fighting, Crag able to keep up just as well with his left hand as his right. After a moment, Crag held his right hand low at his side to transmat his knife back, but I saw my chance and slammed my hand upwards into his left, knocking his other blade away just in time to parry a right-handed stab. Shoving Crag off of me, I caught his falling blade and turned it on him, but it only took a moment for Crag to catch my wrist and make me drop my Shock Dagger. Catching it with his foot and flipping it up to his left hand, Crag blocked my next slash with both blades and kicked off of the rocky cliff to knock me to the ground. We wrestled for a minute in the dirt before Crag managed to raise my blade and bring it down at my head. I caught his arm just in time to stop the blade, and with my other hand I made sure he couldn't use his other arm. Crag shoved all of his weight down on me, making me draw on more Light to keep my strength up. After a moment though an idea formulated, and I released Crag's arm, making my knife disappear from his hand and come to mine. The Hunter's empty fist hit my helmet and I used his moment of unbalance to fling him to the ground. He tried rolling away but I leaped on him and punched him across the helm, stunning him for a moment so I could get my blade against his throat. "I hit you," I smiled, "What's next." "Next," I heard the clock of a barrel and looked down to see Crag's hand cannon pointed at my heart. Then he slapped my hand away from his neck in my moment of distraction. "You will learn that your enemies won't fight fair, and you will start using your abilities like a smart person would." "Someday you need to tell me why that pistol is so special," I laughed, climbing up off of my friend. "Another time," Crag got to his feet and holstered his cannon. "We don't have long before the others decide they should come check on us, and you let your guard down again," Crag's hand flew out from behind his back and a glowing blue grenade flew at my face. • • • Scorch marks and bullet holes dotted the small trail by the time Crag declared we had taken enough time, and we were both worn out from battling with our Light. But it was worth it; for the first time I had actually taken the time to practice forming and throwing grenades, and had quickly gotten very good at using them despite only being able to do short tosses accurately before. Luckily I had already been very practiced with utilizing my Force Barrier, otherwise Crag would've killed me countless times. Yet I still had no idea how Crag had been able to avoid a Nova Bomb from close range. "Do Guardians usually do this kind of stuff?" I questioned Crag as we hovered away on our Sparrows, "Train together, I mean?" "No, most Guardians get all their experience in the field and Crucible," Crag answered in his usual quiet mutter. "But it isn't as good for concentrating on improvement in certain areas as a one on one spar," I noted. Crag didn't deem it necessary to respond. "Did I do well?" "You're a better fighter now, but what will really determine if you did well is if you can use those skills in the field and not hold back against real enemies who can die," Crag responded pointedly. We shot through the Ember Caves on the side opposite of the Fallen's positions, but the fresh crew there still fired off some shots from afar that all missed. "You say more to me than the others," I observed, thinking on how he was responding with full phrases rather than clipped grunts, "Why?" Crag was silent for awhile longer, until we approached the transmat zone and began going around the bend towards the Ishtar Academy. "You're a hard person to be upset with," he finally grumbled. "Crag wishes to express that you are a good friend," Crag's Ghost remarked blandly. "The stiff speaks!" Rush exclaimed. "Shut up, moron," Crag's Ghost snapped, but didn't even sound angry. "Well at least the sappy talk is over," Rush sighed. "Let's get back on the team channel," I chuckled. ________________________ Link to Pt7: https://www.bungie.net/en/Forum/Post/230679077/0/0 Link to Pt9: https://www.bungie.net/en/Forum/Post/230679673/0/0 Link to ToC: https://www.bungie.net/en/Forum/Post/212710816/0/0