come_sailaway | SEPTEMBER EVENT: WE'RE ON ISLAND TIME BABY

SEPTEMBER EVENT: WE'RE ON ISLAND TIME BABY

on the 16th, starting at 6AM and continuing until 10PM, Friday herself will be driving the ship’s tender back and forth between the ship and the excursion, making the trip about once every 30 minutes. those who board the tender will find that they are knocked out for the journey, but will wake up still on the tender, wearing whatever it was they’d been wearing before getting on, and with no side effects.

the destination is a tropical island, with white sandy beaches and turquoise water. the island is rather large, with dense tropical foliage inside the barrier of sand, but passengers will find it difficult to get more than a mile inland. not because of the trees or bushes, but because the villagers intervene around that point, and politely but firmly return them to the beach.

yeah, there’s a village. wood and frond huts built in a clearing just past the sands, populated by about twenty beings that appear to be some kind of bipedal salamander. if they have a verbal language, they aren’t telling it to you, and mainly communicate through gesture. there is a sort of vendor nearest to the beach, sitting on a blanket that holds a variety of exotic fruits, trinkets, and cool shells that they will exchange for literally whatever you bring from the ship. they are also trading bottles of a dark-red, citrusy rum; they also either have difficulty judging or don’t care about human drinking ages, and anyone who isn’t clearly a child will have no problem getting some.

the jungle is teeming with a wide variety of tropical flora and fauna. the plant life is whatever would normally be found in a tropical Earth location, while the wildlife is limited to what can be found on this island and in the jungles of Sumeru. why? because I feel like it. my fleeting whims decide every aspect of this game and i ain't stopping now..

the surrounding ocean extends out about five nautical miles before reaching what could most accurately be called The End of the Map: the water ends very suddenly, followed by the sky, and beyond it is an endless black void that makes your brain twitch the more you stare at it. if you try to enter it, you will die, and it will hurt the entire time you are dying.

there doesn’t seem to be any restriction on magic, except for one rather major one: anyone with the ability to fly will find that they are suddenly unable to. whether magical (i.e. Venti), biological (i.e. Phil’s wings), or mechanical (i.e. MB’s drones) in nature, anyone attempting to take flight will find it impossible to get any lift. just barely over the horizon, something gleams as it points to the sky.

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It was Diana's first time off of the ship. Every logical part of her brain was screaming at her that this was a huge mistake. There were so many things she couldn't plan for, up to and including missing the last tender back and being totally and completely fried by the sun.

For better or for worse, though, Diana was rarely led by the logical part of her brain.

And her heart was crying out to feel solid land under her feet. Even if she could only manage a few hours. She'd never been the water baby that her sister was, but standing at the edge of the surf, feeling the sand between her toes as a gentle breeze kissed her skin. She was wearing her bikini, with her bellbottoms.

Put aside the fact that she was trapped on a cursed boat, and this evening was a pleasant reminder of her more carefree, hippy days.

She turned as she heard Clarke approach, smiling slightly. It had...been awhile. Admittedly, their last conversation had been awkward at best. But that didn't mean Diana didn't care. "Hey," she said, tilting her head. An open invitation, if Clarke-with-an-E wanted to take it.

It doesn't click immediately why seeing Diana out and about here seems so out of place, then it hits like a truck at full force because — oh, right. Of course. Despite the harried flip-flop between dire and what some might call enjoyable these outings have been, Clarke would rather have been out in the thick of things that stuck on the ship this entire time. After seventeen years in a spacebound vessel roughly the same size, with none of the amenities but at least the comfort of home, she can more than imagine the amount of stir-crazy that comes from staring at the same walls day in and day out (night in and night out). A flip switched in her brain the second she'd set foot on Earth, and all nerve endings set alight at the prospect of being crowded in an underground bunker a while later but — needs must, and survival comes first.

Still, she thinks it's good to see Diana. Smiles at her with a hint of exhaustion upon approach, little hint of any remaining awkwardness from their last in-person conversation when taking up that invitation and occupying the space next to Diana. Time heals all wounds, save deeply held grudges, and even hunger can bridge those.

