IC INBOX ( SAIL )

[goodweather]

TEXT ‎‏‏‎ ☀ ‎‏‏‎ DELIVERY ‎‏‏‎ ❄ ‎‏‏‎ ACTION

cabin: 137

Comments

Not from Darcy

[saltwaterlungs]

[ Early on in the month, a new folder of photos appears on the recipient's phone. Inside is a selection of photos from various points in Darcy's childhood. Key photos are as follows;

-baptism and confirmation

-a handful of pictures from her first fencing lessons at 8, and subsequent first competition at 12. Features a medal presentation with three other girls about her age.

-Darcy on an idyllic looking farm somewhere mountainous, looking bored and uncomfortable in gumboots

-Darcy at a Christmas market, utterly delighted and chewing on some cured meat.

-a slightly blurry picture of her asleep on someone's shoulder as a toddler, drooling a bit.

-a single picture of her at a princess themed birthday party. Darcy wears the haunted expression of a war veteran and a bright orange flouncy dress.

-several embarrassing photos of her doing dumb kid shit that she is willing to murder over.

Any additional or specific photos I leave up to your discretion, go nuts have fun physically kill her with embarrassment. ]

[goodweather]

[ He hems and haws for about an hour, wondering if he should hold onto these for secret blackmail. The thought very nearly tempts him. Nearly. ]

You look very fierce.

[ IMG_tournament.jpeg ]

[saltwaterlungs]

YOU TOO!?!???
JESUS FUCKING CHRIST
DELETE THEM PLEASE FOR THE LOVE OF GOD

[ But hey Phil doesn't get threats, that's gotta mean something. ]

[goodweather]

[ It means all the world to him. ]

Can’t

[ screenshot_0001.jpeg

It’s a screenshot of the same photo within the album program. The delete option is missing. ]

[saltwaterlungs]

i hate this fucking ship
let me guess you got the one with the orange fucking dress too.
just
please dont show anyone

[goodweather]

[ He... okay, he knows that matters like this are absolutely mortifying and seemingly life-destroying when you're a teenager, and he totally understands and respects that... but also, this is really, really funny. ]

I did get that one. Don't worry, your secrets are safe

There's a bunch here. If you want you can come take a look so you know all the ones that got put out.

Just don't throw my phone overboard

[saltwaterlungs]

[ He gets a knock at his door a short while later. Darcy looks a little like a pitiful stray cat left on the side of the road, if that cat also had murder in its heart. ]

How bad is it?

[goodweather]

[ He answers the door with a small little shit-eating grin. ]

Oh, unsalvageable. Completely life-destroying. If these get out, I'll have to scrape your embarrassment-melted body off of the deck. I mean, more than they've gotten out already.

[ Since apparently he's not the only one who got these. He steps aside from the doorway, allowing her in if she likes, so no passerby can peep. He opens his phone and the album and hands it to her. ] Here.

[saltwaterlungs]

This is Hell. God hates me personally and this is the method of torture Satan has chosen for me.

[ Darcy steps inside his room, takes the phone, and spends at least a couple of minutes trying to work out how to delete it. No success. Darcy huffs and flops herself on the couch. ]

Sometimes I get empty packages and they're new powers or something. This just sucks.

[goodweather]

You got powers? All I got was these lousy can openers.

[ Clack clackity clack go the talons against a nearby side table from where he's sat on the bed. ]

If it makes you feel any better, I think they're kind of sweet, but I'm not going to be sharing them around. You're going to hash that out with... huh, speaking of, who else got these?

[saltwaterlungs]

They're not sweet, they're fucking embarrassing. Nobody should've got these. I was an annoying, obnoxious kid, and I hate being reminded of it.

[ Huffs and throws up her hands, ] Lucius and Erin. I don't know who else got them. I'm this close to putting death threats up around the ship in case anyone got them but didn't tell me.

[goodweather]

Most kids are annoying and obnoxious, Darts. At least the fact that you're embarrassed about it means you've outgrown it. More than I can say for some people, eh.

[ He leans over, elbow on his knee. ] Erin will probably hold them if you tell her to. Lucius... I don't think I've ever met him. Anybody else, well, I can't exactly ask around. I can help you print the death threats though.

[saltwaterlungs]

Thanks, [ She huffs. As if she's not touched by the sentiment, but she's still too pissy to really emote that right now. ]

Lucius at least is scared of me, so I think unless like. Jinx or Clarke or someone gets them I'm probably fine.

[ And, because she didn't actually properly look through them the last couple of times... she does. Lingering on the pictures of her at competitions, the early days of her fencing team. In a small voice, ]

I wish there were more recent photos of my team.

[ Phil might remember at least one of the girls from their recreation of night of the living dead, the one with the curly red hair at least. ]

[goodweather]

[ Phil has a far better memory than the player does, which means he does remember. There's a soft huff through his nose as his expression softens. He considers for a moment. ]

You know, I don't think I ever asked about them. How many girls were there?

[saltwaterlungs]

Four in total. Plus two reserves, but they're not in this picture. Sabine, [ the girl with curly red hair, ] Farah, [ a girl in an athletic looking hijab wearing a warm smile, ] and Luna, [ a girl with dark hair and braces. ]

First competition we won together. We all went to the same fencing club, so the coaches just shoved us together so we could enter into team fencing as well as the individual competitions. We worked well together.

[goodweather]

I'm glad it worked out. [ Faint little smile. ] I don't know too much about sport fencing. Do you all specialize in different kinds of swords as a sort of 'team composition' thing? What's your favorite?

