The Legend of Jack Devon
Chapter 1: Jack of the Bloodbath
"He's a dangerous one, that's certain," one shadowed figure.
Another shadowed figure nodded. "I've never seen someone so... bloodthirsty..."
"It looks as if watching the slaughter of his own parents and their crew turned him into some sort of... monster..." a third shadowed figure.
The original figure sighed. "At least our Armada have him detained. No need to release a bounty, since there is no way he'll escape, especially with Admiral Deacon on the ship. When he gets here however... we must execute him immediately, that boy... Jack of the Bloodbath."
A brown-haired boy lay in prison clothing on the cold wooden floor of an Armada ship. Well, the hair was mostly brown aside from that blood-red streak. People say it was dyed that way when that part of his hair was soaked in the blood of his parents as they were murdered. Nobody knows for sure, however, why Jack of the Bloodbath had the red streak in his hair. His cold purple eyes opened slowly, as if he wasn't even human. Anyone who would look into those eyes of his would either submit to him immediately or die an excruciatingly painful death, just as Jack's parents had. He closed them again quickly and sharply. He didn't want to remember that. There was only one thing he wanted to concentrate on. How many clockworks he will destroy. He hated clockworks, because they weren't human. There wasn't any blood in them that he could gouge out through the eye sockets. They didn't feel pain, so he couldn't hear their screams as he maimed them before killing them. And worst of all, they were solid metal. It wasn't fun at all to chop them up. He just wished there was a nice meaty human being in there with him that he could chop up. If he even had his katana with him that is. He was sitting there waiting for his own death. His own blood would be spilt. The only blood he didn't want spilt- the blood of his parents- would be spilt. He looked at his hands and grinned. Long nails. Yes, nice and sharp. He started scratching the floorboards. It wasn't very fun to scratch up the floorboards when comparing it to slicing people up, but it beat doing nothing. Suddenly, he heard a giant crash, followed by a 'YOHOHO!'. He grinned.
"Pirates," he chuckled. "This should be entertaining to listen to, if I don't get to watch..." he sighed. He wanted in on the action.
"YOHOHO!" A fat pirate with a long white beard yelled. "Pirate Baron Boochbeard has arrived, ye iron scallywags!"
"Butch, how many times must I tell you?" a Monquistan with a Polarian accent scolded his captain. "Nobody expects such an untasteful entrance from a Pirate Baron!"
An official-looking clockwork stood up and walked towards the helm of the ship. He spun round to face Boochbeard. "Butch Cavendish, better known as Boochbeard, the man who holds the title 'Pirate Baron', the man who is the strongest pirate captain after the Four Corners' Pirate Lords. I'm Admiral Deacon, the Chief of Staff of the Armada. Pleasure to meet you. What is you business here?"
"Orders from Pirate Lord of the Northern Corner, Horace Avery. I've come to retrieve Jack Devon, whose parents you slaughtered with that damned hand of yours."
Deacon chuckled. "Trying to steal my prize are you? If you want to do that..." he disappeared, then reappeared again aiming a pistol at the back of Boochbeard's head, "...you will have to defeat me first!"
Boochbeard smirked. "Very well then..."
Faster than a bullet could travel, Boochbeard spun out of the way of Deacon's pistol barrel and swung his left leg into Deacon, only for it to get caught... inside of Deacon's body!
"WHAT IN THE BLAZES?!" Boochbeard yelled.
"Impressed?" Deacon asked the Pirate Baron. "I can transform into liquid metal at will. Naturally, I can solidify at will as well. Which means..." his hand transformed into a blade, "...I can do this!"
He swung his blade-for-a-hand down onto Boochbeard's caught left leg and sliced it right off. He then used his other hand to punch Boochbeard and send him across to the other side of the ship. As Boochbeard yelped in pain, Deacon's clockwork crew stood silently awaiting orders from Deacon. Orders which never came. Deacon simply ejected Boochbeard's left leg from his lower torso and transformed his hand back to its original shape using the liquid metal method. He raised a pistol and pointed it straight at the quickly defeated pirate's forehead. While Boochbeard was unbelievably strong, Deacon made him seem like a mere ant.
"Now to finish you off, little bug," Deacon mocked the old man. He didn't even know mocking his enemies was part of his program until now.
"I do not think so myself, Deacon," came a voice. The sound of a rapier being unsheathed was made, quickly followed by something that the human eye could not comprehend. The standby clockwork crew was suddenly sliced to pieces, along with Deacon's hand. On top of that, a Monquistan was in a swashbuckler's finishing pose on the other side of the ship to where he previously was- all in less than a millisecond!
Deacon made a whirring sound as he used his liquid metal technique to regenerate the hand that this mysterious monkey had just sliced.
"Mr. Michael Gandry, Boochbeard's First Mate," he said emotionlessly. "If you're so powerful when he's so weak, then why are you aiding him? Shouldn't he be the one aiding you?"
"I have my own ambitions," Gandry replied.
"I see," Deacon said. "Might I inquire something I have calculated? Why have the rest of Boochbeard's crew not done anything? Living creatures are less obedient than us clockworks after all."
Gandry smirked. "Who ever said they weren't doing anything?"
"ALL RIGHT MATEYS! FIRE THE SHIT OUTTA THE PHOENIX CANNON! BLOW A HOLE INTO THEIR SHIP!"
A giant beam was launched out of a mysterious-looking cannon, shaped oddly like a phoenix, with the beam coming out of the phoenix's mouth, straight into the side of the Armada ship. While the original cannonball barrage didn't even put a dent on the ship, only succeeding in shaking the ship a little and alerting the passengers of their presence, the beam pierced right through the unbelievably tough ship's outer layer.
Deacon yelled. "YOU HAVE THE PHOENIX CANNON?! IMPOSSIBLE! IT'S LOCATION IS-" Deacon was then hit with the beam. "AAAARRRRGGGGHHHH!"
When the beam had stopped, all that was seen was pure destruction. The phoenix cannon was designed to restore human life yet destroy everything else. Due to the Armada ship's durability, the majority of it still remained. On top of that, the energy used for the phoenix cannon had restored Boochbeard's leg. Boochbeard, now completely healed, walked towards the crisped remains of Deacon.
"I don't think there's enough of him left to restore him," Boochbeard called out. "We can safely assume Deacon will stay dead."
Two figures walked through the cloud of dust caused by the phoenix cannon. When they had come out, it was seen that they were both wearing prison uniforms- black and white stripes. One was Jack of the Bloodbath, with his light brown hair with the red streak and the purple eyes. Another was a former Amber Horde Member. Jack had seen his wanted poster before- his name was Subodai the Horse Barbarian, wanted by the Armada for 50,000 gold coins- an impressive amount for his deeds. This was why Jack freed him. Subodai had told Jack that if he freed him then he would become Jack's underling for as long as he lived. Now, Subodai the Horse Barbarian was under the orders of Jack.
"I overheard you wanted to take me to Horace Avery?" the bloodthirsty outlaw asked. "Go for it- do your duty."
Boochbeard smiled. "I didn't think ye'd come with us so easily, Jack of the Bloodbath."