Being in the Depths for weeks on end was nothing like being at sea. For starters, there were no gusts of wind to carry their ship, no breezes to feel against one’s face. The air down here was stagnant and damp. There were no waves to rock them, no sunlight to warm the wooden deck or moonlight to guide them through the night. The closest equivalent was the ‘star’ of the Arathi, a giant crystal stalactite the locals called Beledar, which switched between light and shadow with little warning and made it hard to feel truly rested. More than once on this trip, Jack had been rudely awakened by the sound of sirens blaring and people shouting orders to take up arms against monsters from the dark. It was less than ideal.
His lack of sleep certainly didn’t help his foul mood, but there were other factors in play that were making it hard for him to function. Back above ground on Scarabs Landing, Jack found solace and stress relief in the boxing ring and in his journaling, but there was no one to spar with here, and little time for solitary musing.
While his back had grown stronger laboring under the Scarabs, he had neglected exercise and entertainment between all his work duties, and he could feel his sharp edge dulling. Sometimes, when he thought about how far he’d managed to fall- from a Lieutenant of the Royal Navy to barely more than a strong set of arms for a bunch of smugglers- it made his temper bubble up like acid in his throat; burning and hard to ignore.
As he finished up his work of repairing a rigging that had been torn on the journey down, he grumbled to himself about his misfortunes. His quiet seething made him jerk the rope with more force than was really necessary. Whoever came behind him to untie the knots he made would have a hell of a time with them. It wasn’t until he turned to stomp off that he noticed someone watching him on the upper deck. It was Captain Pavlov- leaning back in a wooden chair, her boots kicked up on the railing separating them. She had her signature cigarette balanced between two fingers and a pair of half-moon spectacles with darkened lenses hanging on the bridge of her nose. When their eyes met, her head tilted to the side and she took a drag of her smoke. How long had she been there?
Jack didn't stick around to find out. He sulked towards the galley doors to attend to his other tasks and get out from under her gaze. The last time he’d spoken with the Captain was just after his escape from the Dragon Isles, when she convinced him to make his deal with the Scarabs more official; Five years of steady work, of protection, of anonymity. All he had to do was sign on the dotted line, “So I know you’re actually serious,” she’d explained to him while he lay in his infirmary bed.
It wasn’t like he had many other options now. He was a dead man in the eyes of the Alliance, and to return would only mark him as a deserter. Deep down, he was glad for the chance to start over as someone else. Being Jacques Abernathy had become far too complicated. Running away from it all with Sorae was the first choice he’d made in a long time that felt like the right one. Still, the Captain’s lingering looks didn’t exactly make him feel welcome. There was still quite a history between himself and his new employer.
When she looked at him, Jack wondered if Kordya remembered the trouble he’d caused last time he was in her territory, or the faces of those he had inadvertently gotten arrested and hauled off by the Alliance in the raid on Scarabs’ Landing. He certainly never made it easy for them. She must despise him for it, and Jack couldn’t blame her, either. He himself was slow to forgive, and had their positions been reversed, he didn’t think he could stand to be in the same room as her. If Kordya did hate him, it came out in cold stares as an icy disgust– nothing at all like the violent envy of his previous captain. He considered that an improvement, at least.
As he stood under the covered entrance leading inside the galley, Jack went to pull the two halves of the pocket doors apart but was struggling to get them to open. He pulled and pulled, but neither seemed to budge. After a few more tries he managed to tug the left door open, but only by a few inches. Why the hell won’t it open?! He thought to himself. The doors were of Goblin design, made of metal, and inset on some kind of track. They were also stuck, and he was getting madder by the second.
With a loud CLANG, Jack finally forced the doors apart and accidentally lodged one of them inside the wall pocket. Regardless, the entrance was clear and he could go inside the galley now– which he did in a hurry, hoping that no one would be lingering around to laugh at his struggle. He got his wish. There was no one in the kitchen, so he found a seat at an empty table and rested his head in his hands for a moment. A door had gotten the best of him, and it was really just not his day today. A brief respite was all he could afford, but he would savor it. He needed to breathe, to cool down.
The last thing he wanted to hear was a low whistle coming from the open exit.
“Shitfire, son…” Captain Kordya drawled out as she inspected the now-even-more-jammed door. “What’s wrong with you?”
Jack’s defenses were up immediately. “Nothing,” he lied, “That was an accident.”
