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𝗖𝗛𝗔𝗣𝗧𝗘𝗥 𝗘𝗜𝗚𝗛𝗧𝗬 𝗦𝗘𝗩𝗘𝗡
the scroll

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・・・・☆・・・・☆ ・・・・

"What the hell do you mean Tara's back?" Kiara questioned after Kyla and JJ left the room and told everyone what he had just revealed to Kyla.

"What I mean is, she's back," JJ answered with wide eyes. "I didn't recognize her at first because she-she like dyed her hair brown or something."

"Probably to be just like Ky," Sarah pointed out and Kyla groaned, wanting nothing more than to just jump off a bridge at that very moment. Not only did they have to deal with the freaks who tried to kill her and JJ, but now they had to deal with Tara on top of it all.

"Wait, Ky told me she was at this reform camp thing. Did she mention to you how she got back here?" Rhi spoke up with crossed arms. Alex had been sitting behind her, dissociating and scratching at a piece of loose wood on the counter.

"Oh, trust me, she ran her mouth," JJ said, making a talking gesture with his hands. "She said she escaped Kitty Hawk and fell in with those mercenaries we just ran from who said they were going back to the OBX. At first, she just wanted a ride back to Rafe but after figuring out what they were doing, she wanted in on finding the treasure. And then when she found out that guy almost killed us when Ky and I went diving...she was even more determined to stay and hurt us."

"Of course she was. Since when is she not?" Kyla complained. "I mean, how the hell did she even escape Kitty Hawk herself? That place had better security than Area 51."

"She probably killed someone like she's always wanted to," John B assumed, releasing a sigh.

"God, can this get even worse? First, I get suspended from Davidson. Then, I get fucking shot. And now this? Jesus, I can never catch a break when it comes to Rafe and Tara. They always just seem to show up at the worst goddamn times," Kyla ranted, her whole body tense which had made her arm start to hurt. "Ugh, ow!"

"Wait, you got suspended from Davidson?" Rhi inquired, her eyes widening. "When? How?"

"Someone sent the video of me punching Ruthie to the school or something, I don't know," Kyla explained, shaking her head and aggravation.

"Wait, so what are you gonna do?" Kiara asked her sister, not wanting her to get kicked out of college for just defending her.

"I don't know, Kie! I don't know! I just need something to fucking calm myself down right now or I might explode!" Kyla exclaimed, letting out a soft groan again at the pain in her arm.

"Hey, hey, hey, I got the perfect idea on how to solve this..." JJ trailed off before he walked off, searching in one of the drawers and coming back with a blunt and a lighter. "There's nothing some good 'ol weed can't fix."

Kyla glanced back and forth between JJ and the blunt, deciding whether or not she could take it. Ever since she had first tried alcohol and weed two years ago, she had been more open to the substances. She then sighed. "Give it to me," she said in defeat, holding her hand out.

"Hey, a 'please' would be nice," JJ muttered and Kyla shot him a scary look. JJ cleared his throat before he quickly handed her the blunt and she placed it in her mouth, letting JJ light it for her.

"Ky, you barely ever smoke," Alex finally said after being silent for so long. She had smoked a few times being at college, but she was mostly just stuck to drinking whenever they went out to party. And even then, she made sure to never repeat how drunk she was the night she tried to make out with JJ before they were together. God, it felt like a lifetime ago.

Kyla sucked in the smoke before she breathed out, hoping that this would calm her body enough so her wound would hurt less and she would stop freaking out. "I kinda got shot, so lemme just do this in peace, please," she said passive aggressively, not forgetting their conversation from before. She was going to have to tell JJ sometime soon and deal with the issue, but right now definitely wasn't a good time.

"Hit me," JJ then said to her and she placed the blunt in his mouth, letting him puff out some smoke. "Oh, that's good."

"Wait, I want some," John B said and JJ handed him the blunt.

"Wait, now you're making me want it," Kiara pouted.

"Me, too," Rhi agreed and Alex just rolled his eyes at all of them, going back to scratching at the wood. He wasn't sure that getting high would be a good idea after just getting away from mercenaries, but he knew no one would listen to him if he tried to stop them.

