Catch! [Open]

[Sparrow]

One piece of meat, two flitters, and a race that Tuck was planning to win. Aleyi had tossed the prize high in the air, but it had reached it's maximum and was falling again. He had to rush to snag it while it was still airborne, as well as to beat Pip to it.

He could hear her, but not see her. She was behind him. He had this one. Then he felt a spider-like tickling on his belly, and with a screech of dismay, turned and dove for the table. Pip swept out from beneath him, turned right side up again, and with another downstroke, was on the meat, swallowing it practically before she had landed.

Tuck realized the trick his sister had played on him and chattered angrily at her while Brooke heaved her most royal of sighs and Aleyi laughed. Flitters were great entertainment.

[ShadowReine]

Laughter came from not that far from Aleyi too. R'mer, leaning against a table, with a note of, "Your firelizards are crazy."

Not that his was any better and, of course, he had a completely insane dragon to deal with too. Most people could at least make some guess as to how their beasts would act, but with Tinth...

"Of course, I think Brooke is looking down her muzzle at the others." Typical queen, that. The bluerider shrugged a little bit.

"They're entertainment, at least." And he had, at this moment, nothing better to do than to watch crazy flitters get into it with each other...now, where was his blue hiding?

[Sparrow]

"Less crazy than your dragon," she shot back with a laugh. But not by much. She flicked another morsel towards her flitters and they scrambled over each other to nab it. This time, Tuck won, although it was only due to the fact that he had a longer neck.

Aleyi didn't even have to look at Brooke to know that R'mer was telling the truth about her. "When is she not? Although I really don't see what's fun in that." She would never quite get the little queen, or any queen for that matter.

"Where're your flitters at? I'm sure Pip would love a little more competition." Tuck, probably not.

[ShadowReine]

"Not sure. I think they found a wild fair to play with," R'mer admitted. "Meaning they'll be back when they get hungry."

He was fairly sure that as far as firelizards were concerned, their bonded humans were nothing more or less than sources of free food. "And hey...I'm the only person allowed to tell Tinth he's crazy. Even if it is completely and utterly true."

He loved his dragon, but crazy was definitely a word for it. "Eh. She's a queen. It's like...what queens do. Even the newest one...Fioloth looks down her muzzle at people. I'm glad her rider isn't like that."

Kari would keep that little violet down to earth if anyone could.

[Sparrow]

"Ah. I bet Pip would like to do that too." She did too, sometimes, with Tuck trailing. Brooke liked that, but Aleyi didn't. When the smaller flitts were gone, the only person for Brooke too boss around was Aleyi. Not a great situation.

She laughed. "Okay, got it. You still have permission to call my flitts crazy though." Because there was no way she could say it to them often enough.

"Fioloth doesn't even have much of a muzzle to look down yet." Not that she was going to go point that out to the young queen. "Although... I guess it is more than Brooke's got." Had been since hatching. "Whaddya think of that, Brooke?" The little Gold snorted. She was still Gold.

"And yeah... I'm glad Kari's not like that. I think we've avoided that in our queenriders so far, pretty well." A good thing, since it was the human part of the pair that had a lot more to do with people like R'mer and Aleyi.

[ShadowReine]

R'mer grinned. "Yeah. The only arrogant female rider I know is Gwenduinne, and given how that white of hers can fly, she has reason."

And was supposedly quite attractive, but R'mer, entirely homosexual, was not that good at appreciating the female form other than aesthetically. In which sense, he supposed she was...okay. But yeah. He could appreciate a cute boy much more. The way things were.

"And okay. Your flits are crazy." He glanced at Brooke. Who was snorting and acting like the queenlet she was.

[Sparrow]

Aleyi laughed. "I think she's got more reasons than a talented dragon, but I don't think you're the one to discuss those with." Not Gwen either. Sure, she was good-looking, but Nyocia had no shortage of good-looking women, and some of them were actually interested in women. And nice too. That was even more of a plus.

