User:Fish/Damon Piracy
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This story is a work in progress. |
| Note: This page descends from a branching story called Dreams Incorporated. Follow the link to start at the beginning. |
The Secret Map (Golden Age of Piracy)
The leather benches of the Dreams alcove fade away into a dark, warm nothing filled with a soothing hum. Damon feels himself dissolve, one nerve at a time, until he too was a nothing. His body feels as if he is made of warm water, swirling on the surface of an ocean of oil — separate and discrete, but fluid, without form, almost indistinguishable to his senses. The world consists of Damon and not-Damon and there is no time.
Around him the humming descends in pitch until it becomes a low buzz, then a series of fast clicks, then slower and slower like a metronome winding down. His own personal perception of time is speeding up rapidly to synchronize with the Dream computer's input signal. Damon feels the clicks now, in bursts of light and air, and the smell of salt, a micro-flash of sensation vanishing past into nothingness. Then, in the same manner as a wagon wheel will appear to inexplicably reverse direction on a movie screen, the bursts of light and sound and sensation resolve into a Dream.
Damon finds himself standing on the forecastle deck of the LeStrange, a two-masted French brig, captured and repurposed for piracy. It boasts twelve guns and spans a length of one hundred twenty feet, weighing four hundred tons. How he knows this, he cannot say; the Dream computer is very adept at instilling unconscious knowledge into the human mind. The LeStrange is at sea, five miles west of the Leeward Islands and the port of Basseterre, capital of the French West Indies. Blue sky spans the horizon from aft to stern, with only a few straggling clouds behind that run before an easterly wind. It is storm season, late summer; if there were a mercury thermometer aboard it would surely strain the top of the bulb. From the look of the time period, such things hadn't been invented yet.
He takes a moment to examine himself and notes that he is dressed in seventeenth-century finery, somewhat stained and patched, perhaps, but serviceable. Damon sees that he wears a white linen blouse, open at the collar; his chest is dotted with sweat. He also wears a pair of blue wool breeches with leather pockets, and a pair of fashionable square-toed leather shoes. He has no waistcoat or jacket — a moment's thought suggests to him, through knowledge the Dreams computer feeds him, that they are hanging in his cabin. The weather is much too hot for much clothing, especially heavy wool. The sails above him crackle in the wind, and Damon looks up into the rigging. He smiles faintly to himself, as he becomes aware that the labyrinth of ropes and canvas overhead are somehow known to him. Marvelous machines, Damon thinks, still amazed at the Dreams computer. I've never sailed a day in my life, but here in this Dream, I know every inch of this ship.
Two sailors clamber in the rigging, ascending toward the crow's nest. Both are wearing standard issue gray ship's slops, minus the shirts; they, too, are feeling the hot weather. Damon looks at them from a distance, sees the sweat glisten on their muscular backs, and marvels again. He feels no urge toward them, none whatsoever. Here, in the Dream, the computer has made him straight, as requested. It suppresses his biological desires and replaces them with a new set. He stares hard at the sailors, willing himself to feel attracted to them, to envision them as sexual objects, but his computer-controlled libido is inert. Damon resists the temptation to glance around nervously, to see if any of the crew had noticed his almost-lascivious looks, but he doesn't. There is a moment of shame instead, a distant sense of loss for his natural self.
"Nice, aren't they?" says a voice beside him. Damon looks to his left, and there is the cabin boy — Seth, of course, in character.
"Oh, I'm sorry, I forgot," Seth goes on. "You're straight here, aren't you?" He shrugs, and grins a lopsided grin. Seth's voice, in this character, is pleasantly boyish. "It's too bad you are, too, because you're pretty handsome."
Damon examines Seth's new form, the character of Henry Dunn, the cabin boy. With a difference, Damon thinks witheringly. Who writes this stuff? Seth's new body stands about a head shorter than Damon himself, and is somewhat more slender of build. Seth's new blond hair has been cut, ragged and short, exposing a slender tanned neck; his face, like his body, is clean-lined and boyish, and unshaven. Seth has acquired a nicely toned shape, from what little he can tell; despite the heat, Seth is wearing a linen blouse with a ruffled front — the ruffles had seen better days, they are dingy with sweat and oil — and knee-length trousers with hose. Life at sea has little tolerance for the weak and flabby, apparently. Damon, always the athlete, is used to the idea of being muscular and fit, and is amused by the idea that the cabin boy's body is probably stronger and more fit than Seth's own natural one. Seth reaches up with one small hand and grasps Damon's chin, feeling the week's worth of whiskers there. "Oh, I could definitely do you, in here," Seth teases. "Definitely. It's too bad you're straight, it really is."
"Capitano, a moment, por favor." A swarthy-skinned crewman interrupts them brusquely, giving each of them an odd look — he must have caught sight of Seth fondling Damon's chin. The crewman is a Spaniard with a long hank of hair tied at the collar of an open red waistcoat. There is a messy blur of scar tissue stretching from his collarbone to his left shoulder, the grisly remnant of a wound that had been badly tarred. "Capitano," he announces, "we're in sight of land. The Leeward Islands are due west."
Acting as the captain, Damon nods at the mate. "Gracias, Santiago."
"Sir," the mate says. It sounds like a hestitant preamble, and Santiago looks sidelong at the cabin boy for a moment, eyes full of suspicion. "Are we putting to port in Basseterre? We need to take on water and salt, and beer. That is," he added with the suggestion of a hint, "that is, if you believe the map leads to the Leeward Islands. For the treasure. If we're staying there, to search for the treasure, of course we won't have to rush to load the supplies, but if we're leaving right away to follow the map—" He trails off, significantly. The unspoken words hang in the air: you are leading us to riches, aren't you?
