The Dragonriders of PernŽ is a trademark, Registered U.S. Patent & Trademark Office, of Anne McCaffrey. This is a recorded session, generated by Harper's Tale MOO on Saturday, December 26th, 1998, for the benefit of members unable to attend. Logged by Pyrene.
The Joys of Nannyhood
Living Caverns
Ginnie is wiping down one of the tables with a cloth, looking rather bored yet dutiful.
Pyrene stalks in trailing a handful of rosy-cheeked younglings, who wave brightly to
Ginnie. Pyrene is too busy scowling at the milk she is pouring into child-size mugs to
notice anybody else in the room.
Ginnie smiles and waves at the kids, thinking that they better not sit down at one of the
tables she just cleaned off, but not saying that out loud out of politeness.
Why sit on tables when you can stand? Although fortunately the brats aren't doing that
just yet... instead grubby hands and elbows are rested on the surface as they wait
impatiently for their milk. Pyrene continues pouring as fast as she can. It's nothing
short of a miracle the milk goes into the cups and not onto the table.
Corenne arrives from deeper in the Weyr.
Corenne exchanges the protection of stone for the bowl outside.
Ginnie just shakes her head and giggles, as she goes on to the next table.
Corenne walks in from the Central Bowl.
Corenne steps into the shadows that lead back into the Weyr.
Pyrene finally finishes the brats drinks, and pours herself some redfruit juice before
collapsing into a chair with a sigh. "Now be good!" she instructs the kids
wearily, "And /tidy/!" Only then does she notice Ginnie and give her a faint
wave. "Told you they keep people busy..."
Rowann arrives from deeper in the Weyr.
Rowann heads north into the redolent depths of the kitchens.
Ginnie leans on the table and says with a grin, "Looks like they keep some people
busier than others."
Katerina arrives from deeper in the Weyr.
Pyrene shudders, "If the nannies ask you if you'd like to be an as assistant... say
No!"
Ginnie takes a look at the kids and nods. "I don't like children much, anyway."
Smelly, dirty, obnoxious things...
Aaliyah arrives from deeper in the Weyr.
Pyrene looks worriedly at Katerina, "Am I supposed to be looking after you as
well." She just about manages not to agree with ginnie, probably not the best time.
Aaliyah
Snapping blue eyes sparkle in any light provided, whether it be sunlight, moonlight, or
even glowlight, and, though they examine everything carefully from behind rather too-long
bangs, they seem to be unoccupied and unobservant. A mass of white-blond hair cascades
behind her, wavy and flowing, though it seems always to be getting in her way, falling in
front of her eyes and tickling her ears. Average in height and slight in frame, she walks
with poise and grace. Both hands are usually laying idle by her sides and only gesture
when absolutely necessary to get her point across. Her face is quite attractive, with
those high cheekbones, strongly upturned nose, and softly lined chin, though something
tells you that her personality isn't going to match that practically flawless exterior.
She seems to have become more accustomed to the wintery High Reaches, for she doesn't look
quite so ridiculous in her fluffy clothes. Feet finally found themselves a pair of nice,
warm socks, looking to be made from llama wool or something similar. And her scarfs aren't
strewn just every which way, but settled neatly in their place around her neck, encircling
her neck and then hanging their ends down across her back. The tunic that she wears is an
odd shade of purple, thick and insulating, not totally covered by a cream-colored coat
that she bundles tightly around her. Boots are the same, binding ones that she walked here
in, and they keep her feet dry when she insists on walking through the snow. Perched on
Aaliyah's shoulder is Cynin.
She is awake and looks alert.
Carrying:
Cynin
Aaliyah is 15 Turns, 6 months, and 21 days old.
Rowann comes out of the kitchens, the smell of fresh baking following just behind.
Rowann waves at all the people. Wonders if there's a party going on :)
Aaliyah is tired... or at least that's the way she looks. It would seem to the normal
passer-by that her old, lumpy cot gave her more trouble than it usually does. Anyway, she
somehow makes her way to the place where the klah is stored, managing a slight glance at
those here with her before she grabs the freshly poured drink and makes her way to a
nearby table that suits her critical tastes.
