Published at 8th of March 2024 7:43 am

Chapter Seventeen

This chapter is updated by JustRead.pl

I stared at the body next to me, a powerful urge to look around for cops pulsing through me and I did just that before realizing how stupid I am. I—he was trying to kill me! Him and his whole crew! They were going to feed me to a monster thisisn’tmyfault! I shot to my feet and looked at my hands—my hands that were strangely free of blood. I dropped them and thought about what to do.

I just killed a guy.

That thought kept playing over and over in my head as I lifted the body over my shoulder, wincing as part of the corpse rubbed on the spell glued to the back of my neck. I felt something start to leak shortly after and I hoped it wasn’t a combination of blood from the body and pus from my rash mingling to give me super hepatitis. I stood with my burden and turned, looking at the floor. There was surprisingly little blood… Oh yeah, my magical arms had themselves a little meal. Another thing to worry about.

I just killed a—

Shut up! SHUT UP! Don’t think about it. Just—just gotta do something with this fucking corpse—wait, why did I have to hide him? They knew I was down here. I kicked down a door, they knew I went below decks. They could also just follow the trail of sweat I was leaving behind because, by God, was I sweating. And panting. And shaking. And feverish. But whatever, another log on the dumpster fire that is my life.

Eh, fuck it, better safe than sorry. I hauled ol’ corpsy (okay, trying to make a joke about the guy you just killed to avoid thinking about the guy you just killed is a fucking losing proposition and I immediately regret it) along and went into a part of the ship I hadn’t been to before; the crew mess I had passed when I had been looking for the magical aura before with my table leg. Fortunately there was no one around. I glanced around, my mind running itself ragged trying to think of ways to salvage this fucked up situation.

I killed—SHUT UP!

I'm not the most stable man on the best days, and today is a far fucking cry from my best. It was all I could do to keep myself moving and not to just shut down, physically and emotionally. Sweat poured off of me in sheets as I lugged my recently deceased burden down the hall. Jesus I think I really might be sick. Was I actually sick or just reacting to having killed someone? Fuck it, why not both?

If I were in a better condition I could probably do a better job keeping myself calm. I might be able to talk myself down by reminding myself that these guys were murderers and I had done everything I could short of killing myself to prevent me from taking a life.

But I wasn't in better condition. I'm surprised I could think at all.

I found myself going into the kitchen area. It was a smallish industrial type kitchen, similar in size to a Chinese restaurant, without the display area for the food. It did, however have a walk-in freezer. I crossed to it and awkwardly swung open the heavy door while keeping the corpse over my shoulder. Inside were stacked boxes of bagged food, vacuum sealed meat and yet more boxes. This wasn’t much of a hiding spot but if the pirates were only keeping this area guarded with one guy (The guy I killed) then it might buy me some time to stash him here.

I placed the guy at the end of the small aisle that existed purely because whoever organized this freezer knew they’d need a space to walk to grab the stuff in the back. I avoided looking at his face, leaving the freezer as fast as I could, not slamming the door solely from fear of being heard by those looking for me. Once away from the body and separated by insulated sheet metal I took a ragged breath.

I—I need to leave. I need to GO.

But I also need to eat. I was a dumbass and left my knapsack behind (cleverly hidden in a trash can) when I snuck by the guards to look at the ward and now I don’t know if I’ll have the chance to go retrieve it. I quickly started opening shelves and cupboards, looking for canned goods. After a bit I slapped my forehead and went looking for the pantry, quickly finding a door that led to a small room filled with the canned goods I was looking for.

Realizing I had nothing to carry them with and not wanting to spend more time here, I took off my shirt and turned it into a little bindle without the stick. The shirt was crusted with a substance on the collar in the back, which I took to be some form of matter being excreted from the rash on the back of my neck. As soon as I wasn’t fighting for my life I really was going to have to wash those off or it won’t be pirates that kill me.

