The Dulcet Tones of Pain. A Ferry to the Afterlife!

[Kyubey]

Pirates being what they are, the most obvious interpretation of Akki's words was not lost on Alcantra, who's face flushed with embarrassment as soon as they were said, and hid his face with his hat. He made an attempt to look stoic and serious, but it seemed that in matters like that, he was still just a boy.

"...we've no time for matters of that nature, Mr. Alcantra," said Benjamin, who clearly had the same idea.

"Of course we don't. I would never. You know that, Ben."

"It's of no consequence now. So, Miss, you say you can help us?"

"She doesn't know who the target is either. I already asked."

"Then I'm not sure how much help there is to give, without more clarification."

"Maybe so, but it would cost us nothing to just..."

"Be silent. I know your stance. Step onto the deck, Miss. You have my word, if you are as unarmed as you claim, I will not harm you."

If Akki did as Benjamin requested, she would see his pale, skeletal figure, covered in a heavy coat, propped up against a table, sitting beside Harry's still unconscious body. His pistol was still in his hand, and he kept it pointed at the entrance to the deck, not lowering it for anyone. If Akki were to try and move around the deck, she would find the gun following her, with near mechanical certainty. If it wasn't for the gun, and his watchful stare, the old pirate might have been mistaken for a corpse. One would not need to have a great imagination, to figure out what would happen if Akki did anything even remotely suspicious, or threatening.

"Two questions, miss. Firstly, why have you remained aboard, if the situation is, as you claim, so dangerous? Second, did you know, prior to the ship's departure, that we would be visiting, and for what purpose we are here?"

By all accounts, Benjamin did not trust this newcomer, and was not alright with her sudden part in the recent events. There were too many things that didn't add up, and his years had taught him better than to simply believe that a civilian would be willing to give any sort of aid to a pirate. Akki had secrets, that much he could tell, and he aimed to get at them before the truth revealed itself.

[Shark a' Pult]

Emerging slowly and with her hands clear to see, Akki hoped this all wasn't just some trick and that she would now be killed by some stranger. Thankfully when she did see, there was a huge relief taken off her mind. It seemed Benjamin preferred the use of guns, and therefore she was in no danger, since it would take him at least a few sentences for the description of him firing while she could dodge within a few words. Something like, 'she hit the deck' or 'she jumped to the side' and just like that, gunshot missed.

"Where am I supposed to go even if it wasn't dangerous? I didn't get a chance to debark with everyone else, and I'm not about to jump overboard. If you get lost here, you'll never see daylight again. As for you all, I thought you were just passengers. Aren't you, are you here for something other than the ferry? I'm just a musician, hired to play during the trip."

The first answer was a truth, since they were still entirely underground yet chugging along across the water. Even with the currents, leaving proper boats in these waterways had only one outcome. Even if the ship was burning, it would be wiser to try to help put it out, rather than evacuate. At least not without someone or something which was familiar with the waterways, in this case the lizardman captain. The second answer, well she wasn't the best liar, but it wasn't hard to do so in order to save her skin. She just kept calm, partly to avoid being shot at, partly so as not to betray herself with any emotions or expressions.

"You mind if I sit down? I was injured, and have been walking and standing up for awhile now."

[Kyubey]

"Whether you recognize us or no," Benjamin said cooly, "it would do you well to learn when you're looking at pirates, Miss."

As he spoke, Alcantra poked his head through the doorway, looking after Akki as best he could. He frowned notably when he saw the gun pointed towards her, but didn't dare say a word about it.

"Now you see, Benjamin. There's no harm."

"So it seems. You may leave us now, Alcantra."

"But I can't just..."

"The others have yet to find the enemy. I shudder to think of what should happen if he finds us before you find him. All your mates count on you."

Alcantra frowned again, clearly frustrated, but didn't argue either. The hierarchy of the Black Spot Pirates, as it was plain to see, was very well established, and didn't leave much room for Alcantra to contradict his elder shipmate. Grunting with irritation, and shooting one last look to Akki, he turned away.

"You'll be safe here, Miss. Please don't move, for now." With that, he left through the doorway as quickly as he came in, his coat swooshing behind. Now, Akki and Benjamin were alone, if one didn't count the unconscious Harry. A far more ideal situation, for the pirate. He couldn't operate as he wanted while Alcantra was there with his foolish chivalry, ready to defend Akki at every word. The gun still remained pointed, and Benjamin's gaze was still as cold and firm as before. His first and strongest instinct was to get rid of her right then and there. Whether she was a threat or not, her presence was a complication, and he tried to remove those as much as possible. Additionally, he was suspicious for another reason. Unlike most of his fellow pirates, Benjamin was quite observant. Normally, he would have seen no reason to disbelieve Akki to any extensive degree, if it wasn't for one simple word she said, coupled with a small detail he happened to notice while sitting on deck.

