[Training] (SE) where’s your backbone?

KIADA

your battleworn tongue doesn't say the truth;

that you are ruined

She’s made it to Halo for the next coming season, and with it the idea of training and growing stronger. Of course, it doesn’t hurt that she’s had a variety of training partners already, offers and the ability to not have to train alone certainly was appealing. And she’s managed to lug a fair amount of weaponry over for Chulane to test out whenever he wanted to.

But for today? She hopes to get his attuned status figured out — to see how much he lets go into that form to work it out. So she sends a letter out with a raven on wings of black shining blue to the place she last knew he was, requesting to meet for training the next morning.

And when the next morning came, she was slightly bleary eyed, the light of the day having yet to fully come over the mountain tops. And it was fucking cold. Her hair is braided back, and she wears her training leathers as she waits for him to arrive, arms crossed and trying to keep herself warm before she freezes to death in the halls of the palace.

and you wonder why he lets you,

the butcher

touch him

the sun

Happiness is not an ideal of reason but of imagination

Receiving the letter was pretty much the highlight of my time here so far, I cannot lie. It arrived one evening quite unexpectedly - few knew where I lived, and fewer still would want or need to write me a letter, so it was easy to assume that the note was for the landlord. But there was my name, there could be no doubt, and so I took it to my room and opened it with some excitement.

I nerded out in joy a lot after I read the letter in full, multiple times.

Rolling out of bed exceptionally early (I had asked the cook if she wouldn't mind waking me up when she usually awoke, which was grotesquely early, and she seemed to take a special satisfaction in the task, and I wonder if I'll ever get to sleep in again), I don my clothing and my letter, and make my way to the palace. I felt like a young squire, off to learn the ways of being a knight for the first time, learned in the theory of combat but extremely unpractised in the execution.

"Princess!" I proclaim happily as I enter the vast room where she has placed herself, pausing my approach to offer her a deep, sweeping bow. As I rise and continue onwards to her, my grin is very evident, and I can't help myself as I say with a warm laugh "Curious that I should find you in a palace, don't you think?"

CHULANE

KIADA

your battleworn tongue doesn't say the truth;

that you are ruined

She rubs along her biceps, a cloud of air in front of her as she waits for him to arrive. And surprisingly, he’s quite on time for how short of notice she’d given him. Her icy gaze flickers along his form as he enters, calling out to her with the term ‘princess’ that has a wide grin crossing her face, a roll of her eyes and a huff as she moves to meet him. “Chuy.” She replies, flashing him a grin as she prolongs the nickname out far more than it needs to be and starts to tilt her head.

But she offers him a chime of a laugh and promptly turns on her heel to head toward the section they’ll be training in. “I certainly don’t live in a princess quarters, if that’s what you’re asking.” She comments, turning her head to look at him over her shoulder and winking. “The Grounders like to talk all about their farms and things they’re missing out on back home.” As if it were any indication by the slight bags beneath her eyes, of just how much she’d heard from them in the past week or so.

She stops when she reaches the section and turns to him a bit more fully. “So what do you think about trying out our shifts, hm?”

and you wonder why he lets you,

the butcher

touch him

the sun

Happiness is not an ideal of reason but of imagination

Her warm, teasing tones greet my ears, and I cannot hide the pleasure the simple sound gives me. I follow her to the designated training section, listening as she talks of the Grounders she is 'caretaking' for while they stay here. I offer a sympathetic smile as I get near enough to see the fatigue that lines her face - I was born of farmers who liked their home and nothing else, I knew of the sort of stories she was talking about. While I myself had loved that life, I also loved a life of exploration and adventure, which is what led me to Antarctica, and consequently, to here.

Still, we power on, and arrive to the training area promptly. She turns to face me and I am a bit surprised when she proposes we work on our shifts.

It's a bit of a daunting prospect for me. The animal shift itself was something that I fine with, that I had practised in my own time, but the empathic link, the sharing of emotions and thoughts, still felt very much like an invasion on my own self, or like I was exposing myself to the world. I considered her words, and ultimately my excitement in being here, and seeing her shifted form(s), brought me to agree with her proposal.

"Sounds a bit easy," I say with an over-exaggerated air of one who knows better, though I very clearly did not. "How about we agree on some conditions? Feline only shifts?" I ask with a devious grin, my eyes piercing her own with the question.