"I'm glad you made it out. Have you seen any of the animals yet?"

Yeah, at least it was awkward for both of them. There was that whole 'misery loves company' school of thought. Diana preferred to think of it as just people loving company.

And they both were. People. In some sort of way.

It was still a bit to process, maybe.

She shook her head, turning her face into the spray. "TBH, I've been kind of avoiding them. I mean, I would avoid them. If I saw any. After what's happened on a lot of these trips. I almost didn't want to come at all, you know?" But, of course Clarke-with-an-E knew. "Don't want to wander too far from the tender, anyway." As much as she hated the thought of boarding it, of passing out, of returning to the ship...it was better than burning and dying.

"That's fair. It's good to be cautious, especially around the animals with the Captain's whole 'three outta four of the animals I make turn evil' statement. But —" A brief moment of shuffling to get comfortable. Fully peeling off the overlarge strap of her camp issued rucksack, now weighed down with clothes and shoes and a few goodies from the salamander blanket vendor. Digging the large jug of rum into the sand at her side. "— I'm starting to think this isn't one of the places he made. All the wildlife here seems pretty unaccustomed to humans. I held a lizard, and almost pet a parrot."

It's meant to be encouraging, as if to say: we have a few hours here, you could poke around.

But mention of the tender draws Clarke's brow back in thought. She thinks she gets it, despite the only other vampire she's well acquainted with having no issue with the sun. And nods slowly.

"Are you worried it won't come back in time?"

"A little," Diana admitted. It felt like the sort of sadistic thing the Captain might do. Lure her off the ship and then fail to return her in time. Except for the fact that she was pretty sure the Captain took no interest in her personally. She was kind of small potatoes on the ship and, quite frankly, happy to remain so.

Phoenix had given her martyr complex and hero complex both solid beatings. The martyr complex wouldn't go away, but the hero complex was happy to take a little hiatus.

What a mess she'd left behind...

"So. A lizard and a parrot. You get one more with fur on it and I think you're officially ready to be a Disney princess." She paused. "Please tell me Disney princesses survived into the future."

Complexes be like that. Meanwhile here's Clarke, relatively fresh off learning her future includes killing the shell of her own mother post bodysnatching; simultaneously numb to everything around her, equally seeking out a beating and something to beat into.

Speaking of beats, there's one of silence here. Long enough to indicate that, no, Disney princess archetypes aren't a thing anymore. Clarke's also got a bad history being called 'Princess', but for once avoids latching onto that hurt and just gives Diana a small, sidelong sad smile to apologize for not knowing what she's talking about. But!

"I also saw baby turtles hatching and crawling towards the sea."

Full Disney princess moments, this time in Moana flavor.

"Remind me to teach you about Disney later," she said. Because this girl needed some joy and magic in her life, damn it. And Diana was a big fan of the Disney products, if not the man himself, who'd actually been pretty horrible.

Still didn't stop her from visiting Disneyland, whenever she was in LA.

Absently, she drew the arc of Tinkerbell flying over a Disney castle with her toe.

"Baby turtles are groovy, though. Surprisingly cute for creatures that are basically nothing but skin."

The amount of interest Clarke has in Disney is tantamount to the amount of interest she has in being stabbed. Again. But there's things we all must undergo for friends and acquaintances we hope to consider as friends, and if the day comes when she's forced to sit through retellings of Cinderella and Snow White, she'll weather it. Probably point directly at some Grimm Book Of Fairytales plot line copyright infringement, since some ancient astronaut nerd probably brought that on board the Ark, but not gripe too hard.

As for baby turtles —

"We had pictures of animals in our textbooks," Clarke offers, seemingly out of the blue callbacks to life in space. She's watching the white of waves cresting that still manages to be visible in the darkness of sundown.

