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 Posted: Thu Dec 16, 2010 6:26 pm
Roka couldn't have agreed more with F'sey until--
The wherhandler moved back as if to walk away, making sure not to touch Her. "Let's go, blackrider." A request from a man that didn't look like he could use the word "please". By itself, unnerving. Paired with what came next, terrifying.
"You're the blackrider?" Roka was weighed down by the intruding emotions, but nothing would hold her back from doing what she came here for in the first place. She stood up and approached the girl, having already decided befriending this wayward soul was the best way to seek information. This rider had few friends, even among new color enthusiasts. "Amai, isn't it? I'm Roka."
Her tiny voice spoke up to rectify the wrong. "Emiristh."
"Your dragon?" Roka sounded like someone who spoke more confident than they felt.
No answer.
"I wanted to talk--"
Roka was cut off. "It's so sad."
"What's sad, dear?" asked the mindhealer gently. That was her first mistake. The second was gently brushing the hood down; when she saw the blindfold over the girls eyes, she felt deeply, deeply disturbed.
"You're so sad." The blackrider sounded devastated beyond repair. "If there was any mercy on Pern someone would kill you, you poor, miserable thing."
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Posted: Thu Dec 16, 2010 6:39 pm
What? What the shards was going on?
F'sey sucked in a sharp breath, looking frantically between B'lin and the strange girl. Amai. Whatever, he didn't really care. If she wouldn't leave, he'd leave. (With his bronzerider.)
"Look, I've agreed to be Wingleader. Let me out of this cell. I want to leave." His skin was practically crawling at the sight of a (presumably) blind dragonrider. There was something so wrong abut her.
"Let me out. I want to leave.." Leave Roka to deal with the lunatics, seriously.
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Posted: Thu Dec 16, 2010 6:49 pm
B'lin had been ready to write this off as just another strange thing about dragonriders Hold boys like him would have to get used to. He perceived the comment, as sympathetic as it sounded, as a threat. A threat toward Roka was worse than a threat toward him. (He had no special commitment to her, but as a woman...)
Roka felt herself being tugged back and snapped out of her daze when she noticed B'lin now looming in front of her. She'd dealt with all sorts, heard many things, but this was a mountain she had not begun to climb. Instead of fearing it, she saw potential. This could make her entire career. She could study this like no one before her, walk the tables maybe -- be a master. The master.
"It's alright, B'lin. Guard, can you let him out, please?" She leaned over to make herself visible and nodded toward the door.
But it was no good. "I can't let him out. The Whermaster or Whersecond has to do it."
"If you get one of them, I'll keep Amai here company for you," Roka bargained.
"...Alright." Unethical or not, he'd take any excuse to get away from this madness. He had no remorse leaving his "post" and taking off to find Bekar. Stupid dragonriders. Why did they bother with them?
Roka scolded the remaining men. "You both need to calm down."
Although her eyes were blinded (if only by the cloth), Amai had her head facing F'sey.
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Posted: Thu Dec 16, 2010 7:02 pm
At least B'lin still had a sense of nobility, even under pressure. F'sey was ready to duck and cover, in no mood to spend time with some crazy woman, or watch Roka pick the soul from someone else's bones.
Blinking as he was scolded, the greenrider scowled at Roka. "How do you know that man is even going to come back? For all we know, he's just played you for a fool and run off to do whatever the hell he wants." He was still leaning against the front of his cell when he realized Amai was watching him. Or something.
She was turned towards him, anyways.
"Piss off," he growled, resembling something like an angry snake.
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Posted: Thu Dec 16, 2010 7:16 pm
In a situation that didn't call for professionalism (and this was the moment she had waited her life for), Roka would have made some remark about straight men always coming back to her. Alas, F'sey would have to make due with her ignoring him.
Not everyone was. "He's still here," she cooed gently, like a mother -- like Ialluth. "You don't need to worry for now. He's right here with you."
B'lin went from nervous to protective to an inexorably maladroit state.
