Logs:Philosophy of Reality
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| RL Date: 21 April, 2013 |
| Who: D'kan, N'ky |
| Involves: High Reaches Weyr |
| Type: Log |
| What: The two still-learning riders catch up, touch base, clear the air, then muddy the water before their dragons go flying. |
| Where: Snowasis, High Reaches Weyr |
| When: Day 28, Month 7, Turn 31 (Interval 10) |
| Mentions: Meara/Mentions, N'gan/Mentions, Quinlys/Mentions |
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| It's a relatively rare sight, N'ky in the Snowasis - it's an even /rarer/ sight to have him in there with a beer in hand, rather than his more typical mug of klah. The teenager occupies a stool at the far end of the bar, where he's enjoying a degree of peace from the folks trickling in to enjoy a post-dinner drink. He's doodling idly in the notepad that's open in front of him. Unfortunately, he will get no peace from D'kan. From the look of things, as he first enters the Snowasis, the brownrider went specifically in search of the greenrider, because upon spotting N'ky, D'kan heads straight for him and takes the barstool right next to him, sitting with his back against the counter. After motioning to the bartender that he'd also like a beer, he gives N'ky a long look, then glances out over the rest of the bar. For the first several seconds it seems D'kan might just stay quiet, but finally he asks quietly, "Doing okay?" N'ky looks up when he's joined by D'kan, giving the brownrider a smile that, while forced a little to make it bigger than it might otherwise have been, isn't unwelcoming or lacking in warmth. "Yeah," is his reply to the eventual question, spoken with a shrugging roll of one shoulder. His pencil is set down, notepad closed over his sketches, and draws his beer - which seems untouched - towards him. When D'kan's drink arrives, he picks up his own to chink glass to glass, before raising his to sip from it. The return of the question is slow in coming, but his gaze flickers up to the brownrider when it does. "You?" D'kan turns back toward the counter when his drink arrives and gladly clinks his glass with N'ky's before taking a good, long drink. "Shells, I'd missed that," he shares softly before giving the greenrider a grin. He eventually answers's the other's question with an echoed, "Yeah," though it's quiet and low. He takes another drink before regarding N'ky again. "This shit sure hasn't turned out to be like I thought it would, you know?" "I, um, n-never really drank it before to, um, miss it." Which may be why N'ky's taking it so slowly with the drink he has; tiny little sips, and nothing more. He mulls over D'kan's statement for a long while, long enough for it to almost seem as if he might not actually venture an answer. But then he bites down on his lip, brow furrowing in a determined sort of frown. "Yeah. I... I-I didn't think I'd be so b-bad at everything." Leisurely mulling over his beer, D'kan doesn't try to rush any answers out of N'ky, just letting them come in the greenrider's own time. When that last statement arrives, he gives N'ky another long, considering look, though not a surprised one. After a couple seconds, a corner of the brownrider's mouth quirks upward in a smile, and he reaches over to gently grip the other's shoulder for a moment. "Look. You're good at a lot of things. Not your fault some people just can't seem to see it." He turns slightly on the barstool so he can lean sideways against the counter. "For starters, you are amazing with Cailluneth. She picked you because you were the only one who could possibly fit her, and that's important, right? Second, you are so sharding good at caring. So much, I think it scares people sometimes, but I mean that in a good way." N'ky turns sideways on his stool so he's facing D'kan, propped up on the elbow he's got resting on the bar. "I love Cailluneth. Sh-she's the best part of me." He swirls his beer around, pouting thoughtfully down into the whirling dark gold liquid. "D-do you ever think you, um, you m-might not be g-good enough to do what you w-want to?" That quirked smile grows a little wide for a moment before D'kan looks down into his own beer. "All the time," he admits, shrugging one shoulder just a little uncomfortably. "Half the time, though, I don't even know what I want to do." A tiny frown appears for a moment, then he takes another drink of beer before looking up at N'ky again. "You haven't been the same all month. Been worried about you. I was thinking, now the dragons get to fly a bit higher and stuff, Kaz and Cai should really hit the skies more often. They're good together, and it's a nice break for us, too. Get away from stuff." Continuing to swirl his beer around, slowing only when it threatens to spill over the rim of the glass, N'ky shrugs, and doesn't lift his gaze. "I w-wanted to be a f-farrier, and I was g-good at it, th-then I wanted to be a dragonrider and Cailluneth chose me, but I d-don't think I'll be good enough -- I know she doesn't c-care, but... b-but I-- I j-just... I wanted to be good and I tried to be good, and now I just f-feel like I'm not, and why should I bother?" He shrugs again, raising his glass to sip from it. "Cailluneth would like f-flying with Kazavoth. She loves being, um, up there." D'kan waits for N'ky to finish, smiling slightly at his agreement about their dragons flying, but then he remains silent again for quite a few seconds. Then, setting his mug back on the counter, he draws one of his feet up to the barstool's next run, then leans an elbow on the bar while folding his hands over his upraised knee. "Is this about all that silver thread bullshit?" he asks, voice gentle, but eyes intent. "N-no." Despite the emphasis on the word, N'ky is not the most convincing of liars. And he knows it, too, as his frown deepens and his teeth cut down into his bottom lip. "M-maybe." Fingers raise to run through his wild, regrowing curls, and he huffs out a heavy breath. "A b-bit. Yes. B-but I'm doing b-badly in everything." History and