[PRP]Meanwhile, in the Darkest Timeline[V'rind/K'ienn/Drgns]

[ShinosBee]

The sun was high and the sands were hot, and the air was full of the low hum of dragons and the gentle rocking sway of eggs.

Inside one thick shell, the dragonet stirred, feeling something tugging at his mind. Time to go, time to uncurl, time to find the one he'd chosen. It'd been a hard choice, really. So many potentials. But he knew what he wanted, and what would be best. He was strong, and he would take what was his and make all of Pern kneel before him—the herald of a new age for all dragons on Pern. It was time...almost. He shifted inside his shell, making it rock back and forth, testing it. A moment more, or two and...Wait a moment.

From outside the shell he heard a snapping crack, the thump of a body hitting the sands, and even in his dark ovoid prison, he saw red. That one. That one! Daring to be first, daring to think he was...no...No! The dragonet surged with energy as he sensed the mind of the other hatchling, and the intent behind it. He would not allow that overpuffed nobody to take what was his!

With a flex of his limbs and the lightest thought, the hatchling burst from his shell as if it had been made of paper mache. He toppled onto his feet, onto the sand, and had only a moment to notice the (beautiful! regal!) shade of his claws before he was off, wings flared and mouth dropping open to screech defiance and fury at the bronze who was posturing just ahead. His muscles bunched, and the hatchling leapt...landing atop his brother and bearing him into the sand. He ground down with tiny claws, flapping to catch his balance and shrieking triumph before staring ahead at the gathered people. They'd thought the bronze was the king of the clutch? No, never. He was best here, the strongest and most fearless! In fact, he thought to himself with no little pride, why not shirk what he knew was expected of him. He'd pick someone totally unexpected...but they'd still be the best of them all, just because they were his.

That'd been the plan, at least, and the hatchling had fixed a whirling eye on one of the watching hopefuls with long dark hair...until he felt again the bronze beneath him trying to reach out. Not for the woman he himself had been eyeing, but for a young man one or two people to the side of her. A surge of anger bubbled up again—the bronze was daring to try to impress first? Well, that wouldn't do at all. With a pause to scream in the face of the bronze, the hatchling kicked off, all but sprinting at the young man in question with eyes whirling rainbow colors.

Kovalienn! You're mine! You belong to me, Krahsujunth!

Teiha

 

[Teiha]

Crack.

Light streamed into the tiny black space. His cramped muscles were begging to be stretched, but first – he took a deep breath of the fresh air, then rubbed his nose against the cracked shell. Like scratching a terrible itch, he rasped against the wall of his prison until it gave way. The dragonet’s head emerged, followed by his forelimbs. Then, with a powerful kick of his hind legs, he was free. After shaking the remains of the shell from his body, he looked about himself, relaxing as he saw that he had made it first. Before that one. The choice was his.

With graceful steps, the slender dragonet made his way toward the line of upright beings that were all watching him, admiring his burnished bronze hide. He sensed the intense desire that some projected toward him and sifted through their siren calls, noting that some of them felt strangely shallow. They called to him merely because of his appearance, with nothing of any worth within themselves to offer in exchange for his utter devotion.

He moved closer to the crowd, weeding out the petty voices without any further thought for any of them. There was one who could return that deepest devotion. One who was his perfect match. One who would rise with him to greatness.

There. That boy. The one whose heartbeat felt like fire and thunder.

From where he stood, the bronze lifted his head and stretched his wings to their full breadth.

Then, suddenly, a wave of pure rage struck him like a physical blow, accompanied by the sound of an egg exploding into a million shards. He’d no time to even turn to look before he was flat on his stomach in the sand, the wind knocked out of him and his surroundings whirling just as fast as his bright yellow eyes. A brawny blue dragonet stood over him, bellowing like the monsterous brute he was. But the bronze would not lose. He would have his chosen. He reached out to the boy with his mind, determined to summon him from where he’d frozen among the other white-robed youths. The boy seemed to be shining, alive with hope as he made his way through the crowd. Just a few steps closer, and the dragonet would be able to look him full in the eyes.

Then the blue’s maw filled his vision, jaws opening in a ghastly screech. With a crushing leap, the blue launched himself from the other dragonet’s back, placing himself between the bronze and his chosen partner.

