Chapter 11: Trouble, Nicholas POV (Patreon)

Happy New Year, everyone. Sorry for the lack of posting. It turned out I couldn't work while travelling. 

Chapter 11

Trouble

Nicholas POV

Pan left the throne room to chaperone the crew’s celebration, leaving me alone with Nargus. I couldn’t tell if his transformation was going faster or slower than normal or if there was anything I could do to help. I saw lines of power running through his body, crisscrossing his flesh, highlighting the changes that were taking place as his bionoid physique evolved to a Transcendent state, but the changes didn’t tell me if everything was happening the way it was supposed to or if something was going wrong.

I eventually forced myself to look away from what was happening. Watching Nargus transform disturbed me.

It distributed me because his transformation seemed so trivial and yet so absurdly important. The trivialness came from the transformation taking place because of an achievement reward. I’d received quest rewards from my old classes, minor prizes that changed how the class functioned, and this felt similar.

Where it stopped being trivial and became absurdly important was that this achievement reward was turning Nargus into a being who could devastate planets with his thoughts. He was becoming a being who could rearrange matter like Lego. He was becoming a being who saw the world and understood it. He was becoming a being that, quite frankly, terrified me.

As Transcendent beings, we were too close to what my mother believed in for me to feel comfortable about my own beliefs. My mother was catholic. She didn’t believe in a hellfire and brimstone God, and she didn’t believe that people were evil for not sharing her beliefs. She didn’t even believe you had to attend church every Sunday. But she did believe in God and that God was looking out for us. She prayed every night before she went to bed and said it helped.

At one point, I’d believed so, too, but that was in the past. I hadn’t believed there was a being or beings watching over us since I was sixteen. I didn’t lose my faith because of anything the church did. I actually have many fond memories of the Sundays I spent with my mother there. No, I lost my faith because of science and a little philosophy.

Science showed me irrefutable proof that the Earth was older than the bible claimed, and philosophy made me question why God would allow bad things to happen to good people. The old line, ‘It’s all part of God’s plan,’ never sat well with me. It felt like a copout. So, little by little, I lost my faith, unable to bridge the gap between a loving God and the evil that existed in the world. Because how could God exist without intervening in our misery? How could he watch us suffer? How could he have that much power and do nothing with it?

Now, I had evidence that suggested I’d been wrong. There was an old bible verse I’d memorised as a child that kept coming to mind.

And even the very hairs on your head are all number.

Being human prohibited me from experiencing the full range of my Transcendent capabilities, but I knew that I had the power to see everything in multiple solar systems. I had the power to know each and every person more thoroughly than they knew themselves. And I could change everything I saw with nothing but a thought and time.

That seemed to fit the definition of God.

Yes, it was on a much smaller scale than the God my mother prayed to, but if this was possible, then there was likely a Transcendent being looking over our universe, or perhaps all universes. And that thought didn’t bring me any comfort.

The idea that I could be snuffed out with a thought scared me. And I didn’t have the highest opinion of Transcendent beings if my actions were anything to go by.

To win Nargus’s loyalty, I’d burned entire worlds. I’d stripped them of life. The excitement I felt at avenging the destruction of my sector quickly vanished as I let lose my Power on those so much weaker than me.

Through my Domain, I’d watched Horde children crumble to ash, burned alive by the Power within my Domain. I saw them reach out for their mothers and fathers in their last moments, frightened by what was going on, unsure of what was happening. The only comfort I had was that they hadn’t felt pain. The Game didn’t allow it. And the fear they felt was just a child’s fear of being unsure of what was happening. They’d been spooked. But spooking an entire planet of children still left a bad taste in my mouth.

I wasn’t that person.

I didn’t want to be that person.

I just wanted to get everyone out of Sector 3.

And now, I was a God, making other Gods, destroying entire worlds in a game. Everything was happening too quickly, and much of what I believed for so many years was now coming into question.

Through my Domain, I watched the crew’s celebration winding down. The Pantheon was floating in a system without any habitable planets. The destruction of their Sector’s largest shipyards was what had turned Nargus completely loyal to me and generated more doubloons than everywhere else we’d destroyed put together. It had made the normally violent crew ecstatic and caused an impromptu celebration.

