Archive of Our Own

On the few occasions when he'd been allowed to play (acting) captain, Jim had always done fairly well in ship to ship combat. He'd kept his cool; he'd followed the letter of the protocol while occasionally putting some creative interpretation on its spirit, and nine times out of ten, he'd won.

(Jim still felt that 'hooking up your personal robot buddy to the central computer in order to check out the battle scenario in advance' had been a perfectly valid strategic approach, but sadly, the Academy's administration had not agreed and awarded his hard work with an 'E for effort'.)

And the thing was, now that the real thing was happening all around him, he didn't actually feel scared. He knew exactly where he was supposed to be (on deck) and what he was supposed to be doing (warding off boarders). He was being there and doing that, and back at the Academy, it would have worked like a charm. Back at the Academy, he wouldn't have slipped, or hit his head hard enough to black out, and he definitely, definitely wouldn't have ended up getting sold as a cabin boy.

Slavery was, of course, highly illegal - unless you were a robot, in which case it was a matter of heavy political debate that would probably not get resolved within the next hundred standard years.

(B.E.N. said it was all very silly, because everyone he'd ever met seemed very nice and being buddies with them would be no problemo and if they'd want him to do their Advanced Astronavigational Maths homework every now and then, that would be no problemo, either.)

("Last time, I promise," Jim had said, and B.E.N. had said, "Sure, Jim.")

If there was such a thing as karmic retribution, Jim felt that 'getting sold as a slave' was way, way out of proportion by way of punishing someone for cheating on their homework a few times.

"Too ssskinny. Two hundred."

Getting sold as a slave for barely half the asking price was just adding insult to injury.

"Good soup," one of his captors called, which Jim hoped was either a joke or a sign that he should have spent more time in the alien language simulator. He tried to remember if there was a word for, say, 'laborer' or 'cleaner' or something like that in Bikarian which sounded like 'soup'.

His would-be buyer sniffed. "One-fifty."

Jim tried to decide if a possible mistranslation or bad joke was worth the risk of needing to escape very, very quickly. Probably not. He wouldn't say he was in any way fond of his captors, but they were looking to turn a profit, which meant keeping him alive, looking healthy. Their security was pretty tight, and this didn't exactly look like the kind of place where you could run outside and scream for a pair of lawdrones (well, not and actually get them) but still.

"Three hundred."

Negotiations had begun: not good. Jim slouched a little bit more.

He didn't catch most of the actual haggling, which happened in Bikarian again - there was something about 'amusement park tickets' which had to be another mistranslation, and 'snowglobes' (what language module would even include that word?) but just when they seemed to have settled on Jim's proper value (one-sixty-two credits, a 'hatbox' and 'two chickens'), someone else stepped up.

"Four hundred and that's me one and only offer."

It was the exact price they'd been asking for him. Way too much to pay for someone you might or might not be planning to turn into soup.

Jim tried to tell himself that, really, this was good. Best thing he could have hoped for, other than a raid by the lawdrones, which had been a one-in-a-million chance, anyway.

Looking up at John Silver, who seemed to be glancing in every direction except Jim's, he almost managed to convince himself. Almost.

"Ah, Jimbo." Silver sadly shook his head. "Still don't know how to pick yer fights, do ye?"

"They're the ones who picked it," Jim said, stung. Which was silly; the smart thing to do here, clearly, would be to play it cool. Convince Silver he wasn't going to try to escape or anything, create a false sense of security - rekindle their old friendship, such as it had been. "I was just doing my job."

Silver arched a questioning eyebrow.

"I joined the Navy." It belatedly occurred to Jim that, possibly, people who had joined the Navy were not the kind of people pirates were inclined to look kindly upon.

"The Academy, is it? Always knew ye were smart." Silver sounded proud. "And a true credit to the institution ye are, I don't doubt. Intelligent, brave - the stuff heroes are made of, eh?"

"Yeah, sure. A real hero, that's me," Jim said bitterly. He wondered what, if anything, the Navy had told his mother.

"In each life, some obstacles may block yer path to glory and riches." Silver slapped him on the back. "Chin up, Jimbo. Ye're still young, still got plenty of time to make yer own life."

