Chapter 3 – Luck of the Draw
A dim room that shook ever so slightly, vibrations unsettling dust from the rickety wooden ceiling. Each dust particle picked up pigmentation from the faded lights in the room taking on a simple shine of a snowy glow. Two sets of eyes peered through cracks in the ventilation shaft.
“Now what?” Zill asked rubbing his neck.
“We get her out.” Grimm said with devout determination.
“Brilliant.” They focused their eyes below once again, the fallen star tied in one corner, sitting at the side of a man who wore silver tights covered under red boot and red velour shirt that did nothing to hide the flamboyancy of their assortment. They glistened between a silvery black in the dimly lit room.
He was whispering to the fallen star but his words weren’t audible past the cankering of the men that surrounded him on both sides forming a wide spread circle. Dice fell in between the crowd, a few tumbles forced the inertia out of them, settling on a single dot on both of their faces.
“No.” One sharply dressed pirate moaned. “I wanted to mate this harlot first!” The mascara around his eyes winced and contorted with his disapproval.
The other gave a sharp smile through perfect teeth, their only deformity being that they were gold plated to a perfect shine. “She’d be mine first!”
The man in silver tights settled back into his black velvet chair decored with silver trim along wooden arms.
He rested his glances, which burrowed deep towards the dice. “She still be mine till I grow weary of her.” His smile is bearish in nature, revealing a pearly set of teeth, one in silver with a carving of a jolly roger upon it. His lips peeked a plump color along his tan skin, eyes smeared with mascara forming elongated eye lashes that parted along to the side of his face.
The Falling Stars finally spoke her voice resonated within the room heard over the words of the men and their lord. “I told you!” She pleaded.
“She still doesn’t shut up when she’s captive.” Zill remarked sarcastically.
Grimm pointed out to him. “She was sold into slavery, not captured.”
“Semantics.”
“By you.”
“Still semantics.”
Her voice shouted again echoing through the rafters. “You can be the strongest pirate if you have the Heartless.”
“The Heartless?” Grimm repeated.
Zill smirked. “It’s a rumor, she’s gotta be desperate to convince them to let her go based on an old fairytale.”
“She sounds convincing.”
The man clad in silver and red spoke, his voice stringing along itself melodically. “I am already the greatest pirate, who needs the Heartless!”
He threw a fist in the air, his men cheered to his burly voice and poise posture. “Not just the greatest but also the handsomest of pirates!”
His man all chimed. “You were sold by that puny punk!”
Zill growled punching one of the wooden pillars that supported the rafters. “Who the hell does he think he is? Best pretty pirate? Puny punk? I’ll show them!”
Grimm put his hand on Zills shoulder to calm him down although his physical strength was no match for Zill’s building fury. Zill gave another punch to the rafter.
“Prick.” As the word leaves his lips. The rafters give their own disgruntled groan as they begin to make a final call deciding to crumble around Zill and Grimm. Next thing they notice they are on the floor, tossed around in a heap of crumbled rafters surrounded by the pirates gang
Grimm fell a second later behind Zill, crashing in another echo as he face planted. The falling star watched them with awe at their reckless abandon.
Zill doesn’t notice her glances, his eyes fixed on the pirate in silver stockings. “Who’s a prick?”
The pirate leader looked at him with a peculiar eye. “So you did sell this girl to the little smuggler.”
“Crimson.” Zill said under his breath, his behavior seemingly apologetic, till he raised his glance once again, eyes fixed towards the head pirate. “Feel free to womanize whatever I sell to you. But to call yourself great, what a metro sexuality of confusion you are.”
“Its the deadliest handsomest pirate you prudent fool! Or to you it should be Scar Crimson!” Crimson brings a fist slamming against his velvet chair.
The chair rickets under his weight. “Have you never heard of the saying if looks could kill?”
“Yours could kill on many accounts Scarlet, but beauty not being one of them.” Zill retorts.
“The name is Scar Crimson!”
“Scarlet princess works just the same, isn’t that right Scarlet’s men, or do you guys go by the title of bitches these days?”
The all growl and howl at Crimson to off his head at his insults.
Crimson grabs the Falling Star by her hair drawing his dagger around her neck. “You keep talking and I’ll kill your slave Laurena!”
Grimm lifts his head off the ground, joining Zill in recourse. “Who?”
“Me you dumb dolts!” The Falling Star finally joins the conversation, her cheeks turning a flurried red. “I’m Laurena, just how stupid are you two?”
Crimson loosens his grip on her, a bit taken back by her temper. “And how stupid are you? Who the hell is going to become the best pirate by having a great wardrobe and outstanding makeup skills?”
“Ar…” He said a bit baffled, as a few chuckles rose among his men, cuing him to regain his composure. “ARGH! Get them! Kill them all for assaulting the pride of captain!”
“Guess now we have to rescue her to rescue ourselves, huh?” Zill said regretfully.
Grimm nodded. His knuckles turned white as they cracked with a dazzlingly loud sound. It left a smile on his lips, one that only expanded as he continued to pound one face after another of already toothless pirates as one came after another in an arc till it made a cut between the circumference of pirates and Laurena.
Zill came leaping forward avoiding a few of the pirates, till he came landing legs spread on top of the arms of the velvet chair.
He grabs at the ascot wrapped around Crimsons neck. “If anyone’s becoming a fearsome pirate first, its me. If there is a heartless…”
His grasp was strong enough to draw Crimson close to his face, his nose almost touching Crimson’s powdered nose, a dark glare in Zill’s eyes of determined infatuation. ”Understand?”
“Zill.” Grimm was busily prying the chains off the Fallen Star. “This isn’t the time.”
In return Zill bares his teeth at Crimson one more time. “Prick.” He jumps off the chair grabbing Laurena by her hand, pressing her to follow him.
“Lead the way Grimm.”
Grimm nods dashing out towards the one corridor that linked the abandoned warehouse the Pirates used to an old airfield encampment. “Zill.”
“What?”
“Did you really have to threaten the strongest mobster in this area?”
Zill shrugs leaving Laurena to answer for him. “He has the uncanny talent to always worsen any given situation.”
“Shut up.” Zill tosses Laurena upon his back, her arms wrapped around his neck and legs wrapped around his waist. “Just hold on.”
A stampede of feet rushed behind them the sound of live metal being drawn from sheaths and a few guns firing towards their way.
“Idiots, don’t be shootin’ the girl!” Crimsons voice reverberates through the halls.
“Thank God I have her on my shoulders.” Zill announces.
“So honorable.” Laurena says sarcastically, her head barely hovering taller than his, her butt having a tiny bounce as Zill continues charging forward behind Grimm. Till finally Grimm halts in his tracks.
“Shit.” Grimm states. He stares at the wall in front of him, it shined with red bricks with a dull glow peering through each bricks cornerstones.
The stampede of feet stops behind them, Crimson walking through his pack. “I’ve reconsidered my offer harlot, I want the Heartless artifact!”
Grimm’s eyeball peeked through the cracks that illuminated the faint light through them. His knuckles tapped against the wall with a hollow resonance.
