#ALSO IM SO SORRY GAMERS | Explore Tumblr posts and blogs

landfilloftrash · 3 months ago

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Crimson Runs Blue within Crépuscule (part 1)

***

If arriving onto islands with action and drama as things generally went to hell were a competition, her crew was striving hard for that first place position.

The speed at which the Red Dragon flew across the waves at first was astounding, and then Mister Jones had been willing to hear their new guest out— Lockwell’s and his own former husband— and then they had started literally flying. Their cohort in the sea of The Glittering Hoard following in hot pursuit.

The Red Dragon was full of surprises.

Vyrdakks had taken the note from Soleil regarding his first mate’s betrayal rather well, minus a moment of sputtering, considering everything happening at that moment in time, and had simply directed whatever he was feeling into getting the crew of The Red Dragon back onto Nassau with little to no fuss, while the rest of them plotted on what they could possibly do to disable the giant death laser aboard the kell’s floating colony that Misirak was planning on using on Nassau.

A lot was happening.

She would continue to mention this internally and address that ‘yeah, hi, wow a lot was happening all at once and I’m not sure what to do about it at this exact second’, because if it didn’t it might have a bit of a shutdown, and they had neither the time nor space to have anyone go mute.

She would mentally address the added stress from Ulysses attempting to obliterate Kallstrom from existence in the middle of the early morning’s night later.

For now, Nassau was rapidly closing in on sight and space, and the entire lot of them— Davy Jones, Gaura, Kallstrom, Pepper, Ulysses, Vyrdakks, and herself— were apprehensively planning as the island came into view. Abaddon, she was partially aware, was still the crow’s nest; he did not say a word to the group, but it knew he was listening.

The ship had lowered into the docks, having made berth once more and settled contentedly despite the hubbub on the topdeck.

“Fuck.”

“Shit,” it agreed.

“Well you know what, we really tried,” Gaura was looking at the sands like they’d eat him alive, “it’s been nice knowing you guys.”

“I wish I didn’t wake up.”

“Pepper.”

“Well. On the bright side,” Ulysses piped up again, “after this you won’t need to wake up any longer, because we’re going to be dead.”

“Ulysses!”

“QUIET,” Vyrdakks clattered, with a wave of his upper arms, “I will fix this.”

“We have things to attend to,” he huffed a wet sounding breath; she imagined eliksnis’ vocal cords were not meant for the straining language that was common. “Like Lockwell.”

“I think getting blown up’s more important,” Gaura countered, his expression unamused as his tail slowly flicked from side to side.

Ulysses continued along with Gaura. “I think getting blown up is more important right now, cause if he sees the laser charging up he might think its you trying to attack Nassau–!”

Vyrdakks held up two hands to stop Ulysses. “I can manually, disable, the laser.”

“Well then you better get going,” Gaura grumbled.

“I feel like your first mate would have planned for that,” Ulysses assumed, “and have a backup of some sort. Is that any way possible?”

“No.”

“Look–!” he growled, “I have to clear everything, first of all!”

“I have a question,” it interrupted calmly, deciding to throw its own hat in the ring and lessen the rising agitation, “a couple of questions actually.”

“What.”

“First of all,” she raised a claw, “when you ‘turn’ the laser ‘off’, does that make the timer start over?”

He blinked at her. “Y– Yes..”

“Okay, so” it pulled its claws to its beak in thought, tapping it, “how long does it take to get to maximum power?”

“Fifteen minutes,” he answered, tilting his head, “at maximum power.”

Ok. Optimistically? That was an entire fifteen minutes to spend getting things ready to tackle the ship. Realistically? Best to be hazarding closer to eight or seven at most.

Leaning on optimism for now, in case the first mate wanted to make a big statement instead of a practical one; It did some rough basic math in her head. “Ok, so if you cut it off at thirteen, before the blast is discharged, that could buy us.. Thirty-ish minutes?”

“About,” Pepper confirmed.

“If we can convince Lockwell–” it thought about what was possible crammed within twenty-eight minutes; a lot. “...Yeah I think we can do this. This seems plausible.”

“I mean, yeah, but I do feel like someone should go tell Lockwell we’re not dead.”

She looked at the triton in confusion. As if they weren’t going to do that..? How else were they going to tell him that his husbands were back and that it wasn’t Vyrdakks at the helm? It cared incredibly deeply for Gaura, but sometimes it was genuinely very confused by his thought processes.

“I mean, we have you on our side, Eno,” Ulysses chimed in, “so I think we can convince him pretty easily!”

It gave a small ‘smile’ while privately thinking. Convincing Lockwell was not the issue, it never was; it was going to be his reaction to the multiple situations coagulating into one massive one that was going to be the possible new problem.

“Alright—” Gaura piped up, “here’s what I think, here’s my two cents; I think someone take Davy Jones and talk to Lockwell, and I think our good friend Vyrdakks should deal with the laser so we don’t all die instantly and defeats the whole purpose of coming here.”

What–? Ohh, he was presuming that they were all immediately heading for The Glittering Hoard instead of telling anyone on the island what the situation was. It was very glad she had not been under his command very long, because it had a sneaking suspicion she would get lost very easily.

It shook her head in weary amusement. Knights, always rushing in blade first.

“That’s just my thoughts,” he shrugged, “makes sense to me.”

“I can delay it from here,” Vyrdakks countered, visibly irked by the idea Gaura presented, “I will not miss the opportunity to see my husband after sixteen years!”

“Well you better go see him fast,” Gaura frowned, “because fifteen minutes actually isn’t that long.”

“I have! A plan!” Vyrdakks exclaimed, growing both defensive and more irritated— if the hissing clicks as an undercurrent were any indication.

“Mm, okay.”

“Alright,” it gently cut in, “what is the plan, and how can we help?”

“Disable it, every chance I can.”

So nothing particularly on their end of it, just to do the things imperative to survival quickly. “Got it.”

“Should we go beat the shit out of your first mate? ‘Cause I can do that.”

Both Pepper and itself snorted quietly at that. Right back on track.

Vyrdakks, meanwhile, looked at Gaura silently. Its laughter died with a soft sadness. Having someone betray you was never.. An easy experience. There was a lot that was packaged into it; the Kell might not even really want him hurt, despite what was happening right now.

“Hey,” Gaura shrugged again, a hopeful glint in his eyes, “the offer’s on the table.” Vyrdakks merely turned away and headed towards the ship’s gangplank. “We have things to do. Go.”

“Alright, fine.”

“We can beat them up later if it calls for it,” Pepper assured, patting Gaura on the back amicably. The triton brightened considerably at the prospect.

As they started to head off the ship, she saw Kallstrom return to the group with a bundle of cloth— which he then took and threw on; a cloak of which he immediately started pulling the hood up— most likely so he was not immediately recognized and mugged on sight. A smart idea.

Stepping onto the island was like— not quite stepping into soup, but certainly like walking into a room made of compact cotton. Everything immediately felt muted. The air was thick, and foggy, despite the dawn of light peeking into the sky’s shifting tones marking it a rather clear day to-be.

It twigged something in the back of her mind, like flying had earlier. Something was distinctly wrong, and it was unsure as to the specifics of the gizzard-gut feeling.

As they headed for the main clearing of trees, marking where the island’s town resided, she heard rather than saw Gaura lean over— a shifting of armor on armor, rather than the clank of him walking— and start whispering. “Listen, if it comes down to it, we can just go in the water.”

It covered a laugh by coughing quietly instead.

“I think the laser will still get us,” Kallstrom dryly responded.

“Not if we go under it. You can hold your breath, right?”

Pepper had been seized by a high-pitched fit of giggles, spontaneously appearing from thin air, because from Eno’s knowledge there was absolutely nothing funny of the sort happening. (It was doing breathing exercises to make sure it didn’t join them.)

“I can’t breathe— You do know that electricity is very conductive to water, right?”

“Well..” And a small noise of discontent. That was a no then. “I don’t see you coming up with any ideas..”

“I’m..! Working on it..” He quietly huffed. The sour discontent radiating off the tiefling in that moment was strong, and it once again refrained from the urge to give him a wing-side hug. He’d made his opinion on hugs very clear.

They didn’t get to say much else, because as they all turned the corner of the massive copse of palm trees the sight of the People's Republic heart shut down any attempts at levity.

The town was not in complete ruins, but it was near it. Broken buildings, burnt debris— scatterings of cannon fire throughout it all. People scattered similarly, looking rough and worn, huddled together in small groups. She saw evidence of wounds amongst nearly all of them. But the true thing they all stopped and stared at was at the center of town; because there lay Silver’s dragon-bird— speared through the heart with a massive metal spike, tethering it permanently to the earth.

It also spotted Silver, laying next to it, looking for all the world to be dead asleep— that even from this distance, his chest moving softly confirming that he was alive— but that left it with the fact it that Silver now lay in the exact same state, that upon The Red Dragon, Casanova was in.

“Hm! Man, that’s uh,” Gaura began, looking over the corpse of the bird, and then looking at the slowly shambling people; devastated, “..nevermind.”

Houses were smoldering, the embers glowing slightly, destroyed completely in some cases underneath the dragon’s wingspan instead of by artilleristic bombardment. Families huddled in blankets. Those that were able-bodied moving slowly through the town, tired and lost.

Except for one.

Bustling around like their talons were stepping on hot coals every second was a familiar owlin, bearing symbols of the First Church and handing food to one group before handing a bundle of blankets to a group that huddled next to a small fire.

“Miss Mara?” she tentatively called, unsure how well its eyes were working, because surely—

Xiomara’s head snapped in their direction with feathers immediately puffed– her ‘ears’ up in the air in shock. If the woman’s eyes could get any wider, they did in that millisecond.

—Surely her auntie would by all reason, still be back in Kingston.

“Oh—! Oh! My gods–! Eno!” and without further prompting, she started sprinting through the square directly towards her, giving Enososin only a moment to brace her stance and accept the tackle hug that Xiomara gave her at full speed.

It was a ‘running’ trend amongst the Church, it noticed, that the lot of them simply ran and tackle-hugged; damn the consequences.

“Miss Mara—!” she squeaked out, “Hi–!”

“Oh my gods– You! Are! Alive!” she cheered breathlessly, “Okay! You are alive!”

“Hi,” she greeted again, unsure of what else to say in all genuinity, “What happened here?”

“We thought you were dead!” Xiomara sharply warbled the reprimand.

That had not been the question, whatsoever. Enososin was incredibly unsure of the extreme reaction to her return; she would freely admit, three months was so much longer than she expected, but it was not nearly long enough for Xiomara of all people to throw in the towel on someone being alive or dead.

Lord in Heaven she thought she was gone for three months by Vyrdakks’ account, which was becoming increasingly clear that was not the case.

“I–I’m not,” she stumbled, “I promise.”

“Ooohh my gods. Oh dear,” Mara patted its biceps as if making sure there was solid give to them before looking up with a wild look in her eyes. “3 months ago— There was a storm. So much lightning and thunder; and then the dragon fell out of the sky with the spike in his heart.”

“While we’re trying to help people, Lobo has been attacking Nassau, every week. In all honesty? I think he’s lost it!”

