Roxie Wood's Story

Even with the constant, comforting sounds of the sea, the ship was too quiet. The crew were back on land, having agreed to let the ship be used for this quest, adventure, whatever you wanted to call it. Roxie had tried to persuade Austin to stay, to come with them- but apparently part of the deal was that they couldn't accompany the ship. Roxie was captain now. She knew that she was going to have to teach some of the group to sail as well, because if anything happened to her, she was not letting this ship go down as well. They'd gotten a huge pile of supplies, but now had no crew. Not unless everybody else just so happened to be a pirate or a member of the navy.

She swung her feet out of her bunk and stood up. It must have been almost time for the others to have gathered at the docks. She changed into a pair of light, black leggings, a white shirt and the captain's jacket that Austin had left her. She buckled her belt around her waist and slid her sword and pistol into place, before pulling her hair back in a messy braid. She swallowed her cup of pills, washed them down with water, then headed up to the deck. She had enough pills for ninety days. If they were at sea any longer than that... well, they'd have to deal with that when and if it came to it.

It wasn't hard to spot the group. They clearly weren't sailors, anyway. It was... a little smaller than she had imagined, but that was probably a good thing. Less of a drain on the supplies. She let down the ramp, folding her arms and looking at them.

"It's pretty obvious that none of you lot are used to the high seas. Roxie Wood, your captain for this trip."

Matt left early that morning, having paid one of his friends to look after Jess until he got back, or... until she didn't need looking after any more. She'd been having a bad morning and had cried when he was leaving, making him feel even worse. But if it was her certain death or a possibility of her cure, then he would always take the risk. Even if it meant a possibility of him dying.

He had been the first to arrive at the docks and had watched the others arrive. Three other girls, one guy. One of the girls looked like she was still a teenager, while the others seemed to be a little older. He stayed out of the way, keeping his head low for hear of being recognised. After a while, he turned his attention to the ships. A woman had gotten onto the deck of one of them, and as she neared, he could get a better look at her. She was maybe a little over average height, dressed vaguely like a pirate. His suspicions were confirmed when he got a glimpse of the sword hanging at her waist. More than likely a pirate.

She kicked down a plank onto the docks, introducing herself as Roxie Wood and as their captain. Yep, she was a pirate. She stood with confidence. As he approached, he realised that she wasn't as impressive. She was thin and pale- but her gaze was strong as she caught him staring. One of her eyebrows arched, and he grinned at her. "Matt Hale," he said, holding out a hand. She shook it, grinning back at him.

The trip from his apartment to the docks had been a nightmare in itself but some how he had managed to make it there with all four of his suitcases intact. One look at the ship and Kevin dropped everything.

"We're sailing in... this thing." he blurted out as the suitcases scattered around him one bouncing open shooting clothes onto the ground. Shit! he scrambled to pick them up cursing under his breath and complaining about how expensive they were. He sighed to himself as he got them back in haphazardly, closing the case up again however still with articles of clothing sticking out around the edges. Standing up again he watched as a woman he assumed was the captain, kicking a plank down then standing in front of them and introducing herself. Kevin just stood there with a bored look on his face and took a mental note of her cliche pirate attire.

Another man in the group introduced himself to the captain, Kevin smirked thinking to himself about how the guy kind of had a "bad boy" vibe to him. Not one to be out done Kevin walked up to Roxie, "Heeeey! I'm Kevin Wolfe!" he said in an obnoxious tone just to make sure anything he said would be heard over Matt. "I don't know about sailing but I'm the best damn bartender you can ask for." he smiled at Roxie then turned to Matt and winked. Kevin laughed in a manner that was heavily laced with sarcasm and leaned on Roxie's shoulder. "How about we have one of your cute little cabin boys take care of my luggage he can just put them in my cabin. I hope the cabins have decent sized closets."

The first guy that approached Roxie seemed like he'd make a good pirate. He didn't flinch away at her gaze, and there was something about his stride, his manner, that reminded her of certain members of her crew. He seemed like he'd be a valuable member of the crew. However, things rapidly went downhill from there.

