Inklings, A story of Friendship
Tuesday 11 November 2008
Chapter Eleven…Under the command of Captain Jules!

 To Laura, yes sorry about the last chapter, I was trying to get everything settled. You are in it more but not for another chapter or so, you will see how it goes later on. No, no one is allowed to push RK in the pond, sorry, but he is under my special care because I have something MUCH better planned for him! Anyways, here is chapter eleven, it is about Leah, Jules, and Mark. All the rest of you have to wait for your chapter, sorry.
 P.S. I am trying to not make you out to be a girly girl Leah...I have a standard for girls in my books and I believe you have reached that. My standard is girls who can save themselves, but are not to proud to be rescued. So, if you scream in it at all it is only because I think anyone would scream in such sistations. Anyhow, enjoy!
 P.S.S. To the person with no blog, sorry about that, I give you permission to clobber me with a lage stick. That was rotten of me, I will try not to do that again :D
 My word count is now 42,648

Jules rest his fist on his hips and looked out over his crew, HIS crew. He grinned at the realization. This was his ship and they were his crew! At his side stood Leah, who had kept her position as first mate, Mark was about some where, Jules was still trying to find a good position for him.
“Where are we off to Cap’n?” a tall shinny man asked as he sauntered up to the main deck where Jules was standing.
Jules pushed his three cornered hat back and let the wind blow through his hair. Good question, he was new to this world was really was not sure what pirates did here, he supposed they looked for treasure like all pirates.
“You won’t happen to have a treasure map on you?” Jules finally asked.
The man grinned, revealing rows of missing teeth, the teeth he still had were black. “Eww,” Leah whispered and Jules had to agree.
“O’ course I do Cap’n! I am a pirate after all!” as he spoke the man yanked a roll of leather from his back pocket. This he handed to Jules with a bow.
Jules looked sideways at Leah, both thinking the same thing, how cliché! But neither said anything, one does not offended pirates after all, even if you were the captain. Jules moved over to a barrel and unrolled the map. 
Leah rested her hands on the edge of the barrel and looked at the map while Jules rubbed his chin and muttered things like, “Interesting, very interesting!”
“What is?” Leah asked.
“It seems the treasure is on a small island north of us, and it looks like it is close. The only problem is, if it is so close, why has no one ever sailed to it before?” Jules turned and looked at the man, directing his question to him.
The man grinned almost idiotically, and said, “Our Cap’n is a smart one he is!”
“Well,” Jules asked when the man paused. “Why has no one sailed to it?”
“They have Cap’n, and they all died; every last one of ‘em!” the man laughed, crazily.
“He is insane,” Leah whispered.
Jules looked at the man and then at Leah. “I would agree, if it were not for the fact we are in a book; that is being written by our characters.”
Leah smirked as Mark swung down from the rat lines and landing by his brother grinned widely. “Cool! No one EVER came back alive? Man that would be a great adventure! Are we going Jules?” he looked hopefully up at his brother as he spoke.
Jules looked at the man, then at Mark, then at Leah. Mark obviously wanted to go, the man seemed to care less, and Leah seemed content to follow Jules if he went or not. Jules finally shrugged his shoulders. “Aw why not, we are in a book after all, what is the worse that can happen?”
Leah grinned. He was right, what was the worse that could happen? After all no one every really died in books, because they were just made up! In the Inkling’s room they did not know their characters were grinning and laughing at their poor authors.
Jules turned to the man and was about to say something when he realized something rather, important. “What is your name?”
“Slim,” the man said with a grin.
Mar cocked his head to one side. “Not very pirate-ish if you ask me.”
“I didn’t,” the man said without blinking.
“I am sure our names aren’t very pirate-ish if you ask me,” Leah said.
Slim grinned wider.
Jules shrugged. “No matter, sail toward the island Slim,” he said with authority.
“Can’t” Slim said dryly.
Jules raised an eye brow. “How dare you tell your captain you can’t do something!” he tried to thunder. “Sail toward the island! Now!”
Slim grinned like a loon. “Can’t, I don’t know how to sail.”
Jules’s shoulders dropped. “Great, just great! Can anyone else sail?”
The man grinned. Jules, understandably, was getting annoyed with him. “Where is the rest of the crew?” Jules demanded.
“About,” the man answered lazily.
Jules drew his sword and pointed at the man. “Find them, or you will walk the plank!” he roared.
The man shrugged his shoulders and sauntered off without a word.
“I don’t think he was impressed,” Mark said as he moved away from Jules. Though he was not scared of Jules he was not about to take any unnecessary risks.
Jules moaned and rammed his sword into the deck. He was about to turn on his brother when a grin alighted his face. “Say Mark, you don’t have a task yet, how would you like to be helm’s man?”
Mark whooped and without another word raced up to the wheel and steered the ship to the north. The wind filled the sails and about removed Jules’s hat from his head. He clamped it tightly on with one hand as he sheathed his sword with the other.
Leah ran to the bow and let the wind play with her hair and she leaned out over the railing. This was exciting; she was aboard a pirate ship, sailing off on a grand adventure to find treasure! Nothing could get better then this, except a trip to Narnia.
Below, on the lower deck though, trouble was brewing like a pot of coffee. Already the crew was starting to doubt their young captain, and already there was a hint of mutiny in the air! And Slim was at the center of it.
Jules joined Leah at the bow of the ship. He stood beside her, arms crossed over his chest, trying to look commanding. The truth was he was not really sure what a captain should do when not plundering and digging for treasure. He turned and looked back at his crew, and was surprised to see some of the men approaching him.
They stopped in front of him and eyed him. Mark looked down at them from the helms and Leah turned and scowled at them.
“Cap’n,” one man said almost nervously.
Jules bit back a smile. The man was nervous, this was good; it meant Jules held a certain amount of fear with the men. “Yes?” Captain Jules snapped.
“Well Cap’n,” the man looked back at his comrades. “We, we are not too sure, about your decision, about going into the north, we heard there is an, an evil thing in the waters,” the man was stammering like mad as he spoke.
Jules looked up at Mark who grinned and then over at Leah who shook her head. He then looked back at the men. “Like sea monsters?” he finally asked.
“Aye Cap’n,” the man replied nervously.
“I don’t believe in sea monsters,” Jules said confidently with a toss of his head that nearly removed his hat from his head.
Slim laughed from down below, though it was a quiet laugh. “You will Cap’n, you will.”

