After blipping down to the storage deck to get dressed for the day and take care of Littletooth, Iris blipped back into the crew quarters to find almost everyone gone. She spotted Eli at his hammock across the deck and promptly blipped over beside him.
"Where is everyone?" she asked.
"You know, I'm not sure," he said, "must be something going on in the city today."
Her eyes narrowed.
"Hey, I think Autumn wanted to see you in the kitch--"
Iris blipped straight up to gun the deck, then again to the main deck. The main deck was crowded, but that was nothing compared to the hull of the ship. Dozens of pirates had climbed over the railing and were descending the hull of the ship like expert cliff climbers. More still followed after them, while some cheered or shouted as they ran and leapt overboard. Iris blipped to the railing and looked out, the beach was closer than it had been the day before -- or rather, the ship was closer to the beach, she supposed -- and the pirates were swimming to shore in droves. She turned frantically to the nearest crewmate, he was a shirtless, spindly fellow in baggy pants.
"What's happening?" she shouted.
"Beach day!" he shook a fist in the air as he yelled his answer, then leapt over the railing and dove to the distance waters below. Cheers of "beach day!" echoed from the remaining pirates on the deck.
Iris blipped straight down through the gun deck and back to the crew quarters, where she tried her best to slow the words that spewed from her mouth at Eli, "it's a pirate beach day! Please can we go, please--"
Eli was already laughing and holding up a staying hand. He said nothing, but nodded behind her. Iris turned to see Killup holding open the door to the galley as Autumn hobbled out with an arm full of wrapped sandwiches.
"You going to help me carry these, or not?" her voice came from somewhere behind the sandwiches.
Iris looked back to Eli with wide eyes, noticing that he was now wearing shorts and a thin fish net shirt. Titus approached beside them, wearing the pirate's disguise they had bought him during the early stages of what became the fish heist. His hair was down and his posture was unusually relaxed.
Cameron, shirtless and also wearing shorts, jogged halfway down the stairs and poked his head out, "you guys almost ready?"
"We're going?" Iris smiled.
"Better get dressed," Eli smiled back.
Iris disappeared, and they heard a few thumps and a tumble from the deck below. A minute later she reappeared wearing a swimsuit and an impossibly wide smile. Abby's drawstring stretched to wrap around her waist, hanging at an angle from one hip like a loose belt.
"What about Vic?" she asked hurriedly, "is she coming?"
A ghostly Victoria peeked her head through the hull of the ship, "waiting on you guys."
A few moments later, Iris was blipping onto the railing of the ship and holding a rope for balance as she looked out towards the beach. Victoria floated in the air just beyond the railing, arms crossed impatiently, as the rest of the party -- and Killup -- gathered behind Iris.
"Think I can survive this fall?" she asked Victoria over the wind.
"Please don't try," Eli said from behind her.
"As long as you do that blipping trick, it's probably fine," Titus shrugged.
As Eli turned to scold Titus, Iris leapt. The rushing air whipped her hair and pulled tears from her eyes, the hull of the ship whizzed by in a blur, and she laughed joyously as she plummeted towards the lake. At the last moment, she blipped, redirecting her momentum to launch her out away from the ship and across the water. She had intended to gracefully arc downwards and dive into the water, but in her excitement she hadn't quite accurately calculated her speed or trajectory. She slapped into the water with a bounce and a tumble, skipping off the surface two more times before finally sinking with a splash.
After a few quiet seconds, she popped her head up out of the water and cheered.
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This story has been stolen from Royal Road. If you read it on Amazon, please report it
The pirate beach day was everything Iris could have imagined it to be. A few crewmates played drums and stringed instruments and the wind carried their music down the beach. A swimming competition was quickly organizing at the shore, and from the looks of it Titus was planning to participate. Iris was just finishing up the process of laying out towels for each of them -- one of which Victoria was already sunbathing on despite still being in her spectral form.
"What's the point of sunbathing if you're doing it as a ghost?" Iris asked.
"This way I don't get a tan," Victoria answered without opening her eyes, "but I can still feel the warmth."
Autumn kicked up sand with every step as she ran towards them, "Iris! Come help me with the sand castle!" Killup galloped after her on all fours, his wings tucked tight but his tail flicking around as he ran.
Iris was about to agree, but when she looked up at Autumn she noticed someone in the distance. She faltered and hesitated, then gave an apologetic smile to Autumn, "maybe in a minute, there's someone I have to talk to."
Autumn's shoulders slumped, "but I ran all the way here! The other team's getting a head start!"