After both the girls had their turns of taking a puff of the blunt and they passed it around a few more times, Kiara gave the blunt back to JJ and asked, "Do you think now's a good time to look at this scroll?" She held up the container it had been in, waving it slowly.

"Oh, yeah, you're right," John B pointed at her and she carefully took the scroll out, sprawling it on the counter so they could all see it. "Okay, so obviously, it's a map of sorts, right?" John B pointed out right away, trying to decipher what it had meant.

"Yeah, but it looks like a trippy mosaic," JJ voiced, feeling the blunt start to get to him.

"It's so weird. It's all scrambled," Kiara ran a hand through her hair.

"Okay, thought I was the only one seeing it like that. Good," Kyla breathed out, not wanting to get too high. Just enough to calm her nerves. And she had already started to feel it working.

"I mean, what are we supposed to do with this?" Sarah questioned, holding her hand out.

"Decode it. That's what we're supposed to do," JJ answered and Sarah tilted her head, squinting to see if that would work.

"But...how?" Kiara slowly asked.

"With the codebreaker? That's how," the blonde said, lifting the blunt up in the air before he handed it back to John B.

"Codebreaker. That's funny," Rhi laughed, leaning against Kiara. Kiara glanced at her, sending her a smile.

"It's really not," Alex muttered under his breath, but no one could hear him.

"All right, everything's coming into focus now." John B then handed the blunt to Sarah after he took another puff. "You've just got to let your eyes go out of focus for it to be in focus," JJ drawled.

"I think we're mind melding," John B said in a dazed way.

"We got a mountain range."

"Yeah."

Kyla looked over at Sarah holding the blunt, blinking at her. "Uh...Sarah?"

Sarah looked at her. "What?"

"What are you doing?" Kiara questioned Sarah when she also noticed the blunt in her hand, gesturing to it with her head.

"Oh. Oh. Shit, sorry," Sarah whispered when she finally realized, quickly handing the blunt to the younger Carrera girl. "I don't know, shh." The boys didn't seem to the notice, though, since they were busy trying to decipher the map and just talking a bunch of high nonsense.

All of a sudden, a clatter was heard outside and some dogs started to bark, causing them all to freeze. "What was that?" JJ questioned before more rustling was heard outside.

"I knew we shouldn't have come back here," Kiara breathed out as John B grabbed a bat and JJ grabbed a paddle.

"Hide the scroll, hide the scroll," Kyla instructed, trying to find something to cover it with. Just in case those mercenaries came back, they could at least try to hide the scroll so they wouldn't be able to find it.

Kiara was able to find a blanket and placed it over the scroll, John B then went to one side of the room while JJ went to the other, searching for whatever had made the noise.

John B opened the door, looking outside. "Nothing on your side?" JJ asked.

"No. Nothing," John B confirmed. "That's so weird. It kinda sounded like maybe it was—"

He was cut off by a large crashing sound from right next to them, making them all gasp and jump away in fear. "Oh, I'm sorry. I'm sorry," Groff immediately apologized, holding his hands out.

"Ow, fuck," Kyla muttered since she the jump back made her arm hurt once again.

"JJ. You made it," the man breathed out, looking at the blonde boy. "I, uh, I'm sorry to bother you here. I swam...I swam all the way in," he told them before he began to cough.

"What are you doing here?" JJ questioned, his jaw tensing. Kyla looked at the boy, swallowing hard at the expression on his face.

"I-I had nowhere else to go, son," Groff answered. John B looked at JJ and they both shared a glance before JJ sighed, going over to Groff and helping him over to a seat.

・・・・☆・・・・☆ ・・・・

"So, you're JJ's real dad?" Kyla asked Groff once they gave him a few minutes to settle in.

Groff sighed and nodded. "I don't deserve the title...but yes, I am JJ's biological father," he confirmed. Kyla looked over at her boyfriend and saw the way he was leaning against the wall, avoiding everyone's gaze. "I could have done better by him, I know that. I look forward to telling you all about it."

