Making A Splash

Chapter 9

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Morgan’s first morning as a pirate began much the same as every other day of her entire life: with breakfast.

Breakfast was something of a stark contrast from the previous night’s feast. Morgan had her choice of either rice or oatmeal, with a side of salted pork that had been cut into thick slabs and fried, and a tall cup of orange juice so pulpy she could have eaten it with a fork. She chose the oatmeal, as that had bits of fruit in it, and ate quickly, with Poppy beside her doing the same. All around them, the rest of the crew ate as well, and it wasn’t hard for Morgan to pick out the ones who were sluggish from lack of sleep or nursing hangovers.

To Morgan’s total lack of surprise, Red Molly was among those who were clutching their heads and wincing at the bright sunlight that poured in from the portholes, but to her credit, that didn’t seem like it was going to stop the Captain from doing her duty. Poppy, having slipped out of her seat next to Morgan without her noticing, appeared at Red Molly’s side as soon as she entered, reminding her of the way they’d been arranged the first time Morgan had ever seen them.

“ALRIGH—ah, fuck…” Red Molly hissed in pain, taking a deep breath and rubbing at her temple, before continuing at a more reasonable volume. “Alright, as all but one of you knows, that crate of Empire wine for Captain Silas was our last delivery, which means we need to decide our next course of action.”

There were a few seconds of quiet muttering while Red Molly continued to rub her forehead, then turned and whispered something to Poppy, who bowed her head and stepped away.

“I’ll say this, our options remain the same as always, though due to present circumstances”—Red Molly’s eyes fell on Morgan, her usual grin a little lopsided—“I am taking returning to Empire waters off the table for the time being.”

There were more mutterings at that, but in the end all of them seemed to resolve into grunts of agreement, which put Morgan at ease. She would hate for her presence as a new recruit to inconvenience the crew already.

“So, reports, proposals, let’s hear ‘em,” Red Molly said, motioning with one hand while accepting a cup of something, hopefully water, from Poppy.

Lined up against the wall of the mess, Morgan saw Balthazar, leaning back beside the human man and the green-scaled fish man she’d also seen the night before, as well as the red-skinned, red-shelled woman and the bull man. After a quick conference between the five of them, the human man stepped forward.

“Balthazar reports we’ve got dry food and fruits enough to last another month or so, but both fresh and preserved meats are running a bit low”—Balthazar grumbled something at the man's back, and he added—“and he is running out of spices. Karnak reports he has enough wood that we won’t need to stop and forage, but is running low on nails, glue, and resin. He recommends we avoid risking combat with anything capable of firing back until he can restock. Similarly, Izzi reports our last battle against the Thorns”—the name was met with a few quickly muttered curses and even a hiss from one of the crewmembers—“has brought our supply of shots, powder and munitions below what she considers acceptable levels.”

The human man rattled off each name and status report with such practiced professionalism that it reminded Morgan of the times her father had let her sit in and listen while he took conference calls in his home office.

“Mmh, probably for the best we’re avoiding Empire waters, then,” Red Molly said, wiping her mouth with the back of her hand. “We’ll miss out on a few opportunities to hit more colony supply ships, but they ain’t worth risking our lives over.”

Red Molly’s eyes narrowed and her grin disappeared as she asked her next question.

“What of the Black Rose?”

Morgan felt the room grow colder at the mention of another name she had no context for, but she noticed there were no grumbles or hisses for this one.

“Last known reports place it in the north-east seas, south of Yuusha, pursuing the Cloudchaser,” Hollis answered after confirming with Ethan. Red Molly let out a sigh through her nose that was shared by many other members of the crew.

“Good,” Red Molly said, closing her eyes. “Captain Aurora can outrun that monster for weeks. Carry on then.”

Hollis nodded and cleared his throat before continuing.

“Taking all factors into account, and after conferring with my fellow officers, I believe our best course of action would be to make for a friendly port, at a leisurely pace, while using the extra time to see to it our newest recruit is trained up swiftly. Additionally, between Ethan and any of our faster swimmers, we should scout our route for any large sea beasts, nothing higher than Iron rank, and attempt to subdue them if it is reasonable to do so. As always, any sea dwellers competent enough at sea hunting are encouraged to join the hunting party, to help keep the ship’s stocks of fresh fish up.”

Morgan couldn’t help but be impressed, even if a lot of what had been said went over her head. She supposed that, despite whatever small misgivings she might still have about Red Molly and her grasp on reality, the captain did have a competent and well-organized crew working under her.

“Mmmmmmh…” the captain hummed, leaning her back against one of the wooden supports, savoring whatever was in the cup Poppy had handed her. “Ahh… anyone have anything else to add? Kaz, you find any more treasure maps scrawled on the walls of toilet stalls?”

The crew shared a good natured laugh, Kaz himself included, but nobody appeared to actually have anything to say. Except Morgan, who raised her hand. Red Molly turned to look at her expectantly, and an uncomfortable moment of silence passed before the captain threw a hand up.

“What?” Red Molly demanded, and Morgan felt herself flush, realizing she’d slipped back into classroom mode for a second, waiting patiently until she was actually called.

“Ah, uh, you said you need fast swimmers and people to catch fish,” Morgan said, unsure if she should be looking at Red Molly or the human man, Hollis, as she spoke. “Well, I’m a really fast swimmer myself, and I, uh… think I’m pretty good at catching fish, too.”

For some reason, her words earned her a fresh round of amused chuckles from several of the crew.

“Already tryin’ to get outta work, huh?” Red Molly said, smirking. “Well, alright, I’ve seen what you shark types can do, we’ll make room in your schedule for some hunting time. But you better bring in some good stuff, or else!”

Morgan felt a momentary spike of anxiety, before movement beside Red Molly drew her eye, and Poppy gave her a quick smile and a nod from under her hood. She figured that meant that she was not actually in any real danger if her catches were sub-par.

With that out of the way, the meeting went on uninterrupted. There was a call for votes by show of hand for the proposed course, which was unanimously agreed upon, and then the ships’ navigators, the bird man and the tentacled woman (whose names were Ethan and Omiya, respectively) were called up to list off the islands most likely to be nearest. Keyword being “likely,” Morgan noted, as the way they both talked about them quickly made it clear that islands in this world did, in fact, move about, and even had things like preferred regions and known travel routes.

Several options were presented; a small cluster of elven and orc islands to the south, a few far-out Empire colony islands to the south-east known to have lax patrols and a few pirate-friendly ports, or a medium-sized trading outpost on the outskirts of a nation called the “Kingdom of Torgard” to the west.

The Empire colonies were disregarded entirely, and another round of voting was called for. Several crew members were allowed to toss out quick, single sentence arguments for their pick of choice (“Better drinks in the elven marshes!” “Better beds at the outpost!”) before the votes were cast and, in the end, it was decided that due to more favorable currents and a higher likelihood of certain supplies, the ship would be heading west for the trading outpost.

With the meeting adjourned, everyone was quickly dismissed, the entire crew dispersing to their stations, and in under a minute the mess had been deserted, leaving Morgan behind with Red Molly, Poppy, and the green and black scaled fish man, all of whom approached her now.

“Sooooo…” Red Molly said by way of greeting, her lips pulling up into a toothy smirk. “Did you sleep well?”

Morgan opened her mouth to answer right away, but hesitated. It was a perfectly normal, innocuous question, or would have been coming from anyone else, but something about the way Red Molly had asked it made Morgan feel like she was really asking something else.

“Uh, yes?” Morgan answered, warily, then followed up with a question of her own. “Why?”

“Well, when you didn’t turn up at the crew quarters, we got a little worried about you,” Red Molly said, her light tone and broad smile telling Morgan she hadn’t been that worried. “Theeeeeen, we heard you’d ended up in the sickbay.” Red Molly’s grin widened and she leaned forward, lowering her voice to a stage whisper that was still entirely audible to everyone present. “Feeling a little under the weather already, hmm?”

Morgan blinked, and her eyes went wide, flicking nervously from Red Molly to Poppy, the latter of whom was holding her head in her hand. Morgan jolted in her seat, throwing her hands up.

“W-wait, no no, it wasn’t like that, I swear!” Morgan protested, which caused Red Molly to burst out laughing and take a few steps back, even doubling over at one point, too amused to stay upright.

“Oh, wow!” Red Molly gasped, one hand on one of the wooden pillars as she caught her breath again, chuckling all the while. “I wasn’t actually going to suggest it was, but now you’ve got me curious. And on your first night too…”

“Captain.” Poppy’s voice was cold and composed, and her face was flat and stone-like, unlike Morgan, who could feel her cheeks burning at Red Molly’s accusations. “I extended the offer to Mo— to Miss Morgan to sleep on one of the available bunks, as what she’s divulged of her past led me to believe she would be most comfortable sleeping in a bed for her first night.”

“You extended the offer?” Red Molly asked, seemingly ignoring everything else Poppy had said. That once again had her grinning like a madwoman, but thankfully now her gaze was focused entirely on Poppy. The leech girl stood as still as a statue, gazing ahead of herself instead of meeting the captain’s eyes, and Morgan had to admire her control.

“Well, isn’t that interestin’,” Red Molly said, shrugging and finally turning back to Morgan. Behind her, Morgan watched Poppy’s shoulders rise and fall as she took a long breath and let out a silent sigh. Seemingly satisfied with… whatever that had been, teasing or hazing or whatever, Red Molly seemed finally ready to get down to business.

“So, Morgan,” she began, starting to pace a little in the open corridor between the tables. “What to do with you. You made it pretty clear yesterday you don’t have much in the way of skills.”

“Yeah…” Morgan agreed, lowering her head a little. “I know, on principle, how a ship like this functions, but I don’t know the first thing about how to work the, uh, sails or anything like that, and I know how a cannon works but I’ve never fired one, and I took like two years or so of judo classes but I’ve never been in a real fight.”

Red Molly continued to look Morgan over for a few moments, nodding to herself.

