LBJ Campfire, Monday Evening

[rocksthescarf.livejournal.com]

Chuck didn't know who started the campfire outside his cabin but he was glad that someone did. He was capable of working a lighter but that whole Boy Scout-y wood and newspaper in the optimal fire starting position thing was lost on him. So when people did the hard stuff for him he was appreciative. Silently appreciative. He wasn't about to be thanking people out loud.

Now he was sitting back against a log with a joint in his hand and was debating going back inside the cabin to grab marshmallows. Maybe after the munchies set in.

[Open! You will keep me entertained whilst I wait for the Gossip Girl finale]

Comments

[bitten_notshy]

Jack smiled at the blush, then ducked his head briefly before answering. "It was his manner," he answered. "I could tell what I was saying didn't make any sense to him, and he didn't seem like a good actor."

He brought a hand to his chin. "I was always told Malory was full of lies, anyhow."

[blondecanary.livejournal.com]

"He wrote the first legends, right?" Dinah checked, not sure of her facts. "There's been a half dozen movies and a musical play about them now. And it is weird, to have Merlin telling me the legends got it wrong. Arthur's not a stable boy, his dad's alive. You're lucky you didn't meet Arthur first, the huffiness would've been huge if you'd reacted that way to him."

[bitten_notshy]

"He wrote the version I read as a boy, and one of the first compilations in modern English," Jack confirmed. (He'd been raised to be pedantic about such things.) "So you think the legends are about them, and it's not just a coincidence of names? And I'm yet to meet Arthur."

[blondecanary.livejournal.com]

"I guess they could be? There's a lot of similarities. Their facts are just off enough from the usual version for it to be possible that someone got them wrong, and made up some of the romantic parts to be more interesting." Dinah grinned. "Arthur's a good guy, but really aware he's a prince and most people here aren't. He's giving me fencing lessons, but he can take some getting used to." Massive, massive understatement. "If you use his titles, he'll be a lot more friendly."

[bitten_notshy]

"That's what legend is, isn't it?" Jack asked, brushing his hair down. "Someone takes facts and adds romance or violence to make them interesting."

He nodded at what she'd said about Arthur; it was something to keep in mind, at least. "You fence?" he asked, instead.

[blondecanary.livejournal.com]

"True enough. It's odd thinking you know a legend, though. But it's odder for them, I think," she said, thinking of Merlin's vehemence that he was not That Guy. Dinah brightened up at the question about fencing. "Yup! Well, since February. It's with broadswords, not foils," she added. "In case something invades that needs to be killed a lot. Do you fence?"

[bitten_notshy]

"I know how to," Jack said with a nod. He'd lived with a legend for ten years; he thought it was decidedly stranger from his side, especially given Sebastien's predilection for casually dropping into conversation that this poem or that play had been based in part on him. (And, these days, Mr. Doyle's detective.) "My guardian wanted me to know ... well, anything he thought was useful. Fencing is useful."

A thin smile. "Just with foils, though. I haven't been trained to kill anything all that thoroughly."

[blondecanary.livejournal.com]

"It is useful." Dinah turned a little red, hoping Jack didn't think she was bragging. Skill with a sword was great, the killing part... not so much. "I haven't used one here in the invasions, I'm not good enough yet. Just guns and sticks, and whatever was handy." That might have sounded worse. Wonderful.

[bitten_notshy]

Jack didn't think she was bragging; he also didn't think it was ladylike, but there seemed to be different rules for that here and he wasn't one to deny a woman her skill based on gender alone.

But he couldn't resist a comment. "Women fight here, then," he said. "I mean, without magic."

[blondecanary.livejournal.com]

"Uh-hunh. Some don't, but a lot of us do-- I've been training for a year and a half now, others even longer. Ninjas, and swordswomen, and some of them know magic too." Dinah looked thoughtful, trying to remember her history. "Not so much in 1899 where you're from, yet? Mostly nurses in the army, if they even do that?"

[bitten_notshy]

"Not so much, no," Jack agreed, handwavily giving a quick explanation of what he knew. "A ninja? What, like a samurai?"

[blondecanary.livejournal.com]

"Right, exactly. Hinata and Ino are both from a Japan where they've been trained as ninjas-- they have different specialties, but Ino goes out on assignments all the time. Temari just graduated, she was one too. Jaina and Tahiri are Jedi knights, well, knight-in-training, for Tahiri. That's in another galaxy, though." Dinah grinned. "And there's some girls who just like to fight. We all end up at Fight Club on Sundays."

[bitten_notshy]

"You're about the third person to mention Fight Club to me," Jack mentioned. "I may have to go some week, just to see what the fuss is."

[blondecanary.livejournal.com]

"It's really cool," Dinah said. "Professor Atreides, she's tutoring me in other stuff--" To mention that or not? Maybe. Just not yet. "She runs it with Tyler. Um, Mr. Durden. He's not teaching this semester. There's the school gym and salle if you want to find someone else to spar with at another time, though."

[bitten_notshy]

"I'm sure you'll find me at one of them, anyhow," Jack promised. "I don't do well with too much time on my hands."

[OOC: OK to drop this?]

[blondecanary.livejournal.com]

"Cool!"

[and np!]