Back to Basics

Posted on Mon Oct 17th, 2022 @ 10:19am by Captain Akiva ben-Avram & Master Warrant Officer Trenton Mayhew

1,690 words; about a 8 minute read

Mission: S1E5: Symphony of Horror
Location: Overwatch Station Gymnasium
Timeline: MD 5

It had been a long time for Akiva since he'd entered a gym. A career of hands-on work in addition to hard colonial life kept him fit and trim, but the past year with Memory Theta had made him feel soft. And that would say nothing of not being much help against the Trill extremists on Deep Space 9. He needed a refresher course for more than one reason. In truth, physical labor had always been an outlet for his anxiety. The lack thereof was perhaps showing in his personal life.

One of the first things he did after meeting with Ari was schedule a training session with Master Mayhew.

Mayhew stood before him in a red gi with a thick black belt wrapped around his waist. The man bowed before Akiva, who was dressed in a form-fitting robe with its skirt girded around his thighs. He nodded in return without the formal bow.

"I have to admit, Captain Avram, that I was surprised when you requested a sparring session," Mayhew said, eyeing the other man's getup. "You... do not seem the type."

"Every Hebron boy learns Abir Qesheth from a young age," Akiva said flatly. "It's tradition. I never excelled at it, so I never went beyond the ceremonial forms."

"Abir Qesheth?" Mayhew said slowly, attempting to reproduce Akiva's enunciation. "Never heard of it."

"I imagine not." Akiva's smirk was a mixture of pride and chagrin. "It came to prominence on Earth around the start of the 21st century, though it claims a much older pedigree. Critics compare it to Kuk Sool Won and Hapkido. I'm not familiar with either one except by the rumor that Abir inspired them..." Akiva trailed off with a turn of his head and a shrug.

"I've studied a fair piece of each." Mayhew tried to hide his boredom as he fell into a Goju Ryu stance. Hopefully he would respectfully knock the desk jockey on his ass a few times and be done with it. "Begin."

Akiva fell into aleph stance, his feet crossed and his hands up to form a lopsided X with his body.

"What the hell is that?!" Mayhew fell out of stance for a moment, his face incredulous.

"Come at me and see." Akiva's facial expression could not have been more serious.

"Fine by me."

Mayhew switched up and dropped into a shotokan squat to throw rolling side kick, which Akiva attempted to block with an elbow. He succeeding in deflecting it, though Mayhew's foot still glanced off his side.
Akiva stepped forward, crossing his feet back into a reverse position, and reached for Mayhew's shoulders with opposing hands. Left hand to right shoulder. Right hand to left shoulder.

It was intended to be a unique chokehold, but Mayhew easily threw Akiva's balance off with an attempted hip roll. Rather than follow through, Mayhew planted his weight to anchor himself to the floor, then pivoted into Akiva's momentum.

Akiva found himself dumped upside down on his own head. He groaned at the gymnasium ceiling.

"Not bad." Mayhew extended a hand to help Akiva off the floor. "Your execution was terrible, but I saw what you were trying to do. With practice, some day you might manage to perform a move without telegraphing it beforehand."

"Thanks. I think." Akiva accepted the other man's larger hand, then grasped him by the elbow as he was pulled to his feet.

"I mean it, Captain." Mayhew clapped him on the shoulder. "Your instincts are not refined but they are there, which is more than I can say for some."

"Please, do go on," Akiva said with playful sarcasm.

"What I'm saying, pansy ass, is that I am willing to train you." Mayhew straightened his mouth so Akiva wouldn't think he was joking. "You have the raw materials for me to sculpt."

Akiva visibly perked up. "Do you really mean that? I... I washed out as a child, which is part of what fostered my love of tinkering."

"You'll have to forgo that ridiculous dance-fighting you started with, of course." Mayhew indulged himself a chuckle at Akiva's expense. "You did fine once you stepped out of practiced form and into the flow of combative energy."

"That's my heritage you're talking about," Akiva teasingly chided.

"No. You leave your heritage at the door," Mayhew said with an aggressive point to the corridor, an action which only accentuated his tracheal vocalizer. "Just as we all do. When sparring, there are no friends or family, there is no universe, there is no outside world -- nothing but you and your opponent." He grinned. "Or, in this case, your master. Do you accept my terms?"

Akiva clicked his tongue before giving in to a reciprocating grin. "Sure. I concede to your greater wisdom."

