The atmosphere aboard the ship was one of anxiety, though none of the crew actually voiced their concerns. Liliana could feel their fear in the air. She tried her best to ignore it, however, as her mind was cluttered with other thoughts. The setting sun gleamed orange from the sea's horizon as she stepped into the captain's cabin.
She found her sister stretched out on her back in the hammock at the back of the room, frowning as she scanned maps and charts of the area. Sitting on her bare hip was a brightly colored parrot, dipping its head to pick a mouthful of the seeds that filled Morgana's deep navel. Each time he dug deep enough into the food, Morgana's stomach would involuntarily twitch as his beak brushed the sides or bottom of her innie.
“What can I do for you, Lil?” she asked, never taking her eyes off the charts.
Liliana shifted awkwardly, almost afraid to ask her sister for what she came for, though she wasn't really sure why. “Do you still have much of that body oil left?”
At this, Morgana turned and eyed her younger sister over the top of the parchments. A slight smirk crossed her face. “Yeah, I have plenty. What for? You planning on seducing your admirer tonight?”
Liliana shrugged, blushing a little. “Well, it's just that... You know, if you don't need me for anything else tonight, I though...”
Morgana chuckled, causing her belly to shake for a moment; her parrot squawked and fluttered his wings in agitation, but went back to his navel seed without a fuss. “Baby sister, I don't think you really need to seduce him, he's pretty much head over heels for you, and he's incredibly bad at hiding it.”
Liliana managed to smile. “Well, it can't really hurt, then.”
Morgana laughed again and stretched, pulling her stomach in slightly. “Fair enough. Bottle's on the table, have fun.”
Liliana quickly thanked her sister, snatched the oil from the table and ran back out on deck. Morgana started to pull her hat down over her eyes, dropping the charts to the floor, when she felt something sharp suddenly stab the bottom of her navel. She let out a squeak of shock and pain and glared down at the parrot. “Seed's gone, you little bastard!”
Her parrot merely squawked again and flew off to its perch. She continued to glare at him as she used her finger to brush the excess seed crumbs from her belly button, then pulled her hat down again.
***
The last orange rays of the sun were barely visible in the sky when Liliana found Richard tying up the rigging tight. Most of the crew had disappeared below deck for the night, leaving three or four left for the night shift. Richard wasn't a particularly high-ranking crew member—barely above cabin boy, really—but he certainly never complained.
“Hi, Richard!” she called, hooking her thumbs at the waist of her trousers, pulling them down slightly to show a tad more of her lower tummy. He turned his dark eyes to her and immediately got flustered.
“Oh! Um... Hi, Liliana! Er, how are you tonight?” Richard inwardly cursed himself for not coming up with something less generic to say. He was also trying his hardest to keep his eyes on her face and not her middle. She did not make it easy for him, as she took a deep breath of the salty night air, causing her ribs to expand and her petite, tight stomach to pull itself in and flatten. Her belly chain glittered in the fading sun as her midriff moved.
“Just enjoying the sea,” she said casually as she exhaled. Richard went back to the rigging to keep himself busy and to prevent an awkward silence from descending on them. Liliana slowly rubbed a hand down her bare stomach then, driving Richard crazy in the process. “Only problem is the salty air keeps drying out my skin. Hope you don't mind me doing this.” She uncorked the bottle of oil and poured some into her palm, then began to lather it on her midsection.
Richard fumbled with the ropes at the sudden attention brought to her belly, and Liliana bit her lip to keep herself from giggling. “Uh, no, of course, I don't mind,” he blurted out, trying to keep his composure.
“So, you enjoy being aboard this ship?” Liliana asked nonchalantly, glancing up at him as she massaged the oil into her belly skin, giving her stomach a sheen like her sister's.
“Oh yeah, you and your sister have a... very great crew.” He swallowed hard, unable to keep his eyes off Liliana's shining tummy.
“Hey, if your just about done with that rigging, do you think you can give me a hand? I always have trouble getting this stuff to soak into my belly button...”
