Having double vision is kind of trippy, but given the last few months, I’ve sort of gotten used to it. Double hearing and double touch, meanwhile—still super trippy.
Zyneth stands on top of the Prismatic, looking up at the ship that’s slowing beside us. It’s a lot like Earth sailing ships of old, except in place of sails are transparent films of glowing magic, and runes are lit all along its hull.
Zyneth doesn’t even flinch as the underbelly of the ship bumps into the Prismatic below water, causing the submarine to rock. He shifts me over to one arm as he raises a hand to shield his eyes from the sun. Well, not me: mini-me. It’s how I’m able to see, hear, and feel everything that’s happening.
“How kind of you to come out to meet us,” someone from the ship calls down to Zyneth.
“I wasn’t given much of a choice, what with my ship flooding,” he replies. His tone is casual, as if he were chatting with a family member and not someone who might decide to kill him. Then again, he seems pretty at home with life-or-death scenarios.
“Pitty, that.” The voice is masculine, but I can’t make out the shape of their silhouette from this vantage point. I call on Echo for a Check.
[Access denied,] she replies. [Subject is not within direct line of sight.]
Ah well, it had been worth a shot. Guess we’ll have to do this the old fashioned way.
“Given the craftsmanship of your vessel, I expect you have plenty of excess supplies on board,” Zyneth says. “I don’t suppose you’d like to help patch us up?”
The man laughs. “It’s refreshing for a target to have such manners—and humor. If you can maintain this disposition, I expect we can see this job through without any bloodshed.”
“Your employer is Gillow, I take it?” Zyneth asks.
“They opted to remain anonymous,” the man replies. “But I expect you’ll be meeting them soon enough.”
At least we have confirmation they want us alive. Probably so Gillow can gut us themself. I bet they won’t be pleased about the state of their sub, though. That thought brings me some satisfaction.
It’s the little things.
“We’re going to throw a ladder down to you,” the man says, and a rope ladder is cast over the side as he speaks. “I suggest you take it.”
Zyneth eyes the ladder, but doesn’t move toward it. “And walk straight into my captor’s hands? I think I’d rather not.”
“It’s that or we leave you here with your ship to sink,” the man says. “But I’d prefer to get paid and I’m sure you’d prefer to keep living.”
Zyneth hesitates, putting on a good show. He needs to get up there to scope things out, but agreeing too quickly would seem suspicious. “While I trust you not to kill me, seeing as you’ve had ample opportunity to do so if that were your aim, I am still reluctant to accept your offer; you’ve guaranteed our lives, but not our wellbeing.”
“If it’s injury you’re concerned about, I can personally guarantee you’ll remain unharmed while aboard my ship.” No guarantees once we get to land, I note.
“And my companion, too?” Zyneth asks.
The man, who I’ve decided is likely the captain, given how he refers to the ship as his, tips his head. “Where is this companion of yours? We were told there would be a cambion and a homunculus.”
Zyneth gestures to mini-me. “The homunculus’s core. Its body was damaged during your attack.”
“Fine. Your homunculus core, too.” He waves a dismissive hand. “There’s not much left to safeguard anyway. Now will you come aboard willingly, or do we need to escalate this engagement?”
“That’s not necessary,” Zyneth says, glancing down as water laps at his boots. “I’m on my way.”
This has got to be the most civil abduction that’s ever taken place.
Zyneth shifts me to one arm as he climbs the ladder. I’m given a bird’s-eye-view of the Prismatic as we rise. I can see the shadow of the submarine beneath the waves. Despite our intention to let it float, it’s almost entirely submerged now. It won’t be long before it sinks.
We’ll need to speed things up. I wiggle the glass in Zyneth’s hands, and he taps one of his fingers in response.
Zyneth swings himself up over the rails, and immediately the crew is upon him, weapons drawn. He raises his hands, mini-me included.
“I assure you I have no intention of trying to fight through all of you at once.”
Even so, a nereid moves in to seize Zyneth’s knife. He grimaces. “Do be careful with that. I’d rather not lose both halves of the pair.”
“I’m afraid we won’t be returning your weapons at any point,” the captain says. “Though it’s such a nice blade, I believe I’ll be keeping it myself.”
The man is a dracid, his skin covered in green scales, and his dragon-like head decorated with a row of horns. He stands a foot taller than Zyneth, and is twice as broad. It’s really annoying to not know the captain’s name, level, or class. I hadn’t realized how much I’d come to rely on Echo to help me size people up before now. Well, it won’t be for much longer.
