It's evening, and dinner service is almost done in the living cavern. Still, M'noq is here in the war room, not having left for dinner yet. Certainly he intended to work, but for the last ten minutes or so he has been tipping his chair backward, looking up at the ceiling. "Do you think that crack in the ceiling is getting longer?" he asks aloud, to someone… maybe the archivist? "I keep looking at it, wondering if the whole ceiling will come down on us one of these days."

Timing seems to be one of D'wane's strong suites today since he manages to walk in right as M'noq poses that question to the room at large. His current search for the particular report from that particular threadfall two months ago is stalled, even with his finger right on the spine of the folder as the weyrsecond turns to seriously consider the ceiling. "I've seen bigger…" Although he's not saying not to call the smiths right away. "Think if we stack enough reports up we could shore it up?"

M'noq has a heart-pounding moment of flailing as he is surprised by D'wane walking in, and he almost tips over backward in the chair. He only barely catches himself. "Oh, D'wane. Ah, that sounds like you're looking for an excuse to get rid of reports. Which I'd rather see happen by not having us write them, to be honest." But he gives the man a welcome grin.

To be fair, it probably is starling to find out a man as large as D'wane can move pretty quietly. You'd expect him to lumber or something, which he usually does. But turns of being yelled at by cranky archivists has at least taught him to use some caution. He nods along with M'noq's statements, since it is true he is probably looking for an excuse to get rid of some hidework, since it seems to multiply whenever he turns his back. The grin he gives in return probably should be concerning for the poor wingleader in front of him. "Thank you for volunteering, M'noq. I think Va'os and I both agree it'd be great to consolidate some of our reporting. Make sure you get with the healers and the headwomen and the weyrling staff and the smiths and the other wingleaders to make sure that we have a list of what is absolutely crucial for everybody's Threadfall reports. Oh, and the leatherworks too." And probably some more he's missing.

M'noq bursts out laughing. "Ah, that's a good one, D'wane. You do realize that if I start asking around, anyone who writes a report is going to say they need one, and everyone who receives a report is going to say they need all of them? That's how hidework works." He waves a hand at a stack of reports he had been working on. "There's probably six useful lines of information in any of these reports. And that information gets transferred to things kept long term anyway. There's more information we need by the sevenday, then by month and quarter and so on. But not a lot of it really needs to be written down."

D'wane can do a very impressive stone face. It was very important to practice as a guard, and still comes in handy now. He'll just cross his arms and stare at the brownrider for a moment. If it was a joke, he's not letting on at all. "We already know who gets the reports. We're not adding anybody to the list. Just about time we made sure everything we're collecting is still stuff we're using and not something someone came up with turns ago." Although Southern unlike the older weyrs only has SO much history for antiquated old procedures to have piled up compared to Passes upon Passes. "If you think there's so much duplication, I'd like to see a list. In about oh… end of the month?"

M'noq shakes his head, pulling the top report off his stack and sliding it over in D'wane's direction. "Not duplication. Just useful information. The summary here gets transferred to another report, which is preserved for posterity. This long form report is maybe looked at by… what, you and Va'os, and once in a while other wingleaders who happen to be interested? Do you even read them word for word? You want to know who looks at reports… mostly it's you guys. Then no one looks at it again, until it is either thrown out or crumbles to dust on a shelf somewhere."

"Mostly, but not all," D'wane's going to raise a finger in objection to that. "We do use the summaries the most, but I can't count the number of times Varden's brought up something from a long forgotten" (or only skimmed if he's being honest) "report to support why we should or shouldn't do something in a council meeting." Those reports, they come up whenever you least expect them! "Having just the summary would put us in a bind if we ever needed to figure out what ways we could prevent more injuries in the future since I know I can barely remember what formation I was flying at a specific point in a specific fall last seven, let along last turn."

M'noq shrugs helplessly, then goes back to staring at the crack in the ceiling. "Information that Varden uses is in his own report, I think. Information in these gets passed to him at the end of 'Fall." He's quiet a moment, musing. "It's just a lot of information to sift through if you're actually reading it. I suppose it isn't so much if you only skim." A pointed glance in the direction of the Weyrsecond.

D'wane nods. "And how do you think Varden makes his reports?" He glances over at that long form report pointedly. Although it's probably a journeyman reading all the reports and getting something useful for the Weyrhealer. "Because every wingleader giving oral reports to several different crafts as well as me and the steward and whoever sharding else needs the information sounds more hellish than the mountain of reports."

"Varden only needs the short form, you know," M'noq points out. "He doesn't have time to look at anything more than the header of this long report for each of the wings, which is why he most likely doesn't. Between that and his own observations and records of casualties, I rather doubt there's much useful information that we're providing him." He pauses, before his voice turns more musing. "I miss having a wingsecond dedicated to hidework. N'lim wasn't particularly good at sharing information, but his handwriting was decent and reports were always filed on time."

"You sound like you're talking out your ass to justify not doing it. Since you doubt, prove it," D'wane eyes the wingleader as he just goes ahead and puts his call on that bluff. Put your marks where you mouth is, M'noq! "Worst case, turns out they actually need it and we keep doing the same reports. Best case, you can prove we don't actually need everything and save everybody some time. And is uh, Th'res, not good with reports?" Took him a moment, but he remembered which wingsecond was in which wing!

M'noq slumps in his chair, fiddling with his pen, not actually looking at D'wane or paying much attention to the assignment he was just given. "Nah. I mean, I joked that N'lim's only talent was hidwork, but that clearly wasn't true. I mean, he gave his life in Threadfall to save a wingmate. Th'res works hard. He works all the time, in fact. But his people skills are too good to waste on hidework, so I end up doing a lot of it myself. I'm turning into-" He coughs, cutting off the name. "Anyway." He scoops up the stack of reports he was looking at and hands them back to the archivist with particular care.

Well, nothing sobers a conversation up quite like mentioning a fallen rider. D'wane coughs as he hurriedly pulls out the particular report he was looking for. He does read them. Sometimes. For Falls of particular note at least. Like this one. A quick glance just to confirm it's the right one before he tucks it under his shoulder. "We can always use some more leaders with people skills. That's something that's harder to teach than most. At least talk to Varden about the reports." The leather workers and all the rest… maybe he can relent on that. But upsetting the healers is not something D'wane wants to do at the moment! He'll give a brief salute and head back off to his weyr for yet more hidework.