Solo The 'proof is in the painting

[Adon]

26 Summer 516

Adon shaded his eyes and scanned the sky above the grass. It looked like it was going to be another hot dry day, which made it perfect for the task he'd planned for today. He had a tent to waterproof, and there was no point in doing it on a day when the coating woudn't have the time or opportunity to dry out. He retrieved his brushes from his tent builder's kit, and set the little pot of oil and wax to warm, melt, and mix beside the fire while he set everything else up. He cleared a wide patch of grass, going over it carefully and brushing away anything loose that might cling or stick to dampened cloth - leaves, small pebbles, torn grass, a stray horse apple...

Once it was clean, he unrolled the small tent he'd been working on and spread it out flat, outside uppermost. It was the sort of thing a hunter might use on a multi-day hunt or, more likely, a walahk might buy to take along when traveling with one of the trade caravans. He pegged down the edges to keep it still and prevent it from either shrinking or stretching to much when it got wet, smoothed out the wrinkles, and double checked the seams. It wasn't decorated, and once waterproofed, wouldn't be, mostly because bright paint attracted too much unwanted attention when you were out alone in the grass. He rubbed his finger stumps with a rueful smile and limped over to the fire. He stirred the contents cautiously, looking for any remaining lumps of wax. He didn't find any in his stirring, and didn't notice the uneven mixing of the oil and wax that a more skilled philterer might have done, so he wrapped a cloth around the small pot and lifted it away from the fire and over to the pegged out tent.

Dipping one of his brushes into the mixture, Adon leaned forward, stretching a little to reach the centre part of the tent first, and began to paint it onto the cloth. The centre would be the roof when it was eventually put up which meant both that it needed the most waterproofing and the least disturbance. Starting there meant he could work outwards without having to lean over parts that he had already painted. He painted quickly, but not as neatly as he might have, so that some strokes put a lot on and some much less, so that he needed several goes to get a relatively even amount spread over the light brown cloth. The light colour of the cloth made it easier to see where he had painted, thouh not how evenly, as it darkened when dampened, and he paid extra attention to the roof seams to make sure they were heavily waterproofed. One layer for the main cloth and two for the seams meant he needed the extra oil to soak in and seal the holes made by the stitching.

Boxcode by Shimoje

[Adon]

He drew the brush carefully down one seam, so absorbed in his work that he didn't hear the footsteps coming up behind him until they were almost on him. Finishing the seam and looking up, he saw Keighvin and Jessie standing there. Keighvin greeted him with a grin, and asked, "Can Jessie stay with you while I go hunting? I need to go faster and further than she can as yet."

Adon sat back on one heel, having found over the years that that was more balanced and comfortable for than a standard crouch, and gave the pair a smile. Jessie glowered back and clung close to her brother, but he nodded at her as an equal. "Of course," he told Keighvin, and added to Jessie, "You can help me with this tent. No need for idle hands here."

Keighvin nodded back, peeled away from Jessie and was up on his strider and gone before Adon could get another word in. Instead he turned to Jessie. "This is the sort of tent a hunter uses if they're off on a long hunt," he explained, knowing she valued hunting above all else. "Putting this one together means you'll know what to look for if you ever look to buy one, so grab that brush and help paint on this mixture. Start from the middle - or as close as you can get - and work outwards. It makes the tent waterproof. You work outwards so that you don't rub the waterproofing off by trying to lean over it. Understand?"

Jessie nodded once, gave him and the tent a long expressionless look, and picked up the brush Adon had indicated. She dunked it in the oil and wax mixture, plopped herself down in the grass on the opposite side of the tent to Adon, and began to paint it on her side. Adon in turn settled back into the grass and when it became clear that she couldn't reach all the way to the middle, he leaned out to take care of painting the band of cloth between where he had left off and she had begun. It was awkward, and he had to lean out over the centre patch that he'd already done - as he had told Jessie, that was always a problem. He had to put a hand down for balance as he leaned that far, and the already painted area limited where he could put it - unless he wanted a hand-sized leak in his waterproofing, where the oil and wax had clung to his hand and his touch. After several hovering attempts, he finally found a section of unpainted wall that was close enough to the balance point that he needed for him to place his hand there and still not fall when he leaned out and over. From there, he painted the oil and wax mixture in long neat strokes across the gap, then straightened back to his own side, dunked the brush for a new load, and begain to work the waterproofing down his side of the tent.

