Jean bobbed about like a headless chicken, his face was flushed and he was wringing his hands in the air. All about him people scrambled about, throwing barrels overboard and staring at the ship chasing them. However, the French merchant seemed to be oblivious to all of this chaos, he was so focused on his current situation.

He had been vaguely aware that someone had tried to get him to go back below decks, but the Frenchman had been in no mood to be ordered around. He rounded on the sailor and had stormed onto the deck to get a better view of what was happening.

“Mes marchandises!!” His higher-pitched voice barely heard over the din. He stamped his feet and swore a hundred oaths at the captain, at God, at his misfortune, and at the damn vessel behind them. Regardless of his oaths the crew dumped more and more of his precious merchandise overboard in a vain attempt to lighten their ship.

“This cannot be happening to me!” He cried aloud, wringing his hands again. Jean rubbed his face, smearing his powdered cheeks. He took several deep breaths of the freshening salt air. Well, if it were not for the fact it was tinged with the not-so-sweet scent of unwashed men, it would be freshening. The Frenchman glared at the rear of the ship where the captain of this doomed enterprise was staring into a spyglass. No doubt he was monitoring the pirate vessel closing behind them.

His face clouded with anger, Jean stormed to the bridge and stood in front of the captain.

“Capitaine, could zehy not be bribed?!” he shouted. “Wee could haff given zem zee goods and zey would leave us alone, non?!”

---

“Load ‘th guns with Langrage! Prepare f’r boardin’ action!”

Eoin had a wolf-like grin on his face as the captain’s ordered echoed across the deck. Oh what a life it was to be a pirate. The surge of adrenaline as they closed with the quarry. Soon they would be in the chaos of battle. There was nothing on this Earth like a nice fight and a nice pint afterwards. The Irishman checked his pistols on his belt and that his sword was ready in its scabbard.

Moving past the bustling crew, Eoin leapt onto the rigging, allowing himself a nice view of the ship they were chasing. She was a fine vessel, slow and full. Well, she had been at least. Eoin smirked at the cargo bobbing in the ocean, what a shame, but it was pointless. They were closing fast and he could sense the tension in the air. He rested a hand on one of his pistols, his eyes scanning the other ship, soon there would be targets to shoot.

Soon…

-Hermes
Captain Garland grimaced as the irritated and irritating Frenchman began harassing him. Garland turned.
“Much more likely they would have taken the bribe and stolen everything else of value aboard while they were present, Monsieur DeLyons. Go below, you don’t want to be above deck when the cannon fire begins.” Garland growled the last few words, gesticulating with his telescope as he did so.
The ship shakes as another wave breaks against the Hermes’ hull, causing Garland to drop his telescope, the lens shatters into a hundred shards. Garland curses wildly, picking up the now useless tube and hurling it overboard with all his might.
“James! Get that god damned white faced, coward of a Frog below-decks!” Garland shouts.

Garland stamps on the glass shards, grinding them to finer pieces. Garland grinds his teeth upon finishing his frustration driven rant, setting his eyes on the horizon in the process. And as if seeing it for the first time, the storm appears as a god given opportunity for escape.

Garland returns to the ship’s wheel.
“Mr Bentley, change course, take us into the storm. Lets make those fucking pirates risk their necks chasing us.”


-Spacegrace

“That crazy bastard wants to lead us into that storm.” Kenneth muttered.

“Alright boys! We’re following that crazy bastard, he must have something worth stealing aboard if he’s willing to risk sailing into a squall like that!” He shouted to his crew.

“Ready the port cannons and fire as you bear!”

-Hermes
Garland clung to the railing as a wave crashed over the side of the ship, sweeping away anything not tied down.
The wave immediately followed by the roar of cannonfire as the gunners on the Hermes returned fire on the Pirate. Garland opened his mouth to shout encouragement, but was silenced as another wave drove seawater into his opened mouth.

It was then that he realized that the Pirate was moving in to attempt to board.

“HARD TO PORT BENTLEY!” Garland shouted at his helmsman, but the wind tore the words out of his throat and away into the storm.

Bentley never heard the order to change course, and continued his heading. It wasn’t until the Pirate’s hull collided with the Hermes’ that he realized they were being boarded.


-Scapegrace
Kenneth swore as the Scapegrace abruptly collided with the cutter.
“CRAWFORD, YOU BETTER NOT HAVE DAMAGED MY SHIP!”

“I didn’t do anything I haven’ done a ‘thousand times Cap’n!” Crawford shouted back.

Kenneth cursed the excuse away. His crew hadn’t wasted any time, and already had several grappels thrown across to the other ship and were tying them down to the Scapegrace.

A few ragged gunshots erupted from the Cutter, a few even struck unluckly crewmen aboard the Scapegrace. But with how the storm was raging, this battle would be coming down to cold steel rather then how many guns were present.

---


Eoin O’Callaghan:
Eoin heard a crack from the merchant Cutter, and a rifle ball howling past his head and buried itself into one of your fellow crewmen. A glance over his shoulder and he sees the man on the deck with a ragged throat wound with both hands clamped to it, the man gargles frantically as he bleeds out and drowns at the same time. You can’t remember his name though.