Brooke didn't approve of R'mer looking right at her when he was calling Aleyi's flitts crazy. Normally she could just pass off a comment like that as being directed at the smaller members of her fair, but now it... well, it wasn't. She snorted at him primly to express her distaste.

"Wow Brooke, wow. Your creativity never fails to impress me." Aleyi shook her head. "Can you believe I paid money for her?"

It hadn't been her greatest investment.

[ShadowReine]

"She's decorative," R'mer pointed out. "Definitely a good looking and well put together firelizard."

Sure, the little queen was, well, every inch a queen. Maybe, R'mer thought with amusement, some firelizard queens took one look at their bigger cousins and realized that in order to be noticed they needed to puff themselves up to, well, many times their size. Being as they couldn't do that, they would, instead, settle for having very large personalities.

Of course, he didn't have a queen of any size attached to him, so it was only a guess.

[Sparrow]

"Because decorations are exactly what we get flitters for." Aleyi laughed. But R'mer was right. In Brooke's case, that's basically what she was. She rarely did anything useful. She just sat on Aleyi's shoulder whenever it was available and made her look like... someone with the ill fortune of acquiring a queen flitter.

"But enough about Brooke. I think there's more in this Weyr to talk about than her." As much as Brooke liked being talked about- so long as she wasn't being called crazy- she wasn't a horribly interesting topic.

[ShadowReine]

R'mer considered. "Hrm. Heard any good gossip lately. It doesn't seem like we're getting much in the way of dragon-induced romantic awkwardness lately."

He liked Aleyi...and was very glad she also rode a blue. He suspected she wouldn't like waking up next to him any more than he would. But it was amusing when it happened to other people. All riders seemed to feel that way.

Well, except for the T'mar's of the world, who didn't care who they woke up next to.

[Sparrow]

Aleyi thought, but couldn't come up with anything. "No. Pretty disappointing." Not just disappointing for the lack of gossip, but probably for Jerglith and Tinth too. Little dragon-induced romantic awkwardness also meant few females had risen lately.

"I blame Jorindath. Seems like she's been proddy." ((OOC: ...because I guess that Flight isn't over, so it probably hasn't happened yet... I don't even know.)) If any other female was about to rise, she couldn't do it here.

Well, at least a proddy queen meant that soon there would be an influx of Candidates, and that always lead to some excitement.

[ShadowReine]

"I wonder if she'll pick Apolloth again...and I hope B'can doesn't react to losing the way her *last* weyrmate did if that happens." Shudder. To be that obsessed with a lover was not something R'mer ever wanted.

Sure, it would be nice to have one, but it wasn't as if he would have to *marry* the guy. That kind of commitment was for holders...and R'mer had once been a holder and was sharding glad not to be one any more.

"And yeah. Queens tend to inhibit other females, although you'd think some green would sneak off..." Amirinth was cute. So was T'mar's green...what was her name again...

[Sparrow]

"I can't really see B'can doing that." Nor did she want to. It wasn't like B'can had to lose Inolyn just because Apolloth lost Jorindath, anyway. But if that did happen, and she did shoo him out of the weyr... it would certainly lead to some interesting gossip.

She didn't expect that to happen though. In fact, Aleyi would be surprised if anyone other than Apolloth even won the flight. As conceited as he was, if he had any say in the matter, he wouldn't let anyone else win. It would ultimately be Jorindath's choice but... Aleyi simply didn't expect it.

Aleyi shrugged. "If any greens are sneaking off, I imagine at least one of our boys will inform us of it."

[ShadowReine]

"Tinth certainly wouldn't let a green or barred sneak off without following her," R'mer agreed. "Especially if she was particularly pretty. And given Tinth's idea of particularly pretty changes as often as everything else does..."

