[ OPEN ] Hot Springs Episode!

[shri]

CHARACTERS: EVERYONE
WHERE: The Second Flight
WHEN: DAY :022
SUMMARY: The Sauna!
WARNINGS: Nekkid times.

[ A few hours after the murder, she hasn't blown the ship up, and here they are. Another knock knock on everyone's brain: ]

( For those of you that are interested - I have secured us a place at the Sauna. Free for us to be use without interruption from outsiders.

You are to be clean before you come in. )

[ Maybe you're here because she bullied you, maybe you want to soak - maybe you're the poor bastard that is standing guard at the door. Either way, welcome to the Suana, have fun. Or don't. ]

Comments

[skaikru]

( smug satisfaction in the face of others' discomfort was a recipe for a whole wealth of retaliations: being punched in the face, pushed in the water and subsequently drowned, abandoned halfway through a conversation... it's luck or something that clarke's only really considering the third; currently displaying the war of willpower playing out between furrowed eyebrows. is it unreasonably high strung to forego a nice sauna soak and just slump back to the berthings or viewing deck? probably. does that mean she's going to stop kicking her feet and jump in immediately? no. )

But it's public. ( clarke reasons, like that fact cuts down on the already heightened intimacy of being privy to one another's thoughts and emotions. )

[justttkidding]

[ For a moment, he considers laughing. Instead, he just raises an eyebrow. Even though he's still thoroughly amused at how much Clarke is silently kicking and screaming about this whole thing.

It's been a while since he's been around anyone so prudish. ]

We're all connected, mentally, and you're worried about a little skin. [ His words are measured, with only the slightest uptick at the end, indicating a lightness to them. ] There's plenty of dimmer corners here, you understand.

[skaikru]

( in good-natured jest or otherwise, the light teasing and quirk of the brow have clarke opening her mouth to object, to make a counterpoint. there's heady intimacy and then there's heady intimacy; there's being laid bare for the whole nest to observe and consume, and then there's being stripped naked and vulnerable. and ultimately, she couldn't rightly decide which is worse, but has had almost a full month to grow accustomed to one aspect.

her mouth clicks shut after a moments breath in which the proper explanation of her internal plight won't come, teeth knocking. try again. )

It's different, ( comes the eventual, gritted response; lacking in any real explanation of her misgivings. is it prudishness, or is she just a difficult teenager raised in a very reserved, utilitarian society that didn't even have bathtubs. dragging her gaze away from november, clarke fixes her eyes on one of the aforementioned dim corners of the pool as if it could bite. but she's stiffly bringing hands to her throat and unlacing her vest. ) Do you like all of your private thoughts not really being private anymore?

[justttkidding]

[ Politely, he turns his head away as Clarke fiddles with her vest. He doesn't care about the nudity, but he's English and it's difficult to kick certain habits.

Not to mention that he likes Clarke. If she's embarrassed, well, he's not going to make it any worse than he has already. ]

Hmm, to quote– frankly my dear, I don't give a damn.

[ It's hard to, being a contractor. And with the logic of it all outweighing the obvious pain points, he can't find it in himself to raise a fuss. ]

It's not as though we can kill each other with the information we find, which would be my main concern normally.

[skaikru]

( there's a brief flicker of confused ignorance — sorry, what is casablanca, who is clark gable? read your audience, james blonde, and figure that black and white movies did not survive the apocalypse — but it is short-lived; overridden by the stubborn indifference she's gradually adopted in order to keep undressing despite the creep of discomfort, like clammy hands up her spine. overshadowed by the belligerently maintained opinion that there were bound to be things worse than death in this, their new reality. )

You sound like you're adjusting well.

( her stole is lifted from around her neck and carefully folded with the anal retentive perfection of those fiddling with their hands in order to forestall the inevitable. then in a rush of falsified bravery, there goes the long tunic. )

[justttkidding]

[ No appreciation for the classics anymore. Kids these days. Or just kids in apocalyptic times who wouldn't have those things. Not that he knows that. ]

I've had to adjust to many things over the years. This is just a bit of a step up is all.

[ Every time he got sent to a new country, adjusting to the culture, the language, the people. The timezone differences alone. He never really minded. ]

And you, Miss Clarke? Still adjusting?

