fh_trips | The Crown Princess - Monday [Cabins and Lido Deck]

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spring break 2009: crown princess cruise

The Crown Princess - Monday [Cabins and Lido Deck]

It was a beautiful day in the Caribbean! The sun was bright in the cloudless sky, casting no shadows on the open section of the Lido deck: Sunbathers beware. Luckily, the Horizon Court offered umbrellas at some tables for the sun shy.

Near the pools were large lettered signs discouraging guests from diving or jumping into the water due to the lack of depth.

[OOC: Cabin Listing | Ship/Shore Post | Cabins Thread | Pool & Bars | Terrace]

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"I thought perhaps we should start a pool," Alice said, seating herself near the boy with little preamble. "Whether or not you would succeed, and how long negotiations would take, in either regard. Everyone would be welcome to write their best guess and contribute a small amount of money; the closest would win. But by the time I had hatched the notion, you had already won."

Edited 2009-02-23 21:16 (UTC)

"I am an excellent negotiator," Arthur said, with an idleness born of carefully concealed confusion. The people here had a different idea of protocol, he reminded himself, and it'd do him no good to act out. "Sorry to spoil your pool."

"Quite all right," Alice reassured him graciously. "I prefer my games of chance to be more complicated and less mercenary. Though I am happy, for your sake, that you did win. I am certain other distractions will present themselves, by and by."

"So I keep hoping," Arthur said, dryly. Some impulses were hard to contain, sarcasm always chief among them where he was concerned. He tapped the edge of his glass before he took a sip, considering her. "I agree that it's good to have things sorted."

"Indeed," Alice said, folding her hands in front of her and doing her best impression of being Quite Serious Indeed. "One shouldn't like for one's affairs to be messy, after all. Even if one is on vacation."

"I find affairs around here tend to be messy as a rule," Arthur said, with a raise of his eyebrow, "A drink is the least they can get me."

That's how far politeness carried him, it seemed.

"On this ship, or on this island?" Alice asked, her own eyebrow raising to match. Because, really, verbal sparring required a certain attitude. "One isn't quite here, geographically, and the other we've hardly been on long enough to determine that sort of pattern."

Arthur waved a hand at her. "Whatever," he said, firmly, "The island. What's attached to it. I'm not partial to the specifics."

"One should say what one means and mean what one says," Alice recited, as haughtily as she could pretend to be. "Terribly confusing, if one doesn't. Though I suppose I could forgive you on the grounds that we are on vacation, and you can hardly be expected to speak precisely and clearly to every strange girl who accosts you whilst you drink. Particularly those ungracious enough not to introduce themselves."

Arthur looked at her warily. She was mad, but then so was everything that gravitated around the island, and he had not yet the experience to tell the different types apart. "You'd be right in that," he ventured, instead, "Introduce yourself, and perhaps we can put all of this confusion behind us."

"Alice Liddell, pleased to make your acquaintance," she said properly. "I would curtsy, but it would seem even more ridiculous in a bathing costume than it does when I wear denim jeans. Of late from Oxford, England, though my idea of "of late" is not that of everyone else's. Pray introduce yourself, as well, good sir?"

She could act quite proper indeed, when occasion called for it. (More or less.)

She was so proper about it it actually came as a bit of a shock. Not that Arthur would admit to it. "Prince Arthur," he said, "Of Camelot. Well met." He made a good effort to crease out any hints of shock from his brow. "And I can't disagree about the ridiculousness of curtsying in that."

There. That made things easier to deal with.

Arthur, the Once and Future King. Alice was thoroughly British enough that she had to persuade herself not to stand and bow, or embarrass herself in some other fashion.

"Quite difficult to curtsy without skirts," she said instead. "Though it would be equally difficult to swim in a dress, and possibly quite dangerous if the fabric was too heavy. Well met, indeed, Your Highness. I do believe I've met your manservant."

"And I believe you've met my roommate," Arthur replied, considering her thoughtfully. "I hope Merlin hasn't given you any trouble."

It was absolutely important that he mention that to anyone who spoke of meeting the boy. He was an idiot, after all.

"Your roommate and I spent an evening in the common room," she beamed. "For that matter, I believe Merlin was in my room, which makes it an interesting daisy-chain. Perhaps half the school had changed rooms for the night. No trouble whatsoever; he was delightful. He told me of Albion."

"Thanks for housing Leto in his time of need," Arthur said, with the ragged edges of clear deadpan. "I suppose there's little I can say if Merlin's been delightful."

Incorrigible moron seemed more the word for him. He barely bit down on 'surprising as it may seem'.

"And he would've," he continued, "No doubt."

"You are quite welcome," she said, in a fake-proper tone once more. Alice quite delighted in playing grown-up. "We were discussing his Albion and my England, and how they had some intriguing similarities. He knew some of the same town names I did. And where is Merlin? I would have expected you to be sending him about on errands, lest he enjoy himself."

"I'm not opposed to Merlin enjoying himself," Arthur said, and didn't quite catch the roll of his eyes. He managed playing the adult quite well if other people were being adults at him, but... "As long as he doesn't loiter when he has duties to tend to. As for Albion, from what I've gathered, the two lands are practically identical."

Which was... something he was both troubled and comforted by.

"And you would never invent duties because he seemed to be doing too much loitering?" she asked. As innocently as she could manage, which was not terribly. "He didn't know Oxford, but I told him it was in the south, near Kent and Sussex and Surrey and so forth. It might be some variety of a parallel world, you know. Or perhaps Albion was in fashion as a name in your time. It crops up now and again for us, but it's mostly poetic."

"I don't invent duties," Arthur said, with a clear hint of offense. "It's just that his worse actions sometimes coincide with the stables needing a good mucking-out."

This was all more important than talking about Albion, clearly. Or perhaps his mind simply hadn't managed to accept all of this parallel world lark yet.

"Cause and effect," she agreed easily, letting the other matter fall aside. "He loiters because he wishes to avoid stable-mucking, or you assign him stable-mucking because he loiters. Perhaps both at once, which would be a particularly vicious cycle."

"Or he's just an idiot with a fondness for having vegetables thrown at him," Arthur said, dryly. "And horse dung."

He was so sophisticated, really.

"One would think you could avoid the middle-man, in that matter," Alice mused. "Keep vegetables on your person, hurl them at him at your leisure."

(Was dead zomg, am back?)

He shot her a look that clearly implied she was at least partly mad. "Now why would I do that," Arthur said, "If I can find perfectly good people to do it for me who might enjoy it just as much?"

[[ welcome back to the living! ]]

"Efficiency?" Alice asked, lifting her shoulders in an idle shrug. "It would save a great deal of time, you know. Though it's quite generous of you to wish to share that joy with others. Quite noble."

(TY!)

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