Yasha
Pirate
'I would not mind you in my head, if you were not so clearly mad.'
Posts: 77
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Post by Yasha on Mar 8, 2010 22:45:27 GMT
PART 1
“You'd better not be looking”, Tavi screeched from behind the ridge outcrop.
He'd been out by the gorge since first light trying to build up what little courage he could with little success thus far. Which was not helped when some time later Midge had given him the fright of his life by whistling right in his ear while he was concentrating. She knew how sensitive his hearing had been recently and insisted on taking every opportunity to taunt him. This from his supposed best friend.
“Oh will you hurry it up you great boob. Why would I want to look at your pale pasty arse when I have such an interesting rock right here”.
Outraged and hideously embarrassed he hissed under his breath. Nothing particularly flattering and mostly revolving around bloody girls and their bloody smart comments. It was all her fault to begin with.
He looked down at the remains of his boxers and khaki pants and groaned. Great, perfect. Both had a great rent down the back, the boxers were unsalvageable having been rent in two. The khaki pants had at least split down the seam and might be saved. But there was no chance in hell he could wear these home.
“Damn it”, he muttered low before yelling “Midge?”
“Yeah”
Even in that one word he could hear the laughter and mockery he was bound to get later.
“Umm, have you got my sweater out there. I think I left it by the willow stump”.
He heard her low chuckle and the shuffle of feet against dry rock and loose grit and she moved. Before even being asked she must have hefted the sweater into the air, because the next thing he heard was a low grunt and then he saw it falling in his direction. It landed just in front of the outcrop and with a surge of courage he darted out, pants held in front of him just in case Midge glanced over, and snatched up the jumper.
Ducking back behind the rocks he tied his sweater about his waist first leaving most of it hanging over his rear then pulled on his trousers over the top so the jumper wouldn't flap in the wind. It was undignified and it looked ridiculous but at least his back side was covered enough for him to get back to camp.
“Are you done yet, seriously. I'm starved”
Cheeks flaming, Tavi strolled out trying for all his worth to be nonchalant about the situation.
With just a glance in Midges direction he turned and struck out for camp not waiting to see if she followed. A chuckle and scuffing of feet later and she was strolling beside him with a skip in her step and a small curve to her lip showing her amusement.
He knew she'd be the first to break the silence.
“So. Does your brother know your coming out here on you tod? Actually forget I asked that, cos I know the answer. If he DID know he would have talked you out of it by now. Either that or smacked you up side the head for being such a prat. And you are you know. A pra..”
“Yes. Fine. I'm a prat,” he interupted.
“I don't know what I'm doing and more likely to get hurt then anything else for trying this unsupervised. But you know what? I don't care”.
He quickened his stride and ruched on ahead, Midge hurrying to catch up with his longer legs.
She didn't say anything else until they came into view of the camp site.
Twelve long thin cabins stood making up three sides of a square with a clearing and a tall flag pole at their center.
And leaning, arms folded, against that flag pole was his brother. His face a picture of grim disinterest. Even as their eyes met and he gave a brief nod before straightening and heading towards them. His new wife all but skipping at his heels. They were the oddest pair. Where Jeremy was stoic, grim and sarcastic Kira was cheerful to the point of distraction. Almost always bouncing in Jeremy's wake as if to counteract his negativity. They seemed happy together though. He'd never understood why.
“Hey” Jeremy murmured low.
“Hey back” Tavi returned as they came face to face.
End Part 1
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Post by stokerino on Mar 9, 2010 0:03:29 GMT
PART 2
Tavi stayed silent for a moment. Though he was stood in front of her and she could not even see his expression, in his mind he was warning Midge not to say a word about his trousers. He was also waiting to see if Jeremy said something too, as if his brother might have telepathically sense his embarrassment.
Suddenly he became very aware that said embarrassment was being concealed only by a loosely-tied jumper. And of how closely Midge was standing to that jumper. Within arm's reach, he guessed. And Midge was not a girl that could be left within arm's reach of mischief without consequence.
He went to casually sidle two steps away from Midge, but such was his nervousness that he moved too quickly and awkwardly stumbled instead.
