Amazon Airship Pirates Pt. 01

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Charles Dartington falls into the hands of voracious amazons.
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Part 1 of the 4 part series

Updated 06/08/2023
Created 06/19/2016
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And so I decided to take a stab at steampunk erotica. The only small problem, as it turned out, was that I found that I wanted to establish the steampunk bit, and to determine something about the erotica, so the latter was a little time arriving. Don't worry, we get there in the end – though if you're in a hurry, you might want to look elsewhere. The other problem was that the tale grew in the telling, so this is just Part I – the first three chapters. In fact, this turned into something of an origin story. Even when it's done, there may be sequels. Charles Dartington is, I think, due some more adventures after this – as are others of our cast of characters.

*****

1. Pirate Attack!

It was a calm morning on the China Seas, and after breakfast, Charles Dartington decided to take a stroll around the deck of the steamship. When he came to the forward walkway, he found himself pleased to see Miss Elphinstone already there, and he smiled as he wished her good morning.

"Good morning, Mr. Dartington," she replied, and for a moment he thought he glimpsed a half-smile on her own face.

"Good morning, Mr. Dartington," her companion and chaperone, Mrs. George, agreed, materializing at her side and speaking in a tone that suggested that she wished Charles little good. "Come, my dear girl. It is best to find shelter before the sun is too high," she continued to Miss Elphinstone.

"Yes, Miss George," the younger woman agreed, paying no attention to Charles. The two of them set out towards their cabin. Charles watched them depart, reflecting idly that he might have wished that there had been someone of near his own age and class aboard the ship with whom he could be permitted to pass the time. Growing lost in thought regarding his near future, he turned to make another circuit of the ship.

"Pirates!"

Jolted out of his reverie, Charles looked around for the source of the warning cry, and reflexively scanned the horizon. But then he saw two crewmen pointing upwards, and he followed their gaze. A dark speck in the heavens above was rapidly becoming discernible as the teardrop shape of a dirigible, trailing a thin plume of smoke, and Charles, who had a keen and informed amateur interest in technology, realised that it must be driving down by raw engine power. He saw also that it must have approached in the cover of some thin morning clouds, explaining why it had not been sighted before. A second and a blink of the eye later, he saw that its hull was a rich crimson, and he knew from his reading of Indian news-sheets that the warning cry had been all too justified.

For long moments, Charles stood paralyzed and stunned. The ship was surely far off the routes menaced by the dreaded airship pirates! He had even made casual study of the navigational realities himself, as well as accepting the shipping company's reassurances, so he knew that finding prey this far from their secret bases would be an uncanny feat of navigation and a great risk for the villains...

The dirigible swooped down over the ship, and a cluster of dark shapes fell from it to burst on the deck. A moment later, Charles caught a distant waft of something cloying, spicy, and oddly sweet, and his memory of other studies made him gasp. Sleeping vapours! The pirates were cunning and well-armed!

But that latest memory brought with it other information, and in a moment, Charles broke out of his paralysis and dashed for his cabin. The vapours were a powerful soporific, but they were also highly soluble in water, and little danger once dissolved. It was the work of but a moment to soak a towel from his washstand in the basin, then tie it around his mouth and nose. Then, Charles ventured forth once more.

Already, he found, the vapours were having an effect; several crewmen and passengers lay insensible on the deck or at best leaned helplessly on supports – and indeed, the little that reached Charles's nose made his head spin. But his improvised mask served well enough to protect him as he made his way along the passenger walkway. On the way, he found one of the ship's mechanics who had clearly been overcome by the vapours after emerging to see what was happening, a great spanner lying by his side. It was the nearest thing to a weapon that Charles had yet seen, and he took it up and hefted it nervously as he looked around.

Then, sounds from an upper level made him look that way, and he saw that the pirate dirigible was now hovering a bare few yards above the ship, and had dropped grapnels and cables down. Even as Charles watched, figures came sliding down those cables, and Charles realised that other strange rumours were true. Even at this distance, the figures appeared female, slender as well as agile in swirling dark skirts and capes, though their faces were covered by masks to protect them from the vapours.

