[CANDIDATES] Bored

[Arcane]

It's not even winter yet and already the lake is already half frozen over. I dare you to jump in anyway. There's nothing better to do right now anyway and it'd be funny.

[nineofswords]

Candidate Nayru

"Jump into a half-frozen lake?" Nayru asked in horror, almost visibly recoiling. "That sounds supremely ill-advised. A fantastic way to get frostbite to me. I believe there's a learning song warning about the dangers of winter that I'd be more than happy to sing. In the meantime, however, why don't we all stay here by the fires where it's warm, and perhaps enjoy a few mugs of warm klah. It's truly the perfect day for it." Jump in the half-frozen lake. Really. Who would be so abysmally foolish?

---

Candidate Miguel

"Did someone say 'dare'?" Miguel asked excitedly, already pulling his shirt off. "Oh, you're all absolutely on." He started hopping on one foot as he started pulling his boots off. "Who's coming with? There's no point jumping in the freezing lake if there's no one around to see it, after all!" He'd gotten one shoe off and was starting to work on the other as well while he was hopping towards the door to the candidate quarters. "Well, c'mon! Whoever's coming better get on it fast! I'm not planning on waiting long!"

[FirebrandPhlox]

Candidate Sheridan - Miguel

Sheridan side-eyed Miguel as he began stripping. "Seriously? You're going to hop in the lake? In this weather?" She sipped her tea and pulled her furs closer. It was downright frigid already, which was to be expected for a High Reaches autumn. She had experienced plenty of the Weyr's long winters to know that jumping in the lake at this time of year was a great way to wind up in the Infirmary with a nasty cold.

Then again, if an idiot was going to put on a show for free, might as well get some entertainment out of it. She stood up from her seat. "I'll watch you, but there's no way on Pern I'm getting in with you."

[nineofswords]

Miguel - Sheridan

"Uh, of course I'm going to jump in the lake?" Miguel said like that should be the most obvious thing in the world. "The fact that it's cold is what makes it fun! It's like a...a challenge! A test of strength and bravery! And we're supposed to be dragonriders sometime, right? So this is a great way to show what I'm made of!"

He continued tugging off his last shoe. "Hey, no need to come in with me! I just need a witness so no one can say I didn't do it!" He flung his shoe behind him and darted out into the cold beyond the candidate's barracks. "Hurry up! C'mon if you're coming, then!"

[FirebrandPhlox]

Sheridan - Miguel

Sheridan gave Miguel a long, judgemental stare. Sure, dragonriders were supposed to be courageous, but it wasn't bravery or daring that made people jump into a half frozen lake for no reason other than a dare. Dragonriders were also supposed to be smart enough to analyze risk before diving into danger head first. Miguel had seemed to have confused pulling a stupid stunt as some form of proving himself.

"Oh, I'm definitely coming," she pulled her furs tighter and held her warm mug of tea in her hands. While Miguel was sprinting into the cold, she followed at a brisk, but controlled pace. If it had been cold in the barracks, it was downright frigid in the weyrbowl.

"You're not from around here, are you?" Sheridan called after Miguel as he ran to the lake. She refused to believe that anyone who had grown up in the mountains surrounding High Reaches would be so willing to risk the hypothermia, but she had been proven wrong before.

[nineofswords]

Miguel had been given judgemental stares before. By a lot of people. This had never been something to deter him in the slightest, and in response he gave Sheridan a huge grin and a big thumbs up. This was going to go great! "Forsk yeah! Let's go, then!" Finally! Someone to witness his daring act!

So the ground was a lot colder than he'd been expecting. He let out little exhales of discomfort - "hoo! Ah! Hee!" - as he ran across the ground, trying to get to the lake as quickly as possible to save his poor feet.

He turned around, runnning backwards when Sheridan asked a question of him. "Not really, but is anyone really 'from' anywhere when you think about it?" Where he'd been born wasn't where he'd ended up, and he'd lived in the north and the south. He'd known heat and cold, famine and a full belly, sleepless nights of stress and days where he'd lazed the whole morning away. One place was pretty much like any other at the end of the day as far as he was concerned. Any of them could be like any other place if the conditions were right. Sure, it was cold outside in High Reaches, but with a roaring fire or out on the hatching sands, it could be as hot as the sands of Ista at noon. It was all a matter of perspective.

He was nearing the edge of the lake now. "Okay! I'm doing it! You better be watching, cause I'm not doing this twice!" He ran right up to the edge of the lake and without giving himself a moment's pause, he dove under the surface.

