[center][h2]The Reckoning - Part 3[/h2][/center] [center][img]https://i.imgur.com/Eo0s0sS.jpg[/img] [/center] JP/collab from [@Gunther], [@wanderingwolf], and [@sail3695] [b]Rex Black[/b] is a character created by [@Psych0pomp] Rex spoke from his place beside the cockpit’s entrance. “You want the room, Cap?” “Stick around.” Cal’s voice held the cold edge of a scythe. “Dog that hatch.” As Rex sealed them into the cockpit, the Captain’s eyes fixed upon the cook. “Caught a wave a couple ticks back,” he said as he stepped clear of the pilot’s console screen. “You might oughta have a gander.” As Hook watched the video, the captain pulled a fresh cigarette. When the image cut to black, Cal released a cloud of smoke. “Now talk.” Joe watched the video of what he had done last night. If it weren’t for waking up in a mud puddle this morning, he would have thought it a nightmare. “Ah dunno what to tell ya, Cap’n,” Joe watched the capture. The proof was right there. He couldn’t get out of this. “When everyone leff’ las’ night, ah went to another place. Ah was drunk. Ah muss a’ been feelin ready for a fight. Sometimes when ah gets drunk, ah get angry and let mah feelins go. Ah found this fella and he was an asshole tah me. He took a poke at me. Knocked me upside the head. The bouncers kicked us out. We went to what ah thought was a deserted alley. When we got there, we started tah fight. Only, ah got the advantage right away and ah muss have let loose with all mah anger.” Joe was very ashamed of his behavior. He couldn’t look the captain in the eye. “Ya think when ya do somethin like this, it would take that anger away, but no. Ah juss felt bad. Real bad. Is that guy alright? Ah dunno. Ah was pretty out of it.” Joe was losing it. His eyes were welling up. “Tell me that guy is alright.” Joe was filled with remorse. He needed to sit down. He reached for one of the seats on the bridge and dropped into it. From his place leaning against the entry hatch, Rex couldn’t see the cook’s face to read truth in him. He just had the man’s words and body language to feel his way through to anything that might help Cal and their kidnapped deckhand. “Man said we took two things from him,” the First Mate replied. “Spent a fair good time talking about the cargo. Judging by his interest in having you at the meet and the beat down they gave the kid, I conjure it’s a safe bet you killed one of theirs.” [center][url=https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YSAMOBVncSg]Wanted Man[/url][/center] Joe dropped his head into his hands, elbows upon his thighs. He felt horrible upon hearing the man he beat died as a result of his injuries. “Not again,” he mumbled to himself. He shook his head in anger. “Cap’n the night before I met you on Persephone, ah did the same thing. It's the alcohol that does it ta me. Ah lose control of mahself.” Joe was very upset with himself. “Ah need to see a Shepherd before I die. Ah juss hope no one else was affected by mah lack of control.” Cal pulled on the cigarette, hardly taking any smoke for the way his teeth clinched the filter. When Hook’s tale came to an end, he expelled what little smoke he had managed to inhale. “Sam,” he said as the ruined butt was ground under a boot heel. “Backtrack that wave.” The AI complied, whirling the kidnappers’ video in high speed reverse. The captain watched, his jaw locked down tight, arms folded as the biker, Root, seemed to jabber like an animal from a kids’ capture, before an abrupt scene change. “Stop.” Cal turned to face Joe Hooker. “How about that for someone else?” He pointed toward Abby’s face, frozen on the little screen. “Mayhaps you don’t recognize her, all bruised and swole up as she is. Care to take a guess?” Joe looked at the capture display. He struggled to see it properly. He recognized the red hair. Obviously it was a female. Since he had not seen her yet this morning, it could be only one person. “Oh mah lord. Is that Miss Abby?” Joe was shook to the core. “We gots to get her. Who has her? Is this someone akin to the fellah I kilt?” Joe felt very bad. He was shook to the core. “We gots to get her, Cap’n! What do they want? Me? They can have me. Ah’ll trade places with Miss Abby!” Rex feigned a diffident shrug. “Might come to that.” “No,” Cal’s voice was firm. “This pooch was screwed before you threw hands in a bar. That’s not to say you didn’t make things a whole lot worse.” His eyes took in the screen. The girl was just a kid…just a gorram kid. “Hook,” he said, holding his gaze, “mark my words. If I’d had half a mind of your little homicide fetish you’da found yourself off this boat on New Melbourne. Not sayin’ that won’t happen on Osiris, but for now, you’re in this thing with us all the way. I need every gun hand I can get,” he faced off with the cook as he spoke. “What I don’t need is hot heads, drunkards, or moon brains who freelance a trigger before I say. You can take it as fact that this [i]la shi[/i] is business you’n me are gonna settle, but that won’t come ‘til after we get her back. So tell me straight,” the Captain demanded, “can this boat count on you doin’ your part?” Joe felt really bad about the situation. He knew it was his fault. His and his alone. He felt bad for Abby and wanted to help get her back. He looked down into his hands as if the answer were written there. Alas, it was not in the palms of his hands. Then he looked up at the captain, right in his eyes. In a very deadpan serious tone, “Yes sah!” He hoped he could stop the drinkin’ and the killin’. Maybe a shepherd could straighten him out. If the captain needed him to do more killing to get Abby back, then killing is what he would do. He didn’t like it, but it appeared to be a damn necessity to fix things straight. Cal’s eyes were a combination of mistrust and cold resolve. As a long moment passed between the two men on the now silent bridge, he finally spoke. “Enough for now. Let’s go.” The cockpit hatch whined protest as Rex pulled it open, permitting his captain passage to the galley. ……………To Be Continued……………