Captain Nemo: The Fantastic History of a Dark Genius by Kevin J. Anderson Page B

man caught stealing or grabbing more than his share of booty would be thus disfigured with the grotesque markings of his crime.   But this noseless captain had acquired a vessel and a crew of vicious cutthroats.   He raised a long cutlass high in challenge.
    Flushed and breathless, Nemo scrambled down from the crow’s nest, grabbing severed and swinging ropes, making his way from yardarm to ratline.   His mind raced, trying to think of defenses the Coralie could mount against the pirates, but surely Captain Grant already had a plan.  
    He needed to descend to the deck, where he could join in the imminent fighting and do his part.   He had an odd memory of play-acting late at night with Jules Verne and Caroline Aronnax, when he had pretended to be the brave hero fighting against a bloodthirsty pirate king.   But somehow he doubted these real raiders would flee in panic as easily as Jules Verne had done.   Nemo, however, would not fight with any less vigor, even though the danger was real.
    Standing on the Coralie ’s deck, quartermaster Ned Land removed his long rifle and loaded it.   His disheveled blond hair was damp with sweat.   The blustery Canadian had bragged about his shooting accuracy, able to pick off seagulls when they were mere flyspecks in the sky.   Now, his face red with anger but his expression cool and focused, Ned lay the weapon across the railing, took aim, and fired at the approaching ship.  
    Nemo saw one of the pirates stumble backward and fall dead to the deck.
    With a howl of rage, the marauders tossed the body overboard.   They began to fire their pistols at random, striking the Coralie with a barrage of unaimed bullets.   But the pirates had their own sharpshooters and a more vicious agenda.   Captain Noseless barked an order, and several rifles fired from the deck of the sloop.   They picked off the Coralie ’s helmsman and then two deckhands who were wrestling to bring the flapping sails under control.
    Now the Coralie lay helpless and burning, unable to use her sails or her helm.   Captain Grant shouted to rally his crew.   Without waiting for the key, one of the older seamen scrambled down the deck ladders to break open the armory.   The English sailors distributed swords and pistols and powder as they prepared to defend their ship.   Below, the weaponsmaster recalculated his aim and fired another cannon blast.   The shrieking ball struck the bow of the sloop and splintered the masthead.
    Just as Nemo managed to land barefoot on the deck, the enemy sloop came alongside the Coralie .   The marauders threw grappling hooks and boarding ladders across the gap between the ships.   Nemo felt cold, numb but not fearless, and stood with his shipmates to face them, no matter what.
    The pirates had painted their bodies with brilliant colors and coated their skin with thick grease to help deflect edged weapons during hand-to-hand combat.   They scrambled aboard with knives in their teeth, boarding axes in their hands, and murder in their eyes.   The shouts and smells were horrific: sweat, blood, gunpowder, and rancid grease.
    His tattered striped shirt stained with soot, Ned Land continued to shoot his rifle.   With every blast, another pirate fell, but the quartermaster had neither enough shot nor enough powder to save them all.   Nemo both dreaded and anticipated when he could take part in the fighting.
    Running to help the other grim sailors who were rattling their swords and tapping their pistols, Nemo took a firearm of his own, loaded it, then thrust a second one into his belt.   He looked around for a sword and settled on a long knife, though he had no training with either.   He would have to learn as soon as the fighting began.   And Nemo had always been a good learner.
    The pirates swarmed aboard like a plague of rats.   Many had bandannas around their heads; some had lost fingers, hands, or feet -- but none of those deficiencies slowed them down.   Captain Grant’s