Shiver My Timbers

The crowd had started off cheering this on, thinking they were going to be watching a free AFW match, right in the middle of this bar. It wasn’t like this sort of thing was rare. In fact, most of the bars near the arenas had insurance that covered just this sort of thing, and Kozue wouldn’t have been surprised to learn that the Pig & Sickle was no different.

Their audience was steadily growing quieter and more uneasy, though, as it became clear that this wasn’t a wrestling match or a fight or a brawl. It was more of a dissection, and Kozue - one of the most recognized names in Tension - was on the operating table.

Kozue was sucking in deep breathes as Scarlet approach, mixed with the occasional breath to clear the spit out of her mouth. She’d been beaten before, sure. She didn’t have a problem with the rough treatment. But this? This woman’s strength was staggering, and it was getting a bit hard to talk shit when she was getting ragdolled. Speaking of which…

”Guh!” Kozue cried out as her neck was grasped tight and she was hauled. She wasn’t able to get much higher than her knees at the moment, but that seemed okay with Scarlet. Worked perfectly for what she had in mind.

Kozue’s eyes widened as she was lifted up on the crushing corsair’s shoulders, right into the telltale powerbomb position. ”Fuck you!” She feebly tried to throw a few punches in Scarlet’s face, but she couldn’t summon the power to get any real impact from. Frankly, she doubted it would’ve made a difference if she could.

Kozue came crashing down on a table nearby, slamming right in the center. This table wasn’t like the ones that were found around the ring, not the easily breakable kind. No, this one wasn’t made for human bodies to crash straight through. That being said, it did cave in, but only halfway, leaving Kozue stuck in the middle, her legs dangling out while her body was sandwiched between the wood.

For a moment it looked like she might have been clean out, but then she began to stir. Legs feebly kicking, arm weakly raised, faintly trying to sit up in the wreckage. Couldn’t move. Could barely breath. But still awake.

”Oh, fuck...fucking…” She gasped and struggled to make a coherent sentence. ”I’m not...not…done.”

The Captain bat an eye as she felt what she assumed was a slap strike her head when Kozue was lifted on high. Whatever it had been, it did little to deter her. Hiking the girl up by her pants, she railed the sail high and brought the American Ninja down through splintering wood. A few strands of her hair has been displaced in the scuffle on her shoulders, she casually brushed it back.

She took the long way around Kozue's current resting place, giving the table a small kick in passing, enough to jar the frame a bit but nothing more. "Four years, aye?" She shook her head, the disappointment practically dripping from her words. Reaching the far end of the table, she stood near Kozue's head, glowering down at her. She reached out with a hand, giving the girl's cheek a light smack to make sure she knew Scarlet was there now.

It was hard to tell with some of these people, they had a tendency to become delirious. There was no denying the girl could take her fair share of punishment, but beyond that there wasn't much to see, especially not anymore.

The Captain reached out to clamp her entire palm over Kozue's face, jerking the girls head about to shake her body loose from the table enough to pull her up from the broken frame. Using both hands she would guide the girl across her shoulders, wearing her like a boa as she resituated a hand to hook over the girl's thigh. She would pull down holding her face and leg, her torture rack might have been the genuine article by the unrelenting force applied to it.

"Starting to think there be a reason why ye going nowhere bonnie wench. I'm hearin' a whole lot of piss from ye, not so much as touched a spot of genuine fire in ye." As if the hold Couldn't get any worse, she managed to apply even more downward force, idly twisting from side to side as she stretched her own back to at least get something out of it for herself.

Yeah, that rib was definitely busted now. No question. Maybe more than one, too. Scarlet had her royally fucked up, and it was becoming more and more apparent as the beating went on. It hurt just to breathe, ached to move, and her body was desperately telling her brain to shut the fuck up and stop provoking the pirate. Call her captain, call her Scarlet, call her whatever she wanted. Give up, and maybe there would be something left when the police and ambulance arrived.

But her brain didn’t much care. She could batter her body to pieces, but Scarlet wasn’t getting a finger on Kozue’s pride.

She could, however, touch other things. Like her face, for instance, which she did with a slap that woke Kozue all the way up and got her direct attention. Not done yet. Nope.

She let out a scream of rage into Scarlet’s palm as her face was grabbed and she was lifted up, with the same ease and strength that would’ve been shocking if Scarlet hadn’t used it several times already. She threw Kozue on her shoulders like it was the easiest thing, and then came the torture rack. The move quickly lived up to its name. The New Jersey Ninja was flexible, could bend in all sorts of ways, but it was put to the test here. Some of the patrons looked like they were even thinking of coming to her aide, but general fear kept them at bay.

No, if Kozue wanted out of this, she’d have to do it herself. Growing desperate, Kozue started feeling around Scarlet’s head, until she got a good sense of her where her nose was supposed to be. Once that was done, she swung her fist out, throwing most of what she had left into a hard blow aimed at the center of the pirate’s face.