Jeremy stared at him, his eyes narrowed.
"So," he said, casting a dubious eye over his younger brother, taking in his flushed complexion and apparently unstable balance, "how much did you drink?"
As off the mark as Jeremy's assumption was, the unexpected nature of the question only reddened Tavi's face further, which did nothing to not help his case. "I have NOT been drinking!"
"Uh huh," Jeremy responded flatly. He stood up from against the flag pole and looked over to Midge. "Has he?"
"Well actually," Midge said, "what he did was..."
"Lies!" Tavi blurted.
"We were over by the cliffs, you see..."
"Slander!"
"And he claimed, so he did, that he could..."
"Deceit!"
"Knock it off," Jeremy snapped. Kira started bouncing for attention on his arm. "You too," he said.
"He claimed," Midge continued, "that he'd found a spot he could dive into, without any rocks and such. So naturally, I bet him a day's wage that he couldn't. But then he upped the bet to a week's, and so..."
"I see." Jeremy interrupted. He looked back at his younger brother. "So you had been drinking."
"No. I. Had. NOT!"
"Oh, I'm sorry," Jeremy remarked with faux surprise. "So you're just naturally imbecilic?"
"Bite me, Jerry."
Midge coughed loudly. "But the important part..." she said. "Actually, that was just the first part. Okay. The first important part was...well...this."
She lashed out her arm and, in one swift motion, pulled the jumper from Tavi's waist, leaving a cold breeze behind.
Kira tried and failed to stifle a laugh.
"He did a really sucky dive," Midge explained. "Well, hardly a dive, really, more of a stumble over the edge. His clothes caught the edge of a plant on his way over, and, well...there are the results."
"I slipped," Tavi hissed.
"Yes, yes. Of course you did. He didn't fall very far in the end, really - only a yard or so. The funny part was when he stood back up there afterwards...flapping in the breeze...because he didn't want to lose the bet. Couldn't do it in the end, which brings me to the second important point."
"Which is?"
"That you owe me a week's wage." She snickered, rubbing her thumb and forefinger together in the classic gesture of 'pay up, bitch'. "I'll accept it in installments, of course..."
Tavi could feel the weight of his brother's glare upon him.
"Brave or stupid," Jeremy finally said. "One or the other. Never be both." He leaned back against the flag pole and looked back out to the far distance. "Although I don't think you have much of a choice in the matter," he muttered.
Tavi went to say something, but just grumbled under his breath instead. "I'm going to change," he said, and trudged off in the direction of one of the cabins. He caught Midge's eye on his way past, and quickly hurried on before she could fully form an expression of smugness. Not to be denied her chance to gloat, Midge simply followed him.
Jeremy was trying to bat the cheerful ball of energy that was Kira away from him when he spotted something on the horizon. He squinted at it for a moment, and then his eyes widened.
"Kira," he said quietly, "raise the alarm." He gave her a look that was deadly serious. "And make sure they know it's not a drill."
End Part 2
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Post by stuart alman on Mar 10, 2010 10:54:40 GMT
PART 3
As Kira scampered in the direction of the cabins to sound the alarm Jeremy eyed the approaching airship suspiciously. There was something not quite right about it, but he couldn’t quite put his finger on why.
Kira burst into the cabin just as Tavi was putting on his new trousers.
“What the FRACK!!” he shouted, falling over as she stormed through the door, ignoring him entangled with his clothes on the floor.
“There’s something coming, Jeremy wants you to be ready and alert” she noted glancing out the door at the sky. “Well what sort of something?” Tavi grumbled as he finally got the trouser legs sorted.
“I don’t know, but it’s certainly got your brother spooked”
“Jeremy’s spooked???” Tavi looked unnerved by this, his brother was never spooked. Caught off guard and alarmed yes but never spooked.
“Where’s Midge??” Kira asked staring round the cabin.
“How should I know, I’m not her babysitter!” retorted Tavi. To be honest he was just glad she’d left him alone for five minutes to change in peace. Now that an emergency was upon them he was slightly concerned where she might have gone.
