It was only after Francis left that Arthur wondered what he'd heard that made him stand up and leave so suddenly.

And right as it was getting interesting... A voice muttered, and if Arthur could slap himself he would. That is, after I get out... Arthur thought, reminded of the task at hand.

He knew he'd have a lock pick in his secret pouch if he only could get to it. He squirmed in his seat, trying to turn his pants at least far enough to the side so that he could reach the pouch. If it hasn't already been emptied, that is... Arthur thought, but tried to stay positive. It's my only hope...

Arthur's pants were getting worse and worse in terms of how comfortable they were. His erection wasn't as bad as it had been, but with the combined sensation of the cloth rubbing against it and his pants getting tighter and tighter as the seams moved to the left during his attempt to reach his pouch.

Arthur had to squirm and scoot in his seat for at least another 60 seconds before he could finally reach his secret pouch. Arthur's hand immediately reached to the familiar inner seam of his pants, groping along for the little bag. He felt the flap that would open it, and tugged it so that it came undone and opened. The pouch was facing sideways, so the contents were all on one side, but there were contents, and that was what mattered. Arthur quickly found the first of his three emergency lock picks, pulling it out and shutting the pouch again.

Arthur had to twist his wrist at a strange angle to attempt to pick the lock, and the fact that he couldn't see it wasn't exactly helpful. It was difficult even for Arthur to try and pick a lock both not looking and not in the proper position. However, he still managed it, and the first handcuff opened with a snick. Arthur pulled his hands in front of him, making quick work of the other cuff, and then discarded the cuffs on the chair, returning the undamaged pick to his pouch.

Arthur stood up, happy to stretch his legs and have the freedom to walk around without being supervised. Arthur had only been on the ship for a few hours, but he already wanted to be back in England. I'll get back there soon enough, if I can get out of here unseen... Arthur thought, and surveyed the room once more, this time to see if there were any hatches or trapdoors leading elsewhere.

The only door Arthur could see aside from the ones leading to the main deck was one in a corner that appeared to be a closet, but Arthur knew looks could be deceiving and went to check it out.

When he opened the door he found that it was indeed a closet; full of assorted shirts, pants, jackets, and shoes- and some parchment and ink bottles in a crate at the bottom.

Arthur had his gaze locked on a red coat, however, that seemed incredibly familiar to him. He reached out and touched it, feeling the expensive velvety material it was made out of. It was definitely the coat of a captain, but the strange thing was that Francis always wore a blue coat, not a red one. Arthur strained to remember why he knew this coat in particular, but only found the faint tickle of recognition that symbolized some sort of-

Arthur jumped at the sound of a loud thud outside the door to Francis' room. Right, focus Arthur. Look for some sort of exit. He thought, and looked down at the box full of rolls of paper and bottles full of black ink. Upon the first glance it appeared to just be messily strewn about the crate, but when more closely inspected one could see that they had been placed to perfectly cover the bottom of the crate.

Clever. Arthur thought, and gripped the crate so he could pull it out of the way. But when he picked it up, the floorboards came up with it, and it turned out that the crate itself was the trapdoor. Not what I was expecting, but it works well nevertheless... He thought, and set the crate to the side to look down the hole. There was a wooden ladder leading down into a dark room, but Arthur didn't have time to question what might have been down there.

He quickly descended a few steps down the ladder, and then looked up again so he could grab the crate and replace it so it would once again hide the room below. Arthur had just settled the crate back into the right spot when he heard the sound of two swords clashing together; one of them then falling to the ground with a loud clatter. There was an exchanging of words, but by that time Arthur was already on the last rung of the ladder; his right foot hitting the ground.

Arthur turned to face the room, squinting against the darkness and waiting for his eyes to adjust to the lack of light. The sun was setting, so there was very little light coming through the floorboards of Captain Francis' room, and no light at all from the sides of the ship.

Arthur got to his knees, groping around the floor in hopes of finding a lantern there. Arthur's hand finally bumped something metal, and as luck would have it there was a small little lantern sitting in the corner of the room. Arthur felt around the bottom for the switch, and twisted it as soon as his fingers found the small knob.

Arthur looked around and found the room to be fairly empty. There were some maps pinned to the walls, all scribbled on with circles and X's and dotted lines marking all the important places. On some there were arrows with notes off to the side explaining things about the markings.

Arthur found a desk against one wall, with both a lantern and a candle sitting next to yet another map, this one unmarked. It was yellow and had lots of rips around the edges and a piece missing from inside the top left corner of the map. Arthur knew he should try to get as far away from the Captain's room as he could, but curiosity overwhelmed him and Arthur became something of a puppet, walking closer and closer to the paper in a robotic manner.