Richard almost fell overboard at the sound of the question, struck speechless for a few moments. She looked up at him when he didn't answer and said, “I mean, I understand if you—”
“No, no!” he said suddenly, perhaps a little too loudly. He inwardly cursed himself again. “I mean, it's fine.” Swallowing again, he stepped up to her as she handed him the bottle. He dropped a bit of oil onto his shaky finger and moved it toward her shallow innie.
“I think it works best if you swirl it in with little circles,” she said softly, smiling warmly at him. He nodded, almost breathless, and pressed his oiled finger into her navel. She inhaled sharply, pulling her stomach in and making it concave. “Sorry, just a little sensitive there,” she giggled.
“Perfectly fine,” Richard managed to breathe. He took hold of her hip with his free hand—not tightly, but enough to keep her still—and swirled the finger of his other hand around in her belly button. He was amazed at how soft her skin felt, both on her belly and inside her navel. He slowly massaged her innie for a while, beyond the point where the oil was soaked into her flesh. Realizing how mesmerized he had gotten, he awkwardly cleared his throat and his cheeks flushed with color. “Well, hope that should help,” he said, standing up and removing his finger.
Before he turned to go, however, Liliana took his hand in her own and pressed the tip of his finger back into her belly button. Richard simply stood there, shocked, as she pushed his finger into her own navel. As she did so, she never took her eyes off of Richard's. They stared at each other for a long moment in the dark, her hands wrapped around his and his finger inserted into her navel, and slowly their faces moved toward each other, and their lips finally met.
***
Morgana slept soundly in her cabin, rocked to sleep by the waves lulling the ship to and fro. Above her, a tiny droplet of water squeezed its way between the planks of wood on the deck and reformed on the ceiling. It stretched down almost to its breaking point and hung in space for a moment, then fell at last, landing squarely inside Morgana's belly button. It was not enough to wake her, but her brow furrowed in agitation in her sleep, and she unconsciously pulled her stomach in a bit.
Another drop of water fell from the same spot, and another after that, and another, each pooling inside Morgana's navel and causing her to suck her stomach more and more until she could suck it in no farther. One more drop finally made her eyes flutter open and she lifted her hat. “Is it raining?” she asked to no one in particular, watching another drop fall from her cabin's ceiling and onto her midriff.
Rolling off of her hammock and standing, letting the pooled water roll down her lower belly, Morgana opened the door to find the her ship in the middle of a heavy rainstorm. “Where did this storm come from?” she shouted over the wind to the helmsman.
“Out of nowhere!” he yelled back. “This is a bad omen, Captain! I knew these waters were dangerous!”
“That's superstitious nonsense!” she barked. “If you're too afraid to drive us through a little rain to the island, get below deck and give me the helm!”
The man hesitated for a moment, then said, “All yours, Captain!” and hurried below deck.
“Coward,” Morgana muttered under her breath, taking hold of the helm. She had to admit, she wasn't entirely upset: she thoroughly enjoyed the feeling of the cold rain spraying against her bare stomach, it was one of the primary reasons she always showed it. There was something incredibly invigorating about exposing her soft belly to the elements, as if daring the forces of nature to challenge her by proudly baring one of her most vulnerable spots to it.
Morgana was still enjoying the freezing rain on her goose-bumped belly, trails of water running in and out of her navel, when the ship suddenly lurched violently. “Did we just hit something?” she demanded.
“CAPTAIN!” came a ragged, fearful voice from above. She looked up, barely able to see the man up in the crow's nest through the sheets of rain. Whatever information he was going to relay to her never reached her ears, however, as something massive rose out of the sea next to the vessel.
It was beyond gargantuan. The serpentine beast erupted from the depths of the sea, its yellow eyes alight in the dark. From its silhouette, Morgana saw two large fins adorning the sides of its head, and a mass of long, thick tentacles covered in suckers surrounded a leech-like mouth of razor sharp teeth. It let out a bloodcurdling, garbled roar that could easily be heard over the storm.
“WAKE THE CREW!” Morgana screamed at the nearest pirate, who sprinted below deck.
