Sime/Gen Roleplaying: Householding Naros Scenario
Episode #57: The Ancient Art of Snake Shrinkage (11/11/98)
Tictoc sorts the papers and gets ready to meet the next influx of new people.
Tictoc hopes there will be someone worthwhile in the group!
Kenmore signals at the door to Snake's rooms with a pile of books in his tentacles.
Wise Snake wonders why he bothers to beat around the bush.
Wise Snake: Yeah!
Kenmore opens the door and puts the books on the table.
Kenmore is outwardly calm, but inwardly ~ nervous/excited ~
Kenmore: How are you feeling today, Snake?
Wise Snake looks at Kenmore for a long moment before saying, "paranoid".
Wise Snake: Why?
Kenmore nods thoughtfully.
Kenmore: Please have a seat. Tell me, how long have you been feeling paranoid?
Wise Snake was already sitting, but in the interest of not starting a fight she takes a different, more comfortable seat, on a nearby couch.
Tanzarra is on her way to see Tictoc and sees one of the new arrivals.
Wise Snake stretches out on the couch.
Wise Snake: Paranoid? [warily] Well, for as long as I can remember.
Kenmore: I see. From your childhood?
Kenmore is pleased - this seems to be going exactly the way the book said.
Wise Snake wonders what in the world has gotten into Kenmore.
Tanzarra: Hello! Are you waiting to see someone?
Wise Snake: Er... I suppose so.
Kenmore waits for a moment.....
Tarana: Are you talking to me?
Kenmore: Errr, I see. Tell me about your childhood.
Wise Snake props herself up on an elbow and gives Kenmore a penetrating stare, while zlinning him.
Wise Snake knows Kenmore has read all this in her BC file, and Zeor's records.
Kenmore takes notes.
Wise Snake: What do you want to know?
Tanzarra: Yes. I was just wondering if you were lost or looking for someone. You're new here?
Wise Snake sees Kenmore taking notes and it finally dawns on her that he has some kind of set purpose for asking these questions.
Kenmore: Tell me about your mother.
Wise Snake: My mother?
Wise Snake's expression changes.
Kenmore doodles while pretending to take notes.
Wise Snake: She was a hooker. Somehow managed to get impregnated by a famous channel. She died when I was born.
Wise Snake zlins Kenmore to find out of this was what he wanted to hear.
Kenmore: I see, and how does that make you feel?
Wise Snake wonders if this is some kind of a test.
Kenmore: ~ unflappable ~
Wise Snake: Well, I, ~unsure what he wants of her~
Tarana: Yes. I was told... they told me I should come here.
Kenmore gives no nageric clues, or facial tics either.
Tanzarra: Well I shall take you to see Tictoc, she's the Channel in charge.
Wise Snake becomes less certain as Kenmore retreats behind the unreadable face and nager.
Tanzarra: Oh my name is Tanzarra. Pleased to meet you.
Wise Snake: How does it make me feel?
Wise Snake: That I never knew my mother, or that she died?
Tarana: Okay. By the way, I'm Tarana.
Wise Snake: Or that she was a prostitute?
Kenmore: Errr, yes.
Kenmore wishes that he were on firmer ground here. None of the examples in the book asked questions back.
Kenmore tries to look as if he were listening closely. Easy to do, because he is.
Kenmore lets none of the uncertainty show in his nager, of course.
Wise Snake looks annoyed, but thinks surely there is indeed a constructive point to this.
Wise Snake: Well, I guess I feel like she got burned.
Tanzarra: Welcome. Would you come with me and i'll introduce you to tictoc.
Wise Snake: And I never got a chance to do anything for her.
Tarana twiddles her tentacles. Catches herself. Retracts them too tightly. Relaxes them again.
Kenmore: Ah, so you missed the chance to help your mother?
Tanzarra zlins Tarana.
Wise Snake: I wasn't alive yet. [points out]
Kenmore writes down "feelings of guilt".
Tarana stands up and prepares to follow the sime.
