Sink or Swim {{OPEN}}

[zidane]

The life of a Roman soldier was a life of action and decisiveness, and being able to do what was necessary for the greater good. As the praetor in the camp of the roman decedents, Zidane thought that this philosophy was harder to put into practice than anyone really thought about. Especially in times that were getting THIS chaotic. He remembered the days when he was just a harmless flirt, floating around the camp and surprising the socks off of everybody with how fast and skillful he was with two swords and a sharp and silver tongue. He pretty much hit on anything alive and female, and he also had as many enemies from it as he had friends.

The transition between that time and where he was now was astounding. Staggering, really. Now he was Zidane the office-body, spending most of his time either in the principia doing paperwork and incidence reports, or scouting around for troublesome signs that he kept catching wind of when he was paying enough attention. There were enough reports of people who did stupid things or flew off the handle. Really, what did anyone expect from a camp full of hormonal teenagers who were brought up to direct their violent tendencies into war games and awkward socializing? But still, some days when he woke up in the morning, he rolled over in his praetor’s bed and wondered for the million-and-somethingth time what he was doing in this position.

Finally, the stress was getting to Zidane enough that a dip in the heated swimming pool in the dead of night was certainly not the most irrational thing he was capable of at this point. Floating aimlessly in the quiet, he finally let his feet touch the bottom and he sunk down a bit with a groan. Not only was his brain hurting from all of what had been going on for the past few weeks especially, but his body was also aching and tense from the stress. He’d hoped that the pool might help him relax enough to get a good night’s sleep, but so far, it wasn’t doing much for him. Maybe he should have found someone with him to talk to about some of this junk, but who would still be up right now, and who could he talk to without having to look over his shoulder? "Ugh, gods help me," Zidane said to no one in particular. Life was complicated. He sunk down more into the water until his mouth and nose were submerged and he let out an exasperated stream of bubbles.


Word Count: 421
Tags: Open

[Deleted]

Gunnar was normally awake at night, not that many could tell anyways. He slept with his eyes open and it had freaked more than a few people out. Not that he didn’t mind, Gunnar was always ready for a good chance to give someone a heart attack or send them to the infirmary for a bout of high blood pressure. And as per usual, he enjoyed the idea of messing with that cute little girl in the infirmary. Tessa, that’s what her name was. Oh how Gunnar loved to torment her and he had to say that if it wasn’t for the fact that she didn’t jump or nearly go into a dead faint every time he popped in behind her. It was priceless. But as it was the dead of night, he didn’t know if she was awake enough for him to actually scare her thoroughly. Gunnar thought that if her night time wanderings had anything that indicated she was busy learning something new, she was probably up, or asleep. He didn’t particularly care one way or the other.

Gunnar swung his legs out of the bed that the cohort provided for him. Though it was still up in the air on whether or not he was going to continue with the legions. As he was always neutral, till something piqued his interest of course, he would hang out in New Rome once he saw fit. It would mostly be if his contracts had gotten in the way of being in the legion. Though most would frown down on him for putting his other jobs before the legion, though most wouldn’t understand why he did what he did. Gunnar grabbed a towel from his trunk and a pair of his swim shorts. No, they weren’t cheap, not at all. Gunnar didn’t do cheap at all. His suits were top of the line comfortable and the best that money could buy. They were cheap compared to some of the other things he had. His jobs paid very well and if he had even cared to live a minimalist life style, he could live well into retirement. Even at the rate he was going he was going to retire and never have to work again. The soft and rather plush, it had better be, after all it was the best Egyptian cotton that he had found on a trip that was so long ago.

The Chlorine hit his nose, almost instantly as he pushed the door open. Gunnar slipped through the shadows and into the locker room. He quickly changed, setting his under shirt, flip flops, and other things into the locker as he changed into his swim trunks. As per usual, the slate grey matched fairly well against his tanned skin and went well with his dark hair. For being a legacy of death (both ways mind you), he wasn’t as pale as the rest of his family. Though in Ukki’s defense, Grandfather Pluto always seemed to like to burden the poor man with so much paperwork. There was a lot on Gunnar’s mind, there always was, but it was nice to have someone like Ukki to understand him and the pain. Though to be honest, Gunnar was rather for not even admitting to having emotions. But according to Ukki that was a bad thing to do. He stepped out of the changing room and into the actual heated pool. The shadows were running rampant and he sensed a heartbeat. If the heartbeat wasn’t enough to clue Gunnar into the fact that he wasn’t alone, the plea to the gods was the next clue.

