Gopher (open)

[shadowreine]

One of the ideas Loren had grasped very quickly was that Candidates were, well.

Cadets.

And thus, the lowest of the low, until a dragon saw fit to bond to them. Two of the smaller females had clutched, meaning there would be eggs soon. Rumor had it that these clutches would skew towards the blue and green colors.

Which were, of course, the lowest ranking. Loren wondered if anyone would be ambitious enough to fake sickness so as to avoid this hatching and wait for one of the golds...the larger females...to produce her clutch.

Personally, she did not care. If she bonded a green, then so be it. It would be a steady life, a secure place in the world, and the small part of her that wanted to be an officer could be readily quelled.

Right now, she did not feel like anything so much as an unpaid servant. She was in the storage rooms, getting down fresh linens for the Candidate rooms, including her own. Of course, they were expected to police, expected to do chores, and commonly, it seemed, expected to do everything nobody else wanted to do.

"I'm so glad we have enough facilities here that we don't have jacks to clean out," she said to Ivy. The green firelizard, of course, just chirped at her.

[blackmage]

Eric turned yet another corner, confused by the new location still. He probably should have been paying more attention to where he was going but that required too much effort and so instead he was a little lost.

And that explained why he walked into some girl talking to herself. No, not herself, one of the teeny little dragons they seemed so fond of. Eric personally found them rather annoying and kind of a pain. And they kept trying to steal his hats. [The hat of today was, for the record, a fedora to match the tie and vest he was wearing.]

"Oh. There's someone standing there." He mumbled blinking at the girl. "Sorry. Or something."

He didn't recognize her but he barely recognized anyone here after all. He could hardly remember the dragon and human combo that had saved hs ass in the flood and the only few he had ever talked to for very long was the woman with the red hair who ran the place.

"Then again Jacks? What's your deal? No wait. Military family, right?" He snapped his fingers, making a wild guess based on her manner of speech.

[shadowreine]

Loren turned, flickering the man a grin. She did not know him, although from his dress, he was not Pernese. The Pernese, even when offered more modern clothing, tended to be more comfortable in their loose homespun. She supposed she could not blame them. People liked what they were used to.

Nobody ever mistook her for Pernese. She had seen vaguely brown Pernese, but no out and out black ones...and despite her mixed blood, most saw her as black. "I'm Loren," she added. "And this is Ivy."

It seemed to be remiss in Pernese times not to introduce firelizards. Fortunately for Eric, the young green was likely too small to actually make off with his fedora...and even more fortunately, she was not eyeing it. Yet. Had he been wearing glasses, he might have had a problem...

[blackmage]

Eric eyed the flit for a moment carefully considering it-uh-her if he remembered colors right.
"Ivy. Because she's green?" He said, sounding somewhat unamused. Was the little dragon watching him? He raised an eyebrow at her and made a mental note to keep an eye on the green creature's actions.

Oh. Right. The girl. Small or more accurately tiny she was at least a foot or more shorter than he. He resisted the urge to snicker. He thought he did rather well. SHe didn't seem to be dressed in any strange manner so he thought it safe to assume she was from Earth. That and the vague hint of a New York accent...Brooklyn, maybe? After a moment of deliberation he shrugged.

"My pleasure, Miss Loren. I'm Eric. No attatchments as of yet."

[shadowreine]

Loren smiled. "Because she has those darker green strands sort of wrapped around her. I thought they looked like ivy stems."

And yes, she was small. The Pernese did not seem to care about physical size in dragonrider prospects. They cared about 'sensitivity'. And fitness...they did expect the Candidates to be sound in mind and body. But size, no, not a concern of theirs. She supposed once you were on a dragon, it did not matter.

Ivy just chirpled at Eric, brightly, cheerfully, then tugged on Loren's hair. "Ivy. Stop that. I don't need grooming or whatever you're trying to do."

Tug.

Sigh.

[blackmage]

Eric didn't bother to conceal his snort of laughter this time.

"Apparently you should have named her Cosmetology. She seems like a very-ahem-competent hairdresser." He was mostly just glad she wasn't going after him. "Ivy is nice. It fits her."

He bit the back of his index finger as he thought about something for a second. The question was bugging him.
"Your voice. You don't have a Colorado accent, so where are you from?"
Holy crap. Was he actually attempting to make small talk?

Another laugh as the girl sighed. He fished around in his pocket and came out with a rubber band.
"Hey, greenie. I don't know how your owner feels about this but you want to play with something?" He stretched it around his hand and deftly snapped it above Loren's head and down the hall. "Here's hoping you like to chase things."

He shrugged at Loren. "Sorry if that's improper or something but that wa sa sure fire way to get my cat's attention at home."

[shadowreine]

Loren shakes her head. "Virginia. Mostly."

Ivy took off after the rubber band, but her squawks and chitters clearly indicated that she lost track of it relatively quickly. Fortunately, she kept up her search rather than returning immediately.

"I think you're tormenting my firelizard now," she added, but with cheerful undertones that made it fairly plain that she did not really think Ivy was in any distress. "So. Hoping to Impress a dragon in the next Hatching?"

That seemed to be the only thing half the Candidates wanted to talk about. The hatching. The possibilities. At least one did not *want* to Impress this time...wanted to wait for a gold clutch.