It Began With a Crash

For Bernadette

Open for Play
The Six Kingdom's most prestigious university and the de facto cultural capital of Anaxas.

The Stacks | Ghost Town | Muffey

User avatar
Sienna
Posts: 27
Joined: Sat Jul 07, 2018 5:10 am
Topics: 11
Race: Galdor
Character Sheet: Character Sheet
Plot Notes: [url=http:/fullurl/]Plot Notes[/url]
Writer: Saffron
Post Templates: Post Templates
Contact:

Wed Aug 01, 2018 12:44 pm

Near 27 o'clock,
14 of Intas, 2718
The Cafeteria
Image
Sienna gave a slight smile to the woman, an imbali, no a passive, and placed her order at the serving counter, “The stew, the rice, and the brownie please.” Picking up her plate, she turned around, and took in the groups of students scattered through the wide space. The cafeteria tended to be a little emptier of the crowds this late in the day. This close to the first curfew, the younger students were largely absent. Sienna picked an empty table some distance past the end of the serving counter, and set her plate down. She had gotten into the habit of taking a quick supper after her evening ramble, and then spending a solid few hours at the library.

It had been nearly two weeks since the school year began, and Sienna still felt like a foreigner inside. To all outward appearances she was settling in well enough, with her classmates being too busy with their own workloads to spare too much attention for a quiet, slightly taller than average girl. Their attitudes ranged from indifference to mild curiosity to a harried sort of helpfulness. Sienna's air of neutral reserve did not typically encourage casual chattering, and many of her classmates had provisionally tagged her as either shy or snooty (or worse, boring).

Sienna was neither, but she was lonely, and the feeling seemed especially strong tonight. It wasn't just the more understandable displacement of a new class at a new school, or the pressure of taking two magics as her majors. Those were bad enough, but it was the hundreds of little things that tripped her up by being subtly.. off. The uniform still felt wrong, and the weather was too wet, and even the way people spoke sounded off to ears tuned to the lyrical accents of her Mugrobi friends. But what she couldn't get at all used to was... the passives. She took a gulp of water and kept on observing the few passives serving the students food, without quite staring at them. They didn't much talk among themselves, though she noticed that the man glanced at the older woman every few minutes when she wasn't looking. An infatuation? Could Ray truly be among one of them?

She'd patiently extracted a bare handful of tiny clues, more hints than evidence, from her parents. She'd wracked her brains in an effort to come up with a scenario in which Ray could still be alive.. But nothing had clicked till the last summer term when her class had been assigned an advanced history and sociology project on Anaxas by a visiting professor. It was then that the ugly, unsettling suspicion that Rayne had tested out as a.. passive.. had reared its head. Oh Gods she still felt slightly sick at the notion, though granted it was no longer as bad as when she had first thought of it..

Passives were dangerous, everyone agreed on that. And her parents had been much worse, careening between hostility and hate, fear and pity. She had been a little ashamed of what she had thought of as their irrational and bigoted attitudes, she was honest enough to admit to that, but now... She realised that thinking about the imbali society in the abstract was a whole different equation from seeing them around every corner, and possibly having Rayne be one of them too. Her feelings were still very muddled about it all, but it all made her feel vaguely guilty, and unaccountably nervous. She wasn't used to this feeling.

Her food finished, she stood up, her mind still wrestling with her feelings and thoughts about passives, and stepped out into the aisle. She hadn't noticed the girl moving past her seat with a tray full of dirty dishes. There was no field to give the usual subconscious warning either and with a loud crash, both the privileged galdor teenager, and the tired passive, ended up on the floor. Sienna managed to sit up, her hip stinging lightly, then noticed the girl, then the greasy leftovers and broken dishes around and on them., and lastly the sudden silence in the cafeteria. ”Well.” Sienna's voice was almost unnaturally even, That has clocking well cracked the water barrel.”
Image

Tags:
User avatar
Bernadette Seymor
Posts: 16
Joined: Tue Jun 26, 2018 4:55 am
Topics: 6
Race: Passive
Character Sheet: Character Sheet
Plot Notes: Plot Notes
Writer: Lantern
Post Templates: Post Templates
Contact:

Sun Aug 05, 2018 9:41 am

Image
The sudden loud sound of the crash made Berna start and glance up from her work behind the counter. She nearly dropped one of the clean glasses she was organizing on the counter.

