Chapter 13: Twilight Isles, Part Four
I couldn't begin to list all the things I want to say right at that moment. But if there's one thing I wanted to say right now, it would be…
"Is the one commanding the coup an idiot?"
"No, but he definitely isn't smart either." Deuce stated, "That is so goddamn obvious for a 'secret' base."
"Guess he thought that being a forest means that no one would ever find them." Ace noted.
"Well, regardless if he is an idiot or not, we found the place." Luna stated as we all keep a lookout over the obviously guarded cave entrance, "Now, we just have to get inside and get evidence of that bastard Reginold's double cross…"
"Wait, your advisor's name is Reginold?" I asked her.
"Yeah. Didn't I mention that before?"
"No, you did not."
"You've been calling him 'the advisor' every time you refer to him." Deuce pointed out, his captain nodding in agreement.
"Huh… guess I did…" She muttered, before snapping, "But not the time for that right now! We got to get into that cave and find those documents. The coup is three days from now, which means we have both today and tomorrow to accomplish this. But with our boat being inaccessible right now–"
"Thanks to a certain someone…" I muttered; Ace blew out an innocent-sounding whistle in response.
"–It'll be in our best efforts to deal with this by the end of today." She pointed out, "That way, we'll have the whole of tomorrow to find a way to get back to the mainland."
"Okay, any plans on how to get in there?" Deuce asked.
"I could beat the crap out of those two dudes down there, and then go in guns blazing." Ace stated cracking his knuckles.
"Nope, bad idea." I stated, "We can't risk alerting anyone inside, especially with their operation date so close. They could simply blow the base up and destroy the evidence with it."
"Good point…" His first mate noted much to a disappointment of the freckled faced pirate, "That leaves only one option. To sneak in undetected, get those documents, and escape without alerting anyone."
"That's lame…" He pouted.
"It's the logical solution." I pointed out, "Not everything can be solved by blasting it to bits."
"Okay, then our next course of action is set." Luna stated, "But how do we sneak in? From what I can see, there's only one entrance."
"There might be another entrance, but searching for it might take too long…" Deuce stated, "We'll have to go through the main gate."
"There has to be a changing of the guards soon, or…"
I then notice something in the distance. Resting a few meters away from the cave entrance on the dirt beaten path is a large caravan with a horse next to it with its rider, in a similar attire as the guards, possibly feeding the ride animal something. The caravan itself is covered in a white hooded cloth roof, with several barrels and crates visible being the white cloth flaps.
If I were to guess, that has their supply run from town. Go figure, they got to feed the people in the base somehow. And judging by the amount of stuff they have, there are a lot of people in the base.
And then, it hit me.
"Guys, I got an idea."
"Afternoon, fellas." The caravan drives up to the two guards, its rider waving his hand at them, "How's the shift?"
"Boring, really." One of the guards stated with a yawn, "I still don't get why we have to stand guard over a cave. Wouldn't that make it obvious that there is something inside?"
"Oh, quit complaining. Besides, it's captain's orders." His partner scolds him, "Anyway, how's the shopping trip?"
"Pretty good." The rider tells them, "Got quite a haul, along with a few… 'extra' supplies. Got to tell you man, it ain't easy getting it."
"Come on, it's not like you didn't want to get it yourself!"
"Yeah, yeah. So, mind moving aside for me to go through?"
"Just one sec." One of the guards walks towards the back of the caravan, checking the undercarriage along the way. Using his rifle, he pushes the cloth aside and took a good look at the series of crates and barrels, "Looks clear. Let him through."
The two guards step aside, letting the caravan ride into the cave.
A few moments of riding through near darkness, the caravan exits out into a large open space. The cave expanded outwards to the size of a small town that has several poorly constructed wooden houses of various sizes and disrepair along a couple watch towers of similar states, with a good portion of it opened to the skies and leading into the ocean.
The small 'port' has several small ships flying the black jolly roger, a skull inside a large cog, with one of them with men bringing aboard several large crates of various sizes, with a few of them having rifles barrels and handles sticking out of it.
The supply caravan rides and park itself near a large shack that seems to have an open-air kitchen. "The supplies are here!"
