Logs:Sticky Issues
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| RL Date: 15 September, 2012 |
| Who: K'del, Nahia |
| Type: [[Concept:{{{type}}}|{{{type}}}]] |
| What: Nahia presents her progress on that idea of hers to K'del. K'del helpfully(?) points out some flaws. |
| Where: Nighthearth, High Reaches Weyr |
| When: Day {{{day}}}, Month {{{month}}}, Turn {{{turn}}} ({{{IP}}} {{{IP2}}}) |
| Weather: Heavy, driving rain makes everything a wet and muddy mess today. |
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| Nighthearth, High Reaches Weyr With its entrance located between the kitchen and the living cavern, this tiny bubble cavern is cozy, always kept warm and is filled with comfortable chairs and a small round table. At the far end, there's a hearth, outlined in ruddy, aging bricks, where a pot of stew simmers in the evening hours. Generally quiet, the nighthearth is the haunt of insomniacs and those seeking quiet from the bustle of daily Weyr life. Rain has driven many a resident or rider inside, to the chagrin of whichever assistant will have to deal with the clean-up of tracks of muddy boot-prints, and the living caverns have just about reached capacity as a hot meal sounds like the perfect solution. Home to the various overflow, the nighthearth has so far stood its ground: a couple of old ones in the corner, some children up front being as good at sharing as you'd expect from a couple of four turn olds, and Nahia. She's moved the round table of the room from its usual spot to be snug against one of the comfy chairs and aligned several papers with identical writing on each across. Rather than sit in the chair, she's stacked it with an array of books, though they make about as much room on the seat as the petite Harper might've. Caught halfway between sitting and standing, she holds a mug in her hand, balanced on half-bent knees, as if she means to rise and get herself a warm cider. But her head has turned back towards the papers and, eyes narrow, she stands there, unflinching, between purposes. Weather like this often means drills are cancelled entirely, allowing relieved wingriders to stay out of the muck and the cold as much as possible, though even a simple trip to the caverns for a meal cancel out that luxury to some degree. Today, however, Avalanche has drilled as scheduled, and though the weary riders entering the caverns now have, by and large, stripped off their outermost, rain-sodden clothing, the cleaning staff will have their hands full in mopping up anyway. K'del appears in the doorway of the Nighthearth looking soggily bedraggled, and perhaps a little disappointed at the fact that, though it may be quieter than the Living Caverns, the 'hearth area is far from empty. Determination - and a sincere need for warmth - sends him in anyway, to warm his hands by the hearth, and to fill a mug from the newest pot of klah. Running over the line over and over again, some noise or shadow of a thought must have finally dislodged Nahia, because she nods, turns, and takes the needed step up to the hanging pot only to find her entire view is of K'del's back. She comes to a full-stop, both hands up and a mere inch from shoving right into him. Crisis is averted, she coolly lowers her hands to both sides -- only to very obviously clear her throat a second later. Hands dainty at her sides, rubbing slightly at her leggings, she fails to wait the obligatory moment to see if he's even going to turn around before declaring, "Oh! Weyrleader-- just the man I was hoping to talk to-- oh." Her second 'oh' being the crestfallen one, she, with dropping and raising eyes, takes full account of his status, and flinches a bit for how needed that klah must be. "This is a bad time." "Wha-- hm?" K'del is surprised by the cleared throat behind him, though he dully spins around on his heel a moment later to properly register the person addressing him. He certainly does look worse for wear, with cheeks chapped from the chilly rain, and water still dripping down the back of his neck and soaking into his shirt. Despite that, it only takes a second or two before he's waving his hand - the one not currently holding on to his mug - to illustrate the point he makes verbally: "It's fine, really. Nahia." He remembered! "If you let me sit down, I swear you'll have my undivided attention-- don't plan on moving until I'm warm through, that's for sure." Nahia's face lights up with excitement before she schools it down carefully, more professionally, "Really?" Just to make sure; also, because her eyes have tracked back over him and, judging by that scrunching wince, he looks kind of sad. Clearing her throat a second time, she scrambles over to her arrangement just several steps away. With a sweep of her hand the books are gathered up to clear the chair. She hooks a foot under it and tries to edge it to turn out towards him welcomingly, but it's far heavier than her and merely skids an inch and kind of tips then settles. Dropping the books -- carefully, reverently -- down at its feet, she crouches over the papers, picking up one and gently sliding her hand under to turn it and check the readiness of the ink. Finding the glimmer to look mostly permanent, she piles them together and knocks the stack to align it. All that industry helps to stop her from immediately assaulting the Weyrleader. Immediately. "I've just drafted up a starting proposal for my idea to get dated and stamped by Journeymen. But you're obliged an update, sir." Obediently, but currently looking somewhere between amused and bemused, K'del settles adjusts the position of the chair to his liking, and then settles into it, giving a wary glance to those books. His klah he holds between both hands, long fingers wrapped around the warm ceramic; he leans back, stretching out his shoulders, adjusting his stance until he's comfortable. Certainly, he's attentive in listening to what the Apprentice has to say, though the abrupt knitting of his brows makes it difficult to miss that he's surprised. "I am?" Having half forgotten she was holding a mug of klah, and entirely forgetting she was holding it for the purposes of getting klah, Nahia lets the ceramic clink quietly onto the table in an absent gesture as she sinks down onto the books as a makeshift seat. Her mouth, slackening progressively, eventually makes the "Ohhhh," of the revelation stealing her features. "You..." a little, shamefully girlish disappointment flutters in her eyes behind her blinks, but she recovers her dignity with a quick lick of the lips, "were just saying that before... to be polite." In a low, trailing off got'cha. K'del looks suddenly, horribly, unquestionably contrite, rather as though he's only just put two and two together to reach the requisite four. "No," he corrects, in a voice that says all too clearly that he's determined to make up