TheAmishPirate

Breathless Dead

The moment arrives for the Captain to speak. Dolce recognizes it well. How many times had they met, in the days prior? That first glance, when he’d realized a meeting must be called. The long hours before a mirror, seeing a tidy uniform instead of his favorite vest. The constant, electric presence, keeping him awake to read one more chapter, one more page. They’d struck an uneasy truce, and were it not for that he’d be asleep this very moment. Miracle of miracles, they’d found some common ground to work around. After all, he knew how to deliver a report in a clear, steady voice, no matter the situation he faced. He knew how to address a room, without looking at anyone in particular. If his voice slipped, he would carry on without blinking, and no one would realize he’d never meant to say it quite that way in the first place.

Captain Dolce faces the assembly. A fragile peace bends. But does not break.

“As her Highness has said,” his soft voice fills the room, not one tick louder than it needed to be. “We do not know what we sail into. We do not know who presently holds the Endless Azure Skies, nor how they will receive ships passing through their territory. But what we do not know cannot change what we do know: Our destination is farther still. Our business is not with the Azura. Our goal, then, is peace. If the gods smile on us, we will be welcomed as honored guests, and all who meet us will be blessed.”

“Thus, our own course set, the decision then must rest with the Azura, and we must be ready for their answer. If they seek to entangle us, we must politely decline. If they seek to threaten us, our hearts must be steadfast. If they seek to bar our way, we must find the path through. But we must not make their decision for them, or else the consequences will rightly fall on our own heads.”

“I do not mean to suggest it will be easy. But.” Here, he lets himself look. Look upon the many grand and wondrous souls who’ve come together for this voyage. So many, from so many impossible places, all under one roof, for one purpose, sharing in a dream and a life together. He, at the head of it all. Who could have imagined it? “If I speak of difficulty, I speak it out of the faith that such a company will rise above it.”

Then, he waits. He has spoken his turn. He has prepared all he could. He has offered all that is proper and good. Now, he must let there be reply, and let his fate be what it may. So he waits. And a lioness in the company waits, feeling nothing of her burden when compared to the anguished coal buried deep in her chest.

TSL: The Excess of Flowers

Why would she be thinking of those sorts of stories?! They’re dumb! And completely wrong! The priestesses are all radiant serenity, the day can always be saved with good vibes and holding hands, and the only really bad things happen to the people who treat the priestess badly. Who would waste their time with crap like that?

(The best ones are when the priestess realizes the terrible roars are actually cries of pain. They approach the weary monster, armed only with kindness and soothing holy water. They speak a soft, gentle tongue that no one has dared to use with them before. They will wait, as long as it takes, for the monster to curiously snuffle their outstretched hand. The first touch. And their walls come crumbling down-)

A-anyway. Two Hundred Gates Temple. Never been, but yeah, she’s heard of it. Supposed to be not bad, if you like that kind of thing. And don’t mind adding a good pile of days to your journey, when hers ought to have been over tomorrow. What a pain, leaving for another trip when she’s already imagining the feel of a real bed again. A roof over her head. And yet.

When was the last time somebody’d thanked her? For anything? Not like she needed it or anything, but. Still, how long? When was the last time someone left a perfectly good barge behind to chase after her, in the driving rain, with half an umbrella, when she’d busted up the other half? All her thoughts had already begun to tread the same, bitter grooves in her heart, with nothing but a black, lonely night to look forward to. And yet.

I wanted to. Thank you.

“Listen, bud...” The growl’s gone out of her voice. Now it’s as cold and hard as the icy rain. Take heed, little priestess, of the wisdom of beasts. “I’m flattered, really, but you gotta know it’s not gonna be that easy. You’re gonna get what you saw tonight, every day, and there’s nothing your veil’s gonna do about it. Maybe it’ll be N’yari. Maybe the people on the street. Definitely your sisters, if we’re unlucky enough to run into them. Now, maybe I can get you there through all that, maybe I can’t, but you gotta know that some of that trouble’s gonna rub off on you, if you have me along.”

