ᴛʜᴇ ʟᴏɴɢ 18ᴛʜ ᴍᴏᴅs (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
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brethrencourt2017-04-29 11:17 am
pyracy) wrote in brethrencourt2017-04-29 11:17 am
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TEST DRIVE 001b
Try on those ridiculous clothes, sample the catering, and run through your lines. It's time for the Long 18th Test Drive.
ARRIVAL: Characters come to in a dark, tropical forest in a huddle. There are the sounds of strange birds, animals, and insects all around, some of them perhaps worryingly close. With a closer inspection, arrivals realize they're on an incline: Going up will prove fruitless, no matter who they are. The ground there starts to grow rocky the further they climb, and they may find themselves slipping back down to their arrival point, even if they're expert mountain climbers. The ground sloping downward will eventually level out leading toward light, music, and noise. But for the moment, they're simply a group of lost people (or monsters/bipedal animals/robots/etc) with no idea where they are or how they got here. Now's probably a good time to ask, "Who the hell are you? Where am I?" Time to use the buddy system.
TORTUGA: There's a town off the coast of Hispaniola that never sleeps, and that town is Tortuga. It's swapped hands more times than anyone can count, but for now, the French have it. And they do like the extra money the pirates that frequent it bring in; they like it so much that they imported over 1600 prostitutes from Europe to keep them happy. So you might as well relax while you're here, as much as you can with random gunshots and fist fights, anyway. Drop in for a drink at the Faithful Bride, check out the wares for sale (provided to you tax-free thanks to piracy) near the dock front. Visit the warehouse where those ill-gotten goods are stored and distributed. Maybe you're looking for work on a ship? The captains can usually be found - frazzled and busy - in the taverns and at the shipwrights and everywhere in between (just look for the hats), and if they're in a good mood, they might be willing. But the key point of Tortuga is this: Have fun. Some examples might include: A barfight! Wandering into a brothel (maybe by mistake)! Getting duped into joining a crew! There's no end of trouble to get into.
MIRROR POST: When they arrived, every person found, in a pocket or a bag or tucked away somewhere on their person, a little compact mirror. It's nothing fancy: Square, with hinges and a latch that keep it closed, the outer casing carved from seashell, the inner mirror a little spotted with age. But if it's played around with enough, it quickly becomes apparent it works as a communication device. Here you have access to all of the marked folks, no matter how far and wide they might spread. Need to have a heart to heart with a buddy in Singapore? Want to send out a general ad to everyone at large? Looking for answers to questions? This is the quickest way to get all of that.
CHOOSE YOUR OWN ADVENTURE: The world is open, and it's full of pearls that are just waiting for you to take them. Maybe you want to have some quiet time to scrub clean in a bathhouse in Singapore. Perhaps you're visiting the fabled pirate city of Libertalia in Madagascar. Maybe you've found yourself lost in Mayan ruins or stranded on an island. Or you were shipwrecked in a hurricane. Or you've decided to relocate to Port Royal or one of the American colonies for a quieter sort of life. Either way, this is your story, might as well make it a good one.
Jack Sparrow | idk some movie about priates
[ There's a feeling you get when you've been gone from someplace familiar for a very long time, only to return and find that it's exactly how you left it. It's a feeling that brings back the most mundane of muscle memories, the kind of which make it easy to retrace your steps and puzzle out the very things you did before you left, the things you don't remember because it's so routine and regular that there’s no point in obtaining the memories.
This is the exact feeling Jack Sparrow gets when he arrives in Tortuga, looking past the railing of his ship and onto the crowds below.
When Jack makes his way down the gangplank, he arrives at the exact spot he'd stood last he was here. The same spot where he'd held out his compass to Elizabeth Swann and was all too easily able to turn her desperation to reunite with her dear William to his own need to find the Heart of Davy Jones.
He'd found it, of course.
He died not long after.
The spot on the dock shines brightly in his memory, but he walks past it without sparing a beat. Because truly, Jack has a lot of memories that shine bright in Tortuga, here in the closest place he has to a home. If he were to stand around all day and remember each one of them, he'd get nothing done at all. And he does have quite a lot to do today.