“To arms! TO ARMS!” he called as he ran at full speed through the bowels of the ship, shoving men and women out of their hammocks.
In the lower levels, Liliana was curled up against Richard, his hand resting on her soft tummy, one finger still in her navel. They both groggily blinked the sleep from their eyes as the thunder of feet above them scrambled for muskets, pistols and swords. “What's going—?”
Richard's question was immediately drowned out as a massive tentacle punched through the hull above them, snapping a support rafter in half. Liliana shrieked as the jagged piece of wood dropped toward them, the splintered and pointed end heading straight for her bare belly. She pulled her stomach in as far as she could as a reaction, which ended up saving her life. The beam stopped just short of her incredibly concave belly, the jagged wood mere inches from her skin.
She laid there for a long moment, stunned, holding her stomach in, before Richard helped her slide out from under the beam. She quickly thanked him, giving him a quick peck on the lips, then hurried off to the fight, Richard at her heels. Liliana unsheathed her preferred longsword as she sprinted up to the rain-soaked deck and into the scene of a nightmare.
The sea monster was in the process of snapping the mast in half, several thick tentacles squeezing the pole into splinters. Near the helm, Morgana had managed to hack off the end of one of the monster's tentacles, coaxing a howl of pain from its mouth. A second tendril wrapped around her ankle, however, lifting her high into the air and near the beast's face. Its cold yellow eyes regarded her with a mix of interest and hunger, and another tentacle coiled itself around her waist. Morgana tried pulling her stomach in, though she knew it wouldn't solve anything. The tendril squeezed tight, a large sucker planting itself right over her deep navel, coating her bare midriff with some kind of slimy mucus.
On the deck, her sister Liliana was facing a similar crisis. She was backing away from a tentacle, firing a shot from her pistol, when she tripped and fell back over a body; whether it was dead or not, she couldn't tell. The tentacle circled around her waist as well, but did not squeeze right away. Liliana could feel the cold, slimy limb on her back, but it hesitated above her stomach, hovering over her. A large drop of greenish-yellow slime stretched from the tentacle, reaching down to her belly button. She sucked her stomach in as well, keeping the drop of mucus from reaching her tummy, but the tentacle suddenly tightened its grip around her, thick slime drenching her stomach and belly chain.
“Liliana!” Richard called in despair as she was lifted up with her sister. His mind raced, looking around as panicked crew members ran toward and away from the leviathan, dying and fighting and escaping. He looked up to the crow's nest atop the main mast, which was somehow untouched by the monster, and an idea sparked in his head. Sword in hand, he jumped up to the rigging and began to climb.
Morgana and Liliana slashed and stabbed at the large tendrils holding them, but their efforts only seemed to enrage the beast further. Its tentacles spread apart, revealing the circular rows of teeth, and both girls screamed. It removed the tentacle around Morgana's waist, holding her instead by her ankle again, and brought her close to its mouth. A long, thin tongue wriggled from the rings of teeth, approaching Morgana's bare, slime-covered stomach. She yelped in fear and surprise as the tongue slithered into her navel at the center of her concave belly, savoring the taste of her belly button.
A pistol shot rang through the air then, piercing one of the monster's large yellow eyes. An ear-piercing roar almost deafened Morgana, and in its rage and pain, the leviathan hurled both girls away, sending them crashing to the deck.
Richard was atop the mast, smoke still billowing from the barrel of his gun. An angry tentacle lashed out at the mast, wrapping around it and squeezing, causing it to snap with almost no effort. “Richard!” Liliana screamed as she watched her beloved fall with the top of the mast. Just before it reached the monster's awful mouth, he leaped away and into the ocean. Before the monster could catch it, the broken mast fell into its mouth and pierced the back of its skull. Roaring in its death throes, the sea behemoth thrashed around, wild tentacles slamming on the deck and causing Morgana, Liliana and several other crew members to roll and duck for cover. At last, the beast fell back, its one remaining eye rolling back into its skull, and with a mighty crash disappeared beneath the waves.
