Fort Weyr - Lake Shore
This lake shares many features common to mountain lakes — a brilliant blue jewel nestled amongst the rocks. The waters are crystal clear, and the north shore slopes gently before abruptly falling away into the depths. This lake does have one significant differentiating feature, however. The south shore of the lake is a tumbled mass of rubble, rock and earth of an ancient rockslide smoothed only by the elements in the intervening years. This rubble, as well as the rather sheer east and west faces, makes for the north shore to be the only one easily accessible.
It's a glorious autumn morning in Fort, with just a hint of crispness in the air as the last of summer's heat clings stubbornly to the sunlight that floods the bowl. It bounces off the choppy surface of the lake, where the waters are churned by activity near the shoreline - one gold dragon, one brown, hunkering low as they can to allow a swarm of candidates to brush and scrub their hide. Not too far from the dragons is Thys, standing in conversation with a man who's taller than her, a little older, and also dressed in riding gear. "Don't forget between their toes!" Thys calls out to the crowd she's supervising, grinning over at them all before she winks at her companion and continues their conversation.
It seems everyone has a task set to them this morning. Candidates bathing dragons, Riders overseeing the bathing.. and one tiny woman darting madly along the shoreline after a tiny blue firelizard. Wait.. what? Nope the eyes do not play tricks here comes Gabriela hot on the winged heels of Azul. "Come back here you little wank! Nobody said you could play with that!" Azul is having a wonderful time winging this way and that with a small spool of something clutched to him. All the while Gabriela is jogging and jumping trying to catch the joyful creature. Right up until she gets a smidge too close to that water line. Rocks are slippery when wet you know. And with a slip she shrieks and careens directly into the chilly waters. Splash
Attention was drawn to Gabriela even before she managed to slip; the use of a certain 'w' word has Thys looking wide-eyed at the girl, then rushing to help her when she gets a good dunking. "Fl'n, help her up, won't you?" The junior weyrwoman hovers over Gabriela, while the brownrider offers her his hand to haul her up, if she'll take it. "Are you alright, Gabbi? Here, take my jacket…" And she starts shrugging out of it, when Fl'n stops her. "Mine's warmer," he argues, removing his much larger jacket to hold it out to the girl. And just as Rhenesath croons her concern from where she's getting bathed, so does Thys from up close. "Anything bruised? Worse? Cut? Hurting? Do you need the infirmary? Or… is it just your pride that's been hurt?"
What a way to garner attention. Gabriela coughs against her fist to clear her lungs of any inhaled water bits. "Thank you," she accepts the brownrider's help. Slight as she is it's a simple tug and she's on her feet and wading out of the water. Azul cheeps in concern and drops the spool. Directly on the brownrider's head as Gabby accepts his jacket. "Sorry about Azul!" She tilts her head to glare at the winged terror. "No thank you ma'am. I think it's just my pride and clothes that got injured and soaked through." For his part Azul looks terribly sad even as he perfects a landing directly atop Gabby's head.
"What the…" Fl'n lifts his hand to his head when something drops on it, though the spool bounces away harmlessly. That doesn't stop Rideth from wuffling concern over towards his rider though, the little brown escaping the cleaning crew to give an almighty shake of his body, spattering everyone within the splash zone. Oops? Some of those water droplets make it as far as Thys, Fl'n and Gabriela, and the goldrider laughs it off lightly. "As long as you're not hurt… have you met my brother before? Fl'n, brown Rideth's; Fl'n, this is a rather wet Gabriela. I got her a job in the stores… if she took it?" Questioning brown eyes turn onto the younger girl, brows raised in expectation.
"Gitar string." Gabriela inserts the 'what' neatly in there as she bends over to retrieve it. Forgetting entirely that Azul is on her head. With an offended squeak the little blue disappears between. As water rains down from the side and above, Gabby is left to blink blandly at Rideth. Why not? She's already soaked she figures. "I have not. It's a pleasure Fl'n." Cuddled into his jacket she smiles sweetly. "I do work in the Stores. Though I have yet to come across my boss." She tilts her head as she shrugs, "Someone called Tupell gets great satisfaction in telling me where to go though."
