Logs:Humble Pie
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| RL Date: 30 December, 2015 |
| Who: Kh'tyr, Olivya |
| Involves: Fort Weyr |
| Type: Log |
| What: After a hung over chat with Quinlys and subsequently learning the dragons were hatching right that moment, Kh'tyr asks Olivya to take him back (professionally). |
| Where: Weyrlingmaster's Office, Fort Weyr |
| When: Day 10, Month 9, Turn 39 (Interval 10) |
| Mentions: Mirinda/Mentions, N'rov/Mentions, Quinlys/Mentions |
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| The last of the baby dragons have curled up for their first naps, stuffed full of meat and happy, and the last of the new weyrlings have either been sent off to the hatching feast or have joined their dragons. Perhaps one or two of them may overhear the command that Olivya offers simply to the brownrider, a thing of only, "Kh'tyr, my office, please." She turns on a booted heel to stride in that direction. And once inside, she waits holding the door, ready to close it (and lock it ominously) behind him. Kh'tyr has no assistant's knot, and yet he showed up in the barracks roughly half way through the hatching to lend his experienced hands to the matter of getting young dragons settled. For once, his hair is combed (or was when he started), for once his clothing is orderly (or was when he started) and for once he was nothing but a consummate professional. "Yes, ma'am," holds no indication of sarcasm, a simple inclination of his head with the words conferring respect to the ranking rider before he follows along in her wake. Through the door he comes and moves to her desk, turning around to face her, leaning against its edge. "Ma'am," he addresses her, expression guarded. Olivya will lean against the closed door, ceding the space of her desk to the man even as her gaze slides over him in a thoughtful moment. She doesn't speak immediately, but when she does, she starts with care to offer, "Not that I do not appreciate your help this morning, Kh'tyr, but the last thing you said was that you didn't want the knot." A pause, as her soft blue gaze allows a hint of regret before she adds, "I can't have you helping with the weyrlings unless you are under my program. Too many cooks in the kitchen, you understand." "Yes," Kh'tyr clears his throat, eyes falling to the floor as if he might have had time to write prompts for a speech there to help him with this (maybe that's why he was late?). "About that." The floor apparently has no advice to make humility easier, so there's a gathered breath and he draws his brow eyes up to look at the greenrider across the way from him. "Weyrlingmaster Olivya," he addresses her formally, straightening, "May I please come work under you?" It's almost obligatory that that sound a little suggestive, but his expression is schooled to something suitably serious for this request. "I've already borrowed an assistant from Ista. It's too late to send her back," is Olivya's first reaction, not an no, markedly. But her gaze lingers on Kh'tyr, and her breath is slowly let out into what may just be a sigh. She adds, after, "I want you to work for me, darling. I want to work as a team. But if you still don't want to work with me--." That she hesitates is something that many don't get to see, nor the way her fingers wring against the doorknob, knuckles turning white. Luckily, it's locked and doesn't open. The brownrider watches her, then clears his throat. Pushing off the desk, he moves toward her. In front of her, Kh'tyr sinks to a knee and reaches for that hand on the doorknob, trying to coax it into his own before saying, "Olivya," regular rhythm this time, not the one he reserves for razzing her, "Will you please be my weyrlingmaster?" He might well be proposing marriage given the way he goes about it. "I promise to be what you need me to be for so long as we both shall serve." For all the dramatics, he's giving her a disturbingly earnest look. Olivya doesn't yank her hand away, but nor does she do anything with it after she allows it to be captured and pulled into his. Instead, she only continues to watch him with that thoughtful look of hers. Finally, she exhales a mysterious, "Three or four turns." She draws closer before she continues in explanation, "Three or four turns, Kh'tyr, and then the knot may very well be up for grabs again. Can you promise to support me in everything, without betraying me to N'rov or Rin or-- Anyone else, for three or four turns? Until you get your chance again?" "Don't be an idiot," is probably not how a man begging for a job is supposed to address the person being begged for the job. He pushes easily back to standing, dropping her hand and giving Olivya a hard look. "This is the chance of a lifetime, Olivya. Do it like it's forever. Give everything and hold nothing back. If you plan like it ends in three or four turns, we're done before we begin." At least he said 'we.' "I've used up all my chances. If I ever get a shot, it'll be somewhere else." He's resigned to that now. "And not High Reaches," though he doesn't explain. "I need this job, Liv. I'm not me with some