[ He spares a glance, spots that she's finally shed all her stitches of clothing. Maybe it's something impulsive, a bubble of Annie that she left in his mind last time they talked. But he steps closer, easily crossing the space between them. And just as easily, scoops her right off her feet with only these words– ]

Sometimes you need to just jump in, you know. [ Then she's being tossed into the water, unless she manages to cling on. ]

[skaikru]

( for all the adjusting she's undergone in her life, you'd think clarke griffin would be an expert right about now. perhaps not on par with contractors, or even half of the people oh so lovingly selected by the nest. but from transitional generation to survival pioneer, from space kid to grounder, from peacekeeping princess to genocidal warlord; she's done her best with the respective scars in her psyche to show for it. and then here — battling the instinctual desire to lean into the comfort of broods and symbiotes, struggling with a newfound definition for mortality, simultaneously manipulating the direct pathway accessible into each others brains and stubbornly clinging to the outward desire of returning home despite that being slowly realized as less and less of a possibility...

she's not. not, and opening her mouth to lie about it; if not outright, then to at least shrug off the question and skirt the truth. but that plan is upset, quite literally, when her feet leave the ground. a strangled squeak of indignance lodges in her throat as clarke registers the switch in orientation, something halfway between what and put me down on the tip of her tongue before being oh so unceremoniously deposited in the pool.

whatever desperate clawing to keep ahold of november she attempts are short and fruitless (how to you dig your fingers into someone's clothes when they're not wearing any???) and with a splash, she's done for; completely submerged only to struggle upright and scrub damp hair out of her face so as to better pierce the downright evil man with her best scowl. clarke's mind is racing, jumping from expletive to revenge plot faster than her mouth can keep up until — bless you, symbiote, for supplying the appropriate amount of scorn in borrowed swear words — clarke eventually lands on vehemently spitting: )

What the fuck.

( though it's really hard to sound all that menacing when you're half-naked and look like a drowned puppy. )

[justttkidding]

[ Much like Clarke, November has gone through change. He's seen the moderately wealthy and stable life growing up outside of London. A family that cared, that pushed him to grab his ambitions. And then it was South America, surviving a war that left the soldiers disillusioned, confused, different. Alongside it, Heaven's Gate, the complete and utter destruction of everything in that area, in its path. The transition from human to contractor and he remembers the distinct feel of nothing. Like the life he lived before had been a fiction, a book he'd read and then put down.

Years later, the top of MI6, a case in Italy and then Japan.

Now here, with the nest. Surrounded by emotions that aren't his, minds and barriers lowered. There's one thing that's stayed with him – the ability to adapt. Before, it was because he prided himself in it. After becoming a contractor, it was because logic dictated the talent.

Something else has stuck with him: his absolutely terrible sense of humor. Scientists would argue that contractors didn't experience such things. That humor was directly tied into emotion and the experiencing of it. Maybe they're right, maybe they're wrong. Right now, as he looks at the sodden and thoroughly ticked off Clarke, he can only react in one way; that is to laugh.

The sound rings out, warm in all the ways his mind isn't. Echoes off the stone walls of the pools. ]

Like I said, sometimes it's best to jump in. Or be tossed. [ November smiles, a mischievous curl of his mouth. ] Aren't you going to exact your revenge? I'm waiting.

[skaikru]

( oh revenge. the idea sparks something hot and eager and utterly childish, and clarke is tempted to clamber out of the water and shove november into the shallow pool for all of three whole seconds. she thinks about it, even takes a half step forward with pleasantly hot water sloshing to lap at the edges of the pool with the slightest movement before pausing; reeling in some measure of composure. she had been working her way into the water gradually, and although flushed in the face and rather unhappy about the last few moments, she was here now. and if she was going to find some measure of relaxation, tussling with a fellow member of the nest was going to undermine that quest quite spectacularly.

plus, giving into the antics and allowing the man to tease a rise out of her seemed... like a bad idea. like unintentional encouragement. so instead clarke glowers, cuts her hand through the water in a weak attempt at a splash in november's direction. the water droplets don't even reach his feet. )

Go find someone else to romance.

( don't wanna SEE YOUR FACE, don't wanna HEAR YOUR VOICE. out of her sight, sir, and pronto. )

[justttkidding]

[ There seems to be a flurry of emotion on Clarke's expression.

He watches, privately and outwardly amused, as she goes through shock, annoyance, and general unhappiness over the whole ordeal. It's about what he expected, honestly. She's so drawn tight that there were only a few options he saw unfolding as a response to his actions.

Finally, she seems to settle, mouth flat and frowning, brows knitted together. There's a pithy splash of water that arcs with her hand cutting across the surface and it splatters on the tiles. His feet don't get wet at all. ]

Miss Clarke, don't take this the wrong way, but this is not how I would romance you.

[ That's an entirely different conversation. Even so, he recognizes a dismissal and he figures he's pushed his luck enough. With a little mocking bow, he strides off towards a different section of the pool altogether. ]