“Schhhhhhhheisse,” she whispered. That’s what Vyrdakks had been referring to in regards to the last major attack being ‘three months ago’. Not Gaura and her own arrival, but the arrival of Lobo; Taking Silver and his winged friend out of commission.

“Man,” Gaura murmured, “Looks like we missed the party, Kallstrom.”

“Okay. Uhm–” Xiomara seemed to register both Gaura and Kallstrom for a moment, her expression shifting from frazzled to baffled, before her eyes went wide once more, “Oh my God, we have to tell Rollo.”

“What?”

Rollo?

“Along with everyone else, your father has been worried sick!”

Her Father was here?!

If her aunt’s reaction was anything to go by; she was so incredibly dead.

Could they even deal with that right this second? No matter how much she needed to confirm to him that she was okay, there was a bigger, ship sized issue off the shore; It was going to hazard a ‘no’. “I– !”

Xiomara, however, was already in the midst of grabbing her by the wrist and tugging in a way that only this woman had earned to tug at her. Nevermind then. “Oookay!”

“I’ll–?! I’ll be back!” she called, to the rather startled group of her crew, plus Davy Jones and Vyrdakks lingering near the tail, “I’ll be back!”

“Be safe!” Pepper called.

“Yeah, looks like you have some catching up to do— see you later,” Gaura agreed, tossing a thumbs up as she was pulled away.

As she was pulled away she instead started meeting her aunt pace for pace so it was not tugged along, like a misbehaving child. After assuring her stride not too large, it looked down in confusion at the long-eared screech; it had to clear the air of how long they’d been missing for. “Miss Mara, how long has it been–?”

Xiomara was quick on the explanation. “It’s been three months since he first started—”

“No!” she quietly protested, “How long have I been gone?” A week of no contact was different than three months. Three months of no word was very different to however long they’d been gone. It needed to know how much damage control there was going to be, and how much of the earth had already been completely salted.

“Since spring!” she trilled anxiously.

Its mind briefly stopped and sputtered. Since spring..?

“It is the dead of winter, dear.”

Dear God in Heaven they had been missing nearly an entire year.

“It’s been a year..?” she whispered in horror.

“Uh– Oh gods, it has–” Mara cried, “Yes! Yes, it has!”

“We were gone for…?” Surely not—? How-? What?! “We were only on that island for a day or two at most—?! Oh heavens.”

Mara’s anxious trilling was not helping its headspace any as she whistled a softly repeating, “Ohh dear, oh gods..”

“I hate timey-wimey shenanigans–!” Briefly letting its face fall into her free hand to clutch the sides of her head— digging claws through feathers before pulling its hand through and back away. “Okay.”

“Oh dear, oh dear.”

That was enough of that, for right this second. It needed to stop Mara’s growing anxiety before Eno either joined her, or snapped at her. Neither were helpful.

“Okay, don’t you think—” and she started pulling enough that Xiomara started to slow their frog march, and to perhaps stop the anxiety spiral the choirwoman was clearly going through, “don’t you think I should help heal? What–?”

“Oh!” she startled, surprised at the question as they stopped walking for a moment and her aunt pulled herself together to take a moment to breathe. “I..! Oh.. I don’t know..”

She quietly prodded. “Miss Mara…” “We have it covered, for now, we’ve had it covered for a bit. Uhm,” finally the question Mara had been holding in for enough time that it practically exploded from her beak; “Where have you been?!?”

“I–!” she broke off. It couldn’t explain the actual details. Not without risking her aunt’s health. “An island. It—”

“For an entire year!?” “No!” She rushed, feeling herself flatten in fear of being misunderstood; God, she would never intentionally do that without telling.

Intentionally was the key word.

Because the fact of the matter was it had, and she couldn’t even explain the actual truth of it. Not that it really wanted to, not to Xiomara, because that would really only serve to stress the older woman out, and it was trying to manage that; not feed into it. But she sure could explain part of the truth. “I– Okay. The properties of the island itself.. It seems to have… during our stay, unaligned us with the proper flow of things. We honestly couldn’t have gotten off faster unless we dragged people kicking and screaming.” “Oh dear, okay.. Good thing is you! Are alive and well.”

‘Well’ was an extremely subjective term and it was not going to be looking into its headspace at the current moment in time! She merely confirmed; “I am alive.”

Her aunt sighed in relief, feathers settling ever so slightly as its hands were pressed. “I'm just glad to have you right now.”

Great. Fantastic. Minor crisis of Miss Xiomara going supernova in anxiety averted for right this second. But as they both continued, once again moving, it could only look around at the destroyed homes and people and murmur to herself in turn. “Oh Heavens.. Oh gods..”

“You seem frazzled dear,” oh God, they really were just switching who had the severest amount of anxiety between the two of them, “are you alright?”

“I..?” Alive. On an island. No clue as to why everything seemed particularly wrong from the ocean to the very air. Concerned on a higher level, and it was getting to her control levels. “I’m fine.”

But that wasn’t fair to Mara, who had seen pretty much every state of anxiety Eno had ever gone through; if she hadn’t, Rollo most definitely had.

Okay. How to explain this.

“I–? you–?” Horrible start, Folook. Gather the words fucking needed. It took a breath for a moment, and tried again. “To give you a slight— ehm? Explanation…? As to why I’m.. Like this? In my eyes, I was here nearly two weeks ago.”

“This is–!” it could only gesticulate to the area surrounding them, “Jarring.”

Understanding flooded her eyes and posture as she blinked in response; having dealt with this for three months was probably a little desensitizing. “Oh..”

A deeply exhausted, familiar, bellow cut through their conversation. “Xiomara! We have injured.”

“Rollo, Rollo, Rollo!” Miss Mara called, frantic and excited in equal measure; any sort of calm gone as she pulled Eno towards her Father with such a tight grip it was jarring to be moved. “She’s not dead!”

“What?? Who?” came the confused reply, footsteps and voice growing louder as he came to see what Mara was talking about. “Who is—”

The cutoff couldn’t have been more abrupt, as the man himself came into view. He had once more gone through a change she had not been present for; An armored goliath stood before them. Broad frame that was made broader still by pauldrons and the fur draped artfully from beneath. The intricately designed armor was hidden beneath a brighter piece of cloth, decorated lightly with small patterns the light only caught when he moved and hid the deel beneath, equally patterned. The surcoat was held in place with a belt twisting vines of symbols decorating it, as well as draping decorations that hung from it of the Church. The entirety of it wasn’t ragged, per-se but it had most definitely seen wear and battle. It was as much a statement as it was battle-gear; get out of his way.

Papa.

About twenty different starts came to mind, all wanting information for very different things— ‘A year passed. I missed something.’ ‘Your clothes?’ ‘Why are you here?’ ‘I’m sorry’ ‘Why is Mara here on Nassau?’ ‘What happened while I was gone?’ but she fell back on a shy wave and a quiet, if frazzled greeting, “Hello again.”

“..Twice.”

It refrained from flinching, just barely.

“I do seem to have a bad habit of doing this!” she agreed, a mite hysterically.

Xiomara, unaware of the other’s internal plight, had changed her familiar iron grip from Eno’s hand to her shoulder, and partially pulled her down as the choirwoman frantically chattered with jerky movements. “She is physical! She is real! Otherwise, I have just completely lost it!!”

“Not yet, not yet,” it quickly reassured in a whisper, patting her poor Aunt’s hand and gripping Xiomara’s shoulder in solidarity. There wasn’t much she could do when poor Miss Mara got into a frantic state, only get something to snap her out of it, and from the other woman’s grasp on her, she was not moving.

Rollo stood there, staring. The basket he carried— because he did carry one, supplies no doubt from his running around— she had noticed his hand had been partially loose, and then abruptly, it tightened. The whites of his knuckles not even showing as the basket shattered like poorly woven string in his grip.

Both owlins paused in their movements with a quietly whispered, ‘ah’, and ‘oh dear’, from them respectively, with equal softness.

“Xiomara,” he repeated, “the wounded.”

There was not a moment of debate from the long-eared eastern screech, as she nodded and began to hustle off. Eno was partially pulled along by her aunt’s grip as much as Enososin herself attempted to follow to help.

That was— of course— stopped, by Rollo looking at her directly with a raised hand.

Firmly stopping in her tracks with a widened stance, Xiomara’s hold on her broke by sheer repelling forces. The woman briefly paused, her stride broken only to look at her in a silent confirmation of sanity, before once again making her way to the critically wounded or sick.

When Mara’s clicking footsteps had retreated enough for the goliath’s ear to no longer catch them, he finally spoke; his eyes having not left her the entire time. “What happened.”

Its first instinct was to immediately tell him in full what had happened– but it forcefully stopped any of that from coming out. It was not going to risk the literal unraveling of the man before her. Which left… it preemptively scrunched its face at the mere prospect of lying to her father, even by omission and for his own health. “Do you want the long version or the short?” She asked instead.

“You’re going—” and he stopped. His face finally breaking from its barely kept together neutrality and staring solely at her, to looking partially off to the distance, and shifting through so many micro-expressions at once she didn’t even try to categorize them individually. There was a short and heavy exhale of breath, like someone had punched him in the chest before his eyes snapped back to her face with a familiar fire burning in it. “A year.”

Ah. That had been grief then. “I know,” it whispered. “I did not—”

“You said a week.”

“I did,” she spoke a little louder, “And I was only gone a week!”

“However—!” it tried begin an explanation, only to be met with a wall.

“One small mission, to help assist— some.. admiral,” he hissed the word like poison— rage starting to very visibly seeth into both his face and tone as the small list laid like a heavy stone between them, “to subdue some pirates.”

“And a year,” he nearly roared— fuming with such a furious anger she’d never seen that it nearly caused a retreat from her inching its way closer.

“I know,” she whispered again. What else could it do? From its own perspective, this shouldn’t even be happening. None of this was right. Rollo shouldn’t be here. Why was he not in Kingston? Silver shouldn’t be in a coma and his bird should not have been struck through the heart.

“A year— where I thought you were dead,” he spat, gesturing his hand sharply. “And then you’re alive. And then you’re dead, again.”

Very slowly throughout his growing frantic state she had made herself a bit smaller. Not out of fear that he would hurt her, or think of an attempt to actually strike her, but out of shame. A thousand apologies were fighting in her chest, and none of them mattered, because its father was shaking with terror and anger at its disappearance again and all it wanted to do was hug him.

But she closed her eyes and hid its wince with a grimace of sorts at the continued onslaught. “Yeah,” with a pained whisper as a reply. “I can give an explanation.”

“An explanation is not good enough,” he huffed, rage simmering back down to a more simple anger; directed somewhere else, “because now the world is…. It’s bad.”

“Rotting,” she murmured, remembering Celestine’s words and the snow in the air near the end of spring, “It’s rotting. I know.”

He shook his head, face falling to something more of a pained look. “Worse. It’s stagnant.”

“Oh..” It was barely above a breath of sound. Rot meant things were at least moving; not in an entirely good way, but in a way that meant life was proceeding as it should in certain capacities. Stagnation on the other hand... “Oh dear..”

He continued— his eyes falling closed at the explanation of how the world was collapsing. “The water is no longer flowing.”

