Impossible
Location: D'ven and Teraneth's Weyr
Time: Late evening on Day 2, Month 8, Turn 2
Players: D'ven and Roa
Scene: What is the sound of one brain cracking?
D'ven has just finished pulling up and extra chair, and filling an extra glass. Where he would normally be wearing a riding jacket, instead there is a sleeveless tunic, angry red scoring evident on his upper arm and shoulder, like twisted claw marks. Sinking back into his chair, he glances towards the ledge. Clearly expecting company.
And company comes. Golden Tialith depositing her rider onto the stone before settling down to wait nearby bronze Teraneth. He is offered a rumbling greeting as she makes herself cozy. Roa slips into the main weyr and pauses as she notes D'ven's new look. "Huh," she says simply. And then, "You'll need a new patch, then, won't you."
"Yep." D'ven agrees with a nod. "Have to get it redone." Teraneth returns Tialith's greeting with a brassy rumble. "It's nice to see you weyrwoman. Please, sit." A half-waved hand indicates her glass. "How are you?"
"I'm well enough, thanks." The weyrwoman moves to the offer chair and sinks down in it, hands settling on her lap. "We're trying to see about moving E'sere to another Weyr until the trial concludes."
D'ven smiles, though there's little humor in it. "Sounds like an eminently sensible move." He replies, before his smile turns darker. "Send him to Benden. He and the Weyrleader there deserve each other." He chuckles for a moment. "Anyway, I promised you I'd think on what you said."
"I'm going to speak to S'lien at Telgar first," Roa notes quietly. "They're cousins, you know." She studies the glass set before her on the table, but as usual with her, doesn't touch it yet. "And what have you thought?" she asks.
"Oh? I didn't know that." D'ven replies, before considering his answer. "One of the first things I thought, weyrwoman, was you asked me a lot of questions. And I never really asked you any of them. So supposing Tialith rises first. Congratulations, you're Senior. What then?"
Roa's head cants to the side. "Well, I suppose I'll get untangled from whoever my new Weyrleader is, get up, and put some clothes on," she muses idly. But then, with a bit more sincerity, "Go through records, get them cleaned up. Meet with the Headwoman and the Master Healer of the Infirmary. Speak to the Headmaster and see what can be done to keep Caucus at High Reaches, if that's still in question. Fix this mess with Nabol. Get everything lined up and tidy, to start."
D'ven laughs softly at the comment about getting untangled. Then he listens intently, nodding at the end. "I see. Alright, let me try and put this another way. You know what I'd want to do with the Weyr, if by some unlucky chance it was down to me. What about you? Where would you want to take High Reaches?"
"Ah," Roa says softly. She leans forward so her elbows rest on the table and, fingers clasped, her chin rests on her hands. "The safety of those I care for is important to me, as well. I suppose...unlike you, I don't entirely agree that things were ever so much better before. And I think, occasionally, new ideas are not hurtful."
D'ven nods. "I had gathered that, when you started talking..." He pauses, trying to find a tactful way to say it before giving up and moving on. "...anyway, talking about it maybe being odd that the dragons got to choose. You got any new ideas in particular, weyrwoman? Or were you just planning on seeing what you could find?"
"I think...I plan on seeing what people are ready for," Roa says carefully. "Just because I think something doesn't mean it's smart. Or feasible. I think a lot of things. I think, for example, that just now, I'm freaking you out." This last is said to the wine glass.
"You've been...giving me reason to be thoughtful ever since the last time we spoke, weyrwoman." D'ven replies with a half-smile. "But no, you haven't exactly changed in that regard."
"And where have your thoughts led you, D'ven, if you're willing to share?" While Roa's chin stays resting on her hands, her head turns so she can peer over at the other rider.
D'ven is quiet for a long moment. "I'm thinking it worries me, the idea of you maybe ending up paired with someone who saw things your way. Maybe even saw things a little more extreme than you do. There'd be no break. No counterbalance, no other point of view. I'd say it scares me, but you know me. I don't fear anything." He grins for a moment. "I'm also thinking, maybe there's something you ought to know about me that you don't. And this is probably the only time you'll ever hear me admit this. There never was anything I did, that I didn't do as best I could. Even Caucus, for all that it wasn't my choice to go, though I'll often brag contrary to that. I'm not am ambitious man, weyrwoman. But I believe in living well in more ways than I might lead people to believe."
