Twenty-Seven Bells: [ACTION/VOICE]

[simplestgift]

[January is proving to be a difficult month, but Archie is making it okay. It’s been just over a year since he arrived, just over a year since his death, and he’s been thinking about how much has changed since he lay half-naked and shivering in someone else’s bed.

He met and embarrassed himself in front of his first modern woman.

He met someone like him.

He tried to write poetry.

He tried a drink from another world.

He fought as Horatio’s first lieutenant.

He fought a duel and had drinks with the man afterwards.

He drove a tractor while purple and narcoleptic.

He found himself as a member of a family, and not only a shift-induced one.

He was reunited beyond hope with the dearest of friends.

He almost died.

He bought a cake and got drunk with an old comrade.

He designed and helped build a ship.

He became Robin Hood.

He became his old self.

He fell in love.

He fell from a hundred feet and survived.

His hair grew longer, he grew older.

He still has no way to let his family know he is alive.

He still can’t completely trust Jack Sparrow.

He’s more convinced than ever that he’s ruined for love.

He’s less convinced than ever that that’s something to be as ashamed of as he is.

He doesn’t want to go back to the Navy, and he’s not sure he wants to go back home at all.

He’s become something he didn’t think possible a year ago.

In spite of all that has happened and all that has been done, Archie Kennedy has become happy.

He hasn’t forgotten the pain of lying in his sickbed in prison or his deathbed in another prison.

He hasn’t forgotten shutting down before a midshipman and a captain who would take any word or gesture as an excuse to destroy him.

He hasn’t forgotten four walls touching him all at once or the overhead grating letting in not nearly enough light.

He hasn’t forgotten Christmas with his family, mince pies and contraband whiskey and stories of drunken shore leave.

He hasn’t forgotten flying for a few terrified, joyous, breathless seconds with the water coming up to meet him and Bush screaming in his ear.

…Not going to jump, and that’s my final word!

…Weak-kneed officers who don’t know how to keep order.

…iiiiitoooons neeeeever shallllll beeeeee slaaaaves!

…ister Kennedy? Just…look after him.

…Must get strong. Now drink.

…Last time, they locked me up in a hole in the earth for a month, with no room to stand up or lie down. Now leave me alone.

…Been a long time. Jack’s missed you, boy.

…It’s all right, Archie. It’s all right. A bad dream. Sleep now. Sleep.

Welcome to Purgatory!

He hasn’t forgotten and he won’t forget. But all of it, joy and pain, is only a part of a whole. The whole, at this moment, is happy.

His life then and his life now are the same life, two parts of the same story, despite what he believed when he first arrived here. What more valuable lesson could he have learned in only a year?

When he was a child, he’d loved his brothers because one has to love one’s brothers. As a man, he’d loved them because they were Finley and Neil. Luceti had been home at first because it had to be and there was no other choice. Now, more and more, it is simply home.]

[Today, Archie goes to the smithy to ask a favor of its weapon smiths (OOC: dibs go to Hiccup Haddock). In the evening, he brings home a bottle of Madeira and a ham to cook before work. Tonight, he'll be working the bar and tables at Cloud Nine.

Eventually, he speaks over the journals, tone light and warm but professional.]

This is Mr. Kennedy.

Any member of the crew of the Britannia is welcome to come with me to tour the ship in the morning. She's quite a handsome woman and I'd very much like you to meet her.

For those who've not yet heard, Britannia is a sixth-rate man of war with the capacity for twenty-two guns, but no actual guns. She carries enough sail to cover her namesake, so she's fast, and nimble as Jack jumping over a candlestick. Winter isn't the best time for sailing, but once things warm up, Captain Hornblower will be taking her out on her maiden voyage. As his first leff--first mate, I'm responsible for hiring the crew, so do speak with me and not with him if you wish to join.

[A pause. Then, he speaks very softly, with many sentiments wrapped up into two words:]

Thank you.