There was a brief temptation to agree, to let Silver keep talking in this vein - as he would, Jim knew. As long as you were doing what he wanted you to do, Silver would talk on and on and on, all smiles and backslaps, and not a word of it to be trusted.

"Are you going to let me go?" he asked.

Silver's face fell, which was an answer in its own. "Ah, now, Jimbo. I think of ye as a dear friend, ye know I do. But I got a crew, and, ye know, buying ye wasn't exacly cheap. Now, if the money were mine, I'd consider it well-spent to the last cent of it and not a word about repayment, but the sad fact o'the matter is, it weren't."

I did it for you, Jim thought. I let you go, even though I didn't have to.

"Now, don't ye worry, Jimbo. We'll just be wantin' someone for a bit of swabbing, a spot of cleaning - some simple cooking, maybe. Nothing ye haven't done before. Fact, it'll be almost like old times, won't it? We'll see if maybe there's some new tricks I can teach ye."

"Yeah," Jim said, sighing. "Sure. Like old times."

Silver's crew was, as expected, a delight.

"What'sss thisss? Dinner?"

Doesn't anybody have a sense of humor that's actually funny anymore?

"Now, we'll be havin' none of that," Silver said, firmly pushing Jim towards the stairs leading to belowdecks. "Jimbo here's the new cabin boy. Promised ye I'd be gettin' someone to help keep the place clean, didn't I? And I'm a man of my word, I am."

The ... Plinian? Jim decided he was going with Plinian until corrected - the Plinian whistled. Jim had learned how to say or rather: whistle 'hello, I do not speak your language, can you write it down, please?' in Plinian, but it took him two minutes and he'd never had a chance to practice it on an actual Plinian.

Now did not seem to be an ideal time to remedy that.

"He certainly doesn't look like much." Jim had nothing against spiders - or aliens who looked like spiders, for that matter. He did, however, feel he was beginning to develop a very strong aversion to spiders who looked at him like he was something distasteful they'd been forced to scrape off their shoes. "Cheap, I assume?"

"Cheap enough. Done a bit of hagglin'." Silver shrugged. "Two hundred."

Jim kept his mouth very firmly shut. So Silver was lying to his crew, so what? It shouldn't have been any kind of surprise; he knew full well what Silver was like, after all.

And I still let him go. It had felt like the right thing to do, at the time. I didn't think that I was ever going to see him again. He'd thought about Silver at the Academy sometimes, imagined running into him again unexpectedly.

In Jim's fantasies, though, it had always been Silver who was in dire need of rescuing, or at least quite down on his luck, and it had always been Jim who'd saved him. Saving Silver would only have been the beginning of another adventure, naturally.

They'd join forces against some common foe and, inevitably, one day, Silver would look at Jim and realize that Jim was all grown up now, no longer a boy but a man, and Jim would -

Silver shoved him. Hard. "Now, enough of this gawping - there's work to be done."

There were a total of sixteen crew members, which Jim knew would be enough to overpower most civilian crews. Merchants hired guards, occasionally, but rarely more than three or four and, as Jim knew all too well, hiring complete strangers carried its own risks.

Somewhat to his surprise, they mostly left him alone.

Somewhat to his - well, might as well admit it, disappointment, in spite of his lofty promises, Silver didn't show much of an interest in renewing their acquaintance, either. Jim told himself that he was disappointed mostly because Silver was still his easiest and safest way out of his situation.

True, none of the crew went out of their ways to bully him, but they were still pirates. Jim wasn't under any illusions about their perfect willingness to shoot him if he tried to escape, which was why he wouldn't. He would never try to escape.

He would simply do it, and then he'd make his way to the nearest Naval base and then - well.

Pirates were still criminals, and Jim hadn't joined the Navy so he could sit around and not do anything about them, had he? If Silver hadn't wanted to end up in front of a judge, he should have run off to find another line of work; Jim'd let him go once, but no way, no how was he going to do that again. It wasn't as if he owed Silver anything, after all.

Two nights later, Jim finally saw his chance.

He'd managed to slip a fork into his boot at dinner a week ago. A knife would have been better, of course, but the knives were counted by the cook, who was an Ithi. Ithi counted everything, and so Jim now knew that since he'd come aboard, he'd peeled six-hundred-and-twenty-two plotatoes.

"Jimbo? Is that you, me lad?"

