Author's Note: This is both a Sid Meier's Pirates and Pirates of the Caribbean story, SMP for basic world setup and goals and POTC for overarching world. For example, mermaids(yes, they will be featured) will follow the rules setup within POTC: On Stranger Tides and not some other world type. I'll also get my ship types and abilities from the SMP video game so if I say a merchantman or a sloop and you have no idea of the ship size or type you can do a basic Google search and come up with an idea of what I have in mind. It will also give me limits to cannon counts and speed and thus make the story flow more smoothly as far as mechanics go.

It's also meant to be part of a longer series but for now this is stand-alone and while I did originally intend to have lots of sex scenes, probably won't write most of them because it's not something I like doing and makes me feel weird. I also don't have an intended upload schedule but am working on chapter fifteen as I post this on FF and will probably soon upload the chapters. For now, it's just something I'm throwing out there and yes, I'm using Disney to fill out the world. For example, the first Governor is Eugene Fitzherbert from Tangled and Rapunzel is his wife, but they're older than their movie counterparts to allow for certain story elements to play out.

Hope you like it and look forward to reading your reviews.

"The goddess herself, bound in human form...fury or favor, you not be knowing, but when the mood strikes her, and it's her favor she bestows on a lucky sailor, well, you've heard...legendary." Hector Barbossa

Chapter 1
May 11, 2019 = Saturday

It was a fluke I ended up in Miami during a convention on RC and model boating with time enough to enjoy it. By nature, I'm a truck driver hauling freight from any city in the United States down the highway to another city. The hours suck, the pay's terrible what with every cop and politician trying to stick their hand down your wallet and it makes for lonely hours.

I also get no time for the hobbies I like, or even recreational time to just lay back and enjoy time. Most of my free time is in a sleeper, a box five foot long, seven foot wide and seven feet tall, resting from the fourteen hour day I just had and preparing for the next one. So, for fun I end up watching movies or reading, which is fun in and of itself but the lack of choices after months on the road make life dull. I can quote you Master and Commander, or any of a number of other movies from the nineties, but it doesn't satisfy the longing I have for the sea.

Yea, I'm an odd one. Standing here on a pier watching the various ships as they sailed the water in front of me was calming on my spirit. Oh, I wished I could sail a ship like some of the ones I saw. Brigs, frigates, schooners, fluyts, galleons, and sloops of various sizes sailed with their sails unfurled and flags of various nations, kingdoms and historic pirates on display from their mainmasts made me feel at home.

So it was that I was so lost in the moment that I didn't see the red haired woman come to stand beside me. It wasn't until a ship-of-the-line I had been eyeing went behind her that I even noticed her. She was wearing loose-fitting tan capris and a striped white-and-blue tied on crop top shirt on her overly petite hourglass frame. She was a looker alright, five foot five and not a hundred pounds sopping wet. Her breasts were fairly ample and she had a lovely heart shaped butt and her skin was fair and creamy.

She give me a smile as she cocked her hip, then turned and walked away, her hips sashaying with each step. I watched her go, as she disappeared back into the crowd, then turned back to the boats as they sailed. I could never catch a woman like that, not as a down and broke truck driver. I might be six foot tall, well muscled and dark haired, but my muscles were covered with enough fat that people didn't even think of me as being strong and most people shunned me for it.

I didn't care much what people thought though, as I had long ago quit caring about what other people thought of my physical appearance. I knew I wasn't the best looking guy in the world, but in my long sleeve western shirt, blue jeans and cowboy boots, I could intimidate the best of them. I often wondered if that was because of the clothes or because of the persona I seemed to emulate as a cowboy, even though I never wore a hat.

Turning back to the water, I watched the ships sail for as long as I could. It was eventually my hunger that forced me to leave the pier and I headed back into the convention center in search of a meal. I ended up at an eatery featuring recipes and staples on sailing ships and was directed to a picnic like table and given a wooden keg to sit on. Food here was just what was served and had just gotten my food when that red head from earlier sat across from me.

"It' s not everyday that someone turns me down on an offer," she told me as I bit into a piece of hard tack and began to chew while eyeing the bacon. They had bacon back then?

"I'm smart enough to know when I'm out of my class," I responded after swallowing my bite of hard tack. "Besides, I came to the pier for the ships. Lord I wish I could go back to when men sailed the seas on real ships and not these steel monstrosities of today."

"They lack a certain charm," she admitted. "I wouldn't take you for a man of the sea at first."