"And when we were kids, Wells and I talked about them a lot. I really wanted to ride a horse, he really wants to pet a lion. But we knew, even then, that we'd never be able to. Because we were meant to be another 'transitional' generation, meant to maintain the Ark and have exactly one child who'd become a part of the next transitional generation, hoping that somewhere down the line our descendants would get to set foot on Earth. And hopefully see something as amazing and steeped in nature as turtles being born."

This is Clarke and her interpretation of groovy, apparently.

Diana had done both. She'd ridden quite a few horses, actually. And once pet a line. The wonder of the experience was no lost on her. Of course, it helped when you had a couple of Cainite friends who could, you know, talk to animals. And tell them not to bite the pretty lady who smelled like almonds.

She looked over at Clarke again, at the way the moonlight silvered her profile. Such a profoundly sad life.

And Diana knew she was playing with metaphorical fire when she had to ask. "Who was Wells? Childhood sweetheart?"

"Wells Jaha, Chancellor's son. And basically my best friend since we were born."

It's not quite the same blush as childhood sweetheart, but there is an undoubted sort of pure love in the way Clarke speaks his name and borders on full blown reminiscence. The way someone loves something familiar and stable, one of the only things they had to hold onto for a long while, and adores vestiges of an old life. Like a sibling, like a confidant, like a constant companion. Like someone she could have loved romantically and been absolutely comfortable with, if the world hadn't said otherwise.

"If I had to think about it, if the Ark hadn't failed and we'd never gone to Earth — we probably would have gotten married. Campaigned to fill our parents shoes. But in the end, I got to ride a horse, and he was murdered in the first week we were on the ground."

And as was always the case with Clarke-with-an-E, the story ended in murder and bloodshed. Diana was detecting a distinct pattern here. One that made her think she really just needed to stop asking anything related to Clarke's past.

Except that you couldn't do that.

The past defined who you were as a person. And who you wanted to be in the future. To deny Clarke's past would be to deny her. And Diana wasn't going to do that.

She just...needed to be a bit more careful, she supposed.

"Sorry," she said. In a way that was genuine, but without pity. No point in pity, at this rate. "For both, kind of. Riding a horse is never as smooth and romantic as people think it's gonna be."

Undermining what quickly could have become a fresh mourning period for the dead and a self deprecating pity party — that was funny.

She abruptly turns her head to regard Diana, and some of the sorrow plating Clarke's face buckles; brow furrowed and lips curled like she's not sure if she should outright laugh, but still exhales practically hard enough her nostrils.

"I didn't mind it, really. And at the end of the day, sore butt or not, it's way faster than walking."

One might never call Clarke overly charismatic. She's got a limited scope for humor, an even narrower margin for fun. But she's relatively decent at reading people, and based on past conversations alone can guess the death and destruction of childhood innocence was enough to harsh the mood. Self aware enough to register that's always a risk in talking about her histories, yet somehow not able to contain it — especially lately. Redirection is possible, though. And while this isn't the chat she'd imagined having upon sitting down, it's not a horrible measure to lean into.

"What about you? I know... childhood might have been a long time ago for you, but you never really forget your first sweetheart, do you?"

She let out a small laugh through her nose. A sore butt was the most honest thing anyone could ever say about riding. Sore butt. Sore thighs. Sore back. Sore everything. She would never understood those bodice ripping romance novels where the heroine and hero had a good tumble after a full day of riding.

That just...wasn't logical.

Diana shook her head, drawing the shape of triangle in the sand with her toe. "I wasn't exactly what you would have called a 'good person' when I was young," she admitted. "First time I kissed a boy, we got caught and I immediately accused him of throwing himself at me, just so I wouldn't get into trouble." Never mind the terrible trouble that would befall him.

She looked at Clarke, her lips quirking a little bit in the corners. "For me, it took dying to really understand love, to have any kind of capacity to care about anyone besides myself. Which, I realize, is a super weird thing to say, but it's just how things played out."