The remaining men and women aboard the ship slowly got to their feet, some in shock, others testing their parts for injuries. Morgana let out a loud, “Blech!” and tried to wipe the mucus from her belly and navel, hoping the rain would help wash it away. Liliana, while also disgusted with her slimy midriff, ignored it and ran to the side of the boat, searching the water desperately. “Richard!” she called weakly, fear entering her voice.
A wet thud sounded behind her, and she whirled around to see Richard flop onto the deck, out of breath, but otherwise unharmed! Delighted, she ran over to him and knelt above him. “Are you okay?”
Richard laughed breathlessly. “Just fine. You?” His hand reached up and brushed her navel as he asked, though he was unpleasantly surprised to pull it away covered in mucus.
Liliana giggled. “Slimed, but okay,” she said, kissing his forehead.
“Dammit, Morgana!” shouted one of the other men angrily. “Didn't we tell you this was a fool's errand? Did we all say how needlessly dangerous this would be?!”
“All things considered, I'd say that went extremely well,” Morgana snapped back, wiping the last of the monster's slime from her belly. “Would you rather have us sit on our hands in Tortuga while our food and supplies diminish and our wages disappear?”
“There are far better and safer ways to make a coin, and you know it, Captain! You repeatedly and knowingly lead us straight into the most dangerous waters and lands, and expect us to be grateful!”
Morgana marched right up to the man, staring up at his face. “You don't like the way I captain this ship, you can leave. I didn't force you onto this boat, you came yourself,” she whispered in a dangerous voice. “That goes for all of you!” she said loudly. “Now, if you're all quite finished bellyaching,” she shot a glare at the man,
“I believe our destination is in sight.”
Sure enough, as the rain died down and the first rays of the morning sun pierced the clouds, an island appeared just on the horizon. “I have work to do before we reach shore. Return to your posts,” Morgana ordered. She then walked up to Liliana and Richard, saying, “Nice job, Richard. I owe you one.”
Richard had rarely gained his captain's attention at all over the years, let alone her praise, and was shocked when she offered her hand to him. “No problem, Captain,” he said, unable to hide the smile on his face as he accepted her help to his feet.
“Just treat my baby sister right, or I'll forget all about that debt,” she whispered, though she smiled as she said it. He gulped loudly, and Liliana couldn't contain her laughter.
She found her sister stretched out on her back in the hammock at the back of the room, frowning as she scanned maps and charts of the area. Sitting on her bare hip was a brightly colored parrot, dipping its head to pick a mouthful of the seeds that filled Morgana's deep navel. Each time he dug deep enough into the food, Morgana's stomach would involuntarily twitch as his beak brushed the sides or bottom of her innie.
“What can I do for you, Lil?” she asked, never taking her eyes off the charts.
Liliana shifted awkwardly, almost afraid to ask her sister for what she came for, though she wasn't really sure why. “Do you still have much of that body oil left?”
At this, Morgana turned and eyed her younger sister over the top of the parchments. A slight smirk crossed her face. “Yeah, I have plenty. What for? You planning on seducing your admirer tonight?”
Liliana shrugged, blushing a little. “Well, it's just that... You know, if you don't need me for anything else tonight, I though...”
Morgana chuckled, causing her belly to shake for a moment; her parrot squawked and fluttered his wings in agitation, but went back to his navel seed without a fuss. “Baby sister, I don't think you really need to seduce him, he's pretty much head over heels for you, and he's incredibly bad at hiding it.”
Liliana managed to smile. “Well, it can't really hurt, then.”
Morgana laughed again and stretched, pulling her stomach in slightly. “Fair enough. Bottle's on the table, have fun.”
Liliana quickly thanked her sister, snatched the oil from the table and ran back out on deck. Morgana started to pull her hat down over her eyes, dropping the charts to the floor, when she felt something sharp suddenly stab the bottom of her navel. She let out a squeak of shock and pain and glared down at the parrot. “Seed's gone, you little bastard!”
Her parrot merely squawked again and flew off to its perch. She continued to glare at him as she used her finger to brush the excess seed crumbs from her belly button, then pulled her hat down again.