I watched Colin walk across my balcony.

He knocked on my door, stuck his head through and started talking. “Captain, are you done with Nargus? The crew would like to continue ransacking the Horde’s sector. I know-”

His sentence ended as he spotted Nargus’s statuesque form transforming into a Transcendent being on the nearby throne.

“Nargus is indisposed,” I explained. “The quartermaster will appoint a helmsman shortly.”

Colin nodded his head. “Ah, yes, captain.”

He backed up and closed the door.

Through my Domain, I watched him race to Rob. In a whisper, he told Rob what I’d done to Nargus. Rob told Porter as soon as he left. Porter told Heart. And Heart told everyone else. Heart was a bit of a gossip, so that wasn’t surprising.

The news spread through The Pantheon amusingly fast until I noticed Savage, Ripper, and Bracken begin to walk through the ship. They were silently tapping pirates on the shoulder. The pirates then put down what they were doing and tapped other pirates on the shoulder, who did the same. They never spoke to each other as the forty-two men quickly and quietly made their way to the armoury, which Pan had recently moved to the lower deck against the stern.

He’d said the armoury's location was designed to give us time to react to a mutiny. And I was happy to see it doing its job, as I only realised what was happening when they were nearly there.

“A mutiny,” I whispered, finally coming out of my quiet contemplation.

The mutineers began to collect cutlasses and pistols, sliding them into their sheaths and holsters, clearly intent on creating violence.

I projected my voice to Pan’s ear while they handed out weapons. “The crew is about to mutiny.”

Pan was on the bow, dealing with a group of crewmen who were arguing over the outcome of a dice roll. Having access to doubloons lowered the violence but increased the gambling and arguments. “How many, my Liege?”

“Forty-two.”

Curious about why the deck crew had disappeared, Rob went to the front of the main deck and down the staircase to check on them. “Mutiny!” Rob roared, ruining my chance to talk to Pan but cementing his loyalty in my mind.

Several armed mutineers turned, raised their pistols, and fired at Rob. I was faster. I summoned a portal behind him and used my power to yank him through.

The speed needed to save his life slammed him into the wall below my balcony, causing a loud thump that matched the volume of the mutineer’s pistol fire.

I leapt off my throne and raced for the doors, summoning portals behind any crewmen who immediately took up Rob’s cry of mutiny, showing their support. I pulled them through as quickly as possible, getting them together so they wouldn’t be immediately overwhelmed.

I’d put in hours of effort getting them on my side, and I didn’t want to lose them all to a few seconds of trigger-happy mutineers. I reached the balcony as the last portal closed and spotted fifteen surprised and confused faces below me.

I had to move fast.

The mutineers were too organised.

I opened another portal above my supporters and dropped pistols and cutlasses into their hands, forcing Savage to watch a fifth of the weapons in the armoury vanish. The last cutlass and pistol I sent to Pan as he leapt over the bow railing onto the main deck to block the only staircase to the lower deck.

The entrance was in the centre of the wall of the forward raised deck on the opposite side of The Pantheon to the armoury. It was designed to force the mutineers to cross the entire length of the ship to begin their attack and buy us even more time.

I gave the fifteen crewmen a reassuring smile. “Please, take your weapons and assist the Quartermaster in holding the stairs. Our counterattack will begin momentarily.”

Rob looked at his pistol and cutlass and then turned and charged towards Pan. “For The Pantheon!”

That seemed to be all the encouragement others needed because they ran after him, shouting his battle cry. “For the Pantheon!”

Pan had told me the first thing I needed to do in a mutiny was organise who was with me and disrupt those who were against me. The fifteen who had called out a warning were clearly on my side. I needed to find the rest.

I opened twenty more portals next to the remaining crewmen who weren’t obviously siding with the mutineers. They got the hint and stepped through, coming out below me. While they did that, Savage finished arming his people and turned to join the rush for the stairs.

I cleared my throat, thinking fast and talking faster. “Good evening, gentlemen. It seems we have a mutiny to deal with. Those who are with me, raise your hand. Those who don’t wish to take a side retreat to the bow.”

Several people looked at each other, frowning as five hands shot up.

