"Moro! Moro move damn it! Are you seriously sleeping at a time like this!"
Moro Sunder's eyes opened. Three men loomed over him wearing ragged shirts and smelling like salt and rot.
"What time is it?" Moro muttered, rubbing the sleep out of his eyes.
"Time for you to get off of your bum and help us catch this thing! Oliver has him nibbling on the bait right now!"
The three men yanked Moro off of his bed and out from his room, up the stairs and into the bright light of the sun. The sudden movement nearly stopped his heart. He deserved a break, for the last 17 hours he had been trying to hunt this one singular fish, yet his body simply kept failing.
"Moro!" Oliver said, gripping the fishing pole tight, standing at the edge of the ship.
Moro groaned.
"I'm sorry...I fell asleep."
"Yeah, I know. Try not to collapse into your bed when trying to get some water for us next time, okay?"
Oliver looked at Moro.
"Yeah...Sorry."
"It's okay. Now come here, take hold of the pole for a minute, I have to go get something. Make sure the fish doesn't go off of the bait, or I will kill you Moro. I mean it."
Moro smirked and nodded. He took the fishing pole in his two hands as Oliver walked off. The three men who had rudely woken Moro up-Edmund, Giles and Bartholomew-followed behind Oliver.
Moro sighed.
The ship he stood on moved slowly, upwards and downwards on the waves. After all these years, he still felt nauseous when the sea got this aggressive.
Moro felt a slight shake.
"Oh no, don't tell me this is happening," Moro muttered, sweating now.
The fish was going off of the bait.
Moro tried to hold on. He dug his bare heels into the damp, splintering wood, his knuckles turning white as he fought the sudden, violent surge from the depths. The pole began to bend.
"Stay...on..." He hissed through his gritted teeth.
The pole wobbled.
Then it snapped.
Moro flew back at once with a shriek, the pole flinging and flying backwards into the ocean. He felt his back SMACK on the hard, wooden floor. There was a plop sound that rung in his ears. The fishing pole they needed to catch food, the one they had been using for the past three months was now gone.
"The fishing pole...I lost it..."
Moro opened his eyes to see Oliver standing over him with his arms crossed and his eyes disappointed.
"What the hell happened Moro?"
"I...The fish started to move and I...The pole flew out of my hands and landed in the ocean..."
The three men who dragged Moro out of his bed walked over to him.
"What happened?" Edmund asked. Oliver rubbed his eyes.
"Moro lost the fishing pole. He accidentally flung it over board."
The three men began to howl with laughter. Oliver's face stayed stern as he reached his hand out to Moro.
"Let me pull you up."
Moro grabbed on. Shame filled his body. How could this happen? He thought. The second I go on the pole, I lose it. It's like I'm cursed with bad luck. Or maybe I'm just an idiot.
Once Moro was on his feet, Oliver put a hand to his shoulder. The men kept laughing.
"Can you three just go away?" Oliver said. "Enough! We've got no pole and barely any food left. We are gonna die from starvation. Laugh again and I'll toss you overboard myself!"
The three men went silent at once. Once they had walked away, Oliver turned and looked at Moro with pity.
"I-Somehow, Moro...These things always happen with you. How, just how do you manage to lose the fishing pole in the span of one minute?"
Moro looked down at the ground in shame.
"Why did you choose me to wake up? We have thirty other crew members on board. Why me? You always choose me, Oliver...Always."
"Because you have potential Moro." Oliver said lightheartedly. "The captain of the ship is meant to bring out the strength in the youngest members. That's why I choose you. I've said this to you a thousand times before."
Oliver put a hand off of Moro's shoulder and looked out at the horizon, the sun giving him that nice warm feeling. Moro turned to look too.
"Regardless of how you lost that pole..." Oliver muttered, "There is no chance now that we can feed all of us tonight. We have to saviour the bread we have in the storage room. I'll get to cutting it up with Caleb so we can share evenly between us. It will be evening soon."
Oliver walked off, down the stairs and over to the chef room where Caleb lived under deck. Moro sighed and looked out at the ocean. He couldn't appreciate it's endless beauty for long before a horrible, deep twist in his stomach formed from hunger.
"Damn it! I'm so hungry..."
Moro stumbled off of the railings of the ship and walked down the stairs to the left, where four more of his crewmates, Elias, Thatcher, Bram and Cutter were pouring out the dirty, gone off water from their barrels. Moro stood and watched.
"Can I help?" Moro asked. The four pirates turned to Moro with surprise.
"Well look who finally got out of his room!" Thatcher said, grinning. Elias, Thatcher's wife, hit him.
"Hey!" Thatcher shouted, rubbing his shoulder. "What was that for?"
