Beauty of the sea
bonus ending.
The years rolled forward and Kyoraku finally left the sea. He retired to his home by the bay and lived with Shiro as long as the mer-creature wanted to abide with him.
In the mess hall of the ship a few years prior: Kyoraku and Starrk were having a conversation on this topic.
"I don't quite know what to do." Shunsui stated. "The sea doesn't call to me anymore."
"That's because your heart and soul aren't here anymore." Starrk gave an honest answer. "You're homesick for your farm."
"... plantation." Kyoraku interrupted.
"Plantation then, You need to be there, not here."
"I'm tired, and you're right; I need to be home." He let out a gusty sigh and tilted his chair back from the table.
"The ship will be fine and you can dip your toes in the water occasionally so to say."
"Actually," Starrk paused a moment. "There's something I've been wanting to run by you for a while now."
Kyoraku quirked an eyebrow at his second in command. "What is it?"
"Well, there's not much profit in pirating anymore. There's too much competition." He continued, "I think we should retire the black and fly your island's colors."
The chair fell back to the deck with a thump, Shunsui scratched at his chin in thought. "I think... that's a splendid idea."
"Good!" Starrk scratched his nose, " With the slight alteration that we signify that we were once pirates and should not be messed with." It all came out at once. "On a corner of the flag we put the skull and bones like other privateers have done."
Kyoraku leaned his elbows on the table in thought. "That's a sound idea."
"We've made better profit from hauling your cargo than we have raiding." he wove his fingers together and also leaned his elbows on the table with his chin resting on his hands, "We'd be in a sounder place in life."
"You have a lot to say about this, I don't think I've ever heard you this talkative in all the years that I've known you."
"It's an exciting project that I've had in my head for months now."
Kyoraku chuckled. "Seems like you have the rest of my whole life planned out for me."
Starrk grinned at him. "It's not easy to plot your boss's retirement."
Shunsui lightly thumped the other man on the shoulder with a loosely balled up fist. "I suppose there's no time like the present to tell the crew."
"I suppose so." was the short reply.
The captain hammered on the table with his mug. "Attention please." He waited for them to settle down and listen. "I have some news for you that you might find shocking." The crew exchanged confused glances.
"My friends, I'm telling you now; this is my last journey with you as captain of this ship."
There were shocked gasps and murmurers through out the cabin.
"From the very first time I stepped on a ship as a child; I knew the sea was in my blood." He smiled softly. "But now it's different, a different place calls to me and that is my home on the island."
"Mr Starrk will be in charge of the ship and I expect you to respect and listen to him as you do to me." he got distracted by Starrk drumming his fingers on the table. "We will be making another change; we will no longer be raiders, but traders. The black will retire and we'll fly different colors."
There were more shocked murmurers from the group. "May you have good wind and smooth sailing." Shunsui saluted them with his mug raised. "Don't worry friends you're in good hands, and I'll be around."
He could sense some anger and resentment from his crew but once things settled down they'd get used to it. They were a good crew after all.
During the rest of the evening he could sense some of the resentment fading.
"Sir?" a crew member addressed him. "You will always be our captain. We will listen to and obey Mr Starrk, but to us you will be the one in charge, after all it's still your ship."
"Careful there mister, I will have nothing to do with the day to day running of the ship. Hear me clearly... Mr Starrk is in charge of all things." He rubbed his chin. "I appreciate the sentiment but please just treat Mr Starrk the same as you would me."
"Yes sir!"
Days later it was time for his departure. He was seen wandering over the ship, lovingly touching everything in a goodbye tribute. At the great steering wheel he held on and turned it slightly. "Goodbye my lady. You've been good to me all these years." he twitched the wheel once more. "Be good to the new master, he's a good man and will treat you right."
"... he better." Kyoraku added as an after thought.
Home was calling to him but he had things to do at the dock first. They all disembarked and wandered to The Mist. Inside was a bustling crowd, they could just barely squeeze everyone inside.
Shunsui banged on the table for attention. "You have been the best crew to sail with for many years. It's been a pleasure to be your captain." He raised his mug, "May the wind forever be at your back and the sea's smooth to sail."
