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Well, hopefully you guys WILL comment on this chapter! Have a fun time reading it, aye?
**PLEASE NOTE: There is content in this chapter that may not be appropiate for those that take don't take horrid scenes lightly! Read at your own risk!**
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Among the Dead and Gone
The crew left Port Royal early the next morning, right after their rebellion against the institutions of the island. They had quickly packed all their things, with the exception of the furniture, and boarded them back on to the ship, while the rest of the world laid distracted in the chaos they had ensued. As they sailed off in to the distance, Delmaria instructed Prince to make a quick pass by Fort Charles, to see how everything had turned out. At first sight, he began laughing hysterically.
The explosion had worked perfectly. The stone balcony off at the back of the fort had been completely cut off from the rest of the fort, shattering it off in to cold waters below. The front wall of the fort had been relatively destroyed, crumbling down at its left corner. The rest of the fortress was left in shambles, chunks of the walls lying scattered across all parts of sight, large cracks and gaps permeating through the floor, small spots of smoke rising up from various areas hidden away by the rubble. The entire crew was still in stitches as they pulled away in to the thick early morning fog.
They wandered aimlessly around the Windward Passage for a few days, practicing their aim with a few new toys the crew had salvaged from Charles before they blew it in to the sky. Delmaria was especially entertained by a set of throwing knives that he had found lying around in Greer's attic, most likely a piece of weaponry Gordon managed to hide away from his sister well-enough so that it wasn't trashed, melted, sold, or used as a cooking utensil. He spent hours on end throwing them across the deck, landing them square in the center of the large wooden wall that stretched across. By the end of the week, the wall had been covered in dagger marks, sword cuts, and bullet holes, which wasn't exactly an exciting moment for Dead, who spent his time repairing the ship. Every time a new board was put in, another fell off. "Captain, you best not be going to that Bollard fellow for repairs anymore!", to which they all laughed at.
Still, the crew could only keep themselves entertained for so long. It was only Monday until they demanded Delmaria to set course to the Hinter seas, so that maybe they could catch themselves a nice hefty War Galleon making it's way from Kingshead to Padres, filled with cargo holds on valuables. So, Darkskull preformed his usual ritual. He spread a map of the Caribbean out on the deck, and flipped his old lucky charm on to it. Where ever it landed, that's where they would head, he always prophesized. Sure enough, it landed roughly northeast of Padres.
They spent their time eagerly awaiting some form of action, as the
Shark cut through the waves before it as fast as the seams of the sails could handle. Each of the crew mates speculated about what they would find, a rogue Spanish merchant ship, a plump East India Trading Company galleon, possibly even a cursed ship wandering its way through the fog to the other world. Meanwhile, they exchanged various myths and legends they had learned while about on the seven seas, telling of magical sea monsters of other worlds, maelstroms the size of countries, and all other fables pirates make up to scare each other senseless.
The night before they reached on their destination, Delmaria began getting a very strange feeling in his gut. He spent a few hours after the crew had headed below the deck for well over a few hours. Opening the windows, and then closing them. Lying down, and getting back up. He examined every little detail in his cabin, to the point where he had might as well gotten a doctorate on the subject. He finally accepted the fact he needed to put his mind to rest, and returned for the last time to his bed off to the side of the cabin, tucked away in the wall. He gazed out of the window that sat right next to him as he took a deep, calming breath, fogging it so that he may look at the man in the mirror. He wasn't sure if he saw the same person.
1
July 13th, 1724
2:25 PM
The bells of the
Shark clanged rapidly as Delmaria shouted at the crew to get themselves prepared. The crew was still jumbling their clothes around as they pulled themselves out from the bowls of the ship, hopping on to the wood floor and grabbing themselves a cannon. "Move mates, move move move! Starboard!"
The clear blue skies above emanated the same color of the calm ocean waves below, slowing swaying back and forth, washing the side of the boat. Not a single cloud or island was in sight - but there was a ship.
The crew's luck had led them to a massive Ship of the Line, under the installment of the English Royal Navy. It sat off to their right side only a few kilometers away, it's proud, mammoth, red and white sails wavering in the light wind. Its hind side faced the pirates, leaving them to believe they hadn't even been noticed yet. Still, Darkskull wasn't willing to take the chance of giving up an early start.
Prince quickly grabbed a hold of the wheel as Firesteel and Andrew released the sails, spinning it wildly to keep the ship on a quick turn. The breeze was in their favor, pushing them with a powerful force towards the behemoth of a war ship. As they neared, the elegant red painting shined through to them, giving away in the nearest detail, with the gold lining below the numerous rows of windows boasting a royal decree of force.
