Snippet #2668507

Carrington straightened once more, his eyes barely holding any semblance of sanity and completely at odds with those of the man that now stared fiery fury towards him before issuing orders to the new Lieutenant. Carrington himself was briefly happy for finally knowing her name, however, he did not balk, nor so much as blink as the Nate stared at him with a promise that would have meant certain death for anyone else. Carrington was not just anyone though, he had been with Nathaniel since the beginning... Of everything, he had fought and killed for the man time and again without question or complaint and he knew damn well the the good captain wanted to strike him right now. If they had not been in view of the crew, he just might have, but such a thing was trivial at best. The pair had come to blows more than once. In fact Nathaniel was, perhaps, one of the only people to have ever actually harmed him as Carrington seemed strangely impervious during battle.
He almost chuckled as he suddenly remembered the last time they had squared off. He hand had found out the Carrington had nearly slit Daniel's throat while he slept, and had dragged him into the Captain's quarters. It had been a vicious fight with the sailing master losing a molar and breaking two fingers, while the captain had walked away with a broken nose and a dislocated thumb.
The two had gotten good and drunk afterwards and Carrington had yet to make another attempt on the younger man's life.

He only smiled as Nathaniel asked the, obviously, rhetorical question of whether he had fired the cannon, but nodded and saluted once again and rushed off to quickly ensure that everything below deck had been prepared, though it was in much the same state as before they had arrived, so he didn't dawdle below deck long.
When he emerged he watched as the new first mate went about her tasks with a martial zeal that made him wonder how she had ended up on the bad end of the navy. That is until a nagging suspicion planted itself in his mind.
No way a hard edged officer such as she had been simply kicked out of the navy, even if she was a woman. She had to have either slain an ally, or she was here for some other purpose.
A wicked smile split his features as he imagined strapping her to a cannon before realizing another folly.
The captain was impressed with her and blatantly liked her. Such a thing might not have been common thing for another to see, but he knew Nathan and knew the man would not simply surrender a pistol to here, nor make her first mate without a damn good reason. They were too much alike and that would inevitably prove to be a blow to moral. Nathaniel was hard, but fair, and Carrington was often there to either enforce his wrath, or boost morale afterwards. With double the ferocity, the crew would grow resentful if they were not careful.

As these thoughts flitted through his addled mind, Carrington turned his bifocaled eyes towards the first rays of the coming dawn, swishing and flicking his spyglass to full extension and raising it to his eye, a smile of anticipation split his lips once more. He saw the silhouette of sails in the distance.

They were truly out of time.

Once the firing of pistols and muskets began, Carrington looked over his shoulder, and for a moment, he was star struck as he laid eyes on the woman that had a pleading look on her face as Nathaniel and Miss Thompson closed in on her.
Walking would not be the word to describe Carrington as he hummed and glided through the chaos of shooting and working men, the peppering of gunshot, and general mayhem that the night had devolved into. He hummed an old classical score as he weaved and danced through the crowd and seamlessly made it to the group to hear the end of Nathan's roared order and Miss Thompson placing her hand over her bullet wound. Despite the continued fire, Carrington seemed not to care, instead he reached out and deftly snagged the ascot from a passing crewman and crouched to quickly fasten the makeshift tourniquet to the first mate's arm before stepping in close to Nathan.

"Ye know I'd never countermand an order, Captain, but there's sails coming with the dawn. 'Tis now or never. I can always shoot them later, or we can maroon them." he whispered to his friend, the plaintive look in his eyes being one of the rare moments of true emotion, a gesture he reserved for his old friend.

Turning, he looked over the two bloodied women and gave the youngest one a dashing smile as he snapped open his watch, noting that the five minutes had more than passed.
He crouched back down and whispered to the Lieutenant, "Miss Thompson, we should, perhaps, raise the plank and be off, but me shoutin' the order gets you not an inch with the boys.", with a smile, and stood once more.

Another group of shots rang out and took Carrington in the arm. He stumbled back with a cry. Righting himself, he put his finger through the hole, finding that he had not been hit, but instead rewarded with a new hole in is recently repaired coat.

"Ye god forsaken sons of 'ores!", he roared in righteous fury, and snatched the musket one of the old crew had just finished loading and fired it at the nearest naval grunt sprinting towards the ship and shot him square in the throat before angrily storming back to binnacle to keep an eye on the approaching navy ship and attempt to get an idea for a course since the captain had yet to give them a destination.