Where Am I? (Open)

[Ember]

Huh. Whoops. Iskierka stared at the mini-waterfall in front of her as she tried to figure out how she had gotten lost. For her it was pretty unusual, but then again Burimyu was a whole new place and considerably larger than Selenitas. It would take a while to get used to the layout...but that was exactly why she was exploring it. She refused to live in a place she didn't know inside out. Still, she hadn't expected to actually get lost while exploring. Well, to be more precise she just couldn't remember how to get back.

She could keep telling herself all she wanted but that didn't change the fact that she was in a bit of a bad situation. Woe! Woe! Woe! Woe is I, lost with Iskiiii, no prettydazzling gurlies for drooling. "Stop babbling, you're giving me a headache." Always nice to know your own 'mandyr doesn't think you're woman enough for him. Or maybe it was only because he was bonded to her? The brown, easily enraged, snorted and charged against her neck. "Hey, that tickles. Congratulations, you've moved up from not even being felt."

The increased anger she felt and the pushing against her neck brought a small, humourless smile to her face. It was still odd to be able to be forced to be angry at herself...and yet not. She'd mangled the bond between her and Ioth but it seemed impossible to do so with her bond with Rhino. He was just so different from her blue that no matter what she did it didn't work. Thankfully the brown monster wasn't bonded super close. She could still work around his modd swings at least. His chases were still a nuisance though. She didn't like being so out of it during flights or runs.

Grrrrr. Stupid Iski teasemocking always. No wonder no have gurlie of own. "And you do?" That earned his silence and she snorted. He did in fact have a 'gurlie' of his own, he just tended to forget about her when she wasn't around. And she wouldn't be around for a while yet. Waaaah! So mean, where sparkly girlies!? Rhino unloved, loooonely- "Didn't I already tell you to shut up?" Iskierka asked with a small sigh as her 'mandyr returned to whining about the unfair world.

[Avu]

It’s not that bad.

She blew out her breath, pulling one shoulder up into a halfhearted shrug. It’s kind of worse. And since that sounded utterly selfish, Meira added, even though she knew Jingth tried to pretend not to mind, I’m sorry you can’t sunbathe, even. A brief dismissal from the gold dragon, tinged with a faint wistfulness— Meira bowed her head slightly, pivoting on a slow turn. Hated this—getting lost every time she set foot out of her room, the sinking knowledge that a minute of inattention would result in five minutes trying to find her way back to the original path. Not, really, that she was ever in a hurry. Could explore, if she wanted, and sometimes she did, had meticulously gotten herself lost, but most of the time she…didn’t. Actually, she’d been spending a lot of times in the archives—they were closed, which meant nobody went, and Meira never touched any of the scrolls, sat just outside the door of the library. Quiet there. Private.

But she couldn’t stay there, not if she was supposed to be one of Burimyu’s leaders, and not since there was only E’rro for Healing otherwise, and not since Jingth had pointed out that retreating like that wasn’t an emotionally sound way of coping. So—Healing and ‘Council’ duties aside—Meira had been…kind of drifting a little every day, between people, making sure they were holding up even if she wasn’t. Made it easier, that there were only so many people at Burimyu at all, and most of them Legatus, but the Weyrlings; they couldn’t have taken the change in stride. Or maybe they had, and she was the only one who wasn’t able to let go of Selenitas.

Mandyr speak, Mimic piped up suddenly from one pocket, the Salamandyr’s tail curling comfortingly around her wrist, the brown’s tongue flicking out to touch her palm in a light caress. Meira looked down at him, the bright eyes fixed forward, frill half-extended in curiosity. Maybe this was how Mimic coped with leaving, because sometimes she could feel the fluttering of pain from him, too; Doppelganger and Lilitu, Riaren—by throwing everything forward. Optimism; it could only get better from here. She touched his spine with one finger, earning an absentminded purr. His claws pressed against her wrist as he tilted his head, crooned; Cheer up, stranger-friend—fair soon.

—you don’t know that choked in the goldrider’s throat, but she swallowed them, pasted a smile across her face (it felt faker with every time and sometimes she felt like she’d forgotten what a real smile felt like) and tilted her face up from the ground. “Sorry,” was the automatic response that slipped out, voice rough from lack of use. Meira swallowed, clearing her throat, gaze flicking to Iskierka curiously—the bluerider wasn’t someone that she was in contact with usually. She wasn’t sure if the apology was for Mimic—and she didn’t know when she’d started apologizing for the Salamandyr’s sweetness, and she thought she’d feel worse about that, but she just…didn’t—or for accidentally interrupting whatever Iskierka was doing.

