This is my half of a writing trade with good ol' Mr. Marcus IND. Apparently, the events herein are going to be part of his work-in-progress novel. Go check out his page: http://us.vclart.net/vcl/Artists/Marcus-D/


We were, of course, all a little surprised when the other captain showed up and demanded that Captain Rodros surrender our ship. Such things just weren't done; Captain Rodros was a lord, a knight put in charge of the ship to use it in the King's navy, and here came this self-righteous ape-thing telling our Captain that he had to surrender our ship. But in the end, the ape did it.

And the worst part was, Captain Rodros had to agree to it. After seeing what that shiny little weapon was capable of, I'd have offered to give that ape a foot rub, myself. So I don't blame the Captain. None of us do. I think maybe we respect him too much to blame him. But that's not saying it's right.

You should have seen it, though.

I was out on deck, lifting up a bucket of sea water to wash the deck. Jallo up in the crow's nest suddenly started jumping up and down yelling about a ship on the horizon, his eye stuck to his spyglass, his tail whipping around like a snake that got stabbed. The Captain came running from his cabin wearing nothing but a hose, shimmied up the mizzen and snatched the glass from Jallo's paws. We were all just as surprised at the news; we'd hove-to only a few days ago, and we'd followed the shore the whole time. I shot a glance to the west and saw blue peaks in the distance. We were definitely still within our own borders.

"She's fast," I heard Jallo comment.

"Damn fast," the Captain replied. He shoved the glass back into Jallo's hands and made his way back down the mast. "Start manning the guns, fellows!" he called out. As he rushed past me, he slapped my back hard, and I dropped my bucket. "Don't worry about that right now," he said. "Get down below and start loading balls.

I saluted him and ran down the ladder to the low decks. I could hear the Captain running around up top, yelling at whoever he ran into. My mates below were already moving around fast, pushing the guns to the portholes, loading balls and grape and powder, getting torches ready to light the fuses.

Just as I ran to grab a ball myself, though, the Captain came down the ladder in a rush and shouted for everyone to stop. We all stared at him with funny expressions. "False alarm, Captain?" someone asked.

The Captain grimaced, showing a hint of sharp teeth under his thick black whiskers. "Come up. You'll see."

We all gave each other looks, but we obeyed the Captain and followed him back up top. When we arrived, we immediately knew what he meant. The other ship was already abeam us. Damn fast was right; it was faster than the wind during a stormy night. And it was completely made of metal, with large glass windows and an array of weaponry that looked like it could pulverize an entire nation, sitting atop the ship, of all places. The crew all stood on the deck, as ours did; they were an odd species I'd only previously heard about, wearing what must have been military uniforms, all iron grey and fitted almost perfectly to their well-formed bodies. I would have studied them closer, but I was too preoccupied wondering how the ship was staying afloat with all of that weight.

We all stood by the rail, watching, as a bridge formed between the metal ship and ours. One of the humans--monkeys, I thought, upon closer inspection--wearing a much more decorated uniform stepped onto the bridge and walked toward us. I made to draw my knife, but a quick look from the Captain made me pause. The ape was now right at our port-side, eyes locked with our Captain's, hands behind his back.

"I am Captain Sotos," he said. His blue eyes--a weird color, a little disturbing--moved around our crew. "You all should do well to remember that. As of this moment, your ship belongs to the United International Freedom Force. Who is your captain?"

Captain Rodros stood up taller, his nearly naked form bristling with dark fur, his mane flowing down his back like it was part of a crown. "I am."

"Not anymore. You work for me, now."

Captain Rodros's nose wrinkled in a snarl. "Under whose authority?" he growled.

The ape, Sotos, let out a sigh. His hand went to his belt, from which he pulled out a small black object, no longer than his hand, with a nose that looked like a mini cannon. In one swift motion, he turned and pointed the object at a member of his crew, and his finger twitched. A spray began flowing from the thing's nose, hundreds of shots a second it might have been. The crewman's body flailed about like he was having a seizure, and his chest and stomach were slowly filling up with little holes. Blood shot out of his back and spattered against the wall of their main cabin.

The grotesque dance went on for what might have been minutes. The man never fell.

When Sotos finally lowered the gun, he had opened a hole in his mate wide enough to see through. The nose of his weapon was smoking, glowing red. He turned back to Captain Rodros just as his crewman was slumping down onto the deck, his body splashing red drops onto his fellows' pants. None of them flinched.

Every one of my mates was gaping at the scene, at the power of this foreign creature, at his ruthlessness. But our Captain didn't change his expression at all. With a cool look, he pointed to the ape's weapon. "Is that what I am supposed to obey, then?" he asked.

