Leo is here, now, like he'd never left, stretched out in a hammock below decks that definitely hadn't been there before. He's wearing a pair of jeans, a light blue button up shirt, and a faded maroon sweater vest that she's definitely seen him wear before, though it definitely hadn't been that weathered, his clothes a bit tattered like he'd been gone a year instead of a month. He's barefoot though, little wire-scars criss-crossing the tannish-brown soles of his feet as they wiggle up and down to an unheard rhythm.
He's smoking a joint, his constellation swirling slowly in his hair, flickering lazily in the sort of multi-colored show that happens whenever someone catches Leo lost in his own thoughts and fully unaware. He's got a book in the other hand, thumb planted firmly at the base of the spine to keep it open as he reads. It's 'The Three-Body Problem' by Cixin Liu, and he looks completely absorbed in it. Beside him, on the floor, is a backpack, stuffed full of things, leaned up against the side of the ship. He's got headphones in, quiet music pumped into his ears as he chills out.
Over the sound of the headphones, eventually, comes a sound that's ... not unusual, the sounds of people being angry aren't unusual to Summers, but the particular sound isn't one that Leo has heard before. It comes from the deck of the ship. Wait. Did someone go past him?
Well. They don't renown the mermaid as an Escape Artist for no reason: the sounds definitely are coming from the deck, and are definitely mermaid-like, sort of. Siren-esque. But they're... incoherent screams of anger? The sound of glass clanking? Splashes in the hedge water? Is she swimming with the eels or something?
The sounds penetrate eventually, Leo's constellation suddenly flashing to a bright, traffic cone orange as he turns his head up and to the side. His book is dropped down flat, so that it lands on the page he was reading on the deck as he nimbly rolls from the hammock and lands on three limbs - two feet and a hand. The other hand casually keeps the joint aloft as he stands up, flicks the joint with his middle finger, sending the cherry flying off the end and spilling a little weed. The cherry lands on the deck, a warm little dot that is smashed by Leo once he's stepped into a pair of flimsy flip-flops. It leaves a black mark on the floor as he walks forward, sticking the newly unlit joint between his ear and skull as he takes the steps three-at-a-time up to the deck. It all takes about one and a half seconds, the hammock still wavering from his departure as he hits the deck. Leo is used to things going wrong -very- quickly on the Go Away. And so there's Leo, giant glasses magnifying his search for the source of the angry sounds. Eels are no joke.
Once he can see the top deck of the boat, the source of the anger becomes obvious: Etsy is breaking one of her own cardinal rules. She's throwing glass into the water. Well, Maddox will never let her swim with the eels anyway, and with good reason, so why not? She's fishing glass bottles out of the bin and flinging them with pretty deadly accuracy at the eels as they come near the surface. Each fwing of the bottle is accompanied by a somehow-enticing shriek of rage. This is the curse and the blessing of being a siren, one guesses. Even your flailing screams of anger sound kinda sweet. Her eyes are a dark, dark color -- almost black, but not quite -- and she's screaming, throwing bottles, screaming more.
The eels are no joke, and neither is an angry Etsy. Who knew someone that small and usually patently innocent and adorable could turn into a whirlwind of teeth and anger? Dr. Etsy and Mrs. Mermaid.
The arrival of Leo above decks is soundless, no interruption at all given to Etsy's rage-filled screams, Leo practically floating there above the deck, looking effortlessly graceful, his hair fluttering in the wind, before he moves rapidly forward, everything about the way he moves elegant and carefree, flowing with a sort of strange, effortlessly casual perfect efficiency to carry him over to her, his hand suddenly coming into contact with her shoulder. "Etsy." he says, saying it suddenly and firmly when she takes a breath from her screaming, not -trying- to be sneaky, but potentially rapid and graceful enough to startle her badly.
That scream is directed his way, and Etsy -- not as generally effortless as she seems to be, but still on her tip-toes, rocking back and forth in her anger like an anchored boat near a stormy shore -- twists with a bottle in her hand, ready to smash it into -- nope. Not going to smash it into Leo's face. The swing starts, and then stops halfway through, and she drops the bottle onto the deck. A hollow thud, a sonorous rollrollroll, and then that bottle goes 'ploit' into the water, exiting the Go Away and the scene. The mermaid, on the other hand, flings both her skinny arms around her Tellurian friend and clings to him tightly, burying her face in his chest as angry screams convert into silent shuddering. It's fine, Etsy just needs to swallow her emotions like usual, right?
There's a moment where Leo's eyes snap to the bottle and the orange color in his stars suddenly flickers toward a panicky purple. He even -almost- starts to move, his body tensing to dodge out of the way of the projectile in a way that somehow remains effortlessly graceful. The effect lasts as his arms come up to wrap around her, his feet descending somehow, his graceful wrapping of arms transitioning smoothly into his usual kind of gangly agility as he pats her on the back, not saying anything except to make soft soothing sounds, just holding her for a bit.
