We'll rant and we'll roar like true British sailors...with a soldier

[simplestgift]

Who: Norrington (abidinglaw ), Hornblower (captainhornblower ), Sharpe (greenjacketed ), Bush (wouldntbetonit ), Kennedy (simplestgift ), and Wellard (bravelad ).
What: Officers' dinner.
When: The 23rd at four o'clock
Where: The captain's cabin of the Britannia
Summary: Archie's feeling like recapturing some of the magic officer dinners used to have when Aubrey and Maturin were here.
Rating: A is for Awkward, B is for Bonaparte, C is for Cinnamon, D is for.../shuts up

So Archie isn't Aubrey, but he's tried to make things warm and have lots of good food.  He's done pretty well, but his attempts to replace the captain of which he was so fond aren't perfect.  The beef is, perhaps, just a tad drier, the pudding a teensy bit too moist, and other such nitpicks, but hey.  One of you try it.

Comments

[greenjacketed]

"Myself, I've only found the local population to be strangely welcoming. Regardless of rank or..." A noncommittal waggle of his head. He needn't say it.

[simplestgift]

"Class?" He drums his fingers. "It's catching, too." Although after such "uncles" as Matthews and Styles, it's hard not to at least want to be tolerant. "They weren't worried until we built the ship, I don't believe."

[greenjacketed]

"Aye, Kennedy. Class. Or the lack thereof. They're very forgiving of that, here. So it surprises me that they cannot forgive the building of a ship."

[simplestgift]

He's not sure if he's being accused of being oversensitive.

"There was a...oh, here they call it a draft, but they use it to refer to an engagement a draft of men--and women, and children sometimes, and very large turtles--are sent to fight in. One was at sea, and the captain was voted--democratically--to captain one of the ships. I do believe every potential mutineer found his or her way to our ship. I believe there were three who had no objection to taking orders and gave him due respect. The others regaled me with how very independent of mind they were and how this mission did not at all have anything to do with cooperation or acting together. I'm astonished any of us made it out alive, let alone myself and the captain."

[greenjacketed]

...Bloody hell. Perhaps as a private, he'd often enough questioned the chain of command. Dreamed, now and then, of deserting. Or -- as many a private does from time to time -- imagining the satisfaction of an 'accidental' bayonet in a bad officer's gut. But from his fresher perspective, being in command, he understood things differently.

While it was often terribly disused, order and discipline were not things to be waved off. And Sharpe's internal horror at Archie's tale was growing rapidly...external.

"De-democratically..." It had always been one of the tougher words for him to choke out. "By God."

[simplestgift]

"The way pirates settle things, yes. What I could never understand is why they voted for him if they didn't want to follow him."

[greenjacketed]

"Ain't that just the problems with democracies," he quipped. "A fine leader once said...once told me -- always to ask what the men want. You needn't always listen to them...that is, beg pardon, to do what they ask. But you're always to ask. Sounds a fair sight better to me than voting."

[simplestgift]

"He must have been a wise man. I think the finest leader I served under knew what his men wanted without asking at all. Or perhaps he only convinced them to want what he wanted." He nods toward Horatio. "He's well on his way to becoming Pellew himself, in my opinion. He was his favorite, when we served on board Indefatigable."

[greenjacketed]

"She was," he corrected -- smoothly. Perhaps the smoothest he'd been all night. "Very wise indeed."

[simplestgift]

Death and loss, despite how common it is in war, doesn't seem to get any easier for Archie as time goes on. If anything, it gets harder. "My condolences."

[greenjacketed]

No matter. Sharpe simply cleared his throat some more and did his best to move on. He was not here to discuss his dead wife.

So he glanced over at Hornblower, instead. "Glad to hear it, Kennedy. That he's a good one. The few captains I've had the pleasure to meet -- have been good men."

[simplestgift]

"Then you've been fortunate. I've sailed under more bad than good. But the good ones are worth enduring the bad ones."

[greenjacketed]

"Besides passage to and from wherever His Majesty wants me and my men, I've spent some time aboard the Pucelle. By mistake, really. Not sure the Navy ever wanted a rifleman underfoot."

[simplestgift]

"Not normally, no. Rifles aren't the most practical in our profession anyway."

A beat.

"Although we endure the marines getting underfoot all the time, and you lot are considerably brighter, so it makes no sense."

[greenjacketed]

"I was headed home on an East India Company ship. We were taken by the French and then taken back by our own Navy. Captain Chase sent the Calliope along and asked me to join him on his Pucellle. He and I had met in India. Friends, I suppose."

[simplestgift]

"And how was she?"

[greenjacketed]

"A beauty, Lieutenant."

Nearly as fast as the French Revenant and certainly capable of taking her. And the Pucelle held some of his favourite memories -- Lady Grace, even more beautiful than the ship. God, he could have married that woman...

"A terrible, terrible beauty."

[simplestgift]

"What was so terrible about her?"

[greenjacketed]

"Off Trafalgar," he confessed -- earnestly not concerned with how it might look to own up to ignorance about the Navy's ways. He was a soldier, not a sailor. He knew land battles, not sea ones. "I could not even tell when we were winning the battle. So many ships all lined up, pummeling the bollocks out of each other. All that crashing wood and those slippery decks.

Different from a war on land."

Different -- he stressed the word. Not worse and not easier. Just different.

[simplestgift]

"One can tell from the flags." Just a free hint. "At Trafalgar, were you? I don't suppose you could..."

He trails off wistfully. Apparently the major didn't really know what he saw, and therefore might not even be able to talk about it.

[greenjacketed]

A quirk of the corner of his mouth. The flags, yes. He remembered the flags. The frantic running of the flags. Up and down. And little Mister Collier noting them all.

"At Trafalgar, yes. As I said -- was a mistake." He inclined his head, inviting the Lieutenant to finish his inquiry.

[simplestgift]

"You couldn't tell me what it was like? Which ship, and who was the captain? This is three years after my time, you understand."

[greenjacketed]

"Madness, as battles often are. That part don't change. I was on the Pucelle with Captain Joel Chase. He listed many of ships and their captains, but..."

An apologetic shrug. "It was eight years ago."

[simplestgift]

Archie tries to recall something from eight years ago as a frame of reference. Eight years ago, he was in prison. Forget that.

"Things do fade." He knows how silly it is to make that statement as if it is sage wisdom, but he can't think of anything else to day. He takes a sip of port wine. "You're from further along than any of us, you know."

[greenjacketed]

"Dunno what else to tell you and yours other than we're still very much at war." Of course they were. Even on the verge of pressing into France, he didn't feel like the end was near. And parts of him didn't want it to be.

But his answer was bleak, and so: "We have'em on the run. Last I heard, the Peer's preparing to march into France."