I pushed the image of the man I killed out of my head and began packing cans into the bindle. I went with things that had a lot of fluid, thinking of killing two birds with one stone. Canned peaches, peas, the odd jar of salsa (for variety), can of cranberry sauce, corn, creamed corn and—Oh thank God, some Spam. I tore open a can of Spam and ate the entire block of maybe-meat right there before tossing a few more cans—

I think I heard something. I stopped chewing and listened hard.

“—to be an idiot to come down here.”

Yeah well, fuck you guy.

I tied up the cans as quickly and silently as I could, choking down the remaining Spam I had been chewing on. I went to leave the pantry but footsteps sounded from just outside the mess. I swore internally and closed the pantry door, hiding against the wall beside it.

Please don’t smell me. Please don’t smell me. Please don’t smell me.

“Well he went through that door,” said the second voice. It was distinctly bored sounding. “We wouldn’t have to come looking down here if you hadn’t decided to play with your food.”

“I wasn’t playin’,” said the first voice, which I now recognized as the Australian with the hyena laugh. “The fuckin’ cunt set me on fire.”

“And you let one of your little strings touch you,” replied the second voice. Was it getting closer? “Which had the added effect of—“

“When I catch that little fuck I’m going to carve my fuckin’ name into his chest,” the Aussie interrupted. “My fuckin’ hair’s ruined and I smell like an ashtray.”

The voices began to recede.

“Oh calm down,” said the second voice. “Nothing a pair of clippers and a shower won’t cure.”

“I don’t have any fucking eyebrows, Jerry!” The Aussie yelled. “I’m going to be lookin’ fuckin’ surprised for the rest of this fuckin’ cruise!”

“Imagine how horrible it’ll be for the people looking at you,” Jerry replied mildly.

“Fuck you!”

Soon I could no longer hear them.

How odd. They didn’t seem to be putting a lot of effort into finding me. Which, if I were to put a little thought into it, says they weren’t worried about finding me. Why not?

I’ll have to ask Ida. I’d have to… God damn, there’s a lot I got to do.

Like get a new shirt.

***

Obviously, after shooting a bunch of pirates and setting part of the ship on fire, there was a little more activity on deck than normal. But really, “a little” being the operative words. There were a few more guards posted at the usual places but the amount of roving guards was down. I guess the six I shot took out a chunk of their roster? I don’t know. It was weird.

When I made it back to the store but Ida wasn’t around, which I guess makes sense. If she was put on guard duty and a ruckus was caused she’d be called into action. I decided to wait a little bit to see if she’d show up. I went and retrieved the knapsack I had cleverly hidden in a trashcan (wincing as I saw something brown and wet sticking to the bottom of it) and looked around the area for a good place to wait.

Now that I wasn't driven by panic and nearly starved, I noticed a hatch that was cleverly hidden behind a little collection of chairs and tables on the observation deck. I went over, my eyes roving over it with increasing interest. It was slightly smaller than a traditional door, so I’d have to duck to go in once I got it open. I gently placed my two bags on one of the nearby chairs and examined the latch. It was fastened with a padlock. My claws can stick into the metal sides of a ship, they shouldn’t have trouble with a little bar of metal. And they didn’t.

The hatch opened with a slight whine of old metal that made me wince and glance around. I opened it enough to get a good look inside, but waited, listening to see if anyone came to investigate the noise. After a time that felt like an hour but was probably closer to three minutes, I ducked my head into the room and had a look around with my night-sensitive eyes. It was just a storage room, but full of what looked like emergency equipment. Fire extinguishers, flotation devices, signal flares… Wasn’t keeping this stuff locked up a safety hazard?

Well, maybe it was more of a pain in the ass to have nosy passengers keep stumbling on the expensive and important safety equipment than making sure all or most of the crew had a copy of the key for this padlock. Who knows? Not me. All I know is that there is enough room for a certain warlock to hide with his stolen food.

