by Brad C Baker
A sailor paused to curiously watch him. “Where you going with our rum, mate?”
“Ah, relax Toby, I have a plan to free us up from those tendrils. Now, what say you give us a hand?” Vlados replied with a grin.
“Sure, mate.” Tobias Fent decided the best way to figure out what was going on with the rum was to help his newest shipmate. Planting his feet, he shouldered up half the weight of the cask onto his hips. The two made the gunwale much quicker, then set the cask down.
While waiting for Crallick, Vlados took the time to glance over the side. The roiling waves had an eerie calming near the hull of the ship; Vlados was beginning to understand that the calmed water was where the bells of the jellyfish were acting as breakwaters, mollifying the rolling force of the ocean. Then he started. There, at the base of the tendrils, the water rippled away, then broke revealing his first view of what he assumed was one of the aquans. These… fish? ‘Well,’ Vlados thought to himself, ‘for the sake of argument, let’s just call them beings.’ These creatures, beings, had massive eyes, adapted to the gloom of the depths. Their sallow eyes had to be twice the size of his palm. Those eyes were offset to either side of the fishlike skull. Gills flanked either side of their necks. A lean, tapering trunk was clad with heavy but streamlined scales. Long and flexible legs seemed to act as a bifurcated tail; each foot providing half of the fin of that appendage. There was a dorsal fin that crested the spine of the beings. The aquans sported harnesses that held several spears, not tridents as the land-dwelling myths often said of sea-folk. Vlados thought he’d have preferred tridents. These spears seemed to have been fashioned from coral. They were savagely barbed and irregularly pointed in such a way to be sure to leave gaping, rending wounds in their victims. Their forearms ended in fin assemblies that held a membrane for swimming between very flexible fingers.
Damn it, where was Crallick? Vlados began a quick count of the aquans trying to ascend the side of the ship.
“So what’s the deal with the rum?” Toby’s question jarred Vlados from his reverie.
“Ahh, me boy. It’s like this,” Vlados began. “Ye alcohol should be nice ‘n nasty and toxic to our gelatinous friend there. Like leeches don’t fancy salt… you see?”
“Yeah, but why does it have to be the rum?” Toby pressed, feeling rather concerned about the fate of the crew’s rum.
“Well, I suppose we could break out the stores of the captain’s wine?” Vlados sarcastically mused.
“Never mind,” came the glum response.
Peering over the side again, Vlados exclaimed at the top of his lungs. “Borders! Five here!”
Crallick ran up with an armful of crockery vessels. “The ship’s chef is going to have it out with me after the fight, I suspect,” Crallick growled. “Here you go.”
“Thanks, no, just keep those fishy things off me back!” Vlados said, and got to work filling his soon-to-be arsenal of grenades.
“With pleasure,” Crallick smiled. With barely a thought, Crallick reached through the ethereal plane of luminescence to touch the spirit of his blade. He beckoned it to his hand, and with a sparkling of light, it materialized there.
Vlados hadn’t the time to remark on the phenomena. ‘Later,’ he thought to himself.
Cries of ‘boarders’ and numbers rang up from around the ship after Vlados’s alert. The fore-port called out six, while the fore-starboard called out five. The Stern-port cried out seven, and the stern-starboard another two. For the twenty soul crew, they would be hard pressed indeed.
As the first wave of boarders scaled the slimy tethers that held the ship fast, the ship’s company made ready to repel them. Those not already armed were running to the arms locker to retrieve crossbows and swords. The surgeon prepared her room for the casualties that would be certain to visit her.
There were only four sailors in the bow of the ship. One in the forecastle took sight with a short bow, and loosed an arrow over the side. It impaled itself to the fletching in the gill of an aquan who, with a gurgling noise, fell free, back into the ocean. First blood went to the crew of the Flamerunner.
The stern of the ship, meanwhile, had Mr. Tritts holding a rather small four-man skirmish line in an attempt to protect the sailor manning the helm. The other side of the ship had Raquel and Wanda, side by side, set to receive their fishy guests.