Back outside Jeremy realised what was so odd about the approaching airship, it should have been overhead by now but it’s not. This information processed in his head for a moment. Oh Frack, that’s not any old airship that’s the Fucanglong the mad pirate Langhams airship.
“KIRA!” he shouted at the top of his lungs. Kira launched out of the cabin with Tavi close behind.
“We have to get out of here now!” Jeremy explained. “That’s Langham’s airship we’re screwed if we stay here!”
Tavi and Kira stared up at approaching leviathan Fucanglong.
“It’s gigantic” Tavi gasped. Jeremy glared cold and hard at him then looked around the campsite.
“Where is Midge?” he asked hurriedly.
“I don’t know” shrugged Tavi. His brother stared him down.
“You two get out of here now, head for the tunnels I’ll stay here and find Midge then join you ok” Jeremy stated shoving Tavi in the direction of the tunnels.
“We’re not leaving you” whined Kira.
“Get out of here now! Or I’m annulling the wedding” Jeremy spoke coldly but with a sense of desperate urgency, you could tell it was an empty threat but it demonstrated his desperation. Looking noticeably hurt Kira nodded and started dragging Tavi in the direction of the tunnels. Jeremy started searching the remaining cabins shouting Midges name at the top of his lungs the airship was now overhead time was almost up.
Kira dragged Tavi around the edge of the cave into the first tunnel.
“Oh hey guys, what’s up?” Midge grinned at them from a side corridor.
“What the Frack are you doing here! All Hell’s broken loose out there” shouted Tavi.
“Oh no, we’ve got to tell Jeremy” squeeled Kira as she turned to run back to the camp there was a loud explosion and the whole tunnel system shook. A huge rock slide covered the entrance and forced them into darkness.
“JEREMY!!” Kira screamed clawing at the rocks that had just sealed the way to her lover. Grabbing her Midge and Tavi attempted to restrain her from clawing at the rocks cutting open her hands.
“It’ll be ok” Midge spoke softly rocking back and forth with Kira crying in her arms.
. . .
Jeremy glanced up at the sky coughing his lungs full of dust, the rockslide had just missed him but he had been thrown to the ground by the blast. As he stared upwards he could see the main cannon preparing to fire again. Breathing deeply he coughed his last words.
“I love you kira” he whispered, as the cannon fired again levelling the entire campsite.
End Part 3
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Post by Emily on Mar 14, 2010 22:02:04 GMT
By the time Tavi, Midge, and Kira reached the surface it was dusk. They made their way back towards the ruined camp, and paused on top of a hill that overlooked it. Kira started forward, desperate to search for any sign of Jeremy, but a flash of movement made Tavi shove her aside into the bushes, quickly followed by himself and Midge. “There’s someone down there,” he whispered. “It could be Je-“ Kira started, “-standing guard with a large gun? I think not.” Midge crept forward through the trees to a better vantage point, the stealth she usually employed in tormenting Tavi being put to good use for once, and he heard her draw in a sharp hiss of breath. Silently she beckoned him forward. As he rounded the lip of hill he saw what had been hidden from them before, the Fucanglong had tethered alongside the cliffs at the edge of their village, its massive bulk hanging silently in the air whilst a ramp led across the gap to the land’s edge. Amongst the ruins of the village silhouetted figures moved about, the last rays of light glinting off weaponry that left no doubt as to their intent. “Pirates” Midge breathed. “But what the hell are they doing here?” Tavi replied, scanning around the area. He could see no sign of prisoners or corpses amongst the pirates, and the houses were mostly in ruins but maybe Jeremy had been lucky, maybe he’d managed to dodge the cannon blasts and escape, maybe he was hiding on the far side of the village or in another one of the caves... “Could be a raid..?” Midge whispered, worry knotting her brow as she peered down at the village, “looks like they’re searching the ruins.” “What have we got that’s worth taking? “ He shot back, “The storage barns are a smoking ruin and we won’t see traders through here until spring- it’s just a normal village” “Depends on your definition of *normal*” Midge said, with a pointed look in his direction. “Don’t be stupid, no one knows-“ he trailed off miserably. There was no point in arguing what the priates were after, who knew why they’d picked his village? Maybe they’d just seen it from the air and were up for a little impromptu violence. He sighed. “Look, unless you feel like going down there and asking them, we’ll probably never know. Let’s fall back to somewhere safe until they leave and then we can go down and search for Jeremy. Kira-“ He looked back towards where he’d last seen her, only to find her gone. Cursing under his breath he cast about in the trees, “Kira!” Where the hell was she? A panicked squeak made him turn back towards Midge. Following er line of sight he watched the tiny figure of Kira down in the fields below, slip from the tall grass of the fields whilst the guard’s back was turned and up the ramp into the Fucanglong.
