*Chapter Two*

Krystal woke the next morning wrapped around Fox's warm body. It was a comforting feeling she hadn't felt since childhood. She was glad he was still asleep, lest he choose to ruin this welcome sensation.

She knew all good things must come to an end. After an hour of enjoying his warmth, she reluctantly crawled out of bed. She was glad the only other person in her home was asleep. If anyone else found out, they'd never let her live it down.

Fox awoke not long after.

"Good morning." Fox greeted as he slowly crawled out of bed, "What are we doing today?"

"Training." Krystal answered, "It wouldn't look good if you died on your first raid here. But first, we eat."

Fox nodded as he grabbed his staff and followed her outside. After a small breakfast, Krystal took him to a small training area.

"Our first lesson is melee combat." Krystal explained as she wacked a training dummy with her staff, "These staffs are fairly cheap and can take a lot of abuse, so don't be afraid to strike with all your force."

Krystal gave the dummy a few more wacks before motioning for Fox to do the same. Fox gave the dummy a few satisfying wacks.

"Those were a good first few wacks." Krystal said as she continued her lesson, "We should work on your technique before we go over your staff's hidden features. To get the most power, you need to use your entire body. The force doesn't start at the arms or even the shoulders. It begins with the feet. Your feet start the process, your legs add force, your body adds more force, your shoulders add more force, and, finally, your arms add the final bit of force. Get the proper technique down and it'll be almost instant. Pay attention to my entire body as I do it in slow motion."

Fox stood back and watched as Krystal demonstrated the technique. Fox watched as individual muscle groups added force to the strike. It looked like a wave that started with the feet and ended at the target dummy. After Krystal stepped aside, Fox tried to replicate her technique. It wasn't the best attempt, it looked like he did less damage to the dummy, but it was a start.

"Just keep working on it." Krystal told him, "It's like a wave. Each muscle adds energy to the wave. At the start, some of that energy will cancel out. With time, you'll get the timing down and the energy from the muscles will increase the size of the wave. With practice, you could have it down by the end of the day. Not perfect, not even anywhere near as good as someone who's done it for years, but you'll have the basic timing down."

Fox spent the next few hours working on his technique. By noon, his timing was still fairly poor, but he still wound up doing more damage with the technique than without. By now, he could feel which muscles were adding power to the wave and which were still working against him.

"That's enough practice for now." Krystal told him, "We'll eat some lunch before we continue."

The pair walked to the marketplace. Krystal got the pair some fruit and some cooked meat. Fox was unfamiliar with the meat, unable to even determine if it were mammal, bird, reptile, or even fish, but it wasn't bad.

"It's time to resume our training." Krystal told Fox. For the next several hours, Krystal watched Fox work on his swing. Over time, his technique improved.

"You're certainly doing better." Krystal told him, "It's a shame the attack is in a few days. In a few weeks, you would have been better than most of our warriors."

Krystal sighed. He wouldn't get a chance to get more training than an expendable, diversionary "warrior". As it stood, they didn't have the population to train anyone to be expendable.

As she watched, Fox formulated attack plans in his head. If they were attacking an Andronian outpost, Fox could see them mounting a simple assault with minimal casualties. All it took was avoiding the machine gun nest, since Andronian soldiers weren't known for being the best shots.

A proper base, even a small one, would be more of a headache. Vital buildings would be protected by machine guns with overlapping coverage. There was also the occassional tank or two. If his Arwing wasn't grounded, he could easily take out the typical base in under a minute.

Soon, dusk came. The pair returned to Krystal's house. Krystal was impressed by his progress. Tomorrow, he'd learn about his staff's special features.