Introducing... Bruce Livingstone, Pirate Hunter

Having a TV crew following him around wasn't making Captain Bruce Livingstone's new commission any easier. They were annoying, they were demanding, but worst of all, they had no clue about shipboard life. The sound recordist had already bashed his skull off a bulkhead at least twice, so far as he knew, and they were barely a week out of Perth. 'Do the bugger good, probably,' thought Livingstone. He had been given command of HMAS Maralinga after his previous command, HMAS Toowoomba was decommissioned. It had been a dirty old tub, and patrolling the northeast coast from the Torres Strait down to Cairns had been a hell of a job. Fever and disease were rife up there, and if that wasn't bad enough, the people smugglers had upped their game. Their detection systems and weaponry were twice as technologically advanced as the Naval Command had led him to believe. One of his sailors had been shot from a rusty little barge that he wouldn't even expect to see ferrying passengers between Port Pirie and Whyalla. He had survived, and received a huge lump of compensation. The incident had highlighted the Toowoomba's elderly deficiencies, and it had been put out to pasture. 'Probably running powder out of Brisbane' Bruce mused miserably. He had enjoyed his time on her, despite the rigours of the job.
Not that he was unhappy with the new assignment. His experience dealing with the smugglers had elevated him on the list to take over from veteran captain, James White Sr., as captain of the Maralinga. It was a frigate, the biggest ship Bruce had yet commanded, and he liked that it was named for a town in his home state of South Australia. 'Bogans united, eh, old girl?', he muttered, as he stared out at the vast blue expanse of the Indian Ocean. They were about 200 nautical miles northeast of Mauritius, and had passed within sight of the island of Rodrigues early that morning. The TV crew had collared him on the way from breakfast. "Do you know what island that is? Could there be any pirates there?," the blonde presenter asked him. "Rodrigues is part of Mauritius, and their government are part of the anti-piracy agreement signed by the UN. Anyway, there's too many bloody tourists there anyway. Now excuse me, I've things to see to." With that Bruce stepped into to the bridge. "Do these kids know anything?", Bruce asked his first mate, Steve McMahon, after the door had clanged shut. Steve looked at him wearily, then shrugged. "Gives the crew something to talk about, at least." He directed his attention back to whatever he'd been doing. The TV crew obviously had no idea about what the pirates were actually up to, and Steve obviously didn't care. "They're probably expecting Blackbeard or something," he continued, from the position he was occupying in the corner. "Reckon the crew probably are, too."
Aside from what had been in the brief, Bruce had been researching the pirates himself recently, even before getting the news that he was to lead a team of 'international peace-keepers' patrolling the sea lanes between the Gulf and Madagascar. His interest in the sea had been a passion since childhood, devouring books on the history of the oceans, especially the Indian Ocean, where he now sailed. Bruce knew from the journals of the RAN and the online Naval Archives where the main pirate nests were likely to be, and he had decided to base himself near the island of Socotra, known as a regular refuelling point for the pirate's captured prizes. Bruce wasn't the type to preen, but there was no harm in making himself look good on camera. After all, even the Chief himself might see the show when it aired, and there was no harm in being the assertive, yet affable "Bruce Livingstone, pirate hunter."
Bruce was musing on his possible TV career when a junior officer called to him. "Captain, we have reports of a commotion on the foredeck, looks like somebody's gone overboard." Bruce caught up his binoculars. "Where exactly?" he asked. "Port bow, just forward of the guns, sir," came the reply. The guns were blocking his view. "Come with me, Steve." He dropped the binoculars on the desk and made for the door. "I'm going to see what's going on." This was likely to be the most interesting event for the next few days, and he might at least be there to see it. "Wonder who it is." Steve caught up with him. "Reckon the dip will have sobered him up at least." Bruce smiled grimly at Steve's directness. As they reached the main deck, a sailor ran up and saluted. "Captain, sir, we've noticed a person floating about 400 yards to port, should we launch a boat to pick them up? Only, they could be dead, these are dangerous waters." Bruce thought about it for less than a moment. "We'll launch. Lieutenant Commander McMahon will organise it." He turned to face Steve. "Here's something else for the crew to talk about. Keep me informed." "Aye, sir" came the salute, as he was already halfway up the ladder to the bridge.
