Logs:Boys Will Be Boys, But a Girl Isn't Always a Lady
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| RL Date: 21 February, 2013 |
| Who: Nicky, Linae, Wakizian |
| Involves: High Reaches Weyr |
| Type: Log |
| What: Nicky declares war. Wakizian engages in snowy battle. Linae is the civilian casualty that brings peace. Mostly. |
| Where: Lake Shore, High Reaches Weyr |
| When: Day 19, Month 1, Turn 31 (Interval 10) |
| Weather: Steady, today's snowfall sticks, creating dunes on the bowl floor. |
| Mentions: Alida/Mentions, Peregrine/Mentions |
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| Lake Shore, High Reaches Weyr The rest of the bowl may be barren, grass barely surviving at best, but here by the lake, it's brilliantly green in the warmer months: thickening and thriving in the silty, boulder-dotted soil just before it transitions to soft sand and thence to the cool, clear water itself. A large freshwater lake fed by a low waterfall, it not only provides warm-weather bathing space for humans and dragons, but has one end fenced off as a watering hole for the livestock in the feeding grounds. The water there is often muddier than the rest of the clear lake, whose shallows drop off abruptly several yards out into deep water, and whose edge undulates against the coarse-hewn bowl wall: here close enough to just be bramble-covered rocks, there far enough away that a narrow land bridge divides the main lake from a smallish pond. Between are several rocky outcroppings that form excellent makeshift diving points, though only one -- across the bridge -- has a set of narrow, slippery, quite possibly tempting stairs. Steady, today's snowfall sticks, creating dunes on the bowl floor. Obvious exits: Diving Cliff Lake Bowl Far End of Lake
Wearing a hat, scarf and gloves combination that are clearly home-knitted (and badly so in both execution and colour choice), Nicky is of the type that can't bear to stay away from the snow. He's got snow on his shoulders and his coat is damp, a sign that he's been out for a while, while the long, pom-pom'd ends of his scarf, which trail down by his knees, also glitter with little ice crystals. His meandering walk along the shore is paused when he spots a familiar figure up ahead, and, while still out of sight behind Wakizian, the lanky youth crouches down to scoop up a handful of snow. Crunching his way towards the Smith as quietly as he can, he waits until he's a couple of metres away before coiling back his arm, taking aim... and letting fly towards that red hat target. It's too bad Pern can't capture memories in slow motion because the snowball impacts the bull's-eye - or where the bull's-eye would be - and explodes powdery flakes outward. This is apparently the perfect snowball snow. Just enough to stick together, but not so much as to be particularly dangerous. The snow splatter evidence quickly melts around the edges. Wakizian doesn't move. What his expression might be or his reaction is anyone's guess. After a few moments, he meanders down towards the lake, weaving his way though some taller drifts, very nonchalant. Wait... what?! Nicky looks utterly surprised that there's no reaction from that /perfect/ hit. He stares after Wakizian with one brow raised questioningly high beneath the curls that just about peep out from beneath his hat, crushed as they are to his forehead. Confused, he bends down, forms another snowball - then another too, just for good measure - and follows his fellow candidate. Two, three, four steps more, and he lets loose with another snowball, aimed for the same spot as before. It's good that Nicky's building up his arsenal. He might just need it. Apparently, Wakizian is not as oblivious to the opening shots of the battle as he pretends. At the last moment he dives behind a dune, ducking the second shot. But now the enemy's position is revealed. The candidate's face pops up from behind the dune and a pair of snowballs volley towards Nicky. "You're going down!" When you're as tall as Nicky, it's no easy feat getting your limbs in gear to try and duck any sort of assault - so when Waki suddenly changes from passive to aggressive, Nick ends up with a facefull of snow. He splutters as he snorts it out of his nose and mouth, flinging his last precious missile towards the Smith before turning to scrabble though the snow and behind a dune of his own. There's no returning battle cry; just a volley of quickly-made snowballs launched in a steady stream towards where his opponent is hiding! Wakizian gets winged by one of the missiles before he ducks back down. The bird's eye view would show more catching