Dark Empathy by Archibald Bradford (inspiring books for teens TXT) 📕

Amazons; “Take care of her. I’ll be pretty annoyed if you let her die.”

With that she stalked away, the circle parting to let her through as Myrina and Tiana raced to Escrya’s side.

“What was the point of this madness?!” Kaylee shouted after her.

Nina spoke without turning around.

“When she wakes up, tell her I’m okay with it.”

Nothing left to say, she left the Amazons to tend to the proven warrior.

Chapter 23:Throwing Down

After all of the interpersonal drama lately it was almost a relief for Nameless to get back to training with Kavanaugh that afternoon.

Though when Nina had caught up to them and casually filled them in on what she had been up to, sending Ophelia flying off with her medical bag, he had nearly blown it off to go to the Amazon’s side.

It had taken Volka’s calming aura to stop him, Milly and Erica from doing just that; Kavanaugh’s lessons were a supremely important facet of their training, so the warrior angel would not bend on them skipping it.

The cadets had been working with the bald instructor for a few weeks now and were making real progress in their ability to identify and counter the variety of lost-tech weapons they could potentially come up against in the field.

Their main method of combating them was actually more lost-tech, specifically a series of little canisters, each about the size of a plumb, with different coloured rings on them to identify what they were.

Every member of the Aegis was trained in the use of the three main types of grenades that modern mechanists were able to reverse engineer: red rings for light strobes, yellow for adhesive bombs, and green for stinger gas.

In his time in the wilds with Miranda Holt, Nameless had seen all three of them used at one time or another, but witnessing her handle them and handling them himself were two very different things.

Fortunately, though the monster girls in the academy didn’t attend the ‘lost-tech’ portion of Kavanaugh’s lessons, they did attend the ‘applications’ part, training with their bond-mates in simulated combat as they familiarized themselves with the non lethal tools in the Aegis arsenal.

The only exception to this was Ophelia, who would eventually be filling a non-combat roll once she completed her medic certification.

They were working in the largest of the training salles, under the close supervision of Kavanaugh and two other instructors.

The rectangular building had floors padded with brown leather throughout, with a high domed ceiling supported by numerous wooden beams and rafters.

The padding protected the occupants from the inevitable trips and tumbles, though it did little for wounded pride.

Baron’s glower would be intimidating if he wasn’t covered from his neck to his waist in goo from Ginger’s latest toss.

“Your timing’s still off.” Kavanaugh noted; “You missed him with the bulk of it, also if you’d thrown it a bit higher and you’d have suffocated him. The main concern is to catch up both of his arms, so at least you achieved that. Never forget that a perp with a free arm can still shoot someone. Now get the solvent, you have to help him out of it.”

“Do I though?” Ginger said while biting her lip.

“What?”

“Do I have to? He looks mad.”

“You think anyone you throw that shit at is going to be happy about it? He’ll get over it, now get him out cadet!” He barked.

Their focus today was on the adhesive grenades, colloquially known as goo bombs, so they weren’t practicing with the other two types of canisters.

The strobes emitted a flashing light that was disorienting and painfully blinding, while the aptly named stinger gas would easily fill the room and make breathing agony as it burned the eyes of anyone who wasn’t wearing a special mask and was also stupid enough not to seek out the nearest exit.

As Kavanaugh said, the cadets would get to experience both canisters as they neared the end of their training, in order to learn how to fight while under their effects.

The glint of amusement in his eye was telling, so none of the cadets were looking forwards to that lesson.

As for the goo bombs, with even a small application of the accompanying solvent the remarkable substance disappeared like magic, without even leaving behind any residue.

Privately, Nameless had to admit he still didn’t understand how the goo could go from a solid to a gas so readily, despite having listened intently to Kavanaugh’s description of the chemical process.

They were currently working on take downs through teamwork and everybody was participating.

Well… almost everyone.

One of the instructors was doing his level best to be patient while trying to persuade the one glaring exception.

“You think that shit is going to hold me?” Nina asked with a smirk as she spun Milly’s hat around one tiny fist; “Or are you going to try to teach me how to swing a hammer?”

“No, but...”

“You ever even been in a fight there little fella?”

The man placed his hands on his hips, tucking his clipboard under his arm and pinching the bridge of his nose as he mustered his patience against her condescending tone.

“The point of this exercise is to establish teamwork with-”

She turned towards Nameless as he worked with Erica and Milly to try to subdue Volka. The human was standing ready with a canister in hand while the two monster girls tried to corral the wily warrior long enough for him to use it.

For the purpose of the exercise she was forbidden from using her wings save for short hops, but the veteran warrior was easily putting the trio through their paces all the same.

Nina gestured towards them with the hat.

“That’s my team, we work fine. See the little guy with the big dick? He points, I squish. Simple.”

The instructor worked his