Why
Location: Weyrleaders' Office
Time: Early Morning on Day 2, Month 8, Turn 3
Players: R'en and Roa
Scene: Roa gives R'en the news before he can hear it from anybody else.
Leaving Sehkrath has become a much easier task as of late. So long as he has something to occupy himself with - a chat with his fellows, perhaps, or a poke at some interesting bit of rock - he's fine with R'en being away and often falls asleep on his own anyway. Of course, all the weyrlings were a bit shaken last night, during the keening, but thank goodness for short memories; if the human has the ability to disallow the dragon's tapping into particular things of the past it's even easier to move on. So after the first of the day's feedings, early the next morning, R'en washed up a little and followed Roa out of the cavern to come with her to the office they've just entered. He's saying when they walk in, "--not that it's any o'their business, how I spend my time. Good kids, though."
The weyrwoman is in a strange sort of mood. A bit of anxiety, a lot of quiet internal musing and a dash of head-nodding as R'en talks and they head office-wards. Roa pads over to the table to lean up against it, hip resting on the glass, arms crossed over her chest. She takes turns studying her toes, then R'en's, then back again. "Sehkrath doing okay after last night?" she asks quietly, daring a glance up.
R'en's toes make good on not going anywhere and he watches her watching them and not watching them in turns. He hasn't always been the best at showing anxiety or displeasure on certain levels. Apparently this is one of those occasions when he fails. "Yeah." Which is a lie. But then he picks his own leaning spot, a chair, and knocks against it with a rap of his knuckles. "Little shaken. Doesn't know much. Me neither." Which brings him around to why he might have come to her had she not come to him first. "What happened?"
"Uhm..." Roa clears her throat. What happened. Right. Right. One arm uncrosses so the hand can tuck a wisp of hair back behind her ear. If there was a wisp to tuck. Which there isn't. "Six of Nenuith's weyrlings died." She glances up again and falls quiet, waiting to see how that news is handled before she offers any more.
That unconscious and unnecessary maneuver has R'en watching Roa with an intensity that wasn't there before. If it's one thing he's learned in life it's how to shut up sometimes and watch people. And if he knows anyone's mannerisms he knows hers. Thus, flags have gone up even before she says another word. When she /does/ he's stuck staring. "Six? Six pairs?" Two months is enough of a crash course to give him /some/ knowledge about these things. "What makes that happen all at once?" And. "Why'd ours know?"
"Yes," Roa agrees very softly. "Six. They jumped between. All of them, but they lost six doing it. Too young, I think, to go so far. We know because they're in Nabol. Five Mines." Her lips twist into something that could be a smile, if there was any hint of mirth to it. "I suppose you get to gloat and say 'I told you so', now."
'The cream's gone sour, don't drink it' or 'that water's way too cold, you'll shrink your junk' would be predictions that R'en would only be so happy to gloat about upon their coming true. 'The exiles will take Five Mines' is not among those things lighthearted, maybe because he's had horrible thoughts and dreams about that very thing happening pretty much ever since he was put out of the position of power to /keep/ it from happening. That could be one reason, of many. Suffice to say, when she tells him he no longer has any blood. It's all gone. There is no other explanation for the sudden lack of color in his face or the way he grips the back of that chair until his knuckles go white, just so his legs won't give out and leave him on the floor.
Oh, thank goodness. This is the bit that Roa's good at. This is the bit that gives her a steel spine and easy confident words and something to do. Because when Jen is falling, she knows how to catch him. The weyrwoman pushes away from the table and moves towards the pale bronzerider. "I know," she offers. "Me too. Sit, okay? Sit down, we're going to hash this out."
How many times has she succeeded? It has to be more times than she's actually attempted. But for all of her success, she's also run up against his stubborn hardheadedness. At first there's nothing in his eyes that could allude to him actually seeing her or much of anything. They're out of focus and staring, blankly, at something only he can see. That is the first bad sign, the sign that he's thinking about /everything/, and all at once. When she speaks again he blinks, startled, and has to watch her face, meet her gaze, before he remembers what to do. "Hash-- hash this out?" His grin is unpleasant and cynical and there's cold, hard laughter in his cold, hard voice when he asks, "Is he with 'em?" He. It can only mean one.
