thisavrou_log | It's the eye of the tiger

As promised, the morning after receiving the triptan shot, Tex awakens to the alarm she had set on her MID. She has a bit of a medicine hangover, she thinks, but it's nothing a nice shower won't help cure. After washing up, she goes to the training room at the appointed time—actually arriving a bit early—and resists the urge to get started with a set of push-ups before the doctor's arrival. She knows she needs for him to monitor her activity—that's the point of all this.

She sort of realizes then that she never bothered to ask the doctor his name. It won't do for her to keep thinking of him as Church's double. Indeed, she decides that should be the first thing on her agenda, since he's going to be acting as her personal trainer for a while. She ought to know who he actually is.

So when he enters moments later, she approaches and says, "What do I call you?"

Dressed in a thermal and not bothering with anything else for this bit of exercise, it might be hard to tell if Adrien was just waking up or had been awake for some time. His sleep schedule was a wonder in and of itself for the sheer lack of it, even when the ship was calm and the crew on R&R.

Courser padded along at his companions side, something resembling half a chicken hanging from his mouth. Adrien was distracting the young tracker from training by feeding him, otherwise Courser would have been trying to help. As they came through the door, he spoke softly to the bahari, sending him off to the side of the room, before he turned right into Tex's question.

Oh.

Right. That pesky social convention of names. He was and would always be utter rubbish at remembering these things.

"Adrien," he offered as he held up a hand in which he held two bottles of water. "I'm making a sweeping assumption that you didn't bring any?"

She didn't show any surprise or fear when the creature padded in at the doctor's side. She was curious about it—what it was, where it had come from—but mentioning it would be fine to save for later. It certainly seemed a more interesting pet than the cats and small-breed dogs that had taken up residence on the ship. Tex was more of a large-dog person, or thought she probably would be should she have the opportunity to bond with one.

For now, though, it was nice to have a name. It helped in her separating this man from Church in her mind, though his differing voice and accent already had gone the distance in helping this process. "I didn't," she said in response to his question. "It didn't occur to me this morning."

Tex is otherwise well-prepared for this session, wearing sneakers, bicycle shorts, a sports bra, and a wide-armhole tank top—clothes she'd acquired on this trip with the unlimited funds she'd been given. Now that she's not in motorcycle leathers her muscles are on display—she's obviously pushed this body to its limits in the past, even in her now more weakened state.

Adrien merely nodded and tossed one of the bottles towards her.

"Lesson one. An organic body is over 50% water. Hydration is key to almost everything about keeping the body healthy, even staving off headaches. Whenever you exercise or exert yourself, keep your water intake in mind, dehydration can happen quickly and is devastating."

He walked his own bottle of water over towards where Courser was curled up and gnawing on his breakfast. Setting the bottle down, he headed towards the terminal.

"I have a few training programs written but I figured we start with basics and see where your fitness level falls."

The darkness of the thermal did not accentuate his own musculature unless the eye was looking for it. If she was paying attention she may notice that while not muscle bound, his build just wasn't right for it, there was a sculpted, razor sharp precision to his muscles that suggested rigorous training, not just maintenance workouts.

"Do you have a specific area you want to work on?"

She caught the bottle and held it for a moment. She knew that, of course, about needing replenishment of water when working out, but applied knowledge is different from academic knowledge. And she never had been the best about keeping hydrated. She uncapped it, took a drink, and set it on a nearby weight bench.

"I mostly do what feels good when I work out, what I find I'm in the mood for," she explained. "Lots of work with the heavy bags, though I do my best to keep a balance between the different muscle groups of my body." As far as specific areas? "I'm mainly concerned with learning how to stop when I should. At least when I'm in the rebound condition I'm in now." She has pushed herself to exhaustion before.

Standing with his hands on his hips, Adrien listened to her with a slight furrow between his eyebrows. He nodded but his next words were probably not going to be particularly encouraging.

"Already, it sounds like you've overdone it," he said, without chastising, just matter of fact. "Fitness comes in four key components for an organic body." He lifted his hand and ticked off each one with a finger.

"Muscular strength, muscular endurance, cardiovascular endurance and flexibility. The bag, for instance, is something you should work once you've strengthened the core four. We'll work today on all four, starting with a test to see where you are right now in terms of your endurance."