First blood may have been the Flamerunner’s, but the drop belonged securely to the aquans. Within the span of a heartbeat, fins were touching down on wood decks. With jagged coral-grown spears leading the way, seven aquans charged the three defending sailors. The archer in the forecastle cabin, who was trying his best to cover the sole sailor on the starboard defense, didn’t notice the two aquans who hadn’t stopped their ascent at the deck, but kept climbing to the roof of the cabin. Two spear thrusts were swiftly batted aside with lively parries of men, fresh and amped up to fight. The port defenders felt confident that they could hold their own. The poor mook on the starboard side likewise batted away two initial thrusts, though his movements were more harried, and fraught with worry.
The two sailors on the port bow delivered light cuts with their sabers to the aquans, who were wholly committed to winning the deckhead.
The archer took sight of an aquan flanking the solitary defender on the starboard bow and fired, mumbling “I got you mate” as he did so. The arrow sliced harmlessly off of the dense and very curved angle of the aquan’s skull. The defender fared no better; as it was all he could do to stave off the rain of thrusts that tracked in towards his body.
Along the port gunwale, one flopped over the rail, surprising Crallick, causing him to veer away from Vlados and Toby. Vlados, by sheer accident of fortune, was on the far side of the cask of rum that he was working feverishly to fill flasks with. Toby shrieked a shrill cry of surprise-laced terror when four aquans leapt over the rail, not feet from where he stood. His cry was horrific enough to shock the closest aquan into dropping its spear. The aquan just down from the startled invader was not so easily spooked and promptly ran his spear along Toby’s left side. The hooked and barbed coral nature of the savage weapons became readily apparent as a spray of blood spurted out from the force of the strike. Toby had the flesh flayed clean away from his left hip. He howled in pain.
His cries caught the attention of both Crallick and the other aquans in his immediate vicinity. Crallick cursed under his breath. He couldn’t be everywhere at once. But he had to back up Vlados. So, giving the solitary aquan a baleful glance goodbye, he turned and charged to try to save Toby. Toby tried to stab the aquan who had dropped his spear, hoping for some quick, gratifying revenge, but in his haste he slipped on the deck, now slick with his own blood. This caused him to wind up on his own arse, looking up at the impending doom of the aquan spears.
With an unintelligible war cry, Crallick leapt onto the stairs beside Toby that lead to the aftcastle. This did two things: one, it interposed himself between the aquans and their prey; two, it allowed him the advantage of elevation. Taking his greatsword, he launched a devastating blow at the aquan closest to Toby. There was a crunching sound as though a salt pillar had just been split in two. The greatsword sundered the aquan’s spear, along with the aquan’s forearm, cleaving them free from their former owner.
Higher up on the aft deck, two rapiers flashed in the daylight, foiling two attacks. Raquel turned her attacker aside with a flourish, embedding her rapier to the hilt in the liver of the boarder. He wouldn’t be long for this world, even if he somehow survived the battle, which Raquel was going to ensure he didn’t. With her free hand, she pulled free a pistol to level it at the one bearing down on Wanda.
Wanda, parrying a savage thrust, quickly prayed to her benevolent goddess, Flowwe, mistress of the waters of life, to take back that which was hers to give. Divine energy pulsed through the cleric’s spirit, channeling out through her fingers to envelop the charging aquan with a desiccating miasma that instantly leeched all of the water from the attacker’s body. The dried husk
fell to the deck in a pile of shimmering scales and lumpy bones.
Seeing that Wanda had things well in hand, Raquel pivoted the pistol back to the dying aquan, and then decided not to waste the shot.
On the aft port, Mr. Tritts had a spear sheer into the flesh on his right shoulder. His clavicle broke on a barb and sent him yowling with pain. Beside him, Mr. Shneed fared little better, catching a spearhead literally in his hand. While this saved it running him through the bowel, it ruined his right hand. A sailor in the aftcastle shot the head of the aquan threatening Mr. Tritts. Then he began to reload his pistol. Mr. Shneed yanked the spear free of the grip of the boarder, and spun it around with a growl. “Ye like to play in the coral, mate? Well, have at it then!” He thrust the newly acquired weapon back at the aquan with such ferocity that when the jagged head lodged in the aquan, and the body sagged back overboard, it caught Mr. Shneed so unawares that he was pulled along with the dead body over the side. They collided with the bell of the jellyfish, where tendrils of a poisonous nature quickly scavenged the free lunch from its surface.
