Uncharted Waters discussion

This is the deck of the ship where most of the socializing and work happens.

Captain Garrette looked over the deck at his working crew and growled when he sees his daughter working harder than the others.

Genieve fixed some wrong rigging and glared slightly, surveying the crew.

Chester leaned against the rail of the ship trying to untangle a knot from a coil of rope. He paused for a second to bruch a strand of hair from his face and noticed Captain Garrette glaring at him. He chuckled nervously as he straightened up and held up the rope. "Captain?"

Captain Garrette glared at Chester. "Taggart, what is that mess in your hand? Pray it isn't a rigging rope for if it is your very life will end." He growled.

"Heh heh. No, Sir. Er, Captain. Just a spare rope left on the deck. I didn't want anyone to trip over it." He loosened one of the loops that made up a knot. "I picked it up and noticed it was essentially one giant knot."

Captain Garrette narrowed his eyes. "Genieve!" He snapped and looked at his daughter. "Aye, Captian?" She asked. "Help this sailor with the riggings and show him how to do a proper knot." He growled.

Genieve sighed before nodding. "Aye, captain." She said and walked over to Taggart, eyes narrowed.

"Uh, to be fair, I'm trying to remove the knot..." Chester replied. "Heh. Okay.... Nevermind." He held out the rope for the Captain's daugnter, making a bit of a show of it for Captain Garrette. "Ma'lady!"

Genieve shot him a glare and snatched the rope away and undid it with a simple pull and tossed it back in his face. "If you knew how to recognize sailor knots you would've done that five second ago." She growled.

Chester searched for a clever response, but nothing came to mind. Instead, he just met Genieve's eyes and tried not to look intimidated. "Sorry. I'll do better next time."

Genieve rolled her eyes and sighed before sitting down on a barrel. "Sit down, sailor. Now that my father's asked me to, I'll show you how to do the basic knots." She said and pulled a scrap of bloodstained rope from her pocket.

((It makes no sense that he would have spent four years at sea and never learned to tie a knot... I mean, this could be his first week on the Blood Blade, but what about his time in the Navy?))

"Is that..?" Nevermind. Chester didn't want to know. He held up his rope and sat on a nearby crate across from her. The lid bowed a bit beneath his weight. "Teach me."

(SOrry!!! I totally forgot about that. I can delete that. Or he can just say he already knows and she doesn't know he has past experience.))

Genieve started showing him Blood Blades knots. "So to prevent enemies from being able to tamper with out riggings we have special knots known only to Blood Blades." She explained.

((If it is his first week on her ship, he wouldn't the secret knot yet... We're good.))

"Useful." Chester mused, as he tried to replicate her steps. "

((I plan to spend some time adding some locations today. I want to have a Brethren Court kind of group where all the pirate captains under the pirate code convene to talk about pirate stuff. Thoughts?))

((I like that idea!))

Genieve sighed and continued teaching him new knots. "You should do each before you fall asleep to the point where it becomes muscle memory." She told him.

"Uh... Yes, Ma'am. Right? Is that how I adress you?" Chester shrugged. "Never had the Captain's daughter aboard when I was in the Navy."

Genieve gagged slightly and shook her head. "No. It's far too formal. Just call me First Mate Garrette or Redhand or Jill." She told him.

"Jill it is. Short and easy to remember. Very down to earth." He snapped his mouth closed like a clam. "I'll shut up."

Genieve glared at him and smirked a bit. "Probably a good idea, sailor." She said and began tying knots on her bloodstained scrap of rope, not even looking at what she was doing.

Chester fumbled with the first few knots but by the end of the day could tie it ninety percent of the time. He felt he could have perfected it had he not not had other chores and tasks around the ship. When he found himself excused at sunset, he went to show Genieve. "See. Simple, really, once you have the hang of it."

Genieve nodded and smirked slightly. "Nice. Now do it blindfold." She said and tied a kerchief around his eyes and put the scrap of rope in his hands.

Chester fumbled with the rope for a second, then slowly tied a somewhat decent not. He pulled up the blindfold to look at it, and untied it. "Not great, but not terrible." He shrugged, then repeated the process several times.

Genieve smirked and crossed her arms. "You really are starting to get good at this. Maybe tomorrow we can do something else than knots." She said.

"That would be nice." Chester returned the smirk. "Maybe you can show me the super secret Blood Blades deck swabbing technique?" He sighed inwardly at the stupid joke.

Genieve rolled her eyes but smirked slightly at the awful joke. "More like sword fighting." She told him. "If you wanna be a Blood Blade, you gotta know how to fight."

"That's a good point. I know a little bit from my time in the Navy, but honestly, I'd be better off tying nooses around their throats." He held up a slipknot. "I didn't even carry a sword."

Genieve smirked. "We start at dawn." She told him. "Goodnight, Taggart." She told him and turned to walk to her quarters.

"Uh. Goodnight, Miss Genieve." Chester said feeling awkward. "Sleep well." His stomach turned and he mentally slapped himself. Idiot!She's the Captain's Daughter. He hurried below deck, where he spent fifteen minutes tying knots in the dark then fell asleep.

Genieve chuckles slightly at the sailor's awkwardness and how formal he was. If it had been someone she barely knew she might've given him a solid punch but she knew Taggart was just an innocent. Perhaps too innocent. On this ship, that would go away quickly. She returned to her quarters and fell asleep.

