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Post by Noa on Sept 12, 2020 23:07:47 GMT -6
Azalea followed him faithfully; it was one of the commands she knew, and she was used to doing it. In fact he thought she might have been a little dependent on him, come to that, which was funny, since Aster had gotten her as an... adult, more or less, though she was a halfbreed at the time, which had confounded things somewhat. Avander, who was more independent, had been raised by Aster from a hatchling. But then, Avander had also been given run of the estate grounds to act as a wandering deterrent to anyone stupid enough to try trespassing, whereas Azalea had mostly been limited by her mobility issues to the lake and its surrounding shores.
Once they reached a space between two buildings, Azalea balked slightly.
{I don't know if I'll fit,} she said hesitantly, looking at the space. Aster eyed her, and gave the matter some thought.
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Post by Noa on Sept 12, 2020 23:12:09 GMT -6
She would have fit, but it would have been tight, and maybe they ought to start with something easier just to let her work up to it. "My bad," he said. "Let's go this way, then." He gave her the command to follow again and went down a different route between two other buildings, and Azalea trailed behind him once more.
She couldn't get her full length between the buildings, of course, because they'd have to be real longhouses to do that. The Pliathor's size owed much more to their length than their girth, even if the top of Azalea's head, lying flat on the ground, came up to Aster's waist.
But even this much entrapment was enough to make Azalea feel a little uncomfortable.
She didn't complain, but he could feel it through their link, and again the guilt tugged at him.
{We came here to practice something, didn't we?} she said.
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Post by Noa on Sept 12, 2020 23:26:14 GMT -6
Well, if she figured that much out, Aster wasn't going to lie to her. Besides, maybe it would be easier to bear if she knew that this was all toward some purpose. "Yes we did," Aster said. "Remember how you didn't like the pocketpets moving around? This is like that. Sometimes, if we have to go through the city... You're a lot bigger now, so it'll feel a lot like this." He motioned to the buildings, then gave her a mental image of what she would look like if she walked through the city streets now.
In all honesty, he didn't anticipate having to take her into the city very often. After all, he sent Rabbit on most of his city errands, and Azalea traipsing through a populated area was pretty much guaranteed to scare the crap out of a lot of people, whether she was aggressive about it or not.
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Post by Noa on Sept 12, 2020 23:35:51 GMT -6
Still, it seemed like the most credible way to present the necessity of doing this to her, and it wasn't like the situation would never come up. Sometimes he might want a seriously unnerving escort, or else maybe he would have to take her to the Pit at some point. He thought, a little wistfully, about seeing her in an Aquatics tournament now. Back then she hadn't fared too well against the likes of Pliathors and Tat-lungs, but he figured she would give almost any beast a good run for their money now.
{Okay,} Azalea said. She didn't seem happy about it, but she did sound a little more determined. {Like the pocketpets.}
"That's right," Aster said. "Nothing to worry about. Here, have a snack if you think it would help." He held a fish up to her, and she opened her mouth obligingly so that he could put it in.
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Post by Noa on Sept 12, 2020 23:38:28 GMT -6
When her mouth was closed, she looked pretty harmless, if you maybe forgot about how massive she was. Between the flowers and the floating seaweed fronds and her blunt head and big glossy eyes, she made a less intimidating figure than a lot of other Pliathors, when she wasn't putting on a show of being threatening. But her teeth, though shorter than other Pliths, were still very sharp and on full display with her jaws open.
If he didn't know her so well, Aster might have been intimidated, by sheer scale if nothing else.
He tossed the fish in, and Azalea swallowed it whole. {They aren't very satisfying anymore now that they're so small,} she said mournfully.
"No, you'd do much better with a whole cow these days, I guess," Aster said. Feeding her had certainly got more expensive. But even this small treat was enough to distract her for a moment.
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Post by Noa on Sept 12, 2020 23:42:53 GMT -6
He furthered that distraction with a little more command practice. He wanted her to be able to forget where she was, but it was a little harder to forget this sort of discomfort than it was to forget with the pocketpets, because the buildings were actively limiting her movements.
In the end, he supposed the only thing for it was time, and maybe more treats, so she could build more positive associations with this sort of restraint. And once she got used to moving more carefully, maybe she would have to put less effort into it, though he didn't know for sure about that one.
It definitely wasn't something that would happen over the course of a single walk, so he had her spend some time between and around the buildings, then called it good and walked with her through wider, more open areas again until it was time to go home.
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Post by Noa on Sept 12, 2020 23:48:42 GMT -6
They spent a few days doing this, and slowly Azalea began to feel more at ease moving between the buildings. It wasn't to say she ever really enjoyed it, but she didn't tense up or feel as acutely uncomfortable as she had before. And as she grew more comfortable with it, Aster asked her to pass through narrower places, until eventually they could challenge the gap between the two buildings that she had balked at on the first day they began doing this.
