SOARING FAR

Fugger hung through a porthole dispensing rapidly with what had only recently entered. Bellhound behind paid little respect to his captain, in hysterics at the pirate who couldn’t hold his liquor. Fugger spat, cursed and complained to the sea of its gulls and their incessant cries. Pulling his head back inside, he turned to face the insubordinate subordinate. Fugger poured another glass wordlessly.

“Can’t be serious. You planning another trip to the ‘hole?”

His captain was serious, asserted without comment--right down the hatch. His first mate watched incredulously before making himself another round as well. The two resumed their merriment for a time until Bellhound’s premonition came true, Fugger once more with his head jammed outward, Blackgill’s hat left knocked over the table. They had consumed a great variety of the stores the boat offered: a selection of cheeses, crackers, dried meats, even fruit. Fugger attempted to stress to his first mate the last’s particular importance, but his knowledge failed to impart. In any case it all came out in the end: fruit, dried meats, crackers, and cheese. Fugger watched the mess swirl beneath black rolling waves not quite appreciative of the glinting moonlight. He raised his head slightly to meet the horizon beyond, his thoughts once again having strayed to the meaning behind his mission--”SHORE”. He considered the positive possibilities it might bring. For the first time since treading wood on bare feet, Fugger appreciated the strange luck that placed him here.

A tentacle shot out from below and wrapped itself tight round Fugger’s neck without warning, hushing his gasp. It attempted to jerk him out from the window, managing his upper torso while Fugger’s boots pressed hard against the boat in resistance. He felt two more arms wrap around him, no doubt the ship’s navigator attempting a rescue. Fugger felt like corked wine. The tightening grew with a punishing grip, his head past red and straight to blue. He wrestled the flintlock pistol out from its holster, cocked it, aimed downward and blasted. The tentacle instantly loosened its grasp of Fugger, who fell backwards atop Bellhound. Rolling over to the side, Fugger fought for air, and the two of them meanwhile turned audience to a terrible, wretched moaning blasting out from the water below. Fugger shot a frenzied look at his first mate, struggling out:

“P... pow.. der an’... lead.”

Fugger first learned how to fire a pistol at thirteen, and he never stopped. He sported a strong base of knowledge regarding shooting, cleaning, greasing, loading, reloading, priming, fixing and firing some more. When Bellhound met his captain back topside with the supplies necessary to ready Fugger’s flintlock, he went to work faster than the color returned to his cheeks regardless of the antiquated weapon’s being. Bellhound, meanwhile, began an assault of questions--what happened, what’s going on, how do you know what you’re doing? Fugger shrugged the queries off and re-holstered his weapon. Looking then at his first mate, he suggested Bell arm himself.

“Am a navigator--not a fighter, Fugger.”

“Fight like a fighter or die as a... navigator,” the captain responded, embarrassed somewhat in his heroic delivery.

“Hell am I even fighting?”

Bellhound’s answer arrived in the form of a violent bursting of water that tipped the vessel to its side, a massive wave rising out from the ocean to reveal a thick fleshed, cone shaped beast decorated in dozens of eyes and armed with seemingly hundreds more tentacles rising out from the water in all directions encircling the ship. Fugger scrambled to his feet despite terror. Bellhound too eyed the beast with fear, uniquely from his captain, he realized. Drifting from docks to boats and back again in just the last year, Bellhound had not only witnessed the repeated warnings of salty old sailor tales but once himself had observed a similarly sharp pointed monster peak and drag whales down to depths unknown, a fishing trip having vanished from memory till the current crisis could unfold. As Bellhound watched powerful arms begin to grip the ship, he turned to his captain to warn of their impending fate. Fugger cursed, pulled the flintlock out and blasted another of the appendages. An unmuffled scream out from the waves inspired the captain to further action, drawing his saber out and dashing towards the next suction cupped target. Bellhound watched his impassioned leader attempt to resist a fate unresistable, he felt, the vessel groaning as its wood compressed. He dashed down below deck much to the dissatisfaction of his still fighting captain.

Seagulls scattered in all directions as the mast became host to coiling appendages. Fugger leapt onto its ladder and climbed fervently, blade between teeth, stabbing at octopus flesh when possible. He reached the top and sunk his saber deep within a tentacle and suddenly found himself soaring through the air. He wondered if he’d die. He questioned why he always had to die, why the figures came for him, why Blackgill wanted a ship he did little more than inhabit at the wrong time. Fugger felt the grip loosen on his blade and zipped through the air and into his pillowy flags plunging far, the sails resisting his form and bouncing Fugger back onto the deck pathetically. He did no more than lay there, reminded of his first days let loose onto the yard, beaten down easily by more seasoned occupants. He breathed hoarsely--little more than barely. Fugger wondered whether he’d wake up elsewhere or have ran his chances dry already.

Appendages began to close in on him. And although Fugger would not be able to witness the event for his face faced flat, a cannonball blasted out from below and straight through the cone shaped menace putting a hole in its brain. Tentacles clumsily retreated as the bored beast descended back down beneath the waves, never to attack whale nor ship again. The water filled with dye.

Fugger passed out.