Chapter Text
Kipperlilly walked to the Briefing room, hoping to get a new partner for her boat. Opening the door to Corsica Jones office, she hoped to talk to her about trying to find a new person, only to see a face she recognized. Unfortunately.
"Kipperlilly! I was just about to go find you. Your last crewmate just quit, something about the demanding schedule and… other things we can talk about later. Good news though, Fig wants to join us. Want to show her the ropes."
Kipperlilly looked between her sailing instructor and Fig before rolling her eyes. Of course, just her luck that this would happen. At least they would be close to the optimal weight.
"How much do you know?" Kipperlilly asked, crossing her arms. She'd rather be back in hell then teach another new person how a boat works. Although it was nice to imagine that she knew more than Fig.
Fig scoffed. "My girlfriend lives on a boat. Take a guess."
"That doesn't explain how much you know. Do you know what the Jib is?"
"You're acting like those toxic men that are fans of bands. What's next, 'name 5 parts of a boat?'"
"Name one."
"The Boom Vang. Is that niche enough for you? Or do you want something like the third bolt on the daggerboard holder?"
"…"
Corsica cleared her throat.
"Fig, can you step out for a moment?"
Fig nodded, flashing a smile towards Kipperlilly as she closed the door behind her.
Kipperlilly looked at Corsica.
"Kipperlilly, this is what I mean. I get that you are in charge. Hell, you're great at being in charge. But you have to remember to be a teammate. You are supposed to be in sync with your crew, not above them. All your other crewmates say that you were too hard on them. So I got someone that can-"
Corsica took a deep breath, trying to phrase her next sentence as best as she can.
"I got someone that can handle you."
Kipperlilly glared at Corsica.
"Not that you're unhandleable, but I mean. You guys have a lot of chemistry with your old rivalry. Fighting is an awful lot like sailing. It requires knowledge of both your friends and foes. So I figured since you two already know a lot about each other, it would be a good match. If you hate it you can tell me, but you are at least practicing with her once. Got it?"
"This is bullshit Coach. She's probably plotting to get me again once my guard is down."
"And if she does then there will be ramifications. Is that good enough for you?"
"Fine…" Kipperlilly said, rolling her eyes.
Corsica smiled. "Great, have fun. Stay safe. And don't yell "room" at the new people they start crying."
Kipperlilly walked out of Corsica's office, heading to Shimmerstone Lake. Who did Fig think she was, gallivanting around trying to steal her spot. It was one thing for her to kill her, sending her down to hell while she brought back the rest of the her party. Sure they had fought each other, but she didn't necessarily fight Fig. It was mainly Riz and Kristen. The bastards.
"Kipperlilly. Earth to Kipperlilly."
Kipperlilly looked over to the shore line, seeing Fig next to the Flying Junior. Her Flying Junior.
"What?"
"Can you hurry up. We're wasting time because you had to go talk to coach. Less time to practice means we're running behind. Even Max and Buddy are out there, and I saw how they set up that boat. It was bad."
Kipperlilly grumbled to herself for a second. "Aren't you supposed to be good, can't you be patient, I need to grab stuff from my locker. Like our mandatory life jackets. Do you have one or do I need to grab you a spare."
"Oh shit… I knew I forgot something. Can you grab me one?"
"Fine."
Kipperlilly walked to the locker room, rummaging through her locker for her gloves, sunscreen and sailing shoes. Finding them, she walked over to the back of the room, trying to find the worst life jacket to give to Fig. Unfortunately the more time she looked, the more time Fig could mess up her carefully made boat. In the end, she grabbed a dull, gray life jacket with broken seams.
Walking back to the shore, she watched Fig tighten the Forestay.
"tsk tsk tsk tsk. Fig you know the Halyard is the first thing you do, right?"
"You do it then. Oh wait, you can't. You can't put enough tension on the Halyard. Sorry shortstop."
"You're acting like a child"
Fig smiled at her. "Yeah no shit, what do you think we are?"
"We're 17, we're basically adults. Besides I'm turning 18 in a few weeks."
"Yeah yeah yeah. Did you bring sunscreen?"
Kipperlilly held up her bottle.
"Throw it over, and can you tie a bowline knot? I gotta put on sunscreen."
Kipperlilly tilted her head in confusion, throwing over the bottle. "Why do you need to do that, aren't you immune to sunburns."