He lifted his wrist and began to type on the MID to call up some basic equipment as well as mats for them to work on. It wasn't going to be as exciting as the bag work or ... well any of that actually.

"Do you have any sort of music you like?"

She arched an eyebrow a bit as he explained the components, but she also knew she'd pushed things hard without using any sort of guide. She knew she was strong and that she had endurance, but perhaps those factors weren't up to the level of perfection that they could be. She remembered when she'd fought Ocelot—she'd been sure she could beat him handily in a hand-to-hand fight, just like she had beat York and Maine and Wyoming, but the limitations that she kept running into in this body had taken her a bit by surprise. She had beat him, but it had been a closer thing than she had been expecting.

"Anything with some good guitar work," she responded when he asked about her music preferences. There was nothing contemporary to her times in the network's music library, but she called up one of her favorite, more upbeat rock songs from it and got it started playing on the overhead system in the room.

Adrien cocked his head and listened to the song that started up before giving a small nod. It would certainly suffice and since this was her workout it seemed only fair that they go with her music choice.

"Alright, we're going to start with warm-up." He began, motioning for her to take a position on the mat and then moving to stand slightly in front of her and to the right.

Adrien demonstrated and talked through what they were doing and why. He discussed the need to give an organic body the chance to raise temperature, increase blood flow and slowly lift heart-rate. It was noted as a way to avoid muscle tears and increase body efficiency.

From the warm-up he would lead them into an 8min 2 mile run.

As they went through these initial steps, he kept an eye on her, watching for the signs of fatigue that Tex herself might not even be aware of. As for Adrien himself, if she had the focus to glance his way, she might note that none of what they were doing appeared to even wind him.

[ooc: For the record I am not an exercise guru or a doctor but Adrien is both so figure that he's walking Tex through the medical as well as the exercise/fitness whys and how fors in everything they're doing. He understands that some of it may be stuff she already knows but he's thorough. ]

She moved along with him, listening to him speak, appreciating the methodical way he worked and explained things. Tex herself tended to go balls-to-the-wall when she came to work out, pushing herself to the limit without much preamble to it. Icing strained muscle after a workout was for her a rather regular occurrence, and she was sure now that telling Adrien this would lead to something of a mini-lecture on the topic.

Because he'd been so thorough in explaining how he was bringing her through a warm-up, she managed to avoid her instinct to treat the run as though it were a race, letting him set the pace and remaining by his side the whole time. Conversation was the last thing on her mind, letting a companionable silence linger between them as long as he was content to do the same. She was interested in learning more about him, at some point anyway, but casual talk seemed out of place while trying to work out.

As far as her condition at the end of the run, while she was easily strong enough to accomplish it, her breathing belied the fact that she wasn't used to these sorts of distances. She did a lot of patrolling on the ship, but that was all done in her robot body, and most of her workout in her human body tended to be strength training rather than aerobic exercise.

She did indeed notice how much fitter his lungs seemed to be than hers and as she headed toward the weight machine where her water bottle rested she paused to take a few deep breaths. "I think I'm sticking to your method," she said—a bit of an admission there that she hadn't expected it to prove so much more superior to hers.

It was true. Between his medical profession and his military back-ground, Adrien was nothing if not methodical. Perhaps to a level of detail and by the numbers that could be downright annoying and he'd accept that accusation if it were ever hurdled at his head.

He appreciated that she was good with companionable quiet, as he was himself, though he was reminded that the simple act of running in company did seem to make it go by a little quicker. With or without a bit of competitive spirit working into the mix!

As they pulled up and she went for her water (something he noted with an inward nod of approval) Adrien walked over to scoop up his own bottle. Courser, having finished his breakfast, was indulging in a bit of a laze and merely flicked his colorful tail towards his companion.

Taking some sips, Adrien walked back towards Tex as she made her comment. He didn't smile, though perhaps by now she'd picked up on the fact that smiling was not something he did, but he nodded, pleased she'd found some use to the methodology. Between the run, the way it stirred memories and her statement, Adrien unbent a little and offered up a small anecdote.

