Aura, Pirates, and Sharks 2

<<COBY RYSN>>

I pushed my muscles and Aura as hard as I could, but even with my semblance speeding myself up and slowing him down, the filth that sired me nearly had his own semblance up before the barbs I'd prepared punched through his skin and sent their toxins flooding into his veins. Immediately, the ghostly shape of a shark forming around him fractured, incomplete.

With the toxin delivered, I leapt back, putting some distance between us while pulling out Beisht Kione. The compact weapon snapped open, the stock unfolding and the barrel telescoping out. Barely pausing to take aim, I pulled the trigger, just as the barbs on the harpoon attachment flared open. With a hiss of air, the metal projectile fired, cutting through the air to pierce my target’s skull. Or rather, it would have, if he hadn’t caught it mere centimeters from his eye.

I didn’t give him a chance to speak, not that I’d understand him if he did, with my semblance speeding up time for me and slowing it for him. Something that I couldn’t keep up for long, with the building pressure in my head. Focusing, I grabbed the rope attached to the harpoon and pulled as hard as I could. The rope went taut, before the harpoon slid out of his grip, the prongs screeching against his Aura as they slipped past his fingers. Catching it, I gave the harpoon a quick inspection, and winced at the amount of metal that had been sheared off.

With the pressure growing in my head, I lowered the dial on him, reducing the pressure but also letting him move at a normal rate of time. To my frustration, he laughed, rolling his neck while pulling out Correnteza, the weapon extending to it’s full length and the spike gleaming.

“Nice to see your balls finally dropped,” he said with a chuckle. “Had I known that was all it took, I’d have done it months ago!”

I didn’t respond, merely watching, observing, and buying time for the toxins to do their work. If I’d done the ritual correctly, which from all indicators I had, then the longer they worked, the more fucked over his control over his Aura would be. Considering how the overwhelming majority of his fighting style was based on manipulating his Aura, if I could stall the fight long enough then even ignoring the fact that I’d never so much as touched hi-

My train of thought was interrupted as he moved, his control over his Aura still sufficient to let him move fast enough that, even speeding up my own time, I was just barely able to move Beisht Kione in the way to block his swing, the sheer weight and speed he swung with sending me flying. Focusing, I carefully projected my own Aura from my hand and slammed it into the floor, the hooked blade of my soul carving a gouge and halting my flight. I glared at him, even as my soul protested how I’d just used my Aura. At the amount of control I had, it was wasteful, inefficient, and nowhere nearly as applicable in straight up combat as what he or Levi were capable of.

The other people who’d been at the table were standing up by now, a man with graying hair and a mustache that looked like a bug had crawled onto his lip and died moving away, the hark haired woman, her associates, and a giant of a man falling into ready stances, and a pale, ponytailed man grinning in excitement. Levi had pulled out her trident Leviathan’s Kiss, her eyes moving between me and our father’s back, a questioning look on her face. I shook my head, if he killed me, then she’d be able to take Coral and flee.

I took another deep breath, my eyes narrowing as I tried to strategize. My father’s greatest asset in a fight, after his absolutely monstrous control of his Aura, was easily his speed. His semblance, Shark Skin, formed an ethereal, ghostly shark construct around his body, further enhancing his speed, strength, and mobility. Fortunately, it seemed that the toxin was preventing him from using it, otherwise I’d be dead already. My own semblance, Blink Time, allowed me to manipulate the rate at which time affected someone, but I apparently needed a lot more practice before I could use it on both myself and an enemy for more than surprise attacks.

My father glanced down to where the enhanced lionfish barbs had stabbed into him, his eyebrows furrowing, before looking up at me with a vicious, bloodthirsty grin, “Not bad, kiddo. Gonna take a bit to burn this shit out. Glad to see you stopped with that ‘fair fight’ bullshit.”

My eyes took in the surroundings, figuring out the materials used for everything, the beginning of a plan forming, and I simply said one word in response, “Pirate.”

His grin widened, and he all but purred, “That’s my boy.”

Ignoring the shiver of disgust that sent through me, I adjusted the angle of Beisht Kione’s barrel before squeezing the trigger. A burst of fire exploded from the end of the barrel, the bullet flying out of it before deflecting off one of the metal plates that had gone flying off the table, perched almost innocently against a pillar. From there, it ricocheted off one of the three prongs of Leviathan’s Kiss, and punched through his jacket into his back. He snarled, his eyes going black as they glowed with his Aura. I swallowed, bracing myself for his next move. Whenever his eyes went black, he alwa-

“Oof,” my breath left my lungs as he all but vanished, only to reappear with his fist slamming into my gut. It was immediately followed by the spike end of Correnteza drove through my left foot, pinning me to the floor. I cried out in pain, both from the sharpened piece of metal, and from the way he serrated his Aura as he punched me. But the worst part of the blue was it broke my concentration on my semblance, snapping me back to a normal time rate.

