The Feeding Buckets (4/4)
Dragonsfall Weyr
Amber Hills Hold
Vintner Hall
Healer Hall
Hidden Meadows
Dolphin Cove Weyr
Dolphin Hall
Emerald Falls Hold
Harper Hall
Printer Hall
Green Valley Hold
Leeward Lagoon Hold
Barrier Lake Weyr
Sunstone Seahold
Citrus Bay Hold
Writers: Duskdog, Estelle, Halyonix, Heather, Sia, Yvonne
Date Posted: 25th November 2024
Characters: Nosarre, Zaphare, T'lonas, A'ten, Sanvi, K'yne, Saibra, I'serin, A'ris
Description: A ruckus occurs at the new weyrlings’ first feeding. Passively. With no discernible cause.
Location: Dragonsfall Weyr
Date: month 3, day 22 of Turn 12
Zaphare had probably said a hundred things over the turns that she deserved to be smacked for, but no one had ever actually done it until now. She wasn’t expecting it and definitely didn’t roll with it; even though it came from an inexperienced hand it still nearly knocked her off her feet.
Even as her hand came up instinctively to cup her jaw, Zollarth spread his wings and _screeched_ his anger, and she felt his outrage rise as surely as her own. “What the-- why, you-- you… you _hit_ us!” she snarled, tackling Nosarre and sending chairs scattering, Zollarth shrieking and batting at their attacker’s flailing legs with his wings.
}: Oh goodness gracious, no! :{ Kiziolth cried as Zollarth and Zaphare sent Nosarre tumbling backward. She reared back on her hind legs in sudden surprise and to get away from the tangle of legs and blue dragon. She lost her balance and tumbled into Respellath.
Nosarre hit the ground hard, her breath rushing out of her in a sharp gasp. Zollarth's furious screech drowned out Kiziolth's panicked creel. "Scorch you-" she wheezed, her hands grappling to push the other weyrling off, but Zaphare was stronger than she looked. She elected for kicking and hair pulling instead.
“You scorching dimglows!” Sanvi shouted at the fighting women on the floor as she leapt to her feet to put herself between the two tangled green dragonets and the flapping, screeching blue" and immediately caught a wing to the stomach that doubled her over.
“Of course _you’d_ fight like a -- unf -- girl!” Zaphare grit, as if she, too, wasn’t also a girl and also (more or less) fighting in the same stereotypical way. The couple of punches she’d tried to land were awkward, and she clawed to gain control of Nosarre’s wrists in order to try to pin her down. “Apologize! Or else!”
}:Or else!:{ Zollarth said simultaneously, snapping the hem of Nosarre’s robe between his teeth and shaking it furiously like a canine shaking a stuffed toy.
Nosarre didn't mean to kick the dragonet. Or maybe she did, a little bit. But in her squirming to try and avoid the blows and get Zaphare unseated she might have hit a glancing blow against the blue at her feet even as she resorted to awkwardly slapping Zaphare as she struggled to keep her wrists free. "Screw you!" She shrieked back.
Kiziolth untangled herself from Respellath with only a few scratches, intent to try to help her rider…but immediately got tangled in her wings again and tumbled.
Zollarth gave a little _hurk_ noise as he received a kick to the belly, letting go of Nosarre’s robe as his mouth automatically opened to expel the breath that was temporarily knocked out of him. Immediately, he backpedaled, curling in on himself pitifully. }:I’m hurt, I’m hurt! Unfair! Terrible! Cheating!:{ he wailed to any dragon who would listen.
The blow to Zollarth felt like a blow to Zaphare, too -- a shadow of a feeling in her own belly, so real that it took her a few seconds to realize it wasn’t her own pain. Her anger took a backseat to comforting her crying lifemate; she let go of Nosarre abruptly to fall back and wrap her arms around her blue. “Zollarth, it’s okay, it’s okay! You’ll be alright, don’t cry!”
}:I’m dying,:{ said Zollarth, though it was becoming increasingly clear to Zaphare that he absolutely was not injured beyond a little bruise at most, and a burn to his ego. }: We hate her. We _hate_ her! :{
}: We don't like you either, stupid! :{ Kiziolth cried as she rolled helplessly off her wings and into her back, stuck. Her legs kicked uselessly in the air. She didn't know exactly what was going on, but she knew Nosarre didn't like them and that Nosarre thought that she barely touched him, and that was enough for her.
Nosarre scrambled backward, her shoes slipping against the floor as she struggled to put distance between herself and Zaphare. Her heart pounded, each beat echoing with fury and shame. She reached blindly for Kiziolth, who was still tangled awkwardly in her own wings, her eyes a panicked whirl of yellow and orange.
“Hold still, stupid thing,” Nosarre muttered, her voice tight as she pushed to her knees. With clumsy, shaking hands, she righted Kiziolth with a firm push.