Jim considered pulling out the fork. He'd be able to do some damage with it, he knew - although he'd have to aim carefully, which would be rather tricky, given that there was no light.

"Hang on a minute, let's shed some light on this here situation, eh?"

Silver was perfectly able to see him, of course. With one of his eyes, anyway. Probably, Jim should have considered that before making his move.

"I'm not a lad," he said. "And I'm not a boy, either."

Silver turned on the light and tutted. "Stealing forks, waking up innocent souls by sneaking into their cabins in the dark of night. Boyish pranks, if ever I've seen any. So tell me, Jimbo, what's got yer nose all twisted out of joint like a Parpalan windworm, then?"

You. "Other than the fact you're working me like a slave?" Jim asked. Daring Silver to reply that, why, Jimbo, but ye are a slave, aren't ye? fairly bought and paid for.

"Well, now, see here, Jim," Silver said. He looked a little pained, a lot like he was about to spin some fabulous yarn about how, really, it was all for Jim's own good. "Ye think I can just do as I please? Ye think any of these cut-throats wouldn't be leaping straight for me throat if they thought for a moment I'd gone soft on 'em?"

Jim scowled. "Gee, I wonder where I've heard that story before."

"Ye're right, ye know. Ye're not a boy anymore." Silver's expression was sober, serious. "If I treat ye as one, 'tis only for yer own protection."

Close enough. "You don't treat me as anything at all," Jim accused. "You ignore me." That rankled worse than anything else, worse even than hearing the same old lies.

"For yer own safety," Silver said. "Like it or not, 'tis the truth. Ye think it doesn't tear at me, too?"

I think you're a liar. "I never said I cared," Jim said. "I was just making an observation, that's all. But hey, if you care so much, maybe you should - oh, I don't know? Set me free or something? Next port, any port is fine by me."

"Ye think ye're not gonna land up to yer neck in trouble again within a day? 'cause if ye are, I might consider it - provided ye get me money back, of course."

"How am I supposed to do that?" Jim asked, exasperated. "What, you think I can just pull out another treasure map or something? Look, you want me to pay you back, I can pay you back." Not that I will, but sure, I could do it.

Silver gave him a long, thoughtful look. "Ye're absolutely, positively sure ye haven't got another treasure map stashed away somewhere?"

"You want to search me, be my guest," Jim offered. Then he thought of Silver actually taking him up on that offer and flushed. "It'd be a total waste of effort, though."

"I think ye'd best be gettin' back to yer hammock now and hope nobody sees ye," Silver said.

"And everything can go back to how it was before? I really don't think so."

"Jim." Silver sighed. "What do ye want?"

I just told you. Weren't you paying attention? Don't you ever listen to me? Jim said nothing. Even if he had gotten his hands on another treasure map somehow, did Silver really think Jim would give it to him just like that? After what had happened last time?

I might be tempted. It would show him, wouldn't it? Good thing he didn't have one, probably.

"Ye want the crew to think - " Silver started, then abruptly shut up. "Well, off with ye, then. Quiet like a Salazan sandmouse, mind. Quieter. Got some light sleepers amongst the lot."

Jim went, making sure to bang against both the table and the doorframe as he did so, smiling as he heard Silver grumbling behind him.

When he woke up the next morning, it was to the sight of Silver standing by his hammock with an expression on his face that was so utterly gleeful that for one moment, Jim thought he'd had a treasure map on him somewhere after all, and that Silver had found it.

(The question of how, exactly, Silver would have been able to search for it without Jim noticing was put aside for contemplation on another day.)

"Change in plan, Jimbo."

The rest of the crew (minus Arkie, who had the dawn watch) were slowly waking up around them.

"What," Jim said. He felt groggy. He'd never been much of a morning person, and being consistently kept up late to do the dishes didn't help.

"Starting tonight, ye'll be sharing me cabin. Nice and cozy, two peas in a pod."

The image was weird and more than a little unreal, until Jim's brains took away his clothes, at which point it became a great reason to try and poke some more of his brain cells awake.

"Gah?" he managed.

Still beaming, Silver leaned forwards. "I warned ye fair and square, Jimbo. Don't go lookin' too pleased now, will ye?"

Jim scowled. Silver's red eye glittered.

No doubt about it: this was going to suck.

"You'd better not snore."

