Chapter 10

"Avast! To arms, yeh spacers!" Silver shouted, making a beeline to Amelia's stateroom, where he hammered upon the door. "Captain!" he bellowed.

"Enter!" he heard Amelia's voice call back, and he swung opened the door so fast that it banged on its hinges. "Yes, Mr. Silver? Can I help you?" Amelia asked.

"Aye, Captain! Pirate corsair, bearing down on us outta the Southwest, ma'am! "They're nearly upon us, Cap'n!"

Before Amelia could even get to her feet, a loud explosion was heard. "What the devil?" Amelia demanded, racing for the door.

"They're here!" Silver said.

Amelia jumped into action. "Delbert! Get the children under cover immediately. Lock this door after me, and don't let anyone in but me! Do you understand?" Amelia shouted.

"Yes! I'll take care of that directly, dear. Now, go… be our Captain!" Delbert told her, racing out to gather his children.

Amelia threw open the doors her weapon's safe, retrieved her plasma musket, and primed the weapon. "Do you need anything, Silver? No, I would suppose you still got the same one handy?" she asked Silver.

In answer, Silver frowned, and his cyborg arm rotated to reveal his laser cannon, which now hummed as it powered up. "I'm all set, Cap'n," he told her.

"Very well then… let´s go deal with these pirates!" Amelia said and ran out the door just in time to see Delbert ushering her scared and startled children past her into her stateroom. Amelia nodded, knowing her loved ones were now as safe as they could be.

The pirates clambered aboard the Legacy at her bows, and before long her entire complement of spacers were fighting furiously, rebuffing pirates everywhere.

Amelia shouted orders to her stalwart crew, pausing now and again to snap her musket to her shoulder and fire off a few well-placed shots in assistance.

Silver could see Amelia was hesitating, afraid to leave her family unguarded. "Cap'n! Get down there, and drive the scum off, lass!" Silver yelled. "I´ll stand guard here… an' yeh can be sure naught a pirate will get past the likes o' Long John Silver!"

"Thank you, Mr. Silver!" Amelia replied, and rushed forward into the fracas, pausing only to fit her bayonet to the end of her musket first.

"Aye, lass. What are friends for now?" Silver replied as Amelia smiled back at him on her way to the fight.

The enraged felinid Captain attacked, and with the aid of her trusty crew, hewed down, dispatched, or otherwise drove off, droves of pirates. The battle went on until such time that Amelia now stood face to face with the fellow that appeared to be the pirate Captain. Without a moment's hesitation, she attacked. "Fancy yourself a Captain, do you?" Amelia growled, her voice laden with sarcasm and derision.

"Aye, woman, Captain I be!" the pirate growled back and fought her furiously cutlass to musket.

Amelia must of made quite the impression upon him as he asked, "And what does a woman like yourself be doin' here? Yer Captain must not have the good sense to realize that it's bad luck to have women aboard!"

"I guess I shall forgive you, pirate scum, as you undoubtedly have only limited cranial capacity," Amelia snapped back, her voice cold as steel. "It'll take more than the likes of you to take command of this vessel!"

"Oh, will it now? How come?" The pirate shot back.

Amelia chose to let her actions speak louder than her words. She made a clever twist of her bayonet-tipped musket, snapping its brass-plated butt up into the pirate Captain's most surprised face, knockng him flat on his back before her on the deck. Amelia's seventeen inch long bayonet was only a few milimeters away from his throat. Now, she chose to speak, informing him, "First, I may have neglected to mention that I scored the highest at the Academy in armed and unarmed combat." Amelia had to restrain the urge to spit this pirate's throat with her bayonet, and when she finally composed herself once more, she added, "The other reason, my good pirate, is that I am the Captain of this ship."

The pirate Captain looked to Amelia's dangerous green eyes, then to the razor sharp tip of her bayonet at his throat, then back to her eyes again. Neither one showed any promise of his leaving this ship alive. "I yield," he proclaimed, afraid for his life.

"I accept," Amelia told him. "Now, tell this rabble you call a crew to lay down their arms, or I shall have my men kill them all… each and every one."

The pirate Captain gulped audibly, but then managed a high-pitched whistle. The other pirates stopped their fighting and looked over to where their leader lay upon the deck. Some of them looked angrily at Amelia.

"Very well then, scum!" Amelia yelled, getting their attention handily. "Any of you entertaining the idea of rescuing your Captain, think again. I'll cut down any of you like the dogs your areno offense, Doctorif you put one foot toward me or my men. So… drop your weaponsimmediately!or face the consequences!"

The pirates looked into the faces of the Legacy spacers and then that of the angry Captain Amelia Doppler. In a moment, the ship was filled with the sound of weapons hitting the deck as the pirates willingly disarmed themselves.

"All right, spacers!" called Amelia. "Gather them up and escort them down to the brig, on the double!"

The crew escorted their charges down to the brig, and soon there was only Amelia and the pirate Captain left to go. "Mr. MacGee! Get me Mr. Silver… immediately!" Amelia ordered. Jake ran up to where Silver still stood guard, and escorted him back to the Captain.

"Ah, there you are, Silver! Kindly take this rogue down to the brig… I'm sure his loyal crew misses his company," Amelia quipped, her wit returning after a victory. "A word of advice, Mr. Silver, don´t put away that cannon of yours before he is locked securely inside his cell."

"Aye, ma'am!" Silver said and Amelia finally lowered her bayonet from the pirate's throat. "I'll take care o' it right away, ma'am. Get up, you!" Silver said, gesturing significantly with his carbonized laser cannon for the pirate Captain to move out.

Amelia watched them go, then headed up to her stateroom. She knocked on the door, and called out, "Delbert! It's me!"

The door opened, and before Amelia could say one word, she was bowled over off her feet by her children. Amelia laughed from her position on the deck, as her children swarmed about her, hugging and kissing her repeatedly. "Easy, my loves! I'm fine. It´s all right, children…" Amelia said and hugged and kissed them back.

Delbert moved forward, smiling, to her rescue. "They were afraid that they would lose you, you see," he told her. "I did try to tell them that we shouldn't worry about you, but rather worry about the pirates."

Amelia smiled, snuggling her cheek to Amanda's head. "Oh, children… do you know, I have forgiven our Mr. Silver," Amelia announced.

"Really, Mom?" Benjamin asked, clearly surprised.

"Oh, yes… and if I do see him later, I would like to ask him to come up here and tell his recounting of our tale about Treasure Planet. Because you four would want that, wouldn´t you?" Amelia asked.

The children cheered their mother, but Benjamin was determined not to be outdone.

"Mom… you–are–the–BEST!" Benjamin said and hugged his mother again tightly.

"Yes, yes," Amelia added a moment later. "But now, children, please do me a favor, and do let me up off of the deck. It's rather cold down here!"