his boots. It would also show the pre-staged ammunition. Whether he was waiting for an assault from a surprise enemy or from the littles still giggling and making snow angels a distance away, who knows? But it seems he's well prepared. It doesn't, therefore, take long for more snowy projectiles to be launched across the battle field. "Come out, come out, wherever you are!" Waki calls. And where /is/ Nicky? Because there's no response attack to those last balls fired across the battlefield... because he's crawling his way through the white stuff to get to a different attack point. Harnessing the element of surprise, he pops up by a snowdune closer and to the side of Wakizian, pelts the candidate with all he's managed to make, then ducks and scoots off. His movement might be trackable by his laughing, gleeful call of, "G-give up yet?" Linae has arrived. "AUGH!" As Nicky finds his new position, Wakizian's flank is exposed - and especially vulnerable, as he's looking around the other side of the dune for his opponent. His side is splattered with fluffy snow as Nicky's launches find their mark easily. Waki rolls (compounding the problem) to then crawl quickly around the side of the drift. "Cheap shot!" The Smith-turned candidate complains. Most likely, he's just sore because he's had to abandon his ammo depot with its still sizable pile of prepared snowballs. A pair of littles about six-turns old are amusing themselves a ways off - no longer being watched quite so closely by the older boy. "I'll never surrender!" Wakizian's baritone carries over from behind a different drift - apparently he's on the move! And that makes two boys, shuffling through the snow in the hopes of making their next attack a surprise one! Nicky crawling through the snow dunes towards where he believes Wakizian's voice is coming from, the pom-poms at the end of his long scarf trailing in the snow behind him as he tries to move as fast as his awkward long-limbedness allows. Having found what he believes to be a good spot he stops, makes himself a good number of snowballs then makes like a meerkat and peers up over the top of his snowy barrier, trying to catch a glimpse of the enemy. Movement catches his eye and without stopping to think, he unleashes a massive snowball with a gleefull warcry. Untangling from a clump of girls all about the same age, one or two of them looking familiar as fellow candidates, Linae is bundled against the weather in a mismatched mish-mash of clearly borrowed clothes, scarf and gloves and hat of different colored yarn knitted by different hands. Two of the girls with her pause at the sight of flying snowballs, shriek girlishly (girls shriek girlishly, hum), and scurry off with new agendas on this snowy day. It's for the best they go tearing off, really, since that errant-flying snowball comes squarely for where they stood a moment ago, right to where Linae has walked in their absence, and - while she's still taking the lay of the land - nails her right in the side of the head with a deliciously wet, powdery spray of snow. She reels, unharmed but not unfazed, and turns toward the source of the assault to call, "Where I come from, we usually start with 'nice to meetcha!'" "Welcome to 'Reaches!" Wakizian's baritone is all too cheerful as he pops out from behind a drift and seizes the opportunity to launch a hefty snowball towards the former ferrier-in-training. Grinning triumphantly as it finds its mark - the other boy's face. "I win!" The red-hatted young man declares, and then he's standing and tromping out from the snow - raining flakes as he approaches Linae, mittened hand offered. "Well met, I'm Waki. That's Nicky. Usually he's more polite than I am. So that probably was a snowball intended for me. Which makes you my new hero. The whole reason I won. I owe you a cup of klah." Nicky looks at snow-covered Linae in wide-eyed shock. "S-soo---mmph!" The apology's cut short as he gets his /second/ mouthful of snow, which knocks him back a step out of sheer surprise. While Waki's busy with introductions the lanky lad brushes the snow from his face and rubs at the cold-reddened skin of his cheeks and nose, before meandering over to join the pair. "S-sorry," he says to Linae with a sheepish, crooked grin, while his snow-filled hand comes up behind Wakizian to dump a load of the frozen stuff on the shorter lad's head - just as well he's wearing a hat, right? Nicky giggles impishly, looking very pleased with himself as he offers a rainbow-gloved hand to the Smith. "Truce, s-since there's a /l-lady/ here now?" Linae closes the eye on the beaned side, wiping her hand across