Logs:The One Whit Talks About
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| RL Date: 28 May, 2009 |
| Who: Ajatha, Madilla |
| Involves: High Reaches Weyr |
| Type: Log |
| What: Madilla hands out more lavender, and talks about Whitchek and hatchings with Ajatha. |
| Where: Infirmary, High Reaches Weyr |
| When: Day 12, Month 11, Turn 19 (Interval 10) |
| Mentions: W'chek/Mentions |
| Infirmary, High Reaches Weyr Two sets of double doors, one from the the inner caverns and a recently built set from the dragon infirmary, lead into the unnaturally hushed human infirmary. Despite fastidious cleaning, the scent of redwort and numbweed has long since soaked into every smooth-carved surface, along with other, subtler medicinal smells. Pristinely made cots are lined up against the walls; most of them are left open to view, but some in the back are surrounded by curtains for delicate procedures or critical patients. About halfway between the two entrances is the counter for the healers on duty; it guards the entrance to the storage rooms just beyond, their shelves and cabinets lined with meticulously labeled bottles, boxes, jars, and even vats of supplies. The Weyrhealer's office is also here, along with another side room for mixing up medicines and the like. Mid afternoon finds the infirmary buzzing with the usual kinds of business, the waiting area full of patients ranging from mothers and small babies to even one or two older people. Most of the healers are busy with the patients, but for the moment, Madilla is working triage - not that anyone seems to be in particular danger of collapsing on the spot. The young apprentice collects a filled-out chart, promises a middle aged man that he'll be seen to as soon as possible, and begins to wander back towards the counter. And woe of woes, there's another case to add to the workload. No less than three candidates are appearing at the door of the infirmary. Two of them are teenaged and already just around six feet, and one of them bulking at the sight of the place. The other is looking warily at the scene, but the one, shorter than the other two, is pushing the pair in with a well-placed jab in the back. "In. You hurt yourselves, you're going in. Shoo." There's no denying the non-nonsense edge to Ajatha's tone as she guides the pair in and pointedly pushes them to some of the seats. Certainly, Madilla does not look terribly enthralled by the new arrivals when she sees them, having only just gotten back to the desk and resumed what is probably her usual position behind it. Even if she was inclined towards letting her gaze linger in that direction, she doesn't have the time: a mother with a screaming child storms up towards the counter to insist, loudly, "We've been waiting half an hour. My baby is sick, and you can't spare a single moment to look at him." Madilla's voice, in return, is quite a bit calmer: "Davrin is next on the list; I promise it won't be much longer. If you'll just take a seat?" One of the boys visibly winces at the woman filling the room with her demands for her poor child, but that might be the result of a headache. The other seems to be trying to sneak away, but the blonde is snagging him by the back of the tunic and reeling him back in. "Braijon, Bakurn, stop being babies. Sit there like good boys." Ajatha, on the other hand, seems just to be their keeper for the moment, but now she's taking in Madilla leisurely as she deals with the lot of them. "Busy afternoon, huh? How do you keep up with all of this?" Something must have worked, maybe even the scowly glances from the other people waiting, because the woman adjusts her baby on her hip, and does go back to sit down again, even if she's glowering at Madilla. It does, however, leave Madilla free to turn towards the girl addressing her, and offer a rueful grin. "Pretty busy. Something about autumn gets everyone sick, seems like. But we're trained to deal with it, so it's not so bad." Pause, and then: "What did you need? Or - they, looks like?" Ajatha steps away from the pair, but near enough to keep them under her attention. "I'd think so, considering. Them? Oh, you know how boys are. Messing around in the kitchen, when they really shouldn't. Somehow, they knocked over something and got a little busted up. One of them looks like he might need a stitch above his eye. Just real minor things. They'll be good enough to wait, and stay, without complaint. It'll give them time to think about what they've been lectured about." There's a glance back over her shoulder at the pair, who scuff a toe and duck heads pointedly. Tsk. "But, you would be Madilla, right? The one Whit's always talking about?" Madilla's gaze flicks from Ajatha towards the two boys, and her expression shows distinct signs of