"Yes. Stop that. Sit. We're talking about what happens next, what you're going to do, and what you're not going to do, R'en. Okay?" If before, Roa was inclined to revert to his old nickname, perhaps the use of his new one just now is more than accidental. A reminder that who he is and who he was are different. As for 'he', Roa can only shake her head, hands spreading wide. "I don't know. It's possible. I can't imagine they'd take all the dragons and leave all the others behind after protecting them since the pass began. When we find out, I'll tell you or R'vain will. You'll know."
"'M not gonna sit!" Even if he is next to a chair, and even if he is only a matter of feet in distance away from her, R'en is very loud and very adamant about that. He'll be standing. Putting a hand up to pause her or maybe to apologize somehow, then letting it linger between them, he takes a moment. After, he puts his palm to the side of his face, buries shaky fingers in his hair and closes his eyes. "Y'don't need t'tell me. I know." His best efforts at keeping his voice steady are going all to shit. "Oh... fuck."
"I really wish," says Roa softly, "that we were both able to imbibe generous amounts of alcohol just now." She swallows sharply. "You know," she repeats. "Tell me. What you know. I need to hear it."
There's a lot of agreement happening in the fast and jerky nodding R'en is doing. Yes, drinking would be good right now. Of course that thought makes him suddenly all too aware of Sehkrath, in another cavern not far and mentally much, much closer. And he really can't be thinking of Sehkrath right now. Pushing the poor young mind away and blocking him off, if only momentarily, the bronzerider comes to an answer he can give the Weyrwoman. "That he's there." Swallowing too, noticeably, he clenches his jaw and curls his fingers against one eye. "Shoulda done more. Coulda done more."
"R'en. Stop. First off, that's probably not true, and second, even if it is, it doesn't matter now. It's past. Can't be changed. Let it go." Roa lifts one arm, settling her fingers lightly on Jen's shoulder. "You're needed for other things, now. You have other tasks now. I need you you hear that. To understand it. Can you? Do you?"
The touch to his shoulder opens his eyes - well, one - and he finds it in him to look at her, fully. But if she thought any part of him would be comforted she's wrong. Instead of another outburst, though, R'en just looks her over, his expression dead. His hand drops. "You couldn't pay me t'go over there, Roa. Ain't enough riches in the world. Tell me somethin' though." And for this his voice drops considerably, until it's rough and cracking and a rumble inside him. "You think you can keep him from comin' t'me?"
If she was aiming for comfort, Roa seems willing to take what R'en offers up instead. Perhaps because it's tied to some words that she rather desperately wanted to hear. Her chin dips down into a small nod. "Yeah," she says quietly. "I think we can do that. Just don't...you tell me, right? You tell me or R'vain or Ashwin if something feels off. No taking it into your own hands, no heading off on your own. Right?"
Right? It would be such an easy thing to agree to if only R'en wasn't R'en. But because he /is/ R'en and because there are things that happen inside of his head that don't make sense to anyone else but him, instead of answering her a yes or a no he simply lifts his chin to look up at the ceiling or something, makes a decision and turns from her to walk back through the way he came in by.
Her hand falls away from his arm as R'en moves, and the fingers ball into a fist. Roa's own chin ducks down as she walks quickly after him. "Jen! Don't. Stop...please don't." Her fingers reach again, aiming to snag a shirt sleeve or, really, anything that can keep him from moving away. "I need to know you'll talk to me. R'en. Please. I need to know this isn't you walking off to fix the whole world on your own."
At first her plucking fingers find a struggle; R'en jerks his arm out of her reach the instant he feels the brush of someone else but ends up turning on his heel a split second after to face her again. Because of her quick pace and his abrupt stopping there's almost a collision. Acting out of sheer surprise he puts his hands out there, on her shoulders, to halt her, and purses his mouth. Nnh. "This is me walkin' off." Which could be construed as an agreement, really. He's turning again, running his hand through his hair.
The little weyrwoman draws up her chin and pushes back her shoulders beneath R'en's touch. Her eyes are wide and bright, and at his answer, she sucks in a sharp breath. "Why?"
"/Why/?" Stopped /again/, R'en turns once more, only halfway this time so he has to turn his head to give her the look he's giving her, which is incredulous at best. "There's nothin' I can do for you, Roa, /damnit/. I know now'n that's all there is. What more d'you want from me?"
