Topman (n.) - Higher-rated seaman specializing in work above the deck, in the sails and rigging.
36 - Omid Gul
Origin: Persia
Appears in: 7 memories
Accepted fates: Fell overboard, drowned by a terrible beast
Story Summary
Omid Gul is first “seen" in A Bitter Cold Part 1, where he sleeps in his hammock like most of the other
topmen and seamen. He bunks with Lars Linde and Nathan Peters;
the fourth spot in the area is empty, and was presumably filled by Samuel Peters before his untimely
death. This makes him the only topman that does not bunk with other
topmen or other men of a similar nationality (not that there are many Persians aboard the Obra Dinn).
Although it's not visible in this memory, he owns a scimitar that
he hangs from his hammock.
Gul next appears much later in the story, during Soldiers of the Sea. In Part 1, he and the other
topmen are working the main sail when a bolt of lightning strikes and the
crab riders attack. He seems to be in a rather precarious situation, seeming as though he is about to
slip and fall off of the sail, but we know he gets out of the situation
alright and heads below deck to assist in the fight with the crab riders. He retrieves his scimitar and
advances towards the second crab rider as it makes its way down to
the orlop deck in Part 4. Next, in Parts 7 and 8, He is again seen attacking the second crab rider with
his scimitar, seemingly preferring to attack it from behind.
Finally, Gul makes two appearances during The Doom. In Part 2, he is seen on the port side of the main
deck, looking out over the water for the launch boat stolen by
Nathan Peters, Alexander Booth, and Duncan McKay. Nearby, John Davies and Davey James investigate the
body of Lars Linde. During this same memory his scimitar can now be
seen hanging alongside his hammock. After that, in Part 6, he is seen off of the starboard side of the
ship, falling towards the water as the ship gets rocked by the kraken.
Presumably, he was up in the rigging and lost his grip. He then drowns, but unlike other crew who
disappear in this chapter, it is not possible to give him the fates of
being eaten, torn apart, or crushed by the kraken, likely because he is the only person who disappeared
off the starboard side, while the kraken attacked the port side.
Interpretation
I think the most characterization we can glean from Gul's actions stems from his possession and use of
a scimitar. It would have been uncommon for a lower-ranking crew member
such as a topman to own such an exquisite item, and for it to be a weapon no less. These men were often
very poor, only having a few small items to their names, so it certainly
makes him stand out. Perhaps it suggests that he is a former military man, who for whatever reason has
left his post and switched allegiances to the United Kingdom.
Of course, he is also very brave for facing off against the crab riders. We see very little of him in
The Doom, but his presence in Part 6 suggests he was up to something
before his unlucky demise. I can't imagine what, he had no weapons on him and it'd be hard to really
fight the kraken from all the way up in the rigging, but I don't think he
would've chosen the rigging as a hiding place, you know? So, based on his bravery in Soldiers
of the Sea, I have to assume he was up there for good reason. Given that we
also see Lewis Walker and Wei Lee in the rigging in later scenes, perhaps the topmen had somehow devised
a plan to defend the ship from the rigging, maybe in a way similar to the
midshipmen?
This is out of order now but I think the scene in The Doom Part 2 is interesting. There's not really
much evidence for it but I imagine that Gul was the first person to spot Lars's
body, and went to go alert someone and that someone happened to be Davies. It would be a nice and neat
explanation for why those characters in particular are the ones that are dealing
with the deceased Dane.
I never really noticed the oddity of Gul's sleeping arrangements until writing this page, but I don't
think it means he was antisocial with the other topmen or anything like that,
as he is seen hanging out with plenty of them in the Under Way sketch. I guess he just happened to end
up as the unlucky 10th wheel lol. He's a bit of a third wheel in the
situation between Lars and Nathan as well, I have to imagine. There must have been tension between them
building up to Peters's outburst in The Doom, and Gul must have had
quite the time being forced to exist in an uncomfortable proximity to that.