He watched as the other male, he knew him as the praetor Zidane, sink lower and lower into the pool. “Now why would the praetor’s be praying to the gods?” Gunnar’s face drew into a smirk, which was the only emotion that ever crossed his face from time to time. Well with the few exceptions of course, Gunnar didn’t particularly care to show people how he felt. Gunnar slid into the water, the warmth seemingly melting away the knots in his shoulders. Felicity was always complaining that he was worked too much and too stressed. For the record, Gunnar really had less than a care in the world. He wasn’t stressed and he wasn’t over worked. Gunnar thought he could really take in another couple of contracts per year. “It’s been a while since I last saw you, Praetor Zidane, don’t tell me you’re doing like Remus and keeping yourself cooped up in the principia.” Gunnar submerged his head in the water, brushing his hair back. He let out a sigh of relief, he stretched, his body’s joints all popped. There was a good bit of built up pressure. He made a mental note to do this if he ever felt the need for another midnight wandering.

[zidane]

The warm water was doing amazing and wonderful things for the tension that was trapped in Zidane’s muscles from the stress he’d been under. He was mentally berating himself for not thinking of coming to the heated pools before when he’d started feeling overwhelmed. But seriously, who thinks rationally when they’re running on a lack of sleep and singly focused on dealing with the cesspool of issues that had continued to pop up as the days went by? Well, maybe he should have taken a moment to breathe, but he was suspecting with a little bit of dread that Remus’s work ethic might have been rubbing off on him. Oh gods, could it get any worse? Frustrated, the blonde ran his hand though his soaked locks of hair and pushed it into a confusing mess of tangles, emitting a groan. Some days he wished he could tell someone else to do his job, but he was far too aware of the honor and repercussions of refusing it that he’d be facing if he were to back down now. Maybe he just needed to figure out how to delegate his time better without burning out. It was really all so confusing.

On top of the feeling of being buried in his work, Zidane was starting to realize that the camp was certainly large and full of people who always came and went. Normally he was made aware of all of the comings and goings, but to assume that he was conscious of it and knew everyone who moved between areas, camps, worlds, or wherever the heck they came and went to, was so dumb an idea it was funny. Sure, Zidane had always been a very social and gregarious guy, but his memory for every person he’d ever seen was somewhat dull, and he was always a little embarrassed to admit that he didn’t know everyone who knew of him. With the increased traffic of veterans, civilians, and even heavenly traffic into the camp, it was a wonder Zidane remembered anyone’s name. Yeah, yeah. He was getting into a pattern of being a bit on the complaining side, but surely he’d earned the right to rail a little bit on his current sorry state. He’d imagined that he’d be doing it alone tonight though.

Instead, his sharp ears picked up on the sounds of someone moving around in the building, and he realized that his hair stood on end a little bit as he felt the presence of the mysterious person grow closer. Although Zidane was not so well acquainted with all of those who passed through the camp, the feeling he was getting alerted him that he likely did know who was coming in for a midnight dip and he wasn’t at all sure of how to feel about it. As if to confirm his suspicions, as his head sunk lower into the water, he saw the silhouette of the legacy pretty much everyone shied away from. With the reputation as one of the most self-serving and scary people in all of camp Jupiter, which was somewhat bolstered by the drawling way Gunnar asked him why he was spewing agitated prayers to the heavens, the stream of agitated bubbles grew a little stronger as Zidane wondered what he’d done to deserve having his night intercepted by this particular member of camp.

Then again, Zidane had to admit that he knew very little except the rumors that flew around camp about Gunnar, and being just and unbiased was supposed to be a desirable trait in a praetor. So, he figuratively sucked up his conceptions and schooled his features into a civilized expression and stood back up, letting the water flow back down his skin in a comfortable way. “I was just hoping they might take pity on me and give me less paperwork. I doubt they particularly care about my past-times at work, though.” He grinned in a genial manner, though it might have been edged with weariness. “ Ah, well. You know. I try to set myself apart from Remus, but I think we might find his corpse in the stacks of paperwork if I left him to take care of it all. And to what do I owe the pleasure of this unexpected dip in the pool at this late hour?”