“You wanna change your mind? That’s your call, and I can respect that. Get your butt back to the river, catch that barge, and there’ll be no hard feelings. But if you wanna tag along,” Her hand shot up, cutting off the eager nodding before it could start. “Think. Really think about it, and make your choice. I’m not gonna have you regretting it.”

Can’t you see, bud? This is just the same mistake all over again. Please. Learn your lesson. Wise up. And get back to the barge.

Breathless Dead

A miracle. No other word came close, by miles.

Dionysus foiled. No hands lost. No damage of consequence to the Plousius. Mynx, untouched. Redana, safe and sleeping, her dear heart battered, but still beating.

A miracle. Wrought, in some small part, by his own hands.

Dolce eyes wrinkle in an enormous smile, even as frightful tears leaked from the corners. “Well done. Well done. I promised her she wouldn’t, and she hasn’t. Thank goodness. Well, well done.” He wipes at his cheeks. Pats them dry. Misses a little. Finds his chin. Over-corrects. That’s wool, now. Oh dear. Oh, dear...

The bridge went far away and slowly sideways. On the other end of the universe, a wobbling bleat.

Then, merciful silence.

**********************************************************

So Iskarot did know how to flatter a person. The old softie. A flicker of warmth lit her face. “What do you know? I suppose I did something right after all.” She raises her bowl to her guest. “To survival, evading self-destruction, and being worth it.” And she meant it. At least half of it, anyway. A good record by her standards. As to the rest: A work in progress? A performance yet to be bought? Another lie for the pile?

She'd sort it out later. There was victory coleslaw to enjoy.

“I must say, to the first two points.” She continues between mouthfuls. Since when did the Order of Hermes bother with cooking secrets? She’d have to tell Dolce. “If I have to sit alone in my room for another day, striving to reach competence with basic food preparation, I will critically jeopardize someone’s survival. Possibly my own? I plan to play it by ear.” Did she need to stab her chopsticks into her bowl so forcefully? Absolutely. The need was dire. “Please. Please tell me you know of something I can do with myself that doesn’t run afoul of Zeus.”

TSL: The Excess of Flowers

Han works the knots in a bubble of silence. Where she goes, the quiet follows. Where she leaves, the whispers start. Never to her face, oh no. Goddess forbid someone should say an unkind word and ruin the mood, right? Much better to blame someone behind their back, where you can be as brave as you think you are.

Whatever. She doesn’t have anything to say to them anyway. She has...other things to think about.

The Priestess. She hasn’t said a word to her since the N’yari left, and it’s the smartest move she’s made all evening. Do y’get it, bud? Do y’see why you should’ve left her alone? Now you know; next time you see the toughest girl in the room keeping to herself, you return the favor. That’s nature’s way of telling you somebody’s trouble, and all the best intentions in the world can’t save you from what’ll happen. (She thought she was being careful. She thought she remembered where it fell. All the same, the Priestess holds a shattered handle.)

The trip home. No umbrella. No hat. No poncho. No problem. Not like she was getting any wetter. It was getting late, but so what? Not like she had a carriage to catch. (Not like anybody was waiting on her.) She’d get there when she got there, alright? Things happened on the road. That’s how it was.

Machi. Machi. Stupid, stupid, Machi.

What were you thinking?! Did you seriously expect her to just, just swoon to pieces, because. Because! She wasn’t. Gonna. That wasn’t gonna happen. It wasn’t gonna _ever _ happen. And you’d have to be an absolute rockhead to think otherwise. And now. (Her chest feels. Light. Lighter than it should. Wrong, now. It remembers the weight, the pressure, the warmth. It may never forget.) Shut up. (A blur. A dizzying, blazing blur. Both of them. Impossible, to pick a moment right now, and not get lost in them all.) Shut up! (She meant it. She meant it. She meant it. She meant it all, and more. All of it.) Shut! Up!!!

