Stupid holders and good wine.
Who: Miniyal and Reyce
Where: The lower caverns
When: Day 26, month 3, turn 4 of the 7th Pass.
What: Reyce is less than pleased about the Instigators being at High Reaches Weyr. So, he goes to console himself with cheap wine. His drinking is interrupted by Miniyal who, as always, says the wrong thing around him. Or at least lots of things. And she's not even drunk! A couple of people are discussed including his baby's mother and her former lover. Also, Roa's name gets taken in vain and there are insults. Oh, and he wastes a perfectly fine bottle of wine. Tsk.
8/14/2007 - 8/15/2007 & 8/20/2007
At High Reaches Weyr, it is day 26, month 3, turn 4 of the 7th Pass.
The lower caverns is riddled with little hidey holes, the kind that every native knows like the back of their hand and every Caucus student gets lost in at least once. Reyce may have been lost here before, but four turns in and armed with a nondescript bottle of wine, it's more likely that he came seeking just such a hidey hole. It's a nondescript place whose furnishings - a trio of sunken old couches - look like they've been here since the Fifth Pass at least. The door is closed, as it always is on these random alcoves scattered through the lower caverns, but when opened it will reveal Reyce slumped against one arm of the least battered couch, drinking straight from his still mostly full wine bottle.
That is yet another problem with the Caucus. It brings in students who learn the hidey holes that the rightful residents of the Weyr should get to use when they want to use them. Miniyal knows every single place like this in her home and has since not long after she could walk. This is not one of her usual haunts, but occasionally she does visit here for assorted reasons. Tonight there's no real reason to be here rather than somewhere else. She just feels like a change. What she doesn't feel like is company which is why when she opens the door she can't suppress a quiet groan when a student, particularly this one is spotted. Ah, well. Steeling herself for ridicule she comes into the room and closes the door, pretending he's not there as she moves towards the back of the room.
As soon as he hears the door open, Reyce whips around, spilling a bit of wine on his fingers as the bottle jerks with his motion. His narrowed gaze fixes on Miniyal, then moves beyond her to see if she's brought any other people with her. Unlikely though that may be. When he sees no one else, Reyce just turns back to his drink with a sinus-clearing sniff, ignoring the groan as he unashamedly starts licking his fingers to get off the dribbled alcohol. Apparently, as aggravating as Miniyal's company may be, it's not aggravating enough to disrupt him from his wine. His eyes follow her quietly to the back, since there's nothing to block his line of sight and nothing else to watch, but the ridicule doesn't come.
"Classy. Must be good stuff." Miniyal comments without looking back at the one she comments to. Instead she starts to shove one of the couches to the left. It sends up some dust from the collection gathered under the couch which makes her sneeze. "Oh, well. So much for this spot. I guess it was time to move anyway." That is just her talking to herself. It doesn't require any response and clearly she hopes for no response. Even if she did talk first. The couch gets another shove to the side and then she grabs the back to shove it forward another inch.
He's been addressed. Reyce blinks at her, then blinks down at his wine bottle. It must be the good stuff she's referring to, but it doesn't look that good to him. He tries it again, a quick swallow that goes down with a quiet hiss of breath - not dissatisfied, but not the genteel appreciation wine should inspire. Opening his mouth at all, even to hiss through his teeth, turns out to be a mistake when some of the dust stirred by Miniyal reaches him, and he abruptly cuts off with a cough. "The hell you're moving it for," he asks, his throat drying out as he speaks and hardly more than a hiss itself by the time he reaches the last word. Another swallow of wine tries to tamp it down.
The couch gets shoved once more and then Miniyal crouches down and begins to sweep away dust on the floor. "People hide things. I always wonder who made these spots to begin with, you know?" Conversational. Maybe she's been drinking already. "But, obviously no one leaves records of that so I just have to wonder." Then she pries up a piece of the floor that looks like someone chipped it out ages ago. From the hole she pulls out a couple of bottles and a few carefully rolled pieces of hide. "So, you're here drinking crap. Why?" A small leather bag is pulled out and tucked away into her boot before she goes about putting the stone back in place.
Reyce's eyes remain thinned, waiting for the dry-out of dust to go away. Then she discovers a cache of bottles under the floor and his interest is piqued, the wine bottle plugged with his thumb while his other arm wraps over the back of the couch. There's an old nail protruding from the back of it, and he jerks back when it scratches his forearm, then simply resettles his arm in a diferent place and takes a look at her find. "Felt like it." He answers quickly, only so he can ask, "You hide that?" with a jerk of his chin towards the cache. His eyes squint down again, more of a considering look this time than a defense against floating dust.
"Yes. I didn't stumble upon it by accident. Well, I stumbled upon the floor. The couch wasn't always here. I had to move it. Luckily people are lazy and never moved it again." Miniyal tips her head to one side. "I'd offer you a drink, but you already have one. And I don't have glasses." And she is not sharing a bottle with him. Nor does she believe he'd want to share one with her. "It's pretty bad to drink without a glass. I mean, even binge drinking our drunkard of a Weyrleader used a glass." With a shake of her head she tucks the small roll of hides into her boot along with the bag of whatevers she retrieved.
A little grunt greets her answer, and Reyce withdraws slightly. "You don't either," he points out, somewhat moody, when she harangues his lack of a glass. The few words are followed up with a rumble as the Bendenite clears his throat, perhaps still bothered by some of that dust. Withdrawing his arm from the couch, he turns his back on her while he goes for another, straight from the bottle drink of wine. "You came here for that or the other stuff?" he wonders. He seemed more interested in the bottles, but apparently he did notice the hides.
Miniyal moves over to the couch near the one Reyce sits on. There she perches on the arm of it and holds the bottles in her lap. "I came for it all. Have to move stuff around or people might find it and then I'm fucked. So, once a turn I go around and switch things up." Shrugging her shoulders she looks at her wine. "I guess when I finally have my own place it won't matter. I'll be able to put everything there and not worry about it." And she certainly doesn't sound like she might not do that. Shifting back an inch she kicks a heel against the side of the couch which brings up a little more dust. The bottles have no markings on them to identify them, but the way she holds them clearly they're worth something. If only to her.
But a honking snort interrupts her while she's resettling herself with those precious bottles. "You're moving things every turn, you think a weyr's good for it?" Reyce wonders. Lifting his shoulder forward, he knocks his nose against it with a squishy, nasally sound that he ignores. "People know where you live, you hide things there, you're not there all the time. No door. And you're gold." He lumps her in with her dragon in one mumbled statement. "Stairs," is the last he bothers to explain, over a huffing sigh, before he goes for another drink.
"Well. . ." Miniyal frowns and shakes her head. "It's different. Besides, I know who lives here. Well, I don't know the recent arrivals. None of them will come digging through my things. And, Peloth will be there when I am not. It's not like I'll have a lot to do, you know." Eyes rolling her brushes a bit of dust off one of the bottles and eyes the cork in it speculatively. "Also, I know how to hide things so people don't even know they are hidden." She stops and then sits up straighter. "I am /very/ good at hiding." she finishes with a hint of pride to her tone. Then she studies the cork again and rubs her thumb over the top of it.
Reyce considers her hint of pride, his cheeks puffed out with a mouthful of wine. His lips pull back again as he sucks the drink down. "Somebody moves a couch," he suggests, turning his gaze briefly towards the one she just retrieved her things from. Speaking of, though, he leans forward and gives his wine a waggle towards the chair that she's sitting on. "Sat there earlier, don't think the arm's on good. Your thing." His safety warning given, the Bendenite falls back against his own, trustily secured couch arm.
Her shoulders shrug as Miniyal holds one of the bottles up. "I would have lost very little. That's why I don't keep everything in one place. It's a risk. But some you have to take. Most of the places I hide things no one but me has been in for turns." The arm is given another kick. "So, what are you hiding from? Issa? Baby? Someone say something mean and you had to go get drunk til you forgot what it was?" Her head tilts from one side to the other as she looks down at the arm she's sitting on. Another risk she seems willing to take. "Anyway! I said. people are lazy. No one moves shit."
When she pushes again for his reason for being here, Reyce lets his eyelids drop low and gives her a lizard's indifference. Stony stare. "You do that," is his return, still not an answer to her question. It takes him a beat to decide that such a question is not fully comprehensible without a little explanation, so he waves a hand and provides some. "Say two things at once. Why am I here, but you're talking about something else already. Can't shut up or you're changing the subject, so I'm not supposed to answer?" The only hint that this is a question is that he remembers to lift his eyebrows at her.
"I'm sorry. Can't you keep up?" Miniyal doesn't smile because she's just not gonna smile around him. It's bad enough to talk. There are lines to draw. "Most conversations are too slow. I get bored. There's just not many people I find interesting. I mean, in a conversational way. They drone on about something stupid or can't keep up." Which would explain the first question. Another kick to the arm and another cloud of dust before she stops and holds the bottles of wine closer. "So. Why? No, I'm truly interested. I won't say a word until I know. Unless you take too long."
