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Hera never brings him food herself. She does usually help prepare it – she has a better sense of the Terran diet than most, and when it comes down to it, she doesn't fully trust the others not to poison a meal they know is going to their half-Terran 'guest.' But she always finds someone she does trust to take it into him. And then, at first, she'd waited, leaving him to eat alone before she entered his room.

She kept to the first. But the second, she gradually eased. Hera remembered how total her isolation had been, and what had eased in her when she'd grown used to sharing meals. That was something she could do, even if she wouldn't serve him.

So the time she waits becomes shorter and shorter. Until today, when it's only a few minutes after seeing Muroc exit the makeshift cabin that she approaches. She nods to the guard, and then though she doesn't have to, she knocks on the door. She doesn't wait for an answer before entering the room.

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"Fair enough," Kanan says, but he's not smiling at all now.

And he waits, hands clasped behind his back, for Hera to open the door.

Hera does open the door, again nodding to the guard as they pass, who also rises to follow them. She leads him down the hall, and up a couple flights of stairs. Most of those they pass walk by with their eyes averted, though a few do openly stare, and one Kelpien slipped right out of the hall the moment he spotted them.

Hera doesn't acknowledge any of this, though she does frequently blink back to Kanan, and the guard walking behind them.

After about five minutes, she stops at another door, and opens it. The guard takes up a position standing by it, and as Hera enters the room, lights lined along the ceiling flicker on. It is a larger room, and mostly empty, except for a steel cupboard in one corner, a few hooks along the wall, and set of black mats laid out along the floor.

Kanan's face is like stone. Maybe someday he'll figure out how to separate mental shielding from the more physical kind, but --

Right now it's a no-go.

Some of that stiffness falls away as he enters the room behind Hera, studying the setup with surreptitious glances.

(The back of his neck still prickles with awareness of the guard, sometimes. This is one of those times.)

Hera heads for the cabinet, opening one side of it. Near the top hang several sets of white clothing, and below this there's a shelf with a closed pitcher and several steel cups. Hera pours water from the pitcher into two of the cups.

She pauses after setting the pitcher down again, for a few seconds just staring down at the cups. But then, she shakes her head a little, and lifts up the cup, before walking back over to Kanan.

"I take it they didn't teach you much about other species." she asks, as she holds out one of the cups to him.

"No."

Kanan shakes his head, reaching out reflexively to take the proffered cup.

"At least -- nothing that I wanted to learn."

Which was certainly a disappointment to his father. Wanting to take people apart is a useful talent in the Terran Empire.

"Well, I want to show you something one of my teachers taught me."

She pauses long enough to take a sip from her own cup. "It's a Klingon martial arts form called Mok'bara."

He half-smiles, though the wariness doesn't quite leave his gaze.

"This isn't some half-baked excuse to break all my bones, right?"

Then he shakes his head.

"No, sorry, I know you wouldn't -- "

She'd just do it, is the thing, no excuses necessary. So this really is what she says it is.

Hera lets that one pass without comment.

"Mok'bara is the basis for many Klingon combat techniques. But its purpose is to clear your mind, and to help you stay calm and focused."

She suspects it goes without saying that this is something he could probably use.

Edited 2018-08-14 05:38 (UTC)

"Focused, huh?"

He leaves the 'calm' part alone, largely because that's the more true piece of things.

"That'd be . . . nice."

"Then if you'll follow my lead -"

She holds her hand out to take his cup back, so she can set them both down by the side of the mat. They'll need their hands free, after all.

"- I'll start to walk you through it."

"All right."

He leaves about half the water in the cup, holding it out to Hera.

"Thanks."

Maybe it's too soon to say that, but --

Her eyes linger on him for a moment, but she takes his cup, and walks over to the edge of the mat to place both cups on the floor.

"All right," she says, as she returns to him. And then, for the first time, she turns her back to him, her arms held loosely her side.

"Take a wide stance, feet about a shoulder width apart." She shifts her left foot as she speaks. "You want to feel centered and grounded, like nothing move you."

Kanan startles, he can't quite help it, and takes a half step back to put more space between them. It --

It seems like a good idea, suddenly.

"On the balls of my feet, right? Or -- planted, like a tree."

It's a question, even as he shifts his legs into the indicated stance, awkwardly looking at the way Hera's holding herself so that he can better mimic it.

Hera glances back at him, waiting for him to seem to settle.

"That's right. Now, lift your hands -" She does the same as she speaks, lifting her hands in front of her face, palms down, letting her fingertips barely brush as she lowers them again. Though she keeps her eyes ahead, she angles herself so Kanan can follow her movements. "- and then down again -"

"Lift," Kanan mutters, repeating the movements as Hera makes them -- or rather, repeating them just a count-and-a-half behind. His fingertips don't brush so much as crash into each other, and he frowns.

"And down . . . "

She guides him slowly through a sequence of five steps, and then smoothly moves back to the first, so that they can repeat them in a cycle. As they repeat the steps, she gives fewer instructions, and gradually moves more quickly.

After the third repetition, she stops, and turns, watching to see if he can move through them on his own, without her demonstration.

His brow is furrowed, and his movements are halting -- he goes too quickly through the rise, and only a hair slower on the fall -- and the placement of all his limbs is more swinging than deliberate, but --

He makes do.

Hera lets him repeat the sequence twice, watching but not speaking, and then holds up a hand as he finishes.

"All right," she says. "How do you feel?"

"Tense," he says, almost immediately.

"But . . . focused."

Hera nods, as that's about what she expected, and then turns, and begins the sequence again.

"Don't feel that you have to rush through it," she says as she moves. She takes a steady pace, each step flowing smoothly into the next. "It's not about getting to the end, or worrying about your next step. It's about helping you stay in the moment."

"I make most of my mistakes 'in the moment'."

His voice is tight, and it matches the frown on his face, but -- he does take a deep breath and stop trying to rush it.

At least for a little while.

"Then for the moment, try not to worry about mistakes."

She keeps moving as she speaks, and as they reach the end of the sequence, she adds,

"There's no one waiting to attack you, Kanan. Not right now."

His shoulders hunch in, but he forces them back, keeping up with the movements.

He doesn't look at her.

"Not in this room, maybe."

She lets her voice soften, just a little -

"It's a start."

Kanan looks up at her at that, eyes a little wide.

"Oh. Uh. You're right. It is."