"Haven't snored a day in me life," Silver said. "Nights, now - can't make any promises there." He smirked. "Ye settled in all right then, Jimbo?"

"Yeah, sure. Most comfortable sleeping bag I ever had." A sleeping bag. On a ship. When Silver had made his announcement, at the very least Jim had expected - well, something other than a sleeping bag.

Peas in a pod, Silver had said, but of course Silver was a liar. Jim knew Silver was a liar.

"Have you ever been honest with anyone? Just once in your life?"

Silver arched an eyebrow. "What's this now? Complainin' 'bout us working ye like a slave and then, when it's time to turn in to bed, ye want to talk? Go to sleep, Jimbo, there's a good lad."

"I can probably hurt you," Jim said. "Especially if I sneak up on you while you're asleep."

"Ye wouldn't," Silver said comfortably, turning his back. He was still wearing a shirt. Jim had yet to see anything he hadn't already seen by observing Silver by day.

One of Silver's knees still seemed to act up a little, on occasion. Jim suspected that 'on occasion' translated to 'when Silver knew Jim was looking'.

"You don't know me," Jim said. "You knew me when I was a boy. That was years ago. People change, growing up. I changed."

"Well, fine. Then I imagine there'll be quite a hullaboo when come morning, they'll be finding me dead body in here, and ye nowhere to be found. Planned on takin' the sloop, did ye? Sneakin' past ole Fizzle to steal some supplies? Quite the daring escape plan, Jimbo - couldn't have thought of it meself. Far too risky, don't ye know. Now me, I'd rather take me chances when they're good."

"And when's that going to be? In another month? A year?" Jim pictured a year spent sleeping here. He'd probably go crazy within three months, if not sooner.

"Could be a month. Could be a week. Could be a day, or an hour, even. Life's full of surprises."

"Trust me, that I do know."

"Aye, I imagine ye do, at that." Silver remained silent for a few moments. "And for what it's worth, I'm truly sorry yer luck ran out the way it did."

"That and two credits will buy me a cup of coffee," Jim said.

"Ye used to have better dreams than cups o' coffee," Silver said. "Don't go gettin' all bitter now, Jimbo. Ye're too young for it."

"Yeah. I should wait until I'm your age, right?"

As far as unanswered questions went What do you want, Jim? had gone much the same way as Have you ever been honest with someone in your life?.

Jim thought that what he should want was to return to the Navy with a captured pirate ship plus crew in tow. He'd definitely be a hero, then. People would be telling each other stories about him.

Silver would spent the rest of his life on some prison planet.

If he were honest with himself, Jim might admit that he didn't quite want that, but still. Silver had gotten a second chance once, and he'd gone right back to a life of crime.

What Silver wanted, clearly, was to get rich - either by finding another treasure or by leading a life of piracy until he'd decide he had enough, which would be never. They'd both seen Captain Flint's treasure; what could ever compare to that?

Try as he might, Jim couldn't really see how he and Silver could end up on the same course.

Jim was never going to be a pirate, and while he'd certainly be happy to hunt down another treasure, he'd do it mostly for the fame, the glory. The idea that one day, some fatherless boy would open up the holobook of the Adventures of Jim Hawkins, Navy Captain and forget about everything else for a while.

Silver would do it for the money. If he ever succeeded, probably, he'd spend the rest of his life figuring out a way to keep it safe, just like Captain Flint. The treasure would become his new obsession.

"Deck's not gonna swab itself, Jimbo." Silver winked at him.

Jim sighed. "You never answered my question last night."

"Refresh me memory, will ye?" Silver turned to regard the deck.

"Honesty," Jim said. "Any familiarity with the concept at all?"

"Me most intimate friend, it is. Nothing I value more, cross me heart and hope to die."

"You value it in other people, you mean."

Silver shrugged. "Honestly, Jimbo, would ye rather I told ye the truth? That it's a cold and scary world out there, and that ye should bless yer lucky stars I found ye when I did? That I've had to talk 'til me face turned blue to keep these ruffians off yer back - if ye'll forgive me me crudeness of expression?"

"I don't believe you."

"Yer mistake, then. Best be sure it don't become yer last one, eh? Now, keep in mind what I told ye."

Jim tried stabbing the deck with his mop. The impact hurt his arms, but both the deck and the mop failed to show any signs of distress.

