Chores) Digging up the past

[dragon]

Cleaning. That was what he was supposed to be doing. Cleaning. Well... in all his turns, he never would have thought this could be part of cleaning. But nooooo ... this is what he got stuck doing. Well ... on the bright side, if he ended up with pockets full of oddball bits and shards, no one was going to care or chop his hands off for it.

But it was bloody hot.

Standing in the middle of the hatching grounds, sweating his eyes out, Llannu held a shovel, standing next to a large pail. Which at the moment was empty. But it was supposed to hold the shards and bits of egg shell from the last clutch that had hatched here. Making for a nice, soft, clean sand pack for the next Queen to lay her eggs on.

Bits of shell getting embedded in a Queen's foot could make for some nasty infections, he was told. That and it wasn't very nice to land on as a Candidate if you happened to get knocked down somehow.

Somehow. Riiiiight. After all other things he'd seen? Llannu had a pretty good idea why a body would get knocked down. Because he was getting eaten by a dragon. Either a hatchling, or the mother. One or the other. He was really starting to not want to be a Candidate, worse than his initial misgivings at coming here in the first place.

With a resigned sigh, Llannu stabbed at the ground with his chovel dejectedly, ignoring the bits of shell that were laying on the surface already. Wiping the sweat from his face with one of his sleeves, he sniffed, wishing he'd thought to bring a skin of something wet to drink.

[Rei]

Crystoph frowned from his place on the stands. He ought to be down there helping the other candidate remove egg shards and smooth the sand but in all honesty he didn’t want to. It sounded like a stupid chore anyway. Besides the shards should have been picked up months ago. Why in Faranth’s name they had to do it now the red head didn’t know. It was bittersweet for sure. His own twin had impressed here last hatching and Crystoph had been unable to stand all because a stupid feline had given him a concussion the night before the hatching took place. It hadn’t even mauled him. No instead a wher had chased it off and he had been taken to the infirmary because he was light headed and dizzy. All because of that stupid incident he missed the hatching.

Really it was probably better that Crystoph hadn’t gone in hindsight. Perhaps the Benden riders where right and it was the twins strong bond that had driven the hatchlings away. Well no more. He hadn’t even seen Mik since the twin impressed. The candidate had heard about the impression to be sure but he had yet to actually see his brother or his dragon. In fact Crystoph had the sneaking suspicion that for some reason they where avoiding each other. Well it no longer beared thinking on. He couldn’t even impress a flit or mandyr for Faranth’s sake. Maybe there was something wrong with him. After all he had been standing since he was 14 turns and he was 20 now.

Wiping his brow he looked down at the other toiling candidate and sighed before picking up the canteen he had brought with him. Striding down the rows of seats he jumped the rail and landed softly on the sands. “Hey you. Catch.” Crystoph called out before tossing the water filled skin at the boy. Bending down he picked up a shell shard and gingerly turned it over in his hands. To think a dragon was once held within this shell. Cocking his head he examine the fragment and wondered which of the weyrling dragons it had belonged to.

[dragon]

"Hey you. Catch."

That was all the warning he had.

Llannu's head jerked up like he'd been bitten, just in time to see something big flying at him on an impact trajectory. He squeaked and jumped, managing to catch the object despite himself. But between the impact of it on his chest and his tripping over himself, he fell over backwards to land on his back in the sand. "OOF!" He exclaimed upon landing, all the air knocked out of him. "Ohhhhhh."

Rolling over, he rubbed at his back and frowned at a tiny piece of shell that he'd landed on. Thankfully, the soft nature of the sand had saved him from any real injury - from the fall or from the shard. Instead the shard had sunk into the ground, leaving him with nothing more than a poked spot. Well. Now he knew why he was out here sweating away on this stupid chore! That ... kinda hurt.

He looked over at Crystoph again, heavy bangs swirling around his face. "Uh ... thanks?" He asked, before clambering back to his feet and attempting to dust his backside off with one hand while hanging onto the skin with the other. "What is it?" He asked, eyeing the skin thirstily. Unfortunately, he'd learned the hard way to not always straightaway drink something that someone else tossed at him. Especially if said person was older than him. Which Crystoph most decidedly was. There really was no telling what was in that skin.

[Rei]

Crystoph paused in his examination of the shard to look back at the candidate who was now….sprawled out in the sand? Raising an eyebrow he shook his head. He hadn’t thrown it quite that hard. As Llannu righted himself the red head tossed the shard into the bucket where it landed with a loud clatter that seemed to echo in the silence of the grounds. Bending slightly he picked up another and tossed it in the metal bucket as well. Why was this kid messing around with digging them up when there where so many lying scattered upon the hot sands. Maybe he had rocks for brains?

The boys thanks had Crystoph nodding absently. “No problem.” He muttered as he picked up the bucket and busied himself with picking up the scattered shards. The candidate ignored the other lad’s movements for the moment and then turned as he was addressed again. What was in the skin? Crystoph gave the kid a odd look before replying. “Water. Where you expecting anything else?” Without waiting for an answer he strode away picking up bits and fragments and dropping them into the pail. “Hope you brought more than one bucket cause we are going to need it. There are a lot if shells here. Seriously you’d think they would do this like after the hatching? It would have been a heck of a lot easier. Now some of them are half buried.”

