Mina had a problem: the life of a corsair was turning out easier than it should have.

Most of the sailors she was robbing were the temporally localized equivalent of Bob from the office. They didn't want to cross sabers with her. The majority of them didn't even have sabers! They were poorly paid and overworked; they weren't about to risk their lives to preserve the profit margins of some company in Holland run by people in curly wigs.

Mina could empathize, being newly temporally localized herself. Back home she knew plenty of Bobs from the office. Even so, her instructions from HQ suggested that she cultivate infamy as the best way of drawing her target's attention.

Well how was she going to do that? Slitting these creampuffs' throats or tossing them overboard wouldn't make her infamous. It would just make her hated, and there was a clear but subtle difference between the two concepts. At the same time if she just let this bear go there was the risk he would go on to tell tales of the "merciful" fossa who spared him.

Mina rolled her eye and sighed as the bear continued to beg and plead. There was no way that Captain Barefang got his fearsome reputation by shaking down Bob from the office. But if this was what starting out on the bottom meant, then shake him she would until someone came along who'd grant her the opportunity to be properly nasty.

Artwork by  jonas