Chapter Text
“Ever has it been that love knows not its own depth until the hour of separation.”
― Kahlil Gibran, Lebanese poet and writer. 1883-1931.
There’s a significance to all of the memories in a person’s life. No matter how wonderful, nor how ugly and harmful, the things humans go through will stick with them forever. Curiously, it seems to be the menial details that are remembered. The temperature of a fever when your first child is sick, the hush of snowfall on the eve of your parent’s funeral, and the scent of a late grandmother’s home furnishings. Or, for instance, the weather on the day when Tobias met Malcolm.
It was strangely warm and sunny, bringing about a hubbub of life to the boardwalks. Late afternoon sun tickled the back of Bilgewatians who had decided to go out for a stroll in the hazy heat. Portly house husbands walked out of their homes and met with friends in the street, gossiping about their spouses before immediately heading to their favorite pubs. There would always be a feeling of hardness in the community along the shoreline, but on lazy days like this it was easier to get along.
It is for that exact reason, Tobias often reflected, that the day went so well in the first place.
He had long since set up a sort of business spot on the northern docks, sitting on a set of old crab traps and waiting for the right sucker to come by and take a gamble with his cards. At the time, Tobias was young enough to appear inconspicuous; Bilgewatian children often had already mastered the art of pickpocketing and trickery, but even still they were… well, Tobias liked to use the term “under-appreciated”, but he was sure others could find different ways to describe them. The point was, they were able to get by with the use of their wits and by taking advantage of a grown-up’s ignorance.
Tobias, in this regard, was no different.
In many, many, many others, he was as strange as could be. For one, it was hard to call him a child anymore. He'd recently met his nineteenth year, and it was starting to show in the patch of facial hair that he'd finally been able to muster. He also stood out like a sore thumb amongst the reds and browns of the Bilgewater-made leather and cloth that the civilians wore in the greens and silver River clothes he had kept for nearly a year. His inarticulate grasp on the common tongue also left something to be desired while scavenging the streets. Instead of letting these disadvantages hold him back, Tobias had learned to utilize them. Now there was no possible way to track him with physical records due to the language barrier, and the odd clothing meant he could be seen easily when he wanted to be. Tobias was content, to say the least, with what fate had forced him into.
Which brought him to this day, sunny and bright and unassuming.
A crowd had gathered around him, all pushing and shoving light-heartedly. Tobias was being fair with his gambling; the stakes were not too high and he was able to cheat using the simplest of tricks. He’d be able to afford dinner tonight, which is all that mattered to him.
“Bah,” a large woman threw down her cards and tossed her heavy dreadlocks behind her head. She tutted, but grinned lopsidedly at him. “Yer smarter than y’look, lad. Can appreciate’at.”
Tobias offered her a chirping laugh as he pocketed the coins on the overturned box serving as a dealing table.
“It is how I was raised.” he said. The woman squinted at him as though trying to think through his accent. Eventually she shrugs and stands, grumbling to herself about losing her pocket change to a ‘river rat’.
Tobias had long learned to ignore comments like that — after all, he wasn’t much of a Riverman anymore. Shuffling his cards, he peered up at the congregation before him.
“Now, is there anybody else ready to pay up?”
The crowd rumbled together, debating if they should step forward. A Bilgewatian may be cocky, but deciding on who gets to show off is more complicated than the spitting contest itself. He clicked his teeth.
“Nobody who wants to lose to a foreign child?” he taunted, flipping the cards between his hands. The muttering only grew, fueling Tobias’ attitude. “Is everybody afraid that their pockets will be emptied by a kid?”
“I’ll take a swing at it.” A gruff voice said. Tobias glanced towards the source to see a burly young man pushing past the crowd.
He couldn’t have been much older than Tobias. Youthful mischief glinted in his eyes and in his crooked smile. He was broadly built and wore it proudly in how he held himself. He sported a thin, dark mustache that looked like it had just begun to grow. He walked with his feet wide apart and his shoulder jutted out in front of him, like he used his upper body to move his lower. If it weren't for the avid compliance to the Bilgewatian aesthetic, he would look like a shaved grizzly bear.