I shook my head, smiling at a thought. "I find a peace in it," I admitted. "It's like watching them earlier, it calms something in me to watch a ship sail silently across the water."

"Have you ever thought about sailing in real life?" she asked me, and my smile turned bittersweet.

"I have, but I got into truck driving instead," I told her. "My seas are concrete and earth now, and I traded silent wind for rumbling diesel. It doesn't calm me like a ship, but anymore its a fantasy."

"Sea fantasies are my business," she said with a wicked grin. "What would you give for a fantasy to come true?"

"What would you want?" I asked back, as I continued to enjoy my meal. It was filling me up fast, and soon I would be wandering the area again, but as I looked at the young lady in front of me, I couldn't help the stirring of lust in me. She was definitely the type of woman I longed for with her perfect figure and dreamy looks, and I was certainly now interested in fulfilling my personal fantasies with her.

"Nothing, really," she said with a big smile on her face. "You're the kind of person I like to do things for, true men of the sea. I bet if you were a pirate in the 1600's you would have ruled the Caribbean."

I smiled. She was teasing me! "Best thing is to know how to approach an enemy," I told her and she leaned in close and put her head on her hands as she smiled at me. "Approaching them from their downwind allows you to pounce quickly with several shots as you tack back and forth in their blind spot. Also, giving them a round or two of grapeshot when you get close enough will take care of any enemy on the deck allowing your boarders a chance to take the main deck and helm with little difficulty. Since that's usually where the captain is, the rest of the crew will give up once he's dead or captured as they have no idea what to do without him."

"You sound ferocious enough," she said, finally extending her hand. "But what will you do when you go board to board with a bigger ship? Surely there's no way to win?"

"There's always a way to win," I countered. "And it might cost you your ship in doing it, but if it means the difference between losing a brig to acquire a ship-of-the-line, it'd be worth it. Depending on the circumstances, the best thing to do is to allow it to catch up or run right along its railing and allow your men to storm the deck in force instead of trying to go gun to gun with her; it's a fight you'll lose."

"A surprise attack then?" she asked and I nodded.

"Especially if neither side has the wind at their back," I said and she leaned in closer. "But don't ever try to turn back to fight if they have the wind behind them, especially with a competent commander. He just has to lay back and pelt you with his broadside until he breaks ya."

"So, want your fantasy fulfilled?" she asked with a sly wink of her eye as she extended her hand.

~ December 12,1659 = Friday ~

Thinking I was about to get lucky, I reached over the table and took her offered hand and stood up, just to get knocked back down again. Everything about my situation looked different, primarily as I was no longer in a restaurant, but on the deck of a single masted ship with gaff sails. Even my clothes were different, as I was no longer wearing the jeans and long sleeve shirt I had in Miami, but a pair of blue cloth trousers and white cotton shirt. I had on a pair of buckled shoes, and around my waist was a belt

The man who stood over me was dressed in purple with a large felt hat and he sneered at me. "Back to work, swab," he ordered, then kicked me again so that I fell into a bucket of water.

Enraged at being treated so callously, I charged the man and we both fell amid a group of men who were on their knees as they swabbed at the deck. Several more men drug me from the man in purple, and several more drew cutlasses and pointed them at me. I quit struggling as I saw the cutlasses aimed at me, but movement behind those men caught my eye.

More sailors were pulling swords, and with a yell charged at the men who were holding me. I stomped on the instep of the man on my right, then used my strength to throw the hobbling man to the deck. The man on my left let go, and scrambled for a weapon. A nearby man tossed me a cutlass and I snatched it out of the air just as the man who had been holding my right arm got back to his feet. The man went wide-eyed at seeing the cutlass and I slashed it across his chest to leave a deep bloody gash. The man fell to a knee and I ran the sword through his chest, killing him.

Turning back to the melee in full swing, I saw the man in purple, who my brain now recognized as the captain, run up a set of stairs to a small cannon. Fearing that he would turn it on the crew, I ran after him and got there just as he was about to light the fuse. I slashed at his wrist, but the captain yanked his hand back before my blow landed. He then threw the candle towards me, and I ducked which gave the captain enough time to arm himself with a cutlass of his own.

Facing off sword to sword, I dueled the captain while the crew fought on. Slash, parry, feint, dodge, slash; me and the captain seemed evenly matched as we fought across the poop deck. It wasn't until the captain feinted left, that I got the upper hand as his foot slipped on a rope that was laying loose on the deck. Falling to the deck, I pounced on the downed captain and kicked his cutlass from his hand, then put the point of my own cutlass to his bike. Sighing in defeat, the captain spread his hands in surrender.