“Well, most of that is expected. Gullen here, the bosun, will handle teaching you the basics,” Red Molly said eventually, motioning to the fish man, who gave Morgan a slight nod. “No matter what position you end up in, everyone on this ship needs to know their knots, so he’ll be… showing you the ropes for the next few days.”

Red Molly snickered at her own joke, causing both Gullen and Poppy to roll their eyes.

“Never gets old, does it?” Gullen asked sourly, before turning to Morgan. “Nice to finally meetcha up close, lass. Ye can call me bosun or ye can jes’ call me Gullen.”

“Uh, nice to meet you,” Morgan replied, smiling. “I’ll do my best to learn from you quickly, all my teachers have always said I was a fast learner.”

“Teachers? Multiple?” Gullen said, arching a brow.

“Oh, uh, yes, well my parents—” Morgan started to explain, but Gullen held up a hand to stop her.

“Ah, ye don’t have to tell me, I was jes curious. It’ll be good to have someone else aboard with some manners and a bit of sense in their head though,” Gullen said, chuckling and sticking his hands in his pockets.

“But you will have to tell me sometime,” Red Molly piped up briefly to say, giving Morgan a hungry, lingering look that sent shivers down her spine.

Morgan smiled back at the captain nervously, shrugging her shoulders in an attempt to appear casual. She was planning to give Red Molly, and probably Poppy, the full details of her circumstances for being here in this world, but she knew now was not the time.

“Anyway, you’re certainly big enough to work the cannons, but it’ll be up to Izzi if she wants you on the gunners crew, same with Karnak if he thinks you’d make a good carpenter,” Red Molly continued, and Morgan was sure she remembered those names from the start of the meeting, when the human man she still didn’t know had delivered the ship’s status report. Red Molly paused again, bringing a hand to her chin and tilting her head. “You mentioned something there about fighting, you said you took ‘judo?’ Can’t say I know what that means.”

“Oh, right, it’s just a martial art, er, that is, a special fighting style,” Morgan said, shrugging her shoulders. “It’s for self-defense, mostly, and I only had two years of practice before I, uh, ended up here, so I’m not very good...”

Morgan knew from experience how annoying it was to talk to someone who constantly bragged about how good they were at fighting, whether or not they actually were, so she always strived to remain humble whenever she mentioned her judo classes… Unlike with swimming, nobody cared if you bragged about being good at swimming, which Morgan did do. Just a little bit.

“Hmm, that’s… unexpected,” Red Molly said, after regarding Morgan in silence for several moments. She had a hand on her chin and was stroking it thoughtfully. “Provided you’re not lying, of course, but I can’t see why you would. Well, you’re in luck, we’ve got time set aside for martial training later today, think you could show us some of this ‘judo’ then?”

“Uh, sure?” Morgan said, tilting her head. She wasn’t sure what had Red Molly so confused; she didn’t seem unfamiliar with the concept of martial arts, and Morgan figured there was no harm in showing off a few basic throws and takedowns. She was more interested in what kind of martial training the pirates already got up to, and wondered if that meant she’d be taught how to use a sword or something.

“Good, I look forward to it,” Red Molly said, nodding and turning on her heels, waving over her shoulder as she walked towards the door. “Well, I’ll see you up on deck. Gullen, she’s in your hands now.”

“Aye,” Gullen replied, nodding his head and touching two of his fingers to his brow in a lazy salute. As Red Molly departed, Poppy followed in tow, pausing at the door to nod her head at Morgan before disappearing as well. Beside her, Gullen made a noise in his throat that might have been a chuckle.

“Come on then, let’s get topside. Those louts’ll already be getting us ready to make way, but I want you to see a bit of how it’s done,” Gullen said as he began to lead Morgan out of the mess and back to the main deck.

“Right!” Morgan replied enthusiastically, as eager to prove herself as always. While they walked she could hear a rhythmic grinding noise through the walls, growing louder as they approached the stairs where a bright column of sunlight beamed down from above. Morgan had to squint her eyes against the brightness as she emerged beside Gullen, covering her brow with one hand.

On the deck, a small crowd of crew members were all busying themselves with a number of inscrutable tasks, but the largest group was gathered around a large cylindrical wood and metal crank with five wooden poles that stuck out like spokes on a wheel, with three or four people to each pole, slowly walking in circles to turn the crank.

“Let’s see some hustle you lot, we want ta be underway within the hour!” Gullen shouted as he emerged onto the deck, causing a noticeable reaction to run through the crew, but not without some grumbles and comments tossed back in return. Pointing to the crank, Gullen looked up at Morgan and explained, “That there be yer capstan. Very important that is, right now it’s draggin’ the anchors back up outta the water, but we also got one fer haulin’ heavy cargo.”

“I see...” Morgan nodded along, leaning over the railing and watching as a surprisingly thin length of chain was steadily drawn out of the water through an opening near the front of the ship. She’d been expecting something huge and heavy made of crude black iron, so the relatively flimsy chain made of some green-tinted metal confused her.

“It’s so thin,” Morgan said absently, and Gullen cocked his head to follow her gaze.

“Th’ anchor chain? ‘Course it is, this ain’t a barge, lass,” Gullen said with a chuckle, pointing at the steadily winding chain. “That’s steel strengthened with mithril, so it’s only as thick as it needs to be to do its job without weighin’ us down unnecessarily.”

“O-ooh, wow,” Morgan said, her eyes suddenly wide at the casual mention of what was, to her, a fictional mythical metal.

With that momentary distraction out of the way, she turned with Gullen as he pointed up to the towering masts, where several more crew members were working on the raised and furled sails, and began explaining what they were doing and why.

For the next hour, Morgan watched and listened as Gullen took her from one end of the ship to the other, pointing out and naming every piece of equipment and its function, from the names of each of the various sails to the ropes and beams that held them in place. He showed her around the helm, where Red Molly and Ethan, the bird man navigator, were discussing something while the latter steered the ship. After the sails had been lowered and trimmed, Gullen led her back down into the lower decks, finally giving her a proper tour of the ship. She found out where the crew quarters actually were, she was shown through the gun deck, where Izzi and her crew of gunners sat at various small tables, chatting or playing cards. She was also brought down to the lowest decks to see the cargo holds, getting a glimpse at the sacks, barrels, and crates that contained the ship’s many supplies. Along the way they also encountered Karnak, the carpenter, who turned out to be the large tanned man with the horns of a bull. Despite his intimidating appearance, he greeted Morgan and Gullen warmly as they passed.

“Well, that’s all of ‘er,” Gullen said as they finished the tour and began backtracking up through the decks. “Ye’ve been awful quiet, have ye any questions?”

“Oh, uh, no, I think I got everything,” Morgan answered with a smile. “Though I kind of wish I had something to take notes with, that’d help me remember it better.”

Gullen chuckled at that, arching a skeptical brow. “‘Got everythin’, y’say? Well then, can ye tell me which is the clewline and which is the buntline?”

Morgan blinked, then smiled wider. He was quizzing her? But it hadn’t even been an hour.

“The clewlines are the ropes on the outermost corners of the sails, and the buntlines are the lines that run along the middle, and both are used to control the shape of the sails,” Morgan answered confidently. “There’s also the halyard for raising and lowering the sails, and the braces, sheet, and tack for controlling the angle of the sails themselves, and all of those together comprise the standing rigging and running rigging of the ship.”

Gullen just peered back at her for several seconds, and Morgan got the distinct impression he was trying not to look impressed.

“I was gonae ask ye to name the sails next but—”

“Main sail, main topsail, fore sail, fore topsail, fore staysail, jib, and flying jib,” Morgan answered, beaming and crossing her arms behind her back.

Gullen let out a snort and nodded. “But I can see ye weren’t lyin’ about bein’ a fast learner. And why ye get on so well with our good doctor already.”

“Heh, sorry,” Morgan said, shrugging her shoulders. “I’ve been in school for most of my life, so picking up and holding onto information is one thing I’m very good at. That doesn’t mean I don’t appreciate you taking the time to teach me, of course, and you should still keep checking in to make sure I’ve retained everything. Reinforcement is very important to learning.”

By the time Morgan finished speaking, they’d made it back onto the main deck. Once there, Morgan saw that most of the crowd had since dispersed, leaving behind only as many crew as it took to tend the sails and keep watch.

“Aye, I’ll do that, though I don’t imagine I’ll have to fer long,” Gullen said, making a quick circuit of the ship, inspecting the lines as he went. He continued to quiz Morgan along the way, asking her to identify the rows of wooden pegs the ropes were secured to—“Belaying pins!” “Very good.”—or the series of wood and metal pulleys that the ropes were run through to help make them easier to handle—“Blocks and tackle.” “Aye.”—until finally stopping at the very front of the ship, looking out over the water.

“Well, that went quicker than expected,” Gullen said, pausing to hop up onto the railing and take a seat. “I suppose there’s still room in that head of yers for some knots?”

Morgan nodded eagerly, and Gullen produced a spare length of rope and began showcasing a truly dizzying number of knots, making sure to tell her what they were best used for and even pointing to a part of the ship where that very knot was in use, then asking her to tie them herself while also repeating back the information. Before she knew it, another hour had passed, and she felt like she had a good enough handle on most of the knots to practice them in her downtime.

At some point, a series of clanging noises rang out across the deck, and Morgan looked over to see that it was a bell that hung near the wheel, being run by one of the crew members at the helm.

“Shift change,” Gullen explained as he stood and stretched, and Morgan watched for a few minutes as the crew already on the deck met with and swapped places with a fresh batch before descending into the ship. Morgan dimly recalled hearing the sound of the bell at some point in the night, and again during her tour with Gullen. “Ye’ll only need to learn to count the bells if ye end up a deckhand, but I shan’t think that’s where yer destined for.”

“Really?” Morgan asked, following as Gullen once again began to lead her towards the helm.

