[center][img] http://i.imgur.com/PXheJ60.png [/img][/center]

Everything flushed like a wave. The emotions and tears crashed against the shores of Emilio’s mind-beach, destroying any would be protection made from the sandy foundations. It crashed inward, and then outward. As the sudden, and cacophonous, wave receded from the dampened wood of the hull, back toward the sea below, the clouded assault against Emilio’s senses ceased. In his crouched position he rose ever slightly to straighten his back. The layers of colorful cloth, now mostly dampened in vibrancy from the relentless exposure to saltwater, twisted and creased as he moved. The room was eerily quiet for a long while. Emilio breathed purposefully, turned his head ever slightly to the right.
 
The boy behind him was young, though fit. He was handsome, though ambiguous. His voice held in it the shakiness of a second or third tongue, but it was more confident than expected. Emilio hadn’t heard him enter, of that he was worried. He’d lost himself in the corpse of the young man who’d sacrificed his life for the mission. Emilio turned around more, the tears visibly dried against his dirty skin. The boy looked familiar, but Emilio couldn’t produce a name or anything else which was relevant for that matter. A part of him recoiled on the inside and he felt like he might cry again. He staved it off but couldn’t help consider the meaning of the event. He realized now, in the sight of both this living boy and the dead, that he did not only weep for Pablo. He wept because he could see into the future, because he already knew the fate of so many others. Pablo was only the beginning, and this boy before him was a testament to that. Emilio recovered the few words he could hear from when the boy spoke, which he realized now had awoken him from his subconscious slumber.
 
He chewed on the name for as long as he could: Pablo, Pablo, Pablo, Pablo, Pablo, Pablo. He finally couldn’t say it. “He was a very brave young man.” Was what he settled on. Suddenly imbued with a seemingly unnatural energy, Emilio duck-walked his way over to the feet, wrapped loosely in hammock twine. “Help me carry him outside. He deserves a seaman’s burial, at the very least.” Emilio waited until the boy was grabbing at the shoulders and invisibly counted toward the lift. The body was lifted easily, and hung between them on the hammock.
 
“Hold the door open with your feet, if you will.” Emilio said motioning toward the door. They began moving gingerly through the crumbling exit. The door slammed behind them as they exited since it’d been torn off of it’s primary hinges during the fight. Though the noise drew everyone’s attention, the body kept it. Emilio directed the trio over to the edge of the ship, near where a girl was emptying the contents of her stomach. As he did he asked the living boy a question.
 
“What’s your name, lad?” He asked quickly and quietly. 

"Luke." The boy spoke pointed and distant, Luke took a second to adjust his grip. He could see in the eyes of the captain as they held the hammock by the side of the ship. "He was brave, if he decided to come on this ship. I am sorry for your loss, captain. May we work to keep everyone else from the same fate."

The early sun rays danced across the azure orbs of Luke’s eyes, like pearls in the deep. The light settled somewhere in the center as the duo placed the frail and limp body against the bannister. 

“No, Luke,” Emilio responded despondently, “I’m sorry.” The group Emilio had expected was now above deck, mulling around or working on repairs. Epu sat ready at the bow as he saw the coming moments, and all they could entail. 

Luke stood tall as he looked upon the body, folded his arms and waited. He wondered what the captain had in mind. 

Emilio grasped the rough hewn bottom portion of the port side jacob’s ladder with his left hand, hammock twine in the other. He pulled himself up onto the bannister and faced the crowd. The ship rocked beneath his feet with the tumbling waves. “Ho, all! Listen closely.” Emilio took a second look at Luke, briefly eyed the sick girl near them, saw Alana at the tip of the bow, with Epu not far away. A second glance revealed the gentleman who’d saved Leonard’s life before, the young woman Emilio had flirted with at the festivities, and the gamut of sailors and officers. He knew this is what he needed to do. For his sake, and that of those around him. 

“We are headed to Morocco, but not only for aide, of which there is some waiting. The events for which this very ship is named, that which wretched you from your homes, I must say it has been a bountiful blessing for me. I would have been turning on the crooked man right now were it not for the Dragon which burnt your peaceful village to the ground. The cinders of your loved ones and your homes made way for my release. It is a terrible burden which I’ve held for so long here, one which perhaps no one deserves. I was not marked by God, and neither were you. We are merely pieces on the chessboard, today and forever it shall remain this way. I am sorry for having deceived you, and I am sorry that your sacrifice afforded me such a luxury as life today. But that luxury is not a promised one. 

