Logs:Taxing Vices
| |
|---|
| |
| RL Date: 13 September, 2015 |
| Who: Kh'tyr, Z'riah |
| Involves: Fort Weyr |
| Type: Log |
| What: Kh'tyr and Z'riah are brilliant. Everyone should listen to their ideas. (Not.) |
| Where: The Glass Fountain, Fort Weyr |
| When: Day 21, Month 10, Turn 38 (Interval 10) |
| Mentions: Lilah/Mentions, X'vae/Mentions |
  |
>---< The Glass Fountain, Fort Weyr(#533RJs$) >------------------------------<
Despite its subterranean locale, the creamy wall paint, pale woods, and
frosted glass give the cavern a light, airy feel. Oil lamps reflect softly
in the polished wood of high-backed booths, glimmering through the opaque
glass dividers that help lend intimacy to the seating arrangements;
round-backed booths carved from stone, lined with deep, terra-cotta
colored padding and the addition of strategic, lyric shapes painted in a
subtle red shade. The sweeping, half-circle shaped bar with its top of
smooth stone, backed by cut-glass-fronted cabinetry flows gracefully into
the soft lines and mellow colors that dominate the Glass Fountain.
All the atmosphere aside, the main attractions of the room are clearly the
massive, multi-pronged chandelier that hangs from multiple chains from the
ceiling and the re-worked leak - which no longer resembles a leak at all,
having been channeled through glass to become a beautiful piece of art. A
curving wave and a series of glass bubbles guide the water past a bank of
glows, allowing the light to shine through the water and turn it into a
sparkling fountain. From its dark, dim, shabby history, the Glass Fountain
has become an elegant place with lattice-stands to hold the menus with
their selection ranging from typical 'bar food' to high-end dishes and
fancy desserts. It's been a weird day and sometimes a man needs a strong drink. That's exactly what Z'riah is here for, considering that he heads straight for the pretty bar as soon as he steps foot inside the Glass Fountain, and it's whiskey that he asks for as soon as he's got his butt on a stool and has a bartender's attention. But once his glass is filled and handed over, he asks for the rest of the bottle so he can keep it topped off himself. Other people need no excuse for a strong drink. Some even have many human reasons to have a strong drink. Whichever category Kh'tyr falls into (if truly either alone), tonight he can be found occupying a stool at the bar, hands beating an upbeat tuneless song (perhaps music only he can hear) on either side of his own whiskey. He glances briefly toward the greenrider before finishing off the music and reaching for the man's bottle. "You don't mind sharing, do you?" Clearly, manners are one of the brownrider's strongest suits. "Only if you don't mind paying for it," the greenrider returns without grabbing for the bottle back. Not yet, anyway. Wages are cut. A man can't be too generous with things that cost money these days, but Z'riah will allow the possibility that this stranger will pay up in the end. "Marks don't grow on trees, you know." Except that they kind of do, don't they? "I suppose," Kh'tyr returns almost dismissively, as if such pesky things like marks and paying for things is hardly worth his notice. Clearly, he's busy thinking brilliant and deep thoughts the way he pours a hefty helping and sets the bottle back down, lifting it and drinking deep. "There are always ways to make extra marks. Probably ways to keep them from getting taxed, too," the brownrider observes, eyeing the glass thoughtfully before looking toward the greenrider and giving him a once-over. "I wonder if there are any professions the Weyr wouldn't tax." "If you keep looking at me like that, I'll start charging you and we can find out, can't we?" Z'riah says to the brownrider with a smile that's both suggestion and... offer? Whatever it is, he's taking a healthy drink from his glass and then taking a moment to give the other man his own once-over. "Unless you have another suggestion." "What makes you think I'd be the one paying and not collecting?" Kh'tyr inquires as he swirls his glass and then sips, looking at the greenrider over its edge. "Because I don't need to pay for it." Z'riah is entirely confident in this fact. But he will allow, "You don't really look like you need to pay for it, either. Much as I'd be willing to take your marks. I think I'd rather have you for free than not at all." He seems slightly disappointed in himself that he's come to this conclusion at all. "What if you did?" Kh'tyr counters, placing an elbow on the counter, chin on his fist and using that as a point to lean from, toward the greenrider in question. "Would you? More importantly, would you turn me in for not paying at tax on my earnings?" "Only if you were a lousy lay." That's a good reason to turn someone in, right? Z'riah seems to think so and he has notoriously fantastic judgment. "Is that what you're doing here? Looking for people to call out?" The greenrider is less impressed with this prospect. "I'm drinking," Kh'tyr answers as if that much should be obvious. "Besides, I don't care." Or he'll say he doesn't and have another drink. "Transfer from Igen to make good on a promise to a missing woman who'll never know you came and get your pay cut. It's been a good month." And he'll reach for Z'riah's bottle again. Z'riah has to laugh at that. Hopefully not that part about the missing woman. "I just came from Monaco." He feels the pay cut pain. "But if I don't have to watch my best friend ruin his life, I guess that's worth a few less marks in my pocket." He drinks the rest of his glass and holds it out in silent request for Kh'tyr to fill him back up, too. "Here's to you then," the brownrider offers once his glass is full again, lifting it before drinking. "Perhaps the Weyr should put a tax on friendship next." Kh'tyr mulls the idea over a moment. "Or organize a way to procure additional income or a way to cost themselves less. This whole tax thing seems-- ineffective. Boring. And pay cuts is no way to keep riders loyal." "Fuck friendship. It's not worth a tax. Fucking, though. They'd solve all their financial woes if everyone had to pay the Weyr to fuck each other." Z'riah seems to find this wholly amusing. "Anyway, if they wanted loyalty, they probably wouldn't keep pulling in people like us." Foreigners, he probably means. "They aren't really taking more than I can live without, anyway. You're not one of those uppity wingleaders they gouged, are you? They don't need as much as they get to begin with." "So Dice opens an after hours service," Kh'tyr