“Aye, well, I have a feelin’ the captain has a few more important positions in mind for ye, dependin’ how you perform in your other tasks,” Gullen said, smirking over his shoulder at Morgan. They ascended the stairs up to the helm, passing by Ethan, still at the wheel, and stopping before Red Molly, who was leant against the back railing and staring out at the ocean.

“Captain,” Gullen spoke, to draw her attention.

“Mmmh?” Red Molly hummed, turning and facing them. “Ah, you two. How’s it going?”

“The lass is a sponge,” Gullen said, causing Morgan to grin. “She’s already soaked up as much as I can show her today. I’ll want her to try her hand a few times at haulin’ the lines or settin’ the riggin’, and she’ll need to practice her knot work till she can do ‘em faster, but other’n that she’s already leagues ahead of most new recruits.”

“Didn’t even take all morning, huh?” Red Molly said, crossing her arms and smirking.

Morgan grinned back and nodded. “Well, I did say I was a fast learner.”

“That you did,” Red Molly said, pushing herself off the railing. “Well, I promised to let Izzi and Karnak get their hands on you and see if you’re suited to work in their areas, but I think that can wait. You said you’d like to try your hand at catching us some fish, and there’s still that ‘judo’ you mentioned.”

“I-it’s really nothing special,” Morgan said, waving her hand, but was ignored as Red Molly moved past her, heading down the stairs.

“So here’s what I want from you. The hunting party, that is, Poppy and a few of the others, are going to be going for a quick hunt soon,” Red Molly said, motioning towards the lower decks. “They’ll be in the mess with Balthazar, go join them. I’m eager to see what you’re capable of.”

You and me both, Morgan thought. Out loud, she said, “Right, got it!” and took off down the stairs, heading for the mess. She didn’t actually know if she was capable of catching any fish; she just knew that she felt like she should be, based on how easily she’d chased the fish around after first waking up in the ocean. True, the only fish she’d actively tried to catch so far had managed to elude her long enough to lead her into a fishing net. Then again, she was pretty sure that fish had been special in some way.

Arriving at the door to the mess, Morgan shook her head. She didn’t need to start doubting herself now; she was a pirate, officially, and she was also more than six feet of fins and claws and teeth, she could definitely catch some fish and bring them back to the ship! She was prepared to live her life to the absolute maximum!

Opening the door to the mess, Morgan stepped in, and her eyes immediately fell on Poppy, who stood there in the central aisle, completely naked.

Back out in the hall, Morgan cursed herself. She’d been so startled she’d backed up, slamming the door behind her as she went. If she hadn’t already been noticed upon entering, that surely would have drawn all eyes in the room to her, and now she was going to have to go back in there!

Taking several deep breaths and reminding herself of what Poppy had said, that getting hung up on being seen without clothes was not something common to sea dwellers, she once more pushed the door in and stepped inside once more.

Thankfully, when she peeked into the mess again, Poppy was clothed, after a fashion. Her bandage wrappings had been replaced with a simple top that was tied around her chest and a flowing shawl that was draped across her hips, both made of some flimsy-looking, brownish-gold colored fabric, with tiny shells and beads hanging from the fringes or woven in patterns.

Now that she wasn’t blinded by surprise and panic, she could see that Poppy was not the only occupant of the room. There were also two other figures, similarly clothed as she was: a man with silvery gray scales and large black dots running down his sides, with a prominent lower jaw and, like Morgan, a mouth full of sharp, pointed teeth. Beside him was the cephalopod woman she knew as Omiya, the other navigator. Getting a good look at her (but not that good a look at her), Morgan saw that her larger head was shaped like a spade, sweeping back behind her like the body of a cuttlefish. In the middle of her face, between her two huge eyes that resembled glassy orbs, was a black beak, and hanging down from the sides of her head and chin were several tendrils, two of them being significantly longer and thicker than the others and ending in wide, flat tips. Her body, which Morgan was not staring at, was mainly purple, splotched with pink and black spots. Her hands were large and thick, with only three oversized fingers and a thumb, and instead of feet, her legs just sort of ended in a pair of blunt, stubby nubs that she seemed to have no trouble walking on.

“Oh, hiya, it’s nice to finally meet you!” Omiya said, using one of her head tendrils to wave at Morgan.

“Oh, uh, h-hello,” Morgan said, finally stepping into the room instead of just gaping at everyone from the doorway. “S-sorry about that, I…”

“You were raised by humans, yeah, Poppy told me,” Omiya cut in, the tendrils on her face waving excitedly as she talked. “That’s soooo weird. Do you know why? Did they fish you out of the sea when you were just an egg? Did you know your real parents? Oh oh, do you think they were just raising you until you got big enough for them to eat you?”

Morgan stared back at Omiya, her mouth slightly agape, trying to figure out which of her many back-to-back questions she wanted to answer first, while also trying to process what some of them implied about this world. To the side, Poppy let out a sigh and looked up at Morgan.

“Please forgive Navigator Omiya, she has not had much experience with humans, or land dwellers in general. I have told her they do not eat our kind and likely have not for tens of thousands of years, but she refuses to listen,” Poppy said, her stoic indifference standing in stark contrast to the other woman’s bubbly exuberance.

She kind of reminds me of Mandy, only… less mean….

Shaking her head, Morgan regained her mental footing and put on a smile. “Uh, well, to answer… some of your questions, yes, I did know my real parents, I still lived with them, I just… spent a lot of time around humans when I was growing up? And I’m definitely sure they weren’t planning on eating me.”

“Mmmmm, okay, but I’m still not letting my guard down around Hollis,” Omiya said.

“A-hem!”

A familiar over-exaggerated clearing of the throat drew the room’s attention back to the front, where Balthazar stood by a small pile of woven baskets, looking somewhat peeved.

“Are ye all done natterin’?” he asked gruffly, and Morgan joined the others in mumbling a quick apology. He turned to her, squinting one eye and tilting his head. “And I suppose yer goin’ along too?” Morgan nodded again, and he sighed, pulling out a book that he’d been holding under his arm and passing it to Poppy. “Well, I ain’t goin’ over the list again. You lot, show ‘er what she oughta be lookin’ out fer, while I go get ‘er some baskets. Ye better be ready ta go by the time I get back.”

With that, he turned and marched back towards the galley. Realizing what he meant, and knowing she didn’t have time to worry about being shy, Morgan began frantically removing her clothes while also trying to listen as Poppy held open the book she’d been given and pointed out what types of fish were in the area and which types Balthazar was particularly interested in them catching.

This is fine, Morgan assured herself. Just… just think about it like the locker room after gym class.

“...and lastly, there are various species of larger bladefish in this area, but I… hope I don’t have to tell you how dangerous those are,” Poppy said, pointing to a page of the book that showed what at first glance resembled a swordfish, but with its signature extended bill and tall top fin replaced with actual metallic growths, which the accompanying text assured were razor sharp and capable of inflicting terrific damage on the unprepared. The shapes varied, from straight like an ordinary swordfish, to wickedly curved like a scimitar, to wavy and serrated like a saw blade. There was even one that appeared to have an axe blade sticking out of its face.

“Uh, r-right, I’ll be careful,” Morgan said as she stepped out of her pants. She was glad now that she didn’t have shoes to remove, nor a need to wear them, as she quickly folded up her clothes and set them next to the others’ piles. A folded pile of the same odd golden fabric was pressed into her hands by Omiya, and she found it both surprisingly light and alluringly smooth to the touch, like silk.

“Like it?” Omiya asked while Morgan struggled to tie the chest piece behind her back without bumping into her fin. “It’s sea silk, some of my finest pieces! Poppy told me how you get weird about being naked, like the land dwellers do, and I never have an excuse to dress up fancy like they do back in the citadel unless we're bargaining for directions, soooo I decided to do you a favor!”

Morgan tried to formulate a response, but the thin strips of smooth cloth slipped out of her fingers again, and she let out a frustrated grunt.

“Here, let me help,” Omiya offered with a giggle and a series of clicking noises from her beak. Morgan gladly turned her back to the cheerful woman, biting her lip as she felt large, slightly clammy fingers working deftly to tie the top into place, once around the back of her neck and once around the base of her fin, then doing the same for the hip shawl, leaving her, well, still pretty underdressed, but feeling much less exposed. She almost felt more like she was ready for a day at the beach. Just as they finished, Balthazar returned from the galley with his hands full.

“Ready? Good,” Balthazar said, not waiting for an answer before passing Morgan the items he held in his hands. One was a pair of tall, lidded baskets connected at the top with a belt made of rope and cloth, meant to be worn around her waist then tied around her thighs as well, sort of like the holsters of an old revolver. The second was a much larger basket of the same make, with two large loops so it could be worn like a backpack.

“Now remember you lot, if possible I want these fish alive an’ whole til you can pass ‘em off to me,” Balthazar said as Morgan and the others set to strapping the baskets onto themselves. “Try not to put too many holes in ‘em or take too many nibbles, and that goes double fer you, lass.”

The last comment he delivered while pointing up at Morgan, and she felt her cheeks flush a little. She wanted to protest, but she couldn’t really blame him. She was a towering shark girl now, afterall. She had another brief struggle when she realized her back fin would prevent her from wearing the largest basket as intended, but Balthazar showed her how to untie and reposition the loops around her stomach instead, so she wore the basket sideways, resting on her lower back in the space between where her fin stopped and her tail began.

With preparations finally complete, the small crowd left the mess with Balthazar leading the way. Morgan trailed behind, and when Poppy noticed she also fell back, and the pair of them brought up the rear together.

“So, this was your idea?” Morgan asked, reaching up and lightly tugging the flimsy silk top she wore. The bottom hem had tassels running along it from which more shells and beads dangled.

Poppy’s lips twitched ever so slightly and she looked down at her own matching garment. “You volunteered to go hunting, and I did not want you to be unable to participate. If I had not arranged this, I fear you would have tried to go swimming with your clothes on.”

