>Flamethrowers< -- The Perches

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Date Posted: 08:21:25 02/24/05 Thu
Author: I'mer & Svorath
Subject: >Flamethrowers<

I'mer runs a Threadscored hand through his short black hair as Svorath lands neatly in the Perches, near the Thread-fighting gear. Vaulting off the brown dragon's back, he makes a beeline for the flamethrowers, wincing when he sees the untidy pile they've been left in. They probably got called off to see about that green clutch - or the Hatching Feast - and left them here without putting them away properly, he thinks, trying to be optimistic, as he kneels beside the pile and begins to sort them. As something of an expert on the delicate machines, I'mer knows just how few there are left on Pern, and how easy it is to wreck them. And though he was born in a Smith Crafthall, and knows a fair amount about their inner workings and how to repair them, he doesn't think he can build one from scratch.

But is that any excuse for abusing them? Svorath asks, wandering towards the lake. He rarely speaks unless finishing I'mer's thoughts, as he's doing now; they rarely disagree, and disagreements are sorted out in lightning-quick flurries of thought that are usually over before a telepathic sentence could even be spoken. They have the tightest rider-dragon bond they've yet seen, and quite honestly, they don't always know where one of them ends and the other begins. Their personalities had just meshed so exactly that they usually think along the same lines, and the thought of one literally becomes the action of the other - particularly in flight, whether it be flying Thread, flying greens, or just flying for the joy of flying. In circumstances such as this, where I'mer is doing something in which a dragon simply cannot be included, they may not act as one, but Svorath can still deplore the carelessness of young goldriders. While I'mer locates some tools and sits down with the flamethrowers, the brown slides happily into the cool lakewater. Usually, bright direct light - like today's sunlight - is neccessary to make it obvious that his hide is brown, not black. Dim light and shadows make him look more like a dragon-ghost or a statue, completely ebony, and at night he can simply close his eyes and blend in with the night sky. But as he steps into the water, it darkens his hide the trifling amount needed to once again instill that illusion of blackness. Leaving his human half to the mundane tasks of caring for the gear, Svorath dives underwater, luxuriating in the feel of a good, freshwater swim. It's been far too long.

None of the six flamethrowers I'mer finds are actually damaged, but they could all use a little polishing, a bit of a tune-up, and so he sits down with them and his tools to do just that. This, he's sure the goldriders could do, but it gives him something to be doing, now that he's found a weyr and tended his dragon and his gear. Svorath has only located one or two others from his old Weyr, not people he'd known well, and I'mer just isn't ready yet to dive into a group of strangers. For now, he'd rather do make-work and see if he can catch someone else alone when they come to the Perches. He's not shy - far to the contrary, in fact, for while the brownrider doesn't talk that much, he's very friendly. He just doesn't like being surrounded by a bunch of strangers, all at once, like he would be in the Lower Caverns. He'll make friends one at a time, if he can.

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