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December 2020, Auckland
Yes, in her short life so far, if there was one thing Defiant had learned, it was the value of privacy. Because the one downside to life in Auckland was that many of her ancestors (even ones who predated the airplane) had insisted on coming along, or at least dropping in to visit, and the American Magic base on the Hauraki Gulf sometimes felt as haunted by a hundred and seventy years of overbearing grandparents as Harbour Court had.
Fortunately, her crew were willing to step up and insist that both sailors and spirits should be as free from unnecessary distractions as possible when in “race mode”.
The real worry was that they might provoke an international incident, as despite Patriot’s kindest explanations that she was racing against the British, the New Zealanders, and the Italians, some of the older yachtfolk insisted on giving her advice for facing “the Rosbifs” (she’d had to look that one up), “the Convicts” (which wasn’t even right, it was the Aussies who were descended from convicts, not the Kiwis), and, well, various terms for Maori and Italians that Defiant thought were too rude to repeat.
Defiant’s hull had been dry-docked and officially “retired”, with the sailors and engineers moving their focus to Patriot’s training and preparation as the final World Series event in Auckland drew closer and closer. It was the longest Defiant had ever had her other body remain “stationary”, and it felt strange to be walking around like normal in her humanoid form when her ship form was so still.
Even if she was no longer sailing, she still tried to find every excuse she could to be out of the base and away from her relatives. Fortunately, the team were only too happy to let her come along onboard a chase boat as an “extra coach” to watch Trish practice and offer advice.
The sensation of riding along on the small inflatable motorboat had taken some getting used-to-- when Defiant felt the wind and spray on her face, it was almost like during her own runs back in Newport, and she instinctively reached out her senses to feel them on her sails and hydrofoils as well-- and felt nothing.
Well, of course she didn’t. All of her ship parts were back onshore, still in shipping containers, in perfectly still and dry air. If Defiant focused too hard on feeling through her hull for too long, she found herself feeling itchy and stuffy.
On one of the first rides out, she had staggered a little bit, clutching the edge of the inflatable chase boat a bit tighter than was typical. When they had pulled up alongside Patriot for a discussion, Defiant hung back for a moment, shaking her head as she tried to focus entirely on her human form. On the here and now, on controlling this body, not her other body back there. Because now she was here, now, and if she wanted to cross onto Trish’s hull, it would be very embarrassing to get it wrong and fall in, especially right here in front of everybody--
“Diana?” Dean’s voice suddenly interrupted her thoughts. Defiant looked up to see her helmsman staring down from Patriot’s cockpit, his left hand clutching a shroud line for balance. She nodded at him, smiling a bit weakly, and got ready to try to climb across.
Dean pushed his visor up, and Defiant could see concern in his pale blue eyes as he reached out his right arm to help her aboard. She had tried her best to hide her unease, but as a veteran skipper, Dean knew yacht spirits too well for that. Swallowing her pride, she gratefully accepted the help and climbed across, into the cockpit.
“Are you alright, Defiant?”
“I feel... like I’m only halfway here.” She shrugged, her green eyes flitting briefly to the Auckland skyline to avoid Dean’s gaze. It was embarrassing to admit, a yachtgirl struggling with her sea legs. “I just feel like I can’t focus like this.”
“Diana.” Hearing her helmsman speak softly, Defiant turned back, looking up at Dean uneasily. “That’s perfectly normal. It’s a big adjustment having your hull put in storage. I’ve seen every boat I’ve worked with go through it.” A small smile appeared on Dean’s worn face as he reached over to pat Defiant twice on her shoulder.
“Even Black Magic?” She said, in a whisper Dean might not have heard if she had been human. One of the supernatural aspects of a strong crew-avatar bond was heightened communication and… empathy.
Dean shifted his gloved hand towards the yachtgirl’s back, and Defiant let herself be pulled against his gray flotation jacket for a quick hug. “Even Black Magic. Just be careful and take it slowly.”
“Mm-hm.” Defiant nodded, feeling Dean squeeze her once and then let her go.
“Why don’t you check on Trish?” He suggested. Defiant nodded and reached out to grab another shroud, making her way to her sister, who was speaking with Terry near the other wheel.
One hand for yourself and one for the boat.
