HoloPirates: A Tale of Adventure

The Burning Sea

I slowly came right back into the land of the living, coughing and sputtering as I tried to spit out all of the hot saltwater from my mouth. My ears slowly began to hear again, and I heard a variety of sounds around me, like crackling flames, lava roaring, and splashing water, along with the snap of wood breaking. I turned and looked around, and I saw that behind us, there was our ship, completely engulfed in flames, and it had split in two pieces, both of them sinking in a V formation. The engine had completely fallen off of the ship and sunk beneath the waves, and to my horror, I couldn't see Marine, or anyone for that matter, anywhere around me.
"MARINE???" I screamed, my voice echoing over the crackling of the flames and the roar of the volcanoes around me. "BOTAN??? CHLOE?? NOEL??"
I frantically looked around, and, by a stroke of genius luck, I managed to spot Marine through a hole in the side of the ship, leading to the flaming remains of the gunnery deck. And there, laying on the deck as the ship sank, was Marine, unconscious, and with a flaming support beam that had collapsed over her ankles. As I watched in horror, I saw the water that was flooding the ship slowly begin to travel farther and farther up her waist, trying to submerge her as the ship sank. And that sent me into a panic.
"Oh fuck!!" I yelled.
I kicked off of the piece of driftwood that I had been floating on, and I madly kicked and clawed my way through the water, trying to get to the sinking ship as fast as I could. The flames began to burn brighter and brighter, almost searing my face as I got within reaching distance of the ship. At this point, the water was all the way up to her chest, and yet, before I could do anything to get her out of there, I heard a cracking noise, and I saw the flaming mast above the deck crack, and it plunged downward, punching straight through the decks and the bottom of the hull, spraying a large amount of splinters and flaming pieces of wood straight at me, forcing me to let go of the hull as I slapped wildly at my chest and face, slapping the fire and splinters away as the ship flooded at an astronomical rate. I only had time to steal one more glance at Marine, before the water completely submerged her unconscious form, and in a panicked fugue state, I hefted myself through the hole in the hull, right into the heat of the flaming deck around me. The air was hot and heavy, and I struggled for breath as I clawed and pawed, trying to find Marine through the water, heat and flames. I crouched on the deck, and thankfully, as the water got higher and higher, I felt my fingers grasp Marines shoulder, and I hefted her out of the water, still unconscious, but when I tried to pull her away from the deck, I noticed that her feet were pinned underneath the beam that had collapsed. The only problem was that the water was near the roof of the gun deck, meaning that I had to hurry if I wanted to save both of us.
I waded and splashed my way over to the beam, and I crouched down in the water yet again, trying to hold my breath, and I positioned the beam on top of me, trying to get into a dead lift stance, and I pushed as hard as I could, almost bursting my thighs as I pushed up on the beam. The beam didn't budge, even as my lungs began to run out of usable air, and I repositioned myself, trying to get lower on the beam to put on more force, and I pushed with all of my might, and thankfully, with a stroke of luck, the beam was lifted off of Marine's ankles, and I got out from underneath the beam as it collapsed harmlessly a foot away from the both of us. I grabbed Marine around the waist, then hoisted her above my shoulder as I swam to the hole in the hull, trying to escape the sinking ship before it would drag the both of us to the bottom of the burning hot sea. My skin still burned from the heat of the water, but as I got over the hole in the hull, with Marine still weighing me down, I began to have even more pressing problems. My lungs caved in on themselves, desperate for air, but I fought on, trying to steel my nerves as best as I could to get to the surface, which was still about twenty feet away. As I kicked and paddled, holding onto Marine for dear life, I looked down, and I saw the remains of our ship sinking down into the water below, all that hard work and time, gone in an instant, but I was snapped out of the thoughts when I felt my lungs begin to burn, punishing me for the lack of fresh air.
Ten feet left.
My lungs burned yet again, then, I saw shapes, stars, and streaks of light begin to dance around in my vision as it got blurrier and blurrier. I found it harder to keep kicking and paddling, but with Marine's unconscious form still perched upon my shoulder, I somehow found the strength to push forward.
Five feet left.
I kicked and kicked, rapidly closing the distance, and I began to see splotches of pure color popping in and out of my vision as my skin still burned from the heat of the water, and, after what seemed of an eternity of swimming, my head broke the surface, and I sucked in a massive breath, pulling in so much air that I thought I might inhale the entire region of the Deep Fire. I breathed heavily, coughing and spitting all the while, and I held onto Marine.
"MICHEAL!!!!"
I turned to the sound of Botan's voice, and I saw her, Chloe, and Noel all in a lifeboat, all three of them looking so much worse for wear at the moment, and now, there were no sign of the rest of the crew anywhere. They were paddling and steering towards Marine and I, and I began to swim towards them, trying to pull in as much air as I possibly could. As I was swimming towards them, to my absolute surprise, Botan jumped in the water without any hesitation and swam, nearly perfectly, over to me, grabbing onto me and trying to drag me towards the boat.
"No no," I said, shaking my head. "Take Marine, I'll be fine."
"Are you sure, Micheal?"
"Aye, I'm certain. Take her and help her."
She reluctantly obliged, grabbing Marine's limp body, and she hauled her aboard the rowboat, climbing up inside as I followed her. Marine was laying on her back, still unconscious, but I knelt on the deck, placed my hand on her chest, and started to perform CPR from what I could remember from school. After doing fifteen chest compressions, I leaned down, placed my lips on her, and blew into her mouth, trying to resuscitate her.
Still nothing. She remained absolutely motionless and silent, and her chest was still, which nearly sent me into another panic.
"No no no no no no no." I muttered, switching back to the chest compressions.
"Micheal, what are you doing?" Noel said, nearly breaking me out of my concentration.
"Just shut up and trust me!" I snapped, my mind encased with panic.
I continued with the chest compressions, and when I got up to fifteen compressions, once again, I tried mouth-to-mouth respiration, and still, to no avail.
"God, please don't do this to me." I muttered. "Don't fucking do this to me."
I switched back to chest compressions yet again, pressing on her chest to try and restart her breathing, and, to my shock, Marine gasped, and she sat straight up, holding onto me while crying and coughing. I made a loud noise of relief that I couldn't even control, and I began crying with her, tears streaming down my face as she held onto me. I pressed her further against me, trying to comfort her, but I cringed the moment I heard and felt Marine vomit all over my leg, retching and throwing up as her nails dug into me. I wanted to freak out, but with how Marine had just narrowly escaped death, I just sat there, taking it as I tried to calm her down.
"Its alright babe." I said, not daring to look at my leg as Noel, Chloe and Botan all grimaced. "Its uhh, better out than in."
She sniffled.
"I'm sorry about your pants." She said, wiping her mouth clean of the vomit.
"Oh its all good." I said, avoiding looking at them as I held the gaze at the ruins of the fortress. "I'll just wash them off in the water real quick."
She sniffed and backed up, and I swung my legs and body over the side of the boat, washing off all of the vomit with a little bit of scrubbing and cleaning, and when my pants were finally clean, I climbed back in the boat as Noel began to paddle off towards the fortress.
"Do y'all know where the Storyteller is?"
"The last that I saw of him, he ordered us to save the both of you, and he left to go fight the guy up there. He wanted to draw his attention away from us." Chloe said. "We just gotta get up there, free the prisoners, and maybe help him in the fight against the guy he's fighting."
"Aye that."
And with that, we sailed closer and closer to the island.