"Calm yourself, Santiago," Damon says with a brief smile. "There is a treasure. Go make ready. We'll pick up supplies in Basseterre."
"And the ship?" the crewman asks, his brow furrowing.
"Try to make her look a little less French," Seth says dryly. "We don't want anybody recognizing her."
Santiago hesitates to take orders from the cabin boy, so Damon orders: "Make it so."
When the crewman had gone, Seth crosses his arms. "Make it so? Please. This isn't Star Trek."
"I've always wanted to say that," Damon explains.
Seth, arms crossed, continues to frown. He has a puzzled look. "Look, play Captain Picard if you want, but there's something you've got to see." He grasps Damon by the elbow firmly and leads him aft toward the stairs that lead below the quarterdeck.
"What is it? Something urgent? About the map?"
"Not about the map," Seth says shortly. "About me."
They enter the captain's cabin at the aft of the ship. At Seth's beckoning, Damon closes the door behind them. A tiny amount of light leaks in through windows of oiled paper, and Damon sees the cabin — one hammock and blanket, a heavy oak table buried in sea charts, compass, quadrant, pens and ink. A pair of empty bottles nestled in fishing net clink together as the deck sways slowly with the waves. Damon makes for the table, looking with an expert eye at the charts of the eastern Caribbean sea. "Something about our position, then?" he asks.
"No," Seth says, and his boyish voice sounds peculiar. "Not that at all."
Damon looks at his lover. Seth is hurriedly unhooking the buttons of his blouse, pushing the ruffles aside irritably. He pulls open the front of his linen shirt and shows that his chest has been bound, tightly, with a linen undershirt. The cabin boy tugs at the cloth with strong fingers and pulls it free —
— allowing Seth's breasts to bounce out.
"Oh," Damon says. "That."
"Yes," Seth says, looking up at her lover. "That."
"Oh," Damon says again. Seth really did end up with a nice pair, he realizes. Small, but that is to be expected, from all the exercise one would get on a —
"Stop staring at them," Seth says firmly.
"I'm sorry," Damon chuckles. "I'm so sorry, I'm straight. I forgot. It's kind of hypnotizing, actually—"
"I don't want to hear it," Seth says, but she doesn't sound entirely displeased.
"You don't mind?"
"Of course I don't," Seth says. "I told the computer I'd play a straight girl. I just didn't think it'd be here, that's all. Cabin boy with a difference," she sighs, and looks down at her bare torso. "This wasn't what I was expecting at all."
"Well, it's no wonder you're keeping it secret from the crew," Damon says. "Most of the women who sailed with the pirates did keep it a secret. At first, at least — Anne Bonney sailed with Calico Jack, you know. I can see why they would keep it to themselves. Bunch of sailors with a woman on board—"
"It's bad luck," Seth nods. "For the ship, and for the women too, I expect." She makes a face. "Probably better we don't tell them."
"Whoa, whoa, hang on, hon," Damon objects. "Hey, now. You're the one who's always telling me that I should come out, huh? That I shouldn't be keeping secrets? You can't be what you're not, isn't that what you said? Right? That means you should come right out and tell those guys out there who you really are. Fair's fair, right?"
"No," Seth says. "No, that's not what I meant. You should tell everybody who you are—"
"This isn't about me, Seth," Damon smirks. "You want to find out what it's like to have your secret spilled, huh? Well, now's your chance."
Seth's face, boyish in appearance when Damon had assumed Seth was male and feminine now that he knows the truth, takes on a shocked expression. "What is with you? Do you know what a bunch of pirates would do if they found out I'm a woman?"
"Come on, it's obvious!" Damon says, and Seth looks down at herself, to see where her disguise might be inadequate. Damon shakes his head. "Not you — the story. The Dream. Look at this." He seats himself at the oaken table and draws over a leather tube that has been gently oiled and sealed with wax to keep out moisture. "It's the map. See here? Read this line, just above that series of marks."
The cabin boy takes the pirate map and reads from the indicated line of instructions. "And woe to any Manne who doth seek my Tresure, for noe Manne can find yt; and Ill Luck be on any who do, any Manne who may unearth my Treasur shall have a Curse upon his Heade, a Foul Spel that doth not Break for a Centaurie of Doom." She looks at Damon. "So what?"
"So? Isn't it obvious? Santiago was asking me about the map. He was hinting, and pirates don't hint. They're nervous. They want reassurance that the map is genuine, and that we're going to find whatever is at the end of it. We can give them that reassurance by telling them about you. You can find the treasure, since you are no man. And it says no man can escape the curse, but you can. If we tell the crew that we have you aboard, and you're the key to the treasure, they won't lay a finger on you."
Seth puts her hands on her hips. "Or we could tell them I'm no man — I'm a boy."
Damon nods, thinking to himself. "Of course, there's no point in telling them about you, if we don't tell them about the curse at all. There's no point in making them more nervous, is there?"
"We're going to have to tell someone about the treasure map," Seth points out. "Look at that: it's a mess. Lines, symbols, pieces of maps with no latitudes marked, and half of it written in ... in Dutch, or something. Neither one of us has the slightest idea where that map is supposed to take us. We've got to ask somebody for help."
"What, admit to the crew that we don't know where we're going?" Damon exclaims. "Are you crazy? Maybe we'll put in to port — there's got to be someone there who might know what some of this gibberish means."
"Have it your way," Seth sighs. "You're the captain."