for that blunder. "No, I'm interested. Wasn't just trying to be polite, Nahia. Just didn't expect you to have results worth sharing, as yet-- but your proposal. You've narrowed it down, then? Got it all planned out?" He lifts one hand from his mug to wave it expansively, encouraging her to continue. "I'm sorry. I'm tired; not thinking properly, maybe. Tell me about what you've been working on." "Oh-- " Hesitant to quite be excited, lest she break this fragile thing going on with him right now, Nahia adjusts on her seat then, bashfully, tips her head to the side. "Umm. Well, then. Sort of... yes. I've-- I got really inspired one... every night." Up close, the girl's lacking some healthier color under her eyes, but she leans forward with contained energy, hands spreading over the stacked papers. "Not everything in its entirety. I guess this is what I'd consider a prelim... but I got some really good advice about making sure my idea didn't get whipped out from under me, so I'm stamping the original thought before I start walking around asking for advice and spreading things." She sweeps a look across her shoulder at him, "Except you, sir. I would never suggest." "That I would steal your idea? Should hope not. Makes sense, though: get it in quick. " There's something teasing in K'del's reply, though his expression has taken on a more studying aspects, with Nahia directly within the cross-hairs. "Every night? Hope you're still getting enough sleep. And getting fresh air and exercise, at least when the weather's fair enough to do so. You're not over-working yourself, are you? You're young, to be engaging in this kind of... project. Need to be careful." Once a father, always a father, it seems - even if Nahia is considerably older than his own children. "Hmm? Sure, of course." That helmet of black coils bounces even with the slightest shake of her head; Nahia's vaguely noncommittal shrug of a shoulder as she turns back to the sheets. "My dad," speaking of, "always says that preparedness now makes for opportunity later." Mention of her father sends an unconscious signal down the girl's body, instinctively straightening her shoulders. She sits taller, shunning any sense of lacking for rest, with a slight raise of chin, while her fingers play against the paper. "What I'm proposing is a kind of... trade market for information. Where someone might usually offer goods, or services, they'd be submitting useful information or skills written down that they want to share. Then... some kind of," her hand shoos off where she obviously hasn't worked out all the necessary details, "Distribution. To everyone! Instead of just to a few." K'del is watching Nahia too intently to miss that shift at mention of her father; it signals a change in him, too, though his is more subtle, visible only in the tightening of his mouth and the spacing of his fingers around his as-yet-untouched mug. "A trade market," he repeats, keeping his tone thoughtfully neutral, and leaning back further in his chair to consider. "Distribution. How do you propose to moderate the information? What happens if someone submits information that is false? Seems like there'd be plenty of opportunity for misuse, unless you had some way of policing the information... but that almost seems like it'd defeat the purpose." "Have to be a way to look through it first. Or," thinking writhes Nahia's butt on the seat of hardcovers. "Anything would have to be verified first before going out... if... it could..." Complications are clearly nudging against each other in her brain, slowing her down and creating a light furl at the edge of her mouth down. The so immediate block eventually causes her eyebrows to furrow, as she sticks an elbow onto her knee and presses a hand across her temple to concentrate. "Or the... source would have to sign it! So people could go talk to whoever wrote it to correct them-- no. No, that would just start a bunch of barfights..." Thoughtfully; "You could require all information to come from at least two separate sources. Of course, you still might run into people working together to spread information. And then there's the interpretation issue, natural bias. One person'll see something one way, another person another, and who can really say which is correct?" K'del seems to be taking the idea seriously, giving it genuine, considering thought, for all that this time he actually pauses to take a sip from his cooling klah. "It's never as simple as we would like it to be." "Who am I to say one or the other is? That's not the point," Nahia isn't accusing K'del; phrasing it outloud helps her thinking process, as she stretches out what little there is to her legs, running her hands down to wrap her knees. "If two people disagree, why not share both sides? Isn't that the original issue I saw in the Harper records? That one side always manages to win out over the other, but once all the people involved are out of the way, how can we know if that was right, or wrong, or would be seen differently now because we know different things today... it's a-- it's a maze." Bringing a sense of tire into her voice as she brings a hand up to run across her mouth a second but, jaw firming, she recovers, eyes hardening and ready to tackle this. "Right," agrees K'del. "But it all makes it hard to know if someone is deliberately slanting events to suit their purposes." His mouth draws in, and for a moment, he looks genuinely concerned, and as if he's on the verge of saying something that he ultimately bites back. "It is a maze," he agrees. "Not sure it's one I'd have the fortitude to try and wade through, but good for you for trying. Just... don't let it eat your life away, Nahia. Don't let it take over." Nahia hums in distant understanding. Just clear enough to be someone trying to prove to someone else they're listening, which wouldn't be necessary if they were really listening. But she breaks from staring and leans back without a sense of loss of conversation. Her look over to K'del is endeared to him but, in a way, brushing off his attempt at fathering -- in the innocent way of not quite noticing it's being offered. "Don't worry, sir," she acknowledges more heartily, grinning in a way that puffs out her cheeks and makes her seem all that much younger, "I've still got a few good turns on me." And she turns back and nestles herself in close, staring with the sudden fervor of having fallen into the work, her hand dipping into her shoulderbag to fish out a pen and add a few spare notes to the back of one of the proposals. For the rest of the evening. K'del's expression twists, amused and rueful all at once. A few minutes later, he's on his feet again, depositing empty mug in the appropriate rack before he heads for the door - and, presumably, for a quieter hearth at home. |
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