Ginnie is just wiping the tables, and watching to see how big of a mess those kids make.
Rowann can make a really big mess. She goes over and sniffs the mulled wine.
Pyrene waves back to Rowann with something of a moan. The brats in her charge wander
blithely around the room. Ranae going right up to Aaliyah who she's never met before,
while Ewyrpin with his usual penchant for disturbing people at work, sits on the table
that Ginnie is wiping.
Rowann dips her finger in the wine and tastes it, making a face as she does so.
"Yuky!"
Pyrene peers at Rowann and wearily waves at her, "No, Rowann... not the
wine...."
Ginnie frowns at the boy on the table. "Could you please sit at one of the benches?
That's what they're for, you know. Nobody wants to eat off of something where your behind
has been."
Aaliyah sniffs as she glares down at Ranae. A cold, too, has she? My, it does seem if
she's gotten the brunt of things... or maybe she's just searching for a little sympathy.
"What are you doing?" In /her/ opinion, there are /way/ too many children here
at the weyr.
Rowann pokes around, looking in every nook and cranny possible. "Cookie?" she
asks.
Ewyrpin looks back at Ginnie. "Pyrene's responsible for us, you should yell at
her." There are advantages to having your former peer incharge of you. Ranae blinks
adorably up at Aaliyah, "I'm Ranae," she replies, apparently to a different
question than the other girl asked.
Pyrene drags herself to her feet and makes the table which normally contains the cookies,
"Oh no... There aren't any...." Her life is now officially dirt.
Aaliyah sighs and look down into her mug, seeming to be absorbed in the klah that swims
inside of it. Is she ignoring the child? As if an answer to the question, she suddenly
replies haughtily(sp?), "Good for you."
Ginnie gives Pyrene a look of sympathy, and Ewyrpin an exasperated look. "I'm not
going to yell at her because you're a brat." She throws the cloth down on the table
and walks off, towards the kitchen.
Ginnie heads north into the redolent depths of the kitchens.
Ginnie comes out of the kitchens, the smell of fresh baking following just behind.
Ranae beams with pleasure at what she takes to be a compliment. Pyrene meanwhile catches
what Ginnie said and gives her a grateful look, while mopping the milk off Filla's lap.
Ginnie returns with a plateful of cookies, and places them in their usual spot before
going back to the table and standing with her hands on her hips, trying to stare the boy
off of it.
Pyrene falls upon the cookies before the brats have a chance, biting into one blissfully.
Ewyrpin is torn between getting his share and annoying Ginnie. His stomach wins,
inevitably, but Pyrene holds the plate out of his reach with a wink for Ginnie.
Though eyes appear to shift every so often in the young one's direction, Aaliyah seems to
have forgotten the burden, looking around the cavern with the usual uninterested
curiousity and sipping carefully at the hot klah.
Rowann pounces upon thhe cookies, taking three of them and happily pushing them into her
mouth. Crumbs fall everywhere, as well as stick to her face.
Cookies always do the trick, Ginnie remembers from her little siblings. She grins back at
Pyrene and scrubs at the place where Ewyrpin's butt was.
Rowann offers a half chewed cookie to Ewyrpin, saying "Wan won?" with a full
mouth on top of her speech problems.
Pyrene decides that she might be getting the hang of this after all. Still holding the
plate, but distributing cookies to everybody but Ewyrpin, she makes her way to Aaliyah to
give Ranae hers and offer one to the older girl, "Sorry, if Ranae's bothering you, do
you want me to move her?" Ewyrpin eyes Rowann's soggy cookie scornfully and then
suddenly snatches it.
Rowann giggles tonlessly as Ewyrpin takes the cookie. "Cookie good."
Aaliyah looks up at Pyrene, smiling... well, sort of... and clears her throat. She takes
the cookie, and with the usual lack of manners no thanks is given, but she does say,
"Ummm..." and then yet another glance at Ranae, "No, she's alright
now." Just as long as she doesn't get wild, she adds silently in her head.
Pyrene catches sight of Ewyrpin and Rowann, "Ewyrpin! That was Rowann's cookie! Go...
help Ginnie with the tables if you're determined to interfere! Rowann, come get another
one." she beckons gently to the girl while nodding to Aaliyah, "I'm Pyrene by
the way. Assistant Nanny." she adds with a sigh.
