Though big and powerfully built, the Captain was only one creature, so if we could get him alone and away from his crew, we could overtake him. The would-be slaves aboard the ship outnumbered the crew by about half, giving us an edge in numbers.

As menacing as he was, the Captain didn't seem to know exactly what he was doing when it came to running the ship... or keeping slaves properly guarded for that matter. Mutinies aboard slave ships on Earth weren't particularly uncommon way back in the day, and slavers often had to take extra precautions against it.

They had to account for the massive disadvantage in numbers and the desire of would-be slaves to fight for their freedom. I wasn't yet sure of how willing the slaves aboard this particular ship would be to fight against the captain, but I was damn well gonna try to get them to.

I had a few good reasons for them to if they refused.

It was also apparently the first voyage the Captain had taken as a slaver, so it was possible the lack of experience was what was causing the slip ups. I hadn't yet seen the rest of the Captain's crew or how competent or armed they were, so I didn't want to go jumping right into a full on mutiny just yet.

In fact, I was beginning to think it might've been a good idea to hold off on breaking out while we knew so little. The problem with that though, is that we probably didn't have enough time to act before we ran into Charybdis.

I was assuming we didn't have a lot of time at all.

"Hey... Lassie," I called out from where I sat against the back wall of my cell, "how long do you think we have until we run into Charybdis?"

"Judgin' the distance from the shores of Paw Print Port an' our current direction, I'd say we have..." Lassie paused to think before once again calling back, "...just under three days afore we reach Charybdis territory... an' that was yesterday."

The bottom dropped out of my stomach at the response.

I only had just under two days to successfully pull off a mutiny and rescue the rest of the girls—and I guess the other slaves—from the other ship, assuming we were even near the other ship.

Yeah, there's no time to finesse this.

The only upside to this situation was that the Captain most likely wouldn't have any time to sink his figurative—and quite possibly literal—claws into Rarity. That wouldn't matter if this universe exploded because I died at sea of course, but it was still a reassuring thought.

"That's not enough time for a drawn out mutiny," I whispered just loudly enough for Lassie to hear, "we're gonna have to act... like, now."

It wasn't Lassie that answered however. Rather, another gritty, but masculine voice coming from a cell on the opposite side of the room spoke up.

"Don't be so hasty, kid," the voice warned, "the Captain might not have any experience in the slave trade, but he doesn't need any to put an upstart like you down for good."

I looked towards the voice, and I could tell it was coming from the cell opposite and slightly to the left of mine, but I couldn't make out the speaker in the relative darkness of the room.

"Why do you say that?" I asked with a slight frown, "you know what the guy is packing?"

"I only got hearsay to go on," the voice replied after a moment, "but from what I can gather, that pig that's always hanging around the Captain used his connections to get ahold of some newfangled weapons called 'firearms'. They're like tiny little cannons you can fit in your claws, hands, or paws."

Oh... that's not good.

"Apparently these things haven't even been cleared for public use yet," the voice continued, "but somehow that swine was able to get enough to outfit the entire crew."

I hadn't seen any sort of weapon on the Captain himself, but it would've been dumb to assume he didn't have one hidden on him somewhere. In any case, this would make things a lot more difficult for me, and would explain the Captain's lax attitude when it came to guarding the slaves.

After all, we didn't have any ranged weapons of any sort, and one well placed shot would be enough to put us out of commission and silence any dissenters if we misbehaved. I was assuming that if these guns were new, they wouldn't be very efficient and probably a little unwieldy, but I wasn't about to dismiss the potential danger either way.

Though I did wonder if they would actually shoot, given that they were suppose to be delivering the slaves to their new masters alive. Maybe there were procedures for a potential mutiny that I didn't know about. Either way, I got the feeling we'd be finding out soon enough.

"These 'firearms' ye speak of," I heard Lassie say from her cell, "wouldn't happen ta be little metal tubes with odd wooden handles now would it?"

"Yup, that's how I heard em' described," the voice replied, "why, you've actually seen one?"

"Aye," Lassie confirmed, "as a matter o' fact our stalwart prison guard just so happens ta be carryin' one on him right now."

I couldn't see the guard from where my cell was, but Lassie apparently had a better view. I heard some shuffling from the cell the voice had originated from before a pair of what looked like clipped claws and a beak poked their way through the bars.

I guess the guy was a griffon...

"Well, would you look at that," the griffon muttered before retreating deeper into the cell once more, "just like I said, with those weapons, escaping ain't gonna do us any good."

"We might as well try," I pushed, "I don't know if you heard Lassie, but we're all kind of headed for a giant whirlpool of death, and we don't have a lot of time to sit around and mope about our situation."

