Nightsea Outlaw

When he was finished, Alex dropped down to the deck of the Robin. Erin and Jean were finishing tying up the drim pirates that had attacked them, and Alex now knew a lot more about drim than he ever needed to in his life. Sayed stood off to the side, not interfering but also not participating.

Alex was impressed. He knew he couldn't order any of them around. They weren't a team or anything like that, and he definitely wasn't a leader, but they had taken the initiative in handling Bargen's crew like they were a team. If he were some middle manager, he would have given them a speech about how proud he was of them taking the initiative.

Instead, he had to do the opposite.

"Let them go," Alex said as a rope ladder fell behind him to the deck. "Their captain is going to take us to the coordinates."

"It can't be that easy," Erin said, standing up and wiping sweat off her forehead.

"I made him an offer he couldn't refuse." Alex smiled, but he was the only one who would understand it. "Turns out that they work for someone on an island in the center of this place called 'Nowhere.' Knowing our luck, that is where the coordinates are. If we help him free his men from his boss, he'll help guide us through the island."

"A twist of fate indeed," Jean whispered, crossing his bony arms. "The question is, why would they be there? No one goes into Death's Yard for a reason, and supplying any operation out here would be an amazing feat."

"There are a lot of details on that." Alex shrugged. "But what's important is his boss, Mister Deadman, is searching the island for artifacts, and us going there is going to start a fight."

"That's quite the name." Jean laughed, tapping his chin with one bone.

"I've never heard of him," Erin added.

"Either way, Bargen needs his men back to sail his ship, and we can take them all down if they give us any more problems." Alex nodded to Sayed. "Cut them loose, Sayed. We can get moving as soon as they climb back up."

"Yes, brother." Sayed set to work with a smile, his previous mood forgotten.

Alex knew Sayed well enough to guess why he was happy to cut prisoners loose while also being unwilling to help tie them up. To Sayed, a loss of freedom was unacceptable. Sayed was a man who believed everyone deserved to be free without compromise. While it was an interesting perspective, Alex was more of a pragmatist than that. He and Sayed didn't always agree, but they didn't need to. They just had to respect what the other was willing to do.

"You guys better thank your captain," Alex said as the pirates stood up and began climbing back up their ship. "Don't forget how easily we rolled your crew when you lead us back to the island. We won't be so nice next time."

He would have said that they had gone deathly pale, but their deathly pale flesh didn't seem able to change colors at all. The twelve of them made their way up the rope ladder and back onto their ship with a few whimpers but nothing more.

"Alright," Alex said. "It's the same setup as before since it was working so well. Is everybody good?"

"Eliza's at your service." Jean smiled as the spirit rose around Erin in a purple light.

"I will need to redo the harness," Sayed said, going to gather more rope.

"If we must." Erin shuddered as she walked toward the cabin with Eliza on her shoulders.

Alex smiled as he opened his gate, and the Flying Dutchman started off in front of them with a quiet hum. All in all, he was ready to get to the island. Whatever was ahead of them was already proving more interesting than a set of numbers and a mysterious nightsea phenomenon.

Snap. Snap.

Mister Deadman snapped his fingers as he walked, keeping up a tempo for his movements as he took in the camp around him. His men were working, directed by the two remaining Knuckles to his Finger. Mister Deadman tilted his fedora as he stopped on a balcony overlooking the laborers.

They were drim, every single one of them. They were made to serve, and he was nice enough to make sure they were at least paid for their service. Sure, he might need to kill one or two to make an example of them, and his underlings might accidentally squash or cut the hands off of a few more by accident, but if they played it cool, most of them would get a hefty bit of dolers from this operation when they all went home.

The balls and chains just made sure they didn't forget what was waiting for them at the end of the operation.

"Men," his voice flowed like cool running water. "We all need to be cool here. You've all been doing great, and the boss likes it. He personally called me the other day and said that we're doing such a great job that we're going to triple the number of work hours. That's approval from Lord Bacia himself, you hear?"

"Yeah!" One of the drim workers held up his rotting arms, pickaxe in hand, before noticing that no one else had done the same.

"You see." Mister Deadman shook his head. "That's precisely the problem with you lot. You just don't know how to be cool."

He pointed one finger to the drim, who had cheered. He cocked his thumb back like his finger was a gun and made a shooting motion. All that was missing was the sound effect.

"Bone Shot."

From Mister Deadman's finger, a single bullet shot out, long and white. It cut through the drim's heart in an instant and sent him falling to the ground. Mister Deadman regained his stance, putting his hands in the pockets of his pinstripe suit as he looked out over the rest of his men.