Kenmore: You don't blame her for putting you in this situation?
Wise Snake: Shen, no.
Wise Snake: I'm sure she didn't die on purpose.
Tarana: ~wanting to hide~
Wise Snake's showfield betrays a glint of ~anger~ directed elsewhere.
Kenmore: Hmmmm.... but people can still cause harm to us without it being on purpose.
Tanzarra: Are you all right? There is nothing to fear here.
Tarana: I heard....
Tarana: ~embarrassed~
Tanzarra takes Tarana to Tictoc's office and signals.
Tictoc: Come!
Tanzarra: Don't be embarrassed, you'll be fine.
Tarana enters.
Kenmore: What about your Father?
Tictoc zlins the two entering.
Tictoc: Yes, Tanzarra?
Tanzarra enters.
Tictoc finishes writing and looks up.
Tictoc: Ah, and you have brought ummmmm... yes. I've been expecting you.
Tanzarra: I was coming to see you and I found one of the new arrivals down the hall.
Tarana looks around, eyes not daring to alight on anything.
Tanzarra indicates for Tarana to come in.
Wise Snake tries to cover ~hate~
Wise Snake: I don't really know that much about him.
Tictoc sighs. Just what she needed, another nervous Sime.
Wise Snake speaks in a forced-dispassionate voice.
Kenmore: Do you blame him for your mother's death?
Tanzarra: Tarana, this is Tictoc. Tictoc, Tarana.
Tictoc: Please, sit down [to the new person] Did you want to see me about something? [to Tanzarra]
Wise Snake: He was a Farris; he slept with her; she died because she never managed to get connected with the health care and support the Tecton and Zeor would both have given her had they known.
Tictoc: Welcome to Naros Tarana.
Tarana: Pleased to meet you.
Wise Snake: By not checking back to see if she had become pregnant, or to see that she was being cared for, he both murdered her and condemned me to... this.
Wise Snake: ~savage~
Kenmore wonders who the man was.
Tanzarra: Ah, it can wait.
Tarana stretches out hand, pulls it back, hovers for a minute. Sits down.
Tanzarra was just going to discuss her next transfer.
Kenmore nods thoughtfully.
Kenmore: Your mother could have gone to Zeor for help.
Wise Snake: Could she have? [narrow eyed]
Tictoc: Where are you from, Tarana?
Wise Snake: A barefoot, poverty stricken whore from the ghetto, how was she going to make it 500 miles to Zeor?
Tictoc smiles thankfully at Tanzarra.
Kenmore: Or the local Center would have helped her to get there.
Wise Snake: Listen to you!!
Wise Snake: Do you have any idea how many people in Bender Cove never even donated until I came onto the scene?
Kenmore wonders if any of the books said what to do in case your case suddenly attacked you and he missed that section.
Wise Snake: There wasn't a Sime Center anywhere in Bender Cove except for the upper city one, then.
Wise Snake: Do you know what happens to poor people who go walking over into that side of town?
Kenmore: You think that your mother was unaware of the situation?
Tanzarra stands by the wall quietly.
Tanzarra: ~~ support, calm ~~
Wise Snake: She wasn't educated, she had never been out of her own neighborhood, she had no resources whatsoever.
Wise Snake: I don't know if she actually knew what to do or not.
Kenmore: Then her ignorance was the cause of her death perhaps?
Tarana: On a farm. Near Wyene.
Wise Snake's nager flares ~fury~
Wise Snake: Oh yes, that must be it.
Tictoc: Wyene? I've not heard of Wyene. Is it far?
Tictoc: ~ soothing calm ~
Wise Snake manages to restrain herself from saying anything additional.
Kenmore wishes that she would say more.
Tarana: Not near anywhere, really.
Kenmore: Perhaps your father isn't fully to blame?
Kenmore: It takes two to make a baby, after all.
Tictoc: You didn't grow up in a Household?
Tarana: No. Only just heard of them. After I....
Wise Snake's eyes glow eerily as she clamps down on the ~fury~.
