"Hey Jeff, where's Mack?"

It was early evening, not too long after sunset a few days later when David emerged from his bedroom, with Megan close behind, and found Jeff in the front room, reading yet another book.

"He went outside for a while. Said something about too sensitive hearing."

Megan blushed. David was rather glad that he couldn't. They'd been doing a bit more than just holding each other of late, and though they did try to be as quiet as possible, a certain amount of noise was inevitable. "I guess I'll go find him then." David gave Megan another smile and then walked out into the woods.

He found Mack not far off, amusing himself by throwing fist-sized rocks at a large outcropping and watching them shatter.

"Hi Mack."

"Hey."

"It seems like you're past tripping over your own feet," said David. "It's probably time for the next step."

"Hunting?" asked Mack.

David shook his head. "Not quite. You need to learn a few things about how to fight."

"I know how to fight," said the big man, looking a bit offended.

"I'm sure you do." David smiled. "You probably know a lot more about hand to hand fighting than I ever did, or ever will. But you've never fought a vampire. It's not quite the same."

"What's so different? You said yourself, they have bones to break like anybody else."

David chuckled. "So they do. But they don't move like a human moves. I do, most of the time, because I'm not trying to move fast. You picked it up yourself, adjusting these last few days, learning how to slow yourself down. But you don't know yet how to actually move when you're moving fast."

"It can't be that hard," said Mack dubiously.

"Try it then," said David. "I don't even have my sword on me. If you're really ready to fight vampires, you ought to be able to deal with me well enough, since I don't know jack about unarmed fighting."

Mack eyed David dubiously. But then he shrugged. "Okay." He shifted his feet, balancing himself, ready for movement.

David just stood there, flat-footed. Mack moved forward, keeping an eye on David, waiting for him to do something. But David just kept standing there. Mack shrugged mentally, and aimed a punch at his friend.

And though he swung fast, while his fist was still in the air, David had moved just far enough that it missed him. Mack followed it up with a second punch, but once again David was able to move out of the way in the instant between the start of Mack's motion and the end. David smiled. He could practically see Mack thinking that he just had to move faster. He'd learned this lesson himself, early on, though he'd held a sword. Mack kept circling and attacking, but his blows were always just a little bit behind where David was.

"All right, I give up," he finally said. "How the hell were you moving like that?"

"Well, I cheated a little, because I really am faster than you are. I probably wouldn't have been able to do that flat-footed otherwise." He grinned. "The real trick, though, is to anticipate. You're used to fighting slow, where you have time while you're still moving to adjust things. But with vampires, your eyes can't keep up with your fists. You've got to guess in advance when they're going to swing and which way they're going to go, and aim for where they will be, not where they are. No matter how fast you move, a vampire can be fast enough to dodge if they can anticipate your movement at all, and you can't correct in mid-swing, there's too much momentum behind it. And that's the other thing. You telegraph what you're going to do. Most vampires will, so you can take advantage of that, but if you give a hint of when you're going to swing it just gives them that much more time to get out of the way. I'll admit it's easier with a sword. I have a bigger range that I'm covering with my motions, where you're limited to the reach of your arms. But you still should be able to catch me, if you try. You're fast now too. Don't prepare for movement, just move."

"Right. Move." Mack nodded to himself. "I guess you're right that I'm going to need more practice."

David smiled. "Probably not that much more though. I had to learn everything from scratch. Once you get used to the speed, and the need to anticipate, you'll be fine. And honestly... most of the vampires you're going to run into really can't fight at all. They're terrible at it. You could probably beat up a good number of them right now. But I'd prefer that you don't chance running into one who can actually fight without any experience. There are a few, and if you're not going to learn sword fighting, you're going to lack one of the biggest advantages I've got."

"Nah, I'm not changing my mind there. Maybe I won't be able to kill as many as you do, but fist-fighting's my skill, always has been."

"All right. Well, come at me again, see if you can get me. I'll bet you still can't."

"I'll take that bet."