Chapter Text
“Ugh!” Powder groaned, tossing a pile of parts on the floor of her cabin, a cloud of dust puffing out from the side of the small contraption she had been tinkering with for the past hour.
Vi was laying in her bunk on the other side of the shared cabin, re-reading her favorite novel for what was probably the hundredth time since she had boarded The Last Drop several years prior. There were only so many books available on a pirate vessel and she couldn’t very well run off to a shop to buy new ones while they were out to sea for months at a time. She always kept an eye out for books to grab while on raids, but unfortunately it would seem most merchants on this side of Runeterra were not prolific readers and she’d only been able to pilfer two or three new editions over the past few years. So, she appeased herself with the same collection of stories that she read on a constant repeat.
She closed her book without bothering to save the page. She’d read this one so many times it wouldn’t matter where she picked it back up later.
“What’s wrong, Pow?” she asked her younger sister as she sat up and swung her legs over the side of her bunk to face where Powder was slumped on the floor, surrounded by various bits of metal and a few unloaded firearms of varying sizes.
“I can’t get the pin to lock,” Powder grumbled with her eyes closed.
The young teen had been trying to build a new type of explosive for the past few weeks, one that could fit in the palm of your hand but create a sizable explosion to rival that of a cannon. She called it a hand grenade.
Sometimes Vi worried about her younger sister and wished she’d been able to provide her with a normal childhood, and more age-appropriate opportunities to use her intellect.
Powder was so bright that, under different circumstances, she could have done just about anything with her life. Most thirteen year old girls did not spend their days fixing cannons, cleaning rifles or engineering weapons for a band of pirates. But then again, Powder wasn’t most girls, and neither was Vi.
When Vi, Mylo, and Claggor turned old enough for Vander to let them start participating in raids, Powder was just ten years old and begged to join them. She loathed being left behind by Vi and the other teenagers from Zaun who had all been accepted onto the crew as young children.
Powder would cry and throw tantrums pleading for them to let her come with them, which, under no circumstance would Vi ever allow to happen. So, while permitting a ten year old to start playing with guns and ammunition may not typically be the safest or most rational course of action, letting Powder get involved in the maintenance of the ships weaponry had been their compromise.
She spent the next few years shadowing the ship’s Master Gunner Benzo alongside Ekko, one of the other Zaunite kids aboard the ship. It gave her something to pass the time, kept her brain active, and helped her feel like she was contributing to the crew and keeping her family safe. And as it turned out, she was also quite good at it.
Vi hopped off her bunk and walked over to Powder, crouching down to her level on the floor and placed her hand on her shoulder, forcing the young girl to open her eyes.
“Hey,” Vi said with a smile and a twinkle in her eye, “You’ve been working on this for hours. How about I go sneak some beef jerky out of the galley and then we can play some cards. You deserve a break.”
Powder chuckled as some tension started to ease out of her shoulders.
“You know, I think Sevika is starting to catch on that we’ve been stealing food, and she’s not too thrilled about it,” the young girl offered with a grin.
“Ehhhh,” Vi responded, “Sevika Schmevika. She doesn’t run the galley. Or this ship for that matter. C’mon, we both know some jerky would cheer you up right now.”
Powder couldn’t help but smile wider at that, “Yeah, you’re right.”
“Great,” Vi said as she popped up off the floor, “I’ll grab the snacks, why don’t you clean up this mess and go get the cards from Mylo and I’ll meet you in the wardroom in ten.”
“You got it, sis,” Powder said with a serious tone that was laced with a hint of humor while throwing up a mock salute to her forehead.
Vi laughed and winked at her sister as she swung open the door to their cabin and sauntered off toward the galley.
“Jericho! My man, how’s it hanging,” Vi boomed as she danced into the galley, throwing on her signature lopsided grin and clapping her hands together. “What are the chances you might be willing to spare a cooooouple sticks of beef jerky for me and Powder to have a little game night. No game night is complete without snacks, as you know.”
The ship’s cook rolled his eyes at the young pink-haired pirate but let out a good-natured laugh at her antics.
Due to spending months at sea with limited supplies, the ship had very specific allotments of food for every crew member, which Vi knew - and Jericho knew that Vi knew.
However, growing up as essentially one of the captain’s adopted children had instilled a sense of confidence into the young woman that often led to her seeking special treatment. And while Vander may be the one who adopted the gang of orphans onto his boat, many of the other crew members felt a special fondness for the gaggle of Zaunites, having watched them grow up aboard their ship and in a way, helped to raise them.
Jericho smirked at Vi and held up two fingers.
“Just two? C’mon Jericho, we’re talking game night here,” Vi said with a pout and crossed her arms, “What if I offer to help wash some dishes next week?”
Jericho lifted two more fingers.
