"The best bit about magic," said the pirate with gout, "is the sparkles."
"That's way off," argued the pirate in green. "It's got to be the sawing people in half!"
"The leotards!"
"The vanishing elephants!"
Soon a fight broke out amongst the men, and their afternoon tea poured over the deck, crumbs of ship's biscuits crashing to the floor and teeth following suit. It was in the middle of this that the Pirate Captain kicked his way through his quarters and strode onto the deck malevolently, a hard thing to do in bright sunlight, but he pulled it off well. The Pirate Captain was all teeth and curls, with a pleasant open face. If he had been born a pencil rather than a pirate, and thinking of what sort of pencil they would be if they weren't pirates was among one of the crew's favorite pastimes (bypassing comparisons to trees, creatures, fonts, and sedimentary rocks), the Pirate Captain would undoubtedly be a broad but thin strikingly darkly-stroked hand-carved carpenter's pencil.
"What's all this racket, you coves?" the Pirate Captain said in greeting. The other pirates looked at him apologetically.
"Sorry, sir," said the pirate with rickets, who had just splashed hot tea in the face of the pirate with a nut allergy. "We were just discussing what the best part about magic tricks is."
"Well, that's simple, it's learning the secrets of the tricks by means of force," the Pirate Captain said while waggling his cutlass at an imaginary magician. "Number two, would you come here a mo?"
As the Pirate Captain and the pirate with a scarf left the crew, the pirate with a nut allergy - scalding tea streaming down his face - gave an impressed nod. "He's right. Next to learning a secret while running someone through, leotards are rubbish."
"What is it, Captain?" the scarfed pirate asked him as soon as they were inside the captain's quarters.
"Ah, I'm sure you know. I'm just awfully curious why the crew should be talking about magic at such a time. Have I missed something?" He straightened the pile of junk on his desk absent-mindedly.
"Yes, sir," the loyal first mate replied delicately. The Pirate Captain always loved to be 'in the know,' so having missed a small adventure because he overslept had to be worded carefully. Luckily the pirate with a scarf knew that his captain's curiosity would keep him from being moody, so he backed off on replying delicately and gave it to him straight. "While you were asleep, the lads grew so restless they begged to go ashore and check out that old antique shop." The ship was currently docked outside an artsy town in France. "You know how I can't say no to them when they're pleading like that."
"That is hard, yes."
"So we went and got some trinkets to tide them over."
"Ah. Not sure what that has to do with magic, Number Two…?"
"Oh, well, yes, you see Albino got himself a vanishing doubloon kit and they started the discussion that way."
"Vanishing doubloon, really! I'd like to see that. Disappearing doubloon would be better, I think. Alliteration, that sort of thing. Disappearing doubloon... Can he perform it well?" The Pirate Captain made to walk back on deck excitedly.
The pirate with a scarf winced. "No. No he can't. But the pirate in red is good, if you'd want to see him have a go…" he drifted into a high-pitched whisper at the sight of the Pirate Captain's face souring, pretending to fix up his scarf as though he hadn't been talking. The Captain never did like the pirate in red. Too surly and rebellious, even for a pirate.
"I never did like him. Much too surly and rebellious," he muttered to the door to the deck. "Even for a pirate."
"The pirate with a hook is all right at it," the pirate with a scarf said with a shrug. And at that the captain perked up again and strode back out to his crew to see.
The pirates had returned to their criss-cross-applesauce positions, balancing saucers in their hands and chatting to each other politely. The whole teatime idea was brought about by Jennifer, a formerly upright-Victorian-lady now part of the crew. Of course the pirates had had tea before, but it was only by her expertise did they learn the chatting about the weather bit. That's what they started off chatting about, anyway, but as always the minds of the crew tended to wander off into strange directions. Now they were talking about sea cucumbers.
"So they're cucumbers in the ocean?" the pirate with long legs asked the circle. "I thought they were cucumbers shaped like a letter C."
"I'm back!" The Pirate Captain stood in the middle of the circle. He added a 'scurvy knaves' for good measure. "I'd like to see the disappearing doubloon trick if you lot don't mind, it sounds rather interesting." At this the albino pirate clapped excitedly and brought out a small box.
