Tamer Gothic – Book 2 – Shadow Lord
Part 36
Pirates of the Shadow Islands - Part 2
Pirate Ship – The Shadow Sea
"Master, the pirate leader" Kira said as she threw the captain of the ship to the ground in of me "The bitch had your sword and gun".
"At least this one didn't steal my coat" I muttered as my Dark Elf passed me my magical weapons.
The last time I'd been taken captive on a pirate ship a captain had taken my coat. That had been very rude.
"No I got that back" said Kira proudly.
I then inspected the commanding officer of this vessel. She was a She-Captain, a water type pokegirl, and she wearing tight fitting pants, a ruffled shirt, and a jacket that covered with bits of finery. She would have fitted in rather well in one of the Pirates of the Caribbean movies.
"I've taken then ship, Captain" I said the pokegirl "Tell the rest of your crew to stand down and I promise none of you will be harmed as long you behave".
The poke didn't accept my proposition.
"No you will all lay down your arms or we'll the kill other prisoners" she replied.
So far things were not going well.
"We've got men, women, pokegirl, pokekits and children on board" she informed me "I know you hero types you won't risk kiddies getting hurt".
She was right about the very last part as while I was no hero I wouldn't risk harming children, but I also doubted they existed and given that Thomas had his mind reading pokegirl with him in a few moments I'd know if they did or not.
I then turned to Thomas who shook his head at me, which let me know that the She-Captain was bluffing. The crew that was left had no children to hold hostage.
"You are to surrender unconditionally or we will kill everyone of you" I then said.
To be more precise Illyria would be the one to do the slaying and then she would fudge a lot of memories so that the people on my side would think that they had done the work with me leading them into some sort of epic battle.
"That's an empty threat" replied the pirate "My crew will fight to the last and then you'll be forced to kill the hostages to get at them".
She had a point there.
"You'd kill us for daring to stand up to you" I reasoned "And my buddy here has already called the League Defence Force, so you don't have a lot of time to make your mind Captain".
That made her nervous.
"Surrender now and I promise to tell the League that you didn't treat us too badly" I offered "They might go easier on your crew then".
Still the pirate wasn't folding which meant I needed more time in order to work my charms on her. I knew that sooner or later I'd get some control over her it was just a matter of doing that before things got out of hand.
"They'll kill me if they can" the She-Captain then said "So tell you what. You surrender and I won't kill all of you if we can somehow get away from the League".
That was when an idea hit me. This was a near-human type who could use magic. She had gills but her light brown hair hid them mostly so I wasn't bothered, and she had one big rack so I wouldn't mind Taming her.
"You're a Water/Magic type and I'm a Tamer of Magic types" I told the poke "So if you tell your crew to surrender then I'll take you as my poke and Level 5 you. That way you get to start over with a clean slate and you'll never even remember being a pirate. I don't mistreat my 'girls so it's a good offer".
I could tell now that I was getting somewhere with her, and it was a good offer as a Level 5 cycle was a memory wipe. After it was done the She-Captain wouldn't even remember her own name, but she'd keep most of her powers and she would still know how to sail a ship as those things were hard-wired into her. Also her past would be wiped clean, she'd have no criminal record so she could start over.
In the past I had considered a level five Taming cycle to be the same as killing someone as it wiped away a pokes personality, but right now I was saw it in a better way. It could be more like some form of reincarnation only without anyone actually dying. This She-Captain would become a different being, but her soul, assuming such a thing existed, wouldn't be touched so it was better than simply killing her which might send her soul to hell or whatever.
"What of me crew?" inquired the captain "You'll just turn then over to a league and those gits I'll kill em all".
I hoped then that the other Tamers with me had some spare pokeballs.
"Okay how about this" I said "Anyone who lays down their arms and surrenders to a Tamer goes into a pokeball, and then later gets a Level Five Taming Cycle. Anyone who resists will be killed on the spot".
The She-Captain was tempted. I could see it on her face. This ship even had the equipment needed for the extreme Taming Cycle. I assumed it was used on pokegirl prisoners so they could be indoctrinated by the pirates.
"How do I know your not lying?" the She-Captain then asked me.
It was easy to explain why I wasn't lying.
"If we don't Level 5 you then the league would confiscate the lot of you" I pointed out "So not only would violating my agreement with you lose me a powerful pokegirl I could also get into trouble with the League".
It was even possible that we could lose our licences which was a big deal for us Tamers and the She-Captain had to know that.
"Well I don't want to die" the pirate pokegirl admitted "So I'll speak with the others".
