“Of course!” said the captain. “I will expect you to train very hard during your time here on the Vermillion!”
“Can I join you in the shop?” said Jia, coming down the steps from the wheel. “I’m looking for some pants with more pockets. I’m running out of space in my vest.”
“’Course you can, Li’l Hammerhead!” said Brocco. “If we don’t find anything, I’ll make it for you.”
“Hammerhead?” Matt asked.
Jia smiled. “That’s his nickname for me. Because of my tools.” She patted her pocketed vest.
“And because she’s smart as a shark,” said Brocco. “I’ll have nicknames for all of you soon enough, once I get to know you a bit. I’ve already dubbed your brother Li’l Bullet, and I think your sister should be Li’l Blade. There! Bullet and Blade, how about that?”
“If the name fits, wear it!” said the captain. “Enjoy Brocco’s shop. You’ll never see another like it!”
That was an understatement, Matt thought. Brocco’s “shop” was perhaps the greatest paradox Matt had ever seen. It looked like the backroom of a runway fashion show mixed with an artillery room. One side of the room held shelves stacked floor to ceiling with colorful fabric, thread, yarn, and baskets of sewing materials and tools. Movable clothes racks hung full with dresses, coats, and shirts. On the other side of the room there hung swords, daggers, spears, axes, guns, and a number of other weapons that looked to be from all different eras and countries. From the ceiling hung a collection of hats—wide brimmed hats and bonnets with flowers and lace, ribbons and feathers, little cloches with netted veils, top hats, fedoras, golf caps, and sailor hats. Dangling between the hats were what looked like cannon balls, hand grenades, and bundles of dynamite.
“Wouldn’t Mom love to get her hands on some of those swords?” said Ruby, her neck craned upward at all the swords on the wall.
“Of course! Li’l Blade’s gonna need her own sword. Let me see if we can find a good size for you.” Brocco browsed the swords and pulled a smaller one down. “There! That should be a right fit!”
Ruby rotated the sword in her hand, admiring it.
“Now all we need to do is find you the proper outfit. A good weapon is always nice to have, but never underestimate the power of good fashion when facing enemies.” With lightning speed, Brocco drew his pistol and cocked it. Ruby yelped and dropped the sword. Matt jumped, and Corey raised his hands, backing away.
“He-he-he-he!” Brocco laughed, high-pitched and hysterical. “You look ready to wet yourselves! Don’t worry. It’s not loaded. I always practice good gun safety.” He raised the gun to the ceiling and pulled the trigger. There was a huge blast. Brocco fell backward over his chair and his legs went over his head. Ruby screamed and crouched to the floor as debris fell from the ceiling and smoked filled the room. Matt coughed and waved it away.
Brocco stood up, brushing himself off. “Oopsie daisies! Guess I left one in there.”
“Brocco!” shouted a voice above them. “You just destroyed a very valuable ceramic pot from twelfth-century Rome!”
Brocco winced. “Sorry, Al! I’ll make you a new dinner jacket if you want. Or would you like a gun?”
“Don’t call me Al! You know I hate that name!”
“Well, you didn’t like Bert either. How about Bertie? Bertie Beans? You like beans, don’t you? He never takes to the nicknames,” Brocco whispered to Matt.
“I’ll be up to repair the damage in the floor, Albert!” called Jia.
Only a growl came as a response.
“Let’s get started on our new crewmates!” Brocco pulled a measuring tape from around his neck and without warning wrapped it around Matt’s head, then his waist, stretching it down his arms and legs and across his shoulders. He measured Corey and then Ruby, too, and then marked it all down in pencil inside a little leather notebook.
“Now we’ll need to get you some new outfits,” said Brocco. “Can’t have you running around in the same clothes all the time, can we?” He started rifling through the clothes racks.
Matt was a little concerned, based on Brocco’s fashion tastes. He looked like he put all fashion eras in a blender with the lid off. But they did need clothes besides what they were wearing if they were going to stay for more than a day or two. It wasn’t as though they had packed for this adventure.
