[PRP] A Special Project [Zelaya/Juhvek]

[ShinosBee]

The smithies of High Reaches were no place for a candidate with no experience at the craft, and no desire to learn it. The heat of the forges, the clang and bang of hammers on metals, showers of sparks and hissing steam? No, it wasn't at all where she would like to be. The young woman had come wandering over, the half-formed idea of a project in mind, wanting to ask about costs, or materials, or if it were even possible, and if so why it'd not been done before. A free day well spent, if you asked her, but her nerve had failed upon ducking into the smithing area. Men and women, the smiths of the weyr were terribly strong looking, each one intense with focus and...and she'd come to interrupt one of them?

Perhaps she could find someone not currently hammering away. She knew full well there must be an area where the smiths worked on...colder projects, or went to disburse their creations. She didn't need to stop someone in the middle of a tricky job. One door down, two? She peeked in to the sight of a number of flamethrowers in various states of repair. some were hung from racks, others in pieces on long tables. A few other odds and ends were scattered around, tools and other small projects. From inside, the sounds of someone working away...Maybe she'd be better off just sending a letter? No...no harm in asking.

Gingerly she knocked at the door's frame, before ducking inside to wait in silence. If someone was in the middle of what must surely be a complicated moment or task, she could wait. She only had a question after all, and she had all day. Whomever was here might not have the time or be inclined to pause on her behalf. And that was fine.

demon_pachabel

 

[demon_pachabel]

Juhvek had been handed off a flamethrower that had apparently jammed up when it had been in the air and it now sat disassembled on his work bench, one of the inner mechanisms in his hand. He'd been looking it over, fussing with a switch that had been sticking in place to determine if it was something that needed to be ground into place or if he simply needed to oil everything again. Not that he wouldn't simply do it anyways.

The sound of someone tapping on his door frame caused him to look back towards it, eyeing the young lady who stepped in with a flat, unchanging expression.

"Oh good, they sent someone with hands this time. I told them I needed someone willing to chop off a finger for what I was doing..." his tone was as flat as his expression, and for a moment he let the statement settle, his attention diverting down to Zelaya's hands. After a moment, he added - "I'm kidding. Was there something you needed, Miss....?"

ShinosBee

 

[ShinosBee]

She stared right back at the man, debating on her odds of being able to explain that she was in fact not here to sacrifice a finger, steeling herself to explain, when thank Faranth he admitted to joking with her. An audible sigh of relief left her sagging just slightly, for just a moment, before she felt her heart begin to calm down. "Certainly to keep all my fingers, thank you," she demurred, taking a few steps closer. "I can find someone else if you're busy, it's only a question, really." He seemed busy now that she could see properly what he was doing. While she knew the sight of a flamethrower, seeing one in pieces made it clear how very ignorant she was to their mechanisms. How on earth could anyone have thought of something like this, and then made it work? Unfathomable.

The sight of it in pieces reminded her of what had happened to Sylfie, and she felt a moment of guilt over not having checked in with the goldrider yet. So many had been hurt, and she'd been utterly focused on Z'tir's condition to the point of neglecting anyone else. She'd have to make a point of looking after her as well, and soon. She'd been a horrible friend, but no doubt Sylfie would understand. Family had to come first in moments like this.

And so on with her request, there was no time to waste with days as full as they had been lately. "My name is Zelaya...I'm a candidate here." Introductions first, manners mattered! "And I was wondering if, perhaps, it might be possible to make something? Something to help protect riders in threadfall? I've looked the records over, but I've not seen anything like it, and I'm unsure if that's because no one's tried it, or if it's been done and failed so spectacularly that it wasn't even recorded."

demon_pachabel

 

[demon_pachabel]

His expression didn't change at the small protest put up. "They're good ones. Better hold onto them," he stated almost monotonously relaxing in his seat. Juhvek offered a gesture of the hand to urge Zelaya to offer up her inquiry when she mentioned it. The task he had separated all over his table could at least wait for the time being. Thread wasn't going to fall immediately, after all.

His brows raised slightly at the request as it was made. "Even failure must be documented - how else are we to not repeat our mistakes?" he said, thinking over the possible reasons more protective gear had not been attempted. "It isn't impossible, though I imagine resources are a large factor - one first needs the means to prototype - and test - such gear, then after corrections are made to test it again. Then the question of cost effectiveness is also something that would be brought up. Do you put it on only the rider? Do you put it on the dragon as well? How much material would it take for both or multiple pairs?"

Somewhere in the Weyr, he was certain that his sister's interest had just been piqued by interesting ideas being spun into existence.

"There are some places that we will never be able to protect with precision either. However, I would think that reinforcing the gear around the chest, head, and back of the shoulders is very doable."

ShinosBee

 

[ShinosBee]

Zelaya listened with all the attentive, silent patience of an apprentice before a master. She knew nothing of the crafts involved in such a task, and thus she knew the need to hear and mind the opinions and thoughts of those who did know what they were about. Metal, she knew in general, was a fairly rare thing. Mines they had, but firestone was always the priority. Ores were less common, and even a blade or belt buckle could cost a pretty mark. Gathering up enough for an entire dragon—something she'd not even considered—would be a huge undertaking. And to outfit an entire wing, or a flight, the Weyr...no.Simply not manageable. But perhaps the riders. Or, in this case, one very important (to her) rider. That, maybe, could be done.