Gauge, a not evil by morally flexible individual, stopped looking at those around him and turned to me. “Captain, you didn’t mention anything about those who will support the mutiny.”

“They will obviously pretend not to take a side and try to stab me in the back when it’s most opportune. Those who didn’t immediately raise their hand move to the bow or accept being called mutineers.”

I drew my boom pistol and pointed it at Gauge. Everyone who hadn’t raised their hand turned and ran to the bow, getting the message.

I glanced at the five who had volunteered to join me. “Thank you for your support, gentlemen.”

I didn’t trust any of them, but I was almost entirely certain they wouldn’t turn on me until I was clearly losing.

As I opened another small portal above the five crewmen, Pan fired the first shot, killing the first mutineer. I pulled through more cutlasses and a pair of pistols for each of them, dropping them into their hands. Everyone picked up their weapons, looking around nervously, as more crew began to fire on each other.

I jumped over the balcony, landing main deck in front of them. “Follow me, gentlemen.”

I strode across the deck towards the crowd near the staircase. The five fell in behind me. Pan had the others blindly putting their pistol around the corner and firing down the staircase. When his pistol recharged, he would step into the open, with a barrier summoned in front of him, and take a shot.

It was a good strategy. We could do it all day without them ever overcoming our defences.

I pointed to the lines of crewmen waiting their turn to fire down, and the five following me broke off to join.

I walked up to the staircase, crafted a barrier with my power, and looked down despite not needing to. Three pistol bursts struck my barrier in yellow flashes before the fourth went through and chipped away at my personal shield.

I raised my pistol and shot Vicious’s arm off, covering several pirates in blood and body parts. “Surrender, Gentlemen.”

They replied with three more shots to my personal shield.

I stepped back, out of the line of fire, and made my way to Pan. “I thought you said they weren’t likely to mutiny with how many systems we destroyed.”

“They shouldn’t have, my Liege. “Do you have any idea what set them off?”

“It doesn’t take a genius to realise they’re upset that you turned the Nargus into a Transcendent instead of them,” Rob replied.

Brom glanced over. “Is that what this is about? Shit, I’m out.” He dropped his pistols and cutlass and then backed away with his hands raised. “I’m not against you, Captain. But I’m not taking a blade for you after doing something as stupid as that.”

Colin looked over. “Why the Horde and not one of us?”

I looked him in the eye. “He was completely loyal to me.”

“Fuck,” Zonk swore. “I can’t compete with that sort of offer.”

Half the others grumbled but also agreed with Zonk. Having someone be completely loyal to you was worth a lot in their eyes. It was more valuable than promises, materials, or items.

Pan stepped into the staircase and took a shot. “The captain said surrender.” He backed up as they fired their reply at him.

The crew continued approaching the corner and blindly firing down to keep the mutineers at bay. Through my Domain, I could see Savage and Ripper trying to convince a group of mutineers to charge the staircase, but they were having no luck. Everyone knew that being the first up the stairs was a death sentence, and none of them were willing to die for each other.

The mutineers were beginning to lose their passion when Bracken got creative. “Why don’t we use the cannons?”

That wasn’t good. “Pan, prepare to charge.”

Pan turned to me and frowned. “Why?”

“They remembered we have cannons.”

I needed to provide a distraction so Pan could lead the charge down the staircase. Pan and I were probably strong enough to put down this mutiny alone, but I wasn’t interested in taking an unnecessary risk. We had the support of some of the crew, so we might as well use it.

“With me, gentlemen,” I said, pointing to the five who had arrived late.

They rushed over and I opened a portal which led to the back of the lower deck.

The mutineers were all trying to shoot up the stairs or collect the cannons, so no one noticed their backs were exposed. I stepped through the portal, raised my pistol, and fired, taking Savage in the back of the head and scattering his brains over the mutineers.

The startled mutineers turned as one, surprised by the shot coming from the wrong direction. They immediately raised their weapons, and I found myself staring down the barrel of almost thirty pistols as their owners pulled the trigger.

Bursts of energy exploded across the lower deck as I summoned a portal before me. I would have been in quite a predicament if I couldn’t fold space to act as a shield. But I could, so their weapons fire was about as effective as one would imagine.