Reyce seems a prime candidate for being unable to keep up, but her concern with the subject hasn't instilled in him any particular need to hurry. After asking her to rewind a bit, now he's taking the time to consider his answer. Eventually, he throws off a shrug and decides to share. "Don't like how it's going here, the Instigators," not new people - he doesn't beat around the bush with that, "other things people want to ignore. What's happened. Don't want Asha here and I've got no place to go, I don't like it." He lifts his drink, the level of wine in which has edged a good ways down since she got here, and tilts it. "Don't forget shit when I'm drunk but I'm stupid, it doesn't matter as much. And I don't -" he points the neck of the bottle at her directly, and might have pointed a finger were his not busy holding it in the first place - "like talking to two things at once. Don't say them both," he commands, and releases her from the crushing burden of being singled out by his bottle.
An attentive listener like her has no problem waiting. Miniyal sets one bottle down carefully behind her and begins to open the one still in her lap. It's tough, but she manages it ever so slowly as she waits. The bottle gets pointed and she peers at it, sniffs, and shakes her head. "The only thing worse than a boring drunk is one who doesn't care what he's drinking. Here." Cork partially removed she holds out the bottle. "One of my better ones. Had it for five turns. Was saving it, but not overly concerned right now." And she keeps holding the bottle out to see if he takes it. "Well, all things considered it's hardly surprising they wound up here. I mean, even I saw that as an eventual possibility. Besides, you're letting Issa raise Asha, right? What's the difference?"
Reyce considers the bottle she's holding out to him, snags it, and sets it on the floor in front of him. Gesture received, but not yet moved upon. "Wasting it," he tells her bluntly, but since he hasn't opened it yet, she still has time to retrieve her wasted wine. "And I'm not," he continues, dragging his legs up on the couch. His own wine bottle gets crooked behind an elbow, what remains of its contents dwarfed just by his arm. "Letting Issa-" but his eyes drift off without focus, his forehead faintly creased, and after a beat he returns to her with narrowed eyes and a somewhat hazy attempt at paying close attention. "Difference is Issa wouldn't put her in danger."
Miniyal blinks several times and peers down at her hands thoughtfully. Finally she shakes her head. "No, that's wrong. She wouldn't put her in danger knowingly. Perhaps not willingly. But she would. She's Diya's protege. And Diya would do anything for what she believed in." Looking up at Reyce she almost looks apologetic. "I'm sorry, Reyce, but there's no way I'm going to believe that safe and Issa go together. I respect her in a lot of ways, but I wouldn't trust her ever. Not with anything important." Moving the remaining bottle to the crook of her arm she twists at the ring on her finger, eyes drawn down to the motion and away from him.
When Miniyal shoots him that apologetic look, she meets not anger, but confusion: why are you saying this? Reyce seeks comfort from his bottle, downing what remains of it in one gulp. "Don't like her," he mutters, dropping his eyelids into a low, unfocused glower. "'Nd Issa." His glower trails lower, finding the bottle that Miniyal failed to reclaim and considering it just briefly before he swings it up for himself. A corkscrew appears from nowhere, though it takes him a few tries to get it fixed in the cork adequately. "Issa's what to her, I don't know. Protege?" Apparently under the impression that his ramblings made any sense, he lifts an inquiring look to Miniyal. It's punctuated by the faint pop of the corkscrew as he gets it out.
"Protege. Yes. That's what she was. Diya was her mentor pretty much most of her life." Miniyal looks up from her ring when the cork is popped. One boot stretches down to toe at the floor under where she sits. "I'm not. . .fuck. I don't want to sit here and say bad things about Issa. That's not what I want. I'm just saying that if you are pissed off about the Instigators being here. . .some of them have been here all along. At least people who believe in what they believed in. And, I'm sorry, but she's one of them. She'll raise Asha to be the same way. She's a believer. And you're wrapped up in yourself. Maybe if you took her somewhere else, but she's here. She'll be raised here. You don't think between our new arrivals and Issa and Roa that there's not going to be- Well. I'm afraid you have to get used to it."
The corkscrew's been removed, but Reyce doesn't get to his drink yet. He's too busy concentrating on Miniyal, eyes squinted and brow furrowed, an expression that lasts till she shuts up and he clears with one of his habitual sniffs. "Can't," he breathes out heavily, dropping his eyes so he's staring into the full bottle. "Can't get used to it." His words lapse for a moment, and he draws another of those sniffs. "But I'm supposed to do what, got nowhere to go. And I won't - Issa loves her, can't take her from her mother. /Fuck/ Roa," he bursts out suddenly. Unlike Miniyal, he has no hold-ups about sitting here and saying bad things about someone. But then, he's had more to drink than she has. "Not raising a kid here." His voice drops into a growl for this last, his eyes thinning at Miniyal to direct this new decision.
Around and around her ring goes on her finger. She's been wearing it long enough that it has a nice line to follow and Miniyal does that. Twist, twist, twist. "So, you're not going to raise her here. But, you're not going to take her from Issa. You /really/ think Issa will leave here? You're crazy." Miniyal shakes her head and glances up from her ring for just a second. "Or stupid. Probably both. I mean, I'm sorry, I really am. But there's no way you'll convince her to move. So, you're going to have to take her from her mother. And her mother's going to try to come take her back. And hopefully you sort it out before Asha's old enough to be fucked by it all."
"I'm fucking drunk," Reyce asserts, but after that flash of strength he retreats swiftly, tugging the bottle towards his chest as his eyes fall tp the edge of the couch. "Maybe both," he admits afterwards, finalizing his seizure of the bottle by taking his first drink from it. "She's not what you think. Don't want to say bad about her, but the fuck do you think of her?" His eyes trail their way up the space between them till they find her face, though his own remains downcast, and it's a slanted-up look he gives her. "You're painting this picture of her would sooner risk Asha and piss with me because all she can do's what you expect from her. She's not what you think." He's helpful now, offering this bit of insight with a lift of his bottle before he drinks from it again.
"You better appreciate that bottle. It's rare as shit." Miniyal points this out as if it's more important than anything else being said in the conversation. Well, of course it probably is to her. If it's important enough to hide it's important enough to care about. "I'm not painting a picture. I grew up here. You think I don't hear shit? Think I don't know shit? How many times you think she went to visit them? For Diya, for Roa." Pausing a moment she shrugs. "Fuck, she took me once." The ring stops its circular motion around her finger now and she just stares at it, blinking rapidly. "I don't think she would knowingly risk Asha. I think sometimes she gets caught up in what she believes in and might lose track of all but the goal."
"I don't," Reyce admits about the bottle, holding it out to her again. He's forgotten by now that she abhors his glass-less drinking, but the gesture doesn't seem to be one of rejection: more a confused attempt to be helpful. If he's not going to appreciate that bottle, it should go back to her. It will continue to hang there for a few minutes, until she reacts to it or his arm gets tired of holding it. "You are painting a picture," he points out to her, but this time the phrase sits ill with him and his mouth crumples with dislike over the last few words. He snorts it off heavily. "I know her, you know her, both get different things out of that. 'S waste of time."
The bottle is looked at, but it was given and so she doesn't take it back. Reyce cooties and all going on now. Well, that and Miniyal is not the sort to deny a man who needs his drink. "It's fine. Whatever. I mean, the wine. To dip briefly into being all pitiful and shit, I've no reason to give a fuck about keeping it all anymore. I can drink crap alone." Her head shakes as she rubs the stone on her ring absently. "But, that's beside the point and we're not discussing why I'm pathetic but why you are. Always a nice change. Any conversation between the two of us is a waste of time. Our minds are made up about each other and about what the other thinks. And, neither of us gives a fuck about what the other one thinks. You're a waste of space just like anyone else sent here for Caucus."
All right, back the wine goes. Reyce accepts possession with another drink, not carried off exceptionally well as his lips almost get sucked into the bottle and he has to pull them back with an audible pop. The back of his arm dashes hard at his mouth, trying to rub off the feeling. "Get tired of you," he says, the words muffled as he's still speaking into his arm. "I'm not thinking the same things you are, 'h don't like you but I don't know what you think and don't claim it, so where you're getting that. It's your own thing." He's more successful with the bottle this time, taking a quick swig that doesn't get his mouth stuck.
"I didn't say you were thinking the same things I was. I said we both have our minds made up. And if you say you didn't make your mind up about me a long time ago you're a fucking liar." Miniyal folds her hands together after tucking the unopened bottle tighter against her. "And, of course you get tired of me. Everyone gets tired of me. I get tired of myself sometimes. Not often. I can usually keep myself entertained as long as someone dumb isn't dragging me down. The problem is, and feel free to make of it what you will that I say this, most people I meet are not smart enough to hold my interest. Conversations move too slow. People can't keep up. I mean, even sober you can't keep up with me. It's not your fault. Probably has a lot to do with the way Blooded families tend to breed with each other. I mean, any herder can tell you that's going to lead to, well, what we get. Idiots."
