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Post by Noa on May 14, 2020 22:23:18 GMT -6
“When I say ‘dash’, I want you to run as fast as you can for..." Casting around, Aster roughly measured a distance. "Let’s say, from that line of trees to about where I am.” He indicated the tree line at the edge of the clearing. Rhys eyeballed the distance, and Aster waited until he was ready before he gave the signal. “Ready? Alright, dash.”
Rhys ran pretty quickly, actually, for a creature of his size. His first dash wasn’t bad at all, excepting that he was a little slow on the start. But they had to work on his responding to the signal anyway, so Aster was sure his start times would improve soon.
“That was pretty good,” Aster said. He had been working with Azalea more as of late, and she was praise driven enough that she reminded him that maybe some of his other creatures might appreciate it too.
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Post by Noa on May 14, 2020 22:24:00 GMT -6
It wasn’t a strategy he could use with, say, a proud creature like Summer, or even Avander, but he felt that Rhys would appreciate it, at least. And sure enough, Rhys did seem to brighten a little at the praise. It wasn’t as effusive as it would have been on Azalea, but it wasn't nothing either.
“Think you can do it again?” Aster said.
{I think so,} Rhys said.
“Okay. Dash,” Aster said.
The second dash was almost as good as the first. Not quite, but almost. Aster could really feel the effort going into it, despite Rhys’s initial reluctance. Maybe it was just that he happened to be immediately good at this. Some of the things that he had had to learn had taken him ages to get the hang of, so it must have been a relief to have something simple and relatively easy like this.
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Post by Noa on May 14, 2020 22:24:30 GMT -6
Well, ‘easy’ might have been a strong word for the sprinting maneuver. In fact, Aster could already see signs of strain and fatigue in the Felusine’s body language. Rhys was trying not to let it show, but Rhys had that stubborn streak, and he had spent too long trying to prove to Aster that he was ready for bigger things. It had probably become a habit, a frame of mind that was hard to get out of.
“Let’s take a break,” Aster said. Rhys gave him a startled look, and then a guilty one. For all his efforts, Rhys didn’t really have much of a game face. Not that it mattered; as someone who trained creatures for a living, Aster knew what signs to look for, and anyway they had their bond; if he wanted to, he could tap on that to feel exactly what Rhys was feeling.
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Post by Noa on May 14, 2020 22:24:46 GMT -6
He preferred to avoid it, of course, since he valued his own privacy and imagined his creatures felt the same, but if it was a matter of preserving their health, of course he would do it.
Watching him, Aster sighed a little. “It’s normal to feel tired when doing this sort of thing, you know. Sprinting like that takes a lot out of you, especially at the beginning. Endurance is something you can only really build up over time.”
Rhys didn’t meet Aster’s gaze, but the tension did ease out of him a little. “When you’ve caught your breath, we’ll keep going. I’m not coddling you, if that’s what you’re thinking. There’s just a right and a wrong way to push yourself.”
And true to his word, when Aster felt that Rhys was ready to go again, he gave the signal. “Dash,” he said.
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Post by Noa on May 14, 2020 22:25:09 GMT -6
Rhys was even slower off the start this time, not because of his reaction time but because he was still tired from the first two tries, but it was as Aster said, endurance had to be built over time. And it wasn’t going to be built any faster if Aster didn’t push him at least a little.
Aster did take it a little easier on him from there on out, allowing him longer breaks between repetitions, but they worked on the sprint a few more times before Aster called it quits for the day.
They came back the next day to practice more of the same. This time, Aster had set up markers to indicate how far Rhys ought to run for each sprint, so that he had an easier and more definite way to see than Aster’s makeshift indicators yesterday using only a treeline and his own body.
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Post by Noa on May 14, 2020 22:25:19 GMT -6
But the methodology was still much the same. “Are you ready?” he asked Rhys, who stretched, then shook himself off, before getting into position. Aster took that as his signal that he had prepared himself, and said, “Okay, dash.”
Rhys sped off. It was a little slower than his first attempt the other day, but maybe he was just getting warmed up. At the end of it he didn’t seem terribly winded, though he did show signs already of the exertion that the dash had taken out of him. He had managed two dashes from a fully rested state yesterday, so today Aster asked the same of him, giving the signal once again without much of a rest in between. “Dash,” he said.
Again, Rhys took off. He was faster this time, perhaps having limbered himself up a bit more, but by the end of it he was exhausted again.
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Post by Noa on May 14, 2020 22:25:33 GMT -6
Only so much progress could be made from a day’s training, Aster knew, especially for something like this. So they kept the regimen the same for that day, and for the next few days also.
It was the work of several days of building strength before Rhys could dash effectively three times in a row, and the work of weeks before he could do it as many times as Aster asked of him, within reason. In a live situation, Aster hoped never to have to ask him to do it consecutively so many times, but it was a useful skill to have, especially against creatures who had nothing more than physical means to level against him. And Aster’s goal with most of the things he taught Rhys was still to keep him safe.
It had taken a long time, but eventually Rhys’s endurance had been built up to Aster’s satisfaction. From there, they could move on to things that might be more interesting for Rhys to learn, as the Felusine so clearly wanted.
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Post by Noa on May 14, 2020 22:48:52 GMT -6
Aster had a training plan thought out for Rhys. That had been the case since Rhys had arrived at the estate, in fact. The Felusine might not have believed him when he said that he did eventually plan to teach Rhys a lot of things, including the full scope of his abilities, but Aster wasn’t someone who raised a creature to no purpose. Perhaps he had been a bit too overzealous with keeping the kid gloves on Rhys in particular, but he hadn’t really intended to coddle the Felusine forever.
