faderift | [whooshing, explosions.]

Entry tags:

[whooshing, explosions.]

WHO: Jack Rackham, some irregulars, and YOU.
WHAT: Jack shows up in Kirkwall and is very Jack about it.
WHEN: Harvestmere. Nowww.
WHERE: Kirkwall docks, Kirkwall proper, the Gallows.
NOTES: Kvetching.

[Please note: Anne Bonny

whatthefuckami is liable to threadjack nearly any of these at any time. You've been warned.]

a. DOCKS | ota.

That's a new face. And a new ship. The Lion has made port, and the black has been sequestered, making it look like just a normal ship, if of somewhat... Tevinter make. If you're one to spot those sorts of things.

Captain Jack Rackham, tricorn on head, well-dressed and perhaps a little rumpled from a long voyage, is arguing. Loudly.

"This is not bilking. I have been bilked. I have bilked others. I am an experienced bilker. These docking charges-- if you can call them that-- are nothing short of robbery. And I shall not be robbed."

Yes, yes, he knows. He's making a big deal of it so his crew can slowly slide off the ship, small caches of cargo along with them. It's a distraction.

Don't be a narc.

b. KIRKWALL | ota.

He is buying jewelry. He is six feet tall, somewhat well-dressed, immaculate facial hair, and he is buying jewelry.

"Baubles," Jack corrects. "You ought to call this Baubles of Kirkwall. Beads of pretty-colored glass? Ribbons? Your advertisement, ser, leaves much to be desired."

Never mind the fact that glass beads and ribbons are precisely what he's looking for. He's here to argue the price down. Help him. He turns to whoever's next to him, and holds up a tiny glass object, dark red with glass swirls of darker red within. "Now tell me, serah, would you call this a ruby?"

His Tevene accent prickles most when he's trying to put on a front.

c. KIRKWALL PUB | ota.

A loud conversation is happening with a wall. Well, it's between a rather flamboyant man and someone who looks like he'd prefer to be a wall.

"There's a what- a what on?" Jack shakes his head. "Of course I wouldn't know which finger Nevarra's stuck up its ass this time. I was at sea!"

Murmurs increase in volume. The pub doesn't really like this rabble-rousing lout. Not that it's stopping him. "Oh, for fuck's sake, another war. Just what I needed in this cesspit. Present company excluded, of course." He takes a long swig from a jar of rum.

d. GALLOWS MAIN HALL | ota.

It doesn't matter what time it is. Jack is bored and waiting on information or a report or you know what, don't question it. He's here. He's by the fire. He's got some rum.

He's dealing out cards, even if nobody's sitting in the seats across from him. One is rather near to you, though.

"Come now," he says, "I promise a good game. And my opening bet will change your life."

He hefts a pineapple onto the table.

LOCKED TO FLINT.

A pirate walks into the Gallows. The real joke will be walking out again.

What a terrible name for a building, really. Who came up with it? Oh, yes, southern Templars. What grim sorts they must be. All thoughts Jack muddles with while walking through the building with a pineapple under his arm and a tricorn on his head. The hat is for amiably tipping in the direction of anyone who questions his presence. He reassures quietly and with gentle confidence that, really, he's just here to see a friend; no, it's official business; yes, it's above your clearance level; oh, no need to worry about it.

It would probably be more believable without the pineapple, but he needs that.

Finally, he makes his way past guards and scullery maids to the division offices, and finds the one marked Forces. Knocking on the door, he considers saying something. Oughtn't there be something to say for old friends meeting again after years apart?

Well. Friend seems like a strong word.

He knocks, firm and demanding, and he waits.

LOCKED TO GWEN.

He's walking back down from the division head offices with absolutely no pineapple, but some stickiness of the juice left on his fingers. Well dressed but not particularly refined, he passes through the corridors while licking his fingertips. The tricorn is now under his arm.

All in all, he's got that jolly demeanor well suited for swiftly avoiding bothersome questions like why the fuck are you here. Sometimes literally. He ducks behind pillars where needed.

Ducking past one such pillar reveals the entrance to a library, and why not, really. Best see what they have. He pokes about, murmuring to himself and shaking his head, occasionally making an approving click of his tongue. Someone tells him to shhh. He waves them off. What is this, children's hour? Honestly.

But looking around to disregard someone in the right direct reveals another sight to see. A familiar one, though not quite as familiar as some. No, but he's seen pictures; the likeness is unmistakable (or a woman has a very unfortunate twin). He gets that canny look on his face, and in one smooth motion, sweeps his coattails aside so he can sit next to her.

"I've read your book," he says, and then makes a face.

"Mmh. That felt rather ominous to start with. How's this: Captain Jack Rackham of the Lion, lately of Nascere, less lately of a snakepit, how do you do, how pleasant, yes, yes, I've read your book." He holds out his hand for a shake.

He hasn't licked his fingers in at least fifteen minutes.

LOCKED TO SILVER.