"When I joined my last crew, I had been in civilian life for much too long and out of shape. There was a man in the crew, who had super human abilities, including stamina, strength, endurance, speed ... all of it. I spent months going out cross country running with him, just trying to keep close enough to keep him in sight."

Adrien paused, took another sip of water and then admitted.

"He was good enough to slow down and not lose me, at least for the first few months. Anyway, I never did ever run past him. But the view was worth it."

She appreciated this, his candidness. She nodded. "Sounds like he set a good precedent." Not that she wouldn't be able to run circles around Adrien when she was in proper good shape, she was sure of that. With the ability to calculate her exact speed and pressure of her footfalls, she would never have to have him slow down for her to keep him in sight.

"What next?" she asked once she felt she had drunk a good amount without overdoing it. She felt somewhat tired, yet invigorated in a way. It must be the effects of filling her body with oxygen and hydration.

He had a few tricks up his sleeve, though at the moment he wasn't pushing any of it to the forefront and he probably wouldn't really hit his own stride until he was finished helping her. Though if she employs her robotic body, well then yes she's going to definitely have the physical advantage on him then.

For now, he took one last sip of water before capping the bottle and tossing it aside.

"Now strength. Push-ups, sit-ups and pull-ups. We're going to do them in sets of 4-4-3 and go for 5 sets and see how you feel."

As he spoke he motioned for her to take a position on the mat. His intention was to go in cycles; first the push-ups, then the sit-ups and then the pull-ups. Rinse, lather, repeat five times.

She understood right off and took her position on the mat. Doing so few at a time seemed ridiculous to her—she usually did as many at one go as she could manage—but well, so far his ridiculous suggestions were making sense. It was the sort of thing Allison had likely known that hadn't been imparted to her via the imperfect way her intelligence had been made.

Tex immediately pushed that thought aside, as she typically did when thoughts of Allison came up, and began. The motions themselves weren't difficult, and she she knew she had good form—it was one of the aspects of working out in her human body she had bothered to research. After the warm-up and the run, and with the way the exercises were being cycled, they were having more of an effect on her than they normally would. She lowered herself after her final pull-up and dropped to the floor.

"I normally have to do more of these to get to this point," she admitted.

As soon as he saw that she had good form and technique, Adrien stepped back a little and acted as spotter, but otherwise kept out of her way. He also kept a close eye on how she moved, in case he needed to call and end to the exercise earlier than he expected; he gauged the 5 sets on how she'd handled the two mile run.

Walking over to where she'd left her water bottle, he picked it up and brought it too her, holding it out as he nodded.

"It's the theory behind rotating through the sets rather than focusing on one set at a time. It's okay to do that, I should point out and alternating methods can be beneficial. Sticking to one form allows your muscle groups to get into a rhythm that can carry you a little further that is an accurate representation of fitness level but it certainly won't hurt you."

Honestly, these are more words than he's ever spoken at one given time.

"My personal theory is, a fight doesn't happen in neat little silos. I need to be able to use all muscle groups in any combination when in battle circumstances and I don't want my muscles complaining because they're used to arms first, then hamstrings, then core. And as I believe you can tell, this also adds more cardio to the mix."

He was something of a fiend about cardio.

Edited 2016-06-12 23:04 (UTC)

She stretched her shoulders with a quick crossing and spread-eagling of her arms before accepting her water and taking another drink. "Yeah," she agreed when he'd finished speaking. "I'm impressed."

And she was&dmash;she was impressed with him, she was growing to respect him greatly, and she was setting aside any comparisons to Church that might have been entering her mind as they went along up until now. Adrien earned her interest all on his own merits.

At the suggestion that she was impressed, Adrien glanced aside, looking a little awkward in response to the compliment. He wasn't good with them and cleared his throat, mumbling a bit.

"Yes, well. When you're the weak link on the crew, you learn how to compensate," he said, walking over to pick up his own water to help try to cover his utter social fail.

She found that embarrassment cute, but besides a slight smirk she didn't show it. "So, next? Or is it time for a cool-down?"

"Next would involve swimming," Adrien said, taking a few sips of water and then crossing his arms.

"At least today it would. You could also go through another two to five sets of the strength training but I don't advise you push it today," he continued with a firm 'doctor's order's' expression.

