When Johnny Apple was just a lad with a broken tooth smile, his dadda would swing him up high and higher and yell to him while he was flying, ah yes, flying in the cool breezy land air (though it never smelt nor felt nor burnt as well the Lady's breath), he would bellow, in that big, jovial merry voice of his that, "Laddie, laddie boy, ye must seize life by the wheel an' steer it well when ye got a chance to, aye?"
Dadda still had traces of the rollicking, rough sea accent that he would never, never ever get rid of. Johnny Apple remembered Mamma telling Dadda once, when he was nothing but a lad with a broken tooth smile and rough, capable hands, he remembered Mamma laughing when she told Dadda, that she married him only for his sea accent. And Johnny Apple had remembered how Dadda had smiled with his mouth and eyes and picked Mamma up and hugged her tightly, and how he had took a flying leap and entered into the fray awkwardly, and how, and how his pretty Mamma and Dadda laughed and hugged and cried.
Johnny Apple had left home one pretty summer morning, when he was not so much of a lad and had a broke tooth smile and rough capable hands and a slight sea accent, he remembered (false or real he would never know) that he had told his Dadda and Mamma that he would return when he had made his fortune. Dadda had clasped his hands tightly with hands that were deformed and bent with bone-disease, and whispered, " Now ye remember my words, lad, take hold of the steerin' wheel and steer life well, aye?"
Johnny Apple had remembered the big storm, when he was not so much of a lad and had a broke tooth smile and rough, capable hands and a missing eye and a much, much heavier sea accent , and how he had had yelled and screamed when those creatures leapt onboard and took the little merchant ship, how the crew had died under thrusting swords and how some leapt overboard, willing to play dice with the Lady instead of staying to fight.
He could not remember anything after that.
He could only remember the burning pain when rough hands had held him down and jammed a compass into his eye.
He could only remember the animal crack-scream that he had shrilled when he was something so hard so pain so knobbly oh gods help me dadda mamma so pain so pain was rammed into his back, shattering bones and making him scream scream crack scream so pain oh gods oh lady help me help me.
He could only remember the way he had laid on the oddly smooth seaweedy floor.
Well. You can't exactly ask Mista Wheelback how the process of going insane was like, can you?
And it comes to an end... Please review ! XD