Rowann wanders over to the table and get another. "Jus sharwing. Sowwy" she says
with wide eyes. She looks at Pyrene and sees that she says something about Assistant
Nanny. "You a nanny Pywene?"
Ginnie waves another cloth in the air. "I can always use more help," she says,
looking at Ewyrpin authoritatively.
Calling out a slight, "I'm Aaliyah" in response to Pyrene's greetin, she gives a
sweeping gaze around the cavern and now understands why there are so many kids here... a
nanny, who is a natural attraction for children. No wonder.
Pyrene nods to Rowann, "They tricked me into it... Nice to meet you Aaliyah,"
Ranae nods beaming up at the girl, "Pretty name!" Ewyrpin wanders grudgingly
over to Ginnie, "what do I have to do?"
Rowann sits down at a table, happily chewing a cookie.
"Wipe the tables! The ones on the left side of the room are still dirty, so go to one
of them, and scrub it off, get off all the spots and the crumbs, which can go into the
floor because I'm sweeping next."Ginnie drops the cloth into Ewyrpin's hands, her
look quite authoritative.
Aaliyah nods a bit towards Pyrene in acknowledgment to her comment. Yes, she always liked
her name. It always put her first in all of the things they did with the Harper who often
visited her home. Another, larger bite of cookie is taken and is washed down by a gulp of
now luke warm klah.
Pyrene dumps the cookie plate on a random table and dashes across the room to pull Qui
Quae and Quod away from the fire. Ewyrpin stares back at Ginnie in suspicion, "Isn't
that /your/ job?" He's palmed his chores off onto others often enough.
Ginnie shrugs. "Well, yes. But you were told to go help me, weren't you? And Pyrene
is in charge, isn't she? So, you have to help. It's not that hard. At least I don't have
you scrubbing the floors or something like that."
Ewyrpin growls something not very childlike and commences table scrubbing.
Rowann watches the other little mutants as she sits quietly.
Pyrene sticks the triplets with Rowann in the hopes that they'll follow her example. Quick
survey of the room: Ewyrpin scrubbing, Ranae gazing adoringly at Aaliyah and the rest
munching cookies. Which means she can return to her chair for a few precious moments of
sit down time.
Ginnie finishes off a table with a flourish of her cloth, watching Ewyrpin out of the
corner of her eye to make sure he doesn't do anything mischevious.
With a shake of her head, Aaliyah states under her breath that she will never, ever, no
how be a nanny. She looks down into the empty mug and stands to go retrieve some more and
nearly knocks ranae off of her feet. Serves her right for standing so close. Then, taking
her stray hand and pushing the child gently out of the way, she follows the path to the
hearth where hot klah is a'waiting her.
Rowann gets bored with her cookies, and gets up to play with her stuffed toy dragon. She
flies the ragged blue beast thru the air and over the heads of the other mutants. She
roars as she zooms it thru the air.
Ranae is immune to knocks and bruises, or at least they don't bother her. She trails after
Aaliyah and gets distracted along with most of the littl'uns by Rowann playing with the
dragon. Squeals of excitement scurry throughout the cavern. Pyrene sits determinedly in
her chair with her eyes closed. She's resting.
Sabrina comes down from the workrooms above.
Sabrina smiles to everyone as she ducks in, immediately heading for the klah pot.
Coming around to near the hearth in her cleaning of the tables, Ginnie decides it's quite
time for a break and goes to pour herself a cup of juice, leaning against the wall to
drink it.
Rowann says, "Fread. Fread. Dwagon fights Fread." She pretends that her stuffed
dragon is charing Thread. She may share cookies, but not her dragon toy!"
Pyrene lies back and resolutely ignores the world. As long as she can't see the brats
climbing over tables and chairs (which Ewyrpin just wiped down) in their efforts to get to
Rowann's dragon, she doesn't have to worry about it.
Aaliyah pours herself a mug full of klah... literally full to the brim, almost
overflowing... and moves out of the way to make room for the next person to get theirs.
