Co-Dependency [[ Training Thread / Closed ]]

[Faolan]

A few hours' walk from the Pravus headquarters found Feng and his little pet in a large cluster of trees. A bit longer time spent exploring the thicket and braving the sloping hills ended with him emerging out into a large clearing surrounded on all sides by trees. There was a bit of sunlight filtering down through the foliage overhead, casting the occasional patch of light and warmth onto the ground that shifted with each sway of the canopy. Here seemed a suitable place to get some rest and to do what he'd set out to do, and he turned to the spider on his shoulder and commanded, "Down."

Arioche leapt obediently off of her master with a thin line of spider's silk trailing along behind her to help soften her landing. She landed on all six of her limbs, as she was wont to do, and turned around to face her owner and await further instructions. Off in the distance a bird-like cry pierced the air, but other than that the atmosphere around them was hushed and quiet. Knowing that such a situation usually tended to upset her master, the string spit pokemon began to click her little pink mouthparts together in earnest, a soothing metronome to ward off the chaotic thoughts lurking within her owner's mind. For a few moments the expression on Feng's face grew tense, then eventually smoothed out once Arioche had begun to increase the rapidity of her clicking motions. A soft coo of gratitude escaped him and he flashed the spinarak one of his rare, genuine smiles; it was the sort that actually made him seem normal and boyishly carefree.

"You know what they say about you..." Feng's voice dropped to a murmur, long, limber legs taking him around to the back of his pokemon in confident strides. Nonetheless, halfway through it still seemed like he was prowling as he encircled his pokemon from behind. Arioche remained still, quietly awaiting her instructions. The clicking of her mouthparts hadn't let up in the slightest, nor did they increase to indicate any sense of fear in her. While not exactly the nicest trainer in the world, Faolan had refrained from outright beating her [ these last few weeks, at least. Before... it was best not to go there ]. Perhaps it was because he had seen just how useful she could be and had sought to not injure her unnecessarily; there were always pokemon battles for that task.

"There seems to be a running gag about bug pokemon and fly swatters... just one misstep and 'squish'. You're out of the picture." Feng clapped his hands together suddenly, once, to emphasize this little sentiment. Arioche's clicking stopped for just a second then, but more out of disbelief than anything else. It wasn't that hard to get rid of her. Feng should know thi--

"At your level, I'm inclined to agree."

-- Or not. Arioche regarded the man before her warily, almost as though she expected him to squish her at any given moment. But the pravus grunt made no move of hostility toward her, instead choosing to kneel down and extend an arm to her. Arioche obediently moved to scuttle herself up along his arm, plopping down on his shoulder where she resumed her clicking. A chuckle from her master indicated his pleasure with her, but before she could plant a string-shot-loaded kiss on his cheek, she felt her front promptly snatched up and she was thrown up into the air.

Several feet higher than she was used to being, she flailed her little legs desperately for something to grasp on-- until she caught the look on her master's face from her upside down, spinning position and a little light bulb went off on her head.

Quickly she began to spray out her webbing, coating each tree closest to her with a fine layer of string shot. It took a few moments but finally she had a sturdy enough connection that jolted her into a wide arc, leaving the spinarak to sail rather helplessly through the air until she came into contact with the nearest tree trunk.

Once there she attached her limbs securely to it, gave her master a look, and shot out another wad of web at the tree next to her. She ensured that the connection was sturdy before swinging around it and, midway, breaking the string before another one shot out and attached it to a tree branch closer to the floor. The momentum from these swings ensured her that she kept arcing around instead of just plunging straight down, and in no time she was ground level once again. The trees she had used glistened slightly with the remnants of her string, but she knew they would disintegrate in a few hours and it would appear as though no one had been there.

"Good girl.." Feng crooned to his little pet once she had landed on all six limbs again. In retaliation she rearranged the expression on her back into a sour one but walked her way over to her master nonetheless. When he knelt down to help her climb onto his shoulder, she made sure she attached a generous amount of webbing to his arm and to herself; that way, if he decided to do that little stunt again, she would at least take him with her. It wouldn't work, she knew, but a spider could dream, right?

The methods of Arioche's master weren't always the most traditional, but it did keep the excitement going in her life. She knew, for one, that there was usually [though not always] a method to Feng's madness, and it wasn't until they were heading back to the city that she realized the advantage being tossed in the air gave her. At that height and at that speed, she was forced to determine the safest route down, and in a quick span of time, too. In battle an enemy pokemon was not very charitable to a fallen [or flying] foe and if this had been a match against a trainer, doubtless she would have lost miserably.

"... thank you, Master." Her voice was rather squeaky and hoarse with disuse, giving the pokemon a rasping sort of tone. It was enough to make Feng glance over to her in wide-eyed astonishment, but soon enough a sly smile curved the corners of his lips upward and he pressed a hand in between her pink mouthparts to silence her. The fact that she had spoken said volumes about her gratitude and, rather insane though Feng tended to be, he understood the message loud and clear.

( Word Count: 1104.
Experience Points: 552. )

[Faolan]

It was rather hard to balance the stack of small discs in his arms [ that was what they looked like, at least ] as Faolan trekked through the forest in his casual civillian clothes. This time around, the sky was bright and sunny, though tinged with streaks of pink, orange and gold that signalled the departure of the sun and the onset of twilight. In a few hours the noctournal pokemon that populated this region would start to be up and about, but since this was an area filled with rather weak and low-level species, there was nothing to worry about in the way of being attacked.

