...flee into the sea to escape this place.

Faced with the man on the ground and maybe four or five running towards you, you decide that the mission has ended before it could even begin. You move into a sprint towards the sea. First feet, then ankles, knees and waist, before finally you start to swim out the way you came in. Your arms cut through seaweed and your legs kick up stand as you power out into the night. Your black clothes instantly fill with water again, dragging you down, and you pull the cloth away from your mouth as the buzz of combat continues to rise within you even as you move away from it. Your arms splash in the water, almost masking the splashing of those in pursuit. You have a good head start on them and are nearly out of the cove proper.

A real shame. It’s possible that you could float around the island. Climb up the cliffs at the back and approach it from behind. It’s the more risky option as you’d need to climb up steep cliffs in the dark, but the moon could help. Your arms and legs begin to ache and cramp as you push yourself through the water. You don’t really have the energy to tackle cliffs, and so survival will have to do.

You gasp in surprise as arms close around your torso, the almost supernatural swimming powers of those that live their life at sea besting your own amateurish efforts. You thrash against the arms as they pull at you, kicking up water and reaching for the form behind. Grunts sound from behind you as your clawing fingers find there mark. Hands grab at your loose clothes, pulling you beneath the water’s surface. Salt water fills your nose and mouth as you try to breathe liquid, sending your system into struggling coughs. Frantic seconds split between being under the cool water and coughing above it, each cough a moment more that air is denied to you.

The world starts to fade away and your limbs grow weak. More arms reach around you, pulling you somewhere. You’re supported now; men are on either side of you and soon you find sand beneath your dragging feet once more, first underwater, then on dry land. The men drag you on as the world begins to make its return, foggy darkness chased away by fits of coughing that leave you warped and doubled up, spitting out water and replacing it with air. There’s a lot of light and activity around you all of a sudden, and the sand takes on a more wooden feeling as the men hauling you reach their destination. You focus and see vast ships up ahead, along with many smaller ships and boats. The men at your side are joined by others. Words are exchanged in confused jumbled chaos.

“The fuck is this?” ”She with a crew?” “Just attacked him.” “Had this on er.” “Good blade.” “Thief maybe? Or assassin?” “She’s cute.” “Heads up! Maxy’s here!”

They make way as another, older man comes running down a nearby hill to the group.

He wears white clothes with a bright red sash around his waist and a fine looking sabre dangling there as well. His face supports a big white beard, very similar to the one worn by the guide that brought you here, but this man is of much sturdier build. His muscles look slightly wasted by old age and some of the skin wrinkles around them, but you would guess that they’re still nothing to be trifled with.

He looks you right in the eyes, “What’s the matter boys? Been fishin? Would av become a fisherman me self if I knew the waters held such fine fare.”

They laugh at the witticism, some more nervously than others. Despite his run, he doesn’t seem to be the least bit out of breath. Your supports let go and you drop to the sand strewn wood, still feeling week from the near drowning, but as you look up at the group of dirty men looking down at you, your heart starts to race as you realise the trouble you’re in.

You’ve been caught, you’re at the docks, and you’re surrounded.

One of the men who dragged you here looks to the new comer. “Bitch attacked one o Roland’s men. Carried a blade. Show im Pete.”

The man next to him grudgingly obliges, showing this ‘Maxy’ and the group your stiletto.

“Nice”, he says, looking at you more than the fine blade. You ready to run, clambering up to put your feet under you. The men stand close and the group looks thick but you have ****; you try to dart for the nearest gap. It seals tight as the men move in to intercept you. A madness you have never felt takes over, strength fuelled by desperation fuelled by blind fear, yet all weakened by your earlier exertions. You lash out; punching and kicking and biting any one you can reach. The men all pitch in, grabbing your limbs and pinning them. You feel hands all over you, holding and restraining you. There’s a call for rope at the same moment you feel a hand press against your breast. Your fear increases, sending you into further fits of fruitless attack and you feel great weights on your limbs as they are each held down by several men, all bigger than you. You feel someone’s knee press down onto your stomach, crushing the air and much of your resistance out of you like water from a sodden sponge. A thin but strong rope wraps around your ankles several times before tightening, and the group spins you onto your front, dragging resistant arms to the small of your back before tying them as well.

They step back and laugh as you squirm on the ground, many of them out of breath or rubbing the recent injuries you managed to give them. Your eye’s go wide as you can’t escape, pulling and twisting the uncooperative ropes. Your see a hunger in their eye’s that you haven’t seen in years, a hunger you hoped to never see again on the face of a man with power over you.