Her eyes sharpened in realization. Wait. “That's..”

He pointed out the sea, glaring out at it with exhaustion. “Look out at the bay.”

With a blink she slowly straightened herself out to peer intently at the water. It wasn’t moving— like they were at the edge of a pond, instead of on an island in the middle of the sea. There were no tides. No waves beating against the shore, even fragmentally; it was still against the beach. The sun may not have risen in the dawn’s early catches, but the strange.. Lightlessness finally caught its attention as well.

That’s what had twigged at her brain. The Red Dragon had been completely moving herself forward, with absolutely no assistance from the elements at all.

If the ship had been a normal one, such as what the Navy mainly armed themselves with, they would have been dead in the water the second they left the Goddess’ island.

“The stars,” the list furthered with angry dismay, “have become incomprehensible— to even Celestine.”

He gestured in a strange aborted shrugging movement, with a shake of his head. “I left Kingston, to come here, because I thought maybe you had abandoned your post. Done the unthinkable, but no.”

Oh. She couldn’t hide her sharp flinch at that.

That hurt.

“I did not abandon my post,” she pleaded quietly, voice cracking. I would never abandon you.

His face softened by a fraction. “I know that now,” came a small lilt.

She breathed quietly. That had hurt. Fine. Explanation time, because comment earlier aside, he damn well deserved one. “The island we were on,” she began, stronger in posture and tone, “we were only there for two days.”

“When we came back— out—” she emphasized, pained at being unable to explain to one of the most important people in her life why ‘out’ was the only word she could use, “this is what greeted us.”

Everything war-torn and unmoving. “We were only gone a week and a day.”

“I do not blame you,” he slumped briefly, his voice grown shaky as hers firmed. “But you must understand that the absence.. Has caused.. issues.”

As if the list he had just provided and the fact Silver and his dragon lay unwakeable in the town center did not cement that fact into its brain like a hot brand. “I see that.” “I am not the only father grieving.”

Strike two for sharp wincing. It took a lot right there not to just say ‘damn it all’ to the consequences and hug him, but there were important things to be divulged and if she hugged him right now she was not going to stop.

“Lobo,” she whispered, thinking of the devastation wrought.

“Lockwell,” he stressed.

“And Lockwell,” she repeated— before the words ‘father’ and ‘Lockwell’ well and truly registered in its mind in remembrance. That was an issue that was going to need explanation too. “Cass— oh sh– MMMMM.”

Rollo’s eyes widened by inches.

“Cass is alive,” she frantically emphasized before any other idea could take firmly root, “Cass is alive—”

“Thank God,” he snapped, shaking his head briefly as if physically removing the dread that briefly appeared on his face and the possibilities that had begun to appear in his mind’s eye.

“—but he’s in a coma of sorts.”

He blinked a couple times. Her father seemed to near immediately pick up what she was getting at; “Similar to Silver.”

“Yes,” she nodded, and then squinted to the side in thought towards where she’d come from. Both Silver and Casanova were in a similar coma, but in completely different situations— unless Lobo had something similar to what the Seekers had used on the tiefling, and in which case, they needed to find a cure for both of them, which might not be a spell or physical salve. It trailed off in thought. “I..”

“I’ve tried all I can to help him, but..” he told her, breaking it out of her searching thoughts, and trailed off as he looked at his hands. “I’ve lost it.”

Lost–? Oh. With how much that had happened in the past few hours, it was easy to let previous worries slip under the newer and more pressing matters. Concern seized its heart with a fierceness of a krakens’ grasp, and she continued to approach Rollo once again; closer still until it was near right in front of him and grasped one of his hands.

“I can not feel the Light anymore,” came the distressed murmur, gripping her hand in return. Strong and warm as always, but the energy was sharp. “All I have is just fire and rage.”

“..That’s okay.”

He laughed bitterly at her confidence. “Oh— No, it isn’t.”

“Yes it is,” she affirmed, pressing his hand in both of hers this time, “because it was what you have. And that is what we have to work with.”

Because if it wasn’t ok, then they had both been doomed from the start of the race, and that was not what Rollo had taught her. Work with it, not against it.

He gazed at her with banked and bloody embers burning within. “We will have to work hard then.”

Not breaking her hold on him, she nodded at him firmly. Come Hell and high water.

There was a brief moment of silence and resettling, before his hand squeezed both of hers tightly, and his other reached out to drag her closer— her hands dropped as he dragged her even closer into a hug her bones had missed.

How else could she respond but in kind? As soon as she saw his hand reach out she had started moving that last foot of space and wrapping her arms around him in the tightest hug she could manage as she pressed her face into his collarbone. I’m so so sorry. I missed you.

As she squeezed everything she had into the hug, she felt Rollo press back even tighter, bones popping between the both of them. I missed you too.

They stayed there for a moment, and even with the stagnation, it told itself that if it had its father and its crew by its side, she didn’t think the end would be so bad.

It was a selfish thought, but a true one.

Before they completely broke the contact, Rollo murmured down to her; fortifying them both for the break. “Go and talk to Lockwell, tell him what you know.”

“Were you at least successful,” he nearly pleaded as they pulled apart, still holding her arms.

“Yes,” she accentuated, relief seeping through, and then she realized that it was going to have to explain Vyrdakks’ presence to him, “doubly so, actually.”

Her father’s face briefly contorted into his ‘Surely, I must not have heard you correctly, please say again?’ expression. “What?”

“Both husbands, actually,” she mused with a tinge of amusement to her words. Secret third evil husband. Quite literally, from Vyrdakks’ own words.

Her father’s bafflement had reached such a level his face went blank and his words short. “I did not know he had more than one..”

It laughed in delight at the reaction. “I did not either! We have both of them now.”

He looked down at her with a raised eyebrow and a smile pulling at his lips in shared confused euphoria. The expression pulled into a concerned and weary smile, as he gripped her shoulders gently. “Be careful. By God be careful.”

Oh, if only he knew. Actually, please no one tell him— she did not wish to give him a heart attack or any other such conniption. “I am doing my damndest,” was all it gave in a tiredly delighted response.

Reaching up, it gently broke his hold by grabbing his head and bringing it down to her own in a loving headbonk. After that, it raced off through the town to where it, if it focused in on certain sounds, could hear familiar voices. Her crew.

As they started coming into view, she raised a hand and waved; drawing the attention of Ulysses and Pepper, mainly, as those two approached her half-way.

“I’m back! I’m back!” it called as it approached.

“I’m assuming everything went okay with Rollo, yes?” Ulysses questioned, trailing beside her as it reentered the main grouping.

With unnaturally widened eyes, it was trying to condense everything within its mind into a ball of yarn so it wouldn’t get lost in the threads; but she gave a nod.

“Fantastic,” he affirmed.

“All that matters,” Pepper agreed with a small nod and twitch of their wings.

“Wait, so are they with the Navy or…?” Gaura’s face pulled into one of his most used expressions; a scrunched up face with an ever so slightly tilted head. “I’m confused now..”

Thing is, now he was dragging her into the halls of confusion with him, as she had no idea as to what ‘they’ he was referring to in particular. “What??” “I think the Church is a separate entity.” Ulysses extrapolated.

Oh what the hell.

“The Church is very much a separate entity,” she groused, looking at Gaura with slight annoyance. She wasn’t even annoyed at him— The mere implication that the church and state would be tied together implied a lot of things she did not stand for; even if the government was ‘good’, those two things never mixed well, and they shouldn’t be. “Well!?” he pointed at her, “Well, why were you there?! At the beginning, why..? Why were you there..?”

This was because of the voyage at the start of their unwitting campaign? “Because the Government has to work with the Church,” she explained, unnecessarily sharp due to her annoyance, “because if they didn’t the Church would be its own separate thing entirely.”

“Ohh,” he exhaled, eyes growing bright with understanding, and then nodded at her with a goofy smile as he understood.

It could not help but tack on; “And the Church is very powerful and that scares the Government!”

“The Church also wanted a negotiator there to make sure that you didn’t murder everyone,” Kallstrom added, and it finally noticed that the way he’d angled the hood made it extraordinarily difficult to see him aside from his glowing eyes. “That too.”

Gaura looked away in immediately distressed shame. Ah. It didn’t mean to make him feel bad, but it was a simple fact of what had happened.

“And you know what?” Ulysses chimed, clapping his hands together, “It did in fact seem to work so it turned out very well, Eno.”

“In my defense—” Gaura clamored, “my orders were to. Uhm. I think the word was—”

“Eradicate.” Kallstrom filled in for him, deadpan.

“—Yeah, that word was thrown around a couple of times.”

Pepper patted Gaura on the shoulder with a sympathetically amused expression. At least the mothkin didn’t seem to hold a grudge against the former naval admiral.

The fact that there were two conflicting orders of interest was exactly why the government and church should stay separate; they actually held each other accountable when the chips were down. And when the government’s chips were down (the Navy going to possibly kill an entire island’s worth of civilians) the Church threw a curveball (a blood cleric who didn’t use her studied powers next to at all).

And people wondered why she didn’t trust political bureaucracy whatsoever.

“Yeaahh.”

Actually. It squinted in thought. Speaking of politics and ‘eradication’ orders—

“Oh! Yeah, hold on,” Gaura took out his Nassau bandana, looked at it, looked at Kallstrom— and then tore it in half with a rip through the woven cloth like paper, tied half of it onto his own arm, before handing the other half to Kallstrom.

“You just desecrated it,” came his slightly horrified voice, “You just— you took the— I– I could’ve gotten my own.” Pepper had started giggling, and as Kallstrom’s horror became louder, there was cackling.

“Well, no— here,” and he gently waved it, “I already tore it off.”

“O-okay!” Kallstrom agreed, sounding more frazzled by the second, taking the torn cloth and tying it quickly around his arm like a tourniquet.

“There we go, now everything’s fine!”

To be fair to Gaura, as he tied on his own piece and offered it to Kallstrom, the move had definitely gotten a few stares of startled surprise, distant approval, and sheer bafflement at the presumed desecration before the split between two of their number.

“Empty Night,” Ulysses groaned, his eyes wide but a small smile pulling at fanged lips, “he’s so stupid.”

There was quite literally no defense from that pure and simple fact; Gaura was stupid in one of the best ways possible. “He’s incredibly stupid, but he’s well meaning.”

“He’s our stupid.” Pepper agreed fondly.

“Pure of heart, dumb of ass,” Ulysses chuckled, hand covering his toothy smile to hide what they were talking about; and none too soon.

The poor triton’s fins twitched and he turned his gaze from Kallstrom to their small whispering gaggle. “Hey– wh- What are you guys talking about over there?”

“Nothing,” she sang in unison with Ulysses’ frantic repetition of the word.

“Nothing!” Pepper pronounced, and started gesturing everyone to follow them. “Nevermind, let’s go!”

“Time to talk to Lockwell,” she sang cheerfully, ignoring the dread. This was either going to go great or it was going to go rather horribly. Time to make sure things went at least decently towards the middle of the two.

Vyrdakks held up an arm as they all advanced and clicked a small device. “That is one delay.”