The monologue wasn’t really addressed to the other candidate, Crystoph just felt like talking. It wasn’t that he was intentionally trying to be rude. He just…wasn’t used to company. Ever since Mik impressed Crystoph had been alone. The candidate just wasn’t the type to make friends easily. In fact it took a very patient person to get past his thorny exterior. Oh he was extremely loyal and protective of his friends almost to the point of being slightly annoying. It was just a long and painful journey getting there. Nothing against Llannu but Crystoph wasn’t in the mood to be more than slightly accepting of his presence.

[dragon]

Water. Llannu nodded, and took a big drink from the skin. Water was safe. "I wasn't expecting anything. It's just ... sometimes it's not water." He explained, before grinning hesitantly and then taking the skin over to a shady spot and setting it there - off the sand. It wouldn't be very fun to drink when it equalized with the sand's temperatures, not at all. So he took precautions against it getting that way. Not that it was going to stay at all cool, anywhere near the sands. But ... every little bit helped. Some.

"More bucket?" Llannu asked, stupidly. "Uuuhhhh .. .yeah. Over there." He pointed at one of the tunnel entrances, where two stacks of nested buckets were sitting. "I was just told to fill the buckets and put them near there. Someone else is gonna come get the shards, apparently. I dunno. That's what I was told." He answered, feeling rather bowled over by Crystoph's personality. Just about all he could do was stare and get out of the other lad's way. Or at least it felt that way.

When Crystoph started ranting about the job and how much sense it made - or didn't, as the case might be - Llannu could only shrug helpfully. "I don't know. I haven't been here very long. How long ago was the last hatching?" He asked, curiously, before suddenly lurching forward into motion again, having realized he was just standing there like a dork. Llannu hurried over to the tunnel, and grabbed up two more buckets. Thus armed, he quickly headed back over to where Crystoph was apparently going to town picking up pieces. "Here." He offered, helpfully, setting them down on the sand.

[Rei]

Crystoph was barely paying any attention at all to Llannu. Sure he nodded or grunted in the right places for responses, but didn’t actively answer until the other candidate mentioned the last hatching. The red head looked at the kid as if he where daft. Really where all the new candidates this intelligent? Oh poor Millieth. “The last one? It was months ago. Hepaticath clutched last. Didn’t you hear about the new queen? They have to be at least 7 or 8 months old now.” Yes that old and here they where picking up old shards. Common sense would dictate that these would have been picked up months ago. Then again this was Selenitas. When did anything this weyr did make sense?

Grumbling Crystoph fling a few more shards into the pail and stalked over to the water skin. Taking a long gulp of the now lukewarm liquid he turned to Llannu again. “So where you from kid?” The red head asked in a slightly interested tone before gazing off over the hot sands. A few more weeks and Millieth would grace the sands with her new clutch. It would be interesting to see if the intruders came again. Or perhaps they where only interested in Hepaticath’s eggs. With a new queen born last clutch chances of another where slim to none. No, wouldn’t be another queen for at least a few turns probably. That’s how those things went. Suddenly Crystoph realized he wasn’t paying any attention whatsoever to Llannu and he remedied it by turning to regard the boy with what he hoped was an interested stare. Really to be truthful he could really care less but hell why not be slightly friendly? He was already wasting to much time here. Obviously.

[dragon]

"Oh." Llannu answered, before picking up a full pail and carrying it away toward one of the entrances, where he had been instructed to leave the full pails. He thought about it as he walked back with a couple more empty pails. "How far apart do hatchings come?" He asked, clearly completely stupid to the ways, and ticks of a Weyr's clock. He didn't know if that was a long time ... or very short. Was it going to be another Turn before the next one, or was it going to be tomorrow? He didn't know, and frankly, had no idea how to judge. A glowing dragon meant nothing to him. It was just ... pretty. Sortof. Baring the part where it was a giant predator with massive teeth and wasn't above biting people in two...

In answer to Crystoph's question, Llannu blithely answered obligingly. He never noticed when Crystoph wasn't paying attention, because he wasn't watching Crystoph, instead watching what he was doing as he did it. "I only recently got here to the Weyr. I have no idea what's been going on here, and I certainly don't know anyone. Much less the dragons' names. So, no, I guess I didn't hear." He scooped up a few shards of eggshell from the sands, sifted the sand off and dropped them into the nearest bucket.

"I'm from Hyphen." was the simple answer to where he was from. Most people knew where Hyphen was ... even if Llannu had no sharding idea how to get there from here. He knew where Hyphen was well enough ... he just wasn't real clear on where Selenitas was, in relation to it. Sheltered, Llannu was definitely. He'd ignored the world and had been happy as a jay bird, until he'd been sucked right off his potting stool and shoved into it. It was a really strange place, the rest of the world was.

