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Kaname’s rare morning to sleep in with his husband was, unfortunately, interrupted much earlier than he would have preferred.
Usually the crew managed fine under Sasaya’s direction, but apparently something had gone catastrophically wrong, since there was someone banging on his door.
Did he not get one day off?
Yasushi groaned, levering himself up, although it was a little awkward since they were in a hammock. “I’ll get it.”
“Thanks dear,” Kaname said, although he was pretty sure that if Sasaya couldn’t handle whatever it was, Yasushi probably couldn’t either. It was probably something that would need him.
“What is it?” Yasushi asked whoever as at the door gruffly.
“Terribly sorry to interrupt your morning off, but uh, we spotted a ship floating abandoned, and we’re pretty sure there’s sirens ahead,” Onagawa said, loud enough for Kaname to hear him.
Yeah, it needed him. Sirens was a bit of a new one though. They were pretty rare. They were dangerous enough that when a colony established itself it was usually killed off pretty quickly. The Dateko had never participated in a siren killing mission, but the Karasuno and Fukurodani both had, and Kaname had heard the stories.
“Tell everyone to get their earplugs,” Kaname said, getting out of bed himself. “We’ll go on through, try and get a number so we can report them to the nearest port.”
Mai creaked around them, evidently upset about something, although Kaname wasn’t sure what. Maybe the sirens? He didn’t remember reading anything about cursed ships specifically disliking sirens, but they didn’t actually know that much about cursed ships, since they were so rare, and were fond of killing people. Pretty much all they knew about them was from first hand accounts of people who had sailed on or captained them.
Kaname, in the interest of helping continue that, was working on his own writings, keeping notes of things he’d noticed, both confirming things he’d read, and adding his own thoughts on it.
“It’ll be an adventure digging those out,” Onagawa muttered as he turned to leave.
“Then tell Mai to stop us in the water, I don’t want anyone, especially not Aone, Obara, Futakuchi, Kogane, and Fukiage to be able to hear anything. You too Yasushi.” If something went wrong, those were the members of the crew that the rest of them couldn’t really be counted on to be able to stop. The rest of them were small enough to be grabbed and held back despite fighting to break free, but those six weren’t.
And although Mai could probably catch and pick them up, Kaname would also just rather not see them grabbed by a siren’s song.
“Make sure you can’t hear anything too, we do kind of need you,” Yasushi said, closing the door and coming over to kiss Kaname. “You are our captain.”
“I wasn’t exactly planning on getting caught,” Kaname said, gladly accepting a couple kisses before pushing his husband away. “We need to get on that. Do you even know where your earplugs are?” For safety’s sake and in case of exactly this situation, earplugs were a standard part of a seaman’s kit. That didn’t mean they got used often, which meant they tended to end up at the bottom of the trunk.
Kaname did know where his were, but that was because he was kind of paranoid and anxious and always double checked that he had everything at every port they stopped at and after every encounter.
Yasushi was taking too long to reply. He had no idea where they were.
“Just go find them,” Kaname sighed, already preparing to take out his extras, which he had because he was nervous and usually over prepared.
Really, his habit of being over prepared was just made worse by how his crew was frequently under prepared. He was their captain, he felt the need to make sure they had everything they needed.
And it was probably going to be needed this time.
“I’ll also go make sure the whole crew has a pair,” Yasushi said, reluctantly stepping away. “And double check they can’t hear anything.”
“Thank you dear,” Kaname replied, already heading for his trunk in the corner of the room where it was bolted down next to his desk, which had all of his important papers and such, mostly locked in drawers so they didn’t go flying everywhere.
He hoped nothing would go too wrong with the sirens, they were dangerous, and not easy to deal with. He’d better tell everyone to prepare for the worst though, and have weapons ready.
Mai didn’t have the defense their old ship did, they’d have to be a little more careful about not damaging her hull.
So far they’d avoided needing to repair her in any way, but Kaname dreaded that time coming, because he had no idea how it would happen. He knew how to get a normal ship repaired, but did a cursed ship work the same? Did they work like something alive would and repair themselves? He had no idea.
He had no idea and honestly he didn’t want to find out.
Not any time soon at least.
Kaname found his earplugs, and stuck them in before grabbing the extras he had and heading out of his room. He did check the bunk room, but it seemed like everyone had already grabbed their stuff, which was impressive. That or they just accepted defeat and assumed Kaname would have some. Which was true, but still rude.
The whole crew was up on the deck, and it was very eerie to be up on deck and unable to hear the waves lapping at the hull, the sound of the sails and rigging in the wind, and the shouts of his crew. Not that they were shouting at the moment, they were all actually gathered together in the middle, except for Sakunami, who was still up at the top of the mast, and would probably be staying there.
Kaname was pretty sure he actually kept his earplugs on him, so he could block everyone out when he wanted to. Kaname had yelled for him only to not even be noticed despite there being no wind way too many times for that to not be the case.
Besides, Sakunami had admitted to having heard siren song once before, and he was known to not be a fighter when entranced, so even if he didn’t have his earplugs, Mai could catch and hold him without him injuring himself trying to escape.