“I can understand wantin’ to take it out on the Mogu, but this ship never did anything to you, so lay off beatin’ on her too much, aye?”
“Apologies, Captain. The doors were stuck.”
“It’s automatic. Try pushing the button next time.”
Now Jack really did feel like a dumb brute. He ran a hand over his face and sighed into his palm, accepting the reality that there may actually be something wrong with him. It’s not that he didn’t already know, on some level, that the scars Everett left on him were more than skin deep. He had hoped that he might carry his new burdens a little less conspicuously, though.
“Don’t be so hard on yourself, eh? I know things ain’t been easy since… Well, you know. And besides, this place is enough to put anybody on edge.”
He watched her fill up a metal tankard with frothy ale from a mini keg atop the bar as she spoke. “Is that how you take the edge off?” he muttered in her direction.
“It helps,” she replied. “Most of the time. Other times, not so much. But you never know until you try, do you?”
Saying this, she filled a second tankard and walked it over to him, then sat down across from him at the little wooden table he occupied. They shared a drink with no words exchanged. Jack shied away from her prolonged eye-contact on multiple occasions, but that didn’t discourage Kordya from looking. She was definitely sizing him up– trying to read into his expression and agitated exhaustion. What did she want from him? Was he in trouble or not?
“Am I in trouble or not?” he inquired out loud, immediately regretting how infantile it sounded.
The question made her blink a few times, then smirk. “You ain’t in any more trouble here than you’re used to bein’ in. Just talk to maintenance about fixin’ that door, learn you a thing or two about Goblin technology. You’re lucky it didn’t blow up in your face.”
Jack didn’t know what to say. From their previous dealings, he only ever saw Captain Pavlov acting generously when she had something to gain in return. He was hesitant to open up to her, and rightly so.
“Well,” she began, “if it helps, we won’t be down here much longer. Storm convinced me to come trade with these Arathi weirdos. Now we’ve done traded with ‘em. The First Mate can be real convincing, but you already know that, aye? We’ll hit Dornogal on the way out, resupply, see if we can make a quick buck in the city, then it’s back to the Landing. Hopefully the Earthen have more valuables to trade than the Arathi did.”
Cutting off her rambling, Jack suddenly looked up from where he’d been staring into his drink. “Why are you trying to comfort me, Captain? I thought you hated me.”
Kordya cocked an eyebrow as she was interrupted by him. “Hated you? Oh, come on now. You’re not so bad, Jack. A pain in the ass, sure, and a bit of a hot head, maybe, but not hate-worthy.”
He didn’t seem convinced of her backhanded reassurance. They sat in tense silence for a few beats more, before Kordya finally sighed and shrugged him off.
“If you think I hate you because you used to be a sailor, well, I don’t. You were doin’ what you were supposed to do, followin’ orders… but it takes guts to put your foot down and say no, I won’t do this. Trust me, I’ve been there. I think I understand how you’re feelin’.”
“Like hell you do,” he snapped back. “You can’t possibly know what I’m going through, and I don’t need your sympathy, nor do I want it.”
The Captain didn’t entertain his attitude long. One harsh reply was enough for her to call it there. Finishing off her drink, she rolled her eyes at the ex-Lieutenant’s dramatics and stood to leave him to his sulking. “You’ll come around. Fix your face, fix the fuckin’ door, and we’ll be topside before you know it.”
Without much more of a farewell, Kordya turned and left out the same way she’d entered in– through the half-open door he’d broken. Embarrassed, Jack was left alone to think about her assessment of him, and her attempts to connect confused him even more. Was he such a broken thing that he couldn’t accept an olive branch when one was smacking him in the face?
That same acidic self-loathing returned at the back of his throat. He waited for a while to give Kordya a headstart before he rose to leave after her. There was only one person he felt he could relate to on this mission, and it wasn’t the Captain. He was overwhelmed with a desperate desire to talk to them, and so Jack descended into the bowels of the Scarabs’ airship to find Sorae Storm. Perhaps their company would improve his mood.
shhh i made these two they're in a band. i have not drawn the other two members of said band, which is called shagfarm. i imagine their music to be like stone temple pilots/stereophonics/the black keys. uh their names are saul fitzgerald (guitarist) and jack abernathy (singer) and wow these two have a weird/dysfunctional relationship haha ok bye