Looking around, I saw the crew celebrating over the corpses of other sailors. Raising my own the crew cheered loudly, I gave a huzzah with the rest of the men. I looked at each of the cheering men, my face going slack as I realized we had just successfully mutinied against the captain. Several men came up the stairs with a length of rope, and they lashed the former captain's arms together. I personally wanted to puke.

"Alright, everyone," a man with a drooping mustache said as he waved his arms for everyone to calm down. "We need to elect a new captain!"

"I say we elect that man there," one of the crew said, pointing a finger at me while I tucked the cutlass in the belt around my waist and re-chewed my hardtack.

"Aye!" another man said, and the men cheered on. The man with the droopy mustache waved his arms and calmed the men down again, then turned to me.

"What be yer name, Captain?" he asked me.

"Owen Hunt," I told them and they all cheered.

"Orders, captain?" the mustached man asked.

"Clear the deck and bury the dead," I said, and several of the men began to move the dead men from the main deck. I went to check the navigational charts, finding a pin in it marking our location just northwest of the Caribbean. Apparently, we were about a hundred miles out from the first islands.

I felt a man looking over my shoulder and finding the mustached man watching me, decided to ask him his name. "Anthony Stiles," he replied to my question. "I wasn't too happy with the way things were going with Burch, anyway."

"Me either," I said as I studied the map. "Any recommendations for a port-of-call?" I asked him and he shook his head as he studied the map with me. I was hoping he had something in mind for helping with our current situation because I had nothing.

"Saint Eustatius is closest, but Danish owned," he said as he looked at our map. "I don't much care to consort with the Danes, and the nearest English port would be Antigua."

"But an English port sees us hung as pirates," I told him. "We mutinied against the proper captain and owner of this ship and took it for ourselves. I don't much like doing a jig on a hempen stage," I told him, using the old naval euphemism for being hung

"Nae, me either," he agreed. "At least with a Danish Letter of Marque we won't face the gallows."

"Set our course then," I told him and his drooping mustache seemed to pick up a bit. "I'll have you as Quartermaster, if you want the position."

"Aye, that I do," he said as he moved to the helm. My nerves calmed somewhat, now that I had an out, but I needed to know what I had so I could do battle with it.

Looking out over the ship, I decided to tour the vessel, assessing my new ship and its capabilities. Standing at the edge of the raised poop deck, and looking out over the main deck, I counted the eight cannons we had, and shook my head in a forlorn way. It wasn't enough to take on a big ship, but it would allow us to fight any merchant vessel we came across, but we did have room for four more cannons along the rails.

As I moved along the ship, I couldn't help but feel thankful to the red haired woman who made this a reality. She had indeed given me my fantasy, but I couldn't help but wonder why and at what cost. I mean, yeah, I didn't want to look a gift horse in the mouth, but it did make me wonder as I moved down to the berthing deck and where the dead were being prepped for burial.

The dead men were wrapped in their blankets, while the crew worked to cocoon them inside. I had never seen the process done before, and I watched for several minutes without anyone noticing me. I eventually moved on, going down one more deck to find the primary hold and extra rigging. It was so small it gave me a sense of claustrophobia and I headed back up to the berthing deck and moved aft.

It was here I found the galley, and a small single cell for the brig. The former captain was just now being escorted in by a pair of sailors, and I watched as they undid his hands and removed the rope from his arms. He sneered again at me, and I smirked back. Once the men had exited the brig and locked the door on our former captain, did he address me.

"I'll see you hang for this," he growled.

"That's why I intend to head for Saint Eustatius and get a Letter of Marque from the Danes there," I told him and he charged the bars. "Once I have my Letter of Marque, I'll turn you over to the Danes."

"You lily-livered deck ape!" he roared. "I'll get revenge on you for this!"

"Try," I said calmly, even though he rattled the bars in his bid to escape. "Until then, you will wait calmly in your cell or I'll tie a pair of chain shot to your legs and drop you over the side."

The former captain quit rattling the bars at that, but his eyes would have burned holes in my soul if he had but the power as he glared at me. I left him to stew in his hate, going back up to the main deck to see the crew had started bringing up the dead and were forming them into lines along the railing. It was a somber affair, and many a man seemed teary eyed at the prospect of burying a friend at sea.

