Don't think, comment


45~55 minutes of baking, or until its golden on the outside.

"What other recipe did you remember?"

"Pound cake. Going to buy what I am missing tomorrow and give it a try,"

"Save me something. Or at least leave me a spoon with the mix,"

"It depends how well it goes,"

"Meaning you will shove everything else down your throat. Try to remember not to eat the foil, I want to avoid having to purge your guts,"

He put the cap back on his pen and put away his journal in the little flap of leather at his back. The small book already had about a quarter of its pages full of scribbling, from recipes to songs and names. Names of all kinds and origins, from the before there was family and friends and mentors, people they felt would be insulting to forget for but a second, and then there were others. Names of interest from this world that had taken them hostage, names of people and places and if they were important there was simply no clear indication of it other than them being worth the ink.

Pulling out a crumbling piece of cookie he offered one to Martina and then ate the other one, his throat almost twisting as he watched her give some to the cat. But he held his tongue, it was a waste of air and he was exhausted enough as it was and so he rested against the stone at his back. The one he had hauled all the way to the top of this bloody hill on the other side of the island. They both watched the horizon as they rested against their bags.

"Sis, do you see that?"

"The dot to our right? I see it, what about it,"

"Don't you think it strange that they are coming to the place without a port?"

"Maybe they will round the island at some point and go to Usato,"

"Or maybe not,"

They stayed there for a while longer than they should watching the ship keep their direction true to the back of the island, they stayed past their rest and bit well into the time of their next lesson and still they held their course true. Both of them were sure they weren't going to start turning now that they could almost see the red of their sails, their navigator should already know where they were and should be preparing to steer to the sides in search of port, except they didn't.

"As incredible as it might seem, you were right. They should see that the place has nowhere to moor already,"

"It's no miracle that I am right,"

"Sure is, its right there with the chances of meeting Borsalino,"

"Who is thinking of meeting an Admiral now?"

Nicolas was proud to say that he did not, in fact, scream when Itse's voice came from in between them. But he did curse when Martina shot a round that missed Faithful and nearly caught him square in the chest, it didn't matter that she was using her [Blunt Bullets] getting shot without preparation was still an affair he could do without. It hurt almost as bad as being hoofed by a horse, but that was only for him because they still managed to make a boar pass out.

"Ah, how hurtful, for my student to try to shoot me when I am checking their wellbeing. Such betrayal,"

"Now try saying it without smiling, you fucking ghost,"

"Language, Sis,"

"Don't give me that Nicolas. She is like the fucking Llorona and you can't say otherwise,"

There was nothing to defend Faithful from that accusation, the woman had a long record of scaring the both of them past what was considered funny. But that was beside the point.

"Language,"

"Well then, if we are done with that. What is it that kept you from coming back, I can see that neither is hurt and you didn't kill anything. So I expect a very, very good reason,"

There was a sense of foreboding in her smile that had him standing a little straighter, something about that wire thin smile put him on edge and made him think that they weren't talking to old Faithful but to someone else. Someone angry beyond words and all too willing to hurt them if displeased, and it was only then that the label of pirate fit her. And when she smacked them upside down.

"We were checking a ship that's behaving strange,"

"A ship behaving strange? Is it sinking? Is it requesting help? And if it was, what could you two have done for it? Swim all the way there and save them?"

"It's making its way to the back of the island,"

And she turned on her heels to look at the horizon and at the vessel they were talking about, now it was clear that it was no merchant. Its form sleek and sharp like an arrow, its deck too close to the water for it to take a cargo worth any trip other than to neighboring islands. Even then the rest of it screamed of assaults and violence as it raced towards their shores, cutting waves and wind like a razor. Faithful shared their thoughts it appeared, if the way she frowned at it was any tell.

"How long has it kept its course?"

"Hasn't changed it since we spotted it,"

Martina kept her answers clipped and to the point, not a bite or scat to her words, as good a testament as any of how serious the ideas in her head were. He also had ideas of what it was, but he hoped he was wrong because he liked none of them.

