The beach, Tuesday morning

[betterthanaplan]

Rey had texted to say she'd be back today, so Duke was out on the beach at his usual time, stretching his way through an easy warm up. He wondered if Nina would actually show up today. He doubted it, though he was sure she'd come up with something bizarre to report about yoga this morning either way.

Thinking about that was a lot easier than worrying that something had changed since Rey's text and she wouldn't show at all. . . .

[ooc: morning yoga is open!]

Comments

[bookbeltof_love]

Nina had woken up to a quandary because, like, see Duke had invited her to yoga on the beach but, like, she still didn't fully believe him that it was, like, all above board and that meant, really, that proper young ladies couldn't go by themselves.

Luckily, part of having a big brother was that she had a built-in chaperone for things like this.

Even if it had meant she'd had to wake him up and wheedle him into it and then there'd been the whole thing where he'd taken a look at her dress and told her to go change because yoga wasn't meant for Nina's frilly dresses.

Nina was still wearing a skirt, but she was wearing leggings under it (she was a lady), and the skirt was less ornamental than the first outfit she'd put together that morning had been.

And she owed Prompto at the very least coffee after this.

"Gooooooooooooooood moooooooooooorning!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!" Nina chirped, hapless chaperone in tow.

[Hapless chaperone shaaaamelessly modded with permission hahaha!]

[hashtag_chocobro]

Hapless chaperone reporting for duty. And owed at least a coffee, it was true, quite possibly a cupcake, too, because this was cutting into his quality sleep time before his computer class. But, honestly, it wasn't like a little yoga before hand would be a bad thing. It was important to stay limber, right? Even if he knew his sometimes lack of coordination did not always go hand-in-hand with things like this, and he thought it was a little silly that Nina felt she needed to drag him along, but, well, Brotherly Duties, and all that, he supposed...

[thatwaslucky]

Rey even made it here more or less at her normal time, in a decent mood and everything when she greeted him with, "Good morning."

She also hadn't really thought people would worry that much.

[betterthanaplan]

Nina -- and her chaperone -- would hopefully note that Duke was not at all shirtless this morning, though the undershirt, long pants, and lack of shoes made for perhaps not the most weather-appropriate outfit in the world. (He had a whole canonical spiel he could do about how yoga was about the mastery of the mind over the body and so he didn't feel the cold -- but that could wait.)

"Good morning," he greeted, with a minimum of blinking at Nina's boisterousness. "Glad you could make it." He nodded to Prompto. "And you brought a friend." He shrugged and spread his hands. "The more the merrier."

[betterthanaplan]

It was funny how going into a war zone could make people worry about you.

"Hey." Duke gave her a broad, deceptively lazy smile. "How was your trip?"

[bookbeltof_love]

"A lady couldn't come alone," Nina said earnestly. "And, like, this will be good for my brother too!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!"

And, really, how much choice had Nina left him with?

(He was totally getting a cupcake after this.)

[thatwaslucky]

"Mostly uneventful," she replied. "I might have to go back once some things get worked out, but that's fine. How were things here?"

[betterthanaplan]

"Quiet," Duke said. "Nobody turned into anything that I know of, and nothing attacked. Which I gather is pretty good for Fandom."

[thatwaslucky]

"It was only a week, it's probably just gearing up for something."

That made it better, right?

[betterthanaplan]

"So what you're saying is, I should have enjoyed it while it lasted," Duke said with a small sigh. "Yeah, sounds about right."

[betterthanaplan]

"I think you'll find one could," Duke pointed out. "Since Rey does on a regular basis." He shrugged. "Well. Might as well get started. You said you had to look up what yoga was. Why don't you tell me what you found out, and we'll work from there?"

[thatwaslucky]

"You really should have," she smiled. "But that's okay. If we get another week of quiet you know to treasure it."

They would not!

[betterthanaplan]

"That I will. Especially if the Perk doesn't try to drown me in sweet-and-low again."

[thatwaslucky]

Rey paused.

"You're going to have to explain that to me."

[hashtag_chocobro]

Prompto jerked his chin up in greeting at the nod, before a lopsided grin sort of surfaced. It'd been a while, hadn't it, since he totally invaded this dude's boat to take, like, a million pictures, hadn't it? But now he felt even more like Nina's reservations were her being silly, because he'd seemed like a pretty cool guy.

"I'll probably just follow along, too, and messy up threads," he offered, "if that's cool."

Participating would be way less awkward than just standing there and trying to keep an eye out for...impropriety, or whatever. Honestly, Nina...

[betterthanaplan]

"It would be weird if you didn't," Duke said, with a small, wry smile. "Yoga's not much of a spectator sport and threads are made to be messy. You have much experience with it?"

[justice_undone]

Breq usually went for a walk in the mornings, but not always along the beach, but this was the path she had chosen today. She slowed down when she noticed someone doing exercises.

"Good morning," she greeted, as she passed close enough for it to be rude to just pretend no one was there, but she wasn't going to disturb someone who preferred being left alone.

[betterthanaplan]

"I am possibly persona non grata over there now," Duke said with a sigh. "Somewhere between talking Octavia into throwing a knife at a clown and pointing out to Nina that her radio reports were not the most accurate. . . ." He shrugged. "Or someone just screwed up and dumped a bunch of fake sugar in my coffee on accident. We'll see if it happens again."

[betterthanaplan]

"Morning," Duke greeted in return. "Here for yoga, or just out for a walk?"

[justice_undone]

"The exercises you do are called yoga?" Breq asked. "I'm just out for a walk, I didn't know this was a place for practicing."

[thatwaslucky]

"You may need to start tipping really well," Rey suggested. "What happened with Nina?"

[betterthanaplan]

"That's right," Duke confirmed. "It's not official or anything, but Rey and I come out here once a week to practice. It's kind of a meditative thing. You focus in on your body and how it feels as you work through various stretches and poses. You're welcome to stick around if you want to try."

[betterthanaplan]

"That is very possible," Duke agreed. He already tipped pretty well. He'd held a number of random food service jobs over the years before his smuggling business really took off. "Mostly she got defensive and tried to claim she was a 'delicate teenage flower'. I told her she should come out here and join us sometime so she could see how perfectly innocent this whole deal really is."

He'd just, you know, also rolled his eyes a lot while he did so.

[thatwaslucky]

"Delicate flower? Does she realize what she was saying?" And Rey didn't really care all that much anymore, but uh.

[betterthanaplan]

"Yeah, I get the feeling she's just naturally over-dramatic." To say the least. "She also seemed to think that the radio is a public service, instead of a weird gossip machine the island just collectively decided to put up with."