Yet another BW challenge picture. This time it was pirates. I'm starting to run out of awesome pirate designs, which is blasphemy, I know. But luckily, I haven't quite reached my limits just yet. The accompanying story is by .

I made an attempt at giving the character some sesquipedalian loquaciousness, but it was apparently so horrid that it had to disappear into the ether and got reworked by my resident writer guy instead.

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The sea exploded.
Well, not literally. But one could be forgiven for thinking so as half a dozen cannonballs rained down from the skies and sent pillars of froth up into the air. The water towered taller than houses for a brief second, before crashing down on the ship. The crew were almost too deafened to notice, the air still resounding with the boom of cannons. The Kensington reared in the water as round after round pounded into her hull, turning one of the finest hulls into her majesty's fleet into so much sawdust.
Before they could even man the cannons it was too late.
The Black Mary was upon them.
The biggest pirate ship in the seven seas slid through the water with beguiling speed. Her fat hull was braced against the Kensington before long, the smaller vessel looking like a lifeboat next to the hulking dreadnought.
The crew gathered on the deck, ready to face their destiny.
And then they saw her.
Carmen the Red.
A pirate who matched her ship in scale; her huge pregnant belly bulging before her figure. Only the most foolhardy sailors even thought about chuckling. The rest knew her reputation too well.
Her crew appeared along the deck of the Black Mary, looking down upon their conquest, swords bared and flintlocks ready.
And then Carmen gave the shout-
"Ahar me Hearties!"
Oddly enough, the tide of carnage and ransacking one might normally expect to follow such a blood curdling battle cry did not come. Instead there was a pause.
"... pardon, captain?" one of the pirates asked.
Carmen pouted and placed her hands on her hips.
"I believe I was quite clear enough, crewman. I said, 'ahar me hearties'. Ahar, as in 'hey there' or 'hello there', but with a more sort of rustic manly machismo connotation. Me as in 'my' from the latin 'mihi', the personal possessive pronoun, and 'hearties' as in compatriots. Allies. My crew. You."
"Oh..." the pirate said.
"So... Hello there my crew?" another said, piecing the sentence together.
Carmen frowned.
"You really are failing to capture the fundamental aspect of intimidation. You know. Ahar. To strike fear into the hearts of one's enemies, as it were. Ahaaaaar."
"Oh. Ahar," the crewman said.
"Yes! Ahar!" Carmen repeated.
"Ahar!" the crew cried.
"That's more like it. Now, whatsay we keel haul these land loving blaggards, gentlemen?"
The crew exchanged nervous glances.
"... ahar?" one of them suggested.
"Ahar!" Carmen cheered, thrusting her sword skywards.
It was good enough. The rest of the pirates swung across to the deck of the Kensington, some of them screaming Ahar, others having more unusual battle cries along the lines of "Prepare for a high possibility of my sword cohabitting the same position as your internal organs in a possible fatal combination!"
They met little resistance. Any sailors who had been up for a fight in the first place were too damn confused by the time the pirates descended upon them. Before long the crew was rounded up and being tied to the main mast.
Carmen herself descended to the ship's deck, causing it to tip under her weight.
"Capital job, first mate. I do believe this is the most successful heist since Black Eye's infamous plundering of the vaults of heaven in ought four, which I think is physically impossible. Which is to say, this was a rather good heist."
"Aye, captain," the first mate said, "Which is to say, indeed captain."
Carmen nodded.
It was only now that the crew of the Kensington noticed that she was tiny. Well, she was huge, but she was also tiny. Carmen the Red, Terror of the Straits of Gibraltir, the Dread Queen of the Cape of No Hope, Sailor of the Styx, was a shorty. This was particularly obvious since they'd been tied up sitting down, and now hardly any of them could see her face over her belly.
"What in the blue blazes is going on here?!" a voice shouted.
Carmen grinned, and put her hands back on her hips. This was the best part of the job really. Nothing beat having an argument with someone who was tied up. Since, after all, they were tied up. What were they going to do to you?
"Ahar," Carmen said, as she waddled over, "And what do we have here my..."
She paused, and fished about in her bosom, before producring a scrap of parchment.
"My... lily livered barnacle scrubber?" she said, "Does that make sense?"
The man blinked.
"What? I don't have the slightest clue if it makes sense or not! Now, I demand you answer my questions right this instant!"
Carmen bit her lip.
"Hmmm, you're right, I really couldn't tell the colour of your liver just from a visual examination. Although I suppose the inference is that your cowardice would alter the hue... I don't believe that's literally true, though. Hmmm. Err, anyway, what do you want, you... you barnacle scrubber, you! You scrub barnacles. That is your job. It is not a very good one, so I laugh at you. Ahahahah."
The man just stared at her, or rather at her belly, for a moment, before regaining himself.
"Are you or are you not Carmen the Red, Terror of the Straits of Gibraltir, the Dread Queen of the Cape of No Hope?"
Carmen did not answer.
"Well?! Are you?!"
"Ehem."
"Answer me, damn you!"