Technically, Defiant told herself, it wasn’t any different from when she had ridden across the Pacific in a container ship, but that had been a completely unfamiliar sensation-- that had felt nothing like sailing on her own. Being on a chase boat, or onboard Trish’s hull, felt almost the same as sailing on her own. Almost, but not quite.
When she had walked around on the deck of the container ship, trying to keep out of the way of the human crew, she had been acutely aware that she was much, much higher above the water than the top of her own mast. When Defiant had walked to a railing, curious to finally see the vast open sea she had read so much about, no spray had reached her face, with only small waves breaking on the ship’s vast hull, far below her.
The constant drone and smell of the cargo ship’s engines had taken some getting used to, but their power and stamina was impressive. She had gone past forty knots on Narragansett Bay, but only for a few minutes at a time. Their convoy’s trip from Panama to New Zealand had happened at about half that speed, never topping thirty, but the speeds had been far more constant than hers.
And yet, the transport ship had also been a sailing ship, at least partly.
Although the mighty engines had never stopped, Defiant had watched the crew raise a large parasail into the air on windy days, like a giant version of the kites she and Trish had used for kiteboarding back home. It had filled with the breeze, yellow-and-white against the blue sky, with the other ships around them raising parasails of their own. Red, green, orange, purple— almost like a field of spinnakers on a summer day off Fort Adams.
As large as they were, the kites weren’t powerful enough to pull the ships along on their own, she knew. But by using the wind for assistance, they would use less fuel. And with the war going on, fuel was more expensive than ever.
“It’s a funny thing, you know.” She remembered Terry telling her during one walk along the wharves on Thames Street “For a hundred and fifty years, we’ve kept developing new technology for sailing just for racing, after motor boats took over everywhere else. Even when the Herreshoff brothers started out in Bristol--” he had waved his hand northwards, in the direction of the shipyard a few towns over where Defiant knew Vigilant, Defender, Columbia, and Reliance, the most stubborn of her turn-of-the-century aunties, had all been born “--they were building motor boats until the summer colonists in Newport asked them for yachts. The New York Yacht Club was founded by the sons of the men who got rich inventing the steamboats, but they kept commissioning new innovations in sailing. Now, we’re all worried about pollution and fuel rationing, and they come to our engineers and say ‘Could we add wingsails to a cargo ship?’, ‘Could we build it with hydrofoils?’. They want something like you.”
Well, not exactly like us. Defiant thought, crossing to the far wheel to stand beside Patriot. There wasn’t much spare room to carry cargo onboard an AC-75 hull—heck, there wasn’t even a cabin. Trish and her crew had been towed out for a few hours of training in Auckland Harbour, and in an hour or so they’d be stepping back ashore, to eat dinner in their team base back in the waterfront, and sleep in their temporary homes there.
“How about fish and chips?” She heard Terry ask her sister. Apparently, he was already thinking of dinner.
“What about lobster rolls?” Trish asked, stretching her left elbow over her head.
Terry chuckled. “Now there’s a New England girl. ‘Guess we could probably find them somewhere. What do you think, Diana?”
Dinner? Defiant hadn’t even thought about it yet. Adjusting to being afloat like this had left her too distracted to feel hungry. “Uh, whatever you want, I guess? I’m not really hungry yet.”
Suddenly, a small electronic beep sounded from a pocket of Defiant’s waterproof jacket. A text message? Carefully, she unzipped the pocket and dug her phone out to look at the screen.
From: Hugo Thomson
Safe in Cape Town. [Link]
It took Defiant a moment for the message to sink it, given how focused she had been on her body-hull disconnect. But when it did, she couldn’t help but cheer.
“Yes!”
Patriot turned at her sister’s shout, seeing Defiant grinning in joy.
“It’s Hugo, he made it into Cape Town alright.” Defiant said, trying to collect herself.
Terry smiled and nodded. “That’s good. The Southern Ocean is no joke.”
There were modern racers whose crews did eat and sleep aboard. For the past month, Defiant had been eagerly following the Vendée Globe, a grueling nonstop race in which 60-foot IMOCA boats were supposed to circumnavigate the world with only a single crewmember aboard. Of course, as circumnavigators had always insisted in their writings, there was no such thing as a true “solo” voyage, with every lone sailor dependent on their ship, however much or little its spirit made itself known. Every Vendée entry was really a duo– a skipper and the avatar of their boat, working together to keep each other alive for three months across the roughest seas in the world.
