Sime~Gen Roleplaying: Householding Naros Scenario
Episode #131: Form Follows Fashion? (3/14/99)
Waybee shuffles tiredly up to the gates of Naros.
Waybee is a scrawny, poorly dressed Sime, aged before his time, wearing a particularly moth-eaten cap and a patched cape.
Eak: Hi!
Eak waves down from the top of the wall.
Waybee takes off his hat, revealing dirty, straw-colored hair and lamentably prominent ears.
Eak is a young kid who had stern instructions not to let anybody in who seems important.
Eak: [without checking with an adult first, that is]
Eak: Are you important?
Waybee: Please, I must speak with Sectuib Riyyh. Let me in, for the sake of my sainted wife and starving children.
Eak pauses.
Eak isn't sure if having a saint for a wife counts as being important oneself.
Waybee: No, ma'am, I'm just Waybee the farmer, but Sectuib Riyyh has a kind heart, and he wouldn't let a child go hungry.
Waybee's voice has taken on a distinct whine.
Eak: Oh, OK.
Eak goes down and lets Waybee in.
Eak: I can take you to Vissera, she'll give you some food. [offers]
Eak usually gets her handouts that way, anyway.
Waybee: Oh, thank you, thank you, but I really must talk to Sectuib Riyyh. Please, you will tell him that Waybee of Waybee Farm is here?
Waybee: I won't take up much of his time, I promise.
Eak closes and re locks the gate.
Eak: I'll show you where he is.
Waybee worries his already mangled cap.
Waybee: ~~ hope ~~
Waybee: You're a kind woman, a virtuous woman.
Eak leads him to a low building that looks like a barn.
Waybee's voice has lost a bit of the whining, but makes up for it in obsequiousness.
Eak: I think he's in there. [points]
Waybee: In there?
Eak nods solemnly.
Waybee had rather pictured Riyyh as being in a clean, elegant office.
Waybee extends his laterals, trying to zlin inside..
Eak: [somebody who might be a channel can dimly be zlinned within]
Waybee dithers.
Eak: I have to go back to watching or I'll get yelled at.
Eak: 'Bye!
Eak waves as she walks off.
Waybee ponders the urgency of his errand, versus the reduced probability of success if he catches Riyyh in a bad mood.
Waybee then recalls that Riyyh is seldom in a bad mood, or at least not the sort of bad mood that causes him to refuse assistance, and takes heart.
Waybee opens the door.
Waybee zlins cautiously, trying to determine Riyyh's mood before proceeding.
Waybee has had to grovel for help often enough that he's got the techniques down pat.
Riyyh is clothed and groomed elegantly enough (or at least he was) but is sitting on some damp straw in a disused stall, with a candle, stationery, ink, and pens.
Riyyh: ~~oh, woe is me~~
Waybee: ~~ oh dear ~~
Riyyh is writing grovelacious letters to local large commercial farmers, offering the dreaded harvest-labor-later-in-return-for-use-of-your-cultivator-for-a-couple-days-this-spring trade.
Riyyh is holed up in the barn for 2 reasons: 1) Nobody will tell Tiarala he's there, and 2) He's trying to get into a mindset where his communications ability with farmers will be slightly improved.
Waybee arranges his nager into as nonthreatening a configuration as he can manage and edges into the building.
Waybee: Sectuib Riyyh?
Riyyh looks up, startled, clutching the papers.
Riyyh hadn't thought anybody would interrupt him here... then realizes it's not one of his members.
Waybee: Sectuib Riyyh, you're my last hope.
Riyyh: Waybee?
Waybee: ~~ grovel, grovel ~~
Waybee: Yes, it's Waybee of Waybee Farm, just as there was a Waybee at Waybee Farm during your father's day, and your grandfather's.
Waybee: But there might not be for much longer, no indeed, which is why I've come, you zlin.
Riyyh puts the papers down, and carefully stops up the ink bottle.
