What I Really Meant To Say

Writers: Eimi, Yvonne
Date Posted: 10th January 2006

Characters: Harki, U'kaiah
Description: Harki offers her condolences to U'kaiah following Jaela's death, making for an awkward moment or two
Location: Dragonsfall Weyr
Date: month 9, day 7 of Turn 3

The news that the Weyrwoman had collapsed caused Harki a bit of worry -
not for Jaela, but for U'kaiah. She tried to squelch it since she hadn't talked to the bronzerider since their last disastrous outing and trip to the healer's, but turns of friendship were hard to brush aside. Dire rumors traveled through the Weyr faster than news did, and each whisper made her feel worse. Jaela was dead, Jaela was dying, Jaela had caught the Plague, Jaela was poisoned, Jaela was murdered. And then the worst had come to pass and the dragons keened out a dirge for Calyth as the golden queen went /between/ to join her rider. Harki lay awake that night wondering what U'kaiah was doing. }:You should speak to him,:{ Cerillith said, more than once, both before and after Jaela's death. And finally the green, and her own guilt, broke down Harki's recalcitrance and she found herself hovering outside U'kaiah's door.

}:He's in there. I just asked Kalamath.:{
**Stop being helpful!** Harki hissed at her dragon. **I don't need your help. I don't even know why I'm here.** She raised her hand and knocked anyway.

U'kaiah sat on his couch staring off into /between/. He ignored the knock. The bronzerider was not in the mood for company. Maybe if he did nothing they would go away.

}:Cerillith's rider really wants to see you, :{ Kalamath murmured softly.

**Harki?** U'kaiah was surprised that of all people it would be her. She was not known for being the forgiving type. Shards. He got up off the couch at last and walked over to the door.

The greenrider was leaning against the door jam in a pose meant to look casual but ended up looking uncomfortable. She tried out a tentative smile. "Hey. How're you doing?"

He tried to return her smile with a small shrug. "You want to come in?"

"Um." Harki glanced over his shoulder but couldn't see into his weyr. "I guess. I don't want to intrude."

"On what?" U'kaiah hadn't exactly been in the mood to look for company. He stepped out of the way. "Are you coming in or not?"

Harki's eyes narrowed but she bit back her retort. She hadn't come to fight. Instead she brushed past him into his weyr, and stood slightly awkwardly beside his couch. The greenrider had never been good at dealing with emotions. "I'm sorry about Jaela."

The bronzerider sighed and ran a hand wearily through his hair. It was kind of her. He knew only too well Harki had not exactly loved the Weyrwoman. But he really wasn't sure what to say to such condolences.
He felt he had no right to receive them. They had spent a few happy weeks in each others company. Was that really enough to earn him such pity? He wasn't sure. U'kaiah dipped his head in acceptance. "Do you want to sit a while?"

Harki sat, but she didn't look any more comfortable on the couch as she had standing. She shook her hair out of her eyes, briefly exposing an angry red mark on her forehead. "I know you two were friends, so..." she bit her lip, then extracted a short amber bottle from her coat pocket, which she placed on the squat table beside her.
"Redfruit liquor. From the Vintner's Hall. Sometimes it's easier when you don't have to think for a little while."

That sounded really good. He flopped down on the sofa next to her.
"Thanks Harki," he said with a genuine, if pathetic attempt at a smile.
Shards but he was missing her already. "How's your head feeling?"

"Fine." The greenrider grit her jaw. "How's yours?"

"It hurts a bit," he admitted as he reached for the bottle. "This will help I think."

"That's what it's there for." She was quiet for a moment. "What are you going to do?"

He popped open the bottle and took a long swig. It was good and strong. "Do?" he asked as he passed the bottle to the greenrider.

"About- drills. Life. You know." She took a mouthful from the bottle. It burned going down.

He shrugged as he took the bottle back. "I'll drill. I'll live. What else can I do? It's not as if... we were weyrmated or anything."

Harki resisted the temptation to roll her eyes, and instead picked at the fabric of the couch's arm. "Do you ever regret Impressing?"

"What?" he asked, his head snapping to look at her in surprise. Where did _that_ come from? "No, of course not. Never."