Corey seemed to find it all very entertaining and tried on all sorts of weird outfits—a baggy pinstripe suit and bowler hat, a velvet smoking jacket with breeches, a kimono, leather chaps, lederhosen, and finally a kilt and Glengarry cap with a giant red pom-pom on top. “Look at me! Ain’t I a bonnie lad?” He put his hands on his hips and did a little jig.
Matt laughed. “Definitely keep that one.”
Brocco kept trying to throw sparkly, frilly dresses to Ruby, which she politely but firmly refused.
Brocco sighed. “One day the Vermillion will pick up a dress-wearing girl.”
“But I can’t swordfight in a dress, can I?” said Ruby, waving her sword in the air.
“True, true,” said Brocco. “I suppose we’ll have to compromise.” In the end Matt thought Ruby compromised a great deal by taking some sparkly, sequined shirts, a pair of floral pants, and a frilly pink nightgown, which Matt could tell disgusted Ruby, but seemed to appease Brocco somewhat in the dress department.
Finally Brocco turned his attention to Matt. “And what shall we put on you?”
Matt suddenly felt a bit panicked. “I don’t need anything fancy,” he said. “Something plain and simple will work just fine for me.”
“Plain?” said Brocco, as though Matt had just said a dirty word. “Simple? Where’s the fun in that? Have some sense, boy. We have to be plain and simple often enough. I say take every opportunity to express a little personality.” In Matt’s opinion, Brocco went way above and beyond personality.
Matt’s heart lurched as Brocco pulled out a gold sequined jacket and held it up to Matt’s chest. “No, not at all your color.” Brocco tossed the jacket aside. He spent the better part of an hour making Matt try on outlandish jackets, frilly blouses, and feathered hats. He was never satisfied and tossed clothing all around. In the end Matt was outfitted in what he felt was an awkward Halloween costume. He wore white knee breeches, blue-and-red-striped socks and mustard-yellow ox-fords, a violet My Little Pony T-shirt (with pink sparkles), and a long waistcoat, much like the captain’s, only it was navy blue with brass buttons, instead of black.
“Ah, now that’s more like it!” said Brocco, beaming.
Matt had never cared much about his looks or fashion, but this just went to show that even he could be embarrassed by an outfit. Corey and Ruby were in fits of silent laughter while Matt looked longingly at his pile of clothes on the floor.
“Just needs a final touch.” Brocco brought out a Yankees cap, but this was where Matt drew a hard line. He ducked out of the way.
“I can’t wear that,” he said.
“But everyone wears these in New York!” said Brocco, waving the Yankees hat. “It’s the one fashion I can get behind in that crazy city.”
“Not me. I’m a Mets fan.” He really wished he had his Mets hat with him now. Stupid locker thief.
“Come on, don’t be stubborn. Just try it on and see how it looks.” Brocco tried to push the hat on Matt’s head, but he ducked out of the way and hid behind one of the clothing racks.
“Give it up, Brocco,” said Corey, laughing. “He’d sooner eat that thing than wear it.”
“Fine,” said Brocco, tossing the hat aside. “But you look unfinished, and I think you should reconsider.”
“That is probably true,” said Corey. “We all know the Mets don’t have a chance of winning.”
“It’s not about winning,” said Matt. “It’s about loyalty.”
“Ah!” said Brocco. “Now that is a fashion we can all appreciate, especially the captain. Nothing’s so important on the Vermillion as loyalty. If we can’t trust each other, we can’t be a real crew,
you know. First lesson as a time pirate. Second is to always pick the right footwear. Who wants some new shoes? Look, these are lots of fun!” He pulled out some orange scuba-diving flippers. Matt felt it wise to keep hidden a while longer.
“Is he a bit . . . crazy?” Corey asked Jia, pointing his thumb back when they’d left Brocco’s shop, their arms stacked with several changes of clothes.
“Brocco?” said Jia. “No. He’s just . . . what’s that word? Eccentric. We all are, I suppose. I mean, when you travel to as many places and times as us, you start to realize that ‘normal’ is a very relative matter.”
