Vashine descended towards the Trilobite. It was not a normal ship. For one thing, there were no doors; every passage of use to the Breathers had been gleefully boarded up. Her crew slipped easily in and out the portholes, laden with treasures and useful bits of scrap. For another thing, it had the useful property of being able to rise and sink at will. Originally, it had been a ghost ship, crewed by the legendary ghost pirate Old Crook-Bones, but a phalanx of silver-tipped swords and one kidnapped human priest had allowed her crew to take the ship and send the ghost crew on a return trip to Davy Jones' Locker. It was a fine ship, and perfect for her purposes, though she didn't fancy the eldritch green fires which burned around the sails--far too visible.
As she sank, she passed through a small school of sea bass. She was used to such school scattering as a matter of course, and was suprised when they didn't--in fact, she smacked face-first into one. Even with a mermaid's gleaming fangs inches away, the bass simply bobbed serenely.
"Hm?" Vashine grunted. "What's wrong with these wretched little morsels?" For usually, when a fish failed to flee, it was a good sign that it was sick. She opened her mouth and gulped in some water, "smelling" it as it ran over her girls. She had very good sniffers, and the fish seemed fine.
She looked around. The other sea bass were watching her dully.
Vashine shrugged. Never look a gift seahorse in the mouth, I s'pose. She plucked the bass and slurped it down. It gave a couple of half-hearted thrashes, but otherwise barely struggled as it slid down her throat and into her belly. She smacked her lips and seized another fish.
"Stuffing yer gob while yer little band o' trollops does all the work, eh?" gurgled an unpleasant voice which sounded as if it had spent a century soaking in rum. Vashine glanced behind her.
Despite their best efforts, they hadn't quite been able to banish Old Crook-Bones himself. The skeletal old tyrant was too much a part of the ship. So--they made him part of the ship. Upon taking the Trilobite, Vashine's crew had knocked off the busty wooden mermaid figurehead and lashed Bones up in her place on the prow. The curse ropes had held him there for years, until he was almost a part of the crew again, albeit one they didn't dare untie. He was crass, violent, foul-mouthed, and cared for nobody but himself, so he fit right in.
"You're just jealous ya can't--gulp--eat nothin' no more," Vashine growled good-naturally, downing another bass.
"I haven't eaten in three hunnert years, an' it wouldn't be raw fish I'd be startin' on," Bones said. "It'd be juicy ribeye an' fresh crisp vegetables, warshed down with a nice bit o' brandy...it's tired I am of the taste of seawater."
Vashine grinned, displaying an armory of teeth, and reduced the ocean's bass population by one more.
"That don't mean I want you eatin' in front of me, you scaly bint!" Bones roared, sending a cloud of bubbles rushing for the surface."
"Oh, really? Feelin' a little peckish?"
Gulp.
"After all those centuries?"
Gulp.
"Must be... must be...hard," Vashine panted. She curled around lazily, patting her stomach, which was by now quite full of bass, and plucked another from the sea like a ripe apple.
Gulp.
"Specially when someone else is enjoyin' the sea's bountry right in front of ya, like." Vashine waved the last one under Bones' lack of nose. "Blood an' bilgewater, but I'm stuffed. Dunno if I can rightly finish."
She grinned again.
Gulp.
"S'pose I had a little room left, a' that."
Grumbled curses echoing in her ears, she allowed herself to sink past the prow and slip though a porthole. Her slick white belly was so distended with fish that it brushed the metal sill as she passed.
Mebbe I shouldn'ta et so much just ta spite 'im, she pondered. Nahh. I'd do it again.
She decided to see how the loading was going. "Layna!" she bellowed.
Her first mate appeared in the doorway. "Yes, Captain Hookrust?" she said meekly.
"What's the haul?"
"I've appraised it at over five hundred bootysworth, Captain," Layna replied. "Any other orders?"
"Lookin' for more work?" Vashine laughed. "Careful, or you'll end up swabbin' out the poop deck."
"Certainly, Captain," the mousy minnowmaid replied, and began to swim off.
"Whoa, now! Just a wee joke. What's gotten inta you all of a sudden?"
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