Oh, goodness, someone is telling a story in a pub. It's so like home, Jack wants to brain himself with the nearest chair. Yet, he listens. A man needs entertainment, and the storyteller's voice is strong and commanding. That voice... that voice is familiar.

Motherfucker.

Never one to waste an entrance, Jack slowly saunters up to the head of the crowd. A little hard to do so subtly, being rather tall and wearing yellow, yet here we are. He waits for a good stopping point, and then-

"That didn't happen," he says, regardless of whether or not it did. He's smiling one of those smiles that says exactly what he's thinking. I'm doing this because it's fun.

"I would know," he continues, "I was there, Mister Silver."

LOCKED TO ANNE.

Walking through the crowd in a new shirt is a lovely feeling. He is, of course, holding one of his last remaining pineapples and a pleasantly large knife as well, so he's given fair berth. Not that he looks like an unhinged murderer, but when one is looking for- oh, there she is!

He's gotten quite excellent at spotting Anne Bonny in crowds. Stabbing his knife into the pineapple so he can hold them both in one hand (by the hilt of the knife), he walks up to her, lightly tapping her shoulder from the side. Four taps mean it's him. Any other number of taps generally means a beginner's course in anatomical research.

"Darling," he says calmly. He embellishes his words with the hand holding the knife hilt pineapple combo. Some of the juice runs down the blade. "Shall we find a place to eat? And chat? At the moment, there's nothing I'd like better."

z. YE OLDE WILDE-CARD.

[mix and match prompts. set something on fire. do something unexpected. i'm fuckin down for it. if youre not sure, feel free to hmu @ wehwalt. but bro. im probs down.]

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When in doubt, Jack wants to give his opinion. A special gift to be able to give it honestly. "Certainly a place of opportunity. If one is to start from the ground up, I can think of worse places. And so few mages."

She blows out a breath, not quite a laugh. Close enough, though, glancing sidelong at him. "Ain't starting from the ground up, either. We've got the ship."

A ship without a crew seems a damn sight better off than a crew without a ship, anyhow.

He weighs her opinion, tilting his head from one side to the other. In the end, a smile. "No options, but the beginning of options. Careful, someone might fall down a fucking flight of stairs and call that optimistic."

"Ain't optimistic. S'just what it is." She pushes open the door to the tavern--and it's, as promised, modest. Wood floor with a thin layer of sawdust, a few tables, an elf sitting at the bar in the middle of a serious conversation with a barmaid who looks more intent on polishing glasses than contributing.

It'll do. Anne sits down, legs sprawled, and watches Jack and the pineapple do the same.

Jack sits down, calls for ale and food, and begins slicing up their pineapple with an experienced hand. "Then we'll say I admire your interpretation of truth. Mmh, nice weather we're having, excellent wind, and we are only a little fucked today."

But it's mostly talk for the sake of talking, and they both know it. "Our best bet for offloading might be in Darktown, if you've been. I wouldn't recommend it, mostly because no one should ever go down there, at all, for any reason." Blah blah blah blah, we're going to need Carta contacts, blah blah.

Anne listens, one arm leaning up on the table, because that's the purpose of all this talk. The pineapple loses its prickly armor in smooth, certain slices, the scent coming up sweetly overripe between them. And Jack talks, and Anne takes it in.

"Already been," she mutters, the disgust evident in her wrinkled nose. "Wouldn't leave a dog in that hole."

Maybe a body, but that's about it. He's not wrong, though--seems like the best opportunity to see most of their goods sold off. No one down there's going to give a fuck about anything going on.

"Oh?" He smiles, and hands her the first chunk of pineapple. "What did you think of the hawker and his dwarven crafts." So many daggers.

Anne takes a bite before answering. No question what he's asking after, but she hadn't wanted to spend more time than she had to down in the depths of that shithole. She won't truly have an opinion until she's come back from Darktown with one.

"Real dwarven quality." As opposed to any number of knockoffs they've run across in their travels. "Prices're shit, but he seemed the type to bargain."

"Probably keeps them inflated for rubes. Slumming nobles." He says, with his fake upperclass accent. He's forgotten how not to have it. Everyone becomes the creature they pretend, eventually; it's part of showmanship.

"Once we gain something resembling a reputation here, I don't forsee much trouble, honestly. Our main task is to make sure our reputation is..." not crewkillers, "formidable."

He takes a slice of pineapple himself, eating small cubes nimbly off his knife. "That, and making sure what coin we have doesn't sail away with the next wind."

The ale arrives on their table as he's going on, and Anne takes a sip. Bitter, especially after the pineapple, and weak, but for the price, it could be worse.

"So we put it someplace." They've talked some about the matter of coin, and more importantly of keeping it. It'd been theory then, Jack painting pictures of investing capital and mercantile systems and everything else's he's read about, everything boiling down to we had a stake in the brothel, we can have a stake in something new. Anne agreed then, and she agrees more now that they're back to being strangers in a strange land. "You see anything promising?"

She's got a few places in mind, but he's the one with a head for this shit.

