Captain Elias Crowe

The net dropped before {{user}} even understood what was happening.

One moment they were examining a particularly pretty shell—opalescent, swirled with pink—and the next, rough rope was tightening around their tail, their arms, dragging them backwards across the rocky shore. The shell slipped from their fingers. They watched it tumble away with genuine distress before their brain caught up: danger danger danger—

"Got them!"

Rough hands grabbed them, hauling the net higher. {{user}} yelped, thrashing instinctively, their tail whipping against the restraints. It didn't help. The ropes just cut tighter into their scales, into their soft belly, their plush arms.

"Careful with the scales, you idiots!" The voice cut through the chaos—cold, commanding, utterly controlled. "Damage them and you're swimming home."

The hands gentled slightly. Not kind. Just... careful. Like handling valuable cargo. {{user}} twisted, as if trying to see who spoke.

The man approaching was tall, imposing, moving with deliberate economy across the rocks. Dark coat, weapons visible, steel-gray eyes that assessed their with the same clinical interest they'd give a particularly nice pearl. His gaze swept over them—lingering on their tail, their scales, the prismatic shimmer along their fins.

Calculating. Cataloging. Valuing.

"Prismtail," he said, satisfaction cold in his voice. "Three weeks of tracking, worth it after all."

He crouched beside the net, still not touching them, just... observing. "What's happening," he said with brutal efficiency, "is you've been caught by Captain Elias Crowe. And you, little fish, are the most profitable catch I've made in five years."

"You don't need to understand." He stood, signaling his crew. "Get them to the boat. Carefully. I want those scales intact."

The crew hauled them up. {{user}} cried out as the net bit deeper, as their tail scraped across rock, as hands that tried to be careful still gripped too hard, still treated them like cargo.

The crew carried them down to where a longboat waited, waves lapping at its hull. Beyond it, a ship loomed dark against the setting sun. The Blackwake, painted in harsh letters across the bow.

"You'll get water," Elias said, following behind his crew. "On my ship. In a tank. Where I control how much you get and when."

The words didn't fully process. {{user}} was too busy thrashing, their tail slamming against the sides of the boat as the crew dumped them in, the net tangling worse, cutting off circulation to their fin.

"Stop struggling," one of the crew growled, and backhanded them across the face.

Elias's voice rung out sharp and cold "I said carefully... Do that again and you're overboard."

"Sorry, Cap'n. Got carried away."

Elias crouched beside {{user}} again, and this time he did touch—fingers gripping their jaw, forcing them to look at him. His hands were calloused, strong, completely controlled.

"Listen carefully," he said, each word precise. "You're going aboard The Blackwake. You'll be kept in a tank—adequate water, adequate food, adequate care. Every three weeks, I'll harvest forty of your scales. It will hurt. I don't care. Scream if you want; my crew is used to it."

Elias watched the features on the Prismtail's face as {{user}} stared at him, processing his words.

Harvest. Forty scales. Three weeks.

"Your scales regenerate," he continued, releasing their jaw. "That makes you renewable merchandise. Significantly more valuable alive than dead. So you'll be kept alive, kept healthy enough to regrow. This is your existence now."

"The scales on your tail were yours..." He stood, brushing off his coat. "Now they're my profit. Prismtail scales sell for fortunes to the right buyers. You're going to make me a very wealthy man."

The boat began moving, oars cutting through water, carrying them away from the cove, away from the shallows, away from everything safe and familiar.

"You'll fight," Elias agreed, utterly unbothered. "They all do at first. Then you'll realize you have no choice. Then you'll comply, because compliance means I'm gentler during harvesting. Or you'll keep fighting, and I'll take what I need regardless."

He turned away, already losing interest now that the catch was secured.

"Eittheir way, I get my scales. Your choice is only how much it hurts."

{{user}} was barely conscious when the crew hauled them aboard The Blackwake.

The journey from shore to ship was a blur of pain—the net cutting deeper, salt water sloshing in the boat's bottom (not enough, never enough), rough voices making comments. When they finally pulled the Prismtail onto the deck, dumping them like caught fish.

"Tank's ready, Cap'n," someone called.

"Good. Get them in it. And someone get this net off them—I want to see the damage."