She listens in silence, and her face remains calm and composed. "I'm not looking for someone who agrees with me," Roa says simply, "I'm looking for someone who's willing to listen and willing to discuss. Who is interested in both convincing and, on occasion, being convinced. And I think your belief is an admirable one to have."
"Never said you were looking for that, weyrwoman." D'ven murmurs. "I said that's what you might end up with and the thought..gave me concern." He picks up at his glass and sips at it thoughtfully. "Well, it's what I believe. Though as you've noticed, it won't stop me complaining and generally being myself about things." The latter is added with a small, secretive, grin.
"I'll try not to let on that I know otherwise, then," Roa offers, meeting his tiny smile with one of her own. And then, subject change. "How was the Fall?"
D'ven shrugs. "We did what we set out to do. It wasn't easy, but...well, there was a surprise showing we weren't expecting." There's a pause, as he tries to keep his tone and face from turning too dark. "A bunch of riders in formations that I've never seen, led by a bluerider."
Roa lifts her head slowly then and it cants to the side, brows drawing down. "A *blue*rider? That's...unusual."
"Isn't it, though?" D'ven grins, though there's little humor it. "But then, not so unusual for a group of dragons that didn't come from a weyr, and seemed rather lacking in cohesion and training. They did very well, though, I'll give them that."
"Didn't...come from a Weyr?" Blue eyes narrow and she sits up a little bit straighter. "You're sure? Because if you're sure that's...huge." She turns now to stare at the glass again. "Why do you think they did it?"
"Believe me, I'd like to tell you otherwise." D'ven replies with a shrug. "But I'm sure as I'm likely to get." At the question, he quirks his lips humorlessly. "Because they want a way back in. They hope to win Nabol's support, and to show us that they're just like us."
The weyrwoman picks up her glass, finally, but only to turn turn turn it slowly in the glowlight. "Certainly took their time about making a move," she notes wryly, "if that's what they're after. What do you think? Are we that gullible?"
D'ven shakes his head. "No, I think we have better memories than that. I think they'll stay where they are. They're criminals, and that's that. Nothing can change that." There's a pause. "Them taking their time makes sense. Hoping we'd forget, forgive, have mellowed. It wouldn't be so fresh in our minds."
"No," she considers with a slow shake of her head. "I don't think that's why they picked now. I think it's something else." Turn turn turn go Roa's fingers on the wineglass.
"Because we look weak, right now?" D'ven muses, before asking "Why do you think they picked now, then, weyrwoman? Or do you not know either."
"No," another headshake and the turning stops. And then Roa gives her answer. "Nenuith."
D'ven frowns at that particular answer. "Oh." He replies, before echoing himself. "Oh." The bronzerider shrugs then. "What do you think will happen, then?"
"I think we are going to be presented with a very serious problem, if you consider their population and the number of turns Nenuith still has in her to rise." Roa sets the glass down, wine still untouched. "I think we cannot, anymore, view them as 'just criminals' who are going to slowly and quietly die off."
"That will be something of a problem." D'ven agrees with a sigh. "So, we have a bunch of criminals who are going to have the means to protect themselves, the means to get wherever they want to go, and if things really go badly another queen besides Nenuith and the possibility of becoming a viable community, in a way."
"No," Roa corrects, "We have a collection of people who number perhaps one hundred and fifty and whose population of impressable-aged members will be almost entirely exhausted with the first clutch. Which is, or will very shortly, be on their sands. What we have is the potential of a series of clutches to die, en masse, upon hatching."
That definitely seems to offend D'ven, and his glass is quickly drained. "Surely Diya wouldn't stay there once that was a possibility?" He murmurs. "Nobody in their right mind would just let dragons die if they could do something to stop it? I mean, it's not as if she was exiled, was she? She went out there, or so I heard. At least that's where people thought she went."
"She went out there, and I have to assume she went out there for a reason. If that reason is to bring them back..." Roa's shoulders lift and fall. "Could she return now, anyhow? She's been living with them for months. I don't think you're permitted back home. Besides which, if there's a gold in her clutch, it won't matter where Diya goes. We have the same disaster."
