#genereux

He looked at her sternly, “I will place you back on my shoulders, but only if you cease this business of crawling about my head. It is vastly improper, and I don’t quite see why either of you want to go about this pirating business when you seemed perfectly content this morning with your justly acquired breakfast of chicken and tunny.”

Genereux, looking only slightly abashed, looked away and allowed her legs to dangle in the air, while her brother still hollered away above. “It only sounds so much more fun to be a pirate. After all, hadn’t you won Temeraire and myself in a great battle with another ship? And then you got to keep us? What if we were able to find ourselves a ship to battle, and then we might find another egg, and hatch a human just for ourselves?”

Laurence adopted a feigned look of dismay, “Why on earth would you want another human? My dear, surely you cannot mean that you want to replace me with another?”

Genereux’s head reared back, stunned for a moment and she hastily replied “No, not at all! That isn’t to say that we want another human but an adventure, any adventure at all does sound appealing when we have spent these last many days at sea with not much to do except eat and sleep.”

Temeraire craned his head, noticing that Laurence and his sister were paying less attention to him, and had crept some ten feet down the rigging to better hear their conversation. “Yes, we are getting bored of just eating and sleeping. We want something better to do!”

Laurence turned his look of hurt up to Temeraire, who he was shocked to see was a shorter distance above his head than he’d expected. “Does this mean you don’t enjoy when I read to you? I thought you both found that activity pleasant enough.” Laurence had discovered early that, while the two dragonlings were not quite equipped to hold a quill and write out figures, they were more than content to rest on his shoulders and tuck themselves into the crook of his neck while he read to them.

Laurence saw Temeraire and Genereux exchange nervous glances at one another- neither wanted to relinquish their precious reading time with Laurence, but the idea of leading a pirate’s life was still plainly too exciting to give up so easily.

Riley silently appeared at Laurence’s side, sporting his newly acquired Captain’s garb and quirked an eyebrow at his friend and erstwhile superior officer. “Should I take this to mean that our new dragon friends are staging a coup on my ship?”

Temeraire bristled in the rigging and shot down another several feet, “We are not pigeons to be cooing, Captain Riley! We are dragons and we will have command of this ship! And shrimp!”

Riley barely concealed his mirth at the plain look of exasperation on Laurence’s face and schooled his own features into a stoic mask. “Of course,” he demurred, and held out an arm for Temeraire, “It is only you are both a bit small to man the helm at present, and I’m sure neither of you would be interested in so boring a job as steering the ship day in and day out. Or managing the logistics of the lot of the ship’s crew. Why not just leave that to us, and we can act on your direction?” Riley turned and arched a brow at Laurence, silently urging him to play along. 

Laurence, for all that he wanted to discourage his dragonlings from future bouts of misbehavior, was quite ready to have done with the present situation and acquiesced. “Yes, doesn’t that sound splendid? The duties of running a ship can be quite pedantic, and I do believe you both might find it a great deal more boring than you’d think.”

Genereux paused, calm enough that Laurence felt comfortable placing her gently on his shoulder. She hummed her assent at first, before she continued “When you lay the responsibilities out like that, it does sound to be pretty tedious. I would much rather be in charge without having to do all that. But I would still like extra shrimp with my dinner, if you please.” 

Temeraire, a little more skeptical, reached a forefoot out gingerly before climbing onto Riley’s still outstretched arm. “But only if it is as you say, and Genereux and I have say in the ongoings of the ship. We will only agree if the crew’s actions make sense for us!”

“Of course,” Riley agreed easily. He had no argument to give, as the Reliant’s mission had changed drastically once they had acquired a dragon egg that hatched not one but two dragonlings. The crew’s every action now was to get these two menaces, as he thought of them fondly, back to England so that they might be trained and perhaps even put into a formation. 

Satisfied, Temeraire gave a short nod, unfurled his wings and gave a short hop, gliding ungainly until he landed ungracefully on Laurence’s head, mussing his hair and nearly unseating Genereux.

Laurence, to his credit, was shocked but unmoved. Riley stood staring at them, eyes widened nearly comically. “They’ve never done that before, have they Laurence?”

“No, sir, they have not,” Laurence croaked, Temeraire still balancing atop his head. 

“It felt so very nice to try, though!” Temeraire crowed, and launched himself off Laurence’s head to glide to the helm. Genereux, not one to be left in her brother’s wake, tried her own luck, hopping off Laurence’s shoulder and landing, not quite smoothly, on the deck next to the helm. “That was quite fun” she called over to Laurence. Temeraire looked narrowly at the crewman standing at the helm. “Chart a course, if you please, straight on to England. I have heard that there are great big libraries there, and I would like to go,” he said primly, waiting for the crewman to disagree.

Upon seeing a sharp nod from Riley, the crewman gave a sharp nod of assent, “Just as you say, er- sir?” And Temeraire’s chest puffed out with delight.

He hopped down off the helm and glided to where his sister sat, and together they marched up and down the deck with much pomp and circumstance, convinced of their success.

Riley looked at Laurence, who looked back at the Captain with chagrin. “I do thank you for humoring them, but I do wonder what sort of trouble we’ve now gotten ourselves into, especially now that they’ve started trying to fly around,” Laurence murmured, not wanting his sharp-eared charges to overhear.

Riley merely shrugged, “I figure that it’s our prerogative to keep them entertained and satisfied anyhow, so it doesn’t much change our duties. Besides, I daresay this might get the crew to be more accustomed to your tiny terrors, and that can hardly be a bad thing.”

Riley clapped Laurence on the shoulder and, after noting that all was well on deck, headed back down below. Laurence looked on after him, and then turned to gather his charges. He strode after Temeraire and Genereux, calling for them to be careful at their gliding practice.

Perhaps he might distract them with the Principia Mathematica for a time, they might get so enmeshed they may even forget about the extra shrimp they requested with their dinner, and the sky might fall down around his ears. One could certainly dream.