“I probably would have,” Morgan agreed, chuckling.

“You are fortunate that Omiya keeps articles such as these on hand for when she needs to deal with… certain citizens of the deep seas,” Poppy continued. “I have never been to any of the citadels myself, but I would like to, one day.”

Morgan, of course, had no clue what “the citadels” even were, but she could guess they had some special significance to sea dwellers if even Poppy longed to visit one, so she took a chance.

“Well, I’ve never been to any of them either,” Morgan said, beaming brightly back at Poppy. “Maybe we could go to one of them together someday, huh?”

As Morgan had been hoping, Poppy’s cheeks flushed red at that, and she could see her struggling to keep her face still and her expression neutral. This only caused her to grin wider, which in turn seemed to cause Poppy to become even more flustered, to the point that she once again reached up for a hood that was not there. Morgan thought that would be all she got from that exchange, but just as they reached the last staircase before the top deck, Poppy managed to squeeze out a reply.

“I am beginning to suspect that you say such things for the sole purpose of seeing how I will react to them,” Poppy said, turning her head down and to the side, scrutinizing the well-trodden wooden floor with a serious expression.

“Hey, that’s not the only reason,” Morgan said, and Poppy laughed, so suddenly and so surprised by it that she brought a hand up to cover her mouth, turning away and hunching over while her shoulders continued to shake.

After taking a moment to compose herself again, Poppy turned back, keeping her head tilted down, and shuffled up closer to Morgan, her voice barely a whisper even though they had long since been left behind by the other members of the hunting party.

“I think… I would like that,” was all she said, before she jumped back, hurrying ahead of Morgan to reach the staircase that led to the top deck before her. There, she paused and took a deep breath, straightening her back and forcing her face back into its customary blank expression, then proceeded up the stairs at a slow, casual pace.

Morgan stood at the base of the stairs, smiling to herself and shaking her head.

Is this really okay? she wondered, watching Poppy disappear into the sunlight as she thought. Do you think she’ll still be as interested in you when she learns the truth? That you've been lying to her, that you’re really just some ordinary human girl who fell off a boat and died? And how could you even be thinking about that at a time like this? Shouldn't you be trying to find a way home, not playing pretend with “pirates?”

Frowning a little at her own sour thoughts, she shook her head again, harder. Since her therapist hadn’t tagged along with her to this fantasy world, it was now up to her and her alone to catch all of her maladaptive self-doubts and self-sabotaging impulses before they could pile up and make her do something stupid, or leave her too much of a wreck to leave her room. Or wherever she ended up sleeping, since she doubted she’d get a room all to herself. That aside, she reasoned that Poppy was… something like a scientist, so maybe she’d actually be fascinated to learn that Morgan was from another world. As to whether she was doing the right thing, joining a pirate crew instead of frantically searching for a way back to her old life on Earth, well…

I can ask Red Molly about it when I bring it up with her. Later.

Deciding she’d lingered for far too long, Morgan hurried the rest of the way up the stairs, emerging onto the deck. Once again, she had to shield herself from the sudden sunlight, and once the spots in her eyes began to clear she could see the rest of the crew, Balthazar and the others who’d volunteered to hunt included, all looking expectantly in her direction, all waiting on her.

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“S-sorry,” Morgan stammered out, waving weakly. Good-natured chuckles from the crew met her as she walked over to where Poppy, Omiya, and the silver-scaled man waited for her, lined up against the left—No, port side, you’re a pirate now!—railing.

Now that her eyes had adjusted, she could see that in the sunlight, the sea silk practically glowed, the golden-brown threads taking on a twinkling sheen, like metal heated in a furnace, offset by the various shells and beads, causing a rainbow to momentarily dance across her vision.

Of course, staring at the beautiful fabric meant staring at the people wearing it as well, so she quickly tore her eyes away from both Poppy and Omiya before anyone could get the wrong idea.

“I knew you’d like them.” Morgan caught Omiya whispering as she took her place in the line beside her, the way two of her face tendrils curled up giving Morgan the distinct impression of a smile.

“Y-yeah, I do,” Morgan whispered back. “I didn't get a chance to thank you earlier, so, uh, thank you. I really appreciate this.”

“Looks like we're all accounted for,” Red Molly called from the helm, peering down at the hunting party with a grin. “Well, better be off then. Remember, these are dangerous waters, so watch your crewmates’ backs, and don’t try to take on anythin’ bigger than you are.”

With that last bit of advice directed mostly towards Morgan, Red Molly clapped, then waved her hands in a shooing motion, and the other three moved to climb up onto the railing, while the assembled crew on deck wished them luck and shouted words of encouragement at their backs.

As Morgan joined the others on the railing, she saw something that made her almost lose her footing and go tumbling off the edge. There was a plank!

Jutting out from a gap between two of the wooden supports that ran along the railing, and secured in place by a pair of metal hooks, a long narrow plank of wood about seven feet in length extended out over the churning waters. Morgan felt a goofy smile spread across her face at seeing something so quintessentially pirate-y, like when she’d first seen Red Molly’s quarters.

Then, she remembered how horrible a practice forcing someone to “walk the plank” actually was, how the victim was usually blindfolded and tied in such a way to make treading water impossible, details that usually got scrubbed out of most media that featured pirates, even the less kid friendly ones. The presence of something so grim and cruel on this ship made some of her previously banished second thoughts resurface.

Her heart almost stopped when Omiya stepped out onto the narrow wooden beam, and she gasped out, causing her to look back.

“What?” Omiya asked, tilting her head quizzically. “You want to go first?”

Seconds later, Morgan’s brain caught up with the rest of her, forcing two facts to the front of her mind: One, this world had fish people, or in Omiya’s place, squid people, who could breathe underwater and regularly needed to leap from their ships for one reason or another, and two, the core ideals of what it meant to be a pirate in this world were radically different from her own, and everything she’d seen so far made it highly unlikely they would employ such an evil method of execution.

Those two facts collided in her head and formed into one greater realization, one that had her grinning stupidly all over again.

It wasn’t a plank, it was a diving board, so that crew leaving the ship could jump to a safe distance without risk of getting dragged back into the ship’s wake and injuring themselves.

“N-no, sorry, you go ahead,” Morgan hastily composed herself, waving her hand. She waited her turn, Omiya taking a quick running start before leaping off. She stepped out onto the plank next, still unable to stop grinning.

“Make sure you jump well away from the ship,” Poppy spoke from Morgan’s back, raising her voice to be heard over the din of the waves and the crowd behind them. “You do not want to be slammed back into the hull.”

“No problem!” Morgan replied with a confident smile, bending her knees a few times and limbering herself up. There wasn’t enough room for a full running start with how long her legs were, but she was still able to get up to a decent speed by the time she hit the end of the narrow plank and jumped. It wasn’t the greatest dive, not without an actual proper springboard, but she still got enough height and momentum to pull off a single tight flip before she straightened out, arms extended, and pierced through the surface of the waves like an arrow, plunging deep into the water.

Fighting the initial urge to return to the surface, she instead kicked her legs to propel herself deeper, feeling for the first time in hours the cool water rushing over her gills. It was still a peculiar, yet invigorating sensation, like she’d been holding her breath for an entire day and was only now able to inhale again.

She felt as much as she heard the other two hitting the water above her, the thrumming noise of solid mass breaking the water vibrating in her ears and through her body. Catching up to Omiya, she flipped over on her back, grinning and sluggishly waving at Poppy and the silver scaled man as they approached. Damn, she never got a chance to ask him his name, and now she couldn’t.

“Are you ready?” Poppy asked as she reached Morgan’s depth. Which, Morgan realized with a jolt, should not have been physically possible. The way humans (and probably all the other non-humans in this world as well, she reminded herself) spoke was by pushing air up from their lungs and through their throats, causing their vocal cords to vibrate. Without air to cycle through the body, producing ordinary speech underwater should be impossible, to say nothing of how difficult it would be to understand due the differences in density from air to water.

And yet, Poppy had obviously spoken to her, and Morgan had clearly understood it, her voice sounding ethereal and slightly deeper.

“Mo… Miss Morgan, is everything well?” Poppy asked, drifting closer with a flick of her tail. Morgan, keen on cracking this mystery, had been staring intently at her waiting for her to speak again.

Her mouth was open, but she didn’t move her lips… but she did move her throat… some kind of subvocalization? Is this a fish people thing, some kind of extra organ and specially tuned sonar? Am I hearing her with my ears or my whole body?

“Y-yes?” Morgan finally replied, hesitating, as she was unsure if she’d be able to replicate whatever feat Poppy was employing to talk with her. She felt her mouth and throat moving in ways she had not directed them to, but also knew without a doubt that what she had said had been perfectly conveyed. “Sorry, just… distracted for a second. I'm ready.”

Poppy nodded, and swam past her, continuing to descend. Morgan lingered for just another moment, staring up at the dark oblong shape of the ship's hull overhead.

Will wonders never cease? she asked herself, smiling pleasantly.

Then, with mounting excitement, she flipped back over and began swimming to catch up with Poppy and the others. She had a job to do, afterall.

With the four of them moving as a group, swimming so as to keep pace with the ship, Morgan made something of a startling discovery. Now that it was day and the sun was up, she was able to see much further in all directions, and could see that the ocean floor was much higher than she expected it to be, and much clearer as well. She could make out the rolling underwater landscape directly below her and estimated it to be about two hundred and fifty meters deep, rising higher in some places to form hills and plunging even deeper down to from valleys, covered in gently swaying greenery as though she were floating above a lush countryside.

All of which, she thought with bemused frustration, should have been impossible. The presence of vegetation at that depth, and the fact that she could even see it in the first place, both went against everything she knew about how light and water interacted. Unlike sound, which traveled further and faster in water than in air, light traveled slower in water, and would rapidly lose most of its intensity after only the first ten meters, with only about one percent of visible light able to penetrate down to a hundred meters. Two hundred meters was supposed to be the very limit past which photosynthesis became impossible.