Headcanons
I can't say I have many specific headcanons for Gul beyond what is shown to us in-game. It is on my
to-do list to read more about Persian/Iranian history from the time period
so I could get a better sense of maybe what kind of person he was or what his story before the Company
was. I'll be sure to expand this section once I do!
37 - Timothy Butement
Origin: Scotland
Appears in: 2 memories
Accepted fates: Shot with a gun by Edward Nichols
Story Summary
Timothy Butement appears sleeping in his hammock in A Bitter Cold Part 1, like many other topmen and
seamen. He bunks with Nicholas Botterill, Maba, and Lewis Walker, and
his arm happens to be poking out of his blanket, showing that he bears a tattoo resembling the
silhouette of a lady. He and Maba are the only crew members with visible
tattoos.
Butement is then among the men who attempt to fight back against the mutineers who are fleeing with the
kidnapped Formosans and their stolen chest in Murder Part 3. The
other three, Lars Linde, Peter Milroy, and Finley Dalton have already been incapacitated and the
mutineers are close to securing their escape. Butement seemingly approaches from
the rigging, knife in hand, telling them to give it up. Edward Nichols retaliates by shooting him in the
chest with a pistol, killing him. However, his body does not
fall into the water as expected; there is a piece of rope wrapped around his foot that causes him to
dangle off the side of the ship. This apparently goes unnoticed for
quite some time until Escape, where Lewis Walker can be seen attempting to cut the rope with a knife.
However, he is interrupted in this task by Leonid Volkov's attack
and never gets back around to finishing it, too busy with assisting in William Hoscut's mutiny.
Interpretation
Butement seems like a pretty decent guy, from what little we see of him, willing to go up against a
mutiny with only a knife in hand. Can't say much else about him, and
bravery isn't the rarest commodity on the Obra Dinn. Though, it is fun to wonder what exactly his tattoo
means. Is it a representation of a specific woman in his life,
or is it a tribute to the concept of women in general? If it is a specific person, who? His wife? A
mistress in one of the many ports he's probably visited?
38 - Huang Li
Origin: China
Appears in: 5 memories
Accepted fates: Electrocuted
Story Summary
Huang Li is first seen in A Bitter Cold Part 1, sleeping in a hammock along with his bunkmates Jie
Zhang, Li Hong, Wei Lee, and George Shirley. After that, he is present for
the execution of Hok-Seng Lau in Murder Part 2, sitting on the main mast with Hong.
When Chioh Tan is apprehended for interrogation by Robert Witterel after his murder of Edward Nichols,
Li is present to act as a translator. In Part 1 of Unholy Captives asks
Tan about the mermaids and where they come from, and Tan replies that the shell must be protected. Li
then relays this to Witterel, stating that the shell is “dangerous".
Witterel asks what shell he's referring to, but is interrupted by one of the mermaids launching a spike
into the chests of Tan and Hamadou Diom, killing them both. Li flinches, but does not come under threat of being
hit. After this, Li is seen in Part 2, lifting a box from the recovered launch boat to carry back below decks.
Like the other topmen, Li is seen in the rigging during Soldiers of the Sea Part 1. Unfortunately, he
is unlucky enough to be struck by a bolt of lighning and killed before
he can reach the main mast. His body falls down and lands on the capstan below.
Interpretation
Not sure what I'm able to say about Li unfortunately, as he doesn't get to do too much before he dies.
The most standout moment is his role interpreting for Chioh Tan, and
I do feel like the scene does a good job of encapsulating the disconnect and loss of nuance in
communication that occurs between the Formosans and the rest of the people
on board. It's not Li's fault, really, they're not speaking the same exact language and I can imagine
it's difficult trying to translate between Hokkien, his own native
language, and English in real time. There is however, another Chinese topman whose translations probably
were malicious...
I do have to hand it to Li though, his death scene is one of the coolest, most dramatic, and
awe-inspiring memories in the game.
