Day 5
When the warning had gone out that the ship was preparing to leave again, Poppet had seriously considered simply staying ashore. In many ways it would have been the wiser choice, particularly after Natasha's recommendation that she stay with someone who could swim well - she had, as well, already noticed how trouble seemed to be attracted to the bulk of them, and perhaps her chances would be better if she separated herself from the ship. On the other hand, Port Royale held little charm to her. Pirates seemed to have become a cultural phenomenon in the future from the way some of the others were reacting to the whole thing as a grand adventure, but to her it was merely a smelly old place where she would have to scrounge for money to house and feed herself for the rest of the week.
Now, though, she was heartily regretting her decision to re-board. She hadn't been of any use in the fight and had resorted to staying out of the way so as not to be a burden on the others. At first she'd believed they would make it through somehow - she'd seen some of the dazzling powers that the other people who'd been dragged to the university were capable of - but when the fight actually began and she felt the ship shaking with the force of cannonball impacts, her teeth rattling with each blow, her confidence had begun to slip. And now here she was, clinging to a piece of board that she knew was never going to be enough to keep her afloat for long enough to be rescued.
To think she could have been sitting in the dining room of some inn with a hot meal right now, instead of feeling the cold seep into her bones from the ocean water and wondering what it would be like to drown. It seemed too much to think that the circus' protection would extend to her here, in another universe, several hundred years before it would even exist.
A few feet away she spotted something more sturdy than the ridiculous piece of wood that was doing increasingly less for her as the moments slipped by. It took a vast well of determination to make herself let go of the board and paddle her way towards what turned out to be some kind of box. Unfortunately it wasn't much better, the weight of whatever was inside already starting to drag it under the surface, and in desperation she summoned the small spark of magic inside of her and pushed it into the trunk, telling it sternly to float. It might have been the biggest piece of magic she'd ever done. Hard to say after six decades of life, albeit six decades where she'd been cosseted and held largely separate from the wider world and its problems. She'd always been good at levitating objects, though, and wasn't this much the same as floating a mug of cocoa through the air to her brother? Both items wanted to drop while she wanted them not to. And this time she had a strong motive, strong enough to power the spell and allow her a respite... however brief.