A shirtless burly man with a pot belly wearing a white apron walks out towards the caravan with a few other men in similar attire following behind. "About time!" The chef-looking pirate shouted rather impatiently, "We were wondering if you got lost on the way back!"
"Sorry, I had to stop to feed ole Trippy here." The rider stated stroking the horse's mane, "You know how cranky he gets without his meal."
"Believe me, I know." The chef huffed, "Alright, boys! Get to work! We have a lunch rush coming soon, so the faster you finish this, the quicker we can get to cooking!"
The men all took to a rush, carrying out barrels after barrels of food items and rolling them into the kitchen with several of them rolling into the wooden storage shed behind the shack. As the last barrel is rolled into the shed, the last man pats his hands and leave the room, closing the door behind him.
Little did he realised, that some of the barrels are a little heavier than usual.
I let go of the breath I didn't know I was holding when I heard the door shut. Good, we're in.
I pushed up against the barrel's lid above and lift it off of me, crawling out of the barrel of potatoes, "Is everyone here?" I called out as quietly as I am allowed to, while feeling and removing a potato that has fallen into my pocket before pulling out Nanashi from inside the barrel.
"I'm here." Ace stated as he pushes himself out of a crate, pouring out a few beetroots that got in his hat before taking a bite of one.
"Same." Deuce announced as he squeezes himself out of another barrel, spitting out a few beans that got into his mouth, "Didn't think I could fit in there…"
"You're telling me." Luna stated as she got out of a crate, before fidgeting a little and pulls out a banana from between her cleavage, "I'm sure there's a joke in there somewhere."
"I can think of several…" The masked pirate muttered to himself.
"I'm more surprised that no one found us out." I stated, pulling out my bag from another barrel.
Allow me explain!
We need to get into the secret base without anyone noticing, and in order to do so, I came up with an idea to do as such.
There was a caravan that's a good distance away, driven by a person wearing a similar outfit as the two guards. As such, I made the assumption, which I was right on point by the way, that the caravan belongs to the little rebellion group and we could use it to sneak in unnoticed.
Thankfully, the rider seems to be very engrossed in feeding and pampering his horse to notice us getting on board and hiding in our respective barrels and crates. Had to dump out at least half of their contents to get in, though…
"Regardless, we made it inside." The princess noted as she walks up to the door, "Now we just have to-Huh?" She tries to open the door, but found it not budging at all. She then pushes with all her might but to no avail, "Um…"
"They must have locked it up." Deuce helpfully summarizes for us.
"Why would they need to lock up the food storage hut!?"
"Well, most likely to prevent food theft." Ace noted as he chomps the last bite of beetroot.
"That's… surprisingly true…" She nodded, "I think the kitchen back at the castle did a similar thing with the fridge too."
"Good thing we're not in the fridge." I pointed out with a shrug, "Thankful for small mercies…"
"Despite the reason, it doesn't change the fact we're trapped here with no visible way out." Deuce stated, "Unless you accounted for the small openings up there." He pointed to the small gaps on the walls above us, "But that's too high for any of us to reach."
"Yeah." Ace nodded, "I don't see a ladder in here anywhere, and I don't think stacking all the boxes here would be enough."
"Well…" Luna looked over to me, "We do have someone here who could reach it."
I blinked in confusion before realising with a face-palm "…Oh right, I have wings…" Unfurling my wings, I flew up to the small gaps on the walls, but… "Sorry, no good. These things aren't big enough for any of us to go through."
"Have you try sucking in your stomach?" Ace asked.
"I'm not that small, jackass."
"You could at least try!"
"These things are only the size of my fists! I couldn't even put my head through!"
"Can you at least see what's outside?" Deuce asked.
"Ah, wait a moment."
I peeked through the gaps, looking about the place the best I can. In our small bumpy journey into the base, I did hear the sounds of waves. This means that we might be near the ocean in some way, and that means that Ace's idea on how they smuggled in their weapons is on point.
And I was right. From the gaps, I could make out a couple of big ships docked in what looks like a rough stony harbour of a small lake that leads out into the open sea if the blue sky in a small opening in the distance is any indication. This place must be at least close to sea level, and the lake is deep enough to house those two large frigate-sized ships.
And judging by the jolly rogers tied to the masts of one of the ships, they are pirate ships.