“Is that all you’ve got!” I shouted. “Surrender or die, gentlemen. Those are your only options.”

Hearing my voice after the gunfire finished, finally convinced my five reluctant supporters that I had a plan, and they charged through the portal behind me.

Pistols were fired and then dropped as cutlasses came free from sheaths so the fighting could truly begin. It was five against thirty-eight, which made it good that they didn’t realise my plan was to sacrifice them.

I waited until they had passed me before drawing my cutlass and dropping the portal. A heroic last-ditch charge was not on the card for the evening. I was here to break these degenerates of their preconceived notions of superiority and nothing else.

The pirates seemed to be moving in slow motion as I reached the wall of bladed chaos. Grifter made an overhead slash at me, intending to cleave my shoulder, but moved so slowly that I had time to make an awkward strike at his forearm with my own cutlass. A thin line of energy appeared along my blade as it met his flesh, lopping off the offending limb.

Before I could follow with a lunge, another mutineer’s pistol blast hammered into my personal shield, dropping it by 3%. Two more quickly followed as I lunged forward, stabbing Grifter through a lung. Three more shots rang out, bursting off my personal shield, finally reminding me that, God or not, I had no clue what I was doing.

“Die, you bastard,” shouted Trident as he and his friend Seabeard charged me.

I blocked a thrust while dodging a slash, trying to talk my way out of panicking as the two fought in time. “Gentlemen, I feel it’s rather unbecoming of you to bring up my parentage while you are trying to kill me.”

The two of them might have been moving slower than me, but I had no clue how to sword fight, and they did. More shots rang out, bouncing off my personal shield, slowly but consistently depleting it. I didn’t have the massive tech advantage with the crew as with enemy fleets. They were Bionoids, which made them higher beings. Higher beings were a threat to me.

I landed a cleave through Seabeard’s chest while side-stepping a thrust from Trident before turning and taking off Trident’s head. A dozen shots landed on my shield as they fell to the deck.

Three mutineers replaced the two I was fighting, making me doubt the intelligence of this plan.

“Bloody hell,” I said, raising my cutlass and willing myself towards the staircase the mutineers were trying to use to reach the main deck.

Bodies exploded, flying away in pieces, as my shield integrity plummeted to zero. I came out the other side battered, bleeding, bruised, and covered head to foot in blood and entrails. My left arm had gone numb as I stared at the top of the staircase, seeing Pan and Rob’s faces.

I willed myself to the top and came out behind them. “Get down there. They need help.”

Pan leapt down the staircase, delivering a slash with his Power and wave cutlass that was several orders of magnitude more powerful than my own. Below, mutineers died as the blade he created cut through two people before knocking over several others.

Rob followed him, crashing into the chaos I’d left behind, using Pan as a shield. The others followed only two steps behind them.

“Surrender before this gets messy, gentlemen.” My Domain-enhanced voice roared through the lower decks.

“We outnumber them,” the Ripper shouted. “Don’t listen to him. The day is ours, lads. He’s afraid. He knows he’s-”

I sheathed my cutlass, drew my pistol, opened a small portal behind Ripper’s head, and fired.

His head exploded, sending a very clear signal to the mutineers.

“I can portal to the other side of the system and take you all out one at a time, like I just did to your leader. You’ve won nothing, gentlemen. All you’ve succeeded in doing is pissing me off. Surrender, or I stop playing nice.”

I holstered the pistol and drew my cutlass, opening a portal and tried to stab a mutineer in the back. Ironstar pivoted and parried, knocking my blade aside.

Pan had suggested we make our first mutiny a way for me to gain a reputation. Winning wasn’t the objective now that we weren’t about to be overrun. If I wanted to win, there were easier ways than charging in. Fear was the objective. Fear of receiving a blade in the back. Fear of dying to something you couldn’t fight. Fear of realising you didn’t stand a chance.

They didn’t need to think they didn’t stand a chance.

They needed to know they didn’t.

They needed to understand that mutiny only led to death. Death they couldn’t stop. Their only options were death or service. Once they believed that, then we had to show them how good service could be.