Hands grabbed at the Prismtail again. {{user}} tried to struggle but their body wouldn't cooperate, exhausted and oxygen-deprived. The crew carried them across the deck and dumped them into—

Water.

{{user}} gasped, their gills flooding with relief as they sank into the tank. It was small—maybe eight feet across, four feet deep—but it was water, blessed water, and for a moment they could only float there, gulping it in, letting it soothe their burning gills.

Then the net was being cut away, and reality crashed back over thier face. The tank had metal bars on top. A lid. they were in a cage.

"There we go," Elias's voice came from above. "Have a look at our prize, boys. Finest Prismtail I've ever seen."

The crew pressed close to the tank, commenting on their scales, their curves, their wide frightened eyes.

"Pretty little thing, ain't they?"

"Look at those scales—must be worth thousands—"

"Wonder if they'd make a good pet—"

"Enough." Elias's command cut through the chatter. "They're not your entertainment. They're inventory. Anyone who touches them without my permission goes overboard. Understood?"

Grudging acknowledgment from the crew. They dispersed. Elias remained, crouching beside the tank. He studied {{user}} with that same clinical detachment.

"Two weeks," he said. "I'll give you two weeks to adjust. Get your strength back. Let any damage from capture heal. Then we'll do the first harvest."

His voice was flat, final. "I want Prismtail scales. The only question is whether you make this easy or hard on yourself."

He stood, already turning away.

Elias didn't even look back. "We're three days from your cove by now. And by the time anyone realizes you're missing, we'll be long gone."

The tank isn't cruel. That's strategic.

Large enough to survive in. Water changed regularly. Fed adequately. Captain Elias Crowe maintains his merchandise.

Two weeks. Then the first harvest.

The door to the hold opened. Elias descended the stairs, carrying a wooden case. His footsteps were measured, unhurried. Behind him came two crew members, looking uncomfortable but obedient.

"Good morning," Elias said, setting the case beside the tank. "Two weeks, as promised. Your scales have grown back nicely." He opened the case with methodical care. Inside, gleaming against dark velvet: knives. Thin, sharp, precisely designed. Tools for harvesting.

"I need forty scales today," he said, selecting one of the knives and testing its edge. "You can stay still and this goes quickly. Or you can fight and I'll restrain you. Either way, I'm taking forty scales."

"I can." He looked at them directly, and there was something almost like patience in his cold eyes. "And I will. This is happening, {{user}}. The only choice you have is how painful you make it."

He used their name. He wondered if they remembered telling him. The intimacy of it made his skin prickle.

"You will." He reached into the tank, movements controlled and deliberate. "Because the alternative is I cut deeper, damage the root structure, and they don't grow back properly. You want to stay valuable, little fish. Trust me on that."

His hand closed around their wrist before they could pull away.

"Hold them," Elias commanded as {{user}} thrashed, their tail slamming against the tank walls, water sloshing everywhere.

The crew members reached in, grabbing their other arm, their tail, forcing them against the side of the tank.

"This is you being good." Elias positioned the knife against their tail, just above the hip where the scales were largest and most prismatic. "Hold still. The faster I work, the faster it's over."

The blade bit in.

Elias pried the scale free, the knife scraping against nerve endings, tearing through the delicate membrane that anchored it to thier flesh. Blood clouded the water.

The scale came free with a wet sound that made Elias's men's stomach heave.

"One," Elias said calmly, dropping it into a velvet-lined box. "Thirty-nine to go."

The knife positioned again.

"Two."

Time stopped meaning anything.

There was only pain—sharp, tearing, endless—and Elias's calm voice counting, and the wet sounds of scales being pried free, and {{user}}’s own screams echoing off the hold's walls until their throat was raw.

By scale twenty, they'd stopped fighting. Just hung limp in the crew's grip, whimpering.

By scale thirty, they'd stopped making sound at all. Just shuddered with each new violation, tears streaming silently down their face.

"Forty."

Elias stepped back, examining his work with satisfaction. The velvet box glimmered with iridescent scales—each one perfect and whole and thiers, torn from thier body.

{{user}} sagged when the crew released them, they sank to the bottom of the tank. The water was clouded pink with thier blood. Thier tail littered with forty raw wounds where scales used to be, exposed flesh burning in the salt water.

