(ง •̀_•́)ง (ember_celica) wrote in valarlogs, @ 2017-12-15 18:31:00 |
|
|||
Entry tags: | !complete, lie ren, yang xiao long |
You Move Well
Who: Ren and Yang
What: chatting and kung fu
Where: Ren's place of employ
When: recently
status: complete
Rating: PG
As glad as Ren had been to be able to cut back his hours working at the dojo once Nora started working for Kanan, he was gladder still that he still had a couple. As studious as he was, he did enjoy teaching others how to defend themselves. He also found kung fu very calming, and it was nice to have a couple of hours every week to clear his mind of the stresses of midterms, papers, and whatever it was that was happening with Nora and these dreams she spoke of and focus only on his forms and the forms of his pupils.
He’d needed flexible hours for school, so he was now just teaching a couple of drop in classes. There were a few higher level students who came for extra training with a cheaper fee, though mostly it was new people who came to see what the sport was like.
He didn’t really know Yang, but he had met her once or twice through Nora. He hadn’t expected to see her at his class, but he was glad to see her nonetheless. “Let’s begin,” he said. “If you know it, please begin with form one. Otherwise, I will see you on this side of the room.”
Once again Yang was in the position of knowing someone a lot better than they knew her. Obviously not as well as Ren’s team knew him, but she still considered him a friend. And she liked to drop in on friends. Ever since the battle at Future Industries, she’d been feeling a little off. Her arm was still not functioning properly, so she’d been forced to use the old prosthetic. Still, she watched with interest, remembering when she’d been a karate champ.
Sometimes she missed those days.
“Follow me,” Ren said, and began making his way through the first form, not saying much but moving slowly and deliberately through each stance so that everyone could follow. After he finished, he would go through and work one-on-one with people to help perfect it. His first stop would be to watch Yang work her way through. Most of the stances involved having good balance, and he knew that if she was wearing a prosthetic her balance would likely been off.
It was off, and it had been for months. But Yang had adapted, and while she generally liked to pretend she was okay, recent events had proven to her that no she wasn’t actually as okay as she thought she was.
So maybe some of the basics would help. At least, this was pretty calming, and with how crazy her mind had been lately? The calming helped. Ren had always been good at that, even without his semblence.
Perhaps her balance wasn’t what one would consider normal, but she had obviously managed to adjust to her prosthetic and was doing well. He had been prepared to give her tips on how to have a stronger stance, but it didn’t seem as though she needed many tips.
“You move well,” he said after a few moments. “Have you had martial arts training before?”
“Yes. I used to compete for the UCI Karate team, and I’ve been trained in a couple other styles too.” None of them were really that close to her dream style, but they were all heavy in the hand to hand. “I’ve been trying to learn how to use my legs better. Kickboxers are a weakness to me.”
Ren’s eyebrows rose. He hadn’t known that about Yang, but granted, he didn’t really know too much about her. He thought about her problem, already thinking of techniques that he could help teach her. “Which other styles are you familiar with?” he asked after some consideration. He himself had only been trained in kung fu - it wasn’t as though he could afford to take any other classes anyway - but he did watch as many different styles of martial arts that he could.
“Jeet Kun Do in particular. Regular boxing but that’s more of a casual thing.” She did a few play jabs at the air and grinned at him. “My dad helped train me. He’s a professional fighter!”
Her previous training certainly showed, and Ren nodded. “Who’s your father?” Ren asked. While he could hardly be considered an expert in professional fighting outside of the kung fu world, he did try occasionally like to see what was happening in other sports. “I can certainly show you some kicks after I make a round around the room.”
“Taiyang Xiao Long,” She replied, a little torn on if she felt proud or not. She was proud of the work and the fights he’d done, but like in her dreams after Summer had died she’d been left alone to care for Ruby as Taiyang had effectively shut down. “He was a good fighter but he...didn’t really take losing my mom well.”
Ren gave Yang a sympathetic look. He had lost his own mother when he was a child, and he knew how hard it could be to lose a parent at a young age. He wondered for a moment how his father would have reacted if he had survived as well, but he generally avoided dwelling on those thoughts. He stayed quiet in case Yang wished to continue.
“I’d planned to follow him into the leagues, but then the…” She gestured at her right arm. “Anyway, I’m part robot now so I wouldn’t be allowed in anyway.”
Yang winked at him. “Just need to figure out what I’m going to do now. Still working on that, but I want to help people, mostly.”
“There are other leagues,” Ren suggested gently. “But I think wanting to help people is more admirable still.”
Yang shrugged her shoulder. “I don’t know. I never actually thought about it. I just kind of…stopped caring for awhile. I’d have to take the arm off if I did try to find a paralympics league type thing.”
Ren nodded. Truth be told, he didn’t know too much about the paralympics, though that did make a huge amount of sense. Over Yang’s shoulder, he noticed one of the new drop in’s struggling with the form that he just shown them. “I must go help some of the other students,” he said. “But once I have made a couple of rounds, I will return to show you those kicks.”
She grinned at him, and nodded as she stepped aside for him. “Don’t worry Ren. I’ll totally get a kick out of watching it!”