aterat | [Closed] It's A Matter Of Scale

Entry tags:

[Closed] It's A Matter Of Scale

Who; Nida, Mono
What; Master and Student Climbing Lessons
Where; Outside of the Historium
When; Late November
Warnings; None

There was always a time in the evenings when Nida was free, and tonight he had plans. He had sent Mono a message, cleared that the young man was ready for some work tonight, and then told him to meet outside of the Historium before dinner. Because this wasn't the sort of thing that one should do on a full stomach, not when you were learning.

Nida waited outside of the building, clad in tight clothing and he was pulling on his gloves. Another pair waited in his pocket for the child, and he waited for his young student. Time to have some fun while they can.

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"Well then, I'll have to help you learn how to roll after a jump," Nida noted. But for now... "We're going to start with the climb thought. But I'm going to wrap the rope around you so that if you call, I can catch you with it."

Mono would definitely appreciate that lesson, because jumping sometimes was necessary… Not here, of course, but where he was from? It came up a lot. Still, he listened to the instructions carefully. “Okay? I guess that’s good for practising.” And maybe he could learn something from that, maybe start carrying things around for climbing if it came up.

Jumping was necessary sometimes. But today would not be that day.

"It's safety, until I can evaluate how you're doing. It's better not to free climb if you're unskilled."

With that Nida moved forward to show Mono the ropes and explain the way that he was going to build him something like a harness.

Mono nodded, “Uh-huh, that makes sense… I know I’m not as good as you are, so I guess you gotta figure out where I’m at first…” But the kid was also extremely keen to show Nida what he could do, hoping to impress the man perhaps and hoping that he was at least somewhat better than expected.

But to do that, he knew he had to let Nida show him how this whole rope harness thing worked. So he paid strict attention to what the man said and did during the explanation.

"Exactly," Nida answers with a grin. Kid's fucking smart. Nida was liking him more and more.

Once the harness was ready and braced around Nida's waist and he hauled on it to show Mono how it would feel to put his weight on the rope alone, he nodded to Mono.

"I'll feed you a lot of slack. So you don't have to worry."

Mono let Nida test it, and nodded a little as he got an idea of how that would feel like. Once he felt a little more sure, he glanced up at Nida eagerly. "So... Now do I get to try climbing?" Mono really was excited to try climbing the way Nida had set things up, and he'd been very patient with all this explaining and safety stuff.

"Now you get to try," Nida agreed with a smile. "Remember, careful. And if your hands feel slippery, you should reach into your chalk bag and dust the tips of your fingers in it."

With that he prepared to brace. Go kid, go.

Mono turned excitedly to the wall at that the confirmation, he didn’t need to be told more than once! “Okay! I’ll be careful!” Said with all the sincerity of a child who was just eager to get started on something.

He moved for the wall and paused, glancing at the chalk bag and making sure it was easy to get his hand into if he needed it… Then, once satisfied, he was away. Mono was very good at pulling himself up, stronger than he looked considering how small he was, and he had a knack for picking his next grip hold as he went. More focused on going up than he was with things below him, if only because looking down in his world was a bad idea. You slowed down? Bad things happened.

The harness was still a little distracting, though, and remembering that he had a chalk bag was not something he was particularly good at. He’d never had one before, so it took an almost lost grip and a near tumble from the wall for him to realize that it might be good to remember.

Yes, remembering was good. Nida almost gasped at the near fall. If he hadn't had the slack taken up at the moment, he might have panicked. As it was he carefully kept the line just tight enough for a catch.

"It's okay, you're doing great, Mono. Just keep thinking up."

Mono was doing just that, learning from the slip up and chalking his fingers as he kept working his way towards the top. He did call over his shoulders, again without looking down, “I can do that! I am almost all the way up!” He smiled to himself, feeling quite pleased with himself.

This was fun, honestly. Climbing was always fun when there wasn’t something dangerous around making you climb. Six hadn’t always understood that. She preferred to let him do the climbing if it wasn’t easy stuff, but she did boost him up if he needed a little extra height to get the first handhold.

Well that's amusing. Nida smiled as he watched the boy work.

"When you get up there, I'm taking a picture with my Tell Phone."

Mono had quite forgotten they could do that with the Tell Phones, but then again he didn’t use his much because of the complications he found he caused it. That aside, he was just excited to be doing something like this.

Maybe with one or two more clumsy moments and remembering his instructions, he made it all the way to the top with a victorious little wave and one of his little soundless laughs. “I did it!” He turned his head finally to look down to see Nida, wondering if he’d done well and if the man might be proud of his attempt.

