Interrogation (adventuring humans)

[Omnia Munda]

(Aleda, G'tet, P'nset, S'gur, Th'ane - if any character is not coming along with Br'ven, please post in Departure or PM to such effect ASAP.)

Br'ven led without looking back. His pace was swift and his stride long, taking full advantage of how much of his height was in his legs, but he paused long enough in the Hold's spacious entryway to be sure he head several sets of footsteps come through behind him before he turned off down a side hall. From there the path was winding. A sharp left here, a sudden right just afterward - the Igenite wingleader's trail took them through narrow halls pocked with doorways leading to what seemed to be the staff quarters. Where ever they were going, he was taking them 'the back way.'

Watched only by ragamuffin children, kitchen women's children and drudges, Br'ven finally emerged into a wider and more generously decorated hall, only to quickly turn through a doorway where one of two heavy, dark wood doors stood open.

The room inside was no Lord's meeting room. It might pass for a library, with its one wall lined in bookshelves and a scattering of large, comfortable-looking chairs each accompanied by its own end table. No distinct meeting space had been designed here, no conference table of any kind, but in an open space where a once-beautiful rug had been worn tired by traffic M'sella stood waiting for them, a glum stare ready in his eyes for the Telgari entering the room.

Br'ven waited for the visitors to file in, standing aside so he could make a head count as they entered, then pulled closed the heavy door. He put his back to it afterward and exchanged a look with his wingrider before casting his gaze once more over the Telgari, attention given clearly to knots and badges upon those who wore them.

"While we wait," said Br'ven quite gravely, "Perhaps you would all tell me what wings you fly with. And - among you is a healer?" He had no trouble picking out Aleda with a glance. "With whom did you study?"

[neopanther]

((ooc: I’m going to presume the topic previous to this will continue here.))

Following the wingleader’s mazy trail throughout the labyrinth of passageways that existed within the weyr, P’nset, having possibly unsettled Th’ane slightly, judging by his reaction, kept his silence. He followed, odd eyes watching as a team of riders (quite obviously so as most were still supporting their wher hide garments). But the meandering path they took finally opened out unto a large ornate hallway, rather impressive, even with the sights he had seen in his travels as a Caminar, he’d never made it here. But it wasn’t there they stopped, Br’ven filed them into a smaller room, large chairs coverirng a worn rug, where that brown rider M’sella stood waiting for them. One wall was covered floor to ceiling in shelving, no shortage of wher-hided binds to fill them either.

P’nset hummed to himself, rather impressed with this room – despite its’ lesser décor, it was a room where P’nset would feel much more at home, remarkable like his weyr back in Telgar in fact, worn, tired, but comfortable. Much representation given to how he felt in this situation.

Br’ven spoke, after having closed the heavy doors behind their entry, obvious he wished to keep this as clandestine as P’nset felt it should be. He begun to ask questions regarding their wings, and what not, P’nset felt there was no reason not to tell the man this information.

“Frost wing, under B’nek, Wingsecond,” His words, short sweet, and directly to the point. A quick glance towards Aleda was given as Br’ven turned his attentions to the Caminar woman.

[Alsivor]

Disoriented and now shocked to her core, Aleda just kept walking. She passed through the hallways feeling shut in by the stone walls, skin crawling at the closeness as they went deeper and deeper into the hold, or so it seemed. She did smile though at the one kitchen boy, maybe three, clinging to his mother's skirt.

They'd all be dead in -- how many days? What was the date? She needed to know. She needed to know how much /time/ they had. Aleda looked this way and that as they went, chewed on her lip a little and closed her eyes, reciting to herself, again, the verses from the Ballad, the bits from the Records.

They were arriving now in the room, the other drageiro was there and she looked back briefly as the doors closed. It was an almost involuntary motion to curl her arm more tightly around Th'ane's and a part of her mocked it. Clinging to a man because she was a little scared. Ridiculous.

Aleda squared her shoulders and lifte her chin as the questions began and soon enough it was her turn and she did not lie. "A healer named Giana, sir. Not at Healer Hall."