Well. Now he's done it. Roa inhales a sharp breath, eyes flashing, jaw clenching. "Do for me? -Do- for me? What you can -do- for me is not close off. What you can -do- for me is stay here, in head and body both and let us be your damn friends for once. What you can -do- for me is be there when I have a...a kid, fuck it all, and poke at her and make awful jokes and help me figure out how the hell I'm going to manage it. What you can -do- for me is not make this the be all and end all of your life, because there's so much more if you just -see- it. That -that- is what you can fucking do for me."
This wouldn't be the first time R'en's fucked up. Why she's ever still been there for him is surely a mystery. She's getting to him, it shows in the way his eyebrows come together, in the tenseness of his mouth. He's trying very hard not to do something and, being him, he isn't having as hard a time of it as someone else might, someone less jaded. Where once there was warmth in him, now there's only a dimness. Standing there, he's like a separate thing. When she's done he finally opens his mouth, even if nothing comes out of it for a few heartbeats after. Eventually he manages. "I can't take fishin' you out of another pool, darlin'."
"And I can't take dropping you off on another island," she counters with, hands squeezing each other to hide the shaking somewhat. "So why don't we both not do that again."
"Then we agree on somethin'." He should smile or something, but there doesn't seem to be a place for one of those things on his hard and determined face. Suddenly the greying of his hair and the wrinkles all add up to something. He takes those shaking hands of hers in his suddenly, engulfing them, and brings them in for a kiss each, one and two, then lets them go and turns from her again. "Got somethin' I need t'do. I'll be by t'see you tomorrow night."
She stares down at each hand in turn as it's kissed. One, two. And then Roa's gaze again darts up to R'en’s suddenly worn and weary face. "I'll be waiting then," she says softly when he turns his back, one hand lifting to run over the top of her hair. She won't look away from him, though, until he's physically out of sight.
And he can't look back at her at all, can't take being in the same room as her. Someday he'll tell her how much she means to him, really tell her, but for now he can't do anything but run away from her and all the things her being there reminds him of. He's out the door and down the hall in moments.
Time: Early Morning on Day 2, Month 8, Turn 3
Players: R'en and Roa
Scene: Roa gives R'en the news before he can hear it from anybody else.
Leaving Sehkrath has become a much easier task as of late. So long as he has something to occupy himself with - a chat with his fellows, perhaps, or a poke at some interesting bit of rock - he's fine with R'en being away and often falls asleep on his own anyway. Of course, all the weyrlings were a bit shaken last night, during the keening, but thank goodness for short memories; if the human has the ability to disallow the dragon's tapping into particular things of the past it's even easier to move on. So after the first of the day's feedings, early the next morning, R'en washed up a little and followed Roa out of the cavern to come with her to the office they've just entered. He's saying when they walk in, "--not that it's any o'their business, how I spend my time. Good kids, though."
The weyrwoman is in a strange sort of mood. A bit of anxiety, a lot of quiet internal musing and a dash of head-nodding as R'en talks and they head office-wards. Roa pads over to the table to lean up against it, hip resting on the glass, arms crossed over her chest. She takes turns studying her toes, then R'en's, then back again. "Sehkrath doing okay after last night?" she asks quietly, daring a glance up.
R'en's toes make good on not going anywhere and he watches her watching them and not watching them in turns. He hasn't always been the best at showing anxiety or displeasure on certain levels. Apparently this is one of those occasions when he fails. "Yeah." Which is a lie. But then he picks his own leaning spot, a chair, and knocks against it with a rap of his knuckles. "Little shaken. Doesn't know much. Me neither." Which brings him around to why he might have come to her had she not come to him first. "What happened?"
"Uhm..." Roa clears her throat. What happened. Right. Right. One arm uncrosses so the hand can tuck a wisp of hair back behind her ear. If there was a wisp to tuck. Which there isn't. "Six of Nenuith's weyrlings died." She glances up again and falls quiet, waiting to see how that news is handled before she offers any more.