amusement, though she makes a decent attempt at banishing them; must look professional, after all. "Stitches, minor bumps, bruises, potential contusions," she says, in a lower voice, making a note in front of her. "It shouldn't take /too/ long." The woman with the screaming baby, after all, is now finally being led off by one of the healers. Mention of Whitchek is enough to pinken her cheeks, and the healer nods. "I'm Madilla, yes. I didn't realise he talked so... much." Ajatha manages to remain disapproving as she lets the younger candidates sweat a little under her look, but while they're still thinking she's watching, she turns back with a flash of amusement in her mask. "Well, that's good. But.. make 'em sweat, huh? They need to learn a lesson, and I haven't the heart to send them up to Milani for something minor like that." At the blush, she ducks her head just a bit to half hide ha small smile. "He finds ways of letting us know about you. And glows when he talks about you. M'Ajatha. Jathi. S'good to actually have a face to put with the name." There's a pause and a sheepish smile. "M'sorry to sound so abrupt, but you don't happen to have any lavender handy at the moment, do you?" Madilla can't seem to help herself: she winks at the two boys. To Ajatha, "Boys will be boys, though I take your point. He does?" This news about Whitchek draws a kind of soppy smile that seems quite out of place, given the healer's otherwise quite serious demeanour, though she ameliorates it with a more rueful expression, head ducking slightly. "He's very sweet. It's a pleasure to meet you, Ajatha. And of course I have some lavender; I've been wandering around with it weighing down my pockets, in the hopes of giving it out. Will the boys want some, too?" She digs her hand into her pocket for it, then extends it palm up, a distinctly wilted, slightly worse-for-wear sprig resting in the middle. "Aww, y'no fun," Ajatha mock pouts but gives over to a lazy grin as her fingers reach to pluck the sprig from the Healer's palm. "I'm sure they will." Braijon, who seems to be the leader of the pair, nods his head in agreement with the assessment, brightening a bit. Jathi nods her head to confirm the note about Whitchek. "From what I've seen, he does. Have an affection for lavender? If y'had that as your hunt material, and all." Madilla doesn't seem to mind being thought to be no fun, given she simply smiles at Ajatha and shrugs her shoulders. A second sprig gets drawn out and offered over for the boys, and then she laughs, though a little awkwardly. "Poor Whitchek. Is he really making as few friends as it sounds like? It would be much better, if he could like some people around here. More, I mean." Her bare hand gets lifted towards her nose so that she can sniff, and she nods, happily: "I just like the smell. It's not the most /useful/ of the herbs I work with, but it smells lovely. So very clean, and fresh. Now, all my pockets smell like it, too." Ajatha really was teasing, really! Nonetheless, she shakes her head and takes her sprig to slide into a pocket for safe keeping, as well as taking the boys' and sliding it back to the wayward boys, though there's surprisingly no fighting, though there's some nudging and whisper back and forth over who gets to hold their awkwardly gotten prize. "I'm not sure exactly if he has made very many, but he's not -bad-. Just a little stiff." As if that's all that's up. "Y'know, my grandmother uses lavender for the scent. She puts it in a satchel and puts it in her clothes press, so all her clothes smell like it." Madilla pauses for a moment, handing over a chart as another of the healers returns to take a new appointment. There are a few words exchanged, before Madilla turns back ruefully, to note, "He's not very good at-- accepting things. I suppose. I hope he finds it easier, over time. To be... less stiff. A man needs friends, I should think." Of the lavender, she adds, with a note of self-deprication, "I suppose that means I smell like a grandmother. I don't mind, though; it /is/ pretty. I usually smell of lots of herbs and plants, anyway. I'm a herbalist, after all." "Oh, no, I don't mean that," Ajatha is quick to reassure, even as one of the boys listening winces in shared 'what're you saying?'