A Pirate's Life? Not For Me! (Open)

“No, no, NO!” Her voice echoed throughout her manor house, servants ducking in fear and praying it wasn’t something they’d done to cause the outburst.

“I don’t want to look like them, I want to look better than them!” The witch ripped off the white blouse her so-called ‘stylist’ had given her, tossing it on to the floor and storming back towards her dressing room.

“Can’t you people do anything?” She asked, rhetorically of course. She already knew they were completely incapable and bordering on idiotic. But she kept them around anyway, out of the goodness of her heart – without her, else might they be doing? Pirating? How ghastly. Besides, who else was going to wash her floors?

“Edward, honestly, I picked you up off the street-“

“My father’s a lord…”

“UP off the street, homeless! Down on your luck! And all I ask is that you do whatever I say. I really don’t think that’s too much to ask, is it?”

“No,” he said, even though it was.

“I didn’t think so. Now find me a dress. A nice dress. I can’t be looking like the rabble, okay? If I don’t dress nice, how will the peasants know that I’m better than them… someone to look up to? Would you really deny the people someone to aspire to? I didn’t think so,” she smiled, taking a seat and gazing at herself almost lovingly in the mirror.

Moments later, Edward returned holding a floor length navy gown, sleeveless and completely inappropriate for the occasion.

“See, now you’re understanding. That wasn’t so hard, was it? Now, quickly, come along. Hair! Make-up! We’ve only got four hours!”


Sitting at a table on the deck of the biggest ship in the harbour, Yukina already looked bored. Radiant, glamorous and shockingly overdone, but bored. Couldn’t someone else do this? She whined on the way, but it had to be done. She knew it had to be her. To gain respect, let people know who she was and blah blah blah. But she never thought meeting pirates would be quite this boring. Shouldn’t they be interesting? You’d have thought by now, after meeting about fifty of them already that at least one of them would’ve tried to kill her. But nope, the only excuse she’d had to beat them up was when they took a glance at her chest. And that had only happened fifteen times!

Signs all around Port Royal marked the occasion. Pirates wanted! Come meet the Witch Queen of the Caribbean! It was an interesting tactic, truth be told. No previous leader that she could recall had tried to combine the forces of the pirates and the noblemen. She knew they wouldn’t exactly get along and she was quite fine if they fought amongst themselves, but with the state of the worlds and how connected they were becoming she had to ensure they were all prepared to defend the Port, no matter their differences.

She was honestly surprised at the turnout. Maybe it was the topless photo of her on the posters, with nothing but her own hair covering her breasts and made to look like a mermaid, or the promise of one gold piece for everyone who agreed to meet her, but something had made the pirates want to come. And so far the responses had been mostly promising, with the line to come up on to ship extending far down the pier.

“So do you pledge your loyalty, should I ever need you?” She asked the pirate sitting across from her, concluding perhaps the longest speech she had made for the day.

No response.

Yukina’s eyes narrowed. He dared defied her? Worse than declining, he would just sit there and stare at her? Challenging her in silent treason? She stood, slamming her fists down on the table and glaring him dead in the eye.

Then he opened his mouth.

No tongue.

Yukina slumped back in her seat and growled at one of her servants.

“I told you people to only bring me ones that could speak! What is wrong with you?” She in fact hadn’t told them any such thing, but it seemed a reasonable assumption, she thought. They were here to have a conversation, after all.

“Bring up the next one!” She yelled, while the mute still sit across from her. She shot him a wicked glare and gestured for him to leave, which he began to – but not quick enough. A sudden barrage of water shot out of the ocean and launched the man back on to the pier, soaking him from head to toe and leaving him more than a little embarrassed as he hobbled away.

“Let’s keep it moving people!”