The old man, slightly out of breath, squats next to you and addresses the group, “Sorry lads but you know the rules; bounty hunters and assassins go to the captain.”

There is a dissatisfied mumble at this. You thank the gods. You’re not exactly thrilled to be trussed up and taken to the woman you came here to kill, but you imagine there may be more conversation before whatever she has in store for you, at least compared to the intentions you saw in the eyes of the gathered men.

“Still, you caught er. An extra round of grog for the lot of ya!” The muttering turn to a cheer at the prospect of free ****, though some still look dissatisfied.

He leans down and picks you up with ease, swinging you over his shoulder like a sack of vegetables. He holds the back of your legs at his front, bending you over his shoulder so your head dangles above his lower back, and without another word, he sets off back up the hill he came down, jostling you with every step. He handles you with a strength you didn’t think his old muscles capable of, setting a brisk pace up the hill he just ran down. While the sea water is no longer dripping from you, your dark clothes are still damp and soak down into his white ones without his notice or care. Lifting your head up, you can see the docks growing smaller, its two large ships shrinking to the size of one of the many smaller ships while they in turn shrink to the size of row boats. There must be hundreds of pirates on the island already, and while the docks plays host to only a comparatively small number, it still bustles with activity. Several hard faces watch you as you go. You see several of the men approach nearby women, each willing to sell to them what they wanted from you.

The road up feels longer than it is, mainly because of the shoulder that punches you in the stomach with each step. You try to think of what to do or what to say. Fighting, better described as squirming, would be pointless. ‘This is all a misunderstanding’ seems fairly weak as well. You’re being taken to your target, but it’s unlikely you’ll be allowed to do much when you’re there. As before, escape is your only option.

You swallow before saying the only thing you can think of that might set you free.

“Um, s-sir? What wo-er-could I do to convince you to, er, let me go? I-I’ll leave and never return, I swear!” It comes out sounding weak, even to your ears, mainly because you don’t want to hear the answer. The answer comes regardless, though not as words but as a slap to your behind. It’s not hard, but hard enough.

“Anything you got to offer I could take anyway. Keep quiet n I won’t.”

His words shut you up. He’s right. You hope his captain is more open to negotiation. You start to think of what she would want, what you can offer. It doesn’t have to be something you would go through with, just enough to be set free. Acting as a mole in the guard? Spreading false information? You wouldn’t actually do it, but that’s not the point.

The ground starts to level off and you see that you’ve reached the top of the hill at last. He continues onwards but you can’t see where; old wooden buildings appear on all sides as you enter some kind of backstreet. The dirt paved road cuts through an alley of ramshackle buildings, strewn with little but moonlight, broken wooden boards, and a man carrying you over his shoulder; a man you are at the mercy of. Fresh panic rises in the quiet night, though you try to keep still and silent. Dozens of plans form and are dismissed, replaced by dozens of fates, each worse than the last. You only stop your wild mental gymnastics when the sound of raucous laughter and music, conversation and general merriment, all start to fill the night, growing louder as you approach its source. You pass by the back of an inn from the sound of it, yet you continue on a little further, to another doorway leading into the building next to it. A wooden hallway swallows the worlds moonlight as the door swings shut behind you, plunging you into a darkness lit only by the flickering candle somewhere past the corridors far end. Before he travels any further, he opens another nearby door, taking you from the corridor into a dimly lit room.

You have little time to see anything before you are dropped hard on the floor. Rough wood hits you hard in the side and nocks all the air and some of your senses out of you. You try to catch your breath, control the rhythm of your breathing as you twist about, having lost sight of him. You hear the sound of heavy wood being dragged across the floor behind you, and you roll onto your other side to look at the room you’re in.

Its candle lit, but barely, with many gloomy spots in the corners. Despite this, your eyes are drawn to the rooms two main and only features: one, the large old wooden stocks being dragged roughly into the middle of the far wall, opposite the door, and the second, another large old wooden stock near the other wall, holding the rooms only other occupant. They are locked in and looking down, the top of their head cascading a bush of thick curly black hair, fuzzy enough to almost hide the hands locked in the holes next to it. From your low vantage point, you can see that the individual is tall, contorted in some way to make their rear stick out as they bend at the waist into the stocks. No fabric you can see covers them, but they are still dressed in shadow and lost to the half-light, rendered a vague form. Their hands also seem dark, as though wearing gloves, but it’s all you take in before your eyes are pulled to the other stocks, drawn to the wood as it swings open. The top half forms a right angle with the bottom, both with three half holes: two for the arms, and one for the neck.

