Just As Good As The Rest of Them

He'd been trying to get in some practice lately. It seemed to be the only thing to really get his mind off of things, and he swore it helped lessen the frequency of his headaches. He practiced in silence after waking up early. The sand beneath his feet was still cold to the touch, and the palm tree he was "sparring" with bore a few new notches from where his teeth and claws had scored it. Though it was getting tiresome fighting a tree of all things...but at least it helped him practice his balance. Sort of. After sparring it for a half hour or so, he dropped back onto his haunches to take a break, thinking about nothing but someday knocking down that tree. Would he ever be able to do it? He wasn't sure...he felt weaker since his incident during the flood. Pathetic even. But he dared not show that to the others.

"Speech!"