Horrible taste (Ink)

[Inkwell]

Orren internally sighed at F'ox's insistence that he was a bad person, that he didn't deserve Snowth, that he didn't, couldn't. So negative. He was going to be a tough nut to crack, that was certain, but Orren had confidence that he'd manage. He'd gotten F'ox to take the food, hadn't he, and that was a start. Much as he'd like for everyone to be happy and whole, these sorts of things did take time. He'd just have to be patient.

"I think you're wrong. If you didn't deserve her, you wouldn't have her. But I bet you'll find that out on your own soon enough." F'ox was but a weyrling, after all. He still had the potential to do something amazing and prove to everyone else as much as himself that he was worthy to ride a dragon.

At the mention of the stolen eggs, his expression darkened. "I can't believe they'd have the gall to steal eggs in the first place. I mean, it's not as though they care, but they're putting all of the other dragon-riding prisoners into a terrible position, not to mention ensuring that half a clutch either dies or betweens. How in the world do they expect to keep the eggs healthy out there without a Gold to care for them?" Sure, Djith was female and probably knew a bit about eggs, but she was no nesting queen, and those eggs weren't hers. It was completely different.

"Still, Snowth is right. L'vey isn't going to let anything happen." He didn't know L'vey personally, not yet, but he'd hear enough of the man and his dragon to have a very high opinion of him. It seemed a lot of the people at Warden's did. "There isn't any reason to, as far as I can see, unless the Watch just feels like getting their straps in a snit for the sake of it." He shrugged. "Which, who knows, they might do. But nothing bad is going to happen without a fight first, I'd say. Nobody wants to see any of the dragons hurt."

[S'yal]

"Dragons do weird things." F'ox muttered, earning himself a sigh from Snowth. She didn't snort in offense or any such thing, just licked his arm and rolled her eyes. She knew better then to get upset- he'd start freaking out and apologizing and it'd just be a messy, messy affair. Snowth didn't like it when F'ox was upset, so she wouldn't get upset so he wouldn't be upset. "... I bet I won't." F'ox muttered, feeling the need to be stubborn about something for once in his pathetic excuse for a life. Or maybe that was jut him being childish.

F'ox frowned, nails biting into his palm. Don't think of the babies with the monsters, don't think of the baby with the monsterfathermother don't think about it. F'ox eventually settled for digging his nails into the table, staring down. "I... Djith... she's smart." His voice stayed quiet, looking up at Orren. "They got a gold wher." He said simply. He didn't know Bellatrisk, but he knew the rumors abounding. Of the wherleader's fight with her handler, at least. One would have to be insane not to know. "The young one. She left with them." He explained, biting his lip. "I'm uh, quiet. No one notices me, so they just talk with me there... that's how I know."

"L'vey is just one man." Haunted eyes focused on Orren. F'ox knew more then anyone else how one man made no difference. They were all ants, scurrying and screaming and crying as they entertained their tormentors. Or at least, that's what F'ox thought. "We were never supposed to impress... I remember the candidate meeting. I-i'd never give up Snowth, but... because of me, she'll never learn how to Between. She'll never leave this place."

"There are people who don't want us here. I have a bodyguard, for Faranth's sake." His tone took a bitter edge, the feeling of being trapped weighing down on F'ox. He could hardly even take a ride on Snowth without being watched, without his every move being tracked. He felt like a butterfly pinned underneath glass, with no chance of escape.

He wanted to be free. Maybe...

I'd never go with them. F'ox reassured himself, biting his lip. I'm a good rider.

[Inkwell]

A gold wher still wasn't a gold dragon, in Orren's opinion. Especially if it was the gold wher he thought it was -- he knew about Bellatrisk, of course he did. F'ox wasn't the only one who heard things. After all, Orren worked the kitchens, and when did people ever gossip more than at meal times? "A gold wher still won't do much for them. They aren't her eggs, she probably won't care one way or the other." Whers weren't the most... loving and nurturing of creatures after all, were they? He certainly hadn't heard so. "But, here's hoping? A wher would be better than nothing, after all."

"And of course there are people that don't want you here. Most of the Weyr are those people." He shrugged. "I'm the first to admit I was surprised L'vey convinced them to let the prisoners stand at all. Not that I don't think you should have been allowed, but that... I don't know... It's a wonder you weren't attacked right there on the sands, is all. It's what I was expecting. Half the purpose of the Dragonriders now is catching criminals, so it makes sense that people would feel that letting criminals ride dragons defeats the whole point."

"So if L'vey is just one man, and he still managed to get you on a dragon and reasonably unharmed, I feel I'm right in having some faith in him. The guards are annoying, I know, but they're probably the best the Weyr can think of right now and, let's face it, the outcry it'd probably cause if you were immediately allowed to fly free would be a sharding nightmare to deal with. Not to mention, with the recent breakout including a few of the prisoner riders, security on you kind of has to be tight. There are probably a lot of people out there that are going to lump you in with them whether you like it or not."

Orren wasn't a man with a good head for Weyr politics, some would say. He was just a cook, so what did he know beyond gossip? But he could use logic, and he could piece that gossip together with his own ideas to make what were at least educated guesses. And after three years at Warden's, quietly watching and predicting, his guesses were getting better.

"We might even start getting attention from other Weyrs and Holds, and I bet that's the last thing L'vey or Leshta or any of them want. You know how you're a lot more likely to muck up and make a mistake when you're under pressure? It'll be like that."

[S'yal]

"It might be better if they died." F'ox said softly, looking down at his fingers. "Their entire lives... if they ever get caught, they'll be crippled. They'll live their entire lives in the jungle, hungry and alone with only an insane criminal attached to them." F'ox wasn't an optimistic creature to say that anything was better then death. He knew that there were some things that were worse then death.

He'd lived through them, after all.

"We were drug addicts and thieves." F'ox's lips quirked up into a smile, though it lacked any humor or happiness. "They thought we would never impress. I proved them wrong. I was the first. Of everyone on the sands. Snowth found me before any other dragon found their rider." Before the Opal, before Invidith, before her brothers and sisters. Snowth had stumbled in the sand, crying in pain and begging her rider to find her. "If the dragonets knew what was coming to them, they'd have never Impressed us." There was that undercurrent, the thoughts that had never left F'ox. Us verse Them. Prisoners verse Guards.

But was he even in the realm of the other prisoner weyrlings? They... they all had their pride. They weren't broken toys, tossed aside and picked up to prevent an innocent life from going Between. They didn't shiver and hide from the guards.

Snowth whispered a protest, but F'ox ignored her. Of course she would say she loved him- she was stuck with him, now. A soft whisper of 'that's not true' ran through his head. I loved you from the second you touched my shell. I'll always love you.

He merely listened quietly as Orren spoke next, but pink eyes narrowed and he very weakly protested. "It was only Kuriel. Only Kuriel and Djith." He remember when Djith was an egg, when he touched her shell. She'd seemed... kind, to him. But maybe he was wrong. F'ox wasn't a good judge of character. He was worst at it then babies. "We're good. We've always been good. I'm good." Good, he was good. There was no reason to hurt him. None. They'd leave him alone if he was good.

"We already have. The watch came and talked to me and the others. They don't want me either." Only Snowth wanted him. The only reason he'd been put on the sands was to stop a dragonet from Betweening. "But i'm harmless. Just a traumatized whore. What damage could I do?" F'ox laughed, before cradling his head in his hands. "I can't even steal correctly."

No, F'ox, you're not. You're not.

"I'm sorry... that was rude of me. You don't want to hear that. I... sorry."