Waybee forbears to mention that Waybee Farm was much more profitable in the days before it was under his mismanagement.
Riyyh had spent the first hour of his labors trying to keep straw off of him and the papers, with no success whatsoever, and had only just begun to get some serious writing done.
Riyyh sighs.
Riyyh: Then things have not been well with you, Waybee? [gently]
Waybee: You've a kind man, Sectuib Riyyh, and, well... no, they haven't.
Waybee: One of my mules died over the winter, you know, and now the other's lame, and I don't know how I'm to plow without a team.
Waybee: ~~ misery ~~
Riyyh: How truly unfortunate. ~sympathetic~
Waybee is careful not to provide details as to the reasons that he is without a working team, as he doesn't want to spoil his chances by admitting that the first mule died from colic due to bad feed, and the second lamed itself on some pieces of scrap metal that he hadn't gotten around to picking up yet.
Waybee: Yes. If I can't plow, the crops won't get planted, and my children will starve.
Waybee manages to look even scrawnier than the average Sime, as a demonstration.
Waybee: You're a kind man, Sectuib Riyyh, everybody knows that.
Waybee: If you could see your way to lending me a team so I can plow, I would be willing to do anything.
Waybee feels secure in making this offer, since no one with any sense would call on such as incompetent as himself to do anything whatsoever.
Riyyh ponders the question.
Riyyh actually feels very uncomfortable at the idea of giving over a Narosian animal into this man's hands.
Waybee: Please, it's only for the plowing. My mule should have recovered by the time the ground's ready.
Waybee's estimate allows for a long convalescence, what with the lamentable tendency of his plow to break down at inconvenient moments.
Waybee consoles himself that at least it is a showcase for the most complete collection of string and baling wire samples in the district.
Riyyh: Would it be possible for you to bring your mule here, in the meantime?
Riyyh: Our veterinarian might be able to do something for him.
Waybee perks up.
Waybee: Of course, of course, you are most kind to offer.
Waybee is more than happy to have the temporarily useless creature eating at someone else's expense.
Riyyh: There are some weeks yet until plowing. Allow me to speak to some people, and I will let you know within the next two or three weeks how we can assist you. I am sure we'll be able to. [kindly]
Waybee: Oh, thank you, thank you!
Waybee mauls his cap so quickly that it starts to rotate.
Waybee: If there is anything I can do for you, you only have to ask.
Riyyh: Thank you.
Waybee: My children will eat because of you.
Waybee adds, even if he has to send them here to live next winter.
Riyyh would hate to come to the point of having to ask to borrow Waybee's plow, because even he can tell it is poorly maintained.
Riyyh however will make a mental note of the debt just in case Naros does become that desperate.
Riyyh mentally crosses himself.
Waybee: I'll have my oldest bring the mule over later today.
Riyyh: That will be fine. [smiles]
Waybee isn't about to give the creature one meal he doesn't have to, which might be considered a kindness after its stablemate died from bad feed.
Waybee: ~~ groveling gratitude ~~
Waybee backs out of the shed, still twirling his cap with all ten fingers and eight tentacles.
Riyyh watches after him, and then sighs and looks down at the straw.
Riyyh: This isn't working, is it.
Riyyh convinces himself the barn was a bad idea and bends down to collect the letter-writing paraphernalia.
Anmyn pokes her head into the shed.
Anmyn: Sectuib?
Riyyh straightens and turns around.
Riyyh: Anmyn? Yes, what is it?
Anmyn: That Hajene Tiarala is looking for you, and Turros still won't get out of bed, and I have some letters here for you.
Anmyn: But no one else from the Tecton has arrived.
Anmyn feels compelled to offer some good news among the bad.
Riyyh: Well, there's a relief anyway. [smiles tiredly]
Riyyh: Tell everybody I'll be in my office shortly. I just have to go home and wash up first.
Anmyn: All right. Should I leave the letters on your desk?
Riyyh: Yes, please.
Anmyn smiles, glad at the chance to help Riyyh.
