Log: Keys and Locks
Who: Lessom (NPC), Lujayn, Milani
When: day 11, month 11, Turn 15
Where: Storerooms, HRW
What: Lu's got a key problem.
Lifted from alchemy_l with thanks.
Standing at the juncture of two tunnels, Milani's busily ticking off items on a list and checking the contents of the basket at her feet. "Okay ... looking good," she murmurs to herself, then straightens and curves her back, one hand pressing into the lumbar region, then tilting her head to the side and rubbing fingers into the side of her neck.
Lujayn comes scuttling out of one of those twisting corridors a moment later, very wide-eyed and hasty. "Milani," She almost pounces on her friend when she spots the other girl, though her expression is verging on desperate rather than the smile of greeting that would usually be there. "Milani, Satiet's gonna kill me; I just got the keys to the locked storerooms today and..." So horrible that Lu can't bring herself to speak of it, at least not until she's taken a few deep breaths.
Milani pauses mid-neckrub and focuses on Lujayn, surprise first causing her to blink then alertness entering her expression. "Uhh -- yeah, Hayda said, and ... what?" The assistant headwoman shifts her clipboard around and toes the basket of stuff she's been collecting over a little towards the wall where it will be more out of the way.
Maybe Lujayn is exaggerating the tragedy, maybe not, but she believes her own emotions. "I think I /broke/ them," She manages to divulge with the manner of one who's not used to confessing any wrongdoing. "Or at least one, it's stuck in a lock back there," A fretful little glance for the tunnel behind her. "I wanted to see what was there, but there was a funny little sound when I tried to turn the key and it just /stuck/." Her eyes are big and pleading - please help her? "Please tell me this happens all the time."
"The keys? Oh ..." Milani looks suddenly non-plussed. "Did you put the wrong one in the wrong lock maybe?" The assistant headwoman puts her clipboard in the basket and pushes the lot firmly against the wall now, dusts her hands off and nods. "C'mon, show me, though we might have to get one of those cute handyguys to come help us if it's /really/ stuck, or broken. And ... don't worry about Satiet. We can get you a replacement if it's broken. It happens sometimes." Not all the time.
Lujayn nods sharply, largely unassured by Milani's lack of panic. "I don't think I did, but.." It's not a very long walk to the dreaded door, especially since Lu is taking great long runner-strides. "..here, maybe you can tell better than I can." The keyring dangles by a single key, stuck rather stiffly in the lock. "I tried twisting it around. Didn't want to go too far away for oil or tools, in case someone else came along and stole them." Keys are a big responsibility in Lu's book, or else they were handed over to the weyrling with a very impressive lecture. Both are likely explanations for her worry.
Milani is lucky she's got long legs to match that stride of Lu's. She nears the door in question and kneels down to peer along the body of the key. "Hmm," murmurs the headwoman's assistant and she reaches out to sloooowly turn the key and get a sense for what's going on with it herself. "Yeah, that's good, we had some thefts at one point, so Hayda gets a little ... twitchy about the keys. Amerie didn't even get s full set for a bit because she's from Crom." Her tongue pokes out a little as she continues to try to shift the key.
Lujayn hovers behind the assistant headwoman, watching closely. Almost too closely, but she has enough sense to take a step or two back; it doesn't take two people to unlock a door. "How does it look?" She's unsurprised by the report of Hayda's strictness, but it doesn't do anything to ease her nerves. "Did I snap it right in half? Is the entire lock broken?" There goes her imagination, unchecked down a steep hill.
The lock protests, making a little grinding noise. "It's not broken," Milani reassures after a minute. "But it's stuck real good," she continues making a little face and stops messing with the key, gets to her feet and considers it for a moment, eyes twinkling. "I think we need to go get Lessom and see what he can do with it," she says with a hint of wickedness in her voice. "He's a nice guy, decent kisser too, not bad on the eyes since he bulked up a little too." Remarked airily. "D'you want to stand watch over the keys? Or go for the handyman?"
Lujayn brightens at this glimmer of hope, eyeing the key less anxiously. "I'll stay here with it," She's stuck on the idea of being held responsible for anything to happen to the keys in her absence, even if the alternative is tracking down a cute handyman. "Maybe it'll come loose if I keep trying."
"Okay!" Milani says laughingly about Lujayn's choice, but she shakes her head next. "Nooo, don't touch it, just let it be. If you keep at it, it might strip the lock or the key might actually break. There's a chance right now we might be able to fix it without breaking anything." She smiles once reassuringly then strides off, steps brisk back towards the inner caverns. A few minutes later she returns with a slender young man who probably was on the lanky side not that long ago, but has broadened a little, a shock of shaggy blonde hair falling over his eyes. He's ogling Milani's behind as she walks ahead of him, discreetly, but ogling nonetheless. "Just over here!" she carols merrily and tilts a flirty look over her shoulder. "And there's Lu! Lujayn, have you met Lessom yet? He's /so/ good with his tools." The handyman bobs a polite nod to the Weyrling. "Lujayn, good evenin', let's see what's goin' on here, see if I can get this out without any breakin' of things."
