And I'm back on my weekly update schedule! Yay!
To make up for the lateness (and shortness) of chapter 20, I've made this one LONG!
Chapter 21: To Alternate
Luckily for the privateer Sydney Underhill and her crew, the escape from the clockwork-infested streets of Marleybone had gone quite successfully without any unplanned conflicts.
They had followed their privateer doubtlessly, effortlessly, as if it had been programmed into their very blood, and she had led them true, she had proven herself once again, and they knew it, they knew it, that they were worrying for no reason, no reason at all.
The longboat had been hidden underneath the perfectly-placed wooden planks of the Port Regal docks, exactly where Sydney had planned to leave it. It would be out of sight, she had reasoned, as no one would think to look there.
Jewel's flexibility had come in quite handy here when they had first arrived at Marleybone, as the only way for this to work was for all three of them to first climb out of the longboat before Jewel laid flat on her back, her torso hanging out from the docks as Sydney held down her feet to keep the swashbuckler from slipping off. Jewel would then reach out and gently nudge the empty longboat underneath the docks, tying a rope from one of the posts to the boat to ensure that it would not float away while they had gone.
The same process was performed to retrieve the longboat, and without any further struggle, they had began to silently row away, with the grey-eyed privateer directing them to the shadowed location in the shallow crevices along the side of the land of Marleybone, the location in which she had instructed Quintus to hide the ship.
That had been the hardest part of the entire voyage for Samantha, trusting the clockwork.
Although she had not mentioned any of this to her captain while they were hiding out in that horrid, damp alleyway, she had been able to think of a million ways that the plan could have gone wrong, all of which related back to the clockwork musketeer.
His arms are too thin, too flimsy, not built to handle the stubborn wheel of a massive sky-worn galleon.
He'll get discovered, of course, discovered by the countless Armada frigates that lurked in the skyways, and upon seeing another clockwork on board a ship bearing the flag of a pirate, they would not hesitate to destroy him, along with the ship.
And then the worst, the worst out of them all.
Whatever happened to him will wear off, right there and then, even if it is highly illogical to be timed in such a way, and he will remember his true allegiance, and the entire plan will unravel, it'll collapse to the ground and shatter like glass.
However, fate had decided to direct them down the path of success, and everything had gone, much to their relief, exactly according to her plan in terms of entering and exiting undetected.
Both Samantha and Jewel knew that Sydney had been forced to run for her life before she could find her friend, but although they felt somewhat guilty of not being able to provide her with support adequate enough to let her seek him out, they were glad that she had made the decision to leave before their situation got any worse.
No one got hurt, everyone made it back safely, and everything had gone according to plan.
What more could they possibly ask for?
The buccaneer and the swashbuckler had agreed with each other that their chance encounter with the strangely-marked clockwork marksman would not be mentioned to their Captain, for, they figured, what she doesn't know won't hurt her.
They were keeping secrets from her, like they had sworn not to, but the end justified the means.
DIdn't it?
And now, back once again on the black, looming galleon, they were finally returning to Skull Island, the pirate haven of the resistance, the sanctuary. It seemed appealing to all of them, especially considering the fact that they had spent the last few days hiding in a dank alley in the streets of Marleybone, and although they did not exchange any direct words on the matter, all of them wondered why they had waited so long to return.
Even Sydney, who hated being one of many, who hated being amongst a massive population of others, no matter what their affiliation was, could not wait to return. After all, she finally decided, she did not have to interact if she did not want to, but there were many tasks that she had been waiting to complete, and this would be the perfect opportunity to finally scratch them off of her metaphorical list.
Nothing pleased Sydney like progress, for she found that it was a most satisfying and fulfilling feeling, and this was rare, as there were few things that actually pleased the impatient privateer.
Progress, yes, progress, perfection, organization, speed, efficiency, success…
…and power.
Power.
Oh, how she loved it.
The privateer lived off of power and influence. She drank it in, every opportunity, every moment, no matter what the form. It sustained her heart, her breath, her being.
Sydney knew she didn't have constant supreme control over a large mass of land or soldiers, but she had her little bits and pieces of power that held her up by her fingernails, even if only by.
Her crew, they followed her unconditionally, wherever she went, whatever she decided, they would follow through, they would tie off her loose ends.
Samantha, her own personal strongman, and Jewel, who acted as the stealth factor that she herself did not possess. They covered her weaknesses, her flaws, they filled in all the gaps that she left behind.
And the privateer was grateful for that.
She wrenched the wheel of the ship harshly to the right, bracing her feet against the deck as the ship curved slowly into the windlane just to the side of them, the wind now blasting a single side of her neck. Her arms ached from constantly grappling with the wheel for control over her own ship, so, naturally, she was relieved when the currents of the windlane began to pull The Grand Fife forwards, allowing her to finally drop her arms to her sides, slightly infuriated by the fact that she had not been able to endure as much as she would have preferred.
Her arms were only slightly muscular, and compared to her legs, they would give out much, much faster under stress, despite the fact that she fought with a heavy, double-bladed poleaxe that was bigger than her in height.
Stepping away from the wheel, Sydney half-walked, half-stumbled down the steep staircase to the main deck whilst wiping the sheen of sweat from her brow. Although the wind had somewhat helped to cool her off during her hours-long game of tug-of-war with the wheel of the ship, it did nothing to dispel the fact that steering was hard work, especially with such a massive and stubborn ship.
It's likely, she thought as she loosened the collar of the white shirt underneath her coat, that I have a million barnacles on my rudder. I suppose that's what I get for being so inattentive.
On deck, Samantha was leaning out over the railing, her long, black hair being blown every which way as she too was blasted by the wind, and the buccaneer had closed her eyes, enjoying herself (calmly, for once) in the breeze.
