Logs:Never Have I Ever
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| RL Date: 13 December, 2012 |
| Who: Jo, Leova, Madilla |
| Involves: High Reaches Weyr |
| Type: Log |
| What: The quarantined three play a rousing game of 'I never'. Results are varied. |
| Where: Ground Weyr, High Reaches Weyr |
| When: Day 3, Month 7, Turn 30 (Interval 10) |
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| It's evening again: the end of another warm day that's warmer still for some amongst the quarantine three. Madilla's quilting, so much her focus these days and days on end, has been largely abandoned in lieu of reclining upon the old couch, her head tipped back against the cushions to stare aimlessly at the ceiling. She may not be keeping her hands busy - may not be able to, perhaps - but they're moving even so, fingers twisting and twining about themselves in what could almost be a mimicry of her usual, needle-in-hand occupation. With Tacuseth settled, it's another day for Jo to claw at the walls. She's on her cot closest to her dragon, the evening air ruffling through her hair as she busies herself flipping open - and flipping closed - a small retractable knife. It's a mark of her boredom that she's keeping the flips in rhythm, her face etched out in stone as another night crawls by with her stuck indoors. Her quick gaze lands on Madilla from where she was, watching her fingers move rapidly in the light. The flip-catch doesn't falter. She's apparently not afraid that it could slip from her fingers by accident. Leova's been staring half-focusedly at Madilla's hands for the last while, herself, less light-headed than she'd gotten the previous night but still with a feverish glow to her cheeks, her heavy-lidded eyes. But then, it's early in its way, not even midnight. For a while there, she'd been humming hoarsely in time with the flicking but now she says, fretfully, "I want to play. Share, Jo? Didn't bring a knife." She's reclined against Vrianth's tail, a limp weight that the dragon's been peculiarly patient with. So far. Madilla doesn't need to see the knife, or look at either of her companions, to know what is going on. She doesn't move from her position, and nor does she still her hands, but her words are calm and cool in a way that is (alas) not quite physical. "Don't drop it," she warns. "Have you ever? Dropped it. I don't know what I'll do if they come to let us out and you've bled out on the floor." Flip-catch. "Got real good at playing with this, before Tac," Jo says to Madilla, wry. Amused. "S'all I got on me. Y'want me to share -this-?" She pauses the flip, sitting up so that she could see the both of them. "In exchange for--?" Jo doesn't give something for nothing. She does send a jock-like smile over to the healer then as she scoots herself back against the pillow to sit up. "Dropped it once," she relates easily. "Made sure to never drop it again since." Beat. "Gotta have faith in me, Madilla," she notes on the last bit, and she resumes the little game. "Unless ya have something else to keep me entertained." "Well, my belt knife, but it doesn't... go in and out," Leova's still rambling with barely a pause, and then all of a sudden chuckles to herself. It's enough to bring her attention back to Madilla-the-speaker instead of just Madilla-the-hands, though she's still got something of a secretive smile. "Make them clean the floor first. So you don't step in it, that's what. And... Don't know, Jo. Can borrow my knife? We can trade back after," except something else, something else, something else: "I Never. I never play that. That would work. We can Know Jo." It's like they're twelve again, somehow, improbably all at once. A low peal of laughter marks Madilla's response to Leova's suggestion about the floor, but it's to Jo that her words seem directed (for all that she still hasn't glanced up). "Faith. Or should that be trust? I do trust you... but I don't know if I trust your hands. Mine..." But she breaks off, refocusing upon her own hands, still moving so precisely. "I Never? You'll have to tell me how to play." Jo may still have the light sheen of a fever - and the delirium is present, perhaps manifesting itself in the play of a knife being juggled in the air - so the trading of knives gets a wry, "Trickier to toss a belt knife. Ever tried?" Yeah, like she's not the only crazy one there. But then something else is being offered, and that gets her to pause in the flipping. To Madilla, her tone easy, "Got the most sturdy, capable hands in all 'o Pern, baby," she says, far too cocky. "Trust. But perhaps ya shouldn't trust me." Eyes flick towards Leova then, back to that offer of a game that gets the healer's attention as well. She sniffs - or sniffles - "Or, we can know Leova," she counters in the same beat. "And Madilla. I'm in." This might be something she regrets much, much later down the line... "Toss it to someone. In a sheath," Leova says. Primly. "Toss it to stick it in something, yeah, been young and stupid." Or desperate? With a short laugh, "Toss a knife to stick in something. Nothing to know. But who knows?" She sits up enough to go through her gear, the rustling underlying her equally-fumbling attempt at an explanation. "The way we played it... one person says, 'I never... something.' 