- Fight Feedback

Gus awoke in a bright, white room. As soon as he opened his eyes the light rushed in, splitting his head in two with a streak of pain.

"Owww!" Gus winced, closing his eyes and covering them with his hand. "Where am I?"

"Medical room of the training hall," a woman's voice answered.

"The training hall has a medical room?" he asked, slowly opening his eyes in the direction of the voice.

"That's right. In years past, things like this were a common occurrence and the only way for students to be treated was in the medical room in the schoolhouse. After some complaints by the medical staff, this room was created for this exact purpose."

After a few moments of having his eyes open, Gus's vision adjusted to the brightness of the room. The voice belonged to a young, light haired woman. On the sides of her temples, Gus saw that the woman possessed some kind of cybernetics. She wore a simple white medical jacket over her clothes and her long hair had been tied up into a ponytail, yet it still reached the top of her back.

"What are they for?" Gus asked, gesturing to the cybernetics as he pushed himself up using his elbows.

"Woah, slowly," she said, rushing forward to help him up. "They're a visual enhancement cybernetic. They allow me to see through people, so that I can analyse their internal organs, bones and whatnot more easily. You took a pretty hard blow to the jaw, it was weird to see the way that it cracked.

Gus slowly lifted a hand to his face, remembering the blow that caused the damage. He tenderly touched his jaw, expecting it to feel painful and different to what he was used to, but was surprised to see it restored to how it had been.

'No, this feels a little better,' he thought. 'It's sharper.'

"How long was I down for?" he asked as he looked around the room. He was laying on a soft mattress atop a firm, silver frame. Identical beds were on his both sides, with four identical beds opposite him on the other side of the room. At the head of the frame of the beds there was a moveable attachment joined onto the bed, which was composed of a light and multiple attachments.

On the bed to his left, he could see the body of Timber Allen resting, still unconscious after their fight. As he looked at the person who had been his opponent, he felt his stomach tighten in a physical manifestation of his shame in how far he had gone. Of course, some part of him understood that it was necessary in a fight, but even still.

'I can't hurt people without good cause, and I went too far there. I won't become a monster. Not like them...'

As he looked around at the other beds, he could see that other students who he remembered seeing briefly in the training hall were in the other beds. Thankfully, none of the other people in his squad were in the beds, which meant that he was the one who had taken the most punishment.

To his right was the entrance to the room, along with a large window that looked out onto the training hall in the same wall. Beneath the window was a desk, containing a computer, files and various medical devices.

"Not long, about ninety minutes?" the woman answered, looking at a clock on the desk. "Yeah, it's nine thirty now."

Gus tried to get out of the bed, but was stopped by the woman.

"Not so fast," she said, putting her hand on his shoulder to stop him from leaving. "You took a fair deal of punishment in that fight, and I can't let you go without checking something." Her eyes flickered as she stepped back, and now shone with an unnatural light blue hue, rather than the green that she had before.

"Take a deep breath for me," she instructed him, her eyes fixed intently on his chest. "Right, hold it. And, breathe out."

Gus complied, following her instructions as she said them.

"We'll do that once again. Deep breath in, hold it, then release."

Once again, Gus followed her instructions.

"Everything internal looks good!" she declared. "Now, can you tell me your name?"]

"My name?" Gus asked. "Don't you already have it?"

"I've got it," she confirmed. "I just want you to tell me."

"Gus. Gus Braye."

"Okay, good. How many fingers am I holding up?" she asked, holding up three fingers on her right hand.

"Three," Gus answered.

She continued running tests with her fingers before moving onto using lights to test the pupillary reflex of his eyes. She shone the light into his eyes, and made sure that his pupils were properly reacting to the intensity of the light by constricting. Once satisfied that he was fine, she stepped back and let him leave.

"Thanks," he said as he left. "For looking after me and stuff, y'know?"

"No need to thank me," she replied with a soft laugh, "although I'm not the one you should thank. It was the head doctor who did most of the work for you, but he had to go to something urgent on one of the upper floors."

"Oh, right. Either way, thanks."

As Gus left the room, he noticed that there was no one in the training hall aside from Officer Cain. Gus walked over to him, confused about where everyone was.

"I let them go early, as I usually do." Cain explained that he preferred to give students some time to change and prepare for their other classes after a combat class. After that, he checked that Gus was okay after his fight.

"Now, a few pointers about your fighting. Your tenacity and ability to take a hit are pretty good. Well, very good. You got up after a number of fight ending blows. Your movement wasn't too shabby either, neither was your decision making. To improve, you first have to improve your defence. Not too shabby isn't good enough. Not too shabby will get you killed. The other thing that I think you should do to improve is work on your decision making."

"My decision making?" Gus asked.

Cain nodded. "You clearly had a plan going into the fight, but after you found out it wouldn't work it took you quite a few brutal hits to figure something else out. In a real situation that's not good enough. Treat every scenario like you won't have a second chance, because often you won't. And that's good life advice too, kid.

Do you have some sort of combat training? Or is it something more?"

"Something more?" Gus asked.

"Yeah. I'm guessing your name is something to do with Andrew Braye, which is why I asked."

"I," Gus began before pausing. "It's a complicated thing, something that I don't think I have time to explain right now," he said, aware of the time he had until the next class.

"I understand, I'll ask at another time. Now get going, you don't want to be late for the first class of whatever you have now."

'I wish you wouldn't,' Gus thought as he turned to leave, unwilling to relive his time there.

Gus hurried back to the house. By the time he arrived, it was quarter to ten, leaving him with fifteen minutes to shower once more and change.

'Damn, this isn't good!'