With a mighty thrust, the cutlass of Black Captain Cole split the heart of his rival, Admiral Flint. Cole flipped the toggle on the hilt, electric flux cascading down the blade, burning Flint black and crispy like a roasted duck. Finally, the dog Cole had hunted across sea and sky was dead. And yet, he felt no joy. He felt nothing at all.

From the deck of Poseidon’s Strumpet, Captain Cole felt the pulse of the Cavorite core that kept his ship aloft, heard the rustling of wind through sail. Cole gazed down at the world and the ants who thought themselves men upon it. He couldn’t even find contempt for these insects who would never sail the seas nor touch the sky.

Cole called for rum and his once beloved cabin boy. But even drink and sodomy with the catamite whom the men called “Three-Legged Ned” could not banish his melancholy.

What good is a pirate that finds no glee in pillage, who feels no swell of triumph at the death of an enemy? Cole thought. Am I no different than those landlocked fools below?