Though he was unconscious to the fact, Flotsam fell quite naturally – if rigidly – into the eyes forwards, attentive vacancy of a subordinate under scrutiny. It suggested everything of tactful obeisance and gave absolutely nothing away and if asked about what the implied metaphorical something was would meet it with uncomprehending obstinance. His head had the cloudy, choppy-weather ache of a hangover, his bandaged back legs itched something terrible and the presence of the First Mate at the edge of his periphery made for confusing, butterflies-in-stomach sensations. The butterflies had a mind to kick and slap and be generally rather thuggish with everything they could get at in there, but on his face none of it would have shown. He refused to recognize the agitated lust for the pegasus and very privately in his head wished the butterflies would go skirmish with that instead and spare him the turmoil. Images of last night flashed hotly, darkly behind his vision.
Captain Nauticaa sat at her desk with the appropriate counter-expression to complement his own, which is to say she wore the authoritative, slightly imposed upon, formal, displeased-on-general-principles, hard-about-the-eyes expression of any individual who deals with subordinates on a regular basis.
It was a time-honoured tango.
The words hung in the air still, though several moments had passed. The actual chair Nauticaa kept was forgettable, the short-coming of someone truly spartan in their stylings, but the broad, scored desk more than sufficed as a trapping of her office. Charts were rolled out under paperweights, delicately inked and inked over with nonsensical notations and symbols from where Flotsam stood. Some of the marks in the wood itself could have been the scars of swordplay, half-tucked away down there.
The words still hung in the air. Flotsam could feel the Captain’s scrutiny bearing down on him. Not unkindly, but terribly, woefully exacting, like measuring scales that he sat inside of being swung about with.
Her eyes flicked down to his legs in the only motion anyone had made for a while. “Curious,” she said. Just that. Nothing else.
Flotsam broke the spell. Or perhaps fell into it. “Captain?” he hazarded.
Nauticaa was a dark, dark piebald, green and grey-black blurring together, a vision of colours that might be found by diving into the ocean, deep as one’s lungs could hold then staring down deeper still. It was the colours of ghostly kelp forests and silent things.
“You got yourself into trouble and out of it again. End of story.” She waved a dismissive hoof. “The ship’s filly will tell you what to do today. Tommorow we’ll discuss your arrangements.”
The words jumped. “Arrangements, sir?”
Now the Captain just look put-upon. “Have you put any thought about what you’ll do when we come into port?” Flotsam’s face had been perfect instinctive schooled ignorance* before, now it must have become easy to read because Nauticaa continued, saying, “I suggest you consider it now. I mean to have us in port within three days. We’ll speak about your situation tomorrow.”
The Captain softened by minute degrees. “Do you remember anything, yet?”
Flotsam let his eye rove the charts. Somewhere in there was a tiny theoretical point that could be called Us here in the ship and another one, equally abstract called Where we’re going. If there was some clue as to the position of either, he couldn’t see it.
“No, sir.” Feeling that wasn’t enough, that she didn’t deserve stubbornness and the conversation had moved on he added, “Sometimes there are moments, a second where I nearly do, but it doesn’t stay. Everything I remember is here.”
Only then did Nauticaa seem genuinely at a loss for words. Flotsam hadn’t met the Captain all that much in his limited time aboard her ship, didn’t feel he’d really gotten to know her, but for the impressions she tended to give one this seemed a rare enough event for her.
“The filly will find you when I send her. Have some coffee in the meantime.”
“Yes, sir. Thank you, sir.”
And that was that. Flotsam bowed out and blinked into the glittering, twinkling-ocean sunlight. If he’d been antsy going in, antsy about his teaser of a tryst with Harpoon, well…that didn’t bother him so much now.
What was the Captain going to do, put him off the ship? The thought put things in perspective.
Around him a smattering of ponies worked at arcane things, checking lines, scuttling above and below decks. A few danced about the, stunted, out of place, ugly improvised mast. Not danced danced, it went without saying,** but rather checking this, considering that, three-quarters complaining that this was what they were stuck with and one-quarter grateful that the damage hadn’t been worse.