Reyce blinks at her slowly, which is doing a lot to support her point that holders are naturally slow. "You made up your mind," he says softly, some of the drunken slosh leaving his words. Some of his concentration has returned, but it's hard to hold onto it, his eyes squinted down with the effort. "So the fuck are you talking about? I'm Caucus, and Blood, and not smart, you want to prove something to me?" The effort finally fails him, and the squint falls out of his eyes as he releases a settled sigh, tilting the bottleneck in towards himself. "You want to make it a waste of time," is his somber judgment. "I don't. Fuck off."
He's blinking enough for the both of them so Miniyal doesn't do any excessive blinking. She does go back to twisting her ring around because it's just not something she can stop doing sometimes. "Bullshit your mind is not made up. And, mostly I am seeing how drunk you are. Because I'm bored and Peloth won't let me drink any more tonight. So, I figure, watching you try to reason out words to say is better than nothing. Anyway, I don't think you're not smart so much as you choose to only be smart about certain things. Most people do. They find something or other they're good at and ignore the rest. Better an expert at one thing. Me, I want to know everything. I'm getting there. And, fine. Make it not a waste of time." Sitting there on the arm of the couch she twists her ring and kicks one foot back and forth, waiting.
Reyce waits a beat to process her decision not to fuck off as ordered, but ultimately winds up shrugging it off. Ignoring her fidgets, he settles himself back on the couch and lets his head lean over the pillows, keeping it upright enough that he can toss a drink down his gullet like a stuffed goose when he wants to. "You're talking about math. 'S fine," he breathes, deciding to take one of those drinks now. Once it's gone, with a smacking sound while he clears his lips, he continues: "I'm not at the bottom yet, I don't care about knowing everything. What I remember you weren't interested in it, don't know that you do either. And didn't say," he lifts his free hand to wave in her direction, from what he remembers of where she was sitting. "Didn't say hadn't made up my mind about you. Said I have, think, that I get tired of you, what else. Don't think it matters, though - and pick one." He tacks the last injunction on there quickly, and with an emphatic jab from his blindly waving hand, but doesn't explain himself. If she's been paying attention, she may remember the phrase (some version of it) from back when he growled about her changing to a new subject before he could answer the first one.
"It's so hard to keep up with what you want me to do. It's worse than when you're sober. At least then you just growl and act surly. It's a very good act too. I've wondered about it often." Miniyal stops kicking with her foot, but continues twisting her ring. "I mean, is it purely a defensive mechanism? Is there a little crying Reyce inside who was never loved and so acts all mean and bad so he doesn't get hurt? That's usually what it means." Here she stops so she might tilt her head to the side and purse her lips. "I'm guessing that's you. And when you found someone to accept you for being an asshole you figured you were validated and therefore it was wrong all along to have tried to be nice, if you ever were, and being said asshole was the way to go. So, really, Issa would be enabling your inability to get along in society. But, I don't think you care much about society as a whole. At least that was my impression a long time ago. I think I'll stick with it too. You care about yourself and maybe another person or three. Oh, but you wanted a new topic. Well, how about the old one. What are you going to do about being stuck here with all the Very Bad People who tried to change the world?"
"No, we've done that topic." Reyce answers immediately, but his words are drawn out. Disinterested, then, but pretty mild about it. "Would say you're wrong but I don't know about it, all I know's details so I don't go for a broad guess what I am. 'T makes sense." There's a missing 'if' in there, just detectable from his tone. Yet he seems to acknowledge that he's not making sense, his free hand lifting again just to flick the fingers gracelessly. "Issa, though, what I thought, is being with her you want to be like that, the kind of person she can talk to 'cause it's easy. I'm not," he admits, rolling his head to the side where he can just catch a quick glance at Miniyal before his eyes roll into a more comfortable position, absent and looking straight off the wall. "Don't like people and I'm not interested what they have to say, 's false when I try so I don't. How I think of it, that one of it, now."
"Fine. Umm." Miniyal is not good at coming up with topics. She's not a good conversationalist. Never has been, never will be. "So, you don't like Roa?" Well, she came up before, but was not discussed. And since she gets to pick the topic she'll be nosy. "What about R'vain? Sefton? Any of them. Feel free to pick one and tell me what you really think. I mean, sure you don't like people but you have to have an opinion about them. Myself, I like people. Oh, not in general. In general they are asses and I'd hit them if I were the sort inclined to violence which I am not. I find it disgusting and the refuge of the idiotic. And, of course you're not interested. What did I say? So self-centered. Like, a text book example. I've done a lot of reading on that sort of thing. Studied a lot of people. It's easy when no one really notices you. I guess they notice me now. Sucks a lot, but nothing I can do about it now."
While she speaks, Reyce takes a drink, since even he has noticed that when she opens her mouth it tends to be a while before she closes it again. Plenty of time to knock down the wine level in that bottle another few notches; good thing he's a Bendenite and can hold his wine. "Don't care," he exhales on an alcoholic sigh. He stuffs the bottle between his knees, another sign of the reverence in which he holds this gift from the queenrider. "Know what I think of them, don't care about it. You're the one studies people, and that I've made up my mind about you, wonder what you say for yourself, think how I'm this way for whatever reasons."
Miniyal's head tilts over and shortly after that straightens it and tucks a wayward clump of hair behind her ears. Still not long enough to tie back she must continue to chop it off haphazardly on her own. Hardly the sort of look most people in her position would go for. "Here's the thing. I know myself. I'm boring. I know what pisses me off, what makes me cry, what makes me happy, what makes- Well, anything. I don't know what makes other people do things. It's fascinating. If you say something to one person they smile and another person looks upset. If you try to help one person they are grateful. Another person yells at you for daring to think they can't do it on their own. People are so interesting. Not that I get them, because I don't. I mean, I don't connect to people." She pauses after that before shrugging. "Well, Gans. But he did that. I mean, he started it. He made it easy to connect. I think him and Issa have a lot in common that way. Their personalities are pretty similar in a lot of ways."
That lifts Reyce's head off the couch, because no matter how drunk he is, any comparison between Issa and Gans will register. He regards her somewhat blearily, though, so it's not clear how much he's really keeping up with this conversation, the evidence that he's as slow as she claims he is mounting without him seeming to notice (or care.) "You're okay with him," he states, his tone flat throughout but his eyebrows making an effort to lift and create a question after he's finished speaking.
"I love him." It's a silly almost question he asks. Miniyal's tone may be missed in his state, but it's clear she thinks him a fool for assuming she might not be ok with her dead lover. "Do I find what he did to Yevide reprehensible? Yes. I told you. I abhor violence in all its forms. But I do not believe that one action defines a man no matter or terrible, or great, that action was. He made mistakes in life. There were things he did I did not agree with. We. . .discussed some of them quite seriously. But, he didn't agree with- Well, no, actually. He never really spoke with disapproval of my actions. I think because he was afraid I would stop trying to do things. I'm a mess. In a lot of ways he may not have helped, but at the same time I couldn't be the person I am now without him. I'm sure you don't care to listen to me go on about-" Now she blinks and drops her chin down to stare at her lap so she can work on the not crying thing.
Miniyal can go on talking as long as she likes; Reyce checked out after 'I love him.' His head eases its way back to the cushions, soon to be followed by a quiet drink of wine, and his eyes stare straight up at the ceiling while she blathers and he considers her words. Because of it, though, she gets plenty of peace to rein in her tears, since Reyce isn't watching, and though he must be aware of the sudden silence, he doesn't seem motivated to fill (or interrupt) it.
That would be a good thing because it takes her some time and even when she lifts her head again she can't quite conceal the redness to her eyes. Of course, Reyce being drunk it's a pretty good guess that Miniyal will get away with it. "I'm done. Wow. Way done. I don't- Fuck. Anyway. You're seriously dull. Are you even awake? Should I have Peloth bug Oshisyth so Issa can come haul your drunken ass back home? I hope you don't do that a lot when Asha gets older. She'll know. It's rough for a kid to be raised by a drunk. They tend to turn into them themselves. Although not in my case. I did it on my own. My parents can't be blamed for that at least."
"Fuck off," Reyce reminds her simply, but answering quickly enough to prove that he has in fact stayed awake. He takes another drink of that wine she so kindly gave to him.
"Oh. Was that a yes or a no? Well, too late anyway. I already told her." Miniyal grins and may or may not have done it. . .ok, she didn't, but he has no way of knowing and she can't help it. A drunken Reyce is a good target. "Peloth says she didn't seem too upset so maybe Issa isn't going to mind. Do you think she'll bring Asha? How's she going to carry both of you do you think?"
Even drunken Reyce has doubts that she did this thing, though it takes him a few moments to puzzle out why he doubts it. "She would be," he states indistinctly. "'nd Issa's not coming down here, haul my drunken ass back home." He's too far gone to attempt one of his impressions, alas for Miniyal, but it's a feat in itself that he remembered her words well enough to quote them. "Don't make fun," he remembers suddenly, breaking into what seemed like the end of his effort at speaking to add this on, "about Asha. She's a kid. Don't care you mock Issa and me but you don't her."