The old pirate who brought you here walks from the stocks over to you, leans down and grabs your black top, dragging you like a sack towards the stocks.

“I thought you were taking me to your captain?” you say nervously, breaking the no talking rule he implemented.

“Huh? I’m not luggin you all the way up there. Easier to lock you up an go get er.” He pulls you to your feet and lays your head in the half hole of the stocks, **** you against the wood. As soon as the other half falls and lock in place, there will be no escape for you, and you’ll be very ****; more so than you are already! As he starts to untie your hands, you ready yourself for…something, some attempt at escape. Perhaps you could punch him, or shove him enough to…hop away? All you know is you can’t be imprisoned here, unguarded and exposed. What if someone come in when he’s gone!? Your heart starts hammering. Yes, if you can grab him, **** him, maybe go for his eyes, anything to bring him down. Your legs will still be tied but as long as he is down. The ropes around your wrists drop to the floor at the same moment he lifts his knee and rests it between your shoulder blades, pressing your neck hard into the wood and fully cutting off your air. Your arms flail forward, grabbing at the wood, at him, at anything, and he plucks them out of the air with ease, holding a wrist in each hand. His strength overwhelms you as he forces them into their adjacent spots on the frame.

The wood slams down hard, narrowly avoiding your thrashing wrists, and he lets go of them to hold it down, reaching over to the side and locking some mechanism in place. You pull at your wrists, unable to move your hands through the small holes. Your chin rests on the wood, giving you a good view of the dirty wooden floor as you push and pull, hoping to tip the heavy frame, but soon the futility of such attempts hits home and you still yourself. Satisfied with your secured state, the bearded pirate walks into the middle of the room, and you push forward, pressing your shoulders against the wood and freeing your neck enough to lift your head up and to try and see what’s going on. The white bearded man isn’t looking at you. He takes off his ornate sabre and gently rests it against the far side of the room before turning to your neighbour and fellow prisoner.

“And how are you doing my exotic flower? I’ve brought you a friend. The least you can do is say thanks.”

You see the other person clearer now from both your position and the adjustment of your eyes. Dark skin, so brown as to be almost black; the mark of southern empire heritage. The dark skin, now seen clearly, explains how they appeared clothed in darkness, and you realise with some measure of despair that they are not clothed at all. The bumps of her chest and the lack of anything between her legs tell you of her gender, which from her thick arms and strong legs, as well as wide athletic shoulders, are signs needed for the identification. She stands as you do, bent at the waist with head and hands in the stocks, which you now see side on, though her height leaves her a little more stooped than you.

He kneels before her and grabs a fistful of her black curls to pull her head up, and her eyes meet his. You really don’t want to know what he did to earn a look like that. You have a horrible feeling you know already.

“Oh those eyes. I don’t think I’ve ever been hated as much by anyone else.” He gives a dry wheezing chuckle, “You’d think I was yer first.” She doesn’t respond but does keep a steady eye on him. He muses her expression for a moment before he mutters to himself “Still, there are other ways to thank someone.”

He lets go and her head flops down, but you’re sure she takes a quick look at you in the process. Your stomach lurches as he nonchalantly walks around to her exposed rear. To your shock, he bursts out laughing at the sight of it.

“Damn! You’re a mess!” You watch as he grabs her cheeks and spreads them, leaning his face in to inspect her. His hands, even sun kissed, stand out brilliantly against her skin. “Echo...echo...echo!” he mocks, as if shouting into some cave or valley. He stands up and gives her rear a quick slap, like the proud owner of an old nag, before moving back to her head and kneeling again. The sympathy inside you that’s not currently drowned in fear doubles when you see his trousers. He is, evidently, very excited.

You always thought such needs faded away with age. Perhaps he’s not as old as he looks.

“Looks like I won’t be givin you another fuckin. All used up and nowhere to go, so sad.” There is almost a genuine sound of regret to his voice, even though it’s lacking any other sign of human compassion. He leans towards her downcast face and reaches a hand under the stocks. Once again, his skin stands in contrast to hers as he grabs one of her breasts, stretched by the pull of the earth yet still small for her size. He gently pulls and squeezes the soft flesh, and you see between his fingers that her nipple is even darker than the rest of her skin, pinched and rolled for his own amusement.