Tarana holds up hands to gesture, indicating tentacles.
Tictoc: Changed over?
Wise Snake doesn't trust herself to actually say anything this time.
Tarana: Yes.
Tictoc: Yes?
Kenmore: Snake, why are you so angry?
Wise Snake: Why am I so angry? Why am I so angry???
Wise Snake can't believe it.
Wise Snake: You're bringing up the most painful subject in my entire existence, and proposing all these theories about whose fault is whose, and what do you expect me to feel?
Tanzarra remembers how she felt when she changed over and wonders where Tarana is from.
Tictoc waits for Tarana to explain herself.
Tarana: My older brother died from it. When he - changed over.
Kenmore: Have you considered that until you accept the pain, from something that can't possibly be changed, you will never get over it?
Tanzarra: ~~ sympathy ~~
Tarana: But I didn't.
Tictoc: I see....
Tictoc: I'm sorry. I have to ask you these questions.
Tictoc: Please don't let them upset you, you are amongst friends.
Tictoc would give her left dorsal for just one normal change over.
Tictoc: Where did you go for your disjunction?
Wise Snake: No. [tries to keep her voice controlled]
Wise Snake: No, I haven't.
Wise Snake: ~very upset~
Kenmore isn't sure if to be soothing or not, the Ancient texts were a little vague on that subject.
Kenmore: Perhaps it would help if you were to talk about it?
Wise Snake: Talk about it!!
Wise Snake flops back against the couch and looks up at the ceiling.
Kenmore: Have you ever spoken to anyone about it? Told anyone the way you feel?
Wise Snake has no idea what to make of this truly bizarre conversation.
Wise Snake is by now pretty sure it is some kind of obscure exercise that Kenmore will want to explain to her only after they are finished.
Tarana: Near Lake City.
Wise Snake: Sure, I've told people.
Kenmore: What have you told people?
Kenmore: The bare facts?
Kenmore: Or how you feel about them?
Tictoc: And how long ago was that?
Wise Snake: It depended on the person.
Wise Snake: I told Tramila everything.
Tarana: Five months ago.
Wise Snake suppresses ~pain~
Kenmore: Please, don't suppress your feelings.
Kenmore: Did you have many friends as a child?
Tictoc: Have you been, well, since then?
Tarana: Yes. But they said I should learn... That I can help.
Wise Snake: Friends? Define "friends".
Kenmore: People you trust, people you confide in.
Tictoc carefully doesn't slump.
Tictoc: Have you been given any channel training at all?
Tictoc: [how come we get all the raw ones?]
Tarana: Well, I know this....
Tarana shifts to healing mode, thinking Gen.
Tanzarra startles, as she wasn't expecting it.
Wise Snake: I was living on the street. Kids had loyalties and enemies but that changed, it was fluid, and violent.
Wise Snake: My brother tried to care for me when he could.
Tictoc: Errrr Tarana! That's very good, but perhaps....
Tictoc: We specialize in disjunctions here. We have many juncts who, like you, have to make the choice.
Wise Snake: And I did have a friend or two whose friendship lasted into adulthood.
Tarana: Oh! Sorry!
Tanzarra regains control quickly.
Tictoc: We very carefully don't offer them a Gen field. They have to know that they are going to a channel, not a Gen.
Tarana drops her showfield.
Kenmore: Your brother is Gen?
Wise Snake: Yes. He was ten when our mother died.
Kenmore: Do you know where he is now?
Wise Snake's eyes cloud.
Wise Snake: No. He and Rapol disappeared when... my enemies... burned down the Ferry Building and I fled Bender Cove.
Wise Snake: ~very opaque showfield~
Kenmore: Ten is very young to be looking after a newborn baby.
Kenmore: He must be a very special person.
Wise Snake considers various responses but ultimately says only, "Yes."
Tictoc sighs. "How do you feel about living in a Household?"
Kenmore: Tell me about your changeover. When you knew you were going to change over, did you tell your brother?
Wise Snake: Yes.
