A/N: I love Ni no Kuni (to the tune of 90+ hours at time of writing). I also love these characters, though I feel like we could have used a little more development. This is how I saw them; your mileage may vary.

Stupid. He was a stupid, arrogant jerk, and she hated him. With each of his laughs that rose from the warm, dry cabin, she hated him more and more.

The ship interrupted her thoughts with a violent forward roll. Her throat tightened as the world crested and dropped beneath her, and she barely made it to the railing in time to empty her stomach into the waves below. Once the last of her meal had been expelled, she dragged a shaky arm across her mouth and swallowed dryly before sitting back heavily onto the deck.

She envied Oliver and Drippy and their ability to sleep blissfully through the endless dipping and churning of the world. After hours of discomfort (and twice counting the cracks in the ceiling of this creaking death-trap), Esther had given up on sleep and focused on merely controlling the nausea of her sloshing stomach. She'd stepped onto the deck hoping that the fresh air would ease the queasiness. Instead, the ship picked that moment to hit choppy seas, and one good crest of the waves was all it took for her to hurtle toward the nearest railing and empty her stomach.

Laughter drifted up from the crew quarters, filling the seconds between her miserable retches. The thief they'd picked up in Castaway Cove – that no-good, waste of space jerk who had attacked them and then demanded to come along, of all the nerve – seemed utterly undisturbed by the sudden thrashing the ship was receiving, and his laughs were the loudest of them all.

After some minutes – or it could have been hours, as she had no way of knowing – the wobbling in her knees spread through her whole body. She managed to haul herself behind a massive coil of rope in the far corner of the deck, away from prying eyes and shielded from most of the spray, before she sunk down onto her backside and gave into the nausea again.

The world shifted, and she had to brace herself against the railing to keep from hitting her head. She felt the blood drain from her face in heavy, thundering time with the keeling of the ship. She laced her arms through the railing and held on with what little strength she could muster, bracing her head against her forearms as the phantom of vomit rose in her tightening throat.

"First time on a ship?"

She could only manage a mental oh gods, not now before she threw up. Gravity whirled and blood roared in her ears. The sound of feet against the deck just barely cut through the noise in her head.

"Ouch. Looks like you just missed, that time." A hand wrapped around her upper arm supportively. "Can you stand?"

Esther shook her head, trying but failing to glare at the face-shaped blur before her. Of all the people on the ship, it had to be Swaine. Even with her eyes half-open, she couldn't miss the mess of curls that framed the angular, slightly ashen face. She cursed her luck.

At that moment the ship seemed to settle, and Esther felt the breath rush back into her lungs. The swimming sensation behind her eyes turned her objection into a half-hearted whine as she felt her feet leave the deck and two wiry arms fold under her. Her head, desperately seeking a stable point upon which to rest, lolled heavily against his shoulder.

Wood scraped against wood, abruptly muffling the sound of the ocean. The arms slid from beneath her, and she felt herself sinking heavily into a nest of cotton roping. The hammock swung in a gentle counterpoint to the ship around it, and she felt the buzzing in her head begin to ease.

"You didn't answer my question," Swaine's voice repeated from somewhere near her. She hesitantly cracked open one eyelid, and then the other. They were in a small room in the crew quarters. Swaine stood a few feet away with his back to her, hovering over a table shoved against the opposite wall. A dim oil lamp cast flickering shadows over the cramped room. The hammock above her was empty, and she thanked the sages that no one else would see her shame.

She rolled her head back and rested one arm over it, grateful for the comparative stillness of the hammock as the ship around it creaked violently. "What question?"

Swaine turned, a small wooden plate stacked with dried meat and hard biscuits in one hand. "Let me guess. Not many ships in the desert?" He hooked one foot into the legs of a stool and pulled it next to her hammock before settling himself on it.

She glared at him. "If you're going to make fun of me –"

He almost looked pained. "A vagabond like me, mocking the daughter of a Great Sage? Men have had their tongues cut out for less." She thought she caught the trace of a wry smirk before he placed the plate on her stomach. "Eat up. You've probably lost most of your dinner."

Esther glanced at him skeptically, then raised a piece of meat to her lips and nibbled. She grimaced. "It's salty."

"That's why they call it 'salted.'"

"Isn't there anything fresh?"

Swaine shook his head. "Wouldn't last more than a few days. Can't have rotten food on board; it's dangerous enough being at sea without adding food sickness to the mix."

"Does there have to be… so much of it, though?" she asked, tearing off a small piece and clamping down before she had second thoughts. She winced. It was like chewing on rubber.