Comments

[herotypical]

He's rather likable. I went to high school with him. And a bit of college.

[simplestgift]

It's just those three nights, then?

[herotypical]

[ she glances sideways. ] You're freaked.

[ a deep breath. ] That's okay. I guess that's...naturalish. I knew him before he contracted the thing so...I guess it's different. For me. It's..

It's not his fault. It's a lot like Derek's style of vampire. It's an...infection. Maybe he'd be better to talk about it but my stance has always been that a werewolf is there to be protected from themselves and what they could unknowingly do when they're not in control of themselves. Oz'd never choose to hurt a fly but when the curse takes him and he's feral...?

Hence the manacles.

[simplestgift]

[Archie nods. Comparing it to Derek makes a lot of sense.]

It...Wellard only just arrived, and he has fired a pistol precisely two times in his life.

[In other word, the baby is here and not necessarily able to handle himself against a maniacal monster. This one, anyway.]

[herotypical]

My people are on it. Normally...well -- normally Will'd sit with him on his wolf nights. Made sure he stayed put. But there's a few of us from home, now. We'll knock together a system.

And now that Angel's...[ she trails off. the cage. angel's cage. the one they had commissioned just in case.

it's perfect. ]

[simplestgift]

Angel's...?

[herotypical]

[ her expression takes on a stony, semi-haunted look. ]

We had Winry knock something together for him in case he...again...just in case. It'll work for Oz's just-in-cases, too.

[simplestgift]

[A beat, then a sharp nod.]

I'll tell Wellard to keep a sharp eye. Which nights?

[He'd rather the boy stay inside then, but he would have to leave it up to the twitchy young mid.]

[herotypical]

Full moon. And the nights either side of it. Three in total.

[simplestgift]

[Another nod.]

Best let Horatio know as well.

[herotypical]

Be gentle with it, will you? It's...it's Oz's thing. His PSA to give. Obviously, I'm most interested in the safety of everyone and he's not the kinda guy to get unreasonable about warning folks...but I made a mistake with Angel. A big one. I made him feel like he was a ticking time-bomb once he arrived and we never managed to...get over that.

I don't wanna alienate Oz, too.

[simplestgift]

[A deep breath.] I won't say who it is, then. Just the nights to look out for a great hulking wolf.

[herotypical]

A-and maybe a little tidbit about not...not killing it. Him. Him the wolf. Because that'd be...well, that'd be bad for anyone. Not just Oz.

[ a deep frown. ] Imagine it, taking out a wild beast only to realize it's...huh. Actually? How about we don't imagine it.

[simplestgift]

No killing. Will anything deter it?

[herotypical]

Silver'll kill one -- but only if the wound itself is fatal-ish. But silver weaponry's just a good idea to keep around anyway.

[simplestgift]

Blunt silver weaponry? [He's not sure where he'd get such a thing.]

[herotypical]

I'll ask Oz if there's anything else. We...never really knew much about the whole wolf thing. He'd gone off to research it. Try to find a way to control it. Maybe he figured something out.

[simplestgift]

Keep me abreast of things. I can hardly judge a man for what he cannot help, but...

[Wellard is here.]

[herotypical]

But lycanthropy is highly contagious. I understand.

[simplestgift]

...Contagious?

[herotypical]

Infected, remember? Through the bite. Th-though, it might not work like that here. Derek's infection didn't.

[simplestgift]

It'd still be best to take precautions, of course.

[herotypical]

Still? I'm gonna go out a limb and actually suggest that a possible werewolf rampage is still a better prospect than if Angel'd ever lost his soul.

[simplestgift]

A safer exchange, then. [And one Jack will be comfortable with.]

[herotypical]

Much.

[ she tosses her axe from hand to hand. ] It saves me from having to give Elizabeth Swann the awkward 'don't invite my ex into the house by accident because if you do he's probably actually the evil-version of him trying to trick his way inside in order to munch on us like pixie sticks' conversation. I wasn't looking forward to that.