Avast, ye miserable curs, ink-stained wretches, and lovers of a good, rhythmic sob! Weigh anchor and prepare for a tale of woe that would make a Kraken weep into its grog. The great Bard of the Brine, the High Admiral of All That Is Awful, Lord Morrissey of Manchester, has once again cut his moorings and fled the harbor of Atlanta before a single broadside was fired. The official parchment, nailed to the tavern doors with the haste of a man fleeing a debt collector, claims the ‘Artist’ has been struck down by a sudden illness. Aye, and I’m a teetotaling missionary with a penchant for needlepoint!

The rumors swirling through the rigging are as thick as London fog. Some say the Admiral was struck by a case of the 'Sentimental Scurvy,' a rare affliction where the sufferer becomes so overwhelmed by his own genius that his legs refuse to carry him toward a stage. Others suggest he caught sight of a stray ham bone in the galley and retreated to his quarters to compose a fourteen-minute dirge about the cruelty of the culinary arts. Whatever the pox, the result is the same: thousands of swabbers in the port of Atlanta are left holding useless slips of paper, their quiffs wilting in the humid air like dying sea-fans.

“I’ve seen men survive the lash, the rack, and the terrible storms of Cape Horn, but I’ve never seen a man so frequently undone by a tickle in the throat,” muttered Quartermaster 'Gloomy' Gary, a longtime devotee who had traded three barrels of salt pork for a front-row spot. “The man’s constitution is as fragile as a lace doily in a hurricane. We were promised a night of melodic misery, and instead, we got the silence of the grave and a cold walk back to the docks. It’s a mutiny of the spirit, I tell ye!”

The consequences on the high seas are nothing short of catastrophic. The Great Gladiolus Trade has collapsed overnight, with crates of the wilted flora being tossed overboard by the ton, clogging the shipping lanes of the Atlantic. In the darker corners of the Georgia colonies, the price of black hair dye and oversized spectacles has plummeted faster than a lead weight in the Mariana Trench. Even Lord Languish of London issued a statement from his velvet-lined cabin, saying, 'The Admiral’s tendency to abandon his post is becoming a hazard to navigation. How are we to wallow in our collective despair if the captain won't even step onto the quarterdeck?'

This marks yet another voyage cut short by the Moz, a man whose list of cancelled ports is now longer than the logs of the Spanish Armada. One must wonder if the 'illness' isn't merely a severe allergy to fulfilling a contract. Mark my words, ye land-lubbers: if ye choose to sail with the SS Melancholy, ye best bring a life-jacket and a backup plan, for the Captain is prone to jumping overboard at the first sign of a stiff breeze or a slight case of the vapors. Until then, we shall drink our rum in silence and wait for the next time the moody Admiral decides to grace us with his presence—or, more likely, his absence.