Jo Harvelle runs on 100 proof attitude power (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
tobeclosetohim) wrote in ![[community profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/community.png)
sixthiterationlogs2016-07-27 03:18 pm
tobeclosetohim) wrote in sixthiterationlogs2016-07-27 03:18 pm
004 { A life you don't live is still lost
WHO: Jo & THE COMMUNITY AT LARGE
WHERE: The Pub & Inn
WHEN: July 27th, Midday through Night
OPEN TO:Everyone was invited personally
WARNINGS: Jo's Better At This Than She Means To Be
STATUS: Open To All; Threads w/ Jo, w/ Others & Threadjacking Welcome
Jo told everyone she saw yesterday to come by the Inn & Pub today.
Anytime after midday, and to pass on the message to anyone and everyone else they saw. That it wasn't a meeting per say so much as something everyone was going to need everyone's help with and something everyone should probably get in on. But without clarifying much else.
She spent the rest of yesterday stealing nearly a half dozen curtains from houses that hadn't been claimed by anyone, and then acquiring enough charcoal to fill two small baskets. It's not paper and pens or pencils but it's going to have to do until someone has a better idea or finds better supplies.
The morning of the 27th, Thorfinn helps her get them tacked to two different walls of the main room of Inn & Pub using her knives to cut holes and then sharpened bones, from earlier meals in the month that she hadn't been aware had been saved even, banged into the wall to make them hold high and sturdy enough.
On one side of the room, three curtains line the wall and it says at the high top MAP & LANDMARKS. In the center most piece there are sketched bits for the buildings they can all recognize, the center most being the fountain, and in the distance the river, certain bits of forest, canyon wall, but there's a lot of white space in every other direction, too.
On the other side of the room, one curtain goes up, marked only at the top with FOR TRADE. For the moment that one is entirely blank, but sooner or later she going to end up writing Fresh Meat, with her name and Thorfinn's next to it. There's a second curtain for that wall folded behind the bar, for when and if it's needed.
For now Jo's sitting on a table, again, feet on a chair, elbows on her knees, hair loose on her shoulders, looking at the maps' ocean of white, waiting to see what else might get filled in by those who show up today. Or at least having a better idea of where they should still be looking that hasn't been covered half a dozen times already by everyone else.
WHERE: The Pub & Inn
WHEN: July 27th, Midday through Night
OPEN TO:Everyone was invited personally
WARNINGS: Jo's Better At This Than She Means To Be
STATUS: Open To All; Threads w/ Jo, w/ Others & Threadjacking Welcome
Jo told everyone she saw yesterday to come by the Inn & Pub today.
Anytime after midday, and to pass on the message to anyone and everyone else they saw. That it wasn't a meeting per say so much as something everyone was going to need everyone's help with and something everyone should probably get in on. But without clarifying much else.
She spent the rest of yesterday stealing nearly a half dozen curtains from houses that hadn't been claimed by anyone, and then acquiring enough charcoal to fill two small baskets. It's not paper and pens or pencils but it's going to have to do until someone has a better idea or finds better supplies.
The morning of the 27th, Thorfinn helps her get them tacked to two different walls of the main room of Inn & Pub using her knives to cut holes and then sharpened bones, from earlier meals in the month that she hadn't been aware had been saved even, banged into the wall to make them hold high and sturdy enough.
On one side of the room, three curtains line the wall and it says at the high top MAP & LANDMARKS. In the center most piece there are sketched bits for the buildings they can all recognize, the center most being the fountain, and in the distance the river, certain bits of forest, canyon wall, but there's a lot of white space in every other direction, too.
On the other side of the room, one curtain goes up, marked only at the top with FOR TRADE. For the moment that one is entirely blank, but sooner or later she going to end up writing Fresh Meat, with her name and Thorfinn's next to it. There's a second curtain for that wall folded behind the bar, for when and if it's needed.