Silver didn't snore. If Jim did, Silver never mentioned it. Possibly, it helped that by the time Jim fell asleep, Silver was already dead to the world.

On the third night after their new sleeping arrangements had been introduced, Jim slipped out and made his way to the kitchen. He told himself it was just to see if he could - he wasn't going to escape right now, probably; he was just doing a bit of recoinnaisance.

"Hungry?"

Jim gulped. At the Academy, they'd been told that reacting with revulsion and/or fear to species with significant differences in physiology and/or body language and/or olifactory aspects (read: aliens that smelled weird) was a perfectly natural impulse that students ought to train themselves out of.

Easier said than done. He'd passed the exam, of course. It really helped, though, when you knew that the alien in question wasn't actually hostile.

"Just thought I'd see about the possibility of a late night snack," he said.

"Hm." Fizzak eyed him in a way that Jim's prejudiced human senses interpreted as extremely threatening. "There's really not a lot of meat on you, is there? Barely a bite."

"That joke's just sooo not funny anymore," Jim said, backing away slowly. "Seriously, man. How about next time, you just tell me my hair looks stupid or something? Or that I smell like plotatoes?"

"You're the one who brought up food. I was just joining in, making some small talk." Fizzak clicked his mandibles a few times. "Humans are always so sensitive. No wonder most of you die young. Although at least you get to mate several times before dying."

"Um," Jim said. The Academy had offered classes on alien courtship and procreation, but Jim had opted for classes in diplomacy instead, figuring that if he knew how to say 'I'm flattered, but I'd prefer to date within my own species', that was good enough for him.

"That was a joke." Fizzak clicked some more. Jim wondered if he was laughing or chuckling or something. "It was also a veiled allusion to you and Captain Silver's night time activities, which have been remarkably quiet thus far. To the relief of the rest of us, I don't mind telling you."

"Er," Jim said. Waiting for Fizzak to declare that yeah, that had been another joke - those creepy spider aliens sure were kidsters, eh? Not like those dull humans who just had no sense of humor at all.

Fizzak stared at him.

Jim decided a tactical retreat would be a good choice at this point. "So that'd be a 'no' on the possibility of a quick bite, then? All right. Fine. No problem. Nice talking to you. Good night."

He didn't quite run all the way back to Silver's cabin, but it was a close thing.

"I hate you."

Silver did a horrible imitation of being solidly asleep.

Alternately, Jim supposed it might be that Jim'd hurt his feelings just a little bit, but if that was the case, it would imply that Silver actually had feelings. For Jim. Which Jim could hurt.

"I could have been dating an Admiral's daughter!" Jim said. "Or an Admiral's son," he added, because fair was fair. He wasn't the one having trouble with honesty in this relationship. "Do you know what great places they send you to if you're dating an Admiral's son?"

" 'spect ye'll be getting lots of bows in the street when ye're walking by with one of those on yer arm, now, don't ye?" Silver said, and ha! Jim had been right. "So what stopped ye?"

Jim shrugged. "I met this guy."

Silver said nothing. One of his eyes gleamed. Jim wondered what it was zooming in on.

"I dated people, you know," Jim said. "Lots of people. And I had sex. Lots of sex. With lots of people."

"Sounds like ye had yerself quite the jolly time at the Academy." Silver didn't sound jealous. Or like he was partciularly convinced Jim was telling the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth here.

"Yeah." Jim worked his way back into his sleeping bag. "It was really great."

"I'm glad fer ye, Jimbo."

"Best time of my life," Jim said. "No doubt about it. The best."

"I heard ye the first time."

"Totally didn't miss you. Or even thought of you at all. I mean, that'd have been crazy, right?"

"Jimbo, truly I - "

"I looked for my dad," Jim said. "I thought - well, it was my last year, and I thought that maybe he'd want to be there, you know. To see his son graduate from the Academy."

"He'd have been proud of ye. Any man would've," Silver said. "All done up in that fancy uniform."

"That night was the last time I got arrested." Jim yawned.

"Went celebrating, did ye?" Silver chuckled. "Ah well. Expect yer mother cut ye some slack that time."

"Not really, no. Oh, and by the way, did you know everyone thinks we're having sex in here?"

