-and we are so far from home [tag pulp]

[Ace]

"Strun. Strun, come here."

Nothing was ever, ever that easy with Strun. Joskull was currently in the dining hall, sitting down for dinner. He came from a decent-sized family, with two brothers very close in age, two fathers, and an uncle. (There was a lot of testosterone in that household. A lot. His father's poor green was quite outnumbered by the entire brood.) Eating alone was not something he particularly enjoyed. It was one of the miseries of apprenticeship, as far as he was concerned.

Of course, moving back to Trelis Weyr a few weeks ago hadn't exactly gone as planned, either. He'd been Searched. With hardly any time to spend with his family, it was off to the candidate barracks for Joskull…which, to be honest, wasn't awful. Perhaps it was a bit better than living with his parents, and, bonus, Bahari had been Searched too. (Two brothers were better than one, of course.)

And speaking of…

"Strun, I need you to go get Bahari. We're supposed to meet for din- Is that someone's note? Give it here, you little shit."

Scowling, Joskull lunged across the table, just in time for his garnet pet to leap out of the way and scamper just out of arm's reach. Someone had painstakingly written this love note and, sadly, the intended would never see it. No, Strun was already ripping it into long shreds, sinking his teeth in and relishing in the sheer joy only the classic riiiiiip would give him.

[pulp]

Oh ew.

Hatsya, perched on his human's shoulder, near visibly sneered when he caught sight of the red little demon that was making such a ruckus. The straight-backed blue sniffed haughtily, turning his head and warbling something low into Bahari's ear, as if the brunet would be able to interpret what he said, and shards she man could've with those images he bombarded him with, notably of Strun's angry little face and a general feeling of dislike. That garnet was such a horrid example of firelizards, he was far more of a beast than any Hatsya had met. The blue shook himself, fluttering his wings and curling his tail a bit tighter around his bonded's neck.

Ugh did they really have to go over?
Hatsya might've whined, but whining was beneath him and therefore out of the question.

Upon recieving that little image from his firelizard the star crafter had made a quick survey of the dining hall before spotting his sibling and his little red terror. A smile curved onto Baha's lips, and he made the motions of weaving through the dinner rush towards the glass-smith. Absently he moved to brush some of his rather unruly curls out of his vision, tucking it behind his ear and giving Hatsya a small scratch on his eyeridge to complete the motion. The blue was still very unimpressed with the direction they were headed, but appreciated the attention nonetheless.

"Well I see your pet's still a little nightmare." Bahari slid down to take a seat next to his brother, and instantly Hatsya had moved to climb down the offered arm and onto the table top, where he went about instantly preening himself. "I still don't get how you can work with sharding glass and focus on that but can't seem to stop him from eating everything. Is that even yours?" He inclined his head towards Strun and the note he was destroying.

[Ace]

Oh, double ew.

Hatsya. That little ponce. Strun's bright red head jerked up, the firelizard momentarily forgetting about his prize as he watched his human's clutchsibling arrive with his own. The clutchsibling. Almost immediately, the garnet flared his wings, standing on his back legs as he hissed at the blue. See how big he was? So large, so full, so fierce! You see that piece of paper, Hatsya? Yeah. Yeah. Grappling it between his front claws, the bright red creature gave a defiant shriek before ripping off another shred. That's what he's going to do to you, you pompous little brat. You're in the wrong neighborhood.

Joskull, meanwhile, only rested his chin on his left palm, rolling his amber eyes at the sudden spike of testosterone. "Brothermine," he greeted Bahari, offering the brunet a nod as the man joined him. The first comment was met with a dry expression, the second was met with a scowl. Straightening, he cleared his throat. "Well, first of all, I get paid to work with glass. And glass is nice." (He was not about to call it pretty, thank you.) Not only that, but he could collect and hoard all the shiny baubles and trinkets. Joskull was good at glass-smithing.

What he was not good at, however, was firelizard training. Case in point: Strun and the love letter than had somehow become a very hostile threat. "Not mine," he finally relented. "No idea where the terror got it. He's bitten me three times today, though. I'm over it. The owner can come and try to pry it from those needleteeth if they want it so badly. I swear, Dad must have been really angry with me the day he gave me that sharding creature.

[pulp]

What was that? The little blue paused, his wedge-shaped head turning to look at Strun's over-enthusiastic display of fierceness and oh honey no. Hatsya kept still, and his head inclined up the barest bit and he sniffed in moodily before turning his head in a complete dismissal of the garnet. What a brute. The blue went back to gingerly preening himself, extending one of his wings delicately to nibble along the finger bones in there. Rip away at whatever it is you're doing, Strun, and bless your little soul, sweetheart, you sure put on a good show. Hatsya just didn't care.

