infomodder | IC contact [Mask or Menace]

[Ace is the biggest badass in the entire City. No one else compares.]

Don't have to have a large social group. Nothing wrong with that. I don't have one, either. [Or...any, at this point. Throw him in the broken pony home with Chilton, toss away the key. No one's going on boat rides with him there.] As long as you're happy, that's all that matters. I can handle one or two or three. Just need to know when and I can get on it.

[And find something to take that isn't the Good Ol' Boy boat trip snack and beverage combination. No beer. Welp.]

[ Bias detected, sounding the Bias Alert...!!! No large social group? Annie keeps that in mind. She wonders if it has anything to do with his profession from back home... or a lack of willingness to want to deal with the living around these parts anymore. Or something else.

There's always room for something else. Though he'll have to quit insisting on her being happy as anything other than a metaphor. Annie and Happy converges once in a blue moon, and is usually left beached on Repression Island in the offseason of happy: the rest of the year. ]

When is it going to be most convenient for you to borrow the boat?

[ She more or less knows her and Reiner's schedules - the rest are up in the air. For... the sober boat trip. Kind of Will to reel himself in away from creature comforts of the more standard, time honored, traditional sort. ]

[Totally biased. Doesn't like people, doesn't care to put more in his social group. Oh, right, and then killed and ate people (presumably) so they're all a little side-eying him at the moment. That kind of dropped the social circle.

Content. If not happy...fine with it? At ease. Not left wanting.]

Weekends are probably the best. I can close the shop up for a day during the week if that's better for you. It's my shop. I own it. I can do whatever I want with it, that's what I'm saying. If it means closing it down for a day, I can do that. It's not a huge deal. Red snapper season's been going on long enough that I've gotten a huge chunk of business already, one day lost wouldn't hurt me at all.

[He has...no idea if anyone else knows fishing seasons like he does (does anyone even care?), but he's tossing it in there because no, he's doing really, really well as it as. He can afford to take a whole week off if he wants. Sober fishing trip might also involve his dog, if she's not opposed. He'll just toss him overboard if he tries to pee in the boat. Look, it'll be a good time. Dog and fish and sunscreen and free soda or Gatorade or something.]

[ Cannibalism does tend to put a damper on things. Even if you only spit, and never swallow... for some reason, no one looks at you quite the same way after you've bitten a man in half. There's no doubt behind any of it, either.

Conflicting agendas are difficult things to juggle. So is contentment. Can someone who's never really allowed herself to be much of anything for her own sake recognize contentment? Ease? To not be wanting, that's simpler to understand... on a physical level. ]

The weekend is probably better for us, too. It's easier to free time up on Saturdays and Sundays.

What's red snapper season?

[ She has no idea about specific fishing seasons. She's aware of them, in the vague sense of knowing different fish are found in market at different points in the year, but it hasn't been part of her connected reality.

Neither have dogs, making them more of a novelty she's encountered here. It's as likely that she'll end up paying attention to the dog as the fish. One's easier to touch than the other. Learning how the dog can swim might even add insight into her own, well, still in progress set of swimming skills. So to speak.

... what the hell is sunscreen? Adventures. To infinity and boomeranging back around again. ]

Fine by me. Just give me a head's up. You know the seasons of the year? It's a little like that, just with fish. They have regulations so people don't catch too many and deplete the species to an endangered point. It comes and goes, different times of the year, and you can only bring back so many. That depends on what type of boat you're in, too. If you're doing it for recreation as opposed to some on-hire vessels, you might be able to keep more. Certain kinds you can catch in certain areas all year long that you can't do in others. So what you might be able to catch and keep in the Atlantic all year long could be different in regards to the Gulf, as it is with this particular fish and plenty others. They have to be a certain size, too, or you better throw them back. People go a little hog wild when seasons open because there's a short window to bring those kinds home. Legally, at least. You can get pulled over in your boat at any time and have it checked. If you're obviously illegally catching fish out of season, that's going to be trouble. It's basically a bunch of mumbo jumbo that no one really cares about other than fishers and people who enforce those laws, in my experience.

[There are rules about fish and no one gives a shit but Will explained it anyway. At least he followed it by telling her he's well aware few people give a shit. Maybe her eyes didn't gloss over so hard they fell out of her head.

Sunscreen and fish and swimming lessons and playing with a dog, the list of activities keeps growing.]

[ What she reads is there are so many more laws dictating everything here, and that worlds larger than humanity's walls still track down the minutia of resources for the sake of knowing where they go. There are many more people required to enforce all these laws.

