Chapter Text
After making sure her door was locked, Fontaine sat on her daybed and put her headphones on. She had just barely managed to pull her tablet out when Finn called.
“You’re punctual today, what’s the special occasion?” said Fontaine. Usually Fontaine had time to get comfortable and mess around on the internet a bit before Finn could call.
“Oh, nothing much, just far fewer fires to put out than usual,” Finn replied, “and I’m only half joking about that. Our wiring is… not great.” He grimaced.
“What, really? I hadn’t noticed!” Fontaine exclaimed in faux shock.
“Yeah, this place is a death trap,” Finn sighed, “but it’s home, you know?”
“What sort of place did you call home before the Dark Orca?” asked Fontaine. Surely there had to have been somewhere.
“Our old sub was much better, actually, it had been Grandad’s first and he handed it and the crew over to Dad when he retired… I think Dannyboy might be the only member of the original crew these days.”
“…so, you’ve lived on a sub your whole life?” asked Fontaine. She could push, ask Finn what happened that they no longer have their old sub or their old crew, but it didn’t feel right. She’d seen the wreckage with her own eyes. She knew enough.
“Yeah, haven’t you?”
“No, we’ve only had the Aronnax for a few years,” said Fontaine, “We still have a house, too, we just don’t go home all that often.”
“We used to visit mum’s side of the family, y’know, for holidays and stuff, but we haven’t done that since she died. We haven’t spent longer than a week at Grandad’s either since… Maddie was born, I think.”
“Why not?”
“That’s when the car crash killed my Aunt.”
It occurred to Fontaine that maybe he hadn’t elaborated to begin with for a reason.
“…What was your maternal family like?” Hopefully none of them had died gruesomely.
“Uncle Ted’s really into vikings, it’s actually kind of how mum and dad met to begin with,” said Finn, laughing at the memory.
“Really?”
“Yeah, they both got dragged along to a historical reenactment thing.”
“I can’t really picture your dad dressed as a viking.” A historical pirate though, maybe, she thought.
“They were basically just Norse pirates, really. Grandad could tell you more, he’s the one who dragged dad there.”
“Tell me what you do know, then.”
“Well, to start, they didn’t wear horned helmets…”
Ant was usually the one who followed their father aboard the floating market, but Fontaine wanted to be out under the open sky today. The market smelled like old wood and seawater, with hints of engine smoke if you got too close to some of the less well-maintained boats. Fontaine tried not to walk too close to the edge. There hadn’t been space on the dock closest to Dolos and his boat, so they’d had to moor several rows down from him and walk past the various criminal elements of the market as they plied their wares.
Dolos himself was no more impressed to see Fontaine than he would have been to see Ant.
“No children on board, those are the rules,” the man stated.
“It’s your boat, you make the rules and you can change them,” Will responded.
“Yes, and I said no children on board,” Dolos nodded to Fontaine pointedly. “She will have to wait outside.”
“She has a name, and no, Fontaine will not be waiting alone on the floating market.” Will scowled at his old classmate, furious that he’d dare suggest he leave a fourteen year old girl alone in such a dangerous place. As fair as his point was, though, arguing with Dolos would only put him at a disadvantage trying to negotiate terms with the man.
“I’ll be fine, dad,” Fontaine said, “I’ll stay right by the ramp until you’re done.”
“You’re sure?”
“Yeah, I know how to lay low.” She pulled the collar of her jacket up a little higher. “I’m not Ant.”
“Don’t talk about your brother like that,” said Will, trying not to smile. “Even if you’re not wrong, it’s still not nice.”
Fontaine watched her father walk up the ramp and disappear into the cabin after Dolos. She shivered. Hopefully, negotiations wouldn’t take much longer.
“Well, well. If it isn’t the sneakiest Nekton,” a distressingly familiar voice called out from across the walkway. Fontaine looked up to see Hammerhead walking across the docks, his Red Claw parked disconcertingly close to the Nekton jetboat. Fontaine scowled.
“What do you want, Hammerhead.”
“That’s Captain Hammerhead to you, lass,” replied Hammerhead, “And my business here is nothing you need to worry about.”
“If it’s with Dolos, you’re going to have to wait.”
“No-one makes Captain Hammerhead wait.”
“I’m not making you do anything, I’m just letting you know Dolos is already seeing a client.” Fontaine looked Hammerhead in the eye. “One who’s a lot less likely to try and weasel out of the bill.”
Hammerhead growled, and Fontaine realised that maybe antagonising a pirate captain in the middle of the ocean without backup was a bad idea. If Finn had accompanied his dad Fontaine was pretty sure she could have relied on him to defuse the situation. Unfortunately, Hammerhead had come alone.
“Fontaine, let’s-” Will paused halfway out the door. “Hammerhead. How… unexpected to see you here.”
“I could say the same thing about you, Nekton. I thought you were too much of a law-abider to hang about a place like this.” Hammerhead gestured broadly around the market as he spoke. Fontaine didn’t need to look to know what he was implying; the floating market was always full of thieves and smugglers. And, of course, Dolos, who was more of an enabler than an active participant, but that was close enough. Will wouldn’t even still be talking to the man if he weren’t the only person Will knew who could reliably translate any of the various ancient languages they frequently came across. The sneer on Hammerhead’s face said that none of that mattered to him if they ended up here anyway.
Neither Fontaine nor Will had anything to say to the man, so they just left.
