Lost Kingdoms, Lost Hearts, Chapter 6: Combat Training 101
Sora learns how to speak with his fists...
I don't own Kingdom Hearts (Yet...) Final Fantasy or Disney so on and so forth.
"WAKEY WAKEY SHORT STUFF!" an overly eager voice erupted out of knowhere and caused Sora to almost have a heart attack as he shot out of his bed.
After wiping his baby blue eyes he stared at the shape that was blocking the light in the doorway. Stood there with no signs of fatigue was Tifa in black sweat pants and a white t-shirt, beaming at him and pulling her gloves on her hands as tightly as possible.
"What? Whats happening?" Sora mummbled out as he checked the time which was 07:03 am.
"Time for your combat training" She said as she stretched her arms and flexed her fingers.
"At seven in the morning?" He groaned as he stretched his own arms.
"Master Yen Sids orders, besides your going have to get used to getting up a random times if your gonna be part of this team, we never know when a new mission is going to pop up"
"Alright give me a minute, let me get dressed" He said as he slummped his legs over the edge of his matress.
"You got ten minutes, then I'm coming in and dragging you out" she winked before she left the room and closed the door.
Sora gave a massive yawn and stood up, flexing his toes and stretching his body to waken his still relaxed muscles.
He stared around his new room as he swayed were he stood, still not completely awake. Said room was quite big, it had light blue walls and a white ceiling, his bed was positioned at one end of the room, the door only afew meters away from it. The wall oposite his bed had his wardrobe and desk against it as well as a book case and little couch, on the desk sat a computer and a small fern like plant. Next to the door was a lamp that gave of an ambient and soothing light, and next to that a television hanging on the wall. Opposite the TV was another small couch against one of the two large glass doors that led out to Sora's favourite part of his room; his balcony.
He pulled back the translucent white curtains and opened the glass door and stepped out to see a waking Traverse Town, and Sora hadn't noticed how high up his room was, he could see for miles around.
He looked to see if he could find the cafe him, Riku and Kairi went to the night before, but to no avail, he was too high up.
He breifly recalled the events of last night and smiled to himself as he remembered how the three of them got home barely awake and they guided him to his room, looking out of his balcony breifly before he climbed into bed.
He walked back inside and saw the time was now 07:09, and he only had 4 minutes to get changed.
He quickly ran to his wardrobe (which he found cloths and pyjamas in the night before) and pulled out a yellow t-shirt with a smiley face on, a black hoodie and some dark grey shorts and got dressed. He pulled on his big yellow shoes before running out of the door.
Tifa was stood in the hallway taking to an old friend of Sora's.
She had long black hair held back with a headband and green eyes. She was dressed in a white-sleeved blouse with teal at the waist of it. She also wore a long purple skirt, and had some black flat pump shoes on her feet.
"Hello Esmeralda" Sora said as he approached the two women.
"Sora!" the gypsy girl cheered and skipped over to Sora and embraced him into a hug.
"I heard you were back"
"Yeah only for like a day though" he said and they were soon joined by Tifa. After a very breif conversation between the three, Esmeralda was about to leave.
"I'm sorry I can't stay and talk more but I'm on a mission today, but we'll catch up sometime okay?" She smiled and with her usual elegance skipped down the hall waving as she did.
Sora and Tifa shouted a goodbye after her and then made their way around the circuler corridoor and stepped into the elevator. Sora had realised that his room was on the 157th floor. Tifa had pushed the key button labled number 6.
With the floors being so close to each other the elevator ride was only about a minute long and they stepped out into another circular hallway. They walked past a series of doors, Sora had noticed all of which had a boxing glove like shape on them followed by a number.
Sora and Tifa stopped at number seven. Tifa pulled out a key and opened the door into a pitch black room. As soon as the two walked in the lights turned on and Sora saw the rooms true nature.
The room looked like a dojo, with a giant matt in the centre of the floor. in the furthest corner of the room was a table with several plates and drinking glasses on it and Sora followed Tifa over to it.