maths in particular, despite the tutoring he's had from various other weyrlings. "I thought I'd m-maybe be a good weyrlingmaster, b-but I'm not really, um, p-proving myself capable by f-failing everything." "Look, you can't measure your whole future by just these last couple months," D'kan insists, looking downright worried now as he frowns at N'ky. "I think you'd make an excellent weyrlingmaster someday, for what it's worth. But right now? We're weyrlings. We're supposed to be focused on our lifemates. On making our pairings work so we'll be good riders in the future. All this... other stuff?" he continues, waving a hand slightly before folding it into the other again. "It's nothing but distractions. Shells, we're supposed to be this family, we're supposed to be learning how to be good riders, but you know what I'm learning? How to stress the fuck out over crap that we shouldn't even be worrying about right now." "I--" Whatever N'ky was about to say is bitten back, and he exhales heavily through his nose, nostrils flaring. "Y-yeah. You're right. It's... it's all just stress." He squirms uncomfortably, taking another sip of his beer. The way he drinks it suggests he doesn't necessarily like it; there's no real enjoyment to each sip he takes. "B-but I don't think I'll t-try to be a w-weyrlingmaster." The greenrider shakes his head, which loosens a curl to bounce right down in the centre of his forehead - attempts to tuck it back fail. "You're my f-family, D'kan. You're my brother." A small smile follows N'ky's last statement before D'kan reaches over to grip the greenrider's shoulder again. "And you're mine," he says, meaning it. Fingers squeeze slightly before he lets go, not quite able to shake that worried look. "I... don't really think now's a good time to be making hard plans for the future just yet. There's so much left to learn, still." He looks toward his mug, then, but doesn't pick it up again. "You know... all that extra work they're putting the silver's through? It's not like the knowledge is only there for a limited time. Nothing's stopping us from learning it ourselves. I don't need some jumped up chick a few Turns older than me holding my hand so I can learn stuff. You don't, either. You want to learn it?" he asks, looking intently at N'ky again. N'ky shakes his head emphatically. "N-no. No, I d-don't. N-n-not now. I d-don't want to be w-wingleader or wingsecond wh-when it comes, either, I d-don't want to." Both feet come together to settle on the mid-rung of his barstool, while his beer is nursed in his lap. "I'm n-not going to be a l-leader of anything - I'll just... j-just embarrass myself. No-one w-wants to follow someone who can't even t-talk properly, and i-if I'm in ch-charge it'll only be worse. I d-don't want to learn it." "Don't want to learn it, or don't want the expectations?" D'kan asks in a low voice, fixing N'ky with another scrutinizing look before he shrugs and looks away. "If you change your mind, I'm going to copy stuff down for myself. Managed to test out of that last blasted Harper class, so... had the time, I guess." He finally drinks down the last bit of beer, then leaves the mug on the bar again. N'ky bites down hard on his lip, trying to shift that curl from out of his eye - and failing once more. "N-neither. I..." He sips again from his barely-touched beer, before setting it down on the bar top beside D'kan's empty. "Th-thank you for the offer, but... n-no. I don't th-think I'm g-going to learn that... s-stuff. I'm already f-failing what I h-have to learn and I d-don't even w-want to learn that." His shoulders sink a little as he sighs. "L-leadership's for b-bronze- and brownriders. And weyrwomen. N-not for g-greenriders." "Right. And that's why they gave all those silver threads to blue- and greenriders," D'kan counters in a dry drawl. "Well, and that N'gan kid. But that's probably just a suck-up move to try to salvage whatever clusterfuck they have going on, still." He glances at N'ky's barely touched beer, then shrugs. "Avalanche? Green-riding wingleader. And Snowdrift and Taiga both have blueriders for 'leaders. And our weyrlingmasters? The ones right up there with Weyr leadership? Blue and green. But hey, bro'. You wanna drink that cup of tears, fine." He gets to his feet and turns as if to go, but then he stops to take a breath before his shoulders sink slightly as he turns back to N'ky. "Never mind. Just forget I brought it up, okay? Want to give Cai and Kaz a wing around the Weyr before we have to tuck in for the night?" It's hard to argue with the case put forth by D'kan, and N'ky doesn't bother. The last point made has his shoulders sinking, and he turns to the bar to brood over his beer when the brownrider gets up to leave. When D'kan stops and turns back around, he looks up and over his shoulder, offering a weak smile. Pushing his beer away, he too gets to his feet, nodding. "Y-yeah. T-Timor's nearly full, and Cailluneth likes it best that way... it's a g-good night for her to fly." He falls in beside D'kan, hands in his pockets and shoulders slumped as they head out to the bowl and their dragons. |
Comments
Comments on "Logs:Philosophy of Reality"Azaylia (Dragonshy (talk)) left a comment on Mon, 22 Apr 2013 07:03:25 GMT.
Aw! D'kan's a good brother to have, and in times like these they really do feel like family. I also like the challenge against the Silver Thread program. It's interesting when not everyone lays back and accepts things. Poor N'ky.
D'kan (D'kan (talk)) left a comment on Mon, 22 Apr 2013 09:27:40 GMT.
I like that N'ky challenges D'kan to get out of his little philosophical pique. D'kan thinks so much, N'ky feels so much, but together they kind of pull each other closer to center.
Hana (Hana (talk)) left a comment on Mon, 22 Apr 2013 14:00:29 GMT.
Right. Must hunt down D'kan. N'ky is driving one to it! And W'zin may not have taken the hint..... (Hee! So many people see N'gan as being as sop to the political side of things..... poor fellow).
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