Disaster! This was for a moment the only thing she could think of.

Sally, the teenager girl who collected the dishes had recently been a kitchen maid. Berna didn’t know what her name had been before she had been gated, but Sally wasn’t the kind of name the galdori used to pick for their children. Savilla? Selene? Whatever. Sally never spoke about it, just like Berna never mentioned that she had once upon a time been Bernadette. The past was gone. So were their old names, although most of them probably knew what their true name had been.

Sally was brand new at the housemaid job. As a beginner she was given the easiest tasks, such as gathering the dirty dishes the cafeteria visitors were happy to just leave on the tables when they left

Berna herself was nearly twenty-five. She had worked as a housemaid for ten years. To work behind the counter and front all the galdor students and occasional professors and university administrators who were the customers of the cafeteria took considerably more experience and competence. The galdori never even saw Sally and other servants who worked with things the galdori didn’t need to even think of. It was slightly different with the cafeteria’s counter staff, like Berna. They had to communicate briefly with her when she took their orders.

She had to keep the counter clean and in perfect order and she had to take orders and work fast, without making any mistakes. Berna even had to smile and look like she enjoyed the work. It wouldn’t have been pleasant for people who naturally expected excellent service have to face a sour servant.

And seeing how the galdori students often behaved like bullies to each other, the faint professional smiles on the faces of gated servants might very well be the only smile some of them received in a whole long day. This was never spoken of. It wasn’t done. Still. The way some of the students took their time when they made their orders, spoke volumes.

Those asked questions about the content of the food and drink the cafeteria offered, sort of drew out the time at the counter when they had to speak with the slightly smiling Berna with her air of professional friendliness and interest. They lingered. Drew out the moment of temporary service-benevolence. Drew out their time of with her, until they had to move on and join the others again. Galdori secretly needing the company of a passive housemaid? It felt like a dangerous and forbidden insight Berna ought to keep to herself and never put words on.


“Scrap! A cup of tea and one sandwich with that white cheese from Muffey!”

Racist. I’ll remember your face, sod. Later ... one day ... just wait ... you will regret that you called me a scrap!

Freckled face, angry gaze. There were also students who definitely just wanted to get away from the counter and it’s disgusting cursed staff as fast as possible. Berna hurried up and made the tea and put the sandwich on a plate. She placed it on the counter, because this kind of galdor were often scared of happening to touch her by mistake.

Perhaps they imagined that diablerie was a contagious disease the passives could spread by their touch? There was a lot of scary tales people told about curses the passives put on galdori children who didn’t obey their parents as they should, or slacked with their homework. There were other scary tales as well, many of them of a more adult nature. In general they all said the same thing: contact with the passives could pull a galdori down and destroy them.

The galdori boy took his tea and sandwich and walked away. Without stopping, he passed by the disaster scene where the young female student and the passive girl who had dropped the dishes still sat, two shocked teenagers in a mess of left-overs, broken glass and porcelain.

Joe, the male servant who was tasked with the supervision of the other staff and said to be considered for a butler job, was already on his way to them. The sound of his determined steps enhanced the displeased expression on his face. He did of course not destroy the atmosphere in the cafeteria by admonishing Sally on the spot. Instead, he told her in a low and ice-cold tone to tidy up and then withdraw to the kitchen.

All signs pointed to a stern punishment awaiting Sally in the kitchen. The few galdori who had followed the event with some interest looked content. Berna knew that Joe was just acting. The passives might pretend to be hard on each other when galdori observed them, but they actually supported each other way more than the galdori ever understood. There were never any galdori in the kitchen so there wouldn’t be anybody who wanted to beat her up. That was the important part of what Joe said to Sally. Only another passive would understand that ...

Sally started to work, silently.

The galdori girl ... there was something with the way she moved ... a stiffness?

Did the other galdori students react to it or not? Wold any of them ask if she needed help? Berna wasn’t sure.