"Come on lets eat" she said and the two tucked in to some toast and orange juice that had been prepared.
The two sat chatting whilst they ate their food and before long Sora had been ordered to stand on one end of the matt whilst Tifa stood at the other.
"Sora although you proved to have competent skills yesterday, Master Yen Sid has still asked me to train you" She said sternly, Sora suprised that he could hear her despite the sizeable gap between them.
"Today I'm going to train you on what will probabley be the most hand-to-hand combat you'll need to learn" She continued.
Sora pulled a puzzled face a he wondered to himself why he would need to learn hand-to-hand combat when he had his Keyblade and Tifa seemed to pick up on this.
"I bet your wondering why you need to learn this when you have your Keyblade, but still... it never hurts to be able to fend off foes with your hands and feet in case you some how manage to lose your weapon, or you dont have time to draw it out okay?" She said and her face was the most serious Sora had ever seen it. He gulped and nodded and a slight smile appeared on her face.
"Okay then, were going to start with dodgeing and blocking, which is straight forward enough, I'm gonna come at you and all you have to do is dodge if not block my attacks okay?" She asked as she prepared a battle stance. Sora nodded once again and got into his own stance.
"Just a quick warning before we start, I'm gonna go easy on you but I'm not gonna completely hold back either" She grinned and with that she ran forward with great speed and after a few steps she leapt in the air and raised her leg high, ready to slam it down.
Sora panicked as she got closer, he had no idea what to do, almost as if all of his previous battle experiences had vanished from his memory.
In the last few possible moments he acted on reflex and quickly jumped out of the way, Tifa was fast though and no sooner had she landed with her dropped foot she kicked out to her side with the other, kicking Sora back.
"Ugh!" he groaned, as he rubbed his side, He knew she was holding back, if she hadn't Sora would've been through a wall, but her blows hadn't lost any of their potency.
He shook of the hit and dodged another kick or two before being struck again and falling on his back. He sat up and rubbed his head and was suprised when Tifa held out a hand to help him up.
"Not bad, but you have to be faster than that, you need to predict what your opponnent would do next and analyse how they fight" She said as she pulled him up, but she didn't let go of his hand. Instead she flung him round and kicked him in the back as she said, "But dont let your guard down... ever"
Sora whinced in pain but was able to roll with the blow and position himslef upright again, spinning round to dodge a flying kick and block another kick form her other foot.
He hopped back and made some distance between them, but she was fast and had covered most of the distance in less than half the time it had taken him to make it.
She stopped herself a few inches away from Sora and began to do a series of spinning hook kicks, swapping feet with each kick as she edged a bit close to Sora and maintained her balance, after about the ninth kick Sora rolled under her latest attack and ran away from her as he tried to think up a plan.
He ran to the edge of the room but Tifa had leapt over and landed in front of him, and in a matter of seconds had launched a kick that sent him toppling backwards.
Sora whinced in pain again as he clutched the area of pain and thought of a plan. He thought about what she'd said before 'Predict what your oppenent would do next' 'analyse how they fight'.
Sora made as much distance between them as he could despite that Tifa was able to level those distances in the time it took him to make them.
He thought hard about what to do before she launched her next kick, Then he realised something and smirked to himself, so far Tifa has only been attacking with kicks, seldom useing her hands.
Sora skidded to a stop and turned in time to deflect a power kick with his hands, he watched her feet to see what she would do next and blocked another kick from the left, she retaliated by kicking with the same leg but at a diferent angle which Sora was able to deflect again.
He decided to try his luck and whilst he was deflecting a kick away from him he used one of his own feet to trip up her lone standing leg.
It worked and Tifa fell, only to stop herself by placing both hands on the floor and lifting her body above her, splitting her legs in mid air and through the turning of her hands spun her self around like a propeller.