Or maybe it was just a general apology—sorry for the war, for leaving Selenitas, for everything.

“I think I’m lost,” almost an afterthought. “I don’t…”

It’d never be like this, at Selenitas. She didn’t ever have to concentrate to know where she was going, could blink and find herself anywhere—the Infirmary, T’san’s weyr (a name she’d been doing her best to avoid thinking about because she missed him and it hurt), the crèche, the Main Hall. Missed that, the casual ease, the comfortable knowledge of belonging.

It’s new.
It’s wrong.

[Ember]

Iskierka turned to look at the person who had just arrived, another mandyr along for the ride. Interesting person to run into while lost. Interesting, annoying and...oh shards, attractive too, or so said Rhino. He uncoiled himself and began stretching languidly, trying to catch the beauty's attention. Rhino smexybeast, righty prazzling booty? he called out, though he certainly didn't specify who he was talking to. Meira should simply know that she was being addressed.

Iskierka completely ignored whatever her 'mandyr was babbling about in hopes to get Meira to ignore him so that he stopped causing trouble. Besides, the unexpected apology was somewhat interesting. "Sorry? What does a goldrider such as yourself have to apologize to a bluerider for?" The bluerider was very much, perhaps overly so, aware of the hierarchy on Pern. Goldriders...didn't necessarily come first since they were easily controlled by the Weyrleader, but they were more important than she would ever be. Meira was also a bit of a special case since Burimyu operated under a council rather than the typical Weyrleadership.

Iskierka was secretly quite amused to find out that Meira was just as lost as she was. While she hadn't been looking for a rescue she had hoped that whoever stumbled across her might have known the way back. "That makes two of us then. Damned place is too big," she commented. Her voice didn't betray any thoughts but she really did think that Burimyu was huge. If ever enemies managed to get into the weyr it'd be quite a task to find them and would invite defeat in detail. Unless they managed to learn every possible route, in which case it might well be easy to do the same to their enemies.

"It may not be my place to ask, but what is a Council Member doing wandering around the weyr? It's not safe." Especially for you, she didn't add. Iskierka didn't know much about Meira but she didn't think she was a fighter. Healer, goldrider, girl, mother. Such were her labels. It wasn't strictly necessary to be a fighter to go wandering, nor did it make other dangers any less likely, but it certainly lent those meant to protect people like Meira a little more peace of mind.

[Avu]

“Ah…yes?” Meira was not entirely sure that ‘yes’ was an appropriate answer to the Salamandyr’s question, but since the words had also apparently bewildered Mimic, who coiled quietly around her wrist, peering curiously at Rhino, she felt like she ought to answer some way. Even if it was the wrong way. Mimic never liked it when he was ignored, something she thought all Salamandyrs had in common, if only because the more obnoxious ones were all looking for attention too. Wasn’t fair to ignore Rhino. But still, couldn’t Mimic…she gave the brown a mental nudge, and he startled against her palm, tongue flicking against her fingers quietly before he tilted his head at Rhino.

Smexy? he asked, evidently the only thing he could think of. His tail wound tighter around Meira’s wrist like an anchor, frill flicking out as if to serve as a distraction for Rhino so Hers could concentrate on Iskierka instead.

Not that Meira really answered the bluerider’s question; she blinked, a little startled at that attitude. What did rank have to do with apologies? But she didn’t answer, merely tugging her shoulders up in a shrug—she didn’t know what she was apologizing for, after all, just that she was sorry. Everything was sorry. A small smile began at the corners of her lips at Iskierka’s admitting that she, too, was lost, something pathetically amusing in that despite the fact that it got her no closer to where she wanted to be. The question, though, made her blink again, and her smile turned sardonic.

“Council members’re expected to know their way around without having a map in front of them constantly,” she exhaled in resignation, “So I’ve got to get used to it, memorize. Can you tell it’s working?” Meira glanced sideways, faintly embarrassed at the impossibility Burimyu presented; she’d never had this kind of problem with Healing. Memorizing was easy then. Still was, she supposed, the steps and how things were supposed to be. This was…she couldn’t. Or didn’t want to. She didn’t know which it was and didn’t want to admit that it might be that she was actually trying not to memorize her way around, because that would feel like accepting this.

