[color=lightgray][CENTER]━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━[/center][table][row][/row][row][cell] [h3][color=662d91][i][b]Alexander Polawski[/b][/i][/color][/h3][i][b][color=662d91]Location:[/color][/b][/i] Mess Hall (C) [i][b][color=662d91]Skills:[/color][/b][/i] N/A [/cell][cell] [right][img]https://i.ibb.co/wQvcSqr/Tuna-casserole.gif[/img][/right] [/cell][/row][/table][CENTER]━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━[/center][/color] The Tuna Casserole went down easy for ol' Mugsy, enjoying every spoonful of it as his calm conversation with Aeron continued to unfold. Tuna Casserole, he'd never in his life think he would enjoy such a grand meal after the world had ended. He had always liked fish, but those days finding an onspoiled can of tuna would have made him feel like the Sha of Iran. And yet now he was enjoying a Tuna Casserole like it wasn't a big deal, like he had just bought a hotdog from a stand before the big game. And now Alexander wondered if they served hotdogs in CMB. Alexander had swallowed another spoonful while Aeron spoke his usual thoughtful phrases, this time about people being more than mere reports. That's one of the many reasons he had been so well-liked when they were both younger, he took the time to meet you even if you were just a small cog in the massive machinery that was the United States Army. Alexander nodded in agreement. [color=662d91]"I'd toast to that, Aeron, if I been a drinking man. I can't remember how many guys in our platoon got chewed out by the top-brass at your level, guys who were nothing like the reports. That Nigel guy sure sems like a good fella, colourful, but if he can swing a sword like he says, I'm impressed."[/color] Alexander mused about the Roman odd-ball, though who was he to judge? He was Mugsy after all. [color=662d91]"Tesla? Oh yeah, the Korean fella who fixed Thalia and me up. Good guy, I might just ask him when I get the chance. Oldie is goldie, some youngsters once told me. Wore glasses too big to be practical, too thin a moustache and dressed like a fancy hippie. Even carried around a typewriter with him! I think he was what people called a 'hipster'…"[/color] Alexander rambled on, leaving the Tuna Casserole for the moment as he talked like he hadn't talked in a long time. It was the old Alexander, he who had a good life, if only for two thirds of the day. Alexander gave Aeron a smile stirring the casserole while he lowered his shoulders again. [color=662d91]"You know what, Aeron? Life isn't so bad, not too bad all things considered…"[/color] The smile wore off however, leaving a long, thoughtful look on Alexander's face as he looked away. [color=662d91]"…I'd only wish my wife could have seen it…"[/color] Alexander eventually would turn back to Aeron, his face drawn out as he asked the question he'd thought of ever since he first heard of CMB. [color=662d91]"You wouldn't happened to know of a settlement east of Florida, somewhere off the coast? That was where I was when this whole thing started."[/color] [color=lightgray][CENTER]━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━[/center][table][row][/row][row][cell] [h3][color=B8860B][i][b]Nigel Cooper[/b][/i][/color][/h3][i][b][color=B8860B]Location:[/color][/b][/i] Outside of Education Center (M) -> Mess Hall (C) [i][b][color=B8860B]Skills:[/color][/b][/i] N/A [/cell][cell] [right][img]https://i.ibb.co/LrnKm2S/Nigel-Hadrian-1.jpg[/img][/right] [/cell][/row][/table][CENTER]━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━[/center][/color] While Nigel would have gotten a good laugh out of the sight of the students and their Greek comedy play out, he was far too preoccupied by searching for the board. It was not too difficult to find, considering Thana had pretty easily pointed it out to him just ten, fifteen minutes earlier. While he had expected to find the list for classes he could attend and teach in himself, as he had understood the Professor, what he found was more…leisurely, so to speak. [color=#B8860B]"So I am to make a Greek of myself then…very well, as you wish, Euphrosyne."[/color] Nigel whispered to himself, inspecting the listed classes that were still open. Quilting had, for some odd maddening reason conjured up by the Sirens of the sea, been his own suggestion earlier. He shuddered at the thought, embarrassed at the sight of himself quilting instead of smithing. No, he would toil with something else, something better for himself, and so he kept going down the list. Nigel was so concentrated on the board that he almost didn't notice Thana walking past him, warning him of the pen over the sword, giving him a good chuckle back. [color=#B8860B]"Calamus gladio fortior, indeed Athena. Have a good one!"[/color] Nigel shouted back at her, his new unexpected friend and fellow gardener of the New Hanging Gardens of Babylon. They would have to work on a new and better name later. Thalia on the other hand he managed to miss, only catching her musing aloud the letters "D N D", before running off. Nigel tilted his head to the side, looking back at the board for what she had meant. [color=#B8860B]"DnD session…tossing the die, or dice."[/color] Nigel mused to himself, having first heard of the tabletop roleplaying game in his university years. But Nigel had felt more drawn to the act of swinging real swords, leaving the rolling of dice to Roman Caesars and other politicans. No, reading the board again his eyes fell on one line that echoed something Thana suggested. [color=#B8860B]"Swimming…Scuba…"[/color] Shivers ran down his spine, unnaturally cold in the scorching Florida steam, though he steeled himself. Thana had told him Maddoc would run said classes, pointing out it would help him helping her in the underwater garden. He wished he could be enthusiastic about it, but the fear held him back. A fear that had followed him since childhood and a certain…well, well. Nigel shook himself loose from the stoning gaze of Medusa, puffing his chest out and doing something he might regret very much later on; he signed his name on the list. And as soon as he had done that, he quickly retreated and made his way to the Mess Hall, as if to distance himself before he changed his mind. Nothing had changed since lunch earlier that day, not even the smell. Fish, more fish for food as was expected. Nigel got in line like most others, further behind Thana and Thalia up front, himself looking for more people he knew. The two old men, Alexander and the General were seated alone at a table, while he recognized at least the girl called Lisa sitting with a larger crowd. Who would he sit with and use his Roman diplomatic skills with, meaning acting awkward and defensive? Only time and dinner would tell.