That unconscious and unnecessary maneuver has R'en watching Roa with an intensity that wasn't there before. If it's one thing he's learned in life it's how to shut up sometimes and watch people. And if he knows anyone's mannerisms he knows hers. Thus, flags have gone up even before she says another word. When she /does/ he's stuck staring. "Six? Six pairs?" Two months is enough of a crash course to give him /some/ knowledge about these things. "What makes that happen all at once?" And. "Why'd ours know?"
"Yes," Roa agrees very softly. "Six. They jumped between. All of them, but they lost six doing it. Too young, I think, to go so far. We know because they're in Nabol. Five Mines." Her lips twist into something that could be a smile, if there was any hint of mirth to it. "I suppose you get to gloat and say 'I told you so', now."
'The cream's gone sour, don't drink it' or 'that water's way too cold, you'll shrink your junk' would be predictions that R'en would only be so happy to gloat about upon their coming true. 'The exiles will take Five Mines' is not among those things lighthearted, maybe because he's had horrible thoughts and dreams about that very thing happening pretty much ever since he was put out of the position of power to /keep/ it from happening. That could be one reason, of many. Suffice to say, when she tells him he no longer has any blood. It's all gone. There is no other explanation for the sudden lack of color in his face or the way he grips the back of that chair until his knuckles go white, just so his legs won't give out and leave him on the floor.
Oh, thank goodness. This is the bit that Roa's good at. This is the bit that gives her a steel spine and easy confident words and something to do. Because when Jen is falling, she knows how to catch him. The weyrwoman pushes away from the table and moves towards the pale bronzerider. "I know," she offers. "Me too. Sit, okay? Sit down, we're going to hash this out."
How many times has she succeeded? It has to be more times than she's actually attempted. But for all of her success, she's also run up against his stubborn hardheadedness. At first there's nothing in his eyes that could allude to him actually seeing her or much of anything. They're out of focus and staring, blankly, at something only he can see. That is the first bad sign, the sign that he's thinking about /everything/, and all at once. When she speaks again he blinks, startled, and has to watch her face, meet her gaze, before he remembers what to do. "Hash-- hash this out?" His grin is unpleasant and cynical and there's cold, hard laughter in his cold, hard voice when he asks, "Is he with 'em?" He. It can only mean one.
"Yes. Stop that. Sit. We're talking about what happens next, what you're going to do, and what you're not going to do, R'en. Okay?" If before, Roa was inclined to revert to his old nickname, perhaps the use of his new one just now is more than accidental. A reminder that who he is and who he was are different. As for 'he', Roa can only shake her head, hands spreading wide. "I don't know. It's possible. I can't imagine they'd take all the dragons and leave all the others behind after protecting them since the pass began. When we find out, I'll tell you or R'vain will. You'll know."
"'M not gonna sit!" Even if he is next to a chair, and even if he is only a matter of feet in distance away from her, R'en is very loud and very adamant about that. He'll be standing. Putting a hand up to pause her or maybe to apologize somehow, then letting it linger between them, he takes a moment. After, he puts his palm to the side of his face, buries shaky fingers in his hair and closes his eyes. "Y'don't need t'tell me. I know." His best efforts at keeping his voice steady are going all to shit. "Oh... fuck."
"I really wish," says Roa softly, "that we were both able to imbibe generous amounts of alcohol just now." She swallows sharply. "You know," she repeats. "Tell me. What you know. I need to hear it."
There's a lot of agreement happening in the fast and jerky nodding R'en is doing. Yes, drinking would be good right now. Of course that thought makes him suddenly all too aware of Sehkrath, in another cavern not far and mentally much, much closer. And he really can't be thinking of Sehkrath right now. Pushing the poor young mind away and blocking him off, if only momentarily, the bronzerider comes to an answer he can give the Weyrwoman. "That he's there." Swallowing too, noticeably, he clenches his jaw and curls his fingers against one eye. "Shoulda done more. Coulda done more."
"R'en. Stop. First off, that's probably not true, and second, even if it is, it doesn't matter now. It's past. Can't be changed. Let it go." Roa lifts one arm, settling her fingers lightly on Jen's shoulder. "You're needed for other things, now. You have other tasks now. I need you you hear that. To understand it. Can you? Do you?"