39 - Jie Zhang
Origin: China
Appears in: 4 memories
Accepted fates: Decapitated by a terrible beast, clawed by a terrible beast, strangled by a
terrible beast
Story Summary
Jie Zhang is among the sleeping crew in A Bitter Cold Part 1. He bunks with Huang Li, Li Hong, Wei Lee,
and George Shirley. He is seen in Unholy Captives Part 2, looking
ready to assist in unloading the goods from the recovered launch boat.
After that, he appears with the other topmen in the rigging in Soldiers of the Sea Part 1 as they
prepare the main sail. After the crab riders attack, he quickly makes his
way down to the orlop deck, which is where he can be found in Part 4. He is armed with a sword, but gets
attacked by the first crab itself, one of its claws
digging into his neck until he is decapitated. The same fate befalls James Wallace.
Interpretation
Another brave soul who unfortunately was no match for the horrors that attacked the Obra Dinn. I guess
I find it kinda cool how fast he sprang into action, compared to
others like Maba or Omid Gul. He's already in the midst of a battle against one of the crab riders in
Part 4, meanwhile Maba only only reappears at the very end of the
chapter and isn't even seen attacking, and Gul is still only approaching the battle in Part 4 and is
actually seen fighting in Part 7.
40 - Li Hong
Origin: China
Appears in: 4 memories
Accepted fates: Speared by a terrible beast, spiked by a terrible beast
Story Summary
Li Hong first appears in A Bitter Cold Part 1, sleeping in a hammock along with his bunkmates Huang Li,
Jie Zhang, Wei Lee, and George Shirley. After that, he spectates
the execution in Murder Part 2, sitting on one of the masts along with Huang Li. One of his hands,
tucked behind the mast, appears to in an odd, held-out position.
After this, he participates in Edward Nichols's mutiny in Murder Part 3, working with Alarcus Nikishin
to bring the kidnapped and bound It-Beng Sia onto their launch
boat, which they share with Samuel Galligan and the Formosan chest. He and Nikishin then row the boat as
Galligan acts as their skipper. Sia and Bun-Lan Lim
then begin to exchange panicked words about the chest and the threat of the mermaids. Galligan tells
them to be quiet, and Hong informs the group that
they're saying strange things about “monsters". Just after this, one such mermaid appears and throws a
spear at Hong, impaling him in the chest and nearly getting Sia
as well, though he manages to dodge it. Thus marks the beginning of The Calling chapter.
Interpretation
I don't know if it's just me, but Hong quite easily appears to be the youngest out of the four Chinese
topmen, and his line delivery right before his death sounds very
unsure and maybe a little scared, like he doesn't really know what he's getting himself into. It makes
you wonder if all of the mutineers joined Nichols's cause of their
own volition, or if some of them, like Hong, were coerced into it. Nichols having someone on his side
that could speak Chinese would be very useful after all; it
wouldn't be unreasonable to think that he went out of his way to get one of the topmen on his side. It
is commonly speculated that Hong was present for the interrogation
with Hok-Seng Lau after the murder of Nunzio Pasqua, and intentionally mistranslated his words in order
to get him executed. It seems like a big gamble, especially if
another topmen were present, but I think Nichols would have had enough power and influence to arrange
the interrogation in such a way to work out in his favor.
Some people also speculate that Hong is giving some sort of hand signal, for Nichols and the other
mutineers, during the execution itself. I used to believe this myself,
but I'm less sure of it nowadays, as it could easily be a small mistake that Lucas Pope made with the
modeling (wouldn't be the only instance, look at Nikishin's head
in Murder Part 3). I wouldn't really know what significance it would have anyway if it were true. If
they were really going to be making weird hand signals to each other,
an execution where a solid half of the crew are gathered on the deck would be a really conspicuous time
to decide to do it. It is a neat idea though, and maybe it could be a
jumping off point for more ideas of the mutineers' coordination before they made their escape.
