FSE

Furry search engine

formerly SoFurry search engine

Something you learn, when you're passionate about a thing is that pure stubborn resolve will get you further than anything else in the world. If you want it badly enough, you'll find a way to make it happen.

So it was that I walked my way up over the pass, down the long winding roads, inland to desert scrubland. Cocoa pushed herself, but it was obvious she wasn't really made for the long hikes. She got plenty of rest, and not an ounce of judgment from any of us for it. But she was a determined girl, she wanted to do her best.

Tempest was as she always was. Utterly implacable when it came to a challenge. Not only did she take the long hike, she took turns carrying the pack. A pack that weighed as much as she did. I thought it was sexy, when I said so, she actually managed to look shy and embarrassed. For the first time in her life.

Her raw strength impressed me. So did her tenacity. That had, even with all of the things we'd gone through together, never changed. No. Quite the opposite, it seemed that all our struggles, all our pain only galvanized her. I wondered if it would really last. Or if she'd get tired of trying to take the whole world on her back. I hoped for the latter, in some ways. But in truth, I knew her pride to be heavier than the rest of her.

My leg ached tremendously the first few days, but I had no intention of stopping halfway every time I got a cramp. So I walked it off. Walked off the blisters my new boots gave me. Walked off the weakness I'd gained over the winter stillness. Walked off all of my frustration at the lost time. Walked until the light and music of the world found me again. It felt like coming home to finally really be back on the road.

It surprised me to realize, in all of it, how attached I'd grown to the idea of freedom. The idea of that long, winding road. Every hill, every bump. Every rocky little detour. Setting up camp. Taking camp back down. Watching the stars from under the open sky. I realized I'd grown to take it for granted before. I vowed to myself to not let that happen again. The starry sky, the scent of the campfire, the warmth of the day, the soothing sensation of wind. It was all to be treasured, savored. Every step of the way.

While I let myself be a bit of a daydreamer, Mira and Claire were the pragmatic pair. There if I needed them, but saving their strength for a fight, rather than burning it all on the trip. It turned out to be the best possible choice. Still, I missed their companionship on the long miles. I missed the conversation, the walking and the playing. I missed having them by my side on the road, even though I knew they were really right there with me.

Claire had reassured me that things would go back to normal when I'd recovered more. That it was just to make sure they had the strength to help me if things happened. I understood. I did. But that didn't change or quiet the longing in my heart.

Still, it was lively at night, when we made camp and took our rest. We all trained, and I treasured every moment of idle chatter from them. To hear them talking, and laughing and having fun, it was a balm to every pain in my heart and body.

Most nights none of us really had much energy left for much more than a cuddle. Some nights, barely even that. But I could hardly complain, we did a lot of cuddling, and there was something so reassuring, so tender and loving about it that whatever else I might have wanted, my heart was satisfied.

When it came to battles, Tempest was still the first one in, but she was as tired as I was as we encountered the trainers on the road we shared. She'd been practicing, long hours spent with me in difficult postures, practicing balance and control and most importantly patience. She struggled, especially with those lessons, but I didn't give her an inch.

She began to see, as I had, that it paid off. Rather than taking a beating to get the first shot in, she lured, and baited, deflecting their impatient lunges, and following up with focus and intent. Even fatigued, she could deliver shocking results, and learned to take the small wounds to avoid the larger ones. She laughed, openly cackled at the small wounds, unsettling the pokemon facing her, as well as the trainers guiding them.

Our sparring had begun to push boundaries, too. As I grew more confident in her defense, my offense began to take a hard edge. More than once she, or I had caught the other unprepared, and more than once I'd ended up needing a bit of this or that from the medical kit.

But the wounds we traded made us both stronger. She knew it, I knew it. We paid the price, and kept the lesson. She had become my protégé.

On the other hand, I was unequivocally Claire's student. She had begun to guide my meditation, to teach me to block her out. To guard my thoughts, and protect my mind from her assaults. I was as weak as a newborn to her. Many of our nights ended with me clutching my head, dizzy, sick and reeling from her psychic assaults. More than once she had to watch as she left me heaving up what was left of lunch. I felt as though I had absolutely no talent for it, but she was patient, and I was stubborn. We would keep trying.

Mira and I played, more than I felt we trained. The way she fought was so wholly alien to me that there was very little I felt I could teach her, so instead, I played with her. I taught her to dodge and roll, to feint and move in unexpected ways. It became such that try as I might, if she didn't want me to touch her, a game of tag became an incredibly one-sided affair. Even Tempest struggled to catch her. No matter how hard she pushed, it seemed like she was only just getting started.

It was Cocoa that left the biggest impression on me in those days, however. She tried, with everything she had just to keep up, in any way. But it was clear as day she was working from a tremendous disadvantage. She walked during the day, as much as she could stand. Until her legs practically buckled. Until the thought of one more step was just too much to bear. She wouldn't settle for less, and she was disheartened every time I had to let her rest.

I felt a lot of things in the first few weeks, but I had come to admire her. She worked harder than any of us, and it had won me over, completely. She absolutely earned that respect. More than the scrawny bean pole I used to be ever had.

