To train or not to train (Marr, Artemis)

This whole week had been a clusterfuck.

Scratch that. The past two weeks had been a clusterfuck.

Between arresting Nicholas Revenue, combing the records for a suitable foster home for the arrested man's daughter (who, for reasons Max really couldn't fathom, had begged to stay with him and until recently had been crashing on his couch in the bachelor officer barracks), and personally scoping out potential candidates... he was physically and psychologically exhausted.

The Bellamys seemed nice enough at least... Though Max was on his way to intercept Olivia to make sure that was actually the case, and not just foster parents knowing how to silence their wards of the state and put on a smiling, cordial face when the Peacekeepers were around.

Max had stuck fiercely to the same motto his seven years in the military, and it had served him well so far:

Trust, but verify.

Besides the fact, Max wanted to see for himself this bully of an instructor Olivia kept mentioning that worked at the Career Training Center.

As far as he was concerned, all Careers were bloodthirsty savages, vying for a place in the Hunger Games and a shot at being glorified for the murder of children. Max’s own skill with the staff and his fists had been born out of necessity rather than out of any ill-conceived ideals of glory or victory.

Max was having more than a little difficulty trying not to imagine the trainers as some kind of a wolf-human muttation with predatory, canine-toothed smiles and cracking whips over the heads of their protégés.

He idly wondered if he could make any of them cower and piss themselves, if he ever opted to show up in uniform.

Technically, Max was off-duty, but it wasn’t far out of his way to go find Olivia. The only hints as to Max’s identity as a Peacekeeper was the badge clipped to his belt (obscured by his shirt and jacket) and the huge dog trotting at his heels, panting contentedly.

Who, as they were nearing the center, suddenly stopped dead in his tracks.

”Kaiser, c’mon buddy.”

Kaiser’s ears were all the way forward, tail still and erect; his eyes were laser-focused somewhere in the distance. The dog’s hackles raised, and a low growl rumbled in his throat.

Something was wrong.

”Kaiser. Seek.”

The command was like pushing a button. The dog took off like a bullet with Max in tow, circling back to make sure his human was keeping up as he lead Max into an alleyway. It was too dark to make out the faces of the two larger figures, both appearing to be male and about Max’s size or larger, but Olivia’s white Peacekeeper recruit-candidate gear was unmistakable.

He didn’t wait around to find out if this scenario was as bad as it looked; Kaiser darted past the two larger figures to stand beside Olivia, teeth bared barking and snapping.

Max glanced around the alley; it was disappointingly barren of materials to improvise a weapon from.

Guess we’re doing this the hard way.

”Hey!” He shouted at the top of his voice, both males turning to look at him backlit against the street lamp at the mouth of the alley, ”Two-on-one your kind of odds, you dickless pieces of shit? How about you pick on someone your own size?”

Granted, two-on-one weren’t his kind of odds either, but it wouldn’t be the first time Max had taken on more than one opponent on his own. He swore inwardly, though, as one of the figures turned to him; his face was visible, and so too was the training club in his hand. It wouldn’t be enough to deal a lethal blow, but if it was anything like the ones the instructors at the Academy had used to teach riot control, Max wasn’t at all keen on letting it hit him.

What a time to be unarmed and unarmored.

Kaiser was still barking and snarling at the second man, who had backed up a few steps from the dog snapping at his legs. With any luck, they’d decide it wasn’t worth the fight and fuck off before it got any worse.