Vaia placed her personal affects in a corner of the kitchen in a slow and methodical manner. The kitchen itself was a room about six paces wide and ten paces long. There was a single door into it and this door was perfectly centered between the left and right walls. A large counter was placed in the center of the room, it hosted a flat wooden counter-top and cupboards on both sides. A few hooks were set into the low ceiling, from which to hang herbs and spices for drying, or whatever else it was that cooks liked to hang. Along the left wall there was another counter top with cupboards below it, filled with pots, pans, knives, and eating utensils. A single stove was set into the far right wall and it was a well made cast iron thing, sitting in a single step deep stone square, which hosted enough water to extinguish any accidental flames. Crates and boxes lined the room, housing ingredients, yet unpacked but probably inspected. The room likely felt claustrophobic and small even if the boxes were unpacked, Vaia observed. The ceiling was just barely high enough for her to stand to full height and she knew that most of the taller crew members would have difficulty feeling comfortable here.

Good. To hell with them. They needed to stay out anyway.

There was a stinging within her chest as she looked about the kitchen, one she knew very well-- the sting of her pride. Vaia grit her teeth then clenched her fists tight as she looked about the bare kitchen space. She needed something else to focus on that wasn't her growing distaste for the position she was placed in-- ah, that's right, she needed a place to sleep. Turning to the wall behind herself, which was at the far end of the kitchen, directly across from the door, she took a brief measurement, then figured she could sleep on this bare strip of floor, directly in front of the pantry door. Likely, they would want her sleeping with the rest of the crew. That was fine-- Vaia figured she could justify her presence in the kitchen as both a safeguard and a preparatory necessity. Simple enough. What she would likely have trouble with was if anyone tried to come in at night. 

Already Vaia began working out a training regimen for herself. This required people leaving her the hell alone at night and the cost was sleep. There was no way Vaia was going to let her skills dull while being forced to perform [i]bitch-work[/i] and she'd be damned if she stayed in this position long enough for someone to want her here. No. If there was one thing Vaia knew, it was that she couldn't stay here for long, and her mere presence here was already burning down her precious tolerance for the position-- but Vaia also knew she wasn't much use now.

When the crew had been told the hoist the sails, she had fumbled. Vaia made no attempt to seem as if she knew what she was doing, but she hadn't fled away from the task or asked for help. She watched and did her best to mimic everyone else's work, but there had been a few ropes tied too loosely or a couple of slip ups here and there-- that other guy? Well, [i]that guy[/i], the one holding her position, at least he knew how to sail. That set him apart from her. That was the main distinction. It wouldn't matter for long, however. Sailing seemed easy enough. Vaia figured that all she needed was practice and she would be able to at least fill his shoes, if not surpass him, in due time. While her position was unfortunate, Vaia began to see it as necessary and that stung her pride even worse than the position itself.

Tense and angry, Vaia decided to examine the contents of the crates, the contents of the small pantry near her "rest area", after she began a fire in the stove. A meal would be needed soon. One that would set the tone for all expectations for her cooking in the future, so it needed to be proper, in her decided kind of way. 

Yes, this meal needed to be the most bland of them all.