Tobias raised an eyebrow.
“It seems I have a challenger.” he commented before raising the stranger four silver pieces. The man watched his fingers carefully, already suspicious of the riverman, before matching the bet with a silent grin. Tobias smiled back.
“Your deal, stranger.”
He wakes with a jerk, panicked, finding it hard to breath, searching around for something- anything- that would give him clue as to where he was and why he was there. The soreness in his muscles and bones blinded him for a moment, making him double over with hands on his torso with a heady groan. His head ached — had something hit him? Most likely. He must’ve been out for a while. There are scrapes and healed cuts on his hands and arm— from jumping over the barbed wire fence, he imagines. A few days at the most, then? The marks hadn't been deep. Nothing presently hurts aside from his head, which is typically a good sign.
Tobias peers around the room, once having deduced the time he spent asleep. With a wave of comfort, he realizes he’s in his quarters — the small portside window shines morning light into the room, the rickety bed under Tobias’ hands is still threadbare and moth-bitten and it still reeks of gunpowder and cigarettes. Outside he can hear gulls crying, the ocean lapping delicately at the hull. He smiles, and leans back into his pillow. A mindless hand wanders, creeping, over to the left side of the bed. The bed is warm and soft, and he’d be perfectly fine if he could just lay there and snuggle. His fingers continue, lackadaisical, over the wrinkled sheets, finding only air.
He sits up slowly, eyeing the empty bed. Malcolm isn’t here.
Strange. Did he not suffer any injuries in the heist? After all, it was his stupid idea to try and rob one of the esteemed Priggs vaults. He should suffer at least a portion of the consequences his partner had. Tobias’ fingers run over the rough bedsheets, slightly resentful that they were only warm where he had been resting. Did Graves also just not sleep in their room? The fight before the heist was bad, yeah, but it couldn’t have been that bad.
He slides to the edge of the mattress and stands, taking a moment to let his legs remember how to be legs again. Pins and needles are slowly replaced by tissue and bone, and Tobias reaches his hands over his head to let his body crack in the satisfaction of being awake. He walks to the door of the captain’s quarters, rolling his arms and neck. He’s in the middle of massaging a knot out of his shoulder, deciding how best to bring out a patented “apology-not-apology” when he opens the door to see Kolt and Wallach are standing in a huddle, whispering to themselves.
Two sets of dark brown eyes turn to him when the doors open. While it’s not uncommon for Wallach to look nervous and flighty, the downright stricken expression on Kolt’s face hits Tobias like a cold shower.
“Tobias— ah, I mean,” Wallach straightens up, pushing his curly hair away back behind his ear. He won’t look at Tobias anymore. “Captain.” Tobias feels his heart freeze. Something’s definitely wrong. Numb from the overhanging anxiety between the trio, Tobias leans back on the doorway and crosses his arms protectively. Wallach may not be able to meet Tobias’ eyes, but Kolt still has no trouble. But instead of a challenging sneer or grin, she’s somber- grim as an old gull.
Careful and collected as always, Tobias simply chuckles; if something’s the matter, he’s going to have to stay calm for them.
“ Captain? ” he asks, raising an eyebrow at the twins. “Now I know somethin’s up when Wallach calls me captain and Kolt won’t correct him.”
He crosses his arms as Kolt and Wallach exchange glances; Wallach is fidgeting so bad Tobias is almost sure he’s full of wharfhoppers. Kolt looks downright pained. Jokes are not helping and it sends anxious fluttering through Tobias.
“Listen, Foxtrot,” Kolt starts, turning her hard gaze back to him. Discomfort squirms in his stomach, feeding the butterflies, as the creases of her frown deepen. “We’ve… got to talk about the heist.”
“Yeah, we do.” Tobias says, his laugh bubbling out of nerves now. “Like, why aren’t we celebrating? Where’s the booze? Matter a’fact, where’s the boozer himself?”