Matt guessed that was true. He hadn’t thought too much about how his environment and culture had shaped who he was, but then he wondered how different he would be if he’d been left in the orphanage in Colombia, never adopted by his parents or anyone else.
“I have to go up to the gallery,” said Jia. “Albert’s probably having a fit right now.”
“Is that where you keep all the stuff you steal?” said Corey. “Can we come too?”
Jia hesitated. “You can, but just a warning, Albert’s really picky about all the investments up there. You can’t touch anything. Better yet, try not to even breathe.”
“Don’t worry,” said Matt. “We practically grew up in a museum. We know the drill.”
“I need to go get some tools and supplies. Why don’t you go put your clothes away and I’ll meet you right back here.”
When they returned a few minutes later, Jia was waiting for them with a toolbox, a fresh plank of wood, and a jar of peanut butter.
Indeed, when they arrived at the gallery, Albert eyed them all with deep mistrust. “Don’t touch anything,” he said.
“We won’t,” said Matt politely. “We’ll be very careful.”
Albert curled his lip at Matt but let them inside.
“Where’s the damage?” said Jia. Albert pointed toward the back wall of the room.
“I’ve already cleaned up the pot and made a full report for the captain,” said Albert. “Brocco ought to be discarded for such behavior.”
“You know the captain won’t do that,” said Jia, kneeling down where the gunshot had blown out a good chunk of the floor.
“He could have killed me!”
Jia took out a saw and began to cut a piece of wood from the fresh plank she’d brought with her.
Matt glanced all around the room, mesmerized by its contents. Paintings and tapestries covered the walls. Sculptures and pottery were stacked all over, and there were glass cases filled with crowns, jewelry, and old pocket watches.
Albert was standing in front of an oil painting on an easel, a brush in hand, though he wasn’t painting, Matt knew. He was restoring. He had a tray with several bottles of solvents to safely remove debris and old varnish. It was a familiar sight and smell to Matt, as he’d seen their own mother with very similar supplies.
Ruby came closer to inspect the painting. It was of a man and two little girls. She let out a little gasp. “That’s a Degas,” she said in a near whisper.
“I know,” said Albert, clearly annoyed. “It called Count Lepic and His Daughters. We rescued it from thieves in Switzerland in 2008, and it will be returned in Serbia in 2012.”
Ruby watched him as he brushed over the painting, and then her attention was caught by something else. “Wow,” she said. “What is that?” She had her face up against a tall glass case. Inside was the most stunning piece of jewelry Matt had ever seen. Several enormous diamonds the size of Matt’s nose were all connected by a web of more diamonds and rubies.
“That’s the Patiala necklace,” said Albert. “Nearly three thousand diamonds, and that large one, the ‘DeBeers,’ is two hundred and thirty-five carats.”
“I think Captain Vincent stole it for the old captain, before she died,” whispered Jia. “I think the captain was in love with her.”
“How did she die?” Ruby asked, also in a whisper. It seemed this subject required it.
“It’s somewhat of a mystery,” said Jia. “The captain hardly ever speaks of her. All I know is she died in a tragic accident on one of their missions. A fire or explosion of some kind.”
“That’s so sad,” said Ruby.
“What was her name?” Matt asked.
“Captain Bonnaire,” said Jia.
“But I wouldn’t say that name in front of the captain if I were you,” said Albert. “He doesn’t like it.”
“Captain Vincent went mad with grief when she died,” said Jia. “He tried to go back in time again and again to save her, but he couldn’t, and he almost destroyed himself and the ship while trying.”
“No one knows that for sure,” said Albert.
“They do. Wiley told me,” said Jia.
“And how would Wiley know? He wasn’t on board the Vermillion when it happened.”
“Do you get some of this treasure too?” said Corey, gazing at an open chest full of gold and silver coins. “I mean, you do some of the work, right? So you should get a share.”
“We get our share,” said Albert. “We get food and shelter and a life of adventure.”
“But you can take some if you want, right?”
“Do you mean steal it from the captain?” said Albert in an accusing voice.
“That’s not what he meant,” said Matt defensively.