“And I’ll chop all the onions for you tomorrow night.”
Jericho beamed and lifted up the fifth and final finger on his hand, holding it out for Vi to shake, which she did with enthusiasm. He threw her a wink and walked through the kitchen door behind him, off to collect the goods Vi had just bargained for.
As she was standing at the galley counter waiting for Jericho to come back, the ship’s Sailing Master walked in.
“Violet,” Sevika said with a disgruntled tone. She knew Vi hated it when people called her by her full name and made a habit out of it for no reason other than to capitalize on that knowledge.
“May I ask what you are doing in the galley at this time of day? Certainly not asking Jericho for extra food when you know that’s forbidden.”
“What?” Vi said with an overexaggerated look of offense on her face, “Of course not, I just came in here to ask Jericho what’s for dinner tomorrow night. Seafood stew again, yum! I’ve been craving shrimp. Can’t wait,” she realized she was offering too many details and should make her getaway.
“Well, it was good to see you!” she offered Sevika a smile that was far too wide for the situation and dashed out of the galley, hiding in a nook across the deck where she had an unobstructed view of the exit to the galley. Once she saw Sevika leave a few minutes later, she darted back in, where Jericho was already waiting with her pack of five beef jerky sticks and dropped it into her eager hands with a wink.
“Phew, that was a close one. Thanks Jericho, you’re the best!”
Vi had only taken a couple steps out of the galley, smiling and tossing around her bag of jerky when she heard them – cannons.
Her heart stopped. Why would there be…
Not too far in the distance, she saw a massive ship emerge from behind a wall of fog, careening toward them at an impressive speed. A bright purple flag larger than any jolly roger she’d ever seen on another pirate ship rippled violently atop the hulking vessel. The boat below the flag was a monstrosity of wood, bronze, and gold. Large sheets of the various materials meeting each other at awkward angles. Strips of steel could be seen criss-crossing across the exterior of the ship and thin, tall pipes blowing out hot, vicious steam were littered across different sections of the craft. It almost looked like a floating foundry.
Vi didn’t even have time to stop and wonder why other pirates would be attacking them before she heard, no, she felt the next barrage of cannonballs. Not yet making contact with The Last Drop but landing just close enough in the water to cause the boat to sway.
Crew members had started to rush to the deck and Vander burst out of the small control booth on the bridge, Benzo was close behind him but was already dashing off to his post as Vander’s thundering voice reverberated across the length of the entire ship.
“Everyone to your stations immediately! Cannons at the ready! Sails up! Prepare to be boarded!”
Vi’s head was swimming as the chaos grew frenzied around her. Crew members were racing to the lower level to man the cannons. Some were fetching weapons from the closets dotting along the edges of the deck. Others were quickly cranking up the anchor and hoisting the sails.
Without another thought, Vi dropped the sack of beef jerky to the floor and started sprinting back to her cabin.
She had to find Powder.
Powder wasn’t in their cabin.
Fuck. She had probably already left to get the cards from Mylo. Vi was starting to feel frantic. She was just about to turn around and leave again when a cannonball finally made contact with the hull of the ship and the floor below her feet violently jerked backwards, sending Vi flying into the wall.
Dread started to course through her veins. She had to find Powder.
She groaned and pushed herself off the wall, tripping over her feet as she stumbled out of the cabin while The Last Drop still swayed below her from the aftershock of the impact.
By the time Vi made it out of the cabin, the ghastly purple-flagged steamer was already sidling up beside them. They had been stationary when the other ship began its assault and they were no more than sitting ducks out here in the middle of the ocean. Vi knew the crew would now be working overtime to get the boat moving but it was too late. Planks started falling from the other boat onto the deck of The Last Drop. They were going to be boarded.
Vi flung herself back into her cabin and quickly laid on the damp floor to fish her brass gloves out from below Powder’s bunk. Powder had custom made them for her just last month, carefully using plaster to cast Vi’s hands for a perfect fit and constructing tiny, intricate hinges at each knuckle so she had full range of motion with them on. They were one of Powder’s proudest inventions to date.
Once Vi exited the cabin for the second time in as many minutes, brass gloves fastened tightly at her wrists, the deck was swarming with pirates sporting purple stripes. Immediately and without warning, a sword came hurling toward Vi’s face and she just barely had time to react, reaching out to block the blow by grabbing the blade with her brass clad hand. She squeezed tight around the sharp edge of the sword and yanked it hard out of the grip of the pirate who had been wielding it, using the momentum of the move to swing the sword above her and bring the heavy hilt of it crashing down on the pirate’s head, cracking their skull.
She had to find Powder.
She tossed the sword to the ground and started racing toward Mylo and Claggor’s quarters.
She had to find Powder.
