Augustine emerged from the doors of the inn. The sun sent a ray over his face and he inhaled deeply through his nose, allowing the fresh air to run through his lungs. The shopkeepers that occupied the street were beginning to set up shops.
A neighbor to the inn flapped a blue and white striped piece of cloth that he then hung in front of the shop. Afterwards, he began carrying out large boxes of fruit to put in the shade. A few children ran by, laughing and kicking up small bits of sand behind them. A nice breeze brushed passed his skin, cooling the hundred and ten degree atmosphere. Then, he exhaled slowly.
“It’s hot,” he groaned. Loud, pummeling footsteps sounded behind him until a sudden force nearly knocked him over.
“Morning,” Jay said as he hugged his friend from behind. Augustine shrugged him off and began walking down the street. “We going to see the priest?”
“Yep,” Augustine replied. “But first…”
Next to the inn, a guard stood with his arms crossed in front of the guard station. When he saw Augustine, he straightened his posture and greeted them. “Hey, kids.”
“Hey,” Augustine said. “What’s new? Heard you guys reeled in some big fish last night.”
“You kids hear too much at that bar.” The guard sighed. “But, yeah, we did. Someone came by and left a piece of paper with some interesting info. Figured we’d check it out just in case and found ourselves interrupting a drug deal. To be honest, it’s not the first time someone’s left a tip for us.”
“Oh, yeah? Any ideas of who it is?”
“None yet.”
Excellent.
“Bummer. Well, hey, we’re gonna run to the church before work. Good seeing you.”
“Take care, kids,” the guard said and resumed his casual position prior to the conversation.
“Aye,” Jay said as they continued walking. “Let’s play a game!”
“No thanks.”
“Come ooooooon!”
“No.”
“Augustiiiine,” Jay whined as he pretended to collapse on top of his friend. Since he was as skinny as a young child, Augustine held him up with ease.
“Fine: one game. Make it count.”
“What number am I think-”
“Seven.”
“I’m not finished, that doesn’t count! What number am I thinking of on a scale of one to ten?”
“Three.”
“Wha- How? Damnit! How did you do that?”
“Because five is halfway to ten,” he began his explanation. “Then three is roughly halfway from one to five and seven is halfway from five to ten. Now, I know you Jay. I know you like to play it safe, so you would choose a number that’s in the middle instead of on the edge like, say, nine. After I interrupted you with seven, you wouldn’t pick that, so that leaves five or three. Plus you’d want to go as far as seven as possible after I said it.”
“What… But… That’s cheating!”
“No it isn’t. Wait, plus, there’s not even any rules! All I had to do was guess a number.”
“No way, I want a redo.”
“Too bad. We’re already here,” Augustine said. They both looked to the side to see a large, worn-out church with no decorations. Jay protested so Augustine grabbed his collar and forced him inside.
The church looked relatively dull. Other than a long, red carpet leading up to the altar and a few religious paintings spread about the walls, it was all wood. The floorboards creaked as they entered, alerting the priest who stood at the other side of the room.
“Welcome,” he boomed as he turned to face them. “To- Oh, it’s you guys.”
“Hey, Castle,” Augustine greeted. He walked to one of the benches and plopped down. “What’s cooking?” Jay began to say hello as well, but a nun walked through the room carrying a tray of food. He rushed over to grab some, but she fought him off.
“No! Bad!” she spat and run into another room. He followed.
“Anywho,” Augustine said. “What have your connections said so far?”
“Nobody knows who you guys were,” he replied. “But you need to be more careful. Lay low for a while. Bosses never stay in the dungeon for too long. You gonna use the gold to rent an apartment?”
“Nah, not yet. The only reason we’re working at the inn is because he let us stay there in exchange. If he had to pay us a wage, we wouldn’t be working there anymore. We just have to keep saving up the tips. With that, plus the gold we just stole, we have roughly seven hundred. We need at least two thousand before we do anything. What if we go and can’t find a job? I don’t want to become a full-fledged criminal and I don’t want that for Jay either.”
“So what are you going to do, then?”
“Well, we don’t all get what we want, so I think you know. I know you just said to lay low but we have to do something,” Augustine said with a determined looked. They held the gaze for a moment until the priest sighed and sat down next to him.