I moved aft, entering the Captain's Cabin, mainly as it was mine now, to take stock of what I did and didn't have. The cabin itself was small, only about ten feet long and the width of the stern wide. There was a twin sized bed in the starboard aft corner, a dresser/wardrobe combination next to it. At the foot was a sea chest, open to reveal a few personal items that belonged to the former captain.

On the port wall, there was a large map with various countries colored differently. It wasn't until I studied it a bit that I recognized it as a political map and that any colonies or territories a kingdom had were likewise colored as their main country. The Caribbean had only four shades in it, and I traced their ruling kingdoms back to Spain, Great Britain, France and the Danes, the last who only had a handful of colonies in the New World.

I had only begun to search when Stiles knocked on my cabin door. "Enter," I said, remembering I was captain now and that he likely wouldn't enter without direct permission.

"Sir, crew are asking if you want to lead services for the slain sailors," he said in a somber tone.

"I suppose that's my duty now," I said, as I eyed the dusty Bible near the door. "I've never led a service before, nor attended one aboard a ship."

"It doesn't matter," he told me as he handed me the dusty Bible. "Open it and read some out of it to assuage the fears of the men and their poor souls. Nary a one will stand and admit it, but we all fear the coming hell that awaits us for what we do."

"Don't believe in redemption?" I asked him as I thumbed it open to see the familiar King James Version I grew up with.

"I do, but not right now," Stiles said with a chuckle. "As a boy, I attended church with my ma. It was there I learned the Commandments and I still remember to this day the sixth through tenth ones."

"Stealing, adultery, murder; what is life without the simple things?" I joked with him.

"Mighty unbearable in one's youth," he admitted with a chuckle.

I finally found the book I was looking for, the book of Psalms and flipped it to the twenty third chapter. For burying someone, I could think of no better passage to read at a burying as I've heard that one read at many a funeral myself.

"I think I'm ready," I told him, and we headed outside. The crew were lined up along the beam of the ship, the cocoons of the dead lined up along the rail. Every head was bowed as we approached, and Stiles took his position at the other side of a board to be at the head of the line.

"Gentleman, we gather here today to lay the souls of these men to rest in the arms of our Father," I told them as I opened the Bible to the spot I had found earlier. "The Lord is my shepherd; I shall not want," I said as I began reading the familiar verses aloud for the crew. Each man was respectful while I read, a few raising their heads slightly before dropping them again. They were the ones I suspected needed this the most, and I didn't stop until I finished the last word and added, "Amen."

With that one word, Stiles tipped the board over the board and dumped the dead sailor into the sea. The other crew gathered along, each body getting two still living sailors to tote it to the board to be dumped feet first into the sea. In no time at all, the crew had the dead in the water and the board they had been using was taken below decks and the other climbed into the rigging to tend to the sails.

I moved back to the poop deck, the highest furthest aft deck on a ship and watched the men move about the rigging. I should admit, I knew nothing about actually sailing a ship and was watching the more experienced men around me sail it. A few things I did know though, was to keep an eye on the heading and to always mark noon. Problem was, I didn't see a clock anywhere, so longitude was going to be a problem, never mind our latitude.

Checking the navigational desk near the helm, I found a variety of tools whose use I could only guess at, a large leather-bound book, a black glass bottle with cork stopper which would be the inkwell, and several feathers with sharpened ends. One thing I did find in the desk that I did know anything about was a collapsing telescope in a box. Pulling it out and extending it fully revealed it to be a two draw, meaning that there were two brass extensions coming out of the main body of the telescope. It wasn't all that powerful, maybe four times more powerful than the naked eye, but it was better than nothing.

I scanned the horizon with it, not finding anything to note. Collapsing it back to its single tube, I put it back in its box and took out the leather book. I opened it to find the ship's ledger, and that the ship's name was 'Badger.' Pulling the inkwell and a feather out, I flipped to the last page. The last entry was marked 12 December, 1659, and was about failing morale making me snicker. Yeah, I say it fell to mutinous really fast.

Dipping the pen, I marked in my best cursive a new entry using the same date. With a fresh dip, I marked in, "Crew mutinied against captain. New commander is Captain Owen Hunt. Setting course for Saint Eustatius." I looked it over, letting the ink dry before shutting the book. Stiles was back at the helm, and I shut the inkwell away with the book.

"How's the wind?" I asked him, sending my gaze into the sheets.

"Following nicely," he said as he looked at the compass mounted behind the wheel. "We should be making good time to Saint Eustatius."

