The Sea, The stars and The Void

Chapter 3

After Emerson's speech the crew quickly starts bustling about the ship doing their daily duties. Many mop the deck, some clean the canons and stack the cannon balls. Emerson asks Athena to follow him and he takes her to the training room. It's a rather larger room towards the lower deck of the ship. The room has several swords and daggers strewn all over. Many of the swords are wooden but some have actual metal blades.

Emerson shows Athena the weapons and hands her a long wooden sword. He shows her how to hold it and tells her to take a fighting stance.

Athena does her best to hold the heavy wooden sword all while standing how he instructed her. Her dress prohibits proper movement of her legs and the sword is much to heavy for her to hold so it droops.

Emerson's notes this and tells her to wait a moment and he walks to the other side of the room and rummages through some crates. When he stands up again he is holding some tan and white colored fabrics.

"Here, these will help. Your dress is going to be a problem I think. It is much too long and restricting. I know it is unladylike to wear trousers but I think that this will help until we can get you some dresses that are better for ship life." Emerson says as he hands Athena the fabric. She looks at it and nods her head hesitantly. She has never worn trousers before.

At least not just trousers. When she was a child her mother put long bloomers on under all of her dresses because she was so rambunctious that her dress often came up. But, there is much about her life she will have to change now, a little wardrobe change should be the least of her worries.

Emerson steps out of the room for a moment, allowing Athena to change. Once she removes her dress she puts on the tan colored trousers. Next, she tries to put on the white tunic but it doesn't seem to fit her properly with the corset on. So she removes the corset and slides the tunic back on. It fits much better like this.

Athena breathes deeply, allowing her stomach and chest to expand. She rarely ever goes a day without her corset. Let alone to not have one on in front of anyone other than her assistants and family.

Once she is fully dressed she folds her dress and lays it, and her corset gently on a crate in the corner. She opens the door and Emerson comes back in. As soon as he comes in goes straight back to the wooden swords and grabs a slightly shorter one and hands it to her to hold.

Athena holds the slightly lighter sword with both hands and gets in the stance she was previously told to take.

Emerson gently pushes on her back and arms to test Athena's balance and stance. Balance is strong but her stance is of bad form. This sword is still not right for her.

Finally, Emerson grabs a real metal sword that is much shorter in length. The blade is no longer than Athena's arm and is thin and light weight. "Try this one. I want to see your ability to distribute the weight of a real sword. I need to know what kind of sword will work best for you. Everyone is different."

Athena takes the sword and is shocked at how light it is. She expected it to be heavier that the wooden sword since it is metal, but she is pleasantly surprised to find just the opposite.

Athena swings the sword gracefully out to her side and up by her head, back into her stance. She smiles to herself and grips tightly onto the handle, she feels powerful and firm in her stance.

Emerson notices the change in her confidence. Her stance is much better. He nods to her and smiles, "This is the one. You are a short sword weilder. Close range combat will be your strong suit." He then grabs one of his long swords from his hip and pulls it out.

Emerson takes a different fighting stance and tells Athena to mirror what he does.

The two start the practice with simple steps, lunges and blocks. It soon becomes apparent to Emerson that Athena is either a natural at this or she has some form of training in her past. Athena starts to raise the pace and intensity of the duel.