Still, some things happened outside the predicted order that he had in mind. The Petite Tournament, for one--- that had happened right under his nose, with Aster none the wiser until after the whole thing had been done and settled. He was still a little bitter about the way that it had happened, but he did also, reluctantly, understand where Rhys was coming from.
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Post by Noa on May 14, 2020 22:49:21 GMT -6
In a way, it was not unlike raising a ward or a younger sibling, and watching them get themselves into the kind of trouble that you wouldn’t have approved of, but would probably have done if you had been in their position.
… Aubrey had never given him that much trouble. But the older Aster got, the more he realized that Aubrey had been the exception rather than the norm. He certainly never lucked out to quite that extent again with any of his Harachiu, though he wouldn’t have called any of them bad kids either.
Still, no one had been quite as adventurous and headstrong as Rhys, who had gone so far as to throw himself in the fighting ring for a chance to do something more exciting than what Aster was offering him.
But beyond that frankly melodramatic example, there were other, smaller things that didn’t go quite to plan.
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Post by Noa on May 14, 2020 22:49:37 GMT -6
The way that Rhys came into some of his other mental abilities, for one. Aster certainly hadn’t expected Rhys to start monitoring his sleep, nor was he prepared for the morning when Rhys confronted him about something the Felusine had begun to notice.
{Last night,} said Rhys. Aster, sitting down to breakfast, had regarded him sidelong, trying to guess where this was going. In retrospect he supposed he ought to have seen it coming, but in that moment he had still been unaware of what was waiting for him, and the frown on his face only deepened as Rhys fell silent, ears laid low, apparently conflicted as to how best to go on.
But it was the morning, and Aster didn’t have a particularly busy day ahead to look forward to, so he could afford to be patient, to take things slow. Besides, he had the very important matter of eating to distract him while he waited.
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Post by Noa on May 14, 2020 22:50:08 GMT -6
Though maybe he wouldn’t have taken a bite if he knew what had been coming. {Your dreams,} said Rhys. {Your… nightmares? No, they’re worse than that, aren’t they? I saw…} At this point Rhys trailed off, likely because Aster was now sporting a truly dire expression, somewhere between constipation and deep, abject regret. And shock, probably. He couldn’t see himself, didn’t know what exactly Rhys was looking at. But even Aster knew that the face he was making couldn’t have been anything good.
{Are you alright?} Rhys asked, placing a paw on Aster’s hand.
“Yes,” Aster said, very convincingly.
There was a pause, as Rhys tried to decide how to process that answer, while Aster stoically refused to give any more of a response than the one he had already offered. In the end he apparently chose to just ignore it and move on.
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Post by Noa on May 14, 2020 22:50:43 GMT -6
{Well, I wanted… I mean, I want to try to see if I can help. I don’t mean to pry into your affairs, but they’re, um… They’re pretty loud. The nightmares, I mean. Even I woke up, so I don’t think they’re helping your, ah, sleep quality.} Aster’s expression darkened further, but Rhys, having adjusted to this, simply powered through the rest of his speech. Aster, through his growing haze of discomfort, realized that he must have thought through what he was going to say before he had approached Aster this morning. Possibly he had spent the night on it, having been awake for however long it had been since Aster had woken him up with the psychic backlash of a bout of night terrors.
… Oh, how he wished this wasn’t what was happening. Unfortunately, wishes had never had much power in changing Aster's circumstances.
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Post by Noa on May 14, 2020 22:50:53 GMT -6
He took his ribbons off before he slept for exactly this reason, so not even Avander knew how bad it really was. The part he couldn’t help was that they could all sense his fear and unease, but it was just one of those things he didn’t talk about, and up until now, they had all respected that. Even Summer. But then, Summer had the most knowledge of what he might have been seeing those nights, and why.
But to have someone privy to the exact nature of his dreams… That was something Aster had never had to deal with. If he had thought it through a little more, he might have anticipated that this was going to happen, seeing as Rhys’s telepathy was an inborn ability rather than something Aster could control by taking off a relevant accessory.
“How long have you been hearing them? My dreams,” Aster said.
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Post by Noa on May 17, 2020 0:36:29 GMT -6
{Well…} Rhys had the grace to look sheepish, at least, when Aster asked him this particular question. {If I’m being honest, this isn’t the first time. I didn’t know what it was at first, actually, and then I wasn’t sure what to do about it, but… I think I can help. I can, can’t I? You said eventually I’d be able to help calm the drakes, so I can’t see why I couldn’t help you too.}
For the first time since Rhys had mentioned his dreams, the pall over Aster’s features lifted somewhat as he considered what Rhys was proposing. It wasn’t anything he ever would have considered for himself, since he hadn’t… No, he had just lived with the way things were for so long that it simply didn’t occur to him that this was even an option.
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Post by Noa on May 17, 2020 0:37:18 GMT -6
… And if he was being entirely honest with himself, on some level he felt that he deserved it too, to be dogged by the nightmares that he had. Aster wasn’t the type to contemplate his own psychology too deeply, much less analyze the twisted circumstances of the past that had led him to this point, but on some deep emotional level, the idea of it felt right. He had gotten away from the worst of it, and he was okay now, but it felt right that he couldn’t shake it entirely. A reminder of what had been, and what could just as easily come to pass again if he wasn’t careful.
Still, for the sake of exploring the possibility, at least…
But the night terrors were an unpredictable thing. They didn’t come every night, and sometimes, when he was lucky, he could go months without them manifesting at all.
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