"Of course you may sit," he said. "The fates have been most unkind, I see. You have my sympathy. But first, answer me one last question. You say you are a musician." It was only here that his focused glare wavered a little, as he glanced, for just a moment, towards the direction of the harp, the one part of the deck that showed no obvious signs of damage. "What instrument do you play?"

[Shark a' Pult]

"Thank you." Akki responded, when she was allowed to sit by Benjamin. Notably she avoided taking a seat anywhere near Harry, and instead took a seat on a footstool she pulled from the band area. Or at least the area they would be, if there was a band. She had enough sense and subtlety of course, to not just plonk herself right down next to the harp and sat a little distance away facing Ben.

"Well I may usually be stuck playing cheap gigs like this, but I was trained as an orchestra player, so I can play a wide range of instruments. Fairly well, if I do say so myself." she responded in a humble tone, rubbing her neck as she did. "Why do you ask? Would you like me to play something while we wait? Any requests?" for a second she let her ambitions get the better of her. In truth this was not out of motivation to get to the harp, but in actuality was something of a soft spot for her, since she always wanted to play what people wanted to hear rather than just getting some loose change by performing "fancy" venues. All of this was clear to see by the way her eyes lit up, and if only for a second, she forgot about the grim task at hand.

[Kyubey]

Benjamin's thin lips curled into a snarl once Akki dodged his question. There were more than enough holes in her story for him to know with certainty that he was directly facing his enemy, and she likely had her weapon (how it could be used as a weapon, he had yet to figure out) within her sights. And then she had the nerve to ask for a request, insulting him by thinking he could fall for such an obvious trap. While he had lowered his pistol, not wanting to make his continued suspicion known just yet, but his bony finger tightened around the trigger. The only thing that kept him from shooting her right then and there was her sudden excitement when the subject of music came up. Hardened as he was, he had a difficult time believing that a real combatant would let her guard drop to such an extent, giving him just the smallest shred of doubt.

"Unless you wish to draw the enemy straight to us, you will do no such thing," he replied coldly. "Then again, our foe might already be right here. One never knows." He looked around the room for a brief second, as if he was searching for some unseen foe lurking in the corners. "You can plainly see what they did to our poor cabin boy. Even if they were merciful to only do real damage to his knees, to attack one so small is so..." he cut shook his head sadly, though if Akki was perceptive, she might have detected something resembling amusement in his expression as well. "...wicked. I suppose it's some consolation then, that it seems he got a strike in of his own."

His eyes cast downwards, to the unconscious body of the boy beside him. More specifically, he was looking at Harry's knife, still clenched in his little hand, and stained with fresh blood. After that brief second where he took his eyes off Akki, he glared back at her, his gaze directly on her bandages.

"Now that I think of it," he said, his voice now more like a low hiss than ever, "you haven't yet told us what it was that caused those wounds.

Even more telling than Akki's wounds, and her noticeable silence on how she got them, was the fact that, if events truly did play out as she claimed, there would likely be others like her still remaining on the ship, and the pirates would have found them by this point. Each point of evidence he found wasn't by itself enough for him to be positive, but together, there were only slight traces of doubt. Overall, the ideal course of action was plain for him to see. As he waited for an answer the hand holding the flintlock pistol twitched, only slightly.

[Shark a' Pult]

"Fine, fine. No playing. You don't mind if I move it though? If you're expecting a fight, I'd have to have one break out here, and for things to get broken possibly..."

Bringing up her hands for a moment in surrender, she accepting Benjamin's terms. She chose not to dwell on what he said too much though, for whatever reason. Instead, she got up off the seat and neared the standing harp. She didn't immediately jump for it or anything, she just stood a small distance away, hands on her hips and clearly thinking about something. Given the way she leaned a bit to the side and back again all while looking at different angles, it seemed she was trying to figure out how to move the thing on her own. Benjamin wouldn't know, but she usually had a wheeled attachment to help cart the instrument around, but she had no idea where it was now after the earlier explosion.

"Oh what, these?" she asked, a little surprised as if she herself had forgotten her injuries as she held her arms up, "I said, there was an explosion earlier. I got off pretty well I figure, could have been worse."

[Kyubey]

Here, Benjamin was faced with a new predicament. It didn't seem like Akki was lying, even though he deduced that she must have been the person they were after, considering there were simply no other candidates to be found. With the way the pirates were tearing apart the lower decks, they would have found anyone else that could have possibly been the enemy, so by process of elimination, it must have been her. But still, he couldn't know for certain, and wouldn't act on the chance of being wrong, lest he fall into a worse trap. It didn't seem like Akki was clever enough to be so deceptive, anyways. Then again, was it not the trademark of a good liar, to appear less capable than one truly is? Still, if she really was so skilled, she would have found a million different ways to have picked off the crew, and absolutely wouldn't have placed herself in Benjamin's hands like she did. Also, and this was most crucial, but his own pride did not allow him to believe he was being tricked.