Wise Snake remembers her brother's expression of disappointment rather clearly.
Kenmore: Was he supportive?
Wise Snake: He told me I couldn't live as an adult without help.
Tarana: It sounds right. Like on the farm. We all worked together. I want that!
Wise Snake: That's what started me on the path that led eventually to Zeor.
Tarana blushes at her sudden spurt of words.
Wise Snake: I think he had really wanted me to Establish instead. He was disappointed, but he helped as much as he could.
Tictoc: What I'll do is put you in with the new channels. Although you are somewhat older then the others, there is much you can learn.
Kenmore: You knew you were a Farris?
Wise Snake: Well we knew my father was a Farris.
Tictoc: How does that sound?
Wise Snake: We didn't know for sure that I was until Veraik zlinned me.
Wise Snake: He was working at the Upper Center at the time.
Kenmore: That's when you moved to Zeor?
Wise Snake: Yes, he helped me get an audience and an interview. It took many weeks.
Tarana: I always liked learning. There wasn't enough time for it before.
Wise Snake: Ultimately, I was invited to Zeor permanently and I lived there for two years as a child before changing over.
Kenmore: Did your brother live there with you?
Wise Snake's nager gives an ironic little twist at the word 'permanently'.
Wise Snake: No.
Tictoc smiles at Tarana.
Tictoc: Well, there is now.
Wise Snake: He had family and children, and a storefront in Bender Cove.
Kenmore: How do you feel about the way you were treated in Zeor?
Kenmore, of course, knows most of that story.
Wise Snake's nager closes again, momentarily.
Wise Snake looks away from him, then reluctantly reveals her ~~intense bitterness and betrayal~~
Kenmore: Snake, it was a dreadful thing that happened and people are still being corrected for it.
Kenmore doesn't go into details, like that one particular channel who has been shorted and made to wait ever since that time.
Wise Snake: In the beginning, before... before my changeover, it was like a dream.
Tictoc: Have you met the Sectuib yet?
Wise Snake: Everything was perfect.
Wise Snake: Two perfect years.
Kenmore: And then, it became a nightmare.
Kenmore: Your changeover - tell me about that.
Tarana: No. Can I?
Tictoc: Lets go see.
Tictoc: Thank you Tanzarra, I'll see you later?
Tictoc ushers Tarana out of the door way.
Wise Snake sighs.
Tarana follows Tictoc.
Wise Snake: It was... I was so pumped up about it.
Wise Snake: I thought I'd be, I don't know, the next Klyd when I was grown up.
Wise Snake: I had no idea whatsoever that anything had gone wrong with the transfer until I was shenned.
Wise Snake: I didn't learn what else had happened until... much later.
Wise Snake: I remembered it eventually, with time.
Wise Snake: You know, I wasn't entirely unaware that he lay dead there, but at the time I just couldn't process it.
Kenmore: And what else was it that happened?
Wise Snake: He'd committed suicide.
Wise Snake: He thought he'd killed me when he shenned me, and he couldn't bear the thought of facing the rest of Zeor, I suppose.
Wise Snake: Nobody knows what he was really thinking, though.
Tictoc: Sectuib Riyyh is a very gentle man, you have nothing to be anxious or nervous about with him.
Tictoc: As I said, we specialise in disjunctions. It takes a special type of person to handle that.
Tictoc doesn't say anything about it also taking a very fertile person.
Tarana zlins. Tictoc's nager just did something strange.
Tictoc: He should be in his office. We will try there first.
Tarana stands up and prepares to follow Tictoc.
Kenmore doesn't want to push Snake too much this first session.
Kenmore wonders how to end it.
Kenmore: Thank you, Snake, for telling me all this and being open and honest with me.
Tictoc takes Tarana down towards Riyyh's office.
Wise Snake wonders if she's going to actually find out what's going on now.
Tictoc signals at the door.
Wise Snake sits up.
Riyyh: Come!
Kenmore: Perhaps some tea?
Tictoc opens the door.
Riyyh's office is nice and clean, although it does smell a bit of fresh plaster.