"Oshisyth would be upset? I don't really know her that well. Anyway, that's beside the point." Miniyal rises to her feet and holds onto her bottle with one hand. "I wasn't mocking her or making fun of her. I was expressing concern about her. I mean, Issa's a wingsecond. If she won't foster her daughter out she has to know she can depend on the man presented as the baby's father to help her out. Otherwise her work is going to suffer for it and I sort of think I'm supposed to care about that shit and all. Well, not /right/ now because I haven't graduated, but I've always been ahead of the curve. It's hard most of the time because I get bored. I wouldn't ever make fun of a kid. Never. And you really have no clue about me, I know, I know, you don't care to, if you even entertain the notion that I would. So, fuck you, Mr. Pity Party."
That gets Reyce's attention again, his focus sharpening rather than just blankly watching the ceiling. "I didn't like the way you talked about her, you were leaving last time. Gave her the gifts." Of course, technically Miniyal was also giving him a gift, but Reyce leaves the black locket out of his reckoning in a moment of drunken indiscretion. "Said something, she should grow up like her parents, and you're not making fun with that. Know you think bad about both of us."
Miniyal's head tilts to one side and she studies first her bottle of wine and then her ring. "I don't think bad about Issa. I don't know why you think I do. She knows damn well what I think of her. I've told her. Fuck, I told you. I respect her. You, you're a complete ass. I have no use for your kind. However, I do think Asha should grow up to be like her parents because as much as I dislike you I do not dismiss the fact that somewhere you have good qualities. And with any luck she'll get those. Don't sit there and try to tell me what I fucking think, you son of a bitch." It's so much fun when a button is pushed. "You have /no/ idea what I think. You try to act like you do. Like you can toss me into some. . .some predetermined space. I hate people who think they have any idea what I do or do not think when they've taken the time to even fucking talk to me unless they were sure they could work a good insult in. Yes, I hope your daughter is just like you both. And, yes, partly so you both see what a complete pain in the ass it is to deal with someone like you. So, just shut the fuck up. Sit there like a whiny drunk because you don't like what's going on around you. Since when /have/ you liked what's going on around you? At least you have-" And she stops again and glares at the Bendenite. "You have so much and you're sitting here bitching about something instead of being thankful for what you have. You could be home right now. You have a home. You have people that give a fuck if you show up drunk or not. Who worry about you. People like you make me sick. You have what some people will never have and it's still not good enough. Just because every little thing is not going your way. You make me sick."
Being yelled at really does not allow Reyce to melt back into his state of drunken indifference, so he has to struggle upright. It takes some effort - he has to grab at the chair arm and use it for leverage - but he gets there, and the more she talks the more he seems to sober up. Seems, however, is probably a key word here: after as much wine as she's seen him drink, it has to be an illusion. "Tell you what you fucking think, the fuck you think you've been telling me this whole time but that, what I think of you, what I think of things, anything you've decided's true so far as you care. That the only reason I talk to you's so I can insult you, that's not you fucking telling me what I fucking think?" The mark of a drunk: excessive use of curse. "Fuck yourself, your 'makes me sick,' your own pity party makes you think you can tell me what I have for my family's not enough for you." Also: incomprehensible threats. Reyce grabs that chair arm tighter and leans forward, even, his narrowed eyes turned up to the weyrling where she stands. "You don't know shit."
"Actually," and by now Miniyal has calmed down. Possibly just because she got him worked up or possibly because she's just going through rapid mood swings. "I told you how you /act/. Our actions are not always a reflection on our thoughts. You may think something entirely different. If you think at all. But, the way you present yourself and the way you act implies just what I have said." She nods her head once and then rolls her eyes. "Don't bother trying to debate me right now. You're too drunk to stand a chance. And, I know plenty. Oh, not as much as you in all sorts of things I imagine, but I know enough to know that I've got you pegged as far as your actions go. Fuck, you're not hard to figure out." There's a full stop so she can really look at him, quite the stare before she snorts. "Big man, Reyce. Go on. Tell me what I say is wrong. But it's true. You have someone you could be talking to about all this. You have people who would just do their best so you didn't have to think about it tonight. Instead you /chose/ to come here and drink alone. You rejected them. And that's disgusting. That's worse behavior than anything I've ever done. I may not try very often, but I don't throw away what I have. I used to think someone else's behavior was the lowest I'd seen around here, but I was wrong. You're the lowest thing I've seen around here. Enjoy your drinking. I'm sure you will since it means more to you tonight than anything else."
The hit comes out of nowhere, wrapping across his body to thud the arm of the couch. Reyce's left hand slides back, finding a grip on the cushions beside him as his right fist aims another blow, then another until there's a surprisingly soft crack and the old wood snaps. Now the furniture matches: the arm of this couch is as loose as the one Reyce advised Miniyal not to sit on, and as soon as that's been accomplished, the Bendenite sinks tamely against the thing so it leans away under his weight. An arm crooks to provide his stubbled cheek somewhere to rest, and he doesn't seem to notice or care what he's done to the couch. His eyes have closed, but his expression remains visible: a little soppy from the drinking, but otherwise a blank. The bottle she gave him fell to the floor when he moved, and now holds only a shallow layer of wine, whatever ran too low to spill out of the open top.
"Violence never solves anything." Pointing this out is probably, well, pointless. However, Miniyal cannot resist and so does, in fact, point it out. "Although it does break furniture. Are you always an angry drunk? Not that you don't seem pretty angry a lot of the time. Well, when I see you. Well, you're not the first person to seem angry around me. Still. . ." The hand that doesn't hold her unopened bottle of wine scratches her head before falling down to find its way into her pocket. "You know, you remind me of someone right now. Oh. Right. Our Weyrleader. He's an angry sloppy drunk too. At least he's entertaining though. Ah, well."
But violence has solved something: it broke the couch, and now Reyce feels better for it. Better being, of course, a very relative term: hazy indifference is surely better than drunken rage. "You want something?" he asks the lingering weyrling, taking visible care to keep his enunciation clear. Perhaps so he won't add slurred speech to the list of similarities between him and the Weyrleader. He shifts from his spot, glancing down at an old nail that pushed out of chair while he was punching. A belated check informs him that the nail did, in fact, graze between two of his knuckles, but the scratch there is shallow and merits no more attention than it takes him to spit on the blood and let it sink in.
The question asked causes a tilt of that weyrling's head. She looks at the holder with a thoughtful expression. "Not from you." Shaking her head Miniyal holds out the remaining bottle. "Want to pass out? I mean, a waste of an excellent vintage, but I'm nothing if not generous. Or whatever. Oh, yea. I just want to see if you puke or pass out in the next hour. I could arrange some people to come check." She holds the bottle out another minute or so to see if it will be taken as one foot taps a few times on the floor.
"Not going to." If she's generous, Reyce is considerate, letting her know in advance he won't puke or pass out. He thinks. The bottle hangs in limbo for a good twenty seconds of that minute before Reyce starts to move, withdrawing that arm beneath his cheek and planting it on the couch again as he pushes himself to an unsteady sitting position. After narrowing his eyes at the wall across from him, probably (given his state) waiting for it to stop swimming, he gives his head a quick shake and a snort to help clear it. Whether that works for him or not, his next step is not to go after the bottle, surprisingly enough, but to push himself the rest of the way to his feet. He manages to be steady on them, staring down at Miniyal from beneath lowered eyelids and giving a sinus-clearing sniff, but he doesn't test that steadiness by moving just yet.
Withdrawing the bottle back to her body she nods. "Need a hand?" Miniyal looks back at him with a little shake of her head. "I can send for someone to carry you home? Or to the infirmary? They're probably used to people stumbling in before throwing up. I imagine most of them hope a person throws up before hand as it makes clean up easier if they don't have to do it. I can completely understand that. Cleaning up after people is never fun." Him being so drunk she can not worry if her tone might imply she refers to something other than just someone being physically ill. It's amusing or interesting or she just has a few more minutes before she really has to go off and do something like open up the really good bottle of wine and consume it. With a glass. Like a civilised person.
As she keeps talking at him, Reyce's gaze begins to wander past her, finding its way to the door where it fixes till she's done. "Can have your room back," he answers, ignoring what she actually said to give that assurance. No sooner is it offered than he sidesteps Miniyal, and now that it's been tested his balance proves steady enough to let him walk, but not at the brisk pace he might like to get away from the weyrling. Instead, he's left shuffling his way to the exit.
She spares him, at least, any last comments. Miniyal stands with her bottle and watches him. Well, to be fair, she /tries/ to spare him any last comment, but it's just not in her to let someone have the last word in any conversation. "You're so kind. Watch your step. Falling and breaking your neck would be horrid. Well, someone would be sad anyway. Somewhere. Have a lovely night." Shuffling away makes it pretty near impossible to not get something tossed at you in the final moments of a conversation.
Reyce lifts a hand over his shoulder to give her last word a dismissive wave, but soon that hand is needed to navigate the door handle and let him back out into the lower caverns, so he can shuffle along to another quiet nook and rest up (perhaps throw up) before dinner time.