There are ways to be tripped up even studying the broad movements of this culture. Annie doesn't care about the specifics of fishing. She cares about the implications. She cares about these words, Atlantic (the ocean they're on, she knows this now), the Gulf (related to a part of the seas). The way there's hundreds of permutations on the hows and whys and that's for fishing, something that's not just survival and hope for staving off starvation here.

If you're doing it for recreation... What a luxury indeed. ]

Have you been fishing most your life? You seem to know so much about it.

[ Is it a hobby. Is it something so ... modern. ]

[Oh, there are so many laws. One day, if she expressed interest, he'd tell her of the ones that had fallen out of fashion. He'd tell her about the ones that were so stupid people refused to believe they'd ever existed. Ones about donkeys in bathtubs or how no one could wrestle a wild alligator (did that mean they could wrestle a friend's pet alligator, and when was it okay to own them in the first place?). He wasn't a lawyer and never wanted to be. His line of work made him know plenty about the law, even if he didn't talk about it much. No reason to when everyone else he worked with knew just about as much as he did, if not more.]

My father worked on boats all my life. Still does. Where I grew up, you learned to swim around the same time you learned to walk. Fishing was a natural evolution. Rules are different in different states, different waters, different kinds of fish, and it's a lot to know, but I've got to know it for here. I didn't know all of it back home, but it's Florida. I own a boat shop. Bit of a requirement. You fish or hunt or anything back where you're from?

[ ... She'd listen. It's almost sad that she'd listen. She might be amused, before the list got too long and she started wondering when it'd be over. Sit back and think of...

...

... Geography. ]

I don't, personally, but I know how to fish, and technically how to hunt. I wouldn't think I'm any good at it.

[ She might be. She can hunt people; it stands to reason. This conversation isn't doing wonders for where her thoughts go. ]

Learning to swim wasn't a priority. We're mostly landbound, outside of the main rivers through human territory, and the lakes scattered around. If you're living on well water, the most you see is down a stone shaft or falling from the skies during autumn and winter.

[He's bad with people, but he's not that bad.

Have a little faith.]

That sounds like nothing I know. Human territory is generally where we want to plant a house and a road and a Starbucks. Too hot or too cold, we leave it alone. Everywhere else, it seems to be the thought that it's really our oyster.

[Wait.]

Oyster meaning it's an opportunity we can take if we want, and nothing can stop us. You stay in Heropa, you have an ocean on one side and the Gulf on the other. Probably wise to learn to swim.

Edited 2014-06-05 04:56 (UTC)

[ Faith is in short supply. Come back later; she might scrape something up off the bottom of the barrel by then. ]

I've moved, actually. Too hot. But I've been learning to swim with a [ she pauses in typing. how to label Reiner? what's the most acceptable way? ] former comrade from home.

It's been an experience. There are community centers that offer lessons, but with the commute back and forth from Heropa, things haven't lined up well for official training.

[Hopefully it's better than that tilapia bullshit.]

Official training in swimming? [Do people still do that? Where he's from, they may as well just toss toddlers in the water. Go, be free. Like Spartan boys, really, though people will not let them die. That's not on the menu. So maybe not exactly like Spartan boys.] You don't need training unless you want to be a lifeguard. You can learn to swim without lessons. I mean, it's great to have them! But unless you want to learn fifteen different strokes and how to save people from drowning, that's a little overboard.

[Nautical terms everywhere.]

Where'd you move to?

[ Can't be worse. It's only one barrel. ]

Anything more than the doggy-paddle might be appreciated. It works... it's loud.

Ah, I moved to Nonah. The residences are outside of the city, backing to a forest. It's quiet.

[ Comparatively. It gives her someplace to pull out her gear, short test runs while she waits on hearing back on getting the right kind of compression canisters installed. Or gets the whole guardian thing finalized... and gets to work with the company in Nonah she's been conversing with.

That Nonah's a little amusing with how she was involved in the not so heroic side of the monorail crash... well, she doesn't talk about that. Or the fireworks. ]

[How big is the barrel? A barrel could hold sixty fish and still be brimming with tilapia bullshit. Need to get a bigger barrel.]

Doggy-paddling's great when you need it, but it'll wear you fast. Learning a basic stroke is pretty much all you need. Well, if you're going swimming in an ocean there's more information you'll need, but for lakes and pools you'd be fine with just a regular stroke.

[No one gives a shit, Will. No one.]