Fig quickly sprayed herself with the sunscreen, putting on her life jacket after.
"You would think, but it's more like radiant damage than fire damage. I'm only immune to fire."
Fig put on the lifejacket, fussing with it to get it to fit correctly. Kipperlilly smiled, she had picked one to make Fig undomfortable, and it looked like it was working. It coincidentally being barely the wrong size was an added bonus.
"Did you have to get the worlds worst life jacket? I swear it's like you want me to fall out the boat and drown."
"Wow… you guessed my master plan." Kipperlilly said, voice dripping in sarcasm.
Kipperlilly had never thought about the sun like that, maybe she'd have to do better at covering her newly acquired tail and horns with more sunscreen. Speaking of a tail.
"Is that… Fig is that a glove on your tail?"
Fig moved her tail around, letting the light catch the fraying fabric on it.
"Yeah, I need to get a new one to be honest. You should get one too, we could go get fitted together."
"Why the fuck do we need a glove for our tails."
"It's like a third hand Kip. A-"
"Kipperlilly."
"Kipperlilly. It's way easier to sail once you use it. Although you'll probably bad at it in the beginning, considering how new you are to it. Here, feed the Clews into the Boom, I'll show you."
Kipperlilly fed the the Clews in, watching Fig use her tail to raise the main sail while she tied a cleat hitch for the Jib sheet, before moving back to the Main halyard and tying a cleat hitch there too. Although Fig wouldn't admit, Kipperlilly could see a slight twinge of pain on her face with the use of her tail. She would have to dedicate a few sets of her practice to strengthening her tail. Why didn't she think of using her tail before.
"Well, there you go, see." Fig smirked at her.
"Are you done gloating?"
"Are you done being a dick?"
"Can we get this boat in the water now?"
"Did you tie the bowline?"
Kipperlilly stared at Fig for a second, accidentally locking them into a staring contest. eventually Kipperlilly blinked, and she quickly tied a bowline knot.
"Why can't you tie it anyways?"
"I did the entire rest of the boat. You can do one thing."
Fig looked at Kipperlilly. Fig would never admit it, but she couldn't tie a bowline knot. She tried for hours with her girlfriend. She knew how to do it in theory. The rabbit goes out the hole, around the tree, and back into the hole. The steps made perfect sense, but once she actually had the rope in front of her it all fell apart.
"Fine…"
Once Kipperlilly had finished her half of the set up, Fig could put the boat in the water from the doc.
"We really need to work on your arms, probably your everything. I could have done this in half the time."
"You're like half my size, stop bullshitting me."
Kipperlilly was probably right, though. Fig had been slacking with her workouts, too busy with touring with her band. Thank goodness she was in charge of touring now.
"At least I have abs, my whole job is about working out, unlike some classes."
"Abs didn't save you from being killed by 'some class'"
"Whatever."
Fig got the boat in the water, holding onto the boat from the dock, while waiting for Kipperlilly to raise the main sail. One of the only parts of the boat that she would allow Kipperlilly to do. At least if that part was messed up she could blame Kipperlilly. Although it would effect her too, a crew is nothing without a good skipper, that's what everyone told her. But that might have been because every skipper she had had before was a man. Maybe now things are different. Kipperlilly might actually be a good skipper. Maybe…
"Are you launching us or no? I've been done for like 5 minutes."
"I swear I'm going to make you go out on your own."
"Oh no I'm soo scared" Kipperlilly mocked
Fig pushed the boat of the dock, jumping into the boat at the last moment possible. The lifejacket kept digging into her sides, but she would be damned if she told her skipper that.
"What drills are we even doing today?"
"Whatever Corsica says I guess. It's a new season so the newbies are doing tacking and gybing drills."
"We should join them"
Kipperlilly laughed. "Please, they're idiots. They don't even know the difference between port and starboard."
"Just because they're new doesn't mean they're idiots. We were new sailors once too"
"I'm still not sure you aren't still a new sailor."
"Oh come on."
"How fast is the wind going? And from what direction?"
Fig held her hand up in the air, trying to feel where the wind was coming from. Leviathan had flags everywhere that she could use to guesstimate the speed and direction. She had never really figured it out without those flags helping her.
"Like… 7?"
"It's 10. You should have looked it up before you got here at the very least. What direction? That should at least be easy, even for you."