“Is she ok?” Sanvi reached out a hand and smoothed it along Kiziolth’s hide. Respellath watched from where she crouched nearby, her eyes whirling with fear and agitation.
"She's fine." Nosarre grumbled.
“And you’re as dumb as a soup sandwich,” Sanvi snapped. “What the blazes were you thinking?!”
“I would like to know that, too,” T’lonas said, striding in, his tone as harsh and disappointed as any of them had likely ever heard before. “Domorth said it was urgent -- what is this, _fighting_? You’ve only just Impressed, and you’re all fighting? Did _no one_ pay attention to our lessons about proper behavior? Or about how delicate the newly-hatched can be? Do you want to panic someone /between/?”
He glanced down at Zaphare sharply. “Is Zollarth hurt?”
}:We’re dying,:{ Zollarth supplied to Zaphare and Domorth both.
“You are not,” Zaphare said.
}:You are not,:{ Domorth replied simultaneously. }:You have been poked.:{
“He’s fine, he got kicked but the pain is already fading,” Zaphare replied, when it became clear that T’lonas was just going to keep looking at her with that _look_ on his face until she gave him an answer. “No thanks to _her_.” She gave a nasty glare over her shoulder at Nosarre.
“Don’t start,” T’lonas warned, looking at Nosarre and Sanvi. “Are the both of you well? Your dragons?”
Nosarre's dirty look matched Zaphare's. "They're fine." She said with hardly a glance at either green. Kiziolth sat quickly back down on her bottom, at perfect-ish attention like her rider initially wanted. Her best behaviour, honest, if she wasn't still glaring in solidarity at Zaphare, too.
Corvanth tilted his head back and daintily snapped up the piece of meat that Arten offered him, then licked a smear of blood from his jaws. }:More.:{ Gobbling down the first few handfuls had taken the first edge off his hunger, but his belly still felt empty and he suddenly sensed that his rider was distracted by some kind of scuffle going on nearby. }:More! A'ten! MORE!:{
A'ten watched open-mouthed at the sight of hatchlings stumbling about and chasing scattered gobbets of meat, new weyrlings swinging at each other and... "Eurgh, yuck!" Usually in the tavern, someone throwing up would have been his cue to run for the mop and bucket, but he'd never had to do it in the midst of a crowd of starving, razor-clawed dragonets before. Should he go for help?
Then Corvanth's patience ran out and he plunged his head into the bucket, greedily scoffing up the remaining chunks.
"Oh shards! Corvanth - chew! Slowly!" Panicking, A'ten leaned over and tried to pull on the dragonet's neck. Corvanth raised his head, and the bucket came with it, juices and shreds of meat spilling down his neck and soaking into A'ten's white robe.
The brown shook his bucket-covered head, once, then again, more frantic. }:HELP! I'm stuck! :{
A’ris, who was having a hard time keeping a grip on his mental block, was beginning to hear _all_ of the dragonets. Not only could he physically hear the ruckus of all the Weyrlings fighting, yelling, was someone crying? But he could also mentally hear all of the tired, hungry, annoyed, panicked dragonets, too.
Having climbed to his feet, in disgust from the filth on the floor, the voice loudest and nearest to him was Corvanth’s.
“Take it easy!” he called to both Corvanth and A’ten. “I’ll help pull the bucket off!” The farmbred brown Weyrling hooked his hands around the edges of the bucket and gave it a swift yank, only, when the bucket released, it released with such force that the bucket went flying, spewing the cut up bits of meat and blood on the inside all over the green Weyrlings standing behind them.
“Watch it!” Katora said sharply, ducking the bucket but catching bloody bits on her clothing and in her hair, which caused her to scowl. In the hair! That was the most disgusting of dirt. She picked one piece out delicately, glaring at it and then A’ris (or was it A’ten’s dragon that had caused it the issue?) before flicking it away. She returned to her crouch in front of Saoirth, who was eating primly.
}: Hatchlings we are, yes, but not ruffians or savages, :{ the green remarked. She looked over at Corvanth as she said that. }: Compose yourself, brother. :{
It was at precisely this moment that Saibra, I’serin, and R’enh appeared at the doorway of the feeding rooms, all looking pristine and elegant in their finery. There was still a glow of happiness in Saibra’s eyes at such a successful hatching, and the tender moment she and I’serin had shared exchanging gifts had been a nice way to cement their work-relationship. All of those good feelings, however, were dashed in an instant as she took in the sheer chaos and destruction of the feeding rooms.
“What the actual feck?” These words were delivered by a stunned K’yne, who had left to grab a healer for Halia. I’serin’s eyes were slowly widening at the scene before them.
“You know, gentlemen,” Saibra said to I’serin and R’enh. “I think we should just leave this in the capable hands of our Weyrlingstaff while we go and speak to the families and visiting dignitaries.”
“The Weyrwoman is wise,” I’serin replied with quiet escape coloring his tone.
Last updated on the December 10th 2024