Roka, on the other hand, was fuming she'd lost this rider's attention already. In an effort to gain it back, she piped up, "No one told me you were blind."
Nothing.
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Posted: Thu Dec 16, 2010 7:20 pm
F'sey looked taken aback, and actually tipped his head to one side. Why she sounded soothing, he had no idea.
"...no," he insisted, glancing towards the door just to make sure he wasn't mistaken. "The guard has most definitely left. The only one still here is B'lin." He furrowed his brows. Maybe the woman was just confused; she was blind, after all. "Maybe you should sit."
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Posted: Thu Dec 16, 2010 7:51 pm
"Yes, that's a good idea," Roka agreed. She spoke louder than need be and didn't hesitate to take the arm of this peculiar person.
The rider was jerked forward. When she caught up, it was not to sit, but to take the hand of her self-appointed guardian. "You've no dragon. How sad." How sad, she said. How sad. It was all so sad.
"No, I don't," Roka confirmed, "but it's all right. Why don't you sit down?"
More silence.
Roka tried again. "Do you want to sit down?"
Still that lull in sound.
Relentless, Roka asked instead, "Is that your assistant? It must be troublesome not being able to see your way around."
"I see through Her." Amai avoided the chair. She could be sitting, standing or dancing for all Roka cared; talking was good enough for her. "We are very sad for the falling. But this one still lives."
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Posted: Thu Dec 16, 2010 7:59 pm
She was talking nonsense. Completely and utter nonsense. F'sey glanced towards B'lin, trying to gauge the man as he cleared his throat and shuffled uneasily. But.
Amai was sharding insane!
"...I thought dragons didn't Impress to the mentally ill," he hissed, moving to another side of his cage. Wouldn't that Whermaster hurry up!?
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Dragonriders of Pern Shop Captain
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Posted: Thu Dec 16, 2010 8:06 pm
Roka glared daggers at F'sey. If he wasn't going to help her, he didn't have to make it worse! "Don't mind him, dear."
"Sharding imbeciles!"
F'sey's saving grace had arrived.
The wherhandler had tried to fetch Brambel, but had been given a resounding "no" when asked to free F'sey. That meant he had to get the cranky old guy instead. Which was unpleasant.
"Always the dragonriders!" he could be heard ranting from down the hall. "Always taking up our time as if we have nothing else to do with it!" Soon as he was in the same room, the yelling stopped. Brambel took one look at the blackrider and scurried to the cell, fumbling through the keys until he found the right one.
B'lin had looked conflicted about what to do. He still did. The most he had moved aside from his valiant effort to shield Roka had been to side-step some old man that looked like he had a personal grudge against all of them.
"Just get out of here," Brambel growled under his breath when the door swung open.
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Posted: Thu Dec 16, 2010 8:12 pm
They heard the Whermaster long before he approached. F'sey would have complained, but everyone had gone silent, Amai included. If he never had to hear her speak again, well, the older redhead would be just fine with that.
He all but hurried out of the cell when Brambel opened the cell. Stopping to tip his head, F'sey offered a hurried "Thanks," as he scrambled out. Honestly? He'd never been so grateful to a wher handler in his entire life. Latching onto his bronzerider (and not giving a sharding damn if B'lin was worried about catching his sharding gay, there were worse things), the new Wingleader tugged.
"We're leaving, kid. Let's go."
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Dragonriders of Pern Shop Captain
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Posted: Thu Dec 16, 2010 8:18 pm
B'lin was worried for a different reason: Roka. She caught the troubled look he was aiming at her and waved at him dismissively. Between that and F'sey's persistence, he had no grounds to argue and went along with him.
"That's the blackrider?" he whispered as they left. "What's wrong with her?"
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Posted: Thu Dec 16, 2010 8:24 pm
"Looks like," F'sey grumbled. "Guess was on to something about those mutant dragons."
He did not let go of B'lin, not even when they were a ways away from the jail. Only when they approached their weyrs did he release his deathgrip on the boy's wrist. "...thank you, B'lin."
For everything.
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