Delmaria was prepared to shout off the call of the cannons, when he laid his eyes on what he saw before him. A void of nothingness. The ship sat there, refusing to move. The wooden ledges of the ship missed large chunks out of them, breaking the majestic red and gold patterns to protrude splintered, careless wooden pricks. The sails were weathered at the sides, torn in to small strips that flung themselves in to the wind, like the flags of a thousand separate empires. Delmaria had Lawrence round the War Frigate to the side of the denounced giant, where the devastation only further continued. Gaping holes sat in scattered spots across the hull, revealing the lonely darkness that was the inner sanctum of the ship. The bow was the site of the worse dishevelment, where, from its furthermost tip to at least 10 meters in to the frontal deck, it had been ripped completely off, only leaving behind a flood of scrap wood that floated on the surface the abyss it sank within. The only sign of life was an eerie, black ladder that hung over the side which faced the pirates, who had all gathered at the side to witness the disaster.
"Captain, it looks like this has already been hit pretty bad. Should we just move on?" Lawrence questioned over Darkskull's shoulder as he studied over the ship of the line.
"No, no. Just because it's been attacked doesn't mean it might not have anything useful left. Lower the boats, we're heading aboard." Delmaria ordered as he tugged off his long, dramatic coat, folding it over his forearm and heading off to his cabin to place it inside.
The crew hastily pulled themselves in to the dinghy and paddled furiously over to the boat, excited by what treasures they might find aboard. The small row boat clunked lightly as it splashed against the floating wreckage, and one by one, the pirates raised themselves up along the black ladder, which looked as though it itself had been the subject of torture for hundreds of years, ropes snarled and planks cracked.
The first who reached the deck was Grace, who, upon peering across the boat, let out a dramatic gasp of excitement, fear, and disgust. She fell back and clutched the shattered railing tightly as the rest of the crew made their ways up the heightened path. In their view, countless bodies of Navy soldiers littered the deck, decorated respectively in their own gruesome fashion. Although they all were quite good distances apart, the blood of the deceased mixed in a dance, surrounding various severed pieces of flesh and limbs. They all shivered, especially shaken, and all gave another glimpse at the row boat below them, taking in to account the possibility of going back. "Uhh... c'mon mates... just.. uh... let's spread ourselves."
The crew wearily separated, heading in different directions. The deck was covered in battle scars, black spots and wide, open holes leading in to the deck, requiring caution while they continued. Wisdom and Grace headed over to a pair of boxes that were hidden underneath a mesh of teamed fish nets over by the helm. They stumbled up the damaged steps, passed the burnt steering-wheel, grip marks still fresh at its crown, and began tugging them off. "Ugh.. this ship smells like..."
"Your part of the quarters?" Wisdom smirked wise-crackily, cutting off Grace as she struggled with a patch of the netting. She immediately threw it at her feet and pushed him with incredibly surprising force, cleansing his face.
"What in the hell is your problem with me, exactly!?" she challenged him, taking a big step forward as she clenched her fists. She was a sizable height below Wisdom, but her fierce attitude made up for it. He just stepped back a moment, to let her steam down. "I thought not. You best not try anything round me anymore, or you might not just wake up tomorrow!"
At the farther end of the deck, Delmaria, Andrew, Firesteel, and all the others stumbled below in to the dark void of the highest level of the hull. It wasn't much - just a large mess hall, with a kitchen that was originally set off to the side, now filled in by a new "window" to the outside world. Past their vision was the crew quarters, and then behind it, sat a single, elegantly decorated door. The rest of the crew went further down, except for Andrea, who went wild collecting the silverware that lined the table, so it could be melted and fashioned, and Lawrence, who sprinted towards the door at the other end.
It was fortunate for Lawrence that there were so many intrusions of light in to the place, for he almost constantly found himself nearly tripping over, or falling in to another hole through the wood floor. It wasn't before long he had made his way past the tremendous twin pair of tables, the various, small, twin beds that lined the sleeping area, and a small cargo hold that carried only a few small barrels of spices before he reached the door. It was quite astounding in itself, hand crafted showings of cherubs, lions, and the waves of the ocean, boasting the divine triumph that "was" the Royal Navy. He ran his smooth, light hand down the door, tantalized by what he would find behind it. His hand slid down it's front, off to the side, where it met the lavish metal knob. He gripped it tightly, opening it, and revealing the captain's quarters.