“Malcolm?” Wallach perks, and his fright damn near breaks Tobias’ heart. He falters at that, and the way Wallach and Kolt seem to flinch around his name. “He’s, uh—”
“Gone.”
The twins snap their attention upward to the towering figure behind them. They stand up, backing away from the Brick, while the numbness spreads from Tobias’ fingers, up his arms, down his shoulders, through his back…
“Brick, wait, we were going to-”
“He got caught,” Brick says awkwardly, and Tobias does not take in the wringing of his hands. He can’t. He can’t focus. The knot is still in his shoulder. He thinks on how stiff his body feels. “He’s … they got ‘im in the Locker.”
The crew turns slowly to Tobias. They’re watching him. The silence in the air makes the waves down in the ocean seem loud, grating on nerves. Tobias tries to swallow, but can’t; tries to speak, but can’t; tries to move but can’t; tries to think but can’t; tries to breath but can’t; tries to seek comfort but can’t, because Malcolm’s gone, Malcolm was caught, and he’s alone in—
“The Locker..?” Tobias whispers. His voice sounds like he’s got a head full of cotton, and all the eyes on him threaten to burn him alive. He looks away from them, vision sentenced to the deck of the ship, where he can’t see his terror reflected by his crewmates’ eyes.
The wood beneath their feet creaks, and he’s sure he can hear them talking, but nothing makes sense. Malcolm couldn’t have been caught; this is some cruel joke, surely, to get back at Tobias for being so rude and smarmy. What had he done recently? He did take Kolt’s shoes once, but he’d given them back because give him a break, it’s a bad habit. Or was this was payback to him being a smartass in general? The shaking in his hands is so funny, he supposes, the goddamn panic attack is a big joke. They’d played worse pranks before, this was nothing, but Tobias would really like this particular charade to end.
“Captain?” Wallach steps forward, and the gentleness in his tone is an afront to Tobias’ reeling panic. “Are— are you going to-”
“Don’t call me that,” Tobias says, sounding sleeker and smoother than he is feeling. His mouth is made of leather when the rest is turning to feathers and threatening to be blown away by the sea breeze. He swallows around the suffocating tightness in his throat. “I’m not your only captain—”
Wallach hesitates, looks to Kolt for support. “But… Graves—”
“Is not staying in that place.”
The commanding tone in Tobias’ words shuts everything down — even the waves seem to quiet. Tobias raises his head, and only now does he realize the four of them are completely out at sea. There is no land. There is no dock. There is no port. Just endless miles of sea. The crew, baffled, searches for something to say.
“The Locker’s never been broken out of before,” says Kolt, ineffectively forcing her voice to not waver. “He’s not goin’ to get out of there just like that.”
Both the fact that Kolt still feels the need to prove him wrong and the fact that she’s right only inflames Tobias’ fear — no one had broken out of the Locker in its history as an established facility. Tobias locks his jaw; if there’s something that life has taught him, it’s that there’s a first time for everything.
“He won’t be doin’ it alone.” Tobias says coldly. The knot in his shoulder reminds him to stand tall, to raise his chin in defiance. “We’re breakin’ him out.”
The crew stares, and for once he does not immediately understand what they are thinking. It seems the Brick’s nervous energy has taken hold of all three crewmates, as told by each fidget they seem to have taken up- Kolt cracks her knuckles, Wallach picks at his cuticles, and the Brick shifts his weight to and from as they just stand around for—
Oh. They’re waiting for an explanation. A plan. He’s the sole captain of the Trifecta, now that he’s without Malcolm. Tobias’ jaw begins to ache with how hard he has it clenched. He makes a vow, in the silence of his own mind and in the chaos that is the sea, it is a solemn oath:
That will be the last time he allows the phrase “without Malcolm” to be applicable in his life.
Tobias sets his jaw, steels his eyes, raises his chin. The crew seems to follow his lead, all growing an uncertain strength from his restitution.
“Set a course for the nearest port. We’re going to need supplies if we’re going to help Malcolm.” he says, before forcing a tight, strict smile. “Poor guy’s bound t’get lonesome in there.”
“They’ve gotta be around here somewhere!”