"Well, this is definitely their base." I tell them, "Also, they seem to be either using pirates to smuggle their weapons, or are pirates themselves. I don't recognise their flags though."
"I knew it." Luna muttered, "This is their weapon supply depo!"
"Good for you, I guess." Ace noted as I heard him bite into something else. Is he eating!?
"Do you see anything else?" She asked me, "Perhaps their command post?"
"…No, not from here. Let me try the other side." I flew over the other end and took another look, "Mm… there are several buildings about, but not too noteworthy. Oh, but I do see a large hut. And…" I squinted my eyes in an attempt to make out the people in the distance, "There are a lot of people walking in and out, a few of them are in different clothing than the ones outside."
"Different how?" Deuce asked.
"Well… they look more… expensive, I think? I mean, they are wearing large coats. One of them even has this crazy hat that looks like a pirate hat with a rooster crown in the shape of… a cog for some reason."
"Really?"
"Yeah. Is that a thing with pirate captains?"
"That must be the captain, or at least one of the people in-charge of this operation…" She stated, "That must be where their command post be. The documents of the coup must be in there!"
"That's great and all, but that means nothing if we're still trapped in here." The masked man pointed out.
"I could break the door down!" Ace stated while cracking his knuckles.
"And give away our position!?" I cried out in shock, "That's a terrible idea!"
"Well, do you have a better idea?"
"Um…"
"Then it's settled!"
"No, it's not!" Luna cried as she walks right in front of him before he could get to the door, "Just brute forcing through thing isn't going to fly here. We need to think things through first!"
"What's there to think!?" He asked, "We run out, beat their asses, grab whatever we need, and get out! Easy-peasy!"
"We have no idea how many of them are out there." Deuce pointed out to him, "We could get overrun within moments, not to mention they are all armed to the teeth. You may be invulnerable to bullets and blades, but the rest of us aren't. We wouldn't stand a chance in a full-on assault."
"He's right." I stated as I landed back down, "We don't know anything about our enemies at all. Just rushing out there is reckless and suicidal."
"…Fine. But what are we going to do then?"
"First, we need a way to get out of here without arousing their suspicions-"
*CLICK*
The sound of the lock clicking caught me off guard before the door of the shed is pulled open.
"Trevor, is that you!? How many times do I have… to…" We all froze as a shirtless burly man in a white apron look at us with eyes wide, obviously not expecting our presence here. "Um… you're not Trevor."
"No. No, we're not." Deuce noted.
"Huh, I see…"
When he took a deep breath, Ace quickly got to him in a chokehold before he could even breathe out a word and drags him in the shed and closing the door behind him. After a quick scuffle here and there, with a little creativity by Luna, we manage to bound the pirate with a mix of some of my rope and her mantle as well as a whole lot of bananas being stuffed into his mouth in a form of a gag.
"His mouth sure can pack a lot of bananas." I stated in surprise.
"But we made quite a ruckus doing that…" Deuce noted, as the sounds of footsteps echoed behind the door, "This is bad…" He then tilts his head for a moment before snapping his fingers, "We could use this to our advantage."
"Huh?"
"Follow my lead."
The pirates on kitchen duty all crowd around the food shed, some wielding flintlock pistols or rifles while a few wielded stolen navy cutlasses, and one is…
"Why are you using a frying pan?" One of them asked the guy.
"The armourer got mad after I broke my fifth cutlass this week." He explains.
"Ah yeah, that make sense."
"Hush!" The one in front of the shed's door tells them, "Stop talking! They could hear us!"
"Relax, there's only one entrance." One of them tells him, "They have no place to run."
"Just, be vigilant, will you?" He snaps back as he raises his pistol, "On three. One, two–"
He kicks down the door, running in with pistol aimed to kill with his comrades fanning into the store with weapons ready. All they found was their head chef, bounded and gagged, squirming about in his tight binds while his screams are muffled by the gag of ripe bananas. None of his assailants are to be seen.
"Olie!" One of them ran up to him and proceeds to cut him free, "Are you okay?"
"You idiots!" He screamed at him, "Get out, quick! It's a trap!"
"Huh?"
His warning came far too late, as the door soon shuts behind them, along with the click of the lock, locking them inside the shed.