Unperturbed by the impossibility of its existence, the dense carpet of seaweed swayed below her, broken up here and there by massive coral growths and even more massive bones. Everywhere Morgan looked, she saw movement, from countless species of fish, alone or in schools, as well as other sea creatures, some of which she recognized and some that resembled nothing she’d ever seen on Earth.

The sight of the fish once again reminded Morgan that she was down here to hunt, not to sightsee, and she’d gotten distracted again. Whatever odd, inexplicable quirks of this world caused the laws of physics to behave differently than they should, she could investigate them later. The other three had once again pulled ahead of her, and were descending upon the underwater forest.

“So, uh, what’s the plan?” Morgan asked Poppy as she swam beside her.

“Plan?” the silver-scaled man asked, looking back, his lips pulled back and showing all his many teeth. “They’re jus’ fish. Catch what ya can, put it in yer baskets, don’t get eaten by a whale.”

With that, he swam ahead, diving further down until he disappeared amidst the gently swaying fronds of the seaweed, where he seemed to vanish. Morgan watched just long enough for one unfortunate school of fish to drift too close to where he’d been hiding, and gasped as the man shot out of the foliage, lightning quick, snatching one fish in each hand and another in his teeth before disappearing once more.

“Ignore him,” Omiya said, rolling her large eyes. She gave Morgan another smile, which is to say her tentacles lifted in a certain way and Morgan’s brain somehow interpreted it as a smile, then she too drifted down towards the seabed. As she went, her body began to change color before Morgan’s very eyes, darkening from purple and pink to a lush yellow-green, perfectly matching the patch of seaweed she slid into. Her two longest tendrils rose out of the patch, then thinned out, and Morgan gaped as she became completely unable to tell which of the gently swaying stalks were genuine and which were part of Omiya’s body.

Once again, Morgan watched on as a few fish drifted too close to the now deadly patch of seaweed, and were quickly ensnared by the tendrils and dragged down into Omiya’s waiting hands.

“Wow, they’re good,” Morgan said distantly. She was beginning to wonder if she’d even be able to compete with skills and abilities like that when, as far as she knew, all she had on her side was swimming fast.

“Indeed,” Poppy said, starting to drift away. Morgan, a little at a loss, followed her for a ways and watched as she perched on the tip of a giant, half submerged rib that formed an overhang above a cluster of pink and turquoise coral.

“You may wish to stay at a distance,” Poppy told her, glancing over her shoulder and giving Morgan a little smirk. “I do not think you would be affected that badly, but it is better to be safe than sorry, yes?”

Curious, but mindful of Poppy’s warning, Morgan swam back a few feet, then turned to watch. Poppy crouched on the tip of the rib and lowered herself, while her tail swung up and over her head, pointed towards the coral, then began swishing back and forth in the water. The tip was open, Morgan saw, and she thought she could… smell something, or maybe taste it, as it entered the water, a faint cloudiness around Poppy that began to spread as she swiped her tail back and forth. It was sweet, like the smell of sugar particles that hung in the air around a cotton candy machine. Morgan tried to pay attention to what Poppy was actually doing, but the smell was actually kind of distracting, and Morgan found herself drifting a little closer in hopes of getting a better taste…

Blinking, Morgan swam back several more feet, wishing she was above the surface so she could take a few deep breaths to clear her head. Now quite certain she knew what Poppy was up to, she watched with fascination as several fish began to emerge from the crevices between the coral, swimming towards Poppy. They reached her and began to circle lazily or rub up against her body, even as she began plucking them like fruit and depositing them into her baskets.

Huh…

Morgan shook her head again. As much as she wanted to bombard each of her companions with questions about their intriguing abilities, she didn't have time to be sitting around. She needed to catch some fish of her own soon or risk going back empty handed.

Putting a bit more distance between herself and the others so as not to disturb their individual hunts, Morgan scanned the water slowly, searching for any fish she recognized from Poppy’s brief overview. A metallic flash drew her eye and she swam closer, discovering a school of narrow-bodied, copper-colored fish averaging one and a half to two feet long, appropriately named “copper mackerels.”

Perfect!

Now, Morgan knew that ordinary tiger sharks were stealthy ambush predators that usually hunted at night, but ordinary tiger sharks didn’t have hands, or several first place trophies from local and regional swim meets, so she wasn’t going to worry about whether or not she was doing things “the right way” when it came to catching fish, she was just going to do what she did best. Sticking low and skimming the surface of the seaweed, Morgan began approaching the school with as much stealth as a six-foot shark-shaped person could. The instant she saw the fish begin to notice her and turn as one to flee, she kicked her legs and arms into high gear and shot off after them.

It was, in Morgan’s completely amateur opinion, shockingly easy for her to close the gap between her and the school of panicked fish. At the last moment, she remembered the admonishment she’d gotten from Poppy for “letting” her win their friendly race the night before, for not using her tail, and with a spare thought, she tried to flex the massive limb behind her.

It was like she’d flipped a switch inside her brain, and her body began moving through the water at speeds she’d never experienced, her spine and tail undulating as one to propel her forward without even needing to use her arms or legs. Morgan plowed through the living cloud of copper scales so fast she wasn’t sure who was more startled, her or the fish. They scattered, and reformed, darting back in the direction that she’d just come, and Morgan, grinning wider than she ever had in her life, flicked her tail and pulled an abrupt about face, taking off after them.

Now that she knew what to expect, she was ready. The next time she blew through the school of fish she reached out to grab one, and time seemed to narrow to a sharp point. The smaller creatures hung there, suspended before her as if they were frozen, until her hand closed around one and she pulled it in, pressing it tight against her chest and holding on with both hands.

Time resumed and Morgan went tumbling end over end in the water as she lost focus on her swimming, her body becoming confused between what it wanted to do and what her brain tried to tell it to do. Eventually she slowed to a stop, unsure of which direction was up, and just hung there, feeling the fish squirming in her grasp and listening to her hammering heartbeat.

“H-huh…” she, for lack of a better word, gasped out, feeling the water being drawn across her gills, and let out a laugh. Then, she let out another. “H-ha… hahah… ahahaha!” Soon, she was full on cackling, holding the fish out in front of her, staring into its glassy eyes. That was so fun! A little easy, if she was being honest, but fun! In a matter of seconds she’d managed to catch a fish with her bare hands, and these fish were tiny. She knew there were other fish out there too; bigger, stronger, faster fish, ones that would really put her new body to test, and she was suddenly very eager to see if she could find any.

But, she reminded herself, if she wanted more opportunities to do this, she had to perform well, to impress Balthazar and Captain Molly, and right now she only had a single fish, still weakly struggling in her hands.

“R-right, stay focused!” she said to herself as she guided the fish down to the baskets she wore around her hips, feeding it into the little slotted opening at the top of one, just like Poppy had shown her. The lids had narrow openings and a small flap that opened inward but would not open outward, preventing the fish from escaping once inside.

Lifting her head, Morgan located the school of copper mackerels again after a few moments. They had fled a considerable distance from her, but not far enough that she couldn’t catch up, and in less than thirty seconds she was upon them again. She passed through the school and, this time, held out both hands, coming out the other end with two fish instead of just one. She wasn’t about to try catching a third with her mouth, not because she didn’t think she could, but because she was pretty sure her teeth wouldn’t leave enough behind for Balthazar to use. She also wasn’t eager to find out what biting into a live fish tasted like. Sure, she’d enjoyed sushi before, but that was a far cry from just chomping into a whole fish, scales and guts and blood and…

“Blegh, no thanks…” Morgan said, putting the other two fish in her basket with the third. The extra weight all on one side made swimming feel a little awkward, but she wanted to keep all the fish from the same school together. She didn’t know if that exactly helped, and they were planning to eat these fish later anyway, but she didn’t see any harm in it. She dove through again, increasing the total to five, wondering just how many Balthazar wanted her to bring back.

She turned to take at least one more pass at the school, but just as she was about to start swimming, a dark shape descended from above and sliced through the panicked mass of copper-scaled fish.

Literally. The large fish, looking to be about as long as Morgan was tall, had used the two foot long metallic blade growing out of its face to cut neatly through several of the copper mackerels in one swipe. As Morgan looked on, stunned, it deftly diced the remains with two more quick slashes before it and a second fish with a similar blade-like growth appeared and began to devour the scattered bits of meat.

“Uh oh…”

Morgan hadn’t had time to read the entire passage on bladefish while she’d been hastily getting dressed, but she did remember Poppy telling her they were dangerous. Even if they were smaller than swordfish on Earth, which could grow up to fourteen feet long, these fish had actual swords on their faces.

Glancing around, not wanting to take her eyes off the feeding bladefish for too long, Morgan realized in her excitement to chase down the copper mackerels that she’d strayed much further away from the group than she realized. She began to swim backwards, a casual backstroke that kept the bladefish in sight, until she realized she could pick up snatches of voices in the water and, more interestingly, smell Poppy’s distinctive chemical scent.

“...see which way she went…”

“...take care of herself, we need…”

“...can’t go until we—oh! There she is, Morgan, hey, over here, quick!”

Morgan peeked over her shoulder. The other three were gathered close together against the edge of a rocky outcropping, Omiya waving her arms and tendrils for her attention. Flipping over, Morgan flexed her tail once and shot towards them, having to use her hands to slow herself down so she didn’t crash into Poppy.

“H-hey there,” Morgan said sheepishly after she arrived. “Sorry for disappearing without saying anything, I kind of got carried away there.”

“Y’don’t say,” the silver-scaled man said, grinning, a bit of red misting off his sharp teeth as he spoke. “Least there weren’t any nets for ya to run into this time.”

“Oh, shut up, Zaak,” Omiya said, rolling her huge orb-like eyes before swimming up to meet Morgan, inspecting her as she circled. “Don’t mind him, he’s just scared you’re going to show him up and he won’t get as much time to slack off while pretending to hunt anymore.”

