stanbill drama for sixfingerednerd

[goodguygrifter]

So this little bastard's in front of him, okay, a kraken or some shit, and she's having a little tantrum, tentacles waving everywhere, that's fine. That would all be fine, if she wasn't waving them at his ship. His ship. One of those tentacles slaps between him and Ford and he hits the deck, rolls and looks over at Ford, wide-eyed. And that's it, alright? No one would disagree, right, there's nothin' wrong with trying to take a little control back, not for his brother, on his ship. His wide eyes narrow, and he gets to his feet.

"Aww, did we wake the widdle baby from her nap?" He stands there, feet set wide, arms on his hips, and his voice carries somehow, all the way from his mouth to that big slimy face, all high up. "Look, how old are you, not even a thousand? I know that first millenium's rough, kid, but life's gonna' go a whole lot easier for you if you learn to recognize the big leagues when you see 'em." 

The kraken shrieks and flails, trying to smash the boat again. This time, the tentacle heads for exactly the place he last saw Ford.

She's not just trying to break his boat, he realizes. She's trying to break Ford, and Stanley feels something shift in him, his face is a scowl and he reaches out and his fist, closed over nothing, tightens. The kraken shrieks again and this time she ain't angry, and Stan's scowl turns into something with too many teeth in it.

"Warned you, didn't I," he asks, cheerful now that things are kinda' going his way. "Look, I'll make you a deal! Come back in another thousand years, try that again, maybe I'll even give you a free swing! But for now it's time to stop that little tantrum, okay?" 

"Hey, Stanford!" He calls it over his shoulder, not turning his head to look. "You wanted to give this kid a little interview, right? Do a little of that research you like so much? Well, go ahead and ask all the questions you want, 'cause I think we got ourselves our first captive audience!"

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[sixfingerednerd]

One of these days, Ford is going to have to tinker with his universal translator and see if he can't add Deep One to its library of known languages. This entire process would have gone a whole lot more smoothly if only he could actually communicate with the Kraken - assuming it was intelligent enough to hold a conversation in the first place.

As it stands, he's having about as much luck talking with the beautiful abomination as he usually does with cycloptopi, which is to say - none at all.

She lets out an ear-piercing shriek and lashes out at him, one massive limb hurtling downward with enough force to crack the ship in half. Ford gets the hell out of dodge as quickly as he can by lunging to the side, using the momentum to propel him forward as he twists, instinctively turning his shoulder to the ground so he can roll off of it and get back on his feet without having to scramble and waste precious time he can't afford to spend.

He fully expects the boat to be split in half before he can find his footing, but to his shock, that doesn't happen. The boat doesn't even take a hit. Ford turns around quickly, wondering what in the hell is happening - only to immediately wish he didn't know. Over the roar of the ocean and the screaming of the kraken, Ford hears his brother's voice, he sees his brother talking and making words, but those words aren't his. Neither is the unholy force he's using to keep the kraken at bay - and God, just thinking that makes him feel ill, let alone seeing it in action.

It's been happening for a while now, Stanley knowing things he shouldn't, being able to do things no mortal man ever could. It's all been small things until now, though, little things that Ford could ignore or explain away or excuse. Lifting a few wallets out of the pockets of unsuspecting tourists with his mind was one thing; stopping a massive eldritch creature in its tracks through sheer force of will is another matter entirely.

The boat rocks violently beneath the torrential waves, and for the first time in a long while, Ford finds himself feeling unsafe in the water, unsafe in this tiny boat in the middle of the ocean with no one around for miles save for a monster and his brother. And the kraken.

"Stanley." He tries not to sound as alarmed as he feels, and comes up a bit short. "You need to stop what you're doing. You need to stop right now."

It's not a request.