He had. It wasn't as high up as Nida intended them to get to, but it was a great first start. Nida smiled and waved up at the kid. Then he got his tell phone out to take a picture of the kid.

"I'm so proud of you, Mono!"

And there it was, something he hadn’t been sure he’d hear, but definitely what he’d wanted to… He’d made someone proud! His teacher was proud of him! That meant he’d done good! And that just made the fun of the challenge better. “Thanks!!” He shouted back down, leaning against the building and looking around. It wasn’t as high up as the top of the grey building where he liked to sit, but it still gave him a good view of the surrounding area. “It was really fun, and the chalk made it a lot easier!”

He would have to see if he could find something like this in his world, or make something work kinda like it, if he went back. It might make things a little easier…

"I know it did. I learned a lot of early work like that."

Nida smiled and just couldn't help himself in that smile. While at Garden he did teach some classes, none of them were ever this. So he truly was shining with this.

"Alright, now you take a moment to breathe, and we talk about getting down."

Ah, yes... Getting down. He looked at the ground below thoughtfully. He hadn’t thought about that.

And he’d said he wouldn’t do what Nida had done... So he took a moment to just enjoy the air and the surrounding view, like Nida said, before he finally offered the man a curious tilt of his head from above. “If I’m not supposed to do the neat thing you did, how do I get down?” He called, because he knew he couldn’t manage that. He’d fallen enough times to know that.

"We're going to keep the line tight as you go down, to catch you. And you're going to experiment with trying to lower yourself."

And it wasn't the most fun to do, but it was something one often did.

"What goes up must come down after all."

“Okay!” He called back, “I guess that’s true…” he mumbled, more to himself as he looked down and tried to decide the best way to go. The kid figured it was just the same as he did to get up… But backwards. Which wasn’t correct, but he at least tried to plan his steps as he tried to start lowering himself down the wall, following the holds he had before.

It’s definitely more clumsy looking than when he went up, though. He wasn’t used to climbing back down, of course, he was used to going up and moving forward. Backward was usually a bad idea.

Backwards was usually a bad idea, but down wasn't always backwards. Sometimes you ended up somewhere high and you needed to get down. And practice mattered. This wasn't even the most difficult way that Nida was going to teach him this.

No, that would be when Mono would climb up one place and come down another he didn't know.

"You're doing good kid. You can do this."

Now that would certainly be an interesting test, the kid would undoubtedly find that rather exciting.

But for now, he was focused on getting down from where he was now. Nida’s encouragement definitely helping as he tried to carefully make his way down the side of the building with careful movements. Unfortunately, it wasn’t quite so well executed as his trip up and when he did slip this time (further down the wall at least than on his way up) there was a lot more scrabbling to get his grip again, a panicked sound escaping him. He definitely needed more work on the return trip.

Nida reacted before he even thought with the slip, immediately taking up the slack given to him on the line, holding the boy up to give him some stability as he anchored himself again.

"It's okay. Take a moment to breathe, to let your heart recover a tiny bit. YOu're okay, and you'll be okay."

Mono felt some relief as he realized that he was still held safely in place by Nida’s grip on the line. He wasn’t in danger. That wasn’t a problem here, not right now. “Thanks!” He called back, still sounded perhaps a little shaken by it. He didn’t know why, but it rattled him a bit. “It’s harder coming back.” He added over his shoulder as he carefully found his grip again and let himself breathe as instructed. Eventually, he slowly continued his descent.

"That's what I'm here for, kid," Nida said. "And yeah, it can be harder with some things. But if you don't learn going down like this, the other stuff won't help. But you can do this, Mono. I believe in you!"

He was so damn happy and proud, and the kid would absolutely know that when he hit the ground.

Mono guessed that was true. Nida was there to teach him… And making sure he didn’t fall seemed like an important aspect to the process. It was a nice security that he really wasn’t used to being there… He smiled to himself, though. Nida’s encouragement really did help as he tried to work out a path down the wall. It helped to boost the kid’s confidence as he chose his next movements downward.

It definitely was slower than his trip up, but eventually the kid settled his feet on solid ground. He turned with a little whirl, arms raised up lightly in excitement. “Hey, I did it!”

Feet on solid ground meant Nida could drop the rope and move to the child to catch him up in a hug. Yeah, this was good. He was so proud.

"You did it, Mono. Bet you've never done something like that before."

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