When he finally got to the desk, he looked down at the map. It was obvious why this one was on the desk; this one seemed to be an overall view of all the maps around the room. The missing piece was probably a big mystery, because none of the maps around the room revealed what was in that area.

Arthur, what are you doing!? Remember where you are! There's no time to look around at this shit, you have to move! He suddenly thought, and snapped out of his trance.

He looked around the room, swinging the lantern in a circle. Arthur didn't see a door anywhere, but suspected that there could be a secret door or hidden panel nearby, so he went to all of the maps, pressing against the walls and feeling for even the slightest hint of a door handle.

Unfortunately for Arthur, his luck had run out, and there was nothing that Arthur could find, even worse, he thought he heard the sound of footsteps up above him. Arthur quickly turned out the lantern, hurrying to the desk and sitting down next to it, hoping if Francis checked the room the desk would block his view of Arthur.

Sure enough the room flooded with light as the box was lifted from its spot, and a shadow was cast where someone's head peeked down the hole. Someone shouted an order and then the shadow disappeared and the hatch was replaced.

They gave up that easily? Well, he probably doesn't think I was smart enough to find this place. Arthur thought smugly. He crept over to the ladder, hoisting himself up a few rungs and then waiting, listening for any sound that would show that someone was still there.

He heard a door open and close and could assume someone was leaving since after the door closed there weren't any footsteps overhead. He decided to chance it- he'd have to exit the room eventually anyways- so he put his hands against the bottom of the hatch and pushed up slowly, only opening it a crack so he could double check that no-one was in the room.

He looked around, and though he couldn't see the whole room, he saw that there wasn't anyone in the area he could see. He slowly pushed the crate over, and then climbed out of the hole, replacing the top and walking into the room, freezing at the sound of someone talking to him.

"Arthur; as confusing as ever." Francis said, and Arthur turned to see Francis reclining in the chair Arthur had been chained to before.

"You had me fooled, at least. I thought you liked me, do you not?" Francis asked, though he should've known how Arthur would react.

"Of course not, are you mental!? You bloody molested me!" Arthur exclaimed, as if bewildered Francis would even ask. Francis sighed, shaking his head.

"It's not really molesting if the second party enjoys it-" Francis said, and Arthur cut him off before he could say any other disturbing accusations.

"I didn't bloody enjoy it, I..." Arthur was going to say that he was just fooling him, but that would've been more than a little stupid.

"You were just imagining it!" Arthur concluded. Francis looked at him suspiciously, obviously suspecting that Arthur didn't say what he was going to before.

"My mistake." Francis replied, though he sounded like he didn't believe it at all. "Well, did you find anything?" Francis asked suddenly, leaning forward as if excited to hear what Arthur would say. "Did you discover any important documents? Maps of the ship telling you how to escape? I would be interested to know, because I certainly never knew of the location of that room." Francis' heavy sarcasm gave away his falsehood though, and Arthur could tell Francis was at least somewhat offended that Arthur had thought that Francis wouldn't find him in there.

"Ah, but I should applaud you." He said, sitting back in his chair; anger suddenly extinguished. "Not many know about that room, much less find it on their own." He said.

"Francis, enough! Just get to the point. What's your next move? What are you going to-" Arthur began, tired of Francis' games. Unfortunately for Arthur, he didn't realize that he was testing Francis' self-control.

See, one of Francis' main pet peeves- and you could ask any one of his men and they'd agree- was when someone tried to overpower him, or dominate him in any way. And it didn't exactly help that Arthur had failed to say 'captain' when addressing him.

Francis shut his eyes, taking a huge breath and cutting Arthur off. "I would suggest you remember to add the word 'captain' next time you say that, mon ami." Francis said in a deadly calm voice, and then looked at Arthur with a fiery anger in his eyes. "And try to remember who has the sword; it'd do you well." He added.

Arthur rolled his eyes, not realizing what he was doing. "My god, you're avoiding the damn question!" Arthur said angrily, wanting to hurry it up and get whatever Francis was going to do over with.

Francis took a deep breath again, trying his best to keep his cool. "Arthur, you are the only person that tests my patience this often…" Francis muttered, but it was loud enough that Arthur could hear it.

What does he mean 'this often?' This is the first time I've pissed him off- well, I don't know, maybe I somehow pissed him off when I was trying to cook with the stale bread and he just didn't show it…? Arthur thought, thoroughly confused. If I ask him one more time he's likely to slit my throat, but otherwise he'll never-

"Oui, oui, you want to know what I'm going to do because you tried to escape, no?" Francis asked, but barely gave any time for Arthur to say anything before he continued. "I could think of a million things I could do to you that you… you would not easily forget." Francis said, and a smirk crept onto his face as he thought about it. "But lucky for you, I won't do any of those things." Francis said, and paused.

