We kept traveling as I sat ready to defend the boat, master started to talk to me.
“Okay time to give you some details, first don’t shoot boats randomly. Either I will tell you witch to shoot or if they attack first then shoot. Second is something I should have talked to you about earlier, have you ever killed someone before?” he asked me.
“No” I responded, I never thought about this before. I should have since Master told me going forward we would have to fight others sometimes.
“Well you will be killing others by shooting at them, easy to say but hard if you have never killed before. My first time I hesitated to pull the trigger, you will probably as well. There is getting used to being shot at but there is no training for that, just learn via combat. So don’t panic and stay calm, if needed pretend you are shooting your mother.”
I didn’t know how I would do if we were attacked now, I imagined it was easy and didn’t think about it. Now I was putting more thought into it, even before I crashed here when I was in the military I never killed before.
“Yeah, its my fault for bringing this up now. Just don’t die on me, that’s your top priority. Once we are safe ill explain more.” he finished.
We traveled for 20 more minutes until trouble came to us, we had passed some boats up till this point but they were fine. A boat similar to the Yellow Back but smaller was near us port side and fired there artillery at us. Luckily they missed, I think because both ships were moving in opposite directions. I froze for a few seconds, I couldn't really hear anything and was starting to shake.
I did have some combat training but it was minimal and the year long trip here was peaceful, I was more of an intelligence personal. Still I did force myself out of confusion and focused on the enemy, I aimed at the deck and went to pull the trigger. I stopped, I was unsure if I wanted to shoot them even thought machine gun fire was aimed in our direction.
I finally fired but I pulled the wrong trigger and fired the harpoon gun, it couldn’t travel far enough and landed in the water. I pulled the other trigger and kept suppressing fire going as master was speeding away from the enemy boat. We finally got away and what felt like forever was only a minute and a half I think, I heard smaller boats heading in our direction and master must have noticed to. The were smart as they were staying behind us since I couldn’t shoot at the stern of the boat. The boat started to turn port side and that gave me a chance to shoot the small inflatable speed boats, each had 3 people on it. 2 gunman and one driver at the back, they started to fire at us and were purposefully spread out from each other. I opened fire on one boat and all three men were hit and the boat was deflating. I saw the damage 50 bmg did to people and the blood, I felt bad some what but knew it was us or them. I took out 2 more while bullets went by me left and right, luckily the big turret cover me entirely from the front. One boat really speed up and tried flanking me, I instantly took it out. The formation split up, half stayed in front of the turret while others tried flanking me.
I didn’t know witch boats to shoot at but instinctively went after those trying to flank me, I took out one after another until one was left. It got on my right and aimed for me, rounds went flying near me but I moved the turret and killed them. I went to fire at the boats that didn’t try to flank me but I was empty, I hadn’t noticed the counter hit zero. Suddenly the boat turned starboard and master intentionally used the cockpit to shield me. The boat really speed up and after a minute the fight was over, I finally looked down at my body to check for injuries and noticed my right leg had been shot. I hadn’t noticed the hit or all the blood coming out of me, master spoke to me.
“Come on inside, I have to stop the bleeding on your leg. Don’t worry about getting blood on the floor, we can clean that up later.” he told me.
I got up to the second floor and Sam was driving the boat, on the way here my right leg hurt a little and as I moved more blood fell out of the wound even though I had my hand over it. Master put me on the bed and removed my belt and holster first, then took off my boots and pants. I got up to look and saw the wound better with my pants off, it was about an inch by inch and a half big. Luckily it was not a very deep wound but still It was bleeding badly, “Lin, lie down and let me treat this. Ill talk to you after, oh and this will hurt.” he told me.
He had a metal box he got from under the bed, he poured some liquid on a wood sub paper towel and wiped my wound. It stung badly and I tried to stay quiet, I then felt him put something in the wound to absorb the blood. Then I felt him wrapping that part of my leg with a bandage roll, I had first aid training so I knew he could do a lot better. He probably wasn’t trained in first aid but still he did good enough, plus some stuff I was thinking of probably wasn’t available in this empire. At least the bandage was tight, my leg was hurting more now. Master could have come and carried me but I guess he couldn’t, whatever it didn’t matter.
“You did great for your first time in combat, don’t be to hard on yourself if you think you made mistakes.” he told me while petting me.
“I panicked at first and froze, when I went to shoot at first I pulled the harpoon trigger and wasted a harpoon. I …..” I was saying before Master interrupted me.
“Under stress people make mistakes, I can buy a new one. Your fine and did great, don’t worry about it.” he told me.
Master went back to drive and Sam and Sarah went over to me to check on me, “You okay? Thank you, for fighting for me, since you know I am there target. Unlike the lower empire to the south with Mortem, Oil port, Servus city, the islands and all those oil platforms the upper empire to the north is more open with less cites and oil rigs. It has more open water so its easier for pirates to sneak in and attack.” Sam told me.
I never did ask about what direction north was and the map Master made for me didn’t have it on there, I played dumb to gather more info.
“South?” I asked.
Sam then told me “You were never told about north, east, south and wist growing up? Well that’s okay ill tell you since Dan didn’t.”.
“I assumed she knew at least that, but yeah I should have asked her if she knew that.” Master responded.
“Compass’s help with navigation and have 4 directions north, east, south and wist. Towards the crater at the top of the empire is north and the bottom is south. The left is wist and the right is east, then there is the directions between them. North east, south east, south wist and north wist also all of known waters are in the south wist corner of the crater.” she told me. Odd that they said wist instead of west, guess the name changed in 150 years. She sounded sincere when talking to me, not demeaning me for saying I didn’t know directions.
“Sorry I didn’t know that, I’m stupid.” I said playing dumb still.
“No, you were kept locked away and not taught about the world. Your parents are to blame for not teaching you this stuff.” she said while patting my head.
“She is wrong Lin. Its north, east, south and wumbo actually.” Master told me.
“wumbo?” I asked.
“You know I went wumbo, you went wumbo, he/she went wumbo, wumbology, the study of ….” Master told me before Sam cut him off.
“Hes joking, don’t listen to him. You stop confusing her, she might actually believe you.” Sam told us.
I would believe him since that change could also happen, I was like a child on this world. Helpless and learning basic stuff. My leg still was hurting, I was wondering if Master had any pain meds on the ship.