“Sometime today, catkisser.”

Han blinks into the iron face of a scowling bridesmaid. Did she just- “You wanna run that by me again?”

“I said. Sometime today. Catkisser.”

Oh. Now there’s some backbone.

“Please.” Another sits nearby, massaging her sore wrists. “Don’t make a scene. We don’t want any more trouble.”

“Any more trouble, huh?” Han barely turns to her, and she wilts immediately. “Is that what you think’s gonna happen? One wrong move, and I pick up where the N’yari left off?”

The bound girl sniffs. “Don’t shout so much, I can still smell the cat on your breath.”

And that’s when the silence hits her. Nobody’s whispering anymore. No one makes a sound. They stare at her, or around her, all their attentions orbiting her, and she sees the expectation in their wide eyes and too-tense limbs. Nobody knows what’s about to happen. But everybody suspects they know.

They’re wondering who will come to save them the second time.

Han rises, and carries the bound bridesmaid with her. No one breathes. “Here.” She tosses her into the lap of her companion. “You in a rush? Do it yourself.” A chorus of indignant oaths strike at her back; she ignores them. (Others are already rushing to help. To soothe her. To glare in solidarity at the unbelievably rude Highland thug.) She binds her sword anew, slings it over her back, and in a single leap clears the stream to the riverbank.

Who needed a stupid boat anyway? She had two good feet. She could walk. It wasn’t that far. She wasn’t that wet. Her arm didn’t ache that much.

She didn’t need any of them.

She didn’t need anyone.

[Marking Angry.]

Breathless Dead

Miscalculation. Error in judgement. Thinking too much. Thinking too little. Mistake. Wrong. He’s done it wrong. All wrong. All wrong.

He says nothing. The only sounds he makes are the bleating cries she beats out of him. Shameful, to beg now. To be so stupid as to think that begging could change anything. The worthwhile sheep accepts the truth silently. The black sheep needs punishment. When the punishment ends, there will be no black sheep. There is nothing more to it. When the punishment ends. There will be no black sheep. Nothing more to it. When the punishment. Ends. No more black sheep. Nothing more needs. When the. Punishment ends. There will be no punishment. The black sheep. Ends the black. Nothing. More. Ends. Ends...

A lost lamb lies crumpled on the bridge of a cruiser, a long, long ways from his home. The Master has not given him leave to rise, or leave to go. He is permitted to partake of the air, provided he does so quietly, without crying. All else is forbidden, without the word of the Master. A good sheep stays where he is told. A black sheep needs punishment. There is nothing more to it.

The lamb tips over against the hull. One hoof finds purchase on the deck. Slowly, he disobeys.

It mattered little, whether it was possible to evade punishment. A Captain did their duty.

“You aren’t going to kill me.” His hand falls heavy on the instruments for leverage. Heedless of broken glass. Still, he rises.

“You didn’t kill Mynx. You didn’t kill me. You...aren’t going to kill me.” His hooves stomp defiance above the screaming chaos. His ears ache terribly at the loudest steps he’s ever taken. Still, he rises.

“Mynx could not harm a friend to their face. Whoever told you that you could do worse was...was a terrible liar. You. Aren’t going to kill me.” Closer. He expects the blow to fall at any moment, and he must get closer. The full weight of a princess in wrath...no, a friend, lost in darkness, will bear down on him, and still, he rises.

Mynx will need all the opening he can give her.

*****************************************************

“Rice is a trial of the gods, given to us to punish hubris.” Vasilia snapped. “A grain so diabolical an appliance had to be invented specifically to defeat it, and yet even this mechanically engineered bane falls to pieces if you don’t posses the precise secret ratios.” Ratios which she might have a better shot at learning if someone hadn’t hidden the rice cooker, Hestia.