Bahari had blocked out the noise the firelizards were doing once he had sat down, why the brunet didn't even bat an eye when Strun decided to go on his little macho-driven show of power. The starcrafter reached out, completely oblivious of the notion of personal space when it came to his sibling, to move a lock of his hair from his face. "You know if you keep scowling like that you'll get a crease between your eyes, and when you do get one I'll relentlessly point it out just so you scowl about it more." He smirked, quite full of himself, and wrinkled his nose at Joskull.

"He's bitten you three times?" Bahari pulled back, his smirk spreading into something fuller as he listened to the blonde. "Shards, what did you do during all those turns? Don't tell me you were too busy as an apprentice to even train your little terror. And if I recall Dad was more weepy than angry." Bahari spoke matter-of-factly as he reached across his sibling for his brother's glass of wine, claiming it for himself and taking a healthy swig out of it. "Hatsya can be a little shit, but he also knows not to do it in front of me because I knew how to use some sharding discipline with him. Have you tried setting something up with bait?" He took another sip of the wine, eying Jos' plate of food greedily. "Find something he likes, cover it in some spice and wait to hear if he starts wailing about it."

[Ace]

FFFFFFF.

HE WAS BEING IGNORED. No. Nope. That was not how the garnet was going to play today. It was amazing that the two of them were even related, to be quite honest. But Hatsya seemed to take after their mother, and Strun was completely and utterly his father's son. He even looked like K'jell's firelizard. Honey. Sweetheart.

Oh.

Oooooh. Now you fucked up.

With a wild screech, the red-eyed beast launched himself across the table at Hatsya. He would make you care, you snobbish little git. Just you try to ignore him when he was claw-deep in your hide!

Joskull, for his part, was largely unaffected by the warrior's scream. If anything, he was just glad that it was Hatsya being attacked and not his own digits again. If his brother wanted his pet back, he could stick his own fingers between the fighting creature. Licking his lips, he rolled his amber eyes. "I tried, okay. But even if you lead a runner to water, you can't make it drink. Strun would sooner wither away and die of dehydration than even consider doing anything I tell him too." And the sooner the blond figured that out, Strun figured, the better.

….and there went his wine. Great. Was his entire family entitled? Side-eying Bahari, the elder sibling continued to grumble to himself. Oh yes, great and wonderful Bahari. "Should I start calling you Master Flitcrafter?" he snorted, rolling his eyes as his brother eyed down his plate of food. Fine, whatever. Take it, you little snot. Shoving it across the table, he should his head. "I am not wasting my time covering paper in space. I can't possibly cover all the paper in the entire Weyr. And he'll probably retaliate against me, you know. Start leaving dead things in my cot again. Heathen."

[pulp]

Hatsya definitely took after his mother, the proper little lady had a gentleman of a son, and he wouldn't be caught making such a ruckus in a public place. He had an appearance to uphold, after all! The blue continued with his preening, even ignoring the screech the other firelizard unleashed--which was probably a bad thing. That warning could've been a nice point to make a note of, being the fact that Strun had launched himself towards the blue would've been, well, nice information to know before he was struck with the force of the larger flitt. The blue toppled over, instinctively grabbing onto the other firelizard and topping in a roll. A startled trill was unleashed, and once Hastya managed to register that Strun was on him did a bit of panic wash other the blue.

Nope, no not want. Hatsya wriggled himself, doing his best to use his smaller build to his advantage and worm his way out of those claws before popping between and landing a few lengths further away on the table. His eyes were whirling a mix of red and orange, and oh he didn't look so proper now! The blue was in a stance ready to flee, and his little chest was heaving away with his sudden adrenaline-infused panting. Honestly he probably could've blinked back to the safety of Bahari's quarters, but let's be frank here, Hatsya might enjoy egging Strun on a little bit.

The tussle between the firelizards was largely ignored by Bahari, who instead was focused on his brother. "Oh psh, you didn't try." Baha teased his brother, shaking his head and smiling. "He turned out to be a little bit difficult and you'd rather make your pretty glass things, admit it." Bahari was all smiles, and oh look at how bothered he was getting over all of this. "Oh shells no, if they even had flitcrafting I'd be horrible of it. Dealing with all of those little demons would be far worse than, shards, anything I can think of." It would be like dealing with children and oh Bahari didn't like that. The starcrafter grinned when Joskell shoved his plate of food out, and reached for a bit of a meatroll with his fingers.

