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Jim was always fascinated with pirates. He was always infatuated with the rebellion, the adventures, and the hunger for endless riches. After decades of specializing in American and Caribbean history, his focus on Blackbeard and Long John Silver’s stories particularly fascinated him. In the bright and early seascape on the Caribbean Sea not too far from the Bermuda Triangle, Jim is on a trip to the Caribbean with a marine treasure search crew. He’s asked to go diving with Jerrod, the leader of the marine crew. He’s just as eccentric and daring as you’d picture him. An adrenaline junkie, but with a penchant for artifacts and adventure.
Jim has spent far too long in his stuffy office of the History department at his University. After his honourable discharge after years of service in the Marine Corps graduating in History at his military college, he got a cushy job working as a historian for over the past 13 years. “Are you ready Jim?” says Jerrod in a gruff voice, as he strokes his beard, with a large diagonal scar trailing underneath it.
“What happened to you there?” Points Jim at his neck where the scar is, unable to avoid the clear scar that caused him a bit of concern before diving. “It was a 500-pound Marlin, jumped out and stabbed me in the neck about 10 years back. Had about 37 stitches. It was ugly. Almost lost my voice.” Jerrod laughs haggardly, knowing he can laugh about it now.
Jim took a moment to meditate on this insane story, knowing to steer clear of the predators in the deep. “Alright. Let’s go. Final O2 check.” Jim’s and Jerrod turn each others’ oxygen tanks on as they breathe into it before the flop ever so quietly into the beautiful blue water, with only their fins making a gentle splash. The sky could not be clearer today. As they advance slowly towards the shallow seafloor, Jerrod signals pointing downward to get below a cave. They slowly swim downward, about 100 meters downward, almost touching the seafloor as Jerrod strays from their path, the corral cave formed from an old shipwreck, attached to it, with calcification claiming the large metal boat as the sea’s own.
As Jerrod seems to have strayed much further away from the seafloor, Jim continues advancing into the bleak and massive cave, the calm clear blue fading into the inky pitch black. Wait…that WAS ink! Oh It’s a massive amount of ink! Must be a squid nearby, but I wonder if it was running away from a shark? As Jim contemplates the activity of the mysterious crustacean, he feels a tug, something wrapped around his right leg, feels like massive suctions have just gotten ahold of him. Jim struggles to pull out his carbon knife, he knows exactly what got ahold of him. As he tries to fight off the large animal, the squid continues to wrap two more of its tentacles around his left arm and face, as he’s about to have his oxygen rebreather pulled off of his face!
He’s struggling further, gurgling, screaming in the most muffled voice ever as he slashes the animal with his knife multiple times in a large sweeping motion under water, desperately trying to break free from the squid’s monstrous grip. The animal seems to have stopped trying to capture him, but all to no avail, since Jim’s almost about to pass out underwater, the image of the squid leaving fading away from his eyes as he sees the water above him relentlessly keep him under.
Suddenly, he hears muffled worker shouts in a strange language as he feels a massive hit against his chest. “That’s a rather crude way to revive someone.’ Jim thinks as he’s regained his consciousness, and he begins to open his eyes. Jim ponders as he awakens from his momentary lapse of existence. The smell of gunpowder attacks his senses as he hears powerful cannons discharging and loud footfalls on a wooden ship? That’s strange. He’s never been on such a ship before. He comes upon a tall large-framed muscular bald man wearing a classic pirate’s hat with a very distinct thick mustache embroidered with a darker shirt reminiscent of something worn hundreds of years ago. The man growls in his language at his cohorts ordering then to continue firing while he investigates Jim. The man speak in a form of broken English, but is it Patois or perhaps Pidgin? It appears the dialect may be closer to Pidgin.
“Oy Bobo Tenup! Tenuuup! Tenuup Bobo!” yells the large pirate in Pidgin ordering Jim to wake up from his horrific unplanned slumber.
