[ID: six panels of a comic for episode 7 of the Skyjacks campaign, taking place in the Red Feather Syndicateās ship, the Civility. Dref Wormwood and Captain Orimar are descending the shipās stairs when the ship tilts sharply, causing both of them to momentarily loose their footing. They catch themselves before they fall, but Dref looks on in horror as a small cloth bound kit slips from his coat and arcs through the air in seemingly slow motion, where it lands with a little āpffā at the bottom of the staircase and at the feet of three men. The cloth kit is labeled āDrefās fancy-boy rudder sabotaging kitā and depicts a drawing of him on a pennyfarthing bicycle, the teasing handiwork of one of his shipmates on the Uhuru. The three menās faces are shown as they examine the kit on the floor, then raise their eyes to look directly at Dref. He looks back in fear, still bracing himself against the bannister and sweating anxiously. End ID]
An Archive of Our Own, a project of the Organization for Transformative Works
Skyjacks fic!!!Ā Word count: 1.5k
a name, a name, a chance
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A name is something given, and a name is something taken.
Or: a reflection on the characters and names of the crew of the Uhuru - or at least, the Captain's and his council's.
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A name. Did they have it before the stars fell?
Maybe.Ā
They arenāt sure. They have it now, two of them, one they arenāt sure when they earned, and the other chosen entirely by them.Ā
The first.Ā
Gable. Ga-Ble. God is bright, it whispers in quiet moments. God is bright. God is blinding.Ā
(God is dead dead dead dead dead burned and scorned and destroyed by their own blade, the blade that gable drove through their heart, the act that made the world collapse and the seas rise and they are dead - fallen - forever)
It weighs like a stone on their shoulders. God is bright. God is blinding. God is dead.
Does it mean they are now the blinding one? The bright one? They donāt feel like it, no matter how much holy fire leaps from their swords and casts glowing light over their face. They are justā¦ Gable.
Fallen. Wandering.
(Gable.)
Itās no wonder that they are more comfortable with the name they chose for themself - the name they picked on a whim, on a moment, all by their lonesome.
Skyjack.Ā
A sailor. A sailor who steals from ships, who hijacks them and takes them from their own. A sailor from the skies, free and limitless, whose horizon knows no bounds but the sun and clouds.
As a Skyjack, Gable is not fallen.Ā
As a Skyjack, Gable is not bright.
As a Skyjack - Gable is free, from every duty but to their crew and captain, and that is more fitting than anything they could ever dare to be.
Gable Skyjack.
Perhaps, in time, they could come to like their name.
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A name. Heās had many. Travis Mattagot, Jolly Jack, Kevin, Puck and Neville, Johnny and Connor - names that flow past his ears like water, each more unimportant than the past.Ā
He likes the names. He like at the constant change, the constant new assumptions, always being what he isnāt but also what he is.Ā
(A changeling, never the same body, never the same form, born over and over and over again. Suppose a name could be like that too.)Ā
Puns, lilting off the tongue.Ā
His Current is one of his favorites - Travis, according to some far away islands, meaning to cross. It stings in all the worst ways, reminding him of his failures, how he could cross but Margret couldnāt, and how now, he always fails to cross into the next life. A failure, is what he is, horrible and ancient and Travis.Ā
(He likes it. The way it gives itself to snarls of rage only spoken by close friends, personal and horrible and wonderful. Travis. To cross. To traverse. All he couldnāt and could do at once. Wonderfully confusing.)
And, of course, who could forget Mattagot, the name of a beast, a spirit, helpful and hindrance, one that brings fortune and agony and in the same. A warning. A threat. All cursed by his enemies as they shouted Mattagot and prepared to kill but never quite succeeded.Ā
Obvious, like a bent card in a deck, but only if you were looking for it.Ā
Perfection, in a name.
(Of course, though, it isnāt real. A pretend, a fake, a mirage, smothering and covering up the name William that only was spoken when there were gambles to be made. He likes who Travis is - the skyjack, with friends and crew and triumphs.
William isā¦ William is supposed to mean warrior. Protector. Strong willed.Ā
Travis isnāt William. He could never be. William could never be William.
Travis is just a fraud. A fake. Lasting one more day on a gamble and a debt and oh, if it doesnāt sting sometimes.)
He wants to be Travis. He wants to make Travis real.
He just hopes he can.Ā
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A name. Jonnit is a name without a meaning, and itās just the way Jonnit likes it. A black slate, a way to grow, room to grow, destiny forgotten in the face of something new. With nothing telling him who he is, or who he could be, just a chance to be Jonnit.