Joe waved Berna over to what she thought of as “the disaster zone”. He would take the counter work himself. If Sienna so wished, Berna would carry her things, escort her to her quarters so she could change to clean clothes, take care of the laundry, fetch a doctor if needed or escort her somewhere else, do housework ... anything Sienna might wish. She would get Berna as her personal servant for the remainder of this day. It was the least the cafeteria could do after what their unskilled “dish girl” had done!

Berna stood at attendance, ready to do what she would be told to do.

User avatar
Sienna
Posts: 27
Joined: Sat Jul 07, 2018 5:10 am
Topics: 11
Race: Galdor
Character Sheet: Character Sheet
Plot Notes: [url=http:/fullurl/]Plot Notes[/url]
Writer: Saffron
Post Templates: Post Templates
Contact:

Tue Aug 07, 2018 4:17 am

14 of Intas, 2718
Image

It didn't occur to Sienna that the other girl could be blamed, and perhaps even punished for the accident till she saw her white face. The girl was perhaps a bit younger that Sienna herself, or that may just be due to the way she carried herself, all shrinking like and clearly scared. The girl had already begun murmuring apologies by the time Sienna shook off her daze. She was darting glances at Sienna, and at the few students looking their way, and her hands were fluttering ineffectually, perhaps unsure of whether to begin cleaning up first, or help Sienna, or just bolt. ”Are you okay? Does anything hurt badly?” Sienna broke in on her apologies, her voice low and calm. The girl froze for a second, then silently gave a minute shake of her head. Sienna sighed internally, did it mean she wasn't okay? Or that she wasn't hurt? She should have phrased that better.. ”Let's get up first, what's your name?”

Before the girl could answer, they were joined by the man behind the counter. ”Are you okay miss?” He offered a hand so she could get up, his expression neutral. Something told her he wouldn't have been surprised to have been rebuked for the courtesy, for courtesy it was. She took his hand and got up, then looked a trifle helplessly at the mess. Her bag had mostly escaped unscathed, but the uniform was ruined. An older boy, sitting two tables away sniggered, then pretended to be absorbed in eating when she glanced over. The girl sitting with him gave a sympathetic grimace and patted her hair near her ear and pointed, a small gesture. Sienna's hands rose to touch the spot indicated, and came away wet. Ugh. It seemed the food and sauce had managed to get in her hair too. She'd need to wash her hair again, in addition to the bath. And send the dirty stuff to the laundry... She wasn't getting to the library today for sure.

With an involuntary grimace, she walked over nearer the girl, where her bag lay and picked it up, only then registering the low voiced scolding the man was giving the girl. ”Oh. It's fine, It truly was an accident.” Sienna caught the girl's name, Sally, and trying to suppress a twinge of pain, continued, ”If anything, it was I who blundered into Sally..” Sally gave her a surprised look but simply knelt down and began clearing up the mess. Sienna looked around to see that the students had returned to their conversations and the food, none of them looked like they'd be offering to help. Typical. And she didn't see any of her classmates nearby either..

Her side was hurting and her ankle was beginning to feel tender too, so when the man motioned the passive woman behind the counter over and explained to Sienna that Berna would help her out for the rest of the day, Sienna could only be grateful, and she let some of that show as she nodded at the man in thanks, then turned to Berna.

Sienna was a bit confused for a moment about how to address the much older woman, then settled on treating her like a family servant. Whatever her race or origins, this woman was certainly that. ”Hello Berna,” she gestured self-deprecatingly at herself, ”I'm somewhat of a mess, is there somewhere nearby I can get the worst of it cleaned off? Before I try walking to the dorms that is...”

The woman wasn't very tall, but then most galdori women from Anaxas weren't. And even if she was a passive, she was born of galdori parents, perhaps like Rayne she had family somewhere too.. Sienna squeezed her eyes shut for a moment in an effort to banish that line of thought. If she began imagine a shadow of Rayne looking out of every passive's eyes, she'd not be able to last here. These thoughts were maudlin and even dangerous. Worse, they served no purpose. She was no longer at the age where she believed the world was all roses and rainbows. There were worse things in the world than being a passive, or a servant, like being dead. She'd take a living Rayne, even if as a dangerous passive, over her being dead.