“It’s called settin’ up a proper ambush, and it ain’t that much different from what you do,” Zaak shot back, bringing a claw up to his mouth and picking at something between his teeth. “Besides, don’t think I forgot about that time I caught ya sleepin’ while pretendin’ to be a pile of ropes.”

Omiya opened her beak and stuck out a far-too-long tongue at Zaak while giggling.

Morgan chuckled along nervously and shrugged. “I don’t think you have anything to worry about there, you’ve probably been doing this a lot longer than me.”

“Now she’s callin’ me old, too,” Zaak said, chuckling even harder at Morgan’s worried expression. “Don’t lose yer scales over it, lass, I’m just yankin’ yer tail. Didya at least catch somethin’ while ya were out there?”

“Uh, yeah, I managed to catch a few copper mackerels,” Morgan said, patting the baskets at her hips. “But, uh, I came back because a couple of bladefish showed up.”

That knocked the grin off of Zaak’s face.

“A couple? As in, more’n one of ‘em?” he asked, grimacing.

“Y-yeah, two of them, one cut up a bunch of the fish and then it and a second one started eating,” Morgan said, pointing back the way she’d come.

“That’s not good,” Omiya said, shaking her bulbous head. When Morgan looked questioningly at her, she pointed up. Morgan followed her finger and spotted it; another large, dark shape, circling overhead like a deep sea vulture. Another bladefish, and this time it was bigger than her, almost ten feet long, with darker sand-colored scales as opposed to the slate-gray colored scales the other two had had. In place of a sword, it had a huge curved axe blade jutting vertically out of the center of its face.

“We had to stop what we were doing because that one showed up,” Omiya explained, huffing grumpily. “If you say there’s two more over there, then we’ll probably have to return to the ship early.”

“Are they really that dangerous?” Morgan asked, earning another gruff laugh from Zaak.

“Maybe not fer you, but the rest of us ain’t fast enough to outswim those bastards if they decide to have a go,” he said, glancing up at the still circling axe-bladed fish. It didn’t look like it was coming any closer.

“We should be reasonably safe if there are only three of them,” Poppy said calmly. “Bladefish tend not to attack anything as big or bigger than them without the advantage of numbers. We will have to move slowly, to not be separated, but as long as more do not appear, we should be…”

Poppy trailed off as the single large shadow overhead was joined by two more, the pair that Morgan had seen earlier, one with a long straight blade and one with a large curved blade.

“Ah, well, yes, as I was saying, we should still start heading for the ship,” Poppy said. Morgan agreed, not at all eager to end up on the receiving end of any of those creatures' attention. “Omiya is the slowest, so she will set the pace. I will position myself behind her, to intercept if they begin to close, the two of you take the flanks.”

On Poppy’s orders, the group arranged themselves into a loose circle around Omiya and began to swim towards the slightly far-off shape of the ship while, as predicted, the bladefish began to follow, if at a distance.

After a moment of swimming, something occurred to Morgan, and she gave voice to her concerns.

“Wait, this doesn’t feel right,” Morgan said, turning her head to meet Poppy’s eyes. “If we’re worried about them attacking, shouldn’t I be the one in the way? I don’t want to sound like I’m bragging or anything, but I am the biggest one here, and I’ve got claws.”

Poppy regarded her for a moment, swimming in that same snake-like, undulating method that Morgan had seen the night before. While her needle-like teeth and tail were likely capable of doing some damage, she lacked the sharp claws that Morgan and Zaak had, and Morgan could see that she understood that.

“Agreed,” Poppy said after another moment, rising up to swap places with Morgan, allowing her to take the place at the back of their formation. “But I will still remain within range to assist if needed.”

“Of course,” Morgan said, giving Poppy a broad grin and a thumbs up.

The group continued to swim, with Morgan and Zaak taking turns keeping their eyes trained on the trio of bladefish as they followed. They had stuck close to the seafloor to avoid inviting attacks from above and below, so while they were closing in on the ship, it was still several hundred feet above them. When they had gotten close enough that it seemed like they would have to start ascending, Morgan spoke up again.

“Wait, wait,” she said, and the group slowed, Poppy and Zaak immediately checking on the still trailing bladefish. They hadn’t moved any closer, but they also hadn’t let them get too far away either.

“What is it now?” Zaak asked impatiently.

“Are we… just going to leave like this?” Morgan asked, furrowing her brow. “I mean… couldn’t we try to… catch one of them?”

“What?!” Omiya demanded shrilly, rounding on Morgan, beak agape. Zaak’s only response was to sigh and palm his forehead. Behind her, Morgan was dimly aware that since they’d stopped, the smaller two bladefish had spread out to either side and begun to circle, while the axe-bladed fish just swam back and forth at the edge of an invisible bubble around them.

“Isn’t that why we’re down here in the first place? I mean, sure, they’re scary-looking, but they’re still just fish, right?” Morgan asked, putting on a grin. “And they’re certainly no match for our intellect!”

“Speak fer yerself,” Zaak said dryly.

Morgan bit her lip and turned to look at Poppy, who seemed to nominally be the one calling the shots. She didn’t want to say that the real reason she was so against leaving this early was because she only had five fish in her basket, and didn’t want her first time hunting to end in failure. She hoped the face she showed Poppy looked serious and determined instead of nervous and slightly guilty.

Morgan’s heart fell as Poppy shook her head.

“It would be too dangerous. Omiya is too vulnerable alone, Zaak is not strong enough to engage them in a head on fight, and I am… not fast enough to outrun them should we lose the upper hand. Only you would be capable of fighting one of them head on, but if you attempted it all three of them would converge on you.”

Poppy’s explanation was smart, it was extremely reasonable, and Morgan could understand her not wanting to risk any of them getting seriously hurt over some fish. But there was one thing that stuck out as odd to Morgan.

“Wait, you’re not fast enough?” she asked, tilting her head. “I saw you swim last night, you’re pretty fast, are you sure…”

Morgan trailed off as she saw Poppy shake her head again and cross her arms. “Thank you, Miss Morgan, but I am afraid I am not capable of performing up to those standards at the moment,” she said, not meeting Morgan’s stare, keeping her eyes on the bladefish as they encircled the group.

“Why not?” Morgan asked, tilting her head. On either side of her, Zaak chuckled and Omiya put a tendril to her forehead. What? Was that a rude question or something?

“Because I have not had… I have not yet consumed…” Poppy began to explain, but trailed off quickly, hunching her shoulders tightly.

Zaak scoffed, all too eager to pick up where Poppy left off. “She’s tryna say she ain’t sucked down any blood today.”

“You don’t have to say it like that, you pile of chum!” Omiya chided Zaak, reaching across the water to begin pelting him with her two largest tendrils while he laughed and batted her way.

“Ooooh,” Morgan said with dawning realization, glancing from the squabbling ball of fins and tentacles that was Zaak and Omiya, to Poppy, who had now turned all the way away from her, so far she had almost turned her entire back on the rest of the group. “Oh, so, you were able to swim that fast because you’d had some of my blood earlier? That makes sense.”

Well, it kind of made sense, to Morgan anyway. She had thought Poppy was a vampire at first, and in a lot of stories vampires did grow stronger from feeding, but it was interesting that that applied to the leech girl as well.

“Well, if that’s all it takes, couldn’t you just take some now?” Morgan offered.

A few feet away, Zaak and Omiya’s fighting came to a screeching halt, and the two of them turned their heads as one, staring at Morgan while they floated awkwardly in place. Poppy, her shoulders hunched up so high it looked like she was trying to make her head disappear into her chest, finally returned Morgan’s gaze. Her own eyes were wide, her mouth hanging slightly open, and her cheeks were glowing. Literally, Morgan realized; Poppy’s cheeks were lit up with a faint red light that only intensified as she drifted closer.

“Woah…” Morgan whispered, only to realize too late that whispering probably wasn’t a thing when you were speaking underwater via unknown means. That thought was driven home by the way Poppy clapped her hands over her cheeks and turned away again.

“I do not need… I c-could not ask you to—” Poppy’s voice quavered, the volume fluctuating as she struggled to form a coherent response, but Morgan just shook her head.

“You didn’t ask me to do anything, I’m the one offering. If it’ll let you hunt better and help me take down one of these things, I’d gladly give up however much blood you need. It’s not like I don’t have plenty to spare,” Morgan pressed, letting out a lighthearted chuckle.

Hesitantly, Poppy turned back to Morgan. Her cheeks were still alight, and she seemed to be looking several inches to the left of Morgan’s head.

“The wound would not close quickly in the water. There would be risk of infection, and the blood may attract even more predators as well…” Poppy mumbled, and Morgan felt a grin spread across her face.

“Well then it’s a good thing you’ve got me here,” Morgan said, pointing towards herself with thumb.

Aaaagh, damnit! Why couldn’t I ever have been this smooth and confident back on Earth!

“D’you two wanna find a cave or somethin’?” Zaak called from behind.

“Shut up!” Omiya snapped, followed by a pained groan from Zaak.

Morgan ignored them and held up her arm, smiling while Poppy studied her face. Finally, she sighed, motioning Morgan closer with a wave.

“It would not do to re-open the old wounds, give me your other arm,” Poppy said, regaining some of her familiar professionalism, though her cheeks still glowed. “Mister Zaak, Navigator Omiya, cease staring at us and keep your eyes on the bladefish.”

Morgan obeyed, swimming closer and holding out her right arm instead. Poppy maneuvered herself until she was floating horizontally and grabbed the offered arm, turning it over so the lighter-toned underside was facing up. With one last glance up at Morgan for confirmation, she lowered her head and opened her mouth, sinking her teeth into a meaty portion of Morgan’s upper forearm.

Just like the first time, Morgan barely felt anything, other than her own suddenly rapidly beating heart. While she could put on a convincing enough air of confidence, she was still in way, way over her head, and she knew it. There was a pretty girl who was also a giant walking leech, latched onto her arm, sucking her blood, and she had asked for it.