Still, our training was dramatically hindered by how hard she pushed herself. She trembled at the simple exercises I'd begun with. Things I'd long since taken for granted. She practiced and repeated the motions I showed her, frustrated tears in her eyes as her body refused to cooperate. Refused to move the way she wanted it to.

It was on one of those nights that I stopped the exercises halfway, I had only intended to give her a chance to catch her breath, but it just about broke her.

I didn't need Claire to tell me what she was feeling. I held her, until her sobbing stopped. Until she stopped slamming her cloven hand into the dirt in frustration. Until she could hear me over her own heartbeat, her own pain.

“I'm more proud of you than you could ever understand." I said to her, as her shoulders shook and heaved, tears quenching the parched soil beneath her. “You're a brave girl. More than you think. More than you could possibly know."

She looked up at me with bitterness, resentment. I understood what was unspoken. How could I say that? She failed at everything. At walking. At stretching. A just standing and not falling over. She was trying her best, how could I undermine that with some half-hearted pitying gesture?

“You don't understand… I know you can't see it yourself, but it's important that you do. Even if it means having to see it through me. Tempest? She's a natural. She was made for this kind of thing. Claire? She's been training with me for ages, and knew ahead of time what she was headed for. Mira? She loves running and jumping and playing. It's a game to her. None of them know your struggle. None of them know what it is to try, and fail, and try again, and again, and again." I explained, my hand caressing her cheek, stilling her tears, and capturing her attention. “They have no idea what it feels like to wake up one morning, and find that all the normalcy, the routine just vanished. That everything you were yesterday, the things that got you by just fine, suddenly don't anymore."

“They don't know what it is to be so tired their legs can't carry them. To keep trying, not because they're cornered and can't stop, but because their spirit tells them they can go a little further. You do. You impress me, every single day. They don't know what it means to train until the limit of their heart and soul, to hit that wall and desperately reach further. The truth is, I don't think I know what that feels like, either. But I know that you do. You are stronger, and braver than I have ever been. So don't give up. Cocoa. Don't give up, because I know how strong you really are. Even if you don't see it yet."

She sniffled at that, wiping the side of her face with her cloven hand, a sorrowful little smile half-formed as she stilled, and listened. Truly listened to me. Over the voice of her own doubts, her own frustrations. Over the voice inside her that told her she couldn't. I didn't have to wonder if it was there. It was writ plain in everything she'd done so far.

“When you're ready, we're going to try again. And tomorrow, if you're ready, we'll try again. And the day after, if you're ready. We'll keep trying, I won't give up on you. How could I? I know how much this means to you." I paused, taking her hands in mine. “We have a lifetime ahead of us to get it right."

Quieted, calmed, she wrapped her arms around me, held me for a long time beneath the pale moon, in the dry chill of the night breeze. We would try again that night. We wouldn't get it right, but that was okay. We could try again when she was ready.

--Cocoa--

It was a damned awful feelin', watching all of them do all of the things they did. Watching him, as he threw punches and kicks that could've torn a barn down to the foundation. Watching as Tempest stopped them, or danced around them. Like she was born for it, born to fight and win.

It was damned miserable to know how special Claire was. She didn't even need to raise a hand, she could've crushed me with a passing thought, if she wanted to. Or set me on fire, just to watch me burn. And she was so damned smart, the way she talked to him, the way she carried a conversation. Try as I might, I knew I sounded like I fell off the back of a turnip truck.

And Mira, I reckoned she hurt me the worst, because all the things I wished I could do, she did for fun, oblivious to the idea that it might be hard for someone. She ate and drank as much as she wanted, didn't gain a gram. She ran like the wind, and it seemed like everything she did was graceful, beautiful. Like some kind of dance. She was the kindest to me of any of 'em, an' that just made it sting all the more.

It was a damned awful feeling, because they were all so special.

And what was I? Some ignorant country bumpkin. Just a slow, dull, fat girl. Weren't pretty like Mira, or tough like Tempest. Not half as clever as Claire. I was wasting their time. Slowing them down. Slowin' him down.

I could see the indent I put in the dirt, his shadow above me. I could feel his touch, and all I felt was I didn't deserve it none. Not his kindness, not his sympathy, and damned sure not all the time he was putting into tryin' to teach me.

...And then he had to go and say the sweetest thing anyone ever told me. He didn't tell me I was special. He didn't tell me I was great. He didn't lie to me like that. He wasn't just sayin' things 'cause he felt sorry for me. He said things he believed.

Weren't no two ways about it. He meant it when he told me I was brave. Told me I worked hard. Told me he wasn't giving up on me, 'cause he knew how much it meant to me. He looked me dead in the eye, an' he told me the most beautiful things anyone ever had.

And he held me, he didn't rush me. Didn't ask me a thing. Just let me have that moment. Just let me have my frustration, my anger. My pain. He didn't tell me I couldn't feel that way. Didn't say a word except that we'd try again when I was ready. That we had a lifetime to keep tryin', when I was ready to.

Of course I could try again. I would try, and try. I doubted it would'a mattered much. I wished it would, but more'n that I just wished I could have been anything but a fat, stupid farm girl.

I just wished I could've been enough.