“Okay,” Castle gave in. “Fine. I help you get gold, you help me stop the crime in this abandoned district. It’s a win-win anyway, but it’ll end soon. Promise me.”
“Promise.”
“Now, listen… This is some deep shit.”
“Whoa, a priest busting out the curse words?”
“This is coming from a soldier now,” he said. He thrust up the left sleeve on his black robe to reveal tons of tattoos, beginning from the wrist all the way up to the shoulder. He turned his body to show Augustine the outer part around the tricep and pointed out a specific piece of ink. The tattoo was of a scroll with a woman’s name, “Jane”, and a broken chain wrapped around it. “Once upon a time, the king sent me to lead a unit of other warriors to a neighboring country. An ally. He sent us there to help them investigate criminal activity.
“While we were there, we found an organization: the Black Hawks. They were trafficking humans, kidnapping people and turning them into slaves. It was hell, but we fought them and released everybody. The things we saw, what these people were doing, was truly the devil’s work. About a week ago, a pigeon messenger flew in from one of my old teammates. He said the Black Hawks are back and heading our way. Just the other day a ship pulled into the docks waving their flag.”
“I don’t kill people, Castle, you know that.”
“I know. I’m not asking you to kill them, I’m asking you to free any slaves they got and then get rid of them.”
“How am I supposed to do that?”
“You’re the mastermind,” he grinned. Castle stood and began walking back to the altar. “You do this; I’ll find you more opportunities for money. I’ll tell one of my nuns to swing by the inn later with a map of the dock. Oh, and uh, don’t forget your dog.”
Augustine chuckled and made for the door. Before walking out, he whistled. Jay came rushing out from a back room with a piece of bread stuff in his mouth and holding a potato high. “You get me a little somethin?”
“Your favorite,” Jay muffled through the bread and tossed him the potato.
“Atta boy.”
Late at night as their shifts at the inn began to end, they regrouped in their attic room. Jay fell onto his bed as Augustine pulled out a rolled up scrap of paper and placed it on the floor in between them. It was the map of the dock, just like Castle said, but a folded up surprise waited for him. He opened it and grinned.
The story has been illicitly taken; should you find it on Amazon, report the infringement.
“What is it,” Jay asked.
“On the back it says, ‘Here’s a gift. You owe me, so give them hell. Sincerely, Castle.’ On the front it’s a layout of what kind of ship they’re coming in on. It’ll definitely help with the planning.”
“Cool. Lemme know when you figure it out, boss.” Jay stretched his body out and turned to his side.
“You could help,” Augustine said, but Jay immediately began snoring. Augustine laid the maps out to study by himself. After a considerable amount of stressful, brain-straining minutes, he slammed his fist to the floorboard. Jay let out a yelp as he shot up to a sitting position.
“What!?” he gasped.
“I think I got it,” Augustine said. He flipped the two maps around so that Jay could see them. “Okay, see here: the first level is the deck and the captain’s quarters. Then there are three levels below that. The crew sleeps on level two. Storage, like food and rum, are on the third level. Finally the cargo, or slaves in this case, is on the fourth level.”
“Okay, so, how do we get passed the crew?”
“Well they are already docked, so most of them should be at the closest inn: ‘The Headsman’. It’s a little past midnight, so the rest of them should be sleeping on level two. It looks like they all just sleep wherever on the floor.”
“So how are we supposed to get by them?”
“Look here. It looks like there’s a door on level two that leads to a small balcony where the crew can go to get fresh air if they don’t want to go to the deck. If we can get to that, the stairs to the third level are just a few feet away so we don’t have to step over anyone.”
“Okay, how do we get there in the first place?”
“We each have one knife, so if I hop on your back you should be able to use them both to scale the back of the ship.”
“Bleh. Hard work… So let’s say it works and we get down to the fourth level; I’m sure they’re chained up. How do we break them out? And then how are we supposed to escape with them?”
“Okay, this is when it gets a little crazy. We blow a hole in the ship.”
“WE BLOW A HOLE IN THE SHIP!?”
“Yes.”
“Are you insane!?”
