Writing Prompt: [September 6th, 2017]

[Vanitypirate]

Foreword:
This will be where you can write a response to a prompt, and read what others have written.
A new prompt will be posted every Wednesday, and the former prompt will be locked and archived.

Please refrain from writing responses that are gratuitously nsfw. Mods reserve the right to remove posts that break the rules to their discretion.

Happy typing!

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This Wednesday's prompt:

“There are three things all wise men fear: the sea in storm, a night with no moon, and the anger of a gentle man.”

[Kidney]

 I don't exactly know how long it is preferred to be, but here is my short and sweet little story.

 



There are three things all wise men fear: the sea in storm, a night with no moon, and the anger of a gentle man







A breath. A rising and a falling, the safety of all brought on by the pleasant sanctuary of the quiet breath. It was perhaps this, that so many people feared would not arrive tonight, for, on the coast of this village, the entire world seemed to drown in the thunder. To catch fire in the lightning, and to be snuffed out by the absence of the sky’s precious moonlight. The only light that caught hold of itself in this suffocating, writhing, scrabbling, carnivorous darkness was the minute candlelight. It was held in the gigantic hands of a man with no wife, but a man with many children, four, to be exact. He was literate, tall, wide and his bald, shining forehead was large enough to wash dishes upon. The two dents in his head he called dimples were very pronounced, and in this darkness, he entertained his children, their little digits passing into these craters. They giggled and laughed, their fingers disappearing, and their faces in obnoxious anticipation to feel his teeth or his gums. But they never did, only his soft, hairless face, which he held his hands to over theirs. He warmed them, for this night was cold, and with the rain and the wind brought the chill from the north.

His daughters, all but one of them were, eventually found sleep at the behest of their father. But soon, after he had quietly sat in his chair, watching the rain hit his plain windows, he felt their little bodies squirm underneath it, poking as his ankles and chubby calves. He rose with a jolt, chuckling like an earthquake as he grabbed them by the backs of their dresses and brought them back to bed. He smiled, his eyes welling as he realized it had worked, he had calmed them. It was hard to do these days, chores needed doing, and money had to be made.

It was this that kept him away from his boy and girls, and it was what made this desperate attempt at calming them so important to him. And at the thought of their playful baying drowning out the thunder in his little cottage, it made him cry as they finally stayed in bed for now. He smiled as the tears ran down his cheeks, and he wiped them away as he stared out the window again, and was reminded what night this was. The darkness outside haunted everything in sight, a shadow placed over the world, and its tendrils snuffed out everything. He couldn’t see anything, not even his porch from the stain glass window on his door. He shook his head, his hunched shoulders nearly quivering as he absentmindedly opened his cellar, and pulled forth a small but tender piece of meat. He placed it on some cheesecloth and was about to begin cutting it into cubes when he heard something. It was light, gracing the back of his skull, like a whisper, like a touch.

It was the most amazing thing he ever tasted, the crimson juices flowing down his chin, the taste melting over his tongue and lips. He tore into it hungrily, grunts escaping him as he tore deeper and deeper. It was gone now, but he didn’t stop. It hurt, but the pain was decadent as he clamped his jaw over cheesecloth, around his finger. But this pain, it stopped him, and he yelled, throwing his head back as he stood up from his spot on the ground.

He screamed, and he cried, he looked around at himself, at the various pieces of meat around him. The cloth wrappings stained and torn, the hook struck through a hunk of meat, hanging by a rope from the ceiling. He looked around, screaming now, he ran forward, tripping over the corner of the cellar, falling. The smashing sound of broken cartilage sounded as he scooped himself off the ground and ran up the stairs. He charged towards the door, bursting through, his children huddled together. He could barely see, for he had no candle. But he heard it, the crunching, the screams gargled over by blood and gristle tore from the body. Benny looked and watched. A single girl now hunched over another, her skin white as a ghoul, her veins bulging, black as the darkness around her. From her face, extended two rays, lighting up the crime she was committing. Ela ate, her belly already extended out to a bulge but even then she pushed more of the liver down her black throat. She coughed, and gagged, and gurgled. She did not chew, her jaw snapped in half, her mouth opened wide as she pushed the organ deep down her esophagus. It bulged at her throat, not passing as she turned towards her father, and she watched as his hands clutched at her throat, pushing the sweet liver down her gullet as he strangled her, his gigantic, loving hands squeezing her. Her head began to swell, the pressure on her neck increasing, building as she looked up. Into her father’s big, blue eyes, before she reached, and plucked one from his head.

