[[ OOC: Since I didn't get to finish the Anubis war, things had a pretty hasty end and I feel like my NPCs got shafted out pretty hard. Since it was all my fault, I didn't want them to suffer, so I wrote up this little one-shot explaining what happened after Anubis won his battle at the nameless island place. Please enjoy - the Bloody Dog pirates will remain around to be NPC'd in the future, and without the massive fail this time. I promise! ]]
"It was well, Pierson?"
Four men sat in the creaking, rotted bowels of a ship. Starlight streamed in through the loose, rotted boards of the cabin, a cold mist curdling in the air beneath the beams that lit the room and it's shadowy occupants with a surreal, ghastly illumination. The ancient man whom had spoken, his gold silk robes painted a dull, sickly yellow by the other-worldly lighting, wrinkled his brow in concern as he waited for an answer.
"It was, it was," a chubby man in a brown suit answered, his round spectacles aglow. He dabbed at his brow, upon which beads of perspiration shone like will-o-wisps in the pale starlight, with a greasy and stained handkerchief. "I estimate it was an approximately seventy-nine percent success."
"Hardly call that 'well,'" a fourth man drummed in a resonating baritone. He towered above the two that had spoken before him, both the old and the fat, his skin so dark as to appear black in the shady room aboard that dubious vessel. He was the only source of colour in the ethereal room, his orange attire and smouldering crimson eyes seeming to glow with a light their own. A stark-white smile cracked some ways beneath the burning eyes. "We lost three ships, along with enough men to fill twice as many. We'll be months breeding back our rats. And, moreover," the man stated, pausing to let steam escape his mouth, "we smeared Jaeger-dono's name."
There was a terse silence as the wise easterner and the wide westerner let the words sink in. The fat one mopped at his moist brow some more, while the old one remained utterly silent. After a few minutes of a sinister and smothering silence broken only by the old ship's creaking and the fat man's fussing, the fourth of the lot spoke.
"Worry not, me hearties," he said, his voice more the growling of a feral dog than the speech of a civilized man. "The pup suffered a loss farrr werse than arr's."
"Dear me, dear me," Pierson fussed.
"You speak truly," Lu intoned.
"Jaeger-dono..." Kin stated in reverence.
"Not many a soul knew o' us afore we took on th' sandy child, an' what few as did..." Jaeger paused, laughing. It was a sound halfway between a rabid dog's snarling and a plague-victim's cough. "Why, the scurvy bilge-rats think wer dead!" Jaeger laughed a while more, taking a mighty swig of something that looked foul enough to kill most men and smelled twice as bad as it looked. His three Legion Heads took their time planning their responses.
"Pierson's puppet trick worked, but it only set our ultimate goal back," Kin complained. "The world will not know of your glory and strength if they hear you lost to a weak upstart like Anubis."
"The flesh will prove that loss a lie, in time," Lu observed. "We yet live, do we not?"
"Aye, we do," Jaeger snickered. "'At we do, boys!"
"Please don't take it so lightly, dear me," Pierson added. "My Ningyou Ningyou powers can't be used so carelessly. Deary me, deary-"
"Don't be a lubber, Pierce," Jaeger snapped. "It did just tha trick, arr!"
"The bridge was crossed, but the toll was high," said Lu. His brow was creased further, his ancient facial hair drooping more than usual.
"Precisely," Pierson continued. Jaeger frowned his terrible blood-red frown, and Kin watched with smouldering eyes. The fat man went on with his explanation only when he felt that he had their attention.
"I can create a doll of any living being, using a part of their body. They will have all the strength and powers of the original, deary me, but will still be much weaker in combat; I control them myself, and I cannot properly emulate fighting styles or skills, you see...deary me, deary me. Your dolls are perfect copies in form, but-"
"We already know th' story, mate," Jaeger interjected. "We only took on a doughy ball o' man like yerself for that power, arrr. Yer brains can be handy in a pinch, too, but don't let it get ta ya!" Pierson wiped his forehead furiously, removing his bowler-derby to move his mopping operations up to his bald pate, while Jaeger and Kin had a good laugh. "I've seen yer power work enough times ta know what it does!"
"D-deary ME...! Don't be so careless, captain!" Jaeger stopped laughing. He was silent for a moment, before a low, rolling growl escaped from his throat.
"You should know how to address Jaeger-dono by now, Pierson," Kin boomed in warning. It was unlike the meager man to speak up to his captain, and Jaeger's right hand man was doing his best to remind him why.
"I'm sorry, captain, deary, deary me! But there's a price!" Jaeger's growling stopped and Kin seemed to settle down a bit, his eyes burning less intensely. "Whenever the dolls are 'broken,' your life will be shortened. Lu's was only incapacitated, but both of you had your dolls destroyed. Your lives have each been shortened by five years, four days, three hours, two minutes, and one second."
"Then don't let them die next time, Pierson," Kin calmly stated.
"Deary me! I already told you, I can't control them perfectly! Even a doll with all of Jaeger's power is no good against a man as strong as Anubis. Deary me, a doll with your's can't beat Ryan." The two did not comment. "Don't mistake me, deary me! I mean, without your skills and memories, those dolls aren't strong enough." Pierson sat his hat back on his pasty, sweating dome. "In the future, please do not command me to send your dolls against such foes. I am certain you can beat them, but you must do it in person!"
"And I will, me hearty," Jaeger answered, his voice strangely calm. "I will. But not now, er even soon. We did arrrr fair damage ta the sand-pup. Thar be other Yonkou, an' me plans got many more stops."
"The longest road has the least pitfalls," Lu offered. "We shall endure through caution."
"That much is right, Lu-sama. We will." Kin bowed in the dark room on the shady ship, his eyes never leaving those of his lord and master, his captain.
"We will."
Sat Feb 19, 2011 10:06 am