"Hope you don't mind sharing, I'm not hungry enough to eat all of that." He snorted, taking another drink of that wine before putting it back in a spot where they both could reach it. "It was just an idea, brother. I'm not trying to sharding reprimand you or anyth--Dead things? Does he actually bring you dead things in your cot? Oh shards I didn't know that, at least they're fully dead?" He made a disgusted face, looking at his meatroll for a bit longer before taking a healthy bite of it. "What made him stop doing that the first time?"

[Ace]

Ah, yes! The enemy was taken unaware! If he could cackle, Strun might have. As it was, the little red beast had his claws, and his jaws, full of pretty blue hide. It wasn't going to be pretty when he was done with it, though! As Hatsya began to wriggle free, the garnet shrieked furiously and tried to grapple with the other male's hide for purchase before his clutchbrother managed to escape between, landing several feet away. Coward!

Hissing, Strun scrabbled after him. Oh, were your meatrolls in the way? Didn't notice. The firelizard ran right over the play Bahari and Joskull were sharing before he tried to lunge across the table for a second time.

Joskull could only stare as the garnet rampaged his way across the table, turning his head to acknowledge the ongoing scuffle only briefly. His brother's pet didn't appear to be bleeding, or in great pain, so the blond didn't feel particularly obliged to stop the fight. (He would feel bad if his garnet actually hurt Hatsya, however. The blue was a nice lizard and, shards, Bahari was his little brother. He'd probably use it to guilt Joskull into things for the next several decades.)

"I did so try," the glass-smith sniffed, turning back to wrinkle his nose at his brother. "It just didn't happen to be worth my time. I get paid for smithing, I don't get paid for trying to teach Strun things." Nevermind he was an apprentice at the time, and was neither paid nor as busy as he was now. That was completely beside the point. Resting his chin on one palm, he watched Bahari eat and drink, making no move to reclaim his dinner. Jeeze, did the brunet ever eat?

"Fully dead, still plenty of blood, though. Nasty business. I stopped trying to teach him things and he stopped terrorizing me. That's how our relationship goes. Sometimes I feel like I'm his pet, and not the other way around!"

[pulp]

The little blue watched as the garnet seemed intent on blazing a warpath straigh tto him, not even bothering to move around the plate of food their Humans were picking off of. Ugh, what a brute, the other flitt clearly had no issue with just tromping right through everything and making a large mess of things. Hatsya lifted his head a notch, hissing and fluttering his wings out as he kept his focus on Strun and his approach. For a moment it looked like he might retaliate and strike back, but nope, Hatsya was much more of a proper gentleman than to sully himself by getting down to Strun's level. As soon as the garnet lunged the blue, in turn, jumped up and popped between again.

This time Hatsya appeared back on the table near the position where Strun first was. Ah, yes he could do this. As long as that neanderthal kept rampaging back and forth Hastya was content with flickering from place to place, hopefully leading the little rage-monster on a path that would only lead him to exhaustion.

Bahari briefly spared a look to the situation, notably when his brother's garnet seemed intent on trampling through the plate of food. Oh ew, he didn't know what the unruly thing might've been stomping through, but he certainly didn't think that it would b eclean enough for it go pass any test whether or not food would be sullied with the contact made. Bahari wrinkled his nose at the thought, sticking to the single meatroll he had plucked before the little cretin had decided to go and make a mess of things. Luckily Hastya was using what his clutchsibling apparently didn't have, a brain. The scarcrafter smirked at his brother's reasoning to the lack of flitt-training and rolled his eyes. "I think not having a little terror would be payment enough. How does he keep around your craft, by the way? Strun surrounded by glass seems like it would be an accident waiting to happen."

Oh and he did know how his brother liked his shiny things, if Strun got into a habit of wanting to smash those he'd be sure there would be enough motivation to spur the blonde into actually training him. Ah, but that wasn't any of Bahari's business, was it?

"That's really gross, brother. Hatsya may like to kill things, but he keeps that away from me, I don't even think I've seen him bloody." That was also because the blue appreciated cleanliness. "Well if you are his pet he's certainly has you figured out, with the whole training you not to train him thing. I mean you could always distract him from something just by throwing paper around, right? So maybe that can be a good thing. Here, let's see if this'll work." Curiosity snagged Bahari's mind, and the brunet reached out towards part of Strun's destroyed letter. He crumpled the remnants up in his hand, balling it up and, with a look to the garnet, tossed it in a direction opposite of Hatsya.

