[color=9e0b0f][h3][u]Alastair Kenelm – The Burned Bitch[/u][/h3][/color]
Alastair spent the early half of the evening laid in one of the gun deck’s many hammocks, trying to catch up on missed sleep. He found it somewhat soothing as he was gently rocked by the ocean waves, with the light smell of sea salt lingering on the breeze to remind him of a place he once called home. Were it not for the loud thundering of footsteps overhead and the chorus of drunken slurs he would have dozed off long before. [i]“It’s only the first night, it won’t be like this every night.”[/i] he quietly assured himself. He went to close his eyes once again but they caught sight of a sudden movement. A shadow fell past the window to his right and caused him to sit upright. [i]‘Man overboard?’[/i] he wondered. He sat still for several minutes whilst staring at the windows, waiting for any further sights. He even tried using his Raven’s Eye, but could not see anything immediately suspicious. He knew it was probably nothing, but experience told him that it would be better to stay up just in case. So then, with an audible sigh, he prepared himself to get up. Though he was agile for his age he felt uneasy climbing in and out of the hammock, and was thus forced to reach for the nearby beam to ready himself. With the rough wooden surface proving some support he carefully and slowly tried to exit the hammock but, much to the amusement of a couple of young girls, failed spectacularly.

[b][i]THOOOOMP![/i][/b]

Alastair fell like a dead weight, landing on his side with absolutely no grace. He winced as he felt a pain in his right shoulder, but a couple of limbering movements let him know that he had not done anything serious to it. “Fuck I’m getting old.” He muttered to the onlookers as much as he did himself. Though they smiled in response, the two girls went back to simply chatting rather than trying to help the old man up. Not that he needed help.  As he clambered to his feet he begun to pick at the splinters that were now embedded in his hand, snarling slightly as he touched each wooden fragment in turn. He had a balm in his bag that was perfect for this situation, but stopped short of pulling it out. Medicines were worth a fair bit, and if someone saw that he had some then they might try to steal them. That in itself did not concern him much, but that would lead them to find other strange items like crushed bones and small scrolls depicting runes. If anyone was to discover that he held such things he would no doubt find himself in a world of trouble, especially with an inquisitor on board.

Accepting that he couldn’t use his balm, he opted for the next best thing: booze. Heading upstairs was probably the easiest way to find out whether someone had gone overboard anyway. He passed a motley collection of crewmates on his way to the top deck, most now too drunk to keep their sea-legs. He even passed a few couples being somewhat [i]lewd[/i] in the darker recesses of the ship, and wondered to himself what the captain would do if he caught such acts. Was the captain really content with half his crew drinking and fucking themselves to oblivion? Regardless, this was likely to be an interesting voyage. Alastair continued along a narrow hallway but, to his dismay, another shadow dashed across the corner of his vision. He instinctively stepped to the side and placed his back against the wall, looking around frantically with wide blue eyes. He thought the shadow had come from his left and headed towards the rear of the ship. But there was nothing. In the corner, where he thought it had headed, sailors continued their acts unphased and uninterrupted, as if it had only been him that spotted it. He took a deep breath and slowly released his grasp on the hilt of his khopesh. He had not properly slept in two days, and he realised it was probably just the exhaustion causing him to see things.

Reaching the top deck he found that the behaviour was moderately better, and that the atmosphere was more pleasant and lively, probably due to the immediate presence of authority. He tried to nod to the captain as he passed, but Emilio was clearly too busy exchanging words with an attractive young girl. He eventually found himself a seat at table surrounded by burly men, and he had travelled on enough boats and stayed at enough ports to recognise these men as sailors. “Having a good night lads?” he asked, snatching one of the vacant bottles of wine from the table, “Who am I kidding? Of course you fucking are!” The tipsy sailors cheered at the sentiment and a couple chinked bottles with the newcomer. It was such an easy thing to make friends with a bunch of drunks.

Leonard Comstock was mulling over a flask of rum as he noticed his Captain come back from the bow of the ship, looking rather dejected. As the stocky, yet lithe looking Dread Captain retired to his room Epunamun returned from his second headcount of the night. Leo switched from the flask to his flint-lock pistol and a dirty rag. He oiled the thing up in a slightly drunken concentration, salt and pepper speckled moustache tickling his nostrils as his focused chin sent the middle of his lips up into a frown. A small rumbling started near Leonard but he didn’t look up, then the whole table cheered and took swigs. Leonard had promised  himself at an early age that he’d never be out drank at a table. He dropped the empty firearm and returned to the flask. 

Before the lips of the flask could meet his own Leonard was distracted by a new profile. There were a handful of men at the table, all of them sailors; except for one man, a new face to the group. Leonard could tell by the man’s dress, his hair, his hands, that he was not a sailor. Leonard prided himself on his ability to tell everything about a man with a single look; at least, everything there is to tell. But with this man, Leonard couldn’t tell. A farmer? A fighter? A medicine man? Various possible lives laid strewn before Leonard, and as he tried to pinpoint the truth things became more and more blurry. This lost feeling came with vertigo, and an indelible mark, and it passed all within a moment. 

Just as the men lowered their glasses Leonard was woken from his meditation, he took a sip of his own and grimaced at the man seated near him. This day wouldn’t be complete until he at least knew the man’s name. With that he could make something out.

Alastair noticed the man's grimace and for a moment he wondered if he was the cause. “Hello!” he said with small nod and the raising of his bottle, hoping to strike up a conversation. If this man had a problem with him, he would rather know sooner than later. 