For now Jo's sitting on a table, again, feet on a chair, elbows on her knees, hair loose on her shoulders, looking at the maps' ocean of white, waiting to see what else might get filled in by those who show up today. Or at least having a better idea of where they should still be looking that hasn't been covered half a dozen times already by everyone else.
no subject
He was sitting quietly not far from Jo, a knife in one hand whittling away at a pace of wood. He didn't care that he was covering his gray scrubs with wood shavings he was more focused on his work. He figured if he stayed quiet no one would notice his lack of conversational language aside from anyone who already knew. Part of him wanted to go back to the woods like he usually does in the day. He didn't though, he just sat there carving at the bit of wood, every now and then reaching up to push his hair back behind his ears.
no subject
Jo has gotten used to the silence with Thorfinn, in a way where she isn't, but she accepted that she has to accept it. For now. She misses listening to him talk. The bravado. The sullenness. The bragging. The terseness. The long line of other things. Ones she hadn't even realized she'd taken note of being there at all, until there wasn't any of it. Until there was a quiet man, with the barest of bones of broken English, sitting next to her.
Quiet was not a thing she would have pegged him having in him. But he does. During the day at least.
Though sometimes she's starting to think that isn't entirely because of the language barrier.
Like right now when he's doing something else.
She lets it go for a while, watching the trickle of people, who came and surveyed, wrote or didn't write, stayed or didn't stay, talked with her or with others, and petered back out, again. But eventually she nudges the edge of his chair with the toe of the heavy boots she's gotten used to at this point a month in, and she points, refusing to dumb things down for him, because he's doing so well, even when he's frustrated, even when he's quiet.
And. Really. Because she respects him too much for it. Even if it's a long ago him. "What are you making now?"
no subject
He didn't mind the silence, though he did miss the constant chatter of his sworn brother. Thorfinn never really had to talk much with Einar, the other man would fill the air with his own endless words and stories and knowledge. Even the boy she knew had been a quiet creature, just not around her. She reminded him of the sister he missed so much. She got to see him in spirits others never would have back then. He was more himself in that moment whittling away than he had been bragging about his old exploits.
He never enjoyed the fighting. He did it for his honor.
Now he didn't have to. He'd never hurt another human being if he had the choice.
When she nudged him he looked up, those brown eyes still so different with their strange soulful light. It had started forming in the boy after the rains, but it had changed over the years.
He didn't know the English word, but he sat the knife aside and he held up the half carved handle. "sól áttavita" The words were spoken since he didn't know the English. He pushed up out of the chair and moved to her map motioning her over. Taking up a bit of charcoal and drawing a simple little cross. He pointed to north. "norður" then South, East and West followed as he held up the wood. pointing to the cross then the ceiling. "sól áttavita"
no subject
Jo slipped down from the table and followed him to the map, that she wasn't blind to noticing he hadn't actually walked up to or done anything with after helping her set it up. Jo wasn't actually sure of the compass rose drawn on the edge of the map, even though she got what he meant the moment he crossed the first line with the second.
Even if she couldn't be sure of any direction, because she was too used to guessing at everything.
Just because this looked like it could be Earth meant nothing. Just because the sun rose on one side of the sky and set on the other, didn't mean it was East and West. A lot of planets had suns, trees. Sure the houses made it seem a lot like a long ago period of Earth, but she hated assuming anything she wasn't positive about. Giving anyone that much of her for granted taken. Especially with the manufactured windstorm on the first day and still no exit found.
"It's a compass?" Jo asked, giving him another new word. Even as truly, the first word sounded entirely close to North, and she was looking between the small cross and the thing in his hand. That wasn't really a thing entirely yet. Just a shape. But she'd watched any number of small things made in the same way already. Growing out of nothing.
Except he pointed to the ceiling, which. "Wait. Or a sundial?" Since that was a simple enough first word.
Some combination of both. Covered early enough on. Sun, moon, stars. Like cups, plates, and so on and so son.
no subject
He hadn't even pondered if north may not be north, if this was a different world with different rules. Sure, it was a different place... but it felt like Leif's stories to him. A land of green and lush lands. A promising place. Even with the irritation of the language barrier he had deep hopes in the land. He wouldn't fail his promise to Arneis' spirit.
