Tweak

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Tweak says, "Lockjaw's coming!!"

Rolf Scamander (outofthewild) wrote in finnigans_rpg,
@ 2014-09-24 17:52:00

Entry tags:

character: charlie weasley, character: rolf scamander

RP: And there be dragons
Who: Rolf and Charlie

What: Talking about Dragons

Where: Finnigan’s

When: Wednesday evening around 7pm

Rating: NSFW - language

Rolf was rather tired, he would admit it. It had been a very long day and he was already missing Rose and their vacation. Just getting home this morning had been hard. They’d each kept wanting just a little more time together, away from everything. Part of him wondered how things were going to go, now that they were back, but he wasn’t going to worry too much – she was his Rosie and he rather thought they’d become something more, now.

He’d worked all afternoon in the shop. The person he’d found to cover had done a fair job, but that didn’t mean he didn’t feel the urge to clean and set everything where he wanted it to be. By the time he headed for the pub, he was tired and thought a pint sounded pretty good, though he came armed with a thick and magically bound notebook to take notes in.

He walked in and looked around; he’d know one of the Weasleys on sight, he thought, though he didn’t think he’d ever personally met Charlie. It didn’t matter, though, he looked forward to talking to anyone who had an interest in creatures of any ilk.

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outofthewild
2014-09-25 08:49 pm UTC (link)

Rolf wrinkled his nose, giving the leg a glance. "Run in with a vipertooth? Damn, man, sorry," he said, and it was sincere and not pitying. It wasn't as if he wasn't littered with scars from the animals he'd worked with, gryphon included and excluded. "They're the reason I didn't want to pursue dragons exclusively, I think. Too much time at that reserve." They were vicious and liked to try to eat people.

"Well, let's start with your most commonly worked with dragon and work out from there," Rolf suggested, fingers playing idly with the quill before putting it back to paper.

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hopalongcharlie
2014-09-25 11:07 pm UTC (link)

"Yup," Charlie said, his voice the sort of nonchalant that meant he wasn't quite done dealing with it yet. "Bastard took a liking and bit me, had to cut it off above the knee to stop the poison spreading. I was more used to the Ironbellies and Longhorns which aren't quite as fast and I didn't get my broom out of reach in time from the supplemental feeding."

He nodded at Rolf's suggested and quickly sorted out two magically expanded notebooks and a couple of rolls of parchment. "Okay, so a lot of my work was as part of the breeding programme for the Romanian Longhorns. Their numbers dropped because of the trade in the horns for potions. The reserve has several different family lines running and was initially trying to not cross them too much, but as numbers grew the dragons were beginning to breed again on their own," he explained, opening the earlier of his notebooks and flicking through some pages.

"Okay, here are the numbers and projections from I think '90, only copies of someone else's work I'm afraid, anything more complicated than accounts and I'm terrible at maths, and it was before my time, but it's the ten year projections." He turned the book so Rolf could read the table of figures and the spell-copied chart.

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outofthewild
2014-09-25 11:31 pm UTC (link)

Rolf gave a half nod; he knew the tone, and he would never push, not when he disliked being pushed himself about his mauling. "They're evil, honestly. I was dead lucky it wasn't them or something venemous when I got grabbed earlier this year," he said. "They barely managed to put me back together." And there would likely be lasting damage, unfortunately. But he was working hard to heal it all, or at least get where his leg wouldn't give out at random intervals.

He listened attentively to Charlie, hand automatically making shorthand notes like he was in the field, though he'd probably be borrowing some of Charlie's notes to go through himself. "Yeah, you have to be careful of too much inbreeding," he agreed, thinking a few of the families around here could take notes as well.

Rolf pulled the paper closer to peer at it, head bobbling somewhat as he did some maths in his head as he looked at it. "Makes some sense. Looks like a decent programme set up," he said. "So you started crossing some of the families, then?"

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hopalongcharlie
2014-09-26 12:27 am UTC (link)

Charlie winced in sympathy. "Yeah, the venomous thing is fucking awful. I've had burns before more times than I can count, but at least there are some great things to heal those. What, er, got you, if you don't mind sharing?" he asked, slightly hesitant. Rolf had brought it up, but it didn't necessarily mean he wanted to talk about it.

