It's a side-story I came up with for Silver while enduring some writer's block with Adventure... (argh!!) and it takes place after Silver leaves the Legacy at the end of the film. As usual, I don't own any of Disney's characters or any part of RLStevenson's original story pitch. Happy reading! --MM

----------------------------

He was free to roam the entire Etherium if he wanted to.

John Silver raised his belly as he took a long, hearty breath as his Cyborg eye noted the distant, water spout-like comets along the dark ocean of space. His mechanical arm maneuvered the speed lever on the Legacy-sealed lifeglider, while the flesh arm simply held his tri-cornered pirate hat in place over his scalp, reminding him of a home he was going back to.

Throughout this journey, Silver told himself that he'd left the Legacy on a preconceived notion that he'd be hung for mutiny... that Captain Smollet would have his head on a platter... but he did not have the dignity to believe this.

Jim Hawkins had to grow up without a father. That was the truth, and the bulky pirate already felt he had become too involved with that boy's inner turmoil. But the man's running away was not at all in vain. He had showed the boy the makings of a good shipmate, teaching him how to maintain a ship's beauty and how to keep it running... and he knew that Jim was strong enough to fill in the rest of those adventurous pages on his own.

Any step further and Silver would have become a hypocrit in the boy's eyes. He could not bear to have Jim discover the rest of this middle-aged pirate's story in the Montressor Court of Law, with all the intended burglaries and homicides that came along with it. Thinking about it even made the man gulp his feelings down on the lifeglider, his Cyborg eye still keen with interest at the comets.

The man had left Treasure Planet with the pride of fulfilling an obligation... one that had cost him the right side of his entire body... and as he now felt his heavy mechanical peg leg tapping nervously about the hours ahead, John Silver knew he had made the right decision to leave Jim. Goodness knows, the boy may have secretly wanted him to meet that dear mother of his, to hope for the best... oy...and at that thought, Silver curled a side of his face and chuckled.

Silver could not see himself as the family man, really... at least not entirely... with his temper, and the monumental scar left on him as a Cyborg.

Humiliation and exile always seemed to follow his deformity into regular society.

Ever since the accident, Silver tried to avoid the public at all costs, knowing how they did not look at Cyborgs with a friendly eye about business. It still boggled his mind how the Commander... – Cornelius Arrow, wasn't it? God be with him... – had practically chiseled himself in sweat to convince the dear Captain that a skilled Cyborg cook would be a useful addition to their crew... and he was glad that despite the mishaps, a respectable figure had trusted him again.

A rush of Etherial wind suddenly swept those thoughts out of Silver's head, and in a small instant he realized that Morph's frightened sticking reaction around his neck would never happen again on such an occasion.

Haha, Morphy... li'l critter... the man mumbled to himself, smiling sadly.

There was no way around it. The burly pirate missed that little playful companion of his, and he wondered what sort of mischief the pink blob was putting Jim through now.

The sailing comets slowly faded into the darkness, and Silver moved over to check on the fuel reading on the Legacy lifeglider.

A soft grunt came from his throat as he knew that he could not travel all the way to Tempestad on a lifeglider; those small boats were designed only for day-long excursions, and it wouldn't survive the extremely long journey ahead of him.

Using his flesh hand, Silver craned his neck over and punched the navigational coordinates of his lifeglider onto the boat's inner-galactic positioning system, to determine the nearest planet to approach. He examined the blinking neon green and blue colors of the grid screen.

48-point-75 Northward, 65-point-7-3 Eastbound... hmm... Jimbo, he's over'n Montress'r, there. Montess'r... ah, yes, so that must be Sahariet, there. And... crustin' barnacles, those specs... tha-- that's VERDONA!

The Cyborg eye beamed as he looked at the planetary realm around Montressor, knowing that his destination was a toss-up between the desert planet called Sahariet, or one of the small moons of his musky, very green home planet of Verdona. It was a place he hadn't set foot on in years.

He quickly searched into his coat pocket for a digital compass to lead him towards the closest moon of Verdona within the next four hours... He was craving a good pint of rum and some poorly-made Bonzabeast stew.

As he took out the bronze, rusty round compass from his outer pocket, the Cyborg located a small shimmer or sparkle that crept out from the inside pocket. Rummaging through a few gadgets and stale sea biscuits he'd stored into that little pouch, the man's optic eye narrowed as his fingers dug out a tiny, reddish-purple jewel.

And the pirates eyes widened with delight.

It was an amethyst, all the way from Flint's Trove, clearly cut and polished. Silver could not even guess how the jewel had managed to dive into his inner pocket, between the chaos that brought destruction of Treasure Planet in those few minutes. Perhaps it was Fate itself?... or a little pink blob that always seemed to know how to make this man smile. And he smiled, regardless.

Silver had practically forgotten about the treasure in its entirety, after giving away the few collected pieces over to Jimbo and his mother.

The man held amethyst in his large hand, admiring it's shimmering quality, and seeing it as his only remaining piece to his past life on the quest for Flint's Trove. It had been such a long journey, almost like a relay that had taken generations of the Silver family, to picking up where others left off... and after the death of his brother, Ezekiel, that burden to find the Trove was passed on to be his own.

Staring into the glimmering jewel on his palm, Silver remembered how his career as a fisherman was immediately brushed off after his brother's death was delivered as a message by robot to his trailer boat in the marshes of Verdona. Their father had told the boys at a very young age about their ancestral-wide destiny to find a certain treasure on a distant planet. The reason was still vague to the grown-up Silver, but as he continued with all that his brother (and many generations of theirs) had started, he saw himself grow more and more determined - sometimes cunning - to find this uncharted place in the Etherium and claim all of its gold and majesty. It became an obsession to him.

But now, as he juggled the little gem on his fingers, it seemed like this jewel would mark the start of a new adventure for this large, slightly overweight Cyborg. Would he go back to the fishing trade with all of his scars and criminal records, or would he continue with the sailing and rule-breaking for more thirst for the unknown?

The Cyborg clutched the speed lever tightly, and after quickly putting the jewel safely back into his pocket, he held onto his hat and jolted the lever downwards, speeding excitedly into the darkness ahead of him.