[Action]

[abidinglaw]

[After having shown his face little over the past few days – probably a joint consequence of not wanting to catch whatever Jack had and wanting even less to be press ganged into holding his bloody soup spoons – Norrington begins this morning absent from his bright and bedless bedroom. He wakes with the rising sun for a rousing stroll on the beach. On the way back, with Cullen house lit by the crisp light of morning, he recalls the recent ice storms and all at once he has a goal for the day. Assess the house for damages. If any housemates are home they might just hear some curious scrapings on the exterior of Cullen house, the occasional bangings, but most ominous of all will likely be the prolonged intermittent silences. Never you mind. It's probably just a woodpecker.

Later in the day he'll be in the village proper for the first time in days and days and days. The item shop is a high priority, and he spends a long time there scrutinizing things with narrowed eyes and a chin cradled in the crook made by his thumb and index finger. Later still, he'll be stopping in at Good Spirits for the sake of overhearing village-gossip. He'll even politely clear his throat behind one or two people in aid of this noble goal. It's amazing what a brief absence will do for a man's social skills.]

Comments

[abidinglaw]

I confess that I am partial to the graceful performance of a troupe of impassioned Morris dancers. The passion is all - you understand.

[He pockets the jade figure. Apparently he has misunderstood her.]

[fleurdesel]

...What? [She pauses in her attempts to grab that elusive strap and turns, utterly baffled.]

[abidinglaw]

Morris dancers.

[Perhaps she had not heard him.]

They hold my attention.

[fleurdesel]

...I. Meant at the moment. I was inquiring as to what it was that held your attention, here. On the shelves.

...

What is a Morris Dancer?

[abidinglaw]

Oh, the noble Morris Men.

[The admiral gives a fond sigh.]

I could not begin to express what you would surely feel at the sight of them. What any gentle hearted man or woman surely must.

[And it's true. One way or the other.]

[fleurdesel]

I think there is a reference here that I am not quite understanding. I have never heard of a 'Morris Man' or a 'Morris Dancer'. But I will take the time to look into it as they are, apparently, worth the admiration of gentlemen and women.

[Despite her frustrations with the strap her tone is entirely sincere, not at all mocking. She was genuinely curious, and fully intends to look up Morris dancing in the library after she gets that damn strap.]

[abidinglaw]

[Okay. By now it is clear that she cannot reach whatever she is reaching for with her own devices. Still, he acts as though this were the first time he had noticed, and innocently asks,]

Are you looking for something particular yourself?

[She is fortunate in that even the topic of morris men is not enough to divert his attention away from a woman in a state of distress. Fortunate, that is, that the subject will therefore be dropped.]

[fleurdesel]

That which I have sought since I've arrived in the village. My case, my clothes, my knives arrived with me. But my weapon and it's holster have not yet appeared. That strap- [she motions to the elusive leather strap just hanging off the edge of the shelf.] Looks somewhat familiar.

...would you be so kind as to aide me, Admiral? I cannot seem to reach it on my own.

[abidinglaw]

Of course!

[She might have asked from the very beginning! There was no shame in putting the resources at hand to use, and Norrington was a tall fellow indeed. Sufficed to say he had stood by now, and joined the doctress.]

Might that be your holster there?

[fleurdesel]

You've my thanks Admiral. [She's a proud and stubborn woman, and does not ask for aide unless there is no recourse. Especially when it came to vertical challenges...even if it was obvious Norrington was more than able to assist her, My god the man was tall.]

The dye of the leather and stitching leads me to believe that it might be, but I cannot know for certain until it is where I might see it properly.

[abidinglaw]

[Well then he shall go to it at once - but this is no mere matter of plucking the leather strap from its moorings. He is not tall enough to see over the shelf on which it sits, so first he sets about removing the items around it and relocating them to other surfaces around them both. He would not want the strap to snag and pull a stray light bulb or an unseen saucer down upon their heads.]

[fleurdesel]

[Without comment or question Adele steps aside to allow the good Admiral space enough to remove the odds and ends from the area around the leather strap, which was indeed a part of a leather holster. An empty holster, but, a holster none the less. Whether it was the one Adele sought or not was a question that still requires an answer.]

[abidinglaw]

[When at last he does deem it safe to lift the leather item free he does so ponderously slowly, but he meets no resistance and soon enough the leather object is held safely at waist-level. He passes it to Adele.]

[fleurdesel]

[It's almost painful, waiting for the good Admiral to pull down and hand over that leather strap. She can see, now, that it is a shoulder holster, empty but shockingly familiar.]

You have my thanks Admiral.

[Her voice is soft, a little rough, and she turns the soft tooled leather kit around in her hands, searching for...just on the underside on the left, her name worked into the leather, wings uncurled on either side. She is suddenly and uncomfortably reminded of the last time she spoke to Irving and flinches before she can shake it off. There is nothing to be done for it.]