'I never ate mashed tubers.' Or whatever. And everyone else who did, they have to drink. See? But you got to tell the truth, or it's just wrong," like the world's just going to stop on its axis if someone lies, like Thread's going to fall right down and swallow them up. "What're we gonna drink?" Madilla doesn't even try to follow Leova's rambling remarks about the knife, though she does shift her position just enough that she can chance a glance in the greenrider's direction. It doesn't linger - not when she can shift her gaze all over again, this time to let it bore into Jo thoughtfully. "You're not trustworthy," she says, not actually a question, but not actually a statement either. "Noted. Did you finish the bottle of alcohol?" There have been a few - something to do while stuck here! - but it doesn't seem to surprise Madilla that there might not be any at present. It's a little out of character for her to suggest, "Cough syrup, if not." Jo tries to follow Leova's ramblings from the way she was staring in her wingrider's direction, to no avail. "Ya can stick a knife into something soft," she's offering, being all helpful-like. But then Madilla gets her attention, and her gaze lingers. After a spill, thoughtful it seems, "Shouldn't," she echoes her own word. "Not not. You' could." There could be that slight emphasis heard there - as if the healer herself could trust her, and nobody else. But maybe the same affliction Leova has is rubbing into her, too. The question of alcohol has her straightening up and leaning over her cot to collect up a bottle. She shakes it, indicating that there's not all that much of it left, but, there's some. "So wait," she says when the rules are put out there about the game. "The one sayin' the 'I Never', they have to tell the truth?" Beat. She gets up from her cot and walk the bottle she had over to Leova. Thrusting it forward, "Ya first." There's raspy laughter coming from Leova's direction, and then the promised sheathed knife sliding on the floor in Jo's, and then the greenrider's sitting back on her knees. She eyes the shelf across the way, where they'd stashed food: looks like the glint of glass over there, like there might be more in the way of somethings-to-do. And then she's eyeing Jo, looking right up into the bluerider's eyes with one hand on the floor for balance. "We," she says, "are not playing Spin the Bottle." Then she'll take the bottle. "Yes, tell the truth. Everyone has to tell the truth. Madilla, you first." She shakes the bottle too, just to double-check. It's for Jo's further explanation, and not anything else, that Madilla finally draws herself up into a seated position, her bare feet coming to rest upon the stone floor beneath the flow of her skirt. Her hair's disheveled, unusually, and her hands, finally, drop to rest atop her knees. "I do," she says, so-quiet, and so focused that maybe it takes her a moment or two longer than it needs to before she's properly recognising Leova's instructions. A deep breath follows. Then, with the glint of a smile: "I never went sailing." Jo's gaze lingers on the healer when she answers her, somewhat guarded - and, somewhat not. Perhaps it lingers more than what's appropriate, but then, Jo's known to sometimes make people uncomfortable. Sometimes, on purpose. It's Leova's words about Spin The Bottle that break it, causing her to send her wingrider a flash of a cocky grin and a dry, "Oh, rats. Here I was, hopin'." She's joking, right? One never knows with her. But, telling the truth. That's going to be interesting. Madilla starts and the convict rider frowns a bit at that glint of a smile and eyes Leova. She doesn't touch the bottle, and instead settles down nearby, within bottle range, keeping both in her view. No drink for Jo? Who knew that Leova could look so mournful, that playful baring of teeth at the bluerider's earlier riposte fading into gloom. Or, make that as playfully