Sime~Gen Roleplaying: Householding Naros Scenario
Episode #129: Pep Rally (3/11/99)
Turros storms up to Riyyh's office and jerks open the door without signaling.
Riyyh jumps up in surprise, scattering papers.
Riyyh: Turros! What is wrong? ~concern~
Turros: What have you been telling people about me?
Turros: ~~ bursting with anger ~~
Riyyh is taken aback by Turros's response.
Riyyh: Please... Turros, please sit down.
Riyyh: I would be glad to talk to you about this.
Riyyh: ~~intimidated~~
Turros stalks to the desk and puts both fists on it, leaning forward to loom over Riyyh.
Riyyh holds his ground, but shrinks back visibly.
Turros: You've been telling people that I'm a bad-tempered old curmudgeon who can't tell a good farmer when he sees one, that's what I hear!
Riyyh: No! No, that's not it at all. Please, do sit down. I can explain.
Turros appears to have lost his recent bout of respect for Riyyh.
Riyyh wouldn't look quite so afraid if Turros' body language didn't look quite so much like an imminent physical violence situation.
Turros: What's to explain? You've got the whole House convinced that I've lost it--and how am I going to get the spring plowing organized, if they think I don't know what I'm doing?
Riyyh: Turros, that's not what I've been telling them.
Riyyh struggles for a tone that is patient and soothing without a trace of a quaver. Well, one can try.
Riyyh: I've been asking them to support you.
Riyyh: You and Veschapo both.
Turros: I've heard it from three reliable sources--"Sectuib thinks Veschapo is good, so please humor the old man until we can convince him to step down."
Turros: ~~ hurt ~~
Riyyh winces at the wording, which could be read an entirely different way as well.
Riyyh is, however, encouraged by the trace of hurt, which suggests the threat of having the crap kicked out of him has ended.
Riyyh's tense chest muscles relax just a hair.
Riyyh: No, Turros, that's not what I've been saying.
Riyyh: I've asked them to encourage the two of you to try to sort out your differences.
Riyyh: For stability, for the future, and for everybody involved, including yourselves.
Turros snorts like an old warhorse hearing the battle trumpets.
Riyyh: You and Veschapo are both going through a difficult situation, and everybody who works for you is living through it also. All I've asked them to do is encourage the two of you to trust and help each other.
Riyyh: [sincere and compassionate]
Turros: I'll trust Veschapo when his plans don't spell ruin for Naros.
Riyyh: Of course, [soothingly] you must decide when he is ready. But until then, he isn't your enemy, he is the person you are grooming to replace you. Your partner.
Turros: Until then, I expect him to do things my way.
Riyyh: Of course.
Riyyh: [gently]
Turros: I won't have him trying to put the new cultivator together without me.
Turros: Who knows what part might have been misplaced?
Riyyh goes pale.
Riyyh: You haven't gotten my message yet?
Turros overlooks the attack of arthritis which confined him to bed on that particular day.
Turros: What message?
Riyyh: No, I guess you wouldn't have.
Riyyh realizes he hadn't gotten up the nerve to send for Turros yet.
Riyyh eases back into his chair again.
Riyyh: I'm sorry.
Riyyh finds the letter from the cultivator's manufacturer and hands it across to Turros.
Turros takes the letter and glances at it, then reads with ~~ growing horror ~~
Turros lets the note drop from suddenly numb fingers.
Riyyh looks suitably solemn.
Turros: We're ruined.
Turros slowly collapses onto the floor, nager ringing with ~~ shock ~~
Riyyh jumps up and hastens to assist Turros.
Turros stares straight ahead, unseeing.
Riyyh guides Turros over to a chair midway between upright and the floor.
Riyyh: Turros, we will find a way.
Riyyh grasps Turros' wrists and attempts to help bolster the Gen's systems against the shock of surprise.
Turros looks at Riyyh, dazed and beaten.
Turros: There is no way to get that much land plowed without a cultivator.
Riyyh: We can borrow, we can buy a different machine, there is a way. We'll work around it somehow. [attempt to reassure]
Riyyh: We have the one cultivator, the newer one, remaining. I will attempt to contact the owners of others to see if some loaners can be cobbled together for a day or two at a time.
Turros would think the boy was incurably optimistic, but he suspects Riyyh is simply unacquainted with some of the more practical aspects of farming.
Turros: A different plow each day?
Riyyh: And it will only be three weeks late. Perhaps the ground won't even be suitable for plowing until then anyway.
Riyyh: I'm sorry, Turros, but anything is better than nothing, isn't it? [pleading]
Turros wonders how Riyyh would like having a different Donor each day.
Turros understands that Riyyh is well acquainted with the finer details of having different bedmates every day, but that's a bit different.