She turns, this time avoiding Ranae all together and heads back to... what's this?... a
different table. Hmmm, it seems that the other one's had too much use to befit her.
Sabrina pours herself some klah and smiles at Rowann as she player with her dragon. She
then spots Pyrene and smiles, not really minding what the weyrbrats are up to, "I
hear you've been made into my Kostya's assistant"
All those feet and hands and knees, sticky and grubby with who knows what, all over those
clean tables! Well, as long as no noticable marks are left, who cares? Ginnie's had enough
wiping for today...never thought there were that many tables until she had to clean most
of 'em.
Rowann screeches as a little one grabs for the toy. "My dwagon!" She tugges it
away from a child and tries to hide it away again where nobody will find it. But it is too
late to quiet down.
Pyrene opens one eye and glares with its full force at Sabrina. "They tricked
me." She says flatly. Ewyrpin starts hitting Hullania with the dishcloth while Qui
Quae and Quod launch a concerted attack on Rowann.
Sabrina laughs, "that's what you get for lying"
Ginnie giggles softly at Pyrene before sitting her cup down and walking over to snatch the
cloth from Ewyrpin. "This is for cleaning things, not for hitting people!" she
snaps at the brat.
Rowann fights off the brats, screeching in a high pitched voice. But the triplets have
ganged up on her and she can't hold on to the dragon for long. She tries one last time to
keep the dragon by pushing Qui, but she fails.
Pyrene closes the eye again and moans softly. Ewypin blinks at Ginnie and protests,
"But she messed where I cleaned, it's not fair!!" Qui falls to the ground with a
wail, quae grabs the dragon and Quod squares off against Rowann, "You pushed my
sister!"
A /new/ chair is chosen by Aaliyah's ordained hand and she sits her small behind in it
carefully, hoping that the child hasn't already climbed onto it. She doesn't really /want/
to hurt the kid. From the corner of her eye a fleeting impression of the girl is caught
and she grimaces. She's still there.
Ginnie , who can't help but try to help out, uses the fact that she's bigger than the
little kids to her advantage and reaches into the brawl to snatch at the prized dragon.
Ranae is there indeed, tugging at Aaliyah's sleeve and whisering, "Can you get dat
dwagon for me?" Aaliyah's a lot bigger than any of the brats.
Sabrina giggles at all the commotion, "why don't you try to find a real dragon?"
Rowann wails "I wan my dwagon!" Normally she's a good little mutant, but the
triplets were too much for her.
Rowann sniffs a bit
Aaliyah shakes her head, still focusing most of her attention on her drink, and only
sometimes glancing up atthe quibbling children. "No, I can't," she answers
curtly, frantically groping for an excuse as to why not, though her face doesn't show much
of her seaqrch. "I'm... uh... not allowed to touch stuffed blue dragons... my mother
said so." Whew, that was a close one.
Sabrina sighs at then great job Pyrene is doing and turns to Rowann, "what's
wrong?"
Ginnie takes the dragon, and, batting away the brats with their grubby fingers, moves over
to Rowann and hands it to her with a smile.
Rowann smiles at Ginnie. "Fank you." She takes the dragon and cuddles it,
carefully stepping from the rowdy ones.
Pyrene finally gets up from her seat at Rowann's pitiful wail and turns to the kids,
"Stop it." she orders rather weakly. The brats ignore her, most of them haven't
noticed the blue dragon's confiscation and continue fighting. Pyrene just stands staring
at them in absolute horror.
Gunwalloe springs from ::between:: looking around for excitement.
Rowann crawls under the table to hide.
Sabrina giggles and pulls a pair of handcuffs out of her satchel, holding them up high and
yells, "who wants to tie Pyrene up?" that ought to get their attention..
Ginnie says, "You're welcome," and then walks away to the fighting triplets, who
she tells, rather il-ly, "Find a new toy to play with. I'm sure there have got to be
plenty of them around here somewhere..."
Blossom glides in from the Central Bowl.
Every brat head in the room (with the possible exception of Rowann) swings round at
Sabrina's words. A virtual sea of them converges on Sabrina eagerly, while Pyrene looks as
if she'd like to join Rowann. Wal has come to save her though and is puffing his little
blue form up to its full mass and glaring at all and sundry.