The touch to his shoulder opens his eyes - well, one - and he finds it in him to look at her, fully. But if she thought any part of him would be comforted she's wrong. Instead of another outburst, though, R'en just looks her over, his expression dead. His hand drops. "You couldn't pay me t'go over there, Roa. Ain't enough riches in the world. Tell me somethin' though." And for this his voice drops considerably, until it's rough and cracking and a rumble inside him. "You think you can keep him from comin' t'me?"
If she was aiming for comfort, Roa seems willing to take what R'en offers up instead. Perhaps because it's tied to some words that she rather desperately wanted to hear. Her chin dips down into a small nod. "Yeah," she says quietly. "I think we can do that. Just don't...you tell me, right? You tell me or R'vain or Ashwin if something feels off. No taking it into your own hands, no heading off on your own. Right?"
Right? It would be such an easy thing to agree to if only R'en wasn't R'en. But because he /is/ R'en and because there are things that happen inside of his head that don't make sense to anyone else but him, instead of answering her a yes or a no he simply lifts his chin to look up at the ceiling or something, makes a decision and turns from her to walk back through the way he came in by.
Her hand falls away from his arm as R'en moves, and the fingers ball into a fist. Roa's own chin ducks down as she walks quickly after him. "Jen! Don't. Stop...please don't." Her fingers reach again, aiming to snag a shirt sleeve or, really, anything that can keep him from moving away. "I need to know you'll talk to me. R'en. Please. I need to know this isn't you walking off to fix the whole world on your own."
At first her plucking fingers find a struggle; R'en jerks his arm out of her reach the instant he feels the brush of someone else but ends up turning on his heel a split second after to face her again. Because of her quick pace and his abrupt stopping there's almost a collision. Acting out of sheer surprise he puts his hands out there, on her shoulders, to halt her, and purses his mouth. Nnh. "This is me walkin' off." Which could be construed as an agreement, really. He's turning again, running his hand through his hair.
The little weyrwoman draws up her chin and pushes back her shoulders beneath R'en's touch. Her eyes are wide and bright, and at his answer, she sucks in a sharp breath. "Why?"
"/Why/?" Stopped /again/, R'en turns once more, only halfway this time so he has to turn his head to give her the look he's giving her, which is incredulous at best. "There's nothin' I can do for you, Roa, /damnit/. I know now'n that's all there is. What more d'you want from me?"
Well. Now he's done it. Roa inhales a sharp breath, eyes flashing, jaw clenching. "Do for me? -Do- for me? What you can -do- for me is not close off. What you can -do- for me is stay here, in head and body both and let us be your damn friends for once. What you can -do- for me is be there when I have a...a kid, fuck it all, and poke at her and make awful jokes and help me figure out how the hell I'm going to manage it. What you can -do- for me is not make this the be all and end all of your life, because there's so much more if you just -see- it. That -that- is what you can fucking do for me."
This wouldn't be the first time R'en's fucked up. Why she's ever still been there for him is surely a mystery. She's getting to him, it shows in the way his eyebrows come together, in the tenseness of his mouth. He's trying very hard not to do something and, being him, he isn't having as hard a time of it as someone else might, someone less jaded. Where once there was warmth in him, now there's only a dimness. Standing there, he's like a separate thing. When she's done he finally opens his mouth, even if nothing comes out of it for a few heartbeats after. Eventually he manages. "I can't take fishin' you out of another pool, darlin'."
"And I can't take dropping you off on another island," she counters with, hands squeezing each other to hide the shaking somewhat. "So why don't we both not do that again."
"Then we agree on somethin'." He should smile or something, but there doesn't seem to be a place for one of those things on his hard and determined face. Suddenly the greying of his hair and the wrinkles all add up to something. He takes those shaking hands of hers in his suddenly, engulfing them, and brings them in for a kiss each, one and two, then lets them go and turns from her again. "Got somethin' I need t'do. I'll be by t'see you tomorrow night."
She stares down at each hand in turn as it's kissed. One, two. And then Roa's gaze again darts up to R'en’s suddenly worn and weary face. "I'll be waiting then," she says softly when he turns his back, one hand lifting to run over the top of her hair. She won't look away from him, though, until he's physically out of sight.
And he can't look back at her at all, can't take being in the same room as her. Someday he'll tell her how much she means to him, really tell her, but for now he can't do anything but run away from her and all the things her being there reminds him of. He's out the door and down the hall in moments.