[Ace]

Cowardly little tunnelsnake, slithering away like that. Even the very thought of those horrible, awful creatures made the garnet bristle all the more. (He was ever his father's son, he was. He would carry on the legacy and help exterminate all the tunnelsnakes across Pern.) Narrowing those beady little eyes, he stared across the table at Hatsya. Oh, he was going to play that game, was he? Did his little blue brother really think himself smarter than his clear better? Did he really thi-

WHAT WAS THAT.

Strun's wings flared out as he glanced over his shoulder at the movement. Huffing, he narrowed his eyes. Paper. Paper. Hatsya was fun and all, but he was only fun as long as he was squealing and trying to escape. Paper, though? Paper ripped. He could rip and tear and shred and add it to his little nest. Yes. Yessssss. Scrabbling across the table, he leapt after the ball of the paper with a wild scream, ripping, snapping and snarling.

Joskull looked up as his lizard flopped around, turning the scrap into confetti and leaving Hatsya relatively unharmed. "Strun doesn't bother me in the shop. Too boring for him. I'm sure he's off harassing Jarn or hunting some unexpecting victim. Or trying to challenge a dragon to a fight. I swear to Ramoth I'm going to lose him that way." Their bond wasn't that tight, but…if pressed, the blond was pretty sure he was going to miss the little brat. (It wasn't really a question of 'if' in his mind, but 'when'.)

"I like Prim." Prim wasn't as obnoxious as Hatsya. The female was very sweet. Hell, even Forge, though a bit stupid, was a good, loyal pet. There were days Joskull wondered if his garnet saw him as anything more than a snack dispenser. "Maybe I should try to get another. You think he would settle down if I got him a female?"

[pulp]

Hatsya only kept his vision on Strun as the little devil snarled and seemed to have a regular fit about it all. The blue sniffed haughtily, and if he could he would've rolled his eyes when Strun's attention was diverted. The blue winked between quietly again, popping back into existence in the space above Bahari's lap. The blue snuggled down into it, cheeping softly into the fabric of the man. Strun was an awful meanie and liked to destroy things. The garnet always made such a mess and Hatsya so did detest messes. The blue kept quiet, turning his attention to preen at the clothing his Bonded wore and hopefully be kept safe there. Strun wouldn't attack Bahari, right?

Bahari smirked a bit at the distraction going well enough, and one arm dipped down into his lap to curl around Hatsya as he kept his attention trained on his brother. "Well actually that's good that he finds it pretty boring. That would be an issue if he took to breaking through all your things." Joskull's job of training his firelizard might've been atrocious, but the man did make beautiful glasswork, even Bahari could admit to that. "You know one of these days a dragon might actually snap at him, but with your luck with that little dimglow he'd survive with only half of his body working just to spite you, probably would yell and scream for you to carry him places." Oh, Strun would probably hang on and keep from dying just to spite them all.

"Prim? Well shards, that's because Prim is all manners and no ego, Uncle got all of the lucky hits in that one firelizard." It was true, the little girl had been a marvelously well-behaved thing. "I mean if you did get him a female he'd either spend some attention on it, which might settle him down, or he might think to protect her, which then I could see him trying to destroy anything that looks at her wrong. I mean there's a chance." Which was significantly better than nothing. "Were you thinking of getting another? What type do you think would maybe mellow him out the most?"

[Ace]

Strun was well and occupied, destroying the wad of paper like an overactive husky would your furniture if you left him inside all day. There would be nothing left but little pieces for his nest once he was done. Hatsya was largely ignored – in fact, with paper offered to him, the garnet probably forget his sibling existed altogether.

Joskull, meanwhile, just groaned and rolled his eyes at the very idea of his garnet haunting him for the rest of his life. Screaming. Yes, that seemed entirely like his pet. Giving Strun a sideways look, he rested his chin on his palm. "I imagine he probably would. Mom said Jarn used to hate him. Attacked him all the time." Of course, Bakari never went into great detail about why their father's firelizard felt it prudent to swoop down upon him. The point was, though, that Bakari wasn't actually bonded to the lizard. And he still managed to win him over. "Maybe I ought to talk to Dad about it." He'd trained one garnet, hadn't he?

Changing his train of thought back to his question, Joskull frowned at his brother's assessment. See, this is why he talked to you, little brother. Not only did you get the family's good looks, but you got the brains, too. (Perhaps it came from being Uncle's little prodigy.) "I didn't even think of that. He's already a possessive little shit when it comes to his nest. I imagine he'd maul my fingers right off if I tried to touch her. Especially if she had eggs. Shit, and he's constantly trying to pick fights with males, too." Case in point: Hatsya, who really wasn't even a real threat to the territorial garnet. "I have no idea what else to do, though, short of putting him on a leash, and I certainly don't want him tethered to me."