Jason’s fingers froze. He looked at the screen and blinked several times. The other characters were milling about the room while Jason, George, and Galdorn wrote the scene for their authors. The plan was simple; each character got to write out the part for their authors, thus keeping another character from being mean to the wrong author.
However, the gallant Jason had come to a dead end. He looked side ways at the boy George and Galdorn. “Now what?” he asked.
Galdorn rubbed his chin ruefully. There was nothing he wanted to do more then have a sea monster pop up and eat all three authors then and there, but then there would be no tormenting which was half the fun. He looked sideways at George.
George looked at the screen and sighed. “This would be easier if Leah was not so nice most of the time.”
“She killed you by having a cheery tree fall on you, a LITTLE cheery tree,” Jason reminded the boy.
George’s face reddened when he remembered. “Put them in a storm,” he said with a scowl. “Storms are good, and I want to have Leah swept over board!” And for such a little boy he gave a loud evil laugh.

The clouds did not roll in, one moment there was blue sky and the next there was black clouds. Just like that. Jules clapped his hat onto his head and looked up at the clouds, he knew well enough that a storm was coming, no was already upon them.
Leah was running up to the helms deck and Jules raced after her, they joined Mark who was having a hard time steering the ship through the wild waves.
“How did it hit us all the sudden like that?” Leah asked as the wind whipped her hair wildly about.
“We are in a book remember?” Jules yelled above the wind.
“A book being written by our characters!” Mark yelled.
Jules looked up at the clouds and shaking his fist yelled, “When I get my hands on you Jason you are dead!”
A gust of wind drowned his words. Slim joined the three and after casting Jules an odd look asked lazily, “Orders Cap’n?”
“Drawn in the sails!” Jules said quickly, though he really was not sure what to do. “Have every man tie himself to the ship!”
Slim shrugged his shoulders and wandered off to deliver the news. Leah looked at the man and muttered, “Seeing as he is not real I hope he is swept over board!”
Mark laughed as Jules kicked off his shoes and raced to the rat lines, for this being his first time sailing he kept his footing on the slippery deck very well. Leah raced after him while Mark struggled to keep the ship above the waves that wanted to consume her, no easy feat to say the lest.
Jules reached the rat lines before Leah and began climbing up in them; Leah followed clinging to the wet ropes for dear life. Over head the sails snapped wildly in the wind, the crew seemed to have vanished somewhere and the three felt oddly alone.
Jules was not sure he would know how to bring a sail in, but he was not going to let the ship and crew, if there were even on board, go down to Davey Jones’ Locker without a fight.
Waves, taller then the ship, washed up over the deck and had he not been hanging on Jules would have been swept off the ship. Down below the waves did sweep Mark off his feet but the young man cling to the wheel and managed to keep aboard the wildly rocking ship.
Leah however, who was clinging just as desperately to the lines as Jules, suddenly heard a snap, and before she knew what had happened she found herself at the mercy of the waves, which were not very merciful. She might have drown then had not Jules looked back and saw her go over.
He was about to go after her when the snap of the sails reminded him of why he was up there. “Mark!” he screamed above the thunder, wind and waves.
Mark only faintly heard his brother’s voice, but he looked up and saw Jules pointing at the ocean. Looking Mark gasped when he saw Leah in the waves. Giving up with the helms Mark grabbed a rope and raced to the side of the ship while Jules returned to battle the sail.
While Mark tired one end of the rope about the railing and the other about his midsection Leah struggled to keep afloat as nasty sea water, which tasted even worse then real sea water, filled her mouth. She tried to spit it out, but that did not work at all.
Another wave washed over both Leah and the ship. Jules was knocked over and would have fallen had not his foot caught in the rat lines, he found himself trapped, hanging upside down as the waves beat against him. Mark did not have a chance to dive over the ship, a wave swept him over and out to sea and when the rope suddenly went tight the breath was knocked out of him and for the first time all three feared they had failed and that they were now going to die in a book.

