Chapter Two: A Rough Start
Head aching, pounding, little Neo slowly opens her eyes. Much to her dismay, she finds herself in the brig of the ship. Trying to move her arms revealed that she was also bound with ropes. Letting out a sigh, she began searching for anything that might aid her in her escape. Eyes frantically scanning the dark of the brig, deep within the bowels of the ship, her eyes spotted a slight glint of something metallic. Sensing an opportunity, the small girl began scooting closer towards that small sliver of hope.
Slowly, she began the long and arduous process of using that piece of unknown metal to cut her binds. Swipe by tortuous swipe, Neo pondered her situation. The slow lull and sway of the great ship, the smell of brine and rum, and the tang of burnt powder was certainly offensive to her senses. Every step made on any part of the ship sent through her vibrations, like a needle signaling an earthquake. All of this, right down to the backdoor loving captain in a fruity hat, was not what she expected from life on the high seas. It caught her senses so much, it distracted her from the passage of time.
After what felt like an eternity, Neo felt the binds begin to slacken, pure joy enveloping her face as it happened. Climbing to her now unsteady feet, Neo stumbles towards the cell door. Crossing her fingers and hoping that Captain Ghira had taken the keys with him, making it impossible to lock the cell, she tried her luck, and much to her relief, it opened!
With ginger and ethereal movements befitting of her station and class, she then moved with practically no noise through the titanic timbered vessel. Rounding the corner, she noticed the most vital portion of the ship, aside from the rum storage, the vessel's armory. Normally, the sly young noble of questionable plans would attempt to nick one of its murderous stock. With a sense of timing and que worthy of a broadway musical, a great neck as thick as a small mast topped with a head practically ripped from an ancient temple turned to look at her.
Two sets of eyes for but a brief moment stared into the other. The giant looked at her with a bemused contempt, as if this tiny girl of golden blood wasn't worth even giving to the ship's cat. For her part, the poor girl's knees rattled and shook in fright like a winters gale on a mountainside of pines. If they weren't screwed on, the poor girl's legs would shake themselves to bits. Resolving this day to not make a mistake so bad the gods would laugh themselves out of their heavenly perch, she made a break for the next best option she had in mind. For his part, the titan went back to his anvil, shrugging off the brief encounter as nothing more than a flight of fancy.
To be fair dear viewer, just because our poor stowaways idea was her next best, like her first, didn't mean it was a good idea. Rounding the corner and breathing akin to a dying greyhound, she looked across the rickety hall at the communal bunks. If there was any other place for such a diminutive underdog, or fool depending on your definition of these turn of events, was the only place she could find any form of protection worth at least a toothpick. All she had to do was brave a den of scum, sin, and the world's worst place to shine a blacklight. No pressure right?
Forcing open the door with a kick, really the effect of easing the rusty hinges open like a pillow on a puppies head, she squeezed her rib thin body through. Rummaging through the dark, nerves so edgy they could cut a line of goths hairdos in half, dainty hands picked their way through very questionable piles of objects. Mercifully in her mind it was dark, so she didn't have to look at what likely horrid pieces of loot, debauchery, or another night in Vegas could conjure up. Finally, her skeleton keys she calls hands finally gripped something that made a click. The sweetest sound she'd ever heard in the horrid line of fate that's been whipped up for her.
Shaking the cylinder of thunder, she realized there was no ammo. Typical of pirates. Practicing actual gun safety, the fiends. With the grit of her teeth, careful not to invoke all the sugar she ate, she then began trying to find a cartridge. Again, the fiends of proper osha regulations seemed to keep a good handle of where they kept the bringers of thunder and lightning. Finally she gripped something that seemed promising. Picking it up, she gave it a once over. It smelled of pig grease, felt like cotton, and rattled like a lead shot and powder inside.
'I got only one shot out of this thing, I better make it count!' Neo thought, trying to muster up what was left of her fragile courage and snuck out.
Again the pirates' seemingly basic common sense of safety struck her again, as they put out most of the lamps that night. After banging, bashing and bonking her way through the cavernous decks of the stolen vessel for what felt like the lifetime of a St. Bernard, she finally arrived on the main deck. Unusually, no one was on deck, or even in the crows nest. However, her poor heart was on the verge of becoming a good impression of a NASA rocket out of her chest, and forced her to act now, rather than later.
Step after step, board after board, she began to make her way for the only thing you could call a getaway vessel in this age. Stopping on a brief instinct, she looked back behind her and upwards. There was the control center of this vessel, the captain's quarters, now no doubt a den of sin so thoroughly defiled a priest would die of a heart attack by its mere mention. Clenching her fist and a fire of indignant vengeance in her eyes, she prepared to storm up that mast and put a bullet in the scoundrels eyes. Only to be stopped by a whispered voice that could have come from a gorgon.
"Boo." Was a bemused, chillingly ethereal voice all too unfortunately familiar, practically just behind her ear.
Neo in an almighty fright jumped for the heavens and nearly tore her skin off her flesh like a moon warped werewolf. Wheeling around, gripping the pistol so shakily she would miss and somehow hit the King of Mistral, she stared at her tormentor. Towering over her, lit in the pale foreboding light of a dying moon was Cinder. A smile curled upon her silken lips at the pitiful sight before her.