Horrified by a danger that was no better for being unclear in his mind, Charles rushed further along the walkway, and then started in a mixture of shock and relief as he saw several figures sprawled on the open deck space at the steamship's stern. One was unmistakeably Miss Elphinstone, clad in the white linen tropical dress which he had seen earlier; Mrs. George lay beyond her, likewise insensible. Even in this moment of shock, Charles found the younger woman oddly fetching in vulnerable disarray, showing slender ankles and delicate feet...

"Over there!"

The voice, muffled but recognisably female, came from behind him, and Charles span on his heel. His heart sank as he saw no fewer than three of the black-clad pirate amazons facing him. Their costumes featured skirts cut scandalously high at the front, revealing dark leather knee-high boots that matched the leather bodices that made them seem especially fearsome; their masks were of black oilskin, with large glass lenses over the eyes. They wielded guns of unfamiliar pattern – what appeared to be large-bore shotguns with short barrels, which Charles thought that must fire a devastating charge. He certainly had no desire to test their power.

Nonetheless, he turned instinctively to stand over the unconscious Miss Elphinstone, and gripped the outsize spanner two-handed in what he hoped was a determined manner. "Back!" he said, as firmly as he was able. "You shall not harm her!"

To his surprise, the three amazons paused. Their filter masks hid their faces, but he felt himself being assessed, and he had a terrible sense that they were amused. Then one of them glanced at the others "I do believe it's him," she said.

"Yes," said another, and then raised her voice. "Captain!" she called out, "Over here!"

"What do you mean..." Charles stuttered, his voice thickened by the gas seeping past his improvised filter, but the amazons made no reply, simply continuing to hold him at gunpoint until a fourth figure appeared. Although she too was clad in the same plain black-and-leather as the others, something about her poise and manner conveyed command, even discounting her striking height and the way that the other three made way for her. She was armed with a simple pistol, which she carried pointing downward.

"Ah," she said. "Yes. You are Charles Dartington." It was a statement, not a question. "A pleasure to meet you."

"Get back!" Charles attempted to command.

The pirate captain tilted her head as she looked at him. "Gallant, I see. We should have expected no less. And who is the young lady for whom you are so concerned?"

It occurred to Charles that there might be a way to gain Miss Elphinstone a measure of protection. "This is Miss Emma Elphinstone," he attempted to declare forcefully. "Her father is a director in the East India Company. If you do her any harm, he will hunt you to the ends of the Earth and destroy you."

"Elphinstone?" The pirate captain sounded interested or thoughtful through her mask. "Really? And what is she doing here?"

"She is on her way to her wedding... To Master Derwent... Even more important in the Company..." Even as he spoke, Charles was unsure of the wisdom of saying so much – but the vapours were making his head muzzy.

"Is she so?" The pirate captain seemed to inspect both Charles and Miss Elphinstone for a moment, and then she shrugged. "There is news. But for this moment..." She glanced to her side, at one of the other amazons. "Sui Pai – if you would?"

The other woman brought her gun to bear on Charles and fired in a single motion. He was confused, because the weapon hissed rather than roared, and he felt a blow on the left side of his chest. Looking down, he saw a feathered dart embedded in himself there, even as a he felt a numbness spreading from the point of impact. He barely had time to think of the word drugs before consciousness departed him.

2. A Prisoner of the Pirates

"How are you feeling, young man?"

The voice drew Charles Dartington back to consciousness, and he shook his head to clear it and looked around him. He found himself in what was evidently a cabin, but not his own cabin from the ship; it was smaller, and many of the fittings were grey metal. It was lit by one small porthole, high on the wall, but only evening light was coming through that, so it had to be supplemented – by a small electric lamp, rather than the gaslight he had become accustomed to on the steamship. He noted that he was lying on the lower part of a bunk bed, and was still dressed as at the time of the attack.

There were three other people in the cabin, but the speaker was sitting by the bed; a short, slender fellow of Indian extraction and indeterminate age, with a neatly trimmed beard, clad in plain tropical whites with smudges of grime or grease at the elbows and cuffs. He looked at Charles with a faintly amused expression, and raised a quizzical eyebrow.

"I... I think I am well," Charles said, sitting up a little as he spoke. "But where am I, please?"