CHULANE

KIADA

She needs to train with her attuned shifts – it’s the only thing she has against the creatures of LongNight. No magic to wield, nothing aside from weaponry. So she focuses on him when she turns to him, the exaggeration in his tones that have her chiming a bit of a laugh to accompany it. Someone’s certainly cocky. “Well, seeing as you only have the one, I’d say it’s fair.” She chimes to him, flashing a brilliant grin. At least it would be warmer to be wrapped up in her fur rather than the training leathers she sports right now.

But before she has a chance to shift or anything, she saunters over toward him to stand before him – peering up at him with a devilish grin that splashes across her face. “Feline shifts only. But, what if we tied a ribbon on one leg… Say, the front left? And we don’t let it touch the ground?” She flashes him a wider grin at this challenge – amused infinitely by the prospect and how much of a failure it might become.

At least it would be fun, right?

So she slips away from him to grab the ribbon she keeps in her bag just in case she needs it to tie something up, before she’s returning with two pieces of it and setting it out on the ground – trying to figure out how they’d go about tying it in the first place. Ah well, they’d get to that when they came to it. Ready? She asks, moments before she shifts into her caracal form, tufted ears perked toward him and iceberg eyes looking up at him, long tail sweeping behind her.

i know every river has an end

you loved me and then you left

you loved me and then you didn't

The importance of training the attuned shifts is not lost on me - everything I have been learning about the world, the Abandoned (or mages, as I believe some preferred to be called) and their associated magics seemed to dominate the world as far as convenience and power went, and I felt terribly underequipped, unprepared, unlearned in basic survival techniques. I had made it this far, but if even half of the tales I had heard so far held truth, I had been playing on easy mode.

She agrees to my terms, offering her own, which I found curious, but readily accepted with a shrug and a friendly "Sure," escaping my lips.

Then it happened: her shift. I knew already that she had a caracal shift, but as the form took the woman whose laughter chimed so easily and playful winks teased me so constantly transformed into a stunning specimen of the feline species. I lowered my frame down to a sort of crouching squat getting distracted in my admiration of her that it wasn't until her voice resonated within me that I came back to the here-and-now, and refocussed on the task at hand.

The transition from man to feline wasn't so foreign to me now, with the patterned pelt sprouting and the muscles and bones changing, it was just another breath since her question and I stood before her in my own clouded leopard form. It would seem that we both clung onto our unique eyes in these forms, something that pleased me for an unidentifiable reason. Excitement of my own making thrummed along the bond between us, anticipation clearly evident.

I looked to the ribbons she had laid out, and lay a large paw - my right fore-paw - over one, and with some creative licence, manage to tie it up, glancing to Kia, and assisting her if she needed it with the ribbon, I turn my muscular frame, stretching my legs and back in a large arch, swaying my overly long tail out behind me, before facing up to her once more, ribbon-tied pay raised off the ground.

'Ready.'

Chulane

fridooh & whimzi @ deviantart

KIADA

He agrees to the terms, and she grins at him in wicked delight, before shifting. Woman becomes a rather small feline before him, and as he crouches she approaches on deft paws – iceberg gaze scanning him up and down, an ear flickering as if to say ‘whenever you want to’ surely out of pure amusement. And when he finally does, and the sensation of his emotions hits her through the bond, her whiskers flicker unphased despite the thundering of her end as the impact of it is felt.

He steps forward into the ribbon and manages to tie it, and she follows suit – using a mix of her teeth and a bit of help from his end, the ribbon is on. And she finds him again, her gaze lifting brightly, shining and glimmering out of pure excitement for what’s to come – letting the sensation flicker down the bond toward him – a sort of… Connection, emotionally, that otherwise wouldn’t have much else to go off of other than playful winks and amusing words.

She watches as he stretches, the tail that sweeps along the floor – and she steps forward on three of her paws, head outstretched and tufted ears perked to give him a slight inspection from her own end of the feline form. And when she’s pleased enough, hearing his ‘ready’ she steps back and lets her tail sweep along the floor, before she darts toward him – sort of a game of tag of sorts, trying her best to keep her foot lifted and not slipping across the floor as she tries to dart away, whether or not she touched him or not.

i know every river has an end

you loved me and then you left

you loved me and then you didn't

It was difficult not to get distracted by the simply adorable tufts of hair that rose up from the tips of her dark ears. My heightened senses could see so much more detail, could hear so much more, and yet, my damn human brain only wanted to focus those senses on the most ridiculous thing - her cute fucking ears. And when my excitement is joined by her own, I barely manage to refocus in time to see what was coming for me.

There is still something of a delay between my feline instincts, my feline reflexes, and my human mind. Surprise jolts through me, unguardedly leaking over the bond, though it is swallowed up by the tumultuous emotions buzzing between us. Kia is far quicker than I anticipated, the handicap of only having three legs to work with making her motion no doubt more awkward than usual, but effective nonetheless.