"Don't ridicule the damn fourteen year old is what!" Elias barked.
"It was just a joke..."
Moro smiled and walked over to the pile of barrels that were in the corner of the ships deck. Carefully, he took one up with both of his hands, grunting as he spilled the rotten water out into the sea.
"You're a strong boy, Moro." Bram said. "You always have been. Don't let those three idiots get the better of you. Bartholomew, Edmund and Giles I mean."
Moro placed the barrel down on the deck once it had been emptied. He wiped the sweat off of his forehead.
"I don't let them get the better of me."
Bram nodded.
"I know...I know, still, I can't help but want to punch them when I see them talk about you like that. They're only kids themselves...No less than five years ago they were your age."
Bram opened his mouth for a moment, then went silent. Moro walked off from the four pirates for a moment to grab another barrel. Why is it so quiet? Moro thought. One second they were talking and the next-
"Oh god." Moro muttered. The four crewmates had dropped their barrels onto the wooden floor, letting them spill. They were staring ahead out into the ocean.
There was a ship heading towards them.
Elias whispered to herself, "It couldn't be..."
Thatcher, Bram and Cutter gripped their hands tightly onto the rails.
"It's them." Cutter said. "The ones we stole from. No doubt they're coming back to get their stuff. They will kill us. They will kill us."
Moro started to stumble backwards in shock. His eyes widened and his heart rose in terror. He imagined them running onto their ship, going for Oliver, cutting off his head.
Suddenly, the silence was shattered.
"SHIP HO!"
The cry came from the crow's nest, followed immediately by the ringing of the ships bell. The deck which had been lazy and quiet just a minute ago erupted into a hive of panic.
Oliver came charging down the stairs, a flintlock in his hand, his eyes insane as he took in the size of the massive ship.
"Cutter!" Oliver screamed, "To the helm! Thatcher help prepare the rest of the crew who just woke up for battle then get the spray nets ready! We aren't outrunning that thing!"
Moro watched as the ship edged closer and closer, becoming more detailed to his eyes every second. He could hear the sounds of the men roaring, smacking the wood, chanting like beasts. No matter how much he tried to hide it, he was horrified.
Moro woke out of his daydream when Oliver's hand clamped onto Moro's shoulder once again, although now it was a much tighter grip.
"Moro! Bram! Elias! Come with me now!" Oliver didn't wait for a response. He dragged Moro toward the elevated quarterdeck of the ship as Elias and Bram ran behind him. Oliver shouted over the screams of the men on the attacking ship.
"We need to get the heavy swivel gun loose! If we can't outrun them, we have to disable their rigging before they-"
"My husband!" Elias interrupted. "Thatcher is going to die, isn't he Oliver? No...It's too dangerous for him to be alone!"
Elias began to sprint away. Oliver caught her with his hand.
"Miss, you are not going anywhere. Stay with me. Your husband is a strong fighter, I have no doubt he will be fine. Now get me a hammer!"
While Oliver began to loosen the swivel gun, Moro gazed out at the ship again. It was close now, close enough that Moro could see the individual scars on the faces of the men lining the rails. But it wasn't the men that caught his eye, it was the hull.
Four square ports had swung open simultaneously, like the mouths of hungry beasts. Inside the darkness of the ships gut, Moro saw a sparkling light. The heavy iron muzzles of the cannons were sliding forward, locked into their position.
"Cannons..." Moro whispered. "Cannons..."
Moro turned to Oliver, who was hammering the swivel gun.
"Moro! I need you to hold this steady for me! Come here!"
Moro gasped.
"Oliver...The..."
Oliver looked at Moro.
"What is it? What the hell is it!"
"Cannons!" Moro yelped. "Oliver, they're going to SHOOT US-"
BOOM.
The world went white for a moment.
When Moro opened his eyes, he wasn't in his ship.
Everything had been swallowed up. The sea, the screams, Oliver's voice. All of it vanished in a single blinding instant. Then-
Silence.
When Moro opened his eyes, there was no deck beneath him.
No sky.
No sea.
No pain.
He was suspended in a void of nothing.
There was no wind, no sound, no warmth. It was not darkness, darkness implied the absence of light. This was something else. An endless, colorless void stretching beyond understanding.
Moro tried to breathe, but he could not feel his lungs. He tried to move his fingers, but he could not feel his hands. Panic rose in him like drowning without water.
"Oliver!?-" He tried to shout. No sound came. Then something shifted.
Far ahead-or maybe impossibly close, a faint glow flickered into existence. It was small at first. But soon it grew. Then the light shaped itself.
The light became something. Someone.
A knight, reaching his hand out to Moro, beckoning.
He spoke, his voice thundering.
"-Child. There is no longer a choice for you. We are now one.-"