41 - Wei Lee
Origin: China
Appears in: 7 memories
Accepted fates: Fell overboard, drowned by a terrible beast, crushed by a terrible beast, eaten by
a terrible beast, torn apart by a terrible beast
Story Summary
Like much of the other crew, Wei Lee is asleep in his hammmock in A Bitter Cold Part 1, bunking with
Huang Li, Jie Zhang, Li Hong, and George Shirley. He
makes a proper appearance in Murder Part 2, where he attempts to hold back or calm down the Formosans
during the execution of Hok-Seng Lau. He also appears
in the background of Unholy Captives Part 2, carrying a box towards the hatch to the gun deck.
Lee and the other topmen are seen working the main sail in Soldiers of the Sea Part 1, just before a
bolt of lightning strikes and the crab riders attack.
However, he is not seen again for the rest of the chapter, though his compatriot Zhang does make his way
down to participate in the battle.
Lee is seen in The Doom Part 2, sitting at a table and having a drink with his last surviving bunkmate,
George Shirley. He disappears for most of the chapter
after the battle breaks out, next being seen in Part 7, where he holds one bag of gunpowder in his hand
and is ducking next to one of the masts. In Part 8,
he is seen climbing some of the rigging on the port side, but a tentacle has begun to wrap around him to
drag him into the water below.
Interpretation
I'm drawing blanks on Lee, to be honest. He doesn't seem to be especially brave like many of the
others, but he also doesn't seem to be disloyal to the captain
or Company. At least he seems to be friendly with Shirley, though I'll save a detailed discussion of
Shirley's relationship with the Chinese topmen for his own
section.
42 - Nicholas Botterill
Origin: England
Appears in: 4 memories
Accepted fates: Speared by a terrible beast, spiked by a terrible beast
Story Summary
Nicholas (Nick) Botterill is sleeping in a hammock in A Bitter Cold Part 1, bunking with Timothy
Butement, Maba, and Lewis Walker. After that, he is seen in
Unholy Captives Part 2, where he is standing on the gunwale, watching the other crew haul supplies below
decks and clean up the aftermath of Chioh Tan and Hamadou
Diom's deaths.
Disaster then strikes at the beginning of Soldiers of the Sea. In Part 1, Nick looks to be climbing
down the rigging with a lantern in one hand, but one of the crab
riders lurks beneath him, getting ready to strike. Judging by the posing in Part 2, he must eventually
realize that something is below him and turns around to
get a better look at it, and when he does so he gets a spear plunged clean through his chest. He lets go
of the rigging (and lantern) and is held up in the air by
the spear, gasping for air and choking on his own blood before eventually perishing. The crab rider
boards the main deck, causing the men working there to scatter,
and then discards the spear, with Nick still attached. It pursues some of the men down to the gun deck,
where Nathan Peters warns the others who were
already down there to stay back since the beast has already cost Nick his life. This makes Nick the
first victim of the crab riders' attack.
Interpretation
There really isn't a lot to work with for this guy, huh? Even for people like Timothy Butement or
Nunzio Pasqua who are in fewer memories than Nick, there are bits
of characterization to be found in the former's bravery and the latter's friendly demeanor. Anything
that you could say about Nick's personality would be quite a big
leap of logic, as the only thing that could even be used to indicate a personality is Unholy Captives
Part 2, and even then he's literally just standing there
lmao. At a push, I guess I'd say he comes across as standoffish and maybe a little lazy, not wanting to
involve himself in actually helping the other crew.
Something more concrete that we do have is that Nathan refers to him with the nickname “Nick", implying
some level of familiarity between the two despite not being the
same rank and not bunking together.
I do think his death is a bit underrated in terms of how terrible it is. It's easy to overlook the
gurgling sounds he makes as he's dying, as it gets drowned out by
the other chaos within the memory, but also just try to imagine what it would feel like to be held up in
the air by a spear with barbs impaling your chest. Like that really
sucks! I can't imagine how painful that was for him to experience!
Headcanons
Despite the fact that I just dunked on Nick for having a complete lack of a canon personality, I have
to admit that I find myself intrigued by the guy for some reason.