The crew is mostly made of dracid and nereids, though there’s a scattering of other species present as well. The main deck looks rather like what any Earth deck would look like in the 1800s. I mean, I assume this is what they looked like. Masts and barrels and all that jazz. Earth ships probably had significantly less runes carved into the wood, I would imagine. As Zyneth begins to drop his hands, I also catch sight of what I’m looking for: lifeboats. Jackpot!
I try to orient myself relative to the ship’s layout. It’s a bit ambiguous, but I think I’ve got the jist of it. Your call, Zyneth.
The predator is swimming circles around my mind, eager for the impending action. I shift my focus to rein it in; I can’t let it act preemptively.
We’ll get to the ‘break shit’ part of the plan soon enough, I tell it. Just wait.
“...other ship.”
I realize I’ve missed some of the conversation taking place near Zyneth. One of the crewmates is speaking with their captain.
“Doesn’t matter,” he says. “We got here first. No one would be stupid enough to fight us for them.”
The crewmate still looks nervous. “They’re not turning away. They might not know we’ve captured them already.”
The other ships were admittedly not part of my plan. I was hoping Zyneth and I would be able to slip away before anyone else got too close. If they get here before we escape, we might have a much more complicated battle on our hands.
The captain gives an irritated sigh. “Then fire some warning shots to let them know the hunt is over.” He raises his voice. “Stoke the sails! Starboard ten. Make for Miasmere!”
“Aye, Captain!” A chorus of replies meet his commands. Above me, I can feel the ship begin to shift.
Now? I wobble in Zyneth’s hands, prompting him. We can’t let the ship pull away. I’ve gotten a good look at where the lifeboats are. What are we waiting for?
Zyneth taps back once: wait.
“Are they tracking us, or the ship?” Zyneth asks, his voice the tone of mild curiosity. “Could be trouble for you guys if it’s the former.”
Zyneth, now is not the time for intel! We’re going to lose our opportunity.
“If you’re hoping for them to intercept us, you’ll be left wanting,” the captain says. “A large arcana-powered vessel like that sub isn’t particularly subtle when you know what to look for.” He waves a hand at one of his crewmates. “Take him below.”
Zyneth rapidly taps my glass three times.
The predator grins.
Here we go.
Just as two of the crewmates are reaching for Zyneth, the Prismatic’s six limbs burst from the water like the tentacles of a kraken. The ship rocks, and the crew goes stumbling. Zyneth stumbles with them—exaggerated—and falls against the quarterdeck, where he throws a hand out to catch himself. He slams mini-me against the raised portion of the deck, whereupon I activate a Sculpt, shifting the legs so it latches onto the ship’s frame. Zyneth lets go, and my glass stays: now I have a raised, stationary view of the deck.
This really helps my aim when I smash one of the Prismatic’s limbs across the ship.
Wood splinters through the air, and the crew screams. The predator gleefully follows my direction, crashing two more of the limbs into the ship. This is fun! It’s not like eating a living creature, but it enjoys the crunching sensation of the wood cratering beneath its blows.
Lovely. We’ve made so much progress.
I sweep a limb across the deck, aiming for as many of the crew as possible, and fling several out into the ocean.
It’s only been a handful of seconds, but the crew is already recovering from the initial shock. Weapons are drawn; magic appears in empty hands. The captain rounds on Zyneth.
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“You—!”
“How could I have possibly done this?” Zyneth cries, backing away. “I’m right here.”
The captain’s eyes narrow, and he draws his sword.
Alarmed, I send one of my limbs his way. The dracid sees it coming, however, and jumps, vaulting over the mechanical limb. That’s the main drawback with these things: they trade speed for power.
The predator gleefully spears one of the tentacles straight through the deck, shattering a lifeboat while it’s at it.
Hey, I snap. Watch out for the lifeboats! That’s the only way we’re getting out of here if we don’t sink the main ship. Which is starting to seem increasingly likely as the predator punches more holes through it.
By the time my attention shifts back to Zyneth, he’s managed to retrieve his dagger, and a new sword to boot. That didn’t take long; I pity the crewmate who had been holding onto Zyneth’s knife. The captain charges after him, and the two clash.
The captain takes several swipes at Zyneth, all of which cut only air; the captain is clearly more powerful, but Zyneth has agility on his side. Another crewmate comes for Zyneth, and he notices just in time, darting away with a returned slash of his own, but it puts him within the captain’s range. The dracid crashes his blade down on Zyneth, who parries with the sword. The weapon flies from his grasp as Zyneth winces, grabbing his arm. But there’s no blood—it’s the tattoos. Zyneth retreats, his single small knife in his good hand as the captain stalks after him.
