Adventures On The Abecean Sea, Sometimes It Doesn't Pay To Stowaway Options

[mALX]

My current Fanfic is too long to cart over here, so I'd like to offer up this much shorter one. I was inspired to do this story by an RP idea I saw floated a month ago on the BGSF. I got extremely excited about the concept, but never having been in an RP I hesitated to join. Still, the possibilities loomed and taunted till I knew I would write this. It won't be a long one, I promise! I hope everyone enjoys it.

Shivani

Adventures On The Abecean Sea

Chapter 1: The Stowaway


The pounding of the waves on the bow of the ship created a huge spray across the deck that seeped down into the anchor storage, raining steady rivulets of icy cold water onto the hard chains where Shivani huddled, struggling to retain the contents of her stomach.

At the time it had seemed a good idea, stowing away in the hold of the nearest ship at the Anvil port. The guards had spotted her, and it would have been no time at all before they connected her with the reports of a runaway slave.

Maybe she had meant to do this for years, but not at this time nor place; yet here she was. Her tail was kinking from the hard chains pressed against it, and whatever protection her thin fur gave her against the cold had lost its use against the elements that now assailed it.

Somehow she had not foreseen that, the ship putting out to sea; well, not while she was on board. Exhausted from the night spent walking in the cold air, it had been only natural to nap there in the dark of the hold. The quiet shushing of the boat as it slipped over the calm waters had not woken her from the tired slumber; nor did the gentle rolling as it set out across the Abecean Sea.

When the storm caused the ship to slam into the breaking seas, throwing the icy tentacles of itself down into the pitch dark hold…and roll violently, sometimes heeling over till she was sure the sails and mast would be washed under in one of the crashing waves; only then had she awakened to realize her circumstance.

It didn’t take long to determine the type of boat she had stowed away on either. It wasn’t the curses and coarse language spoken in guttural tones that told her, but the “Aye Aye Captain” that followed them. A pirate ship! Oh dear.

It was a well known fact that pirates considered a female on board to be bad luck, no matter the age…would they kill her? Or worse?

Thinking fast, Shivani pulled her worn leather helmet off and twisted her hair into a tight knot on her head, replacing the helmet which now sat at an odd angle. She pulled the straps tight around it, forcing it to smash the bun down flat.

Shivani pulled the rusty iron dagger she had found earlier out of her waistband and cut a length of the furled spinnaker sail that rested in the hold. She stripped off the wet leather cuirass and bound her breasts across with the length of sail. There wasn’t much to flatten yet, but there was no sense taking chances.

Tugging the wet cuirass back on proved to be a chore in the tight hull of the ship as it rocked and pounded, throwing her off balance with its violent contortions. Still, she must get out of here, or would be sitting in her own vomit shortly. Even without benefit of a looking glass she was sure her pale skin had taken on a greenish hue, for the nausea had awakened her with a stomach that rolled to match the ships movements.

Crawling out the hatch, she was instantly knocked down from her position on her hands and knees to rolling across the deck by the next lurch of the ship and ended up slammed into the gunwale where she finally gave up the contents of her stomach.

The waves crashing over the bow washed it down the deck toward the stern of the boat. Leaning back and letting the next spray wash over her felt good, in spite of the cold and wet, for the seasickness had left her woozy and faint; and the icy waters revived if naught else.

She closed her eyes, trying to fight off the next wave of nausea when a voice too close for comfort reached her ears.

“Here be the culprit.” The coarse voice was followed by a hand grabbing her up by the cuirass and dragging her toward the stern.

Shivani struggled and beat ineffectually at the massive hand that hauled her up and deposited her before a lowbrow man in the tattered blue coat of a Naval Officer. It was obviously stolen, as it didn’t fit him. The armpits and shoulders were torn, and although unbuttoned it squeezed against his bulk.

She promptly ‘shot the cat’ across the top of his boots, vomiting helplessly and unable to stop.

“Ye’ll pay for that lad, ye will!” The Captain snarled, grabbing Shivani by the back of the neck and shoving her down. “Ye’ll lick them clean then, weakling.”

The words along with the smell of what already rested on his boots caused a fresh wave of nausea and instead of cleaning, She retched some more across the toes of them. Kicking her out of the way the Captain demanded satisfaction from the one that brought Shivani before him.

"Wad ye bring the lad before me 'fore he were done emptying his load? Ye caused this, now ye clean it. An' ye can swab the cockpit as well. Git the lad's head over the side 'fore he fills the ship wi' his swill." The Captain roared at the crewman.