I grabbed my two bags and slipped into the room, slowly closing the hatch until only a sliver of light made it inside—wincing the entire time at the slight whine of protesting metal. I soon became slightly thankful for the corrosion that had produced the noise, because it also kept the hatch in place without wobble. If I moved this stack of life preservers over here, and shifted beside the hatch like so… I could see a good portion of the deck from the little crack in the hatch.

Settling in to wait, I grabbed a can of peaches and frowned when I saw the can needed an opener, and wasn’t a tab-pull like the canned soup I was used to. I almost snarled in frustration until I remembered my claws. Oh yeah. I held out my index finger and sank a claw into the flimsy metal—

Claws across a throat.

A flash of red.

My hand in his chest.

I found myself breathing fast. Panting. I placed the can on the floor, hearing it rattle from my shaking hands. Is this... post traumatic stress disorder? What do I do? Do I find a bag to breath in? My eyes began to water. No. No. I'm not crying for that asshole. I—fuck.

Maybe I'll cry for me.

I felt bad for killing that guy, but not because I had killed him. I felt bad because—because not being like them, the murderers I used, was important to me. Who I see myself as. Now—now I was just like them. At least, that's what it felt like right now. I just... feel cornered. And not just on this ship. My whole life. That one moment I had where I felt I was free to be happy was shattered... and now here I am. Eight years later.

What do I do?

I don’t know. But what I did was have a good cry. Not one of those sobbing ones, where you heave and give yourself a good core workout. I may be having the second worst day of my life, but I didn’t feel especially bad about killing a fucking pirate, one who was trying to kill me of all things. No, mostly I just stared into the middle distance and let water fall from my eyes. Maybe got a little snotty, too.

At some point I must have passed out because the next thing I knew, light was shining on my face. I snapped awake with a snort and quickly wiped the gunk from my eyes. I was lying fetal on the floor, my left arm numb from lying on it while it had been hugging my knees. I shifted awkwardly to a sitting position and squinted out of the crack I had left in the hatch, glad it hadn’t had moved while I was out of it.

It took a few seconds for my eye to adjust to the light. I couldn’t see anyone, but the light coming over the ship told that dawn was underway. My stomach made itself known in no uncertain terms. I held off on eating for a bit, watching the deck for a few minutes before I was sure nothing would suddenly walk into view.

Finally I turned away from the hatch and reached for the cans of food, but paused upon seeing the can of peaches I had discarded. The wave of emotions I had experienced in the night came back, but muted. The punch taken out of them. Steeling myself, I grabbed the peach can and sank my claws into the lid, carving it out of the way with perhaps more force than needed.

I don’t know what I should do. I’m not even sure who I am right now. So much of my self image was tied into not crossing that line, the line of killing another human being. But like so many who had come before, when life was on the line, it had been him or me.

Him or me.

I popped a peach slice into my mouth and chewed thoughtfully. There was something to think about. If I hadn’t done what I did, I’d likely be dead. Could I have ended the fight without killing him? If I’m being honest, probably. If I had been paying more attention or had used more caution in my flight down into the depths of the ship. I don't know. Maybe he was one of their elite fighters or something. He certainly felt like a killer when he had his hand around my throat.

I don't know. I’ll just… have to chalk it up to experience. Do better next time. There… there really wasn’t anything else to do. Turn myself into the cops? Ha! I’m sure if I confessed to the pirates and said I was “Weawwy sowwy” they’d take it well. A slap on the wrist, I’m sure.

Him or me. That’s certainly what it felt like at the time.

The one thing this incident made clear is that I was not taking this as seriously as I should. If I had been using my full abilities, I would have not been in that position in the first place. And if my assumptions are correct, the leaders of these pirates want to turn me over to something that would do things far worse than simply kill me.

I felt my resolve harden. Alright, pirates. No more kid gloves.

I sighed and popped another peach slice into my mouth. I wish I was doing something other than hiding and eating canned peaches while I had my little moment of self discovery.

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