I attempt to swing another limb the captain’s way, but my movement is being hindered by something. A line of water has reached out to snag the arm; then another, and another, until my movement of that limb is ground to a halt. Damn! Of course pirates would all have water Affinities. But they can’t stop all six of the limbs at once. I take out one of the water users with my other limb, while the predator uses the four its controlling to smash haphazardly into people and critical ship parts alike. One limb cracks against the main mast, which begins to tear from its mount. It sways indecisively, then groans as it crashes back toward the aft end of the ship, obliterates the helm, and snaps in two as it vanishes over the stern.
Well now we really need to make sure we save the lifeboats, I say.
The predator acknowledges its mistake, but is entirely unapologetic, to no one’s surprise.
We aim for the water users next, trying to free up the limbs, and succeed in smacking a handful overboard. This wasn’t the great idea it initially seemed, however, as they use twisters of water to leap back onto the ship, turning the columns into extra ammunition to use against us.
New plan, I think, keeping a nervous eye on Zyneth as he continues to fend off the captain’s blows. They’re locked in some kind of cinematic conflict, leaping from stairs and swinging from ropes as they duel all across the ship. I don’t know what else I expected from him, really.
Get that lifeboat out of the way, first, I tell the predator. Without destroying it! Then I let go of the controls, turning the last two limbs over to the predator.
In the Prismatic, the water is already up to my chest. The ship is bound to sink any minute, so we need to make use of its limbs before it’s at the ocean floor. But Zyneth needs my help, and for the predator to use its weapons unhindered, we need more hands on deck.
I keep an eye on the ongoing battle that’s happening above me as I struggle to wade to the cargo bay. Walking is too difficult—I switch to swimming.
Well, the only kind of swimming I can really do in this body. Grabbing all the glass I can mentally hold, I launch myself through the water.
The last month the predator and I have spent patrolling the waters around the Prismatic come in handy now. It’s more clunky without the predator in control, and without so much of its void to help stabilize my glass, but I’ve got the gist of it all the same. I propel myself to the cargo bay, hovering before one of the windows. The ship’s underbelly is about ten feet overhead. I activate a Void Whip, latching it to my beach ball-sized clump of spare glass and fulgurite.
Back on the ship, the predator has managed to bat a couple of the lifeboats into the surrounding waters with minimal damage, and has returned to wreaking general havoc. Two of the limbs are pinned down with water and ice, but the other four are flailing wildly and causing so much mayhem that soon the water Attuners are diving out of the way and abandoning their attempts to keep the tentacles pinned. I search frantically for Zyneth, but I don’t see him or the Captain. They must either be below deck, or on top of the quarterdeck.
I take a gamble.
Hand up? I ask the predator.
It shifts a portion of its attention over to me. The void in my joints tense, locking my glass in place. Together, with the predator working the void and me concentrating on glass, we rocket my body toward the surface.
A little too quickly, I might add. I burst from the water and shoot dozens of feet into the air. If I had a stomach, it would have dropped back into the ocean by now. I rapidly shift the direction I’m pushing my body, directing it over the quarterdeck. After that, it’s less about levitating me down and more about keeping my body from falling and shattering to pieces.
I land hard, dropping to one knee from the force of the impact. My knee smacks into the deck and, to my bewilderment, doesn’t crack.
[0 points of Bludgeoning damage sustained.]
All those tempering experiments are finally coming in handy.
I push myself to my feet, relieved to find the captain and Zyneth up here as well. I knew he’d opt for the high ground.
There’s a handful of crewmates, too; they immediately run toward me, weapons raised. Come on, not even a little shocked to see a glass man flying out of the ocean? I guess the giant mechanical squid tentacles must have filled their ‘surprise’ quotas for the day.
As I push myself to my feet, I spin in a circle, pulling the Void Whip taut. The glass at the other end scrapes across the deck, and then with my help lifts into the air. The crewmates skid to a stop, so I extend the length of the void, and abruptly they’re within range. The glass flail crashes into them, scattering the crew and launching several out to sea.
[14 points of Bludgeoning damage dealt.]
[10 points of Bludgeoning damage dealt.]
[21 points of Bludgeoning damage dealt.]
The notifications stream by. I levitate my head above the rest of my body as I spin, increasing my vantage point and picking which are the next closest crew to target. I suppose one benefit of lacking an organic body is the inability to become dizzy; like a top, I spin into a deadly blur. I shorten and lengthen the void whip as I attack, bowling through everyone in the area. Eventually, it’s just Zyneth and the Captain, who have paused their duel to stare at me.
“Wow!” I come to a wobbling stop, and the glass mace crashes into the deck. “Did you see that? That was pretty cool, right?”
“Calling attention to it somewhat diminishes the ‘cool’ factor,” Zyneth says.