“...it’s news to me too.” She pushed bits of coleslaw about with a single chopstick, forming a larger and larger glob, before starting all over again. “That I could live with...less. I’ve been ‘relevant’ my entire life, I’d no idea what was going to happen if I just. Stopped. If I’d even keep going.” Would she have, if Hestia hadn’t been there to promise her a future? A dangerous thought. One she preferred not to dwell on. “All the same, you give me too much credit. Can you call it acceptance, if the alternative means death? If I’m merely doing what I must to survive? Am I just walking this long, slow road because it’s the path that lets me win in the end?”

TSL: The Excess of Flowers

Han looks her dead in the eyes. She opens herself wide, and lets Machi’s longing gaze pour into her. No distraction. No hiding. And on any other day, Machi might have realized what was coming. But today is the first day she has ever kissed her stone-heart, and she could not recall even the rules of Highland fighting, ingrained in her by a lifetime of practice. For in the Highlands, when you stab someone in the back? When you hit them where it really hurts? You have the common blasted decency to look them in the eyes when you do it.

A decision crosses the space between them, faster than even regret. Leverage crumbles. Legs coil. And a champion goes sailing into the river before the pain could fully register.

(We regret to inform you that Han’s Special Time has. Experienced some unforeseen delays.)

When Machi emerges, it is not as a flailing kitten. It is not as a soaked cat, scrabbling at the deck. She _erupts_ from the river in a great spray of water that sets the barge rocking. And Han nearly tips it over, exploding off the bridge with an umbrella gripped in each hand. In the air they meet! Machi catches the kick! She shatters the umbrella! And the second whirls down on her back and spikes her to the water. A barbed rain of splinters hangs frozen in the air. Again they strike. Again, a champion falls!

“Yield!” Han roars, punching and righting the swaying deck as she lands. “Yield already, you, you! Stinkhead!” She breaks another umbrella over her knee, banging the two jagged lengths of wood together, sounding her challenge to the very heavens.

[Rolling to Fight: 3 + 3 + 3 = 9. Han takes a superior position, and gains a String on Machi. Machi gets to pick an option in return.]

Breathless Dead

No part of this is right. Neither of them ought to be here. The ship’s champion had as much business at the helm as the ship’s cook. Poseidon would prove their folly, momentarily, except there would be no one left to accept the truth of the matter. Or, rather, those that were wouldn’t get to accepting said truth for some time, on account of the more pressing matters of a ship split in two.

But Dionysis didn’t operate on what ought to be. They stood atop a terrifying mountain of possibility, and promised all of it real, in exchange for all propriety learned and ingrained. Only here could the impossible seem rather doable. And only here could an answer be seen for how simple it was.

The crew belonged to the Captain. The ship belonged to the Captain.

Whoever commanded them was, in effect, the Captain.

Click! Went the cover of a speaking-tube.

“Reduce speed. Return to prior heading. 73 point 2 degrees starboard. Raise prow 11 point 7 degrees.” Went the calm, steady voice of a sheep.

Fwomp! Went a pocketful of fluffy, muffling wool, jammed down the only tube to the engine room.

Dolce’s hooves made no sound, as he turned to face Redana, and the communications dial she’d just shattered. Behind him, the blocked pipe, that she would have to go through him to repair. Beside them both, the viewscreen, the gathering storm, and proof to the question that would decide their fates:

Who commanded this ship?

**************************************************

Of course there wasn’t a way to tell in any way that mattered. The thought was a silly, useless old thing, forgotten for a reason. What good did it do her to know what her great-great-great grandparents were designed to do? Their lives were their own, as hers was her own, and she wasn’t going to run off and, and become a street sweeper or whatever they did just because they were born for it. Silly of her to even bring it up in the first place.

The uncharacteristically silly Vasilia considered the implements laid out before her, seemingly deaf to Iskarot’s words. Forks? Corkscrews? Ladles? No, no, it would be chopsticks today. For the challenge, you see. (Oh gods what had her life come to) She laid herself out, set to savor a bowl of coleslaw in her finest bathrobe, and only then did the Grand Magos drift back into her awareness, welcomed by a gracious gesture of her chopsticks.