Sora was able to block one of the propeller kicks and back away from the range of the rest. Tifa flipped herself back onto her feet and ran towrds Sora who watched her feet. He was suprised when he felt the impact of a fist on his cheek, followed by another and then a kick to his stomach which he was only just able to swerve so that in only scraped him.
He balanced himself back up and prepared him self to block. He deflected a kick and was once again shocked to feel another punch that sent him into a 90 degree spin. He felt Tifa grab the hood of his hoodie and was tossed into the air, and came crashing onto the mat which only just cushioned the worst of the blow.
He staggered back up, gasping for breath as he stared at Tifa who was cricking her neck and rotating her shoulder blades before taking another battle stance.
Sora noted that she had started using punches and throws, blending them with kicks and leaps. He would have to fight even harder now and wondered how much tougher she would get.
He prepared a battle stance, one suitable for blocking and waited. He gasped as Tifa had crossed about ten meters in 1 second and had a hand on his shoulder. she turned her head ever so slightly before lifting him up and slamming him into the ground.
Sora was able to use a hand to support himself and with a kick knocked her back a bit, as he rolled out of the way. The moment he stood up she was attacking again this time she led with a punch, which Sora was able to block with his arms, she followed with a sweeping kick meant to knock Sora of his feet, but Sora easily hopped over it.
He soon realised this was a distraction when he saw a fist creeping past his line of vision and caught it in mid strike, grabbing her arm with his other hand and flinging her away.
Once again with inhuman speed she was up close to him launching a punch that missed Sora by a few cm's, followed by an uppercut that Sora only just leaned back to avoid.
She fired one more punch that only just hit Sora's left shoulder, making him stagger back a little and unleashed a flurry of face level kicks, switching feet to keep him of guard.
Of what must have been eleven kicks only two landed, and as she regained her stance she began to start punching with more speed than she had before, Sora kept hopping back narrowly avoiding each punch, until he found himself backed up against a wall, ducking just in time to dodge a punch that made a large crack in the wall.
Sora rolled underneath her and leapt up turning as he landed so he was facing her in a defensive stance.
Tifa however was standing up straight and smiled at him.
"Time for a half hour break, we've been at this for two hours now" she said walking over to the table.
"Really it's been two hours already?" Sora asked in shock.
"Yeah, and your doing really well, better than Riku even" she said as she bit into an apple.
Sora smiled to himself as he imagined himself outdoing Riku.
"Next your gonna start fighting back okay, you can block pretty well so lets focus on you actually using your fists to do some damage" She smiled.
They sat and chatted for half an hour, Tifa already giving him pointers and advice on how to attack, she said they would do twelve hours worth of training taking half an hour breaks every two hours for a total of fifteen hours in the dojo.
When Tifa said, the two stood up again and stood on opposite sides of the mat, staring each other down for a few moments and thinking of the best way to attack.
As expected Tifa was the first to move with her usual inhuman speed, as she ran she bounded forwards tiltilng to one side in mid air rolling with her legs spread outwards to deliver kicks.
Sora blocked them as they hit, launching a punch that Tifa doged as she placed her feet down, quickly retaliating with her own fist, which was blocked and shoved to one side by Sora. Straight afterwards Tifa spun as her hand was knocked out the way with her elbow stretched out so it hit Sora in the jaw as she spun into him.
Sora recuperated by leaning back on his hands and pushing himself in the air so he was horizontal in the air, and spun round slamming his his legs in Tifa's direction. His attack caught Tifa of guard as Sora heard several grunts of pain from her direction.
He slipped as he landed on his feet and fell back, but he was able to do a backwards roll to recover.
Tifa ran at him again launching several punches at high speeds, Sora managing to block every single one and was about to launch a kick himself, but he was to slow as Tifa did a somersault kick that sent him toppling backwards.
Whilst still in midair Tifa had caught up and grabbed him by his hoodie and was moments from slamming him into the ground, until Sora used Tifa's arm to flip himself over and kick her in the face making her drop him and recoil in pain.