The next guy to introduce himself was flamboyant, vaguely over enthusiastic and came with four suitcases. As he spoke, Roxie could feel the despair creeping over her. He looked like the type to either get violently sea sick, complain that the sea was ruining his hair, or be a fantastic, if overdramatic, lookout, and she was getting the vibe that he wasn't the latter. She raised an eyebrow, folding her arms. "Honey, we have no cabin boys. You haul those cases down yourself or you leave them up on deck, simple as. Downstairs, second door on the left," she said, pointing towards the stairs. The crew's cabins weren't bad in size, but those four... massive suitcases would probably take up half of the cabin by themselves.

The girl who introduced herself was dressed in a yellow dress and looked like she'd walked straight out of a fantasy novel or something. She was pretty, there was no doubting that, but Roxie got the impression that she probably had the delicate sensitivities of a princess or lady or someone who was not used to getting rocked and shaken and asked to do tough work. There'd probably be some throwing up with her, too. She seemed nice enough, but still. Not pirate material. "Thank you, Anne, but your titles don't mean anything here. You'll work as hard as the rest of us and you will pitch in. We don't have the luxury of offering you the privileges you're used to. Do you understand?"

Hopefully these bloody tablets would keep her alive and healthy long enough to get the ship to that island or whatever, because she was not letting it go down. She wasn't letting Austin down like that.

If you haven't posted yet, please post so I can move along!

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Emily Tolson strolled down to the port in leather pants and in an over-sized denim shirt partnered up nicely with heavy looking military style combat boots. She marched to the group as always, she appeared to be a late arrival but she eyed up her peers with a confident and steady gaze, it wasn't challenging but it was strong and defensive, assertive almost but behind these strong and seemingly sturdy eyes of steel seemed to be something more fragile and delicate, a certain softness which could only be identified as broken heart syndrome. She was a woman who'd felt pain, no matter how much she tried to hide it but that happened to be exactly why she was here, to bring an end to her peril and suffering.

She still struggled to believe this pirate of a woman could genuinely help solve such an unsolvable problem but Emily was an individual of great faith and she found herself with no other choice regardless of her beliefs. She watched the woman who titled herself as a 'lady' introduce herself to the slightly scruffy woman shouting over at everyone and Emily's haunted gaze turned up to look at whoever it was being addressed as 'Roxie'. Emily sighed back any hostilities that lingered on the edge of her tongue, it wasn't to do with who she was in the company of, her bitterness was another side effect of her anguish but she managed a smirk of a smile as she looked up at the Captain.

"Roxie? If heard right. I'm Emily Tolson,"

She introduced herself politely but briskly with a lack of formalities or social etiquette but she was civil and manner orientated enough to call pleasant. Her hand wrapped around an average side bag which weighed down her slightly skinny back and her knuckles were slightly white and pale with subconscious tension. She noticed the other male and female and gave them a mere nod of acknowledgement and recognition but her brief introduction was the only noise to pass her lips.

Roxie leaned against the mast as who appeared to be the final crew member approached. Her first impression of this Emily was good. No nonsense, nothing fancy, not cocky or overly sensitive or anything like that. She'd do. She nodded at the greeting, before turning around and climbing onto a higher part of the deck, where they could all see her.

"Alright! I think everyone's here, and if they're not, well, tough shit. As you all know, my name is Roxie, and yes, as some of you may have guessed, I am a pirate. No, I'm not going to demand you all give me all of your gold, because we mightn't even make it there and back, so it would be entirely unnecessary and would make you all hate me.

"Now, I don't know why you're all here. Well, I do, but I don't know what's driving you to go on this journey. You don't have to tell me, but I kinda have to tell you, because... Well, long story short, I'm sick and there is a chance I may not make it to this mystical island or whatever. If anyone stumbles across a whole pile of medication downstairs, that's mine. So I'm going to have to teach some of you lot to sail.

"So, have any of you experience in sailing? Actually, let's start small. Have any of you been on a ship like this before?"

Matt looked around at his crewmates. One of them was extraordinarily flamboyant, and Matt couldn't help but grin at Roxie's polite, but stern, instructions to him. One girl was very clearly nobility, if not royalty. If she really was from Scotland or wherever, she must have travelled a good way to get here. Maybe she was made of tougher stuff than he'd originally thought. And then there was the last of them, who he vaguely recognised. Chances were that she was a "lowlife" of some sorts then, because those criminal types tended to hang around together.

He listened to Roxie speak, and was a little taken aback by her sheet honesty about her illness. She'd straight out told them that she could die, and had ploughed on nonetheless. Then again, as a pirate, she probably faced death on a regular basis. He watched the others, waiting for their answer to her question.