George stopped writing. Galdorn nearly fell out of his seat and Jason moaned. “I can’t do it,” George groaned. “Poor Leah!”
Jason ran his hands through his hair and whispered, “Cheery tree death!”
George said nothing, but he did start writing again.

Jules, with much work, managed to grab the rope again. Fighting both waves and wind he pulled himself up and once more set to work at pulling the sail in.
Below Mark had caught his breath and was fighting his way to Leah’s side and she fought to keep afloat. Lightening lit up the sky, striking dangerously close to the struggling pirates. Jules was certain a bolt was going to hit the ship and blast it to a million pieces, living them at the mercy of the ocean.
Mark was now ten feet from Leah, and she was now trying to swim toward him, but this was almost a useless attempt that did nothing more then tire her out. By the time Mark was able to reach her both were so worn out they did not think they would be able to get back to the ship.
Jules had by then reached the sail and was fighting it as he tried to draw it in. With every attempt the sail would slap him and he would almost loose his grip on the ropes. One time he nearly did fall, and in a desperate attempt to save himself he grabbed the sail, and managed to pull it in where he quickly secured it.
He then made his way to the deck and did his best to pull his brother and first mate it. No sooner were all three safe on board then the storm stopped, just like the storm in the Bible. For a long while the three of them lay on the deck, too tired to stand. Finally Jules sat up.
“This is insane!” he muttered as he removed his hat which had managed to not be knocked off in the storm.
“Why are they doing this to us? Doesn’t it seem a little vengeful; I mean all we did was kill them…” Leah’s voice trailed off.
Mark moaned. “We are done for!” he muttered. “Galdorn is not the forgiving type.”
“Neither is Jason,” Jules said as he stood up.
“George,” Leah lowered her head as she spoke. “I never thought George had it in him.”
“Well, being killed by a little cherry tree isn’t very, gallant, kind of an embarrassing death if you ask me,” Mark said as he stumbled to his feet.
Leah shoved her hair out of her face. “True I suppose.”
Jules and Mark offered her a hand up and pulled her to her feet. They then looked out over the ocean and said nothing for awhile. “Do you suppose we can say we are sorry and they will let us go back?” Leah finally asked though she was not at all scared.
“I doubt it,” Jules muttered. “They mean to make us stick this out I am guessing.”
“And to think, I actually created the guy!” Mark looked up at the sky and scowled.
“Well, what should we do?” Leah asked after a pause.
“We sail on toward the treasure I guess,” Jules said thoughtfully. “Maybe along the way we will find the villain and can stop him, and get out of this!”
“How can we just kill him though, that is a little, cruel,” the brothers looked at Leah as she spoke. They had not considered this. It was one thing writing death scenes for people who were not real; it was another matter actually having to kill someone just like that.
“We will deal with him when we meet him,” Jules said after a long pause. “Right now I think the only thing we can do is sail on.”
Mark made his way back to the wheel, his wet pants wrapping about his legs and making walking hard. Leah set to work wringing out her dress while Jules looked toward the north. He was starting to think the characters had gone insane, this by far passed anything that had ever happened to an author before, and he was sure of it. Holding a sword to an author’s back was one thing, trying to kill them in a book was another thing all together.
While Jules was thinking about this Slim appeared on deck and wandered over to Jules, the other pirates who had also appeared; stood behind him and watched.
“Where on earth were you?” Jules demanded as the man stopped before him.
“Not on earth,” Slim said with that annoying grin of his.
Jules let the comment pass. “We could have used you here you know.”
“Ye are still alive Cap’n, no need to fear,” Slim grinned widely.
 Jules looked passed the grinning man and at the other pirates who were shifting their feet and glancing from Jules to Mark to Leah. The three returned their looks undaunted. Slim locked gazes with Mark as though wanting to send him a message with his look.
Jules glanced from the crazy man to his brother and watched as Mark’s face changed. Behind Slim the pirates were grinning more and more widely, and Jules had a feeling mutiny was in the air. Little did he know there was also the hint of a duel.

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Comments

Tuesday 11 November 2008 - Untitled Comment
I knew George didn't hate me! Very good, and I'm glad you didn't make me sound like a damsel in distress! It's going great and I can't wait for you to post more!

Your favorite Cookie-Baking Screaming Banchie Pirate,
Lemony Snicket
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Tuesday 11 November 2008 - Untitled Comment
I LOVE IT!!!!!!!!! Slim's creepy, though. . . . And I don't know if I'd let Mark take the helm. It'd go to his head.
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