"Remember N'thol, from our weyrling class? He didn't come out from /between/. And then there was Liddet, who died in the first 'Fall.
And others. Pr'kal, V'art, Ilra, O'far... Jaela. Sometimes I wonder if any of us will reach sixty turns now that Thread's back."

"What happened to Jaela could have happened to woman, rider or no." Of course, it didn't make things any better. "I know what you mean, though. I guess... I know it could happen to any of us. I really thought after I was scored in that early Fall, that I was one of the lucky ones. Next time... I may not be so lucky. And I know it will happen again."

"It's like we need to pack more living into everything we do because we die so easily. Weyrs are weird places, U'kaiah. They're not like real life." Harki was quiet for a moment. "I wouldn't trade Cerillith for all of Pern, but sometimes I wonder what things would be like if I hadn't Impressed."

"You would have been a crafter. Or some man's weyrmate. And you would have children and a family and probably die old and happy in your bed." U'kaiah smiled at the thought of a _domestic_ Harki. The greenrider snorted and held her hand out for the bottle. The alcohol had hit her stomach and was beginning to warm her from the inside out. "I hated baking, and I'd be a terrible mother. I'd die old and miserable in my bed, and you know it."

He took one more sip before passing it over. "I don't think either of us where meant for typical lives, Harki. Some of us just aren't." U'kaiah would much rather die in the skies than in his bed anyway. "Do you think that's what the dragons know when they chose us? Do you think they know that we just can't make it in the world like everyone else? That we need them to make us whole?"

"I don't know." She put the bottle to her lips and grimaced a little as it burned its way down her throat before handing it back. "Maybe it's because we're expendable."

"Expendable? Never," he said with an emphatic shake of his head. "We're needed. Pern cannot survive without us."

"Pern can't survive without us being willing to die. It's not the same thing."

U'kaiah could feel his ire rising. He was _not_ expendable, and neither was his bronze. "What do you suggest, Harki? That we take back our lives? Let Pern fester in Thread?"

"Shards, do you _ever_ listen to what I'm saying?" Harki frowned and took back the bottle. She needed to feel dulled. "Of _course_ I'm not suggesting that, but maybe I am saying that we never had lives to take back in the first place!"

"Some of us could have had lives. Amazing lives." Jaela would have been a great woman, whether she had been a Weyrwoman or a crafter's wife. Some people are just born to be something more than ordinary. She was like that. U'kaiah had always hoped he was too. Maybe that was what he liked about being around her. She had a way of making him feel...
extraordinary.

"And if we could have had amazing lives, why do you think we Impressed instead of doing that? This way we _get_ the amazing lives that we couldn't have before, but in return, we get to die for them. Oh shards." Harki took a long pull on the bottle and thrust it back into U'kaiah's hands. "I didn't come here to talk about this."

"Well, it certainly doesn't seem like you came to make me feel _better_." It also didn't seem like the liquor was working quite as well as they had hoped.

"Well, I sharding well _tried_." The greenrider stood and turned to face him. "Look. I'm not good with- with this sort of thing, okay? But you're my Weyrlingmate and I really am sorry for you about Jaela. So -
goodnight."

"Shards, Harki. Don't go." He concentrated on the label of the bottle in his hands absently tracing his fingers along the paper. "It's not you."

The greenrider stared at the carpet. "No, it is me," she mumbled.
"I'm not- I'm probably not the sort of company you want right now, and it's okay to say it. But feel free to knock on my door when you... anytime."

U'kaiah sighed as he looked back down at the label. "You know, Harki, you might be right. We may be expendable to the rest of Pern.
But we should never be expendable to each other." He glanced up at her out of the corner of his eye. "Please stay. I don't want to get drunk alone."

Her expression was guarded. "You sure?"

He nodded silently. The time past faster when someone was with him.
When he wasn't alone with his thoughts.

Harki sat back down beside him, and for a moment it felt to her as though they were back in the Weyrling barracks and nothing was important or worrisome other than 'will I Impress?' She bumped him gently with her shoulder to knock him out of his thoughts. "Just don't hog the bottle."

Last updated on the January 10th 2006

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What I Really Meant To Say