Forged In Guilt, Part 1 [Hana/Josh]

"Your showing your age, Josh,” Hana commented after that early 2020s inclusion comment. If anyone felt the need to clarify themselves like they were from that time… well, no point in getting into that now.

Hana raised an eyebrow at his request, and nodded. A quarter of the speed? So... slow down? Okay. Hana took a moment to think, prepare, and then moved in exactly like she had done the las time, but doing her best to get the perfect percentage of "slower" down, like he requested. She... was over thinking it.

As Hana stepped in and brought her blade down, Joshua moved with a similar slowness; he drew his blade from the sheath.
“You’ll recognize this; the motions from Zanjutsu are large and sweeping. We need all the power we can get to guarantee we get through a Hollow’s hide and mask,” Joshua said as he parried the slow strike with the draw of his blade, sweeping the blade high and wide and bringing it down towards Hana. He stopped long before it was close to her, the example given.

“Now, again,” Joshua said, resetting and sheathing his blade.

This time, when Hana brought in the strike the motion was different. Joshua brought the blade straighter out, parrying Hana’s blade lower down its length before flipping the blade and slowly sweeping it towards her. It ended up about where it had been in the first clash they had, when Hana had been moving at speed.
“People are, on the whole, more fragile. A sharp blade and the correct pressure will kill them as good as any swing that could bring down a tree. Now of course, there are those out there as durable or more-so than Hollows. Ya gotta judge that kind of thing. People have different weaknesses than Hollows do.” Joshua stepped back, lowering his blade.

“So, these things ya gotta keep in mind. Where Tairifuck is concerned, ya gotta take into account a few other things. He’s primarily a Kidō user. His hands, his throat, his tongue; these places will weaken him, but they’re also the places he will guard most jealously. He’s quick, but not that quick; grounding him will make it easier to find an opening. All of that though circles around to somethin’ we both gotta keep in mind.”

“We can train until we’re blue in the face, until our bodies are broken, and until we have mastered how to swing a sword. He’s a Kidō user; if either of us wants his life, we’re also gonna need to find someone talented in Kidō who is willing to let us learn how to take them down.”

Hana was guided through some small differences between fighting hollows and men. She could barely note the differences, but assumed she would catch on the more she trained. It was likely a process as fickle as playing the violin or ballet. One wrong angle and the entire performance could be completely ruined.

When Josh brought him up, Hana’s expression hardened. He was making good points. To fight a kido user, she needed to really understand kido more than she does now, but who could actually help her? Who would help her?

"Lieutenant Mizu Morikawa of the Kido Corps was willing to guide me in kido before, but I have not spoken with her for a while. Do you know anyone that would take the time to do that, especially with the state of the Soul Society?"

“Unclear,” Joshua responded, a definite note of annoyance in his voice as he brought his blade up and let it rest on his shoulder. He let out a sigh.
“I imagine it’ll end up being slightly more complicated than usual. I got friends in a lot of places, and there is gonna be no shortage of people looking to train themselves up after all of this destruction. Seen it before, safe money is that half the woods around the Rukongai are gonna end up getting roughed up something fierce in the next month or two. Now who in specific...hard to say. I’m still working on figuring out who I know that’s left,” Joshua said, trailing off with the thought.

The problem with knowing a lot of people was that it was a lot of people to lose.

After a moment he shook his head and looked back to Hana.
“If you can get Lieutenant Morikawa to help ya out then I’d say jump on that. If there is a chance I can jump in, I’d call it a favor to pay back. Kaminari might be willing, after she gets like two weeks straight of sleep. Barring that, maybe she’ll know someone else who can help; she’s in the Division to know who afterall.”

Hana had wandered the Seireitei before, asking random people if they wouldn't mind helping her, so she could do that again. It was how she met Tento and Mizu in the first place. Besides, one thing Josh said made Hana realize something: people aren't going to be interested in training others right now, they'll be interested in training themselves. It would be a better idea to push for intense sparing or real matches and see if she could win against anyone.

“Enough of all that,” Hana suddenly waved her hand as if she was tired of the conversation. “We came out here to train, did we not? We have wasted enough time.” Hana took her stance and faced Josh with a cold ferocity in her eyes.

Joshua had been in thought after his ramble, trying to think who else he could dig up that both might be helpful and still kicking when Hana waved her hand, seemingly tired of this line of discourse. He looked back over at her as she took her stance, noting the look in her eye.
“Very well; let’s see how you’ve improved then. It’ll tell us where ta start,” Joshua said, bouncing his blade on his shoulder once.

He wasn’t, however, going to be taking as lightly as he had in the past.

