[MINGLE] Fishmaggedon

[crushed_pearls]

who: Erin Peters, this fucking fish, and YOU (please, there's so much fish, please for the love of GOD)
what: Eating an entire sunfish, somehow
when: December 6th probably??? Time is fluid here
where: Tauva
warnings: cooking/fish cleaning probably, someone might eat the fish guts?? And whatever you bring with you





It starts in Tauva. Near lunchtime Erin moves just about everything up against the walls that can possibly be moved while texting Johnny for help. Over the course of the afternoon flyers go up, announcing the event. Cooking surfaces (read: just about every bit of metal Erin can get her hand on that might safely contain a small fire) and clean wood are brought in and stacked on the bar ahead of time, and then Erin must face the awe-inspiring might of what is either Gal Friday's generosity or her sense of humor.

Possibly both.

Erin's first attempt to move the sunfish she received gets absolutely fucking nowhere. Her second attempt, buttressed by the might of Stone, gets it about three feet and knocks over several displays in Sundries.

It is at this point that she sends a helpless Come to the Promenade I am being defeated by a dead fish to both Dimitri and SecUnit. You might catch the three of them pushing this fucking car of a fish into Tauva, Erin keeping up a litany of both encouragement and swear words as she spends Glamour like water just to keep up her ability to help.

Stone Sayeth: Bet you wish you'd signed deeper onto our deal now huh?

After that it's setting up towels in thick layers all around the sunfish, which looms in the center of Tauva in all its glory, and then the containers for the fires in a ring around that so people who can't eat their fish raw can get at it.

Dinner time. Come have a ball! All guests under the aegis of Erin Peters, who will brook no violation of her hospitality by violence.

Comments

[hadnoright]

Daisy is brought to Tauva less by the fliers then by the stench of fresh fucking fish which, as you can imagine, is not a normal smell on the ship that does not even have marine life in the ocean around it.

So here's the tiny hunter, standing in Tauva's entranceway looking between the fish and the fires with her arms splayed and wrinkles of confusion in her face, all of which matches the tone of her voice as she says: "Erin, what the fuck."

[crushed_pearls]

Erin tips Daisy a goblin grin and a wave with the glass of caramel whiskey in her hand; she's at the bar, taking a moment to rest and to greet guests.

"I realize this might be a new concept, coming from the famously land-locked deserts of England as you do, but this is called seafood, a word meaning food but from the sea. It's good to see you, Daisy."

[hadnoright]

"I will cut you. Don't test me." Said with the pure and unfettered flippancy of someone who's reached for threats near every day of her life and has only recently gotten used to generally not meaning them. "One, I may've lived there but don't go implying I'm English. I'm Welsh, thank you. And two, we're in a lifeless pocket dimension. Where did you get a— sunfish?"

The questioning tone there takes an additional octave on top of the usual, on account of her registering exactly what kind of fish it is at the same moment she asks. She's still eyeing the thing almost warily as she drifts over to the bar.

[crushed_pearls]

"Oof, my apologies. I'd never knowingly imply a Welsh person was English, bad enough they stole all your shit." Erin takes a sip of her whiskey and, on nameless impulse, offers the glass to Daisy to share. "Ms. Friday provided it, the fish. I'm not sure if she just knows I like fish and cookouts or if me trying to teach her the art of the gag gift has returned to haunt me but, well, here it is. I realize things don't rot here but..."

She gestures with her free hand.

"Like. You can drive this fish. This fish is road certified."

[hadnoright]

"Ugh, living in London for so long better not have affected my accent." She settles herself on a stool and shakes her head at the offered glass. "Don't really drink either. Clouds the senses."

She scans the fish from head to... well, there are no toes. Tail? Butt? "It is a big fucking fish, even with this many people how are... wait, you tried to teach Friday what?"

[crushed_pearls]

"Gag gifts! Y'know, like getting instant Ramen for the man who has everything, or entering a vibrator into your white elephant Christmas party, that sorta deal. I didn't go in expecting her to not know about 'em but since I brought it up it was only polite to explain." Erin quirks an eyebrow at Daisy and takes a sip of her whiskey.

[hadnoright]

"I know what a gag gift is." Paired with a Look™, come on Erin. She's from almost the same year as you. "But you tried to teach Friday. How to gag gift. You realise that's the insane part of that story to me, right."

[crushed_pearls]

"Okay. Why?"

[hadnoright]

"She's... you know. She's the Captain's— thing. She does what he tells him and that's... it. And anyway she gives me the creeps, reminds me of... other things."

The latter one she knows is sort of just a Her Thing, and she makes another 'ugh' noise to herself. The rest... she just sounds like she thinks is a given. Yes, despite being from the same cruise where Jenny and Friday found each other.

[crushed_pearls]

Erin sits quiet with that. There's something tense radiating off of her, and she sips her whiskey about it. When the glass is empty, Erin sets it down on the bar.

Her voice is quiet and tight.

"I was someone's thing once too."

[hadnoright]

Daisy does not like that silence, but she doesn't interrupt it either, just flicks her tongue over her teeth for the taste of iron. Inhales and exhales sharply through her nose when Erin actually speaks, in that 'ohhhh, shit' sort of way.

"That's not. That's not what I'm talking about. Come on."

[crushed_pearls]

"Yeah? Then what were you talking about?" The words should be angrier but Erin just can't muster the energy for rage. "The copy made to replace me, buried in a grave with our shared name on it, the one other Lost would spit on and call a hollow thing and piss all over? SecUnit, literally made to be a thing?"