mournful, because it's nothing at all how she's looked back when there was Fall. "Fine," she says, drawing out the vowel. "Never have I ever... walked the tables for journeyman." And she hands that bottle straight to Madilla. Madilla seems unbothered by Jo's lingering gaze, meeting it with an impassive expression that doesn't shift until their shared glance is broken. Her laughter returns at Leova's commencement of the second round - and she accepts the bottle readily enough, to take a swig, and choke and splutter as is not terribly surprising; Madilla's not really the kind you'd expect to be easy with hard liquor. "Ugh," she says. "Do I have to start again, or does it move on to Jo? I suppose," and her glance slides back to the bluerider, "You still need to confirm that you have never done such a thing." Jo is all cool and collected right now. No drink for her! She meets that mournful look from Leova steadily, and she's leaning back, hands behind her head. When Madilla questions her, her gaze shifts in her direction first. Then, it's to Leova, and back again. "Welllll, I haven't been on no boat, if that's what sailin's about," she notes loftily. "And, the only table-walkin' I've done is when I was tryin' to get across a bunch of men brawlin' over a shoddy card game. Makes me pretty clean over here." As far as -she- knows it. Leaning forward now, "But it's my turn now," she adds, reaching for the bottle. "Never have I...borrowed something that didn' belong to ya. Indefinably." This time, she drinks, knocking it back and relishing the burn. Leova starts to interject, but then when Jo goes for it, she's laughing. "Didn't belong to me? You, me? Specifically? Or you didn't borrow something that didn't belong to you, is what you're saying. Except you did. Don't reckon I never borrowed someone's..." her expression changes all of a sudden and, closemouthed, she reaches for the bottle. Back in the shadows, Vrianth unlids one eye. "I begin to think it's a good thing I have nothing worth stealing with me in here," remarks Madilla, though there's a gleam of amusement in her eye that goes with her tone to indicate that she's not serious. "My goodness me. I suppose it's my turn again. And I never..." She pauses, turning her gaze from one women to the next, even as she's drawing her knees up onto the edge of the couch so that she can wrap both arms around them. It's a long pause; a thoughtful pause. "I'm not very good at this game. I never set foot on the sands in the hatching grounds." Leova's response has Jo laughing outright. It's not often the convict rider laughs - a rough sort of laughter, at that - but when it happens... "Very good, ladies," she notes, especially when Leova drinks on the borrowing bit. "Think now we're getting' somewhere." As for Madilla, "Gonna have to catch ya in something good, soon enough," she adds, watching her. Of course, for Madilla's she has to drink. "That's an easy one," she notes in her amusement as she takes a drink and passes it straight towards Leova. "Seems good at it to me," says Leova, giving Madilla a jaundiced eye. Figuratively jaundiced, for the record! No telling what diseases are going around. "You're telling us you never, ever, ever made off with your sibling's doll? Or skirt? Or treat? Or anything?" She'll tip the bottle in Jo's direction and drink, like it or not... but she's not looking at the bluerider when she says in that voice of hers, all smoky and butter-wouldn't-melt sweet, "Never fucked a greenrider." Not looking directly, anyway. Not if she's going to get a glimpse of the pair of them at once. "Never," swears Madilla, though that, of course, is all about the thieving, and not the follow-up I-never, the one that leaves her face oh-so-expressive. And pink. It probably has something to do with the word employed: fucked, really? But her shoulders straighten, and she reaches quite gamely for the bottle, saying, as she does so, "That isn't news to anyone, surely. Even my daughter knows that." For a... given definition of knowing, presumably. Still, Leova gets a lengthy, meaningful glance. "Aw, come on, Madilla," Jo teases, baring teeth in a smile on stealing. "We've gotta change that! How 'bout, when we're out, we steal something from the kitchen? Gotta start ya off small" and that falters in light of the next one. It's immediate that she drinks, and she does so wordlessly, but she's catching the words and looks between healer and greenrider with noted interest. Then, cutting in, "What, the two of ya?!" She's going to misinterpret those meaningful looks, her lopsided grin more prominent now. "Hey, it's news