Had I been able to let the feline shift that I embodied truly own its reflexes and instincts, I would have seen her coming and responded immediately, but what happened instead was far less elegant than that. Very much looking like a human-trying-to-control-a-leopard's-body (and sucking at it), I attempted to duck away from the oncoming paw, being careful not to let my own ribboned paw touch the ground.

But I am too slow, too clumsy, and her paw deftly bops me squarely on my speckled forehead anyway. My ears flatten and my eyes squint as I hiss in reaction to it, rising up swiftly as she then pulled away from me. Pushing myself forward, I then outstretch my ribboned paw to try and return the action - after all, every action has an equal and opposite reaction.

Chulane

fridooh & whimzi @ deviantart

KIADA

While Chuy struggles to get into the shift, Kiada’s had plenty of practice. Her feline instincts take over, the bounce in her step despite keeping one lifted (though it is difficult) still manages to keep her pinpointed on a course straight toward the clouded leopard. She’s distracted in part by the flood of emotions, the surprise that takes Chulane over. All she can do is pulse some amusement back as she arrives, her paw booping him perfectly on his forehead.

But she’s off like a shot again, bounding away the best she can while keeping her foot lifted, a hum of laughter trilling down the bond toward him at the hiss he offers. Let go, Chuy. Get into it. She chimes to him as he nears and she slows a small amount, maybe to try and give him the opportunity to strike. Only… It doesn’t happen, her tail flickers before him, before the outstretched paw, and misses completely as Kiada turns to watch with her bright blue gaze.

And really? What else is there for the Harpy to do other than to flick her tail back, aiming to bop him aside the head, already pulsing a hint of apology to it, a feline smirk crossing her maw.

i know every river has an end

you loved me and then you left

you loved me and then you didn't

Her words reverberate through my cranium. The intimacy of it is still so new to me, the shock of having someone right there, in a space that normally only my own inner voice resides, gives me pause, my movements jarring and uncoordinated. And so my attempts to return the bop go unanswered, my frame instead wavering after her like a drunk baby, as I reach for and miss her copper form. Just in time, I recall my that this paw is not to touch the ground, and I pull it back, overbalancing slightly but recovering with barely an inch of space to spare. But while I waste this time in recalculating my position, she is moving, ever efficient and well-practised, engaged completely in her form, while I am still spending time re-calibrating the controls between my mind of science and logic and the leopard's instincts and nature.

With an abrupt, surprised, snort, I receive yet another bop from her, this time from her tail, tapping me upside the head, chased by an apologetic swell of emotions that flood my senses.

I pause any attempts at following her for a moment, attempting to ascertain my position in all of this once more, to clarify, to remove this foggy delay that is clearly affecting my ability to effectively interact in this form. 'Let go,' I repeat, to confirm her instruction, my words sent with the confusion that still plagues me, the disconnect, the frustration at the delay. I have control of this body, but how do I let it control me? 'How?' I ask, enquiring after the mysteries of it all, swallowing the emotions that would otherwise overwhelm both myself and the bond, seeking instead more clarification, more help, more clues on how to unlock the full potential of this form.

Chulane

fridooh & whimzi @ deviantart

KIADA

If there’s a war that brews within Chulane when it comes to giving into the shift and letting it take charge, Kiada’s unaware. All she knows is that the minute she shifts, the minute she relinquishes control, it becomes her. It floods her senses with the need to hunt and survive, to adapt and be swift on her feet. So when she bops him aside the head and he doesn’t move to attack once more, she turns fully to approach him, tufted ears flickering in her uncertainty of what he means. For Kiada, it had been an almost immediate shift, an adjustment.

So she nears him, keeping that paw lifted despite wanting to set it down, her head outstretched to sniff at his neck, to brush against his side with a deep rumble of a purr slipping from her throat as her feline playfulness comes out. Forget about the things you know and what you are. Stop trying to control it. She informs him, lifting her attention back to try and meet the clouded leopards eyes.

Let it control you. There’s a flicker of her tail to that, one that might brush against his spotted neck, before she’s off again – hopping down the training ground as if she’s prey to his hunt, wondering if that might be enough to get him to dive right in.

i know every river has an end

you loved me and then you left

you loved me and then you didn't

The copper feline approaches me, holding me with her intense stare, before pressing herself against me. The deep purrs, the soft vibrations, usher something similar from me as I live in the moment, feeling a warm rush of affection and tenderness towards her. From my throat echoes a purr as I lean into her brief touch, drinking in her scent, losing myself to this fragment of time, this instant of quiet, innocent pleasure.