Opening her eyes, she brought her mind back to the present, making a mental note to herself to include short meditation sessions everyday. With her magic related workload, she couldn't afford to be distracted, that way led to misspells and worse. She offered a small smile to Berna, an expression more in the eyes than the lips, then followed her where she led.
Image
User avatar
Bernadette Seymor
Posts: 16
Joined: Tue Jun 26, 2018 4:55 am
Topics: 6
Race: Passive
Character Sheet: Character Sheet
Plot Notes: Plot Notes
Writer: Lantern
Post Templates: Post Templates
Contact:

Fri Aug 10, 2018 10:04 am

Image
The young galdor’s behavior was disarmingly kind. Berna couldn’t recall the last time a galdor had spoken to her with this degree of kindness. They were polite of course. Most galdori excelled at being polite, more often than not in a sarcastic and snooty manner that wasn’t polite at all. They seemed to believe that Berna wasn’t able to understand their elegant phrasings of compliments that were actually insults, but nonetheless they bestowed them on her.

Berna took it they did it in order to get applause from their likeminded masters of embedded sarcasm disguised as politeness. Some were in dire need of trying to seem smart and weren’t below resorting to racism in order to assert themselves. She never responded to it. If those imagined that being passive made a bright person dumb all of a sudden, she would let them believe so.

If they though her “someone they couldn’t expect anything of” they would hardly suspect her for deliberately sabotage the total perfection they strived for. When their cup of coffee happened to fall in their lap it would probably seem like they had been careless and not paid attention. Few would realize that the cup had deliberately been placed in the position that would maximize the chance for an accident. It was a petty kind of revenge on society and on people who harassed Berna, but it was alas the only kind of revenge that was available to her.

Right now there was no reason at all to even think of revenge and sabotage though. The young galdor girl had been nice to Sally and didn’t seem to blame the girl in the least and she spoke to Berna like she found her good and supposed that she was what she had been passed off as ... a benevolent personal servant. The silent smile in the girl’s eyes were what undid the housemaid. It hit right into that hidden and denied longing Berna like so many other passives had quenched and buried deep inside. They all knew it was longing for an impossible dream that wouldn’t come true: to be galdori again, to be welcomed back into the fold of their original race as one of them. Nobody ever spoke about it.

It’s my lucky day. I get to leave the counter and all the rude students to Joe and spend time as servant to this unusually nice galdor girl instead. It’s also a chance to prove myself. Oh, what I’d give to once again be ... like her. Because that must have been how I was. Can’t recall. The past became a blur of fading memories, hard work and nameless fear. But surely I must have been like this girl and not like those other ones...

“I’m sure you want to go to the ladies room and fix yourself a little bit, miss” she said. “If you will come with me, please ... and then we can move on to a place where you can get new clothes and other things you may want. How does that sound?”

The girl seemed ready to agree to anything, if just somebody would take care of her ... Berna acted like she had been given orders, although no clear orders had been issued. The girl has spoken like she though the servant would know what to do. Well. That wasn’t unusual. The galdori weren’t trained to take care of practicalities. There were always servants for servant work.

Something else occurred to her. The girl had accepted Joe’s help. Perhaps she had needed it more than she wanted to show in front of the students who didn’t seem to care about her much.

“Are you ... injured?”she asked hesitantly. “Can you walk properly? Perhaps I should fetch someone ... human or so ... to support you if you are injured I mean, or carry you. “

Berna felt she could hardly offer the girl to lean on herself, passive as she was. Well, she could offer it of course, but perhaps it would just be met with fear or anger and she might lose the opportunity to star as personal servant. If Sienna would want to lean on her she would be more than happy to oblige ... it would have to come from Sienna though.

The ladies room of the cafeteria was at the other end or the room. It was just a small place, but it would be possible to get rid of some of the leftovers and sauce and blotches so that the girl wouldn’t need to walk around with it on the streets.