***
The last orange rays of the sun were barely visible in the sky when Liliana found Richard tying up the rigging tight. Most of the crew had disappeared below deck for the night, leaving three or four left for the night shift. Richard wasn't a particularly high-ranking crew member—barely above cabin boy, really—but he certainly never complained.
“Hi, Richard!” she called, hooking her thumbs at the waist of her trousers, pulling them down slightly to show a tad more of her lower tummy. He turned his dark eyes to her and immediately got flustered.
“Oh! Um... Hi, Liliana! Er, how are you tonight?” Richard inwardly cursed himself for not coming up with something less generic to say. He was also trying his hardest to keep his eyes on her face and not her middle. She did not make it easy for him, as she took a deep breath of the salty night air, causing her ribs to expand and her petite, tight stomach to pull itself in and flatten. Her belly chain glittered in the fading sun as her midriff moved.
“Just enjoying the sea,” she said casually as she exhaled. Richard went back to the rigging to keep himself busy and to prevent an awkward silence from descending on them. Liliana slowly rubbed a hand down her bare stomach then, driving Richard crazy in the process. “Only problem is the salty air keeps drying out my skin. Hope you don't mind me doing this.” She uncorked the bottle of oil and poured some into her palm, then began to lather it on her midsection.
Richard fumbled with the ropes at the sudden attention brought to her belly, and Liliana bit her lip to keep herself from giggling. “Uh, no, of course, I don't mind,” he blurted out, trying to keep his composure.
“So, you enjoy being aboard this ship?” Liliana asked nonchalantly, glancing up at him as she massaged the oil into her belly skin, giving her stomach a sheen like her sister's.
“Oh yeah, you and your sister have a... very great crew.” He swallowed hard, unable to keep his eyes off Liliana's shining tummy.
“Hey, if your just about done with that rigging, do you think you can give me a hand? I always have trouble getting this stuff to soak into my belly button...”
Richard almost fell overboard at the sound of the question, struck speechless for a few moments. She looked up at him when he didn't answer and said, “I mean, I understand if you—”
“No, no!” he said suddenly, perhaps a little too loudly. He inwardly cursed himself again. “I mean, it's fine.” Swallowing again, he stepped up to her as she handed him the bottle. He dropped a bit of oil onto his shaky finger and moved it toward her shallow innie.
“I think it works best if you swirl it in with little circles,” she said softly, smiling warmly at him. He nodded, almost breathless, and pressed his oiled finger into her navel. She inhaled sharply, pulling her stomach in and making it concave. “Sorry, just a little sensitive there,” she giggled.
“Perfectly fine,” Richard managed to breathe. He took hold of her hip with his free hand—not tightly, but enough to keep her still—and swirled the finger of his other hand around in her belly button. He was amazed at how soft her skin felt, both on her belly and inside her navel. He slowly massaged her innie for a while, beyond the point where the oil was soaked into her flesh. Realizing how mesmerized he had gotten, he awkwardly cleared his throat and his cheeks flushed with color. “Well, hope that should help,” he said, standing up and removing his finger.
Before he turned to go, however, Liliana took his hand in her own and pressed the tip of his finger back into her belly button. Richard simply stood there, shocked, as she pushed his finger into her own navel. As she did so, she never took her eyes off of Richard's. They stared at each other for a long moment in the dark, her hands wrapped around his and his finger inserted into her navel, and slowly their faces moved toward each other, and their lips finally met.
***
Morgana slept soundly in her cabin, rocked to sleep by the waves lulling the ship to and fro. Above her, a tiny droplet of water squeezed its way between the planks of wood on the deck and reformed on the ceiling. It stretched down almost to its breaking point and hung in space for a moment, then fell at last, landing squarely inside Morgana's belly button. It was not enough to wake her, but her brow furrowed in agitation in her sleep, and she unconsciously pulled her stomach in a bit.
Another drop of water fell from the same spot, and another after that, and another, each pooling inside Morgana's navel and causing her to suck her stomach more and more until she could suck it in no farther. One more drop finally made her eyes flutter open and she lifted her hat. “Is it raining?” she asked to no one in particular, watching another drop fall from her cabin's ceiling and onto her midriff.
