skymuffins | [Sept. 9/11] Training Hall, Room 15, Afternoon

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[Sept. 9/11] Training Hall, Room 15, Afternoon

Allison tapped her laminated class schedule against her cheek as she made her way down a hall she hadn't been before. Huge windows showcased an equally huge field and if she stopped and squinted through the sunny glare, she could spot areas that looked a little charred.

Well, there was a reason this area of the school wasn't for those who had no reason to be here. Allison hadn't yet decided what she thought of the fact that she was here, though anything had to be better than setting things on fire when she got upset.

She grimaced a bit while she counted doors. There were worse things than the fires, really, but they were more noticeable to others. Allison supposed that was a good thing. She stopped outside the fifteenth door and double checked her schedule to make sure it was the right one.

It was. She was stalling. That's dangerous, she scolded herself, and then tucked her schedule into her backpack. Then, before she could think better of it, she rapidly knocked on the door (to give her tutor the heads up she was here, in case they weren't one of the ones that could just tell that) and opened it.

"Morning!" she said, poking her head in.

It was one in the afternoon.

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And Dover, with a little grin on his lips as he started toward the door after her, grabbed a bag on the way and slung it over his shoulder.

"Good. Packed some scran to keep us going in case we run late, then." And, just in case she had no idea what the hell he was on about... "Hope you don't mind eating vegan."

He'd lost his taste for meat after grade nine, rather thoroughly. His way out before coming back had been... messy.

"I know a shortcut, if you're game. We don't get much of a view along the way, but in this case I imagine that's not exactly a terrible thing, hm?"

"Not at all," she said vehemently. "Shortcut, please."

Because... yeah.

"Vegan's fine," Allison added, taking a moment to just breathe in the afternoon air. It was a nice day. Too nice, she thought wryly, for destruction. "Does 'scran' mean 'vegan food' or just 'food'?"

"Just food," Dover replied, glancing her way with a bit of a smirk as he steered them both left, toward a wooded area that grew a little thicker around the outskirts, but had a foot-worn path running through it that could only be the result of a few years of constant use.

It was definitely not the shortest of shortcuts. But that, too, was part of the wonder of Dover's very versatile vocabulary.

"Probably not the greatest food, I'll admit. I don't fancy myself a chef by any means. But odds are it won't kill either of us. Hasn't taken me out yet, at least."

He was being dramatic. He'd packed some vegetable soup, to be heated later, and some scrambled tofu and cress sandwiches. Which... tasted better than they sounded. Or at least he'd maintain that they did.

Allison managed to not make a face at the path. Instead, she was just grateful it wasn't going to be with the tombstones. And that she'd worn jeans instead of a skirt today. (Which had seemed smart, when playing with fire.)

"Oh, well, if it hasn't sent you to the hospital yet..."

Yes, she was teasing him.

"Are we going to be working late every Friday?"

Was he totally going to destroy her social life?

"Not every Friday, if I can help it," Dover countered, grinning a bit. The teasing was a good sign. If he could get her to relax, this whole lesson would be a hell of a lot easier on the both of them. "I'd like to have some sort of a life, after all. But I might ask you now and again what your Saturdays look like, if I think you're getting somewhere and I don't want to wait a week before picking up where we left off. How's that sound to you, Cuttie?"

It had evolved into a proper noun. She'd probably never hear a real name out of him again.

She made a face at him for the nickname.

"Sounds fair," Allison said, "though I'm assuming I can say 'no, can't' if I've got a big test or something coming up."

Or worse, but Allison preferred to think the worst she'd face would be a test she needed to cram for.

"Naturally." He turned, walking backwards a few steps so that she could see the teasing smile that came over his own face. "But if I find out you're lyin' just to avoid me, I reserve the right to truss you up and make you burn your bloody way free."

He winked, to show that he really had no intentions of doing any such thing.

