Interlude 3

Interlude 3

-o Casey o-​

The Cake sailed towards the other pirate ship that was half again as big as her. Sure, it was a lot bigger than the Cake, but we were faster and better manned than the other ship, pirates or not. Little could match the skill that a well-seasoned crew of pirates could bring to bear. Lucca had hit their main mast with a cannonball, sending it falling over onto the ship.

They were dead in the water, their Jolly Rodger tattered and flying off on the breeze. It had been a skull and lightning bolts with a mass of stitches across it, but now it was just tatters in the breeze. They had the poor fortune of running across us while we were sailing to the other side of the island.

And now? Now we got to board.

I grinned.

This was always the scariest part for the Bonney Pirates. We'd all seen those superhuman fighters, those people that would be pirate captains in the South Blue, and there was always the risk that the other crew would have two or three of those crazy people. And until we'd picked up Florida, our Captain had been our only member at that level.

And now me.

"Ready the ropes!" Captain Bonney shouted, leaning off of the rigging as Tom brought us closer.

"Aye!"

"Ready?" The smaller man beside me asked, and I grinned, all teeth.

"Yeah!" I punched the palm of my hand. This was my first chance to use my new Ability in a real fight! Of course I was ready!

Florida gave a little smile without teeth as he often did, grabbing the back of my shirt with both hands.

I curled up into a ball as the shorter man lifted me above his head with no apparent effort. My heart was beating loudly in my ears, I trusted him to not miss and my powers to ensure I was going to be fine, but this was crazy.

"Geppo!"

The world blurred around us as Florida leapt high into the air, nearly clearing the mast in a single bound before his feet lashed out and kicked against the air again, sending us even higher.

"Jellyball-!" With one hand, he tossed me a bit higher at the height of the jump. I clenched myself tightly together, "Serve!"

An open palm slammed into my side and threw me through the air, the wind whistling in my ear as I hurtled downwards, my body jiggling as I transformed midair–

I hit the deck of the enemy pirate ship as a jiggling mass, splattering everywhere.

"The hell was that?!"

Their ship was big, and their crew varied in size. But many of them were in patchwork and stitched clothing, many of them having obvious stitches in old wounds long ago healed. And many of them having a bunch of different skin colors as well…

"Did they fire another cannon shot?!"

Many of them were carrying hammers and big guns, as many of them were big and well built, unlike the stout builds that most of the Bonney Pirates had.

"I don't know! It just- the fuck?!"

It was the strangest sensation to be jello, to be a mass of blue jiggling stuff. Especially since I didn't have any eyes or ears or nose... but I could see everything from any point in myself spread out across the deck.

"Is this... jello?" One of them poked my main mass with a sword, and I had to avoid giggling because it tickled.

Now for the weird part. Pulling myself back together.

"No no, Jello is a brand, see, the real name of the stuff is gelatin." One of the bigger ones, wearing a lab coat said to the smaller swordsman.

All of my little bits wiggled a bit before they started to roll and flow back towards the central mass of blue.

"Uh… guys?"

Each of the little blue pebbles of my mass rolled back into my main mass as I pulled them inwards, merging together.

"No, see, the stuff is jello 'cause what else are you gonna call it? It's jiggly and springy."

"Guys?"

"But it's actually gelatin, that's the name of the actual material! Jello is just the most popular brand of the food-stuff so–"

"Guys! It's getting up!"

I grinned, all teeth as a human color scheme returned to me and my clothes.

"Oh shit!"

"What the fuck?!"

"He's got an Ability!"

"Jello Shot!" I flicked my wrist hard, transforming my index finger into blue gelatin that flew off of my hand like a bullet. The blue mass slammed into the chest of one of the men with a thwack, shredding a hole in his shirt and drawing blood as it bounced off of him and back onto me, where it merged and gave me the mass to regrow my finger.

"Fuck!"

"Shoot him!" The tallest of them commanded, he had a square head and a rather fancy black tri-corner hat with gold trim and a golden feather. His lab-coat was white and he had a stitched scar that wrapped around his face horizontally.