the side of her face and answering Wakizian's jubilant greeting with a wry, "Yeah, thanks." She shakes off her glove, sending a plop of wetter snow onto the clumps at her feet, and she chases it to the ground, bending to scoop a good handful of the stuff into her palm. Here comes Waki's hand, and she slaps a nice, cold, soggy mess of unpacked snow into his mitten, returning, "Hi Waki, hi Nicky, I'm Lin. Thanks for the warm welcome." Smiling sunnily, she waits to hear how the truce goes over. The problem with snow from overhead - especially a large and unexpected amount of snow - is that it has an uncanny way of finding its way down the back of the jacket, despite the protection a scarf is supposed to offer. Wet hand and wet head/neck/back is enough to make the brawny man dance away in a most outlandish matter, exclaiming, "Cold! Cold! Cold!" It takes him a moment to regain his composure, and looks down at his wet mitten. His eyes narrow suspiciously as he looks to Lin, then to Nicky. "I'm not sure she counts as a lady, Nicky. I think ladies are supposed to be sweet." Beat. "I wasn't even the one who threw the snowball that hit you." This last has a hint of playful whine to it. "But I suppose I don't want to get any wetter, and if I keep my eyes off the littles for too long, they'll probably drown or something." So cheerful! His eyes do go in their direction to reassure himself that they're not endangering themselves. Evidently both have bent to the task of crafting a snow castle, so nothing to worry about on that front. When Lin gives Wakizian a handful of snow and then the Smith dances off thanks to the cold dribbling down his neck, Nicky snorts in amusement - a laugh gone horribly wrong and exiting through his nose when he tries to bite his tongue against it. "H-hi, Lin." He doesn't offer his snow-dampened hand, but he does wiggle fingers in a greeting wave. "Nice to meet you." His cheeks, already flushed from the cool air and exhilaration of the snowball fight, turn a touch darker when Waki points out that /he/ was the one who threw the snowball, and he looks down to the toe he's scuffing in the snow in embarrassment. And it would seem there's a truce to be had, as he sticks his hands in his pockets and raises his gaze once more. "I'm s-sorry, I-I meant to hit Waki. Did I h-hurt you?" "You have to expect to be measured by the company you keep," Linae counters toward Wakizian's innocence with a shrug, her tone one of recitation, like this is a proverb that everyone should know! Now's the first time she even notices the kids, crossing her arms against the chill and looking not so much over the shoulders of the boys as around them, totally confused by the juxtaposition of two boys and babysitting. "Huh?" She blinks, hurt her? "No, I'm fine, thanks. Hi. Are you two, like, brothers or something?" Waki, Nicky, natural assumption? "The company I keep?" Wakizian's tone is indignant. "Isn't it obvious that I wasn't keeping company with him? That I was fighting the noble fight against a dastardly enemy?" He flicks a playful glance in Nicky's direction before continuing. "In fact, you should be thanking me for getting you payback." Right. Because that's what he was doing. It was about her the whole time. His smile beams impishly at the female candidate. "No. We're not brothers. Brother fighting brother in a snowball battle? That would be tragedy. Although that's kind of a good one," He turns a bit towards Nicky to look him over. "Think we could pass for brothers?" "Oh, good." Nicky grins at Linae when she confirms she wasn't hurt, and her comment about them being brothers makes him frown down at Wakizian contemplatively. "C-could we?" His brown-eyed gaze flickers over the Smith, leading to a conclusion that has Nick shrugging his shoulders. "Maybe. M-maybe if you squint." Which is what he does at his 'brother', then at Linae. "Do we look like brothers?" His stammer is less prominent, just as his body language has become more relaxed. Linae starts like she has a response for Wakizian's opening remarks, but he continues speaking and she directs her attention to stamping her feet a few times instead, keeping them from getting a truly frozen layer of snow-crust on them. This occupies her while the two compare notes, ending when Nicky brings the question back around and leaves her shrugging, uncurling one hand from the tight cross of her arms to wobble it back and forth, kinda-sorta. "You act like brothers," she clarifies, tucking her hand back in and rocking back and forth, back and forth. Cold out here! "One day, when I'm allowed to pick up chicks, we're going to use that