Despite Milani's caution, Lujayn has already knelt down again in a gentler attempt to extract the key. "Don't think I have," She returns Lessom's nod with the barest fluttering of eyelashes, moving back to let the handyman have a look. "Neither of us could budge it; bet that wouldn't be a problem for you."
Milani leans against the wall, arms folding across her chest and grins across at Lujayn. As Lessom gets to work, feeling out the key's position first, then carefully unrolling his toolkit to extract a long, thin length of metal, she mouths across to the weyrling goldrider: "Isn't he /hot/?" And makes big eyes to go along with that too. Lessom takes another peek up at Lujayn, smile a flash of teeth in a slightly summer-tanned face. "Nope, ain't broke," he confirms. "Though you got it jammed in there pretty good. Strong hands you got there." He turns back to work on jimmying the key out of the lock carefully.
Lujayn grins back at Milani, all that's needed for agreement while Lessom works. "I'll be more careful next time," She promises the handyman with a smile, craning her neck to see what's going on. No doubt there will be a 'next time,' possibly scheduled for immediately after if and when the key is removed. "As long as I don't have to explain to Satiet that I broke the keys as soon as I got them, it's fine."
Still working away, Lessom squints down at the keyhole, then reaches into his tookit for another piece of metal, more like a wire and fiddles that into the lock alongside the key, then he gets out a squeezebottle of oil and squirts the lock liberally. "Myeah, don't wanna piss of the Ice Lady," the handyman says easily. A few moments later the key inches back a little then falls, plop, onto the ground, gleaming with oil. "Ooooh, good /job/ Lessom!" Milani croons and reaches over to pat the handyman's nice shoulders delightedly. "How's the lock itself?"
Lujayn holds her breath, watching the key move. As soon as it hits the ground she's there to retrieve it, wiping it clean on the hem of her shirt before reattaching it to the ring where the other keys jingle. "Wow, thanks." She beams Lessom's way, still sizing up the unlocked door. "Guess getting inside can wait for another day, don't you think Millie?" Then the lock itself is brought up, and Lu snaps back to the issue at hand. "Ooh, yeah. Forgot about that."
Lessom just grins up at Lujayn and looks over at Milani. "Got your key for this one, Millie?" The assistant headwoman nods. "Surely do, want me to try it out?" There's more nods exchanged and carefully, Milani slides the right key into the lock. "Feels okay," she notes, turns it and the click of the tumblers follows. A moment later the door is open and there's an audible sigh of relief. "All's well that ends well," declares the assistant, pulling the door closed again. Or maybe not. As she tries to turn the key the other way to lock it, it won't rotate fully. "Uh oh ..."
Lujayn smiles, counting off the keys to make sure none of them have escaped since the last time she looked at them half a minute ago. "Sounds like it," She leans to one side as the door opens, sneaking a peek at the room's contents, but her face pales again when the key sticks instead of unlocking. "Stuck open, that might be a little worse," Lu appeals to Lessom, hoping he can fix this one just as easily. "Do we need to get someone else?"
"One of the tumblers must be off," Lessom decides and gives Milani's hand a light touch. "Take it out, I'm gonna have to take the lock of and reset 'em." The assistant headwoman makes a face, turns the key back to neutral and pulls it out. "Neverending excitement around here, yeah?" she says with a laugh to Lujayn. "And we can go look inside after it's all fixed if you want, /or/ you can check out /that/ one," a thumb jerked at a different door. "Providing scrap metal and jelly jar lids are interesting?" Teasing lightly.
At least it didn't eat any more keys. Lujayn eyes the door suspiciously, shaking her head with a dry laugh at Milani's suggestion. "They're not, at least not right now, but who knows when I'll want to do some canning." She rolls her eyes, "Good to know I didn't break it, though." She's oh so happy about that little piece of good news. "Getting something to eat sounds much more interesting," Lu doesn't take long to decide on this, orienting herself in the direction of up and out. "Thanks for the help, guys. I don't know anything about fixit stuff." So saying, she waves and starts off, counting herself amongst the lucky for the day.
"Sure, and you can always ask too, I know where everything is," matter-of-fact, not bragging. Milani looks back down at Lessom, patiently taking the lock apart. "Should be okay Lu, go on and catch a bite while you can." She gives a little wave for the Weyrling and goes back to leaning on the wall, to watch Lessom with obvious enjoyment.