[Tabula Rasa]

Th'ane trailed into the hold, allowing Aleda to cling a little closer and moving his other arm so his hand could lightly cover hers. He took in the shape and make of the room they were brought to, but his focus was mstly on the turns and corridors they took to arrive there. Knowing a way in meant knowing a way out. Th'ane had a lifetime of being cornered to have taught him that a way out was almost always necessary.

"I lead Telgar's Storm Wing," he answered when Br'ven posed the question. "Would you mind, while we're waiting, giving us the date?" There was a twitch of a smile that hovered in the corner of Th'ane's mouth. "I'm afraid I've lost track."

[Omnia Munda]

Br'ven was watching the riders keenly enough. M'sella, however, seemed now distracted; as soon as P'nset began to speak he got that distant look, the look of a man seeing through his dragon's eyes.

"Frost and Storm," said Br'ven softly, then turned his eyes on Aleda again. Perhaps he found her comely as so many did, but there was little in his steel regard to betray it if so; what was couched there was mostly suspicion and mistrust. "Of course not," he replied her, his voice gently sarcastic.

Then Br'ven gave Th'ane a look - a brow-furrowed, mouth-pinched look - and turned away. An answer had to wait for the Igenite wingleader to trudge across a throw rug to an overstuffed chair; he threw himself into it with a vengeance, then arranged his long limbs around him with a reluctant regality.

Balefully, he looked up at the Telgari. "It's fifthday. The fifth of the second." Br'ven's mouth held open after this as though he might say more, but for a long moment no sound came forth. His expression was miserable.

"Of the forty-third turn," he added at last, in a knowing, suffering sigh.


[ I recommend dragonriders read 'Getting to know you' concurrently with this thread, by the way. ]

[neopanther]

Forty-third turn? As in forty turns after the end of their interval shards but they were all almost certainly dead in this reality. P’nset felt his eyes widen in shock at hearing this, but there was nothing he could do, his mind was working at full capacity just trying to process this information. His mind just wanted to make certain. He felt as though time had elapsed and none had noticed, though, Pern in fact had, it was just they who hadn’t. It was like the story he was told as a child, where a man slept for a thousand turns, and woke up to find Pern a completely different world.

“So this is the sixth pass, forty-third turn.” He asked rhetorically, as though an aloud repetition would make it any easier to come to terms with. “So, how long did the interval last?” He was curious now, to know how long they were from their own time, but it was easy enough to say, they were all likely dead, or perhaps for the younger of their ‘era’, they might just be old and beyond recognition. His mind wandered for a moment upon a fact. Well, that would be of course if they ever made it back from this journey, to live out the rest of their lives in their ‘era’.

“Perhaps it would be best for us all if we all had this situation explained to us.” P’nset timidly suggested, he was rather loathed to give out the scarce information they had been given about their quest, but, it might be now or never. He looked to the other riders, to Aleda, for their opinions. Just to make certain that he was not the only one who thought this. He sunk into one of the free chairs, so what, he was older than the others here, and it was getting late, considering that he had been up since dawn their time till evening, left, and was not partaking in this mentally distressing situation that was eating into time where his mind told him he should be counting the wherries as they passed a dreamt gate, as his bonded eyed them from afar, choosing which he would select for his next meal.

[Alsivor]

Aleda marked the way Br'ven watched them all and she kept her regard level as she met that steely gaze. Suspicion and mistrust she was used to. It was the bread and butter of the Caminar. She didn't flinch at all, but then she didn't relax either when he looked away from her and at Th'ane instead. The way he flopped down into that chair though gave her a bit of a pang. And the tone of his voice.

The fifth day. The second month of the forty-third turn. But which Pass? P'nset was asking and Aleda was calculating. Two sevens. Maybe a little more. There was time still, but not much if the /were/ in the right Pass. She tightened her hand on Th'ane's arm to get his attention. He needed to know this, they all did. It was getting to the point where secrecy was becoming a problem and her toes tapped impatience.

[Omnia Munda]

Br'ven met P'nset's eyes with a grim blink. "Two hundred turns," he replied, brows sinking. Behind him, M'sella was 'coming back' from what his dragon had seen and a soft clearing of his throat drew the wingleader's attention away from the assembled Telgari. The two exchanged another of those looks and then Br'ven said, "We're missing your greenrider."