And forth from the blue’s mind came the words that deadened all hope.

Kovalienn! You're mine! You belong to me, Krahsujunth!

No…

NO!

The bronze dragonet writhed in mental anguish, a shriek ripping through him as the connection he had begun to form with the boy was completely severed. He was already slipping away, his clouded gray eyes seeing only watery shapes in shades of darkness. That darkness was calling to him, opening its arms to gather him in and end the suffering. And it terrified him.

A deathly-cold stab of fear drove the bronze to his feet, and he lurched toward the strongest mind he could sense, screaming with both voice and mind.

I DON’T WANT TO GO INTO THAT DARKNESS! DON’T LET ME GO!

VILIRIND, SAVE ME!

ShinosBee

WHAT HAVE WE DONE

 

[ShinosBee]

Pure, burning triumph had filled the blue hatchling's mind the moment he'd connected with Kovalienn, K'ienn, HIS boy. Not Yisketh's! His whip-like tail snapped behind him as he stared in eager anticipation up at the boy they'd both wanted, but that he'd gotten. He was perfect, right? The best here, because of course he was, and because Krahsujunth himself had claimed him. He'd not even heard the baby bronze's deathly shriek of pain as his bond had been denied, so busy was he joining with the young man. It was pure bliss, to have what was his AND what Yisketh had wanted. And once that nuisance was out of the way, then he'd be the king of this clutch. Not that he wasn't already, but with a bronze underfoot, too many people wouldn't be looking his way.

That the bronze would end up squealing in fear and running for that figure with the long dark hair (which Krahsujunth had so nearly considered) was unexpected for all parties. The blue stamped, snorting, and ramming his head into the knees of the boy he'd stolen, the boy who still hadn't responded to the gift that was his blue, perfect self. Well, what did it matter? He looked up at what was his, eyes whirling a dull mix of blue and red. You're going to have to let go of whatever you thought was 'best'. I am, not him. We'll show them all. Don't disappoint me, and forget the rest. The blue snaked his head up to reach for the boy's hand with his teeth. Pain would get a reaction, if nothing else.

Across the sands, Vilirind had watched the blue utterly trounce the bronze with mild interest. He certainly had character! Of course, he had to go stomping off to Kovalienn, and what a waste that was. Just what they all needed...but maybe, really, for the best. He'd been cocky every time she'd had the misfortune to be around him, bragging about the bronze that'd be his, certainly. Well, it seemed a waste of a good keen blue, but it'd bring him down a peg, and maybe that was a good trade in the end.

The bronze though, it'd clearly been upset. The thing was crying, and...paling? Was that normal? She could hear the onlookers gasping, and the golden mother cried out, unnoticed by the apparently bereft bronze. She certainly didn't expect it to suddenly stand up, and stumble towards her!

I DON’T WANT TO GO INTO THAT DARKNESS! DON’T LET ME GO!

VILIRIND, SAVE ME!

The pain, the fear behind those words tore at her heart, and she gasped as she hit her knees in the sands. She was oblivious to the empathetic tears spilling down her cheeks (she, who'd never cried a day beyond her third turn of life) as she opened her arms to usher in the bawling baby bronze. Of course she would help! He was hers! It certainly would be Kovalienn's blue that's picked on hers, but she knew how to handle it. Wordlessly she offered herself to the bronze, a silent, strong shoulder to cry on, and never mind that it made no sense at all that he would turn to her.

Teiha

A WONDERFUL, TERRIBLE THING. MUAHAHAHAHAHAHA

 

[Teiha]

Yisketh pressed into the securing embrace of the girl, his pathetic creeling loud at first, but slowly quieting with her reassuring touch and thoughts. He all but huddled into the safety of her mind like a small creature nestling into its burrow. She was good, she was strong. She was… a little strange, somehow. He hadn’t even noticed her before, and couldn’t understand why. She was strange, but wonderful. Why hadn’t he noticed her? Had she been invisible?

V’rind... do you want to fly someday? To become strong together so we can take care of our brothers and sisters? he asked, speaking her name a little hesitantly, a little reverently. If she was strange, maybe she wouldn’t be interested in such things. He wouldn’t want to offend her. But he had to know.