"It looks like we will be the ones receiving them,"

"Shouldn't we call someone from the city? Maybe not try to take a whole crew by our lonesome?"

"Nothing to be done if they come through the back. We have no ships with cannons and this little thing would be in the water before we could close it off. And by land it takes half a day for a good hunter, think of dozens of city folk coming here. At least a day and then some. We are the only ones that can take them at such short notice,"

And he said no more. He had never thought of leaving them be, not for a second, but he hoped they wouldn't be the ones to do the work.

"Do you think they are pirates?"

"Could be. They could also be poachers from somewhere else, the animals here grow larger than anywhere else and there is no end to those hoping to make a trip, take a shot, and come back with a little extra for the year,"

"But you don't think they are,"

"They would have a cheaper ship if they were, a fisher or something along those lines. Not a schooner,"

She turned to the both of them, her eyes hard as the stones on their backs and her face dry of humour.

"Check your weapons, make sure you have everything in working order and where it should be easy to reach,"

"Anything else?"

"Yes. Hope that you don't need them,"

And with that he felt his face fall, it was a battle that they were heading to and he had no dreams it would go any other way, neither did Faithful or Martina but they both took it in stride. Itse unfastened her rifle from her back and set it apart giving every piece a once over, filled her bandolier with casings and started working on the fat blade she kept around, meanwhile Martina unloaded and reloaded her revolver spinning the drum on the side of the gun and all with the starts of a smile on her face. She was just as happy this was happening as he was terrified of what was to come.

There was something that niggled the back of his throat, hot and sick, he had begun to feel it when it had become apparent the ship was coming here. It was fear, but of what he was not sure. He had spent the last sixteen days stopping claws and fangs with his bare hands, he had crushed boulders and ripped trees, and all that only made the sick worse. He was more than he should be, more than he could have dreamt of, but he was still scared. Scared of being hurt, scared for Itse and Martina, but most of all scared of what he could now do. Bones and muscles seemed so frail now, it was simply too easy for him to snap the leg or the arm of a beast. And a human was even easier.

"You keep sharpening that knife and you will be left with no blade,"

He looked down and at the cleaver in his hand, he remembered guillotining a boar with it, the edge biting into layers of muscle and thick vertebras like mud and shuddered. When they all were ready, he made sure to unfasten his belt, the leather and the steel left behind next to the stones and only then the sick lessened a bit. Even then it was not by much.

They stared down the outcrop of rocks and boulders towards the beach, the ship's hull resting on the sand as its crew came to land. As rugged a bunch as any, most of them had at least one hole punched through their face with big golden or silvery loops hanging from them, ink splashed on legs, arms, and chests like a bucket of it had been dropped on them. Their skin so burnt that it was practically leather by now. And while he couldn't see the desires and emotions of a person as his sister could he could still feel the strongest of them, the most common in each one, and he could only see the red of aggression and black of violence clinging onto them. Like tattered clothes that stuck to them and drifted in the wind like flags that marked them for what they were as easily as a jolly roger.

"Nicolas, you will go down the way to our left and wait in the forest for them to get close, when they are you jump them, you hit them and you go back behind the trees. Martina you will take the left, keep to the gloom and run every time you shoot. Don't stay put for a second. I will be taking down the ones still on the ship from here and then work on the gunners,"

The three of them were side by side and he could feel Faithful grab hold of his arm and give it a squeeze.

"Please, be careful children. I will help you all I can but stay careful,"

He was as scared as scared come but her being there, being willing to put them first made his breathe come easy for a second. Almost without thinking he hugged the woman that had treated them like family and kissed the side of her head, it was all he could do.

"We will Itse. I still need to try a few more recipes,"

"And I have a case of wine I haven't opened yet,"

"Stupid children. You have more to do than eat and drink,"

Catching his sister arm, he gave it a squeeze as well and nodded at her, none of them would get hurt, and he prayed for that to all the gods and saints.

