For Ransom

Chapter 6: Raid

Alessandro

They had been sailing south for two weeks now, the Arctic Circle and the shallow people that lived there long gone. They needed to head west soon, towards the central Pacific, if they wanted to arrive at the Land in time for the summer solstice. The pirate hunter himself had never been, only heard rumors of the mysterious island. The seas there were rumored to be full of supernatural and aggressive creatures that swam in circles around the Land, protecting it from the rest of the world. No ship has ever gotten close to it and if they did, the creatures would sink the ship immediately. It was said that the kingdom's most skilled geneticists had bred, trained, and unleashed these creatures into their ocean. Alessandro had no idea how Soraya planned to get through these defenses, but for now, he would trust her. He had no other choice. She still had two and a half more months to figure it out anyways.

"The winds are blowing south so we are not using any energy as of right now. However, we will need fuel if we want to burrow westward, against the natural currents," Tom stated as they gathered around the table for the evening meeting. Through these daily meetings, Alessandro had quickly learned who was in charge on this ship, other than Soraya who oversaw everything. The crew was divided into seven committees: navigation, headed by Tom of course; food, directed by the head chef, who was an ironically scrawny young man named Connie Ham Smith; maintenance, led by a pretty, if not a bit plain, middle-aged lady that simply went by Jan; finance, headed by a peculiar set of triplets of African descent named A, B, and C; medicine led by a burly Spanish man named Carlos, and lastly, a shy but stunning, wide-eyed Asian whose name he finally learned to be Sairena, was in charge of entertainment and overall morale. The leader of the battle committee had died a couple of months back during an unexpected bandit attack, leaving the spot open for Alessandro to fill. It gave him control of the ship's impressive weaponry and assault cannons that were in desperate need of a good cleaning, whom Jan had been more than willing to do. He quite liked his new position and had vocally voiced his appreciation to his captain, who he rarely saw nowadays with all the work that needed to be done on both ends.

"Glad that you like it," was all that she had spared before she dove back into her countless pile of books and scrolls. He had sighed and left her alone, returning to check on his watch posts for the hundredth time that day and make sure there were no bandits trying to sabotage them. He missed the one-on-one conversations him and Soraya used to have. Tom had informed him that that was simply a part of his initiation. Whenever a new person was captured or taken in by Soraya, she spent a good amount of time with them alone to get to know them. If she liked them, then they were allowed to stay on the Miracle, and the special treatment phase was over. If not, she killed them and filtered their blood for water. He had passed apparently and now, he spent most of his free time talking to the Witch, who seemed like she had nothing better to do anyways.

"How much fuel do we have left?" Soraya asked.

"Not much, I'm afraid. A couple of gallons would be a blessing. Most was used getting us to the damn Arctic Circle." Tom huffed.

"A, B, and C, do we have enough money to get enough fuel to get us to the Pacific?"

"We do. But barely. Fuel is very expensive and the oil rigs will run out soon. The nearest rig is in the North Atlantic, which will be really soon, especially with the southern winds on our side." The triplets replied in complete unison. Even the pitch of their voices matched. Alessandro was unsettled every time and he knew the others were a bit fazed by it too. He tried to make eye contact with Saireena, who seemed to put all of her effort to avoid him and his flirting, so he settled for Jan instead, who returned his smirk of amusement at the odd set of triplets.

"There is also the issue of food." Connie Ham Smith chirped. "Our rations will last us another week or so, maybe two if the fish keep biting. The vitamins are low not to mention the grain. If we want to keep scurvy at bay, we will need to stop at a food market soon-"