Boom!
Cannon thunder blew the calm apart as pitch-black shot struck water and hull, geysers of seawater leaping skyward while the sea reared into violent chop.
A rolling sheet of smoke swept the deck.
In a heartbeat, leisure snapped off the Marines like a shed skin. Faces hardened. Without being told, crews swung to the big guns and the wheel, lookouts clawed for sightlines through the haze, rifle lines formed shoulder to shoulder. Laxity, courtesy of a certain lazy man, evaporated; in its place, Headquarters steel.
Rifles came up as the heavy cannon slewed, iron throats hunting for targets in the fog-shrouded blue.
Then—
Clang!
A brutal ring against the hull. Heads whipped to either beam as rust-scabbed grappling hooks bit deep over the rails. Thick hemp lines snapped taut, shuddering the stanchions as they locked fast.
What the hell…?
Eyes went wide. Color bled out of cheeks.
"Grappling hooks!"
"They're coming up from underwater!"
"Boarders!"
"Close-quarters—go!"
Before the command had finished leaving a mouth, wet, feral shapes swarmed the lines and vaulted onto the planks.
They looked like the dictionary image of cutthroats—burlap cloaks in tatters, a junkyard of weapons clenched in scar-corded hands. Faces were worse: empty sleeves, clouded eyes, mapwork scars, mouths with more gaps than teeth. Every expression was a pirate's leer, ferocity curdled into habit.
If not for the speed and brutality of the strike—and the rank stink of bloodlust—someone might have taken them for a mob of mangy dockside toughs.
"Hahaha! A Marine battleship!"
"Unlucky for you—your luck just ran out!"
"Drop your weapons and hand over your supplies!"
"And the ship! Jump overboard and nobody gets hurt!"
Their cackling swaggered through the smoke as they eyed the Marines like wolves taking inventory of meat.
The bald, bearded brute at their head planted fists on hips and roared, drunk on his own performance. "Hahaha! You guessed right—we're here to rob you blind!"
Rob… us?
Deckhands froze in place, disbelief warring with a growing, absurd certainty.
Under the raiders' cloaks, tatters of Marine blue showed through.
Not pirates.
Marines.
Marines from the New World—the kind who acted like thugs.
Could it be…?
The same ridiculous conclusion clicked into every skull.
"What's wrong? Scared of our tricks?!" the bearded man crowed, mistaking silence for fear. "Drop your weapons now, or we'll—"
His laughter stuttered and died. The looks fixed on him had chilled into the flat pity a man reserves for a corpse he hasn't buried yet.
"How dreadful," a slow, unhurried voice drifted through the haze, "to sail all the way to the New World only to be robbed."
Through the billowing smoke, a tall figure uncoiled from a beach chair. Cloak stirring, hands sunk in his pockets, he regarded the "pirates" with an expression balanced between amusement and something like disappointment.
"You must be the Marines from G5, hm?"
"…B-Borsalino?!"
Silence hit like a slap; then a collective gasp tore loose.
They stepped back on reflex. They might laugh at Headquarters' orders and sneer at its so-called elites, but the name "monster" had followed Borsalino for years. Seeing the man in the flesh turned old stories into fresh terror.
We… tried to rob one of Headquarters' monsters.
"So, Darren, how do you want to handle this?" Borsalino sighed, as if inconvenienced. "Per Headquarters' orders, they're your subordinates now."
Darren?!
The boarders went bloodless. Eyes dragged to another figure rising from a second beach chair, hearts pounding like war drums against bone.
He stood tall and impossibly composed, handsome features cut cold. Short black hair stirred in the sea breeze; a cigar coal glowed red through the smoke. Muscle pressed at the seams of a Marine uniform; his gaze mixed mocking calm with a killing edge. Even motionless, he radiated a pressure like a god out of a furnace.
"So," the Vice Admiral said, voice empty of heat, "should I commend your audacity… or condemn your stupidity?"
He stepped fully into view and the realization hit like lightning: they had just robbed their own commanding officer.
---
Two days later, in the New World—the G5 Branch.
The island base hunkered behind blackened ramparts and caved windows, the old fortresses pitted and flaking. Harbor guns sulked under webs; battleships wore coats of rust.
In the gold wash of sunset, the once-iron bastion looked spent, abandoned to weather and time.
"Vice Admiral Darren," Arthur said carefully as he slipped into the makeshift office. The Vice Admiral lounged back on a sofa, eyes half-lidded in a semblance of rest. "It's been two days… perhaps we should consider letting them down?"
His gaze slid, despite himself, to the window. In the port below, rows of men hung by their wrists like strings of salted fish, swaying over the water. Two days of sun and wind had sucked them dry; they looked halfway to jerky.
To be continued...