“How long– How many times can you do that before, like, they– can they stop the remote from working?” Gaura blathered, his fins going wide as his face scrunched in concern.

“I don’t know,” Vyrdakks admitted.

“Let’s not test it,” Pepper chimed, with both herself and Ulysses echoing it and ushering them all forward.

“I don’t know guys,” Gaura moaned, his ear fins flitting out, then pinned, and then out again, “I’m really worried about this lazer thing.”

“Let’s talk to Lockwell then,” she pointed out, “Quickly!”

“Okay,” he fretted. How he could do that with a monosyllabic answer was honestly quite impressive.

What started as a rather fast paced walk— a jog already for those with shooter strides— quickly morphed into a near full-tilt sprint towards the town hall as they all rushed to get this done as quickly as possible.

As they approached, it heard him well before it spotted him; Lockwell was shouting orders at the entrance slash porch of the town hall, handing out blankets and bundles of supplies. But the second he came into view for everyone else, both Ulysses and Pepper started waving as they hustled; flagging him down.

The pirate lord turned his head at the movement— face turned quizzical before freezing in every movement he’d been doing. As he started moving again, he set down the bundles he was holding— and the methodical way he was moving was giving Eno the niggling premonition of what he was about to do—and promptly vaulted over a table to charge straight for them.

All of them stopped. Ulysses started chanting God’s name, Gaura actively chose the fight or flight option of ‘freeze’, while Pepper was the first to say something fully coherent, and it was simply “Oh, we’re gonna get murdered!”

“A year!!!” came a now familiarly howled mantra, from a rapidly approaching dragonborn the size of a small horse thundering their way, “A year upon my ship!!

“In our defense!” Ulysses blurted, “Wait wait wait, in our defense, we can explain!”

“Kallstrom, we’re gonna die.” Alright that was enough yelling from everyone; one more yell to get the people in order.

Stepping to the forefront of the group, it spread its wings to its full width– feathers angled in a way that jutted out like defensive spears as it yelled at the charging dragon. “Hold on!”

Lockwell skidded to a full stop in front of her, smoke billowing from his mouth and nostrils in pure agitation at the sight of them. “I sent ye off! Told ya that ye could do it! Believed in ye! Then Cass leaves! I don’t see him! What ‘appened!?!”

“We do have Cass!” Pepper pleaded softly, their anguish quiet at the mention of their lover.

Oh melimelum. He’ll be alright..

“Oh speaking of, we do have Cass!” Ulysses jumped in, seizing the opportunity to try his hand at calming Lockwell’s fury, “Uh, he’s in a coma though.” “What?!”

It spun its head towards Ulysses in horror. Good God above, Ulysses, that was not how you approached a father on how his child was doing!!!

And just like that, it was back into chaos.

The next few seconds were absolutely everyone trying to get a word in edgewise to either explain the series of events that led them here, attempt to comfort Lockwell, or the dragonborn himself spitting in confused fury at the lot of them. They were quite literally never going to get any sort of explanation done like this.

“EVERYONE!” it hollered, silencing them with the force of her call; but now that left everyone looking at her, so it pressed onwards, “Everyone! One thing at a time.”

“From your perspective, we were gone for a year. For us, we were only where we needed to be for two days to fetch—” it adjusted its wing to completely reveal a triton with his many eyes, “—Davy Jones.” “Mhm! Yeah!” Gaura chimed in, eager to back her up.

At the movement of her wing, it watched Lockwell’s face shift from a latent fury to a blank shock.

She looked at the two men staring at each other, near blankly with how much emotion they were clearly going through, and made the executive decision to attempt to reveal the second reveal, which could result in something far more volatile.

It hoped that wouldn’t be the way it’d go.

“And when we got out,” it started, “a very helpful and friendly face got us back where we needed to be.”

After revealing the eliksni captain, she started to fold her wings closer to a socially acceptable spread. Vyrdakks wasn’t nearly as partial to being revealed, and stuck close to Eno– nearly hiding behind her feathers, but he was seen; she watched Lockwell clock him.

“Cass is on board The Red Dragon,” she continued to explain, watching the dragonborn absorb all the information, “he is alive, but he is in a coma.”

Lockwell took a deep breath; no more smoke poured out of his mouth.

And then Davy Jones stepped forward.

“I know what you’re going to say, Lockwell,” he started softly. “How could I have done this.. Abandoned you, to raise our son alone.”

“But I thought I could fix it, I do. I thought I could. Truly,” all of his eyes were fixed on Lockwell, but his hair was starting to float, “I– I thought I could get it under control and–”

Lockwell stepped forward, approaching silently.

“—Oh come on, Jack, please!” he begged, starting to get visibly distraught as his hair floated in earnest, “Don’t just stand there silent! Shout at me, scream at me— say something!”

But Lockwell said nothing. He only stopped when he was directly in front of the legend of the seas, and Jack Bellam gently cupped his husband’s face.

“You’re just as beautiful as the day I lost you.”

And they embraced. Sixteen years worth of longing compressed into a hug sorely needed.

It gently heaved a silent sigh of relief. Their job was successful; the two they set out to reunite had been pieced back together. It didn’t move anything other than its head as it turned to look at Vyrdakks; hiding, but looking at the other two men with a longing unhidden.

“Uhm,” Gaura quietly cut in, “This may be a bad time, but we are about to explode.”

“Oh yes, there’s that too,” Ulysses audibly clicked back into the reality behind them.

Lockwell blinked up from his bubble, coming back to himself, and curtly shook his head in an attempt to bring himself back. “Okay. I’m alive. My husband is alive, I’m happy.”

“Great, super, cool tender moment; we have something super really important to tell you,” Gaura prompted, tail lashing in fearful agitation.

He looked wearily wary. “That being?”

“Okay,” Ulysses began, “So. Sol.”

“Aye?”

“Is on Vyrdakks’ ship. Uh.”

Before Ulysses could continue, Lockwell held up a hand, and then pointed directed at the eliksni partially hidden. “Why’re you here.”

“He said he was sorry,” Gaura woefully tried to protect the captain.

“Let Vyrdakks speak,” Pepper chided, gently tugging Gaura on his arm.

Vyrdakks looked at the rest of them anxiously before sliding out from behind Eno, caution in his movements, and there was a melancholy heavy in his voice as he began. “I.. cannot claim the same.. reverence as Davy. But, I have worked to be better, as you told me to.”

“We.. Th- The House of Gold is better now,” he sounded so quietly happy for his House, it was a little difficult not to share it. “We are thriving.”

“Jack—”

“It’s Lockwell to you.”

The firm shutdown had Eno nearly bristle in protectiveness. That had been plainly uncalled for; The Kell was already anxious. There was no reason to shove him further down. However; this was its opinion based on a Vyrdakks who had spent 16 years working to improve himself— not the one that lingered in Lockwell’s memory. She acknowledged it had absolutely no claim whatsoever in this game, and firmly stood back.

But if either of them started to attack Vyrdakks she was ready to pull him back behind her; there was no way it was letting him get physically hurt here.

Vyrdakks paused only briefly, before bending his head in submission as much as acknowledgement. “..Lockwell. Things are better now. We have not killed in years.”

Its heart hurt for him. It ached in sympathy that made her claws twitch beneath her sleeves in need to give him a hug. But by Vyrdakks’ own words, they were on a timer. It reached out and gently tapped him on his carapace. He turned his head minutely down in her direction, his eyes questioning the interruption.

“But we do have a betrayer on your hands,” and then she blinked. No, it most definitely wasn’t his fault for Misirak’s decision at the moment. Backtrack. “Or, our hands. All of our hands.”

“A lot of hands,” Pepper breathed in distress, causing Vyrdakks to look even further down. “So many hands,” she confirmed.

“Too many hands,” Ulysses grimaced.

Eno could swear in the slight distance it could hear someone say ‘I have hands.’

Lockwell took the moment to look away from the lot of them and back to Davy Jones. Davy smiled and gave Lockwell a look. No, not just a look, that was a ‘intertwined lives’ Look. Oh, a decision was being made here. Lockwell sighed at the mute conversation, and turned to eye Vyrdakks.

“Alright ya big roach, come over here.”

Vyrdakks’ posture straightened to his full height for only a brief second, before a lot less calmly than either legend, he leapt for both men in sheer excitement; gripping them in a giant embrace where Eno (were she a betting person) would put money on the sound of bones popping from the sheer force of confined love in his arms.

Hoh, thank God.

It briefly let the instinctive need to press its claws over its heart in relief before rubbing her chest and shaking herself out.

“Good lord,” Pepper quietly agreed beside her.

“Admittedly, Jack, we have a problem,” Vyrdakks timidly croaked.

“What now?” Lockwell asked, his nose plates bunched at the larger man. (Which was incredibly funny, considering the shortest amongst the three was Davy Jones.)

The eliksni Kell seemed to shrink every word he sadly squeaked. “My first mate betrayed me and is pointing a laser at Nassau.”

The dragonborn looked at the shrinking man. “Okay.”

Oh, the poor dear.

“See we would–?” Ulysses started and then backed up again, starting over; “See, the original plan was that if anything fishy was going on then Soleil would blow up the ship, but there is apparently a whole lot of civilians on board so that’s—”

It felt the need to shake Ulysses until he started making bell sounds. “—Out of the question.”

“I didn’t even know that was part of the plan,” Gaura blinked, looking at Ulysses and then the rest of them.

Neither had she.

It put its face in its hands. Ulysses. What the absolute fuck.

“The entire House is—” Vyrdakks started, audibly startled and horrified by the admission, “I was very clear that the entire House was on the ship. I don’t know why you even considered blowing it up.”

Gaura sounded similar to Vyrdakks in tone. “I didn’t even think that was an option.”

“Well,” Ulysses defended, “we were running purely off vibes, if we’re being honest.”

Ulysses, why were you absolutely dead set on making every situation you walked into worse today? Good God in heaven.

“The vibes were pretty off,” Gaura conceded.

“I don’t even know what’s happening,” Pepper halfway whined, “I was out for an entire day.”

“We’re fucked is what’s happening Pepper.”

“Well fuck all this!”

“Uhhhg okay,” it dragged its face out of its claws, looking back up at Vyrdakks, “okay. How do we dismantle the laser. How do we do that?”

He tilted his head in refocused consideration. “Disable the hands.”

“The hands?” Ulysses questioned, his eyebrows raising into his hairline.

Lockwell looked at Vyrdakks with a similarly disgruntled confusion. “What do you mean the hands??”

Vyrdakks gestured rather frantically as he creaked in distress. “Let me explain, ple a s e.”

“What do you mean disable the hands?” Ulysses asked again, gesturing for the man to continue.

“We may have used e-evIL!” he emphasized, pointing at Lockwell before anything could be said, “evil spellcaster hands into a lightning bolt. Launcher.”

Oh good heavens, Vyrdakks. Okay. It had many questions. None important enough to actually ask at the current second in time. Its fondness grew.

“You—!?” Ulysses looked somewhere between horrified and impressed, “Okay! So there’s just? Disembodied wizard hands? To power a cannon in your ship?”

“They reflect off of mirrors,” Vyrdakks explained, sounding rather distraught, “and it..”

