Logs:Knowing Me, Knowing You
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| RL Date: 23 September, 2011 |
| Who: Ch'vaz, Riorde |
| Involves: High Reaches Weyr |
| Type: Log |
| What: Ri and Charlie get to know each other... four and a half months late. |
| Where: Weyrling Training Cavern, High Reaches Weyr |
| When: Day 8, Month 11, Turn 26 (Interval 10) |
| Mentions: E'gin/Mentions, Kh'ry/Mentions, Taikrin/Mentions |
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| The weyrlings have been suffering under E'gin's leadership, and the silver-threaded ones worst of all thanks to the already-intensive regimen they're under. It's getting late, but Ch'vaz is still seated at one of the stone tables, the surface spread out with the threadfighting charts that have come up so often in class. His pencil flicks against the table, rhythmically, as he works; he doesn't even seem to be aware that he's doing it, or that the sound echoes throughout the otherwise relatively quiet cavern. Riorde's been absent of late, whenever she can be. Granted it isn't much, especially with the extra classes and the time spent working on flight straps, but today in due form, after class with Meara, she hied off to somewhere other than the barracks. She only comes back now, late, with her arms full of hides and Sforzath at her side. She pauses halfway through the cavern, considering Ch'vaz with his charts, and after a quick conference with her brown changes course. Sforzath continues through to go to bed; Riorde comes up to the other weyrling's table and dumps her notes. Instead of sitting, she angles to get a look at what he's working on. "That for tomorrow?" Tap. Tap. Tap. Ta-- Ch'vaz's pencil stops abruptly as, equally abruptly, his head snaps upwards so that he can focus in on Riorde. He's kept his distance from the other silver threads - even Quinlys, with whom he was initially relatively friendly; indeed, he seems to keep his distance from /most/ of the weyrlings, excepting the handful of other weyrbred ones. His brow furrows, warily, but his response is even: "Yeah," he agrees. "I feel like I need to know it back to front, you know? When I dropped off my last set of notes to K'del, he told me how important it all was and--" and here he is, late at night, rubbing his temples. Even tired and fighting a yawn, Riorde has a keen focus to her as she leans in to look at the charts, as if letting go of her determined concentration would mean a greater fragmentation, an uncontrollable letting go. "Know what you mean." She backs off, but doesn't leave Ch'vaz in peace. Instead, she joins him at the table and takes the nearest chair. "Do you believe him?" Riorde sounds curious. "I mean - not that it's not important, but that it's actually important for us, now. Assuming any of us even end up in any of the positions, it won't be for Turns." If the bronze weyrling seems surprised at being joined so, he doesn't object - instead, the chart he's looking at gets nudged closer to the other weyrling, put in a position so that they can both see it. "I don't know," he admits, honestly. "But I guess I remember that he was only just out of weyrlinghood when he ended up Weyrleader. And that sort of makes me pause. Things happen, you know?" His foot winds around the base of his bench; he gives Riorde a thoughtful glance. "Anyway, I feel like if the Weyrleader says something like that, it's probably better to listen than not." "True," Riorde allows. "Though things happen more that way for you. I mean, riding bronze. Though if were just that, then Khorde'd be in our classes too - I guess they're not too worried about things happening for him." Judging by the clear note of derision in that statement, Riorde isn't too worried either. She still never names the second bronzeriding weyrling in the group by his honorific; maybe when she does one day, she'll take him seriously. "So," a subject change, as she reaches for her notes, "what do you think of life under E'gin's regime?" The mocking tone she'd used when referencing the first exile weyrling persists with mention of the second. Something about Riorde's tone seems to relax Ch'vaz's shoulders and allow a tentative smile to twitch into being upon his face. "I guess not," he agrees of Kh'ry, his nose wrinkling. And of E'gin? "Some power trip he's on, right? Like he thinks we're all useless and he's-- not. I didn't act like that when I was Wingleader, did I? I know Amareth was always complaining to Hiyanoth that he wasn't listening, but-- shells." He traces out a line on the chart in front of him with one finger, still at least idly paying attention to the work as he talks. "At least it's not forever. And then he'll be just one of us again, and we'll actually get to rest occasionally." In return, Riorde eases into a smile. Still hard, curling towards a sneer, but offered here as something shared: collusion against their clutchbrother. "He's always thought he knows best. Self-righteous -- no, you weren't like that." She's spread her notes before her, but for once seems more interested in company and conversation rather than study. A change from class, where she's self-contained and academic to the point of being stand-offish. "What do you think I should have him do when it's my turn?" Talk about power trips. The relief on Ch'vaz's face seems genuine, and makes his smile more so: "Good. I think I'd rather be a benevolent dictator than-- well. Whatever. Maybe not a dictator, even. I wish I'd gotten a turn later; I bet you'll be leading us in proper drills. You'll have more responsibility." His pencil gets dropped idly to the table, where it rolls half-heartedly towards a stack of papers set further to the middle. "Assign him some kind of pre-dawn duty. Make him get out of bed to prepare something /every/ morning. Justified retribution, I'd say." "I wouldn't have liked to go first. I'm glad I haven't gone yet," Riorde confesses. Real pleasure brightens her expression, briefly, with Ch'vaz's suggestion on how to achieve retribution. "That's a quick way to make everyone else think you're alright. I can't wait for this month to be over." She tilts her head slightly to one side, considering Ch'vaz at greater length. "What do you think of me?" she asks suddenly, without context to frame it in. "Being first is generally awful," is Ch'vaz's opinion on the subject, but he doesn't, at least, seem /upset/ about it; been, gone, finished, after all. His mouth opens, then shuts again: whatever he /was/ going to say gets forestalled by Riorde's question; it seems to confuse him. "Think of you?" he repeats, brow furrowed, studying