Sabrina grins and drops the handcuffs back in her satchel, well out of the brats' reach,
"first you have to stop fighting and clean up in here"
Aaliyah raises an eyebrow at someone's announcement of tying someone up. What? Ah, yes,
the nanny. What a surprise. *yawn* Now she's back to drinking deeply from her second cup
of klah and ignoring the little adoring brat that is hanging about her.
Confusion reigns, but Blossom wings her way in regardless, coming to a perch near Pyrene.
Bejeweled eyes whirl with the scene before her, tiny wedged head cocked to one side as she
observes.
Ginnie grins at Sabrina once she figures out something close to what's she's got in mind.
Besides, if the kids clean up, she won't have to.
Rowann plays quietly under the table.
There's a great deal of conferring for a moment and then the Brats suddenly erupt into a
whirlwind of tidying. Enthusiastic if not efficient, the nearest tables and floors are
wiped with jumpers and skirts to within an inch of their lives. Ranae returns to Aaliyah
and beams, "I'll clean here for you." she informs her.
Pyrene collapses back into her chair and nods to Sabrina, "Thanks... umm, you didn't
really mean it when you said you'd give it to them after the cavern was clean did
you?" She's on her side, right?
Aaliyah quickly stands up and suddenly pretends to be on of those child-lovers that always
seem to be around here. "Oh, thank you, dear," she says, her voice dripping with
sweetning. "Here, I'll get up so it's easier for you..." And then leave when
you're not looking.
Sabrina smiles at Pyrene and leans over to whisper something to her.
Sabrina whispers, "after all the work I went through stilling these from my brother?
Although you might want to hide while they're cleaning in case they find some rope."
Ranae sets to with gusto, delighted to help such a nice girl. Wal, seeing he was called
here for nothing, makes eyes at Blossom instead. Pyrene nods to Sabrina and whispers back.
You whisper, ""I'd love to, believe me, but I'm supposed to be looking after
them."" to Sabrina.
Rowann gets bumped and looks up at all the commotion. What was going on?
You sense Sabrina smiles, "hide then"
A smirk flows across Aaliyah's face, somehow making her look a little bit more evil than
normal. Ever so slowly, she steps away from her table, stopping still every so often as
Ranae looks up. Soon enough, she's all the way in a dark corner, where, hopefully, the
little brat'll never see her.
Bob blinks in from ::between::!
Sabrina hands Sabrina's Satchel to Bob.
Bob suddenly disappears ::between::!
Pyrene blinks at Sabrina and nods, diving under Rowann's table and putting her finger to
her lips. Ranae finishes cleaning and turns round to proudly show her work off to Aaliyah,
only for her lower lip to start trembling. She.. she's gone!
Rowann covers her mouth to surpress a giggle.
Sabrina grins and sits down in a spot that makes it a little bit more difficult to spot
Pyrene.
Ginnie notices Pyrene's prank and hides a giggle behind a cough.
Rowann perches her stuffed dragon on her head to help hide Pyrene a little more.
This is no prank, but a desperate fight for survival. Meanwhile, the brats have finished
their cleaning and swarm around Sabrina once more, "Now help us tie her up!!!"
they chorus eagerly, not yet noticing the disappearance of their nanny.
Aaliyah almost gives in to the sniffling child over at her former table, but catches
herself in time. Oh well, she didn't really do anything wrong. Just a fun little game of
hide 'n' seek. Or so she tells herself.
Sabrina shakes her head and fakes a sad sigh, "my firelizard took my bag, so I don't
have anything"
Ranae alone stays where she was sniffling disconsolately and wiping her nose on her
sleeve. The others all stare at Sabrina unhappily, (Hullania has the audacity to inform
her that she should train her firelizard better) "Don't you have anything? Any rope?
Tying her up was a really good idea."
Sabrina shakes her head, "only my clothes.." okay, maybe it wasn't a good idea
to mention that.. She peers around the room, "um.. where is Pyrene at??"
Rowann watches Sabrina and grins. The brats will never find Pyrene.