Plastering himself to the walls of the cliff he made his way down, black fingers digging easily into the ancient stone made it a simple affair. He was down the wall in a couple of seconds and without a hitch. He walked on all four when he reached the forest, his bulk simply too big to be hidden by the flaking touch of green that was near the beach, like a stalking animal preparing to run like all hells to reach its prey and savage it. The more time he spent doing it the easier it came, his chest and hips almost parallel to the ground, his arms already used to how they should be kept and his legs stretched to avoid raising his ass.

He went past a tree, silent as a shadow, and heard an evil hiss right next to his ear that made him freeze. Then came a smell that almost made him gag, he looked sideways and came face to face with a man wearing his birthday suit. All his clothes and belongings thrown a few meters away and he was squatting by the side of the single, massive tree that had hid him. Before Nicolas could think anything other than that the man needed a doctor, Birthday swung the small shovel he had in his other hand with a fury. He caught it without effort and threw it away before winding his fist back and chucking a hay maker that folded Birthday's hasty defence against his chest and hurled him through the trees, the shrub, and into the middle of the beach.

There goes the element of surprise, he thought.

They all saw the old boy roll like a wheel from the treeline, his head smacking the ground over and over. And Treebick reckoned he should thank whoever he believed in that it was sand he was hitting and not stones. Treebick swallowed as he reached Lasmark and saw all the blood coming from his rock of a head, it was coming out fast and hard like a piss after a fuck, he reckoned someone should do something. Call a doctor, call the alarm. Something. But they were all looking at the man that was flung like a used cloth a good thirty paces and then some.

He swallowed again thinking what could have done it and he drew his sword just as the first screams started. It was a cheap thing, its handle prone to rattle. He had paid more for his belt than for the sword, giving it more thought to keeping his pants up than to keeping a good blade. That seemed a fool of a decision now that he had to use it.

"Guns, bring the- "

The words turned thick in his throat. He saw something in the treeline, it had been a there for second, but he had seen it. A head big as his chest getting a peek at them from behind a tree. A scalp clean as steel and a mast of a forehead sitting over two eyes sharp as nails. It had looked straight at him and even at that distance he felt his blood go cold in him, it was like staring down a cliff and then being pushed off. He felt it like that second you reckoned you were falling and there was nothing to do but take it and leave the rest to fate.

He registered the loud voice of a gun and everything turned over, he was resting against the sand now. The whole world was swimming around and sideways and up and down, he don't remember having drunk half so much or anything half as bad. Then came the red and his head reached the thought he had been shot. So he stayed where he was, not much for a man to do once shot. Except hope for help.

It was wrong. Everything was wrong, the place was supposed to be dead on this side. No one was supposed to be living in this god forsaken part.

But they are here. And you see them, don't you? That ugly piece of his head chuckled as he watched a man tall as their ship zip through the trees and dodge the whipping blades and rains of bullets coming at him. He, no, it then grabbed two of his boys. Its body almost dropping to the ground before taking hold of their ankles and throwing them into the forest and following them close behind. They screamed, loud and terrible, as they found themselves away from everyone and then came the slap of flesh on flesh. One then two and then three wet, loud sounds were all it took for the forest to go quiet again.

How nice of it, he doesn't make them suffer. That's good, isn't it Lock? This way you get what you deserve and without the pain, yes?

I don't deserve to die, I don't want it. He answered the howling voice in his head as another one was shot to the ground, the only thing you could see was the smoke and the glint of a barrel on top of that crag. But that was enough to tell where their death was coming from. And it was enough to know where not to go, so he run. There was no saving the lot of them, so he would save his self at the very least. He would come back when the Captain sorted things out, yes he would.