Thys rolls her eyes. "A lot of people in the stores tend to think they can tell whoever they like where to go." She runs a hand through her short hair, which is slightly damp now thanks to the looming, still slightly dripping Rideth. Fl'n reaches a hand out to his dragon's foreleg, and smirks at Gabriela before asking her: "Have you ever washed a dragon?" Thys looks side-on at him, raising one brow… and then smirking. She, too, looks at Gabriela, and her smile turns warm, chiming in with her brother's question. "Since you're wet and all already, why don't you join the others in scrubbing Rideth and Rhenesath down? If you'd like to, of course. It could be… educational."
"Hey I fit right in," Gabriella quips with a soft laugh. With her personality there is little doubt she has told one or two of the workers where to go and she wouldn't mean to work either. "It's actually real easy when I'm not having to make the excuse that my firelizard ate my homework." Azul is young and playful yet. "Wash a who?" Wide brown eyes are turned on Fl'n before the follow the leg upward to the bulk of the brown. "Nope I haven't. Try to avoid getting to close in case one sneezes or shifts in a nap." Gooey or squishy Gabby is NOT on her list of things to experience. "I reckon I could give it a go if you want," she says with a look to Thys. She is crazy enough to toss baskets at bronzeriders but she isn't about to tell a Goldrider no. Well okay so there was that one time..
"Fantastic," Thys says, putting a gentle hand on Gabriela's shoulder to steer her towards Rideth, who turns and lumbers back towards the shore where he was before. The candidates gather in around him again, and Fl'n commandeers a scrubbing brush from one of them to hand to Gabriela, before he leans casually against his dragon's side. Thys joins him, while Rhenesath watches them with blue-whirled eyes. "So," Thys starts, while Fl'n talks with the closest candidate, "all you have to do is scrub. As if you're washing the floor, almost - some dragons like it in circular motions, or some like long sweeps… you can hurt him, though, no matter which you do. And you never know, this might be a skill that'll come in useful for you in the future." Rideth turns around to look down at Gabriela, breathing his warm breath over the three people. Fl'n grins, turning his attention back to his sister and the stores-girl. With a chuckle, he says: "Could be very handy for you, learning how to wash a dragon."
Well that settles it and Gabriela follows the Riders into the pack of candies already amassed. As she goes she divests herself of the jacket and commits herself to the shivers with the rest of the pack who appear to be scrubbing away rather happily. "Floors don't have a preference so it's not entirely the same," she comments and takes the brush in one hand while offering the jacket with the other. "You might want to rescue this before I wind up soaking it too." It's rather sad that half the candidates working away are taller than she is. "Oh yeah I can see a career change now," she comments with a chuckle. "From Stores worker to Dragon scrubber. Maybe I could start my own business and name it 'Wash N' Fly'." For all her sarcastic humor she does wet the brush and scrub once the jacket is no longer in her possession.
Both Thys and Fl'n laugh at the proposed business name, and Gabriela might just see the siblings exchanging a glance after. Fl'n takes the jacket back when it's handed to him, though he doesn't put it on; rather, he rummages through the pockets while Thys oversees Gabriela's technique. "Try a little harder than that," she advises, stroking a hand along her brother's dragon's side. while the brown's big head hovers above them. Fl'n clears his throat, and steps forward. "You could set up Wash N' Fly as a rider, if you wanted. If you wanted to accept this, that is." He holds out his hand, in the palm of which is a white knot. "Rideth would like you to take it. He thinks you'll make an excellent lifetime scrubber, and he doesn't want to deprive a lifemate of your potential."