Grumbling and cursing under his breath, the crewman glared at Shivani. Aye, he would have his revenge, but when the Captain wasn’t standing there to see.

Shivani’s still heaving carcass was dragged back to the gunwale and deposited with her head hanging over the side so there would be no more clean-up required.

***

She woke in that position, the seas were calm now and the crew was busy hoisting the sails and swabbing the deck. Before she pulled her head up she ran her fingers around the black film that clung to the gunwale and rubbed it on her face to hide its delicate features.

Pulling herself across the deck toward the cockpit, she was stopped by a pair of Naval Officer’s boots that were too small for the feet and legs jammed into them. The Captain’s voice boomed above her.

“So, yer joinin’ the living I see. Are you gonna git to work or do we have to toss you in the briny an wake you up? This ain’t no pleasure cruise. Ye mind telling me what ye were hired to do on this ship?”

She thought quickly. She had seen kitchen work done before. Trying to deepen her voice and make it sound as uneducated and coarse as those around her, she answered.

“The galley…Sir.”

“Well git your weak carcass to it then. An' be quick about it.”

With a hurried, "Aye Aye Captain," she hoped was a good imitation of the one she had heard the night before, she scurried down the main hatch into the nether regions below decks. She tried not to draw attention as she glanced around, trying to see anything that looked like it might be a kitchen. A horrible smell assailed her nose, and she followed it to what could only be the galley.

It was filthy. A malodorous scent billowed out of a pot tied onto a grate over the small fire pit with lengths of steel wire. She couldn’t bring herself to taste the vile concoction, but upon glancing behind her saw the Captain standing in the passageway watching her. She better do something quickly.

Grabbing a measure of salt, she pulled her dagger out and began scraping the salt block into the soup. Crusts of debris filtered off the blade and into the vile brew below. Her nerves on edge by his scrutiny caused her hands to tremble, dropping a large portion of the salt block into the soup.

Her eyes fell on an overly large wooden ladle. Scooping it up, she pretended to be stirring the reeking mixture in the pot while she searched for the block of salt. Glancing back she saw the hulking form of the Captain no longer filled the passageway.

With a sigh of relief she fished the much diminished slab of salt out and dropped it back on the shelf. She would have to wait for the cook’s orders, never having cooked before.

***

A young Nord boy wandered in and stopped, surprised to see her. “Who are you? I thought I was the galley slave.” He spouted, then flushed.

Shivani felt much better about her disguise after that; the boy could not be more than ten years old and looked much more feminine than she did. His voice had a high pitch as well. Should the crew suspect a woman on board, this young lad would be picked over herself as the culprit, and could prove he was not a girl, so would not be harmed.

She lowered the pitch of her voice and tried to sound uneducated. “Uh, I’m your help.”

His eyes brightened. “Oh good, because I’m not really sure…”

Drat! She was hoping he knew more than her. “Where’s the cook?” She asked, her voice cracking from trying to lower it deeper than she was able.

“He near got killed last night in the storm. Got cut real bad, bled into that stew.”

Shivani almost gagged, thanking her stars she had not tasted of the concoction.

“You mean its just us?” Shivani nearly squeaked. The lad nodded.

This post has been edited by mALX: Nov 25 2012, 09:32 PM

[mALX]

Chapter 6: The Captains And The Cooks


It was a while before the cliffs of Dragon Grove came into view. Shivani shifted the helm to run along side them, just barely skirting the wind enough to travel at a smooth pace. John tightened the sails up. She could see the shoals below the cliffs and knew she and John would not survive if they jumped here, nor could they bring the boat in any closer.

John pointed ahead on the port side a smallish island. “Is that the island you were looking for?

“It has to be Betony. That means Daggerfall is dead ahead of us. That right there is the mouth of the Iliac Bay. Right here on the chart is where we are. Look at this chart John. See those things? Those are huge rocks. We want to get to this cove right here, there are two major cities in there if we can get that far. I want you to hang over the bow and watch for anything below the surface. If you see anything at all, just yell to get my attention and then point in the direction I should go to avoid hitting it.”

“Aye Aye Captain.” John saluted.

“Go on with you John, you will have us hung for mutiny.”



***

They barely eked into the main port, slowly gliding over the water as they gaped at the size of the towns. “Coo, this makes Anvil look like a shantytown!” John said in an awed voice.