“Keep lookin’ — they can’t be hidin’ that well!”
“Saw ‘em! They went’at way!”
Two bodies pressed against the cool brick of a nearby abandoned millhouse, breathing hard, adrenaline pumping in an inaudible duet, as the footsteps traipsing against cobbled streets begin to fade.
While that was far from the first time Tobias had been forced to run from his gambling spot, but it was the first time he had to worry about someone else while running. The boy he’d gambled with, while very fun to be around and deceptively smart, wasn’t the most agile person on the docks. While Tobias could duck behind walls and hide and slip out of sight, the stranger wouldn’t settle on a place to hide until they’d been found and were forced to keep running. Tobias’ weak lungs couldn’t keep up with his indecisiveness. It was fairly frustrating.
The voices fade away from their current hiding spot and both boys visibly relax with a heavy sigh. While Tobias slumped against the wall and slid to the floor, chest aching and throat burning, the stranger peeked around the corner to get one last lookout before letting a laugh roll out. The sound of it surprised Tobias; chummy and deep, his laugh was almost sinister in its friendliness, like he’d just smiled at you with a knife to your throat. It was charming, in a peculiar sense. And contagious — Tobias grinned up at him, and it earned him a crooked smile back.
“Ain’t had a run like that in a while,” the boy said. “That trick you tried on me back there, with the way you put your cards away so fast — how’d you do it?”
“A lot of practice,” Tobias answered simply. “It is taught to many children on the River.”
“The River, huh?” the boy tilted his head and scratched his neck. After a short pause of silence, he sighed and sat against the opposite wall of the cramped alleyway. “That where you’re from?”
Tobias felt a hint of scrutiny at this question. The boy did not even know his name, and suddenly he was so curious about where he’d come from?
Curtly, Tobias nodded, and offered no more explanation. The boy caught his hint.
“Ah. Well, alright.”
Not a wordsmith, then. They sat in silence for another beat.
“What is your name?” Tobias asked.
The boy rolled his shoulders before throwing out an awkward hand. Tobias dimly realized it was a poor attempt to be civil -- despite robbing and running from a bunch of angry fishermen and drunkards.
“Malcolm Graves.”
Tobias nodded slowly, but did not meet Malcolm’s hand. Not a terribly common name, almost sounded like his family hailed from some other region. Tobias didn’t think too deeply on it.
“What ‘bout you?” Malcolm asked, putting the hand down in defeat... “Got a name, or are you just the swamp rat?”
A gnawing irritation filled Tobias. A despised title — not only looking down on Tobias for being from the Serpentine River, but a mockery of his banishment. He grit his teeth and sighed. A product of the community, surely. Having no patience with something like this wouldn’t get him anywhere.
“Don’t call me that.” he said, maintaining an even tone. “Just call me Tobias.”
“Tobias, huh?” Malcolm scratched the beginnings of a beard on his chin, looking as thoughtful as a bear trapped in human’s clothes could. “Would’ya mind terribly if we did that schtick again? In a better location?”
Tobias cocked his head to the side. “How do you mean?”
“I mean gettin’ into a bar and workin’ a little bit of that magic of yours.” Malcolm leaned forward with a sparkle of mischief in his eyes. If Tobias weren’t struggling to not scoot away from this frankly not-sweet-smelling man, he would have found his chaotic glee exciting. “Y’know, your cards, both of us can schmooze the crowd a little. What d’you say?”
Tobias sat back, pondering. It didn’t sound like a terrible idea — sure, what the hell was he supposed to do with a word like ‘schmooze’, but context clues are a beautiful thing — and he was kind of sick of having to fight to eat every night. Tobias’ cards, Graves’ know-how of the streets…
“Which bar would we be going to?” Tobias asked. “There are a few I am not allowed to enter after making a few patrons unhappy.”
“Don’t mean nothin’.” Malcolm said, waving a hand. “We won’t be too long, if you’re as good with them cards as I thought. Just enough to get dinner. You in or not?”
Tobias paused. A smile crept over his face.
“Sounds like a deal.”