"So princess, why are we sneaking? Off to find a frog to kiss?" Cinder whispered, putting her hands on her knees as she leaned forward, intentionally putting her face in front of the barrel of the pistol.
'One more step and I'll… I'll…' Neo thought, trying to portray this on her face in a way to get the red clad harlot away from her.
"You'll what? Pull the trigger? Congrats kiddo, you wake up everyone on the ship. And considering you only got one pistol, versus… well needless to say, you're out of options, you're out of time, and you're out of luck." She whispered in a sickenly sweet fashion, dripping with both honey and venom in equal juicy amounts, forcing Neo to back up a step in fright.
'Still got enough to wipe that smirk off your damnable cool face. Wait, why did I say that?' Neo thought, her semblance activating to portray that in fanciful, if poorly drawn, images.
"So you have a semblance? How amusing." She said, keeping her gaze on her, though Neo now really noticed that Cinder's face was plastered firmly with amusement.
'You think this is a game!?' Neo thought indignantly, her thoughts projected in kind through more thoughtlessly crude imaginings, all without her noticing.
"If this were a game, then I won before it even started. It's not like you're much in the competition department. Which begs the question on how you escaped? I saw old Scarecrow and skull bones tie you up personally. Guess his special "Family secret knot" isn't what it's cracked up to be.
Certainly isn't up to snuff to make our late nights more interesting." Cinder muses.
'Well at least she doesn't know that I cut my binds with a bit of metal in my cell.' Neo thought, sighing heavily as her thoughts got broadcasted.
"Thank you for the explanation sweetheart." Cinder said with a smirk, and began to saunter over.
'Oh god, oh fuck, oh god, oh fuck…' Neo's mind raced frantically, portraying very questionable images in kind for someone of such limited… life experiences.
"By the gods!" Cinder roared in laughter, rolling on the deck cackling like a tribe of hyena's after discovering stand up.
Neo blushed in complete and utter humiliation. Here was a badass, swaggering tosser of a pirate tavern wench rolling on the deck like a log run in laughter. Laying her head low and looking away to preserve her pride, or whatever you call what's left of it, she let the gun drop. Mercifully fate spared Neo from her own complete failure in gun safety practices, rich I know, but she has the money to make it work, the gun didn't fire on hitting the deck. Finally, and somehow without carving her lungs into a loveseat after the lack of consistent air, she hauled herself to her feet, and grabbed Neo gently by the shoulders.
"Now then. Let's go see the captain and see what fate has in store for you." Cinder said in a sing-songy tone.
'I'm fucked.' Neo thought, and the less than appropriate images appeared above her head. Classy young lady, classy.
"Careful young lady, I might take you up on that offer." Cinder answered playfully as she hauled her rich butt into the captain's quarters, Neo trailing with a trauma riddled face. So a weekend at my ex's.
"Cinder if I've told you once I've literally told you twice since we met. You're either coming in here with your booty on the table or a pint of rum. And I ain't seeing neither on offer." An equally familiar voice rang out from behind an overstuffed posh excuse of a chair.
"How is the fate of a much richer butt to substitute? Especially oh captain my captain, didn't even bother to do a simple room check, before tossing her in a cell. Sounds about right from your livers sordid track record with rum." Cinder answered, standing Neo up at attention, leaving Neo blushing red in disgrace as her mind projects something that if she found in her mothers reading materials, then I'm either jealous or fearful of her fathers position.
"Excuse me if the overgrown excuse of a carpet that was the previous captain kept this place like shit! You'd think you could throw a little princess in a cell and that would do, but no! Apparently even amongst thieves, honor and chivalry is dead!" Roman bemoaned, seriously or not is up to your interpretation.
"Since when did you act with either?" Cinder asked, Neo trying to tip toe away because of the bickering. However, her thoughts betraying her in the most literal fashion, Cinder snapped her up without even looking at her.
"Cute." Cinder said bemused.
"Practicing some of that mushin I see?" Roman asked.
"You don't need to search deep into some mystic void to keep track of this one. Honestly she's so funny I kinda want to keep her as Mr. Mittens' pet. He gets lonely mousing around the ship all day." Cinder said sarcastically.
'I am not a pet! I am…' Neo literally broadcasted in very violent mannerisms, however the effect was lost on the literal hardened murderers.
"See what I mean? Look how cute that is." Cinder said, pinching Neo's pouting cheeks.
"Well, the one and a half of you have given me a lot to think about this late at night…" Roman said, only to be cut off by a roundhouse kick to his shin, forcing the red headed sea rouge to hobble about.
"SON OF A FUCKING MONKEY'S JACKBITTEN BREEDING WHORE!!!" Roman roared to the heavens in less than righteous pain.
"Guess her height's a touchy subject." Cinder mused.
"Yah think?" Roman growled like a hungry tiger.
"So captain britches and briefs, got a decision?" Cinder asked.
"I don't know. I really don't know…" Roman mused, his voice trailing ominously off, leaving Neo in a state of suspended fate. Cause that my dear test patients, I mean readers, is why he's called cliffhanger!