"... you forgot one," Carmen said. "Sailor of the Styx. You see, the Styx being the river of damned souls encircling the afterlife in Greek and Roman mythology as well as Dante's Inferno. And me being a sailor of it because I bring death to- are you listening?"
She glowered over her belly.
"I spent a long time making up that nickname, you know? The other ones are just boring factual accounts of my achievements. I actually put time and effort into Sailor of the Styx, and nobody remembers it! That's appreciation for you, isn't it men?"
"Indeed!" the pirates shouted, as one.
"So you are her!" the captain said.
"Yes," Carmen said, "Carmen the Red, Sailor of the Styx, Kicker of your Ass. I believe you have some questions for me?"
The captain was getting angry. He had been raided by pirates three times as a matter of course, and had certain... expectations. This was just... all wrong.
"What's going on?!" he demanded, "You aren't ferocious at all! I thought you were a devil woman! I thought you'd have cut our throats sooner than take us prisoner, and leave the shattered carcass of our ship adrift. You know. Nasty pirate stuff."
"Oh, well... we can if you want to," Carmen said, "We wouldn't want to disappoint."
"Nooo!" the rest of the crew wailed.
"I didn't mean..." the captain said, growing flustered, "I just want to know what the devil's going on here! You lot act less like pirates and more like... scholars!"
Carmen grinned.
"First Mate Jones, what was your occupation before you felt the call of the sea?" she asked.
"Treasurer to her majesty, captain," the first mate said.
"Crewman," Carmen said, stopping another of her crew, "And what did you do before giving it up for a life of debauchery and plundering?"
"Deputy head librarian in Oxford, ma'am," the man answered.
"You're all... all nancies!" the captain said in a quivering voice, as if he couldn't believe it.
Carmen's sword was at his adam's apple before he could utter another syllable.
"I'd watch your words, captain," Carmen said, "Yes, we are indeed all scholars, men and women of academia, but we are not, as you so crudely put it, nancies. By which I assume you mean characters of a more pathetic and weak disposition. Wimps, weaklings, cowards, etcetera. This is certainly not true. There is not a soul among my crew who would not kill to save our freedom."
"Except maybe cookie," the first mate said.
"Well of course not cookie. He just cooks," Carmen said, "But the rest of us can and will kill when we need to. We are not bloodthirsty barbarians. We are Mathematicians!"
"Indeed!" cheered the crew.
"Preposterous!" the captain declared.
Carmen chuckled.
"Say what you will, but we shan't be beaten. Our sails are cut to our own measure for the greatest speed and manoeuvrability as per our calculations. Our cannons yield perfect accuracy at a range of three hundred yards. The buoyancy of our hull is calculated to within a half pound for the greatest hauls of treasure. And in the heat of battle we know how to turn the tide by measures you experienced seamen would never even think of."
"Ridiculous! You just caught us off guard! You're no fighter! For crying out loud you're pregnant!"
Carmen chuckled.
"Oh, you noticed? Well... I think you need a little demonstration of what I am rather fond of calling 'applied mathematics'. Crewmen, would you be so good to remove the captain from his bonds?"
The crew obliged without a word of complaint, and shortly the two captains stood opposite each other on the deck.
Carmen sheathed her sword.
"Alright," she said, "Come at me."
"... what?"
"You heard me. I would like you to try your best to clobber me. If you would be so kind. My crew shall standby until I order them to do otherwise."
The captain looked around as if hoping that sanity might have been lurking elsewhere on deck. It was not.
"I can't attack you! You're pregnant! You're a woman! I am no barbarian."
Carmen rolled her eyes, "Don't worry you arrogant inebriate sloth. I have no intention of allowing you to actually hit me. Just give it your best shot. Come. You can aim for my face, which is mostly devoid of babies. You do know what part the face is, don't you, you feather brained nincompoop son of woman of ill repute?"
He had had enough. This woman my have not been the demon he thought, but she was certainly annoying.
He let out a cry of rage and charged across the deck, fists bared.
Carmen casually stepped sideways.
It was by no means enough to escape the path of his rage, but as he approached the ship lurched sideways and he lost his footing. Carmen twisted out of his way as he went crashing down to the deck. Then she stood on his back.
"You see," she said, "My mass has many favourable qualities. You might laugh at how rotund I must be to make your ship rise and fall in the water, but you didn't laugh when it tripped you up, did you? Hmmm? And I doubt a weakling like you could even lift half of my weight, don't you agree?"
He grunted, trying to push against her foot, but it was no good. The huge pregnant weight pressing down on him was more than he could overcome. He collapsed on the deck, defeated.
"There we go," Carmen said, grinning, "Another captain convinced. I rather wish we didn't have to go through this every time. Now that that is over, my 'Hearties', I believe we have work to do, of the looting and pillaging variety?"
"Indeed!" the pirates shouted.
"Excellent," Carmen said, "Crewman Jenkins, inventory the ship's larder and present the results to me. I calculate that I shall crave sweetbreads within the quarter," she said, rubbing her belly.