"Yeah, like I said it started before I arrived, this was some of my catch up. Here," he said, flipping over two pages to a double page spread with a couple of family trees drawn on. "This is the dragons when that cycle started, they're mostly lone animals obviously, but the team had a good idea of some of their groupings, and they tried to match up obvious candidates to start with," he said, pointing at the different family trees, the boxes around names colour coded for what family they had come from. He showed the next spread too with several more trees on it. "You can borrow this, don't worry about copying it now," he added. "Look, if you trace this initial male you can see he was matched there, and there and those offspring are prevented from crossing for at least three generations if possible."

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outofthewild
2014-09-26 01:07 am UTC (link)

"Burns are hellacious too," Rolf said. Burns were their own special brand of painful, in his opinion. In part because very little soothed them for long. "Gryphon," he told the other man, naming the smaller but no less fierce relative of the griffin. "Nastily territorial male that I didn't expect. Got me from the kidneys to the calf down this side." He indicated it. "They put together the ligaments and tendons but gryphons are magical enough that everything else will take time." And might never quite make it. He wasn't quite accepting that yet though.

Rolf read it, absorbed for a moment as he processed the genealogies. "Definitely a well thought out plan," he murmured, half to himself. "Thanks, that'd be great. You'll get everything back in great condition," he promised. The cat rarely bothered his work things, and his desk was usually warded against such things. He'd get Rose to add to it for him. "Looks like they had him spread out enough that it really added to the gene pool," he said.

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hopalongcharlie
2014-09-26 10:53 am UTC (link)

He nodded, although burns could be incredibly painful he'd managed to escape anything that did him more permanent damage than a scar. Mostly they were smaller licks that had got around shielding spells. He winced again when Rolf explained his injury. "Shit, that's rough. I hope it's all getting there."

Charlie took a sip of his pint as he watched Rolf looking over his family trees, glad to see someone appreciating it. "I've got," he paused, double checking two scrolls, "this report which is all about the different methods of actually encouraging breeding. I didn't actually write it but I had some input. It's not like they're actually more than about five percent tamer than your average wild dragon, and that's on a good day, so encouraging breeding was a bit tricky." Plus when your male has the nickname Grumpy Bastard things probably aren't going to go too well. "And yeah, the increase has gone well, and they're still working on it, although the numbers are already showing a decent increase and they're doing well on their own now."

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outofthewild
2014-09-26 11:58 am UTC (link)

"Thanks. You too," he told Charlie sincerely. "I'm hoping I can eventually do field work again. We'll see. But the shop and this will keep me busy in the meantime." And Rose. A smile flitted briefly across his face.

"I was just going to ask about how you went about enticing them to mate with certain dragons, when I know such things can be difficult." Dragons were rather stubborn beings, so it had to be a challenge. His mobile face went through several expression as he thought, pondering ways it could be done. "I mean... potions? What? They're pretty impervious to spells." As Charlie well knew, of course, and a gesture from Rolf conveyed that. "I'd heard there was an increase. There's similar work with the other breeds you've worked with?" he asked curiously.

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hopalongcharlie
2014-09-26 12:25 pm UTC (link)

"Yeah, I went out for a trial after I healed up and got my new leg, but it was pretty clear I'm not quick enough on foot anymore and uneven ground isn't great when you have no feeling in one foot. And trying to fly has proved a bit, well basically I'm fucked until I get some adjustments made which I've been meaning to do for weeks now." He shrugged philosophically. He knew he'd never get back to the work with dragons for more than passing visits in the safest areas, but life wasn't actually bad, especially if he could remember to go and see about his broom.

He snorted a slightly. "Yeah, not the easiest thing to do. I mean they're nowhere near as vicious as the Vipertooths or the Horntails, but there was still some manoeuvring and knocking them out involved. Couple of instances where it went really wrong. But yeah, we tried some potions. I believe there was exactly one attempt at something like artificial insemination which was deemed, well the polite version is reckless and irresponsible, the less polite version involved swearing in at least three languages."

