Tsar Date 45.933.1547
I was only nine when your privateers came for me. Your goons boot stomped our door and ripped us from our parent’s arms. You told us our parents were “dangerous criminals” and said you had our best interests at heart. That your privateers would protect us and take us someplace safe. Now I know that you are a liar.
You took my little sister, Prudence away from me. I was all she had left. We were split-up and I was spirited away to a strange land, and given to strangers. Given to privateers you paid to guard the kids you crimped for your Royal Alliance. You offered them more money if they branded me with some disability or mental disorder. So, within a month I’d been stuck with more shots, and force fed more pills then I can count. I was being erased by your notions and potions. These psychos you propped up as my protectors enrich themselves while taking pleasure in my abuse. I knew if I didn’t escape there would be nothing left of me.
Mom and Dad never hurt us. All they wanted was a better life than you allowed. They were teachers in your system, and saw first hand how it destroyed young minds with monotony and manipulation. Mom and Dad just wanted us to have a real education. To teach us the truth, and let us see the world as it is. They knew your system was designed to foster conformity and dependence, but they were also landlubbers determined to change your system from within. The moment they showed even a mustard seed of progress, you labeled them dissidents and enemies of the Crown. Their only fatal error was taking half measures.
I wasn’t going to repeat their mistake. I ran away as far as land could take me. You declared me a fugitive, but what was my crime? Being a child? I searched for Prudence, but no one would help me because landlubbers are punished for helping kids without asking for your permission. So, every question I asked, every fragmented record, every leaf of paper from your system was a trap designed to send me back to the leeching privateers. People say it takes a village when they really mean it takes a Crown.
I will never ask for your mercy. You have none. Prudence was lost, and I was alone in your sick society. And sick societies produce sick people. I had very few options, but no matter how desperate feral life got, I knew anything was better than being treated like a domesticated animal.
In those days I was so sunk in your chemical fog that I thought that I would rather die than grow up. I wanted to burn down the whole adult world just because you were in it. But now my mind is purged of your alchemy, and you don’t get to tell me what to do! I am free because I say so!
At the edge of your jurisdiction, in a secluded coastal lagoon, I met a band of kids who were born under the black banner. They weren’t like landlubber kids. They were thoughtful and worldly. They knew who they were, and what they wanted to be. They weren’t just kids, they were carpenters, and musicians, and engineers. We spent the day collecting sand dollars and racing hermit crabs. As the setting sun turned the sky red they got ready to shove off. Before they sailed they took me aboard to meet Captain Swan, and once she saw that I comprehended the decision, she offered me the right of passage aboard her merchant ship.
At sea I saw how much was possible beyond your grasp, and I eagerly adapted to this wayward life. We sailed through lightning storms over a primordial ocean, and saw the cherry blossoms sprinkling on the floating markets of Thailand. I met pirates possessed of a powerful moral outrage toward everything you represent, but who didn’t let it hinder their passion for life. I met child prodigies that had never tasted your predation. But most importantly I found that pirates honored my autonomy and property regardless of age. On land I was expected to serve the desires of your Royal Alliance, but at sea I was finally at the helm of my own life.
I became a pirate’s apprentice. I served as a deckhand while I learned the sweet trade from the crew. My back got strong, my mind got sharp, and in time I even acquired a modest booty of my own. I learned peaceful and voluntary means of dispute resolution. I learned to defend myself from a larger attacker. But I also learned that the abuse I suffered by your hand was not unique. The uncomfortable truth is that your entire calloused and draconian system runs on violence. Well, when you treat an entire generation this way our minds begin to dwell on revenge.
You and your privateers claim to be the protectors and advocates of children, but only when it serves your lust for power and pleasure. When you see fit, we are thrown into prison-like indoctrination centers where we are open targets, deprived of any self-defense. Then, when it’s expedient, you arm young soldiers to fight your wars. You arm and disarm us as you wish, and until now we’ve been too naive to stop you.
The simple message of the Letters of Marque was hard to deny. A pirate decides their own course. Anything less is anti-valid. Don’t hit people or take their stuff. We stand up for ourselves, and band together in defense. No one on a pirate ship is more equal than others, not even captains. But I wasn’t certain the pirate’s life was for me until I read in the Letters of Reprisal, “The temptation of vengeance can not satisfy the hunger for justice.” She explained how you use our resentment and outrage to turn us against each other, so I decided I had to temper myself. That’s when the fire inside me was extinguished at sea, when I set my heading on justice for my sister, instead of revenge against you.
I was accepted as a valued member of the crew, but I didn’t enter the limelight until I told them about Prudence. As word spread across the pirate network of my ambition to liberate my sister by any means, many children of the black flag rallied to my side. To my surprise, no adult on any crew denied them the right to pledge themselves to my cause.
My advancement was never hindered by age among pirates. Captain Swan explained that her intention was to remain invisible to the Crown, but she had no desire or authority to stop us from leaving her crew, or even launching our own ship. Our objective was ours to claim, and our lives were ours to risk. Once our numbers were strong, and our coffers were full, we scraped together a meager fortune to purchase a modest vessel: The Emancipation.
With passion in our hearts, and freedom in our sails we raced toward land to shake the shackles of the children. You think you can exploit them because they’re too young to know better, but what happens when we expose your intolerable acts? What happens when we free their minds and show them you are unfit to exist? You cutpurse! You scoundrel! You scallywag! If you will only accept obedience or blood, I choose… disobedience. If you only slay dragons of your own creation, I am that dragon! We are coming to obstruct your injustices. Coming for your hierarchy and status. We are justice, and we are coming to free Prudence from your maw.
