“You…” Rohan breathed. “You’ve gotten yourself into something very dangerous. You attract bad things, Manisha. I know I can’t convince you to stop what you do, but leave me and my crew the hell out of it!”
“You became a sailor to escape the grasp of the paleskins, Rohan! We all did!” Manisha cried. “So why stop at doing the thing you do best within the boundaries they set for you? Why limit yourself? You are an ambitious man, Rohan! Show everyone what you can do!”
The woman’s words were honest. The maritime industry had the least regulations out of all occupations taken by southerners, simply because it was difficult for the Titanians regulate. Anything the Titanians tried to build to patrol the sea around south Yeupis would sink because they refused to build without Utrium, the source of their superiority. Utrium was extremely dense and would hit the bottom of the ocean fast, totalling the Crafts it was made using and killing all the Titanians inside in the Global Ocean’s warm, salty water. Because southerners tried every method to get into the industry, the market for sailors was becoming oversaturated. The only way to still succeed as a sailing merchant or fisherman in the south was to supplement their income by collecting and selling scrap from the ocean floor, or somehow try to expand into the exclusion zone—or beyond.
“I am not getting into trouble just because you’re willing to, Manisha! I need to look out for myself and my crew. Now leave my presence, you fraud.” Rohan snarled.
“Hey,” Manisha took a step forward, staring the comparatively tall man down with steely eyes. “Don’t you dare call me a fraud in front of my son. I’m doing all of this knowing I care for him as well. You care for your crew? Well, I care for my son. I’m not that different from you.”
“I’m giving him the chance to see just how foolish his mama is.” Rohan’s eyes sharing the seriousness as the woman’s.
The tension was rising, and it was becoming very noticeable. The Captain was adamant in refusing to let Manisha and her companions onto his vessel. Their past encounters had left the woman untrustworthy in his eyes. It seemed nothing would convince him. The tales of riches outside the exclusion zone, the promise of extra hands to replenish his reduced crew, and the skills of a master navigator were not enough to persuade Rohan to receive their aid. So what would?
“Stefan, do something for me.” Anwen spoke softly, her gaze fixed onto the two quarrelling southerners.
“What could I possibly do in a situation like this?” he inquired, dumbfounded.
Anwen raised her arms upwards 45 degrees from her body.
“Hold me under my arms. I need balance.” she demanded, her eyes set on the wooden ramp behind Manisha and Rohan.
Stefan hesitated. The last time he touched her, he nearly took her life. He was afraid to put his hands near her again.
“Stop being scared, trust me!” Anwen sensed his unease, although unaware why he was feeling insecure.
He nodded and placed his hands firmly against her ribs, under her armpits. Her left leg lifted 90 degrees off the ground, and her foot unlatched from her ankle, resulting in it hanging loosely in the air.
“Anwen, don’t tell me you’re gonna—
Ivan’s protest was incomplete, as a blinding ball of Reserve the size of fist that was briefly brighter than the sun careened over the heads of the two veteran sailors, culminating in the ramp behind them shattering into smithereens an eye’s blink later. The entire area around shook for a moment. Stefan and Anwen were blown off their feet, falling to the ground from the impact of the blast. It was nothing that would hurt them, but the ramp that allowed Rohan access to Serenity’s Song was now no more than a few hundred fragments of treated wood. Sailors aboard the great ship raced to the portside to see what had happened, and all of them were just as shocked as their captain and the woman who was trying to smooth-talk her way onto the vessel until just moments earlier.
“If we can’t board your ship, you can’t either.” Anwen shot at Rohan, staring daggers into him as she slowly got to her feet again. Most of her left pant leg was reduced to rags, revealing her artificial limb. For nearly a half minute, every one was silent. No one could explain let alone easily process what had just happened in such short time.
But then alarms started to blare, from multiple sirens across the port of Chitran. Their commotion would be detected and would soon be handled by Titanian police forces. And they would come in with heavy armor, submachine guns, and armored vans. Although they couldn’t patrol the waters directly, they met any incident at the port with full force, no matter how small it was. It would take two minutes for them to arrive from the closest detachment, no more.
The tale has been illicitly lifted; should you spot it on Amazon, report the violation.
“You’re trying to get me killed,” Rohan put his hands on his head, pacing around anxiously. “You’re going to get me killed. No, you don’t understand what you’ve done, girl. Everything’s over. It’s over now.”
“It’s not,” Stefan said as he realized what Anwen’s plan now was, needing no verbal clarification. “I can fix it almost instantly…”
Since the wood was touched with Reserve, using my Reserve to restore the ramp will be no problem. It’ll be just like that wall in the Barrens, except the opposite course of action.
Stefan walked all the way up to the man, an effort to intimidate him without causing harm.
“…but you'll have to let Manisha and my friends onto that ship. Do you understand?”
The blares of the police sirens edged closer and closer, becoming ever louder. Rohan glanced back at the wrecked ramp, whose remains were scattered over the boardwalk and the water, then looked back at the towering boy.