[pulp]

Bahari couldn't help but look at Strun and his efforts to shed that paper into smithereens. Sharding strange creature, that one was. The starcrafter rubbed a thumb along Hatsya's wedge-shaped head, silently thanking his lucky stars that he didn't end up with some uncontrollable demon like that. There was a brief moment of pity for his brother, although sibling rivalry often managed to cover that up. His brother hadn’t trained his 'lizard, so it was fitting that he acted like a completely wild thing. The crafter grinned and looked back towards Joskull when he groaned. Oh yep, he could see Strun grappling onto a sweet old age, crippled or no, just to haunt the living shit out of him.

"Well Jarn kind of hated anything if you looked at them and said that certain word." Oh Bahari had learned to use that word very carefully and sparsely, and if he was within earshot of the other lizard, shards, help the poor souls he decided to take his wrath on. "I'm sure if Mother could deal with him and all of that, you could probably deal with Strun. A talk with Dad might help anyways. If he was able to wrangle and have Jarn trained he probably has a few pointers on how to deal with your brute." Granted, hopefully those pointers wouldn't be too late or anything. Strun seemed to be pretty set in his ways, at least from what Bahari could see.

Oh Bahari did like to be right.

The candidate was practically beaming when Joskull agreed with him. "Oh shards, can you imagine how crazy he'd be if there were eggs in his nest? Now do you think he'd even look after them like a sire, or eat them all together? Although that might depend on whatever little lady it belongs to. Maybe you'd get one lucky enough to try and tame him, although I wouldn't hold my breath or anything waiting for that." Bahari snorted a bit at the thought of Strun on a leash and raised a hand to try and stifle the amused bout of laughter. "Oh shells, no, no you can't have him on a leash, he'd probably try to eat it, or just give up on life and you'd have to drag him everywhere."

[Ace]

"I don't want to imagine this anymore," Joskull whined, pressing his hands to his head, like maybe that could stop his thought process. Oh, the idea of his garnet with eggs? Terrifying. He liked things he could collect and- Oh. Oh. That would mean that Strun had spawned. That meant there would be little Strun's everywhere. And that was even more terrifying than the idea of him trying to guard his nest! He probably wouldn't even be able to give the eggs away, not if people knew the sire.

"So, that's a terrible idea. We're going to scratch that." And that was a bit sad, that he wasn't going to be able to have another one. Not with Strun, who would either terrorize it, or terrorize him all the more. Frowning, Joskull reached for one of the previously trampled meatrolls and put it down in two bites. "You're going to have to think of something, brother. You're the smart one. I'll make you some nice glass pieces to look at the stars if you can fix this problem, okay?"

[pulp]

Bahari had to really stop himself from smiling and breaking up into laughter when his brother seemed to regard the idea with terror. Oh dear brother, Baha really found it amusing that a firelizard could cause all of this grief. Granted if Baha had been thinking about the topic of Strun actually producing children he would be rather terrified as well. Well, actually, Hatsya was the product of Jarn and Prim, so perhaps if a nice little lady flitt as introduced the garnet would maybe manage to clutch something that wasn't a destructive force of nightmare fuel. It was a thought, but then there was always the chance of the garnet producing something that could be even worse than him.

Ugh, no, no thank you.

"Terrible, yes, but maybe we could salvage parts of it, who knows." Bahari's hand slithered back out to grasp at the wine glass when his brother went for one of the squashed meatrolls. "I mean I'm flattered that you know I'm intelligent enough to take on Pern's most pressing matters, but this one will take some time." Notice how Bahari said that his brother knew he was smart enough, not that he thought he was smart enough. Oh Baha, your ego was showing. The candidate tipped his head up to consider the offer, drumming on his chin with his free hand. "I guess you could sway me with that." That and, oh you know, they were related. "I'll have to give it some time, in the meanwhile I'd suggest keeping something nearby to distract him with whenever he gets unruly, like what I did with the paper ball."

The brunet downed the rest of the wine, leaning in and moving to ruffle Joskull's blonde hair with a hand while Hatsya repositioned himself and scaled his Human to take his place on his shoulder. "It's nice having dinner with you, if I think of anything I'll send Hatsya with a note." He paused, looking back at Strun with a wary glance. "I'll tell him to deliver it straight to you, obviously." The starcrafter snickered a bit, taking his leave. Oh it was nice to have his brother back within the same space.

FINISHED~