He lifted a hand to comb fingers through his hair. Inexplicably and unannounced, M'sella moved through the room toward the door; perhaps he was to become its guard, or had plans for searching out the absent G'tet to return him to his fellows. But the brownrider didn't exit; he turned his back to the door and crossed his arms, regarding the Telgari with an expression of unbalanced concern.

"As for an explanation," said Br'ven, mouth tight around the irritable words, "I think you might want to start by offering one." He stared past P'nset then, taking in Th'ane and the quiet Aleda with his traveling gaze.

"It'll give you a chance to rehearse what you'll be saying to your weyrleader."

[neopanther]

P’nset let the calculations slip into place, a two hundred turn interval, at which they were at the one hundredth turn. Shards, that made it one hundred and forty three turns in the future. His mind ground to a halt.

But, then Br’ven turned to the topic of explanations, and P’nset started to let his mind click back into place, what sort of an explanation could they give? But it was what Br’ven next said that caught his attentions most.

"It'll give you a chance to rehearse what you'll be saying to your weyrleader."

P’nset’s gaze narrowed, as he spoke again, slowly, clearly, as though he may have missed something in this conversation. That one word, made it all sound very, very suspicious.

“What? What do you mean rehearse what we’ll say to our Weyrleader?” His brows knitted again, he looked to Aleda, To Th’ane, making sure he had heard Br’ven correctly. Surely not. Surely Br’ven was not telling them that J’fel, Their time’s Weyrleader was still holding his position? Surely not, that would make J’fel about 162 turns old. And that was impossible. Perhaps... perhaps it was different, perhaps this was J’fel’s time... his mind began to slowly spin off on different conspiracy theories. Afterall, it would make sense if this was J’fel’s time, else, how could he have given them the image... But. J’fel had impressed back in one of Pelegaoth’s clutches... so it wasn’t like he could have travelled back to them of his own accord, without Jordeth.

This would need explaining before they could even think about moving onto their own tale.

[Tabula Rasa]

"He means Telgar's Weyrleader is coming to fetch us," Th'ane supposed, as his pale gaze traveled again around the room. His attention flicked down to Aleda for the squeeze on his arm and one brow twitched upward in silent query. She was given a few moments to share her thoughts before the bronzer lifted his head and looked over at Br'ven.

"We came to stop a sickness," was his answer. "One that will devastate Pern if left unchecked. But we need information and, most likely..." Th'ane puffed out a slow sigh, "we will need help."

[Alsivor]

Telgar's Weyrleader? Coming to fetch them? But which Weyrleader? Aleda's brow furrowed tightly. That was one thing she had /not/ been so focused on while reading about the plague and though the names had certainly been in there, so was having trouble calling up that particular Weyrleader pair. She took a deep breath and let her mind work on it in the background, leaned in close to Th'ane. "Two sevens by my count, before it starts," she whispered lowly and gave him a brief, thoughtful look before she went back to trying to call up the right names from her memory.

[Omnia Munda]

It needed explaining, to be sure: P'nset was right on that account if few others. But dour M'sella beside the door and flat-faced Br'ven in his chair offered no explanations, nor hint of any to come.

What they did offer was their ears. It was obvious from the moment that Th'ane spoke of sickness that the two Igenite riders were listening. Aleda's comment about the date might have drawn even more attention, had it not been all but overwhelmed by the scrape of the heavy door.

M'sella leapt aside, then laid hands on the door's burnished handle to draw it open. He needn't have troubled himself: the man they'd been told to expect prowled through without hesitation, his broad arm more than muscle enough to throw the door out of his way, then fling it shut behind himself. Such a heavy door, stately and wise, refused to slam; it thumped shut quietly. The spirit of the bronzerider's rage was conveyed only in the sharpness of his movements and in the deeply sour lines etched into his face.

"Igen's duties, sir," said Br'ven; he'd gotten to his feet while the Weyrleader was making his entrance. He snapped off a salute; behind the unhappy-looking man, M'sella was doing the same. But the man from this time's Telgar Weyr had no time or interest for the Igenite riders.

He was familiar, surely. A line drawing of him graced Pern's history books, and at Telgar Weyr there was a portrait of him hung in a particular hall among so many others like it. His was not hung in the most prominent of places in that hallway, and it boasted one of the humblest, smallest frames.