As soon as I felt control over my semblance slipping from my grasp, another blow struck me, his fist slamming into my face. My nose crunched, and I was knocked flat onto my back, my ankle screaming in pain as the spike pinning my foot caused it to bend faster than I could brace for. Another fist slammed into the side of my head, making stars dance across my vision, then again, and I blacked out.

[hr][/hr]

To my surprise, I woke up. Sitting up, I received a further surprise in the utter lack of pain I was feeling. I ran a hand over my chest, feeling smooth skin where there should at least be raw, scraped meat from my father’s Aura.

“Awake, finally,” a smooth, refined voice spoke up, drawing my attention. I turned, and blinked in surprise upon seeing the speaker. It was a woman, ashen of skin and hair, with eyes like red rings in pools of black, and dark veins coursing up her arms to her neck and along her cheeks.

“I confess,” I said hesitantly as I swung my legs over the edge of the bed I found myself in, turning to face her. A glance down showed I was shirtless, and from the feel of things under the sheet, a shirt wasn’t the only article of clothing I was missing. “Normally when I wake up in a lady’s room, I remember how I got there.”

“Is that so?” she asked, her tone dismissive, yet something about her seemed curious.

“Forgetting a night spent with a lady is just bad practice, not to mention rude,” I said, trying to keep my voice calm and nonchalant.

“‘Rude’? From the self proclaimed pirate,” she noted with a hint of amusement in her smirk as she glided towards me. Literally, a glance down showed that her feet weren’t touching the floor.

“Everyone has standards,” I defended, as my mind raced. Everything I knew so far was telling me that there was only one person that this could be, and most likely the reason I was still alive. If I wanted it to stay that way, I needed to keep on her good side, at least until I could gather enough power and resources to break away.

She raised an eyebrow, before asking, “Even Blackfin?”

Much as I hated him, rightfully so, I had to admit, “Even him, albeit in a twisted sense.” The look on her face prompted an explanation, so I continued, “I’m assuming you heard him talk about what he did with my brothers and sisters, so you know his standards had nothing to do with what most people had. His standards had everything to do with how much of a fight you put up. It’s why he kept Coral for years after first capturing her.”

“I presume Coral is the woman he mentioned that you got pregnant?”

I nod, “We picked her up on a raid of some Mistrialian ship when I was a kid, I don’t remember much, just that even blind she managed to kill about a dozen of the crew. It’s why he decided to keep her for himself, instead of letting the entire ship have fun with her.”

Curiously, my host seemed interested, “Describe her.”

I did so, and to my surprise, she started laughing. Not a chuckle, or a titter, but a full belly laugh. I waited, quietly freaked out, until she got her laughter under control, an amused smile still upon her face, “Such delightful news you bring me, beyond your curious gift.”

“What gift?” I asked, more than a touch concerned that she was going to do something to Coral.

Her gaze and attention focused on me, and her hand reached out to caress my cheek with the back of her fingers, “You are going to tell me everything you know about magic, specifically about where you learned to do your trick in the room provided upon your arrival.”

I am many things, but an idiot is not one of them. When a woman who controls the greatest monsters in the world demands answers, when even after rigging things in my favor I lost against someone who (in all honesty) was a pretty small fish, my sense of self preservation demands I provide answers. So I told her about the dream entity, about the majority of the gifts it gave me (I left the impregnation part out), and how it had given me the ability to do the ritual I’d used.

After I finished, she gave a considering hum, before her hand reached out and she pushed me onto my back. Climbing up onto the bed, she straddled my hips as she spoke, “I am curious as to what else you can do with the magic your patron provided. Your task for me will be to focus on growing your capabilities with it, in the meantime, I think you deserve a reward for how you handled your father and…Coral.”

What the reward would entail became obvious as she rolled her hips, grinding her core against my rapidly swelling cock. But there was something I had to ask, “Before we get too far, what happened to the bastard? Also, may I know your name?”

She gave an amused, almost patronizing smirk, “You father is dead, your sister ran her trident through his head as he was preparing to rip your throat out. As for my name, it doesn’t matter. Soon enough, you will be calling me Mistress.” 

I have no idea where it came from, but I found myself whispering, “Mommy.”

She let out a laugh, like the ringing of church bells, “I'll accept Mommy as well.“

I swallowed the lump that was forming in my throat. Much as my self preservation insisted I nod and go along with each and everything that this woman said, there was another part arguing it. Sex had been the one time in my life until this point where I’d had control. With her, even that was taken from me. My internal musings were cut off, as a look of puzzlement spread across her face, and she looked down where she was grinding against me.

Lifting her hips up slightly, she pulled the sheet off my lap, leaving my naked form completely exposed to her gaze. Her left eyebrow rose, and she said, “You are larger than I was expecting. Larger than…”

Her voice got too quiet for me to hear the rest, as she lifted her hips up, taking my throbbing shaft in hand. I felt her guide the head of my dick to the unusually cool entrance to her pussy, before she sank down, enveloping my length in her womanhood.