Bruce wondered who they would bring aboard. It was unlikely to be one of his own crew, as they would not have let themselves float 400 yards without raising some sort of alarm. The likelihood was that it was a corpse, especially since they had not raised another vessel on the radar all that day, meaning that the body had been floating for at least 3 to 6 hours. Under the blazing November sun, that was almost equivalent to a death sentence. He watched the boat swing out on its davits and converge on the floating object. He wouldn't have noticed it himself, not from here. Just then his radio crackled with static. "Captain, sir, we've picked up a girl. Medic says she's alive, but only just." "Thank you Mr. McMahon, bring her to the ship, and see what can be done for her," Livingstone replied. He raised the field glasses again and noticed the film crew fussing agitatedly at the rail beside where the launch would be raised, while junior officers attempted to herd them to a safer distance. He narrowed his eyes, and turned away. He would attend to his other duties until further news arrived. Steve would field any questions. He had a way with words. Bruce often told him he should have been a politician. "You can say absolutely nothing with a lot of words." It meant that he could be silent and aloof while making decisions. They made a good team. 'Steve ought to get plenty of airtime on this TV show.' Bruce checked himself. He shouldn't be thinking about the TV documentary as anything other than a minor nuisance, and certainly not thinking about himself as a TV star. He forced himself to put it out of his mind as he recorded this incident in his log, and took care of some other business. He was examining a satellite image of the northern Somali coast when Steve returned to the bridge. "Captain, can you come down to sick bay, Doc John's got some interesting news to report." Bruce glanced up and nodded. "Right with you, Steve."
As they ducked through the hatch into sick bay, Medical Officer Richard John leapt up from where he sat writing a report. He saluted the Captain, and cleared his throat. "Sir, the girl hasn't regained consciousness, but she should live. She will have extensive skin damage from the long exposure to the sun. I've estimated she's been afloat for nearly twelve hours, and was probably conscious for most of that time, because she has very little water in her lungs." He paused for a breath, looking for a reaction from the Captain. It was his first time sailing under him, and this was their first professional interaction. The Captain's green eyes glinted. "First Officer McMahon informed me that you had interesting news. This isn't something I needed to come down here to find out." The Captain looked as if he was about to turn and leave. John ploughed on. "Captain, sir, I hadn't gotten to the interesting part. We've decided she's of South Asian heritage, and what is her natural skin tone is deeply discoloured by bruising all over her body. An extreme fall, such as from an aircraft, could have caused it, but we've also discovered chafe marks on her wrists and ankles, from a coarse-fibre rope, most likely, and concluded that she was a prisoner of some sort, and received a beating. No signs of sexual assault though, which is strange." The Captain looked thoughtful as he pondered the report. John waited nervously for his reaction. "Thank you, Doctor," he finally said. "Send your fully detailed report straight to me when it's ready, and make sure nobody else sees it. I also want to be alerted straight away when the girl revives." John was relieved the Captain had taken his conclusions seriously. "Aye Captain" he saluted smartly. As they were leaving, Steve looked back and added "keep that bloody film crew out of here as well." The medic nodded, and returned to his report.

Character Sketch - Giovanni Vertese

Giovanni Vertese was a man on the run from Fortune. Fortune had deserted his grandfather in the Bosphorus, long before his birth, and Fortune had left his father bitter and poverty-stricken in a damp apartment in a poor quarter of Venice. La Serenissima held no allegiance for him. Giovanni grew up hearing his father curse the Doge, curse the Sultan, curse the Greeks, and curse his father. Before his grandfather's fatal decision to defend the Greek capital, they had been wealthy merchants trading in fine silks and textiles. Now, the family scraped a living making cheap clothing from cut-offs scavenged on the wharves. Giovanni learned the scavenging trade early. Not just cloth, either. He had sewn pockets inside his tunic capable of holding all sorts of items. Apples and oranges were most common, but he often came home with pockets lined with candle butts, nails and other useful objects.
After a few years, he grew too tall and gangly to be as useful, though he was still nimble on his feet. He was too restless to be a tailor, and refused to live in the same squalor that had embittered his father. Giovanni resolved to flee the city. He saw the sea as the root of his family's woes, and so, unlike most young men of Venice, he took to horse, and faced west.