You barely hear his whisper, “Cource, you could always beg me to fuck you.” Her head snaps up and she tries to bite his nearby face. Sadly, she misses as he jumps back, prepared for this reaction. “Awww. Why play so hard to get when you’re so easy? Still, I’ve got shit to do so I’ll make this quick”

He lifts himself up using the heavy stocks for support. You don’t want to look. The poor woman. He takes a step back before walking towards you, not even looking at your face as he walks past it towards your behind.

No!

You feel his hands on your hips before they hook under the waist of your black trousers. Your eye’s bulge and widen with terror.

“NO! No! Please Stop! Don’t do this! Please, I beg you!” you babble as he starts to pull them down and expose your private area. You try to kick him but can barely hop with your legs tied so tightly.

“Darlin, there’s well over a hundred men in this building. You scream, they come, and it ain’t gonna be to help.” He pulls them down to your knees, exposing everything from your lower back to the bottom of your thighs.

“Please sir. I’ll do anything. Just don’t do that. Please, I beg you.” The words come out of your mouth in a rush, stumbling over each other in their haste to stop this.

“Really? Anything?” His tone is light, idle and condescending, a friendly conversation so divorced from the situation that it gives you immediate pause.

You feel him touch your entrance, a bell shaped head between your lips, ready to part them with devastating ease.

“Yes! Yes. Anything.”

He sniffs slightly, absent-mindedly considering his options. “Right. Well then. Take it like a woman.”

He rams into you, pushing your folds wide with his manhood and shocking down their length with bear fury. You immediately bite your lip to stop yourself from screaming, yet a despairing moan still escapes into the room.

He takes a moment to feel your tender insides, breathlessly exclaiming “Ohhhh! I love holes like this! Ha Ha!” He starts to pull back and forth, first gradually, then in long great thrusts. “You ain’t no saint but you ain’t no sinner.”

You taste blood. A small droplet runs from your lip down your chin. ‘This is it’, your shocked mined thinks, ‘I’m being ****’. Your shoulders press against the hard wood as he repeatedly slams inside you, and your womanhood burns with the friction of his ****. Your hands clench tight, your fingers digging into your palms, and wet tears stream down to join the blood on your chin, mixing with it before falling in droplets to the floor.

The hairs of his crotch mix with your own each time he forces his way inside you. His hard hips press and bounce off your soft behind with each thrust. A long, quiet cry comes to life in your throat, hitching with both your own sobs and the jolts of his impacts. He feels horribly big, far too big for your inexperienced body, and every pull back drags your lips out before each and every thrust hits hard inside you. You feel his hands caressing your hips, holding them in place and almost lifting you off the floor, and you aim a kick at him. You don’t manage to hit hard enough to even get a grunt from him, at least a grunt he wasn’t giving freely; your bound legs feel week under the attack on your core, robbed of their power by the penetration above. He moans and pants and grunts and sighs with each long and painful thrust, until they fill the room and your mind, combining with the sounds of slapping flesh, creaking wood, and your own pained and frightened moans: a deafening orchestra playing the song of your violation. You start to feel drops of sweat landing on your exposed lower back and boyish hips as his battering of your sacred space continues, going on and on as your mind gets emptier and emptier. There’s nothing to say. Nothing to think. No way to stop it and no way to escape it.

Long, long, minutes pass, each eternities to your mind, but true to his word, he is no marathon man and you know when the end comes close for him. He grips your hips harder, grows more frenzied in his attack, and his breath begins to saw his throat and splinter with unthinking moans. Your bruised flower gives him everything he could want, and you know he’s about to give back. Completely at his mercy, you tiredly begin to beg.

“Please...” you get out, “...don’t...I don’t want…to get-”

He moans as he spills himself inside you, spraying his seed directly into your womb as he holds your hips in place, bucking against them with each lancing jet that reaches far inside. His hands squeeze painfully, pulling and pressing you’re hips against his until he is at his furthest limit and you feel every twitch from base to tip as each load travels from him to you. The moment lasts, until it doesn’t. Sure that he has no more foulness he can deposit inside you, he withdraws his member, leaving the cool touch of the air against your exposed and now wet folds. He stands beside your body, out of your view, and you feel his hands reach under you, grabbing your breasts through your black top. He mauls them for a moment, squeezing and pulling your small mounds, made longer by the pull of the ground.

After exactly 26 uncomfortable seconds, he says to the room, “What’s with assassins and small tits anyway?” The rhetorical question seemed directed at the other woman but you don’t look up to see if she responds in any way. You look at the ground, continuing to do so even as his footsteps walk away and out the room, the door closing behind him.