to me. This." There's a short chuckle and then, it's her turn. "Never...lied to yer weyrmates. Or lovers. A serious lie." She looks at them both with open interest as she takes the bottle. "Specificity is important," Leova claims, prim once more, at least once she's garbled out the word. She even sniffs. "Not as though yours weren't obvious." Only then she's eyeing Madilla right back, Madilla the Never-Stole-Nuttin', what? ... until Jo barges in, and she gives her what's frankly a glower, flipped on a mark just that fast. "Not funny." The rest doesn't help. She slithers forward to take that bottle back from the bluerider, gaze downcast now as she drinks. She keeps the bottle afterward. Rolls it between her palms. Rolls it some more. Madilla blanches at the very idea, and her head shakes several times over-- but it's not so awful that she can't sneak a glance, an apologetic one, maybe, at the greenrider a moment later. It doesn't linger, though: Jo's next sally has her mouth opening just slightly, and a frown setting into her expression. It might be that she's deliberating, but if so, it doesn't last: she reaches to take the bottle from Leova, rather more serious and unhappy than the situation surely warrants. "You'd better pass that to me," she says, in an undertone, though not one that seems intended for the greenrider alone. "I've never probed at someone else's secrets, even when I've wanted to." "Didn' think I was bein' comedic," Jo is blithe, eyeing the greenrider with a raised brow. "I only assumed. There was a whole lotta not-talkin' but talkin' with the eyes between ya." So obviously they had slept together, right? Either way, she doesn't drinks, and when she regards the seriousness - the sadness - in Madilla's eyes on it, there's a flash of concern that get blanketed. Cool and collected. When Madilla gives the next, Jo snorts loudly and drawls over, "Pass me that when ya done, will ya?" Of course, she has. "Though I swear," she adds, feeling the need to explain, "that ya don't really know a person unless ya know their secrets." Pause. "I've heard." Finally Leova glances up, at Madilla, dull flags of color across her brown cheeks. It takes her a moment for the surprise to settle in, and then she swallows once, and hands her friend the bottle. But not without drinking first, herself. Without question. By then, all that's left is to wait, first for the bottle to travel to Jo, then three beats more. "Never have I ever been lifemated to a blue. Dragon. Or otherwise." She keeps waiting, then, as for the inevitable. Madilla accepts the bottle, drinking - with another cough and splutter combination - for her lying-to-a-lover, but not for her own challenge. The bottle gets passed on, and the healer's hands begin to play with the bottom hem of her skirt, twisting the fabric around and around between her fingers. "Secrets are secrets for a reason, in my experience," she says, quietly, not looking at either of the others now. Also? "Drink up, Jo. I'm afraid I have no secret blue to admit to." The drink is dulling her senses. And the fever. And the delirium. Her own questions are likely to go downhill the more she drinks. She's going to slip up. Jo watches Leova look at Madilla, the interplay of interest to her. When the next is given - and so easily - "Tease the only bluerider, why doncha," she drawls, knocking back a swallow, her gaze now falling to the healer. "And as for secrets, that depends. Some learn them for leverage. Others, learn them to know what the person's made of." She studies them both, first the wingrider and then the healer, before moving on. And since the last was an obvious one, she then puts in a rather wry, "I've never kissed another woman." And then immediately takes a drink and looks expectantly at them as she slides the bottle to the middle in between them all. Fine. Leova will drink. But sullenly! No drinks for Madilla, hurray! But she's looking a little less sober, and less and less inclined to actually look at either of the other women. "But sometimes, they're better kept secret. Safer. For everyone. And there's a difference between being... trusted with a secret. And trying to push to get one. Is it my turn? I've never... received a letter from my family." Madilla may not be looking, but Jo is. At them both, considerably, but, the healer more for her words on secrets. "Gotta take risks sometimes, baby," she drawls on secrets being safer - remaining safer. "Even kept secrets can damage as much as a revealed one." Trusted. If the lot of them weren't getting so drunk, she'd question further. Leova's drinking though, and