Silver's eye lit up like a light house.

Jim deliberately turned his back. "Just thought you should know," he said, studiedly casual. "I mean, since you're always so concerned about people thinking you actually like me and stuff."

Silver went very, very quiet. Not the kind of quiet where he was asleep; the kind of quiet where Jim knew that, if he were to turn around, he'd see Silver staring at him.

Well. At least I guess I know what I want now. For all the good the knowledge did him.

Another thing Jim had preferred not to dwell on too much the past weeks: the nature of pirate vessels. Which was: to prey on other, innocent ships, killing their crew and looting their cargo.

Logically speaking, Jim supposed he should have expected it to happen sooner.

"See how she's lifting ever so slightly to starboard?" Silver held out a spyglass. "Means she's got a full hold. Might be yer freedom ye're looking at, Jim me lad."

Jim felt a little sick. "Why?"

Silver grinned. "A good plunder'll put everyone in a right merry mood, mark me words. Ye play yer cards right, this time tomorrow, ye're a free man once more."

At what price? On the other hand: would the other ship have gone free if Jim hadn't been here? Definitely not. Silver and his crew were pirates - this was what they did. Sure, they might join in on a treasure hunt if they caught wind of one, but the rest of the time, this was what they did.

"By me reckoning, we got 'em outnumbered three of ours to one of theirs. Might not even come to a proper fight, provided they're the smart thinkin' types and able to do their sums."

I hope they are. "And what if they do surrender? You're just going to take their stuff and let them go?"

"Cross me heart and pickle me if I don't," Silver said. "We be pirates, Jimbo, not monsters - and not slavers, either, if that's what ye were worryin' yer pretty head about."

Jim hadn't, in fact. "Pretty?"

" 'tis how the saying goes," Silver said. "Strictly a manner of speech. Now, if ye'll excuse me, I got meself a prize to catch."

Jim didn't stay to watch Silver 'catching his prize'. Judging by the noise, the other ship had chosen to fight rather than surrender - possibly, they knew better than to trust the promises of a pirate.

There was the sound of screams, shots fired. Wood, splintering. Jim wished he was the kind of hero who would find a way to get himself a weapon and turn the tide; to go up there and see once and for all the kind of man Silver really was: a murderer and a criminal.

Silver came looking for him after the fight, looking a bit singed around the edges, but otherwise unharmed. One of his sleeves looked wet - with blood, Jim realized. Not Silver's blood, though.

"Didn't think ye the type to run and hide from a fight," Silver said, smirking. He looked sickeningly pleased with himself.

"Yeah? What, you expected me to join you?" Jim asked. "I'd rather die!"

Silver stopped smirking. "Now, Jimbo - "

"My name is Jim. Jim. And I will never be a pirate. I don't care what you do to me."

"Right now, I think ye'll need a moment to cool that hot head of yers," Silver snapped. All traces of his good mood had vanished, which was, Jim assured himself, a good thing. Jim was right. Had always been right, except that one time when he'd let Silver go, which had obviously been a mistake and one that had just cost half a dozen people their lives.

It didn't matter that Jim hadn't even seen their faces, or known their names; he knew that they were dead because he had chosen to let Silver go. Nobody else had made that mistake. It had all been Jim, Jim's choice, Jim's poor judgment. Jim's stupid dreams of growing up one day and going off to look for another treasure side by side with Silver, the reformed criminal.

Fizzak brought him some food and a familiar sleeping bag, which Jim accepted with poor grace, and the news that Jim had been restricted to the hold, which Jim accepted with resignation.

He wondered how many people Fizzak had killed. However high the number, it wouldn't make him any worse than Silver, of course; Fizzak, at least, had never lied to Jim about what he did or wanted or felt. Aside from a few bad jokes, that was.

"So what made you decide to become a pirate?" Jim asked.

Fizzak tapped his left foreleg a few times, which meant he was thinking. "Treasure," he said at last.

"Treasure, huh? How's that working out for you?"

"Do you hear how silent this ship is now?" Fizzak said, which presumably meant 'not that well'. "Perla took five, which might explain it, but there's more to it than that."

Jim swallowed once, his mouth dry. "Why did Perla take five people?"

"To crew the captured ship, of course," Fizzak said. "It was damaged, but most of its crew survived and it still flew, so Captain Silver judged it worth saving."

