[whooshing, explosions.]

[calicoy]

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.]

Comments

season recap pineapple

[katabasis]

"Enter," is shouted back, though the order is impossible to follow. The door is bolted from the inside and it's the two banging rattles against the bar that fetch Flint's attention up from the work sprawled over the table at the center of the office.

Matthias needs to begin his work an hour earlier in the day. This veritable parade of morning visitations he's been subjected to today is an intolerable imposition without some second presence in the room to pass the most monotonous of the inquiries off. With an exhale of frustration, Flint snaps shut the book on the table and crosses the room. The bolt is thrown. The door is opened.

Maybe, he thinks at the sight of the apparition waiting there in the hall, he is finally having a stroke.

"What the fuck are you doing here?" is how Friends greet one another.

cool story bro.

[calicoy]

Jack sighs and thinks, Flint as always.

"Fine, thanks for asking." Jack says, and would rather like to slip past him, but being rather taller than the man before him makes it somewhat difficult.

"I was thinking," he says, "we could discuss that in your fucking office, commander."

[katabasis]

There is a beat in which it seems the request may go unfulfilled - a bristling moment of calculation -, and then he falls back by the step required to allow Jack Rackham into the space beyond.

Even now the Forces division office is clearly in the slow motion process of being reappointed - not untidy, but missing the distinction given to spaces meant for some measure of residence in addition to work. The exception is a series of books set into the sill of the far window, and a small painting over the fireplace which would be painfully unremarkable if it weren't so clearly a rough study of a particular dark ship with at anchor in the harbor. The lines of the Walrus are distinctive enough that there are recognizable even translated by the hand of some two-bit painter.

The door is closed. The bolt is not thrown again.

"The state of the island?"

[calicoy]

"Thank you," Jack drawls, and finds a place to sit. He pineapple he sets on Flint's desk.

"They've put some upjumped asshole named Rogers on the task force, but in a move you'll find fucking shocking, the Imperium underfunded him. I guess he wants to reclaim it despite that, make his mark on the world, all that. He wrote a book, you know. It's horseshit. Anyway, the idiot divorced his influential Altus wife, who is calling for all his debts to be called in post-haste. He's working on a short timetable, and it makes him and the island especially dangerous. I was fighting the bastard off best I could, until Anne got a fucking rift shard in her hand, so I'll thank you to stop snarling as though I would ever of my own free will choose to vacation in this frozen shithole."

[katabasis]

Of the myriad reasons for Jack Rackham to show his face in Kirkwall while a small war is being waged in the North, Anne Bonny has a rift shard is the last one he'd anticipated. The far more likely reasoning behind a familiar face in the Gallows would have been, The island is lost; our foothold there has been utterly repelled; in the time you've been gone courting a the assistance of a place that will likely never be convinced to give it, our potential allies have evaporated. Is it crass to be relieved? Absolutely.

He looks it though.

A prompt calculation yields: "How many men came with you?"