It's a lot less partying than you might imagine from Jack Sparrow. As Captain of the Black Pearl, it is his job (and, a thought reluctantly conceded, Barbossa's) to make repairs for her, and make sure she's in tip top shape for the next Adventure of Jack Sparrow. Unfortunately, she does need repairs, especially after their run in with the Flying Dutchman and the entire EITC fleet. As much as he would love to find a bottle of rum, as well as Scarlett and Giselle for some pleasant company, he needs to do the duties that come with being Captain Jack Sparrow.
You can find Jack anywhere in the city. He'll be walking (swaying, rather, as though in time with the motion of the absent ties. Or the swaying of a man whose veins run full of rum instead of blood. Or, perhaps, both?), completely undeterred by the shattering of bottles, the shouts, and the fistfights, all of which have become the signature of Tortuga. He looks like a man who knows this city, inside and out and who may be willing to help. For a price. ]
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He's tired, and if he's being honest with himself, he won't survive in this bustling place if he doesn't speed up the process. Shorten the learning curve.
So, sighing, Kubo adjusts the instrument slung on his back and approaches the most knowing person he's spotted since arriving. The alcohol-to-knowledge ratio does seem pretty equal around here.]
Um, excuse me. . . . Sir? [He sounds unsure about that word.] Would you happen to know a good spot for performances?
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Jack remembers being young, arriving at Tortuga for the first time with a need to prove himself and no idea how to do it. He hadn't been too much older than however-young this boy looks now. However, the fact of the matter is that Jack has no need for a cabin boy (for that's what he assumes the boy is here to ask, the only position readily available for kids this young). He has enough to deal with by Hector, who will certainly try to steal his ship before the trip is up. He has no need to try and take on new crewmen on top of that.
If only this boy had been here, last he was in Tortuga.
He's midway through waving a hand in dismissal when he hears the rest of the question. Where is a good places for performances?
Jack's hand makes an aborted motion as he blinks and truly looks at this boy for the first time. ]
A good spot for performances? [ He echoes in disbelief, eyebrows high. ] Lad, this be Tortuga.
[ He says it with a wave to the town about them, and like he truly expects it to be answer enough. And in a way, to him, it is. Tortuga is a place where sailors pay for food, for rum, for a place to stay, and for women. They would not give their hard earned money away to a street performer, not when there are muscians to listen to for free inside the taverns. ]
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Yes, but. Tortuga doesn't have what I can do. [He brightens with a child's hopping excitement.] Here, wait--watch this!
[Kubo pulls the shamisen from his back and grips his pick. He is definitely desperate to prove himself, and he wastes no time with his usual dramatics. A series of notes pluck toward the sky, and from his back, three sheets of blue paper rise with them. They fold themselves into blue jays, which chase each other above Kubo's head.
His music becomes more frantic, and the first jay eats the second, then the third, before spitting out their confetti remains over Jack's head. Oh, the gore, the horror!]
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If it were anyone else, Jack wouldn't bother answering at all, he just move on with the rest of his night. After all, everyone in Tortuga is desperate for another pretty penny, for another drop of rum, for another night with a whore. But this isn't an able-bodied sailor. It's a child, desperate and determined. Not to mention Jack himself is tired -- it has been a long day and a long fight against Davy Jones himself, and the day still not over.
He supposes, just this once, he can afford to be helpful. ]
Look, lad, [ he says as he takes off his hat and brushing off all the confetti from it. ] You been to one of the taverns yet?
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Uh, no, not yet.
[He sounds unsure, the unspoken question already present in his voice: why? Where is he going with this? And why would he want to head directly into the heart of all the rowdy, drunk men?]
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He was on the brink of using it against one that puked on his shoes when the Pearl caught his eye. Not only was she an impressive ship, there was a man wandering off it. Despite Jack's swaying, he still walked like he knew exactly where he was going. That's enough to earn the newcomer tailing him, all but conspicuous in the way he shoves his way through the surrounding fights elbows first.]
Bandana, straggly beard! You're just the man I'm looking for!
