Difference between revisions of "Logs:And I Won't Feel..."

He'd found an empty room. It looked like it was used as a substitute office on occasion: there was a small desk, writing implements, and a comfortable-looking chair. He tried the chair, and found his guess was right: it was comfortable. He sank into it, his fingers brushing over the arms. Leather. He marveled at the sensation. He wondered whether anyone but the exiles ever marveled over such normal things.

He fished the cloth-wrapped bundle of hides out of his belt pouch. It was always with him, these days, no matter what. He laid it on top of the desk. It looked like it fit in with everything else. He still felt out of place.

Viremi had talked to him. Pleaded with him. He'd never heard his grandfather plead with anyone, and it scared him a little. He didn't know why Viremi had wanted him, him and Evali both, to stand. To seek a dragon. He said it would make them feel integrated. Make them a part of the Weyr. But Devaki knew he didn't belong, and that nothing would change that.

He remembered Turnover. His cheeks burned to remember it. If that was what happened when it wasn't even your dragon mating, what must it be like when you were stuck with a dragon? He didn't ever want to lose that sense of control again. It frightened him.

He thought of Kiami, and all the choices she should've had before her. His chin dropped to his chest. He gritted his teeth. He could feel tears welling up, but he didn't want to cry. It wasn't fair. After everything they'd been through, they should've been owed some freedom from grief.

The losses they'd had after they arrived at the Weyr were far worse then when they'd lost their mother, then father, in the erratic threadfalls. Everyone'd lost someone then. It was a shared grief. But even then, at the time, it seemed like a sacrifice, something people did so that the rest of them could survive. It had a purpose.

This was pointless.

Pointless death.

Despite his wishes, the tears still came. He cried for a while, then sat in the comfortable chair, tipping his head back.

"Pointless." The word surprised him, and he realized he'd said it aloud. He tried again, this time adding a thud of his fist against the desk. "Fucking pointless." It wasn't better, but it was -- something. It broke something in him. Anger spilled out, and he let out an inarticulate cry. That helped. Pounding the desk helped. Spreading the contents of the desk around the room helped, too.

He stood, panting in the aftermath of his rage. And then panic gripped him as he realized he couldn't see his bundle, his precious hides. A noise escaped him. He dropped to the floor. There was ink on the desk, and on the floor, and it stained his hands and knees as he crawled around the desk, searching.

Another noise escaped him, this time a chorus of relief, as his fingers latched onto the bundle. More relief, as he found them undamaged, clutching them to him. It was dark, under the desk. It felt -- safer. He lay there, his fingers curling into a tight fist around the bundle.

He swore to himself he wouldn't let Kiami -- and all the other exiles' -- deaths be in vain. He wouldn't let those that remained struggle and be forced to fit in where they didn't belong. He would find someone to pay, or some way to make it all worth something.

No more pointless deaths.