“And I was actually just on my way back to the weyr, this time.” The weyr. Not hers. The place she slept never had to be home, even though she tried to pretend it was when she was around people. She’d never managed to say home, though. There was a difference between guiding people into acceptance and outright lying. “Depending on where you want to go—I know the Main Hall’s somewhere that way,” Meira tipped her head sideways and back, indicating the direction she’d come from. “Not the direct path, but. Somewhere.”

[Ember]

Crap. Iskierka's hand twitched slightly at the pure desire to touch Meira that flooded the bond between her and Rhino. Stupid. Sharding. Mandyr. Break heart! Mercy Rhino, loved so! The brown in question purred to Meira. And then he was addressed by the other brown. Oh? Rhino questioned, mental tone filled with a jealous rage. Clingylook at my booty? Rhino cha...chall...fight for booty!

Why did mandyrs have to be so damn complicated? Between the random attraction and the random rage for the same person even Iskierka began to lose her composure. She wasn't sure how long she'd had the little menace but she still wasn't able to shut him out like she could Ioth. She never wanted the brown to Impress to her. At the time she distinctly remembered wanting a quiet bath. Nothing wrong with that and yet she was punished anyways. Tch.

And whoa too much emotion. Iskierka sighed inwardly as she struggled to close the lid on her turbulent emotions and pay attention to Meira at the same time. The answer she received had her lips quirking in a smile - though certainly not a friendly one. Closer, perhaps, to a sneer than anything else. It was her natural response, wasn't it? Well, Rhino's anger and her own temperment justified the expression but the lovey-dovey feelings certainly didn't. "Well, you know, if you keep working at it I'm sure it'll eventually work out." The lack of emotion in Iskierka's words would let Meira interpret it as she liked but the bluerider wasn't aiming to encourage her.

Iskierka glanced in the direction Meira indicated but shrugged. "I wasn't going anywhere in particular. I was trying to figure this place out," she admitted. "Though knowing my way back would be a good idea. Not knowing the layout of my own weyr...shameful." Iskierka, also, didn't consider Burimyu her home anymore than a lot of the new weyr's inhabitants did. Of course, she hadn't considered Selenitas or even Benden as her home either. Such a place never existed to her in the first place.

[Avu]

The other Salamandyr was…confusing. Mimic chirped awkwardly, unsure what to do with the sound of disapproval in the other’s voice. His tail curled closer around Meira’s wrist, the brown’s frill twitching uncertainly for a minute before he offered, Love? Friends? like the olive branch it was. He couldn’t bear but add—because he did want to understand—‘splain please. Booty? Mimic’s tail flicked up at the end like a question mark, the brown adding a hopeful croon at the end. Determined to make this come out well, he was. He missed Salamandyr company—Doppelganger’s absence was almost physically painful. Missed his eggbrother so badly. And Lilitu, too—the lovely.

“…ah?” Both eyebrows rose slightly, an insubstantial attempt at covering the pink embarrassment that flooded her cheeks at the deadpan delivery of the bluerider’s words. Meira wasn’t exactly a Mindhealer, but you didn’t have to be to recognize that such an emotionless tone meant nothing friendly. Felt strange, remembering that everyone coped with change their own way. She’d assumed that her presence might help other people—seemed to have for some of the younger inhabitants of Burimyu—because her way of coping was working until she couldn’t remember anymore. Some people coped by staying alone, then. Fine. “Well, thanks,” because manners were manners, even if the words came out awkward, a little cold and stilted, unnatural.

It’s okay, love. Come see me. /I/ want you. The gold’s voice was soft. Jingth had been that way ever since they’d left Selenitas; quicker to soothe, slower to temper. With her, with everyone. Weith was treated with barely-thawed formality, but the white-hot flashes of animosity she used to harbor for the bronze had faded to an entirely manageable level, never showed except in a quickening of her eyes when she was forced to interact with the bronze—fortunately rare, and generally, when it occurred, of her own, grudging, decision.

I’m lost, remember? Meira replied, resisting the desire to fold her arms across her chest. Mimic’s heartbeat vibrated against her palm, the goldrider shrugging at Iskierka’s words. Didn’t want to be anything less than utterly polite, “Good luck, then. If,” a slight smile quirked at the corners of her mouth, more automatic than heartfelt, “that’s the right phrase here.” She wasn’t even sure it was—didn’t know how to talk to Iskierka. Wasn’t sure she wanted to; everything about the other woman was…slightly intimidating, honestly. “I’m sorry for…” Meira wet her lips to buy time, “Uh, intruding, I guess.”