What has my life come to…

Despite knowing she also ought to be watching out for the bladefish too, Morgan couldn’t help but stare at Poppy as she drank. She gaped in open fascination as the glowing spots on Poppy’s cheeks were joined by matching rows of red rings spreading down from her neck and back, continuing along the length of her body, all the way down to the tip of her tail. After about thirty seconds, Poppy pulled away, her mouth open wide in a satisfied smile, her eyes half-lidded. Her mouth opened, releasing a small red cloud, which she quickly “inhaled” while a larger twin began to form around Morgan’s still outstretched arm. Just as last night, Poppy maneuvered her tail over her shoulder, the tip opening to encompass the bleeding ring of teeth marks she’d left behind. A cool sensation tickled Morgan’s skin, and Poppy used her hands to quickly rub a glob of clear goop into her wound.

“T-thank you…” Poppy muttered, still unable to meet Morgan’s eyes again, focusing intently on her task instead.

“Anytime,” Morgan said, smiling crookedly. She tried to keep focused, but between Poppy’s cold hands gliding across her skin and the blood she was now breathing, that proved difficult. She found that as soon as her blood had entered the water, she had become hyper aware of it through an odd mixture of both taste and smell that was impossible to separate into a single sense.

“By the tides!”

Morgan finally looked away, finding Omiya staring at her and Poppy with a look of glee on her face. Or, she assumed that’s what Omiya’s open beak and frantically wriggling cheek tendrils meant, especially since she had both her hands balled into fists under her chin and was letting out a series of squeaking sounds.

“Are we near a volcanic vent, because these waters are getting hot!” Omiya squealed, voice momentarily shrill enough to make Morgan wince.

“Eugh…” Zaak said, making an exaggerated noise of disgust, his eyes still focused on the bladefish. “Yer s’pposed to be keepin’ watch with me, ‘Miya. If the two a’ ya are finished, that blood is gonna spread fast, so whatever we’re gonna do, we should do it soon.”

“Yes, yes, we should prepare. Navigator Omiya can most easily hide and disengage if anything happens, relinquish your baskets to her so they will not encumber you,” Poppy said, already untying the ropes holding the woven baskets to her hips and slipping the larger one off her back. Morgan followed suit along with Zaak, and Omiya accepted the extra baskets with her arms and tendrils, then began to shift colors again, her body appearing to become translucent.

“Miss Morgan, you will lead the offensive,” Poppy continued at her back, pointing at each bladefish in turn as she explained, “the smaller two may flee immediately if you feign an attack on them, but the larger female is more aggressive, and may think it has a chance if it can corner you alone. Mister Zaak, use the seaweed for cover and try to stay on Morgan’s tail. Once you’ve engaged with one or more of them, we will move to support and I will attempt to tranquilize one. Understood?”

“Aye!” Zaak barked, already diving down into the thick mass of seaweed below them.

“Got it!” Morgan said, turning to stare down the largest of the bladefish. Despite the distance, she could tell it was returning the favor, eyeing her up, but still too wary to approach even with her blood dispersing further and further through the water with every second. Morgan tried to steel her nerves for what she was about to do. What was she thinking? She wasn’t some kind of badass seafaring hunter who wrestled sharks with her bare hands! But the others were counting on her. Poppy was counting on her.

Brought back to life in another world just to get myself killed again trying to impress a cute girl, huh? Well, I guess there are worse ways to go…

With adrenaline already coursing through her veins, Morgan bared her teeth at the axe-bladed monster in front of her.

Then, she whipped around, locating the smallest of the bladefish, the one with the straight blade. She flicked her tail and shot forwards, the motion as easy as breathing now. The bladefish saw her barreling towards it, clawed hands outstretched, and promptly turned tail and fled in the opposite direction.

Emboldened, Morgan let out a laugh and flipped around, repeating the move on the other smaller fish, the one with the curved blade. It too did not hold out for even a second before it began to scurry away from her at top speed.

“Ha!” Morgan barked after it.

“Behind you!” Poppy’s voice called, and Morgan flipped over again, finding the axe-bladed fish mere feet away and bearing down on her. Kicking her legs and arching her back, she curved her body up and to the side, dodging the bladefish’s downward swipe with inches to spare.

“Oh no you don’t!” Morgan shouted, reaching out as the fish tried to continue past her after its missed attack. She managed to grasp it at the last second and dig her claws into the thick trunk of its tail, holding on tight while it thrashed and dragged her forward in its efforts to free itself.

The oversized fish dragged her for several meters in a frantic zig-zag before straightening out and pulling her past a large algae-covered boulder, and she felt the movement in the water before she saw it out of the corner of her eye. The bladefish with the straight blade had emerged from behind the boulder and was now charging straight at her, the tip of its razor-sharp snout pointed directly at her face. Before she even had time to react, the seaweed parted and Zaak launched himself upwards with the speed of a bullet, catching the approaching bladefish’s throat with his teeth.

Stunned by the momentary certainty that she was about to be impaled, Morgan’s grip on the axe-bladed fish slipped and it shot forward out of her grasp, fleeing from what it now fully recognized as a fight it could not win. Morgan, determined not to let another cocky fish get the better of her, took off in pursuit. She could catch up to it, but she wasn’t entirely sure if she was capable of bringing it to a stop without ripping it to shreds.

Instead, she overtook the axe-faced fish and then spun to face it, swiping her claws and snapping her teeth. As expected, it turned again, and she herded it back in what she hoped was the direction the others were still waiting. She could see past it, making out Zaak dragging the now still straight-bladed fish towards Poppy. Recognizing the chance Morgan was presenting her, Poppy shot forward, arms pinned to her sides and her legs pressed together, moving like a serpent. She bore down on the bladefish from the front, the red rings on her body glowing brighter as she cut through the water.

With its escape route once again cut off, the bladefish turned sharply and broke to the right, which cost it precious speed it could not spare. Morgan caught up to it a second ahead of Poppy, turning her body at the last moment to drive her shoulder into the fish’s side before wrapping both arms and legs around it and clinging onto it tightly. Now held in place, the bladefish could not swim straight or shake Morgan off, and Poppy was able to descend on it, flipping end over end and striking its side with her tail. The mouthlike opening latched on for only a moment before drawing back, and Morgan immediately felt the fish’s struggles begin to slow, and eventually cease entirely.

For several seconds, Morgan hung suspended in the water, clutching an unconscious fish and just listening to the sound of her heart hammering in her chest. The grin on her face was so wide it almost hurt, and she didn’t seem able to make it go away. Her eyes roamed over the length of her prize, marveling at its size. It was indeed longer than she was tall by almost three feet, and heavier than she expected, even in the water. While she caught her metaphorical breath, she took in the details of the bladefish’s body; its scales, the color of sandstone, the gradual change from flesh to solid metal where the axe blade began to sprout from the two halves of its face, and the tiny nicks and notches she could now see on said blade as she examined it closer.

I wonder how they keep them sharp, she thought as she traced the blade’s curved edge with her eyes. Probably similar to how birds do it, by scraping their beaks on rocks and other rough surfaces.

“Y’better take that from her before she decides to take a bite outta it.”

The voice drew her out of her contemplations and she looked up to find Zaak and Poppy floating a few feet away. Zaak had the corpse of the other bladefish slung over his shoulder, its throat missing entirely. Morgan was uncomfortably aware of the smell and taste of the blood it was leaking into the water. She thought she might gag, but instead it only made her think of her breakfast, and how the only meat it had consisted of was a single slice of salted pork. She was getting hungry, she realized, and now that Zaak had mentioned it, maybe she could get away with just a little nibble. Would Balthazar even notice?

“Huh?” Morgan said, blinking her eyes a few times, realizing how close her face had gotten to the still living bladefish’s underbelly. She shook her head and pulled away, trying to fan the water and clear it of some of the taste or smell or… smelltaste of blood. That was possibly something to be concerned about; would enough blood in the water send her into some kind of feeding frenzy? From the way Zaak was hanging just a bit further back than seemed necessary, Morgan suspected that was a possibility. She needed to hurry up and reassure them. “U-uh, I wouldn’t do that! I was just examining it, I’ve… I’ve never seen one this close up before, that’s all!”

“That’s what they all say…” Zaak chuckled, grinning through his own mouth of bloodied teeth.

Poppy, for her part, approached without hesitation, and Morgan saw she was also smiling.

“That was so… ah, that is, you performed admirably, Mo—Miss Morgan,” Poppy said, catching herself several times. It seemed like she was having a bit of a hard time keeping up her more formal mode of speech with how pleased she was at their success.

“Thanks, but all I did was chase it down, you’re the one who knocked it out,” Morgan said, deftly deflecting some of the praise back onto Poppy, whose cheeks flared for her efforts. She smiled, switching to holding the limp bladefish over one shoulder.

“C’mon, you two can flirt when we’re back on the ship!” Omiya said, materializing from the seaweed, still clinging tightly to everyone’s baskets.

“Yeah, let’s make waves before somethin’ even bigger can show up,” Zaak said, already rising towards the surface, dragging the smaller bladefish with him.

Poppy ignored Omiya’s comment and cleared her throat, swimming up to help shoulder some of the burden of the axe-bladed fish. “That would be wise. Let us go.”

“Still, that was exciting, huh?” Omiya chirped cheerfully. “I forgot what it was like to have someone crazy enough to take on the more nasty fish.”

“Ah, yeah, with Yami gone—” Zaak started to say something, but for once seemed to think better of it without Omiya needing to yell at him. Morgan didn’t know who “Yami” was, but from the look Omiya shot Zaak before glancing back at Poppy, and the way the name had made Poppy’s face fall, Morgan was pretty sure there was some unspoken history there. She knew better than to ask, especially because she didn’t want Poppy’s good cheer to evaporate entirely, so she did the only thing she could do, and ignored Zaak’s slip entirely.

