her fight and fury's fiery, oh but she loves like sleep to the freezing
The Ark listens without interrupting, the stillness in her holding save for the small movements of her hands as she finishes the cigarette between her fingers. When it’s rolled, she lifts it towards Jack without looking away from him, expecting the flame with the same quiet certainty she'd taken his hand when coming aboard. "I’ve heard the crew talk about her," she says with a light shrug once the end catches, drawing the cigarette back to her mouth for a slow drag. Smoke gathers between them before she lets it drift out again, pale against the warmer dark of the cabin. "The general consensus seems to be that she’s got grit and a good head on her shoulders, but her temper and her emotions get the better of her more often than not." Her mouth curves faintly around the thought, not unkindly, though there’s nothing particularly charitable in it either. "I was just trying to get a read on how long I ought to expect all this to last before she does something that isn’t worth sticking around for."
It isn’t quite a question, and it isn’t only about Dreamdust or ports or the thin beginnings of a region that might yet grow into something solid. Still, she doesn’t linger over it, her gaze dropping briefly to the papers spread across the desk before returning to him through her lashes. "If we’re biding time until that ledger resurfaces, I’d rather spend it doing something." The words are casual, but the dark water of her mind has begun to move again beneath them, not restless exactly, but eager for a current with purpose. She isn’t some luxury vessel made to sit prettily at anchor while the world passes by; isn’t a yacht meant for calm harbours and idle afternoons with nowhere to be. Gods knew there had been enough of that lately, enough waiting in docks and watching routes become routine, when there were still places in the world no one else could reach and things worth taking from them once they did.
Then she rises from the chair and moves into the space between Jack’s knees, close enough that the heat of him reaches her through the loosened fabric of his shirt. It slips from one shoulder as she shifts her weight, red hair falling forward with it, though there’s none of the practiced pull of a siren in the way she looks at him now. The Ark peers at him as something older and stronger than seduction, something made to cross black water and weather storms, something that has been growing restless beneath too many quiet docks and too many days spent waiting for a reason to move. "Here, or the desert, or Torchline.." she says, her voice low and steady, "it isn’t about where." Her blue eyes stay on his, daring and imploring all at once, an impossible question on her lips. "What do you want to do, Jack?"
It isn’t quite a question, and it isn’t only about Dreamdust or ports or the thin beginnings of a region that might yet grow into something solid. Still, she doesn’t linger over it, her gaze dropping briefly to the papers spread across the desk before returning to him through her lashes. "If we’re biding time until that ledger resurfaces, I’d rather spend it doing something." The words are casual, but the dark water of her mind has begun to move again beneath them, not restless exactly, but eager for a current with purpose. She isn’t some luxury vessel made to sit prettily at anchor while the world passes by; isn’t a yacht meant for calm harbours and idle afternoons with nowhere to be. Gods knew there had been enough of that lately, enough waiting in docks and watching routes become routine, when there were still places in the world no one else could reach and things worth taking from them once they did.
Then she rises from the chair and moves into the space between Jack’s knees, close enough that the heat of him reaches her through the loosened fabric of his shirt. It slips from one shoulder as she shifts her weight, red hair falling forward with it, though there’s none of the practiced pull of a siren in the way she looks at him now. The Ark peers at him as something older and stronger than seduction, something made to cross black water and weather storms, something that has been growing restless beneath too many quiet docks and too many days spent waiting for a reason to move. "Here, or the desert, or Torchline.." she says, her voice low and steady, "it isn’t about where." Her blue eyes stay on his, daring and imploring all at once, an impossible question on her lips. "What do you want to do, Jack?"
sweet and right and merciful, all but washed in the tide of her breathing
Siren's Wake | After she leaves a space, traces of her presence linger briefly: a faint scent of salt, the sound of distant water, a restless feeling in the chest. People rarely notice it consciously.