Yeah. Sure he did. "I want to talk to him."

"I fear the feeling is not mutual," Fizzak said. He sounded a little bit apologetic. "Or rather, it might be, but my orders suggest it isn't, which doesn't necessarily mean it's true, naturally."

"Can you just tell him?" Jim said, feeling a little desperate.

Fizzak clicked his mandibles. Jim didn't think the situation was particularly funny, but what did he know? "Of course."

Silver came. Of course.

Jim didn't really know why - at this point, he felt that whatever bridges had existed between them had been well and truly burnt, but maybe Silver felt differently. Maybe he still thought he could win Jim back if he just picked the right words, the right lies.

It wouldn't exactly be the first time he'd managed to do just that, after all.

"Ah, Jimbo." Silver sighed as he sat down on a crate. "Breaks me ole heart to see ye down here, truly it does. Say, ye still got that fork on ye?"

"I'm not going to try to stab you with a fork," Jim said.

"Thank ye." Silver actually smiled. "Say, what did happen to old Morphy, eh?"

"He found himself a girlfriend. Or boyfriend. He seemed very happy, last time I saw him." It had happened during Jim's second year at the Academy. He'd been buried in homework at the time, so bad that he'd barely even noticed when Morphy was gone.

"Ah. So that's the way of it then, is it?" Silver reached out; Jim backed away. Silver's expression turned a little hurt. "All these people around ye, finding their heart's desire, leavin' ye back alone again."

"I told him it was okay," Jim said. "And I don't know what my father thought his heart's desire was, but I hope he never found it. So on the list of people who've left me, that just leaves you. Maybe I should pick better friends, huh?"

"I'm a good friend, Jimbo. Ye just got to give me a chance."

"No, I don't." Jim rose, hands balled into fists. "And no, you're not. Yes, you saved my life. Maybe. Whatever. But if you actually, really care about me, you're going to signal Perla, and you're going to tell him to let that ship and its crew go."

Silver kept himself very still. "I see someone has been tattling."

"At least someone thinks I can handle the truth. That maybe I deserve the truth."

"Jimbo."

"No," Jim said. "We're done. We're history. From here on out, you're dead to me."

Silver rose. For a moment, Jim thought it might come to a fight, but Silver simply turned and headed back to the stairs. "Ye'd best get off at our next port of call, then. Should be another two days, if the weather holds."

Two days later, they were under attack.

Not, sadly, by the Navy, which Jim would have welcomed. According to Fizzak, who'd come to slip Jim an early meal, the attackers were fellow pirates.

"No honor among thieves, huh?" Jim tried not to sound too vindicated. Knowing that if these unknown pirates won, he'd probably be worse off than before helped; satisfying as it might be to see Silver brought low, it wouldn't help Jim at all.

Going by the duration, it was a long fight - it lasted at least twice as long as the first one, which made sense, Jim supposed. This time, Silver and his crew were up against pirates, not civilians.

The sound of a cannon being fired came as a bit of a shock; there was still fighting going on abovedecks, so either the other pirate was firing on their own men or there was a third party.

And then everything became quiet until someone threw the hatch wide open and peered down and said, "Mr Hawkins?" in an extremely dubious tone.

Jim got up. He felt a little light-headed. The Navy had come for him after all, it seemed.

"I - " he said. "Yes."

Three days later, he was accompanied to a finely furnitured office to make his report.

"Disgraceful," Amalia said, putting down her tea cup. "Absolutely disgraceful."

Jim cringed. "I was just - "

"Oh, not you," she said. "Silver."

Jim had been fed, and fed well. He'd bathed, he'd been supplied with new clothes, and he'd been invited to come and talk about his experiences with Mr Gringini 'at his earliest convenience'.

"I guess you really can't expect anything better from a pirate," he said.

"Well," she said. "Really. You mean he has actually been discreet? In this one aspect of his job? I must say, Mr Hawkins, I find that very hard to believe. Very hard to believe, indeed. You're not covering for him, are you? Understandable, under the circumstances, but wholly misplaced, I assure you. Mr Silver is more than capable of concocting his own lies."

"Um," Jim said. "What?"