Aster called a break after that. Part of training, especially with this kind of uncomfortable desensitization, was to give the creature some time to recover. As they relaxed in a more open area of the grounds, Aster gave Azalea a look over, and was surprised to find some blood on her hide.
"Did you get cut on the buildings?" he asked, frowning as he inspected the cuts.
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Post by Noa on Sept 12, 2020 23:56:04 GMT -6
Azalea turned her head to look at the cuts, but she didn't seem particularly alarmed. Well, then again, it was her body; if this was something that would have alarmed her, it probably would have happened when she got cut in the first place. The fact that she hadn't reacted back then probably meant it didn't bother her much now.
{Oh, this?} Azalea said. {This happens all the time since I've changed. If I wait long enough, they heal up and go away.}
The way she said it made Aster's frown deepen. She probably wasn't wrong, and maybe it was par for the course with a creature like a Pliathor, but...
"Why not try licking it?" Aster suggested. "That'll help clean it some, and then it'll heal faster."
{I've never tried it,} Azalea said, but she didn't seem opposed. {Do you really think it would help?}
"Can't hurt, can it?" Aster replied.
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Post by Silver on Sept 13, 2020 1:16:58 GMT -6
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Post by Noa on Sept 13, 2020 11:37:28 GMT -6
He had meant it as reassurance, but Azalea seemed startled by his words. {Do you really think it could hurt?} she asked.
Aster winced, realizing his mistake. "No, no. Bad turn of phrase. I'm saying I don't think it could do any harm, even if it doesn't help. And I do think it would help."
{If you really think so,} Azalea said. She bent her head toward the cut, and Aster could sense her doubt, but she was a good sort, and really didn't like to disappoint him. Her tongue slipped out to lap at the very shallow scratches, once, twice, three times.
{The taste is not very nice,} Azalea said.
Aster laughed at that, though he knew he probably shouldn't have. "Is it really?" he said. "But you eat meat all the time, don't you?"
{It doesn't taste the same,} said Azalea, though now her tone took on a ponderous quality too.
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Post by Noa on Sept 13, 2020 21:23:13 GMT -6
It was as if she was giving some thought to it now about why she found it unpleasant, though if she came to a conclusion, she didn’t share it. Suffice to say that he now knew she didn’t like the taste of her own blood, which was at least good to know for future reference, he supposed.
“But they’re cleaner now, and they’ll heal faster because of it,” he reassured her. “Do you have any more cuts like this?”
Even as he spoke, he was inspecting the rest of her length. It hadn’t really occurred to him to look for this sort of thing before. It had never happened with Avander, but maybe it was because Azalea’s range of motion was different… Or maybe her skin was just more delicate. He didn’t know.
Either way, it didn’t take long for him to find more of them.
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Post by Noa on Sept 13, 2020 21:23:26 GMT -6
“Tell you what,” Aster said, “let’s make a hand signal for this too.” After some thought, he swept his hand down the length of his forearm while Azalea watched. He repeated it a couple of times just to get her to commit it to memory, and then gave the signal to her again, as an actual command.
Again, she turned her nose to the area he had indicated, a new set of cuts he had found further down her back. There was a moment’s hesitation, most likely Azalea anticipating the unpleasant taste, and then her tongue lapped at these scratches too.
Aster went on finding scratches, and giving Azalea the signal to lick at them, which she did. As his inspection went on, he did find quite a few of them in various places, which served as good practice for her to remember the hand signal, if nothing else.
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Post by Noa on Sept 13, 2020 21:23:44 GMT -6
The actual concept of licking her own wounds had only taken a little explaining, and he offered her treats in between incidences to help alleviate the ‘bad taste’ that she had complained about.
It was a surprisingly quick process to teach her a whole command, Aster thought, But, well, unlike the last one, this one hadn’t been anything particularly fancy.
They didn’t continue with the enclosed space training until the next day, since Aster figured she had probably had enough mild discomfort for one walk. But when they did come back the next day, he decided to try something else.
“Why don’t we try going into the barn?” Aster said.
He wouldn’t have suggested going into the house, because Azalea still didn’t look like she would fit. That hadn’t changed. But some of the buildings in the back seemed to be built on roomier proportions.
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Post by Noa on Sept 13, 2020 21:24:14 GMT -6
And on those merits, Aster thought they might have had a decent chance at being normal inside.
Not to mention relatively empty, which they would need to be to help accommodate Azalea’s bulk.
Azalea seemed uncertain - Aster was learning that she was not very bold, despite everything - but when Aster went in first, she followed. It was funny to think about her using him as a sort of… gest subject, or a scout, when she was the one who was so much bigger and tougher, but he didn’t mind. It was a trainer’s job to look out for his beasts too, so he owed it to her in that sense.
“Let’s see if we can fit more of you in here,” he said. She passed through the doors easily enough, since despite her overall size, she was a long, narrow thing; and her thickest part wasn’t any wider than, say, a big cow would be.
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Post by Nadia on Sept 14, 2020 11:01:44 GMT -6
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