I guess it mostly stems from his design; he appears to be quite young compared to the other topmen and
seamen, I think his stripey pants are pretty cool looking, and he even
wears a little scarf around his neck that is really hard to see and looks more like a shadow in his
portrait in Under Way. Another really obscure design detail is that Lucas
Pope once posted the design sketches for all the character's outfits, and you can see in the one that
eventually became Nick's outfit that the shirt is very prominently
lop-sided, like he's wearing a shirt that's a bit too big for him. I find details like that really
endearing. At one point many years ago I even made an OC to exist
as the stowaway that died in Loose Cargo and shipped him with Nick lmao. However, that OC has since been
plucked out of the Dinniverse(?) and put into one of my original
stories instead (The Enlightenment Expedition). Sorry Nick!
I do like to headcanon that Nick is good friends with the Peters brothers, and that they liked to drink
in pubs on the mainland together. Maybe some of the other topmen
like Butement and Walker are part of their little group as well. Seems cute.
Okay one little fun headcanon I have relates to the alpha build of the game with the characters'
hometowns. Nick is in there and is apparently from Yarmouth. There are
actually two towns called Yarmouth in England: one on the Isle of Wight and the other, known as Great
Yarmouth, in Norfolk. I like to think that it's referring to Great
Yarmouth, because I learned from a fellow Obra Dinn fan that the minster church in Great Yarmouth is
dedicated to Saint Nicholas. Perhaps our Nick was
(in-universe) named in honor of that church?
43 - Maba
Origin: New Guinea
Appears in: 8 memories
Accepted fates: Torn apart by a terrible beast, crushed by a terrible beast
Story Summary
Maba is among the crew seen sleeping in hammocks in A Bitter Cold Part 1, bunking alongside Timothy
Butement, Nicholas Botterill, and Lewis Walker. After that there
is a large gap in his appearances, only showing up next during Soldiers of the Sea. He appears in Part 1
alongside the other topmen who are working the main sail when
a bolt of lightning strikes and the crab riders attack. He disappears for most of the chapter after
this, reappearing in the cargo hold in Part 8, with a sword in his
left hand. Unlike the other characters in the scene, he is not actively attacking the crab rider as it
and Winston Smith die by each other's hands.
He makes a stronger impression in The Doom, where he makes a trend out of fighting the beasts attacking
the ship. At first, he is asleep in his hammock in Part 2, alongside
Walker. He participates in the crew's attempt to fend off the kraken with the cannons in Parts 3 and 4.
After a disaster kills Abraham Akbar, George Shirley, and Christian
Wolff, the cannons are abandoned and Maba disappears for Part 5. He reappears on the main deck in Part
6, yet again armed with a sword.
After an explosion kills Peter Milroy, more crew members make it onto the main deck and attempt to make
their own marks with spears, guns, and swords. Maba is among them,
but in his doing so a tentacle grabs him around the waist in Part 7, pinning one of his arms behind his
back and holding him upside-down. His sword arm is still free though,
and he stabs the tentacle several times. However, another tentacle grabs his legs and pulls on them
until his torso is ripped apart. This obviously kills him, and
his upper body is discarded somewhere on the deck, while his lower body vanishes. Lewis Walker is then
seen dragging Maba's upper body towards the stern in Part 8.
Interpretation
I do find it a bit amusing that Maba really only makes appearances when supernatural battle shit is
going down on the Obra Dinn. Perhaps he does not care for the more mundane
activities that take place on a ship such as the execution in Murder and the hauling of items back onto
the ship from the launch boat in Unholy Captives. Perhaps he's a bit
of a thrillseeker? Enjoys swordfighting? Regardless, he definitely seems to be very determined and
brave, not giving up in his attack against the kraken even when it looks
to me that his pinned arm either got broken or severely dislocated. Can't have been easy!
It's interesting that in the midst of the battle with the kraken, Walker makes it a priority to move
Maba's body. It could mean that they were good friends in life,
and he wanted to make sure his friend's body didn't get swept away while the ship was keeling from side
to side. There are additional thoughts about this that I'll
save for Walker's own section, because it's more to do with his characterization than Maba's.