One moment Joshua was standing there, lax as you like and seeming to consider something or other; the next, his blade had lashed out and was coming down at Hana in a wide strike. This was a faster strike than he had used in previous sparring bouts, but not near as fast as the one from the beginning of the conversation. Joshua had a good idea of what Hana had been able to handle a while back before things had gone hellish all over. This was just above that level; he’d speed up if he needed to.
“Yer gonna have to be happy with pointers while we fight though, if yer not wanting to hear me lay it out,” he said once Hana either dodged or blocked the strike.

Hana was ready and focused, so when he suddenly lashed out, the fact that she was able to bring her own blade up to block the incoming attack might have been a surprise. However, like she had shown in previous spars, when she focused this hard, there was something in her eyes that was different. Her stance, perfect. Her block, right on time, but her awareness? Only on Joshua. She saw nothing of the world around her. The environment they were in could have been completely erased from her mind, and that was what she was seeing. She focused so hard on fighting, on getting the technique down right, that she failed understanding the battlefield, something that could be a deadly mistake.

"Fine, any advice you give will be helpful this time?" Hana asked, a spiteful question to be sure, but it was still Hana. There was much more to sassing Josh like this, and it wasn't just anger. She was hurt, and a questions of his faith in her capabilities lingered at the back of her mind. 'Was that why he didn't teach me the right way?' she asked herself. 'I will prove him wrong!'

Once the strike was blocked, Hana stepped in to close more distance between them, the back of her blade, swung down the length of Josh's torso. If she hit, he wouldn't have been cut, but she might have caused a bit of damage. The serious, almost robotic expression she had might have been evidence of how hard she was focusing, but it was also hinting toward letting go and fighting at her fullest.

“Depends on how much ya want to listen, and what ya call helpful,” Joshua shot back with no delay; his words and tone were light as normal, but there was something sharp in the retort as well. He knew Hana was angry at him, he couldn’t change that for now. If she wanted the help though, if she wanted the training, they were going to have to work through it all the same. He was mad at himself for forgetting the lessons the Rukongai had taught him, and the lessons taught to the worlds that he thought were behind them. He’d been dumb, and it had hurt a friend. Granted, he wasn’t entirely sure that if he had trained her in how to kill people that the dice would have landed any different in this whole situation. A question for later.

Hana blocked his wide strike, stepping in and bringing the back of her blade across almost like a club.
“Good improvisation,” Joshua said as the sound of steel on steel rang out; he had twisted his wrist to flip the blade backwards and down across his body. It would have been a terrible block in most cases, likely to break his own wrist if he tried to hold it in one hand. He had brought his free arm up, bracing the back of the blade against his forearm to give it the strength need to be a proper block. Even then, holding the blade like that too long would have been a bad decision; instead, he used the block for the moment to step back and make space. As he did, he gave a shove of his blade to try and throw Hana’s back.
“The idea of getting inside an enemy’s guard is the same against people or Hollow. With people though, ya got a lot less room to work with. It’ll limit ya some as well; less room to work with is less room to swing a length of steel.”

Joshua stepped back in, sweeping his blade in low at thigh level and maintaining the same rough speed as before.

Hana would do her best to remember what he said throughout their spar, but her focus was on not getting hit. She needed real experience, and to avoid getting hurt. As he came in, she watched his blade go lower than she was used to. Most people attacked at higher levels. She hurried to the side, stumbling a bit as she tried and immediately failed to shunpo away as he attacked at a lower level. She was clearly not used to it and ended up falling down just in time to avoid it.

Rushing back to her feet, she almost fell again, but was able to catch herself. She took her stance again, trying not to think too much about how pathetic she looked falling like that, but it was written all over her face. Instead of allowing any talk, she stepped in and attempted another attack, still using the back of her blade. It was a wide arc, but accurately aiming for Josh's right shoulder.

Joshua didn’t pursue her when Hana fell, giving her the time to get back up. The action had been telling, however, as she’d scrambled away from his blade. She was in her head, too locked up with her emotions it seemed. He couldn’t really blame her though, she had a lot of emotions to work through. She focused back on him, that intense stare squarely on his person as she stepped in and swung once more.

Her blade found purchase, thudding against Joshua.

At the same time, something sharp touched Hana just at the bottom of her ribs. Joshua’s blade rested just at the base of her ribs, angled up as though it would have continued into her side if he’d been applying pressure. His free arm was curled in across his body, absorbing some of the blow from Hana. He let that scene sit a moment, before withdrawing his blade.
“First rule of fightin’ Hana; people are gonna get hurt. You, them, someone. No one- okay, most people don’t want to get hurt. However, sometimes you let yourself get hurt. Especially if it means you can end the fight. A deep wound on the shoulder and arm is a good price to end the enemy,” Joshua said, laying out in words the scene they had just been in.