Chapter Text
Sungho was pulled from his reverie by cannon fire. A little less panicked than the sailors who started shouting in all directions, adrenaline still surged through his veins, and he ran with the others onto the pontoon.
A few hundred meters away, a ship was heading straight for them. Flying from its mainmast was the black flag with the skull and crossbones, the hallmark of pirates. Immediately, Sungho turned to the panicked crew and began shouting orders, quickly followed by the captain who added his own commands, ordering his men to take their posts.
"Captain, what do we do?" Sungho asked him. "Do we flee, or do we fight back?"
"They're too close, my dear second-in-command. We'll counter-attack."
Sunho nodded and immediately began shouting the appropriate orders. However, he couldn't ignore the bad feeling that urged him to prepare a plan B. Their cargo was quite valuable, foodstuffs that mostly required rapid transport to the other side of the continent. If the pirates managed to seize it, the cost of the loss for the company would be considerable.
Unfortunately for them, the pirates' gunner eventually hit their ship and put a hole in the hull. Sungho had to leave the boatswain in charge of the crew so he could go and assess the damage himself. Luckily, the ship’s carpenters plugged the breach before water flooded the hold, but the sounds told the young first mate that one or more fights were taking place on the upper deck.
He quickly drew his pistol and was about to step out of the hold when his path was blocked. The man was rather tall but could hardly be called so. His face was rather childlike, round with high cheekbones, his limbs long, and his muscles not yet fully developed.
"Oh, that's a fine haul you have there!" he exclaimed with a big smile.
"Hands off," Sungho interjected, aiming his rifle at him.
But he didn't have time to aim before the young pirate struck him squarely in the face, followed by another more precise blow to the back of the head, making him first stagger and then half lose consciousness.
_
When he was able to see straight again and stand upright without feeling dizzy, he left the hold and began running towards the upper deck. The crew was panicking; no one was really at their post, and he saw the pirates returning to their ship by leaping across the wooden gangways they’d strung between the two vessels.
Seeing two of them laden with the merchandise their ship was to deliver a few days later, Sungho's blood boiled. Amidst of the chaos, he leapt onto one of the gangways and climbed aboard the enemy ship.
Blood was pounding in his temples; he had no time to stop and think of a plan. Half-motivated by rage and half by a genuine loathing of failure, he sought either to recover the cargo if possible, or to make those damned pirates pay for their plunder and the impending bankruptcy of their company.
The boat was rather small, and he only saw two pirates on the deck, from whose sight he managed to hide and go unnoticed. A quick glance back at his own ship met the bewildered stares of some of his crew, no doubt wondering what their second-in-command was doing on the enemy vessel in the middle of a battle. Sungho silenced them with a finger to his lips before making his way into the pirates' cabins.
He moved slowly, not wanting to be spotted, listening for the slightest noise. He himself didn't know what he intended to do but ended up hiding at the back of what must have been the mess hall, between two barrels of fresh water.
Sitting there, curled up, he felt the ship's movements as it moved away. He decided to wait a while, gather some information on those damned pirates, and then inform his captain of his position. That way, the cargo could be returned. It wasn't the best plan, but he had no other ideas.
So he waited, summoning all the patience he could muster. He could hear voices, footsteps, the sounds of stairs being climbed and descended, and barrels being rolled. The pirates didn't seem to be numerous; Sungho even began to imagine that he could defeat them all and take control of the ship.
Until one of them abruptly moved the barrel behind which he had been hiding. Sungho jumped: he hadn't heard him coming. Rather short in stature, with short, messy red hair, the pirate looked at him with an expression that was both surprised and pensive.
"Guys! Come see what I just found!" he finally shouted.
It was only then that Sungho's flight instincts kicked in. He sprang to his feet and was about to run at full speed towards the door, but it was the only way out, and it was quickly blocked by the pirates who rushed over at their comrade's call. He grimaced and backed away until his back hit the wall behind him.
"What does he want?" asked a tall pirate with a gentle face and curious eyes.
"Oh, it's you again!" exclaimed the one who’d knocked him out. "Hey, hyung, come see this!"
"He's checking that we're out of reach, I'll take his place," the first one continued before leaving the room.
"We're not going to question you without the captain, but what's a merchant marine officer doing on our ship?" asked the man who had found him. "And a second-in-command at that," he added, squinting at the insignia on his uniform.
Sungho was outraged by the question, which seemed perfectly obvious to him. His first instinct was to reach for his weapon, but his pistol was still on the floor of his ship's hold. And he was particularly hopeless at hand-to-hand combat and knife fighting. All he had left was his bad temper and his characteristic diva-like behavior.
"What do you mean, 'What am I doing here?!' To get back the goods you’ve stolen from us, of course! Do you realize the company is in serious trouble if we don't bring anything back?! You're the ones stealing from us, and you have the nerve to ask me what I'm doing here?!"
The two pirates watched him shout, looking stunned. Meanwhile, two other pirates arrived and were standing in the doorway.
" What on earth is he on about?" said one of them, the taller one.
"You're talking rubbish," added the one with the childlike face. "Okay, we stole some food from your boat, but we left plenty of your goods behind; you won't be leaving empty-handed."
Sungho stood there dumbfounded, his mouth half-open. He had convinced himself that, since pirates had boarded the ship, they’d taken everything, whereas that clearly wasn’t the case. Then he had second thoughts: he wasn't going to fall for that trick, was he!
"You're lying, I'm sure of it! And anyway, you stole from us!" he began, but stopped very quickly, realizing that he was clearly outnumbered.
"Hyung, what do we do with him?" sighed the taller one.
The second man still hadn't moved. He was simply staring at Sungho, looking captivated, and the second-in-command could swear he saw stars shining in his eyes.
"Captain?" repeated the other.
"It's him," he finally said.
“What are you talking about?”
He did not answer straight away, and advanced slowly until he was standing in front of Sungho, his eyes still on him.
“It's him. He's the one I've been waiting for.”