The place with the ceremony a while back? The one where you saw the killer whale? Did you visit the other cities and pick Nonah or did you just pick that one because people you knew were there, too?

[Jesus, Will really wants to move to De Chima. Apparently no one's been, or hasn't mentioned it. He can't just get up and move without knowing anything—

—actually, wow, he can. He's an adult. He could do that, no problem.

He also has no idea about the monorail crash or fireworks or a lack of heroics. Shockingly, he does not give a single shit about it. Some law enforcement worker, this guy.]

[ What about those barrels filled with monkeys? The cheap, plastic kind, where the tails and arms all hook together. Top quality faith out of something like that, make no mistake. ]

What makes up the difference between the two?

I don't know anyone in Nonah. I don't really like the city, either.

[ Annie. Annie, why the hell did you move there? ]

But out of the cities with military outposts nearby, it was the only one close to the woods. I looked.

[ The tiniest, smallest sliver of familiarity. These woods are too small, the trees too stunted, humanity's presence smeared all over everything in a very strange, semi-cultivated manner. At least close to where people lived. Further out, it's a little different.

Will, you are exactly what everyone could hope for in a law enforcement officer. Sort of. Depending on who "everyone" might be. Then again, Annie's not much better. There's too much in the world if one wants to blanketly care about things not directly related to them. Screw that. ]

[But when the monkeys run out, so does the faith, and Buzz Lightyear stays trapped with the toy-destroying neighbor next door. That barrel is too small.]

Doggy-paddling can take a lot of energy out of you. Does still serve a purpose. I know the military teaches it in case they ever need to be silent because your arms or legs don't go in and out of the water. But you can't get as far doggy-paddling as you can with other strokes. It's fun, but you won't be able to get back to shore easily with it. That makes sense. You live with housemates though, right? You're not in Nonah on your own? Former comrade's there?

[Woods are great.

When they don't have...certain...creatures in them.

He's the guy that make the criminals happy or something, Edgeworth said it himself.]

[ Ah, but that's the perfect size for her. Trapped with the toy-destroying neighbor next door and everything, without a Woody on reserve. ]

I'm not sure if I'd call it fun, but it's still hard to accept all this water as something that isn't just for drinking and chartered boat travel by the merchants and government. You wouldn't find the same freedom of use back home. Contamination is too likely, and too costly.

I live with someone I knew from home. We both trained in the same unit, up until graduation.

[ Like Titans? Or things with antlers?

Edgeworth. The man who's more notable to Annie for offering to send her handkerchiefs than his lawyering career - but that's another position of authority and corruption, the trial system within the military. Court Martialing. It was going to kill Eren, and it will be her end, eventually. Presuming humanity survives, and human memory serves longer than human forgiveness can extend. ]

[Hey now, everyone needs a friend. Or a dog. A dog is just fine, too. Friends or dogs, whatever, someone to save them from Sid.]

Does sound like it'd be difficult to get used to. That's how it is, though. It's a whole world of water. Most of the Earth I know is water. Seems that's the same way here. There have been oil spills, but they work to keep those from happening and get them back under control when they do happen. That's nice, isn't it? To be with someone you know even in this new place.

[Things with antlers. Feathered stags and weird antlered dudes, all of it. If it has antlers, it can fuck off.

That last bit makes him cringe, because who he's stuck with? The idea of having to live with...no. No thank you.

Edgeworth never offered to send Will handkerchiefs...then again, Will never offered him a glass bottom boat ride.]

[ Even when you deserve Sid? ]

I wonder how much of the world I know is water. At least someone from home thinks it may be Earth, too... the histories don't match, but who knows. I don't.

It's familiar.

[ She doesn't want to say anything more about Reiner. What can she say? it is familiar. He's familiar. He's also an element of the unknown, and while they're allied, they aren't perfect allies. There's no such thing, and no such absolute confidence.

But he is familiar, and the struggles they both have are ones they can relate back to each other. That matters.

Annie does not understand all these strangers offering her things without strings that tie her down to unpleasant things. What an inversion of expectation. One day, the other shoe is going to drop. She knows it. (Suspects it; expects it.) ]

[No one deserves Sid. Not even Hannibal deserves Sid (not that Will currently thinks much bad about Hannibal, but when he does). No one deserves that shit.]

My Earth is something like 70% water. Mostly oceans. Neat, because that's near the same amount as you'll find in the human body. Everything comes back to water. People I know from my world here are familiar, too.