Ginnie says, "Why would you want to tie /her/ up anyway? I bet she'd just get mad and
stuff. But, what if you tied up one of /you/? You could all go outside and play a game,
and the loser gets tied up."
Definitely not a good idea. Varcol beams at Sabrina, "We can have your clothes?"
The others turn round and blink, "She's gone!" "But she can't go, she's
meant to be watching us." "She could be hiding" Stares go towards Ginnie,
"But we wanna tie Pyrene up!" Wicked smirks steal across a few faces, "Or a
big person..." In absence of Pyrene, another victim can always be found.
Rowann would love to see the triplets tied up.
Sabrina shakes her head, a bit upset at Varcol's idea, "I'd freeze without my
clothes"
Ginnie frowns, looking a little overwhelmed. "Well, a couple of you are rather big...
And you don't have anything to use, anyway, unless you use /your/ clothes."
Aaliyah goes home.
Rowann yawns sleepily, and blinks heavily.
Rowann crawls out from under the table. "I'm tired. Night night."
Pyrene glares at Rowann, if she leaves she'll give her hiding place away.
Rowann notices Pyrene's glare and disracts the brats with her blue dragon, waving it in
the air with a roar.
Rowann weaves around a bit hoping that the triplets will watch her and not the table.
Pyrene scrunches up small, while the triplets do indeed watch Rowann and yet again set
upon her in hopes of getting the dragon.
Rowann runs over and hands Sabrina her toy. "I'm tired. Keep 'em away fwom Pywene.
I'll get the dwagon later."
Rowann thanks Sabrina, and waves good night.
Rowann goes home.
Ginnie looks over all the tables, which are rather cleanish, and smiles before turning
back to look at the kids.
The triplets return their attention to Sabrina, while Ewyrpin and Hullania have
suspicions. The pair sneak over to Pyrene's table and whip up the cloth, "She's
there!!" Pyrene looks at them, decides that she's had more than enough and scrambles
out with as much dignity as she can muster, "All right, you threadspawn!! You can all
apologise to everyboyd in this room who you've disturbed right now, clean yourselves up
and take yourselves to bed! Now!"
Blossom suddenly disappears ::between::!
Sabrina grins at the triplets, "I suggest you follower her advice"
A stillness settles across the bratlings as they try to stare Pyrene out. Pyrene's used to
this though staring right back, and resorting to her usual inventions to help herself out,
"I happen to know that Kostya spent all day today thinking up really good
punishments," she practically savours the word, "And I'd advise the lot of you
to behave unless you /really/ want to find out what they are..." Even if it doesn't
stop them being good, they're more likely to get each other in trouble now.
Ginnie wipes at a table, trying to look busy, while she watches.
Sabrina grins, not sure if Pyrene is bluffing about the punishments or not..
The brats look back and forth thinking, a decision is abruptly reached and they stream out
of there in a torrent of pushing and shoving as they race to reach their cot first. Pyrene
regains her chair with a sigh, "Since they forgot to, I'll apologise on their behalf.
Thank Faranth they didn't realise I was lying about Kostya. They're usually onto me like a
shot.
Ginnie giggles.
Sabrina giggles, "Kostya can be evil when she wants to"
Pyrene finds the redfruit juice that she put aside earlier, miraculously unspilt and
drinks deeply. "I /know/ she can be evil. She authorised me becoming a nanny..."
Ginnie says, "Well, you did rather well clearing them all out of here."
Pyrene grins, "I do have the advantage that I know what makes them trot. And of
course, it /is/ nice to boss them around..."
Ginnie says, "Probably even better to retain your freedom."
Sabrina nods, "I couldn't believe it when I heard you were a nanny"
Pyrene sighs, "I know that /now/! Still I get my own room." One of the reasons
she took on the job after all, "What's so hard to believe??" She demands of
Sabrina. She's perfectly responsible. Really.
Sabrina shrugs a little. She really shouldn't have said that.. "Just surprised that
you openly lie to someone then get hired as their assistant" the truth never hurt
anyone, did it?
Pyrene flushes, "Well, it wasn't all lies..." And she's suspecting that's why
she was hired as an assistant. Some twisted form of punishment.
[The conversation then turned to other things so here seems as good a place as any to stop.]