Albert walked over to Corey and snapped the chest shut. Corey barely had time to remove his fingers. “These are all the captain’s investments,” hissed Albert. “No one touches anything except me, and no one takes any of it out of this room, not unless you want to get discarded.”
“Jeez, sorry,” said Corey. “I was just asking.”
“What does that mean? Discarded?” Matt asked.
“It means the captain takes you someplace far from your time or home,” said Jia, “and leaves you there. Forever.”
“Has he done that before?” Ruby asked, clearly alarmed.
“He certainly has,” said Albert. “All the crew before us was discarded.”
“The whole crew?” Matt asked. “Why?”
“Well, there was a change in command, wasn’t there?” said Albert. “The old captain before Captain Vincent had gathered her own crew that was very loyal to her, but when she died and Captain Vincent took charge, some weren’t loyal to him. A few even plotted to steal the compass from him, even though the old captain had clearly left it to him. Captain Vincent didn’t know who he could trust, so he had no choice but to discard all of the old crew, and then he gathered his own loyal crew.”
“That’s us!” said Jia. “We are very loyal to Captain Vincent.”
“And we’re quite perceptive when we sense those who aren’t loyal to the captain,” said Albert, looking directly at Corey.
Corey lifted up his hands. “I’m cool, bro.”
Albert sniffed, clearly still suspicious. “If the captain were to even get the slightest sense that you were stealing from him . . .”
“What? He’d discard us in the Sahara a thousand years ago?” said Ruby, a slight edge to her voice.
“Of course he wouldn’t!” said Jia. “The captain’s not a barbarian. Honestly, Albert, you really need to lighten up.”
Albert looked as though he were about to make some kind of retort when a bell suddenly began to ring.
“What’s that?” Ruby asked.
“That’s the bell for travel!” said Jia. “We’re going on another mission!”
“Yes!” said Corey, pumping his fist in the air.
Albert frowned, rinsing and drying off his brushes. “The captain didn’t say anything about going on another mission today. We just got back!”
“The captain doesn’t have to tell you everything, Albert,” said Jia.
“But he still hasn’t given me the Mona Lisa! It’s not safe to travel when it’s not in the gallery.”
“Why not?” Matt asked.
“Because the Vermillion always changes the rooms around between transformations, and things a
re always going missing,” said Albert. “The gallery is one of the few places the ship knows to leave alone.”
“And the captain’s cabin,” said Jia. “You know the Vermillion never messes around with his stuff. The Mona Lisa is perfectly safe. Come on!”
11
Game Changers
“Where are we going?” Matt asked as soon as they reached the captain in the dining hall. He had the Obsidian Compass in hand with Santiago perched on his shoulder.
“What’s the mission?” asked Corey. “Is it dangerous? Do we get to steal treasure from robbers again?”
“This mission will be slightly different than our usual,” said the captain. “I thought we might take a little test trip, travel someplace not too far from your time and home and see how Matt does with his time sickness. I believe I have thought of just the thing.”
“What is it?” Matt asked.
“Let’s see how quickly you can guess,” said the captain. “I never like to spoil the surprise!”
“Sir,” said Albert in a whiny voice. “I really think you should allow me to take the Mona Lisa to the gallery before we travel. It isn’t safe—”
“I assure you the Mona Lisa is perfectly safe, Albert, thank you. Crew! Prepare for a quantum time leap!”
All the crew scrambled to find furniture to hide behind or beams to hold on to, but Matt strategically placed himself just behind the captain so he had a clear view of the compass.
The captain first turned the inner dial to the left and then the right, then the middle dial, also to the left and then right, and finally the outer dial, left, right, then left again. It was like a three-tiered combination lock, Matt decided. Each layer had to unlock some specific pathway of time and space, but he was clueless as to when or where they were going. There wasn’t enough time to figure out what all the symbols and numerals meant.
The candles and lanterns flickered, and the ship immediately began to shift. It seemed to be shrinking. The walls were moving in, the ceiling pushing down. The furniture split and combined against either side of the Vermillion. Matt was jostled until he was forced to sit on a smooth black leather seat.
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