Wizardness

Tobias woke. He expected to find himself wracked with pain. His shirt was off and he was in his under clothes, laying atop his bunk. The rest of the fist was sitting around his bunk. Tobias could feel a breeze sending goose bumps across his exposed chest.
“Huh, still gets goose pimples.” Red murmured.
“Why wouldn’t I?” Tobias asked.
Giggles laughed, “On the account of you being metal.”
Tobais pushed himself up. He shouldn’t have been able to, but he could. The metal of his hands turned into a jagged line up his forearms, along his biceps and fully encircled his shoulders. This spread across his collar bone and down, like a lightening bolt, his chest. This left his light brown skin between his shoulders, neck and collar bone untouched. This lightening bolt disappeared into his underclothes, but reappeared as thin line following his femur, turning into a ball around his knees and down to his feet.
“What?” Tobias gasped.
“You went into immediate shock. I set your bones.” Plain said.
“I rushed over and started to heal you, but as soon as I got your forearms sorted, you were already turning into this dull metal.” Raven said.
Tobias felt a huge hand on his shoulder. He glanced down at Plain’s hand. “I’m sorry I hit too hard.”
Tobias sighed, “I thought I could take a swing from you. I was wrong.”
“You did take a swing from him. You could easily take a shot from him now.” Lee’s voice cut through. “I need your sparks out now. You will be pushed hard from here on out. For your sake, I hope all of your sparks save you like his did.”
The fist muttered.
“Go eat. You still have your evening run to do.”
Tobias gingerly got up. He felt the cool stone beneath his feet. Rather than the soft pat of his foot, there was a slight clinnk, sound. Not loud, but like the sound of tapping a knife on a stone table. He took another step, it was louder, but not annoying.
“You know, the stories about White’s Ferry say there was a metal man in the Good God Damn. You must have the same spark as him.” Giggles whispered next to Tobias. “It seems our weapons help pull our sparks out.”
Tobias nodded. “Seems like they help in other ways, too. Do you know what happened to the metal man?”
Giggles grimaced, “He’s still fighting. He’s holding the line.”
Tobias stared after Giggles. “Still fighting?”
Plain caught Tobias’ eye. He gestured towards the table, there was another plate next to the giant. Tobias nodded and quickly slid in next to him.
“Thanks for the plate.”
“It is fair. Are you ok?”
“It’s strange. I’m ok. Now, the important question, did you hit my head?”
Plain laughed, “No, the metal on your head is from the rock you landed on.”
Tobias reached his hand up and touched the back of his head. He could feel where his hair transitioned from normal thick black hair to a strange metallic wire. The entire back of his head was metallic. He touched more of his head, the left side of his head was metal too. Like his head bounced and that side would have smashed upon the rock.
“Fuck me.” Tobias breathed. “No wonder no one survives the Good God Damn training. I wouldn’t have without Draganvil, my weapon.”
“The outside of your head matches the inside of your head. Stubborn as a rock.” Plain laughed.
Tobias smiled as he dug into the food. He quickly devoured the plate. He was still hungry, he went to get seconds. Then thirds. He was finally sated after getting a second dessert.
“You remind me of a style of pottery,” Plain said suddenly. “My people never wanted to throw anything away. But pottery is easy to break.” He looked at his hands. Then he gestured to a mug on the table. “This was my mother’s mug. It was her first mug. She learned pottery by making this mug. It is said as long as you can drink from your first mug, you will never be forgotten. So, we always fix our mugs. See here.” the large finger pointed to very fine silvery and golden lines. “The mug had broken and she fixed it.”
Plain pointed at Tobias’ forearm. The same fine line wound its way all over his arm. Tobias felt a splash on his arm. He started, the giant was weeping.
“Tell me about her.” Tobias said.
“I was young when she was murdered. She had several sparks, one being foresight. She knew it was coming. She prepared me for the day.” He wiped his eyes. “She made sure to bury her notes and most important keepsakes. Made sure the men wouldn’t find them. Made sure I could find them later. This mug was one of them.”