The trip up passed mostly in silence after that. Zaak and Omiya swam a few feet ahead of Morgan and Poppy with their heavier catch, Omiya clearly trying to admonish Zaak without actually using words. It was probably pretty hard to have a private conversation underwater, what with the way sound traveled.

“Thanks again for your help,” Morgan finally said, when they were about fifty meters from the surface. “I couldn’t have brought this thing down without your help.”

Poppy seemed to find that amusing, the way she smiled and shook her head. “That is untrue, you easily caught up to it twice without my assistance, it would have been trivial for you to subdue it alone.”

“Okay, sure, but not without tearing it to ribbons,” Morgan said with a smirk. “But because of you we’ll be able to deliver it almost completely untouched.”

Poppy raised her eyes again, her faintly glowing eyes studying Morgan closely.

“Ah,” Poppy said, coming to some conclusion in her head but keeping it to herself. “Then, if you would allow me, I could teach you how to deliver fatal strikes to most smaller sea creatures.”

Oh, that sounded pretty useful! If a little bit grim. Morgan’s smile widened again, and she nodded.

“I would like that very much,” Morgan said, then braced herself, as they had finally reached the surface again.

Morgan’s head broke through the waves and she emerged into the sunlight, mouth open as though to gasp for air. There was a momentary struggle when she did not, in fact, gulp down a lungful of cool ocean air, but instead continued to feel water rushing past her gills, then it was as if a switch had been flipped, and she inhaled deeply through her nose.

That feels so weird, Morgan thought as she got used to breathing air again after more than an hour underwater. Not for the first time, she found herself wondering just how not just one species, but an entire race of sea creatures could evolve all the way up to being human equivalent while keeping both gills and lungs, two modes of respiration suited for entirely different environmental niches.

They probably didn’t, was Morgan’s current method of keeping herself sane and ignoring the improbable things she saw. It was probably magic or something.

Whether or not she seriously believed that, she couldn’t say yet.

The other three bobbed beside her, also beginning to work their lungs again and taking deep breaths, and eventually someone aboard the ship noticed their return and began calling out and waving. Morgan looked up and took in the ship, noticing something she’d missed before they left. More than half of the sails had been stowed again, slowing the ship to make the eventual task of catching up and returning aboard easier.

As the hunting party neared, more and more heads appeared, poking over the railing as word spread of their arrival. A pair of wood and rope ladders were slung over the side of the ship for them to climb, while ropes with grappling hooks were tossed down, which Omiya slung the fishing baskets onto. Upon seeing the size of the bladefish Morgan had draped across her shoulders, a call went up for even more rope, and within seconds the end of one was tossed down to her.

With Poppy’s help to hold the fish steady, Morgan looped the rope around the end of the axe-faced bladefish’s tail, tying a quick bowline knot and pulling it tight before giving those waiting up top a thumbs up, then joining the others as they ascended the ladders.

Landing on the deck, Morgan found not just Balthazar waiting for her, but what must have been half the crew or more, gathered in a loose semicircle. Four oversized barrels filled with water waited, along with a long wooden crate that had been, somehow, filled with ice. Before anyone could say anything, Balthazar looked up from submerging their baskets into the waiting barrels, turning to face them with an unreadable expression on his stern face.

The larger bladefish was sprawled out on the deck beside its smaller counterpart, and there was naked amazement on the faces of the crew as Balthazar knelt before them. Morgan watched as the man placed a hand on the sandy scales of the axe-faced fish, the other going to his belt.

“Mmmh… fully grown, excellent color, unharmed save a few scratches by the tail…still alive, even…” Balthazar muttered, mostly to himself, pulling an object from his belt. It consisted of a handle with holes for the chef’s thick fingers to slip through, like a pair of brass knuckles, but with a thin, narrow spike protruding from the center like an ice pick. Lifting the bladefish’s head slightly, Balthazar placed the tip of the spike to a particular point above its eye. With practiced ease, he plunged the tip in and drew it back, and Morgan had to hold back a gasp as the fish’s entire body jerked, its tail lifting once and its mouth opening wide.

What was that?! It took Morgan only a second to figure it out, of course. Balthazar had pierced the fish’s brain, killing it instantly. Morgan, still a little shaken, wondered if that had any overlap with what Poppy had promised to teach her.

“Well,” Balthazar grunted as he stood, hauling the now dead bladefish up and into the large crate of ice. It didn’t fit, not entirely, it’s head and tail slightly hanging off the edges. “I can’t lie, I was not expectin’ ya to bring back somethin’ this impressive on yer first go, but I ain’t exactly surprised neither.”

“O-oh, it wasn’t just me,” Morgan protested, hastily putting her hands up. She nodded to Poppy, putting a hand on her shoulder. “All I did was chase the thing, Poppy knocked it out.”

Poppy, predictably, wilted from the attention while the crew made various noises of congratulations and cheer.

“Heh, aye, I did figure that from the way yers isn’t in tatters,” Balthazar chuckled, lifting the smaller bladefish from the deck, where a small puddle of blood remained, spilled from its gaping neck wound. Morgan spent a second longer than she wanted to staring down at it before tearing her eyes away.

“A-ah, that was an emergency,” Morgan said, also turning to nod at Zaak. “That one would have impaled me if Zaak hadn’t intercepted it.” She gave the silver-scaled man a smile, scratching at the back of her head with a free hand. “I still haven’t thanked you for that, by the way.”

There were laughs and more cheers from the crowd, and a few whoops even. Morgan could see Zaak trying to play off his reaction to her gratitude, crossing his arms over his chest and scowling, but the corners of his mouth refused to stop curling upward.

“Yeah, yeah, jus’ doin’ my job!” he scoffed, and beside him Omiya did her clicking giggle, patting one of his shoulders with a tendril.

Behind Balthazar, a few of the crew members Morgan thought she recognized as those who assisted him in the galley were going through the barrels that contained their baskets, pulling fish from them and doing something similar to what Balthazar had done to the bladefish, using their own spiked tools to pierce their foreheads before tossing them into the ice-filled crate. When one approached the barrel that Morgan’s basket had gone into and reached inside, her eyes widened.

“Woah!” the woman, an elf with yellow skin freckled with brownish spots like a banana, gasped. “Chef, there’s copper mackerels in this one! A bunch of ‘em!”

Balthazar’s eyebrow raised as he stalked across the deck to the indicated barrel, taking a peek inside. Beside Morgan, Zaak shifted, grinning sideways at her and grumbling under his breath.

“A few, huh?” he said with a chuckle.

Balthazar counted the copper-scaled fish as he extracted them from Morgan’s basket and spiked each one before placing it in the crate, and by the time he was finished Morgan felt like the entire crew had turned up. Red Molly had appeared from wherever it was she had been hiding, and Balthazar turned to her with a satisfied nod.

“Five copper mackerels, cap’n,” he stated. More cheers from the crowd, even a few whistles. If it wasn’t easy enough already for the entire ship to figure out who was responsible for such an apparently impressive haul by the way the other three members of the hunting party had turned to look at Morgan, she herself couldn’t stop shuffling her feet and staring at the deck.

“I-is that a lot? What’s the big deal?” Morgan tried to ask Poppy quietly, but that proved difficult with how noisy the deck was currently. “They weren’t even that hard to catch…”

“Not even that hard to catch!? Ya went missing for like five minutes and yer tellin’ me that’s all it took to catch nearly a half dozen copper mackerels” Zaak blurted out, throwing his hands into the air in exaggerated exasperation before laughing. “Ugh, you could at least be a smug asshole about it so I could hate you properly!”

The crew laughed along with Zaak, and Morgan felt her chest swirl with a complicated mix of emotions. She really hadn’t been trying to brag, but she also didn’t know anything about any of the fish they’d been tasked to find, or what made the copper mackerels worth making such a fuss over. They’d been fast, sure, but she’d been faster, so she caught them easily, it was as simple as that.

As the rest of their catches were tallied up, Morgan decided not to mention that. Zaak might throw himself overboard. Or her.

Heavy-booted footfalls on wood preceded Red Molly as she approached Morgan, grinning wide.

“I knew I had a feelin’ about you,” Red Molly said, clapping both hands onto Morgan’s cheeks and briefly squeezing them before stepping back, throwing her arms wide. “I was a little dubious when you were bold enough to claim your family name was actually ‘Hunter,’ but now I see that wasn’t just bluster.” Red Molly chuckled, and Morgan blinked.

It… had not occurred to her until that very moment that occupational last names such as hers were not merely interesting little relics of history, but in fact meant to be literal active endorsements of her and her family’s prowess. She almost felt faint as the realization hit her that she might as well have been going around saying “Oh, me? I’m great at hunting, in fact, ‘Hunter’ is my middle name!” and only by dumb luck and fortunate circumstances had she not wound up proving herself a completely clueless amateur.

No one must ever know…

“Well!” Red Molly’s shout and following clap drew Morgan out of her spiralling thoughts, and she stood up straight again as the captain addressed her and the rest of the hunting party. “I’d say the four of you have earned a bit of a break, so go enjoy some leisure time. As for the rest of you lot, back to work!”

At Red Molly’s command, the crowd dispersed. Gullen began shouting for the remaining sails to be unfurled again, while most of the crew returned below decks. Balthazar and his galley crew hauled away the crate of fish and ice, and the ship once again returned to normal operation.

“Oh, and Miss Hunter!”

Morgan stopped at the edge of the stairs to the lower deck at Red Molly’s call, turning back to her along with whoever had remained topside.

“You, especially, make sure to get plenty of rest, you’ve still got a demonstration to put on later this evening!”

Red Molly grinned and turned, taking the stairs to the helm two at a time and laughing to herself while Morgan stood by, her eyes wide, while all around her the deck erupted into curious muttering and sidelong glances. Before the captain could do any more damage, Morgan fled down into the bowels of the ship.

■ ■

(Continued in part 2)