Where: The lower caverns
When: Day 26, month 3, turn 4 of the 7th Pass.
What: Reyce is less than pleased about the Instigators being at High Reaches Weyr. So, he goes to console himself with cheap wine. His drinking is interrupted by Miniyal who, as always, says the wrong thing around him. Or at least lots of things. And she's not even drunk! A couple of people are discussed including his baby's mother and her former lover. Also, Roa's name gets taken in vain and there are insults. Oh, and he wastes a perfectly fine bottle of wine. Tsk.
8/14/2007 - 8/15/2007 & 8/20/2007
At High Reaches Weyr, it is day 26, month 3, turn 4 of the 7th Pass.
The lower caverns is riddled with little hidey holes, the kind that every native knows like the back of their hand and every Caucus student gets lost in at least once. Reyce may have been lost here before, but four turns in and armed with a nondescript bottle of wine, it's more likely that he came seeking just such a hidey hole. It's a nondescript place whose furnishings - a trio of sunken old couches - look like they've been here since the Fifth Pass at least. The door is closed, as it always is on these random alcoves scattered through the lower caverns, but when opened it will reveal Reyce slumped against one arm of the least battered couch, drinking straight from his still mostly full wine bottle.
That is yet another problem with the Caucus. It brings in students who learn the hidey holes that the rightful residents of the Weyr should get to use when they want to use them. Miniyal knows every single place like this in her home and has since not long after she could walk. This is not one of her usual haunts, but occasionally she does visit here for assorted reasons. Tonight there's no real reason to be here rather than somewhere else. She just feels like a change. What she doesn't feel like is company which is why when she opens the door she can't suppress a quiet groan when a student, particularly this one is spotted. Ah, well. Steeling herself for ridicule she comes into the room and closes the door, pretending he's not there as she moves towards the back of the room.
As soon as he hears the door open, Reyce whips around, spilling a bit of wine on his fingers as the bottle jerks with his motion. His narrowed gaze fixes on Miniyal, then moves beyond her to see if she's brought any other people with her. Unlikely though that may be. When he sees no one else, Reyce just turns back to his drink with a sinus-clearing sniff, ignoring the groan as he unashamedly starts licking his fingers to get off the dribbled alcohol. Apparently, as aggravating as Miniyal's company may be, it's not aggravating enough to disrupt him from his wine. His eyes follow her quietly to the back, since there's nothing to block his line of sight and nothing else to watch, but the ridicule doesn't come.
"Classy. Must be good stuff." Miniyal comments without looking back at the one she comments to. Instead she starts to shove one of the couches to the left. It sends up some dust from the collection gathered under the couch which makes her sneeze. "Oh, well. So much for this spot. I guess it was time to move anyway." That is just her talking to herself. It doesn't require any response and clearly she hopes for no response. Even if she did talk first. The couch gets another shove to the side and then she grabs the back to shove it forward another inch.
He's been addressed. Reyce blinks at her, then blinks down at his wine bottle. It must be the good stuff she's referring to, but it doesn't look that good to him. He tries it again, a quick swallow that goes down with a quiet hiss of breath - not dissatisfied, but not the genteel appreciation wine should inspire. Opening his mouth at all, even to hiss through his teeth, turns out to be a mistake when some of the dust stirred by Miniyal reaches him, and he abruptly cuts off with a cough. "The hell you're moving it for," he asks, his throat drying out as he speaks and hardly more than a hiss itself by the time he reaches the last word. Another swallow of wine tries to tamp it down.
The couch gets shoved once more and then Miniyal crouches down and begins to sweep away dust on the floor. "People hide things. I always wonder who made these spots to begin with, you know?" Conversational. Maybe she's been drinking already. "But, obviously no one leaves records of that so I just have to wonder." Then she pries up a piece of the floor that looks like someone chipped it out ages ago. From the hole she pulls out a couple of bottles and a few carefully rolled pieces of hide. "So, you're here drinking crap. Why?" A small leather bag is pulled out and tucked away into her boot before she goes about putting the stone back in place.
Reyce's eyes remain thinned, waiting for the dry-out of dust to go away. Then she discovers a cache of bottles under the floor and his interest is piqued, the wine bottle plugged with his thumb while his other arm wraps over the back of the couch. There's an old nail protruding from the back of it, and he jerks back when it scratches his forearm, then simply resettles his arm in a diferent place and takes a look at her find. "Felt like it." He answers quickly, only so he can ask, "You hide that?" with a jerk of his chin towards the cache. His eyes squint down again, more of a considering look this time than a defense against floating dust.
"Yes. I didn't stumble upon it by accident. Well, I stumbled upon the floor. The couch wasn't always here. I had to move it. Luckily people are lazy and never moved it again." Miniyal tips her head to one side. "I'd offer you a drink, but you already have one. And I don't have glasses." And she is not sharing a bottle with him. Nor does she believe he'd want to share one with her. "It's pretty bad to drink without a glass. I mean, even binge drinking our drunkard of a Weyrleader used a glass." With a shake of her head she tucks the small roll of hides into her boot along with the bag of whatevers she retrieved.
A little grunt greets her answer, and Reyce withdraws slightly. "You don't either," he points out, somewhat moody, when she harangues his lack of a glass. The few words are followed up with a rumble as the Bendenite clears his throat, perhaps still bothered by some of that dust. Withdrawing his arm from the couch, he turns his back on her while he goes for another, straight from the bottle drink of wine. "You came here for that or the other stuff?" he wonders. He seemed more interested in the bottles, but apparently he did notice the hides.
Miniyal moves over to the couch near the one Reyce sits on. There she perches on the arm of it and holds the bottles in her lap. "I came for it all. Have to move stuff around or people might find it and then I'm fucked. So, once a turn I go around and switch things up." Shrugging her shoulders she looks at her wine. "I guess when I finally have my own place it won't matter. I'll be able to put everything there and not worry about it." And she certainly doesn't sound like she might not do that. Shifting back an inch she kicks a heel against the side of the couch which brings up a little more dust. The bottles have no markings on them to identify them, but the way she holds them clearly they're worth something. If only to her.
But a honking snort interrupts her while she's resettling herself with those precious bottles. "You're moving things every turn, you think a weyr's good for it?" Reyce wonders. Lifting his shoulder forward, he knocks his nose against it with a squishy, nasally sound that he ignores. "People know where you live, you hide things there, you're not there all the time. No door. And you're gold." He lumps her in with her dragon in one mumbled statement. "Stairs," is the last he bothers to explain, over a huffing sigh, before he goes for another drink.
"Well. . ." Miniyal frowns and shakes her head. "It's different. Besides, I know who lives here. Well, I don't know the recent arrivals. None of them will come digging through my things. And, Peloth will be there when I am not. It's not like I'll have a lot to do, you know." Eyes rolling her brushes a bit of dust off one of the bottles and eyes the cork in it speculatively. "Also, I know how to hide things so people don't even know they are hidden." She stops and then sits up straighter. "I am /very/ good at hiding." she finishes with a hint of pride to her tone. Then she studies the cork again and rubs her thumb over the top of it.
Reyce considers her hint of pride, his cheeks puffed out with a mouthful of wine. His lips pull back again as he sucks the drink down. "Somebody moves a couch," he suggests, turning his gaze briefly towards the one she just retrieved her things from. Speaking of, though, he leans forward and gives his wine a waggle towards the chair that she's sitting on. "Sat there earlier, don't think the arm's on good. Your thing." His safety warning given, the Bendenite falls back against his own, trustily secured couch arm.
Her shoulders shrug as Miniyal holds one of the bottles up. "I would have lost very little. That's why I don't keep everything in one place. It's a risk. But some you have to take. Most of the places I hide things no one but me has been in for turns." The arm is given another kick. "So, what are you hiding from? Issa? Baby? Someone say something mean and you had to go get drunk til you forgot what it was?" Her head tilts from one side to the other as she looks down at the arm she's sitting on. Another risk she seems willing to take. "Anyway! I said. people are lazy. No one moves shit."
When she pushes again for his reason for being here, Reyce lets his eyelids drop low and gives her a lizard's indifference. Stony stare. "You do that," is his return, still not an answer to her question. It takes him a beat to decide that such a question is not fully comprehensible without a little explanation, so he waves a hand and provides some. "Say two things at once. Why am I here, but you're talking about something else already. Can't shut up or you're changing the subject, so I'm not supposed to answer?" The only hint that this is a question is that he remembers to lift his eyebrows at her.
"I'm sorry. Can't you keep up?" Miniyal doesn't smile because she's just not gonna smile around him. It's bad enough to talk. There are lines to draw. "Most conversations are too slow. I get bored. There's just not many people I find interesting. I mean, in a conversational way. They drone on about something stupid or can't keep up." Which would explain the first question. Another kick to the arm and another cloud of dust before she stops and holds the bottles of wine closer. "So. Why? No, I'm truly interested. I won't say a word until I know. Unless you take too long."
