The Return of the Queens

Chapter 14

A few days later Thea was finally going to start to train Barbara to defend herself. Thea had Barbara meet her at another warehouse in the Glades so that the training would be in private. They were both in their workout clothes when they arrived, so it didn't take them to long to begin the training.

"Ok, so before we start, I would like to know what you want to get out of this?" Thea asked.

"I want to be able to defend myself. I have been watching you for the past couple of weeks and it made me think, "I wish I could take care of myself like that." Barbara said.

"Ok, are you just doing this for your protection or is it because you want to be out there with us?" Thea asked.

"Although it would be awesome to be out there with the team, right now I am just in this for myself." Barbara said.

"That's good enough for me. I think that it would be good to teach you some ways to take care of yourself. Felicity could use this too, but she needs one on one training, and so do you." Thea said.

"Yeah, I think it would take us twice as long with her here because she would be questioning everything. No offense, but she can't just let things be, she needs to know why everything is being done where I am like just do what they say and trust them." Barbara said.

"It's good to have questions, but not too many." Thea said.

"Ok, so let's get started." Thea said as they got on the training mat that Thea had set up.

"We are going to start with some hand to hand combat training. I will show you the move then I want you to do what I do." Thea said and Barbara nodded as they were working on basic moves for about an hour and it looked like she had most of that down.

"So, what do we do now?" Barbara asked.

"Now I am going to attack you and see how good you can do when someone is coming at you." Thea said and Barbara nodded.

Thea came at her with punches and kicks and she could tell that Barbara was getting overwhelmed with her speed, so she decided to stop for a minute and give her a chance to regroup.

"You did pretty good for the first time. You just got a little overwhelmed at the end." Thea said.

"Yeah, I just couldn't keep up with you. I don't know, I guess I just got worn out near the end there." Barbara said.

"Makes since. It was only your first time. You will get quicker and you will also get to where your endurance is better as well." Thea said.

"So, what now?" Barbara asked.

"We do that again for a couple of more rounds." Thea said and Barbara nodded.

They went a couple of more rounds with the basics and then they went for a three-mile run to help with the endurance. When they were done with that, they came back to the warehouse and changed and then they both went to the lair in the basement of Oliver and Thea's club.

"So, now that you two are here, we can go and patrol the city now." Oliver said.

"Sounds good. I will go change into my suit." Thea said.

When she was done, the team went out on patrol. There wasn't much going on that night. Just a couple of mugging. When the team got back to the lair, everyone changed out of their suits and Sara and Laurel decided that they were going to train a little, so it left Oliver and Thea being able to talk for a few minutes.

"So, where were you this afternoon?" Oliver asked.

"I was at another warehouse in the Glades teaching someone some self-defense." Thea said.

"Oh, who is your student?" Oliver asked.

"I am not supposed to say anything, but Barbara asked me for help a couple of days ago, so I decided to help her." Thea said.

"Makes since that she would want to protect herself while coming into the Glades every night. Let me know if you need any help." Oliver said.

"I will. She is actually picking everything up pretty fast. We have only worked on some basics though." Thea said and Oliver nodded.

Sara and Laurel were still sparring on the workout mat when Laurel turned around and said, "I think you two need to get in on this as well. You know they say you always need to train so you don't lose your edge."

"Good point. The two of you against me then." Oliver said.

The two girls worked as a team to try and take Oliver down. He was blocking just about everything that they threw at him. The girls finally wore out, so they needed a break.

"You were both thinking well, you just need to find a way to make your opponent be off guard. It usually means that when you double team someone, you need to go at the person when they are focused on the other person that they are fighting." Oliver said.

"So, you mean that one of us needs to go up and start fighting and let the other one attack while he is distracted?" Sara asked.

"Yeah, it works most of the time because when the person goes for the block, the other person can come up from behind to hit the bad person and when they turn around to take down the one that just hit them, the other one gets them from behind. If you do it right it, you shouldn't be able to be stopped." Thea said.

"Makes since. We need to work on that some more so that we have experience with it." Laurel said.

"We will work on it more tomorrow. For now, let's head home and relax for a little while. Then we can come back and start fresh tomorrow." Oliver said as the team all changed into their regular clothes and left the lair.