"Uh, th-thanks?" Arthur said, phrasing it as a question in case he had said the wrong thing.

Francis looked at Arthur, analyzing him with his gaze. "… …I'm only going to do this once." Francis said, and Arthur braced himself for the worst. "I will let you off with a warning… but only this once." Francis said, and Arthur wasn't sure whether he was supposed to thank Francis again or if he should just keep his mouth shut. He went for the second option, and moving his gaze to the ground as Francis seemed to stare straight through him.

Arthur heard a sigh and the scrape of a chair backing up as someone stood. Arthur quickly looked up to see Francis walking towards him. His face didn't give anything away, having something of a neutral expression. Arthur automatically backed up, forgetting where he was standing, and backed into the closet, tripping over the crate-slash-entry-to-a-secret-room and falling backwards. Francis laughed, and Arthur scrambled to his feet.

"My ship does not have cages that contain beds… In other words, you have deux options: there is most likely at least one bed available in the crew's quarters, or you could…" Arthur knew what Francis was going to say, he just knew it- but it still somehow managed to somewhat surprise him. "Well, there is always extra room here~." Francis said, and even though he was probably kidding, Arthur's cheeks turned a faint shade of pink.

"I'll sleep with the crew, thank you." Arthur said, and realized how that sounded and quickly amended it as his blush darkened a shade. "I-I mean I'd rather sleep in the crew's quarters!" Francis didn't bother to hide his amusement at Arthur's embarrassment, and it was obvious that Francis' anger could fade as easily as it could appear.

"Are you still hungry?" Francis asked suddenly, and Arthur silently acknowledged that since his stomach had first growled his hunger had been a dull ache that he'd pushed to the back of his mind. "Gavin will show you where the cafeteria is and keep everyone off of you in general." Francis said, and Arthur wondered if Francis meant that in a violent sense or a… different… sense. You just can't tell with people like Francis… He's a very rare type of mental…

There was an ever-so-convenient knock at the door, and Francis turned on his heel; walking to the door and opening it to talk to the person standing outside. Arthur couldn't see the person from where he was standing, but he could guess that it was Gavin. His suspicions were confirmed when he walked closer to the door and heard Gavin's voice speaking in shaky French. "…Je vais faire mes meilleur." He had just said, as Francis looked back into the room. Arthur went rigid- his failed attempt at acting casual- but Francis didn't seem to care that Arthur had been creeping forward to eavesdrop.

Francis turned back to Gavin and replying by saying: "Informer moi si il-" Francis began, and Gavin cut him off. "I'm sure it'll be fine." He said, and Francis looked down at the shorter Brit for a second, a silent conversation whizzing between the two. Francis looked back up- seemingly out of the blue- and then walked away. Gavin poked his head into the room, and looked at Arthur.

"Well? Come on now, don't want him coming back and changing his mind, do you?" Gavin asked, and Arthur shook his head, quickly walking up to Gavin to follow him out of the room. Gavin, however, stopped him just before he could exit the doors and shook his head.

"Oh, god, I don't have to stay in here, do I?" Arthur asked, and Gavin laughed.

"Well, no, but he still doesn't trust you. You have to put the handcuffs back on." Gavin said, and before Arthur could ask, Gavin added, "But this time they'll be in front of you, so you can eat." Even though it made sense that Arthur had to put the cuffs on, he had the childish desire to cross his arms and refuse to put them on. Of course, as Arthur had learned earlier, that wouldn't exactly work, but he couldn't help wishing it would.

Arthur nodded again, walking up to Gavin and thinking about his plan to gain the captain's trust. Suddenly realization dawned on him. Gavin said that he still didn't trust me, and although he didn't say it that meant that it could be that Gavin trusts me? I highly doubt it- in fact I think that was just a grammatical error- but this brings a whole new subject into light… I could gain the crew's trust, and, by extension, his! Oh, perfect, perfect… The only issue being the fact that I have to act compliant… But I'm sure I can manage that for however long I have to… Arthur was able to think this over all in a matter of seconds, and the thoughts swirled around in his head as he walked with Gavin, ecstatic for all of the wonderful plans forming within his head.

A/N: Sorry it took so long for this to come out; (I haven't posted a chapter since last year :O!) I've been trying to make sure it isn't too short or anything- that and there's been lots of family time over the holidays. I already said it, but I'm getting all of my French off of google and I don't know the grammar rules for French so I apologize for any mistakes! Anyways, please enjoy, and Happy New Years!

Translations:

mon ami- my friend

oui- yes

deux- two

Je vais faire mes meilleur- I'll do my best

Informer moi si il…- Tell me if he…