Also hooray for another lefty!
44 - Lewis Walker
Origin: England
Appears in: 14 memories
Accepted fates: Clubbed by Robert Witterel, speared by Robert Witterel
Story Summary
Lewis Walker first appears sleeping in a hammock in A Bitter Cold Part 1, and bunks along with Timothy
Butement, Nicholas Botterill, and Maba. He next makes a brief appearance
in Soldiers of the Sea Part 1, where he is with the other topmen as they work the main sail. Though a
few other topmen make their way down to the lower decks to fight the crab
riders, Walker is not seen for the rest of the chapter.
After that, he is again seen sleeping in his hammock in The Doom Part 2, along with Maba. Once the
battle against the kraken breaks out, he participates by lighting the cannons
in Parts 3 and 4. After a disaster results in the deaths of Abraham Akbar, George Shirley, and Christian
Wolff, the remaining crew scatter and Walker is not seen for the next
two parts. He reappears in Part 7, where he is seen climbing up the rigging on the starboard side of the
ship. However, he seemingly puts a pause to whatever plans had him in
the rigging after the death of Maba, and he goes down to move his body towards the stern in Part 8.
Walker appears throughout Escape, first seen in Part 2 where he is cutting the rope that is wrapped
around Butement's leg, though he gets interrupted due to the situation between
Leonid Volkov and the escapees. He begins to approach in Part 3, and by the time we see him in Part 4,
he has already disposed of Paul Moss's body and is in the middle of
doing the same with Volkov's. He is not seen in Part 5, but he is most likely coming down to investigate
the commotion on the gun deck like Henry Brennan and William Hoscut.
Sure enough, he is seen coming down the stairs in Part 6, looking in Brennan's direction.
Walker then participates in the mutiny that occurs in The End. Making use of his agility, he decides to
enter the captain's quarters by sneaking around the back and
jumping onto the balcony, with a knife in his mouth. He successfully catches Robert Witterel off guard
and stabs him in the abdomen, but Witterel swiftly responds by
removing the spear that Brennan used to impale his arm and swings it directly into Walker's forehead,
leaving a considerable indent in his skull and killing him.
Interpretation
Walker is a rather perplexing character to me. He appears in many memories, the third highest count of
any character, but he doesn't make a huge impact in a lot
of them. He often just seems to be lurking in the background or shifting through the rigging during
greater events, which sort of gives a shifty and shady quality
to his character. He also very much feels like a lackey to me, and kind of just goes with whatever
people tell him to do. He doesn't seem to have his own particular
drive or desires, and is the only person in The End with no dialogue, which sort of tells me that he
just participated in the mutiny because, what other options for
him were there?
I do get this strange impression that Walker's a very utilitarian, almost cold person due to how quick
he is to dispose of Moss and Volkov's bodies. Maba is a more interesting
case, as one could also interpret his haste to move his body to be more as an act of friendship
considering their status as bunkmates; after all he's simply dragging
the body elsewhere rather than actively throwing it overboard. It's a shame we don't get to see more of
The Doom's aftermath because I really would like to know why it
was so important for him to come down from the rigging and move him. (I mention some reasoning on why he
might have been in the rigging in the first place in Omid Gul's
Interpretation section.)
45 - Leonid Volkov
Origin: Russia
Appears in: 11 memories
Accepted fates: Shot with a gun by Emily Jackson
Story Summary
Leonid Volkov makes a very small appearance in Loose Cargo, looking down at the crashing cargo palette
from the main deck. After that, he appears in A Bitter Cold
Part 1, where he is seen playing a card game with fellow Russians and bunkmates, Alarcus Nikishin and
Aleksei Toporov. Toporov tells him to stop cheating,
but Volkov brushes off his accusations. He overhears the commotion with the Indian seamen and turns to
look in their direction.