Swaine snuck a small piece off the plate and popped it in his own mouth. "The salt helps you keep water down," he said as he chewed. Esther grimaced at the poor manners. If he noticed her disapproving expression, he didn't say anything. "Let me know when you get thirsty. Shouldn't take long with all that jerky in you."

Esther thought about that. The two ate in silence, Esther dutifully grinding the leathery meat between her molars, Swaine popping small handfuls into his mouth and munching seemingly without problem. After she'd finished the last of the dry biscuits, Esther's mouth felt like sand, and she asked Swaine for the water he'd offered. He produced a cup seemingly from nowhere, and she drank greedily.

When she'd downed the last drops, she placed the cup rim-down against the plate – an old habit from her childhood – and rested both against her settling belly. The two sat in silence, broken only by the creaking of the ship around them. Esther twined her toes idly in the rope of the hammock, considering. "Is this why you didn't want to stay in the cabin with me and Oliver?"

Swaine nodded. "Hammocks may not look like much, but in a storm they're a sight better than a bed bolted to the floor."

Esther glanced at him. "It's not your first time on a boat, is it?"

He shook his head. "Not by a mile. And this is one of the nicer ones. The rats here knock before they come in."

Esther snorted, and clapped an embarrassed hand quickly over her mouth. Swaine grinned and leaned against the cabin wall at the head of the hammock, reclining his body parallel to Esther's.

"There's a laugh. Feeling better?"

Esther nodded and fought to hide her lingering blush. Her belly was pleasantly full, and the gentle swaying of the hammock was almost soothing, compared to the bed she'd been in earlier. "I am." She paused, looking down at the cup. "Thank you." Swaine didn't respond.

Exhaustion had begun to settle into her limbs, and Esther found herself fighting to keep her eyes open. Her eyes drifted to the empty hammock above her, and an idea entered her head that made her pause. For as long as she could consciously remember, her father had filled her bedtime stories with cautionary tales about what happened when young girls fraternized with strange men. Esther had to admit that if the stories had been illustrated, Swaine would have been the model for every villain.

But somehow, despite his crude manners, bedraggled appearance, and almost aggressive sarcasm, she didn't feel threatened. She warned herself that it might be exhaustion that lulled her into complacency – or maybe she just didn't fear him.

"Is the other hammock empty?" she asked finally.

"As far as I know. Why?"

"Do you think maybe I could… sleep in it for the night?"

An eyebrow shot up. "Well… I mean, yes. I don't see why not."

"You seem surprised," she said coolly.

He shook his head. "Just never thought that a Great Sage's daughter would ask to stay in the crew hold, that's all." He shrugged. "Then again, today's not exactly been normal. Stay here. I'll go get your things."

Once Swaine had left, Esther sank into the hammock, grateful for the tiredness that weighed down her limbs. The steady, rhythmic rocking of the ship had a lulling effect, and she felt her eyelids grow heavy.

Scraping wood and the thud of a bag against the ground announced Swaine's return. Esther mustered her fading strength and leaned out to rummage through its contents. After a moment, she pulled a babana from its depths. She leaned back and began to peel the fruit with a contented smile.

Swaine looked at her skeptically. "A babana."

"Yes."

"You're going to battle the Dark Djinn, and you packed babanas."

She nodded, taking a bite. "My father sells them."

"I thought your father was a Great Sage."

"He was. Is. But since Shadar, he's sold babanas in Al Mamoon."

Swaine was silent for a long while. He shook his head. "Of all the bizarre priorities I've seen, yours have to be some of the oddest."

Esther ignored him and took another contented bite out of the fruit. "I was going to offer you some, but if you're going to act like that, then I suppose I'll keep them for myself."

Swaine snorted. "You know, your hair looks like a babana."

Esther blinked. "What?"

"Your hair." He reached over and tugged on her braid. "It looks. Like. A babana."

She snatched her hair back. "It does not!"

"I thought you liked babanas," he said with a grin.

"That doesn't mean I want to look like one."

"You are what you eat."

"Oh, shut it."

Swaine barked with laughter, and swatted aside the peel as Esther threw it at him. "What does your fairy friend call Oliver, again? 'Crybaby bunting'?"

Her face went red. "Don't you dare."

"Babana bunting it is, then. Bit of a mouthful, but I think we can make it work."

"Don't call me that!"

Swaine grinned as he stood and flicked off the gas lamp. "It's late. Get some sleep, babana girl."

The sudden darkness reminded Esther of how exhausted she was, and she stifled a yawn. "That's not my name," she protested as her eyes drooped shut.

"Mhmm." His voice came from above this time, accompanied by the scrape of a stool as he climbed into the hammock above her.

As she hovered on the edge of consciousness, she thought she heard him add, "Names are just words anyway," before sleep claimed her.