Really. Everyone else had a dragon with a personality. Tinth just had moods. "Of course, knowing my luck, he'll pick a barred with a female rider next time...you can have that one." He was pretty sure Aleyi preferred girls as much as he preferred boys.

Flights, of course, tended to make you not care...but there was always the morning after to worry about.

[Sparrow]

"I wouldn't mind." Aleyi grinned. "And if Jerglith picks a girl with a male rider, you can have him." Ending up in bed with a man had the potential for more unfortunate consequences than her simply not being interested. While they were dealt with easily as a rider, she would rather just avoid the situation entirely.

She twirled her fork absently. "What do you think of the business at Danac? With the wherhandlers moving in?" When there wasn't romantic awkwardness to talk about, there really wasn't much at all. Current politics probably weren't the next best option, but there was more going on with them than there was with, say, sweeps.

[ShadowReine]

R'mer shuddered. "I think I feel sorry for the wherhandlers. You know that most holders think whers are stupid and vicious beasts."

Likely because they couldn't talk like dragons could...not that most dragons would lower herself to talk to a mere holder, but the possibility was certainly there.

"Not that they're as smart as dragons, but none of the whers here have ever eaten anything but the herdbeast or wherry they're allowed to eat." He'd never heard of them getting into the breeding stock any more than dragons would, although the occasional wild wher would sneak into the Weyr and have to be chased out. And although whers didn't have an inhibition against hurting humans, they seldom did it, at least not properly bonded whers.

They listened to their handlers, it seemed.

[Sparrow]

Yes, Aleyi knew most holders felt that way. She felt that way still, a little bit. Dragonriding hadn't exactly made her get more experience with whers. Dragons didn't seem to like whers much. But she did feel bad for the handlers. If anything, it wasn't fun to move, and it definitely wasn't great when the place you were moving to didn't welcome you.

"Yeah, it seems like they're pretty obedient. And all this time the whers have been at the Labyrinth, they still worked at Danac, didn't they? Doing patrols and stuff? I don't really understand why there's such a fuss about them living there."

It wasn't like the whers would be up and about there any more than they had been previously. They slept all day, and it didn't sound like many people were interested in sneaking in to wake them.

[ShadowReine]

R'mer shrugged. "Most likely, the holders are worried they'll forget themselves and eat the breeding stock. Whers aren't dragons...but I'd lay bets they aren't that dumb."

Not that he really knew. He'd seen the wherhandlers on those rare occasions when his schedule overlapped with their nocturnal lifestyle. Now that was a reason not to want a wher. Maybe for some of them it had been a reason *to* want a wher, though.

"And yeah. Like I said, I've never seen or heard of any of the whers causing trouble."

[Sparrow]

"We worried about that from wild whers," Aleyi mused. "They're just mixing them up, I guess." Although she wasn't sure Danac had ever had any problem with wild whers either, due to their close proximity to the Weyr. Of course, that might be why they were confused. The holders of Danac lacked experience with whers in general.

"I've only seen a bonded wher hurt anything it wasn't technically supposed to once, and that was the kid's fault." It had been a very old wher, with hardly the strength left in it to lift it's bulbous head, or so they had understood. After throwing rocks it for a while, one of her friends decided go over with a stick and make sure it was even still alive... turned out it was, and rather angry too.

The boy had only gotten a bad bite on the arm and recovered well enough, but no one in the group had been very fond of whers after that. Aleyi gained a little respect for them too, although that still didn't mean she had any desire to be around them.

[ShadowReine]

R'mer shrugged. "I don't have sympathy for kids who bait whers or canines." The results tended to be the same, although the canines were smaller and didn't bite quite as hard.

"Or dragons, although dragons tend to call their riders rather than do their own biting." Every so often, that would happen...and anyone who annoyed Tinth would get R'mer all over them. And if it was a weyrbrat, they would regret it for a few hours of chores at least.

"Dragons are nicer, though. Most of the time." He wasn't so sure about the charcoals...so glad he had not bonded one of *them*.