"Aye, be nice," I told him. "Any family back home to write to when we make port?"

"Just a sister," he said, then smiled as his eyes grew distant. "I write her every Christmas. She leaves me letters at an inn in Plymouth, and I return to pick them up when I can. She lives in Devon with her husband, he's a farmer there."

"Noble profession for a landlubber," I said, and Stiles began to laugh.

"That it be," he said. "I been there once, about a year ago now. She was fat with child then, and she glowed with health. Ye any family to return to?"

"No," I said with a shake of my head. "I lost my parents not too long ago," I lied, not wanting to reveal I was from the future. "Been a wanderer ever since."

"So no one to mourn you when you pass," he said and I frowned. It was definitely a nerve with me, that I didn't have any family to mourn me, even in my own time. My parents were truly dead, killed in an accident in New York.

"Unfortunately not," I said, as I scanned the water. "I been looking to get married myself, and starting a family, but my wandering has left me no time to court a lady," I told him, and meant every word. I really wanted to get married, but the life of an over-the-road truck driver left me no time to get to know a woman better.

"Best of luck to ye on that," he said, changing the subject away from its grim topic. "Ever met a girl worth marrying?"

"Once," I told him, my voice growing soft. "Back before I began my wandering there was a girl in my hometown. She was short, blonde, fiery temper but she never had eyes for me."

"Seen that type before," he said as he adjusted our course. "All too common for sailors like us."

"Aye," I said, a comfortable silence falling between us. The sun began to set, and not knowing where my sea chest was or even where my hammock was hung, decided that it would be best if I didn't make myself look foolish. "Do me a favor Stiles," I said as I walked down the stairs to enter the Captain's cabin. "Have my chest brought to my room."

"Aye sir," he said, and I entered the cabin. Glancing around, I decided to pack up the old cabin's personal affects and packed them in his chest. The only thing I didn't pack were items that I figured were instrumental to the operation of the ship.

Two crew soon knocked on the cabin door, and I let them in. They carried a chest between them and set it down near the door. "Take that chest down to the hold," I said, pointing it out to them. The men nodded politely, and carried it out with them.

I closed the door, then knelt down to examine my chest. Opening it up, I pulled out two pairs of pants, some socks, a belt and several shirts. In fact, it was the same items I carried in my duffle bag in my semi. A small box inside my chest turned out to carry a few bars of soap, a tin marked shaving soap and a brush, straight razor, and small mirror.

The mirror I used to inspect my face, finding it younger than I was in Miami. It was still me, just a me back in college. My eyes were still the same hazel, and my hair was still it's usual dark brown color. I also still lacked facial hair, meaning I shaved with the shaving supplies I carried.

I set it all aside, then pulled out several books, some of which were badly worn. Looking at the inside title page, I found it was the complete works of Shakespeare. Another book I cracked open was an English version of Don Quixote, while the others proved to contain various poems.

Setting the books aside, I looked in my chest again to find a blanket covering an object in the bottom. When I pulled the blanket off, I was shocked to see my old guitar laying in the bottom. I hefted the light instrument out, strumming it lightly to find it was still in tune though the strings were different. I laid it on the bed, before returning to my chest to check its contents one more time. Another box caught my eye and I pulled it out. The box contained a wooden recorder, which I had learned to play in fifth grade thanks to a mandatory music class. Putting it to my lip, I started to playing "Go Tell Aunt Rhody," finding that the sound was much as I remembered it being.

After I finished the song, I put it away as it was getting dark in the cabin. The last thing in the chest was a miniature wooden barrel with a leather pouch tied over the end.. Setting my recorder back in it's box, I pulled the mini barrel out and undid the pouch to find it was nearly full of silver coins. I didn't recognize the style, but I had a small fortune of them. Had to be hundreds of them.

Deciding it was better to just get some sleep to the lateness of the day, I put the recorder in its box back in my chest. Wrapping the guitar, I put that back in the chest as well to make sure it wasn't damaged. The clothes I put away in the dresser, along with my shaving kit. The only thing I could think of was that all the items I carried in my truck that had historical counterparts had been put in my sea chest. Loved my recorder, though maybe not as much as my guitar.

With everything settled, for the time being, I sat on the bed, which was comfortable at least, and slipped my shoes off, then my socks. Never having been one to strip further than that in case I had to get out of the truck in a hurry, I laid back in the bed and covered myself in the cover. In no time at all, I was fast asleep.