"I'll catch up," Iris assured her, "besides, you're you. You got this."
Autumn perked up, "don't take too long!" she turned to sprint back towards the sand castle building zone. Killup ran up to Iris a second later, looked around to see that Autumn had already turned back, and galloped after her.
Iris blipped along the beach until she appeared near a rather nervous looking Milo as he glanced around the beach. "I hope you're looking for me," she smiled anxiously.
"Iris!" Milo shouted, then collected himself and cooled his demeanor, "I mean, uh, yeah. I was hoping you'd be here."
"Want to go somewhere and talk?" she asked softly.
"Yeah."
A short while later, Iris and Milo were sitting on a branch that hung relatively low over the beach, their feet dangling over the sand a few dozen feet below. The ambiance of the beach party mixed with the chirping birds and bugs of the forest and the gentle howling of the winds as they passed between the redwood trunks. Iris had held Milo close as she blipped him up here, spending most of her mana in the process. At first he had been extremely uneasy with the height, but had now mostly calmed down.
"So, that's basically it," she finished her recounting of the night she was kidnapped.
"This whole time I thought you were avoiding me," he said solemnly, "I even tried to come see you on the boat, but the men on the docks just laughed at me."
"You went to the Underbelly by yourself?" Iris raised her eyebrows.
"Yeah, managed not to get pickpocketed though!" he smiled.
Iris laughed, but her smile faded quickly, "I'm sorry, Milo. Not just because I've been stuck on the ship for the past few days, but for not telling I'd be leaving soon. You deserved to know it was a possibility as soon as I did, and you absolutely deserved to know before I asked you to help me make it happen."
Milo nodded, "yeah, you should have told me."
They sat in silence for a moment, then Milo sighed, "I'm gonna be mad about that for a while, but we don't have a lot of time left. I'd rather not spend it arguing." He looked over at Iris.
Iris smiled and met his gaze, "me neither."
They shared a lingering kiss that Iris felt she didn't deserve.
Milo looked out across the beach towards the two sand castles taking shape in the distance. One seemed focused on height, and was already a head taller than even the tallest pirates working on it, while the other was wide and square and resembled a scale model of the Fish Wizard's castle.
"Should we stop her from building that?" Milo wondered.
Iris shrugged, and then nodded towards the ship anchored just off shore, "the captain's watching, I don't think the Fish Wizard is dumb enough to show up here."
"Then, should we go help?" he asked.
Iris smiled, "absolutely."
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Autumn's castle came in at a final size of about four carriages, wider than it was tall save for the few towers that jutted from the roof. The castle the opposing team had built was nearly three times as tall but less than half as wide. The most notable difference between the two castles, besides their shape, was that Autumn's castle had an interior -- though it was only really large enough for Autumn and Killup to enter and only included the throne room, it was finely detailed including the pillars, mezzanines, and the corpse of the shark lobster impaled by a stake of driftwood. Along with the interior details, the castle also included all the external damage the team had caused during their heist.
Titus was still dripping when he stomped up to the front of the sandcastle. He had placed 17th out of 20 in the race, but that wasn't bad for a Hero competing against Champions. Beside him, Eli and Cameron placed their hands on their hips in identical fashions, and Cameron whistled in appreciation of the castle.
"Looks just like the real thing," he said, "they even made the sharbster."
Iris appeared from a blip beside them, splashing her immediate surroundings with loose sand falling from her skin. She, too, placed her hands on her hips and looked up to appreciate the castle.
"So, who judges?" Eli asked.
A looming shadow crept over the opposing team as the boots of the Shark Titan crunched in the sand. Even his long term crew members tended to shrink away and avert their eyes when he approached, and even the lighthearted beach day was no exception. Only Autumn, Iris, and the opposing team's leader stood tall and looked in the captain's direction as he silently inspected the castles. He spent much longer on the opposing team's castle, admiring the fine details of the architecture and the impressive stability of the thin towers. Iris heard the other team's leader introduce it as the capitol building of an empire she had never heard of.
When it was Autumn's turn, she introduced the castle with a proud smirk, "behold, captain, Castle Fish Wizard, just as we left it after procuring Gerald the Fish."
The towering titan leaned to peer through the hole in the roof at the sculpted corpse of the sharbster inside. He erupted into laughter and stumbled back to avoid damaging the castle. His rows of teeth gnashed as he clutched his chest and cackled towards the sky.
"This one!" he spoke between spurts of laughter and pointed at Autumn's castle, "this one wins!"
Autumn, her entire party, and many of the gathered onlookers erupted into cheers.