D'ven considers this. "Considering she committed no crime, and the alternative is so many dragons dying...I think /she/ would be permitted back." There's a definite emphasis that indicates 'and no other'. "But, you're right, we would. And then we'd be faced with trying to persuade people to allow criminals to search their children, or seeing whole clutches of dragonets die."
"Yes," Roa agrees, "Or, we hear them out, make a deal, and consider reintegrating them back into the mainland. That would be fun option number three."
"Impossible." is D'ven's immediate reaction. Then there's a pause. "Except now you're going to ask me what I think of letting the clutches die. And I'll say Impossible. And then you'll ask me of the likelihood of getting people agree to their children being searched by them. And...you get the picture."
Roa lifts her glass, again, into a toast. "Welcome to Weyrleadership, D'ven," she says dryly. "Black and White stopped existing a long time ago." Finally, the weyrwoman takes a sip.
D'ven raises his own glass. "If someday I do wake up next to you, please forgive me if I scream. I assure you, it won't be any reflection on you." There's a wry smile, before he becomes more serious. "Like I said, it's not something I want. This is just one of many reasons why."
"The real question then becomes, who would you rather have doing it? And, think on the bright side. You *could* wake up next to Sinopa." Roa's smirk is utterly wry and bemused. "I do offer this, however. Which you will also not like. There is something you have done in your past of which you are very much ashamed. Are you the same man now, as you were then? Consider that. And consider that in terms of others." The glass is set down once again, and Roa is standing.
"Therein lies the prob..." D'ven begins at the question of who he would rather have doing it, trailing off as Roa's latter words sink in. Lips twist into a silent snarl, as he fights to control his anger. "I'm glad we had this talk. I think it best if you go now, weyrwoman."
Roa dips her head into a small nod. "I am sorry about that," she says quietly. And then she does as he asks. She leaves.
Only when he's sure Roa is gone does D'ven let his anger out, hurling the glass against a wall. It shatters, and thick red wine drips down the wall. The resemblance to blood doesn't seem to please him, the man paling and turning away. "She has no way of knowing. She's just bluffing. She can't know." He mutters to himself, shaking his head as he does so.
Time: Late evening on Day 2, Month 8, Turn 2
Players: D'ven and Roa
Scene: What is the sound of one brain cracking?
D'ven has just finished pulling up and extra chair, and filling an extra glass. Where he would normally be wearing a riding jacket, instead there is a sleeveless tunic, angry red scoring evident on his upper arm and shoulder, like twisted claw marks. Sinking back into his chair, he glances towards the ledge. Clearly expecting company.
And company comes. Golden Tialith depositing her rider onto the stone before settling down to wait nearby bronze Teraneth. He is offered a rumbling greeting as she makes herself cozy. Roa slips into the main weyr and pauses as she notes D'ven's new look. "Huh," she says simply. And then, "You'll need a new patch, then, won't you."
"Yep." D'ven agrees with a nod. "Have to get it redone." Teraneth returns Tialith's greeting with a brassy rumble. "It's nice to see you weyrwoman. Please, sit." A half-waved hand indicates her glass. "How are you?"
"I'm well enough, thanks." The weyrwoman moves to the offer chair and sinks down in it, hands settling on her lap. "We're trying to see about moving E'sere to another Weyr until the trial concludes."
D'ven smiles, though there's little humor in it. "Sounds like an eminently sensible move." He replies, before his smile turns darker. "Send him to Benden. He and the Weyrleader there deserve each other." He chuckles for a moment. "Anyway, I promised you I'd think on what you said."
"I'm going to speak to S'lien at Telgar first," Roa notes quietly. "They're cousins, you know." She studies the glass set before her on the table, but as usual with her, doesn't touch it yet. "And what have you thought?" she asks.
"Oh? I didn't know that." D'ven replies, before considering his answer. "One of the first things I thought, weyrwoman, was you asked me a lot of questions. And I never really asked you any of them. So supposing Tialith rises first. Congratulations, you're Senior. What then?"
Roa's head cants to the side. "Well, I suppose I'll get untangled from whoever my new Weyrleader is, get up, and put some clothes on," she muses idly. But then, with a bit more sincerity, "Go through records, get them cleaned up. Meet with the Headwoman and the Master Healer of the Infirmary. Speak to the Headmaster and see what can be done to keep Caucus at High Reaches, if that's still in question. Fix this mess with Nabol. Get everything lined up and tidy, to start."
