[Everyone's on a boat. And it might be night. It probably is because the mist is darker than it was before. But while normal people are sleeping, Nasira and Shan are up on deck or something.] [Mini Start] * Shan is up on deck! Sparking, as she has been for the past few days. * Shan is towards the stern, looking out at the ocean. * Nasira isn't on deck, but she does come up from the cabins. She looks around and spots Shan, because she's all shiny. That was hard. * Shan is a beacon to light the way!... This job sucks. * Nasira heads up to the stern, stretching. She's wearing a different change of clothes; this one doesn't fit her so well, but at least it doesn't smell like seawater. "Hey, boss. Playing lighthouse?" * Shan blinks and turns her head to face Nasira. "Hm? Oh." Her electricity dies down a bit. "My apologies. This tends to happen when I am... er... agitated." * Nasira grins. "Hey, it's okay. They're gonna have a look at that book soon. Maybe we'll find what we need to and try to get out of here, and you can stop shocking things by accident." * Shan nods. "The sooner, the better." Hey, wouldn't mind going toe to toe with that sea monster again. * Nasira thinks. Only it didn't have toes. I would not advise that unless you can convince it to move to dry land. * Nasira chuckles. "Yeah, well. About that." She looks off into the mist with her one eye. "I wanted to thank you for saving me." * Shan raises an eyebrow. * Nasira glances at Shan, then laughs. "Oh, come on! You think I'm ungrateful?" * Shan shakes her head. "No, that's not it. You're quite welcome, but I have to ask why you would attempt something like that, knowing you can't swim?" * Nasira smiles. "Because I'm crazy. Haven't you been paying attention?" * Shan looks back towards the sea. "Doesn't mean you wouldn't value your own life." I value it as much as I feel, on any given day. You only live once. May as well try to do so with no regrets. What if you die before you've done everything you had to? * Nasira is silent for a moment, then she says, without quite her usual gusto, "Then I'll have to have faith that the world will do it for me." * Shan nods. "I suppose." * Nasira grins. "But I won't die. I'm not dead yet, and there's no reason it'll happen any time soon." Good. You've still got work to do for me, and I would be quite put out if you were to die before that time was up. Really? When's that? It's not like I have pay to keep track of. You might be doing time in prison, remember? Oh, so it's all *that* time. I figured I'd be stuck there... actually, I don't remember how long my sentence was. There hadn't been a trial yet. * Nasira chuckles. "I figure they weren't gonna kill me for it, so not 'till death." She looks at Shan, eye glittering in the dark. "You're not so bad, really." Someone else risking her life to save me? That's not something I'm used to. I'm sure you'd do the same in my position. Without hesitating. But that doesn't mean most people would. I'm not most people. I'm a government official. * Nasira laughs. "Most government officials wouldn't either. You should know that better than me." But I can swim. Quite frankly, I was more afraid of electrocuting you by accident than I ever was of drowning. * Nasira nods. "Would've been ugly." She doesn't seem disturbed by that thought, though. * Shan nods. * Nasira then bows a Caladeem-style bow, though lower than she typically goes. "And so, I am in your debt." She straightens and grins. "No half-measures. I'll do everything in my power to help you on this." * Shan smiles. She returns the bow, Chu-Lin style. "I shall hold you to that." ( But for now I'm shoving you off the boat. *shove* ) (Wheee! *splash*) * Nasira snickers. "Yeah, I know you will." You're a pretty good fighter, you know that? As long as I'm with you, we should work something out sometime. * Shan nods. "Not all government officials are fat lazy fools. And if you like, it would be a pleasure." No, only the ones who choose to insult me. * Nasira grins. "But he won't be doing that again." * Shan nods. "I suppose. Still, you should not have brandished a weapon at the time." I dunno. It *was* fun. Is that kind of fun worth the consequences that could have been wrought? * Nasira thinks. At the time? Yeah, it was. * Shan shakes her head. Well... I can't very well tell you how to live, but I hope you'll forgive me when I say you could do with a little more foresight. ( Like... any foresight :P ) (Pfft. That's no fun!) Nothin' to forgive. I get that all the time. Then you should heed it, no? Maybe not. Then I might be alive, but I don't know if I'd be living. * Shan touches Nasira's