Erin turns her head and orders an old fashioned made with the same whiskey.

"...She feels. She has opinions. Ms. Friday is one of us."

[hadnoright]

"I— it's—" One of those frustrated noises of hers, almost like a growl. "It's different, alright? She works for him. And she looks like some— Stranger thing, and..."

She turns around on her stool, so she's leaning back against the bar instead of forward against it. Not looking right at Erin, anymore. Her tongue flicks over her teeth again.

"Not everything that looks or feels like a person is a person. I've met enough things that aren't."

[crushed_pearls]

"Yeah, well. You won't catch me getting back into the habit of deciding that something that can express an opinion isn't a person. I'm sure you get why."

Erin sighs and takes her new drink. Half goes down the hatch in one pull.

cw minor self harm

[hadnoright]

Daisy bites her own tongue, no more just catching it on the sharp edge of a tooth. The taste of iron is a lot stronger this time.

"I— right. Yeah. I—" Her hands curl into fists. "Look. It's just not that simple. I've met mannequins that could voice an opinion. Could kidnap, kill. Try to call its god. Still wasn't a person."

Except that mannequin was on this boat so what the hell does that say...

"Vampires, too. They were just... they weren't people."

[crushed_pearls]

"I don't deal in such neat divisions between monsters and people, Daisy. Maybe if we all get spat back out into your world we can revisit that idea, but here, in this place..." Erin shakes her head. She goes to take another sip, thinks better of it, and sets the glass back down.

"...You sleeping any better?" Is she offering an exit from the fight directly into a different awkward conversation? Yes. Is she still confident Daisy will take that out because neither of them want to be having this talk? Also yes.

[hadnoright]

"Some of these things weren't ever people, weren't ever even human, it's not—"

She swallows another mouthful of blood-tainted spit and kicks the stool's pole with the back of her heel, hard. Drops her head back to stare at the ceiling for a long, tense moment where she seriously considers saying things she's going to regret. About herself, mostly.

Then she breathes out.

"...no. But again. That's not just a. Here thing. Don't actually expect it to change."

[crushed_pearls]

"I'm sorry. Did -" Erin consciously stops herself from finishing that sentence the way her mouth wanted it ended. "- what you tried before, help at all?"

Unspoken, but very present: it can be tried again.

(Are you really? While we're mad at her?)

Did she stop deserving compassion when we got mad at her?

(...)

That's what I thought. Bitch.

[hadnoright]

"Maybe. I don't know. It was a couple hours."

A couple of hours of better sleep than she gets on her own, even counting those times where she gets so exhausted she just passes out and sleeps through the whole day, but...

[crushed_pearls]

"Before I say this I'm gonna note out loud that I'm very aware of Crabb looking at us; I'm ready to help again. Any time I'm free, for the asking. Someone's gotta look out for us monsters and based on the evidence it's not gonna be -" Erin checks a sheet of notes she's not holding, "- any of us ourselves. Well, except April, April's thriving in her lane and I do love to see it."

"...Think I can persuade you to stick around and enjoy the party? Maybe meet some people?"

[hadnoright]

Daisy just about resists the extremely petty but very tempting urge to flip Crabb the bird. Barely.

"I still don't understand you, you know. We were just arguing. And you just..." Daisy shakes her head and sighs, drumming her claws against the edge of the bar. It's not a rejection, but that doesn't make her any less confused. "We'll see. On both counts."

[crushed_pearls]

"We can go back to arguing. It's not hard. But I figure, maybe you've got reasons that are good in your head, as powerful as the shadow over mine, and maybe the middle of the fish party isn't the time for me to ask 'em." Erin shrugs, picks her glass back up, and takes a more sedate sip. "...And being kinda mad at you doesn't mean I stopped caring either."

[hadnoright]

Daisy huffs, going quiet for a moment again. "Didn't say I want to go back to arguing, did I?" Though a part of her probably does, as uncomfortable as the topic is there's still something more familiar about hostility than care. "But that doesn't make you less... confusing. You 'caring' is still weird enough."

The audible air quotes are so, so blatantly a defence mechanism against acknowledging it genuinely.

[crushed_pearls]

"Mm. One moment. I'll be directly back."

Erin slips around Daisy, deliberately keeping herself between her...friend, and her girlfriend. She catches Crabb's eye, not hard considering how hard the staring has been, and makes a subtle head gesture at Daisy's quiet misery, the look of confusion and loss on her face.

And, with her pants and shirt splattered in fish blood, looking like the monster she so often feels like, Erin mouths 'may I?' to Crabb.

[pointofhonoria]

Crabb isn't exactly proud of herself for staring so hard at them both, but she also can't find it in herself to stop, considering... well, considering. She can't trust Daisy that easily. The visible struggle in her looks genuine enough, yes. It could be an act but she's still so small, and starved, and worn down. She's not blind to that.

But Crabb's still uncertain.

The silent question only makes every single concern and conflicting feeling burn brighter. There are two things that war within Crabb: the knowledge that a person can change, that she herself is in love with someone who considers herself a monster but has come so far, that Daisy has been through God only knows how long on a cruise even worse than theirs and God only knows what else. And the memory of being shoved down the stairs, of being forcefully ejected from her own body, of lingering in Nothingness for weeks, while Daisy ran around using her face.

Crabb grits her teeth. Downs a good swig of a glass of her own. Finally mouths, 'This once. But talk later.'