What adventure! What romance! Quel suspense– unsurprisingly, the race started and ended in France and was dominated by French entries. Given the gender ratios of Francophone avatars, that also made it one of the most co-ed events in the racing world, and had prompted a bit of gentle teasing from Terry about his girls’ interest in a race with so many highly athletic French sailboys.
Not that they were all French. Hugo Boss 8 was one of the few English-speaking competitors, a British IMOCA belonging to the famous— if unlucky— skipper Alex Thomson. He seemed just as interested in the America’s Cup as Defiant was in the Vendée Globe, and had become Defiant’s text-and-e-mail penpal over the past few months.
“Oooh, Huuugo…” Patriot teased, elbowing her sister lightly. “Does Alex know you have a crush o—“
“Trish.” Defiant scoffed, rolling her eyes towards the blue sky overhead.
“What? You think I can’t tell you like him?” Patriot smirked “You’ve been glued to your phone all week since you heard he broke his rudder! ‘I hope Hugo’s alright’, ‘I hope Alex can fix him’, ‘I hope he didn’t hurt his handsome little—”
“Trish!” Defiant snapped, glaring at her sister. “He’s just my friend, and another racer and-- and Terry’s right, the Vendée’s really dangerous…”
Patriot kept her mocking grin and tone. “I mean, I don’t blame you, those shirtless vids from the Doldrums…”
Well, he certainly was good-looking, there was no denying that. Hugo literally was a model, given that he’d done ads wearing his sponsor’s bespoke suits. “I, uh… he…” Defiant felt herself blushing a bit as she tried to answer.
“HA!” Patriot slapped her knee “You DO like him!”
“No, I—”
“Diana’s got a boyfriend, Diana’s got a boyfriend—“
“NOT my boyfriend!”
“You mean, just because you haven’t asked yet?”
“TERRYY! Make her stop!”
As the sleek navy-blue monohull was towed into Auckland in the golden light of late afternoon, the shouts of the two yachtgirls could be heard echoing across the water, with Terry Hutchinson’s gentler voice trying to calm them down.
By the time Patriot reached the NYYC base, the bickering had died down, and both humans and avatars focused themselves on setting up the boat to be lifted out of the water by the crane. For all her sister might get on her nerves, Defiant still wanted Trish to be as safe and healthy as possible. She needed to be practiced and ready to race when the America’s Cup World Series Auckland started in a few weeks.
Finally, as Patriot’s hull was eased into its cradle by the shore crew, Terry briefed the sisters near the edge of the pier as they shouldered their duffel bags.
“The guys are making some calls to look for lobster rolls, we’ll see what we can do. Hit the showers and be in the dining room by 6. You did good today, Trish.” The balding skipper patted his blonde charge on the back. “And Diana…”
Defiant turned to look at Terry. “We’re all relieved Hugo and Alex got in okay, but try not to talk about it where your aunties can hear. You know what they think about British racers.” He said, looking serious.
“Right.” Defiant nodded. Patriot might have teased her about being friends with Hugo, but the things her ancestors had to say were far worse. Her skin crawled thinking of Columbia’s icy sneering. “You seem to be quite interested in Mr. Thomson’s yacht…”
Still, it was hard to feel down about anything on such a beautiful evening in Auckland on the cusp of summer, and with the knowledge that her friend was safe.
Smelling the sea breeze off the Waitemata Harbour, Defiant looked at the evening light now painting the city’s skyscrapers, turning windows into sheets of liquid gold, taking one final look out to sea for the day. Taking a deep breath, she felt invigorated, sprinting off towards the hangars.
Far below, unseen by both Defiant and the busy shore crew caring for her sister’s hull, something small and dark crawled among the pilings of the pier. Within faintly-glowing red eyes, lenses and shutters adjusted themselves as the shadowy body of a small octopus lifted itself over a crossbeam. And then, with a glimpse of trailing Abyss-metal tentacles, the mechanical creature disappeared.
Slipping into the team lounge after dinner, Defiant found her laptop right where she’d left it, charging. Quickly, she had it open and powered up, and her fingers flew as she logged in and started a video call.
The screen showed a young man dressed in a black fleece jacket, sitting in what looked like an armchair. Or, to the special vision shipfolk had for each other, a sleek black IMOCA 60 with magenta highlights, a hydrodynamic spearpoint in carbon fiber, its deck printed with a grid of gray hexagons.