One of The Captain's greatest joys when stretching a fine lass or strapping lad across her shoulders. This was no exception. She carried the weight with ease, pulling at both ends as if snapping the girl in twain we're a game to her. She could feel the girl's body quake as it reached it's nature limit. She turned to the crowd who had since died down. A mixed wash of reactions. Good or bad, it mattered little. This was the beginning of another grand voyage after all, not everyone had the stomach these sorts of dirty deeds. They'd serve their purpose and carry this tale across the winds.

Her joy was momentarily cast aside as Kozue's fist struck her squarely in the face, scrunching her features as the bridge of her nose was tickled with pain. "What a worrisome gnat ye are." She let loose another thunderous guffaw, a few within the crowd laughed as well, though it was the nervous sort.

She rolled her arms over Kozue's body as she turned, eyes locked to the half broken table beside her. "No finer place to bury one's findings." She mused in a low rasped tone, that edged voice that carried with it intent to maim. Her palm forcefully clapped the American Ninja's ass so hard it threw her lower half vertically up off Scarlet's shoulder. The Captain dropped herself down to the side, driving Kozou's upright body through the splintered wooden mess beside her with her devastating finishing move, the "Black Spot".

Under her weight and the force of Kozue's battered body, nothing remained to speak of. Even the stout and solid legs of the table had been blown out leaving long sharpened splinters spread along the floor. The Captain picked herself up through the scattered dust and wooden debris that hang in the air, waving it all from her face. Her palms pressed firmly to her back as she arched herself until she felt a pop, sighing softly at the small relief. She didn't even bother regarding Kozue further. The girl wasn't worth any more of her time.

She whistled sharply as she walked back to where this all had begun, reaching down to collect her doubloon and the scattered yen. "My bottle, if ye please." From the crowd the man from earlier came, holding out the bottle with shaking hands. She snatched it from his grasp with a sickly joyous grin. "My thanks."

"Ye all be on notice, Captain Scarlet Farley now haunts this port." She thumped her chest with a fist, glaring out over the gathered patrons. "Choose ye words with care and tread softly. I won't stand for any more mutineers." Her nostrils flared as she gauged the room, most every on hand had either shrunk away or were nodding alone. A fine crowd, to be sure. "Tell ye friends, tell ye family, but don't forget it ye'self. For now..." She took a hearty swig, exhaling sharply, it felt as if she were breathing fire. A good slow burn she would feel in the morning no doubt, but face it without regret. From her chair she picked up her tricorn hat, settling it neatly atop her person. She scooped up her coat into the crook of her elbow as she made her way out, she began to sing again. "We'll haul 'em high and let 'em dry~"

"We'll trice 'em up into the sky~..." The Captain shouldered her way through the door, slipping into the crisp winter air. "Lowlands, me boys, and up she goes~" As the door slowly creaked behind her, her voice faded into the night. "Get changed, me boys, for your shore-going clothes~"

Kozue woke up with a start and a shout and looked about the room she was in, her mind rushing to fill in a dozen blanks. She wasn’t in the bar anymore, but in a bed, in a small, white room, with a single window, obscured by a beige curtain. White sheets. TV hanging up on the wall. An IV hooked up to her arm, wearing a cheap, backless gown…

A hospital gown. She was in a hospital. Scarlet had kicked her ass straight into a goddamn hospital.

”Fuck!”

Her exclamation came both from that realization and the pain that was setting in, a result of her sitting up way, way too fast. She collapsed back on the bed and stared up at the ceiling, hissing as the pain ebbed.

Three minutes. Tops. That had been how long it had taken for Scarlet to tear her a new one. She’d been beaten before, that was nothing new. This, though? This was domination. Public domination. The sort that she wasn’t going to let go anytime soon. Not now, not ever. It had been a poor showing, but most of that came from getting taken off guard. Next time, she’d be ready. Next time…

Her raging train of thought was derailed when she noticed something on the desk besides the bed. A single card, one with Winnie the Pooh and Eeyore on the front, just sitting there. Cheap thing. Looked like it. Beside it sat a bouquet of white roses, neat and trimmed. All at once she was confused. Kozue had friends, but nobody who was close enough to know she was in the hospital.

”Huh.” She grabbed the bouquet with one hand, then the cared with the other, and gave it a read. It didn’t have much to say, but that was fine. What it did say was interesting enough.

Get well, soon!
The Pirate Hunter

”You’ve got to be fucking kidding me.”

Seriously, how many names did this woman have?

Kozue scoffed and tossed the roses across the room...or halfway, because she didn’t have the strength for a full toss just yet. But she would, soon, and she knew exactly where she taking a field trip to at the first chance she got.