“If we destroy the mirrors, will that work?” she prodded, ignoring the looks of either horror or sheer bafflement directed at the captain and trying to get to the root of the issue. “Or do we have to disable the hands themselves?”

“Disable the hands,” he confirmed, “if you disable the mirrors they will just launch into the open hull and destroy the ship.”

“Oh-kay!” she cheered, startled by the prospect of accidentally destroying the ship, “Then yes. Go for the hands.”

“Okay! Yes!” Ulyses frantically agreed, “Totally just disable the hands!”

“We just gotta break some hands,” Gaura shrugged, grimacing politely, “how hard could it be?”

Pepper put their head in their hands.

“Dismount them or break the spell..?” Vyrdakks suggested.

“Ss– dispel magic, work? Maybe?” she muttered in thought. That was going to be quite a few castings of that spell, if so; depending on the amount of hands as well. It could probably do it, if she put a bit more energy into it.

“I don’t think you have enough energy to dispel that amount of magic,” Ulysses shook his head, brow furrowing at the idea.

Its mind was stubborn; it could probably still do it..

“The entire ship is made of magic as well,” Vyrdakks added nervously, “you would cause many issues.”

Well that shut down the idea effective immediately; she wasn’t risking the elxnis’ lives to try and dispel magic on hand. If they really wanted to remove the hands from the equation, they could just take them off the ship.

“I mean I can go in the room and do the thing where I get really big and just start breaking stuff,” Gaura shrugged, “Might be tech.”

Everyone stared at him, as if he had not heard that if he broke the wrong thing, the ship would get shot with many lightning bolts through the hull and sink the damn thing.

“You know,” Vyrdakks sighed, looking at Gaura, “at this point. Whatever works.”

“As long as the hands are gone,” Pepper sharply dictated, “our problem is gone.”

“And my people are alive,” Vyrdakks stressed; after Ulysses brought up his apparent plan to blow up his House, the eliksni was justifiably insistent on that point to the vampire.

“We are not going to hurt your people,” it emphasized, and then looked at Ulysses pointedly.

He looked up at her with innocent caution and then raised a single finger; “Except for maybe the first mate.”

It conceded to that point with a nod. Except maybe the first mate.

“I will flay him myself,” Vyrdakks asserted with a slight growl.

“Okay,” Ulysses nodded, “Sounds good.”

And after that declaration, Lockwell, Davy Jones, and Vyrdakks all looked at each other, took a deep breath and she watched three very different racial expressions of severe concentration take hold as they nodded to one another.

Davy Jones split off first, bolting off into the distance; on his way somewhere to get shit done.

Lockwell meanwhile turned and pointed at their triton. “Gaura, you still a navyman?”

“Uh, no,” he responded, tiredness sweeping across his face; a reminder of this morning no doubt. “Changed my mind.”

“What’s the cloaked one?”

Oh gods.

“Oh–? Ohhh, the cloaked one? That’s Kallstrom.”

It briefly closed its eyes and prayed quietly for both patience and mercy towards everyone on the crew.

When it opened its eyes again, Lockwell had apparently had enough random curveballs thrown his way today that he didn’t even blink at the name. “He still a navyman too?”

“No,” he shook his head again, “I talked him out of it.”

Eno gave a thumbs up to Lockwell as he looked over them all for confirmation. Please don’t make her go through this morning part two, electric boogaloo.

She also saw Kallstrom give an extraordinarily shaky thumbs up; he clearly did not wish to go through this morning, part two, either.

“It’s okay he’s harmless!” Gaura assured, gesturing to his friend’s arm, “Look! He has the bandana, see?”

Lockwell peered at Kallstrom’s arm as Gaura pleaded. “Did you rip a bandana in half and give him it?”

“I gave him half of mine,” Gaura explained, tail swishing softly.

Gaura Arzorath, the triton you are.

“Honestly?” Lockwell looked at the bandana, the cloaked tiefling, and the adamant Knight, “That’s alright.”

“Good work lads!” he gestured grandly, “Welcome to Nassau. You’re pirates now, so if your da comes back again I expect ya t’be attackin’ him full force.”

“O-kay,” came the deeply dejected reply.

Gaura Arzorath, please stop making me wish to give you a hug every three seconds, it’d be beneficial to the greater productivity of my brain.

“Gaura?”

“Yeah?” he perked up.

“Whatever ya need, you’ll have us by yer side.”

“Auh,” Gaura blinked with a soft expression, and fins flat against his head, “thanks, man.”

“Alright,” Lockwell prompted, looking back at the general group, “the lot o’ ya. We need t’fix this. Three of y’are going to help where you can here.”

“Vyrdakks,” Lockwell continued, “from what I remember has a teleportation circle t’get onto his ship.”

“Oh cool,” Gaura blinked– his fins fanning out slightly as Ulysses made a small noise of interest.

Vyrdakks nodded to the bunch of them and pulled out a small metal stone, shiny in the dawn's light.

Gaura raised his hand, eager to get started immediately. “I call dibs on fighting on the ship!”

“The lot of you’ll be fightin’ on th’ ship,” Lockwell rebutted, “we need to prepare the defenses in case ya fail!”

“Defense Gaura, defenses,” she confirmed with amusement.

“That’s a great idea, but I’m not gonna fail,” the triton countered with absolute confidence, expression turning smug.

“You forget that there are a lot of people on that ship, Gaura,” Ulysses pointed out.

“I can kill a lot of people very q—” and then he realized with widened eyes, and backpedaled, “I can disable a lot of people very quickly.”

“Let’s try not to do th— Oh God, you’re making me sound like Eno.”

It patted Ulysses on the shoulder in amusement. “Welcome to my world.”

He looked mortified. “Oh, don’t do that.”

“My world.”

Gaura put his hands on his hips and looked rather smug; though the boyish look in his eyes overall made the image more charming than threatening. It could only internally plead that Gaura would in fact stick with the ‘disabling’.

“I’m very good at fighting.”

“Okay,” she rubbed one of her temples, “I will stay here and work with the defense; who are the two that will stay with me?”

“Uh,” Pepper started, a small grimace on their face as they started forward towards her.

Eno raised an eye in concerned query; if this was an attempt to remove themself because they didn’t think themself capable, the mothkin was incorrect. “You are quite offensively capable, Pepper.”

“I’m glad you think that,” Pepper huffed with a small smile, but continued looking distressed nonetheless.

She missed something, and that occurred to her far later than it should have. And that something was someone they undoubtedly would want to stay back and look after.

“Pepper,” Lockwell murmured, catching her misstep, “it may be best if you stayed here with Cass.”

“That’s what I was worried about,” they fretted, their antennae twitching in concern.

Of course. “Alright,” it replied, “then you’ll stay here with Cass.”

“He loves ya lass,” Lockwell started, clearly having a speech prepared.

“Oh, I know,” they laughed, distress twisting to wry amusement.

“Ah,” Lockwell relaxed, looking pleased, “he finally grew a pair and confessed t’ya, thank God.”

“Oh thank fuck,” Pepper nodded in vehement agreement.

“My son was a coward,” he muttered in affection, “Alright! Break! Get yer shit done!”

And then the dragonborn pivoted on clawed heel, tail twisting to keep him stable, as he booked it off in the direction of the forge. “Anyone defendin’, follow me!”

Eno startled at the call but followed the sprinting dragonborn with little to no trouble; it was rather similar to chasing after Rovena.

Except Rovena could fly if claw wanted to try and escape her.

Hustling to a stop by the entrance he spun on his tail to look at her. Eyes sharp in the glow of the fire within the forge. “Yer th’only one?”

“Aside from Pepper, and they have to run the opposite direction,” she confirmed, brushing itself off, “Everyone’s more focused on. The laser.” Or at least that was Gaura’s main concern. “And Soleil, still on the ship.”

Lockwell shook his head in consternation. “What’s th’ girl even doin’ on his ship in the first damned place..?”

“Swapped places so Kallstrom wouldn’t get stabbed due to fucking up socially, a revenge plot, or otherwise be recruited into hare-brained murder schemes like the one Misirak apparently brewed.”

He blinked. “Oh. Aye, that sounds like her. Though, I didnae expect fer her to do it for..”

The man trailed off with a raised eyebridge and a small lash of his tail. “The girl’s certainly got a specific taste.”

It whistled a quiet sound of amusement. Oh, okay so he picked it up through mere action; that was at least a little funny.

He shook his head and pointed off to the town and surrounding areas. “What I need from ya, lass, is to go do what a cleric does best; healin’.”

It raised one of its eyes in question; “That all?”

“Fer now? Aye,” he nodded, “if yer needed on the offense, you’re gonna want anyone nearby t’be at peak condition in this environment.” It crinkled its eyes at that. “Can’t argue with that,” and it turned and started her way back to the general populace.

It wasn’t too long into making small rounds, having bothered Xiomara for supplies after catching her briefly, before the smell of burning stones— a very difficult smell to describe on the best of days besides sharp and hot— reached her senses as she made her way around; the walls of Nassau glowing slightly, as she realized that it was being reinforced by magma.

So that’s what Lockwell was doing.

The fire’s glow within the stones looked like runes almost, and it made her blink afterimages of this morning from her head. It was.. Eventful. It wasn’t particularly enthused about the idea of unpacking that, right this second, but it needed to be addressed internally, and what better moment was it going to get?

As she healed people, with blankets, food, and resetting some bones, she tentatively touched this morning’s events, where it really all began with the stars.

(The stars had stared at them all. Told them of their misdeed in the nature of their world.

At least, the severe chastisement from literal celestial bodies had her severe headache explained and promptly chased away; now it slept lightly in the crows’ nest.

Then there was a scream, next an explosion that rocked the air; to say it knocked her out of sleep was an understatement worthy of award. She all but lept out of the crow’s nest in preparation for a fight— hand on her hammer as soon as she touched the planks below.

But there was no one fighting on the deck.

Aside from Vyrdakks, whom had not moved an inch from where he lay peacefully asleep. Part of the reason why she had slept out here was to make sure nothing happened to him—

For she did not trust Davy Jones.

But nor was there anything out on the water— apart from The Glittering Hoard sailing parallel to them as a show of faith in their exchanges— that could be attacking them.

The commotion itself coming from below decks was rather loud however, which had her hand retract from the hammer as she hustled down. What had happened?

The clamor grew to increasing volume, and what was simply shouting to most people, was near deafening to her own ears. A familiar tiefling Navy Admiral with his hair on fire, the smell of smoke, blood, along with burning cloth, and a vampiric wood elf on the ground wrapped around each other, punching and shouting. Kallstrom and Ulysses were locked in combat with one another, while herself and Gaura Arzorath came to a sudden standstill in the hallway watching them in confusion.

“Oh man.”

“What in the Heavens??”

She looked at Gaura who in reply had turned his head and looked at her. “What in the Heavens happened here? What–?”

“I think we should do something,” Gaura replied with wide eyes– head with fins flared snapping between her and the two rolling on the ground.

“Yeah? You think?!?”

“Ulysses tried to bleed me out!” Kallstrom howled.

“I’m doing what needs to be done!” Ulysses yelled.