"Are you supposed to fear taking off the hide?" Gabriela is genuinely curious when Thys instructs her to scrub harder. "How do you know it's too hard or too soft?" Obviously she means when you aren't the one who can hear them. "A what?" Eyebrow quirked suspiciously Gabby flicks a glance at Fl'n. "Good one honey." Scrub scrub. Hold up accept what? What's he got now? The brush pauses so Gabby can straighten up and take an actual look at the two Riders. Forgive her for not paying attention she'd thought they were all joking around. "What kind of dragon would want me?" Gabby reaches out to finger the white knot then glances at Thys with a smile. "Can you picture something that big with a sense of humor like mine?" C'mon! Wash N' Fly.. how corny can you get? "Everything comes with a price in life." She looks curiously at the pair of Riders, "So what does this set me in for?"
Thys defers all those questions to her brother, looking over at him as she relaxes against his dragon's warm hide. Fl'n clears his throat. "Uh… that gets you a pass into candidacy, if you accept it. It gets you…" It's his turn to look at Thys now, for her input. Which she offers, with a grin. "It gets you," she says, "time to learn and prepare for the Hatching, and for a potential lifemate. Rhenesath tells me that Rideth sees something in you, that you have rider potential, so, quite possibly, accepting the knot could be a life-changing decision." She looks back at Fl'n, who looks hopefully at Gabriela. "You'd be my first candidate, if you accept."
Gabriela stands there looking up at Fl'n like she can see through him. Gauging his words with clear intelligence balanced with a sizeable amount of common sense. "Candidacy." She purses her lips and considers it. "You're good," she tells the brownrider with a grin. "You should barter for the Weyr or something. Sweet face like that and a selling personality, you could talk a man into buying a common rock for a fortune." It's a long way up for a short person to peer upward at the pair of Dragons. "Not a single negative mentioned in there. So there must be more than a few eh?" Now she glances at the other Candidates that go from peering at her curiously to studiously scrubbing. Uh huh. So she'd figured! "Alright then. I've had bad and worse before. Let's see what ya'll got in store..I'll do it."
"Sweet." Fl'n is totally blushing in response to those compliments. Thys is laughing. "Congratulations, Gabriela, on becoming a candidate for Kouzevelth and Kainaesyth's clutch. Fl'n… go and get her settled in, would you? I have to go see Inri about something…" She touches her fingers to her temple in a sharp little salute for Gabriela, before disappearing. Fl'n steps up, grinning crookedly, and with his hands deep in his pockets. "I'll show you where the barracks are, get you settled and sorted. Then you can come back and scrub some more, if you want?"
Gabriela is hardly a mystery to Thys after their first introduction. The Goldrider had to know something along those lines were coming for her poor brother. "Thank you." She glances between the two of them and chuckles. "Though if I have to deal with Ha'ze you have to promise to be forgiving. We uh.. have issues with one another." Ha'ze likes to annoy her and she likes to throw things at him kind of issues. "Thanks Thys. Have a good day.." She watches the woman slip away before turning to her brother. "Barracks? I'm not going to lose all my stuff am I?" She steps toward the brownrider as she asks her questions. "Yeah sure I can scrub until I turn blue. So long as there's something warm to eat after."
Fl'n steps away from Rideth, and indicates Gabriela should follow him as he heads across the bowl. "I've never really spent time in the candidates barracks when there've been candidates there, so honestly? I don't know about your stuff… but apprentices prank each other all the time, so I guess this might be the same?" He shrugs, and grins. "Ha'ze's dragon's the father of the clutch, you know that, right?"
"Need to find someone to keep my gitar then," Gabriela comments with a sigh. "Someone pranks my Mama's gitar and it'll be ugly." She is talking more to herself than to Fl'n on that point. "The rest of my stuff I can probably bring with or live without. I didn't have much when I came anyway." Almost said 'ran' but Gabby made a horrible save! "Got that from what your sister just said yeah. I didn't pay any attention to it before and it slipped my mind." She shrugs a shoulder, "I'll see how this goes. But I have a feeling if he lays eyes on me he'll come away with the knot." She chuckles softly at the prospect of Ha'ze trying for it. "Bridges to cross when I get there eh?" Following the Rider back toward the Weyr she continues to pepper him with questions and snippets of flirtation.
The title of this log made me giggle so hard. (I liked the log too, admittedly, but I had to praise the title!)