"Right..." Kyla trailed off, not sure if she could even trust the man just yet. If he had been JJ's biological father this whole time without JJ knowing it, what else could he be hiding?

"But I'm afraid time is short. We are all in danger here," Groff revealed and Kyla swallowed hard, not liking the sound of that whatsoever.

"When you say danger, what do you mean by that?" Alex interrogated, not wanting to stay here any longer if it meant he was about to get killed.

Groff sighed before he spotted the packing tube the scroll was in on the counter, pointing at it. "Let me guess. You opened up that packing tube over there and you found a scroll inside, but you can't read it. That scroll is encrypted."

"How do you know that?" John B cut in.

"Because if you took that from the Corsairs, I suspect that you are in possession of the Mogador scroll...created by Barbary pirates in 1703," Groff explained and the Pogues all made the same, exasperated expression. "The Lupine Corsairs are dangerous mercenaries. Now you've stolen from them."

"Oh, that's just great," Alex deadpanned.

"Okay, so what-what the hell is this Mogador?" John B asked.

"It's...a map."

"To where?" Sarah bluntly spoke.

"Well, if I knew the answer to that, I'd be a very rich man, but I can tell you who made it. Murad the Younger."

"Murad?" The Routledge boy slowly repeated.

"Oh, you know him? Barbary pirate, slaver. In 1703, a Berber shepherd gave Murad a gold coin as tribute. He asked the shepherd where he'd gotten the coin, and after some persuasion, the Berber told him about a hidden vault in the desert filled with gold."

"How does he know all that?" Rhi whispered to Kiara, who just slowly shook her head. "History nerds," the ginger girl muttered even though it definitely wasn't the right time to. She was still feeling the effects of the weed, apparently.

"And one other very special item..."

"The Blue Crown," John B guessed.

Groff turned his head. "So you know what it is?"

"Uh, it's a..." John B trailed off and Sarah cleared her throat. "My dad was a historian. Um, it was just, like, a bedtime story," he quickly came up with and Groff hummed. "Yeah."

"What is it, though? The crown thing?" Kiara inquired, wanting to see how much Groff knew about it.

"A mythical artifact, and if you trust the legends, a dangerous weapon capable of granting wishes and rendering enemies defenseless," Groff detailed.

"What kind of wishes?" Kyla voiced, tilting her head to the side a bit.

Groff slowly shook his head. "Anything your heart desires," he answered and Kyla hummed, sharing a look with JJ.

"And you believe that?" Kiara grilled further.

"No, of course not, but it's invaluable. I'm looking for it just like you, and if I could help you find it, I'd...just want to get my cut. Nothing more," he shrugged.

"If they found it 300 years ago, there's no way that magic cap is still there," JJ finally spoke up.

"Maybe, maybe not. See, Murad was encamped in Essaouira, in what's now Morocco. But before he had a chance to follow the map, it was stolen by an enterprising young woman named Elizabeth Howell, who later became Blackbeard's future wife."

"Elizabeth Teach," Kiara realized.

"Oh, you're also a history nerd?" Rhi teased.

Kiara shrugged, a small smile tugging at her lips. "Learned it a while back."

"Yes, very good. Blackbeard helped her elude her captors, and the two of them escaped to the Carolinas with the map. The rest of their lives they wondered, was there really a vault in the desert that held the crown? On the day he died—"

"He left Elizabeth the map," Sarah interjected.

"And now you have it," Groff continued. "But you can't read it, right? You need a lens, a special lens, a piece of refracted crystal encased with a...chain. Elizabeth Teach had that lens when she was killed at Blackstone."

"So let me guess, you, uh, you have that lens," John B assumed, giving the man a look.

"Not in my possession, no. But I know where it is."

"Where?" The blonde asked.

"Your mother's grave."

authors note!
FUCK GROFF BRO I HOPE
THE POGUES FUCK HIM UP
NEXT SEASON ISTG THEY ALL
NEED TO GO FULL RAFE S2 MODE.
ok anyway sorry this chapter is kinda
boring, i blame it on groff being a part
of it