I nodded and told my Dark Elf to let her go. I hadn't even noticed that Kira had been keeping a dagger within stabbing range the whole time, but thinking on it I figured that she had acting smartly by doing that.
"You're going to keep her?" my sort of Stepdaughter then asked me
I was a man of my word when possible. I would lie if I needed to, but in the case keeping my word was not only easily done but a wise course of action as it would end the fighting and bring a powerful pokegirl into my harem.
My luck hadn't abandoned me after all.
(Line Break)
Pirate Ship – The Shadow Sea
The Captains cabin was at odds with the rest of the ship. Even the cells on board were more or less clean, or at least most of them had been, but this room didn't have a spot of grime in it. Also it looked like what someone with a very romantic view of pirates would expect a captain's cabin to look like.
It had a big feather bed, a table covered in maps, there were paintings on the walls and even some bits of treasure around. None of it was suitable for a man, but I was sure that the females on board would fancy it and the League wouldn't care if we kept some of it as they were going to get the whole ship.
According the law I could actually claim the ship, as the captain had surrendered the vessel to me, but as a Tamer there was a limit to how many pokesgirls I could have so I could never get a crew together and even I could have the idea of a life at sea didn't really appeal to me. There were too many pirates about.
Illyria was here too, she sitting at a table looking at some of the maps, which we would also hand over to the League as they would be good for pirate hunting, and if Kira hadn't just entered the cabin I would have taken a peek too.
"How's it going?" I asked of my alpha.
Given that Raven was off duty at May's and that Kara was happy as Beta, as it got her lots of attention from me without too much responsibility, I had decided to make another of my pokes alpha at least for the next few days. Kira had done so much for me recently that she was the logical choice.
"Better than expected, Master" she told me "Only two pokes didn't surrender and they were Sanctuary Goths, the other pirates killed them when they Goths tried to make them fight".
The Sanctury pokegirls and the Limbec pirates were allies but clearly they didn't get on as well as I had imagined.
"A surprising number of the girls we captured weren't that hardcore" Kira then said "I heard that all the Limbecs cut off the cocks of ever guy they got thier hands on and killed any poke who didn't join them, but the crew of this ship weren't that fanatical".
That didn't surprise me much as some might expect as I had always somewhat suspected that the stories about that group had been exaggerated to discourage pokes from wanting to join the pirates. Besides the Limbecs of today weren't the original group really, the pirate organization had been mostly destroyed and then reformed so it made sense that this group might not yet be as bad as the rumours said that they were.
"Hunter Thomas is down below making sure that all the pirates are getting level five Taming cycles" the elf then said.
It was good to know that Tom supported my plan. He was a more of a Hunter than I would wish to be and I had worried that he might want to kill all the pirates as they were real threats to humanity, or at least would be until they were memory wiped. But he had supported my plan and I was grateful for that.
"I'm just glad they surrendered" I said.
Kira then went to the door and opened it before telling someone to come in. The person was a pokegirl who was short and curvy, with a noticable but not huge bust and she had small hips. She wore a tight blue trousers that showed me her figure and she had on a ruffled blouse of sorts on her upper torso that was tight enough to let me see some cleavage. Also she had a belt on that must have held a sword until recently. Her brown eyes matched her short brown hair, and she had Tomboyish aura about her but she also a bit more feminine than that an actual Tomboy pokegirl.
"Who are you?" I asked.
"I'm Trish, Captain" the poke told me "I'm the captain's Cabintoy. Which means I live only to serve you now".
For a moment I had thought she'd said Cabin Boy but it had been Cabintoy.
"I found her hiding in the pantry" Kira explained "She insisted that she's not a pirate and she wasn't armed when I found her so I didn't think you'd want her memory wiped just yet".
The pokegirl then spoke for herself.
"I'm not a fighter" she said "I'm just a servant".
Kira had been right to bring this pokegirl here as I would have been a little miffed if I had lost the chance to question the poke.
"What are you?" I then asked.
She wasn't offended by the question as she could tell I was really confused.
"I use to be a Bimbo but I evolved into what the pirates call a Cabintoy when I got my hands on a water stone" Trish told me "I'm not the only one, there's a few of us now but we haven't been around for that long".
Using my 'dex I checked the entry and found that there was no recorded evolution for Bimbo that had evolved by a Water Stone. There were ones for Leaf and Psi stone so it seem unlikely that no one had ever tried a Water Stone, but that didn't mean much as it might just not have been recorded before or it might require more than just the stone. If she had evolved while out to sea that might explain why no scientist had ever been able to create one.