No sooner had Sora landed had Tifa done a spinning bird kick, followed by her hand tossing herself up in the air flipping herself upright and slamming down into the ground with her fist, making the room shake.
Sora was barely able to dodge each attack and responded with a roundhouse kick and when his foot landed he leaned forward and delivered a punch that sent Tifa backwards again.
She responded by spinning around with her leg outstretched so it slammed into Sora's side make him cry out in pain.
Tifa went to tackle him to the ground but Sora rolled back as she fell upon him and grabbing her hands before they could grab him used his legs to kick her up in the air and over him.
He watched her as he got up and she landed gracefully on the ground.
She ran at him again and launched a high kick with her right leg, Sora ducked and moved in closer, his elbow in front of him aimed at her exposed stomach.
What he didn't notice was Tifa's foot had stopped directly above him when he had ducked and she slammed it down, Sora realised to late to react and he was smashed face down into the ground.
He felt the warm fluid of his blood trickle out of his nose, and Tifa gasped as he stood up, and looked worried.
Sora shrugged the pain off and knew he had to get tougher, he couldn't let an injury like this stop him, not if he wanted to keep protecting his friends. He gestured to Tifa he was okay to carry on and she nodded and prepared her stance again.
Sora was the first to move this time momentarily catching Tifa by suprise as he launched several punches, all of which Tifa dodged or blocked and threw in a few kicks, only one of which hit.
Tifa spun a leg round barely missing Sora before slamming a palm into Sora's chest making him skid backwards, she quickly followed up with a kick to the stomach that sent Sora flying into a wall.
He got back up despite the aching in his body and met Tifa head on, kicking and punching as best he could, trying to find a way around her defences. He repeated Tifa's early kick hoping it would slam into her side.
He was suprised when she caught it under her arm, gripping it tightly between her arm and ribs, her other hand grabbing the underside of his knee with an iron grip and swung him around by 90 degrees letting go at a precise moment so he was flung across the room.
"Okay time for another break" She said and ran up to Sora placing a hand on his face.
"Cure" she said and her hand began to glow a pale green and Sora felt the spell start to heal his nose.
"Has it really been another two hours?" He asked the concentrating Tifa.
"Yep, it's surprising isn't it? How quickly time goes by when your fighting"
After fixing his nose, she went and fetched a towel and dabbed up the blood. The two sat down again and began to massage themselves and loosen up their muscles.
"Your doing really well" Tifa said whilst massaging her calf.
"Thanks, how much have I learn't?" Sora asked whilst applying pressure to the base of his spine.
"Quite a lot, a few more hours and you should be an expert, then we'll just fight for several hours so everything you've learned will become second instinct" She beamed.
Sora smiled to himself as he was proud of how much he'd accelled. They tucked into a bag of potato chips and Sora learned more about the resistence, such as that in the Pride Lands, Simba had united all of the other Lion clans and had as pride of about 60 or more members, and that Rafiki would comunicate with the tower every day.
"Ready to go again?" Tifa asked, tightening her gloves.
"You bet" Sora grinned and ran over to his side of the mat.
The two sparred for hours, pushing each other to do better, be faster and stronger, and eventually just like Tifa said, it became second nature to Sora. Every now and again, they'd land a hit against one another, but even then it was easily shrugged off.
During their sparring time they were bought water and soup to enjoy for lunch and later, as the hours grew darker they ate pizza and fries that had been bought up by several of the magic brooms of Disney Castle.
It was the last fifteen minutes of their training, both were getting rather tired having done nearly twelve whole hours of fighting.
Sora was incrdibly confident and determined to out-do Tifa in combat at least once before they finished, they ran at each other fists raised, Sora swung first, Tifa easily ducked to avoid it, following with an upercut that Sora leaned back to avoid followed by another punch aimed for his stomach, but Sora swirved out of the way just in time.
He did a spinning kick that Tifa blocked with her arms. With all his strength he heaved his only standing leg so that it went over Tifa's arms, which were still blocking his other leg, until it was about to slam down on Tifa's head.