“Alright, Alright, I’m up! I’m up! Who are you?” Yells Jim, irked at the lack of bedside manner in the steely-eyed pirate. He appears to be from the Caribbean, but he knows only of Nigerians that speak this dialect of broken English. He also notices his scars on his wrists, covered in bruises, as if he were enslaved at some point fairly recently.
“K-Leg ya bobo! K-Leg!” He pulls out a sword from a golden sheath with classic navy markings on it, a shiny blade that could only have been stolen from a navy general. The man is accusing him of being suspicious, due to Jim wearing clothes that do not at all match the classic pirate garb that this man seems to wear. In fact, it’s possible he doesn’t even speak any traditional English at all.
After all according to history, many escaped slaves from Nigeria have migrated to the Caribbean and the Americas, but this…this would had to have taken place in…the 18th century? That’s insane. He must still be in a trance or a coma. It’s impossible. He looks over at the famed Jolly Roger, the pirate flag that identifies the ship’s captain and his crew. He notices the black flags with skulls on each one. Could this be…the Queen Anne’s Revenge? Some people think Blackbeard’s flag was the famed horned skeleton with the hourglass stabbing the heart with three drops of blood, but that’s actually myth.
The death’s heads on a black flag were the far more accurate ones. Also the mast of the Queen Anne’s Revenge was unique as well: a robed winged angel extending her arm to release a bird with her left hand and her right hand clutched against her chest. This ship was a navy ship, a slave ship, but if that’s the case and now this ship is a pirate ship, it means that the person yelling at me was, Black Caesar, who was under the command of Blackbeard?
The famed pirate captain’s hat Blackbeard was known to wear rose from behind the columns as a former navy man’s general’s black jacket flaps in the wind and the dark beard fashioned as tentacles peer out from behind the column as the face of the man reveals himself to Jim. He no longer feels Jim is a threat as he yells at Caesar in Pidgin to stand down.
“Ya came at the wrong time, lad! This be a pirate ship now. Art ye a slave master?” Asks Blackbeard with a gruff, strong commanding voice.
-“Nay, I’m but an explorer, seeking treasure.” Replies Jim with the confidence of a man of these classic times.
-“Very well then. We seek the same. Should you wish to join our crew, ye can, but beware, rebels abound, and our enemies are plentiful. Thus, my enemies are now thine as well. Be mindful, if thou commit but the smallest speck of foul treason, I shall hang ye by the masthead, and you can accompany the stone angel in heaven.” He spoke frankly with a tinge of dark humour in his voice.
-“Understood, captain!” says Jim with a bit of fear in his eyes.
-“Onward ho! Lest ye be a barnacle on the rotting side of thy ship!” shouts the intrepid pirate captain.
Jim has proceeded to aid the captain in protecting the ship from the Royal Navy. The cannons continue firing at the Navy ships, but it seems to only aggravate the Queen’s forces. “Onward! Blast them into the aether, men!” Yells Blackbeard with a relentless fervor for beating back the enemy.
Years upon years have passed, and Jim is still on the pirate ship fighting the same battle. Every day, the same exact battle, the same exact words uttered from Blackbeard, the same commands, and seemingly the exact same cannonballs fired from their implements. ‘It just doesn’t make sense. How did I even get here, and how can I not go back to my timeline?’
He ponders further 'perhaps it’s unfinished business'. It was at this moment that he realized that this is the year the Queen Anne’s Revenge will face massive casualties, and the mighty Blackbeard will no longer roam this earth. The Queen Anne’s Revenge has been taken by Blackbeard and had only managed to stay alive on it for a mere year. In fact, this may just be the day of his death…
Jim collapses as he lays sudden and extremely still on the wooden deck of the ship, as the entire day’s experiences passes by him in a flash of his mind’s eye. This was nonsense from the beginning, and he only seeks freedom from this unusually adventurous trap, but there’s no end in sight, as he remains imprisoned in this eternal day of swashbuckling hell.
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