I didn't know what Arthur meant by cannibals, but the way his face lost all of its color made me nervous. He wasn't the type to show fear. "What's a cannibal?"

"A human that eat other humans."

My stomach flipped. I've never heard of anything so disgusting before. "Why? That's so awful..."

He looked down at me with tense eyes. "No one ones why they do it, but the taste of human flesh makes them mad. We need to get out of here. Now."

We turned to run away from the deranged voice, but before we could, another voice echoed from the other end of the hall. "Banksy? That Banksy? You smells it too, Banksy? People meat...Hewbert likes the people meat."

Arthur swore. "We're cut off."

"What do we do?" I felt panic clawing its way up my spine.

"We fight." The pirate silently drew his blade with one hand and his revolver with the other.

I swallowed nervously. My knife felt cold as I pulled it from its vibrant red sheath, or it may have been that my skin was feverish with anticipation. Shuffling sounded from both ends of the hall, but we couldn't see anything around the corners. Arthur and I stood back to back as we waited for the cannibals to arrive, and so they did.

A single head peeked out from around the corner. The man looked completely normal, until he smiled. All of his teeth had been filed to points. "Hello, tasties." His eyes darted back and forth between us. "Banksy not seen tasties for long time."

"Two for eats! Hewbert didn't think two."

The second voice sounded closer than before, but I didn't dare look away from the man who called himself Banksy. I heard Arthur cock his gun. I've never had to fight before, and the thought of plunging my knife into flesh made me feel sick. Banksy stepped out from around the corner and tilted his head. It looked like he was studying us, but not in the way one would seize up an enemy. He was looking at us like food.

"Tasties falled down our hole. Banksy not see tasties for a long time." He licked his lips.

"Banksy leave some for everyone else," the one who called himself Hewbert said. "We all wants them for eats."

I swallowed nervously. "We?"

"Tasties speaks!" Banksy looked even more delighted.

"We can take just two," Arthur growled. "Wait until they get closer."

"Heeheehee! Hewbert is so hungry. We eats them now, yes?"

"YES!"

The answer boomed around the hall. I jumped in surprise at the magnitude of the volume. A huge hoard of cannibals appeared behind Banksy, and I assumed behind Hewbert too because I felt Arthur tense behind me. They were so quiet it wasn't human.

"Time for eats!"

The crowd hissed and snapped their pointed teeth as they closed in on us. Eagerness shined in their eyes, but they didn't dare get too close. Their wariness showed intelligence, yet everything else about the cannibals' screamed insanity. I was intrigued. That feeling was soon swallowed up by fear as someone behind me shouted. I turned in time to see one of the deranged men leap at Arthur. The pirate stepped aside and brought his cutlass down mercilessly. Blood flowed and screams filled the air.

"Yensin! Big food hurted Yensin!"

"Smell good! Yensin for lunch, mmmmm!"

"Oya want the big munchie! Kill big munchie!"

Three more cannibals charged Arthur, who fought them off with ease. The others seemed too distracted by the fight to come after me. Hoots and hollers were thrown at the fighters in the same way a child would throw bits of coral at a turtle. There was no reaction, but it was fun to do. I watched Arthur cut down a crazed female before turning his attention to an older man with some kind of stone blade. Arthur blocked and parried his sporadic, method-less attacks. I gaped involuntarily as the man's crude blade slipped past Arthur's defenses and carved a long, jagged cut on his arm. The pirate's gaze momentarily shifted toward me, but it was long enough for another cannibal to sneak up behind him.

"Arthur! Look out!"

I was too late. The cannibal hit him on the back of the head with a fist sized rock. Arthur's eyes rolled back and he crumpled to the ground like a pile of limp seaweed. My hand covered my mouth, and I stepped forward to reach him. Several cannibals blocked my path and hissed. They brandished a variety of crude weapons, and one had even picked up Arthur's cutlass from where it had fallen.

"Only one more tasty left."

"Hama wants the eyeses!"

"Leave the tongue for Rute!"

I was completely surrounded in a matter of seconds. Hungry eyes gleamed at me while drool dripped in long strings from gaping mouths. I held up my knife with shaking hands and pointed it at anyone that moved. They seemed to sense my fear and smiled even wider than before.

"S-stay back," I managed to get out with all the courage I could muster, which wasn't much. My eyes strayed to Arthur, who lay unmoving on the ground with a few of the cannibals sniffing him curiously. "Get a-away from him!"

"Food makes much noise."