[azmoham]

Billy Bones leaned in close to the old man, who stank of the sea and blood and old coin spent on drink and pleasure. The man had proposed a story, one to hold off the acrid weather which stormed around the leaky little tavern that squatted desolately on the cliffs of the Dover strait. The place was as waterlogged and uncomfortable as the holds of the ship from where it drew most of its customers, and half as warm in all but the most inviting of weather, which in this parts meant it’d stopped raining for all of ten minutes. A thick mist clung to the whole landscape surrounding the tiny town and its sole dingy little bar, as if G0d was trying to cover up some stain he’d allowed to harden to the carpet of the world. It was by all accounts one of the least welcoming places Billy had ever docked, and he’d docked in active war-zones before. As was to be expected, the people were as sodden, weary and cold as their home, and typically went about their days with the sort of solemn concentration typically reserved for funerals. As such it had been something of a surprise when the ancient man had raised his voice to inquire if anyone wanted to hear an old sailing story. Of course, Billy being rather bored and wishing for any distraction from his dismal surroundings, accepted eagerly along with a few other shipmates. With aching slowness the man had taken his seat around a large table around which the others arrayed themselves, carrying steins of flat beer and bowls of cold stew that was more chicken bones and gristle than anything else.
“This,”
The man began, in a voice as creaky as old timber.
“Is as true a story as any you’ll hear in the whole wide world. Just remember that.”
He made eye contact with everyone at the table, as if assuring they’d believe whatever came next. Finally, after a long tense minute the man cleared his throat and tapped his feet on the floor, humming thoughtfully as if pondering how to begin.
“They call him, The Captain.”
His pale grey-blue eyes scanned the men before him, his stolid gaze causing a great uneasiness to well up in whoever it was fixed upon.
“They say, he was a great sailor, maybe the greatest. He had a fine ship of oak, painted in gold and shining like the sun on a coin.”
He paused for a moment.
“For many a year he sailed, winning fame and fortune, taking queens for his concubines kings his footmen. The wind danced in his sails and never was he becalmed.”
Eyes widened at these claims, murmur of disbelief shifted across the table but the old man silenced them with a look.
“But, he was arrogant in his success, offering not the proper praise to the lord, and so he was struck down. His ship was sundered at sea, ripped apart by a sea with waves a hundred feet tall that roared liked beasts. He was pulled into the sea by the very waves that one served him, some claim it was the Devil come to take his claim on the man’s soul, after all how else could he have such miraculous fortune?”
The old man allowed the question to sit for a second, like a moldy slab of meat plopped without introduction onto the table, and as such the sailors dared not answer.
“But he did not stay down in the tide, he rose again. Hungry as ever. In fact, his hunger grew a hundredfold, till it consumed him like a fat man at a feast. He was as ugly in death as he had been handsome in life, his skin moldered and green, eyes and the tips of his fingers been eated away by fishes. His guts hung from his belly, and his skin was peeled around his legs where the sharks had gnawed at him. His clothing was tattered and he never grew dry no matter how much time he spent above the waves.”
The man’s lurid descriptions unnerved the sailors, who cringed away from the old storyteller, noses wrinkling in disgust. The old man seemed pleased by this, given his malignant smirk as he continued.
“He haunted the seven seas, ever searching for his lost fortune that’d been scattered by the waves. Anyone he found, he killed, gutted them from neck to cock, skinning them and adding them to his coat. His bones, he took them and fashioned them into a ship.”
The strange old man watched as his audience traded looks, some incredulous and some uneasy.
“What’s it called then? The ship?”
Billy asked, a feigned nonchalance in his voice as he peered into the murky depths of his drink, it almost looked like a patch of seawater…
“The ship? It has no name, none have ever asked The Captain. Nor would he tell them.”
The man replied.
“Why? Is his tongue all rotted out or something?”
Another man asked, clearly not as off-put as some of the others.
“No, his tongue is fine. Fresh and pink in fact, it flaps around his rotting mouth, forever wallowing in the taste of decay. None know why his tongue stayed the same and the rest of him rotted, most blame some sorcery.”
The storyteller shrugged.
“But that’s not what I’m here to tell you, I’m going to tell you about when I met him.”
The table almost unanimously shot the storyteller a look of utter skepticism which he returned with a grim frown.
“It’s true. Every word I tell you now.”
He swore, crossing his heart. Few enough seemed satisfied with the answer but if the old man noticed, he didn't show it as he continued on with the story.