[Rei]

In all seriousness Crystoph was a bit surprised at Llannu’s reaction to his question. The candidate couldn’t even be bothered to know who the gold riders where? Oh that was rich. It just reminded him of how unfit he believed holders where. Weyrbred candidates made way better riders. To bad it seemed the queens always gravitated towards hold bred girls. Either way the other candidate’s oblivious attitude was starting to ruffle the red head. He practically growled at the next question. “Are you serious? Do you even pay attention at lessons?”

Crystoph shook his head disbelievingly. “For gold rises, It depends on the timing. In times of threadfall the queens rise more often and their clutches are bigger. More queens are produced ect. When thread isn’t a threat the dragons slow their reproduction and a queen might go up once every turn or so and produce a smaller clutch. Really it depends on a lot of factors, but here I think we have at least two clutches a year. Millieth just rose not long ago. Why do you think we are cleaning the bloody grounds? Why do you think you where searched? For the fun of it.” The candidate shook his head. “Millieth will be laying in the next sevenday or so.” Snorting the red head turned and deposited his full bucket by the entrance before returning to continue his job.

What a dim glow. The Hyphen lad was a candidate and it looked like he couldn’t even pay attention at lessons. Great. More fail riders for Selenitas. Perhaps he should have never left Benden. At least there survival was a way of life. Here it seemed like and afterthought. It really was a miracle Selenitas had gotten this far. Gritting his teeth Crystoph shook his head. His thoughts where borderline treasonous but still he couldn’t help but think them. Grunting he hefted another bucket and continued his work silently. He had written Llannu off as just another waste of space. The candidate had no time for the ignorant anymore. Perhaps it was due to his recent illness and failure at impression. More likely it had to do with the fact that his twin brother had more or less abandoned him. At least in Crystoph’s eyes it was abandonment, and if you couldn’t trust your own flesh and blood who could you trust anymore?

[dragon]

"I ..." Llannu fell silent again as Crystoph launched into what sounded for all the world like an irate, ill-tempered lecture where it seemed it could only end on Crystoph morphing into a dragon himself and biting Llannu's head off with a neat little *snik* sound. He just stared at the other Candidate for a moment, wide eyed.

Surely the older Candidate didn't seriously expect everyone on the planet to gravitate around the lives of the people in the Weyr? That was just absurd. So long as Thread was flown, that was all that mattered. It didn't matter what the names of the riders were. Did it? Surely a rider named B'orb could fly thread just as one named N'dar. Or ... whatever. He didn't know. His whole world had been the turntable before him... it hadn't interested him to pay any mind to anything else, much less dragons and their names.

Sidetracked on a very strange thought, Llannu tilted his head to one side. He was Searched for the fun of it? That was just ... absurd! No wonder this whole thing had been so absurd. Maybe he should find a way home again. If it was all just a joke. Ha ha. Ha. Very funny. Okay, everyone had their laugh ... he had pots to make!

Llannu set his pails down and frowned deeply. And then asked a question that probably would only make matters worse. "Which one is Millieth?"

[Rei]

Crystoph actually flinched when Llannu next spoke. He rounded on the other boy with a expression of shock. “You don’t even know the Senior queen’s name? Where the heck have you been the last turn? Under a rock perhaps?” It really was to much for the red head to believe and before he could stop himself he was laughing. Once he had started it was really to hard for him too even try to stop. Finally once his momentary hysteria had quieted he was able to turn and regard Llannu with something close to pity.

Seriously this kid was supposed to impress? He rather felt sorry for whatever dragonet picked him. He didn’t even know who the Senior queen was for Faranth’s sake. Who didn’t know that? Even holders knew who the Weyrleader’s where. It was taught by the harpers wasn’t it? Protection came from the weyr, they gave tithes to the weyr. Seriously did this kid grow up in the jungle like that wild girl?

Wiping tears out of his eyes Crystoph smiled faintly and spoke in an incredulous tone.. “Kid you have a lot to learn. In the first lesson we learned who the Senior queen was. Don’t you pay attention? Surely you’ve been to at least one lesson?” As red head waited for Llannu to respond, he absently finished picking up the last visible shard. So now what? They expected him to dig? Shell and Shards. Instead of picking up a shovel he began to walk towards the stands and the water skin. “Come on lets take a break.” Crystoph didn’t even bother to see if the kid was following as he made his way to the stands. Hot he needed away from the hot.

[dragon]

Llannu was very confused by Crystoph's reaction. At first it seemed the older lad was going to attack him, ever line in his body speaking aggression. But then it changed to sheer hysteria. That ... Llannu really didn't understand. What was so funny, anyway? Just because he didn't know some girl's name?

"No, I ... I wasn't under a rock..." Llannu stammered. Who would want to live under a rock? Holds were much better ... more room for one, even if it was made from rock... Puzzled, Llannu just stood there hanging onto a bucket that he had forgotten he was holding.

"The first lesson? Y...yeah. I remember the first lesson. I've been attending lessons. But ... that was a lot of names, and ... and .... I can't remember any of them." He admitted, shyly. After growing up in a household of a few, and then being thrown into a Weyr society ... he was honestly shocked he still knew what his own name was. So many people, all at once, all new faces, all new names... sheesh.

Llannu obediently followed though, used to taking orders. "Do people often take lots of breaks around here?" He asked, trailing after Crystoph and still carrying the pail.