Difference between revisions of "Logs:Male Bonding and the Abstinence Pact"

Nursery, High Reaches Weyr

The double door to the nursery is sturdy skybroom and a good three inches thick, meant to contain the natural noisiness of young children. Beyond the doors, a complex of interconnected, glowlit caverns houses the Weyr's infants and children under seven, opening out from a gaily painted foyer where an auntie usually sits to guide visitors and keep a rheumy eye out for would-be escapees.

Two large play caverns see the most everyday use, their smooth walls decorated with layers of more fanciful paintings left by generations of rider and resident offspring. While one cavern is nearly bare, intended mostly for running and roughhousing during inclement weather, the other is lined with shelves at the right height for short legs, stocked with suitable toys, games and crafting supplies aplenty. Beyond the play caverns are two 'quiet' rooms, one with cribs and cradles, the other with low cots for use during both naptime and nighttime sleeping, each with a small sleeping cubicle for nannies on duty during the night shift.

It's REALLY FREAKING EARLY. What does that mean? Well, if it was a normal day, it would mean that Xhaeon would be just rising, or possibly still asleep. But he has the day off from crafter duties, which means he's obliged to perform his candidate ones instead, and ... that means he's in here, currently, with a wild pack of insane kids around him. He's sitting on the floor, with one girl trying to do his hair, and several kids surrounding him with scraped hides and pieces of charcoal. Charcoal dust is EVERYWHERE: they all look like they've just come directly out of some kind of bizarre miner horror story. But the kids are really excited. And happy. And ... loud.

While his fellow candidate is sitting on the floor, Kaeden is doing anything but. He's here, he's there, he's playing the Corgi to the herd of chattering children. Apparently, the little charges are not allowed to go through the door just yet. "Do that one more time, and I'm tying you to a chair," he threatens one of the blonde boys, who's currently sporting a dark charcoal streak across an entire side of his face. The threat is made in a light manner, but not so light that Kaed couldn't possibly mean it. He's a dockhand, after all. They know their knots.

Nicky also has nursery duty. Weird, huh? Maybe someone didn't pay too much attention to the roster when laying it out. Or maybe - maybe! - this was intentional... training for baby dragons, perhaps? Whatever the case, the lanky teenaged boy doesn't look entirely awake when he pokes his head around the entrance to the nursery. A few seconds after stepping inside though, and the noisy hustle-bustle of busy children soon has him looking more alive, and probably wishing he were still asleep. "Hey," he murmurs to Xhaeon when he's woven his way through the little(r) ones to get to his fellow candidate. A skirted little girl attempts to cling to his leg and he scoops her up, resting her mummy-like on his hip, waving over to Kaeden before asking the girl, "D-don't you want to go p-play with the others?"

Tiziano is not supposed to be here right now. However, he was placed on an errand and so here in the depths of the nursery he is. With him? A little boy, a little over three turns old, yammering on and on with the slightest of lisp due to gaps in his teeth that are still growing. "An' then, an' then, an' then... um um um, my dwaddy's dwagon took the herdbeast an' was all RAAAAAAAAAAAWWWRRRRG," The child is quite animated in his speech, where Tiziano looks quite annoyed. "An' there was blood everywhere an' it was so neat!" "Really? Wow. Fascinating." The older teenager scans the room looking for any such nanny to relinquish this strange child he somehow got saddled with. Xhaeon is spied and Tiziano is not even remotely sympathetic. Laughing outright at the older, stronger, burlier candidate. "Looking pretty, dude." A thumbs up goes to him. If only Pern had cellphone's with cameras. Alas. "Here." The little boy is (gently) pushed at Kaeden. "Some rider told me to bring him here. He used my tunic as a tissue. I have someone else's snot on me." Cue a shudder. "Take it, please." The kid, not the snot. That was a gift.

Xhaeon isn't awake enough to do more than snicker lightly at Kaeden's threat, and wince a moment later when the child messing with his hair (truthfully longer than he normally allows it to get) manages to pull a snag she's created. He doesn't comment, though. "Sup," is his tired comment to Nicky, before giving in to the choral request of him to sketch something for the kids around. He glances up, picks a half-decent drawing of a woolie-beast on the wall to replicate, and starts putting it down on the nearest worn-out hide with bold, clean lines. A hush falls, then a chorus of 'oooooohs' and 'aaaaahs' from the four to five kids he has watching. "At least it isn't fingerpaint," he comments sideways to Tiziano, his mouth a wry line. "And at least you-- /ow/," his sharp exclamation and a half-yank of his head out of the girl's hands, injured expression clear (and hilarious) tossed over a shoulder.