"I've seen several businesses flourishing," he says, "but not so much in the way of trustworthy owners. There was a reason the brothel worked as it did. We were the owners, and we... we knew it was in her interest to cooperate, and you knew her well enough to work with her."

He thinks he is being extraordinarily generous with that assessment.

That's generous the same way Chantry alms are generous: the idea's that they're being charitable, but it sure doesn't feel like it. Anne's gaze darkens for a moment, and she takes another drink. "That ain't what it was like, and you know it."

It's an old argument, though, one that's never going to reconcile against itself, and it only makes her miss Max to hear it threatening to start up again. So she changes the subject. "Ain't gotta invest. We could buy a place outright."

She quite doesn't say it with the certainty the words imply, though, leaving the question open for Jack to answer: couldn't they?

"To you," Jack says, vague hand motion included. "To you."

But that suggestion-- interesting. One he'd dismiss out of hand, except it came from Anne, so it's worth considering. "Do either of us know how to manage a business- oh. Oh, no. I am not selling cloth."

She doesn't have a way to tell him to cut that paternalistic shit out, so she just takes another drink. It's never going to heal scarless, everything between the three of them--still feels like two separate units to her, Jack and Anne and Max and Anne, with Jack and Max tolerating each other on the side--but he knows as well as she that Max did a damn sight more than cooperate.

"Ain't gotta sell calico." Even if he wanted to, she gets they could make better money elsewhere. "Get a...a quartermaster for the business. Have them run the little pieces."

If it works on a ship, it'll work on land. Probably.

The wounds between them will fester, and Jack blames Max for making them so. What Max feels, Jack couldn't care. It would require him thinking beyond his deep hurt, a emotional scar in the only place he can get those anymore.

"So we'd be backers and our little patsy would be the..." but he's charitable enough, or maybe just unwilling to invite bad luck enough, not to say the Max, "the quartermaster of the operation, as you said. Then, the problem becomes a question trust. Last time, I will admit, we were lucky to have your husband about. It was absolute shit before she started helping."

First choice, saying quartermaster, that's the good choice. Bringing up his old pet name for Max, that's not so good. He gets a weary, "Stop being an arse," in return alongside a scowl. This isn't an argument either of them can win, and Anne doesn't even want to, at this point. She just wants it to stop being an argument, and it's not going to, and more's the fucking pity.

"It was absolute shit. Didn't know a damn thing about running a brothel." That she doesn't specify, we or you, is the miserly charity she's willing to offer in return. Anne snatches another cube of pineapple off his knife, talking around it. "So what do we do, wait until we got a sense of the place?"

There's a dubiousness there in her voice, like she doesn't trust their coin to stick around long enough for that to happen. (It's because she doesn't.)

He watches her steal his food and smiles, cutting another piece and holding it out for her. When the drinks arrive, he holds the fruit over the glass that ought to be his, but he knows they'll share. The flavor can't hurt this pisswater.

"I don't like that idea either," he says. "My best plan is to apply ourselves to the place as quickly as possible. You remember when we first came to Nascere. Like that, but with some actual fucking experience."

Maker, they were so young and stupid.

Anne takes it without hesitation, though this one, she doesn't eat up right away. If some part of her's intent on savoring it, this last reminder of an island she's not sure they'll see again, it's easily enough appeased. Just a matter of holding a chunk of overripe fruit between two sticky fingers, listening to Jack and snorting at the thought of their first walk up the beach on Nascere. They'd been kids then, too hungry for Jack's visions of freedom and glory to do more than show up and assume it'd all work out.

It's not a matter, she decides, after a moment's thought (and a drag of ale, her glass to start), of what they lack. No Max, no replacement. So they don't start with that. They've got the ship, they've got some coin to speak of, an idea of what they're looking for--

"So we ask around." By we, she technically means Jack, but it's still "we" in the same way Anne gutting someone is. "Ain't like we don't know no one this time."

The idea that Flint'd have the first idea about any of this shit is a tough one to swallow, but his quartermaster's another story. And from them, there's the rest of the organization they've all fallen into. With Riftwatch in common, they've already got a boot in the door.

Jack drops some more pineapple onto her plate, before taking a few for himself. He savors the flavor as well, though for other reasons. I'd thought of selling these, but as gifts... he likes that better.

"Exactly. We have some groundwork already laid out. The rest is... surviving this fucking war going on. The new one, not the old one." He rolls his eyes.

Anne's eyes roll at about the same moment. The mess with Tevinter matters, but there's no winning it with just the Lion, especially not with the rift over the interior of the island fucking things up for everyone. The new war, though, and especially this shit they just walked into with Nevarra--hard to give a damn about an old king in a country she's never wasted much thought on.

"Heard talk that shit's going down in Nevarra City." What shit, she hasn't getting to, but if they're expecting everyone to spend Satinalia there, something's going on. Her voice stays low, and it stops when the barmaid comes back with the food Jack'd called for when they came in. Meat and some boiled vegetables, cabbage and something that might be parsnip or turnip, gravy drowning the lot of it. "Have to survive that first."

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[whooshing, explosions.]

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