Practice makes perfect | open

This was it. Melanie was actually going to die laughing. Hundreds of missions and dozens of quests had lead her to an end of watching one of the highest ranking officers in the Garrison climb this stupid wall one handed, with her following suit. The sheer ridiculousness had stopped her for over half a minute, simply watching Fin climb. Remembering that fire was about to start spurting out of the pegs if she didn't move, Melanie finally forced herself to go to the next peg.

About halfway up, Melanie finally realized why Fin would have the advantage here. She was too short to reach the next peg without having to break the rules or jump. Deciding to keep to their agreement, she jumped towards the waiting peg, missing it by a hair. Luckily she still managed to grab the one below her in time to stop her descent. This was the best. idea. ever.

This was actually really difficult, but Fin was trying to keep a positive attitude. Twice so far his 'unusable' arm twitched as if to help, but he knew he couldn't do it. This was his idea. Fin looked over just in time to catch Mel almost missing a peg. He hadn't even thought of the fact that her shorter arms would be a disadvantage! He felt bad for making her do it for a moment, but she stabilized herself, and he laughed. "Impressive work there, Thorn!"

"I never realized how much shorter my arms were until this moment." She complained in a mocking voice, using her leg to prop her up so that she could try for the too high beg again. Luckily, she managed to hit it this time. With that obstacle out of the way, she was almost certain she could make it to the top without further incident, unless they got hit by that stupid wall of water. That would definitely not work with only one hand. With as slow as they were going, it wouldn't surprise her if it did.

Finley laughed at her realization, but kept climbing nonetheless. However, when the wall started to rumble he knew the water was coming. He quickly spun off the wall, landing right beside Mel. "The fun part," he muttered, wrapping a hand around her waste and pulling her out of the way as water started bursting toward them. He laughed as he did this, but then made the mistake of looking down.

His ears started to pound and he flattened himself against the now slippery wall. Mel was pinned between he and the wall as he nearly started to hyperventilate.

Melanie had noticed Fin's increased heart rate and the signs of hyperventilation at the same time she felt him look down. She hadn't known that Fin was scared of heights, but it did help her connect the dots on a few things. Grabbing on to a peg herself as he pushed them against the wall, probably more aggressively than he had intended, she reached around to put the other arm around his waist reassuringly. "Breathe Fin. We're alright. Just breathe."

With Mels arm around his waist and her words of affirmation, Fin nodded his head and breathed deeply through his nose. His face was turned away from her a little, but towards the wall and not the ground. His hands stopped shaking and his breathed slowed. "Okay... okay. Let's keep going," he tried to ignore the embarrassment swelling up in him as he moved away from her, helping her to grab back onto the wall. He then put his arm behind his back once more and smiled nervously at her. "We're almost there, yeah?" he encouraged himself more than she as he continued to move.

Well, now three people knew his secret.

"Yea, Fin. We're almost there." Hoisting herself up to the next peg, Melanie let him get farther ahead than her to keep an eye on him. She was almost surprised that she hadn't noticed something like this before, but it made sense. No one was perfect, not even Fin.

The thought almost scared her. In a lot of ways, Fin was like Zane in her eyes. An indestructible older brother. Someone she didn't have to worry about getting close to because he wouldn't get hurt. It was irrational, but it was how she thought. It made him more human.

Fin finally reached the top and climbed up, flattening himself on the surface for just a moment. He was incredibly embarrassed, but he didn't want to show it. No, he needed to act dignified and accept his fear, even though he really hadn't. He sat up again as Mel reached the top. "So. Both arms on the way down?" he offered, looking over at her.

"Yea. We might want to just repel down as well, rather than climb. It's time to get off this rock for a bit." Grabbing the new harness, she clipped it on before walking slowly towards the side. Normally she would consider jumping and seeing how far she could fall before it caught her, but right now it just didn't seem appropriate. "Ready when you are Colonel."

He nodded, agreeing with her as he turned to clip on, reading to just repel down. "Ready," he said and off they were, back down the rock wall and very quickly too. When he reached the bottom, he unclipped himself and back away from it chewing on his cheek nervously as he waited for her to reach him. Once she did, he smiled at her, "well... that was a fun day, wasn't it?"

Melanie raised an eyebrow at him, but decided not to comment. "That it was. Maybe next time we'll try doing something on the ground, like sparring." She could definitely use more of that in a controlled environment, though she did enough actual fighting in the field to not worry about it very much. "Or, you could stop by the house some time. I'll make dinner and you can drag Zane out of his room, make him be social."

He nodded and smiled at her, showing his obvious gratefulness that she wasn't bringing it up. He chuckled a little at the mention of making Zane be social. "He could use some of that. Hey, I'll walk you home," he offered and soon the two were headed toward the House of Hades.

(and done! I loved every second of this thread