"Just remember, it's mostly water," Kaeden quips to Tiziano. While the thought is lacking in sympathy, he does usher the kid over so he can yammer at his tiny compatriots instead, then has just enough time and space to once again catch the earlier blonde kid by the shoulder. "Nope. You were warned. Let's go." And up the kid goes, tossed fireman-style over Kaeden's shoulder. But he's in no hurry to find the promised chair just yet. "Hey, Nicky, you should have brought klah or something!" Because it would be awesome if a kid got into that. Some of the blonde's charcoal face paint has managed to leave a dark spot on the candidate's normally white knot. Dangerous chore, this one.

If Xhaeon thought he had it bad with the hair deal, Nicky's little charge has discovered that his curls are awesome for knotting fingers into. For his part, the candidate just winces and tries to ignore her attempts at brushing each curl out with her podgy digits. He grabs a chair to drag it over to Xhaeon, looking sympathetically at the smear of nose-gunk on Tiziano's shirt, then shaking his head at Kaeden for his suggestion. "Um... l-little ones don't have k-kla--ow!!- f-for a reason..." Curl-tugging continues when he settles down, even though the girl's now in his lap and half-facing him, blocking his face and with her knees awfully close to where it could really, really hurt.

"True." Tiziano comments back to Xhaeon, a smirk on his lips. It doesn't last long, falling back into a frown as he turns back to Kaeden. "Yeeeeah. It's still gross. Like really, really gross." There is no lost love as the child goes to join his fellows. Relief is quite evident on the candidate's face. "Shards, there's like a million of these little buggers, aren't there?" He says with some awe, eyes jumping all around the room at the mass of moving children. "People need to stop doing it. Or like... only do people who won't get knocked up." He wrinkles his nose as a charcoal-covered kid gets way too close for comfort, leaving a trail of soot in his wake. "Nannying is totally girls work. Men, real men, don't have time to be mothering babies. Bah!" There's a wince for poor Nicky as he spies the guy getting his hair pulled. "This just ain't right!"

Xhaeon has something of amusement for all the ongoing chaos - especially the kid potentially threatening Nicky's future reproductive capabilities, and the kid fireman'd over Kaeden's shoulder, and Tiz's hilarious statement. "I think the nannies are tucked away in little nooks, drinking mimosas and laughing at us." He doesn't have any comment for what real men do, because it probably would be followed by a punch, and he's entirely too sleepy to get up off the floor. One of the little ones surrounding his now-formed woolie shrieks and stomps a tiny foot, setting black curls flying over her shoulders. "That is NOT how they look!!!!!!" she declares, before flying off the handle and crumpling into tears. Xhaeon, rather than being alarmed by this, simply leans over, snags her around the waist, and settles her on one outslung leg, her back to his chest. "What should it look like, then?" he inquires, offering her his own charcoal. She brightens, and gets to scribbling. Kids.

"Well, I meant for me," Kaeden tells Nicky before manhandling the child on his shoulder until he's cradled in his arm. Already giggling like a tiny crazy person, the boy clearly isn't too worried about what the candidate may or may not do, regarding prior threats. "Maybe," he replies to Tiziano, "but the kids still make good eating." Cue a sudden and loud zerbert to the blonde kid's rotund little belly. Which, of course, just makes things worse. Or better, going by the increased giggles and trailing squeal as Kaeden sets him on his feet, though he doesn't release a grip on the kid's shoulder. The better to march him over to one of the tiny chairs. "Anyone know where there's rope in here?" he asks the room at large before shooting Xhaeon a grin. "The nannies have to do this all the time. With candidates about, they can have rest days, too. It works out." Pause to place the kid back in the chair. "Stay."

"I-I think you should, um, make an announcement, T-Tiz... um. 'No more babies!' S-something like that? We don't need any more... there's, um... ho-ow-ow many here?" Nicky's had enough with the curl-pulling, and he captures the girl's hands to gently steer them back down in front of her... to teach her how to play pattacake. Can't tug anyone's hair when you're busy clapping, right? "W-we should set an example," he declares, in between palm-slapping. "M-make a pact. No babies, not until... um... until we're all at least, er, 30." Because that's a grown up age, isn't it?

Tiziano's eyes start to narrow as he watches each guy seem to almost jive with their nannying chore. "You all seem way too comfortable with those kids. Bun'cha girls, that's what you all are." Except maybe Nicky, who gets a strong, jerky nod from the other candidate. "Yeah! I... I totally should! Don't need to tell the women folk," Mainly because he'd pee himself before getting a word out to them. "But I'm sure all the dudes would listen if I told them not to have sex no more." AHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA. Another child is dodged as Tiziano makes his way through the room a bit closer to the other three males. "Yeah! No babies until thirty! No, no, like forty. And then the women take care of it cause we'll be too busy doing important stuff." Like building things. Opening jars. Farting. Scratching themselves.