“Fix it, kid,”
Then he set his gaze on Manisha whose grin was wider than the sun.
“You won. Congratulations.”
The pieces of wood that made up the ramp floated and rapidly coalesced into its previous form, fusing together to return to the object it was before. Without expressing awe towards the unnatural event, Rohan stormed up onto the open top deck of Serenity’s Song, expecting his unwanted guests to follow behind him. Only a minute remained before the police arrived, so they would be leaving immediately.
“Set sail!” Rohan ordered, and his sailors scattered promptly to their workstations, unable to gawk at their unusual guests any longer. “On to our next and final stop!”
Two sailors quickly undid the moorings of the ship, then jumped onto its slowly moving hull, clinging onto its edge before being helped aboard by their crew members. Stefan was impressed by how well they could read their captain’s intentions without complex directions. It had reminded him of Jay’s own manner of instruction—that must’ve been the way southerners worked. They had a very communal society, perhaps even more so than the north, but it was being hindered in recent years by those who chose to collaborate with the Empire of Titan.
Manisha seamlessly fit into her role as temporary navigator of the Serenity’s Song, determining how fast the winds were moving by looking at the waves and the sails and adjusting accordingly, heading northwards. As a result of her work, Serenity’s Song reached the final stop on its bimonthly tour around south Yeupis in 7 and a half hours instead of the expected 10, to a town that was a three-day hike from the Marius Mountains. It was night when they reached the town, where they would stay until the next night. They would typically stay in a town for a day, but because they left so suddenly, they would spend a few extra hours trading and gathering new supplies.
“Hey, Stefan,” Ivan strolled up to the boy, who was leaning against a guardrail at the back of the Serenity’s top deck. “Nice going back there.”
Stefan was perplexed. Ivan’s typical sarcastic tone wasn’t present in his voice.
“What do you mean?”
“That crazy stunt you did with Anwen. I’ll be honest, I couldn’t have thought of a plan as drastic as yours in that small amount of time. Or did you and her anticipate it beforehand and thought of something as a last resort?” Ivan formed a smirk.
Stefan raised his brow.
Does he think we had it all figured out by the time it happened?
“It was all spontaneous,” Stefan grinned. “She acted first. I just followed her lead.”
“You’re like two peas in a pod,” Ivan chuckled, playfully slapped the tall boy’s back. “Are we sure Initiation doesn’t link minds somehow?”
The man’s jest and subsequent chortle prompted a fit of laughter from the teenager, a level of expression he hadn’t felt in a long time. The last time he had come close to it had only been just a few days earlier when he and Anwen were making and eating soup together, but this was the first time he’d felt that way solely in Ivan’s presence. He realized that he was much closer to the man than when they last left north Yeupis.
“That… that would be a great thing…” Stefan said as he calmed. “Talking to each other without opening our mouths, I think we’d save a lot of energy that way.”
“It sure would,” Ivan agreed. “Anyways, I’m glad our group of three has one idiot and not two.”
“Are you calling yourself dumb?” Stefan tilted his head slightly to the right. “If you didn’t stay calm back when the asshole officer grabbed your drink, we would’ve been screwed. I know that because I also had to have a lot of restraint. You need a good head on your shoulders for that. And sacrificing your comfort so that Anwen and I could be a little more at ease… that’s what a good leader does. You look out for others.”
“Hey, I didn’t ask to be complimented,” Ivan rolled his eyes. "I was just thinking to tell you to get off this damn ship for a bit. We don’t know exactly when we’ll reach the islands so it might be a while until we walk on land again. Manisha expects it to be three months, and that’s with good weather the entire way.”
A snort escaped Stefan’s nose.
“You’re right.” he nodded.
Meanwhile in a busy tavern sprawling with activity not very far away, Captain Rohan sat at a table with two large mugs between him and the woman he was facing. His mug contained ale, while the woman’s was filled with cold iced tea.
“I never thought I’d be treated to something like this by you of all people.” Rohan scoffed.
“Just a little something to soothe your troubles.” Manisha grinned as she took a sip of the tea she ordered.
“Suppose it beats being riddled with bullets by paleskins in armor,” Rohan sighed. “But then again, none of that would’ve happened if you and those northern brats didn’t choose to meddle with me.”
Manisha simply shrugged at his comment. She would’ve convinced him one way or another. It was simply in her nature to get what she wanted. However, there wasn’t much she wanted. All she desired was the wellbeing and success of herself, her son, and her new family members and what they stood for.
“You wanna tell me the real reason you took us here?” Rohan said after a brief spell of silence which he used to chug down half his mug.
“I come here every time I sail to this town,” she stated with an air of confidence. “Thought you might like it.”
“So why is it just you and I here if it’s so nice?” Rohan raised his eyebrow, growing annoyed.
“Just to get any hard feelings out of the way,” Manisha shrugged. “Because after this journey, I have a feeling you’ll wanna kill me.”