A humongous ship sailed through the ocean in the middle of the night.
The ship's sails were blood red, and its wood radiated an ancient darkness. A single lamp placed at its centre illuminated the whole deck, shrouded by the hazy atmosphere of the desolate ocean.
Standing on the rear end of the ship's deck, a scrawny Pirate yawned, "Ay, senor, why do we gotta keep watchin'. Didn't those dumbasses sail into that whirlpool? Then, let us sleep."
A burly bald man stood beside him, holding a long monocular in front of his eyes. Taking it off, he turned to look at the scrawny pirate, making the smaller guy shudder. His eyes were cold, with deep malice hidden within. A linear scar ran across his tanned fair face, beginning from his chin and crossing through the right eye socket.
His left eye was of a dark blue colour, but the right was completely white with no pupil or iris. He replied emotionlessly without a change in his expression. "They got swallowed, sure, but we gotta make sure they don't get vomited out." He turned to look back at the sea, this time without his monocular.
As he did, A third pirate behind them who watched guard from the sides of the ship expressed a dense smile, and turned his fat and short body to face them and said with no humour in his tone, "Hmm, if everything goes well, will the whirlpool shit them out of its ass?"
The burly, bald pirate slowly turned his head to look at his short subordinate. His unrelenting gaze made the little fat man gulp in fear. He quickly turned and looked back at the vast and dark ocean, continuing his observation. While doing so, he accidentally knocked over one of the many tiffins of food in front of him.
Splash!
"NO!" the little fat man screamed, face palming with regret.
The burly pirate sighed and shook his head. Then turned to the ocean and spoke with assertion, "Navymen are usually dumbfucks, but the fleet that was greeting us wasn't just the general navy, but rather a group of slightly high-ranking marines. I wouldn't have been suspicious if it was just the general navy, but for a marine to get entangled in a whirlpool, that even a blind moron could notice an island away is damn near impossible."
Splash! Sizzle!
He suddenly smiled, but the curve of his smile didn't reach his eyes. "Although we couldn't exactly confirm what happened with the last marine ship, we failed to sink. Maybe one of our companions had balls big enough to take down the lieutenant of the ship. Which led to the ship being steered by an ambitious amateur. And then that led to them sailing straight into the whirlpool's maw."
Splash! Sizzle!
The scrawny pirate nodded in agreement. "That ain't impossible for sure. This year's batch had a lot of juicy youth in them, maybe one of them somehow got to the lieutenant's neck before being slaughtered themselves."
Slash! Sizzle!
The burly pirate tilted his head, "Still, there are some mysteries. I am pretty sure there were two monsters around them. A colossal azure sea serpent and a smaller pitch black sky dragon. I couldn't make out the details due to the distance and the haze created by the whirlpool's erupting waters, but I am sure that I saw the pitch black sky dragon fly off towards us when the Marine ship got swallowed. Fortunately, it didn't follow us, and instead just dived into the sea halfway through."
Splash! Sizzle!
The scrawny pirate scoffed, "Eh, prolly the two monsters fighting to get a bite of the marine ship. Almost feel sad for them fuckers, they got; not one, not two, but three death sentence all in one day haihaihaha!"
Splash! Sizzle!
The short, fat and dense-looking pirate from behind spoke again, with a slow tone, "Heiheihaha! How could they die 3 times, idiot?! They would already be dead after the first death sentence, right?!"
The scrawny pirate and the burly pirate both looked back at the short pirate with no humour in their eyes. The small, fat pirate standing at the side of the ship awkwardly smiled back at them. "Also, I wanted to tell y'all something-"
"Shut up! Just fucking shut up!" The scrawny pirate cut off the fat man's words.
For some reason, the burly man didn't move his gaze off the little fat pirate, but unlike him, the scrawny pirate tried to ignore his dumb crewmate and turned back to continue looking at the sea. And the Fat Pirate shut his mouth, as he was told to do.
Splash! Sizzle!
Splash! Sizzle!
Splash! Sizzle!
Splash! Sizzle!
Splash! Sizzle!
Splash! Sizzle!
Splash! Sizzle!
Splash! Sizzle!