Eno startled briefly but then started for the conflict; wrapping both arms around the vampire, beginning to drag Ulysses away from his lock on Kallstrom, while Gaura rushed beside her and then grappled Kallstrom under his arms to pull him in the opposite direction away from Ulysses.

Gaura had managed to succeed with one arm as the cleric grappled with the struggling vampire, but Kallstrom’s other arm was still wrapped around Ulysses’ throat in an attempt to strangle him, then Gaura’s teeth were bared and gritted, and Kallstrom was summarily ripped away from Ulysses with fighter’s determination.

“The fucking vampire tried to bleed me!” he screamed, kicking and pulling away from Gaura’s firm restraint with teeth gnashing. “He tried to kill me, I was right!”

“Hang on, like we’ll deal with that in a second, dude,” Gaura coaxed, “You're bleeding, relax.”

“I’ll deal with him now! Let me go, let me go!!”

“Hang o– Jus— No, shut up.”

A horrifying picture was beginning to form in her head of the events that had just taken place as she gripped the vampire in her arms even tighter. “Ulysses,” she whispered, “what in heaven's name.”

The man in her arms stopped his thrashing for only but a moment. “...He’s going to hurt all of us.”

“Knew I didn’t like that guy,” Gaura muttered, grip tightening on Kallstrom protectively instead of just as a restraining maneuver as his fins pulled back.

“He’s going to hurt Sol,” Ulysses heaved, voice cracking as he tugged, “he’s going to hurt you, he’s going to hurt Pepper!!”

Kallstrom’s eyes blazed dangerously as he continued to pull against Gaura, a hysterical manic grin pulling at his face as Ulysses yelled. “It seems like you’re doing a awful good job of hurting them right now, you fucking leech!”

“No—” he spat, teeth gnashing sparks and shaking his hair that sizzled and crackled with the movement, “that’s not even a good enough insult for the stereotypical vampire— you’re a fucking bat!”

“Euh— Okay,” Gaura winced, beginning to back step and crab-walk towards the entrance of Kallstrom’s room, “Alright, buddy, let’s talk about this in here, okay?”

“No,” Kallstrom snapped, still pulling fiercely— perhaps even stronger now that he was being taken away from his target, “No, we need to discuss this here, I will not be having an attempt! On my life!”

As Kallstrom was partially pulled, partially carried away, Ulysses also began to tug harder at her arms to get at the tiefling again— or more accurately; to finish what he started.

Her blood chilled.

“Well,” Gaura’s voice echoed and muffled in turn as its own grip was tightened, “talk to me first and then we can deal with it.”

‘One aggressor being dealt with.’

And then its eyes fell on Ulysses.

‘Your turn.’

She hefted Ulysses up once and for all, while completely trapping him in one of her arms with no leverage to escape, removing his feet from the ground while cinching his arms to his sides; she stormed out of the sleeping quarters, the living space, and onto the top deck.

“Let me settle this, Eno.” Ulysses growled, twisting and turning to get back downstairs.

“No.”

With the short enunciated click of her beak, she spread her wings and launched into the air with a few brief flaps, letting the air drag and drop her back, before then catching herself— lingering near the ship’s wake.

“Put me down!” he yelled, now pulling himself to be clutching tighter to her.

“You want to get dropped into the ocean?”

Ulysses' stiffness grew closer to rigor mortis as he stayed silent in response.

“That’s what I thought.”

There was a moment in time where she just had to scramble in her own mind to coherently link things together. Gaura, herself, and Ulysses talked to Vyrdakks; he almost unraveled due to them figuring out Calypso’s removal from the greater tangle as a whole. The stars themselves admonished them harshly, and then everything was ok. Vyrdakks had suggested sleep as the three of them had a mini-breakdown over their shared event. It had gone to sleep in the crows’ nest. During the brief time it had been asleep, Ulysses attacked Kallstrom. Ulysses almost killed Kallstrom, apparently and intended to finish the job he’d left undone.

So she asked the only question she could think of in that moment. “What, in God’s name, were you doing, Ulysses?!?”

“I am keeping everyone safe!”

“From what!?”

“Him!!” he cried.“Kallstrom?!” it responded with incredulity.

“Yes!!”

“What has Kallstrom done?” Aside from being eccentrically manic? Being as paranoid, if not more so, than the vampire in its arms that very second? “Right now— What has he done on this ship that warrants an attack on his life? What has he done?”

“First of all he’s plotting to kill Davy Jones!?! Next, he’ll turn around and try to kill all of us!!”

It would be a wonder if all of them combined could take on a man whose mythos include taking down gods, and even if they did— with Davy Jones’ own book, to boot— the consequences dealt by the ones still living would be innumerable. “Okay, do you think he’s going to succeed against Davy Jones?”

Or more accurately, deal with the consequences of being a Navalman on Nassau that killed the de facto leader’s husband and survive?

“That’s not the point!!” he lamented.

‘You brought the damn point up, you fucking nitwit!’

“First of all; No, it is the point, because you brought it— what you were doing wou—” then she caught a gleam of a blade within a death grip near her breast and all other sprints of thought exploded upon impact, “what are you holding?!”

The magic radiating from the damn thing was great enough that it was a wonder that she didn’t recognize its presence around her immediately, especially considering the blood and ash dulling the gleam on the unfamiliar blade marking it as Ulysses’ weapon of choice. But upon second glance— the runes not quite bright— from the steadily ticking upwards feeling resonating quietly within the main source of power; it wasn’t even at full power yet.

That thing was meant to obliterate.

“Tis none of your business,” Ulysses groaned, oblivious to her fear.

‘I can and would drop you right this fucking instant, you kuttungajuk avângak tiguak of a kuvigâk, if not for the fact Sol would have my feathers and wings for a coat for leaving her best friend lost in the middle of the fucking ocean.’

“It is all of my business, Ulysses!” it despaired, and as if in response, its voice started gaining the screech of her baser tongue, “You decided to make it my business when you tried to stab, one of our crewmates!!!”

“He is not a part of my crew.”

“He’s a part of mine!” it hissed loudly, claws twitching violently, “And guess what!? You are too!”

“Put me down!” He repeated, wriggling once again. “Put me back on the ship, now.”

“No– not until you explain, in full, what you think you are doing.” Nothing had been explained except for the fact that Ulysses simply intended to kill someone she cared about. And even then that was simply absorbed by the blatant evidence. And not to mention— “You are violating guest right— of all things to violate!”

Guests' rights under hospitality applied to everywhere and to everyone. There was no exception. Like parlay, it was a yield, and it relied on everyone’s willingness to keep the peace and diplomacy for it to work.

Not to mention; with how many Greek gods they had been dealing with in the past few months? It was a genuine wonder that the lightning-wielder himself, a god of hospitality, had not simply materialized to zap Ulysses where he stood for the violation, as he had done on multiple occasions within the tales.

“I am keeping us safe,” he spat, teeth bared like a feral cat despite the anguish in his voice, “he’s going to stab us all in the back!”

“So you plan to do it first?!”

“Yes! If that’s what it takes to keep us all safe!? Of course it is!”

‘I think I’ll stab you myself at this rate.’

“All that does is beget enemies, Ulysses! You gain more enemies the more you try to lash out in preemptive strike!

Ulysses stared up at it with pervasive fury and despair in his eyes and pursed his lips into a thin line. She stared back at him in equal challenge as the silence grew longer and longer, and the tension thickened. He had nothing to rejoin to that, because he knew it was right.

It let him stew as it turned its gaze back upwards, making sure her energy had not been pushed into its wings, pushing them both forward and close to crashing into the ship, or that they had deviated off course and were too far from the ship.

Neither were the case, but it needed to collect its own thoughts on the matter either way so it did not look back to the vampire just yet.

It quietly inhaled deeply in fortification.

It had just been scared to the high hells and to the deepest reaches of heavens.

The righteous screeching fury at the injustice of attacking a man in his bed roiling threateningly in its chest was not to be let out, and she was keeping it that way, damn it. The equally attention seeking anxiety gripping her bones in a strong hold rattled endlessly about the fact Desmond almost died.

It clawed at her brain like a small child seeking a safe place to hide; Could it trust Ulysses to not hurt the others he disagreed with? Like Gaura or Abaddon?

Could she acquire his word on that?

Could it even believe that claim?

Believing what someone told her, with apt consideration to the surroundings and their reputation, was what had gotten her so far in the first place. If she did not do it growing up, she would not have been trusted enough to gain a spot in the Blood sect of the Church. If it had not done it with Silver, with the Nassauean people; that fight might not have turned out so well. Word was everything, just as much as actions.

Nearly especially on the sea with sailors and their suspicions (which she now had to claim herself amongst); On the sea all you had was your reputation, actions and word. And if your reputation was that you violated your word, your actions and voice meant nothing.

A fast-tracked lane to have no friends and very few allies, and those that would do so would expect any wrong move as a betrayal and end in him hurt; proving a self-feeding prophecy that did not need to happen at all.

That was not what it wanted for her friend.

“You do not want everyone on this ship as an enemy, Ulysses. Do you—” she paused, wondering if she should even bring up the beholder in the room, and then pushed forward gently; “...do you want Sol as an enemy?”

Not quite her final gambit, but knowing him, it was one of the better things to use and bring him to see reason. “Cause this will gain her as an enemy..”

“...Sol is not on the ship right now,” he sulked childishly.

“Sol is the entire reason he is still on this ship!” She chided. “He cares about her! We all care about her!”

Ulysses fell once more into silence. The fact the sea elf was not on the ship to stop him from hurting Kallsrom was undoubtedly another reason as to why he was pulling this maneuver now, and not later. Was jealousy also a moving factor here? She couldn’t very well cross it out, considering the tiefling only seemed rather content when Gaura or Soleil was near, and Ulysses was always hovering near Sol.

‘If you did not try and make a move, Ulysses, that is your own damn fault; stop trying to kill a man who has her interests at heart.’

She sighed ever so quietly, pushing her thoughts away and using suasion for her next attempt. “Ulysses… I.. understand, that you do not trust Kallstrom..”

“And if I can hazard a guess,” she continued, sarcastically wry, “you don’t trust Abaddon either.”

The silence from Ulysses continued, the wind rustling their clothes being the only sound, along with The Red Dragon pushing through the sea.

“Is that true?” she questioned, already knowing the answer that awaited it.

“It is,” came the croaked reply.

There it was.

It wondered; was that why Ulysses volunteered to go fetch him on the island? And why her insistence of going in a pair was something he initially protested against?

Inhaling deeply, it pushed away what her response to finding Abaddon dead, again, would have been. On the ship, or on the island. It pushed away into a deep dark hole. But as she mentally pushed away the possibility, Ulysses seemed quick to assure her of something. “It was just going to be Kallstrom.”

“At least for right now,” he tacked on.

“For right no—” she spluttered in a quiet hysterical breath, “Ohh Heavens… Heavens above and below.”

Her claws twitched.

“Please, just put me down.”

Her voice was quite a bit shakier than it would have liked as it replied. “Are you going to try and stab them again?”

The damnable silence again.

“Then you better get comfortable, because we’re not going down.”

“Just put me down,” he whispered again, his voice shaking in the wind, “please.”