It was almost impossible to make her way across the deck. Fighting and gunsmoke were everywhere. Her breaths got heavier as she sidestepped a left hook from one of the purple pirates, pivoting on her left foot and returning the punch with a devastating uppercut of her own that broke the pirate’s jaw immediately on impact. The pirate fell to his knees and Vi left him there.
She had to find Powder.
She took two steps forward to keep going when another pirate ran up to her with a revolver, prepared to shoot. Vi didn’t waste a second and crashed into her, tackling her to the deck. They started to wrestle and Vi grabbed the pirate’s wrist, causing the gun to go off and send an errant bullet flying off the side of the ship towards the bottomless sea. The shot distracted the pirate just long enough for Vi to slam her heavy brass glove against her wrist, forcing her hand to spasm open and drop the revolver, which Vi picked up and then sent a single shot through the pirate’s forehead without hesitation before she threw the revolver over the side of the ship and kept running.
She had to find Powder.
She had made it only a few more steps when another sword came slicing toward her. A shot cracked through the air and the pirate who had been about to slash through Vi’s upper stomach stopped cold in their tracks and fell over, a pool of blood seeping through the back of their shirt. Vi didn’t have time to stop and see who shot them.
She had to find Powder.
Slowly she made her way across the deck, stopping every few feet to dodge a sword, or a punch, or to fight back, until eventually she made it to Mylo and Claggor’s cabin on the other side of the vessel. She whipped the door open with blinding force and burst inside, her lungs heaving from her long and toilsome journey across the deck. Her eyes were wild and darted frantically around the small space in search of Powder.
She wasn’t there.
Why wasn’t she there?
Vi wanted to scream. She wanted to cry. She wanted to throw up. But she didn’t have time for that. She had to find her. Had to protect her. Had to keep her safe.
She raced back outside, initially not sure which way to go, but instinct dragged her toward the bridge. She wasn’t sure why, but if Powder wasn’t in their cabin and she wasn’t in the boys’ cabin, and she knew that Benzo would never let Powder near the lower level during a battle with stakes this high, where else could she be?
She was on the verge of losing control entirely, the only thing holding her together the notion that she had to find Powder. If she crumbled now, she would be of no use to her younger sister. She had to keep it together.
She took three deep breaths before she started making her way toward the front of the beleaguered ship.
She grabbed two purple-striped pirates blocking her path with their backs turned to her by their ears and slammed their heads against each other, knocking them out. When they crumpled to the ground in front of her, she saw Claggor standing on the other side of them, his goggles were firmly strapped to his head and he looked tired, ragged, but whole. Vi was happy to see him but couldn’t dwell on her relief for long.
“Claggor!” she yelled as loudly as she could, urging her voice to travel over the roaring sounds of shouting and cannons ringing around them. “Have you seen Powder!”
Claggor shook his head apologetically. Vi nodded and Claggor gave her a determined look before they brushed past each other heading opposite directions, each knowing what the other needed to do without having to exchange a word.
Vi stayed close to the edge of the ship as she inched toward the bridge, trying to avoid as much fighting as possible so she could get there quicker, only having to stop twice - once to snap a pirate’s neck and second to steal another sword, this time stabbing the offending sword master straight through the heart with their weapon.
When she was finally far enough along that she could see the bridge in the distance, the scene ahead of her made her freeze.
A pale, skinny man was stood at the helm in an impeccably tailored charcoal grey and burgundy suit. Despite being currently stood in the middle of a bloody sea battle, his short hair was perfectly slicked back with not a strand out of place, and he had an impassive look glazed onto his face, almost as if he was bored. A deep scar littered with various shades of pink and purple decorated close to a third of his face, leaving one of his eyes a deep, piercing red. An eye that was currently trained forward, staring in front of him where Sevika was stood with a revolver. A revolver she had pointed directly at Vander’s chest.
Vi’s blood started to boil. That filthy fucking traitor.
Before Vi had a chance to scream, or fight, or do anything, she saw a glint of blue in the corner of her eye. There, on the other side of the bridge, was Powder, running toward the pale man and holding her latest invention in one of her small hands.
No, no, no, no, no.
“Powder, no!” Vi yelled, but it was too late. She was too far away. Powder released the small metal orb, hurling it toward the mysterious red-eyed enemy on their ship while the sound of Vi’s yell got everyone’s attention. Sevika turned at the last moment, eyes wide, and the next few seconds seemed to pass in slow motion. Sevika pushed the slick-haired man away forcefully and threw her arm out to swat the hand grenade away from them and toward Vander. It exploded a millisecond later and all Vi could see through the fog of gunsmoke around them was a flash of red, and then, suddenly, she couldn’t see Vander anymore.
“No!” Vi yelled, tears immediately streaming down her face.
“No, Vander!”
She started to race forward but someone grabbed her by the waist from behind and she started thrashing around.
