All of them. And I want Peter Pan to see it. Do you hear me?”
“Loud and clear,” the pirate said, brightening a little at the mention of blood.
And maybe final battle.
Hook glowered: no one in his idiotic crew shared his passion for defeating their worst enemy once and for all. They only seemed to look forward to getting it over with and moving on to whatever fun activity was planned afterward. They were short on imagination and education; they had no taste for refined concepts like nemeses and life conflicts and guiding principles.
(They might also all have still been in recovery mode after their shenanigans at Skull Island. The entire crew but Hook and Smee dragged and stumbled a bit.)
No matter. Whatever it took to drive them to victory.
“Mr. Smee, take a note: I need you to go back and recheck cannon crews one, two, and six. They didn’t pass muster. Also, have the Duke unlock the stockroom and distribute as many bullets and shells as needed. My personal stash of purloined weaponry will be available for general use, except of course these flintlocks on me belt. I want every man armed and ready.”
“Oh, they’ll like that, Cap’n. That’ll get them in the spirit! Bullets and muskets! Right away, Cap’n!” Mr. Smee doffed his cap and ran off to deliver the news.
Hook twirled his mustache for a moment, enjoying himself utterly. This was what it meant to be a pirate captain! To be on top of everything, awash in the excitement before a battle!
Wait? What was that?
That sound…
He grabbed the nearest pirate—Djareth—by the earring.
“Do you hear that?” he demanded.
The pirate, wide-eyed, tried to shake his head and shrug.
“THE TICKING! Can you not hear it, you villainous fool? The sound of the crocodile approaching!”
“N-no, Cap’n,” Djareth stuttered. “Nothing, Cap’n!”
“Bah!”
Hook threw him aside. Of course, when he listened, it was silent now: wherever the beast was, it must have gone beneath the waves.
But it was close.
Hook stalked to the prow. A rope had been hung across the decking between the chart room and the railing along with a hastily painted sign that read no admittance. The words could, of course, just have been gibberish; few of the pirates could read. It was the angry red paint that got their attention.
Zane was on watch. He sat on a stool looking vaguely green, like a reluctant landlubber on a transatlantic voyage. This despite the fact that the wind was up and the ship cut through the waves as beautifully as a knife through a kidney. No, it was what he watched: the shadow in its golden prison of bars and sharp picks, the way its blackness recoiled in ripples away from those picks.
“Any change in the prisoner, Alodon?”
“No, Cap’n. He ain’t moved an inch. Looks like he even gave up on the whole escaping-himself thing. He’s just been man-shaped. Peter-shaped. The whole time. Pointing the same way.”
“Hmm.” Hook stroked his chin and frowned. The shadow had been pointing that way more or less directly for the last day. It only wavered a little, when the ship had to curve around a bit of coast or shoals, but always returned to face the same way.
The captain made his way back to the chart room. Zane apparently decided that was as good as a dismissal, or an order to follow, and hastily went after him, getting away from the unnatural scene as quickly as he could.
The cool darkness of the cabin caressed Hook’s tortured brow. He bent over the table that held the map of Never Land with the help of two pressed-glass prisms, a bronze astrolabe, and a perfect skull. A little pewter model of the Jolly Roger stood in for the real one. He did some quick calculations for latitude and longitude. The breeze had remained steady; he pushed the little ship along, down and around the corner of Never Land. Then he took a ruler and tried to predict the route.
“No, it’s the same, look at that,” Hook said thoughtfully. “If this is all correct, Peter Pan has been in Pegleg Point for two days now—unmoving. I wonder why. That dratted boy can never stay still for more than a moment at a time.”
“Maybe he can’t fly, Cap’n?” Zane suggested. “That without his shadow, he lost some of his power, or the pixie dust don’t work or somethin’?”
“True, true,” Hook said, turning it over in his head. “But even if he couldn’t fly, the boy could still run, if the notion took him.