Rolling off of her hammock and standing, letting the pooled water roll down her lower belly, Morgana opened the door to find the her ship in the middle of a heavy rainstorm. “Where did this storm come from?” she shouted over the wind to the helmsman.
“Out of nowhere!” he yelled back. “This is a bad omen, Captain! I knew these waters were dangerous!”
“That's superstitious nonsense!” she barked. “If you're too afraid to drive us through a little rain to the island, get below deck and give me the helm!”
The man hesitated for a moment, then said, “All yours, Captain!” and hurried below deck.
“Coward,” Morgana muttered under her breath, taking hold of the helm. She had to admit, she wasn't entirely upset: she thoroughly enjoyed the feeling of the cold rain spraying against her bare stomach, it was one of the primary reasons she always showed it. There was something incredibly invigorating about exposing her soft belly to the elements, as if daring the forces of nature to challenge her by proudly baring one of her most vulnerable spots to it.
Morgana was still enjoying the freezing rain on her goose-bumped belly, trails of water running in and out of her navel, when the ship suddenly lurched violently. “Did we just hit something?” she demanded.
“CAPTAIN!” came a ragged, fearful voice from above. She looked up, barely able to see the man up in the crow's nest through the sheets of rain. Whatever information he was going to relay to her never reached her ears, however, as something massive rose out of the sea next to the vessel.
It was beyond gargantuan. The serpentine beast erupted from the depths of the sea, its yellow eyes alight in the dark. From its silhouette, Morgana saw two large fins adorning the sides of its head, and a mass of long, thick tentacles covered in suckers surrounded a leech-like mouth of razor sharp teeth. It let out a bloodcurdling, garbled roar that could easily be heard over the storm.
“WAKE THE CREW!” Morgana screamed at the nearest pirate, who sprinted below deck.
“To arms! TO ARMS!” he called as he ran at full speed through the bowels of the ship, shoving men and women out of their hammocks.
In the lower levels, Liliana was curled up against Richard, his hand resting on her soft tummy, one finger still in her navel. They both groggily bl
Richard's question was immediately drowned out as a massive tentacle punched through the hull above them, snapping a support rafter in half. Liliana shrieked as the jagged piece of wood dropped toward them, the splintered and pointed end heading straight for her bare belly. She pulled her stomach in as far as she could as a reaction, which ended up saving her life. The beam stopped just short of her incredibly concave belly, the jagged wood mere inches from her skin.
She laid there for a long moment, stunned, holding her stomach in, before Richard helped her slide out from under the beam. She quickly thanked him, giving him a quick peck on the lips, then hurried off to the fight, Richard at her heels. Liliana unsheathed her preferred longsword as she sprinted up to the rain-soaked deck and into the scene of a nightmare.
The sea monster was in the process of snapping the mast in half, several thick tentacles squeezing the pole into splinters. Near the helm, Morgana had managed to hack off the end of one of the monster's tentacles, coaxing a howl of pain from its mouth. A second tendril wrapped around her ankle, however, lifting her high into the air and near the beast's face. Its cold yellow eyes regarded her with a mix of interest and hunger, and another tentacle coiled itself around her waist. Morgana tried pulling her stomach in, though she knew it wouldn't solve anything. The tendril squeezed tight, a large sucker planting itself right over her deep navel, coating her bare midriff with some kind of slimy mucus.
On the deck, her sister Liliana was facing a similar crisis. She was backing away from a tentacle, firing a shot from her pistol, when she tripped and fell back over a body; whether it was dead or not, she couldn't tell. The tentacle circled around her waist as well, but did not squeeze right away. Liliana could feel the cold, slimy limb on her back, but it hesitated above her stomach, hovering over her. A large drop of greenish-yellow slime stretched from the tentacle, reaching down to her belly button. She sucked her stomach in as well, keeping the drop of mucus from reaching her tummy, but the tentacle suddenly tightened its grip around her, thick slime drenching her stomach and belly chain.