Your left breathing shakily, trying to come to terms with the wet feeling within you as his seed crawls ever inward, looking for purchase within your womb. Tears continue to blur your vision. You think of the moon and your own cycle; pregnancy is a horrible possibility. Your mother once told you that a child can only come from love. The many women you interviewed about these pirates before coming here confirmed how wrong that sentiment was. Then again, he was old. Perhaps his...potency, has diminished with age? The sting where his hips slapped your rear and the glob of warmth you feel leak out of you say otherwise. Put in the stock and used like a whore. Gods why? You feel like breaking down; sobbing until you have no more tears to shed. You pull once more at the stocks, but you don’t know why; your head and hands are held as tight as ever.

Your breath catches as you hear the door open.

Pressing your shoulders against the frame, you manage to look up at the newcomer. He’s of average height for a man, and average build as well. Looking at his face, you cannot think of any single defining thing about him. Everything about him says plane and average, save for the red and white clothes. He’s the kind of criminal that you know from experience is incredibly hard to catch: forgettable and unassuming. He sways slightly as he enters, evidently having had some drink, yet his eyes are sharp and you suspect his wits are as well. Your recently abused slit almost whimpers at the prospect of another man’s violation.

He walks towards you, saying “ello there. Thought I saw old Max commin out. What’s a pretty little thing like you doin in there?”

You don’t want to answer -you don’t want to talk at all- but you know exactly what will happen if you don’t. He squats down in front of you and you perform the greatest feat of strength you have ever accomplished in your life. You smile at him.

“Oh this?” you say playfully, “Maxy wanted to play a game, so here I am. Only, he forgot to let me out. Don’t suppose you could do a girl a favour?” You gesture with your hands towards where the lock should be and smile a ditsy smile.

“What kind o game?” he says, smiling. He lifts a hand and begins to touch your face. You squash the urge to pull away or bite, instead leaning your head into his caress.

“I play any game if the price is right.” You decide to play the whore, since you were recently violently used like one. It’s a bad gamble, but it’s not like you have the best hand right now.

He runs his thumb over your lips, and you kiss it, hiding your revulsion when he puts it in your mouth. It tastes of dirt. Wondering what to do, you start gently sucking the tip in a way you hope looks enticing.

“So what are you gonna do for me if I pay you with your freedom?”

This was both the response you wanted and dreaded. You’re already risking pregnancy; you can almost feel it starting in your belly. You really don’t want another man depositing his essence inside you, but escape is worth it; one man is better than ten, or a hundred. Not for the first time, you wish you were a thousand leagues from here.

You say nothing, continuing to smile around the digit resting on your tongue and giving him a vapid, dreamy look. He removes his thumb and moves his head in close, tilting it sideways and pressing his lips against yours. You play the part, hiding your shock and slightly opening your mouth. He takes full advantage, pushing his tongue inside and wriggling it against yours.

It feels very strange. You’ve kissed boys before, but usually on the cheek. If it was on the lips then it was only a gentle peck, never the kind shared by husband and wife. As you stand doubled over with your head in the stocks and your womanhood feeling sore and used, playing the whore for this man you have never met, the loss of your first real kiss seems like a small but bitter medicine to swallow. After a moments probing, he removes his tongue.

“Well, I’m the man with your freedom and you’re a whore with a mouth, I guess we can work something out.” Your smile slips slightly, but it’s still enough to get the job done. He stands up and lowers his trousers, revealing his fully erect member. You see the bulbous bell shaped end, pinkie purple with streaks of white grime and feel your body clench. One of those was recently inside you and it was not an experience you want again. He angles it towards your mouth and it stares you down like the tip of a spear, reeking of sour sweat laced with an almost rotten tinge.

“Open up.”

You can’t look up enough to see his face but you know he’s looking down at you.

You hate this. A man rapes you and now this man wants to as well? This island sickens you. The prospect of being violated again sets angry butterflies dancing in your stomach. Logically, it should be easier if you’re going along with it, yet it somehow feels ten times worse. If you do as he says, is it still ****? Or do you become the whore you’re claiming to be? The conflict briefly wars inside you. What to do? What to do? Plans form and die in your mind like soldiers in a particularly bloody battle. You had been playing it by ear so far, not sure what was coming next and perhaps hoping to get the upper hand on your target, as though such a thing was possible now. You need a way out. You feel him stroke your hair and watch as his tip draws closer. A vulnerability. Take it, bite it, or avoid it.

The rumble of his voice lays upon you, as thick and weighty as the hand on your head. “Don’t worry...I’ll do all the work.”