Riyyh: Could you bring these back also? [offers the writing supplies]
Anmyn: Of course.
Anmyn takes the supplies.
Riyyh: Thank you. ~~genuine~~
Anmyn: Oh, dear, there's straw on your shirt.
Riyyh: Yes, it's terrible, isn't it?
Anmyn: Oh, yes.
Riyyh picks at the individual pieces.
Anmyn: ~~ sympathetic dismay ~~
Anmyn: You can't go to your office like that.
Riyyh: Well, I shall be up as soon as I am fit to be seen.
Anmyn: I'll make sure people know that you're coming as quickly as you can.
Riyyh: Thank you.
Anmyn estimates that at about two hours.
Riyyh leaves the low building and hurries toward his house.
Riyyh wonders if he should stop by and visit Turros first, since the man would hardly notice if he was covered head to toe in manure, much less speckled with bits of straw.
Riyyh: Oh, dear.
Riyyh chides himself for the uncharitable thought - all his members deserve to see him at his best, even if they only perceive it on a subconscious level.
Riyyh continues to the house.
Kadi stands as Riyyh enters, switching her tail at the draft of cold air from the opened door.
Kadi: Mrupp?
Riyyh smiles at the cat and closes the door again.
Riyyh: Hello, Kadi, and how are you today?
Riyyh bends to pat her.
Kadi rubs against Riyyh's pants leg, depositing a few kitty hairs alongside the straw.
Kadi hopes this greeting will quickly result in a snack.
Riyyh continues up the stairs to his room.
Riyyh wasn't aware of the snack agenda.
Kadi sits down, tail twitching with annoyance.
Riyyh is already removing clothes by the time he hits the top of the stairs.
Tiarala comes out of the kitchen.
Tiarala: Riyyh?
Tiarala blinks at the disappearing figure, and starts up the stairs herself.
Tiarala: Riyyh, darling, what's the matter?
Riyyh inserts the plug and turns on the bath water, before beginning to remove clothes in earnest.
Tiarala catches an unexpected odor, looks down, and discovers some matter that is very much what. Specifically, what is left after a horse has digested its hay and oats.
Tiarala: Oh, dear.
Tiarala gathers from this sign that Riyyh has probably not been in his office filling out the form she brought.
Riyyh finally notices Tiarala's presence and comes to the door of the bathroom, now divested of all, er, coverings.
Riyyh: Hello, Tiarala.
Riyyh: ~apologetic~
Tiarala ~~ enjoys ~~ the sight.
Tiarala: Starting a new fashion?
Riyyh: I didn't realize you were here, I was just coming to wash up before going in to the office [explains]
Riyyh laughs sheepishly.
Tiarala: However did you get into such a state?
Riyyh: One must expect this sort of thing when living on a farm, after all.
Riyyh has been told this all his life, however he generally does a lot better job of avoiding it.
Tiarala: Well, yes, but one hopes to keep it out of one's home.
Tiarala: I hope there isn't anything seriously wrong?
Riyyh: Not that wasn't wrong the last time we spoke. ~~reassurance~~
Tiarala: Oh, dear. That bad?
Tiarala had hoped that whatever-it-was had been solved, so that Riyyh could cook his books and give her the form to take back to Arat.
Riyyh goes back in to check the temperature of the bath water.
Tiarala sort of trails after him, admiring the rear view.
Tiarala shakes her head at the straw-adorned pile of discarded clothing on the bathroom floor.
Riyyh: Care to join me? The water is perfect.
Tiarala brightens.
Tiarala: What a lovely idea.
Tiarala starts taking off her clothes.
Tiarala is reasonably well-preserved, for a woman of her years.
Tiarala dabbles a toe in the water to test the temperature.
Tiarala wiggles her toes, making bubbles.
Tiarala: Bubble bath! I haven't played in bubble bath for years.
Tiarala: ~~ pleasure ~~
Riyyh watches, smiling.
Tiarala slips into the water, grinning back.