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Yasha
Pirate
'I would not mind you in my head, if you were not so clearly mad.'
Posts: 77
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Post by Yasha on Mar 19, 2010 13:01:57 GMT
Brennan's ears still rang from Captain Langham's last screech. He had been called to the man's quarters as dusk had set in. Brennan had expected the tirade that followed. For the most part just an endless stream of colourful curses and insults. The curved hull at the captain's back reverberated and no doubt carried the shouts across the ship.
He had heard others receive similar treatment over the course of his 'stay' on the Fucanglong.
The man was small but he had a set of lungs that could break glass. And from the particularly ripe shade his face was turning he was clearly not pleased. Damn the man, he was still talking. Brennan gave his head a short sharp shake before refocusing on Captain Langham's blotchy face.
"Sorry, I didn't quite catch that last part. Would you mind ever so much repeating it?", he kept his tone soft and voice level. He knew this would only infuriate the man more, but he would not lower himself to this buffoon's level. Even if he was as lucky buffoon.
As expected the little man's jowls shook and he rose from his seat to round his lavish little desk and begin to circle him as a high keen from his pursed lips preceded another tirade.
"How dare you ignore me. This mess is your doing. If you hadn't interfered with my men..."
"I do apologise", Brennan interrupted. "But I must correct you on one vital factual mistake. This 'mess' as you so aptly pointed out is none of my doing. Forgive me if I misunderstood your orders, but I do believe you were ordered to search, question and face any opposition with force if necessary. Not blunder through the sky with guns blazing and level the village along with it's inhabitants. You should be grateful that it seems there were some survivors."
Not that it was likely Langham would show any gratitude any time in the foreseeable future.
It really was ludicrous. What could the Minister have been thinking, bringing these disgraceful brigands into Her Majesty's employ? Surely his political standing was not so insecure that he could not have survived the backlash from sending a small battalion into this region.
Langham continued to sputter.
"If any of these 'farmers' did survive", he made the word farmer sound like a curse, "we should have found them by now. They probably died by our cannons the way that other one did. There can't be that many places to hide in these woods and.."
The interruption this time came from a soft rap on the door. But not the door he would have expected. The room, though compact, had two doors leading from it. The first and most commonly used led to the bridge. The second led to the ship's one redeeming feature. A crew bathing room. The small man was not only fanatical but fastidious; he abhorred uncleanliness.
It was this door from which the knock came. The Captain shot an irritated glance at the door, a scouring look back at Brennan and he waddled over muttering.
"If Crannen is sodden again I swear it will be his last. Yes?" This last was shot out harshly as he flung the door open.
This was also the last word he would ever screech in that grating voice, as his skull was promptly caved in by a foot of pipe smashing into it. A feral cry came from the doorway and what remained of Captain Langham's face was repeatedly struck as the small figure wielding it clambered onto his now twitching body. Unrelenting in it's onslaught it followed every strike with a cried "Mine, mine, mine".
He must have made a noise or moved. He had become completely unaware of his own body in his disgust and fascination with what was happening. But he must have. Because the small figure twitched violently with the pipe still raised overhead and then lowered it slowly as it looked up.
Behind a now slick mop of dark hair a young woman's pale tear and blood streaked face peered up at him. Their eyes met and she wobbled back onto her haunches and spoke again.
"Mine. He took what was mine." her voice shook with a feral intensity.
Brennan could not stop himself from asking, "What? What did he take?" He was surprised at how calm his voice sounded to his ears.