"A psychic type can confirm your story and if you're telling the truth then I'll take you a professor I know" I then said to Trish
That was when I scanned Trish and the 'dex confirmed that she was indeed a pokegirl and that she was an unknown type, which meant that once her story was confirmed then I would be credited with officially discovering her. That could turn out to be a big feather in my cap.
"Would the master like some food? I can cook something in the galley if the master would like" Trish offered with an eager smile.
My stomach thought that this was a good idea.
"I would like something to eat" I admitted "So once you've been checked out you can fix us all something so that we can celebrate our victory over the pirates. Get some of the other pokes to help you".
Then I nodded to Kira so that she would know to keep an eye on the self proclaimed Cabintoy until Thomas's mind reading pokegirl had viewed the pokes memories.
"That's a wonderful idea master" said Trish "I'll get on it right away"
With that she turned and she even softly closed door of the captain's cabin, but not until Kira had also left the room.
"I feel so sorry for that poor girl" said Amy "You are going to keep her, right?"
At some point Illyria had put on her human persona, and was now my sweet girlfriend again. Which was good timing as Jayden was my next visitor and he was not someone who should about Illyria.
"Hey what are what are we gonna do about the other pirate ship?" he asked.
"Other ship?" wondered Amy.
Jayden fully entered the room and then closed the door behind him.
"They just called us on the radio" he explained "I think the captain of this ship was suppose to check in just before dawn because the poke in charge of that big tanker is calling and wondering what the heck is going on over here".
This was just too much stress I so needed a vacation. Hopefully I'd get one soon.
"And let me guess the League isn't going to get here before more pirates do" I said.
It wasn't a question, but Jayden nodded anyway.
"I talked to some admiral guy" the runner up to my title then said "And he told me that it's gonna be like four hours before they get here but I don't think the pirates are gonna wait that long for an answer",
Right now I was chiding myself for not thinking that something like this would happen. I should have asked the last captain if they had been suppose to make contant with the other ship in the near future. I doubted that she failed to tell me this as she had wanted to surrender, it was more likely that it had just slipped the She-Captain's mind and now she wouldn't remember it at all.
"Do you think they will board?" Jayden inquired of me "Because if they do I have a wicked plan to mess them up".
I nearly dismissed his plan out of hand, but I stopped myself when I realised that I didn't have any sort of plan and that I had no time to come up with one as the other pirate ship could be on it's way here right now. Plus I knew the Nikita's brother couldn't be as dumb as I thought him to be as otherwise he could never be a threat to the world in the future.
"What's your plan?" I asked.
Hopefully it was a really good one.
(Line Break)
Pirate Ship – The Shadow Sea
As it turned out it was a good plan. Jayden had figured that since the pirates on the ship heading towards us didn't know what was going on then they would board our vessel in order to find out what was happening instead of just sinking us.
Which made sense as the the Limbec pirates wouldn't be the powerful group they were if they blew up ships rather than seize them.
He suggested hiding so that no flying types would see that we were lying it wait ready to ambush the boarding party.
No one could teleport on board as if they could then the Sanctuary Goths would have used that power to escape when the crew turned on them, so all we had to was keep out of sight. Then we the signal was given we would unleash everything we had on the boarding party.
When I gave the signal the attack shattered parts of the deck as elemental power, magic spells, and bullets massacred the boarding party. All the pirates were killed in seconds as what they must have thought of as a ghost ship turned out to be a death trap.
Thankfully the gangplanks the pirates had used to charge aboard our vessel weren't destroyed as they were needed for the second part of Jayden's rather clever scheme.
We then counter attacked and the poke of every Tamer on board, which was a lot, boarded the enemy vessel and began to kick ass.
Thomas hadn't been able to mind wipe more than a handful of the pirates we'd captured, but the ones that were now on our side were willing to fight their former comrades because none of them knew they'd been bad guys.
The oil tanker was full of plunder and there were no captives on board so we overran it quickly as we had lots of pissed off pokegirls on our team who greatly resented being locked up and having their Tamers so badly treated.
"Can I have this ship?" Jayden asked me as Kira brought me another She-Captain to negotiate with "It was my plan so I should get it".
Given that the League's navy would be here in a couple of hours there was no reason not to. Plus the chances of their being more pirates in the area were slim.
"I guess so" I said to the guy in red coat "Just don't sink it".
If he did I would laugh, but I'd have to save him again for his sister's sake.
"Cool!" exclaimed the skilled Tamer "I'm gonna find some paint and rename this thing The SS Suck it Bitches!".
Mine was going to be the Enterprise because unlike him I had some taste.