Boxcode by Shimoje

[Adon]

For a while there was only the sound of quiet brush strokes against the background murmur of life going on in Endrykas. Adon relaxed into the medative half-trance that this kind of repetative work always soothed him into, and drew his brush back and forth in long strokes. Each stroke overlapped the one before a bit - sometimes more than just a bit if he was honest - to make quite sure that all the cloth was covered. He was interrupted by Jessie saying, "How do you hold the brush like that? I cant get it right..."

He straightened, first sitting back on one heel, then getting to his feet and coming round to her side of the tent. "What's the problem?" he asked, and when she showed him, he smiled, set down his own brush, and splayed out his hands. "My hand's a different shape from yours, so I hold things differently. It isn't that my way is better - just better for me. You need to find a way to hold it that works for you, and lets you do what you need to do with it." He looked at the section she'd painted and saw gaps between the strokes.

She followed his gaze, and then looked up at him with the light dropping out of her eyes in favour of fear. "I tried..." she began, and then her voice dried up with the fear that she'd lose this one last chance as well as her old home. Her face was as pale as her scars as Adon shook his head, and took up his brush again.

"We'll do it together," he said. "Come on, I'll show you. You have to cover all of it. No gaps." He dipped his brush in the pot, and signalled Jessie to do the same. She looked down for a moment, the fear in her face quickly becoming hidden beneath another of her sullen looks, then slowly followed his instructions. Once both brushes were loaded with the mixture, Adon went to one knee and drew his brush along a gap. "It doesn't matter if you overlap strokes," he explained, "but leaving gaps means leaks later, and that isn't good for anyone. Now you do that one, just like I did."

Jessie watched him work, her young face still sullen, then glanced up at him. Something about his expression must have inspired her, because she stuck her tongue out of the corner of her mouth and carefully painted out the next gap. "Like that?"

Adon considered it, and then nodded. "Just like that. Now," he pointed to the next gap along, "shall I do that, or shall you?"

Jessie's head tossed upwards like a nervy horse. "You do it," she said after a moment. "Then I'll do the one after. We take turns."

"Fair enough," Adon replied, with an inward sigh that he tried to keep to himself. Doing it turn and turn about would make the whole task take much longer than it should. Still, if it helped Jessie's healing... He leaned forward and painted the mixture over another gap, then pointed out the next one for Jessie to do.

Boxcode by Shimoje

[Adon]

Jessie swiped a hasty brush over it, and then, when Adon gave her look of mild disapproval, she blushed a bright scarlet and went over the gap again, this time more carefully. The scars that the raiders had left on her didn't redden with the blush, but showed pale against it. Adon deliberately didn't stare this time, but just filled in the next gap without comment. Two more gaps, one for each of them, brought them to the bottom of that panel, so he climbed to his feet and moved around to the next one, which as yet had no waterproofing on it at all. Jessie trailed after him, and he set the pot of waterproofing mixture down between them.

"I'd better do the top band," he told her, "since I can actually reach it, and I'd better do it first so I'm not reaching across other painted areas..." He dipped his brush in the mixture and put his words into action as he spoke, drawing the brush across the fabric in slow careful lines. He made it even slower than even his damaged hand needed to get accuracy so that Jessie could see exactly what he was doing and how he was doing it. Perhaps, he thought, if she learned better than the rushed version she had done on her first panel, he wouldn't have to come along behind her and fix the mistakes. Meanwhile, Jessie hugged her bent legs against her chest and rested her chin on her knees. Her wary blue eyes followed each movement of his hands, though how much she was taking in - well that he would never know.