He took a breath lowering his head, it was a tick he had. When he felt like he wasn't getting through he would always start to give up before something would click. Sun yes, that was the word she had taught him. "Sun, yes, sun." He didn't quiet grasp if compass would be the right word. He took a breath again, looking to her. "Sun, norður He moved his hand to place his index finger against the center of the started compass so that the shadow moved across it. He looked down at the shadow and started to shift until the shadow feel against the only notch he had gotten carved on the top. "Sun go Norður" A mix of both.
no subject
She knows way his brows furrow and when he ducks his head. She knows this is tiring as hell, and that it's like stumbling every single time its new words, new ideas, or even old ones. Sometimes even the same ones from the first day. But she doesn't pity him, or push him. Let's the frustration roll between them, until he does latch on to one of the words she said, and leads to him demonstrating the thing in his hand between them.
Watching his fingers, and the shadow it cast. Sundial. Definitely a sundial, then. Not that Jo knew much about those, except as artifacts and historical things. Things to keep track of time, the sun. Enough to make her wonder how much and how well it would help -- him? them? -- the situation. She didn't reach out to touch, but she nodded, adding as she did, "North. Same."
At least at home it had been. "Sun in the North."
Even if she felt dubious saying that like she had any faith in it.
no subject
In time.
Everything would come in time.
He moved his hand towards the map and then to the sun compass. "Run. Find." Run he knew from the raids, find he picked up around the house. He meant explore but he worked with what he knew even when it was frustrating. He wished Einar was there. Einar could translate got him, make it all easier… but no. He never took the easy way. It was not his way.
He motioned back to the table, a silent question of if she wanted to sit back down.
no subject
He adds the two words and she wants to ask run where? and find what?, but it only takes her eyes going back to the map to know the answers as much in him as in herself. Everywhere. Everything. There was so much to learn and that was needed to know, and he already was working on more of it. Sometimes she felt just a little too useless.
Good about her own base level survival, but not like. In this place. Like the rest of these peole.
He motions back to the table and Jo nods, again. "Yeah."
no subject
They were both to stubborn to stop.
She was important to him, to his life. He wouldn't have offered his skills so freely, been able to offer them without her. "We do good." He spoke in his broken English as they moved back to the table. He had faith in it, they were doing good.
no subject
She stepped back up on the chair, and turned around, dropping herself back on the table, almost exactly where she'd been sitting before, before centering back on him. All golden will and determined smile. If they could make it this far -- them, in that house, unable to talk and learning; everyone in this room, apart, but starting to share: "We'll have this place running in circles around us in no time."
no subject
He dropped back in the chair, watchful as she sat back on the table. A strange pair, a man more comfortable on the floors and in the dirt, and a woman who sits on tables with the presence of a shield maiden. He had no doubts if the choice ever came about she would become the villages jarl. He pushed such thoughts away as he chuckled, half understanding what she said. "They not know us." He lifted a hand to his chest. "We defeat." He didn't have to hurt people to show the world he was a force of nature.
no subject
It feels....good. Not so much in a buoying way. But in a grit under her nails, maybe this counts as one step, way.
"Damn straight," Jo says to Thorfinn. Swearing is definitely not off the table, as there's no way she'd ever make it months without it, and it's not like he didn't know she swore as a child. It was part of her language, even if no many people else here seemed to. But that wasn't rare.
no subject
Some faces he recognized, like the pretty girl with the brown hair he was sharing the inn with, but it being his third day, most were new to him. He'd devoted most of yesterday to scouting the area, so this was his first opportunity to get a feel for who he was dealing with. He spent some time observing the others and memorizing the crudely drawn cloth map before a space opened and he approached to add in some details--distances, mostly, to help flesh out the scale and distance of travel. It grated that Jess didn't know more. Three days and he felt at an unsettling disadvantage trying to get caught up on what's been said and done in the last month already.
He'd always hated showing up late to a party.