Next, he makes a brief appearance in Soldiers of the Sea, where he is shown climbing the rigging in
Part 1. He shouts commands to the other topmen as they attempt
to prepare the main sail for the intense wind. After a lightning bolt strikes and the crab riders begin
to attack, he is not seen again for the rest of the chapter.
Volkov has more of a presence in The Doom. In Part 2, he is sleeping in his hammock, but when the
battle against the kraken breaks out in Parts 3 and 4, he is among
the men who are operating the cannons. When a disaster kills Abraham Akbar, George Shirley, and
Christian Wolff, Volkov is the only man who remains at the scene to
tend to the bodies. He then witnesses the death of Roderick Andersen in Part 5. He is not seen for Part
6, but reappears in Part 7, throwing a spear at one of the
kraken's distant tentacles and, impressively, manages to hit it.
After surviving The Doom, Volkov witnesses Paul Moss, Emily Jackson, Miss Jane Bird, Henry Evans, and
Davey James attempting to escape the ship on the last remaining
launch boat. This sight outrages him, causing him to attack the party with a sword. He and Moss get into
a brief swordfight, but Volkov ultimately stabs him in the chest
and kills him. He then attempts to board the boat, screaming with rage, but Jackson retaliates by
shooting him in the chest with a rifle, killing him in turn.
Interpretation
Volkov definitely seems to be the most fleshed-out of the topmen to me, as there are lots of things
that you can look to in terms of figuring out a personality for him,
though you're mostly just left with questions about his intentions rather than definitive answers. I'll
pose these questions here and, since there's no strong
evidence for them in canon, I'll answer them in the Headcanons section. The first thing about him we
have to ask is, was he actually cheating at the card game? It's hard
to say for certain, his response definitely reads like someone who has been caught cheating but is too
prideful to admit it, but he could also be innocent and his remark
is just some form of banter. Hard to say as someone who doesn't speak any Russian.
The next interesting thing about Volkov is the fact that he is the only Russian that doesn't
participate in Edward Nichols's mutiny. Was he purposefully excluded from the plans
by Nikishin and Toporov, or was he offered a role but declined it? Or a secret third option?
Finally, we have his outburst during Escape. It turns out that he is not as loyal to the ship as his
bravery against the kraken may imply, as it seems like he was eager to use
the launch boat for himself. He doesn't even care that most of the people on the boat are ones who are
much less capable of defending themselves than he is, he just
attacks them in what almost feels like a blind rage. It's also very suspicious that he was already
carrying a sword when he spotted them. Moss's sword I understand, he was
probably carrying it for self-defense against people just like Volkov who disapprove of what they're
doing. But why Volkov, when most of the crew are presumably recovering and
cleaning up from the kraken attack? Was he already planning something mutinous in nature?
Headcanons
I haven't really thought too much on all of my headcanons for Volkov yet but it's definitely on my
to-do list because there is a fic that I'd eventually like to do that
centers around the Russians. For now though, I do like to think that he was indeed cheating in the card
game. I've also got the impression that he didn't participate
in that first mutiny simply because he didn't know about it. After a certain point, adding more people
into a mutiny scheme starts to become a detriment rather
than a benefit, as things get harder to coordinate and keep secret, and presumably the shares of the
prize money would also get smaller and smaller. So I think it was
a deliberate choice from Nikishin and Toporov to keep their knowledge about the plans a secret from
their “friend". If he was even really considered a friend to them.
I view their dynamic as more of a “friends by proximity" situation, they associate due to their shared
cultural background, but they don't really like each other
specifically all that much.
This is another undercooked idea but I have wondered if Olus Wiater had already recruited a few people
into his mutiny scheme idea, Volkov and maybe also Henry Brennan
being among them, with John Davies being the only one we actually hear him trying to recruit. Like it
would be weird to target the fourth mate as your first
recruit, right? And I think it would explain Volkov's sword and his rage at the launch boat. Even if
they were planning to take control of the ship itself, the boat
still could've been a valuable tool, especially if another monster were to attack (I highly doubt Volkov
knew anything about Witterel and Perrott's actions in Bargain).