When: day 11, month 11, Turn 15
Where: Storerooms, HRW
What: Lu's got a key problem.
Lifted from alchemy_l with thanks.
Standing at the juncture of two tunnels, Milani's busily ticking off items on a list and checking the contents of the basket at her feet. "Okay ... looking good," she murmurs to herself, then straightens and curves her back, one hand pressing into the lumbar region, then tilting her head to the side and rubbing fingers into the side of her neck.
Lujayn comes scuttling out of one of those twisting corridors a moment later, very wide-eyed and hasty. "Milani," She almost pounces on her friend when she spots the other girl, though her expression is verging on desperate rather than the smile of greeting that would usually be there. "Milani, Satiet's gonna kill me; I just got the keys to the locked storerooms today and..." So horrible that Lu can't bring herself to speak of it, at least not until she's taken a few deep breaths.
Milani pauses mid-neckrub and focuses on Lujayn, surprise first causing her to blink then alertness entering her expression. "Uhh -- yeah, Hayda said, and ... what?" The assistant headwoman shifts her clipboard around and toes the basket of stuff she's been collecting over a little towards the wall where it will be more out of the way.
Maybe Lujayn is exaggerating the tragedy, maybe not, but she believes her own emotions. "I think I /broke/ them," She manages to divulge with the manner of one who's not used to confessing any wrongdoing. "Or at least one, it's stuck in a lock back there," A fretful little glance for the tunnel behind her. "I wanted to see what was there, but there was a funny little sound when I tried to turn the key and it just /stuck/." Her eyes are big and pleading - please help her? "Please tell me this happens all the time."
"The keys? Oh ..." Milani looks suddenly non-plussed. "Did you put the wrong one in the wrong lock maybe?" The assistant headwoman puts her clipboard in the basket and pushes the lot firmly against the wall now, dusts her hands off and nods. "C'mon, show me, though we might have to get one of those cute handyguys to come help us if it's /really/ stuck, or broken. And ... don't worry about Satiet. We can get you a replacement if it's broken. It happens sometimes." Not all the time.
Lujayn nods sharply, largely unassured by Milani's lack of panic. "I don't think I did, but.." It's not a very long walk to the dreaded door, especially since Lu is taking great long runner-strides. "..here, maybe you can tell better than I can." The keyring dangles by a single key, stuck rather stiffly in the lock. "I tried twisting it around. Didn't want to go too far away for oil or tools, in case someone else came along and stole them." Keys are a big responsibility in Lu's book, or else they were handed over to the weyrling with a very impressive lecture. Both are likely explanations for her worry.
Milani is lucky she's got long legs to match that stride of Lu's. She nears the door in question and kneels down to peer along the body of the key. "Hmm," murmurs the headwoman's assistant and she reaches out to sloooowly turn the key and get a sense for what's going on with it herself. "Yeah, that's good, we had some thefts at one point, so Hayda gets a little ... twitchy about the keys. Amerie didn't even get s full set for a bit because she's from Crom." Her tongue pokes out a little as she continues to try to shift the key.
Lujayn hovers behind the assistant headwoman, watching closely. Almost too closely, but she has enough sense to take a step or two back; it doesn't take two people to unlock a door. "How does it look?" She's unsurprised by the report of Hayda's strictness, but it doesn't do anything to ease her nerves. "Did I snap it right in half? Is the entire lock broken?" There goes her imagination, unchecked down a steep hill.
The lock protests, making a little grinding noise. "It's not broken," Milani reassures after a minute. "But it's stuck real good," she continues making a little face and stops messing with the key, gets to her feet and considers it for a moment, eyes twinkling. "I think we need to go get Lessom and see what he can do with it," she says with a hint of wickedness in her voice. "He's a nice guy, decent kisser too, not bad on the eyes since he bulked up a little too." Remarked airily. "D'you want to stand watch over the keys? Or go for the handyman?"
Lujayn brightens at this glimmer of hope, eyeing the key less anxiously. "I'll stay here with it," She's stuck on the idea of being held responsible for anything to happen to the keys in her absence, even if the alternative is tracking down a cute handyman. "Maybe it'll come loose if I keep trying."
"Okay!" Milani says laughingly about Lujayn's choice, but she shakes her head next. "Nooo, don't touch it, just let it be. If you keep at it, it might strip the lock or the key might actually break. There's a chance right now we might be able to fix it without breaking anything." She smiles once reassuringly then strides off, steps brisk back towards the inner caverns. A few minutes later she returns with a slender young man who probably was on the lanky side not that long ago, but has broadened a little, a shock of shaggy blonde hair falling over his eyes. He's ogling Milani's behind as she walks ahead of him, discreetly, but ogling nonetheless. "Just over here!" she carols merrily and tilts a flirty look over her shoulder. "And there's Lu! Lujayn, have you met Lessom yet? He's /so/ good with his tools." The handyman bobs a polite nod to the Weyrling. "Lujayn, good evenin', let's see what's goin' on here, see if I can get this out without any breakin' of things."