It is short-lived, as her voice gives further instructions, her form pulling away from my own, seeking my gaze to be held within hers, icy connections across the space between us.

It helps, everything she says and does, to stir the instincts within me, but still they meet a barrier, and now I know what makes that barrier: The same wall that keeps my emotions in check, that hides them away from my conscious mind, so that I can function as a happy human in the here-and-now, and not be dragged down into a wallowing heap of depression, grief and otherwise negative emotions.

But then the instincts of the leopard arch up within me once more as they see her elegant form bounding away from me, and the barrier is punched through by it, not shattered but certainly not solid any more.

The emotions flood through the bond, waves of all that I have kept locked away since my arrival, the loss, the grief and nostalgia, the sharp and painful realisation that all I have on Earth is gone now, left behind, abandoned, unreachable - it is a great abyss, a raging torrent, and yet as it flows from me, I give over to the instincts, and promptly follow after the caracal that encases Kia. The emotions are my fuel, my fire, and while I want to pull them back, to control them once more, I let them go, I relinquish control and surrender.

With a low growl I step in her wake, keeping my paw elevated, running with a three-legged gait after her. When the timing seems right, my haunches bunch and then leap, shooting forwards with both front paws outstretched (nails retracted though) in an attempt to tackle her hind-end, to at least capture that dang tail that keeps toying with me.

Chulane

fridooh & whimzi @ deviantart

KIADA

There’s a moment where she’s unsure if the feelings go through, if the point gets across. And when she watches him, curiously, locking her gaze with an equally iceberg pair, only then does Kiada give it a full attempt in unleashing them within Chulane, bounding away like prey would to a predator. And in this instance? He is the predator. She bounds, long legs leaping while doing her best to keep her paw off the ground. It’s not as graceful as usual, but it’s also not as terrible as it could be.

She feels the flood of emotions coat her own, the sorrow and sadness, the loss and grief, and she can relate so incredibly deeply, that she falters as if she’s thinking through her own mind. It causes her to stumble, ever so slightly, slipping across the slick floor as her heart thunders within her chest and Chulane surrenders over to the predator writing within that feline shift.

Kiada can hear the low growl and the padding bounce of his paws behind her, and she skitters in an attempt to swerve, only to have the clouded leopard appear right behind her and shooting toward her like a rocket. He collides into her haunches, and she slips across the floor, forgetting the paw as it lands on the ground and she hisses against that quiet loss. But then she’s giving into her own instincts, wriggling around and trying to kick out at Chuy with her hind legs, trying to push him around a bit.

i know every river has an end

you loved me and then you left

you loved me and then you didn't

A sharp intensity has pervaded me, taken hold, as the instincts, the feral incarnations of this wild beast, this carnivore, thrive on the emotions, the raw and real storm that fights for freedom, that finally has permission, has an outlet, a way to discharge. I find accuracy easily now, putting trust in my feline shift to simply act, to have faith in the instincts that come with it, no longer fighting the emotions that drive it, but not yet at the stage where I can silence them. They writhe and toil, rising and falling like an ocean tide within me, all of the things that I have ignored, squashed and locked away, unwilling to face the pain, the suffering, the sadness and sorrow.

But I face it now, and if I were human there would be tears burning behind my eyes, welling and falling down my cheeks. This form does not know tears or crying, it only expresses itself through its motions, its instincts taking over, dominating, at long last.

I press her to the ground, my victory over her summoning a wave of triumph, of joy, which joined the rest of the tumultuous passions and sentiments churning within me. She is swift to react, her strong legs pushing me off, and they connect, knocking me off as they level against my chest and forelegs. I use the motion to carry my jump further, now leaping away again, letting some distance stretch between us, as the churning, roiling and toiling waves within me rises and falls. I am breathing heavier than when we started, not just from physical exertion, but from the emotional toll, that is no doubt evident on the bond. I catch my breath, and I look to Kia, as I once again try to wrangle down and control these things that scare me so.

'Sorry,' I murmur through the bond, eyes blinking as they look away, the intensity of it, the intimacy of it, intimidating my logical mind, terrifying it. 'How… how do you deal with… I struggle to find the words for it, and instead stand, all four paws on the ground, my gaze drifting to look somewhere between my front paws, as the sorrow, the darkness, the depression and grief rise once again within me, rendering me silent once more, and now unmoving as well.

Chulane

fridooh & whimzi @ deviantart