He grabbed another notebook to answer Rolf's question. "Yeah, there was a bit of a programme with the Horntails and the Ironbellies but it was mostly trying to move them around to prevent cross-breeding, they didn't tend to need so much encouragement."

"We didn't just do the breeding though, we studied behaviour too, and preventing muggles getting too close."

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outofthewild
2014-09-26 12:52 pm UTC (link)

Rolf nodded. It was a genuine concern. "I heard that charm shop down the Alley does business with the Aurory, perhaps they could help you out with the leg?" he suggested offhand. He remembered hearing they had prosthetics; Mad-Eye Moody's eye and leg had reportedly come from them, he'd read somewhere. "It would be good if you could fly again, though." Rolf liked it all right though he wasn't fanatic like some people.

He wrinkled his nose. He could only imagine how some of it could go wrong. He laughed softly. "Okay, yes, I can imagine it ended... poorly." He'd been among other draconologists and magizoologists enough to know what would come out of mouths when things like that happened. "Were there any particularly notable breeding habits you all discovered?"

Rolf peered at the new notebook, nodding as he saw how it correlated to what Charlie said. "Yes, and behavior is something I'm very interested in for this."

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hopalongcharlie
2014-09-26 01:50 pm UTC (link)

He waved away Rolf's suggestion about the charm shop. "Nah, for anything that's less intense it's just fine and now I have the club it works well for everything I need. I really do want to sort out the flying though, I miss it." It was one of the major ways he liked to relax, and there was the casual quidditch coming up sometime.

"Well, the thing about the females generally being more vicious is definitely true, but that's been of record for a long time. There were definite patterns in breeding though, preferred seasons and some behavioural patterns we recognised which hadn't been observed before. You can find those here," he said, flipping to his other journal on the Longhorns and a summary list he'd made. That, thankfully, included a lot less shorthand than his more general notes.

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outofthewild
2014-09-27 01:47 am UTC (link)

"Whatever works for you," Rolf said with a nod and a smile. Everyone had different needs and wants. Charlie at least seemed happy with his club. "I'll have to come see this club of yours sometime." Maybe he'd take Rose dancing. She'd like that, he thought. A giddy little feeling danced inside him.

"True. They are often the fiercer in many creatures," he said. he'd come across it more than once himself. He flipped to the appropriate spot, humming to himself as he mentally made a few notes on things. "Interesting," he said, tapping a page. "That is different than I grew up learning."

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hopalongcharlie
2014-09-27 07:25 pm UTC (link)

"Oh, you totally should. We try to have a bit of something for everyone music-wise. Except Celestina Warbeck because I had more than enough growing up thanks. I'm just busy slightly shitting myself about the first LGBTQ night tomorrow," he said with a grin.

He leaned over to see what Rolf was pointed at and nodded. "Oh, shit, yeah, that one took a while to work out. I basically learnt the opposite when I arrived. There's something like that with all of them I think." He dug through his stack of notebooks and riffled through the one for the Hungarian Horntail and found the corresponding summary list. "Look at this," he said, pointing to one of the observations. "Did you know this? Because I swear I learnt something different originally."

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outofthewild
2014-09-28 03:53 am UTC (link)

Rolf chuckled softly. "Yeah, Warbeck can be a smiiiidge overplayed," he admitted, though he didn't mind it too too much. "Ahh, cool," he said. "I think I heard about that the other day. I hope it goes well."

Rolf read and blinked and took a moment to read it again. "Okay, so that is totally not what I learned," he said, shaking his head. "We apparently need to revamp a lot of things when it comes to teaching." He flipped a page. "And this! Why are we saying it was the other way around?"

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hopalongcharlie
2014-09-28 02:10 pm UTC (link)

"Thanks," he said, with a grateful nod.

"Oh, Merlin that one," Charlie said enthusiastically. "That was one of mine, well I was running the team. It took us what, six years to work it out because of the seasonal patterns?" he said, shuffling through his scrolls again. "Here, read this," he said, finding the relevant scroll and handing it to Rolf. "There's a load of notes on it too but that's everything summed up properly. You would not believe the uproar that one caused when I announced it. I thought my boss was going to hex me!"