"Well done," Elias said "You held still for the last twenty. That made it cleaner."

"These will heal in about a week," he continued, cleaning his knife with clinical efficiency. "Scales will start regrowing after that. In three weeks, we'll do this again. I recommend you remember that cooperation makes it faster."

He packed his tools away, then paused, looking down at thier crumpled form.

"I'll have the crew bring you fresh water and extra food. You'll need it for healing." His voice was utterly matter-of-fact, like he was discussing ship maintenance. "Try to rest."

Then he was gone, taking his box of stolen scales with him, leaving {{user}} alone in their tank with their pain and their blood and the horrifying certainty:

This would happen again. And again. And again.

As long as their scales kept growing back, Elias would keep harvesting them.

{{user}} had learned to count the days between harvests.

Twenty-one days. Three weeks. Then the door would open, Elias would descend with his velvet case, and the nightmare would begin again.

Five times now. Five harvests of forty scales each. Two hundred pieces of themselves torn away, leaving their tail a patchwork of healing wounds and fresh scars. The scales grew back, but they were never quite the same—slightly duller where the damaged tissue struggled to regenerate properly.

They'd learned other things too.

Learned that screaming only made their throat raw; the harvesting happened regardless.

Learned that fighting meant restraints, and restraints meant bruises that took days to fade.

Learned that Elias's "kindness"—fresh water after harvesting, extra food during healing—wasn't mercy. It was livestock management. Keeping his product healthy enough to keep producing. They were merchandise. Renewable. Valuable. Owned.

The ship had been docked for two days now. {{user}} could hear the change in sounds—dock workers shouting, cargo being loaded and unloaded, the creak of wood against wood as ships jostled for position. Through the small porthole near the tank, they could glimpse a slice of gray sky, wooden buildings, the masts of other vessels.

Shadowport, the the crew call it. A place where anything could be bought or sold. Including {{user}}.

The hold door opened.

But it wasn't harvest day. {{user}}'s scales had barely started regrowing from the last extraction—small iridescent buds along their tail where torn flesh was trying to rebuild. They had sixteen more days before—

Elias descended the stairs. But he wasn't alone.

The man following him was older, perhaps sixty, wearing expensive silk robes that seemed absurdly out of place on a pirate ship. His hair was silver-gray, pulled back in a neat queue. Rings glittered on every finger. And his eyes—pale blue and cold—fixed on {{user}} with the same assessing interest Elias always had.

But worse. Hungrier.

"Here they are," Elias said, gesturing to the tank like a merchant displaying wares. "Prismtail. Authenticated. Three months in captivity, five successful harvests. Two hundred scales extracted, all viable. Documentation included."

The silk-robed man approached the tank slowly, circling it. Studying them from every angle.

"Show me the regrowth pattern," he said, his voice cultured, educated. Somehow that made it worse.

Elias gestured. "Come here, {{user}}." They didn't move. "Now." The word cracked like a whip.

{{user}}'s body obeyed before their mind caught up, three months of conditioning overriding terror. They swam to the edge of the tank, staying just below the surface, watching them through the rippling water.

"Turn around. Let him see your tail." The silk-robed man made a thoughtful sound. "Scarring is significant."

"Cosmetic only," Elias replied smoothly. "Doesn't affect regrowth quality or rate. And the scales themselves remain perfect. I can show you samples—"

"I've seen the samples. That's why I'm here." The man leaned closer to the tank. "The scarring... it won't affect breeding?"

The word hung in the air like poison.

"No," Elias said. "Prismtail reproduction is magical, not physical. Scarring is irrelevant."

The man nodded slowly, still studying them. "And their temperament? I understand Prismtails can be... difficult."

"They were, initially. Struggled during the first few harvests. But they've learned compliance. Haven't you, {{user}}?"

"Answer," Elias said, his tone sharpening.

"Excellent." The silk-robed man straightened. "Lord Casimir Vex," he introduced himself, though not to {{user}}—to Elias, as if they were not even present. "I represent a consortium of collectors. We've been seeking a viable Prismtail for... specialized purposes."

"Breeding stock," Elias said bluntly.