The sudden shock of cold drove the hair from his lungs and he immediately surfaced, gasping. But that was worse, and he immediately started shivering as the cold air blasted at his wet skin. His teeth were chattering involuntarily. Shivering, he managed to crawl back out of the water, wet and dripping and miserable over to Sheridan. He tried to give her his best smile. "C-c-can I h-havvve th-th-that b-b-b-b-blanket?" He asked, pointed, moving from foot to foot to keep them from having to be in contact with the frigid ground a moment more than they needed to be.

[FirebrandPhlox]

Sheridan covered her bemused smile as Miguel hopped-ran across the frosted ground in his bare feet. He didn't need to strip down before leaving the weyr, but the fact that he had told Sheridan that she was in for quite a show.

"Well," she said as she walked at an even pace behind the jogging Miguel. "I was born and raised here. Lived my whole life in the weyr. I'd say that definitely means I'm from here." She didn't know Miguel's story or where he had grown up, but everything he was doing currently was screaming "not from High Reaches."

"Trust me, I wouldn't miss this for the world!" She called to Miguel as he insisted she watch closely. She casually sipped at her tea, thankful she had brought the warm beverage as he dove under the surface. Almost instantly, he was clambering out of the lake, skin flush with cold.

He asked for her blanket, and Sheridan considered for a moment if she should hand it over. She let him flail for just a few moments before responding. "Yeah, you can have it," as she shed the warm fabric and held it out to her fellow candidate. "You definitely jumped in that lake, and I don't think anyone will question you. One look at you and the rest of the candidates will know exactly how manly you are." The last bit she said with a heavy dose of sarcasm.

[nineofswords]

"If you've never left, that just means you've never had a chance to see what the rest of the world has to offer!" Miguel called back to Sheridan. "Don't get me wrong, this place is awesome, but how can you know it's your favorite if you haven't tried anywhere else?" That was more how Miguel liked to think of places. Made more sense in his head.

Shivering in the cold, Miguel was worried Sheridan wouldn't let him have the blanket. He'd have to run for the barracks, but it would be a nicer run with the blanket."Oh thank Faranth," he gasped as she handed over the blanket. "You're my favorite person in the world right now. I'll happily take your chores for a week for this, longer if you want." He gathered the blanket around himself, rubbing it over his dripping body and made his way back to the candidate barracks as quickly as his shivering legs would carry him.

He glanced at Sheridan in surprise when she said everyone would know how manly he was. "What? Why would I care about that?" he asked. "What's the point of being young if you don't do the stupid shards people suggest? It makes for gr-great stories! Adventure! Laughs! Tears! It keeps life f-from being to b-b-boring!"

[FirebrandPhlox]

Miguel certainly had an...interesting view of the world. Sure, there was plenty of Pern that she hadn't seen, but Sheridan knew she was content here at High Reaches. This was her home, bitter cold winters and all.

"No need to," Sheridan replied to Miguel's offer to cover her chores. Part of being a leader was looking out for others without expecting anything in return. Besides, if she couldn't handle her own chores, how would she ever manage to make it as a rider with even more important duties? Chores were about instilling responsibility, and she needed to prove that she was responsible and ready for a dragon of her own.

"Frostbite also makes for good stories, but you don't see me hopping in the lake," she retorted, wrapping her arms around her chest to keep warm. "Doing stupid stunts like that is why older people look down on young people like us. They think we're impulsive idiots, and not all of us are." Miguel sure was, but Sheridan was more mature than that.

[nineofswords]

Miguel was shivering and hustling as fast as he could back to the common room, but he still stopped briefly when Sheridan said he didn't have to do her chores. "Y-y-you sure?" he asked. "Feels wrong not to pay you back s-somehow..." He started trotting back to the barracks. "Oh! I know! I'll write a song about your generosity! I'll f-f-follow you around and play it for you all th-th-the time!" It was honestly the least he could do!

"Oh, relax-x," Miguel shivered at Sheridan. "I'm g-going right b-b-back inside. Can't get frostbite that q-quick. E-e-even I know that! And who c-c-cares what old people think? L-l-l-like none of them haven't done st-stupid sh-sh-shards in their y-youth!"

He all but dove back through the barracks door, sitting down in front of the fire and rubbing his arms across his skin. "Oh Faranth, that feels so much better," he gasped. "I think that was colder than between!"