Riyyh: No, no, don't say that.
Riyyh: I'll find a way to do it. Tell me what you require, and I'll find it.
Turros decides that he might as well dream big, since dreams are all he's likely to get.
Riyyh's hands and tentacles grip Turros' wrists in an attempt to reassure and encourage.
Turros: Get me a Harshburger 87-3 with the new attachments, and I'll get your fields plowed.
Turros is well aware that the Harshburger 87-3 is as far above the machine he ordered as it was above the substitutes Riyyh wanted to purchase.
Riyyh looks dismayed, more at Turros' apparent state of mind than at the details of his request.
Riyyh: I'll see what I can do. [promises]
Turros nods blankly, not reassured.
Riyyh thinks nothing short of offering Anmyn's hand in marriage to the son of the owner, and personally heating up the lives of everybody else in the structure of management at the Harshburger company, would get him even the loan of one of those.
Riyyh's efforts will therefore probably be concentrated in other areas.
Riyyh: Look, if it becomes necessary to use a lesser plow... or even a different plow every day... do you think you will be able to help Veschapo handle it?
Riyyh: It's a lot to be putting on his shoulders so soon.
Riyyh: Please?
Turros stiffens at the implication.
Turros: Help Veschapo handle it?
Riyyh is relieved by the sign of life.
Turros wonders if he's just been demoted to Veschapo's assistant.
Riyyh: You're more experienced than they are. They'll be looking to you for guidance, both for farming, and for what to believe.
Turros: Hrumpf. That boy's made it plain enough that he doesn't want my guidance.
Riyyh tries to look into Turros' eyes.
Riyyh: You wouldn't want to see me trying to do it, would you?
Turros: What??
Turros: You?
Riyyh: What other choice do I have, if you won't, and he can't?
Turros manages to keep a straight face for all of two seconds, then starts whooping with laughter.
Riyyh is afraid the stress is rather getting to poor old Turros.
Turros: ~~ slightly hysterical--okay, more than slightly ~~
Turros: That's a good one! You supervising the plowing--you'd get ddddirt on your clothes!
Turros seems to find this concept even funnier.
Riyyh keeps ahold of Turros, trying to bring him down nagerically and verbally.
Riyyh: Turros, it's going to be all right.
Riyyh: All I'm saying is, we have to pull together, and do more than we're used to.
Riyyh thinks Turros will have to do more lying down in bed reading a book than he's used to, for example.
Turros gradually sobers.
Riyyh: I'm sure Veschapo will do his best, and I will do my best, and so will everybody else. But we could really use your help.
Riyyh wouldn't really consider supervising the plowing himself, although he'd probably be willing to host nightly pep rallies and the like.
Turros shakes his head, displaying a textbook case of the ~~ skeptical pessimism ~~ typical of all farmers.
Riyyh thinks he'll be busy enough dealing with whatever drastic measures are required to obtain the equipment, however.
Riyyh zlins the return to sanity and sighs.
Riyyh: If you wish to step aside... I cannot force you to remain.
Riyyh: I know this is a lot to deal with now.
Turros: Riyyh, I'm too old to dig the fields by hand. But if you can get a cultivator, I'll see that the fields get plowed.
Riyyh: ~~relief~~
Riyyh: Thank you. [sincere]
Riyyh: Then I will do everything in my power to make sure you have something to use when plowing time comes.
Turros nods.
Turros: Just now, though, I think I'd better lie down for a few minutes and rest my eyes.
Riyyh: Of course.
Riyyh: [kindly]
Riyyh vastly prefers laying down and shutting eyes to, say, punching the lights out of the Sectuib.
Turros tries to get to his feet, and manages on the second try.
Riyyh assists.
Riyyh: You are welcome to lay down here, if you wish.
Riyyh indicates the nearby couch.
Turros finds that his bad leg is protesting, and hopes that doesn't mean a change in the weather--like a thaw.
Turros limps towards the couch.
Riyyh follows, assisting as required.
Riyyh: ~~kind/gentle~~
Turros wonders if it would tar his image if he started using a cane.
Turros crawls onto the couch and lies down.
Turros sighs as the weight comes off his bad leg.
Riyyh makes sure Turros is settled, then moves his hands over and zlins the leg.
Turros: ~~ arthritis flare-up, aggravated by running around ~~
Riyyh allows some of his approaching need to show, to aid in Turros' body's natural healing.
Riyyh: Perhaps you should rest for the next couple of days? [suggests hesitantly]
Turros gives a loud, curmudgeonly snore.
Riyyh: Starting now, of course....
Riyyh smiles self-deprecatingly.
Riyyh pats Turros' leg and gets up.