I grinned harder as I felt the little slabs of lead slam uselessly into my jiggling form. It was the weirdest sensation to have them lodge inside of me, you could even see them since I was semi-transparent! It was like when you pushed in your belly a bit, you knew it was happening and it wasn't exactly comfortable, but it didn't hurt either.

"Jello Six Shooter!" I snapped my hands out again and again, each time throwing a lump of gelatin out at high speed, impacting into one of the pirates. They didn't pack the power of a pistol shot yet, but it was more than enough to draw blood and injure all on its own. Sending the stitched man stumbling back as blood welled up from his chest.

"You bastard!" The small man that had poked me with his sword charged, saber in hand, and I bounced back, throwing out a half dozen Jello Shots into his torso!

'Fast-!'

It was nothing compared to Captain Bonney, but the smaller man was still much faster than me and I couldn't get away in time before he ducked under my guard and swung his sword up!

He sneered, and I stared as his face seemed to slide into two different directions across a line, "Got you, ya piece of shit!" The stitches that stretched from the corners of his mouths across his cheeks went out of alignment as one half of his head went one way and the other half went the other–

'Oh… that's not his head… that's me…'

I had a moment of fear as my two parting visions of the world that fell apart to the deck… I'd been split in two straight up the middle… and then I remembered. Gelatin. So I sucked in my gut. My entire mass turning into formless blue.

"Prepare for boarders!" The man I assumed was the captain based on his fancy tri-corner hat shouted.

As the swordsman stood, flicking bits of blue off his saber, one of the enemies manning the deck cannons was sniped, almost certainly by Lucca. The Cake was only a half mile away now. We'd peppered them from a ways off, outside of the range of their greater firepower, but now the Cake was closing in and Lucca could get to work with his new rifle.

The two halves of me shot back up and merged together, the masses I'd fired off bounced back towards me, melting back into my mass as it turned back into something human. The swordsman who'd cut me in half stiffened, the normal sized man staring even the captain shouted, "Hiro! The cake ship is getting closer! Get your-! Shit!"

"Why won't you just die?!" The swordsman, Hiro, swung at my neck and I scrunched down like an accordion to let it pass harmlessly over my head, grinning.

"I am Casey Tibbs!" I sprung back up, leaping over his return swing and bouncing several steps away into the center of the deck, crossing my arms over my chest, grinning as I proudly proclaimed, "And I am a Gelatin Man! Jelly Rain!"

With that declaration, I spun in place quickly, turning into a blue blur as I let fragments of myself fly off like little bullets. I couldn't aim them worth a damn, but the tight little bouncy masses flew off of me like rain, little bits of my mass hurtling out and ricocheting around the ship. I reabsorbed any that bounced back to me, but the marble sized masses of the bouncy material knocked chips off of the wood and bruised and drew blood as they bounced between the enemies, the deck, and the ship itself.

There where screams and shouts of pain even as a few more bullets lodged uselessly in my mass. Some parried the blue bullets, but many were injured by the flying masses.

"Damnit! The other ship's closing–!" The captain snapped before he leapt straight through the hail of blue bullets and swung his leg straight into my side, scattering me across the deck, "Get lost!"

'Damnit!' It didn't hurt, but it took me a few moments to re-orient myself and start to pull myself back together. The bullets I'd released splattering and stopping their bouncing without my 'flexing' of them, hanging uselessly against the railings and deck before they started to roll back towards myself.

From my position as a pair of big blue splatters on the deck, I had a surprisingly good view of the ensuing fight, if it could be called that.

One moment, the enemies were gathering themselves at the railing, swords and pistols drawn. Their Captain's black labcoat fluttering in the sea breeze as he raised his empty fists as over seven foot of bulky muscle prepared to fight.

The next there was a flash of dark brown within a foot of their captain as the leather of Florida's coat settled, the stitched pirates captain recoiling in surprise, "What-?!"

A flash of gunmetal gray in Florida's arm, "Asserting Authoritay."

*boom!*

There was a crack as the smaller man backhanded their Captain, sending him flying across the deck and through the wall of the cabin, his tri-corner hat hanging briefly in the air before drifting slowly down into Florida's outstretched hand. The rest of the crew gaped as the young man turned the hat over a few times, "Ah, nice felt." Plucking the feather off of it he swept his hood off and settled the black and gold hat atop his spiky brown hair.

