She did, fortunately, have combat experience enough to translate the practiced maneuvers into their uses within battle. If she hadn't had that, the training would be next to useless without someone to spar against and help work out the kinks.
Even now it was of limited effectiveness. She assumed that she was performing the maneuvers correctly, but with Cologne training Shampoo in demon-hunting techniques, she had no one to tell her yes or no.
She frowned and stood up for a moment and collected the scrolls, she was not going to just leave them lying about. She would return in a moment, but there was something she had to consider first.
****
The door opened after having been closed for the last several weeks. Closed because Kodachi had not felt a need to use the facilities within.
Her laboratory.
The room where she had experimented with and created her various trick weapons and drugs in the past. She walked in, feeling the ghost of the Black Rose drift about her, clawing to return.
It sent a shiver of regret through Kodachi to bear the memories this room brought back, but they did not have the power she had feared of them. She did not have a desire to return to those old, delusional ways. Quite the contrary, she relished her freedom from that persona even more.
She had, to date, forgone using the whole of her rythmic gymnastic arts for the simple fact that in using them, she would let many know precisely who she was.
In the days to come she felt that she would not be able to afford being quite so...picky.
Her trick weapons she passed over. She could duplicate her ribbons easily enough with her webs, her clubs would simply break given the force she could wield them with, and the ring was too unwieldy.
She did, however, turn to some of the plant essences she had collected in clearly marked containers.
Her strength and speed were clearly more than enough for the average thug and mugger. She suspected that her "spider-sense" and natural abilities brought her capable of facing even Ranma on even footing. At least, if she got a bit more experience. She was already superior to him, and most everybody else, in terms of pure gymnastics and acrobatics, but when it came to fighting...she was only just now entering the high ranks.
However, against a mob, she was too slow. Even entangling and immobilizing a half-dozen or so rioters in a web took more time than she liked. For such situations, and for those opponents like Tarou, she needed to be specially prepared.
Fortunately, she already had several answers worked out. A spider needed a sting, after all. She nodded and closed the door to her lab, there was no need to experiment, after all, and the preparation was merely routine. She only need to change the casing that the gas would be held in before being released.
"Mistress," Sasuke said, seeing Kodachi leaving the laboratory. "Is everything alright? I have not seen you enter that room for weeks."
"I am not going back to the way things used to be," Kodachi assured him. "But, perhaps, my old habits will prove useful soon. I'm returning to the dojo for the next two hours. And then I must attend to my studies."
"As you wish, Mistress," Sasuke said. Kodachi nodded and started away before stopping, as if remembering something.
"Oh yes," she said. "Now that I have more firm access to my funds, I believe I owe you some money."
"It is nothing, Mistress," Sasuke demurred. Kodachi had been mooching small change off of him since she was twelve, he expected it now. Though that had been pleasantly absent in the past few weeks.
"It is far from nothing," Kodachi said, drawing out a check and filling it out. "Here, I believe that should cover it."
She handed the check to Sasuke, who nodded and looked down as Kodachi left. He expected to see some small number that would cover the last amount she had borrowed. What he instead saw widened his eyes greatly. The amount given more than made for the amount she had borrowed. By more than ten times.
"I believe I included some back-pay as well," Kodachi called back.
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(Posted Fri, 20 Dec 2002 04:07)
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