"You are aboard the airship Cheng Shih," the fellow replied, "and I am afraid that you must be accounted our captive."

Charles slumped back. This was much to take in. "Do you command this vessel, then?" he asked.

"I?" The fellow laughed. "Not truly, no. I am just the chief engineer. Forgive me, I am impolite; my name is Umesh Sharma. I believe that you met our captain earlier, briefly. But Captain Rukh has left me in charge for a little while. She has a steamship to dispose of just now."

"Captain Rook!" Charles exclaimed. This was a name which he knew by repute; the news-sheets in India periodically referred to that Captain as the most vicious and devious of the airship pirates.

"I believe that I hear the common misspelling of her chose name in your voice," the man said with a touch of pedantry. "She is Captain Rukh. R-U-K-H, in the English alphabet. A much more appropriate bird, if you have read your Arabian Nights."

"But you are a man!" Charles blurted.

"Yes, that is true," Mr. Sharma replied. "Ah, I see that you have absorbed too much of Captain Rukh's reputation from the Company's news sheets. Yes, many of her crews are women. When she began her career of rebellion, she had a number of such with her, and they were fanatical in defence of their own liberty. This was noticed by those who they fought, and the Captain gained a reputation as a veritable Kali, a man-devouring monster. But she has no objection to male allies or helpers, and there are many of us among her crews. Indeed, there are many even among most boarding parties – but now, any ship's crew that has been attacked by us spreads word of nothing but the ferocity of the unnatural women who assailed them."

"But the group who captured me seemed entirely female," Charles protested.

"Mostly." The engineer shrugged. "Because of that history, many of the band's most experienced raiders, most loyal to the Captain, are female. And this was a special mission, demanding a hand-picked crew."

"I see," Charles replied, and the man smiled politely. "But tell me – if your Captain is off disposing of the ship, why take me prisoner here? You cannot have room for all your captives on this airship."

"You are quick," Mr. Sharma replied. "I suppose that you have your father's eye for machinery. You are correct, of course..."

"What do you know of my father?" Charles demanded.

"What anyone may know," Sharma said. "I am an engineer, in my poor way, and what engineer does not know the name of Dartington?"

"So I am a ... a hostage, then? Or do you think that my father can pay a ransom? We are hardly so very wealthy."

"In truth, I do not know," Mr. Sharma admitted. "The Captain is frequently quite taciturn about her plans. She always has her reasons, but she may find it wiser not to declare them immediately. But I may tell you that our orders were to hold you unhurt, and to treat you as a respected prisoner."

"Hmm," Charles tried to comprehend all this. He decided that he needed to learn more before he decided what to do about these rogues' plans. "May I ask one other thing?" he ventured.

"You may ask."

"Can you say what became of Miss Elphinstone?"

"Ah, yes." Mr. Sharma smiled pleasantly. "The lady who I understand you were found to be guarding, with a number eleven spanner. Not the best weapon, I fear. Yes, I can assure you that Miss Elphinstone is perfectly safe and well."

"Thank heavens," Charles muttered.

"In fact, she is even safer than anyone else on that ship but yourself, given that Captain Rukh may have to maroon the rest of them on some remote island for a while," Sharma continued. "Miss Elphinstone is in the next cabin to this one. I should visit her once I am done here, in fact."

"What? You have abducted that poor girl too?" Charles was aghast.

"Another as-yet unexplained order from Captain Rukh," Sharma said lightly. "Although this one was only issued on the spur of the moment, after Miss Elphinstone was identified."

"Oh lord," Charles said softly. "It was I who named her to your infernal Captain! I was trying to ensure her safety, and now she is in greater danger – because of me!"

"Perhaps." Mr. Sharma shrugged. "I really could not say. The Captain's reasons remain solely her own, for now. But I can tell you that our orders are to treat the lady as politely as we are to treat yourself."

"Small comfort," Charles muttered.

"As you wish. But now I must leave you," Mr. Sharma said, rising to his feet. "So much to do, so much to do. Now, courtesy is the finest thing, but you are your father's son, and I am sure that you are already formulating schemes of escape. So I fear that I must leave Moira and Sui Pai here to watch over you at all times. They are instructed to prevent you from escaping or attempting to make trouble. I am sure that you are clever, but they are quite capable."