Like before, Arioche had made her perch up on Feng's shoulder and sat nestled there with her little legs holding fast to her master's jacket. A sticky strand of webbing had shot out to grasp at the stack of discs in Faolan's arms, but since they were small and the boy didn't wobble or stumble about, it was probably a worthless attempt. That didn't make her retract her string any, though.

In no time at all they reached the familiar clearing where they had first stumbled upon, those weeks earlier. The memory of being launched into the air had Arioche gripping tighter to her master's shoulder in case the thought should cross his mind again. But Feng only bent down, beckoned for the arachnid to hop off, and set the stack of disks on the ground carefully. The light that managed to strike the glossy surfaces had little patches of light reflecting off of the discs and all around on the trunks of trees in the forest. Arioche spent some time admiring this before she was forced to recollect her thoughts when her master spoke again.

'Tonight we're going for something simple."

Feng held up one of the shiny discs, which upon closer inspection... bore the face of one of the latest bands to rise up in Pokepop. It was one of the teenybopper boy bands that seemed to be more popular with the younger generation of trainers, usually girls, than the older, well-established trainers of the age. Like all the predecessors before them, the Pokemon Partyboys were flawless, bore sparkling white smiles, and all had perfect hair that not even a hurricane could destroy. Arioche herself felt a small light of admiration spark in her round, black eyes and she skittered forward on eager legs to get a better look.

The disc flying right at her gave her cause to quickly scamper off to the other side to dodge the projectile and her master's obvious displeasure. To further discourage such behavior, Arioche countered the move by spinning up a quick wad of white in preparation for spitting-- but quickly quelled such notions when she saw the odd look of concentration on Faolan's face that meant things were too quiet for his liking. Immediately she began to click her pink mouthparts together in a rapid-pace metronome and gradually the stressed look on her master's face began to fade away.

The frowny-face that the marks on her bottom had changed into when she first spotted Feng's intent look relaxed into a whimsical, content smile to match the look in the boy's eyes. There were no words of gratitude shared between them, despite the fact there was no one around to hear; the truth of the matter was, Feng was not that sort of person and Arioche, really, didn't want him to be. She was always best at subtlety and guile, anyway. Isn't that what a hunter was supposed to excell at?

"Up." It was a command and both a threat at the same time. Other lesser pokemon who had not been with her master might have been intimidated by the hard edge to his voice, but she merely attached a line of String Shot to one of the upper branches and began to scale carefully up it with her legs. Once she had reached it and perched herself, she sat quietly to await Feng's next command.

Rather than speak, though, her master began to walk around to each of the trees in turn, running a hand over the trunk, feeling on the branches closest to him... Occasionally he would murmur and mutter to himself, but Arioche knew this was not because the silence disturbed him -- the few bird pokemon active at this time of night had started crying out into the night air, loud, shrieking cries that pierced the forest -- but for a different reason entirely. Still she sat, though, patiently watching and waiting for her owner to give some command either verbally or, as the case seemed to be these days, physically.

The seconds passed into minutes. Eventually even those too blended into quarter-hours and half-hours and then the one hour mark had passed. Sunset had long since passed and now night blanketed the land. The beams of light filtering through the tree's foliage above her was from the moon and illuminated the clearing with an air of ethereality. It was wondrous and, for a few moments, she turned to peer at the spot where they had come from to see if the effect was just as remarkable. The shift had her scattering a few leaves to the ground, having disturbed them with both her weight and her movement.

A flash of silver caught her eye and she felt a searing pain spread across her bottom as the cd made contact with her bottom with a loud thump. For some reason it felt a lot weighted than normal; the reason for this was made clear when she looked down at where the device had struck and saw what looked like tree sap stuck to both sides of the disc. Below her Faolan grinned, brandished three more sap-coated cds at her, and then flung them at her with surprising force.

The added disc to her bottom did little to hinder her movement as she quickly leapt off the branch and seemingly fell to the forest floor below. But the training from all those months ago had paid off, and in no time she had fastened a string of web to the branches of another tree and swung gracefully over to it. With the combined force of wind and the quickly decreasing strength of the sap coating it, the cd flew off and fell harmlessly down to the ground where Feng was waiting. Three more took its place and sailed toward her, each one just narrowly missing and sticking fast to the base of the tree she had passed. From the ground she could hear her master's childish, playful laugh and the words "stay still!" before another was launched up at her. This she quickly dodged via jumping off to the side and over to the end of the branch.

This continued on for some time-- she would swing from branch to branch like before, just barely avoiding the compact discs hurled at her form, they would fall or stick to the trees... and Faolan would laugh. The moon was high in the sky by the time her master had run out of cds to throw at her, and, after regaining her breath, she attached a String Shot to one of the trees and slowly lowered herself down to sway gently in front of her master. The expression on her bottom was curious as she watched him chortle madly-- but it quickly melted into a smile when he straightened and grinned genuinely at her, much like how a small child would after being involved in hours of play with one of his best friends.

"And that, dear Arioche, is what we call 'Tag.'"

She swayed, turned herself over; hanging right side up, now, she clicked the pink mouthparts together so fast it sounded as though she were laughing. Feng chortled a few moments longer before straightening suddenly with a deadly serious expression on his face.

"Now go pick those up." He indicated the cds stuck to the trunks of the trees high overhead. Arioche glanced up, gave Faolan a look, then scuttled up her strand of webbing to go and retrieve her master's toys.

( Word Count: 1363.
Experience Points: 681.
*PING* Arioche grew to level 11! )