A world of plunder, wealth, poverty and treacheries deeds, this was said to be what Port Royal was all about. It rose some interesting concepts of humanity the great heartless king thought as he slowly passed through shadows and darkness of his home into the wretched touch of the opposing realm of light, it was a task still daunting for him to experiences despite the number of times of occurrences. It was never something he quite enjoyed as of yet, the cool brisk and tender sensation of darkness surrounding you in its soft shady embrace felt as natural as breathing in air for humans. The radiance of these worlds was harsh, bright enough to burn the moon and harsh as the fires of hell upon the cold tan skin of this beautifully man. But for today Lenneth’s curiosity won over his to indulge in the ease of some new captive man’s arms in the endless waters of the dark beach, the taste of their flesh had been tastefully even in the three weeks of their wills breaking.

This mission would mark at least partial down the list of ones Len had on his list for plans upon plans involving this wretched cluster of stars, further down as he crossed out the name of this place his number of places to scout and experiences first had grew smaller with each visit, only a handful of them remained untouched by his charm.

As dark portal rose from breaking threads of reality on top of a building overlooking the roofs tops of the Victorian buildings as he crossed out into the salty air, feeling its touch across his bare flesh and striking muscles as he walked over to the edge. Following in the view the town felt quite a bit mixed bag of feelings for Lenny to witness. While playing with the tips of is golden mane he could somewhat sort out what he was seeing down below him as the people moved about to their daily lives as such boring meat sacks did at this time of day, he could see them in their heart moving from one moment to next of worry, to joy to other ranges less of human then that of a plant. He couldn’t place the exact time, as if that mattered but it appeared to be passing into a later session of the clockwork, the sun moving across into the western side of the skies while the street lamps started to turn on, flicking at the cracked glasses before doing so. The port seemed a combo of old and modern themes Len had seen in the dwarf woods and Radiant garden respectively, a mix of the two styles and advancements while still musty and…smelling of fish.

His soft pearly blues noticed the large number of people moving across into the seas just to the short distance of his location, seemed like a good place to observe something of interest. Quickly though Lenneth would alter his attire and mask his more monstrous features away to show his human like guise all the more. Granted the attire of this world was awful, totally covered from head to top in lays and gahh that white hair or wigs were they? Ya screw that things looked heavy. The rags of the poor didn’t look all that appealing either and beneath his class.

Jumping down he blinded a fellow that spotted him fall with just a hint of heaven before kicking him through a wall and walking away from the scene. Didn’t seem like anyone else notice as he rushed and mingled in the flow of traffic. Taking note of the commotion as the cowards waited near the docks Lenny couldn’t help but notice the strange posters of nearly nude women over what claimed to be a titled witch offering her gold and clearly her vanity to anyone that saw her live. What the hell was a pirates ways? And way was she offering munny for them to meet her? Hmm gets her tits were enough in this case, poor thing. As he walked onward to what appeared to be a gathering coward Lenny spared a second to focus a few shreds of peace for the people as he burnt down a few pictures down in black flames while moving, with his mind of course just for it too look like a freak accident as they burnt to a crisp, few managed to catch a few wooden buildings but dissipated soon after a few marks.

Reaching there and fitting in the sideliners Lenny watched as the current of water rose out from the depths and carried a man off back into dry lands before the lines moved up, a socked old man that had a foul stench and grungy appearances, blehh but that water was infused with some decent powers, a talented amount of control as Len could admit, wondering what would happen next he watched the outer part of the ship on the docks with the rest of the people not in line to meet the witch though he kept his sense, specially his hearing in toned with the distance talks no ordinary person could make out this far.

As the next pirate was brought forward, Yukina was becoming visibly agitated. Okay, maybe the mute was just bad luck, but this whole thing was just stupid. They were all assembled down there, couldn’t she just yell at them all and have it over with? Her advisor had mentioned that it was a good show to meet each one individually, but she was so bored.

The next pirate collapsed in the chair opposite her. This one was much older than most so far, and she had quickly realised that the older they were the more likely they were to resist. She let out a deep sigh, she hoped he didn’t give her any trouble. She didn’t want to have to fight anyone! Except that she did.