Soon he and Starrk were huddled together as Shunsui gave him last instructions on the care of the ship. "Oh and in the next few days have one of the shipbuilders do those last minute repairs inside, and you can arrange your new cabin how ever you wish, just don't change too much about her."
"I won't." Starrk was back to being quiet; his usual self. "Ya know... I'm a bit intimidated to take the wheel."
"You'll do fine. You've seen me do it and you've already flown the bridge before." There was another fist to the shoulder. "Just remember you're in charge, make her listen to you."
The crew partied all night, when finally Kyoraku stood up and announced. "Home is calling me and I'm going to heed that call. Sail well and I'll see you when you pick up cargo from my plantation."
The crew said their farewells and he left to hire a wagon to get home. He was far too drunk and tired to walk the distance.
He finally made it home and wobbled his way to his room. He landed on his bed with a bounce, "Ooof, don't have my land legs yet." he chuckled to himself.
Without even taking off his clothes he fell asleep where he landed and slept the rest of the night.
In the morning he striped out of the clothes and bathed, then changed into fresh clothing. He spent the better part of the day inspecting the plantation. It was thankfully all in one piece.
One year when he went to visit his home; he found wreckage that a hurricane had left behind. Luckily the house was mostly intact but the little rickety dock was lost to the waves.
He rebuilt the house and expanded the small farm into a large plantation. And he built another dock just above high tide level. When he visited the next time the place was operating at a surprisingly good pace.
He grew figs, mango, bananas and sugar cane. Only free men worked for him and he paid them a good wage and living quarters. The plantation manager was doing a good job keeping up with everything.
That evening he was soaking in his the small salt water pool that was just off his bedroom and next to the water. It had an open window so he could see out into the cove and the slipway where Shiro would enter through. He wasn't really paying attention until a small noise caught his attention.
Shiro entered the pool.
"Hello my dearest one." Shiro still blushed at the greeting. It was quite endearing to see. "Sorry I've been away for so long."
Gentle fingers caressed his face. "Missed you too." He had gotten better with speaking human language. He was still better at singing than talking though.
Shunsui pulled him close and kissed his forehead. "It's so good to see you here, I'm actually quite weary of the sea life AMD intend to stay here...with you, if you'll have me." Shiro nodded vigorously.
"I'm having some fried fish and fresh fruit brought to my room soon, I hope you'll join me!" The mer-creature's eyes grew wide with anticipation, but still ducked away when the food was delivered. He was still quite shy around most people.
They ate mostly in silence,broken by a few giggles from Shiro when Kyoraku fed him a morsel of food occasionally.
Later they made love as best as they could, and Shiro swam home after a long cuddle session.
The next day was stormy in the cove. The island was covered with dark low hanging clouds. All boats remained at anchor, for no one wanted to travel that day. The plantation was busy gathering the mango before the storm hit. No one wanted to be up on the ladders when the wind started to blow.
When the wind got too dangerous, all went to their homes and hunkered down to wait for it to pass. Their innate weather sense told them this was going to be a bad storm.
Hopefully there wouldn't be much damage as there had in the past.
The plantation manager and the captain went from house to house to make sure all were safe and sound. By the time they finished with that the wind was blowing hard enough to make it difficult to walk. They latched arms and walked cautiously, side by side. Finally they both made it to their own dwellings to wait out the storm.
Kyoraku knew well enough that the storm would keep Shiro away for the duration. That was fine with him; he didn't want anything to happen to his precious.
The wind blew wildly most of the day and the rain fell in sheets. You couldn't see more than a few feet from the window. It was less than a hurricane but was a grand tropical storm. They endured many such storms.
The house remained solid although the roof did creak ominously a few times.
The following day was spent on clean-up. Some of the buildings did suffer damage, and the fruit that didn't make the harvest were laying on the ground. Half of the workers set about repairing the damaged buildings and the other half spent the time picking up and storing the fallen fruit.
They were lucky this time, there wasn't a lot of damage to property or produce. They could still make a tidy profit and no one was displaced by the damage.