the other weyrling carefully. "Like... what? I mean. I don't know, Riorde. You're obviously smart. But we haven't really talked before now. You're in the midst of... all of them." It's just a tiny bit plaintive. Ch'vaz's answer -- or its lack -- gets Riorde's close, intent attention. The lean girl tips forward with the points of her elbows on the table, hungry for some sort of an affirmation. "You don't like us," she points out bluntly, though strangely without accusation. It is what it is, a statement of fact. "I can't help who I am any more than you can. And I'm not in the midst of anything, not now. Except studying." Her insistency breaks when she tries to make a joke, gesturing towards the work all across the table. "I don't--" Ch'vaz is quick to argue the point, defensive even though Riorde is not actually accusatory. "You're a pre-made group. You all know each other. And most of you are friendly-- ish, at least." His explanation stumbles when he gets that far, and he goes silent, letting his words hang for several long seconds before: "I don't not like you, Riorde. But I don't know you, and until tonight-- you seem smart. And nice. But we've lived in these barracks together for, what, four and a half months? And we're still more or less strangers." "Nice?" Riorde can't help repeating. Her amused disbelief ends, however, on an almost wistful note. "I don't think anyone's ever called me nice." Which just proves Ch'vaz's point: they don't know each other. She grows thoughtful, sitting back with her arms in a loose fold, hands in her lap. "We don't have to be strangers anymore," she says after awhile, measured in tone as she comes to some kind of conclusion. "You're right. We shouldn't be." Ch'vaz's smile is a crooked one, and his cheeks have turned just slightly pink. "There you go," is his remark, made just quietly into the silence. He holds back on further comment until Riorde reaches her conclusion, at which point he straightens in his seat. "Then let's not be. I'm Ch'vaz. I used to be Charlavaz; people call me Charlie. I was a woodcrafter, and now I'm a weyrling. I'm weyrbred, but ours was the first clutch I Stood for. What else do you want to know?" "I -- I don't know." Slightly bemused, Riorde has to smile at her moment of uncertainty. "My turn," she declares in the spirit of a game, straightening up as she presents herself. "I'm Riorde. My friends call me Ri, or sometimes Rio. I lived on an island, and I still wake up thinking it's weird not to hear or smell the sea. K'del let me stand; I didn't sneak on." The clarification of a point that she's been (mostly; selectively) good about keeping quiet on must be something of importance, for she says it emphatically. Then something he probably knows already: "I hit people when I get mad." Having summed herself up, Riorde looks like she's awaiting judgment, expectant but wary. It's certainly news to Ch'vaz, and his eyes widen just slightly, as if with a certain amount of respect-- not even grudging respect, but the real, honest variety. But it's Riorde's last remark that has him grinning again. "I don't lose my temper often," he says, "but when I do, it gets pretty bad. I think my little sister is still scared of me, a bit." There's a beat, followed by a question: "You're with that brownrider, aren't you? Taikrin. That's what I heard, anyway." The set of her shoulders relaxes; the smile she shares is admittedly relieved, gratified that the other weyrling's reaction doesn't seem to be that which has found her wanting. "My little brother, too." Riorde's smile turns wry with the point they have in common. Her smile falters, though, as soon as Ch'vaz mentions Taikrin. "Not anymore." Short and clipped. Riorde looks at her hands, caught in a moment where she's obviously deciding if she'll say anymore. After a quick glance up, something decides her, and she deliberately lifts her gaze to look at Ch'vaz directly. "She told me to find someone else. Another weyrling. So I'm not with anybody, now." The smile the bronzerider shares with Riorde is short-lived; his falters, too, the moment he registers her admission. When she lifts her gaze to his, his is sympathetic - apparently genuinely so. "I'm sorry," he murmurs, sucking his breath in, then letting it loose again. "People are awful to each other, sometimes. There was a girl I liked, back at the Hall. She sort of dismissed me, though, and yet-- after I Impressed, she wrote to me." He shakes his head. "Anyway. I am sorry, Ri-- Riorde." It's a hasty recovery; he's clearly not presuming to actually be a friend just yet. "It's okay," Riorde says, though it isn't. She says it because it's the sort of thing you say so others don't feel uncomfortable. And to convince oneself - every time Riorde says it, it'll sound more believable. "Ri's fine -- not strangers, right?" Her smile isn't quite as full as before, but she's making an effort. "You shouldn't write back," she then adds, weighing in. "If she didn't think you were worth it before Hiyanoth, her loss. We're both better off." She lifts her chin to that and forces a smile. "Anyway," she moves on, "do you maybe want to study together?" A twisted smile. "Ri, then. And Charlie." He takes a deep breath, and then nods. "I didn't. I won't. It's stupid, that I should suddenly be worth something-- anyway. We're definitely both better off, and I'd like that." The studying, presumably, because he doesn't seem to have much else to say that about. His smile even seems more genuine again - friendly. "It seems like maybe it'll all be easier, having someone to bounce ideas off of." "Charlie." She tests it out, experimental. Then, more definitively: "Good." It stands for putting things in the past as well as potential futures -- even if it's just studying tomorrow. Riorde stands and gathers her things, but when her notes are in hand she doesn't immediately leave the table. Instead she opens her mouth to impart one last getting-to-know-you tidbit: "I didn't like girls before, you know. It just sort of happened." It doesn't require an answer, for Riorde appends thereafter, "See you tomorrow." It doesn't require an answer, but it does make Ch'vaz's jaw drop just a little bit open. He stares at Riorde, his thought processes almost audible: oh shit am I reading that correctly? Finally, though, he manages to pull himself together long enough to say, hastily, "See you then, Ri. Sleep well." Is he reading that correctly? Maybe; Riorde doesn't give any further indication one way or another, though she seems amused as she turns and heads off to bed. |
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