“So, I’m going to just cut to the chase,” she said, surprisingly tired of the verbose speeches she had been giving prior, “I need you to promise me that if any threat ever came to our world,” she had to be careful here, not to mention too much about the other worlds or whatever, “that you will put aside any differences and help defend the Port. With me.”

There, reasonable enough she thought. Everyone else had thought her mad, what kind of thing could threaten the Port and their freedom to the extent that she was talking about? They had all just agreed so that they could scurry back to their ships with their gold piece, not really giving it any thought beyond that.

Until this one.

“No,” he said, folding his arms and glaring at her.

“What do you mean no!” She growled, rising out of her seat and leaning menacingly over him. She wasn’t used to people saying no to her, especially men and especially not today. Everything had just been so agreeable and easy… at least this was exciting.

“I’ll die before I pledge allegiance to a woman,” he spat back, traces of saliva landing on her otherwise pristine dress, eliciting a gasp from one of her servants. He shouldn’t have done that.

Now, Yukina knew about the misogynistic qualities of some of these pirates. Bad luck to have a woman on board and blah blah blah. But she was in charge now! There wasn’t any room for this kind of insolence anymore.

Just like before a blast of water shot up out of the ocean and rocketed the man back on to the pier. But he wasn’t done yet, not by a long shot.

“Take this as a warning,” she called, addressing all the assembled pirates, “you will listen to me and do whatever I ask! I am kind! I don’t ask for much but when I do ask, if you don’t heed my call, you might just face the same fate as your brother here. And I don’t think any of us want that.”

As soon as she had finished speaking, a massive tentacle shot up out of the water beneath the pier, dragging the now screaming pirate down into the depths and his grave. She wasn’t watching anymore, already stepping back towards the centre of the deck, but the scream was enough to tell her he’d done his job. A smile crossed her lips.

“Thank you, Famfrit.” She said, barely above a whisper but their connection ensured he would hear. She turned to look over at the pier once more, and a bit of a commotion was breaking out. A little anger over being told they had to obey, mixed with a whole lot more anger about the prospect of being denied their promised gold piece was causing the disquiet.

“Perhaps stay a while, who knows what these cretins might do.” She finished, hearing the bubbling, echoed response of ‘of course’ in her head as the creature remained beneath.

“Edward!” She said, addressing her human servant now instead.

“Yes, ma’am?”

“Ew, don’t call me ma’am it sounds old. You know that.” She snapped, he frowned. “Go and make the pirates get back in line to get their gold pieces. We wouldn’t want to upset anyone, would we?”

[-4DP, 5 remaining]

“She’s a loon, a monster!”

“Why should we listen to a Woman of all things?”

“One piece of bloody gold an’t worth our lives
”
“There are some nobles just near us see? What’s to stop ‘em from arresting us right after their done?”

“We should just plunder them right now! Look at them they wearing such fancy stuff”

“She can’t stop us all!”

“ya’ll bunch of yellow belled cowards”

On and on the commotions went on as the pirates all were thrown off their obedient tracks after that little display from the witch, their greedy little eyes fixated on the hand wash brows of a few country men and fisher that looked on as that ramble they considered criminals. A few standing coats besides the more expensive fashion brand told Len of some higher form of economy class came to see the show, more likely to see the freaks being put back in their place.

A few of the pirates returned back to their line, some shaking in fear as the waters below started to pool in red from their brother just moments ago, one man even started to scream and rush out of the people’s view with his tail caught in the gap between his legs.

But the rowdy bunch was the focus of Len’s attention now, their hearts filled with such greed and distrust of this person, this women they were so quickly to dismiss despite her clear advantage, couldn’t blame them he agreed as well. The other lot danced with their fear of her power, their festering shadows seemed to of a lesser tastes for Len, he’d rather enjoy the energetic ones personally so much sweeter.

And just what else could this witch of the seas do he pondered, returning to her throne above the ships while order was being maintained, she just might be pushed a little further.