Whoever Jonnit would be.Ā
His parents liked to tell the story sometimes, of how they kept scratching out the names of their firstborn, looking for something fitting, something perfect for their child, their son their AnikBasrDrishSim-unnamed child.Ā
Then, like magic, they had asked -Ā
Askedā¦
Well, Jonnit didnāt know who they asked, probably unimportant, heās forgotten about, but they came up with Jonnit on the spot.
Like magic, they say, and suddenly Jonnit has a name without a fate,
A chance to be who he wants.
And thatās really the trouble isnāt it? He wants to be so many things - feels like he should be so many kings, so many fates, that itās hard to choose. Stowaway, cabin boy, apprentice, lookout, star watcher, seer, bird racer, Captainās council, Jonnit, Jonnit, Jonnit -Ā
Itās so much sometimes. So, so much, when compared to Gable, whoās gentle smile seems to shine when theyāre happy for once, and Travisā seems so confident spouting what heās not.
They know who they are.Ā
Jonnit wishes he knows who he was.Ā
(Except, he does, doesnāt he? He just isnāt him yet. Right now, heās Jonnit, the cabin boy. Heās Jonnit, the star watcher. But someday -Ā
Someday heāll be Jonnit, star in the sky, captain of a fleet of golden sails that shine like angel fire. Heāll be Jonnit the Starcatcher, Jonnit the Captain, Jonnit, the greatest Skyjack since Orimar Vale, stronger even, freer even, so strong as to help the Jonnit of the past rather than just the present.
Heās not him yet. Itās pressure, so much pressure to live up to him when heās just Jonnit now, small and young and just starting to know what heās doing but -
He just wishes he was.)
He will, soon.
He knows this, like how he knows the name Jonnit spreads throughout Burza Nyth and the Liquid Swords and Nordia and NāGoni, back home and through the sky.Ā
Heāll get there.
He just canāt wait.
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A name. Dref Wormwood is an odd name, but a comforting one. Itās soft and able to be spoken without a stutter, and gains looks of oh, odd name, rather than oh, I know that name.
It is a comfort, because it is not him, or who he was. It is not Alistair Youngblood, heir to a red-ridden name. It is not Alister Youngblood, born to cruelty.
It is not who he was.Ā
(Alistair, his family calls, and it is mocking, it is horrible, Alistair Youngblood ā Dref could go a hundred years without hearing it and be happy.
But yet, like all things out in the open air, it isnāt to be.)
It is not who he was, but it is who he will be. Dref Wormwood, doctor of the Uhuru. Dref Wormwood, necromancer of Orimar Vale.Ā
Dref Wormwood friend.
It makes him smile to hear it said, ever since Orimar sounded it out that first time. A blessing. A chance. A name.
His name.
Who he is.
Itās an odd name, but a comfort, because Dref means nothing at all, unlike the regal defender or repeller of Alistair, and Wormwood is a star and a plant and a remedy and a poison, while Youngblood is just a legacy. Itās his name. His choice. His comfort.
(When he dies, his crew does not say Alistair Youngblood. They say Dref Wormwood, friend and crewmate.
Even in the afterlife, the beyond, it makes Dref smile.)Ā
A comfort, yes.Ā
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A name. The name Orimar is a good name. A strong name. A name that means a thousand things across a thousand islands, but a good name nonetheless.Ā
(Itās a remnant of a culture forgotten, a culture lost, but Orimar clings tight and does not let it go, because he more than a man, more than a Skyjack.Ā
He is a corsair, and corsairs are as greedy as they are free. He keeps his name and he keeps his home, because he will take the skies and home alike if it means keeping what he holds dear. He will be King. He will be Orimar, boy of something long ago.
Of this, he is certain.)
But Orimar Vale is a feared name, a terrifying name, one that strikes horror into his enemiesā hearts and makes knees and arms and everything shake.Ā
Orimar Vale, captain of the Uhuru - freedom, sailing in the air. Orimar Vale, the man who will be king. Orimar Vale, lover of the Bandit Queen.
Orimar Vale, immortal in legacy and now in body.
Orimar Vale is a name that will not be stopped.Ā
(Even if there are moments where he shakes, where he reaches out, where he takes a pause on his steps to power to shelter orphans young and old, people lost and alone, gathering them on his piece of freedom and helping them Take Flight.
He will pause, because he wants o be King, because he wants Power, but also because he wants to protect what is his.Ā
And he cannot do that without being human to.)
It is name, a legend, that will echo across the skies, even when people say there are no kings, because Orimar Vale is more than a king.
He is a captain.Ā
And that, perhaps, place in front of Orimar Vale, is the best name of all.Ā
