by Saless
Chapter 70

"What's that supposed to mean?" Erica asked suspiciously.

Your world is changing. Magic was weak or absent in your world before, but it's gaining strength. I don't know if it's strong enough to be felt yet, but at the rate it's going it will be before long. Vash replied.

"What does that mean?" Jill asked.

It means other people will begin to develop magical abilities, or learn to tap into magic the way my previous master did. They won't have the level of power you do for quite some time, and you'll probably be stronger by then, but there will be a lot of people with magical abilities in time. Vash said.

"But that doesn't mean we'll have to fight them!" Jill protested.

Most, no. But some will try to profit from their abilities by using them against others. It is unlikely that your police force will be able to adapt quickly. Until they do, magical criminals may operate unchecked. You will need to be able to defend yourselves. Vash said.

Sarah groaned, "But we can't carry our weapons around with us, we'd be arrested!"

Not now, no, but you may be able to in the future. I suggest further trips to other worlds to develop your own abilities would also be helpful, since you won't always have your weapons on hand. Vash replied.

"How quickly is this likely to happen?" Mike asked.

I don't know. There is some time yet, though, I'm sure. It won't happen tomorrow. Vash said.

"Wait, so we might have to deal with people like John, with powers?" Sarah asked weakly.

Erica pulled held her close and said, "Don't worry Sarah, you're the strongest one of us! If someone like that tries anything you can blast them into oblivion or portal them somewhere where they can't hurt anybody."

Sarah was shaking by the time she'd finished speaking and said, "But when John attacked me…I just froze!"

"That was understandable, especially with your history! But now that you're dealing with that, I think you'll find you're able to deal with situations like that better. And if we train like Vash suggests you'll know you can deal with them if that ever happens!" Erica assured her.

She's right, training will improve your confidence. That would be a big help. I really think you, in particular, should do so. The others need to develop their abilities or their skills with their weapons, but what you really need is confidence, as you have enough power to make up for your lack of experience. Vash said.

Jill sighed, "I hate to say it, but they're making a lot of sense. I don't like the idea of having to fight magical criminals, but I'd rather be prepared if that happens."

"I really hope it takes a long time for this stuff to happen, I don't want you guys to have to fight like that. It's bad enough the stuff we've gotten involved in through the portals, but we wouldn't have a safe home to come back to!" Mike said worriedly.

"That's not entirely true. If we need to get away we can always come here. But I hope it takes a long time, too. Especially since I'll be on the other side of the continent for six months!" Erica said.

"At least you'll be able to visit." Jill said.

"Jill, I won't be able to fly all the way out here very often, if at all! I won't have the time!" Erica replied.

"I wasn't talking about flying. Sarah could open a portal to your apartment and you could come through, or Sarah could go to you there." Jill explained.

Erica stared with her mouth open and then turned to meet Sarah's equally shocked look. "Can you really do that?!" Erica asked.

"I…I think I can! I can use our bond to open the portal, or I could fly over there so I know where I'm portalling to, and then I could go back and forth at will!" Sarah replied excitedly.

"We'd better test using the bond first, so we know whether you should fly back with me or not." Erica suggested. Sarah nodded. "I'll go hide somewhere and when I give you the signal you try to open a portal to me, okay?"

"Okay!" Sarah agreed. She waited while Erica ran out of sight. Ten minutes later Erica called her through the bond. Sarah opened a portal and right there was Erica! "It worked!" Sarah said happily.

"How far away were you?" Jill asked as Erica stepped through the portal.

"About four blocks away." Erica replied with a grin. "Thanks for this idea Jill, this will make the next six months so much better!"

"Yeah, thanks Jill!" Sarah agreed, and they both hugged Jill.

"You're welcome! But now I think we'd better get back to learning how to use this stuff." Jill said. The others agreed and they went back to experimenting. Jill soon learned that very thick things, like large tree trunks, could defeat her even with the gauntlets, whereas Erica's sword would go through them like a hot knife through butter. Mike's axe wasn't nearly as effective at cutting through any object, but it did plenty of damage. Especially when in Naga form. Sarah made more noise with her bow, trying out the piercing and electric arrows. The piercing arrows would fly right through a car from front to back and on through the car behind it! The electric arrows were pretty spectacular, too. Sarah was very happy with how much power the bow had, even though it was no harder to draw than her old one. Erica got in on the action with her guns, using both ordinary and explosive bullets.

I think that's enough practice for today, don't you? Vash thought after Erica blew up a car and set it on fire.

"Oops, I guess I overdid it a little." Erica said. "Sure, I'm getting hungry anyway." The others agreed and they portalled everything back to their hiding place and then returned to Sarah's apartment.

"What do you guys want for dinner?" Sarah asked.

"You don't have to cook." Jill said.

"I want to!" Sarah replied, and went to work. Erica joined her and Mike and Jill sat down on the couch.

"I don't like what Vash was saying, that sounds really bad." Jill said.

"I don't like it either. But if he's right it's best to be prepared. We should start looking into worlds to visit. I also think the three of you need to learn some kind of martial arts, and all four of us need to learn to use our weapons better. The martial arts is the most important, though, since we won't always have our weapons and our weapons are magical so we're able to use them better than we could non-magical weapons." Mike replied.

"You could teach us martial arts." Jill said.

"True, but that will take a lot of time. It would be nice if we could jump start the process somehow." Mike said.

"How would we do that?" Jill asked.

"Well, in The Matrix they could learn martial arts by simply downloading the skills into their brains." Mike said.

"But we can't use that, we don't have the ports to plug into their computers." Jill pointed out.

"I know, but we might be able to find something similar that doesn't require an implanted interface like that." Mike said.

I might be able to help you with that. Vash said as he jumped up on Jill's lap.

"How?" Jill asked as she stroked his feathers.

Purring, he said, I may be able to isolate the parts of Mike's memory related to his martial arts training, and copy that information into your's and Sarah's minds. Sarah would have to transfer it to Erica, if she can. It would take you some time to really absorb and assimilate the information, but it would give you your "jump start".

"Sounds good, when can you do it?" Mike asked.

I don't know. I'll get started on it right away, but it may take me quite a while to isolate the memories. You might want to go ahead and train them in the meantime. It would probably make assimilating your memories easier, anyway. Vash replied.

"Sounds good to me. Maybe we can get started tomorrow?" Jill suggested. Mike nodded and turned on the TV. They whiled away the rest of the time until dinner was ready by watching Bleach.

"Come on you two, dinner's ready!" Sarah called out. Mike dragged Jill away from the TV and they all sat down to eat.

"So what do you two say to getting some martial arts training in tomorrow?" Mike asked.

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