Reyce seems a prime candidate for being unable to keep up, but her concern with the subject hasn't instilled in him any particular need to hurry. After asking her to rewind a bit, now he's taking the time to consider his answer. Eventually, he throws off a shrug and decides to share. "Don't like how it's going here, the Instigators," not new people - he doesn't beat around the bush with that, "other things people want to ignore. What's happened. Don't want Asha here and I've got no place to go, I don't like it." He lifts his drink, the level of wine in which has edged a good ways down since she got here, and tilts it. "Don't forget shit when I'm drunk but I'm stupid, it doesn't matter as much. And I don't -" he points the neck of the bottle at her directly, and might have pointed a finger were his not busy holding it in the first place - "like talking to two things at once. Don't say them both," he commands, and releases her from the crushing burden of being singled out by his bottle.
An attentive listener like her has no problem waiting. Miniyal sets one bottle down carefully behind her and begins to open the one still in her lap. It's tough, but she manages it ever so slowly as she waits. The bottle gets pointed and she peers at it, sniffs, and shakes her head. "The only thing worse than a boring drunk is one who doesn't care what he's drinking. Here." Cork partially removed she holds out the bottle. "One of my better ones. Had it for five turns. Was saving it, but not overly concerned right now." And she keeps holding the bottle out to see if he takes it. "Well, all things considered it's hardly surprising they wound up here. I mean, even I saw that as an eventual possibility. Besides, you're letting Issa raise Asha, right? What's the difference?"
Reyce considers the bottle she's holding out to him, snags it, and sets it on the floor in front of him. Gesture received, but not yet moved upon. "Wasting it," he tells her bluntly, but since he hasn't opened it yet, she still has time to retrieve her wasted wine. "And I'm not," he continues, dragging his legs up on the couch. His own wine bottle gets crooked behind an elbow, what remains of its contents dwarfed just by his arm. "Letting Issa-" but his eyes drift off without focus, his forehead faintly creased, and after a beat he returns to her with narrowed eyes and a somewhat hazy attempt at paying close attention. "Difference is Issa wouldn't put her in danger."
Miniyal blinks several times and peers down at her hands thoughtfully. Finally she shakes her head. "No, that's wrong. She wouldn't put her in danger knowingly. Perhaps not willingly. But she would. She's Diya's protege. And Diya would do anything for what she believed in." Looking up at Reyce she almost looks apologetic. "I'm sorry, Reyce, but there's no way I'm going to believe that safe and Issa go together. I respect her in a lot of ways, but I wouldn't trust her ever. Not with anything important." Moving the remaining bottle to the crook of her arm she twists at the ring on her finger, eyes drawn down to the motion and away from him.
When Miniyal shoots him that apologetic look, she meets not anger, but confusion: why are you saying this? Reyce seeks comfort from his bottle, downing what remains of it in one gulp. "Don't like her," he mutters, dropping his eyelids into a low, unfocused glower. "'Nd Issa." His glower trails lower, finding the bottle that Miniyal failed to reclaim and considering it just briefly before he swings it up for himself. A corkscrew appears from nowhere, though it takes him a few tries to get it fixed in the cork adequately. "Issa's what to her, I don't know. Protege?" Apparently under the impression that his ramblings made any sense, he lifts an inquiring look to Miniyal. It's punctuated by the faint pop of the corkscrew as he gets it out.
"Protege. Yes. That's what she was. Diya was her mentor pretty much most of her life." Miniyal looks up from her ring when the cork is popped. One boot stretches down to toe at the floor under where she sits. "I'm not. . .fuck. I don't want to sit here and say bad things about Issa. That's not what I want. I'm just saying that if you are pissed off about the Instigators being here. . .some of them have been here all along. At least people who believe in what they believed in. And, I'm sorry, but she's one of them. She'll raise Asha to be the same way. She's a believer. And you're wrapped up in yourself. Maybe if you took her somewhere else, but she's here. She'll be raised here. You don't think between our new arrivals and Issa and Roa that there's not going to be- Well. I'm afraid you have to get used to it."
The corkscrew's been removed, but Reyce doesn't get to his drink yet. He's too busy concentrating on Miniyal, eyes squinted and brow furrowed, an expression that lasts till she shuts up and he clears with one of his habitual sniffs. "Can't," he breathes out heavily, dropping his eyes so he's staring into the full bottle. "Can't get used to it." His words lapse for a moment, and he draws another of those sniffs. "But I'm supposed to do what, got nowhere to go. And I won't - Issa loves her, can't take her from her mother. /Fuck/ Roa," he bursts out suddenly. Unlike Miniyal, he has no hold-ups about sitting here and saying bad things about someone. But then, he's had more to drink than she has. "Not raising a kid here." His voice drops into a growl for this last, his eyes thinning at Miniyal to direct this new decision.
Around and around her ring goes on her finger. She's been wearing it long enough that it has a nice line to follow and Miniyal does that. Twist, twist, twist. "So, you're not going to raise her here. But, you're not going to take her from Issa. You /really/ think Issa will leave here? You're crazy." Miniyal shakes her head and glances up from her ring for just a second. "Or stupid. Probably both. I mean, I'm sorry, I really am. But there's no way you'll convince her to move. So, you're going to have to take her from her mother. And her mother's going to try to come take her back. And hopefully you sort it out before Asha's old enough to be fucked by it all."
"I'm fucking drunk," Reyce asserts, but after that flash of strength he retreats swiftly, tugging the bottle towards his chest as his eyes fall tp the edge of the couch. "Maybe both," he admits afterwards, finalizing his seizure of the bottle by taking his first drink from it. "She's not what you think. Don't want to say bad about her, but the fuck do you think of her?" His eyes trail their way up the space between them till they find her face, though his own remains downcast, and it's a slanted-up look he gives her. "You're painting this picture of her would sooner risk Asha and piss with me because all she can do's what you expect from her. She's not what you think." He's helpful now, offering this bit of insight with a lift of his bottle before he drinks from it again.
"You better appreciate that bottle. It's rare as shit." Miniyal points this out as if it's more important than anything else being said in the conversation. Well, of course it probably is to her. If it's important enough to hide it's important enough to care about. "I'm not painting a picture. I grew up here. You think I don't hear shit? Think I don't know shit? How many times you think she went to visit them? For Diya, for Roa." Pausing a moment she shrugs. "Fuck, she took me once." The ring stops its circular motion around her finger now and she just stares at it, blinking rapidly. "I don't think she would knowingly risk Asha. I think sometimes she gets caught up in what she believes in and might lose track of all but the goal."
"I don't," Reyce admits about the bottle, holding it out to her again. He's forgotten by now that she abhors his glass-less drinking, but the gesture doesn't seem to be one of rejection: more a confused attempt to be helpful. If he's not going to appreciate that bottle, it should go back to her. It will continue to hang there for a few minutes, until she reacts to it or his arm gets tired of holding it. "You are painting a picture," he points out to her, but this time the phrase sits ill with him and his mouth crumples with dislike over the last few words. He snorts it off heavily. "I know her, you know her, both get different things out of that. 'S waste of time."
The bottle is looked at, but it was given and so she doesn't take it back. Reyce cooties and all going on now. Well, that and Miniyal is not the sort to deny a man who needs his drink. "It's fine. Whatever. I mean, the wine. To dip briefly into being all pitiful and shit, I've no reason to give a fuck about keeping it all anymore. I can drink crap alone." Her head shakes as she rubs the stone on her ring absently. "But, that's beside the point and we're not discussing why I'm pathetic but why you are. Always a nice change. Any conversation between the two of us is a waste of time. Our minds are made up about each other and about what the other thinks. And, neither of us gives a fuck about what the other one thinks. You're a waste of space just like anyone else sent here for Caucus."
All right, back the wine goes. Reyce accepts possession with another drink, not carried off exceptionally well as his lips almost get sucked into the bottle and he has to pull them back with an audible pop. The back of his arm dashes hard at his mouth, trying to rub off the feeling. "Get tired of you," he says, the words muffled as he's still speaking into his arm. "I'm not thinking the same things you are, 'h don't like you but I don't know what you think and don't claim it, so where you're getting that. It's your own thing." He's more successful with the bottle this time, taking a quick swig that doesn't get his mouth stuck.
"I didn't say you were thinking the same things I was. I said we both have our minds made up. And if you say you didn't make your mind up about me a long time ago you're a fucking liar." Miniyal folds her hands together after tucking the unopened bottle tighter against her. "And, of course you get tired of me. Everyone gets tired of me. I get tired of myself sometimes. Not often. I can usually keep myself entertained as long as someone dumb isn't dragging me down. The problem is, and feel free to make of it what you will that I say this, most people I meet are not smart enough to hold my interest. Conversations move too slow. People can't keep up. I mean, even sober you can't keep up with me. It's not your fault. Probably has a lot to do with the way Blooded families tend to breed with each other. I mean, any herder can tell you that's going to lead to, well, what we get. Idiots."