She closed her eyes as they flew for a moment or three. Then she adjusted the vampire so his face was pressed against where a collarbone would be, and both arms secured around him so he didn’t have to look at the sea.

Maybe it would soothe both of their shakes as well.

Continuing to fly for a while was otherwise rather peaceful. The stars, their only companions for the time they spent in the void of sky; the quietness of the air was only broken by the water being pushed through by gently creaking timbers, and the rustle of their clothes in the air pushed through silent wings. There wasn’t quite an actual wind blowing against or towards her; the air was actually rather still and she herself was doing most of the work, and that twigged the back of her mind. Something was off.

There was suddenly a noise to her left of wings taking to the skies— she instinctively churred a questioning greeting before she spotted who it was, and upon recognizing the palette, the questioning sound turned softly happy.

“Oh great,” Ulysses grumbled, shuffling tighter as if that would hide him any better.

“Good morning,” it greeted tiredly, but cheerfully.

“Going for a late night—or early morning, rather— flight, Eno and..?” Abaddon tilted his head in a clockwise motion before dipping hisself lower to peer at the vampire held close, “Ulysses, I didn’t know you could fly.”

She chuckled. “He can’t, or otherwise he’d be in the ocean by now.”

‘I could have dropped him, and had I been in the wrong mood, he would’ve been.’ Was left tactfully unsaid.

“I heard a ‘bang’,” Abaddon prompted as he came back to eye level, looking down at Ulysses and back to it in curiosity.

It blinked tiredly at him as his words processed. Was he playing dumb or was he genuinely asking? She was too tired to try and deal with the fallout of blatantly asking, soooo mind games it was.

“Mmm,” she hummed in disgruntled agreement, “So did we.”

“What happened?” he questioned liltingly.

“Ah, so you don’t know,” she murmured, answering her own question– thankfully within a sentence– and then also looked down at Ulysses. “Ulysses would like to talk or would you like me to, seeing as you wish to hide?”

The elf hissed. “I was attempting to deal with a pest.”

“Oh,” Abaddon grimaced in enlightened understanding, looking back to her for confirmation, “he tried to kill one of the Navymen, didn’t he?”

“Yep.”

The vampire-hunter looked back down at the vampire. “You’re a moron.”

“God knows they can’t do anything,” he continued, lamenting in disappointment before Ulysses could wipe the startled look off his face, “Hell, they could make fine allies if you get rid of the naval brainwashing. I thought you were smarter than that.”

“Paranoia takes away the most logical person’s functions,” she clicked definitively.

“Seems less like paranoia and more like deluded fantasy to me,” he remarked, rolling his eyes at the idea.

“Mmm,” she squinted in thought for a small time, “Can they not be one and the same, here?”

There was a moment of consideration. “Similar at best,” he agreed with a nod of his head.

“I’m right here you know.”

“Youuuu—” she began, her thoughts all crowding to get out at once, as Abaddon’s and her own head snapped towards Ulysses; but thankfully, the vulture chimed loudly, “Yeah! You’re a fucking moron! You deserve to be talked about!”

“You decided to pull a stupid maneuver,” it finally tied together, “so get treated like an idiot for a little bit.”

“Quite honestly, I’m surprised this is the worst of your punishment,” he trilled, “you best hope Sol doesn’t hear about this.”

“That bridge will be crossed,” she inhaled, “when it comes to it.”

“Or burned,” he added, with a mirthful edge to his words.

It laughed an odd noise. Abaddon had a morbid sense of humor, and it was always entertaining if sometimes shocking; Partially, because the jokes usually landed true, and partly— in this case— because, knowing Sol for the little time she had; she would only burn a bridge if forced to by circumstances she had no say in.

That being mentioned, it was always a possibility; “Probably,” she agreed, if only to give Ulysses something to truly think about.

“Well, I’ll leave you.. To it!” He informed looking for all the world, quite done, and looking back to her charge with an amused air. “Seems like you have a lot to think about.. Ulysses.”

“Don’t talk down to me, I’m not a child.”

“You’re acting like one,” Abaddon heatedly snapped back; levity gone. “Don’t presume you can talk back because you think you’re in the right.”

“I never said I was in the right,” Ulysses frowned.

“Then why did you do it?”

“To keep yo— . .. ...To keep my crew safe— how many times do I have to fucking say that!?”

“Ad infinitum,” Abaddon clacked, “until you realize; you’re not.”

Keeping the crew safe… The move he had almost succeeded with had the near perfect unmitigable chance of ripping the entire crew apart. Gaura, because that was his best friend– no matter their arguments, would undoubtedly call for Ulysses’ head on a pike and would likely stop at next to nothing to avenge him. She would have to put the vampire in the brig, under lock and spell, for both everyone else’s safety as well as his own.

Soleil.. God, Soleil– put between a rock and a hard place as her own best friend committed the exact deed she was currently trying to protect Kallstrom from on the eliksni’s ship. She imagined the poor sorcerer would not take the failure of protecting two very important things to her well at all.

Pepper alone would be devastated enough for everyone— Gaura, Sol, Kallstrom, themself, and with what had just happened to Cass, it couldn’t foresee a very tame reaction to a betrayal from inside the house.

Its own reaction didn’t matter in the grand scheme of things, but oh she could foresee that shipwreck setting itself on fire the moment it hit the rocks; thank God it hadn’t.

“..That man is not a part of my crew,” Ulysses repeated.

“Why not be open to the possibility?” Abaddon asked, tilting his head up to the side; looking farther down in open curiosity, “It seems he’s more than willing to consider it, at least.”

“I’ve never met a good Navyman, ever, in my life.”

“You’ve met one and a half,” the vulture countered. “Seems to me you’re just as closed-minded as them, if that’s your train of thought.”

“An eye for an eye makes the whole world go blind, vampire,” he raised his eye in mimicry of an eyebrow. “One would think at this point you’d know.”

“Maybe you should apologize, bake him some cookies,” Abaddon snarked, but there was some genuinity in it, despite the tease.

“Absolutely the fuck not.”

“Well, either that, or see what happens..!” He goaded; the lightness of his voice belying the severity of the possible consequences should he, in fact, let everything play out.

“Either way, it's going to end bad unless you— the accuser, and the attacker— figure out your real priority.”

And with the silence from Ulysses, he gave a nod of satisfaction and peeled away back to the ship.

“Good night,” she chimed. Because it was far too early to actually start the day, even for those on military wake-ups.

He gave a wave up to her as he landed— up in the crows’ nest— and hunkered down from view.

“He is right, you know,” she began, a minute or two after he left, giving Ulyses a moment to process. “As the instigator, you will have to apologize.”

“Absolutely not! There’s no need for it!”

That made something in her bones recoil in vitriolic dislike. Oh absolutely not. She bent her neck and twisted her head so she was staring straight into Ulysses' eyes, upside down as he was.

“What makes you think you’re above apologizing to people.”

“I will apologize to people,” Ulysses quietly said, having shrunk a little bit in her arms at her tone, “but not him..! He doesn’t deserve it.”

Her disappointment in Ulysses’ words grew immeasurably, and she broadcasted it by slitting her eyes at him in distaste.

“No one deserves anything. That’s why we deserve everything. You come into this world and you have nothing. In life, you possess nothing. You own nothing. You are free. All you have is what you are, and what you give. You cannot greet the world with hands full of promises, it’s like trying to give a handshake to someone with a basket in your arms, you have to greet the people with empty ones so you can grasp each other in community.”

It knew for a fact she wasn’t explaining the idea of everyone’s equal deserving of opportunity clearly, and how no one deserves anything more than another, and that frustrated it greatly. She whistled a small, wavering unhappy whistle. “You cannot greet them with closed fists.”

“Violence begets violence.”

“Violence is what will keep us safe,” Ulysses argued, brow furrowing deeper, “That's what kept me safe for so long..!”

“Then maybe you need to learn something new..”

She let her pupils dilate again.

He shook his head at her, face teetering on the precipice of crying as he gave a laugh— an echo of one, at least, as the cracks in it let her see a dismayed man trying his damndest. “You are a foolish woman, Eno.”

“And I will continue to be one,” it replied. If she stopped, Enososin was dead.

“You can’t just— ! Be kind to everyone and expect for things to just work out perfectly fine!”“I don’t, actually.” Honestly, within her mind, everything was expected to go bad and wrong. “I don’t expect everything to work out because I am kind, but I expect it to help lean things in my favor. I have been kind.. to you. I have been kind to Abaddon. I have been kind to Pepper, I have been kind to Kallstrom— as much as he will allow me to,” she added wryly, “you do not see them try to strike me in the middle of the night.”

“Kindness is not an easy thing Ulysses—”

“I understand that!”

“No, you don’t actually,” she shook her head, “you seem to think that kindness can just be pulled from a wellspring or—”

“Kindness is what turned me into a vampire in the first place, Eno!!”

And as he said that he wriggled to give himself enough room, [which she allowed with a small relaxing of her arm; he had something to show] to pull up his sleeve and reveal numbers— wounds that weren’t allowed to heal properly nor with magic— carved deep into his arm.

84311.

Ah.

“Kindness is what had this happen to me, kindness is why my entire village was razed to the ground!”

“Kindness is not what did that..” she quietly disagreed, but knew there was a course to be run– his need to explain broke through the need to keep secrets.

“Kindness is what did that!” he cried, “‘Cause if I had not been kind, I never would have gotten her from that fae trap!”

He laughed, quietly and on the edge of hysteria. “I never would have helped her out, and I would have never…!”

He trailed off, the devastation clear in everything that man was; the free hand not ardently grasping the dagger was desperately clinging to her robes and feathers beneath.

‘Would never have become a vampire.’

“Ulysses, listen,” she murmured, a little more aware of the situation, “Kindness is not what destroyed your home; what destroyed your home was the cruelty of another person. A vampire, funnily enough, striking first, when you opened your hand.”

“Your kindness did not do that. Her cruelty did. You cannot hold yourself accountable for something you, yourself, did not plan.”

“You showed a kindness to someone who..” she tilted her head; a fae trap, huh? “Was stuck.”

“To someone who didn’t deserve it,” he hissed, his eyes narrowing to glowing slits.

“No,” she chided slowly, “no, no one deserves that either. It’s a gamble every time you show someone kindness. One I personally will always make, and you should too.”

“Because it is not a mistake to have cared about someone, it is not an error to have tried to help. People are going to embarrass themselves with mortal connections every day.” She tilted her head at him in amusement. “Like you just did. You have done so twice tonight, actually. And you are strong for it.”

“So again,” it repeated, “cruelty destroyed your home. You did not.”

The silence returned, swamping them both as the seasalt did. But eventually, there was a small gasp for breath.

“Please put me down..”

“Do you think your legs can handle that?” she quietly joked, making it obvious with her looking at the sea below them.

“You know what I mean.”

“I do. Hold on,” she murmured and began to tilt to tack herself above the ship itself, having drifted a mite off course from being solely astern, to adding astarboard to the positioning.

“Actually,” he considered as they returned, “you know what, at this point, you might as well just let me go.”

She chuckled at the slight return of his attempts at humor. “Nope, I’m not dropping you into the ocean.”