He tended to stand well back from ponies at work. He knew most of the crews’ by now, now that he thought about it. There was Moon Tide, an earth pony, water-at-night blue with a paler mane and tail to match, she made a better effort at hygiene than most of the crew himself included, if the block of yellowed soap she guarded jealously was anything to go by. She’d made a big deal of giving him the loan of it after the storm, to “scrub up nice,” then managed to be moody that he used “too much.” She’d been in prime position to speculate on the matter, as she’d insisted she watched the whole thing, and even that hadn’t put a damper on her sulk for long. There’d been a too much shine on tooth and in eye as he, as she had put it, “scrubbed up.” Granted, it’d been a bit of scrubbing on the decks with a bucket and age-browned brush, hardly privacy, but still.
Above in the riggings was Parrot, jungle-green with exotic flashes of blue and yellow stripes along her barrel and on the edges of her wings. A crimson bandana hung loosely around her neck, showing off an easy smile. Like her namesake she seemed to prefer climbing to actual flight. She nodded her head earnestly as Moon Tide directed her on knots and things. One that preferred to go along with the others and follow orders, Flotsam thought.
Then there was Sea Bed, a blue-black unicorn. He didn’t know much about her – she tended to be below decks more than most. She’d never given him grief, by lewdness or otherwise, but something was chilly about her. She and another pony were tying down a load of timber, some of it salvaged from the damage, some of it the reedy, thin banana-curved stuff they’d harvested on the island.
The other one took a moment’s thinking to remember the name of: Hop Scotch. Another earth pony, this one a pale brown. Now that he thought about it, he’d only ever seen her at night before, maintaining watch with a little oil lantern. She was slight, wore a cap and a ridiculously cliché eye patch precisely because it was cliché and had once told him there was a trick to it, but what that was he couldn’t remember. A fair enough one to talk to, she seemed to give a token of thought to what he had to say and would make some conversation when it was otherwise quiet and dark, but he preferred not to be caught alone, in part due to the filthy innuendos she occasionally seeded the conversation with.
Flotsam thought about “getting caught alone,” with Harpoon and quickly shook the thought aside. Not so quickly that he didn’t relish the pleasant tingle for a second, mind you.
At the wheel and having a fairly easy job of it for the moment was the last pony working in sight. Windlass, who was big and staunch and had oddly gentle, attentive eyes for someone otherwise so mean-looking. She stared forwards with the look of a pony capable of keeping attentive to a dreary task for hours on end.
He brushed his way below deck, met the rush of disconcerting darkness – it would be twinned by the blinding rush of light when he came up again – determined to get a decent meal into himself before he was called for anything. He suspected, head and hoof be damned, he was going to find himself with more work than usual today.
Surprising himself, agreed with the idea, even welcomed his recompense. He’d do the same, nothing official, but a light punishment of sorts, a chance for whatever hapless recruit that had made the mistake to have a few unhappy hours to really learn the lesson of it.
Flotsam startled in the dark. He recognized the moment for what it was. He strained, groped after it, but he might as well have tried to grab water in his hooves and lost it. When he came back from it he felt a little woozy, took a second to blink his eyes and head a little clearer and remembered what was certain.
If there’d been another pony in that exact spot with him, and if they’d had their night vision in full swing already and if they had good eyes at that and if been looking for it, they might just have seen strange little flashes, like mirrors flickering, for an instant catching the light of very tiny – or very distant – comets.
But that was a lot of ifs and not one of them had been realized and so the entire moment passed without the slightest bit of awareness on anyone’s part.
What a shame. It might have helped them to notice that, later on.
For the moment though, Flotsam walked, half-feeling, half-remembering his way along the narrow walls to the galley, possessed of a simpler, more tangible concern. Well, that and the whole Rivaplút thing.
“Food,” he mused to no one under his breath. “Food and coffee.”