"Yeah, I heard you, kid," the griffon replied with a scoff, "but the diamond bitch has you fooled. That Charybdis is nothing but a myth, and not one many take stock in. No one's ever seen the thing, and I think a giant whirlpool half a mile wide would garner some attention."

Nope, I am one hundred percent going to believe it, until proven otherwise. Where there's smoke and all that.

"Oh?" I heard Lassie reply with some amusement, "and I suppose that's the reason ships always vanish whenever their foolish captains have tried to sail this route? No one has seen the beast because no on has survived to tell the tale."

"Then just how do you know the tale?" the griffon retorted, "face it, mutt, the Charybdis is just an old tale told by sailors for a good scare."

"Oh, it's far more than just an old tale, birdbrain," Lassie replied in a low ominous tone, "when I said no one had survived to tell the tale, I meant no one... save fer me own pa, and the bloke who had started the legend ta begin with."

"Oh please!" the griffon snorted, "you expect me to believe you just because your daddy fed you a lie when you were little?"

"I don't expect anythin' from ye," Lassie replied in that same unnerving tone, "I only know that me pa came home one day after havin' been gone fer nigh on fifteen years. Me ma was ready ta tear into the bastard fer leavin' her ta take care o' me on her own, but his mind was already gone.

"He was a right mess—stumblin' into the house, haggard looking, glassy eyed, an' three sheets to the wind he was. I remember that day well, I remember that empty gaze, an' I remember the first an' last words he spoke ta me after bein' gone fer fifteen years..."

Lassie's grim tone had been enough to silence both the griffon and I, and all we could do was wait for her to continue. And continue she did.

"...when I ran up to me Pa an' asked him where he'd been all these years, he leaned down and grabbed me by shoulders, a wild look coming into his eyes. Then he spoke to me with a fear in his words me mother and I had never heard before."

She paused a moment before continuing.

"'If ya ever find yerself lost in the southern seas of Abyssinia', he says ta me with a shaky voice, 'beware the screech of the ocean'," she paused again and I could've sworn I heard a small sniff, "that was the last time he spoke ta me, or anyone else fer that matter. After that, he gave up piratin' an' didn't say another word."

There was another uncomfortable silence.

"I did some diggin' of me own ta find out what me Pa was talkin' about, an' that's when I stumbled upon the legend of the Ocean's Maw," she explained, "it was said a great beast called the Charybdis roamed the seas just south of the Abyssinian continent, causing unfathomably large whirlpools beneath unsuspecting ships.

"The only warning sailors would get, was a queer screech that grew louder an' louder... then the ocean would rumble, an' mere moments after that... it would be too late. The ship would find itself in the jaws of the Charybdis—sucked into the whirlpool its massive maw would create an' sunk in the blink of an eye', leaving nothing behind."

"Damn," I muttered in the ensuing silence, "that... is some scary shit."

"...After a month o' silence an' isolation, me and me Ma came home one night ta find me Pa strung up by the neck right there in the middle of the livin' room," Lassie said quietly, "though she never forgave him fer what he did, me Ma was heartbroken all the same, an' I lost a precious opportunity ta finally have a father in me life."

I could practically hear the glare in her voice as she spoke her next words.

"A mere myth wouldn't drive a dog ta kill himself an' leave his family ta see the body," she growled, "me father lost his ship, his crew, his sanity, an' his very will ta live because o' what he saw out there in the southern seas, so don't ya dare sit there an' tell me that damned monster doesn't exist!"

I grimaced.

That, wasn't a story I had expected to hear, nor did I really want to hear it, but it was done, and I wouldn't be able to unhear it. Still, my heart went out to the diamond dog, and my unease only increased. The griffon didn't say anything in response to the story, merely giving a noncommittal grunt after a moment.

"I'm sorry you and your family had to go through something like that," I said after another beat of silence, "I don't really know what else to say."

And I didn't.

As much as I sympathized with the diamond dog, I wasn't particularly good at voicing my sympathy out loud. It seemed I didn't really need to however, as Lassie replied a second later.

"It ain't nothin' fer ya ta fret over, lad," she said in a more composed tone, "it's in the past, an' that's where I plan on keepin' it. We've got more important things ta worry about as it is, what with the—"

It was at that moment that I heard a door open and someone step inside. The many steps I heard indicated there were at least a few someones entering the room. I waited with a frown and was unsurprised to see Napoleon step into view—though the two powerful looking Abyssinian felines behind him were a new addition. The pig had a shit eating grin plastered on his pudgy face as he drew a key from his pocket and addressed me.

"It seems the Captain has finally found a use for you, human."

I honestly didn't expect the chapter to turn out like it did when I first start writing it, but I feel it turned out for the better in the end. Hopefully you guys'll agree.