"Here it is, Captain!"
"If you show that stupid trick again I'll smash it in half," said the pirate in red with a snort.
"Oh, stop, you're just sore that you're not allowed to do it," Jennifer scolded.
"No, I'm sore that he doesn't give you the doubloon back when he's done!"
The albino pirate looked hurt at this. He was a pirate, but that didn't mean he was unfair. "I just haven't worked it out all the way, I'd give it back if I knew how," he said with a frown.
"Yeah, well, if you give it here I'll figure it out for you," the pirate in red remarked, looking helpful, but simultaneously murderous. It was a passive-aggressive thing.
"No! Then you'll just be a show-off, being all good at making it disappear!" He wrestled the box away as the pirate with a scarf barred them from each other with a sigh. "I can do it myself, I'm not stupid," the albino pirate said quietly.
"Lads, lads! Calm down, all right?" The pirate with a scarf raised his eyebrows and patted the albino pirate reassuringly on the arm. "Come now, the Captain just wants to see the trick, so let's do that and move on."
"Good, I wondered when this fighting would die down," said the Captain, who had started doing a pirates' Pilates routine in the middle of the circle.
The albino pirate gave the pirate in red a squinty look and turned to smile at the captain. "For this astounding trick," he said stiltedly, eyes bugging with nerves, "I'll need an ordinary doubloon!"
"Right, right, here you go, old boy!" The Pirate Captain handed the albino pirate a doubloon he had fashioned out of wood. Times were tough on the pirate ship. But mainly the captain was stingy.
"Erm… Thank… you! As you can see, it goes into the box like so -" Albino held the wooden doubloon in his teeth and yanked hard on the sliding part of the box. It wouldn't budge. "Wad bobedt shir," he said with a quavery voice. Gripping the box with his right hand, he smacked it into his left palm wildly. Sweating, he chuckled nervously and spat the fake doubloon out, deciding to bite at the box. The Pirate Captain looked on with an eager smile.
"Wonderful, I love it when they act like they have no idea what they're doing!"
While pulling hard with his teeth, the albino's sweaty palms slipped away from the box and he ended up back-handing the pirate in red's face.
"OOO-ARRGH!" the pirate in red roared through tears of pain. The albino apologized as best and quickly as he could with the box still gripped in his teeth. Soon there was a noise like a newly plucked chicken being slapped against a mahogany desk, and the disappearing doubloon box was shattered along the deck. The albino sniffled and rubbed his head, Jennifer checking his teeth with a wince. The Pirate Captain clapped heartily and picked up the previously-vanished doubloon from the pile of broken wood.
"Ah, you've turned my doubloon all shiny! What a great trick, albino pirate! Good on you!" He patted the pirate on the head. Albino screeched a bit. The pirate in red made angry grabby hands at the Pirate Captain pocketing what used to be his doubloon, but decided he'd rather steam to himself than ask his own captain for it back. A wise decision considering the Pirate Captain was looking for any excuse to make the pirate in red walk the plank. But to be honest, it was all thanks to the pirate in red that these fights kept starting, so he was reluctant to the pirate's absence at the same time; a difficult relationship indeed. "Let's get going, then, crew. We should be able to spot an adventure if we get away from the dock for a while! Isn't that the point of having a ship: being in the middle of the ocean? Come on!"
The Pirate Captain gave his men a winning smile. Pretty much everyone had sauntered back to their usual spots, getting ready to travel, but the albino pirate, Jennifer, and the pirate with a scarf were in a little triangular huddle, each facing the captain. The albino pirate was in the middle, looking particularly forlorn and puppy-dog-eyed. Jennifer was patting his back gently as the albino tried to piece together his magic box to absolutely no avail. Seriously, it was like a pile of toothpicks. Pirate with a Scarf cocked his head slightly and did his best to make his eyes dilate. He ended up looking a bit creepy, but albino's absolute misery made up for it and the Pirate Captain heaved a sigh.
"All right! All right! Let's get a new doubloon box." Immediately the albino pirate leapt into the air with an alarmingly large grin, ran off the boat, ran back, hugged the captain tightly, and skipped his way to the antique shop.