It isn't sadness but anger that vibrates every cell in the mermaid's body. She's pissed off at someone or something, and clinging to Leo is keeping her from maybe jumping into the water and trying to wrestle an eel to prove how mad she is or get the anger out of herself. Finally -- eventually -- when she's not vibrating with anger but shaking with it instead, Etsy sighs. "Had a missing of you." Her voice is low and shaky, and she hiccups once. "CB is a meanness and a poophead." Well, that's an adult and intelligent way of expressing your feelings, mermaid.
Leo's hold shifts from empathy to a slightly more rigid grip, holding her more supportingly than comfortingly once he realizes her anger is the root cause, rather than her sadness. He loosens his hold on her a little bit as she sighs, smiling a little bit at the hiccup. "I missed you too." He says, easing back from the hug now that she isn't -quite- so psychotically angry. He takes a step back and stuffs his hands into his pockets watching her. "What'd he did? You need me to kick his ass or something?" Leo asks, with a faint smile, head tilting some, causing his constellation to bob wildly as his hair rustles, the whole thing ending up at a 45* angle with the tilt of his head, spiralling frustratedly to reassert its proper formation before slowing back to its slow spin.
"So much missings. Is not a same without Leo-friend." Sniffle. "No, no kicking of butts," Etsy assures, and she hugs him a little more tightly before releasing her grip and leaning back on the deck's railing. "Would only make him convincing of meanness of us and not buttheadedness of him." She takes in a huge, slow breath and lets it out, her eyes shifting slowly from their nearly-black color to their standard brackish ocean color. She swallows, licks her lips. "I am smelling your joint. Where it is?" Important questions, first. "You did a texting of me, and I was a happies, because a Leo is back, and was at Cat-22, a place of CB owning. So said, yay, a Leo is back, is motley friend, going to have a motleys and a Leo is back, hooray." And he got an angries, 'Oh, how nice for yous, you have a motleys, no one is a talkings to me, I was a talkings to them about a motleys and now have a motleys and is not includes me,' and angries at me like I even had a knowing you ever had a talkings to him. And I said not to be means to me because is not my faults, and that no one ever bringing his names up, which is a trues, never heard names of CB from anyone until meeting him, and maybe you talking to him about different thing before meeting the Dielle and the Jon and the Billy Ray and the me. And he keeps a yelling and saying 'no one is punching you' but I said 'am not punching bag' because it is a metaphors, he was doing a means to me when is not me being a means. And I said, well, if had a hopes to do a fixing, is gone now, never pledging to someone who does such a means to me, going to do a tell of Leo and Maddox that was so mean to a mermaids."
After that long, almost run-on sentence, she says: "Then went poof and Contract of Smokes because fuck that guy."
"I missed you too Etsy, a lot." He admits with a small grin, moving over to lean up against the railing near her. He nods as he listens to her story, forehead wrinkling up a bit. "CB and Mads and I talked a bit I mean, forever ago. But he's like.. all paranoid and not even in the Freehold, and Mads and I figured that sounded kinda.. I dunno. I mean.. We're gonna work with the Freehold, yanno? Or whatever?" Leo says with a shake of his head, that sends his constellation on a tumble. "But good to know he can't like, you know.. keep from being a dick if things don't go how he thought they were gonna." Leo says with a huff. "Don't worry, I was gonna bring him up eventually, but I was already kinda leery with him being all.. no Freeholdy or whatever. You know?" a pause, before Leo nods, "Fuck that guy."
"We were, by the way, talking about a different thing before we met everyone. I kept it slow because I wanted to know him better, since he's no-Freeholdy. I guess that was a good idea." Leo says, with a faint frown.
She isn't hugging him anymore, but Etsy leans against him, on the railing, because that's what an Etsy do. She leans on Leo, taking strength from his nearness and comfort from his, you know, being bigger than her. "He is not a Freeholds?" Etsy's nose wrinkles up a little bit, and she shakes her head against his shoulder. "I am not ever an understandings of living in a place and not joining a Freeholds. Is the oaths that is good for a paranoids. Is why is an oaths." She flips one of her webbed hands dismissively in the air at the idea, and then listens to Leo as he talks. "Exactlies, yes. If it is going to be him having a yells and throwing a glass at a walls and yelling at a person who obviouslies did not know about the talks, then, is not a persons is want to be sworn to have a protects." She sniffs, and reiterates, "Is have a joints, Leo? Am so much tense and upsets."
She really only smokes with Leo, so obviously she hasn't got her own weed. "Oh, I meeting a pot-selling birds. Should have an introduce. Calliope." And then she drifts back to the other conversation. "Oh, yeah. Could not do a motleys of not-Freeholds. Not same priorities." Another pause. "Anyway fuck that guy."
