------------- Nate’s Crew – Captain on Deck

The world was a big place. In fact, it was a slightly larger place than other worlds, as he’d heard. The off-worlders were little more than a footnote in Arrallonian history, but they had left many things in their attempt to seize and rule the world. One thing was navigational charts, satellite based maps of all the landmasses and the technology for the Arrallonians to conquer those seas. There were still a lot of little dots on those maps upon which no Arrallonian had ever set foot. Most of them were in the temperamental and stormy Atlantean Ocean, the vast expanse of sea bordered by the shores of Hesterland and Avandor to the east, the coast of Callona to the west, the icy reaches of Polaris to the north, and the tropical ports and islands of Beotharn to the south. And he’d spent every year of his adult life sailing back and forth across that ocean.

Nathaniel Scott was born to a simple dock worker and his wife, the third of six children, with little hope of any kind of life other than repeating his father’s. But he grew up charming and strong and smart. His cousins often chided him about the tax man being his real father, since he had little in common with his siblings or either of his parents. Life in Landington was slow, unexciting, repetitive,… and frellin boring. It was no surprise that by the age of 15, he was already in trouble. At the age of 17 he was given two options, jail or a stretch in the military. As he had no interest in standing watch at a city gate for the next ten years, he volunteered for the Sonntaglian Royal Marines.

Training was rigorous and the life was tougher. Discipline was ingrained early and often. It never managed to take. However, Nathaniel’s inherent sense of self-worth and courage quickly allowed him to distinguish himself, where it mattered, in battle. By the age of 22, he’d received a commission as an officer, awarded by the Captain of the HMS Defiant Sword. A few years after that, he met the man who would turn out to be his lifelong best friend, a Marine Senior Sergeant. He got the Atlantean assigned to his platoon and they became an unbeatable team. Five years later, he got to the end of his original enlistment, and the Sergeant mustered out with him.

Lt Scott’s career was distinguished, though it might have been more so. He was always held back by his love of adventure, his contempt for rules, and his sometime blatant disrespect for senior officers. On the other hand, there was never any denying his accomplishments; dozens of pirate vessels seized, numerous boarding actions repelled, and first landings on scores of uncharted islands without ever losing a man. If he’d ever managed to keep his mouth shut, his fly buttoned, and his men sober, he might have gone far. Instead he went far west, to Mauritius, to start a new life, something more befitting a swashbuckler such as he, the life of a privateer.

------------- Credits

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