Last edited by Bernadette Seymor on Thu Aug 30, 2018 10:16 am, edited 1 time in total.
User avatar
Sienna
Posts: 27
Joined: Sat Jul 07, 2018 5:10 am
Topics: 11
Race: Galdor
Character Sheet: Character Sheet
Plot Notes: [url=http:/fullurl/]Plot Notes[/url]
Writer: Saffron
Post Templates: Post Templates
Contact:

Thu Aug 23, 2018 12:21 pm

14 of Intas, 2718
Image

Sienna shook off her thoughts and again focused on Berna as the passive began to speak. The ladies room. Of course. Where were her wits today. "Yes, the ladies room would be perfect. After that let's just go back to the dorms, there will be clean clothes in my room." She began to follow the woman as she showed the way ahead. Her pace was slow, she was holding her bag away from her body with a hand, the other hand partly extending to counter-balance it. The twinging hip and ankle weren't making things any easier. Should she attempt a healing spell on herself here first? The bag was getting especially heavy by the second..

“Are you ... injured?” Berna's hesitant question proved a welcome distraction. “Can you walk properly? Perhaps I should fetch someone ... human or so ... to support you if you are injured I mean, or carry you. “

Sienna had taken advantage of the pause to place the bag on a convenient chair, and she held on to the chair's back as a makeshift support. Berna's offer to fetch someone sounded strange enough that she stopped before answering. Why would she fetch someone if Sienna needed some support? She thought at first that Berna wasn't sure if she'd be able to support Sienna all the way to the dorms by herself, galdori weren't known for being strong after all, as compared to humans...

But that didn't feel like the complete picture either.. Sienna mentally shrugged and decided to move past that hiccup for now. No doubt as time went by, and she got more used to dealing with passives, and watching other galdori interact with them, she'd gain a better understanding of things here. For now she was glad for the offer.

”I am not too badly injured, it's probably just a mild ankle sprain.. Sienna lifted the skirts a bit to glare at the offending joint. She looked at Berna, weighing her for a long moment. ”I think I can manage if you carry my bag for me.. Once I get cleaned up, I can see whether it needs to be looked at and healed..” She thought about it for another bit, ”I might need some support at the stairs in the dorms.. But I think we won't need to call anyone else. I'd .. rather not advertise that I'm hurt.”

That's all Sienna said aloud. But to someone paying attention, it said a lot about Sienna too, and perhaps the environment at Brunnhold, perhaps even the galdor as a whole. Though that last might be stretching it to the limits. Sienna didn't feel it safe to advertise that she was hurt. She hadn't reasoned it out consciously, but she didn't feel secure enough for that. In the wild, animals who were injured, the ones who slowed down the group, were the first to be attacked. The illusion of insignificance allowed one a certain kind of freedom, but a perception of being weak could be deadly.

Sienna potentially had something to hide, perhaps if the gods had been kind, she would have someone she might need to protect. She just needed to somehow figure out how she could do that. Her glance fell to Berna, perhaps.. Perhaps.. This.. mess may turn out to have been providential.. This would require thought.

Berna had been an exceptional example of the well trained passive servant, but who was she really? Someone friendly? Sympathetic? Trustworthy? Perhaps Sienna could try to initiate some kind of conversation? She wasn't very good at small talk at parties, but.. she had to try..

If Berna took the bag from Sienna, they would get the worst of the mess on her cleaned off. Then they would both slowly walk around to the 6th form girls dorms. Sienna had a room on the second floor there.

She waited for a quiet stretch on the route, then tentatively began, ”So.. Do accidents like today's happen often?”
Image
User avatar
Bernadette Seymor
Posts: 16
Joined: Tue Jun 26, 2018 4:55 am
Topics: 6
Race: Passive
Character Sheet: Character Sheet
Plot Notes: Plot Notes
Writer: Lantern
Post Templates: Post Templates
Contact:

Thu Aug 30, 2018 10:15 am

Image
"Iwouldn’t say that it happens often, miss. Give me that bag, please ...”

Berna took the bag, relieved that she could make it easier for Sienna to walk to the ladies’ without having to find someone for the girl to lean on. The best was to get her out of sight as soon as possible, before other galdori got ideas about making troubles about the accident and demand that someone must be punished and such. The less attention they would get, the better for all involved people.