“I think it makes the Imperial City look like a shantytown.” Shivani barely whispered. “Look, there is a huge boardwalk and a place to tie up. It looks like the Market District is there, that is where we need to go. Run up and drop the sails and we will just glide in.”

John furled the sail tightly and tied it down to the boom. Shivani noted how quick and agile he was out here on deck, a lot different than how he was in the galley. This was where he needed to work.

As they barely edged alongside the dock John leaped over to it with a line from the bow in his hand and tied it off on a huge cleat nailed down to the docks. Shivani threw him a line from the stern of the boat and he secured it quickly.

“Lay these wads of sacking down between the boat and the dock so it doesn’t ruin our nice white paint job.” Shivani said, throwing some of the wads to John.

He ran and tied a line of them down the side of the ship as a crowd began to gather on the docks to stare at them.

“What are you carrying?” Some of them called out.

Shivani didn’t want to holler out Skooma, especially since she didn’t know where it was kept. Her eye landed on the dinghy in the back.

“Fish.” She called out, thinking that would be the end of it.

The men began leaping on board.

“Hey, I just swabbed that deck!” Shivani hollered.

“Lemme see those fish.” They growled.

Shivani pulled back the tarp. Before she knew it more men were leaping on board and a bidding war broke out for the fish.

“I’ve got more in the hold, John will you open it up please?”

John started haggling with the men, and soon buckets of the fish were being carried off the ship. When all the fish were gone he handed the large bags of Septims over to Shivani.

“Look Master Jack, we are rich!”

“John, are you telling me you got all this gold for those fish?” Shivani couldn’t believe her eyes.

“They said that storm we avoided blew their fishing around here. The regular fishing boats took off and said they would be back if they found any fish. They haven’t returned, so all the markets and restaurants have had people out here waiting to make sure they got them first. We got more for them because they were competing. That huge bag there was from the castle! Imagine, royalty will be eating fish we caught!” John exclaimed. “What will we do with all this gold?”

“I think we need to use it to buy a quick exit out of here before everyone is poisoned by those fish, especially at the castle! Don’t you remember they were drugged fish?”

“Oh… no, oh no! What are we going to do?”

“Look John, no one has come up from below. Maybe they are all dead. If they are we will just take the Black Flag and sail it back to Anvil immediately. We need to go below decks and look though.. ”

“Well, okay, but I don’t relish the idea of seeing a dead body. You better go first since you are the oldest.” John said.

Shivani could see the fear in his eyes, but she was afraid too. They would have a better chance together.

“No, we are in this together, we do everything together.” Shivani said firmly. For once Evil John did not argue.



***

The ship was an eerie tomb, silent as the grave till they got to the forward cabins where the Captain and the Red Sabres bunked. Strange moaning sounds and poundings were coming from them.

John turned to her. “I hear ghosts!”

“You and your ghosts, John. Ghosts don’t pound like that. Something is wrong. We have to take a chance and find out what it is.”

“No we don’t, lets just get our stuff and get out. Remember Captain Dugal said to kill us.”

“That is because he thought the men liked our stew. Those men were on drugs, they even liked the rat stew. The drugs must give them some kind of munchies or something.”

“I’ll bet stew is just street slang for drugs!” John said as if it was a huge revelation.

“I already figured that out.” Shivani said. “Now come on, let’s just do it. Be ready to run when I open up the Captain‘s cabin.”

They both got in position to run and then Shivani slowly opened the door. She and John both screamed at the same time. Captain Dugal and the other Captains and First Mates were bound and gagged on the floor!

“What happened in here?” Shivani asked, running to free Captain Dugal. “John you untie the others. “Captain Dugal sir, are you okay? Here, let me get you some wine.” Shivani grabbed what looked to be a more expensive wine and popped the cork for him. “Here you are sir. What happened sir?”

“Who’s up there on deck? Where is everyone?”

“No one sir. We haven’t seen a soul till you. We feared everyone was dead.”

“Why don’t I hear the water on the hull?”

“We’re docked sir. Tied up in Daggerfall.”

“Well if you haven’t seen a soul, how’d we get into Daggerfall?” It looked as if the Captain’s eyes may start from his head.

“Evil John and I did it sir. We didn’t know what to do, so we brought her in where you said you wanted to go.”

“Ye’ can’t tell me ye’ got in the mouth of the Iliac alive, two cooks?”

“No sir. Evil John is meant to be up on deck sir. He is more suited to up there. And sir…we found out something a little while ago. The crew were on drugs. When they said they wanted stew, they were talking about drugs, that is the lingo for drugs on the streets. It wasn’t our stew they were talking about.”