"Captain Stein!" the stitched crew shouted as one.

"Y-You bastard!" The swordsman that had cut me in half, only a bit taller than Florida's own five foot eight, charged forward, saber lifting high, "Bone Saw–!"

"Jowls!"

Captain Bonney's boot buried itself in the man's stitched up face for just an instant before he went flying off of the deck. She dropped to the deck and flipped her hair over her shoulder, "You need to watch yourself better Ironhide."

There was a crack of a shot, and one of the stitched crew members dropped as part of their head disappeared. Probably Lucca's work.

"Says the woman who's standing beside me that isn't bulletproof," the shorter man noted casually as he drew two revolvers, immediately unloading a pair of bullets into the torsos of two of the stitched pirates even as Captain Bonney ducked behind him, letting a bullet aimed at her bounce off his suddenly metallic clothing.

"Shut up and fight!" She snapped as she lunged into combat.

And then the familiar shout, "For glory!" Wallace, beard fluttering, shouted as he swung over, his huge sword in hand. The kilt-wearing man was quickly followed by Jaime, Daniel, and Lucca.

Wallace charged forward, swinging his massive two handed sword in a figure eight, batting aside the smaller blades of the gathering of stitched pirates and cleaving them open, Lucca rushing behind him with pistols drawn and firing at the stitched crew members with ranged weapons of their own, covering his partner.

While Wallace's curly brown hair flew wildly about as he fought with his berserker fury, Lucca was smiling, his hair pulled back by his yellow headband, making a black mass atop his head that always reminded me of a piece of broccoli.

Daniel, impeccably dressed with his red and gold pirates coat was a whirlwind of steel, his saber dancing about as he fired his pistol.

Jaime danced at the edges of the crowd, his rapier lashing forward and cutting through the stitched pirates one at a time, diving past their raised swords and hammers, cutting deep X's into their chests.

While the others weren't immeasurably stronger than the stitched pirates, with Bonney and Florida zipping around the deck of the ship, there was little chance of anyone with power being able to threaten them.

"You–!" the stitched pirates captain smashed out of the cabin, kicking his way through the door and raising his fists, "I won't let you hurt my creations!"

Sparks flew from the bolts on either side of his neck, Bonney raised her leg and Florida pointed his gun.

But this one was mine.

As a mass, I bounced myself off of the deck and enveloped the seven foot mass of pirate captain, "Wha–?!"

"Let me show you the power of gelatin!" I shouted, squeezing myself around him.

He made a muffled noise as he struggled, swiping his arms and trying to claw me off, but I just kept pulling myself tightly around his head, reforming my own atop the mass that enveloped his head and shoulders, "Gyihihihihi!" The stitched man shouted, sending useless noise vibrating through me as I suffocated him, his hands clawing at me uselessly, "You can't stand before my Ability!"

"Casey."

I turned my head all the way around, finding Florida looking up at me as the stitched captain struggled, stumbling about, "What?"

From the looks of things, the deck had been cleared, the others moving to enter the ships hold. Florida raised his pistol smoothly and put a bullet through me and into the stitched Captain's head. The mountain of a man stiffened before dropping. I stiffened even as my mass splattered a bit when the stitched captain hit the deck, "Hey!"

But the look on Florida's face wasn't his usual teasing or that small, closed lip smile he usually wore. It was an empty, hard look, and I swallowed.

"Don't toy with enemies," he holstered one of the pistols and popped out the cylinder for the other, slowly reloading it, "It's a good way to get yourself or your allies killed."

"Ah… Right." I pulled myself back together in a literal sense, reforming as I stepped away from the now dead man, "I was just happy to get to use my powers…"

"Save that for when you don't have allies that could be hurt," Florida said simply, though not harshly, popping the cylinder back into place with a flick of his wrist.

"Will do," I said, accepting the criticism.

"Also?"

"Yea-Ow!"

I winced, covering the top of my head as my hat popped back into shape after he'd bopped me with the butt of his pistol. I scowled up at him as he said, "Remember to doooooodge."

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Interlude 3 End