[FirebrandPhlox]

"No, no songs, Absolutely not!" Sheridan yelled as she hurriedly walked alongside Miguel back towards warmth. She wanted recognition from the candidatemaster for her actions that actually mattered, not to be lauded with a song by one of her classmates because she let him use a blanket one time. "It's nothing, d-don't worry about it." Now her teeth were starting to chatter from the cold.

As the pair made their way back inside and into the warmth, Sheridan thought a bit more about what Miguel said about their elders. Certainly the older members of the weyr had done misguided things in their youth, but wasn't one of the benefits of being taught by more experienced people learning from their mistakes and not making the same ones they did? Besides, in a weyr where hierarchy was determined by voting, it very much so mattered what other people thought of you.

"I'm pretty sure Between is colder," Sheridan told Miguel as she took a seat in the common area. She didn't sit as close to the fire, but did appreciate its warmth radiating throughout the space. "He did it, he jumped in, in case it wasn't obvious." She announced to the room, saving Miguel the trouble. If he was the sort to offer songs over a blanket being shared, it was only a matter of time before he started bragging about the experience.

[nineofswords]

"I'm really good at s-songs, I promise!" Miguel assured her. "Not Harper good, but good!" Some people were so modest when it came to getting songs written about them, but there wasn't any reason for it! Miguel had to practice somehow, didn't he? "Kindness and generosity, a dragonrider's qualities through and through!" he started to hum to himself, already improvising. "It m-might not be the same every t-t-time, but that's fine. The message will st-till come across!"

"I don't see how it can be," Miguel argued when Sheridan said between was colder. "I mean, if it is, why aren't we all jumping in lakes in winter all the time as part of our dragonrider training? You know, to get us used to it?" This was a terrible idea, which was why the candidatemasters didn't introduce it as an idea, but Miguel didn't know that, clearly. And he was smiling as he said it, clearly undaunted by his recent misadventure.

"I did jump in!" Miguel crowed, turning and addressing the room (and also warming his back now, but that was a secondary concern). "And I'll do it again if any of you doubt me!" He paused, thinking. "Probably not today, though. I uh. Need to warm up before I try that again." His body was abruptly wracked with shivers again, and he scooted just a bit closer to the fire.

[FirebrandPhlox]

"It's really fine. Please don't make a song about me." Sheridan pleaded even as the other candidate was already composing. She sighed. Maybe he had a short enough attention span that he would forget about the promise to sing her praises by the morning. If not, she'd figure out how to deal with it in the morning.

She could only stare incredulously at Miguel as he suggested dips in the frozen lake as practice for going Between. If it was a practical way to actually train candidates, the candidatemasters would have started doing it ages ago. Considering it wasn't part of their lesson plans, it was obvious that it was dangerous. Not that obvious seemed to come easily to Miguel.

As Miguel proclaimed he would jump into the lake again to prove himself, Sheridan shook her head and rolled her eyes. He was a real piece of work. Not inherently dislikable, but a piece of work. "If you're so willing to do it again, what was the point of me coming with to verify you jumped in the first place?"

[nineofswords]

"But if I don't sing a song about you, how will people know of your generosity and bravery in the face of the cold at my expense?" Miguel asked, aghast. "You won't let me do your chores, you won't let me write a song about you, what am I supposed to do to show you how grateful I am?" he asked. Sheridan was so...serious, it was hard to get a good read on her. And Miguel wanted her to know he was really, truly grateful, that she might as well have saved his life!

"Because you weren't selling it!" Miguel pointed out to Sheridan. "How is anyone supposed to believe I actually did it when you're all 'Yeah...he did it...'" Miguel crossed his arms and did a terrible impression of Sheridan. "You gotta put some flare on it! You gotta give people a reason to buy it, or else what was the point of even coming along?"

[FirebrandPhlox]

"I promise, just saying thank you is good enough for me. It really is," Sheridan assured Miguel. He was so adamant about trying to repay her. That wasn't how helping people worked. You helped someone because it was the right thing to do, not because you needed a reward. The sooner he figured that out, the better for Sheridan.

At Miguel's insistence she was telling everyone wrong, she let out a small chuckle and smiled. "The point was to get to watch someone who was very confident in himself try something really, really stupid. Seriously, it's been a long time since I've seen someone try and jump into the lake when it's half frozen over." She turned to the other candidates in the room, coming around to the idea of playing along. "It was truly a spectacle. He dove in without a moment's hesitation. Just straight into the water. I think his eyebrows froze on contact."