|
Post by Morgan on Dec 23, 2021 22:00:57 GMT -6
That was exactly what Morgan had been waiting for. They had taught this particular behavior to several different creatures by this point, so they knew what they were doing. When they noticed that Kaodie was no longer having to get a good look at the oncoming dangers to get away from them, and goodness was he getting good at it. By the time another thirty minutes had passed (Morgan's arm was really in pain by that point), Kaodie was no longer being affected by the veritable monster of an equillion's presence, either. Morgan was pleased with his progress by the time they finally gave up, turning around to pay the equillion's owner for the time. Kaodie trotted right up behind them on their heels, unafraid of the equillion now. His brashness would perhaps cause him some trouble some day- but that day was not going to be today.
Now that Morgan was sure that Kaodie had gotten it, they went home for the day.
[30] - [End of Hardy and Danger Sense]
|
|
|
Post by Morgan on Dec 23, 2021 22:52:21 GMT -6
Morgan had one more day to be able to work with Kaodie before it started getting cold enough to warrant the pair to save the more involved training for special occasions only during the apparently 'harsh' winter that was supposed to be coming up. The park was much more brisk today; and it was obvious that there was a cold front coming in. Morgan's hip and ankles were already smarting with the cold, adding to the frustration that they had in their own muscle weakness due to fatigue in their left arm. At the very least, Kaodie seemed to be doing passably with what they had worked on. Hopefully it would 'stick'. Kaodie seemed oddly clever, so they were in high hopes.
"Alrighty Kaodie, just a little more today..." Today was going to be a rough day. They had a plan to help him work on hiding from enemy attacks further; as well as to help him recover from wounds from things like burns (which could still effect him; if the way he lost his leg so long ago was any indicator).
[1] - [New Day, New Log]
|
|
|
Post by Morgan on Dec 23, 2021 23:08:23 GMT -6
First off, however, they had to teach him how to do something that they didn't really have a 'previous piece of training' to fall back on to try to get him to do it. It was a technique that involved playing dead so well that an opponent would be temporarily stunned into not attacking him. Any small interrupt of an opponent hurting Kaodie could possibly save his life; with Morgan around anyway. They wanted to give him the best chance to survive an assailant as possible so that they could use him to help theirself and their own to be safe.
Morgan did have an idea on how they could get started, however. They also had a command whistle in mind for it, so they decided to start with that. Kaodie was generally pretty good about listening up for new command whistles, and this one was no exception at all. His ears perked right up as soon as he heard it.
[2] - [Start 'Play Dead']
|
|
|
Post by Morgan on Dec 23, 2021 23:33:50 GMT -6
"That one was different, huh b-boyo?" Morgan says. They got down on their own knees, and they gently reached out to maneuver him onto his back. The malii is quite obviously very confused, but they gave him the command whistle to stick out his tongue; which he complied to doing. They guided his tongue to the ground. "See boyo? This is what I want you to do. Good boyo." He really did look 'dingy' enough to possibly be 'dead', especially at a first glance- but this was going to take a lot of work to get right. They also weren't convinced that he'd take to it as readily as he did with most of the other work that they'd done.
Still, they got up. "Good boyo, g-good boyo!" Morgan is sure to praise the malii and give him a good round of tug of war with their off arm, since their other arm was very sore.
[3]
|
|
|
Post by Morgan on Dec 29, 2021 14:11:46 GMT -6
The next thirty minutes were as much of a nightmare as Morgan had expected. The malii realized that there was a new whistled command- that they were sure of, but he wasn't entirely certain what action was required of him. He stuck his tongue out one time, and laid down another- obviously remembering himself being coaxed into doing both of those things originally. In between failed attempts, Morgan would whistle the command again and then guide him onto his back in the sandbox and give him the whistled command for him to stick out his tongue again. They'd give him lots of verbal praise and a treat for this, but it still took several tries to get him to finally do some semblance of this on his own.
Finally Morgan whistles the command (wondering a little hopelessly if they would have to chalk this one up as a failure) and the confused malii rolls onto his back and sticks his tongue out exaggeratedly.