Reyce blinks at her slowly, which is doing a lot to support her point that holders are naturally slow. "You made up your mind," he says softly, some of the drunken slosh leaving his words. Some of his concentration has returned, but it's hard to hold onto it, his eyes squinted down with the effort. "So the fuck are you talking about? I'm Caucus, and Blood, and not smart, you want to prove something to me?" The effort finally fails him, and the squint falls out of his eyes as he releases a settled sigh, tilting the bottleneck in towards himself. "You want to make it a waste of time," is his somber judgment. "I don't. Fuck off."
He's blinking enough for the both of them so Miniyal doesn't do any excessive blinking. She does go back to twisting her ring around because it's just not something she can stop doing sometimes. "Bullshit your mind is not made up. And, mostly I am seeing how drunk you are. Because I'm bored and Peloth won't let me drink any more tonight. So, I figure, watching you try to reason out words to say is better than nothing. Anyway, I don't think you're not smart so much as you choose to only be smart about certain things. Most people do. They find something or other they're good at and ignore the rest. Better an expert at one thing. Me, I want to know everything. I'm getting there. And, fine. Make it not a waste of time." Sitting there on the arm of the couch she twists her ring and kicks one foot back and forth, waiting.
Reyce waits a beat to process her decision not to fuck off as ordered, but ultimately winds up shrugging it off. Ignoring her fidgets, he settles himself back on the couch and lets his head lean over the pillows, keeping it upright enough that he can toss a drink down his gullet like a stuffed goose when he wants to. "You're talking about math. 'S fine," he breathes, deciding to take one of those drinks now. Once it's gone, with a smacking sound while he clears his lips, he continues: "I'm not at the bottom yet, I don't care about knowing everything. What I remember you weren't interested in it, don't know that you do either. And didn't say," he lifts his free hand to wave in her direction, from what he remembers of where she was sitting. "Didn't say hadn't made up my mind about you. Said I have, think, that I get tired of you, what else. Don't think it matters, though - and pick one." He tacks the last injunction on there quickly, and with an emphatic jab from his blindly waving hand, but doesn't explain himself. If she's been paying attention, she may remember the phrase (some version of it) from back when he growled about her changing to a new subject before he could answer the first one.
"It's so hard to keep up with what you want me to do. It's worse than when you're sober. At least then you just growl and act surly. It's a very good act too. I've wondered about it often." Miniyal stops kicking with her foot, but continues twisting her ring. "I mean, is it purely a defensive mechanism? Is there a little crying Reyce inside who was never loved and so acts all mean and bad so he doesn't get hurt? That's usually what it means." Here she stops so she might tilt her head to the side and purse her lips. "I'm guessing that's you. And when you found someone to accept you for being an asshole you figured you were validated and therefore it was wrong all along to have tried to be nice, if you ever were, and being said asshole was the way to go. So, really, Issa would be enabling your inability to get along in society. But, I don't think you care much about society as a whole. At least that was my impression a long time ago. I think I'll stick with it too. You care about yourself and maybe another person or three. Oh, but you wanted a new topic. Well, how about the old one. What are you going to do about being stuck here with all the Very Bad People who tried to change the world?"
"No, we've done that topic." Reyce answers immediately, but his words are drawn out. Disinterested, then, but pretty mild about it. "Would say you're wrong but I don't know about it, all I know's details so I don't go for a broad guess what I am. 'T makes sense." There's a missing 'if' in there, just detectable from his tone. Yet he seems to acknowledge that he's not making sense, his free hand lifting again just to flick the fingers gracelessly. "Issa, though, what I thought, is being with her you want to be like that, the kind of person she can talk to 'cause it's easy. I'm not," he admits, rolling his head to the side where he can just catch a quick glance at Miniyal before his eyes roll into a more comfortable position, absent and looking straight off the wall. "Don't like people and I'm not interested what they have to say, 's false when I try so I don't. How I think of it, that one of it, now."
"Fine. Umm." Miniyal is not good at coming up with topics. She's not a good conversationalist. Never has been, never will be. "So, you don't like Roa?" Well, she came up before, but was not discussed. And since she gets to pick the topic she'll be nosy. "What about R'vain? Sefton? Any of them. Feel free to pick one and tell me what you really think. I mean, sure you don't like people but you have to have an opinion about them. Myself, I like people. Oh, not in general. In general they are asses and I'd hit them if I were the sort inclined to violence which I am not. I find it disgusting and the refuge of the idiotic. And, of course you're not interested. What did I say? So self-centered. Like, a text book example. I've done a lot of reading on that sort of thing. Studied a lot of people. It's easy when no one really notices you. I guess they notice me now. Sucks a lot, but nothing I can do about it now."
While she speaks, Reyce takes a drink, since even he has noticed that when she opens her mouth it tends to be a while before she closes it again. Plenty of time to knock down the wine level in that bottle another few notches; good thing he's a Bendenite and can hold his wine. "Don't care," he exhales on an alcoholic sigh. He stuffs the bottle between his knees, another sign of the reverence in which he holds this gift from the queenrider. "Know what I think of them, don't care about it. You're the one studies people, and that I've made up my mind about you, wonder what you say for yourself, think how I'm this way for whatever reasons."
Miniyal's head tilts over and shortly after that straightens it and tucks a wayward clump of hair behind her ears. Still not long enough to tie back she must continue to chop it off haphazardly on her own. Hardly the sort of look most people in her position would go for. "Here's the thing. I know myself. I'm boring. I know what pisses me off, what makes me cry, what makes me happy, what makes- Well, anything. I don't know what makes other people do things. It's fascinating. If you say something to one person they smile and another person looks upset. If you try to help one person they are grateful. Another person yells at you for daring to think they can't do it on their own. People are so interesting. Not that I get them, because I don't. I mean, I don't connect to people." She pauses after that before shrugging. "Well, Gans. But he did that. I mean, he started it. He made it easy to connect. I think him and Issa have a lot in common that way. Their personalities are pretty similar in a lot of ways."
That lifts Reyce's head off the couch, because no matter how drunk he is, any comparison between Issa and Gans will register. He regards her somewhat blearily, though, so it's not clear how much he's really keeping up with this conversation, the evidence that he's as slow as she claims he is mounting without him seeming to notice (or care.) "You're okay with him," he states, his tone flat throughout but his eyebrows making an effort to lift and create a question after he's finished speaking.
"I love him." It's a silly almost question he asks. Miniyal's tone may be missed in his state, but it's clear she thinks him a fool for assuming she might not be ok with her dead lover. "Do I find what he did to Yevide reprehensible? Yes. I told you. I abhor violence in all its forms. But I do not believe that one action defines a man no matter or terrible, or great, that action was. He made mistakes in life. There were things he did I did not agree with. We. . .discussed some of them quite seriously. But, he didn't agree with- Well, no, actually. He never really spoke with disapproval of my actions. I think because he was afraid I would stop trying to do things. I'm a mess. In a lot of ways he may not have helped, but at the same time I couldn't be the person I am now without him. I'm sure you don't care to listen to me go on about-" Now she blinks and drops her chin down to stare at her lap so she can work on the not crying thing.
Miniyal can go on talking as long as she likes; Reyce checked out after 'I love him.' His head eases its way back to the cushions, soon to be followed by a quiet drink of wine, and his eyes stare straight up at the ceiling while she blathers and he considers her words. Because of it, though, she gets plenty of peace to rein in her tears, since Reyce isn't watching, and though he must be aware of the sudden silence, he doesn't seem motivated to fill (or interrupt) it.
That would be a good thing because it takes her some time and even when she lifts her head again she can't quite conceal the redness to her eyes. Of course, Reyce being drunk it's a pretty good guess that Miniyal will get away with it. "I'm done. Wow. Way done. I don't- Fuck. Anyway. You're seriously dull. Are you even awake? Should I have Peloth bug Oshisyth so Issa can come haul your drunken ass back home? I hope you don't do that a lot when Asha gets older. She'll know. It's rough for a kid to be raised by a drunk. They tend to turn into them themselves. Although not in my case. I did it on my own. My parents can't be blamed for that at least."
"Fuck off," Reyce reminds her simply, but answering quickly enough to prove that he has in fact stayed awake. He takes another drink of that wine she so kindly gave to him.
"Oh. Was that a yes or a no? Well, too late anyway. I already told her." Miniyal grins and may or may not have done it. . .ok, she didn't, but he has no way of knowing and she can't help it. A drunken Reyce is a good target. "Peloth says she didn't seem too upset so maybe Issa isn't going to mind. Do you think she'll bring Asha? How's she going to carry both of you do you think?"
Even drunken Reyce has doubts that she did this thing, though it takes him a few moments to puzzle out why he doubts it. "She would be," he states indistinctly. "'nd Issa's not coming down here, haul my drunken ass back home." He's too far gone to attempt one of his impressions, alas for Miniyal, but it's a feat in itself that he remembered her words well enough to quote them. "Don't make fun," he remembers suddenly, breaking into what seemed like the end of his effort at speaking to add this on, "about Asha. She's a kid. Don't care you mock Issa and me but you don't her."