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The thing is, as Jack makes his way towards town, he wears his hat square on his head. His red bandana is still obviously poking through, especially from behind where the length of it is nearly as long as the dreadlocks in his hair.
Not to mention that "scraggly beard" is a actually a phrase that Jack has used to refer to Barbossa's beard, and well,
Add it all up and Jack simply doesn't believe that this man is talking to him. He keeps walking, as though he'd never heard him at all.
You'll have to try harder than that. ]
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The-- the tricorn! [Half of these people were wearing them, he'll try again.] Long coat! Staggering! [Again,] Looks like Depp-- Goddamn--
I want to know whoever owns that goddamn black ship! [Now he's getting somewhere. But really, he doesn't know the Pearl? A crime.]
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Unlike Jack, she has terrible memories of being here. And unfortunately for Jack, much of her confusion and loathing lands right on him when she spots him swaying his way around. Her eyes narrow as she observes him sauntering around like he owns everything, and it takes all of her self-restraint not to shout at him and draw attention to herself.
It's more than a little unfortunate for the both of them that Elizabeth Swann hasn't exactly been known for showing self-restraint in the past few years. ]
Jack Sparrow!
[She shouts out over the noise of Tortuga, her voice a commanding presence that demands to be heard and obeyed. Whether or not Jack does, everyone else in the general area stops what they're doing and turn to look at her. She ignores them, of course. They're not who she's after. Not sparing anyone a glance as she stalks past them, she marches her way up to him so she can look at him like he's the cause of all her life's problems. Which really, he is. If you think about it, she'd never be in this situation if he hadn't taken the time to save her and then proceed to hold her hostage years ago.]
Where is it that you think you're going, exactly?
[There's an unspoken King, remember? implied in her tone. Meaning: she expects him to give her an attempt at a half honest answer before she demands one out of him. It's not that she wants to talk to him like a child. It's that past experience tells her that she needs to, because he's likely too full of rum to function.
When she doesn't hit or shoot him the crowd loses interest, and within seconds the usual boisterous noise starts back up again.]
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Not to mention, if he and Hector had just arrived in Tortuga with the Pearl, the fastest ship in the Caribbean, faster than the Flying Dutchman, how is it that Elizabeth Swann and her dingy made it to Tortuga at relatively the same time?
Whatever the case may be, when Jack hears Elizabeth's voice call out to him, he stops dead in his tracks. Still standing with his back to her, he stays completely still, frozen for a long second. But when he spins around, he's grinning, arms gestured out to the side. ]
Dearest Lizzy. I didn't think you stay away long, but this... [ He gestures to all of Tortuga around them as he moves forward to meet her part way. ] ...be much sooner than I thought.
[ He doesn't answer her question "where he's going", because he really, truly doesn't feel like that's a question worth answering. ]
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She reconsiders that plan when she watches him gesture and approach, and doesn't actually answer her question at all. It makes her eyes roll and her jaw sets, and she counts to three in her head before speaking so she can remind herself that yelling doesn't always solve everything (even though recent experience tells her otherwise).]
Tell me, why does it feel like we've had this conversation before...
[She muses on it for a second before shrugging and stepping in close enough that they can speak in lowered voices.]
You never answered my question, Jack. What sort of trouble are you getting yourself into here?
[Because isn't he always up to something?]
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But here Elizabeth is now, decidedly not locked away somewhere. If Jack had any carefully laid plans for the evening, he might be concerned. ]
Aye, true enough.
[ Fool me once, stranded on a deserted island, curled up and pretty only to burn his rum, shame on you. Fool me twice, leaving him to die but parting with a kiss, shame on you.
Jack will not be fooled a third time. ]
Though I be quite sure your new husband wouldn't take so kind to find you flirting with other men.
[ As for her inquery-- ]
What trouble am I getting into? Luv, the same question could be asked of you.
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When he turns and looks her way she stops walking and drops her arms down to her side and tries to look like she just happens to be there and isn't following him around. The grin that spreads out across her face is entirely incriminating, though. ]
You look like a man that knows his way around a dock or two.
[They're walking along the docks now, and as fascinating as ships are, Clara doesn't really know her way around those so she's keen to move on elsewhere. Preferably in his company.]