Eysin: The Giggling Curtain | Ch. 13A - Vegas-B: Population – Whoever Showed Up and Stayed
A carnival of joy takes an absurd turn that isn't quite so absurd. The world’s first nomadic armada society with a russo-italian mayor, disco saints, pirate dumplings, and an evening of good deals.
The ship docks.
Following Arkion, Eysin steps out. Foot reaches—misses deck entirely.
She slips forward, expecting to catch herself, but doesn’t fall.
For a confused heartbeat she thinks she’s caught on a hook—something snagged her cloak, her pack, something.
Then she rotates in the air. Slow. Helpless as a compass needle finding north.
Her eyes meet the Baltikons’ at their level—all of them standing on solid ground, staring up at her suspended form.
They can’t contain their laughter.
She tries to wiggle, to find purchase, push off something—but her body just slips around empty air like she’s swimming through invisible honey.
Not hooked. Not caught.
Just—floating.
Can’t plant her feet. Toes dangle uselessly above the planks, searching for a deck that might as well be a mile below.
Her zerk hums full gold now, light spilling like a secret sunrise beneath the scraps of black rags, painting her face and hands in molten dawn.
“How the hell am I supposed to walk like this?” She does a full 360 degrees, walking within her bubble—upside down, sideways, toes skimming air like she’s moonwalking on invisible glass—always laughing.
One spin too enthusiastic and she flips completely vertical, hair floating like golden fire.
Arkion grabs her hand before she drifts any higher. “Woah woah woah, don’t fly off now.” His grin cracks wide, eyes twinkling like he’s caught a runaway sunbeam—but there’s something wet at the corners, like he might cry or laugh himself sick.
She bursts laughing, rolls in the air like a golden lightbulb mummy wrapped in black—the rags loosen with her movement, gold shimmering through in mischievous winks, turning her into a giggling aurora wrapped in midnight.
Arkion’s voice catches. “Okay, Morris—you’ve dealt with this before.”
Morris chuckles, openly teary-eyed now, and points to Arkion. “Grab a rag slip, string her along like a parade balloon. Bratka’s got a recovery tank for that.”
She tries a little curtsy mid-air—upside-down—and nearly somersaults into the rigging before Arkion yanks the rag.
Eysin grips the rag, floats upright, peaceful as Arkion leads—drifting through the souk like a holy golden statuette wrapped in black. He tugs gently sometimes; she’s stiff, toes skimming deck like a tipsy ghost learning to waltz.
Red paper globes. Bullet-casing chimes. Laundry lines strung with tiny octopus plushies dancing next to black zerk rags. The boxing ring rocks on its ferry—two kids trading love taps while a babushka screams odds in Neapolitan-Russian creole.
A thirteen-year-old with a captain’s hat and a black eye appears, starts walking backwards in front of Eysin—blocking their path but not stopping them, skewer of grilled squid waving like a wand, reciting the law like a paperboy hawking headlines he’s pitched a hundred times:
“No bosses, no borders, no traffic.
You fight, you feed someone smaller.
You steal, you teach the trick to an orphan.
You touch someone who didn’t beg for it on signed parchment?
Pits. Or worse. Capiche, товарищ?”
Eysin—stiff, mouth-breathing through the whole pitch, staring at the kid’s bored, unblinking face far below—tries not to laugh. Suppressed open-mouth giggles bubble up, feeling like letting go would roll her off Arkion’s leash and unleash total crazy.
She bursts laughing so hard the glow flares as far as the narrow streets allow and for some ten seconds everything becomes a circus orchestra.
Half the dock turns.
An eight-year-old points.
“Look! That lady’s a living disco saint!”
Nobody blinks. Saints are Tuesday here.
And riding proud at the center: a legendary imperial first-rate, four-decked treasure ship, painted Sunday-sauce red, gold cursive across the bow reading simply HAKA 7.
Arkion stops breathing for a second.
“Vegas-B,” he whispers. “Population: whoever showed up, ate his wife’s dumplings, and hasn’t been thrown to the pits yet.”
A heavy figure steps onto the bow of the red baochuan.
White linen shirt, sleeves rolled high, white trousers, white deck shoes soft as confession. A single thick gold chain rests against his collarbone like a mayor’s chain on a pirate who won the election.
In his right hand, a small roasted goose leg—held like a scepter.
On his left forearm, a dark-haired toddler sits calm and regal, tiny fingers curled around one of his gold rings.
Bratka surveys the deck with pale, calm eyes—eyes that have seen empires rise and fall and still find time to worry about his children’s table manners.
“Arkion.”
The name lands soft but heavy.
He descends the gangway. The planks do not creak; they know better.
The embrace is fierce, controlled, one-armed so the goose leg and the child remain undisturbed.
Only then does the smile come—wide, sudden, terrifyingly fond.
“Welcome home, figlio mio.”
His gaze shifts to Eysin, still leaking golden light like a cathedral at sunrise.
Bratka freezes.
