10 Years Later
Jack stared at the sunset in the distance, he sat in the crows nest on watch every evening until sunset when his shift would be taken up by someone else.
He had been at sea with Blackbeard for the past four months tracking a Spanish treasure galleon (these were oddly common and frequently attacked by pirates).
He was used to the whole pirate thing, rough waters, bad food, frequently getting hurt wether it be by falling or accidentally cutting yourself, and the chance of getting attacked by official privateers or pirate hunters and getting killed in battle.
Jack joined Thatch's crew when he turned sixteen and went on adventures when he could, Anne seldom spoke to either of the two boys since their first adventure with Thatch after the battle between the Pirates and Ben Rodgers and was working in secret elsewhere either inside enemy ranks gathering information or out with another crew of pirates, and as for Gordon, he wanted to live a normal life, he wanted to get a scholarship and become a businessman.
Jack had admitted to himself that he was attracted to Anne but the lacking amount of her being around made it very difficult for him to try to even get close, but he knew that his adventures would eventually lead him to the woman of his dreams, when all the crew were out having sex with whores he would rather stay on the ship and take care of it.
Even though he was 21 years of age he rarely ever drank and had never had sex with a woman.
Jack wanted to start his own crew but was always told that he was too young and didn't have enough money to buy a ship or a crew, but on this trip Thatch had promised him half of the share of the money they take from the treasure galleon to start his own crew and buy his own ship, as long as they held an alliance together.
"Jack! Get down here you monkey bastard" called Thatch from the deck, Thatch had never been the type of man that liked to keep his two feet planted firmly on the deck and never liked to climb, that was the crews job whenever asked to do so, that and he couldn't climb anyways.
Jack climbed down the rigging and landed with a thud next to Thatch, within the time they spent together he had grown his black beard out and started setting it alight with small chips of wood and hay in battles to intimidate his enemy's, and it worked.
"Come to my quarters we need to have a little chat...." Asked Thatch, it was rare for him to invite people to his quarters but when he did he was either suspicious of a traitor or had something to say in secret.
The two entered his room and Thatch closed the door behind them, his room had a small bed in the corner and a desk nailed to the floor with special types of alcohol in the drawers, he brought out a bottle and put down two glasses, he poured one glass and went to pour some in the next and looked at me for approval, Jack nodded for its considered rude not to accept alcohol from the captain, there were chairs on either side of the desk and they both sat down "I called you in here because you're my most trusted crew member Jack" he started "and there are some things that a captain must share with his most trusted member for any other man will call him crazy" Jack wondered what the hell he was on about "Thatch? Is there something wrong?" He asked "aye, there be something wrong, sinister even. A'ppenin in these waters is something dark and strange...." Thatch explained, Jack was dumbfounded by the captains strange behaviour "what the hell are you talking about Thatch?" Jack demanded to know what was troubling his captain "the last village we stopped at, when I asked around there were talks of ships capsizin for no reason, of dark shapes in the sea, and hells stench comin from the water" it sounded like Thatch was actually going crazy "it sounds like you're talking about a bloody sea monster!" "WELL I RECKON I AM" Thatch shouted in reply, he sat back in his chair nervously and drank his drink in one go.
"So you think there's a sea monster goin around these waters, and you want me to do what?" Jack asked "when I was younger, a while before I met you, something attacked my ship, killing all my crew and leaving me stranded, now it was dead of night when it happened so I can't tell if it's a monster or a new breed of ship, all I'm asking is that you get the crew to start running more night shifts, always keep the ship moving from here on out, do you understand?" Jack trusted his captains judgement so did exactly as he asked.
He left the quarters without finishing his drink, expecting Thatch to drink it for him, he went up onto the deck and called for attention, "The captain is wary of an attack on the ship at night, so in order to make sure this doesn't happen we will be increasing amounts of men on night watch, and we will have men taking shifts on steering the ship to keep it moving, it's a risk on keeping the ship moving at night when there aren't enough men to stop her if needed but the sea in front of us is fairly clear so we should be fine."
And with that everything was set, and the long nights began.