"What," She ventured cautiously, "Of the legs? The head and back," She crossed towards Juhvek, plucking from a pocket of her skirts a rolled bit of parchment, hesitating just briefly before offering it up, "of course would be important. Thread falling from above and behind...But could we not, perhaps, try...this?" The parchment, once unrolled, showed an amateur, but patient and detailed sketch of a tunic from the front, back, and sides. It was a long tunic, beltable, but left untucked from trousers, and bulky enough to perhaps actually be an extended length riding jacket (though the sketching made it a bit hard to tell). Flat or slightly curved plates of metal had been drawn covering the upper chest, wrapping around the shoulders and down the upper arms, across the back for the length, and then trailing down onto the loose ends of the tunic-jacket, which would easily be long enough to cover the rider's hips and thighs nearly to the knees. The plates did not overlap, leaving exposed gaps between, but perhaps might offer some protection, long enough to leap away between. At a glance, it seemed like perhaps the quilted oven-mitts from the kitchens, or the protective hot pads that were used to guard the Weyr's long trestle tables from hot dishes, had been the inspiration. Though obviously, in the drawings she had shaded the plates in, the word 'metal' jotted in the corner of one.

She hesitated a moment longer, and then, perhaps a bit timid, shy of having dared to try to invent such an unusual idea, she explained, "It's for my father, only, and he...his leg was hurt in the last fall, and I worry that more harm will...well. That it should be avoided, if possible."

demon_pachabel

 

[demon_pachabel]

When Zelaya offered her drawing, Juhvek took it and set it out on his table to look it over. It certainly wouldn't have been sending the artists of the Harper Hall scrambling for her talent, but it sufficed in communicating her intentions. He could practically hear Alosha in her weyr stirring with the thought that something interesting was happening and she wasn't there to see it. The greenrider would have had some thoughtful feedback as a rider too.

"I think....smaller pieces of metal with a few layers of thicker hide would keep costs of something like this down and also accomplish what it is you have in mind," he murmured, shuffling through his workspace to find a sufficiently clean piece of parchment to do his own sketching on. Sufficiently only meant it had the minimal amount of dust that anything in the quarter of a Blacksmith would have had on it.

He quickly roughed out something that looked....almost...like a person, with a circle for the head and something like limbs. Then he drew something that would make someone who'd heard of such a thing think of a raincoat - it went over the head and slit at the shoulders for the arms, but hung down to cover both the front and the back. Even longer and he drew a clasp that indicated it would attach to a twin piece on the legs of the pants. Then he wrote a note off to the side 'or perhaps a belt to keep from having to tailor special breeches'. Quickly on top of that, he scribbled some smaller pieces in the same areas that Zelaya had with the similar note of 'small pieces of metal' and '3-4 layers thick'.

"It isn't the most beautiful looking thing, but it'd be simple to construct and easy to take on and off. A few layers would keep thread from getting to bore through it quicker than a rider could recognize it and between, and the length covers the vital areas. Metal can be used to reinforce specific areas as well."

And it would hopefully be warmer than flash-frozen metal that wanted to stick to any spot of skin it could get a hold of...right?

ShinosBee

 

[ShinosBee]

The girl waited with perfect patience as he set to redrawing, sketching, working out something that might work. Her eyes followed each line with the rapt attention of one passionate, if of the product, and not the means, listening eagerly and thrilled in turn to not have had the idea shunned immediately. Already she could imagine Z'tir in the getup, perhaps displeased to be marked as standing out by it, but safer, thank Faranth, safer for it.

A thought came to mind halfway through his work, though of course the quite young woman hesitated until he'd finished to bring it up. Metal had seemed the obvious answer, but it was rare and heavy and... "What, ah...what if...could you use glazed bits of pottery instead of the metal?" It might be cheaper, might be lighter, she wasn't sure, but it wouldn't be eaten through by the thread at all. Could it be bolted on though? How would one attach it? Her mild frown deepened as she realized she had no answers to that obstacle. "Maybe not..."

She shifted around, a bit closer, to look over Juhvek's shoulder at the rendering. "It would e nice if there was something that thread couldn't bore through at all." Solid metal was a folly though, to heavy and too inflexible, not to mention, as he'd also realized, the danger of frozen metal once gone between. "Do you think...is it something you could make?" She'd find a way to gather the marks for it. She had some already, and Z'tir had been...modestly kind. More than he'd needed to be, in that matter, but kind.

demon_pachabel

 

[demon_pachabel]

There had obviously been a lot of thought put into this, or at least enough brain-energy that when he'd offered up his alternative, Zelaya had already brought up another suggestion. "Clay, hmm?" Juhvek ran a hand over his face thoughtfully as he considered both the ease of obtaining the material, as well as the obstacle that they'd no doubt considered when they changed their mind about it. "If you made it so it'd go through the leather like a button on one side, maybe," he didn't know too much about making such fixings, however.

He wasn't a weaver, nor did he work particularly on the details of garments, usually.

"It'd need to be tested by a rider, but it'd be more cost effective than just the metal plating. That also means if it works, it can be made more available for other riders," Alosha came to mind, of course, but he knew there were others who would want it. "I think it's possible. First thing I'd want to try out is if securing the clay through the leather would be plausible. If you ask nicely, I'm certain the tanners may have odds and ends of leather that can't be used for anything besides practicing finishing they'd part with for next to nothing and the clay....." hmm...

Was this something that could be obtained easily at the Weyr? Did the Weyr have someone who dabbled with Glasscraft or even seriously practiced it? "Either we could find a dragonrider who didn't mind going on a dirty expedition for digging some up, or see if anybody here has some readily available," fortunately, all it would take was a hint of an idea to get Alosha on board with that. But if Zelaya was determined to gather the materials themself, he wouldn't get in their way.

ShinosBee