pirate king (pirate!au) ➵ ateez ✔️

hand

You drop to the deck, barely remembering to draw your blade in the panic induced haze clouding your mind. Your knees nearly buckle under the strain and you stumble forward, moving with only instinct to guide you through the chaos.

Luckily for you, you were on the mizzenmast before the pandemonium erupted, so you're relatively close to the sickbay. Your feet take control of their own movements and yank you after them to the wooden door, your fingers scrabble around the handle and you throw the door wide open, the resultant crash barely registering in your ears.

Inexplicable relief floods you when you see your master there, hurriedly sliding a set of razor sharp blades into his belt. He whirls around at the noise, fingers on the verge of drawing a knife from his side, but when he sees that it's just you, his face sags in relief and he crosses the room in three quick strides to wrap you in his arms.

For a moment, everything slows down around you, swirling into background noise in the back of your mind like you're in the eye of a hurricane. There are no words exchanged between the two of you, you merely choke back a cry and bury your nose in your master's shoulder – the scent of wildflowers and honey lingering on his skin – his arms around you firm and unyielding, like the mountain he was named after.

But all too soon your master pulls away and the gravity of the situation you're in slams back into you like a returning wave, surging up in your chest. You stamp it down the panic down and wordlessly accept the pistol your master hands you, fingers gripping the firearm so tightly your knuckles feel like they're about to pop.

"Let's go."

You don't have time to think about the hopelessness of the situation at hand before your master yanks you out of the door and onto the deck. All about you, chaos reigns, the remaining crew doing their best to hoist the sails and make way before the Black Crow comes for them.

San pulls you after him, up the stairs and onto the quarterdeck. There your captain stands, watching over Yeosang with his cutlass drawn as the navigator works quickly to set up a long tube full of what you know to be black powder. It's the second, major distress beacon that's part of the relay system your captain developed long ago for situations such as these, to raise the alarm to every crew member that catches sight of it to report back to the ship immediately, regardless of circumstance.

And this is certainly not a circumstance you wish the crew was returning home to.

There's shouting beneath you as the crew on the main deck works with every bit of strength they have to raise the sails, but it's hopelessly slow – too slow, there's no chance that you'll be able to flee from the Black Crow. A sinking feeling grips you tight in the belly even as you realise this, because how could you possibly sail off when the rest of the crew is still ashore? What would they do when they return, drawn by the light of the danger beacon, only to run smack into the arms of the Royal Navy officers?

You swallow at the thought of your friends hanging from the noose... of Wooyoung dangling from the rope, limp and unmoving, never to greet you with those iridescent bright green eyes again–

No.

You can never allow that to happen.

By the time you look up again, steeling yourself for the unavoidable battle ahead, the dark silhouette of the Black Crow is mere feet away from you, you can see the deck of the ship bristling with vindictive officers, and you see one of them raising a musket to point right at Yeosang...

You whip around to scream a warning at him, anything, but Yeosang's head is down as he draws his own musket from his belt, and you know, deep inside, that you're going to be too late...