“The rest of you will probably be better off,” he mused sing-songily.

“Nope!” it chirped, denying the suicide-ideation happily.

With another catch of air and a bit of interesting positioning, she once more landed on the boards of their lady. It had instead landed on the top deck, by the helm instead of the masts, just in case someone was still awake, or looking for a rematch.

She was optimistic, not stupid.

The ship creaked in a softly melancholy greeting as Eno placed Ulysses back on his feet, gently keeping a hand on his back as he once again steadied himself on stable flooring.

It gently reached out and patted the railing closest to her with its free hand, approaching closer to the helm itself as she petted the ship in returned affection. “Hello,” it quietly murmured.

The creaking in turn shifted in tune, groaning a questioning noise in a tone resembling a concerned inquiry.

“I am fine,” she lied with a small chuckle, “Ulysses.. Might need a few more minutes.”

An acknowledging squeak from the frame as she turned to find Ulysses shaking under her hand like a wet chihuahua with separation anxiety; still gripping the runed knife like a lifeline.

Well, there was only one thing to try and do right this second, aside from the obvious. So Eno slowly approached again, and cautiously pulled at the crossguard of the knife; no budge from the grip of death.

After that, it signed off getting the knife away as a lost cause. When he gave it up, he’d give it up. Instead, it just gently wrapped her wing around him, pressing only softly to give the opportunity to escape. It may not have been bothered by the cold, and maybe vampires weren’t affected by that either, but she hoped the comfort of it might lessen his stress.

After a few moments, standing with the man regaining his bearings, she felt a shift in the wind as much as she heard it. Magic in the air and she stiffened preemptively.

Walking from behind the main mast in a way that could only be explained by shadow-stepping, the many glowing eyes preceded Davy Jones as he appeared from mist, and she gently pulled Ulysses closer to her with no resistance.

“Well now,” he lilted, “how’d it go?”

Ulysses half-heartedly glared at the man. “It would have gone a hell of a lot better if they hadn’t stepped in.”

It could feel him shifting under her hold as he turned to speak up at her. “You should’ve just let me do it, Eno.”

“No,” she groused, her feathers slightly fluffed in defense as it continued to solely watch Davy Jones.

“For once, I agree,” Davy Jones mused, inspecting his claws before turning his many eyes towards them both. “This ship, and my country, are no place for Navymen. Never has been. Never will be.”

“Much as I admire your.. priestly kindness,” he disparaged, “and your willingness to accept others; you forgot one key detail.”

“That if you greet the world, openly,” he mock opened his arms, as if to give a hug, and then brought it in where a humanoid’s heart lay, with a foreboding claw motion. “You leave your ribs reaalll open.”

“So be it,” it clicked

His arms folded across his chest after his display. “Seems you haven’t been stabbed before.”

‘How ‘bout I stab you with my beak and take a few of your eyes in the process, sir.’

It rolled its shoulders in a mimicry of a shrug. “I don’t mind being stabbed.”

It stared him down. It lended a lot more credence to everyone’s calls of her being foolish, but if it had to fight Davy Jones himself about the safety of everyone on this ship, it would, so it stared him down, inviting him to take her up on that offer.

After all, a stabbing couldn’t be too different from the excruciation of a broken bone sticking from your skin.

He rolled his eyes at her. All of them. “According to the ship, as it turns out, doesn’t seem there are any Navymen left, actually.”

What. “What?” she whispered in quiet confusion.

“What?” Ulysses echoed, louder, with horror tinging the edges of the word.

Had something happened while they were flying? She knew Gaura had renounced his place amongst the Navy but Kallstrom—

He shrugged. “She can’t hear any badges. Though, one dipped off the edge of the railing.. about an hour ago?”

Oh.

That was a rather neat ability for their Lady to actually be able to hear the badges, she would admit, but..

He knew.

“I wonder whose it was?” He wondered aloud, staring directly at them with his head tilted.

He knew, and he had encouraged Ulysses to kill Kallstrom anyways.

Ulysses breath quickened, huffing and then growing louder into chuckles and descended into hysterical mad laughter. She gently caught him before he completely crumpled to the floor, and lowered herself slowly down with him, holding him close as he let all the frayed rope tangled in his head snap.

“Still would’ve been good if you did it though,” he offered over Ulysses’ tearful, broken laughter.

“No,” she denied, “No, it wouldn’t have.”

“He is ruthless,” Jones continued, ignoring her, “I’ll give ‘im that. Maybe he has a place at the table. So does Ulysses as it would seem.”

“Y’passed one of the tests, kid!” he announced— jeering almost, “ya killed the last navy man aboard the boat.”

‘Ship.’ she internally hissed, ‘Calling this vessel anything less is an insult to her.’

“Congratulations,” he applauded, and as he did, she watched the knife disappear from within Ulysses’ grip. “Can have a breakdown about it, or y’can be happy!”

“Maybe talk t’him,” his eyes drifted off, closer to thinking out loud than actually addressing Ulysses or herself, “Tell him our rules... He’ll need to get more familiar.”

And then with as much fanfare as he arrived, he slipped around the mast, and was back to the depths he preferred.

‘If he comes within five feet of me I might have to punch his nose in.’

She inhaled.

Exhaled.

Looking back down, solely at Ulysses now, it peered into the shadows and gently held the wood elf’s hand; the one now rather noticeably without an implement meant to stab.

Ulysses’ hand, however, was in a deathgrip on itself, and the rough tang of blood was once more wafting in the air.

She tsked in gentle concern. “Oh dear. Hold on.”

“Don’t.”

It paused in its accessing of magic around them. “You want to keep losing the blood?” she gently questioned. “That’s not going to be helpful for your hunger.”

He was silent, shaking and leaning against her. “Damn it all..!” he quietly cried, the pitch making it all but silent.

Instead of magic, as Ulysses had asked her not to do, it instead pulled out bandage wraps from the little medkit now nearly permanently attached to her hip. Tapping open his hand via gentle presses of some pressure points, it started wrapping his hand tightly and securely so the blood wouldn’t drip.

“God.. damn it!” he wailed again, only becoming vaguely louder to compensate for more syllables; because it definitely was not for her ears.

“..I don’t think he deserves to be damned, right now.” She hummed, “If at all.”

“Aughh,” was his clever retort.

It looked at him, now fiddling with the bandage idly. Eyes drained of any light and crunched into a position that could only be comfortable for a cat; he looked exhausted and ready to lay face down on the planks for good.

“Do you feel better, or do you feel worse?”

“...I don’t know.”

They both snorted in laughter at the indirect answer for an incomplete question, but it asked it again; a bit clearer this time. “Do you feel better for having talked about it at all?”

“I think,” he contemplated with a small scrunch of his nose, “I just want to fling myself off the edge of the ship at this point?”

“Well, we can’t have that, you have people to say ‘hello’ to. I don’t think it’d be easy to explain to Pepper why you just— threw yourself into the ocean and decided to never come back on land. Or Sol for that matter.” Upon thinking about it more for two seconds, and how this was her best friend, it pulled a wry expression. “I think Sol would actually have my head.”

Pepper’s head poked over the edge of the stairs, “Yeah, I would be really fucking confused if that happened.”

Ulysses visibly grimaced and curled into a smaller ball. “Oh great, another person to come fucking scold me like a child.”

Pepper approached with swishing skirts and a soft concerned tilt to their brow. “No, I’m not going to scold you, my dear, I think Eno has done that enough.”

“Us too!” was called from the top of the crow’s nest.

Eno glanced up with an amused trill. Of course he was eavesdropping the entire time; kind of impossible not to, in his position, but it was funny regardless.

Pepper’s head turned upwards, a mien of slight surprise but their voice was warm with affection as they called upwards. “Thank you, Abaddon.”

“But I am incredibly confused,” Pepper continued, returning to look at them, eyes flicking back and forth between the two of them, “and a little dazed, about what happened. What happened? How long was I out?”“Only a day,” she murmured soothingly.

“Okay– that’s clearly a day too many,” Pepper lamented in a wide-eyed grimace.

“You deserve your beauty sleep after all that, Pepper,” Ulysses sighed.

They gestured with a small spread of their arms, dramatic with a slight roll of their head. “I feel like my beauty rest is going to cause me more mental distress… Uhm.”

Enososin turned its head to look where Pepper had started staring– their arms had started falling back to a more concerned chest position, and its gaze landed squarely on Vyrdakks.

“Too much has happened in a single day?” They questioned, clearly unsure of how to politely ask ‘what-and-who-the-fuck-is-that-and-why-is-it-passed-out-on-the-deck’ without saying it blatantly out loud; a surprising show of tact, despite the unnecessary censoring.

“That’s Vyrdakks,” she stated.

“We’re trying to get him back together with his ex-husbands,” Ulysses explained, amused.

“What?”

“Lockwell,” she sang in lieu of a proper explanation.

“What?!”

“Don’t worry about it,” Ulysses waved off tiredly, seemingly sensing nothing was going to get the new-comer on board actually explained.

“Okay. I’m. Uh,” Pepper looked around and then back at them in confusion.

“A lot happened, darling,” it sighed and gently took one of the mothkin’s hands in a soothing gesture. A lot happened and simultaneously nothing at all. Net zero activities, even if relations were altered.

“Yeah, I can tell,” they quietly fretted, pressing closer to the owlin and Ulysses, “is everything alright now?”

“No,” she replied, “but it will be.”

“That is fair,” they sighed, rubbing one of their shoulders with a small grimace.

The quiet once again followed ever so briefly, only broken by the wood elf’s shaky attempts to take in air that his lungs no longer used, and Pepper leaning closer to be shielded from the cold.

“If you all get stabbed in the back,” Ulysses hissed, “I’m just telling you right now. I fucking told you so.”)

Prologue; One - Two - Three - Four

High Seas; It Begins - Something's Wrong - Blood in the Water pt. 1 - Blood in the Water pt. 2 - Crimson Runs Blue within Crépuscule pt. 1 (here!) - Crimson Runs Blue within Crépuscule pt. 2 - Fake Orchestra playing a Synthetic Symphony pt. 1 - FOpSS pt. 2 - Impacto pt. 1 - Ikanaide pt. 2

#my writings #Pirate Campaign #dnd ocs #Enososin Folook #Gaura Arzorath #Ulysses (OC)#Desmond Kallstrom #Pepper Kochavi #Abaddon Diallos #Soleil (OC)#David L. Jones (Davy Jones)#Vyrdakks; Kell of the House of Gold #Xiomara Amar #Saint Rollo #Lockwell (NPC)#Misirak the cartoon villain you are /so jov #thats. a loooottta characters. anyways; this taglist will get worse. also.#gamers. these two parts are 26k words. im so sorry.#2nd part up in literally just a moment #these have kinda just become transcripts I realize;#however. WELP. I LIKE WRITING. AND MY FRIENDS SEEM TO ENJOY IT REGARDLESS. (SHRUGS LOUDLY)#also i looove not being able to describe colors (/jovial sarcarsm) bc this woman has no gottdamn clue what any of 'em look like.#if you see a reference to the dispossessed shhhh yes you do #if you recognize the things referenced within the title. (kisses you)#rea's trash

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