Lenneth whispered behind the common folks as his eyes glued on the scurvy men boisterously showing their egotistic dicks about pride and whatnot. They were causing a bit of a commotion still, just a bit of a push was all that was needed. Focusing at their tiny little hearts as his charismatic eyes scanned the lot of them Lenny began to magically fester the darkness their had, glowing a faint purple as his nature playfully touched theirs. Quickly raging their emotions and common sense into a twisted spree as their own thoughts become turned against them. Some of those in the waiting line just crumbled on their knees, crying about their worthless lives and not wanting to lose it and all, lesser men and all. But oh there were some nice reactions he could feel, some of the scurvy nays become annoyed, even a little blood thirst.

One crazy little pirate even took at his guns and blade before firing up into the air with some spoken profanity of choice sea dogs before rushing at one of the red coats aiming for the people, he laughed as his mind sank behind what his desires he wished for. The other ones similar to his bravado stood back for the moment however their own desires would began to chafe closer to his instanty soon enough, all Len needed to do was whisper such sweet nothings to their hearts.

The foolish pirate’s blind rush was no match for the training and precision of the soldier, who swiftly disarmed the approaching assailant and knocked him to the ground. A slight grin appeared before the nobleman quickly gathered his composure, before addressing the assembled peasan- er, pirates.

“Either take your gold and leave, or just leave. There is no third option.” The man retorted, pleased with his initiative.

He wasn’t the only one, either. Peering back over the side of the ship, Yukina was watching the scene unfold and was more than a little impressed with this unidentified soldier.

“Edward, make a note of that soldier,” she said.

“Edward’s handing out the gold miss,” said Michael.

“Thank you, Edward.” She finished, completely transfixed on what was going on down on the pier.

She wanted to simply have the crowd disperse, but knew that denying anyone their promised gold wouldn’t be good publicity and might result in even more trouble than what had already transpired. She noted a couple of the pirates slinking off after the soldier’s ultimatum, good, she thought, but not great. That meant that a couple of them were leaving unconvinced, that she would have even more work to do in order to gain their trust and their allegiance. She expected as much, but the visual indication was enough to displease her. She hated diplomacy.

But before she could get to that there was still the matter of the situation at hand. She had to think of a quick solution to make them disperse… what made people want to get home quicker than anything? If not the pirates then at least the crowd watching should be sent home, she thought. She would much prefer to have fewer witnesses, should anything else transpire, and maintaining public opinion amongst the nobility was much more important than amongst the rabble.

And then it clicked, so simple. It was funny how in a town so dependent on the ocean that the commonfolk would still be afraid to get a little wet.

Suddenly, almost out of nowhere, it began to rain. Not just a drizzle, not quite a thunderstorm, but real, heavy rain. A brief moment of confusion – wasn’t it meant to be sunny today? – was short lived before the amassed audience quickly retreated back towards the town and back towards shelter. A great number of the pirates disappeared to, much to her surprise, evidently not believing the gold piece was worth any more of their time. The few remaining continued to grab their gold pieces and run with their coats overhead, but a few more remained glaring and jeering.

She would wait, though, to see if they did anything first. A good leader knows how to show restraint, after all.

[Rain Dance used]

My a little anti-climactic Lenny thought as guards quickly took out the little rouge of the sea while the others were still behaving with ordinary commons, the nobles all seemed to enjoy the little show too, throwing around their power and wealth as they stuck their noises up and looked down at the dirt before them. Why this witch wanted to meet them was beyond his current understanding, she appeared to have the support of the aristocrats already.

So the reasoning behind gathering the dirty sea rats must be something of value to her, why else would she pay just to have them visit her in the middle of the way, even as so far as not to arrest them and leave some casually, clearly the guards could have taken any down faster enough and move them to the dungeons.