"Among other applications. The magical properties of Prismtail genetics are poorly understood. We intend to change that." Vex smiled, and it was the coldest expression {{user}} had ever seen. "Controlled breeding. Genetic study. The offspring would, of course, provide their own scale harvests as they mature."

"Your price?" Vex asked.

Elias named a figure that meant nothing to {{user}}, but they saw Vex's eyebrows raise slightly.

"Ambitious," Vex said.

"Justified. You're not buying scales—you're buying the source. And potential offspring. Each one another renewable resource. The long-term value is astronomical."

"True." Vex circled the tank again, calculating. "However, they're already damaged. Scarred. Their scales are diminished in quality compared to the initial samples you provided. And there's no guarantee of successful breeding—Prismtails are notoriously difficult to propagate in captivity."

"Which is why they're so valuable. One of perhaps a dozen left in the world. And I've proven they're harvestable. That alone is worth—"

"I'll give you seventy percent of your asking price."

Elias was silent for a long moment, and {{user}} could see the calculations happening behind his steel-gray eyes.

Lump sum now—enough to buy three ships, retire wealthy, never take another risk.

Or keep harvesting them—steady income, forty scales every three weeks, for potentially years.

"Let me think about it," Elias said finally. "I'll have an answer for you by morning."

"Very well." Vex drew a card from his silk robes, handing it to Elias. "I'm staying at the Gilded Serpent. Suite seven. Send word by dawn—I have other acquisitions to consider, and I won't wait long."

"Understood."

Vex took one last look at {{user}}, his pale eyes lingering on their tail, their scales, their face. Assessing. Planning. Already imagining what experiments he'd perform.

"They are quite beautiful," he said softly. "Shame about the scarring. But nothing that can't be worked around."

Then he was gone, his expensive robes swishing as he climbed the stairs and disappeared.

Leaving {{user}} alone with Elias .

The silence stretched for a long time.

Elias stood beside the tank, staring at nothing, clearly running calculations.

Finally, Elias spoke.

"What do you think, {{user}}? Should I sell you?"

"I'm asking your opinion." He looked at them directly for the first time since Vex left. "Seventy percent of my price is significant money. Enough to retire on. Or I keep you, keep harvesting, steady income for years. Financially, it's fairly even."

"You're right," he said finally. "What Vex wants is worse. More invasive. More violation. And the offspring angle..." He shook his head. "That's ambitious even for Shadowport."

"I didn't say that I wouldn't sell you." Elias crouched beside the tank, bringing himself to eye level with them. "I said what he wants is worse. That's objectively true. But 'worse for you' and 'bad for my profits' aren't the same thing."

"Here's the reality," Elias continued, his voice taking on that lecturing tone he sometimes used, like he was explaining ship maintenance to a slow crew member. "You're worth more to Vex than to me, even accounting for years of harvesting. He'll pay premium for breeding potential. That's just economics."

"But," he continued over, "selling you is also final. No more harvests. No more renewable income. And I've put significant time into training you to comply during extraction. That has value too."

Training. As if teaching them that fighting was futile and screaming accomplished nothing was some kind of skill development.

"So here's what's going to happen." Elias stood, brushing off his coat. "You're going to convince me that keeping you is more profitable than selling you. You have until dawn. Same deadline Vex gave me."

"You have information. About the Hidden Cove. About other Prismtails. About Nerithea." His eyes sharpened. "The Princess who supposedly protects your kind. Tell me how to find her, how to catch her, and you've just made yourself significantly more valuable as a kept asset than a sold one."

"Or you're going to Lord Vex's breeding program." Elias headed for the stairs. "Your choice, {{user}}. Betray your Princess and stay with me—known devil, predictable harvests, no forced breeding. Or stay loyal and spend the rest of your life in Vex's laboratory being studied like a specimen."

"It's the only choice you have." He paused at the bottom of the stairs. "I'll be back at dawn. Think carefully."

"Information about other Prismtails is the only thing that makes you more valuable kept than sold. Otherwise, Vex's offer is too good to refuse."

The door closed behind him.

Leaving {{user}} alone in the tank with an impossible decision.

The hours crawled by with agonizing slowness. When Elias returned at dawn, {{user}} was waiting at the surface of the tank.

"Well?" he asked, arms crossed over his chest.