"May I axe you a question?"

Ouch. Geez. 'What a...what a joke...haaah...' Alec sighed a little to herself, as she rubbed her shoulder with one hand, and turned the knife ever in her hand. Watching her brother unsheathe the katana...he just kind of walked up to the dummy, before swiping the blade down hard. It sliced down the vertical middle of the head, and straight down all the way to the mid chest. Wow...sharp. Really, really, really really sharp. Then, Irene just took a step back, before going back over to the weapon rack of his own volition. Taking this as her own cue to move, she took an extra knife and...first she decided to throw the knife, to see her throwing accuracy. It graced the side, so she at least got a C+, B-? Running over to the dummy, she took the knife and stabbed at it in a wide arc, getting it in the shoulder. Her brother, from where he stood, internally face palmed. A wide overhanded arc with a knife could be easily intercepted in true combat.

Lauren was about to answer the boy's question when she heard Alec's knife clatter to the ground behind her. Turning in time to see the sloppy swing, she sighed inwardly. "Looks like I have my work cut out for me this week." She muttered. Turning back to Luke, she said "Again, you're thinking about only yourself fighting. You can worry about how it's going to work later, for now just show me how you use them." Grabbing an axe for herself from the rack, she proceeded to demonstrate how it should be used. Somehow she made swinging the crude weapon around look graceful. "Hand axes are a good weapon for someone without a lot of physical strength, since the weight and design of the weapon will add force all by themselves." Bringing the weapon to rest in both her hands, she continued. "When using an axe, you rarely have to worry about complicated things like your opponent parrying or blocking your attack, since an axe usually just powers through other weapons. I'll also say that your training here isn't about reenforcing what you already know, it's about adding new skills to your arsenal. My mother had a favorite saying when I was growing up, and that's 'If all you have is a hammer, everything looks like a nail.' What would happen if all you learned how to use was guns, and someone took your firearm? You shouldn't count on always having your weapon of choice, and that goes for all of you." The last part of her speech was directed at the whole group. "I want everyone here to switch what weapon they're using for training at least once this week."

The brother knew what he was doing, that was for sure. The sister... not so much. But Luke knew he couldn't say anything as he wasn't particularly skilled in this category either. Lauren's words brought some comfort, but her demonstration made Luke feel worse. He knew his attempt would look like uncontrollable flailing compared to her beautiful technique. He took the axes, feeling the weight in his hands. He approached a dummy, taking slow practice swings, getting a feeling of how the weapons would feel with each motion. She had a point about what would happen if they were disarmed with a gun. Luke stepped back then approached the dummy quickly, swinging quickly and slamming one axe into the side of it's head. He let go of the weapon, leaving it stuck in figure. "That seems pretty effective."

Rhiannon nodded as Ludonear sat down, mulling over what he had said.

"In some ways you will have a more impartial view than the others do on the current situation due to your isolation from the world at large. Although your mention of your group's approach to cities is interesting; we too generally avoid them due to the tight controls on getting inside and the frequent patrols hunting for people like us." She paused for a moment, a slow smile spreading across her face. "Not that they've even come close to catching me before." She turned to Gaius and indicated that he should speak next; she had a feeling he was fairly well clued up on politics, his personnel file certainly seemed to suggest he had interest in such an area.

"Essentially the world is now largely controlled by a single company called Tricore who rose to power by manufacturing a medicine that neutralises a supers' powers permanently. Currently there are formal governments but they are completely under the rule of Tricore and they've retreated to several large cities. Having done this they then set about terraforming the areas outside of these cities to make the population more concentrated and controllable. The Resistance took this opportunity to build bases and hide out in the wastes Tricore thought were uninhabitable." Gaius shrugged. "That's about it, really. Sure, there are some other points here and there but that's the overall situation."

Rhiannon nodded, a slow smile spreading across her face.

"So, tell me, either of you, about the origins of our organisation?"

As Rhiannon asked if they knew about the origins of the organisation, Ludonear remembered all the wild stories people had told him about the rebels. Many of those stories simply said that the rebels were fake or that the cities had already crushed them. Other, more wild, stories told a tale of highly intelligent monsters seeking control over the earth. Yet again, human had 'heroically' fought them off or wiped them out. One particular story even included creatures from beyond the stars. Oh, how the stories being told besides the camp fires (when they had the luxury of making one) had scared him too much to sleep. Somehow, even the bad memories made him smile a little. His past wasn't exactly fun to think about, but somehow remembering it all felt good anyway. It could be compared to how the elders felt about telling people their 'war'-stories, many friend died in them but the elders told them the same story time and again anyway. Ludonear thought Rhiannon wouldn't be happy hearing all the wild stories he could remember so he let the others go first.