“Well? I believe you were telling me why I’m so great and powerful?~”

TSL: The Excess of Flowers

Nobody wants a dumb rock from the Highlands.

Lowlanders’ll tell you to sand away the rough edges, paint it in an inoffensive floral pattern, and so long as it makes the right noises maybe it’ll be worth something. Highlanders’ll tell you there’s more than just dumb rocks up here, and any dumb rocks that happen to be nearby ought to keep their mouths shut if they don’t want to talk about it later. N’yari are huge jerks who only want to suplex dumb rocks because it makes for a good laugh for a night and then they’re off for whatever catches their eye next.

Dumb rocks don’t get held. Dumb rocks don’t warm up from the rain beneath another, enveloped in them, every twist and pull caught with heavy, cushioning softness. Nobody’s ever looked at a dumb rock like it was the most precious, most valuable thing they’d ever known, like just being near it made them happy like nothing else could. A dumb rock could go its whole life, and never imagine somebody filled with a hunger for you, for your lips, for your stupid, trembling face as they devour you whole and still want more, more, more

When Machi finally pulls away, when Han finally remembers to breath, and her lungs fill in wild gasps, and her eyes stay fixed on that impish mouth, and her thoughts put themselves in a language she recognizes, they bring to her a terrible realization:

Oh gods above and below Machi was serious.

The whole time. She. She meant every word. Every flirt and every poem and every moonlight serenade slash wrestling championship was. Was. Oh no.

She, she couldn’t. This wasn’t. How. This was a fight! They were fighting! And then, they weren’t, and she. She just. Twice. And. Was she going to do it again? (And if not, why did that make her heart sink?) But why. Why?! They were fighting! They’d always been fighting! (Would anyone ever look at her like that again?) Machi was. She’d. A bully! A big, dumb, strong bully who was still so very very close to her face and. And. (What if this is her only chance? What if this never happens again? With anyone?) She. She had to...to...

Share?

Oh. That’s right.

She...had to stop. This, and Machi. Because the N’yari didn’t actually want a dumb rock from the Highlands, she wanted Han’ya of the Oei. Because every victim she’d carry on her back betrayed a little girl who dreamed of a life free of bullies, and no amount of kisses(?!?!?) could make her forget that. Not even if she just kidnapped everyone who really had it coming. Because, today, a kind-hearted little priestess didn’t deserve to get roped up (literally) in...in her stupid nonsense.

(Because mom would get her rose-candy sticks at New Year’s, no matter what they’d said to each other that day. Because dad still had stories she hadn’t heard, no matter how many of them were going to be too long and too old for her.)

She had to stop.

And she had to stop her.

[Marking Insecure, Activating Tenacious Purpose. Goal: Save Lotus and also the rest of the people here from the N’yari. How can she advance her goal in a way that violates civilized norms?

Oh, and Han is now Smitten with Machi. The answer to the question “What have you done that you are sure they view as inappropriate?” worked into the post above.]

Breathless Dead

For the lifetime of every material need met to the fullest: For the nights of sleep free from fear and foe: For the knowledge of ages passed down through the generations: For the mouth of the Masters forbidding in specific, in person, in clearest detail: The lash! The lash!

For the weak link in a centuries-old chain of dinnertimes: For deeds done in darkness by the gifts of home and hearth: For the supplanting of love that must always be first: The scourge! The scourge!

For the reward of the faithless scoundrel: The whip. The whip!

“The ship belongs to the Captain. The crew belongs to the Captain.” Slowly is the only way he can enter. To keep from cutting his hooves on shrapnel. To keep from coming undone.

"There is nothing here you could use to help her. I'm sorry." It slips out. He doesn't know if it's a mistake.

***********************************************************

Another time, perhaps even a week ago, the question would have earned Iskarot a free diversionary tactic with his choice of subtly scathing retort. But today, Vasilia held vigil over his sacred coleslaw, until the time it would be needed once again, and secrets did not belong between them. Or maybe she’d puttered around her quarters long enough that simple company was enough to loosen her guard. Or maybe she’d taken Hestia’s lessons to heart, and the first step to building a past was to acknowledge that it existed in the first place. Who can say?