His name was likely quickening into the minds of those who remembered their histories well, but for the rest there was M'sella, his voice seemingly loud in the room's sudden silence, offering the answer: "Weyrleader M'tani of Telgar."

He was squinting hard at the Telgari assembled in the room.

"I don't have any G'tet or any P'nset in my wings," complained Hogarth's rider in a vicious spit, then narrowed his eyes on Th'ane. "And no wing named Storm."

M'tani tightened his hands at his sides, making claws more than fists, fury twisting visibly through his whole body. He suppressed it, but poorly; he seemed a wire ready to snap. "Explain yourselves." And then, thinking better of it, his eyes narrowed on Aleda; with a crooked finger he beckoned her closer. "You first."

[Alsivor]

The door opened and Aleda turned, regarding the Weyrleader with some interest. Definitely not J'fel. And from the sound of his voice, none too happy a Weyrleader and impatient to boot. And then he was singling her out. That she hadn't expected but she smoothed the surprise off of her face and gave Th'ane's arm a little squeeze and stepped forward, mind racing. She had no idea what she was supposed to say.

"Duties, Weyrleader," Aleda found manners and dropped into a curtsey, head bowing as well. It never hurt to use good manners really. As she looked up she gave M'tani an apologetic smile, edged faintly with sweetness. "Also, apologies for the confusion. I do not think that we expected to arrive as we have." She looked over her shoulder at the riders, then back to Telgar's present ... no past, Weyrleader, eyes right on his face, without flinching.

"My name is Aleda, I am the healer of this group. /Our/ weyrleader, from our time, has sent us here to stop a great danger to all of Pern. A killing sickness that in two sevens' time by my count, will arrive from the South and cause the deaths of thousands." She gestured a little bit behind her. "I am not able to explain how we traveled here as I am not a dragonrider." The sabedoria took a breath and released it, smiled wryly. "But we have come from a time that is yet to come for you." She stopped there and waited to see what the Weyrleader would ask next. Idly almost, Aleda noticed that her palms were clammy with nervous sweat and she had to fight the urge to run them down the side of her pants to dry them.

[Tabula Rasa]

The interested looks from M'tella and Br'ven were a bit more to Th'ane's liking than the seething, tight-fisted man that distracted those looks away. The bronzerider widened his stance just a little, and when Aleda released his arm to step forward, both crossed over his chest.

On the heels of the sabedoria's words,the wingleader spoke next. "She tells the truth," he added, calm and firm. "Your own words confirm it." He allowed a small pause before tacking on a vaguely courteous "Sir."

[Omnia Munda]

Telgar's weyrleader could have no idea how notorious he was, but to see his nostrils flaring and his eyes narrowing at even so small a slight as having been told his own words proved this wretched thing, one could only wonder if he would have gained his reputation no matter what he'd done when the treatment for the plague came to his Weyr.

"I know how you traveled here," snapped M'tani, offering the dragonriders a group glare for their failure to confess what they all knew. "With a healer along for the ride," he added in what was very nearly a sneer. Though the man had not seemed to notice - or care about - Aleda's breeding, her craft, or lack of ridership, earned her just as much derision here from the Telgari weyrleader as she could ever hope for on account of her heritage in her own time.

Or maybe it was the riders who'd earned that derision. "Have none of you a lick of wit? My firestone sack's got a brain on any of you, I wager. What has Telgar become!"

Loathing twisted the man's permanently unhappy features. It was increasingly obvious that whatever life had given him, he aimed to give back with interest at any opportunity.

"You two." He was addressing the Igenites now, a finger pointed at each in turn. "I want not a word of this to your weyrleader, understand me? Not a word to your wingmates, and keep your dragons' muzzles shut. Until I know what my Weyr thinks it's doing, this is Telgar's business, and I suffer you here on account of the Hold."

M'tani brought his focus back to Aleda at last. His expression changed. It softened, but the process was far from enough to make the result 'soft.' He'd been merely dialed down from 'enraged' to 'unhappily concerned.' He rubbed his chin where a day's stubble grew.

"What do you mean," he asked, and suddenly his voice sounded almost tolerant. "The South."