More Impressive Than Dummies

Writers: Avery, Mirren
Date Posted: 14th January 2016

Characters: Sharev, Talern
Description: Two masters plan an exercise.
Location: Dolphin Hall
Date: month 3, day 17 of Turn 8
Notes: Mentioned: Endarin

Talern had been strongly considering extra drills for the past
sevenday, but he hadn't yet made time to talk to the other subject
experts about them. When he saw Sharev outside one of the classrooms,
not meeting with anyone, he immediately altered course to talk to the
man.

"Good afternoon," he greeted.

"Afternoon." Sharev nodded. "I'm headed for a klah, care to join me?"
It had been an interesting day but it'd be nice to take a quick break.

"Absolutely. Can never drink too much," the other man agreed. "I had
an idea and I wanted to bounce it off another head."

"That sounds painful," Sharev replied, his expression deadpan. He
gestured for Talern to walk with him toward the dining hall.

"Have you had your review with the new Hallmaster yet?" Talarn asked
as he fell into step.

"We talked. I'm not sure he was impressed, at least at first. You know
me and first impressions." Sharev wasn't overly concerned.

Talern suppressed a little laugh. "Mine went alright. He asked if I
had any ideas, which is what got me thinking. Storm season's coming up
and that means a wreck chance. I suggested running a salvage
simulation at one of the territory's shipwrecks to train some of the
younger journeymen who haven't got much experience, and try to lure
some of them over."

Sharev smirked. He couldn't help but be biased about their speciality.
Everything else seemed to mundane in comparison. He liked what he
heard though. Any chance to get 'out there'.

"Sounds good," he replied. "It'll be good for the dolphins too,
they'll think it's a great game."

"So do I," Talern said with a grin. "I'm glad you're interested in the
idea, I was really hoping not to do the entire planning myself. With
someone else we can mke them curse us even harder."

Sharev chuckled. "There's nothing quite like putting apprentices under
pressure." He'd endured plenty of it in his day.

"Indeed. There's probably a few seniors who could use the training.
I've also spotted a few promising journeymen who I think we could
convince to come over if they realized how exciting our discipline
was."

"And dangerous. Some people are drawn to it. Not to cast aspersions on
either of us." A bit of danger got the blood pumping like nothing
else.

"It's a compliment, if you ask me. It seems to be a family trait for
me, anyway. My father raced runners, my children are dragonriders."

"I have a brother who rides a dragon, but I don't think he does it for
the danger. The rest of my family are fishermen." Sharev must have
been an anomaly.

"And yet you chose the dolphins. Too interesting to resist?"

Sharev smiled. "I ran away from home to become a dolphineer. To say I
couldn't resist would be accurate."

By now they'd reached the dining hall, and Talern picked up a mug to
fill with klah. "I must admit I like finding out why others joined
up."

"I'd think 'because dolphins' is a fairly standard answer." Sharev got
a mug for himself and made his strong, but with a hint of sweetener.
"The same reason people want to impress."

"Fair enough. I think some of the girls join because this is one of
the only crafts they're allowed."

"And less messy than printing." Sharev grimaced. "Or so I've heard."

"And doesn't require you to carry a tune like harpering. Yeah, if my
choices were water and dolphins or singing, I made the right call."

"Or teaching," Sharev added. "I mean little kids." Once at apprentice
age they were all right.

"I don't mind apprentices, but I never knew what to do when mine were
very small," Talern admitted.

"They're messy little noisemakers, what can you do but leave it to their
mothers to
deal with." Sharev shrugged. Obviously he had no children. "So, drills.
What did you
have in mind?"

"There's a few wrecks in the area where we've cleaned everything out of
them but
haven't dismantled the ship itself. I was thinking we could inspect one for
suitability, then place items in it for our training team to go recover."

"I'm not sure what sounds better, retrieving items or putting them there
in the
first place." Either way, this was going to be sharding lot of fun.

"I'm looking forward to hiding things in a devilish manner," Talern
confessed.

Sharev grinned. "Maybe we should make a bet on this. Whoever can hide the
item found
last, or not at all…?"

"A good bottle of spirits, or do you have another idea?"

"A bottle of spirits it is." Sharev held out his hand for Talern to shake.

Talern shook it solemnly. "I'm thinking about hiding the kind of normal
items you'd
find on a working ship, but I'm open to throwing some other wrinkles into
the event.
Any ideas?

"Hmm." Sharev thought for a moment. "I might have to look around for
something. Odd,
sinkable and not too heavy… how hard can that be?"

"It could be surprisingly hard. Maybe check the Weyr if all else fails,
someone
there might have something that would fit the bill. Too bad my daughter
isn't at
Dolphin Cove or I'd ask her opinion. Perhaps I could get a message passed
on."

"I'd ask my brother, but he'd have to get his head out of his behind long
enough to
help," Sharev said. "Anything that sounds even slightly like fun…" He
shrugged.

"Not so much his thing?"

"Not that I know of, but he's the only one in my family who still talks to
me, so I
can't be too harsh I suppose."

"Ah, family. My ex doesn't talk to me, but the children do." Talern was
fine with that.

Thinking about children gave him another idea. "Maybe we could have a
'rescuing people' variant drill at some point? After they've done fine
with cargo."

"Good idea. Maybe they should rescue us, just to increase the
pressure." Letting a master drown would be an instant fail in anyone's
book.

Talern laughed. "That's an image."

"And a challenge, since we're both grown men." Neither would be light,
especially compared to some of the younger dolphineers.

"It might be good for them to have to struggle with something more
impressive than our weighted dummies," Talern agreed.

"Indeed. They're going to gripe afterward." Sharev smiled. And he was going to enjoy it.

"And well they should. It's nice to get revenge on the grey hairs and stomach churning they cause for us," Talern said. "How does meeting up tomorrow to make more detailed plans sound?"

"Sure." Sharev's hand went to his head. Grey hairs?

Last updated on the January 20th 2016

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More Impressive Than Dummies