The ape smiled, showing off two absurdly straight rows of strange flat teeth. "You could say that."

"And if I refuse?" our Captain retorted, not blinking.

"I can find another crew elsewhere."

"I see." Captain Rodros turned around and looked us over, his hands now behind his back. As he scanned our faces, his hard expression softened until he was almost mellow. At seeing that, seeing his care for us as our Captain, my heart lifted. "It would irresponsible of me to not accept," he said.

Despite all that had happened, it would have been treason to cringe even the slightest bit at the Captain's decision to give us up to this new enemy.


So that was where we were, and why I was where I was an hour later, standing around our own deck, curiously with nothing to do. Captain Rodros was chatting with Sotos, discussing Sotos' plans for us. Some of my mates pressed their ears against the cabin walls, listening intently for anything of interest being said. I wanted to wait until they heard something important.

It didn't take long. Bavy's face suddenly lifted, and he gestured for me to come by him to listen. I stuck my ear against the cabin wall right beside his, and I listened.

"A true captain would lay down his life for any one of his men," Captain Rodros was saying.

"Excuse me?" Sotos replied.

"How do your men trust you? You killed one of them to prove a point to me. It is a foolish way to run things."

"They trust me because they must trust me, Rodros. They will not disobey, me, because they know the consequences."

"But that's not trust. It's fear."

"I hardly see the difference."

"Is this how your own superiors treat you?"

"My superiors don't need to intimidate me. It is for them that I exist, for their cause. Their orders are all that matter. If I had to, I would, at a moment's notice, send all my men to die for the mission assigned from headquarters. This is why it is so important that I have men who know that they must obey me."

"Is that so," Captain Rodros replied. "Well, in that case, I'm afraid I can't accept your offer."

A short silence followed. "You've seen our technology; it's far superior to your own. I am willingly offering your crew an upgrade of over one thousand years of military science, and you are refusing it?"

"Yes, I am."

"Absolutely stupid. I don't understand."

"I thought I had already explained myself well enough. Perhaps not." Captain Rodros cleared his throat. "On my ship there are people fighting for a cause. On yours there are units fighting for a mission from headquarters. You may not, but I care about my men; I do not want them to become drones controlled by fear. So we will stay on our ship."

Sotos sighed heavily. "Superstitious..." he mumbled, then cleared his throat. "Fine. You can stay on your old-fashioned boat. So long as you obey my orders, I suppose it doesn't matter that much how you obey them."

"Thank you, sir," Captain Rodros replied.

A chair scooted across the floor, and I quickly stepped away from the wall and pretended like I was doing something important. Sotos walked out of the Captain's cabin, hands in pockets and back straight. He seemed offended. I watched him for a time, until he caught my gaze. He stopped where he was and turned to me, and his brows curved down. "Tell all of your friends to make room in their quarters. I am sending supervisors aboard your vessel, since your former captain refuses to leave it."

I simply nodded. With unnatural speed, Sotos snapped out his gun and fired it at my arm. I felt a pellet fly through my bicep and out the other side, and blood ran down my forearm, staining my fur dark brown. I screamed out in pain and clutched the wound. Sotos raised an eyebrow. "I realize you have yet to get used to my presence; this is why I didn't kill you on the spot. Let me lay down the first and most important rule on this boat; I am the commander, and you will address me with respect. Is that clear?"

My heart raced like it wanted to escape my chest. I made to nod again, but stopped myself. "Yes, sir, Captain, sir," I said instead.

Sotos replaced his weapon in his belt. "Good." His eyes scanned the rest of the crew that was within sight of this occurrence. "I'm sure I won't need to repeat this gesture again. The next time something like this happens, the bullet will be going through someone's heart."

With that, he walked back to the bridge between our ships and climbed back aboard his metal vessel.

No one said a word until our Captain emerged from his cabin. His face looked haggard, like his conversation with Sotos had taken a great deal of energy. He turned and saw me, still clutching my bleeding arm, and walked over to me. "Let me see it," he said. I offered him the wound, and he took my arm in a strong grip, his claws digging into my flesh. He examined it for a time, then let go and looked me in the eyes. "Go see Hugot and get that taken care of before it's infected. At least the bullet passed through."

"Yes sir," I replied. As he turned to leave, however, I wanted to stop him. "Captain!" I called, and he faced me again. "I..." I tried, but words failed me for a moment. But he was patient. I swallowed and tried again. "Thank you, sir," was all I said. He nodded and walked to the helm, where he stood and looked out over the sea.