[4]
|
|
|
Post by Morgan on Dec 29, 2021 15:20:55 GMT -6
The motion was far too exaggerated to be truly convincing at this point, but they were excited about it all the same. This was a true start to a somewhat difficult piece of training, and now they had direction in which to go. "Great job boyo, G-good boyo!" Morgan reaches into their pocket and procures the rainbow rope toy to play with him as opposed to a treat since he was doing so well. Kaodie notices it right away and hops right up quite quickly out of his little faked 'dead' pose. The two play a few rounds of tug of war before Morgan puts the toy away and gives the command again, really hoping that the trick would stick.
Kaodie was hesitant, but slightly less so than earlier. He rolls over onto his back and sticks his tongue out. Morgan could not have been more happy! "G-good boyo! You're getting it." They were quite relieved, but knew that they weren't really 'there' yet!
[5]
|
|
|
Post by Morgan on Dec 29, 2021 15:38:25 GMT -6
Morgan always wanted to make sure that the critters they taught were going to remember the behaviors as well as the commands, and of course were able to do it under some amount of duress or mixed in with other commands. Something that they loathed to do (as they had to do it with Waar at least once) was to have to harm, in any way, a creature to teach it a behavior- even if it may be life saving in the future. Due to this, Morgan had planned to combine this particular behavior's training with another- starting with harming theirself to have the malii learn the behavior- that was, to lick wounds in order to stop bleeding in a pinch.
The human settled down after giving the malii another couple of rounds of tug-of-war, and then nicked their finger on a piece of paper in their pocket on purpose. Then, they pointed at it to draw Kaodie's attention. They gave him a new whistled command- hoping that as per usual, Kaodie would be compelled to lick their finger.
[6] - [Start 'Lick Wounds', running concurrently with 'Play Dead']
|
|
|
Post by Morgan on Dec 29, 2021 15:55:14 GMT -6
Kaodie, as did many creatures that were close to their owners, felt compelled to sniff Morgan's finger as it was presented to him. After concluding his sniff, Kaodie seems to decide that there was something interesting on their hand. He licks it, tentatively. Morgan winces- it stings a lot more than they'd expected; but it was a papercut after all. "G-good boyo, Kaodie." They are sure to give him a treat for that- though they weren't ready to do another round of tug of war yet. They moved their finger back towards them, and repeated the process with the same papercut. They stuck out their finger to catch Kaodie's attention and then gives the whistled command that they chose for him to lick a wound.
Kaodie was much more confident this time, and reaches out to lick Morgan's fingers. They wince again- OW- and then smile. "G-good, you're doing good." Another treat was given to him at that.
[7]
|
|
|
Post by Morgan on Dec 29, 2021 16:09:04 GMT -6
They switched gears back now; after putting a bit of hand sanitizer on the cut on their finger (they were anything if not careful; they had been a sickly child and knew not to take chances with illness of any kind) they gave the whistled command for him to play dead. Kaodie hesitated at the quick change of plan, but fell over on his back a little bit lazily, his tongue lolling out in a more believable way now. That was a lucky thing, and one that Morgan wanted to make sure he would continue to happen. They gave him a particularly loud round of praise and a round of tug of war that they honestly tried their best on. They really wanted to drive home that he'd done well.
They practiced this a couple more times to similar effect, with Morgan giving him praise each time before they decided to move forward again with the wound-licking behavior training.
[8]
|
|
|
Post by Morgan on Dec 29, 2021 16:18:33 GMT -6
Morgan had to make a decision on how best to transfer the wound-licking behavior from their own wounds to Kaodie. Kaodie was incredibly physically resilient. They thoroughly believed that their father had purposefully ordered him that way; it would be a shame if his kid's first pet was run over by a cart or killed by a random animal attack, right? Kaodie's body was practically impossible to physically harm- his gummy body so stretchy that it simply 'squashed' when stepped on by accident or 'squishing down' to only regain its shape whenever he bounced. Claws rendered towards him simply bounced off without harm. It was wacky and odd and Morgan was pleased with it-
But he did have several weaknesses, that is- elements. A single Elemental Bite had taken off his back leg years ago, since he'd never had to learn to be wary of other creatures.
Due to all of this, Morgan had planned something... Else.