Jewel was where she usually was, which was up on the main mast, tirelessly practicing her acrobatics, her dual daggers clenched tightly in her petite hands.
"I'm glad we're going back."
"Huh?" Sydney sharply turned her head, having slightly jumped at the sudden sound of the buccaneer's unfittingly high-pitched voice. One would think that a girl of Samantha's mindset and build would have a low, harsh voice such as her own, but instead, the buccaneer had the voice of a well-raised, refined young lady.
"I said I'm glad. I'm glad we're finally getting a chance to…relax, I guess. You know, we aren't chasing after or fighting anything…even though that's fun too."
Sydney shook her head internally. To Sam, she knew, everything was a matter of fun or not fun.
"I suppose so."
"Come on, Syd. Even you can't be rigid all the time."
The privateer sighed, half in frustration, as she took this as a weakness of hers, and half in mock-defeat, for the buccaneer was right.
She was still human.
She was still hu-
"Hey, I've got an idea!"
Sydney looked at Samantha, a single eyebrow raised in question.
"Let's go up. With Jewel." The buccaneer pointed straight up at the main mast, where Jewel was visible balancing like a tightrope walker. "All the way up there!"
"Are you serious? Sam, come on. I don't do heights."
"Well, you do now!"
And before she knew it, the privateer was thirty feet in the air, about halfway up the main mast, with the overly hyperactive buccaneer close on her heels.
"Remember, Syd, don't look down!"
She resisted the urge to kick Samantha on the head and continued climbing, rolling her eyes. Climbing for heights always seemed extremely overrated to her. One put in a copious amount of time and effort, but for what exactly?
Well, no stopping now.
There was still a long way to go for her, and as of the current moment, it seemed like a worse and worse idea by the second, but Samantha would force her up if she did anything other than climb, she knew.
So she climbed. One foot higher than the other, don't think about how long it will take to get down, just get up first. Maybe Samantha was right, she thought, she did need to stop worrying so much. It was impossible to enjoy almost anything with her current mindset.
But enjoying is a weakn-
She was at the top now, her feet planted on the long, horizontal beam that held the main royal sail as she clung onto the mast with both hands, trying to take control of her terrible balance as the swashbuckler skirted along the beam beside her seemingly effortlessly, her other hand planted on top of her head from keeping her tricorn hat from getting blown off of her head.
The wind did feel wonderful here, yes it did, and just for a fraction of the most minute, insignificant little second, she let herself enjoy it, because she felt so big up here, and she was on the top of the world.
She was at the top of the world.
I'm at the top of the world.
I'M AT THE TOP OF THE WORLD!
Look at ME! Right HERE! I'm HERE!
Sydney dropped her strong-built walls of paranoia and let herself grin.
It was all confusing, so much more complex than it should be, Quintus concluded from his position inches away from the door of his Commander's cabin, matters as primitive to humans as this.
A smile, the angle of the smile, the timing, the tensing of each and every one of her muscles, in her face, in her body.
His Commander was strange, unlike any other human being he had ever analyzed before. She saw past fear, she saw past primitive, and she only saw potential, for potential was her prime.
However, here was where he did not understand, for humans were primitive creatures, and that was a fact. They had vulnerabilities, too many to allow them to soar to their true potential, they had requirements to be met for their own survival that weighted them down and cancelled out any of the advantages that they had been given. This was something that they could not avoid; these were anchors that they had been born with.
She'd seen those anchors, even though they were hidden below her ship, her vessel, her physical being, and she had began to saw away at some of them, even though they were bound by chains. Quintus did not know whether she would succeed or fail, but he did know that it was unusual for a human being to do so, period.
She'd cut off all external access to her internal attachments, her internal instincts, and it was as if someone had flipped a switch inside his Commander's brain.
He observed her, and he could tell her thoughts were not clouded, as far as he could tell.
Her actions were without hesitating, without evidence of mental repetition, her smile was genuine, as far as he could tell.
But that was what he was uncertain about, it was only as far as he could tell, and as far as he could tell, there was a certain component present in his Commander that he just could not tell much about, not with his understanding.
It didn't make any sense to him whatsoever, for late at night, when the light had receded below the horizon, she would come into her cabin with every bit of intent surging through her veins, she would swoop down on the Armada officer like a bird of prey, but instead of devouring her prey whole, she would hold his trembling, bound form close to her hot-blooded heart as the adrenaline diffused throughout her entire body, agonizingly trapped, all whilst musing – perhaps for his ears, perhaps for hers – about her wild, uncontrollable lust, and Quintus would forget anything he had ever seen, because that was his Commander.
But in the present time – he looked out the window then – this was his Commander as well.
She was fifty-fifty, to no decimal places, no advantage one way or the other, no matter how many different factors one could imagine on one side, her opposite side seemed to have the inverse.
Fifty, the number of absolute symmetry.
And in this case, in his case, fifty, the number of finality.
The Armada musketeer looked over at Caerulus then, who, as if he had spoken his calculations out loud, suddenly began to shrink back, pressing his body desperately into the walls of the cabin, even though they would not give way to his thin figure no matter what. It was hopeless actions, pointless actions such as these that marked the officer's inevitable crumbling.
He wondered what his Commander thought of this, for surely she knew that she was the cause.
Then again, fifty-fifty, most likely.
No way sideways, no way up, there was no way around it, end of story.
And he was stuck, which was something that he'd never been before. Stuck at this perfect balance, this perfect alternating sequence, with no way of forward progress.
Unnerving, that's what the humans called it, of course. He'd heard his Commander use that word before.
Fifty was an unnerving number, he decided.
Review! I'd love to know what you think of this! It really helps me to improve!
Also, it motivates me :) I love knowing that you all are reading/enjoying my story!
See you next chapter!
- Severina