THIS IS JUST AN ARCHIVE OF AO3 STROIES NOW FUCK WILBUR SOOT‼️‼️‼️
On this particular day, the waves were choppy and ragged. The clouds were an angry, threatening gray, blanketing the sky as they blocked out all sun that would dare shine through. They were beating up against Quackity’s ship violently, but it was nothing the old girl couldn’t handle. He and his crew had been out at sea for months now, and they had faced far worse storms than the one that approached them now. Still, everyone was calling for their captain. Needed him to lead them, to delegate the tasks at hand.
It might not be the most formidable storm they had faced, but it was certain to put up a fight. It had snuck up on them, and without the time to prepare, they were all scurrying around, frantic to get everything in order so their ship wouldn’t be ripped apart.
It was a song and dance that they knew well, and they stepped in time with the thunder, kept the beat with every wave that smashed against the wood as if it was a mallet beating against an animal-skin drum. Quackity led them through it with a practiced ease, and though it felt like his throat was ripping itself apart with every order he hollered, he had to admit that he enjoyed it. This was one of the few moments on the open sea where he was truly in his element. Every thought and problem from his life was quieted, replaced with the music of a storm.
There was no doubt in his mind that they would get through this just like all the others before. Even when his men were looking at him in a panic, in fear of what the thunder and the lightning had in store for them, Quackity knew that, by morning, they would all be tired, and their nerves would be frayed, but they would be alive to tell the tale.
And he was right, of course. They wouldn’t call him Captain if he wasn’t right all the time. Soon the rain and the thunder sounded off a final time, the beat dulled to something calmer, and the fighting tide shoved at their ship one last time before conceding, mellowing out with the promise to come for them another time when the song needed some more excitement.
Quackity had a habit of thanking it for the dance. He’d press a gold piece to his lips and toss it over the side of the ship as if he were tossing it to a beautiful woman who’d just entertained a room full of men. It was the only way he knew how to show his awe and his appreciation for something so large such as nature, even if it did have a habit of putting him and his men through the wringer every now and then.
After he’d tossed it, his navigator—Tubbo—approached him, chest heaving as if he’d just climbed down from the bird’s nest at the top of the ship. He hadn’t been able to get up there since the storm had begun, so he must have climbed up only to hurry back down.
He was breathing so heavily that he could barely get any words out.
“Tubbo?” Quackity said, turning to face him fully. “What is it? Spit it out?
“Ship,” Tubbo huffed, trying to point to a place from behind them. Quackity glanced over his shoulder, could still see the storm raging behind them, but he couldn’t see anything else save for the sheets of rain they had just escaped from.
“Is it following us?” Quackity asked, still trying to peer out across the choppy waves. If there had been a ship following them, had managed to get through the storm as safely as they had, then no one would’ve noticed it until now. They had all been much too busy trying to keep the masts and sails from falling apart.
Tubbo nodded quickly, still pointing even though Quackity couldn’t see much.
“It’s not a navy ship, is it?” He asked because that was the last thing they needed. They were still trying to sweep the water off of their deck, trying to get their stores back in order from where the wind had whipped everything up in a frenzy. They weren’t prepared for a battle, and though Quackity could get them through a storm with little preparation, a battle right after might mean the end of them.