Several more smaller storms shook the island, and repairs had to be redone and more fruit picked up from the ground. It seemed to be a stormy season this year. They had, had worse in previous years but this was not an easy season. More storms rocked the shores in the following months and it hindered the harvests and the shipments were not able to be sent out in a timely matter. This was going to be a slightly hard year profit wise.
The captain wasn't too worried He and his plantation always had his treasures to fall back on for financial support. His people never suffered from the loss of sales.
As much as his crew loved him, his people on the plantation loved him more. He was a good and kind man according to them. None knew of his dark side. He did have to bring that side into play once in a while when a difficult sale happened or worse, someone wanted to buy his plantation from him. There was no way he would let that happen.
He didn't see much of Shiro that season due to the rough waters of the cove. Once the water settled, the mer-man was there, bright eyed wiggling with joy.
"Hold still! I can't kiss you when you wiggle so much." He clasped the handsome face in his hands and pulled him close. "You always taste like the sea." Shiro rolled his eyes as if to say, [of course, what do you expect?]
"Missed you." Shiro chimed. "Bad water."
"Yes it was bad water!" Shunsui stroked the silvery hair. "I'm glad it's over for now.
"I missed you too." Shiro pulled the hand down to his mouth and nipped the palm gently,
"Busy?"
"Yeah we were busy. Between repairs on buildings and picking up fallen and damaged fruit with each storm it got kind of tedious after awhile." he patted Shiro's cheek. "I'm glad the season is over for the year." Shiro nodded his head.
Shunsui noticed that his speech pattern had shifted from pirate language to the more gentile court speech. It bothered him a little. After all the years of being at sea and squiring that particular manner of speech, to lose it so fast... it felt like a part of him was missing. He only reverted back to it when he was dealing with his crew.
One day there was a strange ship at his private dock. He marched up to it, wearing his best outfit, and swords. "What brings you here?" he asked the captain of the ship.
"I heard there was good trade on this island."
"I'll give you that, but what brings you to this private cove? How did you get here?" He raised a dark eyebrow, his long dark hair twirling in the slight breeze.
"Oh that... I followed that boat over yonder in. I saw it sail into the cove and just disappear, so I got curious and just kept sailing. So here I am." the captain waved with a huge flourish. "Is there a problem?"
"Yes there's a problem, mate, this here is a private cove. Only registered ships allowed here. Go back the way you came and forget you saw this place. Go to the normal dock in town. This is no place for the likes of you."
"I only allow my ships to haul cargo from here." Kyoraku was angry. He felt his dark side coming out. "Leave now." he placed a hand on the hilt of his long sword. "Leave. My. Cove. Now."
"Fine, fine, calm down. We'll leave." he shrugged. "Shame to leave such a beautiful spot though, the men would have enjoyed a nice relaxing shore leave here."
"No!" Kyoraku didn't relax his grip on the sword until the boat was out of sight.
He kept a close lookout for the strange ship for the next month.
Shiro was very sensitive to his demeanor and kept trying to distract him. It didn't always work however. Of the times it did work Shiro nearly drowned him with his passion, or they would swim together in the cove. The other mer-creatures would sometimes join them and frolic in the gentle waves. They grew more bold around the captain and allowed him to playfully chase them through the water.
Just when he assumed things had settled down, the strange ship came back to the cove, cannons ready. Luckily the Katen Kyototsu was in it's birth and had cannons pointed back in no time at all. Things were very tense for about an hour until the Katen fired a warning shot across the other ships bow. That sent them scurrying off into the distance. Everyone who had gathered; cheered with delight as their ship was victorious. Even if they weren't part of the crew they cheered for their ship.
Later on; once the crowd dispersed, Shiro and one of the other lads brought up a prize from the cove floor: the fired cannon ball. They were giddy with excitement at retrieving such a prize. Kyoraku chuckled heartily at their find and promised to mount it somewhere where all could see. How on earth he was going to explain it being there was another story. But with his quick wit he'd think of something.
That night Shiro swam up the slipway and splashed for attention. Shunsui quickly stripped and entered the pool. They kissed for awhile and held each other close as they watched the moon rise in the sky.