IMOCAs were solo racing boats, built for one particular skipper who was closely involved in each step of the design process— after all, they would have to be onboard alone for months on end. Little wonder, then, that Hugo could have passed for Alex Thomson’s son, sharing his skipper’s red-blond hair, scruffy beard, and blue-gray eyes.
Hugo Thomson was a thoroughly modern racing machine, about the same age as Patriot and Defiant and built and tested in a similar high-tech factory environment. And yet, like most British ocean racers, he had a bit of the look of the clippers about him. Defiant couldn’t really say how, but it was sort of the opposite of the joke that some actors weren’t believable in period pieces because they had a face that had seen a smartphone. A face that had… eaten hardtack? Navigated by sextant?
Of course, that was only her assessment from videos and photos— the two yacht-spirits had never met in person.
“Diana! Great to see you!” As the video connected, Hugo grinned. Not even retiring from his class’s premier race, it seemed, could dampen the yachtboy’s spirits.
“Neptune, I’m so glad you’re safe!” Defiant blurted, her relief spilling out. Pushing a lock of brown hair behind her right ear, she composed herself and tried to speak more normally. “So how are you liking South Africa?”
“Well, I think every ocean racer hopes to pull into Cape Town someday... just not when you’re trying to circumnavigate nonstop.” Hugo smiled again. In a nonstop race like the Vendée, setting foot on land meant retirement from the race— Hugo and Alex could continue once he was repaired, but they would no longer be officially competing.
“How’s your leg?” She asked, thinking of her own foils and rudder.
Hugo’s screen bobbed, as he shifted his laptop so the camera showed his right leg, raised on a footstool in a brace, and yet also a broken carbon fiber structure, colored magenta. “Getting better. No fun to lose a rudder, especially in the South Atlantic, I’ll tell you that.”
“Oh, yeah.” Defiant winced at the sight. “You really have to be careful with appendages and hydrofoils—”
Suddenly, Defiant heard a very unwelcome sound, a voice halfway between her Rhode Island accent and Hugo’s warm British tones.
“What’s that voice? Diana!”
Even among the New York Yacht Club, nobody had the “transatlantic” accent of the early 20th century upper class anymore except her aunties. Even worse, it sounded like Columbia outside the door.
“Oooh #%€£, gotta go...” Defiant apologized, trying to end the video call as her great-grandma walked into the room.
Great-Grandma Columbia looked exactly the same as in paintings Defiant had seen from a hundred and twenty years before, a redheaded Gibson Girl in her middy blouse and straw hat. With fury and suspicion in her eyes, however, she looked nowhere near as cheerful now, as she loomed over the AC-75. Even worse, there was another sloop following behind her, Great-Aunt Vigilant.
“Diana Morgan Barr!” Columbia glared down at Defiant “Who is that on your infernal—“
Defiant slammed her laptop shut and grabbed it to her chest.
“Just a friend, granny!” She exclaimed, looking nervously up at her ancestors “He’s in the Vendée Globe, or he was before—“
Columbia’s eyes narrowed. “I heard the voice. He’s an Englishman, isn’t he? That young Mister Thomson, I suspect?”
Vigilant bent down, to be face-to-face with Defiant. Her aunt’s glare felt like a magnifying glass focusing a spot of sunlight on a paper— and like she might catch on fire if Vigilant stared at her too long.
“What have our traditions come to? Fraternizing on your wretched computer device with the British? Back in our day—”
“Oh great, here we go…” Defiant whispered, rolling her eyes to the ceiling. She shrunk into the cushion of her seat as best as she could as her ancestors launched into their verbal tirades about how she and Trish Weren’t Living Up To The Highest Traditions Of The New York Yacht Club. How it had all gone downhill since their class had been retired, since the Depression, since the War, since Ted Turner, since 1983, since multihulls, and so on and so forth…
She wished she was anywhere else, back on the water, back in Newport, a million miles away on the moon… or maybe in the south Atlantic with nothing but endless sea all around, staring up at the moon from the deck of an IMOCA. Like the video Hugo’s cousin Initiatives-Coeur had posted online, of her skipper Samantha Davies alone on deck, looking up at the moon shining above wispy clouds, leaving a shining path of white across the ocean.
It must be nice to have that kind of peace and solitude out at sea, Defiant thought. It must be nice to get away from everyone and everything.