[Ember]

The other salamandyr was...stupid. Rhino brushed Mimic's mind with the mental equivalent of an annoyed sigh. Life sooooo unfair. Not only clingy bo on Rhino booty but duuuuumb clingy! Booty be clingpost, yes? No like touchtouch booty. My booty! Fight for booty, kill for booty, Rhino explained with plenty of antagonism in his tone. Really! To go through all that explanation and that other brown was still touching his one true love! Bad bad bad.

Iskierka was cold but even she could recognize when she made someone awkward. Especially if it was someone as transparent as Meira. She had no problem with people being awkward around her. It usually meant they didn't come near her and that meant she didn't have to pretend to be civil with them if they were of a higher rank. The bluerider would rather pretend she was okay being alone her whole life than actually make the effort with people who wouldn't care one way or another if a tool died.

If she had anything in the world then it would be Ioth. Except in her desire to protect him she destroyed that too. Iskierka twitched ever so slightly when Meira spoke again. Er, right, conversation. "Mm, beats me if it is," she commented wryly, not caring if it seemed out of place. She stared at the goldrider for a moment when she apologized before simply shrugging. "You weren't intruding. Nothing to intrude on...and even if you were there isn't a need to apologize. It's not like you walked in on a couple having sex or something. Some things simply don't need apologies, miss Councilwoman."

Somehow the teacher role had stuck with Iskierka like a bad habit. She couldn't get rid of it and it seemed to crop up at the oddest times (in her opinion anyways). "If the leaders of a Weyr aren't confident everyone will lose their way. Tools can only do amazing things when they are wielded with confidence. Whatever your age, everyone born with a right to a position such as your has to learn when, and if, apologizing is appropriate. Well, this is nothing more than the ramblings of a tool anyways."

[Avu]

He was…so, so confused. Mimic chirped uneasily, well able to pick up on the antagonism in Rhino’s tone, and yet utterly at a loss to place it. He missed having company he could understand. This was so…stressful; what if something he said accidentally made Rhino hate him? (Of course, there was a chance it was too late, but Mimic preferred not to think about that—he was so terribly lonely even with His and he’d so like a friend.) Yours, he said uncertainly, shrinking back against Meira’s wrist like it was a shield, Not fight, kill bad. Sorry. Is fine, promise? It never occurred to him that it was his hold on His that was the problem—it never would, probably. As it was, he flicked his tail nervously, hopped backwards a small step along her forearm.

Run awaaaay…confused Mimic was very confused.

She paused at Iskierka’s words, hesitation slowing her step. The goldrider had already turned to go—where, she didn’t know, but anywhere. Meira swallowed, and then nodded silently at the words, not sure if she was supposed to classify that as encouragement or just a casual comment. Not sure about much, really, not in this situation. Although, yeah, thanks to every god she didn’t actually believe in that she hadn’t stumbled upon a tryst. At least that was one situation that had to be more awkward than this. The advice, anyway…it wasn’t anything she hadn’t heard before, but she supposed this was where the phrase ‘easier said than done’ came into play. Hated Jingth for being gold, sometimes.

But was that…was that really what people thought of her, of the Council? Was that what they thought about the Weyrleadership, too, before they’d left Selenitas? Meira dropped her gaze, spine stiff at just how oblivious she’d been. Tool. Hated thinking of people that way. Lots of people had something to die for; not many had something to live for, but everyone at the Weyr, everyone who’d Impressed—they did. They weren’t tools. And she didn’t want to use them. (Some small part of her reminded her that Jingth did, and often, too—casually as breathing, like it was nothing. Like dragon, like rider, then, was it?)

“Honestly,” she said quietly, after a moment, “Speaking as—I wasn’t always. I didn’t want to be. I was fine with a wher, and this may be slightly beside the point but…you don’t have to have a shiny dragon to be…worth something.” She hadn’t wanted Jingth, at first, especially not when she was pregnant and terrified that she was going to traumatize the gold; she’d wanted Meisk back. “Just—yeah.” It was beside the point, but it still felt like an insult to Meisk’s memory to let a mindset like that go unchallenged. It had been years, of course, and most days she didn’t even think of the wher, but she never forgot him, either. She added, quieter, “Thank you,” a little embarrassed, turned to go.