while you're being my wingman, Nicky. The brothers line. I'm sure there's lots of ways to make that work. I think having had a drink or two is the same thing as squinting, so it'll work great." Wakizian grins at the other forge-frequenter. Now that that's all settled (as far as he's concerned), his attention shifts back to Linae and a brow raises as he observes her. "New to 'Reaches? Did you come from somewhere warm?" Pause, "You're one of us right? I mean, I saw you in the candidate barracks, didn't I?" "I-I think saw her in the barracks." Nicky responds to Wakizian for Linae, while unwinding his super-long scarf (it's down to his knees when it's wrapped around his neck, and he's tall). The rainbow-coloured, badly-knitted woollen wear is held wordlessly out to the frozen-looking girl for her to take if she wants it, even though it's a little damp from the snowscapades. "But there's another girl that looks a kinda... kinda the same. I think." He bites his lip, thoughtfully. "There's lots of girls in the barracks now." "Puh," is the sound of Linae breathing out, her breath taken and her lips together to start to answer Wakizian only to skip the words, the exhale creating a plume in the cold air in front of her face. "You just asked four questions in a row," she informs him with a glaze sheening her eyes, like she's gotten lost (or tuned out) somewhere along the way. "Thanks," she adds, taking the scarf from Nicky almost absently, pulling it on around her shoulders automatically, only a little of it trailing in the snow while she does so. "And I am, yeah. 'One of us.'" She buries a smirk in the process of winding the scarf around herself. "I do that." Waki admits with an incorrigible grin. "Can't keep up?" The question holds a touch of challenge in his tone. He looks to Nicky and heaves a clearly theatrical sigh. "Do you know that she is the second girl that I've asked those kinds of questions to lately who just doesn't seem to want to give any details? She's in the barracks now too. Have you met Alida yet? The one with the pretty blonde hair and I'm going to knife you in your sleep demeanor?" This question is posed to both candidates, brown eyes bouncing back and forth between the two. There's a whisper of a smile as the scarf is exchanged and the Smith leans just enough to nudge Nicky with his elbow, a subtle brow raise communicating nice move to his comrade. Nicky unfolds the collar of his coat so that it's keeping the snow away from his neck as best as possible, then slips his hands back into his pockets. The nudge from Waki makes him grin shyly. "M-maybe they don't like answering those questions, Waki. But look at her..." Out from the warmth of his pocket comes one hand, with which he indicates Linae. "Sh-she's really cold, which probably means she isn't from around here - b-but she doesn't have to tell us. Not if she doesn't want to." A reassuring smile is sent Lin-wards. "I've not met Ali--nah? -dah? Alidah?" Something about the straight line of his lips suggests he might not want to either, given that description of the girl. A second borrowed scarf is really the piece de resistance for Linae's unconventional attire, the loops around her neck and chin completing a very tasteless ensemble, all to keep the cold out. She just shakes her head at the idea of keeping up with Wakiziain and finishes making herself unpretty, tactfully pretending not to notice the ribbing. "The only girls I met were," she nods to the tracks in the snow where the two ran off at the first sign of snowball-trouble, definitely not the types of girls that smack of stabbings. "And I came from Tillek," she tosses out there to dispel any notions that she's afraid or unwilling to confess her origins. "And I'm really cold," she echoes Nicky's sentiments willingly, looking toward the Weyr. Wakizian looks Linae up and down, "I'd imagine the Headwoman could find you some more stuff. Long underwear is practically a must at this time of year." At least he's making an effort to be helpful. He glances over his shoulder to where the littles are and the cold seems to be starting to affect them, too, finally. "Oh, Tillek! Peregrine and I were born there. See, Lin? Something in common." He offers her a grin and then to Nicky, "Oh, hey, have you met Peregrine? Maybe you know her from SmithCraft? She just got moved out here." A glance from candidate to candidate and then to the littles and he offers, "Shall we move indoors? Maybe to get a nice cup of klah or tea?" "Tillek," Nicky repeats thoughtfully. "I've never been to Tillek. The sea is cold?" Not the best-phrased question - not that Nicky notices. "W-Waki's