At the last possible moment she moved one of her arms so it was above her, effectively blocking the second kick.
Reacting fast, whilst Sora was still in mid air, he rolled, lifting his legs off of Tifa and landing away from her. No sooner had he landed had she kicked out against him, Sora stepping back just in time to dodge it, and ducking moments before she spun round with another kick, evading it.
Sora went to tackle her whilst she only had one leg for support but as he did she leaned back and flipped herself over kicking as she did, her foot missing Sora's nose by millimeters.
Sora was quickly able to push himself back up before Tifa stomped down on him. Before he could stand upright properly Tifa had leaned forward and decked him with a fist in the cheek, causing Sora to hurtle back.
As he spun round he saw Tifa running towards him and decided now was the time to strike, faking the last spin he spun round with his leg out and struck Tifa, and struck her on the torso several times before she could recover.
Just as he was about to deliver a punch that would have knocked her down, she caught the fist with one hand, and with her tight grip yanked him towards her, her other hand already curled into a fist punching him when he was close enough.
The punch made Sora turn 180 degrees and stumble forwards. He felt a series of kicks to his back sides with one final power kick that sent him tumbling forward.
Sora was barely able to roll with the punch and once he regained his stance ran towards a panting Tifa and leapt forward at her with his leg outstretched hoping to deliver a flying kick.
Tifa rolled at the last minute underneath him and as he landed Tifa delivered a powerful drop kick before Sora could turn to face her.
Sora just fell forward and collapsed on the mat panting for his breath and cradling his shoulder. He frowned slightly when he realised there were some moves Tifa would't be able to teach him that would always make her an incredible hand to hand combatant.
But he also smiled when he realised he must be a good fighter to make Tifa pull out her best moves.
"TIIIIIIMES UP" She cheered and gave a slight hop before walking over to Sora and helping him up.
"You are really good" she complimented, still panting herself.
"Thanks but I didn't stand a chance against those last few moves you used" he said reffering to the drop kick and series of kicks before that.
"I would teach you that stuff but... I wouldn't really know how, its such advanced stuff, plus you need the right levels of balance, focus, strenght and speed" she said as she headed towards the table grabbing a towel and bottle of water.
"Sounds difficult, beyond my skill I'm guessing" he said mimicing her.
"Yeah, sorry about that" She said but Sora laughed it off and both agreed Tifa was a master of hand-to-hand combat.
They both left the room and Tifa locked the door. They walked down the hall way and stepped into the lift were Tifa informed him of what would happen tomorrow.
"I think tomorrrow you'll meet with Merlin to learn and practice with new spells" She said leaning against the elevator wall.
"I thought you taught magic as well?"
"I do, but I have a mission tomorrow, besides Merlin was the one who taught you before, so he knows exactly how to teach you" she smiled.
Sora smiled back a he remebered the kindly wizard and how he trained him with his living furniture.
The door went ping and Sora stepped out, Tifa seemed to be going to a lower floor.
He followed the arrows down the hall that led him to the shower, and sighed in releif as the hot water soothed the remaining aches that Tifa hadn't healed afer their session.
He wraped himself in a towel and walked down the hall way, saying high to Aladdin and Vaan who passed him, still in their civilian clothing and went into his room.
He dried his hair as much as he could before changed into his pyjamas and climbed back into bed, letting out an even bigger sigh of releif as his body was absorbed into the soft spongy matress.
His eyes were staring out of a gap between his curtains at the hue of light from the town below him, before sleep took over him and he began to snore softly, awaiting the next day.
Hmmm I have mixed feelings about this chapter, I enjoyed writing the combat parts but I just hope you guys didn't find it too boring. Please let me know R&R all views and opinions welcome, if it's good yay, and if not then, oh well constructive critisism :) Until next time The-Mighty-Marvelite-Phoenix.
Next Chapter; Magic with Merlin...