Atlas Winters
Atlas could only smile as he watched the woman parade her manhood for everyone on deck. The smile probably did not help her sense of power, which she clearly did not have over him. That was something Atlas had realized not too long into this line of work. If the fear of death lingered anywhere on your mind then anyone could take some kind of power over you. However, if death had become like it had for him, as a sweet friend that he would inevitably join one day, no manner of threat could rob you of anything. And yet, there was something mildly attractive about the woman pretending like what she said actually mattered.
And so, the old pirate stood in silence, though he was sure his grin spoke enough for him, as the woman he had yet to be introduced to called him this name and that. Her continuous use of the “old man” insult made Atlas wonder just how old he looked, a for a few moments his mind floated away and he began to try and picture himself, not remembering the last time he had looked into a mirror, let alone shaved or cut his hair. His clothes had to look like simple rags by now. Hygiene was something he always tried to have back when he was a captain, and it stayed with him to the best of his ability even into his days of depravity. He was as clean as the salt water could keep him, at least, and he still had all his teeth (or the missing teeth had been replaced by gold or silver substitutes. He already had two gold teeth from many fights in his younger years, and while gold was hard to come by he was able to manage another gold tooth as well as a silver one since the time of losing his ship. Of course, said teeth had come out of dead men, but a tooth was a tooth no matter whose mouth it came from. Atlas often wondered if the teeth he had stolen had come from someone else’s mouth at one point, and if that chain continued for a few more people. In that case, these teeth were a legacy, and it was his duty to carry them on until someone came and took them from his freshly made corpse.).
The woman talking brought him back into the moment. She was saying something about him not knowing how things are done, and then offered another insult. Curiously though, she raised her blade up as if she meant to kill him. Without losing his grin, Atlas followed her blade into the air and studied it intently as it came down to do what many other better swords had tried, and part of him actually wondered if there were the end. Though he knew it wasn’t. There was some black fate that brought him here, and it didn’t bring him to simply have him die by the hand of a pissed off woman who probably just needed a bath and a good lay to get her senses about her.
Fate answered, as Atlas predicted it would. His eyes trailed the blade as it swept inches from his person and imbedded into the ship’s rail. Yup. Right as I said. I’ve done far too much of both good and evil to die like this. His gaze moved from the rail to the voice that spoke up immediately thereafter, “Well, I’ll be damned! If it isn’t Derek James!” If the years had been bad to Atlas, then the good that was meant to be in his own years had somehow found its way to the cheery captain that now stood before him. Tok was a sight to see, holding himself with a confidence that only fit a pirate captain. Atlas recognized it quickly, considering he once had it himself. “Good God, it’s been years, mate! You look…” Atlas could feel Tok give him the once over, and once again he tried to picture what it was others were seeing at the moment. Considering how Tok ended the sentence, it was nothing good. “Well, you look like you’ve certainly been living. What have you been doing, bloke?”
“Living, certainly,” Atlas agreed with him, “though I’ve not been called Derek in quite some time.” Atlas couldn’t remember the last time he’d been called that, to be certain. It had been years ago at best. Most people who knew him died around the same time the name did. “I was just trying to explain to your…” Atlas turned towards the woman who moments ago had tried to take his head off, “friend here that I’ve become quite skilled with a net and all. Atlas I’m called now, Atlas of the winter, or Atlas Winters if it suits you. Drinking and netting, is all I guess, that I’ve been doing lately, the past years, fucking long time actually…too long, ‘tis true.” He faded off after realizing he had been going on about nothing.
But then there was a change. Like a ship somehow resurfacing from the depths of the ocean, a bit of his old self emerged from underneath his decrepit exterior. With a swift motion, Atlas cracked his neck and turned his head in the direction the ship was sailing. “You’re sailing for the Americas.” Atlas spoke softer, differently than his original tone since arriving on the ship. It wasn’t a question. He had made this trip enough times to know when a ship was going on such a voyage. He knew where they were going, or at least had the general idea, but why? Such would soon be discovered. “I want in.” Closing his eyes for a moment, Atlas felt the breeze wipe across his face and hair. He ran his hand along the end of the ship, feeling the wood, regretting all the years he had not spent on such a ship.