The captain takes a step back. “The glass homunculus. This is not the description we were given in the brief.”
“Sorry to disappoint.” I reel the void whip back in, dragging the glass across the deck and up into my hand. “I have leveled up a bit in the last few months.”
Then I aim the glass orb at the captain, and blast it forward. The blow catches him in his chest, flinging him over the railing and off into the ocean.
That would have been a great moment to pause dramatically and allow Zyneth to bask in my badassery, but the Void Whip goes taut a moment later as the glass hits the edge of its range, and I’m yanked off my feet, crashing chest-first into the deck.
[17 points of Bludgeoning damage self inflicted.]
“Ow.” I start to recall my glass as I roll onto my side, checking my vial. It’s deep enough inside my chest that it’s unscathed. Maybe I should add a few more glass layers of protection, just in case.
“Are you harmed?” Zyneth helps me back to my feet.
“Mostly my ego. How is your arm?”
“I’ll survive.”
We both jump as the ship emits a great crack. Zyneth turns to look, and I watch through my glass eye on the main deck, as the Prismatic’s tentacles bury themselves in the ship, and then slowly begin to pry it in half.
“I think it’s time we get going,” Zyneth says. A spray of water geysers out of the center of the deck. “Is all of that the predator?”
“Yes.” I mentally nudge it, letting it know it’s time to leave. I can feel our bond stretching; the Prismatic is starting to sink.
The predator scowls. It was having so much fun, too. It liked using the limbs of this dead metal creature. It gave us so much more power!
You won’t have any power at all if you sink with the ship, I point out.
“The lifeboats are on the far side,” I tell Zyneth. At least, that was the last I saw of them when they went overboard. “We will need to get through the last of the crew to reach them.”
“Shouldn’t be a problem,” Zyneth says. Most of the crew are overboard anyway, still attempting to make it back to the ship. “However, that will be.” He nods out to sea.
Having omnivision, I really have no excuse to have missed them before now. I guess you could blame it on my attention being focused on Zyneth and the captain, or the fact that the water still dripping down my glass gives me a bubbly and blurred view of my surroundings. But there’s certainly no missing them now: the other three ships are rapidly approaching us, each from different directions.
“I thought the captain was going to fire warning shots,” I say.
“He was—until we attacked. That might even have worked, though it’s clear now that the ship is in disarray.” Zyneth sheaths his knife, resting a hand on his tattooed arm. “I suspect they’re not expecting much of a fight. Here to clean up the scraps.”
“Expletive.” The censorship only makes me more irritated. “The lifeboats will not be fast enough, you think? The predator and I could try pushing it from behind.”
“A good idea, but I doubt we’d be able to outpace those vessels,” Zyneth says.
“Then we are in for another fight?”
The ship groans, and the surface we’re on develops a noticeable slant.
“It does seem that way,” Zyneth admits. “Though with the state of this ship, we currently face a significant disadvantage.”
I can feel the strain of the predator’s distance growing, so I poke at it again. Leave, unless you want both of us to be in a world of pain. I pause, struck by an idea. But before you go, I’ve got one last thing for you to do. You wanted power, right?
The predator listens, excitement ballooning inside it. Oh, yes, yes, it has been waiting for this!
Still clinging to the pirate ship, the limbs of the Prismatic abruptly go still, as if the beast has been slain. A few of the crew cheer, but not for very long; water bubbles up from the holes in the deck. Their ship is getting pulled under with the Prismatic.
A moment later, the power hits me, jolting from the predator’s essence back into my soul. I stumble, catching myself against a railing, then hold perfectly still, overwhelmed by the deluge of magic.
The predator finishes prying the arcana crystal from the Prismatic’s interface, and the last dregs of magic vanish from the ship. Instead, the predator is siphoning energy from the crystal back into us.
“Kanin?” Zyneth asks.
Stop, I tell the predator. Not so much. We’ll need that for the fight.
The predator lessens its pull on the magic just a hair, but it’s too excited to let go of it completely. Carrying the crystal with it, like a bone in its teeth, the predator lopes down the hall, dives out into the water, and then claws its way up the side of the ship. Zyneth startles as the creatures spills out over the deck, a mix of water and shadows. I hold out my hand, and the predator relinquishes the arcana crystal to me—only because it knows we’ll both be using it soon. The shadows ooze back inside my long coat. Now that I have the arcana crystal, I tamper the energy draw back down. I slump with relief as the electrifying sensation becomes more manageable.
“Not a complete disadvantage,” I say to Zyneth, holding up the crystal. The drops of water on its surface glimmer like beads of blood. “Ready for round two?”