Charles looked at the other two people in the room properly for the first time, and saw that they were evidently amazons, of the same crew which had assaulted the steamship. They had, however, discarded not only their filter-masks and dark capes, but also their leather bodices, revealing loose, creased silk blouses in dark shades of blue and green. Both were perhaps in their late twenties, weathered but still young. Moira was, Charles assumed, the taller of the two, slender and with red hair and a pale complexion and a light dusting of freckles; Sui Pai was more compact and broad-shouldered, her features confirming the Chinese extraction which her name implied. Both now gazed at Charles, and he felt oddly disconcerted until he realized that they were most likely simply appraising him, with neither the nervous indirection of a social inferior nor the fluttering evasiveness of most young women of his own class or higher.

"Oh, and I should also note that it must be some hours since you ate," Mr. Sharma said from the doorway. "So, once Miss Elphinstone is awake, I would invite both of you to dine with me in the wardroom. We may talk more then." And with that, he departed.

Charles glanced again at his guards, and then carefully shifted himself to rise from the bed. He was bemused to discover not only his shoes on the floor, but a pair of familiar bags alongside them.

"My luggage..." he said.

"Captain Rukh had it brought up," Moira explained. "It was easy enough to discover your cabin from one of the ship's crew, and she thought you'd want a change of clothes."

Charles grunted, and then reflected that his shirt was sweat-stained, crumpled, and still had the faint odour of the sleep vapours – and he would not have a pirate mechanic put on a better show of social niceties than himself. So he extracted a fresh shirt from one case, and then looked at the women. "Excuse me," he said, "but I would like to change."

"Go 'head," said Sui Pai.

"We've seen men's chests before," said Moira, "and our instructions are to keep an eye on you. All the time."

Charles scowled, looked around, and then decided to get into the bed and cover himself with the sheet before changing, to the evident amusement of the women.

Then he asked for directions to the heads, and was relieved when his guards did not insist on joining him there, although they made a show of checking what he was carrying with him and of searching the chamber – mostly for show, Charles suspected. The journey there and back was along a corridor with a small glazed porthole, and a glance through that confirmed that they were indeed hundreds or thousands of feet in the air above the ocean, although evening was well underway; the setting sun glittered on the waters far below. Charles had to fight a moment of vertigo then, but reminded himself that he was in a much more substantial craft than on the two occasions when he had ascended from fairgrounds in balloons.

By the time he was done, another amazon appeared to announce that he was awaited, and he found himself taken to a small, sparsely appointed, but not uncomfortable wardroom, where Mr. Sharma sat on one side of a table which was bolted to the deck, and Emma Elphinstone was on the other with a face like thunder. Yet another amazon lounged against the wall behind her, evidently her own guard. A third lightweight chair was close to hand.

"Please, sit," the engineer said. "Wine?" he added, lifting an aluminum flask to pour into a beaker of the same material. Charles observed that the table was laid with plates of cold meats and vegetables.

"Thank you," Charles said, deciding to play along with this game and sitting down at the third side of the table.

"I apologise that all our food must be cold..." Mr. Sharma began.

"No fires on an airship," Charles could not resist interrupting. "That's common sense."

"Indeed. But our cold supplies are adequate. Please, do eat."

Charles found that he was famished, and could not resist the opportunity. He was pleased to note that Emma Elphinstone was also eating, if a little more delicately; whatever befell, it seemed best that both of them should be in good health. Mr. Sharma attempted to fill silences by discussing the provenance and spicing of the food, with limited success.

"Mr. Sharma here has been saying that your abduction was the purpose of this outrage," Emma said at length, in a tone that made Charles feel that she might be inclined to blame him for all that had ensued, "but he also says that he does not know why the chief brigand of this gang chose to add me to her plunder."

"Captain Rukh can be whimsical..." the engineer began to say.

"Actually, we may know more about that," said Moira suddenly from across the room, where she had taken up her own lounging station. "You were due to be married to Robert Derwent, wasn't that so?"

"Yes," Emma allowed.

"Well, my nice lady, some of us know Master Derwent of old, from before we joined this band... At least by reputation."

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