Atlanta's Stomach flipped, again Sickened. "Oh Neptune... Oh Marina, you poor thing."
Marina frowned at Atlanta's words. It was a very hard frown; almost a scowl even.
"Guess pity was not what she was after." Atlanta thought and schooled her face into something less upset.
"Sorry. But they hurt you real bad, huh?" she said.
Marina's expression was no less sour. But it turned more of a saddened kind as she reluctantly nodded. Her hands balled into fists, scrunching the fabric of her skirt at her knees. Then she turned her inner arms out again, glaring down at them. Then glanced away, not wanting to look at them.
'them' being scars.
More scars. Dozens more of them.
Atlanta was reminded of those blue whales with scrapes and harpoon marks littering their backs. Or turtles with marred shells. Or Florida manatees with the propeller rashes-
Much as Atlanta liked animals, those helpless things never made her feel so angry and at the same time so useless like this. Rage at Marina's previous injuries and the unfairness of them made her feel! Recognizing it though, her anger, her own upset, Atlanta took a deep breath trying to reel it in. She didn't want to upset her friend more. Marina's expression seemed much the same really; defiant and brave as her actions were.
"May I?" Atlanta asked, soft as she could, holding out her hand.
Marina hesitated. Then nodded and shifted in the seat so she was facing Atlanta, knee to knee. She flexed her hands giving a little A-Okay, and lifted her arms for Atlanta to take a closer look. Gently as possible, just as Marina had been with her, Atlanta took one wrist to examine the arm. And repressed a shudder realising once again she had a marked mermaid in her palm.
Around each wrist; and along Marina's arm, to just below mid forearm thereabouts, the skin was littered with inner and outer with little stripes and nicks. Some thick, some fine. Mostly all lopsided. Some cutting across. But all crossways along, and around and around. All the smooth and raised and dimpled and puckered and cut into. All the stories behind them.
'There's so many?!' Atlanta thought, turning Marina's arm over for a better look, carefully and keeping one eye on Marina's face to check how she was. Marina flinched. But didn't pull away; her skin still cool against Atlanta's own hand. On closer inspection there were a lot more marks here than on her leg. But they were scattered and thinner. They didn't engulf the skin so much as peppered it in little stripes and nicks, rather than full wrap around the shackle on her ankle. There were marks that could be a shackle sure but there were none as bold as that 'original' one that Atlanta had seen. 'Maybe she'd been cuffed at the wrists instead? But then why would they go up? And how far? Is there more?''
"What happened, Marina?" she asked. There was a particularly nasty one on the back of Marina's forearm that looked more like a burn, its skin all marbled like sea foam or a comet. Atlanta's other hand of its own accord reached for it but she found herself unable to physically do so. She took Marina's other arm instead, to have a wrist in each hand and concentrated on turning Marina's hands over and back again.
There more on the top of her right more on the inside of her left wrist, Atlanta noted. Marina was mostly right handed so that could amount for it maybe? She counted around twenty-nine in total, possibly it was hard to see where one ended or if two scars should really be one. Some scars were as faint as scratches, tinged blue. Others deep, a stark white on the pale skin. Some were neat. Some looked pink and angry despite clearly being more than years old, as if recently scrubbed raw. But all healed. Or at least Atlanta hoped so.
Although… a couple were worryingly fresher, more so than the ones surrounding them and the old one on the ankle. It was jagged lines criss crossing over about her wrist over the tops of others. These were still pink, not yet even two years old, Atlanta guessed. Could it be a rope? There was certainly a couple that looked like rope burns. Atlanta thought she recognised the pattern, having had quite a few of her own bruises and rubbed in injuries over the years in the wasps. But had been fortunate to never be as deep to scar, even at the hands of more ruthless villains. Marina's showed signs of being cleaned and cared for at least. But still…
"You didn't do this to yourself. Did you?" Atlanta clarified looking up at her. Marina squirmed. Then took a deep breath and shook her head sadly.
"No... they hurt you really badly." Atlanta said again quietly. Then asked, "Did Titian do this?"
She hadn't meant to pry further or push. The questions had just slipped out, the anger bubbling behind it.
Marina shrank again, this time at his name. Hesitated again and nodded. Then shook her head. Her face pinched unsure, and tug-tugged her wrists. Her way of politely asking Atlanta to let them go. Atlanta did so.
"All not -never mind. Not all." Marina fumbled, frustrated making her shunt-ey flappy hand sign as she always did when trying to think of the sign or find the 'right' word. Or in this case get her words in the right order.
Atlanta twigged and tried, "Is that 'not all of them' do you mean?"
Marina nodded and flashed a relieved smile for a moment. Then continued to 'talk' about it. Funny enough Marina had taken better and more stubbornly to ASL then to Makaton and charades the crew had started with. Possibly because the commander once accidentally had referred to it as "for babies' '.
But now Marina was starting to struggle. Whether due to the subject, or the time they'd been speaking was causing fatigue, her signs weren't as 'neat' making it harder for Atlanta to make out. But they had other ways to talk now if need be. Like word cards, and flipping through both a dictionary and the ASL book they now kept on the standby lounge coffee table. It took a few attempts to start, with Atlanta fetching the notebook from her pocket to help.
Marina signed thanks before switching to the pencil and wrote in neat capitals. (the occasional letter was missing or the wrong way around but it was legible.)
"NOT ALL. WHEN PRI SONER YES. THESE R ALL OLD. CAUSED THEN. BUT NOT TESE THESE." She said well, wrote, pointing out some scars.
And then pointed to bands Atlanta had suspected of rope welts. At this Marina switched back using her hands.
"Mission. Troy." she said in aquanaut diver sign (tapping two fingers on her opposite shoulder and then a t with her hand to make the captain's shortened version of his name, rather than finger spelling it.)
Marina then tapped one finger on the same shoulder and put her hand over her ear to sign another, "Phones."
Marina frowned then mined, something being thrown with both hands out and over. Atlanta doubted it'd be a blanket.
"A net?"
"Yes, no yes no." Marina replied. (six taps. New code Atlanta supposed. Three taps for a 'maybe' then?)
"Okay, Like a net but not. A cage? A trap?" Atlanta guessed. "ah. Mission and trap. So You got caught?"
Marina nodded again.
"Yes. Bad. Tied up. " she said in both American signs and divers. And then said "mission", a second time.
"Alright." Atlanta responded calmly. Even if her head whirred. Two missions, is that what the second one meant? Or was it just an accident and Marina had merely repeated herself? And which mission or missions did Marina even mean?!
The invasion of the private holiday island; where Marina had been reckless and got caught. Where she'd tried in vain to save the Carlson's? And ended up with a sword fish poised above her head in place of Troy!
Or on the island of Baln; where Marina had faced a painful electric chair contraption to force Troy and Phones to reveal missile jamming codes. That one would explain her signing the fella's names, right?
Or maybe she'd meant the mission where it hadn't been a mission at all? Stingray had been on shore leave then off course somehow. (although Atlanta had a few ideas why. Friends don't causally owe each other that amount of money after all!)
They'd encountered a whirlpool and then been imprisoned amongst treasure. There, Marina and Phones had been both strapped to racks till things went click. And then a lot of things went bang when Troy's cannon went off and saved them. But it had still hurt. A lot. Even Phones had had to take some leave to rest up and recover.
That was three missions out of dozens off the top of her head that Atlanta could think could have contributed to adding to the collection of battle scars on Marina's wrists.
Three missions, none of which at any point Marina could have been able to cry out in pain or ask for mercy…