D'ven laughs softly at the comment about getting untangled. Then he listens intently, nodding at the end. "I see. Alright, let me try and put this another way. You know what I'd want to do with the Weyr, if by some unlucky chance it was down to me. What about you? Where would you want to take High Reaches?"
"Ah," Roa says softly. She leans forward so her elbows rest on the table and, fingers clasped, her chin rests on her hands. "The safety of those I care for is important to me, as well. I suppose...unlike you, I don't entirely agree that things were ever so much better before. And I think, occasionally, new ideas are not hurtful."
D'ven nods. "I had gathered that, when you started talking..." He pauses, trying to find a tactful way to say it before giving up and moving on. "...anyway, talking about it maybe being odd that the dragons got to choose. You got any new ideas in particular, weyrwoman? Or were you just planning on seeing what you could find?"
"I think...I plan on seeing what people are ready for," Roa says carefully. "Just because I think something doesn't mean it's smart. Or feasible. I think a lot of things. I think, for example, that just now, I'm freaking you out." This last is said to the wine glass.
"You've been...giving me reason to be thoughtful ever since the last time we spoke, weyrwoman." D'ven replies with a half-smile. "But no, you haven't exactly changed in that regard."
"And where have your thoughts led you, D'ven, if you're willing to share?" While Roa's chin stays resting on her hands, her head turns so she can peer over at the other rider.
D'ven is quiet for a long moment. "I'm thinking it worries me, the idea of you maybe ending up paired with someone who saw things your way. Maybe even saw things a little more extreme than you do. There'd be no break. No counterbalance, no other point of view. I'd say it scares me, but you know me. I don't fear anything." He grins for a moment. "I'm also thinking, maybe there's something you ought to know about me that you don't. And this is probably the only time you'll ever hear me admit this. There never was anything I did, that I didn't do as best I could. Even Caucus, for all that it wasn't my choice to go, though I'll often brag contrary to that. I'm not am ambitious man, weyrwoman. But I believe in living well in more ways than I might lead people to believe."
She listens in silence, and her face remains calm and composed. "I'm not looking for someone who agrees with me," Roa says simply, "I'm looking for someone who's willing to listen and willing to discuss. Who is interested in both convincing and, on occasion, being convinced. And I think your belief is an admirable one to have."
"Never said you were looking for that, weyrwoman." D'ven murmurs. "I said that's what you might end up with and the thought..gave me concern." He picks up at his glass and sips at it thoughtfully. "Well, it's what I believe. Though as you've noticed, it won't stop me complaining and generally being myself about things." The latter is added with a small, secretive, grin.
"I'll try not to let on that I know otherwise, then," Roa offers, meeting his tiny smile with one of her own. And then, subject change. "How was the Fall?"
D'ven shrugs. "We did what we set out to do. It wasn't easy, but...well, there was a surprise showing we weren't expecting." There's a pause, as he tries to keep his tone and face from turning too dark. "A bunch of riders in formations that I've never seen, led by a bluerider."
Roa lifts her head slowly then and it cants to the side, brows drawing down. "A *blue*rider? That's...unusual."
"Isn't it, though?" D'ven grins, though there's little humor it. "But then, not so unusual for a group of dragons that didn't come from a weyr, and seemed rather lacking in cohesion and training. They did very well, though, I'll give them that."
"Didn't...come from a Weyr?" Blue eyes narrow and she sits up a little bit straighter. "You're sure? Because if you're sure that's...huge." She turns now to stare at the glass again. "Why do you think they did it?"
"Believe me, I'd like to tell you otherwise." D'ven replies with a shrug. "But I'm sure as I'm likely to get." At the question, he quirks his lips humorlessly. "Because they want a way back in. They hope to win Nabol's support, and to show us that they're just like us."
The weyrwoman picks up her glass, finally, but only to turn turn turn it slowly in the glowlight. "Certainly took their time about making a move," she notes wryly, "if that's what they're after. What do you think? Are we that gullible?"
