HoloPirates: A Tale of Adventure

Approaching the Fortress

As I stood on the bow of our severely undermanned ship, I held the spyglass up to my eye and looked through, scanning the horizon for the fortress that we were assaulting. So far, there was nothing, but as I looked a little off to the port side of the ship, I saw that there was a large volcanic island that was shrouded by ash and smoke. And for some reason, as I stared right at that island, a growing feeling of dread spread over me, gnawing at the inside of my soul as I stared at the shroud of ash. I clicked the spyglass back into its smaller form, and I turned around, spotting Marine at the helm, and I walked over to her, passing up the Tempus Dark Waters and the rest of the crew, which truthfully, wasn't that many people, and when I got up to the aftcastle, the ship crested over a large wave, causing a large about of hot saltwater to splash over the deck, all of the droplets causing my skin to sting from their sheer heat.
"Hey, when can we get the hell out of here?" I said jokingly as Marine tried to steer the ship towards the shrouded island.
"Just as soon as this guy gets taken care of." She said with a smile.
We both fell silent, but after just a moment or two, she turned to me, her smile having disappeared and instead, was replaced with uncertainty.
"So, uhm, what's the plan after this?" She said. "I mean, we're already here, so I'm wondering what the hell is going to happen to him and you and....us."
She looked away when she said us, and I got the feeling that was coming from her. Truthfully, I wasn't too sure about what to do. I knew that I wanted to stay with Marine, but at the same time, there was my mother, back in LA, and truth be told, I still missed her. But, just for Marine's sake, I gave her a confident smile.
"Well, I wanna stay here with you, Marine." I said as more hot saltwater was kicked up from the ocean by our ship. "Aye, I might have another world to belong to, but I've come a bit too far to just go back to that life, you know?"
She flashed me a grin, then squeezed my hand before looking back at the shroud of ash and smoke.
"Thank you." She said with a slight giggle.
I wrapped my arm around her shoulder and pulled her in close, trying to exude some of my confidence with her, and thankfully, it worked as I felt her relaxing in my grasp once again. We both looked out over the horizon, just gazing at the waters around us as we sailed closer and closer to the shrouded island. S we got closer to the island, I noticed the Storyteller come up and onto the deck, looking out over the horizon and at the same island.
"He is there." He yelled over the deck. "No more surprises. He must know we are approaching, so this is it."
He turned around to us, and I saw that a grim look took over his face.
"Prepare yourselves for the absolute fight of your life." He said.
Marine gripped the steering wheel as we slowly, but surely, got closer and closer to the island, and once we were within two miles of the island, all of us watched, dumbfounded, as the smoke and ash cloud cleared from the island, and it revealed a sprawling, glossy black fortress, and two volcanoes that jutted from the island, one of them being short and fat, and the other being tall and narrow, both of the volcanoes constantly blasting fire and ash into the air. But, as I took in the sight of the fortress, I felt my heart nearly sink right down to my gut.
Because this was the exact same fortress from my dream, long ago.
"There you are, you little maggot." I heard the Storyteller say to himself.
I immediately took off running straight fort the bow of the ship, trying to steady myself against the rather violent rocking of the ship, and when I got up to the very front, I pulled out my spyglass, clicked it to the maximum length, and took a look at the fortress. I had no idea what it was built out of, but the foundation of the fortress looked like it ran deep into the sides of the volcanoes, and I saw that on a few of the walls peeking out from the side, that there were jail windows built into the walls, likely being a prison or something of the like. Higher up the fortress, there were many, many cannon ports that had small cannons poking out of the holes, and at the very top of the fortress, there were rows upon rows of ramparts, holding more cannons and banners that were emblazoned with a picture of a bloody vintage scale against a black background, likely their battle flag.
At the very, very bottom of the island, there were a fleet of ships that were docked in a small harbor, all of their flags being the blood scales banner. But, the worst part was at the very top of the fortress, where when I focused the spyglass, I saw that there was a man standing up there, with a girl next to him. The man was rather tall, wearing a very, very well tailored business suit, and yet, the part that caught my eyes was the fact that his face was blurry, almost like a censorship, and even through that, I could see that he had no eyes. Just hollow, empty sockets that seemed to stare us down.
And right next to him, there was a much, much smaller girl, wearing a sailor maid's outfit, and she had bright purple hair that spilled all around her body in very long twin tails. She looked nervous standing next to the man, but before I could say or do anything, I saw the man point his finger straight in the air, and a large red projectile of pure fire and energy shot out of his hand, careening like a mortar shot towards our ship.
"Oh shit oh shit!" I yelled, backing up as the projectile screamed through the air.
It arced through the air, cutting through the clouds of ash and smoke with ease, but, as it got closer to the ship, all four of the Tempus Dark Waters yelled in unison, and they knelt on the deck, pressing their hands right into the wooden surface as they began chanting in a language that I couldn't recognize. As the projectile screamed and shrieked closer and closer, a bright blue and sizzling energy shield was projected around the top o the ship, and at the very last second that it was formed, the projectile slammed against the top of the shield with a horrific crashing noise, the sound shaking all of the timbers and structures within the ship. The force of the impact threw us all onto the deck, rather hard, and I watched as the Storyteller got to his feet, a look of absolute anger, hatred, and disgust plaguing his face.
"Thats it." He said.
And without another word, warning, or even an indication, he snapped his fingers, and he disappeared right into thin air, leaving all of us alone on the deck of the ship as one of the volcanoes erupted yet again.