... until a memory awakens

As Weevil laid there on the cold surface of the earth, gasping, coughing and almost pleading for mercy, not once had he uttered a single word. His plight went unspoken and unheard, with no sign of salvation near. The dignity he was stripped of had fallen so far down the abyss of despair that he might even be but another furniture piece to be toyed and twisted to the dark hearts of those around him. As he laid there, struggling to get up, his blurring vision could only see the shuffling of booted feet, ears ringing too hard to hear the she demons words, an icy comfort to his broken capacity to think. Everything seemed blank. Even the colors he saw were dull, a plane so unfocused that he had thought that he had perished and gone to limbo. If it were not for the bodily pain he suffered, he most certainly would have thought so.

Then, at the corner of the haze that was his fading sight, between the towering boots of hell that stood still encircled around him, he could barely see the silhouettes of the training duo towards the center of the courtyard. It so appeared that his torturous ordeal was being ignored by them, those two powerful women with metal snakes in their hands, striking with precise impunity. For the slightest moment in time, he had thought the glint and flash of steel to be beautiful, otherworldly, even ethereal. The bells in his ears rang loud with each stroke of dazzling light. Clash after clash, like a blacksmith's hammer unto cold iron anvil. The way they moved, like butterflies in the wind, the beating of their wings like the crashing waves of the sea. For that slight moment, he thought that he could hear distant voices...

"The key is the displacement of ****, my intrepid pupil."
"But Master Golan, meeting strength with strength is the way of the land. A mighty edge can break any foe."
"That may be true, but a truly enlightened man would know that there are other ways around such an edge. Even the weakest of armies can defeat the strongest, when the right amount of **** is applied in all the right places."

The ghosts that whispered into his ear went on, the rumbling sounds of their voices manifest like a passing breeze. The silhouettes in the distance blurred even more, until nothing but shadows replaced them, playing like wisps in the wind. However, there was an order to the chaos of their theater. The shadows began to dance.

"Impudent whelp! For whom do you speak for in the presence of the Gods?"
"I speak for Master Golan! The one whom you slew! My Master! Your reign of terror ends here, self righteous cur!"
"Come then! Enlighten me with his blade so that I may once again lay his legacy low!"

For that slightest of moments, the dance macabre of the wisps took form, an episode of a time long lost rapidly flashing before him. It was but a fraction of a moment, and within that moment, the pain fled from his aching body. A violent shift of wills invaded his exhausted and faltering mind, replaced with an instinctive, **** need to act. With a snap back into the realm of reality, his hand gripped onto the handle of his weapon. His arms pushed himself off the ground, legs twisting to an upward rise in a motion much likened to the reflexes of lightning. He did not see the wooden blade of the guardswoman come straight for his face, but more so felt its presence long before it was committed. Tucking his tip down below his shoulder just as his opponent's attack passes, his sword whirled, contact between the two forces minimal as they met at the exact point of his choosing, stripping her of her faux steel for it to jam itself into the dirt. The follow up brought the tip of his weapon straight towards her neck in a fleetful display of speed. Before it touched her, the surprise saved her from the severe damage that could have been done to her throat, falling backwards in a mewling cluster of shock and awe. In that fleeting moment, when Weevil had returned to his senses, he had found his sword thrusted into the air where his tormentor had been, and herself propped up on ground before him, weaponless and ****. All around him, eyes were wide open, mouths gaping at the sudden reversal of events.