Emissary (Book 1)

Friends

"What the hell," I cried out as I fell to the ground on my back.

Peter ran to me and tried to help me stand up, "How did he throw you to the ground so fast?" He asked.

"Well thank you for your concern my friend," I was in pain. Not from my back but from the dizziness in my head as a result of my complete and uncontrollable flip in the air.

"You'll survive," Peter replied, "but how the hell did he make you fly like that?"

"Why don't you go and ask him yourself?" I snapped at my friend who I was leaning on for support, "maybe he can show you what he did."

"Oh no thanks," Peter said as I returned limping to where we were sitting in a circle surrounding our new instructor.

"I would like you to meet your new teacher," Chief Daii Mustafa said pointing at a short yellow man with yellow skin wearing a matching yellow shirt and yellow trousers.

"This is master Yang, your new instructor," the Chief said. "Master Yang is from China and he will be teaching you new combat techniques without using any weapons of sorts." The chief should have warned me before I volunteered to fight this puny guy.

"As you can see from this demonstration Master Yang will teach you to defend yourselves even when you are not armed," the chief explained, "he will also teach you how to kill your enemies with a single blow or render them defenseless as you saw happen with John."

"Unfortunately master Yang's Arabic is not so good so you will have to be patient in his class," the Daii explained.
"But how will we communicate with Master Yang?" Peter was stupid enough to ask.

"When you're on your back like your friend there then you'll know when you haven't been following his instructions." The chief replied and Peter shut his mouth up.

Master Yang's classes proved to be very interesting as well as very painful. But after a few months we managed to spend less time flipping in the air or sprawling on our backs. Few of us excelled in these lessons and I was one of those but at a great cost to my bones structure and my self esteem.

"What the hell happened to you?" Mistress Maria cried out in horror as I came into her house. I could barely open one of my eyes and my right arm was wrapped in a sling to hold it in place. Master Yang had showed us a new technique to disarm a knife wielding opponent. Unfortunately my arm was in the way. The black eye was from the day before. Another result of my lack of concentration against a fellow student. But I could not miss my weekly lesson with the Mistress even if I had to crawl on my hands and knees to get to her.

"Sit, sit, before you fall to the ground," she yelled at me, "how the hell am I supposed to teach you boys anything if the Chief keeps sending you to me in pieces?" She exclaimed and that is when the girls came into the room.

"Aaaaa," Joel screamed and Luna laughed.

"Hurry Girls," the mistress shouted, "let's treat this man's wounds before he dies on us." And the girls ran to either side of me and helped me lie down on the cushions.

"Who did this to you?" Joel asked. I can see she was about to cry in my arms. I didn't know if she was really concerned or she was acting that time. Joel was a great actor but I liked her company and we grew to be good  friends for a long time to come. Luna held her hand to her mouth trying to hide her giggles but she couldn't help herself. She wasn't a good actor.

"Luna," the mistress said, "go and get water and some ointment to put on his eyes," and the girl sprang to obey.

"I am sorry mistress," I apologized, "I don't know if I can hold the Oud in my hand today."