right, you need the... the long... um... do girls wear the same?" He turns to the Smith candidate for assistance, while miming longjohns along the length of his own body. "P-Peregrine? No. No, I've not met h-her... no. But we could go get miss Lin indoors and warm, if she'd like to go?" Linae has time to nod about the headwoman, no time to assure that she'll keep it in mind before the subject moves on to Tillekian origins, and she clarifies, "I just came from there," as opposed to being from there. Her heel crunches the snow when she pivots to start back through the tracks made by herself and the other girls, retracing the way to the Weyr, then crunches again when she brakes and looks back over her shoulder at Nicky after the words Miss Lin catch up to her. "I'm sure your mom'd be really proud, but let's not go overboard." Wakizian shrugs helplessly in response to Nicky's question about whether the winter dresscode works for women as well as men. "If they don't, that might explain why they're always cold and we're fine. But that could also be all the time in the forge making us hot-blooded or something." As if that's a real thing. He shrugs again and turns to call to the littles who start making their way towards the candidates. "Oh. Just came from there. Well then, let's find something else in common. What were you doing there? Trading for fish?" The Smith queries of Linae. The littles are soon at their heels and Waki and company, at least, is ready to move towards warmer surroundings. Pausing halfway through following Linae to wait for Wakizian and the youngsters, Nicky stretches his arms up over his head and yawns, creating a plume of white breath in the air before him. Once Waki's caught up, he falls in beside the little group, stunting his steps so as not to out-stride them. "H-habit," he replies bashfully to Linae with a shrug of his shoulders and a sheepish, crooked little grin. To Waki, he says; "I-I think she was... a Baker. Who made bread, and sometimes muffins - but not cakes or savoury stuff." "I figured," Linae says to the matter of h-habit, acknowledging the fact without negating the idea that Nicky could leave off the formality. The walk to the caverns from the lake is long enough that she has time to evaluate the kids tagging along (and dispel her earlier assumption that they're Wakizian's kids, not that anyone knew or cared), and to observe of the not-papa, "You ask a lot of questions." Lost to the subject of whoever was a Baker, who made bread and muffins, she lets the two talk about that part while she puffs along, toes getting number and arms getting folded more tightly around her middle as she goes. The words 'snow is stupid' are practically imprinted in the deepening creases in her forehead. Wakizian eyes Linae carefully, then responds to Nicky's suggestion. "Wishful thinking. She's not pleasant enough to be the kind to bake delicious things for people." The littles are both girls. Discernible only now that they're close enough for the little bits of their faces that show through the winterized outfits to be identified. Their whispers were not of any consequence to Waki until one latches onto his and the other snags Nicky's. "We want cookies." They chorus. Apparently all that talk of baking. "Will you take us to the kitchens? My mam works there." One of them adds helpfully while both give the boys big pitiful kid eyes. Wakizian is nothing if not a total sucker for females of any age. He probably does all kinds of favors for the Aunties too. "Only if you promise I can have one." He replies with a laugh. How about it, Nicky? We can bring some to Lin later? You know, a welcoming gift." He grins. There's a shake of his head to turn down Waki's hand, and Nicky grins down at the kid. "S-sure, we can..." Oh but look! There's the suggestion that they go there, appearing out of nowhere. "It was nice meeting you, Lin. S-see you in the b-barracks, perhaps?" The little one tugs on his hand with a surprising amount of force, leaving Nicky with just enough tie to wave apologetically before he's dragged even further. "I'll cope without the cookies, thanks." Linae unfolds her arms enough to pluck at the folds of the scarf, very briefly considering unwinding it and giving it back to Nicky before he's dragged off. Leaving her... all by herself in the snow halfway between the lake and the caverns. High Reaches sure is looking awesome! The little with a grip on Waki is quick to follow suit with her fellow, and Waki is stumbling after the other boy, towed just as easily, and without another word. |
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