"This whole thing is going to be give and take, Cuttie. You'll only get out of this what you put in. So running and hiding means all you'll get by the time I graduate and move on is better at learning where I don't look if you take to mitching lessons."

"I won't," Allison said, huffing a little but unable to keep from smiling slightly. She stuffed her hands in her pockets. "If I'd wanted to skip, I wouldn't have shown up now. Hard to 'truss me up' if you don't know what I look like, right?"

She thought so, anyway.

"Have you done this tutoring thing before?"

"Not even once," Dover replied. Because... Hey, it was a thing worth admitting to, really. "Took a few years to convince the administration that having someone with the experience to show the newer students how not to blow their own arms off would be useful. And then it was a matter of waiting until there was a new student in a situation that wasn't all that different from mine. There are different levels of pyro, after all. People who light candles so they can work their powers aren't exactly my area of expertise."

He shrugged a little.

"Like I said, I didn't get the benefit of this sort of thing when I was starting to come into my own. If it makes you feel any better, though, I do know all the theory they could cram into my skull. Powers theory, and all of that nonsense they make you learn about proper teaching methods, too."

One of these things, he'd promptly taken and flung out the window.

"I do like theory, but that's not really comforting," she observed. "Any of it. Though I appreciate that if I blow a limb off, it'll be with supervision."

Well, she did appreciate it. It meant he might be able to get her to the healers fast enough that they could fix it.

Lighting candles was a parlour trick. The fact that she wished she could train that way was immaterial, really.

"Trust me, luv. The 'blowing your arm off' part of the curriculum is one that I'd really prefer to skip, if at all possible. It's no bloody fun, having to reattach one of those."

Dover spun on his heel, walking forward again down the path, keeping his eyes down even though his surefootedness a moment before was testimony to the fact that he had been down this way at least a thousand times or more already.

"Healer, too, by the way. In case you're still worried. Not as powerful as some of the H.A.H. back at the school, but good enough to pass until someone a little more accomplished in that area can get on the scene. And they don't tend to take the shortcuts, either."

The really, really long shortcuts that might have actually meant twice the walking. Those ones.

"Thanks," she said, ducking her head a little. "That really does make me feel better."

Playing with fire was a scary prospect. Knowing he could heal was a comforting piece of knowledge.

"I can't do anything like that," she said, a bit wistfully. "I would've liked being a healer."

"Well, if you start taking to the lessons at hand quickly enough, I could probably be swayed to teach you some more practical shite," Dover offered, grinning sidelong at her. "How's some good old-fashioned mundane first-aid sound? Learned a fair bit of it before ever knowing I was going to get a rock shoved into me throat. Didn't let myself get lazy and forget it just because a chunk of larimar made it easier for me, either."

He pursed his lips for a moment in thought, and then nodded as he made up his mind.

"I'll make a chart. Little milestones I want to see you hit. And for each one you do pass, I'll teach you the way the healers without the rocks do the same bloody things I can do with one. Most of what the H.A.H. do can be done by anybody. Just a little more slowly with with a bit of ingenuity on the side."

"Really?"

Allison was not big-eyed with excitement, she really wasn't. Much. Honest. Even if it meant that this would wind up cutting into her social life (and his!) more than just these lessons would.

But to able to help someone instead of harm them...

She'd take it.

"I mean, if it won't be a bother for you..."

"Nah, not hardly," came Dover's reply, slipping back into 'casual dismissive' as the trees started to thin and the sound of a babbling stream could be heard dead ahead. "You want my opinion, the H.A.H. could stand to learn a thing or two about conventional medicines, anyhow. They get cocky, thinkin' they can fix it all with their powers. I'll tell you, in my time here, I still rely more on what I can do with my hands than what I can do with my stone. Powers are a wildcard, especially for people like you and me. One time you need 'em most might be the one time your only hope is a tourniquet and a prayer."

There was that tone again. Slightly haunted. Mostly, carefully, matter-of-fact.