When I finish locking up the wooden door with a large iron padlock with the key we pilfered from that chef-looking pirate, the captive pirates already started banging on them hard. Thankfully, the banging isn't that loud to attract any attention but if they got close, that's a different story.
"Good thinking." Ace praised his first mate with a D-worthy grin, "Killing two birds with one stone."
"What can I say? I'm a great planner!" He replied with a thumbs-up.
It's a good thing the shed has little in terms of lighting, making hiding and going around those pirates a cinch! And with their attention solely on their bounded friend, it made it even easier to sneak past them and lock them up in the shed. We got out, and manages to keep our anonymity in the base.
"But people would start getting suspicious if they don't show up…" Luna grimaced at that fact, "We need to move fast. Rein, can you remember where that building is?"
"Yeah." I looked around before finding and pointing that building out, "Right there. It's quite far, but we might be able sneak inside without any trouble."
"Okay, you'll take the lead."
And such, we took to sneaking through the base as quietly and sneakily as we can. Hiding behind buildings whenever someone came too close, ducking between covers, we manage to get through the base unseen by any of the pirates as we made our way towards the command centre of this base.
When we reach the large wooden hut of a house, we hid under the window that is facing away from the port and is obscured enough to avoid anyone noticing us.
Luna took a peek into the room, before nodding with affirmation, "Yup, this is the command post." She tells us, "And I noticed a few papers on the table there. If there's any inflaming evidence against Reginold, I bet my money it's in there somewhere."
"Great!" Ace nodded, "Let's go get them, then!"
"Unfortunately, it's filled with a lot of people. We'll be spotted if we just barged in." She added, before blinking a little, "Huh, it's really in a shape of a cog. Is that a thing pirate captains do? Wear funny looking accessories for some unknown reason?"
I took a look at Ace, before turning to her and shrugging my shoulders, "Maybe."
"Wait, what does THAT mean?" The pirate captain huffed.
"Something we can all discuss later." Deuce tells him with a pat on his shoulder, "For now, we need a way in. Let's look around for an empty room to enter."
We made sure to stay under the window as we, as softly and quietly as possible, make our way around the hut to look into another window. This time, the window is a lot higher so I was the one to check it out, via awkwardly flapping my wings to slowly ascend upwards before taking a peek inside.
This room seems to function as their storeroom, if the rows of shelves along the walls are any clearer indicators. Luckily, no one seems to be inside the room at the moment, and the window while small, isn't too small for someone of Luna's stature to go through. Unfortunately, that can't be said about our two pirate companions.
When I pass down this information, Ace and Deuce understood and tell us enter through there, while they find another way in.
"Try not to get spotted, okay?" The masked man reminds us as Luna stepped on my shoulders to get through the window. I doubt I'll be able to carry her up to the window silently if that time with the Strider demonstrated my weakness in the strength department, which led to me being a human stepladder for her sake.
Thankfully, the skirt is long enough to avoid the infamous panty-shot in such situations. We do get a nice view of her shapely rear though… never going to get that image out of my head now…
At any case, we managed to get into the storeroom without making a sound. The storeroom is pretty dark, but bright enough for us to make out what was on the shelves.
Filed papers filled the wooden shelves with a few books and maps in them, some of them are stacked rather haphazardly between each other. I pull out a stack of them, finding several sea charts that were labelled with several map-like lingo of sorts. No idea what they meant, though.
"Any idea what these are?" I asked the princess as I show her the charts.
"Sea charts, obviously." She stated while she flips through them, before pausing for a moment, "…Of the capital city. They must have spent years drawing these much. How long has they been planning?"
"Any idea what's on these?"
"I'm not a cartographer, I'm afraid. I only know the location because it looks like the map around the capital."
Well, that is useless. For all we know, these might be the point of attack for the coup…
"But…"
That got my attention as Luna referred to one of the charts in her hands, "One of these seems to outlined an abandoned tunnel leading into the capital."
"A tunnel?"
"During the last years of the Hundred Year War, the rebellion army have dug a tunnel through the mountains right into the capital for a surprise attack." She explained, "But after the war, my grandfather has the tunnel collapsed and sealed off to prevent another similar attack pattern to happen to us as well. But such information is only known to the royal family with a few exceptions! No one should know about this!"
"My guess, that advisor of yours found out about it and decided to use that tunnel in a similar tactic." I theorized.