He raises the goose leg and crosses himself—Orthodox three fingers, Catholic flourish, 100% Baltic superstition.
“Madonna santa e tutti i santi del Baltico… we got a live one.”
A short, sharp whistle.
Two teenagers appear as if conjured, rolling forward a dented copper bathtub filled with sparkly water.
“Emergency protocol,” Bratka declares, voice suddenly brisk, paternal, unstoppable.
“Saint in the tub. Suit drinks the overflow. Nerves knit. Everybody eats.”
A third kid (captain hat, black eye) skids up with a bucket of bath bombs.
“The sparkly ones are for saints, right, boss?”
Bratka doesn’t blink.
“Every last one.”
A fourth teenager (tiny, serious) holds up a rubber duck wearing a tiny paper crown.
Bratka nods solemnly.
“Yes. The duck stays. The saint deserves dignity.”
They lower her in like she’s a holy toaster that’s been recalled for being too shiny.
The zerk flares sunrise-gold.
For thirty glorious seconds Eysin levitates three feet above the liquid in a halo of molten fire while children scream bets in perfect English—because even miracles speak the language of gambling here.
“Five meters!”
“Ten!”
“Twenty and she owes us fireworks!”
Eysin, still hovering, halo flickering like a dying neon sign, mutters through gritted teeth:
“Aw, you gave me a rubber duck.”
Bratka raises his goose leg in blessing.
“Of course we did.
Everything in Vegas-B becomes holy eventually.
Even the plumbing.”
She splashes back down giggling, whole, utterly alive, glitter clinging to her like she just lost a fight with a disco ball.
Bratka watches, goose leg still raised, eyes suspiciously bright.
From the doorway, a tall, immaculate woman in crimson watches the chaos like a dragon doing taxes. The Accountess.
“Bratka. The new saint is dripping on my ledger.”
“Relax, amore,” he calls back, raising the goose leg. “The ledger’s waterproof. Like my heart.”
The woman snorts, fond and dangerous, and glides closer with gentle poise. She cups Arkion’s cheek, plants a soft kiss there. “As soon as Atlas shows up, we sit down for a trade.”
Then to Bratka: “The band outside is waiting for your blessing.”
Bratka hands his goose leg to Arkion and strides off, leaving them to settle in.
“Feeling more yourself now?” Arkion asks, about to take a bite.
The charge, the gold, the light—they’re gone!
Eysin swoops by, steals the goose leg, and bites into it.
“I just started acknowledging the hunger again!”
Welcome to Vegas-B.
Even the saints get baptized in grappa…
and the rubber duck gets a crown.
*
Later—negotiations in the long galley, lamplight painting gold across old maps and older wine.
Bratka sits at the head of a ridiculously small table, Arkion and Atlas on scattered pillows across from him.
Bratka holds the glass jar Arkion brought, tasting almonds. “Where’d you get your hands on these?”
Arkion grins. “Atlas’s contribution. We’ve got a dayoba back at Ceremony.”
“I’m thinking little packages—on the streets—to the tourists. Sugar, spices, improve the street smell.” Bratka throws more almonds in his mouth. “Osgar can handle the assembly line?”
“He can even get them blanched.”
“Perfetto. What else you got?”
“Parma cheese. Grated.”
“Accepted with gratitude and tears of joy.” Bratka wipes an imaginary tear. “Madonna, I could kiss you.”
“Please don’t.”
“Pecans. Forty-to-one verified.”
Bratka raises a thick black eyebrow—strange against his white-as-white hair. “And I suppose you want me to believe they’re not walnuts dressed up for carnival?”
Arkion shares a camera feed—spectral analysis, container logbook hovering on a small holo screen. The numbers don’t lie.
Bratka whistles low. “You beautiful bastard.”
“I try.”
“And now, boys—” Bratka leans back, fingers steepled. “What will it be?”
A pause. The air shifts.
Arkion’s voice drops. “Access to your elevator.”
Bratka’s eyes sharpen. “Ah. You want up.”
“We’re going up there to claim the two Zodiacs.”
Bratka leans back, scratching the bullet shell dangling from his ear. The scar on his cheek catches the lamplight—fresh, still pink, the mark of a headshot that missed by twenty degrees and a heartbeat.
“The Zodiacs.” His voice is careful now. “You’ve heard the rumors, then.”
“We’ve heard rumors,” Atlas says quietly.
Bratka’s gaze flicks between them. “They say something woke up near Sampo. Something old. Big enough to make the Continental nervous, and those bastards don’t get nervous about anything smaller than a collapsing star.”
He pours himself more wine. Doesn’t offer them any. A bad sign.
“Word is, it’s circling. Waiting. The Zodiacs have been dark for three weeks. No signals, no movement. Either the crews are dead, or they’re pretending to be furniture and hoping no one notices.”
Arkion doesn’t blink. “After everything you’ve seen, you believe all that?”
Bratka laughs once—sharp, fond, dangerous. “You always were the stupidest smart man I know.”