She closed her eyes and wavered slightly before opening them again.
"My Jeremy"
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Post by Ally on Mar 21, 2010 20:30:29 GMT
Keep her talking. Brennan knew without pausing to think that his life depended on that. The woman was teetering between another outburst of murderous rage and total collapse – not just emotional, but physical, too, by the look of her. If he could just give her a little push in that direction…it wouldn’t be kind, but at least he’d live. He had no intention of ending up like Langham.
“Who’s Jeremy?” he asked, in as kind a voice as he could manage.
The woman made a small, choking sound. “My husband.”
“How long had you been married?” Out of the corner of his eye, Brennan caught sight of Langham’s coat, slung over the chair where the man had been sitting. Being an unpopular captain and somewhat paranoid, it was rumoured that Langham carried around more concealed weapons than anyone could conceivably need even against the kind of mutineers that this ship would produce. Slowly, he began to edge towards it.
“I-” The woman stopped and blinked, then shook her head. “Can’t think. Not long.”
Nearly there. Brennan reached out for the coat. “I’m sorry.”
As soon as he’d said it, he realised it was a mistake.
The woman’s head snapped up. Her eyes narrowed. Her hands, slick with blood, tightened around the pipe.
“Not enough,” she snarled, and lunged forwards.
Blindly, Brennan grabbed the arm of the chair and swung it at her. The desk overturned, tripping the woman, and the chair caught her on the shoulder as she fell. The pipe flew out of her hands and rolled across the room. The woman hit the floor, her head smacking against a leg of the desk.
Brennan stood staring for a few seconds, taking long, deep breaths. She didn’t move. Dead or unconscious? No, she was breathing, very lightly. He was safe, but only for the moment.
But there were other problems. He looked across the room at the pulpy mess that was Captain Langham. Unpopular as the man was, the crew wouldn’t stand for this. They’d tear the woman apart. And that would be a kindness compared to what the Minister would do to her if he found out who had ruined his plans…
Walking across the cabin, Brennan picked up the pipe, then went over to Langham’s body. Most of the crew were still out searching the area. If he could dump the corpse outside with the murder weapon, send the crew out to search again for the survivors that had obviously slipped through their net, hide the woman and put her out of the ship just before take-off…all right, it was a ridiculous plan, but he didn’t have much choice.
Holding his breath, he leant down to pick up the body.
There was the crash of a door opening, and a familiar slurred voice. “Cap’n?”
Brennan yelped, spun around and raised the pipe, and found himself looking into the shocked face of Crannen, Langham’s drunk of a first mate. All right, Brennan thought frantically, this looks bad, but at least it’s just Crannen, I can talk my way out of this…
And then an expression Brennan had never seen before came over that broken-veined, bleary-eyed face. Crannen smiled a cold, sharp smile. He stepped forwards, and suddenly he was standing straighter.
“Oh dear, Brennan,” he said in a clipped, courtly accent much like Brennan’s own. “The Minister certainly won’t be happy with you.”
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Post by stokerino on Mar 21, 2010 23:39:14 GMT
At the sight of Kira's dash inside the moored airship, Tavi instinctively lurched to his feet. Midge, equally stunned herself, at least had the wherewithal to drag him back down to ground level before one of the pirate crew spotted him above the tall grass.
Several seconds passed before either of them spoke.
"Dense wiff..." Midge muttered under her breath.
Tavi had not yet finished being astonished. "What?" He blinked. "Why did...?"
"I'd stake two reasons." Midge whispered back, holding up her two fingers. "Actually, three," she said after a moment's consideration. "One: revenge. Two: mad, blind lunacy. Three: in order to demand a damned good explanation. Choose any combination of the above, and you'll have your derivation."
"Demand an 'explanation'?" Tavi hissed incredulously.
"Confusion is a weighty facet of grief," Midge pointed out.
"Sounds loopy to me."
"Which would be where I refer you to the 'mad, blind lunacy' part."
"So how come she...never mind," Tavi shook his head. "We've got to get her out."
"That's brave talk from a lad who, not twenty minutes ago, back-pedaled from a mere watery plunge."