the woman smirks. That was an easy one for dragonriders. It's Madilla's turn and on that, the bottle isn't touched. She watches them both, brow lifted for their reactions to the request. Resting on her arm, Leova's head lolls to the side so one eye can open at Madilla again. "But if you don't ask, then how can..." she swallows thickly. Alcohol, fever, always such a good idea. "Never ever?" Her eyes have gotten all glisteny. "But Lily..." Still staring at Madilla, she reaches out and actually manages to get the bottle in one hand and take a desultorily swig without spilling. I'daur would be proud. Though she does have to glance to replace the thing, which might lose a point or two. And then she can look at Jo, turning that imploring stare on the bluerider as though the other woman can be trusted to confirm, "She wrote her. Showed us the picture. Right? Whyn't you get a picture? You should. They should send you one. Lots of pictures." Alcohol and fever have no claim on the intense glance Madilla pushes on Leova, this time, for that unfinished sentence-- not that it can last, because Leova's mention of her own daughter has her mouth snapping shut: a very silent 'oh'. "I lied," she confirms, very quiet and pink cheeks. "Inadvertently. Do you visit your family, Jo? You should. And that wasn't, for the record, a probing question. It's not probing a secret if you don't know it's a secret, right?" She'll have to reach for the bottle, to toss back another fiery gulp. And splutter for it, too. Jo's trying to understand Leova. She stares her down, frowning a bit when there's subjects being touched upon that she doesn't have a clue about. But, she's listening. One better believe that. Pictures? The bluerider merely shakes her head, this time her silence is a bit of sullen one. She watches their exchange and tries to analyze it, but when Madilla asks about her own family, she's not thinking. She's answered it immediately, and the cool and collected Jo would not have done that. "They think I'm dead, or in the mines, and I was. I suppose, the fact that I'm alive is my secret from them." Pause. She looks at Madilla now. "Ya lied." She echoes that, looking from her to the greenrider. Leova's still staring right back at Jo even when the bluerider goes and shakes her head, making future focus so difficult. She mutters something without much focus either, just a scattering of syllables under her breath, swallows, and then looks that much more sad for her wingmate. "Never wanted my family to know... never not wanted my family... it's too hard. Too hard." More decisively, "Never lied." She stretches out her hand expectantly, and when she gets the bottle, she'll drink twice. Madilla's eyes have gone wide, rather as though she's only recognised the minefield she's walked into now that she's in the midst of it, with nowhere to go. "I think I've lost my taste for this game," she says, abruptly, drawing her knees back down, and planting bare feet back to the floor. Her attempt to stand ends equally abruptly: she's too wobbly for that. Except; "Mine don't want to know, so I suppose we're all on the same page. Sort of. Maybe we should--" Her words are beginning to sound a little fuzzy. "The families we make are better, anyway, right? Better. Safer. Happier. Better." Jo leans her head back. With Leova's words on family, "Hard, yeah," she agrees, her voice low. "It's always hard. And some don' want ya." Never lied? She reaches for that bottle, too, but she pause when Madilla speaks. When she tries to stand, the bluerider's almost to her feet to steady her. All the same she's watching the healer now should she get to her feet again, and when she speaks on family, "Bastards, the lot of them," is her pronouncement. "Ya right. Ones made are always better. Ya better off. Better..." She leans back, a hand going to her forehead as the drink mixed with a fever starts to take its toll. "Don' think...I can play...anymore," is what comes out, her voice going a little faint. "Better," is what Leova agrees, very softly, her hand fallen open there on the stone. She isn't touching the glass any longer, the cool kind glass. Her lids are still open, they fell open too. Her mouth has parted, vulnerable and soft, her lips chapped where she's tried to lick the dryness away. A curl of tail surrounds her ankle. Better. |
Comments
Azaylia (Dragonshy) left a comment on Sun, 16 Dec 2012 01:55:56 GMT.
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Boo! Not enough sexy 'Never Have I's' ;) Though their accidental bonding is still pretty great.
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