Author's Note: Any chance of a review? An alert? Just anything to say people are actually reading this?
Shadow watched quietly as the four fought, their technique – in his opinion – sloppy, their speed sluggish, their awareness almost nonexistant. Quieter than a breath he moved amongst them, his own shadow never passing into their view or across their bodies so as to tip off his presence, doubtless their opponents saw him but that did not matter.
The first he killed by sweeping her feet from under her, a knife ending up lodged in her chest, the second – the first's opponent – took a foot to the jaw followed by a fatal punch to the chest, it was a favourite of his, he'd nicknamed it 'The Heartstopper'. The other two had stopped fighting and were watching him, with a surprising coordination to them they attacked simultaneously.
Shadow ducked the first blade and grabbed the second in his hand before bringing the other open-handed against the wooden blade, it splintered leaving a broke stub. Shadow grabbed the one who's blade he'd broken and pulled him around into the path of the fourth's blade. The result was fatal. The fourth dropped his blade, smartly acknowledging it as a liability against such a fighter. He changed it a combat stance, one foot slightly forwards, feet shoulder width apart, hands out in front, his left hand leading, the same hand as the forwards foot – a foolish indication of his fighting preferences, the hands were open their fingers splayed slightly. This was a fighter who excelled at grappling and throwing. Shadow took all this in then completely disregarded it. His fist connected with the fourth's jaw hard enough to lift him off his feet, he hit his head on the way down.
Shadow turned and walked back to his seat as the four he'd 'killed' slowly got back up or in the case of one and four were brought back to consciousness through a bucket of water kept at the side of the dojo for just that purpose.
"That was terrible. Ash you need to be more aware. Dan you were completely offguard when I was finished with Ash. Sally your swings are too wild and Nick, while you were smart enough to ditch the blade you were too slow to even try and block and you give too much about your style away. Now all of you take a ten minute break and then we'll begin again."
Shadow watched, for average humans or even vampires they were good, but better than average simply wasn't enough. Still he was glad he'd recruited them.
He'd found Ash trying to escape a patrol in San Francisco, her actual name was Aislinn but she was a complete tomboy and preferred answering to Ash, before he'd found her she'd been living on the streets for over a month. He'd intended to simply leave her but when she'd taken down one of the patrol with her bare hands his interest had been piqued enough to let her tag along.
Dan was what could only be described as a left-wing vampire, he'd been fighting the anti-human laws ever since there introduction. Eventually he'd annoyed one Elder too many and a Reaper squad had been sent after him. Shadow had seen to it they all left in a shoebox. With nowhere to go and with a political savvyness that Shadow quite honestly needed he too had been aloud to stay.
Sally was the vampire slayer who had confronted him in Miami. She'd managed to track him down halfway across the country when he was busy killing an overly outspoken Elder in DC, that alone had earned her a place in the little group that he was half-unwillingly collecting.
Nick had been a werewolf who was about to be sentenced to death when Shadow had killed nearly the entire court he'd been in. Experienced at combat, by this time he was exactly what Shadow was looking for. Which meant Shadow was keeping a very close eye on him in case he was a plant by the Night World.
It was nearly two years since the Night World took power, fortunately a lot of the infrastructure was still down and very few nightworlders were techno-savvy or he'd have been caught ages back. Shadow had spent the last six months training these four and was finally starting to get results.
He'd managed to teach them the basics, how to throw a knife, shoot a gun, hold a blade, the basics on how to fight, how to use your environment to your advantage – he'd started a bar fight in front of them to demonstrate that particular chestnut of wisdom, five different kill strikes and he was also starting to teach them free running and gymnastics to give them ease of transport across the city and the flexibility for some of the more agile fighting styles. He predicted another four months and he'd be ready to move house one more time. Four months and he could finally return home...
Author's Note: Two chapters on two fics in a night, I'm on a roll. *cracks knuckles and starts typing agains* Anyway sorry about this one, it's a bit of a filler chapter, still got some decent combat into it so hopefully not too boring.