“But they were fightin’ to git the cooks on board their ship, an’ that is the two of you!”

“Sir, if I may. Cooks are the street lingo for the one that sells the drugs. They weren’t talking about us.” Evil John stepped forward.

“An’ who was that sellin’ the drugs then?”

“We don’t know. We only worked in the galley.” Evil John piped up.

Shivani stepped up. “Sir, we found bags of drugs under the dinghy. They’re still there, we didn’t know what to do with them. Sir, who attacked you this way? Evil John and I will hunt them down if you would like.”

Evil John squawked and Shivani trod on his foot.

“My Sabres’ll take care of them that done this. Where are they?” Captain Dugal growled.

“We haven’t checked for them yet sir, we thought it best to rescue you first.” Evil John said, a note of pride ringing in his voice. Shivani trod on his foot again. “OW!”

“Mind yourself.” She said under her breath to John.

Captain Dugal stared at them both for an extended minute as if trying to make up his mind about something. “Let me see these bags of drugs then, because them that tied us up said drugs was stolen from them, and they found a bag of them in the Captain of the Galleon‘s cabin.”

Shivani led him up to the dinghy and pulled the sacks out from behind it. “Here they are sir.”

Captain Dugal was sniffing the air. “Somethin’ smells…like…fish! Has there been a woman on my ship?” He glared down at them.

“I don’t know sir. When the fighting broke out, Master Jack and I hid.” John said. Shivani elbowed him.

“Sir, we did see a woman on board. She was dressed like a Red Sabre, and the other Sabres tried to push her overboard but she dragged them in during the scuffle.” Shivani said. “We couldn’t stop the ship quick enough.”

“Oh, yeah. I forgot about that.” Evil John said.

“Are you telling me one of my own Sabres was a woman? Don’t you think I would know something like that? Which one are ye’ trying to say was a woman?” Anger appeared to be boiling over his features.

“It was John, sir.” Shivani improvised.

“Scurvy John?” Captain Dugal demanded.

“No! No sir, the other John.”

“What do ye’ mean, there are eight more John’s at least! Which one?”

“Er…I think it was John the Gauntlet…John.” Shivani tried to think of a name.

“Gauntlet John? But he had a beard!”

Evil John stepped up. “She, sir. I know, it was a disgustin’ sight.”

Captain Dugal put his hand across his forehead as if to push the image out of his mind. He turned away and suddenly the full effect of the neatly coiled lines on the deck swam into his vision. Evil John and Shivani watched as his expression changed to horror and then his eyes seemed to start from his head.

“What in the hell? Who in blue blazes painted my ship white? Who would do that to me? I’ll skewer the [censored] that did this to my ship!”

“The drugged crew members did it sir. We couldn‘t stop ‘em.” John stepped up quickly.

“If they’re alive, I’ll kill ’em! An’ I’ll torture ’em first!” Captain Dugal roared and then spat.

Shivani’s knees bent to clean up the spit and she caught Evil John shaking his head no. She slowly raised back up.



***

“The two of ye’ check the cabins and see where that slimy crew is. And find me Red Sabres first!” Captain Dugal sat down at the highly polished helm and took a long swig on the wine bottle.

He looked at the pristine patterns of coiled lines and perfectly furled sails, the polished tackle and winches…and the brass compass cover that shown so he could see his reflection. The gunwales were painted perfectly, not even a drip anywhere…white.

Unable to stand it another second he got up and stepped out onto the dock. At the last second he turned and looked back at his ship. “GAAAAAH! BASTARDS!” He shouted. The sides of the ship had been painted white all the way down to the waterline!


***




Deck of the Black Flag after clean-up by Shivani and John:


http://www.solarnavigator.net/images/rope_...coiled_deck.jpg






The ships compass after clean-up by Shivani and John:


http://www.robinsdocksideshop.com/Binnacle_brass.jpg




The (White) Black Flag:


http://www.tesnexus.com/downloads/images/2...-1265054619.jpg


http://www.tesnexus.com/downloads/images/2...-1265054436.jpg


http://www.tesnexus.com/downloads/images/2...-1265054550.jpg


http://www.tesnexus.com/downloads/images/2...-1265054549.jpg


http://www.tesnexus.com/downloads/images/2...-1265054549.jpg


http://www.tesnexus.com/downloads/images/2...-1265054549.jpg


*

This post has been edited by mALX: Nov 3 2012, 12:42 AM