“I was but a young lad, about your age”
He pointed to Billy
“Working on a schooner that was heading across the sea towards Spain to collect spices to sell back here. We’d been at sea for nearly two weeks, the men grew weary of the tides, myself included. One night, when the fog was thick and cold, we were sitting on the deck, five of us including the capt Charles, playing a game of Bones. When all of the sudden, the mist cleared.”
Billy rose an eyebrow.
“Cleared, don’t ghosts make the mist thick?”
He asked, a few men chuckled.
“The Captain ain't no ghost, he’s as solid as you or me.”
Was the grim reply. When Billy failed to retort, the old man cleared his throat and kept speaking, fingers now worrying at a rope he wore around his neck.
“But the mist cleared up, soon you could see clear across to the horizon, and on that horizon you could see a ship. White, and pale, and moving faster than anyone could believe. With every blink of the eye, the thing seemed to gain ground, closer and closer it came. Charles must've known what was coming, because he rushed us below deck. He wasn’t no coward or taken to wishy-washy superstition, something was happening. We hurried below deck and capt Charles locked the door above us. A few men asked what was happening, most were sleeping by then.”
His voice grew as distant as his gaze as he spoke.
“Charles said something to the first mate, Willy, but whatever it was, it spooked him. They argued a little but apparently Willy lost because he stomped off and began waking the crew. Soon enough all of us was sitting there in the dark, huddled around the captain. He didn't say nothing about The Captain nor his ship, just that everyone had to stay quiet down here and if they didn't, he’d gut them himself. Well, that got us to shut up, so we sat down and we waited. We waited for what felt like a year, before, very quietly, we heard it. A little ‘thump’, he’d reached us. Charles looked scared as he sat on the steps to the top deck, clutching his rosary. He knew whatever was up there. For a while there was silence and then we heard Him, heard his steps. He wasn't loud, but he didn't need to be with how silent we all was. He walked real funny, with a sort of...limp. Must be the chunk missing from his leg.”
The old man smiled, nobody smiled back, not even those who’d been joking earlier.
“It sounded like this:”
Suddenly, the old man grabbed a nearby glass and slammed it onto the table, his audience jumped. The old man then dragged the glass along the table before picking it up and slamming it back down and dragging it back. He did this a few times, before stopping.
“Just like that, ‘thump! Pshshshshshsh, thump! Pshshshshshsh, thump!’ Over and over, up and down the deck. We could hear him moving up there, above us, we thought he was looking for us, we thought we were safe.”
The man’s tone implied both statements were gravely erroneous.
“But we wasn't, we never were, soon as he saw that ship, we was doomed.”
He muttered, almost to himself.
“For hours, he paced, up and down, up and down ‘thump! Pshshshshshsh, thump! Pshshshshshsh, thump! ‘thump! Pshshshshshsh, thump! Pshshshshshsh, thump!’ we listened and we barely breathed down there. We knew there was something wrong, we could feel it in the air, smell it. The air was thick with rot, and it got quiet, real quiet, like the whole world was holding its breath.”
The table was near silent, all that could be heard was the men’s breathing, the shifting in their seats.
“The whole time, the captain was sitting there, holding his rosary, praying harder than any man I’d ever seen. Hour after hour, we sat in the hold, listening to the footsteps. It felt like days, weeks almost, it was agonizing. Apparently, old Charlie couldn't handle it. The capt stood up, and rushed up the stairs, screaming. He screamed like he was on fire, like his innards were melting, like he was being stabbed with a thousand needles, he screamed so loud and so long I swore I’d go deaf from the sound of it. So loud, we couldn't hear the footsteps. We listened, Charlie running up the stairs and slamming open the door to the deck. We could hear him, up there, stomping around. ‘Thump thump thump thump thump thump!’”
The old man slammed the cup on the table repeatedly to emphasize the effect.
“Until he stopped, and then...the waves came back. It was the first thing we noticed, the sounds, they all came back, first the sea and then the birds and then the old ship. After who knows how long of waiting, we went back up on board, the whole crew. There was nothing there but a pair of the captain’s boot. They were fine leather, about my size. Reasoning that a dead man didn't need his boots, I took them. When I went to put them on, I found...this”
He pulled out whatever was attached to the ends of the rope, it was a small golden coin, as shiny and new as any in the world. The old man stared at it, how the light danced off the coin’s fine polished surface.
“I think, this is what The Captain wanted.”
Suddenly, all the men noticed how quiet it had gotten, like the whole world holding its breath. Faintly, Billy thought he could hear someone coming up the hill, someone with a limp...