He stands, moves to a lockbox on the wall, pulls out two laminated cards.
“Arkion, it’s just a symbolic way of looking at things. I know these things out there spell trouble. What’d the saint say the other day? There’s apparently something spilling through time up there, and if we take his predictions seriously, it falls suspiciously close to the moment you intend to conquer them.”
He sets the cards down, sits back heavily.
“So what’s the real story?”
Atlas speaks up. “The Krakens are staying put because they’ve got Daegan hooked up to some machine in one of the Sampo branches. Trying to get him to remote-control them.”
Bratka’s expression darkens. “Daegan. Our brother—the defector.”
“Gen is on her way to see if we can do something about his situation, too.”
Bratka nods slowly. “Well. That’s just good manners, isn’t it?” His voice is dry, but there’s weight beneath it. “Alright, my whalers will be ready. I heard Vinu will be around, too?”
Atlas thanks the ceiling.
Arkion nods, “yes, Vinu and the Constellation fleet are already on their way over.”
“Since you lot are going out there to help EESO staff migrate back home anyway—have someone send a message to my agents up at Continental. Their service is required here for the duration of the transfer of power and the whaling.”
“Thank you.”
Bratka slides the two laminated cards across the table. “Now! The way up and down—Mastercards. Tourist visas, technically. Expire in seven days.”
Arkion examines them. “Stolen?”
“Improperly discarded.” Bratka winks. “The whole garbage line is in on it. They pay a little tax. Very civic-minded, those garbage men. Pillars of the community.”
“Generous.”
Bratka nods once, satisfied. Raises his wine. “Then go. Try not to die stupidly. I hate writing eulogies for idiots.”
As they stand, Bratka reminds Arkion, “Stay for the feast, figlio. Tessa’s been cooking since dawn—dumplings that could convert atheists.”
His wife stands in the doorway, a small wooden box in her hands. Crimson dress flows like spilled wine; gaze sharp as a tax audit, softened at the edges.
She glides forward, places the box in Arkion’s hands. “As your wedding gift.”
Arkion bows his head. “Thank you, Tessa.”
Bratka shifts, awkward—a giant behind his beard. “Ah, merda—I didn’t prepare. But anything! Anything you want!”
The room pans slow: legendary arm rings glinting on hooks, royal jewels scattered like guilty stars, ancient books stacked in shadows, furs draped over chairs like sleeping beasts, a globe etched with forgotten seas spinning lazy on its axis.
Arkion’s eye catches the bottle on the small table—nearly finished, red wine rich and velvety, cork askew from Bratka’s sips. He points. “That.”
Bratka blinks. “The dregs? Not valuable enough, boy.”
He pours the remainder into a small canvas bag, ties it with a sailor’s knot, thrusts it over. “Here. I’ll whip you something proper when all this is over.”
Arkion grins, slings the bag. “Deal.”
*
A day done of deals.
Night comes alive.
Bratka raises a tankard the size of a torpedo.
“To the Transfer of Power upstairs—may it choke on its own paperwork.
Down here we already voted.
Motion carried.
Party continues.”
The stage ship kicks into a tarantella so fast it should be illegal in twelve dimensions.
The boxing ring erupts.
A kid sets off a firework shaped exactly like a middle finger aimed at the Continental.
*
Arkion finds Eysin in the dining hall, wedged at a bench, listening to Cassius spin yarns to Lily and Pond, dumplings vanishing into their mouths.
“—and that’s Bratka for you,” Cassius rumbles, voice like warm gravel. “Forty years adventuring with Tessa: storms off Cape Horn, treasures in atolls, whispers in shadowed ports. Fleet’s just the wake—orphans, pirates, misfits scattered wide. Rockstars join, Baltikons swear in. No one knows the size. Impressive? Hell, the Navigator Guild hides, runs. They wouldn’t dare.”
Lily leans in. “You do know our bounty is so high they won’t even put it on a poster?”
Cassius nods, solemn. “Still, I swear, the Guild dares not find out what Bratka can do. The capacity of Vegas-B: Unknown. Unclashable.”
Arkion’s hand lands gentle on Eysin’s shoulder, drawing her gaze. She spots the small canvas bag slung at his side.
“What’s in the bag?” She leaks back in time, with gentle amusement.
“Come with me. I know a spot.”
From every perpetually seasick scrap of lace fluttering across Vegas-B—some drunk on grappa fumes, others hiding in rafters like guilty voyeurs—the collective voice rises in a breathless, scandalized whisper-chorus:
Incoming (yes, we did just say that): sax and violins, unsolicited existential French commentary, and a bedframe auditioning for heavy-metal stardom.
Don’t touch that dial—the howling night is just getting warmed up.
Pierre is prepping his Gauloises, and the bedframe is tuning its strings.
Continue reading:
Eysin: The Giggling Curtain | Ch. 13B - Vegas-B, Part 2: The Howling Night With Literal Time Fuckery
He has locked her hips with effortless fulcrum sorcery she never saw coming.