Riyyh smiles.
Tictoc: Riyyh, I have someone here who would like to meet you.
Riyyh: Hello, Tictoc. Hello. [to Tarana]
Tictoc: This is Tarana, Tarana, this is Sectuib Riyyh.
Kenmore smiles at Snake.
Kenmore personally could use a tranquilizer.
Wise Snake: Well?
Wise Snake: Aren't you going to tell me what this is all about?
Tarana: Pleased to meet you.
Riyyh: Welcome to Naros.
Tarana holds arms at sides.
Tarana: Thank you.
Riyyh gestures for them to take seats if they like.
Kenmore: Hmmm? Oh, no.
Kenmore fishes through his pockets and pulls out a bottle of little green pills.
Wise Snake: What!
Kenmore: Would you like a tranquilizer?
Wise Snake: You aren't??
Wise Snake stares at the bottle.
Tarana sits at the edge of chair.
Wise Snake: Yes. [more calmly]
Wise Snake: ~hope~
Kenmore passes Snake one tranquilizer.
Tictoc sits down next to her ~ reassuringly ~
Wise Snake grabs it and downs it immediately.
Kenmore takes one too [or is that one two?]
Wise Snake eyes the bottle.
Kenmore puts it back in his pocket.
Riyyh: Was your trip here a good one? [kindly]
Tarana: Yes. Sarena was very helpful.
Riyyh winces at the name.
Riyyh has been having these little Bender Cove flashbacks when small details remind him of people and events there.
Riyyh immediately covers the reaction.
Riyyh: I'm glad to hear that.
Tarana: You know her?
Riyyh: I'm sorry, I... no, I don't.
Tarana: That's all right. ~trying to be reassuring~
Tarana: What am I supposed to do here? I mean, I know in general, they said I could be useful here.
Riyyh smiles at Tarana.
Riyyh: We are mainly an agricultural community, although we also put a lot of effort into our disjunction program and various outreach programs.
Riyyh: I have made an effort to accept new members who are from rural or farming communities because the people who had to leave must be replaced.
Tarana: That must be why they thought I'd fit well here.
Riyyh: There are many areas of the farming operation which will require additional hands, even though the harvest has ended.
Tarana: But I thought....
Riyyh: Of course, if you have a particular preference or skill, we would wish to accommodate it.
Riyyh: [kindly]
Riyyh zlins Tarana's uncertainty.
Tarana: When I was young, I was taught that we all have gifts to offer.
Riyyh smiles.
Riyyh: Yes, that is true.
Tarana: We should use those gifts.
Tarana: I mean... I know I can weave, and shear sheep. But....
Riyyh realizes Tictoc will have to resume her heavy workload in the infirmary and flicks a tentacle to her letting her know it's OK for her to leave if she wishes.
Tictoc: Thank you Sectuib. Tarana, I'll see you later.
Tictoc smiles at her.
Tictoc hopes everything will work out well.
Tictoc leaves, trying not to obviously rush.
Tarana: I wouldn't have turned - Sime if I hadn't been meant to be Sime.
Riyyh returns his full attention to Tarana.
Tarana: And I wouldn't be a - channel, If there wasn't a reason for it!
Riyyh has many many years of practice at appearing to have his full, interested attention on a person, since he figured out people like him more that way.
Riyyh nods.
Tarana: And Cherryl would still be....
Tarana: I mean, they say that I am a special kind of Sime.
Riyyh: Of course you are special, Tarana. ~sincere~
Tarana: That I use more -
Tarana: Um.
Riyyh listens carefully.
Tarana: I mean....
Riyyh: Go on. ~encouraging~
Tarana: I can't just take. I wasn't brought up that way!
Riyyh: Of course not.
Tarana: We all shared.
Tarana: They said you need channels. As channels.
Riyyh: Ahh.
Riyyh sighs.
Tarana: ~earnest~
Tarana: I carry the life of other people in me. My cousin...
Riyyh: I regret that you have been misinformed.
