Chapter 11
 Danner and Death

     Danner retired to his quarters, flopping on his large, 
extravagant bed.  He loved his room.  He loved everything about it:
the blood stains on the walls, the pictures of the mutilated bodies
collected over the years, the dead parrot laying in its cage which
hung idly from the ceiling, his father's decapitated head resting in the
chest beside his bed.  Danner loved death, and his room seem to be 
a perfect alter to it.
     He loved everything about death.  The sound an animal 
makes when it realizes its fate.  The red serum of blood, seeping 
serenely out an open wound during a specifically nasty demise.  The
satisfaction he felt when he took a life.  All of these were death's
gifts to him.
     At least, that was how he saw it.  When he murdered his 
father, he had not even been thinking about being the heir to the 
most feared piracy in the world, but just about pleasing death.
He had grown fascinated with this new master ever since his best friend,
the cabin boy Joshua, died.  For years afterward, he played with death, 
tested its power.
      During his early years, he started by capturing insects
whenever the ship landed on a planet.  He smashed them, dissected
them, pulled their wings off, examining their agony and surprise.
It gave him a secret satisfaction to kill the little ones, to destroy
them and end that which they prized most: their lives.
      Later, he started to test his secret ambition on animals,
capturing small kittens and dogs on different worlds.  He used many
different instruments to kill his prey, and, feeling a sick and 
warped since of authority and power, enjoyed it. His first premonition 
was to shoot them with lasers, but that proved to be to fleeting.  He 
tried stabbing them, lavishing in their pain and fear.
      Once, his father found the dead bodies of the animals and
took them away, banning Danner from ever leaving the ship again until
he had over come the desire to kill.  In a fit of rage, he stormed
to his room, where he found a kitten which had escaped his father's
sight.  He grabbed the cat and, with a look of murder in his
eyes, bit down onto its neck, tearing its head off its body with a 
single bloody snap. Blood exploded onto his face and clothes, and 
it was a few moments before Danner realized all that had happened.
      When he finally came to terms with what he had done, he
was filled with an insatiable since of pleasure, flopping onto his 
bed, a huge grin spread across his face.  At that moment, he knew it
was time to move on to the most abundant life on this ship to destroy:
the pirates.
     His first human murder happened in a bathroom stall on the ship.  
He had gotten hold of his father's sword when he had been sleeping, and 
now was waiting patiently for the next unlucky person to pass through the 
bathroom doors.
      He was reveling in his own glee at his master plan when the bathroom
doors swung open and in walked on of his sisters, Jamie, who was just 
twelve years old.  He had not planned on her coming in, and tried to fight 
back against his desire for blood.  He felt that he would explode when the 
little girl opened the stall next to his and pulled down her dress to 
urinate.
      Somehow, though, he managed to suppress his desire and to stay quiet 
the whole time.  The little girl was not even aware he was in the room as 
she pulled up her dress and walked confidently out the bathroom.
      Danner was shaking, his desire overcoming his will power.  He was 
almost to the point of going outside and killing someone in the hall when 
a rookie pirate by the name of James walked into the bathroom.  Danner 
waited impatiently for the man to pick a stall and enter it.  Once 
James's decision was made and he walked in, planning on doing his 
business, Danner busted in, slashing at the rookie with the huge sword.
      James was dead after the first slash, but Danner couldn't contain 
himself, and mutilated the body in a fit of rage.
      Later, once the body was found, an all hands alert was called to 
order to find the killer of the rookie found in the bathroom.  Everyone was 
a suspect, and Danner's father was fully intent on holding everyone of them.
      He never had the chance however, for Danner, half because of fear of 
being caught and half because of his need to kill, murdered his father while 
the man slept.  The investigation was immediately brought to an end, and 
Danner took his place as captain.
      After he became captain, his warped and demented puberty almost at a 
climax, he was able to land whenever he wanted to and pick up animals.  He 
was able to surround himself with death with no one to tell him what to do, 
and he was finally happy.
      But now, his desire to kill again flaring up from long lost memories, 
his animal supply was exhausted, and even the individual body parts were 
torn apart.  Danner could not keep up this charade much longer of being 
stable and sane.
      No matter, he thought.  I can destroy whenever I want.  In fact, he 
mused, I can finish destroying the only one whoever was in the face of my 
wrath and escaped.
      "Oh, dear sister," he whispered.  "What plans I have for you.  You 
shall be my finest gift to death and all its glory."
      Just then, he heard screams echo through the corridors.  He smiled to
himself.  The screams and ruckus were no doubt the cause of the escape of 
the little red-haired one.  Finally, he thought, an excuse to kill them.  
Not that he needed one or cared about it, but it was always nice to keep 
himself in power and friendly among his servants.
      Once again, he put on his mask of stability and confidence, and walked
outside to accomplish death once again.  First the little one, then his
sister, then anyone else he wanted.
	Somewhere, off in the nexus of everything dark and mysterious, Danner
could feel death smile.