Duncan Quagmire and Violet Baudelaire: A Reunion

Chapter 9 - Duncan Quagmire

"Duncan! Wake up! Duncan!" Isadora shaked Duncan and he reluctantly sat up.
    "What?" He muttered. They were in the exact same situation last night except that the roles have changed, Duncan was the one being woken up by Isadora. He glanced around the room and noticed that light shone through the windows. At least it's morning, Duncan thought and looked back at his sister.
    Isadora was wearing black leggings, brown leather ankle-boots, and a blue shirt. Her hair was braided into a side braid. He looked at the clock. It was five to six. Shoot, he said to himself. He shot out of bed. "Why didn't you wake me up earlier?" Duncan asked Isadora, annoyed as he rushed to the wardrobe and opened it to find a pair of brown pants, black boots, and a striped black and white shirt.
    "I tried to wake you up half past but you couldn't wake up!" Isadora replies, she took another look at the bookshelf, making sure she hasn't let out any non-reptile books, she muttered "Whoever used to live here, must have been a big fan of reptiles."
    As soon as Duncan put on his shirt, He looked at the clock. One to six. Duncan grabs Isadora's arm, opens the door and started running down the corridor after she closed the door behind him. The boots weren't exactly comfortable as his toes rubbed uncomfortably together. As soon as Duncan knew that Isadora was keeping up with me, he let go of her arm and continued running until they got to the deck.
    They halted. All of the crew except for a few who were steering the boat were on the deck which made a total about twenty, not including Jemma Farley who stood in front of them all. Duncan suddenly remembered his close encounter with her last night and immediately straightened his back. Hopefully she doesn't suspect that Duncan or Isadora had anything to do with the accidental crash in the living room, right outside her office.
    "Isadora, Duncan. You're late." She stood tall and remained eye contact. Her hair was now tied back into a pony tail, all the more emphasising her strong jawline.
    "I'm sorry captain Farley. We were only late by seven seconds," Isadora says. She regretted she said the last part.
    "Seven seconds past six. Join the crew," Jemma brought her attention back to her crew. "We are going to be continuing some skills we started yesterday morning. Please go back to your partners and get your sword out. George, Peter, please come to me, as well as Duncan and Isadora." Jemma motioned two of the men to come to her as the two Quagmires walked over. Much to their dismay, George the man they overheard talking to Jemma was going to be working with them today.
    "So, Quagmires, this is George and Peter. As they have excelled in the arts of sword fighting, they will be teaching you the basics today. Now get into pairs, George and Duncan, Peter and Iz." Isadora looked disgruntled to the way that Jemma gave her a nickname already as if they were close. Duncan shot Isadora a worried look about George, she gave a small smile back and walked over to her partner. Duncan faced George.
    "So, I'm going to start by teaching you the basics, stance, control and attack and defence. First, here is your sword," George handled a sword carefully to Duncan who's excitement rose. He took the long sword, took in the heavy wait, the black handle and the silver blade, the point glinting in the sunlight. "I want you to take care of it now, it is yours."
    George began speaking again, "Stance now. Your feet should be shoulder width apart, leading foot should be forward and knees slightly bent. Can you show me?"

Soon the minutes became into hours when finally, Duncan has finished the basics which included movements which took majority of the time. The initial excitement has finally wore off and it was replaced by tiredness, standing in the sun all morning. The clouds slowly drift in the sky. The time now, nine, the sun has fully risen up and casted a shadow at the back of the boat, therefore none of the crew gets shade when they were practicing their sword fighting.
    George and Duncan has now started with dueling like everybody else. They got in position and it turns out that once Duncan got the hang of holding a sword and using it, he can be quite good on the attacking side. He occasionally looked over the deck and see Isadora in the same situation as he was: sweating in the heat, sword fighting against adults. Not exactly the situation he saw himself in now, two weeks ago.
    They started duelling again. How Duncan longed to be with his journal, writing down ever idea that came in his head. The freedom of writing, being able to spill words on a page, is what he lived for. Duncan breathed in and out, imagined his pencil on a blank sheet of paper, just writing whatever his mind and — "Aaaargh!" Duncan yelled. His knees sunk to the floor and he felt the wooden floor collide with his knees.
    Pain was seeping into his right arm and he looked at it. A large cut lay there, blood gushing out of it, down his arms, to his elbow, marking the wood. George came by his side, "you weren't paying attention. You were dozing off."
    "Yeah you could of told me! Instead of cutting my arm!" Duncan yelled back and Jemma caught the motion.
    "George? Why did you cut him? It's his first day!" Captain shouted at him as Duncan clutches his bleeding arm. Isadora, also catching wind of the raised voice also rushed over. She saw Duncan's cut. "Oh Duncan! You need to be more careful!" Isadora took the bottom of her shirt and gently put it over his cut. "This should hold the bleeding," she said soothingly.
    "Okay, sword fighting is over, brunch is being served in the living room." Jemma announced and all of the crew cheered. "Quagmires, you can fix his arm up in the bathroom down your corridor?" Jemma asked and she turned around and left.
    They both walked back to their corridor and to the bathroom which was barely enough space to fit one person, let alone two. Isadora began her work at dabbing her brother's arm gently. Duncan winced slightly but after a while he didn't feel it anymore because all he did was imagine the Baudelaire's reaction.
    He imagined Sunny saying a bunch of baby words he couldn't understand, probably touching his cut. Klaus would be more on the intellectual side and look up how to ease the pain and recover quicker. Duncan chuckled, This was so like Klaus, consult a book. Then he imagined Violet's response. She would be doing what Isadora would be doing, soothing him, comforting him.
    After all of the pain eased away, and just left Duncan with a large cut on his arm. They went back to their room. Duncan took his journal out and slid out a pencil from the bookshelf. He sat there and looked at his surroundings. When he was normally stuck on writing something, he would normally look at the objects in his room.
    His eyes skirt the room and it lands on a picture on the wall, a portrait of someone. The man, more like teenager with slightly tanned skin, black waves and familiar eyes. Duncan has seen them before. "Isadora? Come look at this picture," Duncan called out. Isadora looked up from the notebook she was writing poems in and settled her eyes on the picture.
    "I've already seen it."
    "Doesn't he look familiar? I swear we have seen him before."
    "Yeah I've thought that too," replied Isadora with a bit of curiosity. Suddenly there was a knock of the door. "Come in!" Duncan called out and the door opened to show George outside the door.
    "Duncan? Isadora? Captain Jemma Farley wants to see you in her office."