[ There are elements about Duplicity that, so far, may seem terrible ("terrible" even being quite the understatement) but that Irving can still wrap his head around -- from bigger things; factual like what he can see and hear and touch, that every society has will naturally have its own culture and laws and expectations; to even many of the grander and abstract, things that should be far beyond his comprehension and yet he is able to somehow accept; the technology; being trapped in a different world, or possibly Hell itself; that creatures beyond simply man or beast exist in the world be it this one or any -- and then there are the elements which catch against him like thorns, the things not necessarily any worse than anything he's already endured before, but are too... intimate, and intrusive, to be bearable in quite the same particular way.

For example: he looks up when Jack points, smiling slightly at the light fixtures and nodding. The technological and industrial progress in this place is definitely not what frightens him. He's lived to see many advancements unfold in real time himself, and he's not even 35. ]

Speaking of blessings. [ Still smiling. ] Hot water showers. I washed myself until the water turned cold.

[ Granted, he extremely needed it; they may have washed him during intake but he could still feel the grime of years at sea itching all over every part of him. As for the rest of it -- the cars, the train, the devices -- though Irving's only glimpsed the tip of how far things have progressed since his own time, so far most of what he's encountered here are things fairly easy to understand the purpose of.

His smile disappears so fast it's like it was never there at all, face paling to a sickly shade before a bloom of color spreads from ear to ear like a stripe of sunburn. Irving leans in slightly so he can be heard, voice low and tone stiff: ]

I'm not sure if I appreciate your implications, Mr. Rackham.

[ What the fuck is written about him on that card? ]