-------------------------------

Kovalienn had known this was his day. It was just this feeling that something amazing was going to happen. After an invigorating speech from his father that was worthy as an address to a fighting wing before a heavy fall, he’d stepped onto the sands of the Hatching Grounds with the other Candidates, tall and proud and expectant. Before long, a gorgeous bronze dragonet hatched, and practically swaggered toward the group of boys he was with. The bronze moved so regally, his deep blue eyes whirling with peaceful confidence, that Kovalienn was instantly smitten. He focused all of his thoughts on that beautiful creature… if any dragon could reach for the sky and obtain it, as the boy hoped to, it would be that one.

When another hatchling tackled the bronze, Kovalienn fought not to act on a startlingly intense fantasy – to run and help, and as a result, Impress that distressed dragonet. He literally stepped behind another boy to use him like a visible reminder: Don’t interfere. Don’t get in the way. Let them come to you. But… no, that wasn’t entirely just the boy’s dream playing out in his mind. There was actually something there. What…? The dragonet was calling to him, with a soundless beckoning of the mind.

He stepped out from behind the other boy, hardly daring to believe it. The silent presence was becoming stronger in his head, and he could just barely sense a voice… He drew closer, inviting the dragonet further into his mind. Just a few steps, and he’d be able to reach out and touch--

Kovalienn! You're mine! You belong to me, Krahsujunth!

With a startlingly expansive bound, the blue hatchling landed in front of him and blocked his path, muscles rippling as it stood at his feet, broad chest heaving with exertion and pride. They locked eyes. As if it were far in the distance, he could hear the keening of the bronze, but he barely noticed. A blue. A blue. A blue. He stared stupidly at the dragonet as it proceeded to butt his knees with its head. You're going to have to let go of whatever you thought was 'best'. I am, not him. We'll show them all. Don't disappoint me, and forget the rest.

Kovalienn let out a yelp as the dragonet’s teeth raked his hand. He had quite returned to his senses, and shot the blue hatchling a glare while cradling the bloody appendage. You’re the best, are you? What makes you think so? Even as he said the snippish words, he felt a stirring in his heart. There was something in Krahsujunth that drew him in, even as he heard his father’s voice telling him that blues and greens weren’t anything close to good enough for the son of a bronzerider.

“Blues and greens aren’t anything close to good enough for the son of a bronzerider,” the Candidatemaster said, coming up beside him.

“What was that?” Kovalienn said, a little surprised at the man’s sudden appearance. He glanced down and noticed that his own legs were bare. Funny, he hadn’t noticed a draft before.

“Your dragon needs feeding, Kovalienn. Take him to the tables, then get that hand looked at.”

The boy nodded, then looked down at Krahsujunth. This… was going to be hard to explain to his father.

ShinosBee

 

[ShinosBee]

The level of raw emotions flowing off the little bronze was not anything V'rind was prepared for. Honestly, the bronze was...kind of a weenie. Especially for a 'big confident' bronze. If he'd been a human, V'rind would no doubt have pried him off her, and then told him to grow up. But he wasn't. He was her dragon, somehow, and she ached for him. It was confusing to realize on some level that he hadn't been meant for her, but there he was, all the same. And she guessed she could suck it up and let him have a peek into her heart too, since his was so amazingly on his nonexistent sleeve.

"Well...that's sort of why I'm here, isn't it?" Wasn't it? She couldn't quite remember. She wanted to fly though, that was sure, so she nodded to the bronze, reaching out to grab both headknobs and give him a light jostle. She'd had many brothers. She'd never been a gentle thing herself. Part of her worried that the light roughhousing would hurt the little baby-soft bronze, but well. Someone had to toughen him up. Still holding him by the headknobs she pulled his head close, to press her forehead to his. Their mingled breaths puffed between them, and she stared into his whirling facet eyes. "Honestly, I don't really care about some of your siblings. I care about you though...so...How about you tell me your name, and then we'll see about the rest of'm."

She released the bronze and stood, pulling the thick white fur of her cape a bit tighter around her shoulders against a strong gust of cool wind. It seemed to settle somewhere behind her ribs, chilling her from the inside out, but she ignored it. Like anything else she was uncomfortable with.