"Oshisyth would be upset? I don't really know her that well. Anyway, that's beside the point." Miniyal rises to her feet and holds onto her bottle with one hand. "I wasn't mocking her or making fun of her. I was expressing concern about her. I mean, Issa's a wingsecond. If she won't foster her daughter out she has to know she can depend on the man presented as the baby's father to help her out. Otherwise her work is going to suffer for it and I sort of think I'm supposed to care about that shit and all. Well, not /right/ now because I haven't graduated, but I've always been ahead of the curve. It's hard most of the time because I get bored. I wouldn't ever make fun of a kid. Never. And you really have no clue about me, I know, I know, you don't care to, if you even entertain the notion that I would. So, fuck you, Mr. Pity Party."
That gets Reyce's attention again, his focus sharpening rather than just blankly watching the ceiling. "I didn't like the way you talked about her, you were leaving last time. Gave her the gifts." Of course, technically Miniyal was also giving him a gift, but Reyce leaves the black locket out of his reckoning in a moment of drunken indiscretion. "Said something, she should grow up like her parents, and you're not making fun with that. Know you think bad about both of us."
Miniyal's head tilts to one side and she studies first her bottle of wine and then her ring. "I don't think bad about Issa. I don't know why you think I do. She knows damn well what I think of her. I've told her. Fuck, I told you. I respect her. You, you're a complete ass. I have no use for your kind. However, I do think Asha should grow up to be like her parents because as much as I dislike you I do not dismiss the fact that somewhere you have good qualities. And with any luck she'll get those. Don't sit there and try to tell me what I fucking think, you son of a bitch." It's so much fun when a button is pushed. "You have /no/ idea what I think. You try to act like you do. Like you can toss me into some. . .some predetermined space. I hate people who think they have any idea what I do or do not think when they've taken the time to even fucking talk to me unless they were sure they could work a good insult in. Yes, I hope your daughter is just like you both. And, yes, partly so you both see what a complete pain in the ass it is to deal with someone like you. So, just shut the fuck up. Sit there like a whiny drunk because you don't like what's going on around you. Since when /have/ you liked what's going on around you? At least you have-" And she stops again and glares at the Bendenite. "You have so much and you're sitting here bitching about something instead of being thankful for what you have. You could be home right now. You have a home. You have people that give a fuck if you show up drunk or not. Who worry about you. People like you make me sick. You have what some people will never have and it's still not good enough. Just because every little thing is not going your way. You make me sick."
Being yelled at really does not allow Reyce to melt back into his state of drunken indifference, so he has to struggle upright. It takes some effort - he has to grab at the chair arm and use it for leverage - but he gets there, and the more she talks the more he seems to sober up. Seems, however, is probably a key word here: after as much wine as she's seen him drink, it has to be an illusion. "Tell you what you fucking think, the fuck you think you've been telling me this whole time but that, what I think of you, what I think of things, anything you've decided's true so far as you care. That the only reason I talk to you's so I can insult you, that's not you fucking telling me what I fucking think?" The mark of a drunk: excessive use of curse. "Fuck yourself, your 'makes me sick,' your own pity party makes you think you can tell me what I have for my family's not enough for you." Also: incomprehensible threats. Reyce grabs that chair arm tighter and leans forward, even, his narrowed eyes turned up to the weyrling where she stands. "You don't know shit."
"Actually," and by now Miniyal has calmed down. Possibly just because she got him worked up or possibly because she's just going through rapid mood swings. "I told you how you /act/. Our actions are not always a reflection on our thoughts. You may think something entirely different. If you think at all. But, the way you present yourself and the way you act implies just what I have said." She nods her head once and then rolls her eyes. "Don't bother trying to debate me right now. You're too drunk to stand a chance. And, I know plenty. Oh, not as much as you in all sorts of things I imagine, but I know enough to know that I've got you pegged as far as your actions go. Fuck, you're not hard to figure out." There's a full stop so she can really look at him, quite the stare before she snorts. "Big man, Reyce. Go on. Tell me what I say is wrong. But it's true. You have someone you could be talking to about all this. You have people who would just do their best so you didn't have to think about it tonight. Instead you /chose/ to come here and drink alone. You rejected them. And that's disgusting. That's worse behavior than anything I've ever done. I may not try very often, but I don't throw away what I have. I used to think someone else's behavior was the lowest I'd seen around here, but I was wrong. You're the lowest thing I've seen around here. Enjoy your drinking. I'm sure you will since it means more to you tonight than anything else."
The hit comes out of nowhere, wrapping across his body to thud the arm of the couch. Reyce's left hand slides back, finding a grip on the cushions beside him as his right fist aims another blow, then another until there's a surprisingly soft crack and the old wood snaps. Now the furniture matches: the arm of this couch is as loose as the one Reyce advised Miniyal not to sit on, and as soon as that's been accomplished, the Bendenite sinks tamely against the thing so it leans away under his weight. An arm crooks to provide his stubbled cheek somewhere to rest, and he doesn't seem to notice or care what he's done to the couch. His eyes have closed, but his expression remains visible: a little soppy from the drinking, but otherwise a blank. The bottle she gave him fell to the floor when he moved, and now holds only a shallow layer of wine, whatever ran too low to spill out of the open top.
"Violence never solves anything." Pointing this out is probably, well, pointless. However, Miniyal cannot resist and so does, in fact, point it out. "Although it does break furniture. Are you always an angry drunk? Not that you don't seem pretty angry a lot of the time. Well, when I see you. Well, you're not the first person to seem angry around me. Still. . ." The hand that doesn't hold her unopened bottle of wine scratches her head before falling down to find its way into her pocket. "You know, you remind me of someone right now. Oh. Right. Our Weyrleader. He's an angry sloppy drunk too. At least he's entertaining though. Ah, well."
But violence has solved something: it broke the couch, and now Reyce feels better for it. Better being, of course, a very relative term: hazy indifference is surely better than drunken rage. "You want something?" he asks the lingering weyrling, taking visible care to keep his enunciation clear. Perhaps so he won't add slurred speech to the list of similarities between him and the Weyrleader. He shifts from his spot, glancing down at an old nail that pushed out of chair while he was punching. A belated check informs him that the nail did, in fact, graze between two of his knuckles, but the scratch there is shallow and merits no more attention than it takes him to spit on the blood and let it sink in.
The question asked causes a tilt of that weyrling's head. She looks at the holder with a thoughtful expression. "Not from you." Shaking her head Miniyal holds out the remaining bottle. "Want to pass out? I mean, a waste of an excellent vintage, but I'm nothing if not generous. Or whatever. Oh, yea. I just want to see if you puke or pass out in the next hour. I could arrange some people to come check." She holds the bottle out another minute or so to see if it will be taken as one foot taps a few times on the floor.
"Not going to." If she's generous, Reyce is considerate, letting her know in advance he won't puke or pass out. He thinks. The bottle hangs in limbo for a good twenty seconds of that minute before Reyce starts to move, withdrawing that arm beneath his cheek and planting it on the couch again as he pushes himself to an unsteady sitting position. After narrowing his eyes at the wall across from him, probably (given his state) waiting for it to stop swimming, he gives his head a quick shake and a snort to help clear it. Whether that works for him or not, his next step is not to go after the bottle, surprisingly enough, but to push himself the rest of the way to his feet. He manages to be steady on them, staring down at Miniyal from beneath lowered eyelids and giving a sinus-clearing sniff, but he doesn't test that steadiness by moving just yet.
Withdrawing the bottle back to her body she nods. "Need a hand?" Miniyal looks back at him with a little shake of her head. "I can send for someone to carry you home? Or to the infirmary? They're probably used to people stumbling in before throwing up. I imagine most of them hope a person throws up before hand as it makes clean up easier if they don't have to do it. I can completely understand that. Cleaning up after people is never fun." Him being so drunk she can not worry if her tone might imply she refers to something other than just someone being physically ill. It's amusing or interesting or she just has a few more minutes before she really has to go off and do something like open up the really good bottle of wine and consume it. With a glass. Like a civilised person.
As she keeps talking at him, Reyce's gaze begins to wander past her, finding its way to the door where it fixes till she's done. "Can have your room back," he answers, ignoring what she actually said to give that assurance. No sooner is it offered than he sidesteps Miniyal, and now that it's been tested his balance proves steady enough to let him walk, but not at the brisk pace he might like to get away from the weyrling. Instead, he's left shuffling his way to the exit.
She spares him, at least, any last comments. Miniyal stands with her bottle and watches him. Well, to be fair, she /tries/ to spare him any last comment, but it's just not in her to let someone have the last word in any conversation. "You're so kind. Watch your step. Falling and breaking your neck would be horrid. Well, someone would be sad anyway. Somewhere. Have a lovely night." Shuffling away makes it pretty near impossible to not get something tossed at you in the final moments of a conversation.
Reyce lifts a hand over his shoulder to give her last word a dismissive wave, but soon that hand is needed to navigate the door handle and let him back out into the lower caverns, so he can shuffle along to another quiet nook and rest up (perhaps throw up) before dinner time.