"Eating time yet?"

"Hewbert want eats now!"

The one called Hewbert stepped closer and bore his sharp teeth. It was a feral grin full of savage desire for food. For human flesh. I momentarily entertained the thought that I wasn't actually human, but I doubted it would make much of a difference. My heart beat faster with each step the crazy man took, and my hands shook to the point where I was afraid I would drop my knife.

"Tasty, tasty, red and bloody," Hewbert sang. His hands reached out toward me.

"N-n...no!" Something inside me snapped at that moment, and I sliced at his hand.

He howled as bright blood welled up from the clean cut across his knuckles. I watched in disgust as he licked at it like a wounded animal. With some strange confidence I didn't know I possessed, I pointed my blade into the crowd and met their gazes with a steely expression. They shifted uncomfortably as if they could sense the change in my demeanor. A few backed away, and several others cowered in fear of my bitting blade.

"Look! Look on the shiny point stick!" There was excited whispering as each cannibal conversed with his or her neighbor.

"Munchie is princess!"

"Princess?"

"Princess! Princess!"

They all dropped their weapons and crowed around me before I could process their words. Each person tried to touch me or pull me in one direction or the other. In all the commotion, I lost track of Arthur until I spotted him being carried away with the bodies of the cannibals he killed.

"Arthur!"

"Princess come! Come eating with us! Lots of food now! Three peoples for eats!"

Captain Kirkland wished for death. It was the second time that day that he had woken up without remembering falling asleep, and it wasn't a habit he really wanted to start forming. His head also hurt like it was about to split apart. Something warm dripped slowly from the back of his head, and he knew without having to look that it was blood. The floor he was laying on stank of it.

Arthur pried his eyes open and looked around. Even lying faced down he could tell he was in a bad spot. The Captain forced his sore body to move as he pushed himself up into a sitting position. He glanced around to see the two cannibals he had killed lying on the ground next to him. This must have been some storage area for bodies before they were eaten. Arthur noticed the temperature was quite low, and wondered if the savages knew anything about preserving food.

He bit back a curse as he heard loud shouts from the other side of a thick wooden door. That could only mean one thing. He looked around for the mermaid, and his heart stopped. She was nowhere to be seen. The worst possible thoughts filled the Captain's mind as panic gripped his heart with icy fingers. What if they had eaten her already? What if she was being cooked up right now? What if they didn't cook their food before eating it? What if they preferred their meals alive?

The one glimmering bit of knowledge that kept Captain Kirkland from going insane was the fact that he was alive. The fact that his heart was still beating meant hers was too. He stood up, which was met with protest from his stiff legs, and looked around for anything that could be used as a weapon. His cutlass and revolver were gone, but he still had one other revolver and a few other smaller weapons hidden on his person. The cannibals hadn't bothered to search him. He still needed something bigger than some hidden knives though.

"This'll have to do," he muttered as he picked up a metal bar that had been lying on the floor. There was no telling why it was there or what it was used for, but the worst kept coming to Arthur's mind.

Then the door shook. Arthur took an offensive stance with his crude weapon ready to knock the daylights out of whoever was trying to get in. He wasn't about to be made into lunch. The mermaid's smiling face appeared in his mind, which only made his determination stronger. He had to find her before it was too late. The door shook again, as if someone were determined to get inside. Arthur's grip tightened. The door burst open, and he swung.

"Arthur!"

The Captain stopped mid-swing. His corroded metal bar hovered a hairsbreadth from the mermaid's nose. She looked up at him with a shocked, but also slightly amused expression. It was like she expected this. Arthur moved his weapon away, and it fell out of his hands. The relief that flooded through him was so intense that he nearly collapsed. Instead, he gathered the mermaid up in his arms and held her tightly. She smelled so lovely, even covered in dirt and blood. The Captain held her out at arms length in alarm.

"Are you hurt? Where's all this blood from?" he questioned.

"Hm? This?" She looked down at her blood streaked arms and legs. "It's not mine."

That's when Arthur noticed the bloody knife in her hand, and some strange golden object in the other. One of his brows quirked up in curious amusement. "What have you been up to, love?"

"I'll tell you later. Right now we need to run."

The words were barely out of her mouth before angry shouting and screeching started to echo from outside the room. Arthur's eyes widened, and he looked down at the mermaid for some kind of explanation. She just bit her lip and handed him his cutlass and revolver. He took them from her and sighed.

"As long as I'm running with you, love, I don't care why."