Riyyh: You see, we have far more channels here than we could ever hope to put to use.
Tarana: But...
Riyyh: Tarana, I do not doubt your sincere desire to help.
Riyyh: ~compassion for her~
Tarana: You don't understand.
Riyyh listens patiently.
Tarana: I loved my cousin.
Tarana: If I weren't Sime, and a Channel, I could be working on the farm. But since I am, it would be a waste!
Tarana: I want to help others, like me.
Tarana: If we had known, if there had been a channel where I lived....
Riyyh: ~sympathy~
Tarana: If you have enough channels, then why wasn't there one?
Riyyh: Tarana. [gently]
Riyyh gets up from his desk and goes over to take a chair near Tarana.
Tarana: Somebody who could have known, who could have helped.
Riyyh: Yes, it would have been so much better.
Tarana: I want to do that.
Riyyh: But Tarana, I cannot send channels into Gen Territory.
Tarana: Not yet.
Riyyh: We're hundreds of miles from the border.
Tarana: But if they knew, from someone who knows what it's like....
Tarana: But for that I have to have training.
Riyyh: I know. I know how you feel.
Tarana: For me to be able to help anyone, I have to have training.
Riyyh: Tarana, you can't just go into Gen Territory, alone, and be a channel somewhere. It doesn't work that way, Gen Territory has laws forbidding it....
Tarana: I know that.
Riyyh: There are Sime Centers, along the borders, but those are run by the Tecton and they just aren't training disjunct channels in the Tecton anymore.
Tarana: But if I can help anyone, it would be better.
Riyyh reaches out and gently touches one of her hands.
Riyyh: Tarana... zlin me.
Tarana: It would mean that it all meant something.
Tarana zlins.
Riyyh: ~caring, compassion and honesty~
Riyyh: You do mean something to us, and we require your help as more than just a channel.
Riyyh: When you came here, did you come here to stay forever, to pledge Naros?
Tarana: Can I ask a question?
Riyyh is somewhat taken aback when she avoids the question, but responds kindly.
Riyyh: Of course.
Tarana: What does Naros stand for?
Riyyh: The word Naros means Concern.
Riyyh: Naros stands for the willingness to assist others.
Tarana: Helping others.
Tarana: That is what I have believed in all my life.
Riyyh: Yes, that is one of the reasons I chose you.
Tarana: Helping others with the best gifts we have.
Riyyh has been finding a lot of people are much different in real life than they appear on paper.
Riyyh: Tarana, that doesn't necessarily follow.
Riyyh knows this from recent, personal experience.
Tarana: I'm sorry, but yes it does.
Tarana: How can I be of help if I do not use all that I am?
Tarana: Why am I the way I am if not to use it to help?
Riyyh: Tarana, I feel for you. I recently fell into the same quandary myself.
Riyyh: It is a very difficult question to face.
Tarana: ~questioning~
Tarana: May I ask....
Riyyh hates to explain all this to somebody who was safely in the dark, but of course she will find out via the grapevine anyway, so....
Riyyh smiles sadly.
Riyyh: I... have a gift, Tarana.
Tarana: You're a Channel.
Tarana: ~encouraging~
Riyyh: Yes, I am, but beyond that I have another talent, which is the healing of others' hurts as people.
Tarana leans forward, listening.
Riyyh: By giving of myself... by giving what they ask, no matter what they ask, because they are my people and I am their Sectuib.
Riyyh finds this painful to describe.
Tarana: That is a large gift.
Riyyh: But... what I found was that this is a double-edged sword.
Tarana: ~understanding~
Riyyh: By giving, even though they wanted, I was not always doing good.
Riyyh: You may as well know this now, because you will hear it sooner or later anyway.
Riyyh: The reason there are so many channels here is because... they are all my children.
Tarana: Your children?
Riyyh: Yes.
Riyyh: Tictoc, for example, is my child.
Riyyh thinks he'll avoid mentioning that Tictoc's son is also his child; best not to burden innocent new non-Narosian ears with too much at once.