Mr. Tritts barked a command through gritted teeth at the only other sailor by him. “Fall back and hold the line! We have to keep the helm.”
“Aye sir,” was the grim reply.
Back at the port bow, unbeknownst to the defenders, an aquan slipped down the cargo hatch to the next deck down. There he found a cask filled with fresh water. He knew that mammals couldn’t live with only salt water, so he decided to vandalise the cask. He burst the seams to reveal a very shocked and angry froggle.
Topside, the confidence in the fore-defending sailor rose as he expertly swatted away another spear thrust, not giving any ground. But then it came crashing down as his mate’s spine, along with the barbed spearhead that carried it, ruptured through the back of his mate. The nearly instant iron stench of arterial blood, along with the acrid urine and pungent fecal stench, exploded in the briny air around him. His morale was instantly soured. Craving vengeance, his cutlass found a chunk of flesh to take from the left thigh of his now wailing and limping opponent.
Back below deck, Hullaboo grabbed up his fancy steel spear and promptly jabbed it at the aquan who had destroyed his sanctuary. The aquan contemptuously caught the thrust and pinned the spear against the deck with its own, then he glared at the froggle. ‘Fine then,’ Hullaboo thought. ‘I’ll use your spear.’ With a cat-blink fast reflex, his tongue lashed out to seize in its adhesive grasp, the aquan’s spear. Thinking it didn’t taste right was an afterthought, as he launched it into the astonished aquan. Then, with his foe dispatched and his shiny spear free, Hullaboo uttered a mighty “Croak!!” and leapt up through the cargo hatch to land on the aft deck.
The starboard side of the foredeck saw the sole defender surrounded by four aquans, his back pressed against the rail towards the main deck. Four spears frenetically thrusted at him. His hands were a blur; desperation drove him. Parry one, Parry two, and fumble with other hand for pistol. Parry three, and draw pistol. Too slow! Burning pain. Blurring sight. A cough. Taste of blood. Hard to breathe. Whistling around the frothing wound on the left side of his chest, where a good four inches of spear spitted him like a roast.
It was hard to draw a bead when firing into melee. That’s why he never heard the aquan behind him on the deck. It was the rending of his right arm as he was drawing the bowstring taut that loosened the arrow, through no will of his own. Pain flooded over him. He saw with feeble relief that his arrow had found its mark in an aquan’s kidney. In defiance more than anything, he spun around with his bow still in his left hand to drive it into the gill of the yammering aquan. The aquan flexed the gill covering closed, but still lost a chunk of flesh and heard a crunch of cartilage.
The sole defender managed to fire a shot into the belly of the aquan wearing his mate’s fletching. His sword too busy to do anything but parry, he wanly smiled relief as blood loss gave him a comforting feeling of woozy bliss at seeing one less enemy at his last stand.
At the starboard main deck, the aquan that Crallick had ignored noticed the dwarf working furiously on something involving a keg. He figured it had to be stopped. With a silent charge, his long loping strides carried him on well-flippered feet to the quarry with great speed. There came his thrust. Right on the mark! But, with the pitch and roll of the ship, even dulled as it was on its jellyfish bed, the dwarf rolled forward through blind luck and grunted as the spear only seriously bruised his back as it caught on his leather jack. Dropping his work, Vlados whipped out his hammer and turned to meet the offender, knots beginning to form in his shoulder where the armor had saved him. “What buggery is this?” he roared.
Before Toby could make his feet, the unarmed aquan leapt upon him, leathery-slick fingers grabbing for his neck. Little hook-like nails embedded in his neck and a viselike pressure mounted in his windpipe, causing him to gasp then wheeze. His sight began to swim. Snot drooled from his nose.
A vicious thrust of a spear lanced into Crallick’s side. Too bad for the attacker that Crallick never paid attention to the warnings against wearing metal armor on ships. The coral head shattered against his ringmail. Shards were still driven into his side, and he grunted as two of his lower left ribs cracked their displeasure.
Toby flailed about, desperately trying to hang onto consciousness. His battering hands uselessly fluttered against his murderer’s scaled hide.