[9]
|
|
|
Post by Morgan on Dec 29, 2021 16:49:59 GMT -6
They pulled out a small knife that had a barb on the opposite side of the simple hidden blade- something that could hardly give any sort of a permanent injury and instead would work quite well for making the shallowest of cuts. In order to assure that it would work, they pulled out a lighter to slightly heat it. They thought better of it once or twice, and then gently pressed the point to the top of one of Kaodie's paws, and then they gave him the whistled command to lick. Immediately Kaodie was surprised; pain was not something that he was used to feeling in the slightest (a lot of the time to his detriment). He then quickly bends down to lick it off; though Morgan isn't immediately sure if he had understood that the command meant to do that. Either way, they gave him lots of praise for it. "Good boyo, Kaodie, goood job." They gave him a treat instead of playing tug of war with him, after he licked the wound so clean that it no longer even appeared to exist at all.
[10]
|
|
|
Post by Morgan on Dec 29, 2021 17:41:10 GMT -6
Morgan had heard of the wound-licking being used to instantly heal the tiniest of nicks, but it was still very odd to see it right in front of their own eyes during a training practice. It made sense, many creatures had a natural way of taking care of their own thorn-strikes, and this seemed to be it for critters like Kaodie. It wasn't much, but it would do. Now they just had to work on repeating it until Kaodie understood that it was a command.
Whenever Kaodie heard the command again, as Morgan issued it, he seemed confused as to what to do. However, whenever the bespectacled human pointed to his paw again where the injury was, he was quite quick on the uptake and licked it immediately. "Good, good boyo, Kaodie!" At this, they gave him another treat. "That's exactly w-what we're l-looking for, Bud." They murmured. Then, they decided to change gears again, to make sure he learned both of the behaviors without fail.
[11]
|
|
|
Post by Morgan on Dec 29, 2021 17:59:16 GMT -6
They brought the whistle to their lips again, and Kaodie tilts his head -his ears pricked up already in anticipation of the noise- and Morgan is sure to give the whistled command for him to 'play dead'. Kaodie was much more confident this time, since they'd been working on it over an hour at this point (not counting the time they spent working on him learning to lick his wounds- which they were no way near done with) so he flops down quite dramatically and pokes his tongue out in a way that perhaps could have convinced Morgan had they not been working with him so insistently on this for so long. "You're doing great b-boyo, really convincing!" They praised, and then they gave him a treat.
After running him through it a few more times, they were quite convinced that he'd learned to play dead- so it was time to switch gears back to teaching him how to care for his own wounds.
[12] - [End 'Play Dead']
|
|
|
Post by Morgan on Dec 29, 2021 18:22:22 GMT -6
Morgan figured that they had a good running head-start on teaching him to lick his own wounds. Kaodie was already doing the motions, they just needed the malii to do it on command quickly; just in case an injury happened on the fly. They really might not have room for errors in the future. They whistled the command for it, and Kaodie tilted his head. It was the new command, and it wasn't like the other one. As with all malii (and all creatures as clever as Malii) he was quite quick to put small details together. He bent down to where he'd had the slight heat-related injury earlier (there was still the tiniest little dimple there in his gummy flesh) and he licked it, healing the rest of the dimple that remained. Morgan was quite glad that it was coming together well! "G-good job!" They gave him another treat. "G-good job, you're doing great."
[13]
|
|
|
Post by Morgan on Dec 29, 2021 18:56:03 GMT -6
They really had to work on making sure that Kaodie was going to remember this well enough, now. They hadn't planned to be out much longer today, and it was already beginning to threaten some sort of precipitation (Morgan guessed rain, since it didn't feel quite cold enough to snow but it had dropped temperature quite a bit the last hour or so), so they hoped to only have to spend about thirty more minutes on the work. With how quick Kaodie was on the uptake, they were uncharacteristically hopeful.
They gave him another of the teeniest tiniest little burns that they could muster and then they gave the whistled command for him to lick his wounds. Kaodie did so without having to be pointed towards it this time, so he was treated with another game of tug of war. Thus started another twenty minutes of repetition just like that- command, behavior, and praise with alternated treats and tug of war.
[14]
|
|