through the night, fighting off nefarious Spanish villains across the quarter deck of the pirate ships in our dreams.
And now I was aboard a real pirate ship.
The sexy little imp reappeared from behind me and took my arm, taking me to the aft gangway leading down just beneath the quarter deck. Above me, the captain was speaking to an impressive-looking humanoid whose eyes bored upon me. He was a tall, golden-skinned man with wide, powerful shoulders and long black hair, wearing nothing but a small loincloth and a shoulder armor rig, along with a scabbarded sword at his hip. His eyes followed me until I was out of sight, headed below decks.
The imp was in a rush, and heading down the gangway led us to a darkened underbelly of the ship. First was a sweeping gun deck, with a row of eight heavy cannon on either side leading forward, crisscrossed with the crew’s sleeping hammocks. I got only a passing glance of the whole thing before being led further down to the berthing deck.
The main room was replete with more creaking hammocks hanging from the ceiling, many taken up by the snoring crew from other watches. They circled a central area where a few quiet crewmen sat on boxes and benches around a cooking stove from which emanated a rich meaty smell. Again, I wasn’t able notice much as she dragged me around the kitchen bustling with activity and a small room with stores, and then further aft to a hold that was partitioned with canvas to give the place the appearance of several rooms. She slid the canvas door aside in one room to what were her quarters, and pushed me inside. Once inside, her demeanor changed from rushed to seductive and provocative. She circled a bed large enough only for her, tracing her finger across the ruffled sheets, then over her curvaceous figure, before leaning on the bed itself and speaking to me in a voice much softer than before. She pointed at her chest and said, “Kivara.”
“That your name?” I said.
Kivara nodded and knelt on the bed, taking off her top and revealing herself to me. She crossed the bed to me and looped her arms around my neck, pressing her chest against my bare flesh, boring her mouth into mine. I could see all the reasons to resist, the dangers of allowing myself to get close to someone I barely understood, but as her hands caressed my back, probed beneath the fabric of my jumpsuit, feeling her touch over my body, I surrendered to my baser urges. I can’t say I regret it.
The dreams that followed were disjointed, the chatterbox-like sleep that comes after too much drink. Faces and places were framed by flashes from a camera, there one moment and gone the next, only leaving slight afterimages to remind me. They were my memories, my life in fast-forward and reverse, a few frames at a time in disjointed fashion, past and present intermingled.
Then Cool Hand came to me. It was a stark contrast to the life-flashing-in-your-eyes backdrop. He stood above it, as if he had torn himself from the madness and stepped forward, his cheesy grin intact. Cool wore the same clothing as ever, unmarred by the wounds that had taken his life. He fought against that backdrop, as if it threatened to swallow him in. It was too much for him to overcome, and his form was forced back, blending into the scenery
“You done yet?” he managed, struggling against the inevitable, sucked back into a vortex like a butterfly against a tornado. Then he was gone, and I heard a voice, like a caressing whisper, waking me. I looked for the source, but it was beyond me, while at the same time all around me.
“Help me,” it cried.
Then I woke.
Sharp pain radiated through my forearm. Long, thin cuts marked the flesh where Zundergrub had stabbed me with Shivvers’ dagger. Overcome with agony, I grasped the forearm about to scream when a figure threw the canvas walls of my room aside, shocking me out of my waking dream. The figure carried a bundle of clothing that concealed his features, until he threw it at the deck beside me. Once freed from the burden, it revealed itself to be the behemoth I had fought on the rock shard earlier. I looked over at my arm and it showed no new injury, just the old wound the doctor had given me.