pirate king (pirate!au) ➵ ateez ✔️

clay

The ship, for the first time since you stepped upon it, is completely silent.

As silent as grave, the Treasure drifts through the night, lost and aimless. You're seated where you first started upon this ship, at the main mast, waiting for your judgement.

The deck is completely void of anyone.

Your fingers come up to touch the crystal hanging around your neck. The crew can't bear to look you, your mere presence like a stain in their eyes. It's your fault. It's your fault the ship ended up in such disaster. Your fault Yeosang got shot. Your fault that Seonghwa has lost his only chance of making amends.

You can't find it in you to cry anymore. Wrung dry, every bit of you completely exhausted, you simply want to close your eyes and sleep for eternity, uncaring and unknowing of everything around you.

You've had enough. You've done enough. You just want to sleep.

San is tending to Yeosang in the sickbay, whose life and death hangs in the very balance. Even exhausted, the healer refuses to stop keeping vigil over the navigator, afraid that with every second that passes he might slip into darkness, that every breath might be his last.

You haven't spoken to a single person since the battle ended. The only one who managed to comfort you even just a little was Jongho, who gave you a tight squeeze before going below deck with the rest of the crew to lick his wounds.

You shouldn't have come to this ship.

You hear heavy footsteps on the floorboards behind you and you instinctively know who it is. They stop behind you, a tense silence settling in the air.

"Captain wants to see you."

You can't muster the energy to answer the quartermaster. All you do is push yourself to your feet, and for the first time since the battle, your eyes meet.

His stare is one of barely restrained fury and anger, you can feel it radiating from him like a burning stove. From the look in his eyes, he probably wants to hurt you in every painful way possible, but he keeps his fists clenched at the sides, his teeth grinding as he fights to maintain a facade of calm.

You wish he'd hurt you. At least that might distract you from the crushing anguish in your chest.

But he doesn't, so you simply get up and follow him.

Right before you stop at the captain's cabin, your hand lingers on the doorknob. Wooyoung had been in the captain's cabin before you, explaining the events of the night before. Are you ready to face the eyes of your captain and crew, to take the punishment for your lies?

You aren't and you never will be, but you push the door open anyway and step inside.

The first thing you see before you is your captain, sitting at the desk. His back has been treated with San's most potent cleaning spirits and as much healing energy he can spare, wrapped with a light gauze to prevent infection and numbed with one of your master's anesthetic concoctions, but you still have no idea how he's physically able to sit upright before you.

Wooyoung is seated at the side, head bowed against his chest. He's picking at his shackles, something you know he does when he's upset about something, and your heart twists in your chest.

When you step into the room, he doesn't look at you.

Your captain's face is unreadable, completely inscrutable. It's like the first time you'd met him, all over again, when you had been terrified of him, fearing for your life. It's like the beginning, when Mingi had forced you to your knees in front of the captain, and you had felt more than learned exactly how dangerous this man was.