He found his opportunity when the Armada intercepted a ship on a return from Ireland to England. He headed down into the cannon floor, sabotaging the guns to become weak spots of the ship. He fired a preemptive cannon ball to provoke the ship. The stop shipped immediately fired, directly hitting a powder keg starting a massive sinking of El Gran Grifón. As the ship started to go down, he began braving the war-torn waters around the ships and their takeover, Velazquez reclaimed his revenge for his mother. In the skirmish, he used it as an escape from the Galleon to avoid being unfairly judged and executed by the corrupt monarchy.
Upon deserting the now downed Spanish Armada, he took up mercenary and navigator work for lowly pirates making a name for themselves. He eventually made his way back to Puerto Rico to honor his mother and learn more about his people. After some time living amongst his people took the mantle, “El Tiburon” and decided to continue helping prevent villages like his mother’s from being ransacked.
He made a trip to nearby Port Royal to look for a crew to become a part of. Eventually running into ‘The Captain’.
The captain was boasting about a job they just finished in a pub in Port Royal. El Tiburon heard how they had to take the boat to a questionable area to breach the island and laugh at how inefficient it was. The captain, noticing the laugh ask “what’s so funny?” to which Tiburon replied “the fact that you’re still alive after a docking like tells me you aren’t long with this world.” After going into way to much detail on where he would have docked, El Tiburon and the captain starting exchanging some war stories, then scar stories, which evolved into a drinking contest. They became fast friends.
They discussed many of the beauties of the sea (from wondrously mysterious sights in Bermuda, to the gorgeous wenches in Tortuga).
After their first night meeting, during a rum and grog induced moment of “clarity”, the captain spoke to Valezquez on using his divine skills as a navigator to start planning a heist of royal banks throughout the Caribbean.
This started their heist career: trying to top each heist with a grander and complex plan each time. They eventually planned for the mother of all heists: Nassau.
After hitting a treasury in Nassau, they noticed they were being tracked by several Naval vessels. Knowing they were outnumbered, Velazquez threw some red barrels overboard. Signaling to the captain, he jumped overboard.
The captain smiled as Valezquez leaped.
Weeks prior, during heist planning, they discussed how Valezquez still owned much of his military garb. Seeing this as an opportunity to help the captain, he made sure to secure the red barrels containing said garb. While waiting for the naval ships to “rescue” him, he changed into his military outfit in the water. Once he was scooped up, he detailed how cruel the captain was and that he was lucky to get out of there alive. They kept him locked until docking at the next port. After bribing his jailer and gutting a xenophobic naval officer, he used his contacts to acquire a boat to head as North as he could of the Caribbean until things died down.