“I really should have asked what Hammerhead was after,” said Will with a sigh. The Dark Orca was hot on their tail, apparently running a lot smoother than usual as they sped through the mediterranean sea. Dolos had obviously gone and sold the same map twice again.
“He probably wouldn't have told you anyway,” Ant pointed out.
“True, but he might have let something slip by accident,” replied Will, “He’s not very good at hiding his motives.”
Ant snorted, then went back to the game he’d been playing. Clashes with the Dark Orca were almost routine these days; Hammerhead would try to steal whatever artefact they’d found, he’d fail, then bluster a bit and chase them until the much faster Aronnax was out of sight. Facing down the Dark Orca wasn’t an intimidating prospect anymore. There was nothing their Captain could do to get one over the far superior Aronnax.
Unless we’re not on the Aronnax, Fontaine thought. The look on Hammerhead’s face when she’d told him to wait flashed through her mind. He backed down the moment he saw dad, and nothing happened. Fontaine tried to focus on the screen in front of her, but she couldn’t get that look out of her head. She stood up abruptly, drawing her parents’ attention away from the radar at the sudden movement.
“If you need me, I’ll be in the kitchen,” said Fontaine.
The hallway was quiet; the thrumming of the Aronnax’s various life support systems were almost inaudibly subtle. Not even the water-filled pipes Jeffrey was following her through made a noise.
“I’m not going to give you any snacks, Ant feeds you plenty himself.” Fontaine glared at the fish, who was doing nothing more offensive than swimming beside her. Jeffrey, predictably, didn’t respond. He just looked at her with those big fishy eyes. He continued to follow her down the hallway and into the kitchen. She could feel his glassy, oddly perceptive gaze on her as she went about making a cup of tea; boiling the kettle, getting the strainer down to use the fancy loose leaf she’d been gifted for Christmas, measuring out just the right amount, and pouring the water. Then it was only a matter of waiting.
With nothing to occupy her hands, Fontaine’s thoughts strayed back to the incident on the floating market. She didn’t like to compare Finn to his father, but sometimes it couldn’t be helped. Finn had called her sneaky once with obvious approval and affection, while his father had nothing but disdain for her. Fontaine agitated the strainer in her cup, desperate for something to do with her hands; to take her mind off of how small she'd felt in that moment before her own father appeared to rescue her.
She briefly wondered if Finn had ever felt that way about the Captain appearing.
After checking the colour of her tea, she finished it off with sugar and milk. A sudden flurry of movement as she was putting everything away caught her eye. Jeffrey was acting strange, swimming back and forth as rapidly as he could with the tight turns he had to make in the narrow tubes, until he noticed her watching and swam off rapidly down the hall. Fontaine hated to admit it, but he was a smart fish. If he was being strange, he usually had a reason. So, despite feeling ridiculous for taking orders from a fish, Fontaine followed him down the hall.
The door to her dad’s study was open.
It shouldn't have been, Will didn't leave it open even when he was in there, but there it was. Open. Something was wrong.
Fontaine crept up to the doorway and peeked in as subtly as she could. Mad Madeline had managed to crack open the storage case for their latest find, a huge rectangular block of stone with the Nekton crest on one end. There were seams along its sides and down the centre, but they hadn't been able to open it yet; her dad was hoping that Nereus would have an idea when he popped up next. But they wouldn't have anything to ask if Madeline managed to break it.
“What, exactly, are you hoping to achieve here?” asked Fontaine, startling the younger girl.
“None of your business, Nekton,” snarled Madeline. She went back to trying to move the stone box, despite it being roughly two thirds her height and almost twice as wide as she was. If it were completely hollow, she could have fit inside. Fontaine watched Madeline struggle fruitlessly for another moment, then hit call on her communicator.
“Hey dad, you might want to come up to your study, there's a pocket sized pest trying to make off with our latest acquisition.”
“I’m not a pest!” the smaller girl shouted, almost drowning out Will's affirmative reply.
“Then why did you sneak aboard like one?”
Madeline screeched in outrage and leapt at Fontaine. The force of the impact knocked Fontaine down, but she managed to flip Madeline over and put the girl in a headlock. Madeline clawed fruitlessly at Fontaine's arm, the neoprene of her wetsuit too thick for the younger girl's nails to have any effect.
“I don't know what Finn sees in you, you're a bitch to deal with.” Fontaine froze in shock, giving Madeline the opportunity to pull free and make another attempt at taking the new artefact. Fontaine managed to grab the other girl by the ankle and drag her back down to the floor as she tried to stand. Will made it to the study just as Madeline tried to go for Fontaine's face with her nails and pulled her off by the collar of her wetsuit.
“When did you manage to sneak in?” asked Will.
“A pirate doesn’t reveal her secrets,” snarled Madeline. She tried to break his hold to no avail. He readjusted his hold on her anyway and turned to talk to Fontaine.
“She didn’t manage to hurt you, did she?” he asked.
“No, not really,” Fontaine replied, “She was more annoying than dangerous.”
“I’ll go contact the Captain about Madeline then, you take care of yourself, okay?” Will ruffled Fontaine’s hair with his free hand and then escorted Madeline up to the bridge despite her loud, insistent complaints.
Fontaine was once again alone with her cup of tea, now gone cold. She took it back to the kitchen to empty it out and clean it, with nothing to occupy her thoughts except Madeline’s hate.