“Liliana!” Richard called in despair as she was lifted up with her sister. His mind raced, looking around as panicked crew members ran toward and away from the leviathan, dying and fighting and escaping. He looked up to the crow's nest atop the main mast, which was somehow untouched by the monster, and an idea sparked in his head. Sword in hand, he jumped up to the rigging and began to climb.
Morgana and Liliana slashed and stabbed at the large tendrils holding them, but their efforts only seemed to enrage the beast further. Its tentacles spread apart, revealing the circular rows of teeth, and both girls screamed. It removed the tentacle around Morgana's waist, holding her instead by her ankle again, and brought her close to its mouth. A long, thin tongue wriggled from the rings of teeth, approaching Morgana's bare, slime-covered stomach. She yelped in fear and surprise as the tongue slithered into her navel at the center of her concave belly, savoring the taste of her belly button.
A pistol shot rang through the air then, piercing one of the monster's large yellow eyes. An ear-piercing roar almost deafened Morgana, and in its rage and pain, the leviathan hurled both girls away, sending them crashing to the deck.
Richard was atop the mast, smoke still billowing from the barrel of his gun. An angry tentacle lashed out at the mast, wrapping around it and squeezing, causing it to snap with almost no effort. “Richard!” Liliana screamed as she watched her beloved fall with the top of the mast. Just before it reached the monster's awful mouth, he leaped away and into the ocean. Before the monster could catch it, the broken mast fell into its mouth and pierced the back of its skull. Roaring in its death throes, the sea behemoth thrashed around, wild tentacles slamming on the deck and causing Morgana, Liliana and several other crew members to roll and duck for cover. At last, the beast fell back, its one remaining eye rolling back into its skull, and with a mighty crash disappeared beneath the waves.
The remaining men and women aboard the ship slowly got to their feet, some in shock, others testing their parts for injuries. Morgana let out a loud, “Blech!” and tried to wipe the mucus from her belly and navel, hoping the rain would help wash it away. Liliana, while also disgusted with her slimy midriff, ignored it and ran to the side of the boat, searching the water desperately. “Richard!” she called weakly, fear entering her voice.
A wet thud sounded behind her, and she whirled around to see Richard flop onto the deck, out of breath, but otherwise unharmed! Delighted, she ran over to him and knelt above him. “Are you okay?”
Richard laughed breathlessly. “Just fine. You?” His hand reached up and brushed her navel as he asked, though he was unpleasantly surprised to pull it away covered in mucus.
Liliana giggled. “Slimed, but okay,” she said, kissing his forehead.
“Dammit, Morgana!” shouted one of the other men angrily. “Didn't we tell you this was a fool's errand? Did we all say how needlessly dangerous this would be?!”
“All things considered, I'd say that went extremely well,” Morgana snapped back, wiping the last of the monster's slime from her belly. “Would you rather have us sit on our hands in Tortuga while our food and supplies diminish and our wages disappear?”
“There are far better and safer ways to make a coin, and you know it, Captain! You repeatedly and knowingly lead us straight into the most dangerous waters and lands, and expect us to be grateful!”
Morgana marched right up to the man, staring up at his face. “You don't like the way I captain this ship, you can leave. I didn't force you onto this boat, you came yourself,” she whispered in a dangerous voice. “That goes for all of you!” she said loudly. “Now, if you're all quite finished bellyaching,” she shot a glare at the man,
“I believe our destination is in sight.”
Sure enough, as the rain died down and the first rays of the morning sun pierced the clouds, an island appeared just on the horizon. “I have work to do before we reach shore. Return to your posts,” Morgana ordered. She then walked up to Liliana and Richard, saying, “Nice job, Richard. I owe you one.”
Richard had rarely gained his captain's attention at all over the years, let alone her praise, and was shocked when she offered her hand to him. “No problem, Captain,” he said, unable to hide the smile on his face as he accepted her help to his feet.
“Just treat my baby sister right, or I'll forget all about that debt,” she whispered, though she smiled as she said it. He gulped loudly, and Liliana couldn't contain her laughter.
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