An Unsolveable Mystery

Writers: Eimi, Roxanne
Date Posted: 28th September 2005

Characters: Knara, U'kaiah
Description: Knara and U'kaiah have their lunch date
Location: Dragonsfall Weyr
Date: month 7, day 1 of Turn 3

The greenrider made her way through the dining cavern looking for her wingleader. She spotted him at a rather empty table and smiled.
Maybe that was a sign that he liked her a little bit or perhaps it was her imagination.

Knara smiled at the bronzerider as she slid in across from him. She found it difficult to talk to someone if she was sitting directly beside them and eat at the same time, so she chose the opposite side of the table. "Thanks for coming, U'kaiah." she said her voice hiding any trace of nervousness she felt. She had shared meals with many men over the turns. None of them made her want to run the other direction as if her life depended on it and get into him back to his weyr for some exploration at the same time.
"I'm happy you invited me. I have to say, I was a little surprised since you had made a formal appointment to see me later. Lunch is so much nicer." He gave her a reassuring smile. She looked nervous. It was kind of cute.

"It seems easier to talk when there are more people around and food is always a good thing." she said simply. She always got more nervous when she was alone than in a group of people. The people didn't even have to be paying attention to what she was doing, it just made her slightly more comfortable for some reason.

"Oh? What was it you wanted to talk to me about?" U'kaiah asked curiously.

"I had a new formation I thought might help with the problem that some of the greenriders have been having lately." she said straightforwardly.

"Really?" He asked with honest curiosity. It wasn't exactly what he had expected her to say, but anything that could help the wing took presidence over flirting anyday.

"It's somewhat of a hobby of mine. I've been coming up with formations since my days as a weyrling. They don't always work, but the weyrlings are usually happy to try them out for me from time to time." she said feeling she had to explain why she had the ideas.

"I appreciate that. It's good to know you are always thinking." He gave her an encouraging smile. "Do you have the formation with you now?"

She nodded and handed it to him with a nervous smile. He was so handsome that it made her words jumble together and her stomach had flutters. She had never felt like this around a male before and wondered if it was normal. She'd have to ask her friends or sister about it.

He spread the hides out on the table in front of him. His face took on a look of concentration as he tried to visualize the formation in flight in his mind. "You know, Knara, I think this could work. I think this could work really well!"

"I've not had a chance to get the weyrlings to try this one out yet, but I can ask them to if you'd like to know for sure." she said glad that he liked it. Perhaps this was a way for her to talk to him about other things on her mind as well.

"Why don't we try it in our own drills next sevenday. I can have copies made and distributed to the wingriders to study. That is if it is all right with you."

"Uhm..Sure." she said trying not to sound as suprised as she was. "That sounds finem too. Now that we've settled that, what do you like to do besides play waterball?" she said with a smile.

"Well, besides the rumors that I'm sure you've heard..." he said with a knowing smile. U'kaiah knew full well he had a certain reputation - one that he took great pleasure in earning. "I spend a lot of time in the Record Room. I am still working towards my senior journeyman knots."

"Da always wanted me to find a craft that was interesting to me, but I never did find one that I could stick with. I was going to try my hand at being a harper, but Hydrazineth found me. I don't have time for much else now adays. I think I would have ended up as a foster mother if I hadn't Impressed."

"And how would you have liked being a foster mother?" he asked as he poured them both a glass of juice.

"I'm sure it would have been fine, but I would never trade being a dragonrider for anything now that I know what it is like." she said taking a sip of the juice he handed her.

"I for one could not imagine myself in any other life." The bronzerider said with a far off smile. "If I had not been a dragonrider... I think I would still be in the stands trying to send thoughts of love to the little dragonets at Hatchings in the vain hope one was for me."

"I can so see you doing that." she said with a chuckle. He was so funny and yet so totally serious at the same time.

"Well, luckily Kalamath saved me from such a pathetic fate," U'kaiah said with a chuckle of his own. "I dare say, we are the lucky ones, you and I."

"How so? By being chosen by a dragon?" she asked not quite sure she understood what he meant.

U'kaiah nodded. "Because you are not a fostermother and I am not a hopeless half-wit in the stands. Because we don't know what it is like to never have been chosen by a dragon. With all the candidates stumbling back to the lives they had hoped to leave behind after each Hatching... yes, I could myself among the lucky on that score."

"When you put it that way I can't argue. I think it is harder for the holdbred candidates when they fail to Impress as those who are weyrbred have seen the process their whole lives and know what to expect in a way."

"I don't know," U'kaiah said thoughtfully as he gently rolled the hides back up. "I almost think it would have been worse. Being holdbred, you don't have the daily reminder. I know it would have been hard for me.
But then again, I never had another plan. I always knew I would be a dragonrider, and failure to Impress hadn't even entered my mind as a possibility." He tapped the rolls in front of him. "And I would have to say, you would have been wasted as a fostermother. With a tactical mind like yours? How could a dragon _not_ have chosen you? They know best, and I have a feeling they know talent when they see it."

"Why thank you. I think that must be true, especially since there are some riders who never even stand and get chosen from the stands. Their dragon had to sense something special in them to seek them out." she replied thining of how her father Impressed even though he wasn't a candidate.

"Who knows how they find us. Do they know us from the egg? Or do they know us when they see us? It's a mystery," he said with a shake of his head. An unsolveable mystery.

"A mystery indeed."

Last updated on the September 28th 2005

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An Unsolveable Mystery