[abidinglaw]

[Again, if he sees this flinch then he gives no sign of it but smiles and turns back to what he was doing. Now he moves one shelf further distant than he had been and begins picking through the trinkets there. Most he relocates to the back of the shelf, but some he brings forward and arranges in a line. Half of a pale yellow shell, a bundle of herbs and a wooden stake all meet his approval, as does a small pot of epoxy resin.]

[fleurdesel]

[She appreciates his discretion, taking the time to check the straps. Other then a rough edge on the left shoulder and a dark stain on the leather, there is no other evidence of what happened prior to her arrival. She takes a moment to shrug out of her coat, shake out her wings, and slip it on. Empty, yes, but...it fit well enough around her wings and the familiarity was comforting. She pulls her coat on, and looks back over, curious.]

...were I to ask what you find fascinating a second time, would you again answer me with 'Morris Dancers'?

[abidinglaw]

[He reads the back of the bottle of adhesive and pockets it, and after a few more moments moving down along the shelf he comes across a small black box with a latch. This he pulls out and sets on the floor in front of him, noting meanwhile that there is a hinge half-way down the back side of the object. The top half probably lifts up to reveal the contents. It is at that point that he looks up at Adele once again. The box is about a hand's span wide, and its length and depth are equal to its width.]

I do not expect so, no, but I might express an interest in this curious box.

[fleurdesel]

[With no little curiosity, Adele observes Norrington's selections. She cannot quite get a read on him here, his intentions or his habits are equally unknown. But the care he takes in moving items around, the consideration he gives each is unfamiliar, and yet fascinating. After a moment she steps closer, peering down at the aforementioned box.]

You do not often see boxes such as this that is so cubic in shape. Were it not so deep I would venture to say it might be a cigar box, but...Well now I am equally curious. [She huffs a soft laugh.]

[abidinglaw]

A fair guess.

[He tries the latch, and the mechanism springs easily free. The top of the box opens away from him, obscuring the contents from her sight, but in the seconds that follow his expression turns from anticipation to confusion. At least he presents her with a strange, thin, rectangular plate of plastic.]

What on earth is this? It must serve some purpose -- there are many more like it in here.

[He says.]

[fleurdesel]

[The box opens and Adele observes Norrington's expression more than anything else. Odds are it would tell her if whatever was inside was familiar or foreign, and after a moment she must conclude it to be foreign. How much it is, however, she doesn't know until he pulls out the...cassette tape? She can't help a soft chuff of laughter as she shakes her head. The things that appear in Luceti.]

That is something I would not expect to find here. Then again there are records and record players, why not this as well? [She gingerly takes the tape and turns it over, looking for a label of any kind.]

This is a cassette tape. Much like a record they are used for recording music, or speech if one has the requisite device to do so.

[abidinglaw]

[There is no label - not on that one, and not on the one that Norrington picks up to investigate himself. It is a brief sort of affair. First he does what any sane man would do and tries to get his index finger through one of the holes in the body of the cassette tape. In this manner he discovers that the spokes can be rotated, and that the film inside could be made to shift left or right by this means.]

Of course. It is obvious now.

[It is not obvious now.]

[fleurdesel]

I do not know much about how they are produced, or how they work, really. Something about magnetic strips against the film, I think. I am probably wrong. Where did you find this? There might be a player or recorder somewhere on the same shelf, or at least in the same vicinity.

[Without any labels, though, it was quite likely they were blank. She peeks onto the shelves to check for herself, looking around the items arranged for a cassette player.]

[abidinglaw]

Over here.

[The words were useless in and of themselves -- he had not moved. Still, it gave him the opportunity to gesture for her to crouch beside him. Rather than share that space with her, however, he himself stood. He also closed the box and took it in hand. He'd let her keep the cassette she had though. That was only fair.

There was no cassette player nearby -- but he could not have known that. He hoped that she would find one. Though he scorned the marvel that she had described, he was not a man entirely devoid of curiosity.]

[fleurdesel]

[Here being...ah. She knelt next to Norrington and let him move away without comment or question. The cassette in her hand was slipped into her coat pocket so she might search the shelves where he'd found the box to begin with. Odds and ends aplenty, figurines, bundles of herbs, a dried flower, jars of poorly labeled substances, but no cassette player that she could see. Pity. She made a mental note to keep an eye out for one.

It didn't hurt to check the next shelf up, so she did, sitting up on her heels and looking over it's contents for a sign of the outdated, but familiar, shape. There was none to be found.]

I do not think there is one here at the moment...

[She stands, dusting off her knees before looking down the shelves from whence she'd come. There wasn't much else for her to do today.] I could search the other shelves.

[abidinglaw]

Really, you need not trouble yourself. I suspect that if my curiosity overcomes me I need only make a request of the journals.