-ness. "No, I always was surprised when granma does it. It's not a scent one might think for one of her age. From her youth, I suppose. I love the scent myself, and most of the others. I thought you might be one." Answering those things first, she muses. "No, he doesn't seem so, but people are trying to befriend him, or have tried. I hope he.. loosens up just a little, some day." Madilla just smiles for that, her head nodded enthusiastically so that her plait bobs over her shoulder. "Of course," she agrees, resting both arms down upon the flat surface of the counter. "I'd hate to have to give up a scent, just because I got old. I think anyone can like it." The rush seems to have calmed down, at least enough that no one else has come in, though there are plenty of people waiting, still. "I hope so. Perhaps after this whole candidacy thing is done; I think it's stressing him out, a little. Making things worse." Pausing, she then adds, "Are you nervous about it? It must feel very uncertain." Ajatha shakes her head with a tsking on the tip of her tongue. "Don't see why they would have to, if it's theirs, what they've known for most of their lives. It probably is, especially if he doesn't want to be here - here, in the barracks, that is. His plans, whatever they may be, are in peril of being suspended, if he Impresses." There's a meaningful glance her way there, given her attachment with Whitchek. "Nervous? Yes. I think that all of us are a little nervous. It's a deciding factor in every life of us in the barracks." She shrugs her shoulders with a wry twist of her mouth, glancing toward the people gathered. "Either way, it'll all be over soon. Those eggs were hardening, when I touched them, so I wouldn't put it past them to want to break shell within the next week or two." A glance back at Madilla. "But, who knows, huh?" Madilla's firm nod of agreement on the topic of lavender is her only response; she barrels straight into the rest of the conversation, her head tipped thoughtfully as she speaks. "A week or two. Not long at all, then." Pause. "Whitchek knows that... any plans he and I might have must wait until I'm a Journeywoman. And that his Impression would not need to change anything. But the point still remains... no, I don't believe he truly does want to be in those barracks. So." Still, her smile is warm enough, even fond, as she speaks of the other candidate. "I hope, for all of you, that they hatch sooner rather than later. And that it goes the right way for you, whatever way that is." Another pause. "What's it like, touching them?" of their own and wait another month, though I doubt it, granted the degree of hardness. And.. well, I guess that he will get his wish, if it's to be out of those barracks. 'Cause after that, he certainly will be. Though, whether he goes back to the residents' quarters, or to the weyrling barracts, that's the big question. I don't think he would want to go to the barracks either, granted all he says. And rather think that if one might chose him, it would serve him right." There's a little smile that skitters across her mouth as she tries to phrase what she's of a mind to say, but all that comes is a little shake of her head. "It's.. something else. Y'know there's life beneath y'hands, so y'gentle, like y'touch a pregnant woman's stomach. But it's hardening, warm from the sands. It's .. well, something else." Madilla's lips tighten very slightly in response to what Ajatha has to say about Whitchek, though the rest of her expression remains mild. "I don't like to think of it in terms of 'serving someone right'," she says, evenly. "I suppose there's not a lot of point really thinking about it all, except in the abstract. What will happen, will happen. The dragons will Impress who they Impress." Her obvious discomfort softens slightly, eyes sliding half closed, as she considers the whole concept of egg touching. Letting out a low breath, not quite longing, and yet-- somehow, she concludes, "It sounds it. I wish--" But she breaks off, smiles ruefully. "I suppose I should get back to work." And anyway, one of the healers is calling for the other two candidates, now. Ajatha tips her head, the knowledge of what she's said in her eyes. "Bad choice of words. But it might happen, just to spite him in what he wants. Things always happen like that. S'like a rule, or something." Murphy's law and all. "S'all I mean." But. Better not to linger after that, so she bows her head slightly and steps back, touching one of her 'charges' on the shoulder as he rises to come forth at his name. "Like I said. Who knows what will happen. What's meant to be will find a way to happen. I'll leave you to your work. Have a good day, Madilla. Was nice meeting you." "I... suppose." But Madilla doesn't sound convinced; she sounds, in fact, almost outright wary. "It was a pleasure to meet you, too, Ajatha. Good luck, for the hatching. I'll watch for you." And then the apprentice turns away, heading off across the infirmary on some errand or another, invented or not. Ajatha nods her head, and as Madilla turns away, she turns to head back out the way she came. Those poor, poor candidates she brought with her give a collective sigh of relief, too. Phew! |
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