"Hey, I didn't even know I was sailing today. I thought Corsica was just trying to see how much I knew before putting me in a boat. Normally I do."
"You know what I hear? Excuses. Now what direction is it coming from."
"Fuck off. It's coming off the Port side. Happy?"
Kipperlilly looked at Fig, a glint of amusement in her eyes. At least she knew more than Fig, although to have a good crewmate she'd need to teach her how to read the wind on the water.
"I co-"
Corsica idled up next to the 2 sailors in her Jon Boat, the engine noise momentarily drowning out Kipperlilly.
"Alright slowpokes, want me to tow you out to the middle of the lake?"
"We aren't slow!" The pair spoke in unison.
"Alright, jeez. You get 5 minutes to get your ass out there, or else I'm dragging you out there. The newbies are practicing tacking and gybing-"
"Told you so."
"- But you two can practice starting drills and small courses. The wind is perfect for today, it'll be good for you two to practice, since you tend to lose to poor starts."
Fig raised an eyebrow at Kipperlilly. "I thought you were great?"
"It was my crewmates screwing it up."
"Oh right, I forgot nothing is your fault."
The skipper huffed at the accusation.
"Look, Kipperlilly knows the drill, start line is between my boat and the Buoy. You get the 2 minute whistle, 1 minute, 30 sec, 20, etcetera. You'll get the gist. You mess up the start, we try again. If you do well, you can keep racing to the Buoy upwind of the start line. Just watch out for the newbies they don't always respect the course confinements and they're using your start buoy for tacking and gybing."
"Is it racing if we have no competitors?" Fig asked
"I can time you?"
"Sounds good."
Corsica nodded, driving over to her position, leaving wake that jostled the boat from side to side.
Finally getting to the middle of the lake, Fig pointed out the starting line to Kipperlilly, waving to Corsica. Upon seeing that, Corsica blew her whistle.
2 long whistles. 2 minutes.
"Why are your starts bad?"
"My crews could never pull the sails in in time. You know how a start works right?"
"Mostly. You sail near the starting line, or in our case sail over to the starting line, then at about 20-10 seconds we start lining up, luff the sail, and wait for the start whistle. Then I pull in the Jib, you pull in the main sail, and we're off."
"Perfect. Thank god you're competent."
1 long whistle.
"Do you like sailing?"
"I do it. I'm good at it. I needed something after you ruined my life."
"I didn't ruin your life! Porter ruined your life."
"If you hadn't helped Ankarna I would have been fine."
"Is that really what you think? You really are dumb."
Kipperlilly moved her tiller back in forth, sending Fig stumbling under the rocking boat.
"What the fuck? Do you want us to suck?"
"I don't want you on my boat"
3 short whistles. 30 seconds
"Hey I'm mostly over it, I need you to be over it too. Or we won't have a good start. I heard if we do good these next few practices Corsica will let us join the regatta in Bastion City. I heard they have some good coaches that are looking for team members. Don't you want to be the best?"
2 short whistles.
"Of course I do, but I don't want to be the best with you"
Kipperlilly started to line the boat up with the start line.
"Luffing." Fig said, releasing tension in her jib sheet, causing the sail to flail about.
Kipperlilly did the same thing. One of the perks of being a halfling was that she didn't have to duck under the boom when her main sail luffed too.
1 short whistle. 10 seconds.
"Get ready"
Corsica counted down from 5, blowing the whistle quickly for each second. At 0, the short whistle noise became a long one, an indication of the start.
Fig and Kipperlilly started pulling in their lines at the 5 second mark, working in almost perfect unison to get both sails back to perfect and push through the start line right as the last whistle ended.
Both of them looked over to Corsica, who smiled and gave them a nod, letting them know they could continue with their race.
Seeing that, Fig stuck her feet under the hiking strap attached to the bottom of the boat, leaning her entire body as far out of the boat as possible, using her weight and leverage to keep the boat as close to even as possible. Fig looked over at Kipperlilly, seeing her do the same thing, before looking up at the main sail, checking the telltale.
"Skipperlilly"
"Kipperlilly."
"Can you let out your sail the slightest bit? The telltale is slightly high."
Kipperlilly let out the sail. She had to keep watch of the water most of the time. It was nice that her crewmate could help her with the sail microadjustments while she could just focus on steering the boat in the right course. Now they just had to get to the leyline and round the buoy.
