Chapter 3: Wasted Flowers

As the Ben bow Inn came into his view, Jim could see the windows were shattered and the door had been kicked down. Panic struck him as he instantly thought of Alice and his mother and he sprinted to his home. When he entered, he caught sight of the golden robot hiding in the corner of the room. "B.E.N.," he said as he picked the robot off the ground from his shoulders. "What happened?!"

"Jimmy! Jim! Oh my goodness it was terrible! There were pirates that came looking for you, they didn't say why, and Alice and I tried to fight them off but it didn't work. There were too many of them."

Jim set the robot down. "Where's Alice?" He asked scanning the room for his wife, who was no where in sight.

The robot replied frantically, "They took her Jimmy! She was about to be killed when she yelled parlay and they took her. I guess they didn't feel like sticking around because they left shortly after they boarded the ship."

Anger and fear rushed through Jim as he imagined Alice being in the care of bloodthirsty pirates. He set the flowers down, ran upstairs to their room and grabbed his pistol and sword from under his bed. He raced back down to where he left the robot. "B.E.N. I need you to tell me what direction they went and how long ago they left."

"Jimmy I can't let you go! It's a trap!" the robot begged.

"Well I'm walking right into it! Don't argue with me B.E.N.!" he yelled. The robot stopped talking and started calculating on the back of his giant compass.

"They headed North about ten minutes ago," the robot finally said.

Jim didn't hesitate. He ran outside, grabbed his solar surfer, and took off full speed in the direction of the ship where his wife was being held captive.

As Jim's feet slammed onto the deck of the ship, he turned and saw what seemed to be the whole crew ready to pounce on him like giant cats hunting a mouse. Jim braced himself as they charged at him. The brawl lasted a good ten minutes until the captain walked on deck. "What the devil are you brutes up to now?" he asked angrily as he marched over to where the fight was.

The eight eyed alien stepped forward. "We have a visitor Mr. Barbossa Sir," he said as he saluted the captain.

The crew pushed Jim down in the kneeling position in front of the captain. "What's your name, Mr. Visitor?" Barbossa teased. Jim looked up at the captain in disgust and spit in his face. Barbossa jumped back and wiped the spit off with his sleeve. "I see. Maybe a night in the brig will remind you. Seems we'll have two prisoners tonight lads!" Barbossa chuckled and walked back to his quarters.

Two familiar aliens took hold of Jim's arms from behind him and led him down to the brig. Jim couldn't see very well, due to his now swollen eye and lack of light. He was thrown into a cell, and yelped in pain when landing on his now dislocated shoulder. When the aliens left him alone, he looked himself over the best he could with his good eye. Not too much damage (that he could see anyway). Aside from the black eye and dislocated shoulder, he only had a huge headache. He shifted and scooted himself toward the wall of the cell and leaned his back against it.

"Jim?" said the voice-that-Jim-really-wanted-to-hear. "Jim is that you?"

"Alice!" he cried as his heart raced. "Alice, where are you?" he asked since he could barely see his hand that he was holding not a foot away from his face.

"I'm over here, love," she said to his left. He turned and saw her silhouette behind the bars dividing their cells. Relieve poured through his whole body as he saw that she wasn't hurt. He crawled over to her, trying not to let her see how badly he was hurt. "Oh my gosh, Jim! What happened to you?" she cried as she reached her hand through the bars and stroked his face.

He reached up slowly and touched her hand with his. "The crew doesn't like me too much," he replied with a light chuckle.

Alice grabbed his face and turned it toward her so that she could see the damage. His left eye was swollen and bruised. He had scratches and cuts all over his face and neck. He was holding onto his right shoulder which looked out of place and he didn't look like he could breathe easily. She put her hand to his ribs and applied slight pressure to see if his ribs were broken. He only winced after a couple times of her doing this. "Aside from your obvious injuries, you might have a few bruised ribs, love," she told him as she released his face and let his relax against the bars of the cell. "I'm so sorry, Jim."

Jim looked up at this statement. "What are you sorry for?" he demanded.

Alice looked down, ashamed of herself. "Those pirates came looking for you and I didn't know what to do so I claimed parlay which put us in this situation. Not only are we locked up with no way out of this alive, look at you! You're all broken and bruised and it's all my fault."

Jim reached up with his good arm and tenderly stroked her cheek. "It's not your fault, Alice. They would've found me and taken me away anyway. Pirates don't give up easily. And if you hadn't said parlay, I would have found you dead at the inn. I don't care that I'm bruised and hurt. You're alive and with me. That's all I care about." He gently wiped a tear that had escaped and trailed down her cheek with his thumb. "These wounds can heal. Before you know it, I'll be back to normal. If you were dead, I don't think I could ever recover from that. You did the right thing Alice. At least for me. So I want you to know that I'm grateful that you didn't make the wrong decision and take my one true love away from me forever. I just had to go find her again."

Alice laughed as she remembered their earlier adventures that happened a couple years earlier. "I love you, Jim," she whispered as she kissed him through the bars.

"I know, Alice," he replied as he kissed her back.