She hardly could.

“Your guess is as good as mine.” Vasilia shrugged. “The concept is, was, a foreign one, until I took to spacefaring. Where I was born - you’d know the gravitational workings better than I - the planet was positioned such that every piece of drifting scrap in the entire system wound up there. Any castaways still breathing and any wrecks still populated found their home there. Keep going on for a few hundred years, and who even remembers what their great-great-great-great-great grandparents were ‘designed’ to do? If you could even tell. After all, when a bricklayer and a herald love each other very much, what are their children supposed to do? When the child of a bricklayer and a herald and the child of a scrap processor and a court entertainer love each other very much, what are their children supposed to do? For me, I was born, and my family had taken the laurels before, so it was the natural thing for me to do.”

A pause. A thought. One so old, she’d forgotten she’d ever had it.

“Why do you ask? You don’t have a way to, you know, determine such a thing, do you?”

TSL: The Excess of Flowers

Ahhhhhhhhhhhhhh. Dry at last. You can’t get her now, stupid rain! Han wins!!! She’s got a big old umbrella and, and, a thick, heavy blanket to snuggle up under. She’s wrapped up cozy and tight, s’real soft ‘n maybe she’ll just lie here forever and you’ll never ever get to rain on her again. Ha! Just you try to find a gap in her perfect, snuggly, heavy, gosh, really really heavy, enveloping, purring, arm...twisting...blanket?

Bwuh?

Ow ow ow ow ow ow owwwwww okay she’s awake! Always been awake! She didn’t tap out, pass out, or anything, she’s here and she’s fighting and King’s Crown Machi did you fill your pockets with boulders to keep from getting homesick you big ox?! Because despite her best wriggles, the most she accomplishes is eliciting pain from her shoulder and delight from her wrestling partner foe.

All the world is purring. Machi pushes her arm back inch by agonizing inch. She clamps her mouth shut and screws her eyes tight. She won’t give her the satisfaction. This doesn’t hurt. She can take your worst, mangetail. So go ahead. Tear her arm clean off. Play with her hair. Tell her whatever nonsense you want because it won’t make a lick of difference (augh no wait bad words). Machi doesn’t mean any of it anyway. It’s all a trick. A big joke on her favorite target. How many other girls has she put in a headlock and whispered sweet nothings to? Answer: So many.

But endurance alone doesn’t win wrestling matches. Not from this, uh, position. Nor can she tap out either. N’yari wrestling doesn’t work like that. The round continues not until one party surrenders, but until one party endures a penalty for surrendering. And the only way Machi will let up is, is...

A shadow of fear passed over her face.

The Sorrowful Kitten Prostration. The only technique that’s ever satisfied Machi. The only way she’ll accept her victory.

(A glimpse of the priestess, through the mountains of fur and muscle, through the hot breath and honeyed words. She’s all but leaping from her captor’s lap, straining uselessly against arms as big as her. Her eyes are wide. And they can’t stop looking back at her.)

“You i-idiot.” From beneath the warm cold dead dumb mountain, a spark of fire. “Who’d want to be a rock? Who’d want a rock?!”

Machi’s grip tightens. A starburst of pain. She grits her teeth, but she can’t do it. She won’t do it, do you hear her?! (Not in front of all these people. Don’t give them a reason.) If that’s what you’re into, fine! No kittens here! Nothing but dumb, jagged, ugly rock as far as the eye can see!

An arm bursts free of its prison. She punches the deck so hard it splinters and yields her some leverage. And still she pushes, and presses, her muscles bulging, straining.

And Machi, impossibly, rises an inch off the deck.

[Rolling to Figure Out a Person: 5 + 1 + 0 = an absolute 6. My XP is limitless. Asking bonus question for physical conflict: What awakens the beast inside of you?]