suggests, "With pretty riders like you filling out the ranks? Ten percent cut to the house," then he corrects, "well, fifteen, so Dice itself can have its five percent share. Why don't they convince Dice and the Fountain to increase the price of drinks; people would still pay." He knows, he's still drinking. "It's interesting that a Weyr that's suffered so much hardship wouldn't be concerned with loyalty, though I suppose it's not like we can really look for work elsewhere and be guaranteed feed for our beasties." He sucks on his teeth a moment and then shakes his head. "No, I'm one of those assistant weyrlingmasters they gouged and are repaying by headache-worthy weyrlings. Try to tell me I don't earn every thirty-second mark of my pay," he dares, with a flare of eyes and lift of brows. "Shards, I'd be there," says Z'riah like it sounds like something he'd only dream up in some messed up fantasy. "They could raise the prices of drinks, but I might start drinking in my weyr, and then no one would be able to look at me. Not even you." And that would be a horrible shame. As far as weyrlings? "I think you'll survive just fine without your extra thirty-seconds for a while. Besides, I could teach weyrlings as well as any of you can." Maybe he's drunk already, just talking nonsense now. There might still be a business plan developing behind Kh'tyr's suddenly intense look that levels on the greenrider. It might be disturbing that he doesn't yet look affected despite the quantity of drink. "Teach me something." It's instruction, demand even, and he seems to expect action now. "Teach you something. You aren't a weyrling," Z'riah points out. But he looks at the brownrider for a few moments, then raises his voice dramatically to make sure he has the attention of everyone nearby. "Look here! Behold! The majestic asshole in his natural habitat; drinking alone and bitchy because he's too limp-dicked to take anyone home with him." Okay, so Z'riah starts sounding a little bitter, but he's reaching for his whiskey, glass and bottle, so he can take them and find somewhere else to get plastered. Kh'tyr seems unbothered by the exhibition, coolly meeting the eyes of those that turn toward him. He reaches out to the bottle and puts a firm hand on it as eyes narrow slightly to regard the younger man. "Lesson being what? At twenty six," he guesses, "you're all washed up and have nothing to offer the world save the contents of your pants?" If Z'riah wants to go, he'll have to leave the bottle, but since Kh'tyr isn't moving to try to pour more from it, getting the exhibitionist to stay seems to be the point of the exercise. He pulls at the bottle, jaw tight with agitated tension. "Most of them won't," he says as though he truly believes that little tidbit. "Most of us are just out-dated pawns, mouths that the Weyr has to feed because there's no where else for us to go." Z'riah lets go of the bottle, but he doesn't seem interested in leaving without his booze, so he just stands beside his stool instead, glaring at his new acquaintance. Kh'tyr moves the bottle once Z'riah has released it to refill his own glass. Rather than take it up himself though, he slides it in front of the stool Z'riah stands by. "Sit back down and tell me more, about these... charity cases the Weyr suffers." Z'riah looks at Kh'tyr for several moments, glances at the glass, then sits back down. "I'm not sitting down to talk to you. I'm finishing my whiskey and then I'm taking my drunk ass to find someone who's interested in it." So there. "Sure," Kh'tyr sounds like he accepts that, for just long enough for Z'riah to sit down. Then, "But while you're sitting there, you might as well tell me about how you're a charity case. Who knows, maybe self-esteem issues really do it for me and you won't have to look further." There's no way to say if the brownrider is kidding or not, or if indeed one could say he has a sense of humor at all. (He must, surely. But an odd one, just as surely.) "Maybe I don't care what does it for you anymore," grumbles Z'riah after a drink that makes him clear his throat. But he must have at one point. "And I'm not a sharding charity case. I'm just another faceless greenrider in a pointless sea of blue and green." So poetic. Or drunk. "Pretty sure you can't be washed up if you were never anything to begin with, anyway," he points out as though that matters. Kh'tyr's fingers flick in the air as if to dismiss the first, "Sounds like you don't care about much, greenrider. And you yourself have pointed out what a pretty face you have so you can't really claim the faceless part either. Looks to me, like you're a wingrider, which might not be what you wanted to be when you grew up, but certainly worthy of being washed up. So which is it, you're a worthwhile human being with a face just in search of a purpose in life beyond what pleasure derives from the treasures hid in your pants, or you're a faceless, pointless wash up?" "How about a faceless, pointless wash up in the process of finding a purpose," Z'riah amends, then takes another drink. He'll still claim the faceless thing no matter how pretty his face might actually be. "There are plenty of pretty greenriders. Wingriders. Whatever. And I like the treasures in my pants just fine. I like pleasure. Maybe you should try it sometime." "Interesting," Kh'tyr says as if it really is, infusing his tone with a sense of being intrigued. "Well, I suppose there's always a third option, isn't there. Thinking outside the box; I like that." Then the brownrider is standing only to lean close to the greenrider. "If you suspect there's already something occupying my ass, why would you think I'm any stranger to the pleasures offered by something like it?" He poses the question without intent to wait for an answer, choosing rather to move off toward the stairs that climb back to the caverns. If Z'riah's only paying attention to the man and not the subtle movement of hand to jacket pocket, then the marks left on the bartop in his wake (enough for the bottle and more besides) might come as a surprise. Perhaps it's an asshole tax. The Weyr can make a fortune! Z'riah does indeed watch the man, still sort of glaring but possibly only because he doesn't realize his face still looks like that. When he does turn back to the bar and notices the marks, he draws them closer, fingering one piece in drunk thoughtfulness before he puts the lot of it into one of his pockets. He glances back toward the stairs again, then settles in to finish the rest of his whiskey in silence. |
Leave A Comment