It would have surely been a beautiful room, if not that all of it's breath-taking assets had been littered across the floor in chaos. Papers were skew against every inch of the thick carpet beneath his feet, trivial dressers and tables thrown down face first, or on their side, often accompanied by whatever possessions they held, now broken and shattered. Lawrence's feet crunched against the papers and glass that were below him as he studied across the room, slowly making his way towards the general direction of the wall of uncontained, extensive windows. What perked his eye the most was a big, black, brimmed hat, protruding out of it a extravagant, golden feathered. He reached to pick it up, but was startled to realize that somebody else had intended to take it as part of their decor in the afterlife.
By the time Delmaria had reached the lowest level of the ship, the others had departed him across the other cargo bays, going wild as they danced from crate to container. He instructed them to only take as much as they could use, but he knew right well they would do all in their power to take excess.
He had made his way in to a very strange area, unlike any other war ship he had ever plundered or voyaged aboard. The staircase he came from led in to a small, enclosed corridor, leading out in to two different openings at two separate walls, one behind the staircase, and one to the opposite side of where the staircase sat. These doorways then led in to other corridors, which only led in to more. Each was small, and empty, leaving very little, yet a sense of personal, room. Eventually, the corridors intersected to form in to a single entrance, which led to a remote, dark, tall yet wide and short in length, room. Its front curved gradually in an upward, ending at the top in an eccentric, single point. The room was divided by a single wooden column in the middle, and then surrounded by an array of cargo. Delmaria was prepared to turn around, when he noticed, out of the corner of his eye, a darkly tanned hand.
He rounded the boxes to other side of the cargo, previously hidden to him, revealing a beaten and bruised, and nearly lifeless man. His bushy brown beard hugged against the bottom of his face, like the line of trees at the end of a plain and the beginning of a forest, was dripping in a line of blood that poured out of his wide, open mouth. His shirt and jacket had been torn in to small pieces of fabric that danced around him, leaving out his tanned, hairy chest, black tribal markings encircling around both of his arms. A dagger poked in to his body, up behind the rib cage, leaving a grand cut that stretched across the majority of his torso's width. It was Don Victorio, the liberalist "governor" of Padres Del Fuego.
Victorio himself had been a part of Padres Del Fuego for as long as anybody could remember. When Delmaria was younger, if he wasn't practicing his swordsmanship with Thorhammer, he was with Victorio, exchanging stories in the Skull's Thunder, playing their time around town, even heading out on some occasions to plunder a few Navy ships wandering out from Dundee. It truly was a shock when Delmaria had returned five years later to find his pirate friend the "governor" of Padres.
The situation was, however, he technically wasn't. Soon after Delmaria departed from Padres, the Navy found themselves dealing with unholy amounts of pirates running aground. It wasn't too long until a large crime wave struck the volcanic island, escalating in to a struggle of power between the freebooters and the Navy. After roughly a few weeks, the fight came down to a draw, simmered by negotiations - Don Victorio, one of the prominent forces behind the debacle, would take the seat as the de-facto governor of Padres, while the Navy had the right to keep their current institutions, as well as any rights to land claims, and so forth.
Victorio's grip on Padres, at first, was very lenient towards piracy, so long that it wouldn't affect his influence. Yet slowly, he became much stricter on the policies of the island, instructing various taxes, and taking numerous bribes in exchange for "Naval security." It wasn't before long Victorio took it to the extremes, leaving behind the roots of his power. He began construction of a large stone wall, which encased the majority of the island's town, preventing any pirates from making their way in, or out.
At the time of Padres's "remodeling," it was quite unsure why the town was destroyed - some saw it as the gods cleansing the island of the wickedness that ran amuck, some believed that it was the East India Trading Company's way of getting back at the pirates. Yet many had the descending opinion that it was meant to destroy the town walls, thusly and symbolically marking the end of Victorio's rein.
Of course, Victorio believed otherwise. He only became more of a blockhead, taking the largest center of commerce on the island, and placing it behind a piece of the wall that still managed to stand tall. Only a few weeks before today, Victorio announced his plans to rebuild the town walls to its fullest, which would encase every single establishment across the place. It wasn't to Delmaria's surprise he was lying dead and cold on the floor.
As he slowly approached the body, he noticed he was gripping a map of sorts, curled up in to a roll. He leaned over the corpse, careful not to land on top of it, and slowly untwisted Victorio's bony fingers. He didn't even bother to look at the map, but instead, just tucked it in to his shirt.
