Kincade sat alone in the workshop. He supposed this was his home more that it was a prison cell. Somewhere in the ship, John was talking to the actual crew, not those Steamspire pirate bastards, waiting for them and the time to rise up on the promise of freedom and removal of the cuff.

Wallace held them all captive and obedient with beatings, but actual control was that dammed cuff, and that kept them, kept him under the thumb. It occurred to Kincade that these were not the fighters in the crew. These men and women, did he see women on board, he wondered, were the ones who lived by hiding their faces and by not acting meek.

Once again, he looked to the floor and remembered his schooling years. A line once said by Marcus Aurelius, the Emperor of Rome, that he who possesses the gentler and kinder qualities possesses true strength and courage. And he hoped that it would be the truth here and now.

Kincade checked his tools and the knife he had used to take another man's life. Once he returned to New Zealand, he would report this deranged journey to the authorities, who would take the system to task and clear him of any transgression. But, he thought, "One must do that which must be done," putting the knife wrapped in a cotton cloth in the waistband of his pants. Kincade lifted his fingers to his face and ran gently along the borders of the scar. Tracing the shape of the octopus when the first ship's bell rang.

A spider up in the ceiling corner rebuilt the weave of its cobweb after successfully capturing a moth. Kincade watched, fascinated by how the spider had rapped its meal in silk and then set about repairing the trap. It would attach a strand and then reach out to the next spoke in the pattern the spider shook as it tentatively reached out, vibrating the web with each movement. Occasionally, the moth twitched in its bonds, the body accepting fate's decree; the spider fangs had been stuck in deep, Kincade supposed. The poison had the moth, and it did not matter what was wrapped around it; death had come and gone. Kincade took a deep breath and wondered if he was the spider in a web. Or if his plan and struggles were the acts of a poisoned moth in the last moment's life.

John ran into the cabin, "Ships forward and starboard are with you." He said.

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"Excellent," Kincade said, dropping his shoulders from around his ears.

"But they have a request." John continued.

"Which is? "Kincade replied.

"The tools. They want to take these cuff things off. But, before it, all kicks off." John said.

Kincade stepped back to the workbench, reached for several small pieces of metal and one of the hooks, wrapped them in grease-stained cloth, handing the bundle to John. The second bell rang from somewhere on the ship's deck above them in the night air. John left tools in hand, and not a word was said.

Kincade paced the cabin in larger circles each time he completed a circuit until the cabin walls hemmed him in. Finally, after three more turns around the cabin, Kincade stopped directly opposite the door opening and plopped down onto his bum. His legs just gave way, and his back slid down the wall. Peering into the dark cabins beyond, he could hear a screaming plea, "Noooooo." The voice could have been old, young, male.

And the third bell rang.

Kincade launched himself at the door, his legs pumping, and he crossed the room. He stopped hard at the portal's opening. An emotional wall slammed up like a big red wall. The wall of fear. Fear Kincade gave himself a present from Wallace that thrice dammed bastard had set the rules of Kincade's world, and now Kincade did the work for Wallace. He wanted to move through the door. He needed to move. Everything told him to move forward. Everything told him to do it.

Kincade reached for the scar on his face, which started to burn to his touch. This simple reminder that he was an extension of Wallace's will and that all it would take for Kincade to suffer more at Wallace's whims was an act of defiance, and Wallace would make Kincade suffer.

Peering out the door into the darkened corridor before him, Kincade saw nothing, no Wallace or John. Then, another scream, and this time it was clearly John. He was in trouble. Kincade reached up to his face and placed his palm on the scar in the shape of the octopus and remembered that it was a punishment, a reminder from Wallace that Kincade was his puppet, his tool to keep the ship running, a reminder that Kincade should always put Wallace's interest before his own.

Or. The octopus was a prize for freedom won. Freedom of his mind from the constructs of a society that forced simple men to be slaves to money and society's order, to an industry that required workers and managers and owners to play a part in a tremendous and grand performance all trapped, everyone put themselves in a box of their own making. And yet, despite living in the box doing what everyone wanted him to do. Kincade had been given this fate.

Well, bullshit to that! On deck, a bell rang repeatedly.