"Besides, it'll keep me from gettin' rusty, too, teachin' it to you. So, really, doing it this way'll be doin' us both a favour, won't it?"

Her brow furrowed a little, at his tone, because there was something that she couldn't... quite pinpoint in it. Allison studied him covertly as she looked around.

"Your short cut," she said, "wasn't much of one." But she was still grateful. It hadn't been so bad, walking through the woods. Far better than passing the graves. "I... don't think all of the H.A.H. is like that but I see your point."

Not as well as he did, she guessed, but the same could be said for any upperclassman of hers.

"Nah, some of 'em are well and good," he admitted, after a moment's silence too long. "They do their best with what they've got, and they take their jobs seriously. But a power's no good if you freeze up when it matters most, is it? The passive ones, sure, fine enough. But some of 'em need focus, and when you're watching the worst happen before your eyes, you'll be lacking in a bit of that."

He bit the inside of his cheek, and then a moment later he slid into a smile that didn't quite reach his eyes.

"S'why you learn how to do it the other way, too. Train your hands to know what to do when your rock doesn't know up from down. For you, just your hands, granted. But just think how much good your fire'll do you if you need to sterilize something, even? Boil water, clean a needle, any of that? You'll be thankin' me for this someday, mark my words, Cuttie."

There were a lot of flippant things, she thought, that she could say to that. Things like 'I'd rather thank you now' or 'thanks will be the last thing on my mind if I need these things' or 'watch, it'll be you I need to fix and then won't you regret it' but Allison had learnt enough about silences that stretched and the set of peoples' shoulders in the last year to know better.

And she didn't really want to step on any of his issues. He was being nice enough--he'd even made them food, so they could train longer--and she was his first student. He had to be as nervous as she was, on one level.

"I'll do my best," she said, after a moment of her own. "Hopefully I won't be utterly dreadful."

"No worries there, luv," Dover countered, his tone still a little too light, "you're already dreadful. If you were a professional at all of this, you wouldn't have any need for a tutor, would you?"

It was sound enough logic, anyhow.

"Now, the stream's just a stone's throw, around that tree, there. Let's fine a place in the open to settle ourselves down and get started, shall we?"

"Well," she said, keeping it light to match his though she didn't know what had set him off, "if we didn't get started then there wouldn't be a whole lot of point to being out here, right?"

Right.

She walked after him, listening to the stream (which was water and therefore reassuring and how ridiculous a thought was that, really, because of course a stream was water). "What are we covering today?"

And that? That right there? Was when Dover broke into a grin that he meant, reaching into his pocket and pulling out a candle.

"Theory."

What, did she think he was going to make her throw fireballs around on her very first lesson?

"We came all the way out here to light candles?"

Allison stopped and found her lips twitching. Maybe she should have been irritated but, really, it was funny.

"Or is the theory really theory and you're going to lecture me?"

"Oh, you wound me," Dover replied, chuckling a little as he put his free hand over his heart. He was quick to return it to his side, spinning on his heel and planting the candle in the dirt beside the stream. "You ever light one of these before? First time I tried, I blew a hole in that room we just left."

Just saying.

Allison winced.

She could understand why they were out here then.

"No," she admitted, "I haven't. Lit other things on fire but not really... deliberately."

Dover gave a little, knowing nod.

"And it wasn't small, was it? Never is. Small's hard. You could level half the school with a hiccough if your powers flared up on you, but I bet you anything that the first time you light that candle, we'll be staring at a puddle of molten paraffin in the dirt not long after."

He sat down beside her, and then rummaged through his bag, pulling out a dozen more candles.

"Lesson today ends when you light one of these without destroying it. Theory for today is this, Cuttie. Fire's easy. You want it, and there it is. But it's big. That's what I'm gettin' at, here. You want to hold it back. I'm telling you that you have to figure out how the whole mess of it works before you can even think about putting it through a funnel."

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