Cedella “Jonesy” Jones
Level 4 Pilot
Wit: 12 (15)
Navigator: 1st Class
Our helmswoman be Jamaican, a veteran of the Caribbean, and easily the best looker on me ship. Best singing voice too. Easily half the lads have an eye for her, and a few of the ladies, Rumguts included. Hell, even I would try to sweet-talk her into me cabin if I was that way inclined. Captain’s advantage and all. But I’m not one to make that mistake, with neither man nor woman in this company. Unlike most on me boat, I don’t screw the crew, as it were. I have a hard enough job maintaining order and discipline without seasoning the stew with me personal affairs.
I feel the Albatross shift gracefully under me boots as Jonesy turns the wheel and aims our bow ahead of the other sloop. As long as the wind holds, we’ll cut her off before that lighthouse up ahead.
I take a gander at the gizzards of me own ship, just to be sure we be ready for the battle ahead.
The Albatross
Hull Defense: 101/120 (131/150)
+30 Defense from Iron Scantlings
Sail Defense: 31/50 (51/70)
+20 Defense and +25% Fire Resistance from Sails of the Salamander
Agility: 100 (130)
+20 Agility from Copper Plating of the Bow
+10 Agility from Navigator: 1st Class at the helm
Speed: 110 (120)
+10 Speed from Sails of the Salamander
+10 Speed from Navigator: 1st Class at the helm
Guns: 14
12 Seaworth Culverins
Base Damage per Gun: 10 (15)
+5 Damage from Gunner: 1st Class
2 Seaworth Falconets
Base Damage per Gun: 5
Crew: 99
This time I let meself smile. She needs a few repairs, but the Albatross still be in fair fighting shape. Time to go teach this English lordling who the true upper classes of the sea be.
Since we’re faster by a good twenty points, we reel the Sea Stallion in like a fishy on a line. She fires a warning shot from one of her swivel cannons as we draw close, but that’s all the protest she can offer us. Jonesy has brought us in on the prey’s stern to avoid the build of the Stallion’s cannons. Coming in on a broadside, that’s just asking to get peppered like a steak on a plate.
“Hard to starboard, Jonesy! Let’s answer her squeak with a roar of our own.”
That gets a holler of approval from any crew within earshot. They look a motley lot, not a uniform style among them, clothes cobbled together from a dozen or more nationalities. Some have bits of armor, pikeman’s chest plates, conquistador’s greaves and gorgets, the odd dented helmet here and there. All have boots though, purchased with doubloons from the ship’s treasury when we was anchored in Wellington. I’ve insisted on me crew wearing boots, during a battle at least. Ran into a cunning French merchant captain who sprinkled his deck with broken glass and tacks before we boarded his ship. I lost too many good sailors that day.
The Albatross responds smoothly to Jonesy’s gentle touch, coming about to put us broadside to the fleeing Englishman. I move to me gunner’s position at the port corner of the quarterdeck. There’s a pull cord there that I’ve had installed. It runs to bells on the main deck and the gundeck below. Me gunners know to be ready to fire when they hear that death knell.
I pull the cord once we’re turning on the right line but still be well shy of the target. There’ll be a delay of three seconds before me gunners can light the fuses and another five seconds as the fuses burn down. We’re also tilting to starboard now, which helps with the elevation of our shots. I’m aiming for the sails with this volley. Me gunners know to load the cannons with chain shot for the first blast. A ship full of holes can still flee on a full set of sails, especially in the time it will take us to turn back on course now that we’re broadside to the Sea Stallion. But with tears in her sails and a few broken yards, she’ll be going nowhere fast.
The thunder of our cannons sends a delightful tremor through the deck beneath me. It warms me heart to hear me Albatross give her battle cry. Spinning chain shot blurs out towards the Stallion’s fresh white sails, shredding them like paper and splintering a good portion of rigging. Four of me six shots hit, and I watch with grim satisfaction as a few of their crew fall like snowflakes to the deck. One or two are more like rain, having been torn apart like the sails.
