fandomhigh | Keeping Your Advantage: Terrain and You [Weds, 3rd Period]

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keeping your advantage

Keeping Your Advantage: Terrain and You [Weds, 3rd Period]

Today when the students arrived, the Danger Shop was already set to today's terrain. Students would see pristine beaches stretching for miles, with an island about a half-mile offshore.

"Ladies and gentlemen, I present your compensation for having been without class while I was indisposed," Ghanima said cheerfully, although she was well away from the water, next to a trunk of gear. "You may be wondering what sort of terrain you need to learn about with a beach. Rather than build sandcastles, however, today we'll be learning about scuba diving. Water covers most of this planet, so being able to move through it is an important ability."

"Scuba diving may be performed for a number of reasons, both personal and professional. Most people begin though recreational diving, which is performed purely for enjoyment and has a number of distinct technical disciplines to increase interest underwater, such as cave diving, wreck diving, ice diving and deep diving."

"Divers may be employed professionally to perform tasks underwater. Most of these commercial divers are employed to perform tasks related to the running of a business involving deep water, including civil engineering tasks such as in oil exploration, underwater welding or offshore construction. Commercial divers may also be employed to perform tasks specifically related to marine activities, such as naval diving, including the repair and inspection of boats and ships, salvage of wrecks or underwater fishing, like spear fishing."

"Other specialist areas of diving include military diving, with a long history of military frogmen in various roles. They can perform roles including direct combat, infiltration behind enemy lines, placing mines or using a manned torpedo, bomb disposal or engineering operations. In civilian operations, many police forces operate police diving teams to perform search and recovery or search and rescue operations and to assist with the detection of crime which may involve bodies of water. In some cases diver rescue teams may also be part of a fire department or lifeguard unit."

She went on to explain how to suit up properly, as well as the mechanics of scuba diving. "Today we're looking at two ways you might need to use the ocean, and scuba, to achieve a goal," Ghanima continued. "There's three scenarios today, and you can choose just one, or all, if you have the time."

"So suit up, and enjoy the water."

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"Yes, Elsa?" Ghanima replied. "What is it?"

"I... can't do the assignment today," she hedged, sounding apologetic. "I've never swam in my life, and I don't really have a great relationship with the ocean."

For many varied, exciting reasons!

"Considering I come from a planet without water, I understand not everyone has had the chance to learn to swim," Ghanima replied. "In fact, I do believe my first attempt involved my friend, Max, throwing me into the ocean here in Fandom."

"Let's see if we can't come up with an alternate assignment, shall we?" Ghanima considered their virtual beach thoughtfully. "Have you ever seen a tide pool, Elsa?"

"I've... never really stopped to inspect one," Elsa admitted, chewing on her lip for a moment, looking quite relieved. "I hear they're often teeming with life, though."

"They are. Each one their own tiny, unique kingdom," Ghanima said, lifting her skirts just enough to keep from dragging in the sand as she started off in search of one for them to look at. "How about we being with a high-tide pool, and if we have time, you can examine a low-tide one as well? Sea anemones are beautiful creatures, and perhaps if we're lucky we'll catch a few hermit crabs."

"That... that would be wonderful," Elsa replied, giving Ghanima a thankful smile. "I keep meaning to take the time to look around at things outside my own home more often, especially now that I'm out here and I have the chance to, but I don't think I can face diving quite yet."

She followed along with Ghanima, keeping just a half-step behind her and a little to the side as her gaze moved over the sand underfoot.

"Have you spent much time looking at tide pools before?"

"I started the habit when I came here, as I often do my martial training on the beach, when weather permits," Ghanima replied. "My father's family comes from an ocean world - a world that is almost nothing but ocean - while my mother's people only have oceans of sand. I'd never seen an ocean in-person before coming here, and while that much water is still... uncomfortable, sometimes I like looking at the tide pools, and meditating on my father and grandmother."

Elsa's answering smile was somewhere between knowing, and a little sad.

"I could always see the ocean from my bedroom window," she shared. "Arendelle used to be a major port, before all trade was cut off to other kingdoms. But it's been so long since I actually got to go to the water, there, it might as well have been a painting on the wall. And here, I never really felt inclined to. The possibility of tiny ecosystems standing alone apart from the ocean itself was the farthest thing from my mind, when I decided to attend school on an island."

She didn't get out much, anyway.

Edited 2014-11-13 18:37 (UTC)

"Ah, here we go," Ghanima said, kicking off her boots to climb up on some rocks; and there it was, a little tide pool nestled in between the nooks and crannies. "--trade cut off to a port city? Have your people considered lighting whatever armada is 'visiting' on fire, or will that simply make things worse?"

The corner of Elsa's mouth twitched a little in a wry smile as she stepped out of her own shoes and carefully picked her way along the rocks after Ghanima.

"If it was a case of an oppressive armada, Arendelle wouldn't stand for it," she noted. "It's not nearly so simple, though. The ones who closed the city's gates were on the inside, the King and Queen themselves. They never explained to the kingdom just why they did so, but Arendelle is strong, and has more than enough resources to survive, possibly even thrive, for years to come without contact with the world outside."

She took a moment to crouch down to inspect the little tide pool, and smiled a little as she watched a tiny starfish slowly making its way over to a little mussel, stranded among the rocks.