[Outisakanobody]

Even the familiar can be dangerous. A storm at sea was no strange sight, but it was rarely a cause for joy. Gerard Chevalier frowned at the horizon, but swept it away quickly. There were new hands on the ship. He didn't want them getting spooked. He was in charge of the ship's marines. He shouldn't be getting worked up over some clouds. And a sky turning from blue to purple like a fresh bruise.

Gerard shakes his head and adjusts his tricorn hat. He was expected to be presentable at all times. All his marines were. Some took their dress more seriously than others. Like...

"Sylvia. You never tire of sleeping, do you?" he asks his companion, lounging on a chair nearby. She had her own hat pulled down over here eyes and the rest of her immaculate uniform unruffled despite her slouched posture. Gerard never understood why she insisted on always wearing her dress blues, but she was a strange one in many ways.

"I'll take that as a rhetorical question, lieutenant." Sylvia "Daring" Darrow replies, sounding sleepy and disinterested. Gerard shook his head at his subordinate and leaned over the nearby railing, gazing again at the encroaching clouds. He thought he saw a purple flash, and a distant boom.

"You'll likely want to go below deck soon. I imagine the rain will be coming soon." the officer warns. "Captain Caravaggio may also want to meet with us later on as well, so stay awake." he added, though it was largely unneeded. Mister Cortez, the ship's bosun, would likely be the one to gather the other important members of the crew for any gathering. Gerard got no reply and sighed. He was not looking forward to tonight.

---

A storm could be a blessing or a curse. It was dangerous, but a bad one could be a great way of sneaking up on another ship unawares. Perfect strategy for a pirate ship. But tonight would not be a good night for hunting. Dane Fury could tell as much, looking at the rough waves and feeling the whipping wind against his face and exposed chest.

"She'll be a rough one, alright. Rough as I've seen for some time." he comments to himself. Hidden away in a little nook, Dane was very busy avoiding work, so he had little else to do but observe the weather and how it was turning south. Running a hand through his shaggy, dirty blonde hair, Dane blew out a sigh. Sleeping would be a rough, messy affair. Dane would have to make sure his meager stash of belongings was secured, lest they start rolling about and be grabbed up by the grubby hands of his shipmates. Nasty, surly bunch such as they were. They would be especial rowdy tonight, as the ships harsh rolling and rocking would prevent their nightly games of cards and dice, no doubt. Fights were sure to break out, and Dane looked forward to that, at least. Some entertainment would be better than none, and he might get to settle a score or two in the shuffle.

"Maybe the night won't be so bad. Storms at sea: a blessing and a curse." he says with a smirk before taking a swig from his bottle of pilfered grog.