Leonard sat on the introduction for a moment, weighing his options of approach. He could be hostile, but since it was generally outside of his realm of comfort to bother a man who ain’t done nothing, he rethought that option. He could try for a play of familiarity, ease the name out that way. But something caught Leonard as he considered his options. A glint in the old man’s eye said something about his past, something undoubtedly true about him. There was a pain behind the coldness of his blues, a longing in the hewn of his beard; one which reminded Leonard of someone he once knew. There was only one option after that. 

Smiling with expectant eyes Leonard slowly took the bottle from the man’s hand. Filled his grasp with the flask instead. “They call that a Dominican [i]palo[/i],” Leo said in his native English. Rust was worn on it from disuse, and he seemed more comfortable saying the Spanish part of the sentence. “Where are you from Old man?” he finished the sentence with a playful chuckle and a sip from the nearly stale wine. 

Alastair smiled back, genuinely happy to hear someone talking in his native tongue. It was rare for him to come across someone that spoke English, and he knew he was probably a bit rusty himself. Before responding he took a big gulp of the flask, leaving a small gap between the actual flask and his lips; after all, he knew full well what kind of naughty diseases sailors picked up. “Wales, but I’ve not called it home in a long time.” he then replied with a strained voice, slightly taken back by the strength of the [i]‘Dominican palo’[/i]. He quickly cleared his throat before returning the question, “And yourself? It’s nice to hear someone speaking the King’s English again.” 

He heard it then, as he had nearly expected, the Welsh accent. The one he hadn’t heard in decades. “I had a cousin of mine move out to marry a girl in Cardigan. He was accidentally killed by a horse.” Leonard said, taking another swig to distance himself from that life once more. “I was born in Henley, near Oxford; but I’ve never called it home, not really. These words though, this language, is more mine than it is the King’s, eh?” 

Night went from dark to black as the two Brits spoke in the waning torch light. Most people had retired below deck, and Epu was going around shutting off lamps. Yet the quiet chattering of dry lips still seeped through the airiness of the crashing waves. A strained giggle came from the lone table as the boat rocked further out to sea and was followed by the completion of a story. 

“... And so she starts to ride off on my horse, turns to me mid-canter, crushed under her dead nag, and shouts into the air, ‘you’ve got to be faster next time, Leo.’” Leonard said with an abundance of character, breaking down into a hearty laughter. Tears come to the rim of his eyes and fall into his mane, trailing dirt behind them. “Ah, she was a good, lass.” he chokingly reminisced. “Anyway, that’s how I figured out about it. My mum left a letter at an inn I used to peruse in Milan saying little Prissy was dead of the plague. Just like that, and everything becomes so clear. Or, at least you think it is, then moments like this can destroy your preconceptions of the world. I used to think things made sense, everyone got what they deserved. But if that were true I wouldn’t be on this boat right now, and neither would you.” The Oxford cadance was returning to him now even as he wanted to stop speaking. But he knew that being friendly and honest was the only way to get the same from this man.  

Alastair’s mood turned somewhat sombre as Leonard’s story drew to a close. He had drunk too much alcohol for the philosophical words to take any meaning, but he understood the part about loss. “Aye,” he slurred “Losing loved ones is hard; most people on this ship have just found that out the hard way. You can distract yourself from the pain… but it never really goes away.” He mulled over his thoughts for a moment, and tried to think of other words to say, but with each passing second he slowly began to forget what Leonard had even said. He resorted to finishing with a delayed burp instead, one that was acidic enough to burn his own throat and make his nose twitch at the stench. 

Leonard clasped his new friends shoulder and bellowed a healthy “ho, ho, hoooo!” He finished the rest of his [i]palo[/i] and set it on the table. “Now you’re the sort of man I needed to know on a trip like this.” Epu made his way over silently, bent into Leonards ear during the break in conversation to remind him of the patrol; not that he particularly needed a reminder. “Yes, yes,” he said to Epu. “Come, walk with me. I’ll take you to your bed.” Leonard said as he stood the man up by the shoulders along with him. “By the way, ol’ chum, what shall I call you? My father said you should never end a night of drinking with a man without knowing his name.”

Alastair raised his bushy eyebrows in surprise as he realised the two had yet to share names. “Alastair, Alastair Kenelm,” he announced as clearly as he could “And yourself?” 

“Leonard Comstock,” Leo responded with a cheeky smile, “and it is a…”

Leonard wasn’t sure whether he should stop talking or not. Just as he and Alastair reached the stairway down into the ship there was a sudden crashing far off toward the stern, but even farther off. It broke through the hilly surface of the water with ease, rising high into the air and arching toward the center of the boat. It would have been impossible to see against the backdrop the sky were it not for the crimson light emitting from it. The light shined from the reflected surfaces of the human-sized shape as it flew overhead. Leonard sobered up rather quickly and yelled for Alistair to go down the stairs. Just as he did the thing made ship-fall. It crushed the floorboards as it unnaturally slowed it’s fall to the center of the deck. One of the splintered boards spun toward Leonard and hit him across the back as he rushed down the stairway, forcing him to lose his footing and slide down a couple of steps. 

It’s black-steel booted feet regained balance on the destroyed wood, the whole of it’s unusually tall metal body dripping with sea water. It dried it’s lance by spinning it then slicing outward. Leonard peaked from the stairwell, breath as hard as could be, and saw the strange thing only yards away, mere feet from the Captain's quarters. The lights inside the quarters were on, which concerned Leonard, but not as much as the disembodied ebony-plated suit which stood so clearly before him. Black smoke emanated from it’s hinges with sparks of red intermingled there. Leonard’s eyes grew wide and scanned the wooden step in front of him for answers. When it yielded none Leonard turned to Alistair at the bottom of the stairs.
 
Catching his breath, he looked on the verge of lost; “we’ll need guns”, was all he could say. 

[hider=Credits]
FBK and [@The New Yorker][/hider]