Intro and Predestination
Thought it about time I read myself in, so to speak, got it out of the way. Lieutenant Thomas Pullings - you can call me Tom, unless you're under me on the HMS Surprise, in which case that's Mr. Pullings to you ;) I'm first lieutenant to Captain Jack Aubrey, Lucky Jack Aubrey.
And now that's done with...
I can't say I know prodigious much about predestination, but where I am now is the only place I've ever really hoped I'd be. Well, when I first went off to sea back *years* ago when I was just a snivelling midshipman that puked at the first glimpse of a swell, I was bloody-minded sure I'd be made Post one day, but bit by bit it dawned on me; a commission's right hard come by these days, and I've served with midshipmen twice my age and even older... Just look at Captain Aubrey and the trouble even a great man like he is can have when it's left up to the Admiralty. I've got to understand the way of things over the years, and that it ain't necessarily right that I'd have my own ship and crew one day, and be stalking to and fro up on the starboard quarterdeck with a pair of gold epaulettes tacked to my coat.
But here I am, after all that - Lieutenant Tom Pullings. First Lieutenant, what's more, and under Captain Aubrey. Even if I never get my step, even if I never get my own command, this feels right somehow. Now it comes to it, perhaps that's what you'd call predestination after all.
Ah, that's eight bells just rung - I'd better get to my watch. Says somewhere in the Articles that sleeping on watch, even if I'm not exactly sleeping, is a hanging offence, and though Dr. Maturin's give damn good physic, there's no physic I've seen can fix a stretched neck.
~Lt. T Pullings
HMS Surprise
(x-posted to theatrical_muse
And now that's done with...
I can't say I know prodigious much about predestination, but where I am now is the only place I've ever really hoped I'd be. Well, when I first went off to sea back *years* ago when I was just a snivelling midshipman that puked at the first glimpse of a swell, I was bloody-minded sure I'd be made Post one day, but bit by bit it dawned on me; a commission's right hard come by these days, and I've served with midshipmen twice my age and even older... Just look at Captain Aubrey and the trouble even a great man like he is can have when it's left up to the Admiralty. I've got to understand the way of things over the years, and that it ain't necessarily right that I'd have my own ship and crew one day, and be stalking to and fro up on the starboard quarterdeck with a pair of gold epaulettes tacked to my coat.
But here I am, after all that - Lieutenant Tom Pullings. First Lieutenant, what's more, and under Captain Aubrey. Even if I never get my step, even if I never get my own command, this feels right somehow. Now it comes to it, perhaps that's what you'd call predestination after all.
Ah, that's eight bells just rung - I'd better get to my watch. Says somewhere in the Articles that sleeping on watch, even if I'm not exactly sleeping, is a hanging offence, and though Dr. Maturin's give damn good physic, there's no physic I've seen can fix a stretched neck.
~Lt. T Pullings
HMS Surprise
(x-posted to theatrical_muse