D'ven shakes his head. "No, I think we have better memories than that. I think they'll stay where they are. They're criminals, and that's that. Nothing can change that." There's a pause. "Them taking their time makes sense. Hoping we'd forget, forgive, have mellowed. It wouldn't be so fresh in our minds."
"No," she considers with a slow shake of her head. "I don't think that's why they picked now. I think it's something else." Turn turn turn go Roa's fingers on the wineglass.
"Because we look weak, right now?" D'ven muses, before asking "Why do you think they picked now, then, weyrwoman? Or do you not know either."
"No," another headshake and the turning stops. And then Roa gives her answer. "Nenuith."
D'ven frowns at that particular answer. "Oh." He replies, before echoing himself. "Oh." The bronzerider shrugs then. "What do you think will happen, then?"
"I think we are going to be presented with a very serious problem, if you consider their population and the number of turns Nenuith still has in her to rise." Roa sets the glass down, wine still untouched. "I think we cannot, anymore, view them as 'just criminals' who are going to slowly and quietly die off."
"That will be something of a problem." D'ven agrees with a sigh. "So, we have a bunch of criminals who are going to have the means to protect themselves, the means to get wherever they want to go, and if things really go badly another queen besides Nenuith and the possibility of becoming a viable community, in a way."
"No," Roa corrects, "We have a collection of people who number perhaps one hundred and fifty and whose population of impressable-aged members will be almost entirely exhausted with the first clutch. Which is, or will very shortly, be on their sands. What we have is the potential of a series of clutches to die, en masse, upon hatching."
That definitely seems to offend D'ven, and his glass is quickly drained. "Surely Diya wouldn't stay there once that was a possibility?" He murmurs. "Nobody in their right mind would just let dragons die if they could do something to stop it? I mean, it's not as if she was exiled, was she? She went out there, or so I heard. At least that's where people thought she went."
"She went out there, and I have to assume she went out there for a reason. If that reason is to bring them back..." Roa's shoulders lift and fall. "Could she return now, anyhow? She's been living with them for months. I don't think you're permitted back home. Besides which, if there's a gold in her clutch, it won't matter where Diya goes. We have the same disaster."
D'ven considers this. "Considering she committed no crime, and the alternative is so many dragons dying...I think /she/ would be permitted back." There's a definite emphasis that indicates 'and no other'. "But, you're right, we would. And then we'd be faced with trying to persuade people to allow criminals to search their children, or seeing whole clutches of dragonets die."
"Yes," Roa agrees, "Or, we hear them out, make a deal, and consider reintegrating them back into the mainland. That would be fun option number three."
"Impossible." is D'ven's immediate reaction. Then there's a pause. "Except now you're going to ask me what I think of letting the clutches die. And I'll say Impossible. And then you'll ask me of the likelihood of getting people agree to their children being searched by them. And...you get the picture."
Roa lifts her glass, again, into a toast. "Welcome to Weyrleadership, D'ven," she says dryly. "Black and White stopped existing a long time ago." Finally, the weyrwoman takes a sip.
D'ven raises his own glass. "If someday I do wake up next to you, please forgive me if I scream. I assure you, it won't be any reflection on you." There's a wry smile, before he becomes more serious. "Like I said, it's not something I want. This is just one of many reasons why."
"The real question then becomes, who would you rather have doing it? And, think on the bright side. You *could* wake up next to Sinopa." Roa's smirk is utterly wry and bemused. "I do offer this, however. Which you will also not like. There is something you have done in your past of which you are very much ashamed. Are you the same man now, as you were then? Consider that. And consider that in terms of others." The glass is set down once again, and Roa is standing.
"Therein lies the prob..." D'ven begins at the question of who he would rather have doing it, trailing off as Roa's latter words sink in. Lips twist into a silent snarl, as he fights to control his anger. "I'm glad we had this talk. I think it best if you go now, weyrwoman."
Roa dips her head into a small nod. "I am sorry about that," she says quietly. And then she does as he asks. She leaves.
Only when he's sure Roa is gone does D'ven let his anger out, hurling the glass against a wall. It shatters, and thick red wine drips down the wall. The resemblance to blood doesn't seem to please him, the man paling and turning away. "She has no way of knowing. She's just bluffing. She can't know." He mutters to himself, shaking his head as he does so.