((Time skip?))

((Yeah.))

Chester awoke laying on top of his own arm. It had gone stiff and it felt clunky. He tried to flex his fingers to get the blood flowing again. Once the feeling returned, he got up and slid on his boots, then headed to the galley for breakfast. The cook, a fat man with a scruffy beard and a bald head, stood in front of the oven, cooking eggs over an open flame. "Eh, Taggart? Fried or scrambled?"
Chester thought for a second. "Have you got tomatoes or green onions?"
"Not for a while, no. They don't exactly keep well and we haven't been anywhere that trades them." The cook scratched his chin.
"Fried then. Keep the yolk a bit runny, please. With a little bit of salt and pepper if it's not too much to ask."
"Heh. Please. I like you Taggart." The cook mused. "How many strips of bacon?"
"Two."

Genieve woke up the following morning to sunlight streaming in her window and the smell of gunpowder. She sighed before getting up and splashing water on her face to make sure she was fully awake. She began getting dressed and remembered she had to train Chester that day so she wore something she could move around in easily. She decided to dine with the crew instead of in her room like usual and made her way to the galley. She saw Chester getting his breakfast and walked over towards him to get her own.

Chester greeted Genieve and stood aside so she could order breakfast. "Morning, Miss Genieve."

Paul, the cook stifled a laugh. "Miss Genieve. Boy's mushier'n a boiled egg, tell you what." He broke two eggs into a pan. "So what'll it be, Genieve. The usual?" He rubbed the egg whites on his hands off on his apron.

Genieve chuckled and nodded. "Yeah. But hold off on the rum in my coffee today. I'm training Mr. Manners here how to use a sword today." She told him, elbowing Chester roughly when she mentioned him.

"Pfft. Good luck." Paul snorted. "Lad's got no meat on his bones and hand's softer'n... eh... soggy toast." He turned away from the pair, but Chester could swear there was the slightest hint of a smirk on the man's lips.
"Yeah, well..." He sputtered lamely. He stopped, unable to think of a clever retort.
"Heh." Paul guffawed loudly. "Ya'd best hope yer swingin' arm's better than yer mouth, Kid."

Genieve rolled her eyes "Oh it's gonna have ta be to survive on this ship." She said and ate her bacon and gulped down her coffee before slapping Chester on the back roughly. "Come on, Taggart." She said and went up to the deck.

Chester was only halfway through his eggs when Genieve gave him an order to come up top. "Aww... but" He decided not to argue and scarfed down the eggs, almost choking himself, before following her. "So what's first?" He asked, wiping yolk off his cheek.

Genieve stood on the deck and took off her coat. "How to hold a sword." She answered and picked up a saber. "Catch." She told him and tossed it to him, thought it still was sheathed.

Chester managed to catch the weapon, but fumbled with it. "Heh. That'll take some work. So, do I take it out now?"

Genieve chuckled. "Easy, land lover. I'd rather you not have a real blade out near me before you can properly control it. However, for holding, you can take the sheath off."

Chester took out the sword and swung it through the air a few times. "Can you believe the Navy didn't give me a sword? What if we'd been attacked? What do I do with the sheath?"

"Uhhh attach it to your belt?" Genieve told him, kinda shocked that he didn't know something that simple. This was gonna be a lot harder than she thought.

Chester blushed, his sword arm dropped to his side. "Yeah, well, obviously, but that would mean undoing my belt first. In front of a lady. That's not really proper, is it?" ((Chester's a moron.))

Genieve facepalmed before sighing and walking over to him. "There should be a clip or strap on the sheath and you can attach it like this." She explained and attached his sheath to his belt for him.

"Oh. Heh heh! I could have figured that out. But thank you regardless. Now teach me!" Chester said, a touch too eagerly. He assumed what he thought a fighting stance looked like. His feet were in an L shape and his back was straight. It was imperfect, but the basic idea was suprisingly right.

Genieve chuckles slightly and shook her head. "Hold your horses, Taggart. You still can barely hold a sword." She said and corrected his stance. "Plus this is how you stand when you fight. Though you were pretty close." She said.

"Yes. This feels much more right." Chester agreed. "Okay, so how do I start? Fifty slashes? One hundred?" He demonstrated a downward arc with the cutlass, being careful to keep the blade away from her face.

Genieve's eyes widened a bit and smirked slightly at his cut. "Not bad. Not good, but not bad. We might just make a sailor out of you. But I always believed in learning on the job." She said and smirked, throwing her coat to the side and pulling out her sword. The other sailors began looking over to watch them.

"Your plan to better me is to publicly humiliate me?" Chester asked looking around at the staring sailors. "Don't these people have jobs? You know, like making sure we don't hit a reef?" He took up a stance, crossing his blade against hers in an X formation.

Genieve chuckled and bit and smirked, cocking an eyebrow at him. "Scared, Taggart?" She asked smugly and took a step back and stood at a ready position.

"Scared, no. But I'd be lying if I said I wasn't nervous as heck about this." He said, wondering whether or not to make the first move. "Um..." He hesitantly stroked the edge of his blade against hers, watching her reaction, then paused. "So, are we going until first blood, or what?" He wasn't sure where he'd heard the term before.

Genieve smirked a bit. "We go till the other wins." She said and lunged at him, cutting down in a sharp, horizontal arc.