The otherwords appear in the corner of me eye, as they always do in these circumstances, letting me know how we’re faring.
Sea Stallion
Speed: 40/100
Crew: 55/60
Now there’s no hope of retreat, the English captain brings his boat about, aiming to return a broadside of his own. Little does he know that he’s playing right into me hands. There’s a funnel next to me pull cord, the opening to a brass tube that also leads to me gunners on the main and gun decks. Battle be fearful noisy and me voice would be lost in the din otherwise. And the crew be fond of using me hollering tube for their drinking games, pouring ale down at this end for some hapless guzzler at the other end trying to open-throat the flow. At least it ain’t far for them to go to the gunwale or a gun port where they can puke their guts out into the sea. I tried it once meself, on a dare from Rumguts. Damned experience made me cry. Never been so drunk nor sick in all of me days. Never again, I told her.
This time it ain’t ale that be pouring out of the spout below. It be me orders.
“Heavy shot, ladies and lads! Let’s be having their cannons!”
The Sea Stallion gets the drop on us this time as I quietly wagered she would, but it be a stuttering speech, barely heard and leaving little impression. One shot manages to put a hole in me bow, another one blasts the port bow gunwale.
The Albatross
Hull Defense: 129/150
A scratch, nothing more. But that second shot takes out two of me sailors who be standing too close to the impact. Leblanc and Roberts. We’ll drink to them and likely many more when the fray be done.
The Albatross
Crew: 97/99
I wait until we’re bang-on broadside and we’re in the gutter of the sea swell before unleashing all hell against the Stallion’s belly. Four cannons only as I don’t want to sink the English sloop outright. All four guns hit their marks and our heavy shot eviscerates the poor vessel, wiping out most of its starboard cannons and gunners in one fell swoop.
Sea Stallion
Hull Defense: 40/100
Sail Defense: 40/100
Agility: 50/100
Speed: 40/100
Guns: 6
Crew: 50
One of their swivel cannons barks at us. The shot smashes the rail behind me, showering both me and Jonesy with splinters. I feel the sting of jagged wood pierce through me coat on me left arm and shoulder. I look to Jonesy and see that her smooth caramel skin be unblemished, unlike Inkman who’s now bleeding from a cut on his chin and his bare left arm. A few scratches on his conquistador’s breastplate show where more timber shrapnel would’ve pierced his chest. He’s clearly spotted the enemy gunner’s aim and has put himself between the impact and our helmswoman. Clever lad.
Captain Grace “Deadeye” Cortez
HP: 153/166
Tamaki “Inkman” MacKenzie
HP: 202/224
The Albatross
Hull Defense: 128/150
“Grapeshot!” I bellow into me speaking horn, and once again I wait until we’re tilted upwards to port. We’re rocking in the swell now so it’s just a matter of timing to get the right elevation for this volley. I be aiming for the decks where most of the surviving Englishmen are crowded, including that bastard marksman with his swivel cannon.
When I believe the time be nigh, I yank on the pull cord and am rewarded with a thunderous report that sprays the Stallion’s aft decks with black death. The cheer from me crew be cruelly echoed by the cries of the wounded on the other ship. I note with grim satisfaction that their swivel cannon be unmanned.
Sea Stallion
Crew: 36
“Bring us into boarding range!” I shout to Jonesy.
“Aye, captain!”
This be the bit where things get really hairy. Me Albatross be the tougher, more heavily armed ship so the Stallion’s defeat was pretty much inevitable, as long as we didn’t do anything stupid. But boarding. That be a different matter entirely. Aye, we outnumber them almost two to one, but many a brave ship has repelled borders with worse odds than that. If this goes pear-shaped, I could be losing many a fine matey today.
I offer a quick prayer to Bathala and fetch me musket. Time for me to add a few more notches on the old Deadeye belt.