I opened portal after portal, stabbing at mutineers as fast as I could. Without the element of surprise, they were fast enough to block and parry, so none of my attacks killed anyone, but they caused injuries and distractions.

“You blackhearted bastard,” Inferno shouted as he launched himself over the bow railing at me. Three others followed his lead. Heart and Gauge each tackled one of them, also choosing a side.

I willed myself into the air and floated backwards across the main deck, continuing to open portals and stab mutineers, giving the others plenty of time to decide if they wanted to join. The number of mutineers increased by two as I landed beside the helm, leaving the rest looking at each other awkwardly.

It was good to finally know who I could and couldn’t trust. It would make the next mutiny much easier to put down.

***

“Quartermaster read off their crimes,” I said from the balcony. The mutineers had eventually surrendered, leaving us with eighteen fewer crewmen. Pan had the survivors kneeling on the main deck, surrounded by my supporters.

He stepped forward. “Mutiny, for all, my Liege. Murder of fellow crewmen for this pair,” he said, pointing to the two on the left. “Incitement to mutiny for this lot,” he pointed to the three behind them.

“Punishment?”

“A hundred lashes for the mutineers. Death for the murders. Those who incited the mutiny will walk the plank.”

There were some grumblings from my supporters at the pronouncement. Their hands remained on their weapon, and their eyes stayed on the captives, but they clearly didn’t agree with the punishment.

I waited for the grumbling to get a little louder. “Is there a problem with the punishment, gentlemen? Speak freely. Nothing you say will be held against you.”

Colin got up the courage to step forward. “Captain, walking the plank seems a bit cruel. Death for the instigators seems fair, but making them wait for the heat death of the universe in the black abyss is too harsh. You already killed the ringleaders. If would be fair to make him walk the plank, but not this lot.”

I pointed to the ring leader’s main co-conspirator, Bracken, who had raised the ruckus when The Pantheon lost a deck. “Would you object to Bracken walking the plank? He went to Ripper, who went to Savage, who instigated all this. He’s as much a ringleader as they were.”

Bracken stiffened and turned to Colin with pleading eyes.

Colin considered my words, ignoring Bracken. “No, Captain. But the others don’t deserve his punishment.”

“Is everyone in agreement?”

One by one, my supporters nodded.

“Then only the ringleaders of a mutiny will now be made to walk the plank on The Pantheon. Instigators will just be executed. Quartermaster, administer their punishment.”

I saw several of the crew looking at me strangely as Pan drew his cutlass and walked towards the group marked for execution. This was all planned out in advance by Pan. He’d been projecting whispers to my ear with his Power since the mutiny ended. I needed to show the crew that I was willing to listen to them, but I also needed to show them I wasn’t soft.

I cleared my throat. “Quartermaster, are you intending to start with the executions?”

Pan glanced up. “Yes, my Liege.”

“Before they have received their 100 lashes? It will be difficult for these men to understand their punishment when dead.”

“Ah, that it would, my Liege.”

“Proceed with the punishment.”

***

An hour later, I stood in my throne room alone with Pan and a transforming Nargus.

“That was more graphic than I imagined,” I said, still nauseous from the violence. “Can I get rid of the blood now?”

Pan nodded, and I willed the blood and viscera that had soaked through my clothes to pull away and burn.

“The crew seems to be in the right frame of mind, my Liege. They know you will listen to their opinion but also know you are a cold-hearted beast that will beat a man before he kills him. Not a bad first mutiny if I do say so.”

“We lost a fifth of the crew, and half of the remaining crew is mutineers.”

Pan shrugged. “We can pick up a new crew the next time we make port and drop off the mutineers simultaneously. However, before we do that, I think now is the right time to collect the corvette and evacuate Sector 3.”

“Why now? We’re on our way to destroying the Horde’s sector.”

“The crew is cowed. And we know who our allies and enemies are. We can safely make a few of the more loyal crewmen stronger to offset the loss of crew, which will give us enough power to limp through every system in Sector 3, collect your people, and make our way to Sector 6 by the end of the Cycle. If we do this right, the next Cycle will be much easier.”

“I haven’t been thinking that far ahead.”

“You should start. You’ve grown stronger so quickly that things will get a lot easier from here.”