He sat back for a few seconds to sip at his pint, not even trying to suppress his grin at being able to talk about dragons to someone who knew their stuff.

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outofthewild
2014-09-28 07:50 pm UTC (link)

Rolf nodded. "Yeah, those long-term things can be hard to pin down, especially when every year the weather can be different and affect such things," he said. "I've not been a part of very long-term studies as of yet, really, except for the one when I was small and we stayed in one place for... two years or so?" he mused aloud. "I can imagine it was controversial to start, though, contradicting a lot of what we thought we knew like that."

Rolf was just as enthusiastic as Charlie about talking shop. He had similar things that he often could talk about for who knew how long.

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hopalongcharlie
2014-09-28 10:28 pm UTC (link)

"Yeah, we had a lot of shorter projects going on alongside the longer ones. Mostly they worked well alongside each other. Just an extra thing to add to regular observations."

He grabbed another journal from the table and flicked through it idly. "It's like anything in this world, the older order are more set in their ways. Mind you I'm sure someone will think that of me or you soon enough."

"In cheerier thoughts we had a couple of Chinese Fireballs for a while, we didn't find out a huge amount new about them, but if you compare behaviour side-by-side you can really see how environment can impact a breed. See here," he said, showing Rolf a page of statistics and behaviour summaries.

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outofthewild
2014-09-29 03:25 am UTC (link)

"Yes. Several of the things I've worked were alongside longer projects or part of them. But so far I've mainly hopped around from one to one." In part to gain experience, in part to travel, and there was plenty of time to figure out where to settle. At this moment, wherever Rose was was where he wanted to settle, so that was a note to put in his mind.

"Now thr Fireballs are a breed I've always been intrigued by," he admitted. One he'd not pursued too much; his mother had done a good study on them years ago and it gave him a certain reluctance about things as well. He read the paper avidly. "It really is fascinating. Similar to thr study I was doing on gryphons versus griffins."

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hopalongcharlie
2014-09-29 11:50 am UTC (link)

"Yeah? I'm rather fond of them myself, but I didn't get much opportunity to visit their reserve, just a week or so mostly tacked onto transporting the dragons." He shrugged and drank a little more. "Oh, you must tell me about that sometime. Contrary to what my family thinks I don't just love dragons," he said.

"Although if you want the low-down on the two British breeds I have contacts at both of the reserves if you don't. I'd be happy to introduce you," he offered. "I've not had much to do with the actual dragons."

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outofthewild
2014-09-29 12:44 pm UTC (link)

"My mother went to one of the reserves for almost a year, quite a while back. Wrote several papers," he said. Charlie might even have read them, though they were under her maiden name.

Rolf grinned. "Oh, I will. Even if it ended badly for me, it was an interesting job. I've had a few really interesting ones over the years." He too liked to get to prattle on about things at times, and would definitely enjoy getting to talk about it some time.

"That would be nice," he said with a nod. "With it being closer, I could take a day or two. An introduction would ease the way." His grandfather did things like that sometimes, but he liked to work independently from his family when he could.

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hopalongcharlie
2014-09-29 02:10 pm UTC (link)

"Oh, great. I've quite possibly read her stuff. Dragon reserves are not the most thrilling of places outside of work, as I'm sure you know. I did quite a lot of reading." Sure going off the reserve worked just fine but sometimes you just lacked the energy after a whole day of dragon wrangling.

"No problem, just let me know when you're ready to go see them, I'll drop them an owl. They'll have all sorts of research of their own. Plus the MacFusty's are great and their research goes back hundreds of years," he said, the light of excitement of research in his eyes.

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outofthewild
2014-09-29 11:01 pm UTC (link)

"Probably," Rolf agreed. "And yes, they are. Most reserves can be that way - the down time really low key and you need to fill it somehow." Rolf remembered his parents finding things to do when he was young -- things that usually didn't have a single thing to do with their several children. Well, now, his mother had time for the girls a lot of times, but on the whole Rolf hadn't seen much of them either way.