When he put a foot in the forest to their right, he felt his skin prickle all over. Like pins and needles across his face. The shadows were big and ugly here, even when the sun was hitting the place from its spot right over their heads the gloom was still stronger. It was wrong, unnatural. He wanted out of this place, out of this island as he heard something snap behind him. When he turned, he found himself staring up at a woman. A fair face, with long barley hair that stood up at its root, she was taller than him by a head and thick at the shoulders and chest. She was beautiful in a way that screamed of strength and iron. But what took him was not the gun shining despite the darkness, it was how she was showing him all her pearly teeth like an animal. All pleased with herself.

Opening his mouth to scream in fright he felt her hand wrap around his throat and push him against a tree, the back of his head slapping the bark when his neck whipped backwards. She came closer, close enough to see her brown eyes. The colour of the reefs that clawed the hulls of ships.

"I need silence right now, boy,"

Her breath hot in his ear was the last thing he felt as the grip of her gun cracked against his cheek. He slid down the tree like a slug when she stopped supporting his weight and she turned around without another look, a cat big as a dog close to her heels. His eyes looking ahead came to rest on several others of his crew. All with a cut across their faces and of the same mind as him, thinking there was a way out.

You got lucky again, Lock.

"What in Jone's locker is happening?"

Roared Captain Alexander Alex Kent Paul Harris, also known as The Ball, as he avoided a bullet that zipped past the side of his head. Lifting one of the barrels near him he used it as a shield to get to the rest of his crew and get an update. He wanted to know how was it that they were under attack in a bloody rest spot.

"Lock! Come here and explain,"

"Captain, we don't know where Mister Lock is. Last we know he ran into the forest,"

Useless, I am surrounded by cowards. He thought as he threw himself to the ground as another hail peppered the blockade they had made on the prow of the ship.

"Shoot at them then. And get us some time to run,"

"We can't, they are all coming from the top of that cliff. Our bullets can't get past the bottom half,"

Alexander Alex was about to curse as far and as wide as knew when the barrage faltered and then stopped completely, grabbing one of his men by the scruff he lifted his head out of cover and waited for it to get blown to bloody bits. When nothing of the sort happened he felt his lips twitch and sighed in relief.

"They are out of bullets men, get off and push the ship off this damn island,"

Those that were dim in the head cheered and rushed to follow his command while those with a little fire in there stayed put before he started throwing them into the beach.

Disobedience is punishable with death, but I can understand not wanting to go down. He thought darkly to himself as he stared at those that were trying to shield themselves with someone else. But just as the hull had been dragged a pitiful distance into the waters, it appeared. An animal as big as him that swiped men, barrels, and crates with one of its logs like arms. His crew screamed and shouted as they went air born and those that he missed were downed by a woman. She came out from in between the trees as well, her hand gripping a beast of a gun that kicked anyone she hit with the strength of a mallet. The rounds lifting anyone they touched off the ground and flinging them back like dolls tossed in a childish tantrum.

There was no way out of this for the Great Alexander Alex Kent Paul Harris, and he knew it, but to end his saga in an island such as Farra in the North Blue was a disappointment as big as any. Taking some courage in the face of his end he hefted his bulk and shrugged the hands that tried to stop him, a man should know when he is beat and fight even harder for time's sake. With two steps he bounded off the prow of his ship and landed in a cloud of sand and grit, he might have seemed a great Admiral with the right angle. A pity no one would see it, no one would immortalize his image as it was due.

"Look no further Pirate Hunters, here is the man you are searching for. Here stands Alexander Alex Kent Paul Harris, Captain of the-"

He almost bit his tongue as his head was forced back by a bullet in his forehead, looking up he saw the clear sky. The bright blue dotted by the white of the journeying seagulls. And as he fell backwards, defeated, he thought it looked very much like the day he had set sail for the first time. When he was but a boy.

"Sis, he was talking!"

"He was boring me with his prattle,"

"Have some respect he was giving his last words,"

Why couldn't they shut up and leave him to his thoughts.