It wasn’t known why, but some people just were not fighters when entranced. They’d move towards the sirens, but if held back, they’d just stop, not even trying to get around whatever was stopping them in some cases.
No one else on the ship had admitted to having been exposed to siren song before, so Kaname definitely didn’t want to take the chance with the rest of them.
Kaname tapped his husband on the shoulder when he came up behind him, and dodged the immediate attempt to punch him in the face. His husband was a little trigger happy when someone came up behind him and surprised him, and Kaname was well aware of it. He’d grown used to dodging if he wanted to surprise his husband from behind.
He took one earplug out when his husband started talking, and while he missed the first bit of the sentence, he could extrapolate what he’d said well enough. Everyone had a pair it seemed like, which was a definite first. They all worked too, which was a miracle.
Mai was also still upset, obvious by her annoyed creaking, and how the rigging was waving angrily.
“She must just not like sirens I guess,” Kaname said, frowning at the deck. “I wonder why.”
“Probably since they’re known to kill crews, and if a cursed ship has a crew it’s because she likes them?” Obara suggested, almost boredly.
Ah, that would…make sense. If she liked them, she’d rather they not die.
“Is she piloting herself until we’re sure it’s safe?” Kaname asked, partially to the crew, but also to Mai, whose rigging stilled for a second, before the ship shifted in the water. An agreement.
“How do you count sirens?” Koganegawa asked, raising a hand. “Also I’ve never seen one, what do they look like?”
How had he never seen a picture? Oh well, he’d see them soon enough.
“They usually have the torso resembling a human woman, and a fish tail from the hips down. As for counting them, they all have unique markings, try and remember each of them, and we’ll all compare at the end. Pair off, and try and make sure you both get a good look at any sirens you spot,” Kaname instructed, although honestly he wasn’t totally sure if that’d work. There were specific crews that specialized in scouting missions like this, counting up the number of sirens or whatever else in a specific area. They were generally very accurate. The port they stopped at wouldn’t expect an exact count from them though, since they weren’t a scouting crew.
Just a general estimate would probably be fine.
“Also just stay together in general, and if Mai wraps some rope around you, don’t get alarmed, she’s probably just worried.” Yasushi added. “Sticking to your regular pairs is probably good enough. Aone, Futakuchi, Obara, Onagawa, at the starboard railing, Kogane, Fukiage, you’ll be on the port side with Kaname, Sasaya, and I.”
Good pairings, Aone, Futakuchi, and Obara could probably handle each other if necessary, and Onagawa usually hung out with them too, since the four were all the same age and had known each other before coming onboard the Dateko. Kogane should be with them anyway, as the newest member of the crew, although he was coming up on five years with them, so he wasn’t that much of a rookie anymore.
That was why his husband was his first mate after all. Even if he sometimes contributed to Kaname’s problems instead of helping with them.
Everyone nodded, then put in their other earplug and split up.
“We’ll get through this,” Yasushi assured Kaname, a confident grin on his face. “After all, we’ve got Mai. And we could probably handle it anyway, but she’s great to have.”
Mai’s rigging waved smugly in agreement.
Kaname took a deep breath, then nodded. “Right. Sirens don’t have the hull breaking power of a kraken after all. We’ll be alright.”
They kissed quickly, then Kaname put his earplug back in, watched Yasushi do the same, and they headed for the port side railing. Sasaya nodded to them as they joined him, Kogane, and Fukiage at the railing.
Interestingly, there were ropes hanging over the side, although Kaname was pretty sure his crew hadn’t done that. Why did Mai have those there? What was she hoping to do with them? She couldn’t really kill anything that didn’t come onboard first, or at least he was pretty sure that was how that worked. It was how it had worked in the past.
It wasn’t long before there was the first sighting. A siren, just barely poking its head above water, then grinning with all its sharp teeth when it spotted them. It opened its mouth and began to sing, but Kaname couldn’t hear it.
He glanced back over his crew, just to make sure, but no one looked entranced. They were all good. For now. Sirens were known to get tricky and try and get people to take the earplugs out, or to try and get them out themselves.
The siren swam closer to the ship, still singing, but obviously annoyed by how none of them were trying to throw themselves overboard. It had probably expected an easy meal, especially since they’d clearly already stripped a ship of its crew.
The ropes were eerily still as the siren drifted closer and closer.
When the siren reached the hull, it put its hand out, just barely touching the hull before the ropes snapped to life, reaching out and wrapping around the siren’s neck in an instant, yanking it up out of the water and snapping its neck.
Kaname shuddered at seeing the siren hanging limply by the rope, and shuddered again when Mai transferred it from that rope to her rigging, where she hung the siren near the mast, rigging moving smugly.
So that was how this was going to go. That was horrifying.
Kaname hoped desperately that they could convince Mai to put the corpses down and back into the ocean before they reached port.
He didn’t have high hopes about it though.
He traded looks with Sasaya, who just gave a big shrug. It wasn’t like they could stop her.
Kaname just sighed and looked back over the railing. Maybe they wouldn’t need to report this to the port after all. Depending on if Mai managed to get them all.
He hoped this didn’t get them put on the short list for dealing with sirens.
He also didn’t have very high hopes about that one.