Splash! Sizzle!
Splash! Sizzle!
The scrawny pirate grew an irritated grimace and couldn't ignore his annoying crewmate anymore, he looked back at the little fat pirate and shouted, "For fucks sake can you stop dropping shit in the ocean? I have heard like a few too many dozens of splashes for today. Also, what the hell is that sizzling sound? Are you for real cookin' something?! You fat piece of shit do anything but work! I swear, you're lucky as a pig in a pool of shit, that Captain Terror hasn't decided to throw you off the deck yet."
"That's what I was going to tell you about-" The little fat pirate stopped mid-sentence and squinted his thin eyes back at the scrawny pirate.
The scrawny pirate grew furious, "The hell do you think you're lookin' at, boy?!" He balled his fist and stepped forward, "You ain't finna like what happens next."
As the scrawny pirate was walking towards him, the fat pirate's gaze intensified and focused even further. His entire demeanour changed, his short figure somehow seemed more daunting, he spoke only one word in a deep voice that made the scrawny pirate instantly stop his gait…
"Duck."
The scrawny pirate's eyes widened. Without a second thought or doubt, he crouched down and knelt on the floor.
The burly pirate didn't let this scene go unnoticed. He took out a gigantic machete from his vest on one hand, and a revolver which was as burly as him on the other and took on a battle stance.
While this happened, the fat pirate's eyes were locked onto something, something beyond where the scrawny pirate previously stood, something that flew through the air at great speed, towards them.
It was a circle of fire—a bright orange halo that was spinning at great speeds and travelling towards the pirate ship.
But it seemed as if the halo was travelling below the ocean surface; in fact, the waves muddled its image, as if it weren't a physical object but rather the reflection of something flying in the air.
Swoosh! An object flew over the kneeling pirate's head and careened towards the fat pirate. The fat man's gaze didn't budge.
His arm moved at incredible speeds and intercepted the flying object, smoothly catching it in one hand. The wind dispersed off the fat pirate's hand due to the impact, while he stood absolutely still.
The world grew quiet, the three wary pirates didn't move. Then suddenly, the fat pirate sighed heavily, and stood at ease, "Hei! Look at that, we got riled up over nothin'! The halo in the water was just somehow reflected from this frisbee!"
The scrawny and the burly pirate furrowed their brows and looked at each other, then at the object that flew into the fat man's hand.
It was a wooden plate, painted pitch-black.
The scrawny pirate slowly stood. As he did, a frown deepened on his face. He slowly walked to the plate held by the fat man and turned his head so that his ear was facing the black plate.
As he did, his eyes widened. He jumped back and pointed at the black plate while stuttering his words, "It's coming from the plate! The sizzle, it's coming from that plate!"
The fat man raised his eyebrow and looked down, "You're right… It is indeed coming from this. But why would a Frisbee sizzle?"
The scrawny pirate gritted his teeth, "That's the question, ain't it?"
The burly pirate vigilantly sighed, "Slowly. Slowly flip that plate upside down."
"Ok." The fat pirate complied.
He slowly flipped the black wooden plate, its curved surface faced up and revealed what lay beneath.
On its bottom were many perfectly shaped, long, cylindrical sticks lined up straight and stuck tightly like they were glued to the bottom—all painted pitch black, just like the plate itself.
It was hard to tell what exactly these sticks were, so Scrawny hesitantly walked closer to them. When he got close enough to the plate, he saw some previously indistinguishable details. He saw a spark; No, a few unrelenting sparks that sizzled furiously.
Scrawny gulped, not realising what was happening. He looked around a bit and walked to a closed barrel. On top of that barrel was a lantern. He ignited it and brought it back to the plate so he could see the sizzling sparks and the straight cylindrical sticks with more clarity.
As he focused his eyes, he saw something he didn't want to believe in.
The sparks were following a trajectory, they were following wires wrapped around the sticks of the plate.
Then a realisation struck Scrawny. A realization that sucked the words out of his mouth.
He realised the sparks were flames that quickly devoured a wire connected to each stick.
He hastily jumped back, his eyes wide with horror. He shouted with a stuttering scream;
"B- BB- BOMBS!"
…