Despite Milani's caution, Lujayn has already knelt down again in a gentler attempt to extract the key. "Don't think I have," She returns Lessom's nod with the barest fluttering of eyelashes, moving back to let the handyman have a look. "Neither of us could budge it; bet that wouldn't be a problem for you."
Milani leans against the wall, arms folding across her chest and grins across at Lujayn. As Lessom gets to work, feeling out the key's position first, then carefully unrolling his toolkit to extract a long, thin length of metal, she mouths across to the weyrling goldrider: "Isn't he /hot/?" And makes big eyes to go along with that too. Lessom takes another peek up at Lujayn, smile a flash of teeth in a slightly summer-tanned face. "Nope, ain't broke," he confirms. "Though you got it jammed in there pretty good. Strong hands you got there." He turns back to work on jimmying the key out of the lock carefully.
Lujayn grins back at Milani, all that's needed for agreement while Lessom works. "I'll be more careful next time," She promises the handyman with a smile, craning her neck to see what's going on. No doubt there will be a 'next time,' possibly scheduled for immediately after if and when the key is removed. "As long as I don't have to explain to Satiet that I broke the keys as soon as I got them, it's fine."
Still working away, Lessom squints down at the keyhole, then reaches into his tookit for another piece of metal, more like a wire and fiddles that into the lock alongside the key, then he gets out a squeezebottle of oil and squirts the lock liberally. "Myeah, don't wanna piss of the Ice Lady," the handyman says easily. A few moments later the key inches back a little then falls, plop, onto the ground, gleaming with oil. "Ooooh, good /job/ Lessom!" Milani croons and reaches over to pat the handyman's nice shoulders delightedly. "How's the lock itself?"
Lujayn holds her breath, watching the key move. As soon as it hits the ground she's there to retrieve it, wiping it clean on the hem of her shirt before reattaching it to the ring where the other keys jingle. "Wow, thanks." She beams Lessom's way, still sizing up the unlocked door. "Guess getting inside can wait for another day, don't you think Millie?" Then the lock itself is brought up, and Lu snaps back to the issue at hand. "Ooh, yeah. Forgot about that."
Lessom just grins up at Lujayn and looks over at Milani. "Got your key for this one, Millie?" The assistant headwoman nods. "Surely do, want me to try it out?" There's more nods exchanged and carefully, Milani slides the right key into the lock. "Feels okay," she notes, turns it and the click of the tumblers follows. A moment later the door is open and there's an audible sigh of relief. "All's well that ends well," declares the assistant, pulling the door closed again. Or maybe not. As she tries to turn the key the other way to lock it, it won't rotate fully. "Uh oh ..."
Lujayn smiles, counting off the keys to make sure none of them have escaped since the last time she looked at them half a minute ago. "Sounds like it," She leans to one side as the door opens, sneaking a peek at the room's contents, but her face pales again when the key sticks instead of unlocking. "Stuck open, that might be a little worse," Lu appeals to Lessom, hoping he can fix this one just as easily. "Do we need to get someone else?"
"One of the tumblers must be off," Lessom decides and gives Milani's hand a light touch. "Take it out, I'm gonna have to take the lock of and reset 'em." The assistant headwoman makes a face, turns the key back to neutral and pulls it out. "Neverending excitement around here, yeah?" she says with a laugh to Lujayn. "And we can go look inside after it's all fixed if you want, /or/ you can check out /that/ one," a thumb jerked at a different door. "Providing scrap metal and jelly jar lids are interesting?" Teasing lightly.
At least it didn't eat any more keys. Lujayn eyes the door suspiciously, shaking her head with a dry laugh at Milani's suggestion. "They're not, at least not right now, but who knows when I'll want to do some canning." She rolls her eyes, "Good to know I didn't break it, though." She's oh so happy about that little piece of good news. "Getting something to eat sounds much more interesting," Lu doesn't take long to decide on this, orienting herself in the direction of up and out. "Thanks for the help, guys. I don't know anything about fixit stuff." So saying, she waves and starts off, counting herself amongst the lucky for the day.
"Sure, and you can always ask too, I know where everything is," matter-of-fact, not bragging. Milani looks back down at Lessom, patiently taking the lock apart. "Should be okay Lu, go on and catch a bite while you can." She gives a little wave for the Weyrling and goes back to leaning on the wall, to watch Lessom with obvious enjoyment.