"This is bad…" She starts to shake and breath in small gasps. "The tunnel's entrance, or exit in this case, leads in the castle itself. If they use this to attack…No one could… they could easily…"
"We'll stop them." I place a hand on her shaking shoulder, "We will not let this coup to pass."
"…Right." Her shaking stopped as she pockets the chart into her skirt pocket, "Doesn't look like any of these would be any use against Reginold. We'll have to look elsewhere."
With that in mind, we slowly went to the door and slowly and silently pushes it open. From the small opening we pushed out, there lies several pirate-looking people standing and discussing around a large wooden table. On the large table itself is a map spread across it with mugs and plates placed on top of it, as well as a few stacks of documents among other miscellaneous items.
What stand out the most on it is the Den-Den Mushi sitting right there snoozing away. A large whitish snail connected to what looks like printer of some kind with the usual transceiver I've seen so many times before.
I was wondering how they got information down here. That Reginold guy must have been using that Den-Den Mushi to send information he gathered from the capital to this place. That printer must act like a fax machine of sorts to send all those maps over.
If there's anything discriminating towards that guy, it would be there. But before we can search for it, there's a small issue we have to deal with first.
"There's nowhere we can hide." Luna pointed out.
"Yeah, we'll get spotted once we enter that room."
Not to mention that the fact that one of them looks like the pirate captain of the group. A rather tall man with a dark brown goatee, wearing a grey overcoat with a green shirt underneath and a pair of reddish-brown loafers with dark leather boots that has bronze buckles, on his head is the same hat I noticed in the distance, a black tricorne with a cog-shaped accessory that made it look like a rooster's crown with the cog-themed jolly roger imprinted on it in white.
And all over him, in holsters and leather belts, are several flintlock pistols of various sizes with a couple of blunderbusses in the mix.
I may be bulletproof but I know Luna isn't, and our size difference is too wide for me to act as her shield. She'll be swiss-cheese once she got spotted!
"What do we do? Wait for them to leave?"
"Who knows how long that would take." The princess tells me, "And we are on a time limit. Longer we wait, the more likely for their coup to succeed."
"So… what then?"
"…" As I thought, she has no idea what to do either.
As I observe the room a bit more, one of the people talking to the pirate captain caught my eye. A young woman in at least her early twenties, if her hourglass figure mean anything, with long dark brown hair in braid that acts like a headband for some reason, wearing blue button shirt under a leather vest that has a golden insignia on the back in a shape of a three-leaf clover inside a shield with a pair of dark purple pants and high leather boots.
On her waist is a longsword in a leather sheathe with a bronze hilt shaped like a clover and a handle tied in black rope with a pommel the shape of a cross fashioned in steel.
This girl is different from the pirates we've seen in the base so far. In fact, she's not the only one. I spot a couple of men standing next to her in similar outfits, just without the vest and has more plain sabres instead of the longsword. If I remember right, the Latian Kingdom's insignia is that of a clover. These guys must be the actual coup force, and she must be the actual commander and leader of this little operation.
One of the pirates walked up to them with a small salute, "The first supply ship is ready for deployment, captain!"
"Excellent!" The pirate captain grins, "Tell the men to disembark on my arrival!"
"Aye-aye, captain!"
When the pirate walks off, the captain let out a small chuckle, "Looks like things are moving along smoothly, my good lady! Your little coup is going to be a great success!"
"Don't count our chickens before they hatch, Captain Tok." The woman tells him, "It wouldn't be a success until we take back the capital from those damn Britts."
"Tok…" Luna mutters out loud, "As in Gear Head Tok?"
"Know him?"
"I know OF him." She replied to my question, "Gear Head Tok is the nefarious pirate that has been wreaking havoc in our country's waters for the past couple of years, attacking our trade ships and being a damn nuisance. He is the reason my father is having most of our resources moved to developing our naval defences."
"And he is working with the coup." I pointed out, "He must be their supplier for smuggled weaponry."
"Talk about a party-pooper." He shakes his head at her response, "You got lighten up a little. All work and no play would make little miss Desiree a dull girl."