For a moment, she hesitated. She wasn't sure she wanted to introduce her own tragedy into this conversation. At the same time, Clarke had asked. And if they were going to be friends, if they were going to trust each other...there was no point in hiding the truth.

So slowly, she held out her left hand, showing off the engagement ring she wore, between the tacky, cheap rings from Claire's and Hot Topic. "A big part of learning how to love came from meeting him. His name was Joseph. Joseph Penn."

Clarke's come around — through trial and bloody error — to the realization that there's no such thing as good guys. 'Good people' seems like a tangential relation to that theory, something people laude themselves for or hold over their own heads when in reality, they're just being people. It's become as normal to condemn past actions as bad as it is to strive for better future, when what it should really be called is growing up. Clarke's still in the pits of growing, though, don't ask her to formulate this thought outside of blah blah doing bad things doesn't make bad people, usually with a war-related example on the tip of her tongue. End point is she doesn't bat an eye of judgement at the idea Diana was selfish once upon a time, and doesn't regard her any differently.

Her head tilts, visual representation of listening as the other woman continues. And when the ring is presented, she reaches over to lightly brush fingertips under her palm. The light's not great, Clarke has to get her face a little close to fully appreciate the jewelry and sentiment on Diana's finger.

"It's pretty," she reflects. But the ring can't be more important than the giver, she knows that much even if exchanging diamonds or pears inlaid in stainless steel and gold has fallen out of fashion in the future. "What was he like?"

"Wonderful," she said, with a special warmth that she reserved just for Joseph. It had been over two hundred years since the two of them breathed the same air. But she had him memorized. Not idealized, but memorized. "One of the smartest people I'd ever met. With a sharp tongue and this annoying little smile he had, whenever he knew that he'd caught me in a logical contradiction."

She wouldn't even try to mimic it. It was something all his own.

Clarke-with-an-E was smart. She could get the picture, anyway.

"He loved to tease. He called me his 'little huntress' because he knew I absolutely hated it. But he also knew when to stop joking and be serious, too. And he wasn't one of those annoying, macho guys who didn't want to be seen crying. He showed all of his emotions. Every single one. Including when he was scared which was...a lot of the time." Not that she could blame him. The Reign of Terror was, you know, terrifying.

Unfortunately, now that Clarke had put a nickel in, Diana couldn't stop. "So handsome, too. Brown hair and these brown eyes that were just endless. You could stare into them for days and never see the bottom. I only ever saw him at night, so he always had just a little bit of stubble. He was tall for the era, too. Although I guess by today's standards, 2009 standards, he'd be average. With the cutest, tightest little butt."

It's so easy to fall into the role of a rapt listener. Diana spins as pretty a tale as she strums chords on her guitar and coax them into ballads. It's an absent part of her personality now — killed off in favor of survival, buried and forgotten like a ghost until that ghost resurrects and punches her in the face — but once upon a time, Clarke had been a bit of a romantic. Felt butterflies in her stomach with no disdain for them, fell just in love enough with a boy for him to break her heart, then loved a woman just long enough for her death to break her. Romance killer, a joke originally. Now looking more like a reality, based on track record alone.

But they're not talking about Finn Collins, or Lexa kom Trikru. Joseph Penn is miles and miles away from the scope of her vision, and it's easy to enjoy something good someone else had; gives Clarke leave to focus entirely in on Diana, and ignore any of her own intrusive thoughts. Like getting lost in a fairy tale, like watching Disney princess movies for comfort. A smile even sneaks across her lips by the end, though is summarily morphed into thin lips barely containing a squeak-snort.

"Cute little —"

She does have the capacity to laugh. It's just rare, and thus seems uncharacteristic. But that's what's happening now, a soft giggle fit — attempted and failed to be constrained.

"That's — you really don't skimp on the details. So when did you guys get married?"

"The details are the best part," Diana remarked, even as her smiled started to falter a little bit. Unfortunately, those details that made romance novels and love songs so irresistible to Diana weren't quite so kind when it came to her own love story.

Actually, they kind of sucked.