My mission was to go beyond Marrakech and into the Atlas mountains. To find clues which would lead me to this Dragon in order to strike it down. I don’t know how I expect to do this, but so it is, and so it shall be. I shudder to think that any more of you would die without this precious knowledge. If you can survive in spite of it, however, perhaps Sintra may yet have a hope. All you need to do, with the help of my esteemed friend Epunamun, is reach Marrakech, with the ship intact, and return to Sintra with the gold and resources. My actions beyond that will decide whether Sintra will be able to survive its own reconstruction. But that is my burden to bear, and none of yours. Verily, I couldn’t ask any of you to risk your lives any more than you already have by stepping foot on this vessel.”

Luke's eyes widened and he couldn't help but feel a tinge of fear and excitement as the thought of a dragon washed over him. He couldn't believe what he had heard. He had a suspicion that this mission was more than just for aide. 

“This was Pablo. And in some ways it’s all that’s left of him. He was killed by what is known as a Harbinger. We should hope he did not die in vain. ” Emilio solemnly lowered his head and then peered out to the horizon. 

[i]“God grant that I may live to fish, 
until my dying day, 
And when it comes to my last cast, 
I then most humbly pray, 
When in the Lord's safe landing net, 
I'm peacefully asleep, 
That in his mercy I be judged, 
As big enough to keep.”[/i] Emilio quoted in English. 

It was a quiet, simpering affair for him as he remembered Leonard’s broken face in the deck below. Leo had taught him that prayer, and it felt particularly relevant now. “And so I commit his body to the eternal sea. Let go, boy.” As Luke released his grasp Emilio flicked the hammock twine slightly and pulled the top of the hammock outward, spinning with his momentum on the jacob’s ladder as he did. The sheeted mass furled in the wind as it plummeted from the ship and into the ocean. The body smacked against the surface and floated for a while before tilting over and slowly decending. It was made slightly more awkward by the lack of a weight. Eventually the ship simply passed the corpse by on it’s lowest speed. 

Emilio turned back to the group and eyed everyone therein. “This Harbinger is a being of spiritual and corporeal energy, if my source is to be believed. And if that same source is to be believed,” Alana stepped up through the growing crowd of incredulous faces, “that isn’t the only risk we face on our way to Morocco. The dandy Ceasar Luna has damned us by reporting our existence to a local band of pirates. I’ve dealt closely with the likes of these before, and I know that they will find us on the open ocean, there is no doubting that. You can hang Luna by his cockles once you arrive safely back at the Sintra port. All we can do is be prepared, and outwit our attackers.

“Pirates are generally a bloodthirsty but lazy bunch, willing to pillage and rape; willing to steal something you’d spent your entire life building up to…” Emilio stopped when he realized that he was referring to his past. A chill crept across his shoulders and he wondered about the future, about what familiar faces he may yet see again. “In order to combat them we need the advantage of surprise, something we may very well have.” At that Emilio gestured to Alana in the group and she stepped forth. She spoke only to him. 

“We have roughly a quarter of a day. Some time around sunset. They will be to our east. We’ll have the perfect advantage, and I may yet help more.” She said with a smile. As she finished she looked over at Luke, winked playfully. She stared out at the horizon and followed the ripples of the water as Pablo’s corpse drifted down, down, down. 

“We have until sunset, and I have a plan.” Emilio dropped from the bannister and walked into the crowd, then toward the wheel. The Helmsman, a twenty-something year old Sintra native, followed instinctually behind. “I want every scrap of the sails up and blowing. Let’s make this bitch move for once!” Emilio hollered with a renewed energy. The sailors went to work. Those who didn’t received a tongue lashing from Epu as he made his rounds and finally ended up with the captain, the helmsman, and the navigator. 

“Epu, my friend, our luck may have changed yet.” Emilio said as he looked over the map and drew on it voraciously. 

Epu looked over, concerned, his brow slightly furrowed. He glanced over at the casual demeanor of Alana and felt something inside of him turn. “Perhaps it has.” he opined silently, “Perhaps it has.”

[hider= Credits] TNY & [@KingKryent][/hider]