"Atta' boy." Mayhew rubbed his hands together. "I'm going to set up the VI to run you through basic drills while I go take a shit. When I get back, I'd better see less stiffness in your movement or I'm putting you back on the mat."

"All right..." Akiva began to feel uncertain about this arrangement, but soon the hologram appeared barking commands.

---

Hours later, it was early morning by station time. Akiva remained focused on the wooden dummy which suffered his Pak Sau and Lop Sao hand drills, or at least the closest approximation he'd taken from the virtual instructor. His slow, deliberate motions rapidly turned to sudden chopping. In a moment, he abandoned all fluidity gave in to his aggression. His fists flew in a blurry chain punch, one over the other, until a wayward strike snapped an arm off the dummy.

"Before you requisition me a replacement," called out Mayhew from as he came back from his long absence, "I'll have you tell me what you did wrong."

"I lost focus." Akiva turned to bow to Mayhew with his wrists crossed.

"Wrong," Mayhew said abruptly. "You never had focus." He offered a smirk, but he kept his posture. "What you did wrong was lose your footing, which is surprising due to your base style of dance-fighting."

Akiva rolled his eyes. "Chinese boxing wouldn't seem to involve much footwork," Akiva said.

"On the contrary," Mayhew snorted. "Boxing is all about the feet. Your fists are merely the delivery system, and, with Chinese boxing, even more so. If your hands get ahead of your feet, then you lose power and precision." He stepped forward in a flurry of chain punches which put Akiva's previous display to shame. It ended with a backfist that stopped right at the end of Akiva's nose. "Look down at my feet."

Akiva did so, and noted Mayhew's lead foot had stepped inside Akiva's own footing.

"How can you have any footing when you give it all up when I attack?" Mayhew pressed.

Though Akiva nodded, he did not speak or look at Mayhew.

"Kung Fu is not a martial art so much as an achievement of the human spirit," Mayhew said. "You didn't really come here to spar, did you? Level with me, Captain. What's biting you?"

At first Akiva made to leave, but then he realized how cowardly that would make him. Maybe Mayhew would care or maybe he wouldn't, but running from a direct question from someone who was ostensibly only trying to help would make it even harder for Akiva to look himself in the mirror. "Women." Akiva may have answered the man, but he did not have to look at him.

"Ah." Mayhew allowed a tight smirk across his face. "Are you feeling blue, Captain?"

Akiva rolled his eyes. This was not what he had hoped to do in the middle of the night. "No, Master Mayhew, and I would thank you not to speak to me that way."

Mayhew gave a knowing smile, opting to rib the captain more. "Then you struggle to find a woman to take as a wife?"

"Not exactly." Akiva flushed a little at the memory of the past few days where he had been faced with feelings that he'd intentionally left dormant. "My dilemma is narrowing them down."

"Captain, you dog." Mayhew let out a gruff chuckle. "You would not be the first man to change his religion for a woman."

"No." Akiva was quiet but firm. "Not that. Never that. It's the only constant in my life, and my only piece of home."

"Home is not where we came from," the master-at-arms said with slow deliberation. "Home is where we make it."

"What are you trying to say, Mayhew?" Akiva shifted on his feet to stare down Mayhew for the first time. "That I should try to make a home with both women?"

"Of course not," Mayhew scoffed. "That's just begging for trouble. With any sort of triage situation, the bottom line is always determining what--or whom--one cannot live without."

The admonition set Akiva's thoughts aflutter. Ari came to mind... her strength of heart and captivating eyes, her warm and stunning smile that always made him feel as if his feet were on solid ground. But then his thoughts turned to Laena, unique and exotic with a captivating beauty wrought in a paradox of volatile frailty which practically begged for him to satisfy her lonely want while being filled in turn. That both of them were drop-dead gorgeous only made the dilemma that much worse.

"I don't know who I can't live without," Akiva finally muttered. "Maybe neither.

"Then I suggest you go and find out," Mayhew said. "Find your footing before you break something else." His eyes drifted to the wooden fragment on the floor nearby.

Akiva looked at the broken dummy. "You mean that wasn't holographic?"

"Holographic slivers do not teach as well as real ones," Mayhew said. "Still, making another one won't be much trouble. Not like there's much else to do around here..."

"Thank you for the session," Akiva said. "I apologize for the hour." Realizing Mayhew was intending on repairing the wooden dummy himself, Akiva looked surprised. "Would you like some help?"

"Like I said," Mayhew replied, a hint of frustration in his tone. "Not like there's much else to do..."

 

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