Tobias gave the big man a rub on his shoulder. He didn’t know what to say, but it was something.
“They came for us when I was 5. I would have looked 10 to their eyes. They said she stole this boy. She said yes. I was hurt by that. Hurt for a long time.
“The men took me from our home. I am sure they did horrific things to her. I didn’t hear a sound from her, though. They burned our home. They took the money, of course.”
Plain pulled a leather bound book out of his satchel. “This was hers. She wrote about what would happen that night. What might happen to me based on what she said. She also claimed this night had happened hundreds of times. Just in different ways. It was always going to happen.”
“The echos are real.” Giggles interjected.
“Yes. She said we would meet here. That I would find a man that’s skin would shatter like our pottery. I didn’t understand. I still don’t.”
There was a scuff at the door. Tobias looked up to see Commander Lee watching them. “Time for more training. Range weapons this time. Go.”
“Which is my ‘range’ weapon?” Raven asked.
“I don’t fucking know, ask them.”
Tobias patted Plain. As he stood he said, “Don’t worry my giant friend. We’ll get to the bottom of what your mother’s journal means.”
Plain nodded in acknowledgment.
Tobias went to his bunk and grabbed his bow. He saw Giggle using the long segmented staff as his crutch as he grabbed his throwing axes.
“Ok, Epsilon, let’s get out there and practice our ranged weapons.” Tobias said, loudly, but not too loud. He smiled at Raven.
The fist went outside, Tobias had been expecting some sort of shooting range with hay targets. He was not expecting… This.
The “range” was overwhelming at first. Human and halfing sized targets. Targets flit like birds, others, rode like people on horseback. Farther back there were fantastical looking giant plants.
Some targets were blue, some where red. There was a section of the range that reminded Tobias of mock battle scenes he’d set up with twine figures. Here though, the size of the figures involved was confusing. Halfings in red with humans in blue, but shaggy bears and plants in red. All tossed together in a jumble.
“Epsilon,” Tobias called. He needed to raise his voice, because the range was roaring with battle noises. “Let’s start at the side away from the mock battle and move towards the battle. Red is bad!”
Raven grunted “I have no idea how to use this fucking thing.” She looked sharply at the long bladed staff, “Oh, you’re telling me I just flick you at a target?” She stepped forward and snapped it towards a slow moving manshaped red target. The blade launched itself from the staff and cut the target in half. The blade flew back towards her staff. Raven flinched as the blade snapped onto the staff. She struggled to hold onto the weapon. “Holy shit.”
The fist laughed. Tobias felt some tension ease from his shoulders. He didn’t even know he had clenched them. He rolled his shoulders and worked his neck.
“Epsilon, call out your target and let’s get to work!”
Dar’kid’s throwing knives seemed to continually replenish. As did Tobias’, Red’s, and Plain’s respective quivers. Giggle’s axes returned to him similarly to Raven’s blade, but he had a bit more control over when they returned.
By the time they made it to the pitched battle, they were all sweating and exhausted. Dar’kid was rubbing his arm and muttering to a throwing knife in his hand. Giggles was sitting struggling to catch his breath. He took a long swing from his canteen. Tobias felt like he could draw this bow forever. He was ready to go immediately. He recognized they needed a better plan for this, than just call out targets.
“Ok, Fist, a pitched battle is different than random targets. Any suggestions on how our weapons should be used to best protect the blue targets from the red?” Tobias asked.
“I don’t want to throw this thing anywhere near a blue. I don’t have control yet.” Raven said.
“I’m not stable enough to be sure of my accuracy, either. By my range isn’t the same as hers.” Giggle said.
“Ok, so the two of you look for Red Targets joining the fight. Laughing man, target the ones closer in, first.”
“I need really close in targets.” Dar’kid said.
“Yea, you might need to get in there close. Red and I will make sure the close in ones don’t get you or the Red Targets. What about you, big guy?”
“I’ll take anything in the air or low to the ground.”
“Alright, out goal is to save as many of the blue as we can and kill as many reds as we can. Got it?”
“Aye.” the fist answered, not as one unit, but scattered about.
“Let’s go.”