Finally, Adon worked his way down to a point where Jessie could reach to join him. He glanced at her, and straightened back onto one knee, easing his spine where the aches of age were beginning to catch him up. "Do you want to go turn and turn about again," he asked her, "or do you want to keep working down this panel while I start on the top band of the next one? Either way, it isn't a race to get it done fastest, it needs to be done right."

Jessie's head shied up again and her fingers tightened around the brush. "I'll do this one," she said at last. "Better than the last one, you'll see!" She shifted so that she was kneeling and leaning out over the tent, dunked her brush vigorously and drew it slowly along under his last stroke. They overlapped slightly, so that there was no gap between them to fill in later. Adon nodded approval, then shuffled round to the next panel and started at the top again. The tension in his remaining fingers made them ache, but it was necessary for controlling the brush strokes, so he did his best to ignore the buds of pain there.

Boxcode by Shimoje

[Adon]

The brush went steadily back and forth, back and forth, as Adon filled in the top band and began to work his patient way down the next panel of the tent. As he painted on the waterproofing mixture, he kept one eye on Jessie beside him, and on the work she was doing. She seemed to be absorbed in getting the brush strokes right, each newly careful stroke just barely overlapping the previous one, and Adon returned his attention back to his own efforts. He realised almost too late that the seam between the panels also needed to be painted, and that neither of them had done it.

He sat back with a grimace and considered the problem. It did have to be done, but it meant doing what he'd been trying to avoid all painting session and leaning over already painted cloth.... He sighed. Maybe he could shape the stretch so that he only touched the unpainted seam lower down. It really wasn't wide enough to hold a fully splayed hand, even his hand, but he tried anyway, twisting and contorting to brace and stretch along the same line. He got the loaded brush to the fabric, just and tried to draw it down the seam towards him. He got part of the way, then the fingers thathad been aching anyway cramped on him and he all but dropped the brush. He made a wild grab to recover it and lost his balance on his ever uneven legs. His weight jarred down the arm braced only for balance, and he instinctively moved his hand sideways - onto damp cloth.

Jessie flinched back with a startled look, as he shoved his body back into its balance point, and protested, "That was my panel!" Almost, he thought, as if she expected to be blamed for his mistake.


Adon looked at his oily hand and gave her a rueful apology. "I made a mistake. I'll fix it. Not your fault." He wiped the hand on the grass, set the brush down, made sure he was steady this time, and flexed his fingers until they stopped cramping. Then he picked up the brush again, finished the seam, and painted over the smudged gap he'd made saving himself. "There, fixed. See?" He only wished it was as easy to fix Jessie's hurts, both the external scars and the internal ones.

Jessie examined his patch with a frown, and then nodded as seriously as an ankal. "I suppose it will do..." she said, before her frown cracked into a real smile and the seriousness dissolved for a moment into teasing. "But you should only fall on your own side next time. Otherwise how will anyone know I'm the best waterproofer in Gloaming?"

Adon grinned back, despite the jarred arm and still achy fingers. "There are still," he quipped lightly back to her, "more panels to," and his own posture teased her back, "proof that on!"

Boxcode by Shimoje

[Rufio]

　　　
　　
　　
　　

g r a d e s

xp

Observation +4
Organization +1
Logic +2
Cooking +1
Painting +4
Wilderness Survival +1
Socialization +2
Teaching +2
Acrobatics +2
Endurance +2

lores

Logic: Choosing a dry day to waterproof a tent
Bright paint attracts unwanted attention when alone in the grass
Wilderness Survival: Waterproofing a tent
Waterproofing tents: Make sure seams are well-oiled
Logic: Paint at the centre and work outwards
Adon: A patient teacher
Adon: Cares deeply about Jessie

Great work! If you feel I missed anything shoot me a PM. Don't forget to edit your grade request here -