So, her name is Desiree…
She turns to him and gave a fierce glare with those sharp violet eyes of hers. He let out a small nervous chuckle before regaining his composure, "Besides, we have been planning this for years. Not to mention that our men has replaced more than half of the castle's guards now. They don't stand a chance at all."
"There's still the issue with our little loose end that Reginold has informed us about."
"Psh, the wee-little princess?" He chuckles, "There's nothing to worry about! She'll never find this base! It's literally in the middle of a rural island miles away from any forms of civilisation! It would take a miracle for her to find it!"
At that point, a random pirate burst into the room in a hurry. "We have intruders in the base, captain!"
"Intruders!?"
"You were saying?" Desiree mocked him with a raised eyebrow.
The pirate captain could only let out a growl at that response before turning to his underling, "How!?"
"We don't know! We just found Chef Olie locked in the food storehouse with all of the kitchen staff!"
"The supply runs." His partner-in-crime concluded for him, "They must have snuck in through the caravan."
"Damn it!" He shouted before turning to the other pirates in the room, "Send out an alert! Search the entire base for these intruders! And if one of them is Princess Luna, do not kill. Capture her and bring her to me!"
"Roger, captain!"
Just as the pirates prepare to leave, an explosion is heard coming from outside, "What was that!?" Tok cried out.
"Captain!" Another pirate bursts into the room, "We have a massive problem!"
"What is it!?"
"We found one of the intruders!" He tells him as another explosion is heard, "And he is setting fire to everything!"
"WHAT!?" He and the other pirates ran out of the room, followed by Desiree and her soldiers.
Setting fire to everything…? Only one person came to mind.
"What is Ace up to now!?" I muttered in exasperation, "What's the point of being sneaky if you burn down everything!?"
"But now the room is completely empty." Luna pointed out, "This is our chance to get the evidence!"
With that being said, we quickly sneak out of the storeroom and into the room. We then proceed to look through all the papers and files we can find. What we found are papers detailing information on the Britt Kingdom's defences, patrol patterns, profiles of people that we assumed are either bribed or replaced with their own men, and so much more.
Then, I found something that we can use.
"Luna, look at this!"
The princess quickly ran to me and took the papers I offered to her. It is a call log that details our buddy Reginold telling Desiree and Tok about the secret tunnel and its destination. With it are a few others that spoke in great detail on people that he manages to replace and bribe, along with the schedules of the trade ships coming in and out of Port Royalise. There's even one for the Silver Fang, even though we're just stopping for resupply.
"This is it!" Luna nodded happily, "Reginold wouldn't be able to talk his way out of this one!"
"Let's grab these can get out of here!"
I stuff all those papers into my bag before we quickly made our way towards the exit. With the way the pirate has been describing, Ace must have gone town against the pirates with all he got and drawn all their forces to him. That means that no one should be around the command centre, allowing us to leave without catching anyone's attention–
*CLICK*
I stare in shock as several rifle and pistols meet us at the exit. At least several dozens of pirates surrounded us with firearms drawn and aimed at us, with the two Latian soldiers having their sabres drawn behind them. Even the pirate captain has two of his pistols aimed at us, a toothy grin visible on his face.
"Well, well." Desiree walks up to us with her sword drawn and raised towards us, "Thought you can sneak past us, did you?"
"…Shit."
…
To be continued…
Yup! Cliffhanger right here! Can't have things go on that smoothly, can it? It would be against the One Piece formula, and against Murphy's Law.
Man, this arc is a blast to write! Didn't think I would write this long! But we're now at the midway point, yup, MIDWAY. This is a long arc for me, and I'm going to make it as epic as any One Piece arc deserve!
So yes, two more OCs added into my plate of one-off OCs! Gear Head Tok and Desiree. Oh, I have many plans for those two, especially Desiree.
On a side note, I have posted a new story on the website as well as SpaceBattles and Sufficient Velocity where I'll be posting a few 'Pilots' so to speak of a few stories I'm thinking of writing. It's a work in process and would not reflect on the final work but the core idea would still be there.
The first one I have posted is one on the The Rising of the Shield Hero, or Tate no Yuusha no Narigari for the weebs out there. I have quite a fun time writing it, so tell me what you think! If a lot of people like it, I might turn it into a story proper.
The next one would probably about Neptunia but I have come around to writing it yet.
With that, I thank you all for reading this!