"I've heard good things about the MacFusty's, once you can get in to see them," he said. They weren't the most trusting of outsiders, or so he'd heard. "But it'd definitely be a boon. I know they've not published much,a t least recently."

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hopalongcharlie
2014-09-29 11:39 pm UTC (link)

Charlie's face scrunched up in a frown. "Yeah, the MacFusty's can be a bit...protective really isn't the word. It might be an idea to introduce you sooner rather than later. It takes them a while to trust anyone. They take their duty very seriously. They think of it more as protecting the dragons than keeping them like we did," he explained. It had taken a lot of time and negotiation to be able to speak to those most involved the care of the dragons, never mind actually getting to see them. Charlie's eventual tour had been brief, and they all seemed to like him.

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outofthewild
2014-09-30 12:12 pm UTC (link)

"Clannish?" Rolf suggested, not criticizing but definitely repeating something he'd been told in the past. He had time while here; he could earn their trust. He didn't know when or even if he'd get to go on major expeditions again. "Given how much poaching has gone on, I can't quite blame them, honestly." He'd read the stats a while back, just after the war, and they'd astounded him.

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	hopalongcharlie 2014-09-30 01:07 pm UTC (link)
	Charlie laughed. It was a pretty accurate description really. "Yeah, that's about it." The poaching though, it was terrible. "Yeah, we had that problem with the Longhorns too, and I've seen what people do. I really don't blame them." (Reply to this) (Parent) (Thread)

outofthewild
2014-09-30 09:44 pm UTC (link)

"I don't really either. There's a time and a place for harvesting, and it's not like that," he said. He was on a list to call if a dragon died of natural causes and they needed a hand with all that sort of thing. He'd done it twice in the past, and though it wasn't something he enjoyed at all, it was a duty to be done. "At least it seems somewhat under control at this point, more than it was, anyway."

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hopalongcharlie
2014-09-30 10:40 pm UTC (link)

"Yeah, I've done harvesting after territorial disputes, accidental deaths, or just plain old age. They're never fun even if they are important," he said, remembering the apportioning of a variety of dragons that he'd taken part in. It was never a very pleasant job, but it was important.

Charlie hummed in agreement as he finished off his pint. "Yeah, it's far better than it was. A couple of the older keepers had stories, well, cautionary tales really, they were never much fun to hear."

"So, then. You got any more questions for me, or shall I just give you this huge stack of work to look at? Not that I'm rushing off or anything," he hastened to add, "but we wandered off topic a bit."

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outofthewild
2014-10-01 03:23 am UTC (link)

"I've been in a few places where poaching was a big problem. It really isn't pleasant at all." Not to mention dangerous. More than usual. But then as his incident proved, you could get hurt anytime. He took a long draw on his pint as well. "Right off the top of my head? No. But I probBlt will as I go through everything. And I don't mind wandering off topic," he said with a grin. "You're welcome to another pint on me, if you want."

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hopalongcharlie
2014-10-01 12:05 pm UTC (link)

Charlie too had seen the effects poachers could have on an animal, and it was never pleasant. They tended to have zero respect for the creatures they killed and unlike the keepers or other trained people they just got what they wanted the quickest way possible, which was never clean.

"Sure, not a problem. So long as it's not before noon I'm good with whenever. But I have become useless in a morning unless it's pre-arranged and I stay awake, or an emergency!" He'd been a morning person until his new venture meant he worked until four. That was a different style of morning person entirely.

"Well, I'm not going to say no to another pint," he added with a grin of his own. "Thank you very much."

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outofthewild
2014-10-01 12:28 pm UTC (link)

"No worries. I might wake early enough for the shop, but most of my personal business is done after it closes in the evening, unless I arrange for it to be otherwise beforehand, as well." There were always emergencies, of course. But he didn't see any kind of emergency coming up that would impact this book thing. "So it shouldn't conflict, and don't feel in a hurry to reply if you're busy." While he wanted to do this book, he had to do it around everything else he had going on.

Rolf grinned. He hadn't thought Charlie would turn one down. "Not a problem. You're doing me a big favor by helping me out, so I'm happy to give you something in return." Though he'd of course reference all materials and thank all contributers when the time came.

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