Eoin turns back to the Cutter, grimacing at the thought of having the jump the three or foot gap in the middle of this miserable weather.
Eoin retreated from the port side of the ship to give himself a running start, and start sprinting at the Cutter, he jumped and cleared the gap, landing on the deck of the cutter.

Several other pirates are already engaged with the crew of the Cutter, Eoin slashed at the exposed back of an enemy crewmen before engaging a burly and bearded Englishman coming at him with a boarding axe.

---


Roland O'Donnell:
The thumping and shouting on the deck was indicative that the pirates were up to something, the groaning crunch of the hull on the side furthest from him made Roland’s heart skip a beat. The pirates had gotten to boarding range.
A few gunshots above followed by screaming and the sounds of a melee confirmed his fear that the pirates were aboard.

A hatch some fourteen feet to the back of the ship opens up and several gallons of seawater rush into the hold. A body falls through the hatch and hits the bottom of the hold headfirst with a sickening crunch.

Things don’t seem to be going well above.


---



Garland shot at one of the pirates aboard their ship, missing his intended target and striking another member of their crew, cursing, he throws the pistol away.
The situation was basically hopeless, the pirate’s Sloop was crewed by more men than his little Cutter.
Garland was readying himself to surrender and save his own life when he heard lightning boom behind him, he turned to find himself facing a whirling hell of lighting and clouds off the port side of his ship.
Green lightning flashed inside the storm cell as it ponderously moved toward the embattled ships.

It took Garland a moment to realize that the rain had stopped hitting the top of his head, and was now hitting him in the back, the rain seemed to be being sucked straight into the cell and it moved closer.
A loud crack of splintering wood came from the Pirate ship, Garland turned in time to see the Pirate’s aft-most mast come crashing down onto the Hermes, a wooden spar hit Garland, knocking him to the deck as the world swam into darkness.


---



Kenneth bellowed at Crawford as the mast went down onto the Cutter, he could see green light flashing with the roar of thunder behind the cutter.

“CUT THE SHIP LOOSE!” Kenneth shouted to the crew still on the deck, only a few heard over the roaring of the wind and rain as it blew past the ships toward the looming storm cell.

Kenneth turned back to realize the storm cell had closed the gap with remarkable speed, as he stared at the terrifying storm, his skin crawled, it almost felt like it was staring back at him.

Then the Cutter vanished into the whirling clouds and fog of the outer end of the storm.

“CUT US LOOSE GOD DAMN YOU!” Kenneth screamed, his voice was ripped out of his throat by the wind as it tore at him and his clothes, Kenneth thought he was about to be lifted off the deck of Scapegrace.

Then the storm’s outer edge engulfed the Scapegrace.

Kenneth felt his stomach lurch as the deck of his ship fell away from under him for a split second. Then he came back into contact with his ship with a stumble.
Green lightning flashed all around as Kenneth threw his arm in front of his eyes to protect them from the strobing lightning that was present no matter where he looked.

Suddenly the entire ship jolted as if a great wave had hit the ship from below. Kenneth was knocked off his feet from the abruptness of it.

Kenneth realized something was wrong as he stood: The wind had changed directions. It had been blowing sharply from the east before, and was now blowing from the southwest.
Kenneth barely had time to see that the ships were still tangled by ropes and the Scapegrace’s fallen mast and rigging before both ships smashed into a towering pillar of stone that appeared out of the whirling cloud and fog.
Scapegrave took the worst of it, slamming headlong into the rock, her hull splintering and splitting against the rock, Kenneth was thrown forward and over the railing from the force of the collision, he hit the deck awkwardly with his left leg.
He heard and felt it snap before he lost consciousness.


---


INFO:
Your characters all felt the decks of whatever ship they were aboard fall out from under them, almost as if the ship was dropped from a few feet in the air.
Eoin saw the strobing hell of lightning, Roland did, except indirectly through the open hatch.

You both awake on a sandy shore (100 or some feet apart), there is debris from the ships along the shore, and bodies, lots of bodies, you can’t tell if any of them are alive still.
About 500 feet out from shore you see a number of towering rocks, taller than they are wide jutting out of the sea like teeth.
What remains of the Hermes is caught on one of the smaller rocks.
The aft fifty feet or so of the Scapegrace washed ashore 170 feet from Roland/70 feet from Eoin.

The bow and the rest of the ship seem to have been reduced to the debris floating in the water or washed up.

Given the amount of light, and the position of the sun, you guess its around 7 AM.

You retained any weapons of items not in your hands at the moment of impact with the rocks.

The shore is twenty five or thirty feet away from the treeline, which is composed of odd looking palm trees, their leaves seem to be cyan-green, rather than just green.

Map Forthcoming, Majhost is down ATM.

Eoin heard his voice echo off the rocks behind him in the cove, and some from the oddly looking trees up the shore. But he didn’t hear anything that sounded like a human voice shouting back.
A moment later, he heard a warbling shriek -sounding something between a macaw and a monkey- filter through the trees up shore from him.
It didn’t sound like anything he’d heard before.