“Let go of me!” she was sobbing, she tried to get out of their grasp but she wasn’t in her right mind. She couldn’t think straight. She could barely see through the tears pouring unbiddenly out of her eyes. She continued to thrash around, eventually her feet connecting with something solid, she didn’t even know what, but she pushed as hard as she possibly could, sending her and her captor soaring backwards. The next thing she felt was the ground slipping out from under them, and then they were falling, flying. Why were they falling?
And then everything went black.
Captain Grayson of the Royal Piltovan Navy woke up that morning with unease in her gut. She wasn’t sure what the devil was causing the anxious chemical reaction in her intestinal tract nor could she explain why she instructed her crew to sail to this particular quadrant of the Guardian’s Sea today. However, she had been sailing on the high sea long enough to know that when the salty gusts of its wind blew inexplicable warnings onto the sails of your ship, it was better to listen to them than to fight them or question them. Today would be no different.
She stepped into her command center with a frown and had barely opened her mouth to request a status report before her second in command stood up and rushed to her side, beating her to the punch.
“Captain, lookout is reporting heavy evidence of smoke floating toward us from the northwest. May be evidence of an intense battle. It’s still a bit too far off to know for sure, shall we approach to investigate or change course to avoid altercation?”
Grayson’s frown stayed painted on her face. A battle? All the way out here?
Something wasn’t right.
“Approach. And, out of caution, ready all of our men. Combat protocol.”
“Yes, ma’am.”
Grayson moved out to the helm and peered across the vast, cerulean sea toward the northwest. With the naked eye she couldn’t identify anything amiss. But if lookout had spotted something with their telescopes then they would be in the thick of it soon enough. The sea had a funny way of sneaking up on you like that. Right now, the water was calm around her and the fog was light, leaving ample room for the sun to shine through and reflect abstract patterns onto the steady ripple of waves below. She took a deep breath and composed herself, she needed to be prepared for whatever they were about to sail into.
What she wasn’t expecting them to sail into thirty minutes later was … nothing.
Well, not nothing, but as their vessel sliced through the suffocating smoke it became apparent that whatever happened here was over. There clearly had been a battle. Smoke from what must have been an impressive number of cannons clogged the air, and vast amounts of debris littered the ocean around them. Looking down at the wreckage, it only took a few minutes for one thing to become very clear to the Naval captain, and as the realization spread across her chest and down her spine, her heart rate started to increase.
This had been a battle among pirates.
Pirates in this part of the world did not attack each other. It had been an unspoken rule amongst their ranks for almost a decade, a rule that she herself had helped initiate with the help of the Hound. Preventing turf wars and unnecessary maritime conflict was good for everyone. The Navy, pirates, privateers, and merchants alike. While Grayson may not approve of the standard daily activities of most pirates, it was her job to mitigate violence across the waters in her jurisdiction as much as possible. Sometimes, this meant striking deals with large, handsome, bearded men.
If this really had been a pirate battle, then something had officially shifted and a storm would soon be at her doorstep.
It also meant that something had happened to the Hound. He was the glue that kept this whole operation running. The pirates respected him and she and he had come to an understanding ten years ago that used this fact to both of their advantages.
She quickly became flooded with alarm at the implications she had just uncovered hidden in the floating debris below her. Before she could begin to completely spiral, a cry from across the deck demanded her attention.
“Man overboard! Captain, there’s someone in the water!”
When she detected which one of her officers’ voices was piercing through the smoky air, she sighed and steeled herself before walking over to the other side of her vessel.
“And what do you propose we do about that, Kiramman?”
“Permission to rescue them, ma’am.”
“They are a pirate.”
The officer in front of her didn’t flinch, and repeated herself.
“Permission to rescue them, ma’am.”
Grayson stared at the officer, and the officer stared back at her.
“Permission to resc-“
“I heard you the first two times, Officer Kiramman. Tell me. If I denied your request. What would you do?”
The tall woman in front of Grayson locked her piercing blue eyes on Grayson’s gray ones and replied, with conviction and a hint of, something else, in her tone.
“I would go against your orders and rescue them anyways, ma’am.”
“You willingly admit to subordination in front of all your peers, over a pirate?”
“A pirate is a person, Captain.”
“Very well,” Grayson relented and the officer immediately began to move before Grayson stopped her, “However, once aboard our vessel they will be a prisoner, and as the one responsible for bringing them on board, you will be one hundred percent accountable for anything that may happen as a result of their presence on our ship. If this pirate causes any problems on my boat, it’s your ass on the line, Kiramman.”
The officer gave Grayson a single nod and responded simply, “Understood, Captain.”
Then, with a sense of determination highlighting her delicate features, the officer walked over to grab a rope and without a second thought, dove into the icy water and piles of debris that surrounded them.