Retreating from the map, he ended up next to a man who looked like he'd stepped out of an old Viking story, battle scars and overgrown platinum hair and all. Interesting, but not as interesting as his pants, being the same grey as Jess'. He gave a friendly nod, gaze dropping down to eye the woodworking project in his hands with curiosity. More the knife than the wood, if he's being honest, but the whittling is interesting, too.
all Icelandic will be hover-able for translations~!
Thorfinn's eyes lifted once more when he felt the eyes of someone else on him. He knew it wasn't Jo, she would nudge him or say his name. Sitting down it was harder to see that he was small of stature, but otherwise he did fit the look of a proper viking. His hair was in loose braids and he wasn't giving off the most inviting air. Most of it was just a mixture of being socially awkward and irritation with the language barrier he was facing. His oddly calm brown eyes looked over the other male. He assumed just from a glance over the guy had to be about the age he had been when he lost his freedom. Maybe a little older. It felt like a lifetime ago.
"Hello." It came out very thick, his accent lacing the newly learned words. He stopped working when he spoke, finding it easier to communicate when he was looking at other people. He pointed at the other, "You ný?" He couldn't recall the word for new, so he defaulted back to norse.
Threadjacking of Quiet, Notice-y-ness
Jo's not far away from Thorfinn.
On the table. Next to his chair. With her own feet in the chair next to his. Watching most of the groups at the curtains, who keep adding things on either side, fingers blackened with charcoal the same as the curtains. Making them all the same, even in their odd scrubs colors of delineation. Which she ponders on them, especially, now as they all work together, talking about the things on either side and either set of curtains.
Still, she looks over, aloofly, features shift toward wary curiosity when he comes to stand by Thorfinn with that expression himself. That one that's wonder, confusion, not quite belief yet, and something else. Something that makes him stand there and makes Thorfinn say something to him, and she looks back in front of her, to the groups, but she's still paying attention to the side of her, too.
It's not offensive so much as . . . she takes Thorfinn, in general and in specific, as personal.
no subject
Jess' attention stayed on the fair-haired man.
Thorfinn was one of only many hard-looking individuals coming and going, but he was also in grey... Jess wondered if that meant something. The uniforms were deliberate--it stood to reason the color coding was, too. "Hello," he repeated in his own native Londoner lilt. That sure was a heavy accent, and Jess realized English might not be the other's first language. He wasn't positive what kind of accent it was without hearing more. "New? Yes. I'm new."
To tell the truth, he already hated the label, but if it was easier for the others to understand, then he'd settle for it.
Working off his hunch, he gestured back at the man. "English?"
no subject
If he planned to keep sitting he had to offer a seat to the other, Norse were big on hospitality. Despite how hard he looked, Thorfinn had changed on the inside but his scars were the past he hoped to out run. To eventually settle in Vinland and make a hopeful place for the outcasts of his society.
He nodded to the other when he confirmed what Thorfinn suspected, that accent, it felt like one he should know, but he couldn't place it. He had traveled a lot in his younger years and the world had changed much in the thousand years since then. "No English." he replied with a shake of his head. These words he found himself repeating more and more. "I learn." He motioned to himself as he spoke the words. It wasn't easy recalling the new words but he was doing his best. He wanted to make Jo proud and be able to communicate.
no subject
Resisting the urge to look longingly at the knife the man set down like a dog missing its favorite toy, Jess took a chair and pulled it out, moving it around so that they were almost sitting side by side and Jess could keep his view of the room without putting his back to the door. Habit.
The way the other man's accent wrapped around the vowels brought Helva to mind. He hadn't thought about his Scandinavian squadmate in a while, but over the months of their training Jess had heard her lapse into her native language a few times. Their accents sounded similar, he thought. What country was she from? Now that it crossed his mind, Jess wasn't sure she'd ever mentioned it.
Hazarding a guess, Jess said, "Svenska?" He vaguely remembered that was the word for "Swedish," though his accent was probably atrocious.
no subject
Thorfinn was watching the other's movement's and the way he set his chair, a knowing look crossed his features. Oh he remembered that, hell he still does that at times. When he ran with the horde he almost never turned his back to a door unless he had no choice, or wanted to look utterly confident. The movement alone gave him an idea, but not one he could ask.
