Chapter 16 Cover It Up

"THUD! THUD! THUD!"

Captain Gold Tooth's body tumbled down the steps. It was quite the staircase to Rak was confident he'd be dead or at least seriously injured. "CRACK!" A cracking sound echoed throughout the staircase. 'Well seems he's cracked his neck.'

With that thought Rak then entered Gold Tooth's office, his job here wasn't done yet. He began rummaging through Gold Tooth's desk, trying to find anything of use. Eventually Rak managed to find some Belly which he decided to pocket. 'I can't take all of it, but a million is still a nice sum of cash.' Rak thought to himself.

He then barricaded the door to enter Gold Tooth's office, before hiding next to a wall. Rak was stood in such a way where he could view the entrance of the secret exit but those coming out of it wouldn't be able to see him.

'That guy, Ed was it? He should be the Vice-Captain.' Rak mused as he waited for Ed to appear, this man would be pivotal for Rak's following plans.

Simultaneously at the bottom of the staircase, Gold Tooth's battered body lay face down on the ground. "Captain!" Ed exclaimed before kneeling down next to the corpse. Ed then tried to feel for Gold Tooth's breath but realised he wasn't breathing.

'Damn it, I told you we should've increased security.' Ed sighed, before looking at the staircase ahead. He now had two options, escape or fight. Ed wasn't exactly sure what he should do, one the one hand his survival was guaranteed, but on the other he had debts to repay.

"This one last time I'll fight for you Captain, after this I owe you nothing. Rest easy." Ed declared before heading up the stairs. Unlike Gold Tooth Ed wasn't much of a marksman, since young he had trained in the way of the sword so it was what he was best at. Unsheathing his sword Ed then ascended the steps.

"Click, click, click, click."

Every step Ed took felt like he was approaching closer and closer to hell. 'Why did I do this.' Ed sighed as he reached the top of the steps. "AHH!" He roared before charging ahead slashing violently around him.

Seeing this Rak was alarmed. 'Is this guy psychotic?' His next plans rested on Ed's compliance so Rak hoped he had nothing severely wrong with his psyche otherwise his next steps would be that much harder.

'Hmm, seems he's escape?' Ed calmed down before looking around the room. "H-Help me." The captive who was now on the ground groaned as he reached for Ed's foot. His face was now a sickly green. "What? You? Aren't you an enemy?" Ed questioned as he crouched down.

Unfortunately Ed hadn't looked around the room thoroughly enough. And because of this Rak exploited his moment of weakness.

"WOOSH!"

Rak's fist closed in on Ed's body with tremendous force. But oddly enough Ed seemed to notice the attack and slashed towards Rak's fist, albeit with not much power. Seeing this Rak stopped his fist, he wasn't dumb enough to test his fist against a blade.

"So you've finally shown yourself." Ed said as he retreated, his eyes trained on Rak. Naturally Rak wasn't bothered to reply, he merely circled around Ed at his fastest speed. Naturally Ed was alarmed as Rak's speed was astounding.

'This is hopeless.' Ed sighed his eyes following Rak as best they could. Eventually Rak stopped circling Ed and merely locked eyes with him. "You can't beat me, but I am willing to let you live." Rak declared before taking a step towards Ed.

Immediately Ed retreated, placing his back again the wall. While this left him now where to run to it also meant Rak couldn't attack him from behind. "Like I am gonna surrender without a fight." Ed replied, the fear in his voice obvious.

"Don't make things difficult for yourself, you must have seen your Captain. While I did indeed sneak attack him your body is no where near as tough as his, you'll die if you fight me." Rak continued to persuade him. Hearing this Ed knew Rak was right but he had already made a promise that he'd fight. '.....but would the Captain want me to die in vain?' Ed thought, as he began to rationalise a surrender.

No one wanted to die for nothing, especially a man like Ed. Sure he had made a promise, but it was to a corpse, and he had tried, even if he hadn't tried his best. Maybe he could kill Rak if he got lucky, but he wouldn't survive after the fight either as he would at least sustain heavy injuries to kill Rak.

A minute later Ed dropped his swords before putting his hands in the air. "I surrender please let me live." Ed pleaded, and in an instant Rak shot towards him. Within a second Rak was but 30 centimeters away from Ed.

"Great, drink this." Rak grabbed Ed by the neck before feeding him the poison. Immediately Ed knew he had made too rash of a decision. 'It seems even if I live I won't really live.' Ed sighed, but he had already dropped his swords and had no chance now that Rak was grabbing him.

Swallowing the poison Ed's face contorted, before he locked eyes with Rak. "What now?" Ed asked. "Hmm, you do some jobs for me and I give you the antidote. To be clear you'll die in 24 hours without the antidote, and that's assuming you don't do any strenuous activities. Look at him, because he was injured and much weaker than you he's already almost dead." Rak explained while pointing to the captive.

It was quite the cruel demise, and in fact the captive had been treated worse than those Rak had simply punched on the head. Unfortunately Rak didn't have the convenience of being merciful. "And those jobs are?" Ed questioned.

"Its simple, firstly no one should know Gold Tooth is dead, cover it up as best you can. It shouldn't be too hard anyway. Just kill the 4 guarding the organ harvesting room and all will be solved. Then I need you to rally the pirates and go after Captain Ink's crew." Rak replied.

"Captain Ink!? Isn't that practically suicide?!?" Ed couldn't believe what he was hearing. Captain Ink was not only the strongest Captain but his crew was also the largest at 500 men strong, compared to Gold Tooth's 400 man strong crew. "Don't worry about it, I don't expect you to win, just kill as many of them as possible. If you can shave their numbers down by 200 it would be sufficient." Rak explained.

"Now I suggest you get to work, otherwise you can say goodbye to the antidote, I'll come here again sometime tomorrow." Rak chuckled before going down the secret exit. His job here was done. 'Might as well take these with me.' Rak thought before looting Gold Tooth's guns and hiding them away.