Crallick caught his breath, then uttered a brief incantation. The planks of the deck and the rails suddenly erupted in life, growing woody vines that snaked and coiled around the four aquans in front of him. He then cleaved his sword towards the one directly in his path. As it tried in vain to pull free of the vines, it never noticed the serrated sword split the air before splitting its gills, trachea, jugulars, carotids, and finally, it’s spinal column. The vines held the macabre piece upright, and the head balanced on the body, venal blood pouring down the sides of the cadaver while arterial blood spurted crimson out of its mouth in a sick parody of a garden fountain.
Raquel deftly riposted a clumsy thrust of a spear before, to her horror, she felt her grip on her rapier pull free, caught in the barbs of the spear. The aquan flicked his spearhead sideways, launching the blade off the end of the ship.
“You bloody cuss!” she exclaimed. Then she fired. The shot punctured a third eye into the aquan’s face. Its skull never ruptured. However, its eyes did a rather erratic dance before the whole body sagged limply to the deck. “That was my favorite blade, you sodding panty waste!” She began to kick the inanimate corpse with a fury.
Wanda jumped with a fright. She wasn’t used to hearing such loud noises in such proximity. That momentary lapse in concentration cost her. She felt the tip of a spear drag along her lower thigh. It opened up both her breeches and her flesh with a searing hot pain. She clutched the weeping wound with a yelp. Then she besought Flowwe to salve her pain. With a wash of relief running over her as a waterfall, she then flashed her blade towards her assailant. It struck home, but not severely. She barely pinked the scaly hide.
The sailor on the aftcastle heard the creak of the longboat and knew he was in trouble. It took every bit of discipline he could muster to continue loading his pistol. Fortune smiled upon him, and he rolled away in time to see a spear lance the cabin roof where he had been mere moments before. He fired in retaliation. The force of the shot caught the aquan full on in the chest, shattering its sternal plate into flechettes that made short work of the organs behind it, and blew the thing clean off the roof to further feed the jellyfish.
Mr. Tritts took another savage blow that tore a chunk of flesh out of his calf. His mate let out a shortened scream. A spear had plowed through both lungs, and when it passed the aorta, it ruptured it, causing an eruption of blood to vomit forth. The lad had only been seventeen. Mr. Tritts abandoned his reason, dropping his weapon in favour of his claws and teeth. He leapt upon his foe. Clutching its shoulders with hooked claws, he then began furiously kicking, his lower claws rending fle
sh and slewing out loops of intestines. With a feral growl, he looked up from his victim to its adjacent ally. He leapt again.
Below decks, the quartermaster finished doling out the weapons and made ready to lead the last four sailors out with him. Three more had gone before, to render aid as quickly as they could. The surgeon glanced about nervously. “Chessintra, help me. I may need more beds,” she said as she listened to the screams of terror and pain from topside.
Back topside, the port bow of the ship continued a stalwart, pitched battle, with one sailor desperately holding off a brace of aquans. One sliced a ribbon of molten pain on his right thigh, while he used his cutlass to direct the point of the other spear into the shoulder of the one who had just injured him. He then finished the job by lopping off the rapidly weakening aquan’s right arm. Rapid blood loss did the rest. As the body toppled unconscious over the rail to feed the jellyfish, the sailor backed up to give himself a little breathing room. He almost backed into the looming Hullaboo.
Hullaboo croaked out a loud “C’mere!” then flayed his tongue out and yanked the aquan off his feet with such force that he was able to drag him a good ten feet to rest at his feet. He jabbed his spear down at the struggling aquan. The frustrating thing had no interest in dying that day and managed to yank to the side, causing the froggle to narrowly miss his own tongue. He missed the aquan altogether. He narrowed his eyes in threatening concern.
Behind them, on the forecastle roof, things went from bad to worse for the gallant archer. One rammed his spear at him, but only managed to lock him up with his bow, keeping the tip at bay. The archer growled his defiance. The aquan stared back silently with gaping eyes. They were so alien, it was impossible to tell if there was malice or any emotion at all in them. The archer felt himself being turned in a vital dance for leverage. Then after turning almost a full half circle, an electrical jolt of pain blossomed in his lower back, then a massive pressure in his stomach. Moisture inside his pants. Then nothing below his waist. The archer’s eyes became confused. He watched the fish-face in front of him change colour, from blue and orange to scarlet. He was vomiting. He was no more.