Jean whimpered at the strange shriek.

As the shriek ended, Eoin heard a human shout, followed by a single gunshot. You’re pretty sure it was Captain Vaughan who shouted before the gunshot.

Eoin grabbed Jean by the back of his coat and half dragged, half marched him up the shore toward the weird trees.
As Eoin got close to the trees, he noticed a mark in the sand parallel to him, it looked like someone had dragged a body up the coast. The drag trail was even marked with a trail of sun dried blood up and into the trees.

As Eoin reached the trees, the noticed a sword next to the trail, it is unmistakably Captain Vaughan’s sword.

Jean pushes through a set of particularly dense trees and undergrowth and fines himself standing at the top of a three foot high embankment that steeply slopes down to a gurgling creek.

Out of the corner of Jean’s eye, he sees a prone man down by the water, laying on his back. The man’s left leg is clearly broken, given that part of his shin bone is jutting out of his left just below his knee.

Another warbling shriek echoes out of the trees across the river from the man with the broken leg. Whatever is making that sound is very close.


-

Eoin shoulders through the increasingly dense underbrush, Jean hasn’t gone far, Eoin can see the back of his fancy jacket through the growth.

Eoin is interrupted by a low sounding chirrup behind him to his right, he whirls around to find himself facing an odd little creature clinging to the side of a tree Eoin had passed moments before.
The little critter’s beady black eyes regard Eoin, as Eoin watches the creature.

The little thing lets out another low chirrup, moving its left foreleg up the tree and grasping the frayed bark further up.
Eoin gets the sense that the little creature is more afraid of him, than he is of it.

Roland didn't open his eyes immediately when he came to. He was more preoccupied with the pounding in his head. It felt as if someone had slapped him with a cannonball while he was asleep. Eyes still closed, he brought a hand to his head and felt a the warmth of fresh blood.

"What did I get myself into now?" he asked aloud, sitting up slowly and opening his eyes. "And where the hell have I ended up?"

He took in the area around him - a beach, with trees that were shaped and colored unlike anything Roland had ever seen. It was light out, and the storm had passed, and both ships seemed to have deposited most of their passengers to the sea, and had ended up destroyed in the process. The bodies had begun to stink, and Roland wrinkled his brow.

"Bloody hell," he muttered, and then shouted, "Is anyone alive?"

The stranger was swift in his looting, though not particularly skilled or graceful. It wasn't clear what he was looking for, until it seemed he'd found it: a small pouch of coins, which he proceeded to pour into his hand. After examining them closely for a few moments, he selected one and tucked it away into an interior pocket, discarding the rest onto the sandy beach. The man then noticed he was being watched, and quickly buttoned up his coat, concealing several glinting objects arranged diagonally across his chest.

Moving slowly and in a manner to suggest violence was the last thing on his mind, he slung his oil-cloth wrapped musket over his shoulder and started making his way along the beach toward his observer.

"Hola, amigo!" He called out in a strange dialect of Spanish, "Hablas español?"

A few more steps and he stopped, a good thirty paces away. He doffed his hat with a curt bow, revealing golden hair and a pale complexion. Smiling, he switched tongues, struggling to maintain the accent, "English, perhaps?"

Monte groaned. Madre de dios…

He looked around groggily to find himself on a beach, of all places. His memory was extremely fuzzy, though given the amount of driftwood he had a feeling that the ship he’d been on - the Hermes, right? - had been destroyed. The young Hernandez gingerly got to his feet, muttering in his home tongue as he rubbed his head. Monte had enough presence of mind to realize his clothes were all but ruined, at least, and his face became a mask of disgust as he experimentally tugged at his salt-stiffened clothing. “Son of a...!” The Spanish nobleman swore, going one for several long seconds in his native language.

For a man so young and of such noble lineage, he was quite good at swearing already.

Once that was all out of his system, Monte finally took stock of his surroundings… and paused, blinking. Something about the colors on the palm trees was off. A small, almost petulant frown decorated the nobleman’s face as he took a few steps toward the island’s treeline. Yes, there was definitely something wrong. The leaves were more… what was it, bluish? Bluish-greenish? Hernandez looked puzzled, but finally realized he was wasting what could possibly be very valuable time.

After all, who sat around pondering colors when there was adventure to be had?!

Monte checked to make sure his rapier was at his side, grinning when he saw it had somehow stayed near at hand when he was hurled off the deck of the Hermes. His grin widened as he drew the weapon, giving it a few idle and experimental swings as he looked around again; this time, he kept a closer eye on the beach.

That was how he spotted the boy.

He was pretty short and wore rather plain clothing. Hernandez frowned as he noticed the boy also looked rather… well, feminine. His clothes hadn’t dried entirely, and thus clung to his lithe frame in a vaguely attractive fashion. Monte quickly shook his head clear, swearing quietly to himself. Something must have hit my head, he decided, mentally, I was most certainly not queer before I got on the ship.

Regardless, the Spanish noble approached the unconscious lad, though he kept his rapier in hand. He held it low, though, so as to not appear so threatening as he came close enough to nudge the little Spaniard with his boot.

“Hola, ¿como estas, niño?”