Always a good idea to have more characters to toss around. This story continues to get curiouser and curiouser and better and better.
curiously, where exactly is this "If there’d been another pony in that exact spot with him, and if they’d had their night vision in full swing already and if they had good eyes at that and if been looking for it, they might just have seen strange little flashes, like mirrors flickering, for an instant catching the light of very tiny – or very distant – comets."
happening? Is shining lighting up here? is it the area in the ship? Kinda hard to tell.
I hope when cadence and the others find him they dont beseech the rest of the crew
Initially, I personally found the asterisk styled foot notes a curiosity.
But in this chapter, what with them referring to something that would have been more meaningful sitting right next to the sentence they were referring to (remember, we have to scroll all the way down to the bottom in order to read the footnote, then return back upwards) since the commentary was clearly a bit of humor to be added to the material.
I may once again be missing stuff, but I feel that if you are going to use the asterick footnote thing, then it might as well be on stuff that we might actually need a "nudge" on. The flashing lights for example (which may receive further explanation on their own later, likely having something to do with Luna and Cadence if I were to make a bet).
It's also of my opinion that "First Mate" should only be capitalized like that if it is being used as an alternate name for Harpoon, rather than rank. I'm of the opinion that you were trying to use it as a rank (hence "the" coming before it) is why I felt the desire to point that out.
6529775
Point taken. Future chapters will be more considered when the auld asterooskies get used and be less asterisk-wanton on general principles. Only the best puns/non sequituers and/or narrative-nudges-as-necessary.
Also, I'll watch out for that proper noun caps-sized / rank not caps-sized thing now that I know.
6528829
Ah! a small ambiguity, readily remedied
by the addition of yet more bees. The answer to that can be inferred, this being the second instance of this particular phenomenon. I'm a touch cagey.6528655 Glad you think this way!
6529818 Gah, really? Must be important if its being deliberately obscured.
Guess I'm going vague hint hunting...
EDIT:after finding the other clue the where is marked, if not guaranteed given the wording. so thats interesting. the exact words of both initially made me think it related to the circumstances of his loss of ID, but given the nature of its appearance I wonder if theres been some deliberately placed mental dmg or block.
either that or theres been some terrible dmg physically acquired through his initial ordeal.
given that there is some info hes getting in fammilliar situations then theres some backround memory thats come back to him, if subconsciously that is letting him recognize a situation as fammilliar in the first place. the other question is, why could patch see it in that situation.
something weird is going on behind this. i can't wait to see whether other hints will shine any light on this mystery.
i just hope im not missing something obvious in trying to figure out the meaning.
Wishing Harpoon and Floatsam good luck in their relationship. I do wonder though... Will Floatsam bring Hardpoon home? My vote leans to AYE! As Floatsam brings her home even with his memory back.
6530840 I dunno. Could be awkward what with him being married and consort to the alicorn ruler of the crystal empire and all.
You know, in truth that might be the most sensible thing she could do. Extra random stallion on board is a disruptive influence, and she doesn't really owe him anything else. I suppose the real question might be whether she's going to want some form of compensation for the time and effort of saving and taking care of him.
Huh, that's interesting. Magical amnesia perhaps, as opposed to something more physical trauma related?
6531287
To your first point. Floatsom's timely shield during the storm did save the crew the trauma from losing their beloved "little sister," while also preventing much worse storm damage that might have sunk the ship. Nautica might consider any debts squared for that.
To the second point. Magically induced amnesia would logically be a lot more reversible than the kind caused by brain injury. Of course that means that the vessel Shining was aboard most likely deliberately sunk by a hostile force with access to powerful magic. His presence could put the band of pirates in far more danger than anypony realizes if whoever did so finds out he's still alive.
If the OCs of this story were voiced, what would they sound like?
6532884 I blame cherngelerngs!
Because racism!
So there's a random siren character we haven't seen yet apparently, and Shining has magical amnesia.
6546952 Jessica or maybe elizabeth.