She sighed a little, trying not to get mopey as she continued.

"He proposed to me in Paris. Didn't ask me to marry me because he knew I'd say no. He just told me that he wanted to marry me and slipped the ring on my hand." She looked down at it, remembering the way the candlelight made the pave diamonds sparkle like fairy dust. "I tried to talk him out of it, telling him he needed someone better than me. Someone human. But he was so stubborn and I was so in love with him, I agreed to marry him."

How stupid she'd been. They'd both been, really. That was love, though. It took away any sense of reason.

"Joseph wanted to elope, but I knew that would only cause trouble, so we ended up having an actual ceremony. I made it all the way down the aisle. And you should have seen the dress. I mean, it was a dress! But then..." She shook her head. "Things didn't go as planned."

What Clarke hadn't picked up in regards to always meeting at night and he had end of day stubble, it hits pretty solidly in the face at ...someone better than me; someone human. A cold reality slides into the fairytale haze, and it strikes her that: Joseph Penn had been a human in love with a vampire, and the world probably wasn't ready for that.

Of course there'd been a conflict. And Clarke visibly winces, and is suddenly reaching out to press her palm to Diana's arm, gently but firm. An attempt to snag and belay the conversation, as much as it is one to comfort what she imagines is still an open, weeping wound.

"You don't have to tell me — anything about it, if you don't want to." If you aren't ready.

Diana craved touch like a cat craved a pool of sunlight. The gesture was more than welcome, and Diana put her hand over Clarke's, applying some pressure in gratitude. "I'm fine," she said. "I've had two hundred years to...I don't know...deal with it. Which doesn't make it all okay. But..." She shrugged. "I know I need to talk about Joseph. Talking about him means he's not really gone, you know? He's still with me. A part of me."

Probably one of the best parts of her. And no, she didn't just mean the fabulous ring. Knowing him just made her so much better.

"My vampire granny had some pretty unconventional ways of thinking. Made her a lot enemies. She was at the wedding, so I guess it wasn't all that surprising that a couple of those enemies decided to crash the party, to prove a point to her, I guess." That was the part of it that still caused conflicting emotions. It hadn't been personal to her or Joseph. It had all been about someone else, someone no one really liked.

If they'd just stopped to talk to her...

Well. They hadn't.

She took a deep breath. "They basically lit the church on fire. It turned into a complete free-for-all."

Pressure to the back of her hand is all the green light Clarke needs to keep her palm anchored there, unflinching as the out she'd offered is circumvented and the story continues. It should not come as a surprise that it's heartbreaking — doesn't actually surprise at all, but still hits like a weighted semitruck through a guard rail. There's no way to envision a burning church in the middle of a wedding and not paint it in one's mind eye like a tragedy masterpiece.

"I'm so sorry, Diana." A heartfelt sentiment, but one underscored by the fact the speaker knows how little that does for a person. Sorry, for something that happened 200 years ago and can't be undone. Sorry from an outsider who had no part. Sorry, which is always the last thing Clarke wants to hear on the backs of her own tragic tales, but can't help offering forth now.

"Did —" No. She catches herself asking the question, when the answer is pretty obvious. Redirects into a grave statement and, with a tight inhale of breath tries again. "Not everyone got out."

"Not so much," Diana said, grimacing. "Although it could have been worse, I guess. Couple of people got..." She had to swallow. "A couple people got lit on fire. Which is horrible when it's anyone, but even worse for a Cainite." Thank God for the advent of electricity. And fire extinguishers. Not that she would ever joke about that kind of thing.

Well not out loud, anyway.

Her sisters, on the other hand...

Diana took a deep breath. "The guy who led the attack actually ended up captured. He spent a couple of years being psychologically tortured for what he did. Which I don't condone, but it did make him a better person." A friend, really. Even if she didn't love him the way he loved her. "But, they didn't catch him until after..." This part never got easier. "Until after he ripped opened Joseph's throat."