"You see, you need to play it cool. You don't yell out when someone tells you good news; you just smile and maybe nod. Everything is in how you act. It doesn't matter what's rattling around inside your noggin. Everything is about what's on the outside, you hear? That's how you play it cool. Now, all of you, get back to work."

Snap. Snap.

Mister Deadman began to walk away, snapping his fingers all the while as he headed over to his office. He paused at the door. The entrance was cut into the excavated rock that overlooked the dig site. Mister Deadman turned to call out to his underlings. It was time for a meeting.

"Bragg, Cragg, get up here!"

"Yes, boss!" the two said in unison in their own slow way. "Bound Jump!"

Boing. Bam.

The two rotund brothers shot into the air like cannonballs before falling back beside Mister Deadman. The planks below them creaked under their weight as they landed. Mister Deadman nodded at them as he opened the door and let them inside.

The two brothers were larger than average men, and each had to duck to enter his office. Cragg was a master of the hammer and carried a large one strapped to his back with a red band. Bragg was the master of the sword and carried a two-handed broadsword strapped across his back with a blue sash. Both were twins with the same face, a balding head, and a bristling beard. The sashes and weapons were the only way that Mister Deadman had ever been able to tell them apart.

Creak. Snap. Snap.

Mister Deadman followed in after his underlings at a cool, calm pace, snapping his fingers as he walked. He went over to his desk and sat down in his leather recliner, snapping his fingers with every other step along the way. The brothers took their seats on the floor. Mister Deadman had already run out of chairs that could hold their weight.

"Lord Bacia sent a message through our Hand," Mister Deadman said. "He wants us to speed up our operations. He believes this place will not stay a secret for much longer, and we had better get him results."

"But, boss," Cragg said, taking his finger out of his mouth with a length of spit following it. "We don't got no more drim. How are we supposed to make them work harder without more drim?"

"We're going to pull in Bargen on the next run, see," Mister Deadman said, putting his fingers on the table and leaning forward. "That's at least twenty more workers. Then we're going to push them harder. Fewer breaks. If they argue with us, then we'll just show them how uncool that type of thing really is."

"Why's he in such a hurry, boss?" Bragg asked. "Even if someone comes, we'll just cut them up."

"No, we'll beat them back," Cragg said, turning to his brother.

"Cut."

"Beat."

Snap.

"Both would be cool," Mister Deadman said, holding his hand up in the air after snapping his fingers. "Remember, fighting with your brother isn't cool, Bragg, Cragg. You do your best when you work together. You do good when you are bound together. You're useless when you're apart, you hear?"

"Yes, boss," both twins said in unison.

"Now, to answer your question," Mister Deadman said. "Lord Bacia is in a hurry because we haven't produced anything on this site in the last year. After a year of digging into that old temple, we haven't pulled up a single artifact. That isn't cool, you hear?"

"But boss," Cragg said. "We can't go faster because there ain't no way to break through the walls."

"And the creatures come at night," Bragg said. "They keep breaking the equipment!"

"Then we'll just have to up your patrols." Mister Deadman shook his head. "We have to play this cool; otherwise, we'll have a Hand coming down to take our heads. Your brothers are Knuckles. You don't understand how uncool a Hand can be when angry, you hear?"

"Yes, boss."

"What time are we expecting Bargen?"

"Should be in tonight, boss," Bragg said, taking his finger out of his ear.

"We'll have to wait for him to report back from the old docks." Mister Deadman shook his head. "How uncool of us to never bother building a new one. Send a few drim out to meet him to tell him to hurry along after this meeting, you hear?"

"Yes, boss," Cragg said.

Snap. Snap.

Mister Deadman snapped his fingers as he ran through the rest of his plan. Besides site one, there wasn't much more they could do to quicken their pace. Site one had been a dead end, an empty temple with no sign of any path forward. That was why they had moved to site two, closer to the second mountain and closer to the massive statue of the monster that was carved on its peak. That site had been much more promising.

However, maybe site one needed one more look.

"Get to work and remember to keep it cool," Mister Deadman said. "I'm going to take a few of our men out to site one for one final sweep. Maybe we can find something that will be useful to Lord Bacia there."

"Yes, boss." Bragg and Crass saluted before leaving the room.

Mister Deadman stood and looked down at the map of the island on his desk. Two peaks, one on each side with a valley between them. The peak to the east had a massive statue sculpted into it of a tentacled creature. The peak to the west had a platform, but its statues had crumbled down the side of the mountain and to pieces long ago. Nowhere was an island that was stuck between those two temples, and all of their work had only found a path forward on the east one.

"Maybe one more try," he said. "Maybe the other site will have something cool hidden."