shoulder and gives her a small shock. "I could do this every hour to reconfirm it." * Nasira twitches. "Hey, that tingles!" * Shan smiles. "Good. Then you must be alive." * Nasira eyes Shan, then snickers. "Nice to see those sparkles are good for something." * Shan chuckles. "You mean besides being a fog light?" I could pull something like that off. Let's see. * Nasira steps away from Shan and draws her saif. She adjusts her grip with one hand and concentrates, the metal becoming heated with a molten glow. * Nasira sweeps it in an arc, leaving a trail of light in the air before her sword cools to normal temperature. * Shan watches, interested. "Good. You can take over for me." Are they really keeping pace with your light? * Shan laughs. "Of course not. I might be able to light dark areas, but this is a bit too much for me." * Nasira grins. "Just checking. I don't know the first thing about driving a boat. Sailing a ship. Whatever." * Shan nods. "I don't imagine my knowledge could be better than yours. I often regret not learning about other countries these days." * Nasira waves it off. "You thought you'd never leave. What's there to learn?" How to sail a ship. You don't gotta know about other countries to learn that. * Shan spreads her hands. "This certainly isn't a Chu-Lin boat." Not that I'd know any better there. (From now on, we should call it 'drive a boat' just to annoy the actual sailors. ;P) ( Sure :P ) ( Drive the boat left! You mean port? Yes, like I said.) Well. You're a government official, right? You're smart. Could probably figure it out before too long. I could apply myself, but that does not mean I would understand. * Nasira grins. "That's the spirit! Decide you'll never figure it out before you even try." C'mon, those guys know how to do it. How hard can it really be? You already know about weather and stuff, I bet. Well, yes, that was a part of my duties, after all. Then all you gotta do is decide knowing how to sail's your duty. * Shan laughs. "If it were that simple, I'd learn to do everything and be done with it." * Nasira snickers. "Maybe I'll figure out how to do it and save you the trouble. As long as I'm stuck with you and all." * Shan chuckles. "Very well. I'm glad you volunteered." * Nasira bows. "I live to serve. And cause trouble. More of the second, a little less of the first... I don't think I'm gonna be able to sleep much tonight, so I'd might as well try to get used to fighting in this fog." Hmm... I wonder if I could teach you that. What? How to sleep? * Shan chuckles. "Mmm... I wish I knew how to do that myself. It could be useful at times." She shakes her head. "No, I meant how to fight in a fog like this." Better figure that out. You don't want to be collapsing in the middle of one of those government meetings- oh? If you know how, that'd be great. * Nasira grins. "Though it's been a while since I've had a teacher." * Shan closes her eyes and moves her arms in a wide circle before bringing them together over her stomach. "You simply have to learn to focus your chi to feel the enemy, and you no longer will need to use your eyes." * Nasira looks at Shan almost skeptically. "Or my eye. What's 'chi'?" Your life force. Your inner spirit. Ooh, inner spirit. Right. * Nasira looks down at her own hands, then back to Shan. "And... you can see it?" It is not something you can see. * Nasira blinks. "It's not. Then how do I focus it?" Through meditation and practice. ... Meditation. Quite. * Nasira thinks about that, then grins. "First time for everything. If it means I'll be able to fight in the dark, I'll give it a shot." * Shan nods. "Then I shall teach you." It will take some time, of course. * Nasira grins. "Sure. Can't learn something overnight." (That and I'd need CP to do it!) ( Yep :P ) Well, you're doing better than I was when I started already. Great! Means I'll learn faster, once I figure out how to feel this chi thing. Want to get started tonight? (Because Arwen needs to sleep!) If you like, certainly. ( Shan: "We learn Kung Fu in the hope that we never need to use it." Nasira: "... Oh, this is gonna be a long night." ) * Nasira nods. "Where do we do this?" (*cracks up*) Anywhere you feel you can best avoid distraction. ( So... you learn how to kick butt. Yup. So you won't have to kick butt. Yup. Then what's the point of learning how to kick butt? So we don't have to. AAAAGH.) ( We hire bodyguards to do it for us. ) ( We just learn Kung Fu so we can pose. ) * Nasira laughs. "Wherever, then. Cabins work." (Kick, punch, it's all in the mind!) * Shan nods. "Very well. Let's go." * Nasira does go! [And so they went!] [Mini End!]