Perhaps also for her. She was sitting alone and now she has sauce in her hair and stains on her clothes, a sprained ankle...and doesn’t want to come off as injured. Intelligent of her. Galdori ... are the wolves of the galdori. It’s best to never let them feel the smell of blood. This one is maybe not too bad though. Seems like one of the relatively better galdori ... but it’s best to no jump to conclusions.

Berna’s kept up the smiling but not openly smiling expression of a perfect servant on her freckled face as they continued to the ladies’ room at a pace fast enough to look natural for people who weren’t in a hurry but slow enough to allow Sienna to attempt to walk without limping. Berna kept her gaze trailed on their goal and avoided to glance at the galdor in order to find out how well it succeeded. If the galdor wanted to pretend to not be injured at all, Berna would play along and not show any signs on concern.

Look, I’m just an obedient bag carrier doing my job. It’s her own business to act unaffected if that’s what she wants them to believe. So ... first the ladies’s, and then to her dorm ...

They arrived at the ladies’ room and Berna transferred the bad to her left hand and pulled the door open with her right hand. It was easy case. All the physical work she had done during her years as servant had made her much stronger than her petite build implied. She might look thin and tiny, but appearances deceived these days. Many galdors were frail and weak. The passives ... not so.

They stepped in and Berna closed the door behind them and put the bag down on the floor. Obviously the university hadn’t found the ladies’ room and the comfort of the female students particularly important. The small "washing room" had empty light grey walls of the plainest thinkable kind, painted not wall-papered. It was possible to wash your hands there, if you didn’t mind using “a towel for all”. Above the basin there was a small round mirror of questionable quality. It did nothing for those who wanted to admire their own looks,

Berna knew by experience that behind the two very narrow doors at the back wall there were old-fashioned and somewhat unpleasant “commodities” people only used if they must. No efforts had been made to make the place seem inviting and Berna suspected that it was a deliberate attempt to make young ladies get whatever they were there for done as quickly as possible and not make the place a hangout for feminine gossip and vanity. There was however a simple stool, which Berna used to stand on in order to reach the upper parts of the walls, at the occasions when she was the unfortunate servant cleaning here.

“Well, then, miss, let’s see ... if you want to sit ...” She made a gesture to the stool. It wasn’t like she asked the girl to sit. She just pointed out the possibility.

It struck her that there was a pair of gloves in the cabinet in the corner, where they kept the cleaning equipment. Gloves! That could be the solution. If she had gloves on, Berna wouldn’t touch the galdor. She opened the cabinet, found the gloves and put them on. Feeling prepared now, she turned on the cold water (there was only cold water there) and filled the basin. She wetted the “towel for all” a bit and then she proceeded according to what Sienna told her to do. Whether the galdor preferred to wash herself or let Berna do it, the passive was ready to oblige.

“I propose that I take away the sauce from your hair though, if you would like me to do it ... it’s not much but it can be hard to see it in the mirror ... “ Again, she did what the galdor said she wanted her to do.

When Sienna was reasonably ready to leave the cafeteria and go to the dorms without drawing too much unwanted attention they moved on. Berna carried the bag and let Sienna take lead naturally. Sienna was the galdor, and besides Berna didn’t know exactly where, in which dorm, the girl lived. The bag wasn’t a problem. She could easily carry it and it was good to have a task to focus on. Secretly she hoped that the galdor girl felt satisfied with her temporary personal servant. Perhaps she would be looking to hire a personal servant at some point? Or at least it could boost Berna’s reputation a bit and support her attempts to make a carreer. If she did well today, would she then get references? The galdor girl was young and a student, but she was still a galdor. Her opinion could be important!

No mistakes! This can be my chance.

They entered the building. There were perhaps some student dorms on the entrance floor, Berna didn't know, but it seemed like Sienna lived higher up. A long and steep staircase rose in front of them, towards the next floor ... oh my ... this was probably the stairs Siena had mentioned back at the cafeteria, the one she might need help with. It seemed ... way higher than Berna had expected.

“I take it we are ... going upstairs? Eh ... which floor do you live on, miss ... and how is it with your foot?”

Berna would do as Sienna told her to, whatever would be needed for going upstairs.


Post Reply Previous topicNext topic

Return to “Brunnhold”

  • Information
  • Who is online

    Users browsing this forum: No registered users and 5 guests