[Deleted]

Gunnar rarely felt anything. But the last time he took a pro bono job, he did have a slight bit of emotion. Oh this particular job was rather satisfying and Gunnar had a bit of particular glee when he slid his dagger across the man’s throat. He watched the man choke on his own blood and the light left his eyes. He took a bite of apple before he left a butter fly as a calling card. The apple had been grey payment from the sweet little girl. He wanted to check back up on her later, he did have some bit of protective nature in him. For all of the torment and torture he put some people through, he thought about Tessa, the girl in the infirmary that he loved to make her lovely hair stand on end. That would be fun for later on in the morning. He always enjoyed watching people, gathering information on them and using it for a later date, though a good bit of information he had on people could be found at the principia. No he had a massive file system and then back up file system hidden about in places of shadow. He wanted to keep all of the knowledge he had safe and in places that no one could find. There was a good deal of information he had on Felicity, his Aunt. She had been acting suspicious and there was a good bit of sudden change in the way she acted. Gunnar wasn’t stupid, he knew that people didn’t change their ways on a whim. Gunnar also wanted to know why she was asking so many questions. There were questions about his work, what he did, his training, and even whether or not he would kill someone for the particularly right price. Gunnar couldn’t help but shake his head, it was all rather stupid though he would try his hardest to remain neutral until someone piques his interest.

Gunnar watched Zidane for a brief moment. He knew of the rumors that circled around the camp about him. Most of the people regarded him as one of the scariest people in the world. Or at least in all of New Rome or Camp Jupiter. Gunnar could only wonder which particular rumors that Zidane had heard. While Gunnar could easily put them to rest, he tended to like to keep people in the dark at times. Though he had his loyalties to particular people. It would seem that Zidane would happen to be one of them by proxy of being close to Remus. With the exception of Praetor Remus and the gods, no one else knew about the oath he had taken when he first entered into the legion. It was a young age and it was so long ago, but even during the war two years past, no matter who tried to buy him out, he still stayed loyal to the camp. He would never raise a weapon against the camp. His information was at the disposal for the Praetors and them alone. He didn’t just give it out on a whim. Gunnar knew the value of having stuff and information. But it was a nice thing to have leverage over people. It was the most fun feeling to have people in terror and quiet to say things no matter who was around. Or wasn’t around, Gunnar had, after all, taken to sticking to the shadows and garnishing information which he would use at a later date.

Gunnar dove down to the bottom of the pool, letting a stream of bubbles slide out of his mouth as he kicked off the bottom, trying to surface. He tilted his head to one side and then the other, trying to rid his ears of water. He took in a breath. Maybe it would be a good idea to put the good Praetors fears at ease. “Praetor Zidane, while I’m sure the Gods do pay heed to our cries and plights, I feel the need to trouble you with some information you may or may not find particularly useful.” Gunnar stated, his smirk had vanished, leaving a blank and neutral face. He watched the younger male with passive thoughts, shoving aside the urge to run a blade across his neck. It would be too easy, but he had made a promise and had some people’s best interests at heart. “But while we may need to check Remus for death via paper cuts, there is something I wish for you to know.” Gunnar’s passive face and brown eyes watched the Praetor intently.

There were many things that revolved around his mind. But as he found that he was better off by speaking simply and not sugar coating things. He didn’t want to sugar coat things, the truth always was best and that’s how he dealt with things. “Praetor, there are things going on that might have flown under your attentions. I merely seek to offer you the same services that I give to Remus.” Gunnar stated. He flexed his fingers and they had already started to wrinkle. Not that he minded, just simply becoming over saturated. “I swore an oath on the River Styx to never raise my blade against the camp and its praetors. The information that I have is at your disposal if you so wish, though it would be unwise to ignore what I have.” Gunnar tilted his head, waiting for a bit of a sign that Zidane might have let his guard down. Not that he was intending to kill him, no, he respected Zidane, though maybe Remus more so since they were on friendly terms. What Gunnar was looking for was a sign that Zidane might take the information that Gunnar had to offer for the defense of the camp.