"Sænska?" Thorfinn repeated what he assumed the other was saying, he's heard a lot of bad accents in his day, he could mostly work though them. After a second he shook his head some. "No, I from Iceland." He knew how to say his home's name in english. He had learned it well enough in his travels.
no subject
"Icelandic, then?" His guess had been close, if you counted being in a completely different geographical area as "close." Hopefully his butchering of the Germanic languages would be forgiven. He was better with Greek and the Romances, but he figured he could scrape together a few Icelandic terms if pressed, assuming the man was a good sport about bumpkins muddling their way through.
But what was a native from Iceland doing here? What were any of them doing here? That was the real question he wanted to ask, even knowing he wouldn't get an answer.
"I'm from England." He gestured to himself as he said it. "I'm Jess."
no subject
"Já Yes. Icelandic." He repeated nodding his head. Icelandic was a off-branch of Romances. He didn't and wouldn't mind any buturing, he just wanted to be able to communicate and his English was bad enough that he would have no right to judge anyway.
When Jess said where he was from Thorfinn straightened his posture and seemed to perk a bit. "England." He repeated the word, it was easier on him, he's spoke it many times. "Ég barðist í orrustunni við London Bridge, undir merkjum konungs Swyen er." As he spoke he lifted his hands as if holding daggers. To mimic his old fighting style. The hand was shifted then to motion to himself. "Thorfinn." He spoke his first name. "Karlsefni." He had only spoken his nickname back home to one other in the village so far, and that was Jo. He was never proud of it, but he figured maybe it would helpful here, to this English boy.
no subject
The show of enthusiastic recognition for his country makes the corner of Jess' mouth curl up a little higher than the other before the man launches into a stream of Icelandic that Jess has to concentrate to catch. Even then, he can only discern one or two words. "London Bridge" leaps out to him for obvious reasons. "You fought at the London Bridge?" he guesses. The pantomiming helps get Jess to that conclusion, honestly.
Had he read about a Thorfinn Karlsefni once? It's possible. Had he had his Codex in hand, it would've taken only a second for him to find the historical figure, but the name stirs a sense of familiarity for another reason. "Of course you'd have Thor in your name." The half-smile becomes a full blown smirk. "It suits."
The fair features, the hair... Jess senses a theme.
no subject
The Thorfinn Karlsefni of the Saga's was mostly known for marrying Leif Erikssons sister in law, leading attempting to colonize Vinland and fathering the first European child in the Americas. He's really not in the saga's as much as his wife would be. The man of the Saga's wasn't exactly the man sitting across from him. Though Thorfinn's dream was Vinland he wasn't exactly that Karlsefni. Different universes and the workings of time.
"All men named Thor." he tried to say, scrunching his face some. "Family. Faðir minn is Thors."
no subject
But since when had any battles been fought at the London Bridge? And involving people from so far north, no less?
"When? When was this?" Jess had a strange feeling about this supposed battle in the middle of Central London where the London Bridge stood as a popular historical landmark. "I think I understand--it's a family name, that it? I was thinking of one Thor in particular. The thunder god. Wields Mjölnir."
It's a blatant cultural stereotype, but it's hard not to think it with Thorfinn looking like part of an old Norse saga with warriors, and giant serpents, and Ragnarok.
no subject
When clicked as Thorfinn had to sit back and think about it. "I..." He lifted his fingers counting silently. He had had to ask his sister just before he arrived here how old he was, he had lost it over the years. "Jeg er toogtyve, slaget skete, da jeg var sytten." He spoke slowly. Then it clicked. "1013" That was the year, it was the year he got assigned to guard Canute and everything went to shit.
Thorfinn nodded to confirm that Jess was right. Though again not all the words connected he knew enough of them at the moment. It was a stereotype but he fit it very well... aside from being short.
(no subject)
(no subject)
now made with whole wheat and 10% more correct tense
But we can keep the cheese, right?
Jo refused to stay silent, say sorry.
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)