Afraid she would cry, Diana leaned her head back, taking a few deep breaths. "That's actually the last thing I remember. When I woke up again, it was three years later and I was on a different continent."

"Three whole years?"

She doesn't expect Diana to be looking at her any time soon, but if the other woman did cast a sidelong glance in Clarke's direction, she'd see a homogenous mixture of wretched sympathy and wonderment — the blonde girl's lost in a slew of questions she doesn't want to ask, doesn't want to make Diana answer, and at the top of the list is: did it make it easier, knowing so much time had passed?

But on second thought, that's a dumb question. Beyond dumb. It wouldn't have worked that way for Clarke, and probably hadn't for Diana. The grief must just have been out of season, and all the worse if people around her had moved on. For a few extended beats, there feels like nothing to be said. No way to help, not even enough context or emotional investment to openly weep with the brunette if that's what she'd wanted. Clarke does what lots of people do and fill in the blanks of a story with ghostly remembrances of their own, which teeters on the edge of backsliding her into memories of Lexa bleeding through compressing fingers, and Finn slack against a line of ropes and chain.

"I know they say better to have loved and lost, than never to have loved at all but... surrounded with stories like that, I'm not sure. How does anyone ever get through it?"

Diana did turn to look at Clarke. And that expression on her face was so sweet and so open and so earnest that Diana had to stop herself from laughing. Considering everything Clarke-with-an-E had told her about her life, it was easy to forget that she was, really, still just a kid. A kid with a decidedly raw deal.

A kid so much like the dhampir on the compound that it was a little heartbreaking.

She reached out, putting both hands on Clarke's shoulders. "Love is absolutely worth it. A thousand times over, a million times over. Because, as bad as heartbreak can be, it's so much better than the alternative. It's so much better than forgetting to have a heart in the first place."

Eye contact was a bit of a weird thing in the Cainite world. But Diana tried to lock eyes with Clarke, if only to drive her point home. "Empathy relies on understanding what pain is like and not wanting anyone else to feel that kind of pain. I get through loss by remembering that it keeps me human. Ish. And, I mean, also the hope of finding love again. Because when it's good, it's really, really good."

Forgetting to have a heart in the first place...

That brushes uncomfortably close to what she's done. What she's tried to do, what with keeping tight lipped secrets and openly telling Stede Bonnet he was an idiot for encouraging relationships on the boat. Only tried, because end of the day? Clarke's lackingly human and hadn't been able to resist the draw of accomplices, which eventually became acquaintances, and then subsequently slid into thick as thieves friends. The drive to keep her nose to the grindstone and not care what others thought about her methods, summarily undermined by shades of affection and protective instincts. It sucked. She didn't know what she'd do without it.

Diana puts hands on both her shoulders, makes and maintains piercing eye contact, and Clarke imagines she looks and feels a little like a blank ragdoll under that careful scrutiny. Part of her protests selfishly: not wanting anyone to feel that kind of pain — includes myself. But the thought dies long before it reaches the back of her tongue.

Instead what trickles past her teeth is:

"Even here?"

Spoken in the same meter of you still have hope? (To which Bellamy Blake had once responded, are we still breathing?)

"Dude," she said, a little laugh in her voice, "I fell in love during the French Reign of Terror. Love isn't exactly known for showing up at the most appropriate times. It shows up when we need it, I think. Even here."

Which wasn't to say she had any prospects. A little flirting here and there. But Diana flirted the way a fish swam. Often and usually without putting much thought into it.

Not the same as anything lasting. No one could blame Diana for being a little picky, though. The guys on the ship were...

...yeah...

"Don't get me wrong," she added, letting go of Clarke, in case she was getting a little too personal. "I still want off this barge and a way home. But I'm not gonna close myself off to any possibilities." She wrinkled her nose. "That's the kind of move my sister would pull. Artemis, the younger one. And she may be the loneliest person in the history of the multiverse. Makes her a little...loopy."

SEPTEMBER EVENT: WE'RE ON ISLAND TIME BABY

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