Xhaeon absentmindedly soothes the little girl a little longer, before she goes flailing after towards Kaeden at the zerbert, arms up in the air, demanding, "Me next! Me next! Kaitlyn UP!!" Yeah, no doubt what kind of personality /she's/ going to have later... "Cheers to that," Xhaeon handwaves upwards the announcement of no-more-babies and Nicky's proposition, flashing the farrier-candidate a quick grin. "No babies until 30." He looks at Tiz, though: "I don't know about abstinence until forty, though. That may be easy for people like you, but some people have to do what they have to do." Beat. "Right, Kaeden?" A roughshod grin which is immediately wiped away from his face when a little boy tugs at his sleeve and asks, eyes big, "What'd abs... absens... absenence?" FML.

"Wasn't there, like... something... some method," Kaeden starts to say before being distracted by an oh-so-helpful girl (you know the type) who's just handed him some of the others kids' scarves. "Oh, perfect. Thanks." Without further ado, he begins strapping the blonde boy to the chair with the scarves. "Something about going between with a rider." This responsible young adult has likely not had one of those "scares" just yet. Otherwise, he'd know all the methods. Scarves are tightly knotted, and the blonde child's smile has finally started to falter, as he's just discovered he actually can't wiggle out. "Hey, man, I warned you," Kaed tells the kid before turning toward Tiziano. "Funny, I thought it was a man's job to complete the duties assigned to him to the best of his ability. So which of us is copping out like a girl, exactly?" To which the "helpful" girl from moments before helpfully awards Kaeden a hard kick to the shin with the toe of her boot. It might actually leave a bruise. He's distracted by the sudden demands of an even smaller girl, though, who is obligingly hefted up, then tossed. Just a little. She's much lighter than most ship's cargo, really. "What's the magic word?" Then back to Xhaeon, "Right!"

"I've never, um..." Nicky stops himself there, blushing from neck to ears - or what's visible of them beneath his tangled curls, anyway. He's suddenly very interested in what a group of kids are doing over in the corner, and he sets down his pattacake girl to go investigate. "S-some of us don't need to, um... c-control, um, things?" He says this back over his shoulder as he crouches down beside the littles, taking a brick to help them build the tower they're working on. It's so much easier when he doesn't have to look at everyone!

"Ha! Shows what you know," Tiziano points at Kaeden, all boastful. "I don't even have nursery duty today. I gotta go fill sacks of firestone. S'man's chore, that's what that is! Lugging around heavy things, getting dirty the right way." He's about to continue on his tirade of what men do, but Xhaeon's comments throw him into a different topic. "Wha'cha mean 'for people like me'? I'm, I've... y'know! Totally. All the time. With all the ladies! Everywhere!" LIAR! "The ladies love me." If only he could talk to them. "They all want a piece of the Tiz-man!" Tiziano voice gets higher and higher as he speaks. He also starts fanning himself just a little. "I... I gotta go. Do things! WITH LADIES." Volume is not his friend. "I mean with firestone! Except... not that. Not that with firestone! Faranth!" Arms are thrown up and Tiziano pretty much runs out of the nursery.

Xhaeon stares at Nicky for a long moment. "Are you serious?" Meanwhile, the little girl at Kaeden squeals, PLEASE-PLEASE-PLEASE-PLEASE!! and laughs hysterically in turn. At Tiz' antics, /Xhaeon/ collapses into hysterical laughter, and has to be escorted from the scene before he causes a puddle from his uncontainable snorts of helpless laughter. At least he's awake. (Really, a nanny comes and breaks it up, shooing off the big man with a little kid to go change a stinky diaper). Ain't no rest for the wicked.

For each utterance of that magic word, the toddler in Kaeden's arms gets a quick zerbert until she's laughing too hard to say "please" again. Laughing too hard to... really do much of anything good, really. Oh dear. "Uh..." Luckily, as the real nannies start showing up, Kaeden is relieved of his suddenly relieved charge, and yeah, that tunic needs to go into the laundry, pronto. As the candidates' nursery shift starts to come to an end (except for Xhaeon's diaper duty), and as Tiziano has suddenly fled the scene with gusto, Kaeden calls over toward Nicky, "I'm going to get cleaned up." Then, once shouting is no longer necessary (possibly after they close those blessedly solid doors behind them), he adds, "You know it's not really a big deal, right? Not good to rush it." And we'll just let them continue guy talk on the way to their quarters. And... probably the baths. Charcoal, snot, and other liquids should not be worn the rest of the day.