"Tacking."
Fig nodded, starting to scoot her way into the boat, grabbing hold of the jibs other sheet, waiting for the turn.
As the boat turned, both sailors swiftly moved over to the high end of the boat, sticking their feet under the strap and leaning out of the boat again, pulling in their sails.
Once they got to leyline, they tacked again, sailing to the bouy and rounding it. Now that they were heading downwind, they could relax, stop hiking, and sit for a bit. Fig rested against the Boom, keeping the sail as far out as possible to catch as much wind as they could. She handed her jib sheets to Kipperlilly.
"That was sloppy."
"Barely."
"Barely sloppy is still sloppy. You can afford to sit out for a second longer during out turns."
"I didn't know if you warned me late, you can't expect me to read your mind Kipperlilly."
"I don't expect you to read my mind, I expect you to do as your told. I expect you to tr-"
"To trust you?"
Kipperlilly looked at Fig. "Yeah."
"Can you see why that might be difficult?"
"I know. It was a poor choice of words."
Fig looked back at Kipperlilly. It wasn't that she didn't trust Kip. Technically if she wanted she could send Kip back to hell. She had domain over her. She wouldn't tell Kip that though. It seemed cruel to remind her. But if Kipperlilly was going to bring it up as often as she is now, she might as well use it for a comeback later.
"I'm totally calling you Skipperlily."
Kipperlilly pulled on her main sheet, using it to hit Fig in the head with the boom, connecting with a dull thud.
"Dude, what the hell?"
"Don't call me that."
"Fine, I won't… to your face at least."
Shit. How had Kipperlilly forgotten that Fig would tell the rest of her party know that Kipperlilly was back. If they came to their regattas then they might try to kill her again. She hated it in hell. She had belonged there, sure, but knowing you belonged there and actually being there were two seperate things.
Fig looked at Kipperlilly, seeing the revalation dawn on her face, followed by something Fig had never seen from her. Dread.
"I won't tell my friends. I doubt they care anyways. No offense, but you were just our threat of the semester slash school year."
"You can't just say no offense and then say something offensive."
Fig grinned. That's exactly what she figured Kip would say.
"Oh hey, we're almost done with this race. How many more of these do we have to do?"
"We have like 2 more hours. So depends on how much you fuck it up."
"Again with the blaming me."
Fig and Kipperlilly crossed the line, looking at Corsica, who was beaming. She called the boat over, grabbing hold of the sidestays.
"Good Job girls! Probably the best I've ever seen from you Kipperlilly. And Fig, you were a beast out there. I'm sure you girls have what it takes. The start was good, but it was maybe a half second late. Do either of you two have a watch?"
The girls looked at each other before shaking their heads.
"I think if Kipperlilly gets one we can get the starts even better. Remember, the whistle will always be a few milliseconds late, so basing your start on them isn't always ideal. Other than that, keep up the good work. Let's try this again."
The girls nodded, and Corsica drove off to set up the start line again.
After 2 hours of practice, the girls finally were released to dock up and untack their boat.
Fig grabbed the sails and laid them agross the grass in front of the boat. starting to roll them up.
"Don't forget to roll them tightly, they need to fit into the-"
"Into the sailbag, I know. I'm used to rolling things up tightly, don't worry."
Kipperlilly looked at Fig for a second, processing what she said. "Oh my god you are unbelievable."
"I aim to please."
Kipperlilly waited for Fig to finish putting away the sails, finishing up the rest of the boat as best as she could. Once Fig left to put up the sails, she tried to copy Fig, using her tail to hold onto and pull the ropes into place.
"So, Kipperlilly." Corsica's voice rang out from behind her, startling the halfling, causing her to let go of the rope.
"Great… Can you get someone to mage hand this? The line is stuck at the top again."
"Just ask Fig. Speaking of, what do you think of you two as teammates? I think you guys did well together. Definitely good enough for competition."
Kipperlilly stared at the rope stuck to the top of the mast before seeing a mage hand grab the rope and bring it back to Kipperlilly. She turned to thank the person, just to see Fig.
"You owe me one."
"Great. Come back tomorrow and I can pay you back."
"Does this mean I'm on the team?"
"It means you're the best chance I have."
"I'll take it."
"See you tomorrow."
"See ya."