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I am the best. Why? Aren't you? I only picked you because you thought you were, and HE thought you were, so if you ARE, then I am too. But I would be even without you, so don't worry about it. The blue flicked his lips over his teeth, tasting blood from his boy's hand. It reminded him how hungry he was, but then someone else came over to distract them both.

When Kovalienn, K'ienn turned back to him, Krahsujunth knelt, his huge bulk descending to offer a leg to climb up to his back. The largest blue on all of Pern, so so anyone would think. Come on then. Before I change my mind. He rumbled, deep as the sea, and bid his rider climb up. Fianth is rising soon, and I'm going to chase. Hurry up. I never catch her though, and that's your fault, I think. Burning pain and need rolled off the blue to crash into his rider, but there was no judgement behind it. If he couldn't catch her on his own, then he didn't deserve her, right?

The blue leapt up once his rider was aboard, but his wings couldn't seem to catch any air. Everyone down on the sands was watching them struggle, even with the eggs still hatching. The tall dark haired figure had a bronze at her side, and they were crying. Up on a ledge near the top of the spires of high reaches, a gold and a bronze lay side by side, and they were crying too.

Teiha

 

[Teiha]

Eyes wide with an equal mix of hope and anticipation of being told off, the dragonet gazed up into V’rind’s face. Then she shook him by the headknobs – but not forcefully – and pressed their foreheads together. He understood it, felt her affection. That small bit of physical contact was such a pure, simple way to show her approval, and the hatchling ate it up, finally feeling free to let loose the love he wanted so badly to give to his lifepartner. He let it well up until it burst, rushing down over V’rind like a crest of warm seawater.

My name is Yisketh.



Yisketh!

The bronze whipped his nose in the direction of the shout. Fianth was in the air, and she was calling for him! A trail of bright light followed her figure as she flew, a golden star flitting across the dusky evening sky. He rose from the sands with a thunderous roar, leaving those tiny hatchlings on the ground. He would not waste this second chance. Yisketh split the sky in two with his great wings, blue sand spilling out of the fissure he’d left behind and piling into the weyrbowl below.

With an exhilarated laugh, he drew close to the golden beauty, his heart dancing at the sight her her weaving form. Such strength, such loveliness! She glanced back over her shoulder, eyes whirling alluring shades of violet. Carry me home, my Yisketh! came her ardent tones. He bore down upon her with powerful strokes of his wings, reaching out to gather up his prize.

As he lifted his talons, he saw that they were blue.

With a screech of alarm, Fianth dodged away from his touch. She dove and disappeared into the crack that divided the sky… a sky that was now black, drained of all color. Yisketh spasmed in the air, as if he’d been shocked, and fell. Down, down, down until he crashed into a sea of blue sand. The weyrbowl was filled with sky, up to the tips of the spires. He thrashed, trying to free himself from the shifting ground, but the merciless blue waves gathered him into their clutches and pulled him under.

-----------------------------------

Upon Krahsujunth’s back, K’ienn tried to encourage his dragon. He really wanted to. But the fact was, blues couldn’t fly golds. So he said nothing. He loved his dragon… but something had always been off about their bond. K’ienn knew he was the best, deserving of the best dragon. Krahsujunth was the best dragon. He had to be. How then, did they become this – a laughingstock? He had been meant to be a leader… but that wasn’t possible for a bluerider. He stared at the back of Krahsujunth’s head as the blue struggled to take off, acutely sharing in the dragon’s tormented, demented… futile desire for things they could never have, wondering how their ill-fated joining ever could have happened in the first place.

Hearing the laughter and jeering of the stands audience, K’ienn looked up to the sky, as if willing someone to come and take him away from it all. On the distant heights, he saw a bronze and a gold laying together, their hunched positions like those of desolated mourners. As he gazed at them, he thought he recognized the bronze as his father’s. But Axantath, with his tattered sails and shattered wingbones, could never have gotten to that ledge. No… not Axantath. It was Yisketh, and Fianth. Wait, that wasn’t right, either. The gold was Zenobiath.

Yisketh roused from his bent position on the ledge, staring accusingly at K’ienn. Do you mind? How would you like to be stared at while you’re trying to grieve for a lost one?

“But… you haven’t lost anyone.”

Are you sure?

Yisketh was standing in front of him now, looking down with disgust upon the puny man.

Are you sure?

Then the dragon's eyes went white.