"But if you don't feel like getting your clothes soaked and having to walk back damp, then we can work on some post workout stretches and call it done."

"I can handle getting my clothes wet," she said. She could handle marching back to her room naked if she felt like—she didn't embarrass easily—but considering what she was wearing she knew it'd be fine. She pulled off her tank as she started to head for the pool room.

Adrien watched her move off, feeling a bit bemused but also realizing he probably shouldn't have been surprised by her decision. She didn't appear to be a woman (or AI) who backed down from anything, so even making the suggestion was going to set her on course.

He probably needed to keep that in mind going forward.

For now, he gave a soft whistle to the tracker, who stood up with a lazy stretch and padded after Tex, beating Adrien to the pool room. Tex would hear a light splash as the bahari jumped into the pool, and a deep sigh from the doorway.

"Courser..." he began to comment, only to shake his head and wave a hand, obviously giving up on the matter. The bahari paddled around effortlessly, his long tail acting as a perfect rudder as he swam.

Walking up to the edge of the pool, Adrien lifted his MID and typed in an alarm setting.

"We're going to swim, continuously for fifteen minutes. If you grow tired or breathless, turn on your back and float. If that still doesn't give you relief, go to the side; just don't drown."

With that, he walked up the edge a short distance and dove almost silently into the water ... boots and all.

She watched the creature swim while Adrien spoke, and once he dived in she kicked off her sneakers and followed suit—she didn't want to mess up her new shoes. This was treated as more of a competition than the running had been—she was dressed more appropriately for swimming than he was and she knew she could swim more laps in the time allotted than he could.

Except that most of her swimming here had been recreational and she eventually found she needed to spend some time floating on her back, kicking lazily to remain in motion. She caught her breath and began again, more slowly this time—and soon, time ran out.

When the alarm sounded she moved to the end of her lane and waited for him to reach her side. She wasn't ashamed to have overextended herself. It had been an inevitability, really, considering the variety of exercises he was having her do. But she was already planning how she might complement his workouts with more exercise on her own time so that she would improve quickly.

He wasn't as worried about his uniform boots and given the number of times he'd been dumped into water in full kit, Adrien tended to train in close to full kit. As his clothing and the boots became waterlogged he was soon swimming with close to an extra fifteen pounds on his body. It didn't keep him from completing the full fifteen minutes but when he did finally come up at the edge, he was finally huffing a little.

Laying his arms across the edge of the pool, Adrien dragged his hand over his face to get the water out of his eyes and glanced over towards Tex. He was obviously measuring his breaths carefully, letting his body recover. Somewhere out in the pool behind them, Courser still swam around, perfectly content and probably making a mockery out of both their efforts.

"How do you feel?"

"Great," she said, not putting verbal acknowledgement down that she was close to spent. And it did feel good to know she was using her body in a more efficient, more powerful manner. Knowing that did feel great.

"Good," he said with a nod. "Then we'll stop there and end on a positive note."

He was rubbish at accepting any personal victories, always looking to dissect events and look for improvements, but that said, he had learned how to not apply that to other people. The power of ending in a positive position was something he could understand and leverage when it involved others.

Setting his hands on the top of the pool edge, Adrien grunted a little as he levered himself out. Water cascaded down his body as if squeezed from a sponge. She had definitely taken the better route in at least taking off her tank top!

"There is a series of stretches I like to go through at the end of a workout. I've found that they help relieve the natural tension that can build up in our muscles."

It wouldn't be a complete remedy and she might yet discover some aches in a few hours but hopefully not as many as if she stopped cold.

For now, he bent a leg back and reached behind himself to grab at his instep and pull upwards. He wasn't actually stretching, he was trying to dump water out of his boot.

"Do you know if there is a practice range aboard this ship?"

There was something to be said for preparation.

"I guess we'll just those right here then," she said, watching him drip off with a slight measure of amusement. The wet look was a good one for him, as long as she looked at him from the waist up. Below that he looked kind of bedraggled and ridiculous.

"There's a room we use for that, yeah," she said. "I built some lanes for it when we were picking supplies up from the prison. I just bought some gear on the planet to outfit it—ear protection and targets."

Edited 2016-06-15 00:42 (UTC)

It's the eye of the tiger

6/11

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