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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Ankh-Morpork Guard" data-source="post: 2065568" data-attributes="member: 10079">Chapter 162: History LessonFor six hours, they stayed in the cargo hold and practiced. Well, Akan practiced. Four of those hours composed of morphing. Back and forth through a countless number of forms. Back and forth until Akan could do it without thinking about it. Back and forth until it was natural for him. True, four hours was not nearly enough to become an expert, but it was the most time he’d spent actually focusing on anymore than just remorphing scars and such.  He still wasn’t as good as Shadow, but could at least keep up with her now without being yelled at. She figured that it was the best they could do for now, and it was definitely an improvement.    The next two hours was a more practical use of the morphing...combined with Shadow teaching him some fighting techniques. This essentially devolved into sparring, which further devolved into a game of ‘you can’t hit me, but I can’t hit you!’.    Now they stood opposite one another. Akan had remorphed the scratch that had gone across his face, while Shadow had just finished remorphing the hand his thrumming lightsaber had lopped off as payment. The lightsaber was considered fair play, surprisingly enough...and Shadow didn’t mind. It was another challenge to avoid and he was much more predictable when he was using that anyway. Not that she was going to tell him that just yet. Maybe after they were done.    “Something’s been bothering me,” Akan spoke up suddenly, the first words that had been spoke in a few hours beyond explicatives and instructions. When Shadow stopped looking like she was about attempt to maul him again, he asked, “How is it that you can just remorph a limb? I mean, Ket...Ket had a stub for a tail. Couldn’t he have just fixed it?”    “It only works to a point,” Shadow said, stretching a little and taking the moment to rub a few achy limbs, “If you wait too long, its irreparable. Of course, it doesn’t happen too often...you’re usually dead in a situation like that.”    “And I assume he was in a situation like that?” asked Akan carefully, feeling through the link how touchy of a subject Ket was. Especially after Nar Shaddaa.    Shadow nodded simply, “Marix...I...did it. By our culture, loss of a tail is loss of one’s honour. When it happened though, it was a more frantic situation. I still don’t know why I didn’t just kill him there. It was before Marix...I...whatever, left. He and I were on a mission together, off in Mrrakesh space. He...was playing both sides. We were ambushed and he turned on me. I killed the attackers only because we were lucky enough that they were young. If they’d been any older, they would have torn me apart. I should have killed Ket, too, but...well...you know by now that Tam-Day-U are not meant to feel. Judgement was clouded and humiliating him seemed to be the correct thing to do. I took nearly all of his tail and made sure he saw it before knocking him unconscious and leaving him for dead.”    “Ah...” Akan trailed off, not have expected such a long answer. He thumbed off his lightsaber and suddenly found the silence that the lack of the humming sound was unnerving. So, he resorted to an old standby, “So we shouldn’t expect him to provide us with dinner next time we see him?”    “Oh, he’ll provide dinner,” Shadow grumbled, noting Akan’s sarcasm but ignoring it for the moment, “But expect poison or something worse. Probably something worse.”    A silence then hung in the air of the cargo bay. It didn’t last long, and it was Shadow who broke it, saying seriously, “Listen, Akan, I don’t even know if we can get to the Hidden Worlds. Technically, I should be killed the second I enter the territory again. And even if we do get in...this isn’t going to be like anything you’ve ever experienced. Ket wants revenge. For what I did, for what my mother did...for what all of the Alraxian Empire did. Or at least, what he thinks we did. Those droids he has...those things we fought. They’re the perfect weapon for wiping out my...our people. Sure, you and I can fight them to a point, but we are anomalies among Alraxians. Our race are peaceful people. Except for the small force of defense soldiers, the Empress’ personal guard, and the Tam-Day-U, no Alraxians have any idea what to do in a fight. A real fight, at least.”    She paused and sighed, looking to the X-Wing that was behind Akan a moment, “The Imperial Defense soldiers are glorified border guards. They’ve never dealt with anything more than simple pirates who don’t use weapons and petty theft. The Empress’ guard are just that...her’s. There aren’t enough to protect anyone else. And the Tam-Day-U...we...we don’t exist. Even if we did, the people would not want us to fight for them.”    “So its you and me against Ket, Nine, and a handful of his droids?” Akan asked off hand, not liking where this was going at all. They’d been up against some bad odds before...but then they’d had help. Friends. Now it felt so alone...    But Shadow shook her head, “I have a bad feeling that its worse than that. Ever since I left him for dead, he’s had connections with the Mrrakesh. Probably long before that, too, but its not worth thinking about. He couldn’t have taken a huge compliment of those droids with him onboard Loki. That would only hold enough to take a couple of planets. We may not have considerable training, but if backed into a corner, most Alraxians can at least bear their claws and put up a fight. Either way, its just not enough troops to take down the entire Empire with.”    So that’s where this was going. Akan sighed, skipping ahead and just asking the necessary question, “What kind of standing army do the Mrrakesh have?”    Shadow ran a hand through her hair nervously, not looking like she wanted to answer it. He gave her a mental nudge through the link and she gave in, “The Mrrakesh are to Alraxians what Alraxians are to Humans. Stronger, faster, bigger...maybe not smarter, but that’s dependent on the individual anyway. You have to understand, a single adult Mrrakesh can easily kill three times his number in Tam-Day-U without help. That isn’t even counting the Mrrakesh as a soldier. They always have a large standing army. The only thing that keeps them from invading the Empire and enslaving us are the alliances with the other major races. But throw Ket into the mix with his droids and it imbalances everything.”    Akan didn’t even mention the possibility that they were already too late. That just wasn’t an option at this point. He wasn’t even doing this to protect the Alraxian Empire. Sure, it was important to do, but he knew barely anything about them. Instead, he had to do this as a sort of penance. For his arrogance and stupidity that caused the death of the Voorts. Of his friends.    And then, suddenly, a sharp pain ripped through him. It was like nothing he’d felt before...it wasn’t from anything external. It was inside him. Burning. Aching. Ripping at his insides. He opened his mouth to yelp but couldn’t even make a noise. The pain was so intense that his vision went from hot white, to black, then to nearly every other colour possible. He barely even felt himself hit the deck, though the noise echoed loudly through his ears. Gritting his teeth and trying to breathe, stop the pain, or just something, Akan could see Shadow hit the ground in front of him...looking about the same. And it kept getting stronger. Stronger and strong until it hurt to think...it hurt to do anything...and defying all logic, it hurt to hurt.Shadow tried to inhale, to breathe, but it wasn’t any good. Instead of air, it seemed like she only brought in more pain. More intense, hot pain. From where?! What was going on?! Fighting through the intense pain which was arcing all through her body in every way imaginable, Shadow tried desperately to find the source. But there wasn’t a reason! They weren’t sick, neither of them had pushed themselves too far and that still didn’t make sense for something like this!! And then a thought flicked through her mind. A thought that Marix latched onto and tried to feed through the link to Akan. But she couldn’t find a way to do it, for once. Her mind ached as much as everything else.    With the strong force of will to ignore the intense pain that was added into everything else, Shadow managed to find her voice...though it was pained and hard to understand, “Ak...nn!! Breathe!! Just...arrrrgh! Brea-arrgh! Growing-nnnn...couple more...ahhh! More...more hours...argh...just...breathe!”    And then, following her own words, she forced herself to breathe. Forced it in a way that hurt even more. Her eyes couldn’t see anymore, and distantly, she could hearing wailing. Whether it was her’s or not, she couldn’t tell anymore. The pain was too intense. The pain that every single Alraxian eventually ran into and had to fight through.    And if it didn’t kill them...</blockquote>

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