[That is like the most Captain Obvious statement ever on a surface level. But...really, it's about all he can say on them that doesn't veer into a completely negative "THOSE MOTHERFUCKERS DON'T TALK TO THEM ANNIE DON'T DO IT" territory.

The other shoe of Will's that would drop would be on the floor for a dog to ravage. Be afraid.]

[ Then pray she never wakes. And pray both Levi and Hange never see a reason to try and get information out of Annie, if it's ever believed that what is learned here can be carried back home. ]

70% of the body? I hadn't realized it was that much.

Yet you're not living with them, are you?

[ Chilton's easy to want to avoid. Gideon is... A different sort of wary puzzle.

That other shoe, on the other hand, is going to be one hell of a slimy, well-loved find. Frightening indeed. ]

[Contacts her one day, drops the beat: I know none of us can possibly be okay, being where we are. But, Annie, are you okay?]

Nearly. Around 70%, depending. Age plays a factor in it, just like nourishment and hydration. It can fluctuate, it's not completely consistent, but the human body has a lot of water in it. No. I'm still where I was put when I got here. There's no one here I know that I'd want to live with. The strangers I've been placed with aren't so bad. No one really seems to mind Gunther, either, so that's a bonus.

[Just imagining Chilton or Gideon dealing with his dog. Just imagining Chilton upset because all his suits are fur-covered monstrosities. Just imagining Chilton and Gideon living in the same area is a Goddamn nightmare almost on par with antlered Titans running around the woods outside his house. No.

Probably got second-hand shoelaces, too. Possibly in a tacky color. Horror.]

[ No. A thousand times no. But thanks for asking. ]

Who's Gunther?

[ There's both amusement and horror in those imaginings. The two can too often end up intertwined to some extent.

Though not as horrifying as the thought of that innocuous, well-worn shoe. ]

[Annie is not okay.

It's a few minutes before the camera clicks on, and Will's not exactly the focus of it. A mustached dog lays sprawled out on the floor, ear flopped over and tongue hanging out for maximum "he's really asleep" effect. There's a moment where it's just the snoozing dog before Will's hand appears and he snaps his fingers right into that ear. Gunther responds instantly, though groggy, a mess of paws scratching on the floor and that mustache quivering as he looks all over the place to figure out why the hell he's suddenly been woken up.

When he sees nothing but Will (if she listens, there's laughter to be heard, but it's very quiet), he makes a face that all but comes with subtitles of "how dare you" or "I can't believe you" or "I'm sick of this shit" before he verbalizes that with a grunt. To drive his point home, he sneezes, which has Will's laughter cut off with a groan. Still amused, but ugh. Snotty pants.]

This is Gunther.

[Who is now ignoring Will and going back to sleep.]

[ She's surprised when she hears her device, looking over and seeing an image broadcast. Will hasn't been one for anything other than text with her, and her expectations tended to stay along those lines. That's surprising enough, but past that, the image of the animal on screen has her lifting her eyebrows up in surprise.

She's never seen anything like Gunther. Dogs, yes, in the sense that such animals were used in hunting, but she lacks experience with them, and they didn't look like the kind of dog she sees now, snapping awake, then making faces at having been roused for nothing more than the entertainment of their caretaker and someone who hadn't known Gunther was anything other than a name until a minute ago.

It's in this process that Annie activates her own video feed, half a face, a blue eye, blonde hair and an expanse of uncluttered wall with a doorframe partly in frame at her back. She's sitting sideways, looking at the camera now, before looking toward the door.

Her voice is muffled by direction. She's trying to decide if Reiner is around. ]

That's a dog, right?

[ She doesn't sound entirely sure. She's seem more of them in the city, all sorts, but Gunther's still different, and she's not sure the small ones aren't domesticated foxes or overgrown rats. People make everything pets around here. It could be true. ]

[Doesn't know seals, but that's not as difficult to believe. They're not as common as dogs by any stretch of the imagination (trying to imagine it is silly, but Will had thought of it after that particular conversation. He flips it so it shows him instead, unshaven guy with shaggy, curly hair that definitely needs a cut, wearing his usual plaid shirt. Will Graham in his natural habitat, truth be told. The smile is less of an attempt and more...sincere. Natural. Almost normal.]

Yeah, he's a dog. German wirehaired pointer, to be exact. Hunting dog, requires plenty of exercise...stays in the shop with me during the day. He's still a puppy, even with as big as he is. Training him is a process but. Making progress pretty well.

[Even if he can't see her fully, it's good to see her at all. Text is one thing, but if whoever it is never shows themselves it feels like a treat when they finally do.

For the most part.]

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