“Slightly. But listen! Since yesterday was the festival, I thought there might be leftover fireworks. So when Castle’s nun came by with the maps, I asked if she could get one from the church. We’ll stop by and pick it up. We put it next to the inner wall, blow a hole in the ship and partially set it on fire, we jumped through into the water, and we go home.”
“You wanna set it on fire too…?”
“Yeah, if we do they will have to stay longer and we can try to get them arrested. Castle wants us to take care of them all together.”
“You’re missing an important bit.”
“What’s that?”
“They’re in chains, Augustine! They can’t swim.”
“Oh, one of the crewmen ought to have one we can swipe.”
“You really think this will work?”
“Definitely,” Augustine said. He stared into Jay’s eyes with determination until Jay gave in.
“Fine. When do we go?”
“Right now.” Augustine hopped up, grabbed the bag that used to contain gold, and jogged down the stairs. The inn had quieted down; most people either left or were asleep. Just a few strays hung around the bar still drinking. As he hit the bar room, he ran into the owner of the inn.
“Whoa kid,” the old man said. “Where you headed?”
“Uh, a friend of mine was offered a job at another inn, sir. I promised I would check it out for him.”
“An inn, eh? Which one?”
“The Headsman.”
“The Headsman!? I know the evil son-of-a-bitch owner. Name’s Kingsman. Fuck Kingsman.” The old man walked back over to the bar and began pouring a drink to a stranger.
“Who y’all talking ‘bout,” the stranger asked.
“Kingsman over at The Headsman,” the owner replied.
“Man, fuck Kingsman!”
“Right, that’s what I said!”
“Be careful over there, boy,” the owner said. Augustine nodded and left the inn with Jay. They passed by the church as planned and found the nun waiting outside.
“Thank you kindly, sister,” Augustine said and tipped an imaginary hat. She smiled, but when Jay waved at her, she sneered. Augustine laughed as Jay’s face fell to a frown. He stashed the firework into the bag and they made towards the dock. They dashed through the darkness of the alleys until they reached the sea.
He peered around the building’s cover. When he confirmed the coast was clear, Augustine sprinted towards the water and leapt into it. The cold water engulfed him and goosebumps appeared all around his skin. He reached the surface and began swimming, though slowly due to the shivering. Jay’s head popped out of the water a few seconds later.
“I-i-it’s s-s-s-o c-c-c-c-cold,” he stammered as he swam behind Augustine.
“B-b-b-b-e q-q-q-quiet,” Augustine said. The ship was anchored close, but a lot of men were partying over on the dock. Once they reached the rear of the ship, Augustine pulled out the two knives and handed them to Jay.
The knives pounded as they pierced the wood, but the cheers and chants of the drunken crewmen on land seemed to drown it out. Augustine reached his arms around Jay’s torso and he began climbing. Thud after thud, the knives pierced different spots of the ship as he climbed.
“W-w-hy are y-y-ou so s-strong,” Augustine asked. The cold water still caused him to stutter a bit, but the work Jay had been doing apparently got his warm blood pumping.
“It’s a gift from the gods, boss,” he said. They finally reached the tiny balcony as the map implied and they hopped over the railing. Augustine shook off the goosebumps and reached for the door. It creaked as it opened, but there were no lights on. They paused to allow their eyes to adjust.
“What’s that over there,” Jay inquired.
“I don’t know,” Augustine said.
“Smells like… food,” Jay confirmed.
Well, if Jay’s nose smells food then it’s food.
They crept down the steps and reached the third level. “This’ll be storage, right?” Jay whispered. Just then, three candles flickered on that filled the whole room. In front of them stood at least a dozen crewmen, all holding swords.
“Now who’re you, lads,” one of them demanded. Augustine and Jay exchanged glances. They immediately turned tail and ran back up the steps. Heavy stomps followed them.
Augustine felt someone’s fingers skim his skin as they gripped his shirt, so he put his hand behind Jay’s back and shoved him with all his might. Augustine was yanked backwards as Jay flew forward over the railing.
“Augustine!” he heard Jay shout out before hitting the water with a splash. The crewman who grabbed him threw him to the ground and when he looked up, they were all looking down on him.
“Hi,” he chuckled nervously.