"Do as you'd like, so long as there's no noise. Although I expect that if my mates find our foe, they'd be naught but a bloody smear before ever making it up here... we are that sort of crew, y'see."

Truthfully, Benjamin, like all true pirates, kept to his word. Like he had said, he wasn't about to harm Akki while she was unarmed. But if the harp was the weapon that had destroyed the deck, then that was a different matter.

[Shark a' Pult]

"You don't know much about this game if you think the likes of your crew can turn the likes of us into a bloody smear. You haven't even met the Valentines yet."

By this point, what with all the yammering going on and Benjamin's distinct lack of shooting her, Akki figured this would be as good a chance as she was going to get. At this distance as well, she felt it was worth the risk, and if she could reach the harp before he shot then she knew he wouldn't be a problem. A bitter old man, apart from the gun she reckoned he'd be less trouble than the kid was even.

With that she made a quick darting motion from her seated position in an attempt to reach the standing harp, already almost within lunging distance. Now the trick was to see, if she could do what she needed to do, without making too much noise. Benjamin shooting his gun, for one thing, would be too much noise.

[Kyubey]

Confirmation. Finally.

As Akki started her dash, Benjamin's pistol, which never once wavered from her, went off, without a moment of hesitation or thought. From the second the shot was fired, he let the pistol slip from his hand, and, with his free hand, was already reaching into his jacket, from which he drew a second gun. Wasting no time, and not at all unclear about his intent, he shot at Akki a second time. After that, he would draw and fire again, from the varied collection of flintlock pistols he kept hidden away, as much as he could, until he saw results, or Akki could do something to stop him.

[Shark a' Pult]

The first shot clipped Akki, as was probably the intent, and the force sent her in a short roll once she hit the ground. As far as she was concerned though, it was worth the risk, because she now had her hands on the harp. Raking her fingers along the strings, there was a sudden upwelling of force about the instrument as the unpleasant noise sounded. Benjamin might feel a strong pressure on him, particularly in his lungs as a blast of air whirled in his direction. It was not an attack, not yet, simply a residual effect of the opening action of the harp; a violent expansion of force to cast aside the following bullets.

With one hand, Akki could continue this defensive maneuver until she could properly, though painfully seat herself in an actual playing position. With both hands she could cease the din, giving way to an actual melodic crescendo. Her fingers began to dance across the strings, and closing her eyes in concentration, some semblance of music began to emanate forth. In unison with this, the floor boards and furniture between her and Benjamin began to split, splinter and otherwise fall apart. Since the gunner showed no sign of stopping his attack, she couldn't just hurt him directly and needed to in some capacity maintain her defense. Slowly but surely though, as the music continued and the sound rose, the sundering force crept closer and closer to him and Harry. It should have been quite obvious to see though, so he certainly had time to react.

[Kyubey]

Benjamin sneered with mild frustration when he saw his bullet only clipped Akki, instead of outright killing her like he had hoped. Perhaps it was for the best, as ending the battle so quickly might have caused even more problems for him, but, being set only on winning at all cost, he stoically aimed his next gun. This was, however, right when Akki started playing, halting his assault abruptly. Just the initial blast was enough to send the old man crumpling to his knees. The pirate was, as could be plainly seen, in poor health, and while simply aiming and firing was no difficult task for him, the sudden force was just too much. It was all he could manage, and indeed was quite a feat for one of his condition, just to remain thinking straight. As the greater force came towards him, he did not even try to avoid it, knowing that such an attempt would be impossible, but he did raise his weapon once again. He didn't try to hit Akki, he couldn't have lifted the pistol that high even if he wanted to, but instead aimed for the floor at her feet. Mustering all his strength, Benjamin fired at the ground. While his action could have been interpreted as a failed attempt to hit a target, such a clear miss almost resembled a signal of some sort, like he was intentionally marking that specific spot on the deck. Able to do nothing else after that, Benjamin and Harry alike were completely at Akki's mercy.

Beneath the deck, a low sort of rumbling sound might have been heard. The pirates had been making noise ever since they dispersed, but, up in the open air, it would not have been very loud. This sound was different, not caused by normal searching. It was clanking, destructive, the sound of chains smashing through all in their path, and, as if called by the sound of gunfire, had been drawing closer, moving, crawling upwards. Assuming no action was taken to stop the source of the noise, it would reach the deck in a matter of moments.

[Shark a' Pult]

No action was taken. Akki merely brought the music to low key and kept it there in preparation. If Ben tried yet again to attack her though, she'd send a few forceful notes his way, aiming for his fingers.