"I did not back-pedal!" Tavi snapped back. "I was going to have another go...after I'd got new trousers."
"Play it however you like," Midge replied wryly. "I merely speculate that the opposition presented by a dozen or so guns, blades and other assorted ordnance as wielded by picaroons of the most dastardly order might be considered slightly more daunting than your blustery frame could realistically..."
Tavi'd had enough. "Shut up!" He interrupted her angrily. "If you want to just do nothing but talk, FINE. I'm not leaving her in there alone! I'm going to run in, grab myself a weapon of some kind and..."
It was only when Tavi felt a firm hand on his shoulder, that he realised that the hushed tones with which he'd started the conversation had long since been left behind.
"Alright you two," the stout man growled whilst poking his gun into Tavi's back. His taller friend had one of his own trained on Midge. "On yer feet."
The two pirates bound their arms with rope and led them out of the tall grasses towards the airship. They did not seem especially concerned with their captives - indeed, they seemed to prefer to grumble to one another about the poor quality of the last shipment of food they'd taken on-board. Tavi was not sure how he had generally imagined pirates ought to behave (torn as he was between the conflicting stereotypes of a jolly adventurer and a steel-faced murderer)...but he didn't think they ought to be as miserable as these two.
Tavi tried to think of a brilliant, daring ruse that would allow him and Midge to free themselves and overpower their captors before they found themselves locked in a brig. There were doubtless worse things that could happen to them, but imagining all of those would not be a productive use of devious thinking time.
As they drew close to the airship's entrance, he gave up searching for brilliance and went for the ridiculously obvious instead.
"Aaah...ahh...oww..." He moaned, and stumbled to his knees in rather unconvincing fashion. "My ankle...I think I twisted it."
Midge knew better than to say anything at this point, but she swore on the graves of any spirits who might have been within earshot of that hideous cliché: if they survived the next few minutes, she was never going to let him hear the end of this.
The taller pirate turned and eyed the fallen youth dubiously. "What's up with this 'un?"
His stout friend snorted. "Probably heard your talk of the stew an' thought it better to end it now, before he's made to eat the wretched stuff."
"Fine by me," the taller pirate shrugged, pointing his gun at Tavi's head. "Though I wish I'd thought of that."
"No use you whinin'. All yer can do is live in hope that somewhere down the line we pillage a decent kitchen."
"Yeah, yeah..."
Having witnessed his plan backfire so spectacularly (although to be honest, he was never really 100% sure where he'd been going with it), Tavi could only stare in Midge's direction in the hope that he could telepathically instruct her to kick the gun out of the pirate's hand. Or to produce a knife that she'd secretly concealed behind her back and stab him. Or to spontaneously develop magical powers and blast his face off. Any of these things would have done, but the more he looked at her, the less she did any of them. Useless cow.
In fact, the attention of both Midge and the two pirates had shifted from Tavi to something behind him. Upon realising this, Tavi struggled in his bound and prone position to shuffle himself round to see. However, before he could do so, the two pirates began to glow. Confused and terrified, they each barely managed to utter one last syllable before their forms vanished in a twinkling ether.
Tavi gawped. He was about to hastily reconsider his classification of Midge as a useless cow, only to then see that she was just as speechless as he was. Concluding quite reasonably that she couldn't have been responsible, his original opinion remained.
Just as their mutual confusion was about sufficient enough to elicit some befuddled babbling from one or the other of them, it was suddenly thrown through another loop as a bespectacled man crouched down next to them.
"Hmm," he said, examining Tavi. "No, not him." He glanced over at Midge, and then at the airship behind her.
"Well," he said, standing back upright. "I suppose he might be in there." He examined his wristwatch, tapped it a couple of times, and shrugged. "Tell me," he said, addressing Midge. "The um, the girl's already run in there, hasn't she? The, um, the bereaved one?"
Midge boggled.
"I'm sure my timing's correct," the man frowned, checking his watch again. "Oh well," he said, "if not, I shall just have to apologise and come back later."
With that, he strode calmly up the ramp and into the airship.
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