"Oh shit, right." Leo says, "You asked, I got annoyed." He says, reaching up to grab his joint and lowering it down to her. "Sorry." he says, offering her the half-smoked but unlit joint. It's as perfectly rolled as a cigarette, like all his joints, the paper tight, the weed packed and ground perfectly. The little tip even broke pretty evenly, a tiny black smudge around the edge the only indication that it isn't just a short joint. Leo is weirdly precise a large amount of time, even accidentally. Part of being a high Wyrd Telluric satellite-boy. He pulls a lighter out as well and lifts it up, offering it to her along side the joint in a dark outstretched hand. "But yeah. Exactly. The Oaths are the point. We're people who know that the Oaths really do mean something, and that liars are the ones who won't swear." He says with a nod. "Sorry he pissed you off." He says, after a second. "You wanna throw more stuff at the eels? They look pretty gnarly today." he says, peering over her head where she's leaned on him to look down at the water.
"Is okays. I am an upsets and tense and annoyeds." She can't eat plants but apparently she can smoke them. She takes the ligher from him, relights the joint. "Is a perfects. So much of a Leos is a perfects." Taking in a nice, long toke, she holds it in her lungs and then lets it out slowly through her nose, smoke billowing up around the both of them. Etsy's shoulders slowly relax, lowering from where they'd been hunched up so much it almost seems like she could touch her ears with them, and she sighs slowly. "Much betters." The lit joint and lighter are passed both back to Leo, and the mermaid sighs. "Yes. And if won't swears, is not for trustings. ALSO," she adds, "The Cat-22 place has NO MEATS." Beat. "Vegans are gross. 'Oh we are eating a plants onlies, we are so much a betters.' PLANTS HAVE FEELINGS."
Says the flower.
"Yes, I think am want to throw things to an eels. CB is a luckies is not here, I would throw him to an eels." Hmph. So she feels better but isn't quite over being angry. Fairest, man.
As a fellow Fairest, Leo understands this instinct completely. So much so that, as he takes the lighter and joint from her he also pushes up, gently, allowing her time to adjust to his missing presence as he moves across the deck. He takes a hit of the joint and tucks the lighter away, using one hand for each as he does so, coming to a stop near one of the large mounds of machinery. He pulls open a drawer and draws out a box full of rocks and various metal bits. All of them are shiny and painted variously - obviously weird, useless gifts or failed attempts at counterfeit currency from Hobs that Leo has kept for some reason. He moves back over to her and sets the box down with a grunt, the thing landing heavily beside her. Then he nods, takes another pull off the joint and passes it back to her, tilting his head back and blowing smoke up into the air with a soft 'pfoooo' sound of relaxation.
She stays leaning against the railing, still moody but relaxing a little now that the lovely weed that Leo has allowed her to partake of. She lets out a contented sigh, mostly contented, anyway, and stretches her arms up over her head. The entire little show of Leo dragging the box out and bringing it over to her is watched with a curious expression. Sure, he's bringing her stuff to throw at the eels, but what is it? When Etsy sorts out what it is, she actually laughs, and then pushes herself up to her tip-toes to kiss Leo on the cheek. First, there is a rock painted with weird spirals in pink and yellow, and Etsy picks it up, yelling, "NOT DEATH TO POO-HEADS BUT MAYBE A VERY UNCOMFORTABLE RASH ON THEIR BUTT!"
There's a grin at the kiss, Leo's constellation flickering briefly blue and purple for a second as he shrugs and offers a grin. He reaches down after a second and lifts up an orange rock. He examines it for a second, discovering that it's a nearly perfectly carved recreation of a Roman denarii, carved into an obviously incorrect bit of desert rock. He shrugs and chucks it down hard at the eels, pegging one on the head and causing it to hiss menacingly as it writhes against the side of the boat. "Yeah. Fuckin' poo-heads." he says, after a second, much more sedate as he peers down at the writhing mass, his eyes zoom-whirring in then back out.
This is the sort of thing that women who have a gift for oracular ability ought not to say, but Etsy doesn't seem bothered. "Poo-heads, a rash to their butts," she declares again, reaching in carefully to pick up a round, jagged-edged disc with spirals and whorls carved into it. She throws it like a frisbee and bounces it off the water before it hits the side of an eel. "Am glad you are backs, Leo." She's said it a number of times, but apparently you can't tell people you care about them enough. "Am loving you. Is big brother. Maybe had one, once. Don't know. But is like that, for yous." Her shoulder bumps against his, anger draining out of her as she throws things at the eels in the water off the side of the boat.
He throws another rock, this one carved with various spirals and wriggled bits that might be pretending to be some sort of writing, but probably aren't. It misses and eel and hits the water with a little *plonk* causing Leo to roll his eyes. But then Etsy nudges him and he grins, nudging her back. "I never had any siblings, but yeah. That seems pretty accurate." He says, leaning over the railing again, and stopping his throwing of items. "I'm glad I'm back too, though. Glad you're still here." A pause, "Glad you kept Mads safe." he says with a shrug, glancing from the eels to the mermaid, then back.
She leans over and kisses his shoulder, another one of those small bits of familial affection. "Yep," agrees Etsy simply enough. "Me too. Have not felt like maybe could have a somebody matter to me and not be afraids of it in a long times. Lots of throwaway times, but. Maddox... matters." And that's as close to admitting that she's more than a little in love with him as the mermaid can get right now.
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