[Kyubey]

All while Akki was busy interacting with Alcantra and Benjamin, down below the decks Bardsey was growing more and more agitated. Wandering the halls like some sort of monster, his living chains tore a destructive path wherever he passed. Entire rooms were smashed apart, as if to uncover his lurking foe, or break them along with the ship, and for every place he visited, without finding the foe he was looking for, his anger and bloodlust grew as well. More than anything else, the captain hated cowardice, and having to fight someone who would not even do him the courtesy of facing him directly seemed to him to be an insult. And yet, through his fuming and his muttered curses, he couldn't help but detect a smile forming across the corners of his mouth. Just as he was frustrated by his target's sneaky tactics, he knew that the wait would make the moment when he could finally strike all that much sweeter. Already, he was thinking of all the ways he could punish the fool who dared hide from him.

And then, just when he was nearing the breaking point, he heard his chance. First, he heard the music, coming from the upper deck, and sensed something, though he couldn't tell what, happening to the ship. That by itself was good enough. There was something that was occurring on the decks that he had once left. Quickly, his chains reached upwards, tore through the floors above him, and pulled their master up, ripping through the lower half of the ship and leaving a series of clean holes in their wake, until Bardsey found himself right underneath the deck. It was around that time that he heard a gunshot, the sound of which he could not mistake for being from any gun but a flintlock, the kind carried by Benjamin. As the bullet landed at a specific point on the deck, he figured out rather immediately what signal was being sent for him. Now, it was as if all the anger had already washed away.

"Is that where you were, little bird?"

He laughed with a wicked glee, as all nine of his chains flew up, with enough force to pierce the surface above it, all around the point that Benjamin had marked. After flying through to the open air of the deck, the chains, assuming they hadn't hit anything, would search for a person, an object, anything. Then, assuming they found someone, they would then try to wrap around the person, after which point the victim would find themselves pulled down, through the floor, to Bardsey's level.

---

Like Akki, Benjamin took no action, as if he was waiting for his fate at her hands. It seemed that, for his lack of ability to fight back, he could merely glare at her instead, with a look of cold contempt. As the chains rose up from the lower decks, he showed no look of surprise or even satisfaction, like he had been expecting that exact thing to happen.

[Shark a' Pult]

Akki had certainly not expected an attack to come from directly beneath her, however she also had not simply just stopped playing and laid down to take a nap and invite death. So while she didn't have much time at all when the chains came rearing up through the floor directly beneath her, her reaction wasn't even properly thought out, more just an instinctive response. As the chains tried to drag her down, her hands pulled across the strings in a rather unorganized but not unpleasant tone. She tried to hang onto the harp at least to avoid being pulled below deck, but her strength was not a match by any stretch. However it might not have been necessary, since by way of her using the harp at the last moment, a rather clear swathe was carved about the deck. A rather near circle to be precise, traced a good few feet around her on all sides.

Thus, Bardsey wouldn't have to worry about her coming down to his level, because that whole portion of the upper deck was coming down to his level in one great collapse.

---

When the dust cleared, Akki didn't fare so well but probably better than most would have since she was at least partially above the deck when it collapsed. Clamoring out from under a portion of floor, she scanned about the strewn wreckage. There clear to see eerily enough was the harp, standing resolute as ever. How it had managed to fall without issue and land properly upright was up to interpretation, but it looked as though it had always been there undisturbed in serene silence. As before, she dashed for it and tried to reach for the strings.

If she could not, then this would be a very short fight.

[Kyubey]

Bardsey awaited his opponent, who he had foolishly thought would be easy to drag down, and was taken more than a little off his guard by the rest of the deck falling around him. While he was tough enough to likely be able to take the brunt of the collapsing deck, it was not damage he wanted to take while an enemy, who he still expected would be strong on their own right, was falling with it. As such, while she fell, Akki would find that what chains had been wrapped around her released and retracted, to shield the captain, like a shell around him.

As bits of wood and wreckage came down on top of him, the chains worked furiously to knock back, destroy, or otherwise guard against them, leaving a sizable chunk of rubble laying harmlessly at Bardsey's feet, while the only signs of damage shown on the captain was a thin layer of dust. As such, while Akki would have to pick herself back up, Bardsey was still standing firm, as ready as he had been when the deck first fell.

"Ah, ahoy there!"

If Bardsey had been a gentleman, or an honorable fighter, the best thing he might have done would have been to politely allow Akki to regain her bearings and retrieve her weapon. However, unfortunately for her, Bardsey was a pirate, and while he did have his own sense of honor, he was equally as pragmatic. Moreover, in the heat of battle, he mistook Akki's running in the opposite direction as her fleeing, and he would just not allow that. Right away, the chains shot forward, flying right at Akki, aiming to hurt her or otherwise at least prevent her from going further.

Of course, due to all the dust, and the fact that Akki was under a pile of rubble at first, he did not see her right away, and so she still had a chance of making it to her harp, if she was fast enough.