other knot." That, too, is back to that disturbing candor. "Don't be an idiot," Olivya counters easily, those abandoned fingers lifting to brush lightly over the collar of his riding jacket, as if to straighten it. "You always had the knot, Kh'tyr, as long as you wanted it." She doesn't speak further on any timeline, avoiding it as she studies the brownrider with an appreciative gaze. "You know the plan. And I need you for it." A single brow is permitted to half-arch and Kh'tyr looks up and away from the blonde as he touches his collar before he flicks back. "Control yourself, Weyrlingmaster," as if she'd come onto him, as if he wouldn't have liked it if she had. "We have impressionable minds close at hand." As if that might be the only reason. "And you should save your energy. I'm not an easy man to work with." It seems only fair to remind her. Amusement crinkles up the corner of Olivya's eyes, the fleeting subtlety of a smile crossing her features as she slides her hand down over Kh'tyr's shoulder and then arm before it falls completely away from him. "Yes, but I promise that I am very easy to work with," is purposefully suggestive. "But we should go over the training program that I proposed to the Weyrleaders, while they are still sleeping. I'd like your input." "Easy," Kh'tyr tastes the word as he says it and it has just so many applications given the sardonic look he briefly allows. "I hope you won't keep them up at night," he murmurs, banter but perhaps tokenly so, enough to show he'll live up to his warning, but not infused with enough energy to indicate he's up for a bout of the banter now. He stares at her a moment. "Alright," he acquiesces, "but you should be forewarned that I have a headache the size of an egg heavy queen, might puke on your shoes or plans, and slept in the ground of High Reaches' bowl in the rain last night because I was too drunk to care." He keeps a straight face in relating the facts of the matter. "If I start muttering breakfast combinations, you'll know why." Then, as if it were only an idea he came up with now, "Or you could wait until the next time they sleep and I might not move onto naming colors of alcohol and their ratings on my personal scale when we start talking drinking rules." "It's more likely that they will be keeping me up at night for the next month or two, isn't it?" Olivya answers with easy humor, not finding any offensive in the banter. It's as he continues, though, that she curves an eyebrow upwards and touches him again. She's not a mother, but it's a maternal gesture that finds the back of her hand pressed gently to the brownrider's forehead to feel it. "And you say that I might be a bad influence on the weyrlings. What are you even doing here, hungover and likely sick?" Her hand falls away, but she still frowns, even as she adds dryly, "And should I even ask what you were doing at High Reaches?" "It wasn't that cold," Mom, "I'll be fine." Kh'tyr makes a bid for swatting the hand away. "I was doing what I'm always doing when I'm not on duty." He gives her a look as if she ought to be able to guess, "Making friends by being my usual charming, moronic self, narrowly avoiding a disastrous decision that might've gotten a foot-- mine or someone else-- lodged somewhere uncomfortable." Down his throat, up his-- "I just think it's best to not start off this professional relationship," oh so professional, "with a poor start." Olivya only makes a soft, judgmental noise at Kh'tyr's insistence, but she doesn't linger over fussing at the man who doesn't want to be fussed at. "Fine. Go to bed, get some sleep. Absolutely do not go anywhere near that hatching feast in this shape," orders the greenrider, turning the lock and then the handle of the door behind her. "I will get you up to speed later." "Yes, ma'am," which still sounds a lot like 'yes, Mother', and this time with some hint of disobedience. Chances are that Kh'tyr is, in fact, too tired and sick to actually disobey but what would happen to his reputation if he didn't at least make a token attempt. "And if you do get sick-- Do not show up here until you are better. Have Mograith send word," continues Olivya as if that sass never happened, though there's a hint of a frown as she pulls the door open to the rest of the weyrling complex. "And, Kh'tyr?" A pause, as she studies him. "I'm glad that you changed your mind." There's a heaved sigh that's probably acquiescence to the first, right along the lines of that last sass. "Crow doesn't taste very good," is how Kh'tyr answers her last, grimacing, "but I suspect it'll sit well enough now that I've choked it down." Without explanation, he steps through the door to follow orders. It's only after that Olivya allows herself one small, victorious smile for the exchange, her gaze lingering shamelessly on him as he walks away. (Hate to see them go, love to watch them walk away, amirite?) She retreats back into her office and then further into her weyr to celebrate in her own tiny way rather than join the hatching feast she's already banned Kh'tyr from. |
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