Tarana: But you aren't that old.
Tarana blushes.
Riyyh smiles at the unexpected praise.
Riyyh: Thank you, that is kind of you to say.
Tarana: What were you giving?
Tarana: I mean... what did you mean to share?
Tarana blushes again, not sure how to ask the question without sounding personal.
Riyyh: Whatever was required. Advice, consultation, assistance in making difficult decisions or mending a failed relationship.
Riyyh: To my Householding, I am Sectuib, father, friend and confidant.
Tarana: You understand!
Riyyh: I do understand.
Riyyh reaches out and gently takes her hands, not particularly aware that he is doing it.
Riyyh: ~concern~
Riyyh: Do you wish to pledge Naros?
Tarana: Yes!
Riyyh: That is why you were invited here, after all. To join with us.
Tarana: I would like that!
Riyyh: Could you accept that what Naros genuinely requires is hard working farm people, rather than channels?
Riyyh: At least for now?
Tarana: I can't.
Tarana: My family needed hard working farm people.
Tarana: My cousin was a hard working farm person.
Tarana: I am happy to do that work, but, I'm sorry, It is not... I know the worth of the work.
Tarana: But I don't need to be a channel for farm work.
Tarana: Cherryl did not need to die.
Riyyh winces at the mangling of the Simelan.
Riyyh: Tarana, I would offer to train you but to be a channel here is not a satisfying existence.
Riyyh: Not only have we very few members for all our channels, but we have two Farris channels staying here for the unforeseeable future.
Riyyh: You could learn the skills here, but you could hardly get much practice at them.
Riyyh thinks even he is getting shorted of work with Snake and Kenmore sucking it all up.
Tarana: They will be necessary.
Riyyh: For what? Forgive me, Tarana, but we simply have a glut of channels.
Tarana: The world finds its own balances. You are just on one end of it right now.
Tarana: Like at home, I mean, on the farm, really cold winters were difficult.
Tarana: But they brought the best wool.
Tarana: I don't mean me.
Tarana: I mean things don't happen without a reason.
Riyyh studies Tarana.
Tarana studies Riyyh back.
Tarana holds up Riyyh's hands (still holding hers)
Tarana: We weren't made this way for no reason.
Riyyh looks fatherly, Sectuibly, and of course amazingly handsome. [and rather unhappy that he can't seem to satisfy her]
Riyyh sighs.
Riyyh: Do you really want to go back into Gen Territory as a channel?
Tarana: I know I can't, right now.
Tarana: I don't know how, and they won't let me.
Riyyh nods.
Tarana: But things change. Look how much has changed in the past fifty years.
Tarana: Even in my lifetime!
Tarana: Think how I'd feel if channels were permitted across.
Tarana: And I'd done nothing to prepare for it?
Tarana is shaking, willing Riyyh to understand how much she "needs" this.
Riyyh is pretty sure they'd never let a disjunct channel across in any case.
Riyyh is nonetheless filled with ~compassion~ for her pain.
Riyyh has always been a bit of a sucker for other people's unhappiness.
Riyyh ~relents~.
Tarana zlins something, squeezes Riyyh's hands with her fingers, and looks him in the eyes.
Riyyh's tentacles wrap around her wrists.
Riyyh: All right.
Riyyh: I will allow you to train, but Tarana, I won't push you.
Riyyh: I can't, we simply don't have the work for a fully developed channel and the effects on your health would be disastrous.
Tarana's tentacles wrap instinctively back.
Tarana grins.
Riyyh: But you will at least have the skills, and perhaps....
Tarana leans forward.
Riyyh: Well, perhaps in time you will find your place here.
Tarana: Thank you!
Tarana moves to hug Riyyh, only then realizing their hands are entwined.
Tarana: I- I'm sorry.
Riyyh carefully withdraws his hands.
Riyyh: There is nothing to be sorry for. ~~gentle~~
Riyyh offers her the embrace.
Tarana: You don't know - you do know how much this means.
Tarana embraces Riyyh.