Suddenly, a tortured, painful cry rang out from above. Delmaria instinctively bounded out up the steps, blazing out in instinct his sword, rag around the handle, as his feet pounded up the numerous stories of the ship's hull. He managed to pass by Prince, Andrew, and the others, as they too joined his path in aid of the call.
They opened their way back up to the deck, and were met with, to say the least, and unpleasant surprise. The former bodies of the Navy soldiers, once tossed across the deck, were now reanimated, slowly making their way across the ship, away from the, towards the direction of where Grace and Wisdom were when they last saw them. The crew sprinted across the deck, easily catching up the slowly-walking skeletons.
Delmaria hooked his sword in to the first of the skellies, scrapping his blade right straight through its spine and coming of through the front by at least half a meter. It slinked its way off the blade, bearing down with it it's large bayonet. A skeleton that had been marching a little after the one now on the floor swung it's cutlass in a back spin, nearly cleaving off Darkskull's head as he ducked to avoid the blow. It then caught back its footing and came it's blade down in a cleave, but was met halfway by the enchanted blade, sparkling it's golden blade in the bright yellow sun. Delmaria then pushed his legs upward from his crouching position, springing the skeleton off balance as the pirate landed a mistimed kick to the right knee, knocking the rusted bone right off place, and toppling the undead grunt.
Darkskull ran off towards the helm of the ship, where the screams of pain continued uncontrollably. He hadn't even bothered with the rest of the skeletons, he simply ran past them, pushing them off to the side as though he were running through the crowd of Tortuga at high noon. He finally had pushed his way up the stairs and over to the wheel, where Wisdom was pushing his shirt in to what looked like a big cut that went across Grace's thigh.
"What the hell happened!?" Delmaria questioned exhaustedly as he knelt down next to Wisdom.
"I-I don't know, she just started screaming, and then the skeletons, and the.. the.." Wisdom seemed frantic, and, for the first time, scared, unable to think of what to do. "Do something! Heal her, can't you!?"
"You expect me to be able to do such a thing? I'm no wizard, my friend!" Delmaria shouted over the roar of clashing metal and bone.
"You must know something! Please, captain, she'll die!"
"We need to get her outta here, is what we need!" Delmaria picked Grace up by her back, and slung her over his shoulders. "Stop.. I.. STOP that Grace! Hold still! Wisdom, clear the way!" Wisdom came to the occasion and swiped up a large, rusty broadsword that sat at his side. He walked about a few meters in front of Delmaria, as he cleaned the path of any skeletons that walked over their way. Darkskull shouted to the rest of the crew to abandon their fight and retreat back to the boat, and so they did, flooding back towards the ladder that lead down to the dinghy. Wisdom stood at the side of the ladder, instructing the crew down as he fought off the skeleton onslaught. As he lowered himself and Grace down the ladder, he took one last look at the pirate.
The captain and the disable crewmate plopped down in to the dinghy. "Andrew, take care of Grace," unloading the girl in to his arms. "Unlatch the dinghy!" The crew just sat there, staring blankly.
"But, Wisd..."
"LAUNCH!" Delmaria shouted. Firesteel unwillingly pushed the boat away from the war ship, back towards the
Shark. They floated back in silence, not taking a look at one another. Until it was broken, by a load splash behind them. They all turned their heads to face a flurry of water spattering across the view, crashing and breaking wildly. They forced their eyes to look through the light bursts of water, to see that same pirate, floundering about in the water. An uproarious cheer commenced as Wisdom pulled himself up in to the light craft, all except for Grace. She just smiled.
2
The funeral was short, and quick. Not many were in attendance, except for the crew, the priest, and a few Navy officials, forced to attend under quota. Their black clothing fixed itself against the black obsidian that they stood on, under tarnish by the torrential rains that poured down on them. Delmaria had the honors of stepping forward and lightly tapping the coffin with the wingtip of his shoe, sending the hollow, open box on its voyage in to the unknown. "Goodbye, old friend." He was lucky the rain was there to hide the fact he was crying.
"So what is the plan now?" Prince mellowed as they walked away, back towards the town. He has to talk pretty loud, against both the roar of the rain, and the roar of the crowds that had gathered not too far from them, tearing down the town walls brick by brick.
Delmaria simply patted against the pocket that sat against his chest. "Great things, my friend. Great things..." He stared out in a northwest direction from the island, peering past the rain, past the night, past the limits of his vision.
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If you really want to know, that chapter had around 3,800 words, with over 23,000 characters. Yeah.
So, big things to come! Please feel free to comment, good or bad!