The Shape of Things to Come (Hypernaturals 15)

Lesson

When Morgan and I practiced pitching, we tried all kinds of things. Deeply frustrating things, at first. Even when one of the people doing it is one of the smartest people you ever met, when you are watching a video of a human pitching, it does not map to a Vampire. Not completely. Our musculature has to be compensated for. Pitching successfully is not only about ball control, but how much power is put into the rotation and the velocity. You can make the ball into a damn gyroscope, but that does not make it curve enough if it is thrown too hard. A bullet spins, but it flies mostly straight.

To make the ball curve in flight at a particular place, we had to throw it slower. Find the spin versus velocity ratios that work for us. Once we figured it out, we did a lot better and had fun with it. Flying gyroscopes.

After all that practice and work on throwing the ball well, we learned today is that while Vampires are playing by these particular rules, it's a hitters game, not a pitcher's one. Even without Morgan and my hyper-time capabilities, Vampires have far better hand-eye than humans. As I was able to do with Victoria, it did not matter what she threw to me. I could slow it down and watch it and plan my reaction to it. Standard issue Vampires can't do that, but they are quick to respond to a given throw. Throw in one fastball, and maybe it gets by. The second time, it's gone.

We borrowed a human stadium for this, so even after moving around some of the lines, we are still playing inside human capabilities in terms of the field. To do this right we really need a field at least twice these dimensions with a much higher outfield wall. The bats should be skinner. The balls softer to absorb more power. Maybe five outfielders too.

To Vampires this is more or less the same as a game of slow-pitch softball is for adult human professional athletes.

The first batter up to face me is Yvonne. The other 'Y'. The other Vampire I know who is physically more powerful than Jessica because she works out like a fiend with her buddy Yolanda. It occurred to me that putting both of the 'Y's on the same team is stacking the deck. This is not supposed to be competitive, but Victoria has both 'Y's on her team?

Maybe to get all my friends and family on my team it just worked out that way. Seems suspicious though. Luciana agreed to the lineups, and this is not a competition in theory so I will waste no worry about it.

As long as Yvonne does not drill the ball through me when she hits it. I made myself mentally ready to dive.

Normally being up against this much brute strength, physical prowess, and downright athletic capability would be scary for a pitcher. A connection between the bat and the ball would almost certainly be a home run. Yvonne is going to have to chill her strength to keep it in the park. I am sure she will have no issue with that. She is the ultimate in Vampire athletes. The elitist of the elite.

I gave her a standard fastball, nothing fancy. Not even my fastest. I did not want her to see me winding up extra hard. I figured with her power, and a hard thrown ball would be more difficult for her to control. One nice thing about being the weaker sex is being unexpected. Using speed to compensate for power. Rolling through the arc of the throw and placing it exactly where I wanted very quickly. To Hele's point during training: I can now treat the baseball like a knife. I am really good with knives.

It was unexpected for Yvonne. She saw me fight Hitomi even but did not generalize that idea to me being able to learn how to do this. It is also likely that Victoria told them I was going to suck at this because I don't want to be here. A classic mistake. Not wanting to do a thing is not equal to not being able to master it. Especially not when I have my family on my side helping me.

Yvonne's bat broke when she smacked it out to deep right field. She was a little behind the pitch and compensated with speeding up her swing and her using more latent power than she meant to. The ball rebounded off the right field wall just below the yellow line, took a hop, and landed in Crystal's glove (the current right fielder), who whirled the ball quickly into second and stopped the hit from being a double.