"They won't be the ones to open the gate again, I'm afraid. They were killed at sea in a storm... very nearly a year ago, now. Their oldest daughter is too young to step up as Queen herself yet, and so the kingdom is stuck in a holding pattern until she's able to take the throne and decide what's best for our home."

"Ah." There were layers of wry understanding packed into that comment, and Ghanima selected a piece of driftwood, gently sliding it into the water to see if she could convince a hermit crab to climb it.

She always had been forever poking at the creatures that pinched when threatened.

"No regent, then? I suppose that's both a curse and a blessing," was all she said instead. "My aunt was regent for my brother and I until we reached our majority, but it was... polarizing."

"No regent," Elsa agreed, softly. "The two servants who stayed with the family after the gates were closed and most of the castle staff was let go have been doing their best to take care of the kingdom and the two princesses, but there isn't much longer to wait before Arendelle's next Queen is old enough to take the throne."

Elsa quietly watched as the crab puzzled out what to do about that driftwood. She was speaking far more candidly, now. The understanding in Ghanima's voice made it clear that this conversation was being understood, beyond just the words that were being said.

That on its own was a relief.

"Do you mind if I ask... what you mean by polarizing?"

"My aunt, like my brother and I, was born gifted," Ghanima said, glancing over at Elsa, her blue-on-blue eyes unblinking. "We are what is called 'Preborn,' those who were aware and conscious before birth, and have the memories of all our ancestors whom have come before us in our minds. It is a constant balancing act, staying 'Ghanima' in the face of all those who want nothing more than to live again, through you if necessary. It is especially difficult as a child, when your sense of 'self' is constantly in flux."

"Preborn is rare. Most call it Abomination. We're generally killed at birth, if not before." Ghanima clicked her tongue at her crab, giving him a tiny nudge with the stick. "Alia was still a child herself when my father - her beloved brother, the only person in the entire galaxy who understood and loved her without reservation - died, and in the wake of my parents death, she faced the fact her mother had fled the planet that had violently taken her lover and son from her and abandoned Alia in the process. She was left alone, a prophetess and holy creature with no friends, now responsible for a galaxy and two small, helpless infants. We could think as adults think, reason as humans reasoned, with thousands of years of experience in our minds, but our bodies were still those of newborns."

Ghanima watched her crab poke at the stick, and she laughed, shaking her head. "More than Preborn, she was Atreides. We are cursed - or gifted - with the talent to see the shifting roads of fate, if we are willing to take the risks. Alia would risk anything to prevent anyone else dying, anyone else leaving her. She succumbed to Possession by her grandfather, a terrible man, and did many terrible things. Most of them, she did for love of us. Because she thought it was the only way to keep House Atreides safe from its enemies."

"She standardized currency across the galaxy. She forced a peace on the Great Houses that had been stabbing at each other for centuries. She continued my father's dream of bringing enough water to Dune that no man would ever have to pay to drink another man's dishwater. In the process, she almost destroyed a planet and an ecosystem, ordered the death of thousands of dissidents, plotted the assassination of her mother, and attempted to marry me off to the man we suspected of murdering my brother, so that she could maintain power." Ghanima smiled faintly. "Alia was as magnificent as she was terrible."

"You loved her or loathed her. There were no other options, when it came to Alia."

"No," Elsa breathed, having forgotten about the tidepool entirely as Ghanima spoke, watching her with wide eyes, "I suppose there weren't. She sounds... ruthless, and effective, and one might not necessarily make up for the other at all, depending on where you're standing."

"Hence polarizing. I loved her very much, and mourned her long before her physical death," Ghanima replied. "Alia was ruthless indeed, and mesmerizing. Effective and besieged by demons. One person, in all their brilliance and their faults."

The crab had latched on to the end of Ghanima's stick, and she carefully lifted him from the water. "Like our friend crab, here. Should his shell become too small and no other is available, he may round up a posse of other small friends, and they will find the largest shelled creature they can and pry it from its shell. But then, they'll form a chain, largest to smallest, and swap shells almost simultaneously. It's called a vacancy chain, and can benefit up to twenty individual crabs, as well as the anemones that often live on their shells. Now all will grow and prosper... except, perhaps, the original owner of the largest shell."

"Now, would his initial assault on the shell's owner outweigh all the good he did for the other crabs? Or do they exist simply as two different things this crab has done? I suppose it depends on which crab you ask, although I have yet to meet a crab that was sociable enough to discuss philosophy with."

"Maybe they're pleased that they know something we don't know," Elsa suggested, smiling just a little bit as she leaned in to get a closer look at the crab. "Questions like that one don't come with answers for us as easily as they do a line of crabs in need of shells, I don't think."

She glanced up at Ghanima, biting her lip for a moment before speaking again.

"I don't know that I would ever want the answer to a question like that one to be so simple."

"The right answer is rarely a simple answer, sadly, despite what some arm-chair philosophers may claim," Ghanima agreed. "Sometimes, I think it's best that there *is* no one answer. I prefer infinite questions, myself."

"Questions that lead into other questions?" Elsa contemplated that for a moment as she reached a tentative hand into the tidepool, thankful for the wristbands that Barry had made for her, to stroke the back of the little starfish she had spotted before. "I think I might prefer questions that lead to answers that raise more questions, myself. Discovery, and curiosity, and learning -- I can appreciate when one leads to the next."

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Keeping Your Advantage: Terrain and You [Weds, 3rd Period]

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