We spent several grueling weeks under Sotos' command, his supervisors watching our every move, weapons constantly at their hips, even while they slept. We had to show respect for them like we had to show respect for Sotos; if we mouthed off even once, we knew what would happen. Despite our Captain's strong words, we really were becoming drones.

We all felt old after a while; our worries were gnawing at our stomachs, our hearts, eating away at us until we jumped at the slightest movement from our superiors. Doing our usual duties was no longer something we did with pride. Every day during meals and before we were allowed to sleep, the supervisors would recite to us the purpose of their organization, their mission statement. Without us wanting to, without us even trying to, the words were ingrained in our minds. We dreamed about that mission statement. Broad letters in clean handwriting, scrolling along our dream-vision.

Captain Rodros was suffering just as much as us, if not more. I could see his face becoming more and more taut under the stress of living under Sotos. For him it was worse; Sotos came up with the idea early on to make him the purveyor of our punishments, should we step out of line. Each time he scratched one of us with the cat, his heart became a little heavier. I could see it in his eyes. We all could.

But there was still something inside of him.


It was late at night, and the supervisors were sleeping around us in our now extremely cramped quarters. I was awake, for some reason. It might have been that I was uncomfortable; I don't remember. All I remember is that the Captain was sleeping beside me, and that at some point during the night, he turned over and put a hand on my shoulder, on the arm that Sotos shot so many weeks ago, and he whispered to me. "We are coming to shore tomorrow to resupply. On the first night, I will call Sotos and ask him to meet with me, and we will have a long discussion. While this is going on, I want you and everybody else to kill his supervisors and flee to the mountains. Do you understand?"

My heart began pounding hard in my chest, and I could hardly get myself to say anything at all. "Yes," I managed to squeak out.

"Very good," Captain Rodros replied, and he turned back over.

I didn't ever get to sleep that night, it turned out.


Immediately in the morning we got to work. I was in charge of the sounding line, and, once we had approached close enough to shore, of preparing the dinghies for launch. We sent out a number of boats full of now empty barrels before we ourselves shipped off for land.

We arrived in a small port--a garrison town, by the look of it, where human soldiers patrolled the shoreline and warehouses, keeping close watch as shirtless sailors hauled goods from and onto ships. A number of other metal vessels were docked alongside our ship in the harbor out to sea, all fully stocked with heavy weaponry and drone-like navy soldiers dressed in their gray dun uniforms. When we arrived on shore, we immediately went to work filling our nearly empty supply barrels with new goods. We didn't stop until sundown, when the humans had trouble seeing what was going on.

We all went to our quarters completely exhausted and sore, wanting and needing rest. But we wouldn't get any rest that night.

As we found our beds and laid ourselves down for the night, Captain Rodros approached one of the supervisors. "I need to speak with Captain Sotos about something," he said.

The man's eyes narrowed and he looked our Captain over. "What about?" he asked.

"Supplies. I need to discuss monetary details. It would be important to know just how much we are allowed to take aboard our ship."

The man thought about this for a moment, then seemed to be satisfied, for he nodded his head and waved for the Captain to follow him. They both left the room and walked outside, over to where Sotos was staying, at the army headquarters building. Only one supervisor was left to watch over us.

As I undressed myself, I began humming an old seafaring tune. By the time I got to the second refrain, a few others joined in. By the third, the whole room was singing it, our voices coming together in musical harmony. The supervisor shifted on his feet, and his hand occasionally went to the butt of his weapon out of nervousness. We continued to sing, and when we got to the end of the song, we started over.

Someone with a bed nearest the supervisor jumped at him, grabbing his arms and sinking his claws into his almost hairless flesh. The man screamed out in pain, and we continued singing. Our fellow wrestled the weapon from the supervisors hands, threw it off to the side, and bore down on him, tearing into his throat with his teeth. We continued singing our tune. A human rushed into the room, having heard his mate's scream. Another of ours jumped on him and ripped into his esophagus, silencing him before he could make a sound. Still we sang.

I stood up from my bed and opened up a window as wide as it would go, and the others around me began climbing out. A few more supervisors showed up in the room and were quickly dispatched.

Through this process, we all left our quarters and darted off into the mountains beyond the garrison town, our dark fur our only camouflage. My eyes constantly went to Sotos' cabin as we ran; in case he saw us leaving, I wanted to know so I could give a signal to our men. But he never did notice. Captain Rodros was keeping him too busy with meaningless blither to notice.

I stopped only a moment to salute our Captain before fleeing into the mountains myself.


As the sun rose in the sky, I watched from a distant outcropping of rock as Captain Rodros was led out before a group of uniformed soldiers and shot.