Note: this requires a bit of introduction. Scoot ‘s Friday flash fiction prompt included “write about a famous piece of jewelry”, and it occurred to me that I don’t think I’d shared a story from my Wordpress days, one of the few bits of fanfiction I’ve ever really done. I’ve touched it up a bit, especially since I first wrote it before I’d seen the film. Enjoy!
The sun’s warm rays spilled across the surface of the sea. At the prow of the mighty ship, secure in Jack’s arms, Rose couldn’t help but exclaim, “I’m flying, Jack!”
Jack would have said something, but a blinding white tear appeared in the sky, and all at once a massive spaceship with rust all over crashed through, laser guns blasting away. It wasn’t just any rusted laser-cannoned spaceship crashing into existence above the RMS Titanic in the year of our Lord 1912, however; no, this was a pirate spaceship, crewed by mutant alien lizards no less, every one of them out for blood. “Arrrrr!” roared the captain, a redoubtable lizard named Slitherspit. “Avast, ye mangy swabs, and prepare to be boarded!”
“Run!” Jack yelled, and Rose took off behind him, dashing back into the Titanic and searching desperately for a place to hide. Finally they found one in a fortuitously located broom closet. They hid there, huddled in the dark, listening to the guttural roars of the pirate lizards and the screams of the crew. Suddenly Jack sniffed. “Say, Rose, you know...you don’t smell so good.”
“Oh, I’m sorry!” the irate Rose hissed back at him. “If I’d known we were going to be attacked by strange beasts with unusual weaponry I would’ve used deodorant! Oh, wait, I can’t, because they won’t have invented that until 1941!”
“No, no, Rose, what I meant was, if I can smell you, they can too! And- wait, what’d you say?” Jack asked in confusion.
The full horror of their unlikely situation dawned. “Oh heavens,” Rose exclaimed in a terrified whisper, “the fabric of time is unraveling! History’s bleeding together! And we haven’t even done the sketching scene with the Heart of the Ocean yet!”
“The what scene?”
“Not now! We have to save history!”
“No, no, go back. I wanna hear more about this sketching scene again. What exactly would I be sketching? You said something about the Heart of the Ocean?”
“It’s a diamond, very famous, family heirloom, now-”
“Oh, I see.” Jack had a suddenly thoughtful look on his face. “You know, there’s these ladies in France…”
“Oh, honestly, Jack.”
But there was no more time to debate, quite literally, for at that moment the broom closet door wrenched open with a metallic shriek, and a glaring pirate lizard stood before them. “Cap’n Slitherspit!” he roared. “‘Ere’s another one!”
Cap’n Slitherspit started towards them, his mighty lizard jaws slavering with drool. He reached out his scaly claws, but just then a second tear flashed in the sky and another spaceship soared through. This one was far different from the spaceship of the pirate lizards, however; it was shiny and straight-lined, glistening in the late afternoon sun. Blue plasma beams leapt from its gunports and sent pirate lizard after pirate lizard screaming into the sea.
Slitherspit might not have known about this immediately, except that suddenly in the corridor materialized the last thing either the lizard pirate captain or Jack and Rose expected to see: an unusually large hamster wearing a bright red sash and armed with a keen-edged rapier.
“Ah-ha!” said the hamster, placing himself dramatically between the humans and the lizard, “I’ve found you! And may I say, sir, that you are a sniveling fiend, not worthy to lick the bootstraps of these good gentlefolk!”
“Good my fanny,” Rose sniffed, “He still wants to talk about the sketching scene.”
“You were the one who brought it up!” Jack protested.
“Er, excuse me, gentleman and lady,” the hamster interjected, “I do beg your pardon for interrupting, but I am rather in the middle of-EEK!”He ducked just in time as Slitherspit’s massive cutlass slashed over his head. Then he flourished his rapier. “Sir! Have at ye!”
Steel met steel, and the fight was on. The hamster was clearly a master of the blade, dodging thrusts and making parries, his blade flying like clean lightning. But Slitherspit had the advantage of size and enormous power, not to mention a stolid tail. One fleeting second when the hamster wasn’t looking, and wham, Slitherspit’s tail smashed into him with all the force of a battering ram. The valiant hamster smashed against the corridor wall, fell to the deck, and lay very still. “Ha-harr!” Slitherspit bellowed in triumph. “Now I’ll finish you off, ye scurvy dogs!”
He started to turn away, but then glanced back at a sudden noise. The battered hamster struggled slowly to his paws, his beady little eyes blazing. “I’m not a scurvy dog, and we haven’t been properly introduced! My name is Ferdinand Roderick Marshalham Willingsford! The Seventh!”
“Go run a wheel, ya blithering idjit!” Slitherspit retorted. It was the third last thing he ever said. The hamster flung away his rapier and from a pocket on his belt produced a small green cylinder, which he hurled towards the towering lizard captain.
“‘Ey,” Slitherspit said, “wot’s this do?” That was the second last thing.
“Run!” Ferdinand squeaked towards Rose and Jack, and then turned tail and bolted itself. The two humans were a little hesitant for a second about accepting the word of a talking hamster, but they remembered the look in its eyes and decided that discretion was the better part of valor. They dashed down the other end of the corridor. The other lizard pirate scuttled after them, realizing danger when he saw it. “Where’re ye bleedin’ cowards goin’?” Slitherspit roared. “Ye’re not afraid o’ me, are ye-”
That was the last thing. The little cylinder had been quietly beeping all that time. Now the beeps merged into a steady tone. And then-
WHOOMPF.
Later that evening, the captain held a special party to honor the brave space hamster who had saved them all. Ferdinand Roderick Marshalham Willingsford the Seventh was so overwhelmed by the sentiment that he breached half a dozen temporal laws and told the captain and the officers present that he had better slow down and pay attention to the other ships’ radio people warning him about the big gleaming iceberg that was just waiting to punch a hole right through his vessel’s hull. Duly chastened, the captain and his staff complied.
Shortly thereafter, the RMS Titanic steamed into New York harbor, not having sunk, and with no one floating on a door or dropping valuable diamonds in the ocean either. Jack became a famous cartoonist by selling comic strips starring a turtle in a paper hat. Rose ended up leaving Cal anyway and marrying Jack the successful cartoonist, and so they all lived happily ever after.
Would you kindly please post a warning about excessive humor and the danger of spitting tea all over my laptop? Of course, it's too late for me, but others would appreciate it. Got a spare paper towel. Zzzzzzt! Dammit! There went the motherboard.
I don’t know how I am supposed to feel after reading this but I think I feel it.