Logs:Taikrin Pays the Price
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| RL Date: 8 July, 2011 |
| Who: Taikrin |
| Type: [[Concept:{{{type}}}|{{{type}}}]] |
| What: Vignette. Taikrin has been a bad girl. She needs to be punished. Occurs after the Clutching Party. |
| Where: High Reaches Weyr Area |
| When: Day {{{day}}}, Month {{{month}}}, Turn {{{turn}}} ({{{IP}}} {{{IP2}}}) |
| Mentions: Riorde/Mentions, F'rint/Mentions, K'del/Mentions, Tiriana/Mentions |
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| Taikrin had an awful lot of time to brood in the days following the clutching. She'd barely made it five steps outside of the Living Caverns that night before F'rint cornered her, and within a couple hours she and Szadath found themselves flying sweeps over the worst possible parts of mountain ranges. Double sweeps. While still drunk (and then, predictably, terribly hungover). "Too much energy and not enough thinking," Glacier's wingleader had pronounced. "Let's see if we can fix that." A pattern was established pretty quickly: fly sweeps for eight hours, return to the Weyr to check in, eat, and take a nap, and then six hours later back out on sweeps again. It left an awful lot of time to mull over her situation, and since she'd been expressly forbidden from taking out a flask with her, Taikrin's thoughts were depressingly clear. The sweeps were /boring/: nothing to see but endless snow-covered peaks and valleys, passing by at a crawlingly slow pace as Szadath conserved his strength for the grueling day of flying. They were forbidden from between, and so by the second half of their first day of sweeps around the Weyr, they were re-covering ground. By the third, the knowledge that they were uselessly circling the Weyr unto exhaustion was driving them a little mad. She and Szadath had rehashed events of the last two sevendays over and over, until it was burned so crystal-bright into their brains that they had trouble distinguishing their interpretation from actual events. The rest of their day was so mind-numbingly dull, it was all they could think about -- which was, of course, the point. "Maybe it's the Weyrwoman-- she always liked us, maybe he's tryin' to turn her against us so she won't say anythin' if he sets us up to take a fall? But /where/ would he send us? Don't know as how they can chain-gang up a rider." « There is no place they can take you that I will not find. And they would help us. » He flashed impressions of his friends, his team: some of his clutchmates, Iskiveth at the fore; wingmates; even Iovniath and Cadejoth, with the respect he reserved only for the leading pair. « You are mine, and we are together. » "Ain't so sure about that, me. But--" Taikrin shifted her thoughts with a skill borne out of long practice over the last few days. "-- what do you think he's on about Riorde? Seemed awful worked up somethin' that weren't no big deal. I still say we oughta warn her. What if he gets t'her? Poor thing don't know nothin' about nothin'." « I don't want to talk to her. It doesn't feel right. » This argument, in particular, had been hashed out many times over, and had the sound of rote repitition on both sides. "But what if she's in trouble, an' it's 'cause of us? That ain't right." « Cadejoth and Iovniath-- » Again infused with respect and a powerful minging of their impressions: honored parents; canny leaders; shrewd tacticians. « -- said that we should just wait. Then we could have her back. » "Yeah, but what if th'Weyrleader's takin' her? Turnin' her against us? Or worse-- hurtin' her? Forcin' her into his bed, maybe? What if she don't know better, that she can say no? /Szad/! I ain't gonna let it be my fault!" Taikrin rallied against the encroaching exhaustion, injecting more fire into her voice than she'd managed to summon since that disasterous party night. Thumping a fist on his neck for emphasis, she insisted, "I /won't/! We got her into this mess, an' it's only /right/ that we get her out!" And what could Szadath do? Exhausted from his endless hours of flight, demoralized from their joint punishment, he finally conceded, « Alright. I'll do it. For you. » When the exhausted pair finished their third day of punishment, sore in every muscle in their body and limp with the day's exertion, they collapsed together on Szadath's couch in a boneless pile. But before the brown could fall asleep, he reached out, reluctantly, to an unfamiliar mind. They knew nothing of the events at the Weyr that might have taken place on this, the first of the new month, only that they had to warn their innocent accomplice before something terrible happened. A distant voice, reverberating like a call through a canyon miles away, echoed softly in Riorde's head: « I am Szadath; Do nothing, say nothing; avoid Cadejoth's. Lay low, and Taikrin will explain. She has a plan. »
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