This bore a little curiosity for Lenny to find exploring though not directly just yet, he wanted to see this play out in secret if given the chance to simple be left to his own devices. He walked back with the coward as the rain appeared out of the blue just in front of the sun moments ago, he wasn’t sure what just happened but could only attribute it to fortune for a water witch, rather by the grace of this world’s gods or by her own hand. The waters ran down his flawless self and made wet his clothing, clinging to him in earnest sensual bits before he started to move slower, it felt nice to him.

Not far the moment Lenny was able to turn around unnoticed and hide inside an ally was the second he took the chance and shifted his methods for a more direct approach. Certain he was hidden from sight Lenny flared himself into a devilishly stunning outfit that tailored from inspirations from the rabble he witness already in line. It was a far cry from a perfect disguise and looked more like a masquerade outfit.

A stunning large hat with a feather in it that would cover his head while his fabrics changed into a form fitting silk of black and golds, a larger overcoat wrapped around his form while décor of elegant linings at the trims. Some fitted black pants and dress shoes for the feet finished his little ensemble before walking back to the docks. Standing in line along with the other still reaming, unhindered by the rain though there wasn’t many left at all.

In fact after the next guy Len was already set to meet this witch face to face. Once called he would follow as instructed before interrogating her for his own ends, for now he’d just wait, tapping at his nails and adjust their shine a little.

Yukina yawned as she leant back in her chair. The pirate's down on the pier had fallen back into line, and any inkling of conflict had died away as quickly as it had birthed. Edward was down on the dock handing out their gold pieces like she had promised, and best of all she didn't have to talk to anymore of them. The day was winding to a close, and she called for a nice big glass of wine to congratulate herself on a job well done.

Down on the pier, another man had been paid and another stepped up... but he went to board the ship? Edward quickly stepped to block his path, quickly giving him a once over and letting out an exasperated sigh. The big hat with the feather, all the gold... wasn't it a bit much?

"The Witch Queen is no longer meeting the pirates, one of which you are not." Edward said, rather coldly.

"If you have some business with the Queen you can make an appointment, I believe she has an opening in four months. Otherwise, might I suggest you be on your way?"

"Edward! What are you chatting away about down there?! Didn't I give you a jo-" The witch had left her seat to go and see what was happening but as soon as she saw the words wouldn't leave her mouth any more. That face... those arms... that body... sigh...

"Edward! Don't be so rude to our handsome guest!" She said, barely containing a giggle. She swiftly descended the gangway to greet the stranger, putting on her fakest smile and approaching him with far too much interest.

"If you wanted to meet the Queen, you needed only to ask," she said, this time the giggle actually escaped her as she paused for breath.

"My name is Yukina, Witch Queen of the Caribbean," she completed, with an almost sultry tone as she extended a hand for him to kiss.

Edward simply frowned. So did the pirates watching.

Hmm the man in his way was a little on edge it appeared, while clearly he had more style then any of those hapless sea horns he was belittled less then they were? What wasn’t being much more of a catch then a common pirate worth more to this witch then cannon fetter?

It appeared so as the dark lady of the lakes returned to her high posts looking down at the poor innocence beneath her care. Her excitement however seemed to only lash for a breath as her attitude erupted in a storm that quickly favored Len’s presence. Smiling at this twist of fate he could expect things to go a lot smoother then he had planned. He could hardly believe such a temperamental hormonal wind of sea salt even felt a twinge of desire, guess even in iron clad sphincter had some blood down its muscles.

Being called handsome showed him a human side to her ego, something he could easily exploit as any plane human would fall for such graces. Smiling he kept in that same spot as the witch queen came down and presented herself in a much more pleasant manner then the yelling fit she had moments ago. The name ranges something in his mind but it faded from thought like a passing breath, Yukina huh? Lenny made no motion as her hand was presented out to him, his eyes looked at the appendage before jetting back at her’s with a sly smile he simply curtsied in a pleasant manner with his jacket while living the hand un touched.

“Greetings your highness, I’m Lenneth a handsome devil as you pointed out. If it were that easy then I would indeed like a…intimate audience with you…away from preying eyes if it tickles your fancy to be alone with me of course”