"Mr Silver," Amalia informed him, sounding as if she weighed each word on her tongue before she pronounced it, "is one of ours, Mr Hawkins. He hunts pirates. All the while pretending to be one himself, so that he may find himself privy to, let us say, pirate-y intelligence. Needless to say, we have placed a trusted observer amongst his crew, to ensure his honesty."

"Fizzak," Jim said, feeling like an idiot.

Amalia sighed. "So few people see beyond the eight legs and the mandibles. I find it quite commendable that you did, Mr Hawkins. Clearly, the Academy has trained you well."

"I - " Jim flushed. He made jokes about wanting to eat me.

"Tolerance for all, Mr Hawkins. As they do unto us, so we must strive to do unto them. Well," Amalia amended, "unless they're pirates, of course, in which case we must do everything in our power to see them brought to justice. And personally, I'm not quite sure about lawyers, either. A necessary evil, some say, but I beg to disagree."

"I - " Jim said, again.

Amalia scowled at him. "Oh, do finish your sentences, Mr Hawkins."

"I - " Jim got up. "I have to go."

"You've barely even touched your tea," Amalia protested. "Really, Mr Hawkins, this is most unorthodox."

"Sorry. Sorry." Jim grabbed his coat.

He thought he might hear her wish him 'godspeed' before he ran out of her office, but that was probably just his imagination.

The ship was still there, lifting a bit to the left. One of her sails hung half-torn and dull.

Jim had never seen a more beautiful thing. He rushed up the ladder, almost bumping into the Plinian whose name he still didn't know, found the deck empty and decided on the captain's cabin as the most likely place to find Silver.

Amazingly, this once, he was right. Silver was there. Better yet: he was alone, looking up as Jim came stumbling in.

"I know," Jim said.

"Ah." Silver looked a little relieved. A little sheepish, too. "Well. Seems ye had the right of it, when ye called me a liar, didn't ye? 'tis a good life, mind ye. Seen a few treasures, I tell ye. Not allowed to keep any of 'em, more's the pity, but the finder's fee's half-decent and it beats finding an honest means to make me living."

"You were at my graduation," Jim said. "You rescued me from those slavers."

"I bought ye from those slavers. Don't ye go makin' me sound like some hero now," Silver said. Not, Jim noted, denying the graduation thing.

"You rescued me," Jim insisted. "You probably watched me sleep, too. I mean, like any of your fake pirates was actually going to harm me. And, okay, now that I think of it, that's maybe a little bit creepy and obsessive, but - "

"Ye think I didna want to tell ye?" Silver asked.

"I think you wanted me to feel like you were keeping me safe," Jim said. "Like you were always going to be there to rescue me. You know, most people just send flowers or something."

"I had me orders, and I stuck to 'em. To the letter." Silver set his jaw. "I'm a man o'the law now, Jimbo."

"Kiss me," Jim said. "How's that for an order?"

"Now, Jimbo, I'm fairly sure ye can't give me orders." Amazingly, Silver looked just a touch flustered.

Jim decided to press the advantage. "I just did. I mean, unless you don't want to follow that order. I'd understand. Really, I mean, I'm young, I'm attractive - but what's that worth, right?"

Silver swallowed. "Say, Jimbo, ye don't still got that fork on ye, do ye?"

"What?" Jim blinked and reached for his boot. "No, why would I - oh."

Silver glowered at the fork. It took Jim a good five seconds to connect the dots. "Morphy?" It was Morphy. Of course it was Morphy. "You're that girlfriend he kept going on about? Er, boyfriend?"

Morphy un-forked and turned into Jim, yelling 'Dead to me! Dead to me'. Jim winced.

"Now, Morphy, Jim here didn't mean it like that, did ye, Jim? Fact is, we was just about to have us a big damn kiss, so perhaps ye could give us a little privacy?"

Morphy made a rude noise and turned into a cloud of hearts, then butterflies, then a flower.

Silver sighed. "Some other time then, Jimbo."

"What?" Jim said.

"Wouldn't want ye to miss yer appointment with the Admiral, anyway."

"No," Jim said. "No. No. No."

Morphy un-flowered and made a soft, querying sound.

Silver sighed. "Ah well. Ye have been through quite a lot. S'pose if little Morphy here averts his eyes, that'll do fer me. That okay with ye, Jim?"

"Yes," Jim said. "Yes, it is."