[ Is he trying to get her to talk about fencing and about her team to make her feel better. Yes. ]

[saltwaterlungs]

God, no. No- we're all sabre fencers. What weapon you use changes the rules you fight by. Team fencing is like... we all have different things we're good at. There's a limited number of times you can switch teammates, and everyone usually has to pull their weight in order to get a win. Whoever's out on the field can't talk to the rest of the team, either, it's like... you prepare together, and then each one of you goes out solo.

[ Darcy flicks through the pictures. She knows what he's doing, but it's working anyway. ]

I'm fast and have good technique. Farah was good at strategy. Sabine's got amazing defense. And Luna's tricky. You can't switch out for every problem you encounter; just because someone else has a good guard doesn't mean they can switch me for Luna the second I struggle with it. Half the strategy is learning the other team beforehand, working out who they're going to send out when, and trying to counter it. As for my weapon; I only fence sabre. Epee and foils are bullshit. You can't parry them. Sabre is fast, aggressive, and rewards you for being the one attacking. Closer to an actual fight.

CLAWS OUT OF MY GRAVE

[goodweather]

[ Phil nods along. ]

Sounds like the four of you were solid. Now... [ Thoughtful hum. ] ... you say "strategy" and "tricky," but walk me through what that means for fencing. Bouts don't last very long at your level, do they? What does that look like when they're that fast? I don't imagine it's like soccer or hockey.

[saltwaterlungs]

Individual points? Seconds. But team relays are first to forty-five points. Technically each bout is on a three minute timer but it pauses in between points, it takes as long as it takes. Sometimes an hour with the resets and pauses and breaks. But... at the level we fight at?

[ Fought, probably, but she's too happy to be talking about it to remember that it's all past-tense. ]

It looks like... you basically have time in each bout to do one thing, right? Sort of like chess at a really high speed. You commit to a gambit and you go for it. Me, I bank on being faster than my opponent. You can't really defend or counter-attack if I'm hitting you before you can react. But Farah- Farah would bait out hits so they'd attack her in a way she was prepared to defend. Luna was amazing at feints, pretending to go for a hit in such a way she could strike somewhere else they weren't expecting. And Sabine- you're not... really meant to play defense in sabre. It rewards you for being aggressive. But Sabine was like... fearless. Like a praying mantis or something. Amazing reflexes. Really good at picking when someone was feinting or trying to fuck with her.

[ Her ears have not gradually gotten more pink shut up. ]

[goodweather]

[ Perceiving you perceiving you perceiving you. ]

Huh! Maybe I'll start watching fencing on the Olympics more often. [ He absolutely will, given the chance. ] You know, I don't think I ever asked how you got into it. You or your team. I played soccer in high school for a while, but... didn't really stick.

[saltwaterlungs]

It's pretty cool to watch, even if you don't know the rules. I'm not quite at the level of some of those guys, but I'm getting there.

[ Was getting there, anyway, before her training started focusing on practical swordplay and incorporating the wisdom of a pirate swordplay master. ]

Me- when I was younger I was... hang on- [ She flicks through the pictures to find one of the ones of her on the farm. She's chasing some older kids with a stick in hand. ]

I was super into like, knights and shit. So my parents told me if I was good and stopped hitting people with sticks, they'd get me lessons so I could really learn to use a sword. It was kind of the first thing I really felt good at.

[ Then flicks back to one of the other tournament pictures. ]

Sabine was from one of the really big Italian fencing families. They're kind of nuts about it over there. Something like... three or four generations of fencers from her family? Both her parents- her brother was on the boys team- her grandparents. There'd be like, fifty people at our tournaments cheering for her specifically, she fucking hated it. Luna got into it to help with strength and balance for ballet, but I think she stopped actually dancing a couple of years ago. Ballet is fucking hard, and super demanding. And Farah... I don't think I ever found out, actually. She also did HEMA- she was the one who gifted me my first not-sabre sword, I'd just started training in it back home. But I don't know, we used to talk about a lot of shit, just... not that.

[goodweather]

[ Darcy hitting people with sticks as a child and having that turn into fencing tracks. ]

I get that. It's not something that comes up too often, is it? I only know that sort of thing about all my coworkers because I'd made a point of asking. After... Punx, anyway. I didn't know them at all before that. I didn't really care.

[ :/ ]

Me, I pretty much only did meteorology because I was good at it, and it was the one thing I could see myself doing without offing myself after ten years. I barely made it through college; the only thing that got me my degree was spite. I was gonna be able to hold my own or die trying.

[saltwaterlungs]

Really? I- it's just surprising. You're smart as shit, I would've thought University would be easy for you.

[ Everyone knows Smart People(tm) never have issues with academia. And Phil is a nerd, so. ]

It's weird how much you can like... deal with people every day and still not really know them.

[goodweather]

You gotta remember that I was an issue back then. It doesn't matter how smart you are, if you don't care enough or if you can't make the system work for you, it's not happening. I skipped a ton of classes and assignments and got into more trouble than any of it was worth. I slept around and got into fights and took drugs. [ Turns to her and points. ] If you start doing that, I'm kicking your ass.

[ Said with the tone of someone who knows for a fact that she won't, but just so you know. ]

There were definitely kids that deserved that degree more than I did, but... Uni just wasn't good for them. I wonder where they went.

[saltwaterlungs]

What- doing drugs and sleeping around? Jesus Christ- do you also want to give me a curfew while you're at it, dad?

[ Because he's right, she's not going to, but Darcy's filled with the spirit of teenage rebellion at all times. Don't tell her what to do. ]

Being smart helps though, right? Like- I thought that was kind of the whole point of university or whatever.