K'ienn blinked and looked around. He was standing up, though it didn’t look like there was any ground beneath him. There was nothing but white, on all sides, above and below. A white bench was in front of him, seemingly hovering in midair. Nonplussed, the man walked through the white nothingness and sat down.

"Congratulations, you're a father."

From nowhere, two arms appeared and placed a baby in his hands. The baby was dark and handsome, like he was, with rakish headknobs and faceted eyes that whirled a deep, blissful blue.

His name is Krahsujenn, said Krahsujunth, sweeping his tail out of the way before flopping down on the bench beside him, primly crossing his knees and taking in the moment with a proud grin. He may look more like you, but he has most of my name because I'm the BEST! And then he hugged his rider, enveloping the man in a suffocating embrace.

There was a sharp pain as Krahsujunth snarled in his ear and squeezed, cracking his ribs.

-------------------------------

K'ienn erupted with a red-blooded roar as he wrestled with the dragon. The harder he fought, the more Krahsujunth smothered him, cutting off his air. Then, quite suddenly, he realized the creature he was struggling with was merely the heavy fur coverlet from his bed, tangled around him as if he’d been thrashing all night.

He was in bed. In his own weyr. He unraveled himself from the coverlet and kicked it away, chest heaving and sweat-drenched hair plastered against his forehead. He heard a draconic moan from the ledge outside, felt the dragon’s paralyzing distress that so perfectly mirrored his own. Yisketh’s glowing, yellow-white eyes appeared in the entrance, his low, continuous creeling begging for consolation.

K’ienn exhaled with a visible shudder, jaw hanging slack as he tried to catch his breath. “What… what in… Faranth’s name…?”

ShinosBee

...and I was totally keen to keep going until I realized HOW HECKING LONG THIS WAS GETTING.

 

[ShinosBee]

Across the weyr on a larger ledge, two blood red eyes snapped open, glowing in the warm almost-darkness of a night not quite held at bay by a low flickering oil lamp further inside the cavern. The dragon they were attached to was one long, rigid wall against the slowly sighing side of the larger female beside him. It was only the instant awareness of that supple pale gold flank that kept him fro leaping up to savage the air, to shriek his fury and confusion, and find a certain man and dash against the rock walls of his weyr. His body he held fixed in place, nostrils flared wide to hiss a strained but almost silent gasp. His mind, though...

His mind lanced out, across the invisible thread that connected him to his rider, and for one horrible moment he was afraid to make the final connection and hesitated. What if she wasn't there? The blue had never been patient or fearful though, and his wariness lasted only a breath before he let himself flood into the mind of the one joined to him. And he went slack, sagging against Fianth's side to realize he recognized every inch and twist of the mind of the woman who had sat stark upright in her bed, and was now slapping at the arm of the man beside her, one hand over her swollen stomach, and swearing up a storm about how it was 'his fault' her dreams had become so very strange.

A dream. Was that all it'd been? He'd retracted his mental probe as soon as he'd realized that the horror of being bound to K'ienn wasn't real. What more comfort could be given than the knowledge of the truth? He did thrum a ripple of (slowly returning) calm to his rider though, having sensed her slight exhaustion, and knowing her sleep would in turn make him more ready to try sleeping again. The thought that that horrible alternative reality might be lurking behind the veil of unconsciousness was an unsettling one...But he had dreamed before of being unable to catch Fianth. Seeing V'rind astride the hated Yisketh was new...but worse, he'd had a moment of sheer terror when the bronze had fallen, crashing down atop her and sinking them both into the pit of sand. She'd believed in the bronze, fully, in his dream. the same way she'd always given him her full support.

It made the hesitant despair he'd dreamed of coming from K'ienn all the more harsh. Was that the sort of thing Yisketh had to live with day in and day out? For a moment the blue felt a bud of sympathy, before he shrugged it off and shifted to rest his chin atop Fianth's shoulder. Yisketh was a bronze. K'ienn would no doubt think the world of him. Had thought the world of him. the bronze wasn't worth his wondering, his worry, or his waking hours when he should be sleeping.

Despite his disregard, Krahsujunth would lie awake a while more yet, staring into the darkness and pressing as close as he could to his golden glittering love without waking her, every touch reminding him that this was the dream come true, and not [ithat.

Teiha