Archer crept along the halls. He needed to find Silta; he had no clue what to say to her or how to get to her, but he knew he had to find her somehow. He had no plan to implement, but then again, Silta had been the one to tell him to plan less and experience more.

He didn't feel like he was experiencing anything as of now. This was not something he'd look back on in a few years with a glow of fondness. This night would live in his dreams. Racing through these silent castle halls, fighting the stench of death as he aimlessly searched for someone he didn't even have the words to convince.

As someone searched for him.

He couldn't stop looking behind him. The halls were dark and every blind corner sent his heartbeat sprawling. He was beginning to walk sideways, so terrified of leaving his back to the open space.

He rounded another dark corner, his breathing sporadic and rapid. He needed to calm down. He was too on edge. Too jumpy. He needed to calm down.

He was so focused on his back that he didn't even think to look down. His foot hit it first, and he tripped right after, landing hard on his palms in some sort of puddle. He scrambled back, trying to get to his feet as he slipped again.

Nausea began building in his stomach. It was dark in that hallway, but he could smell it. The air tasted of iron, and the floor was slick with dark, fresh blood.

He froze, curled into the wall there on the floor. He hadn't tripped on a puddle or a gun. He'd tripped on a body. A blonde-haired, kind-eyed boy he'd once called a friend.

The blood dripped from Archer's hands as he held them out in front of him. It was on his arms where he'd braced his fall, stained on the knees of his pants, covering his boots.

He let out a low sob, lips quivering as he rested his head on the wall behind him. That loud, noisy bullet that echoed down these halls, resting there in Denver's forehead.

Nausea boiled up again, uncontrollable and persistent. Bardarian had done this. He'd forced Denver to take on too much, gave him reason to fear for his life if he wasn't good enough. Britter and Silta had done this. They put him on this team, knowing this might happen. They used his lesser skill to their advantage. Denver had done this to himself. He let his pride get in the way of reason. He went off on his own to prove something he had no business proving.

And Archer had done this, too. He'd let him wander off, let him run to his death.

So in the end, everyone helped kill Denver a little.

Shaking down to his core, he carefully got off the floor, ignoring the tap tap tap of blood dripping from his hands. He could not think about this. If he thought about this, then he'd start thinking of the people he'd killed tonight, the ones who had friends and family and children and lives. If he went that far, he'd never go back.

He stepped over the body and the blood. He ignored the wet feeling, the drip drip drip as he walked away from his dead friend. No thinking. No thinking. Just move on.

In front of him, the wall gave way to a railing. Below it was some sort of ballroom, the floors dark and musty, the air stale and stagnant. He couldn't see all the way down, but he could almost see something, maybe if he got a better angle.

He was wrenched back, his throat closing. He went to spin around, to see what was happening, but he was pushed forward again, into the railing.

"Evening, lad. You're a hard man to find." The voice was calm, but it reeked of rum.

Archer was being choked from behind, his entire body held in place by somebody much bigger and stronger.

"I don't normally kill like this," Bardarian said effortlessly, like choking a man to death did not strain him. "It's not exactly honourable, coming from behind, not giving you a chance."

Archer knew the air was there; he could feel it all around him, but he couldn't reach it. He dug his fingernails into the Captain's arm, sputtering for breath.

"But here's the thing," Bardarian said matter-of-factly. "You're just so crafty. I don't think I'd like to take a gamble with honour."

Archer pushed back with all his might. They both hit the wall, but it made no difference. He could see the stars blink by in his vision as he watched the edges of his view begin to fog at the corners. He watched the world slowly disappear. He couldn't breathe. He needed to breathe.

Bardarian was still speaking, "This is what I'd like you to hear before you die, Kingsley: I respect you more than you know. You've given me more trouble than any famous captain, legend or royal. You, Archer Kingsley, are formidable beyond reason."

Archer couldn't prosses the words, but he could think of his lungs, of the air they begged for. He tore uselessly at Bardarian's arms, tried desperately to kick him away. He tried to do Silta's trick and reach up to his neck, but he wasn't in reach. He kicked out behind him and tried to bring them both to the ground, but Bardarian was far too stable.

Archer realized he could die, right here, with no last words but a sob for his dead friend.

"That's it, Kingsley," Bardarian was saying, his voice distant and distorted in Archer's oxygen-deprived state. "Fight to the last second."

He felt his vessels expanding, filling with too much blood. He felt the capillaries in his face explode from the pressure. His lungs screamed for air. I'm trying, he told them.

He gathered the last of his aimless thoughts. He piled them up and put them together. What would Silta do?

Would Silta get out of this? Of course she would. Physics was her weapon, the environment her arena. Her opponent's strength was also their weakness.

His swelling eyes lazily danced to the railing and the large drop below. He reached out for the wall, pressing himself against it, then kicked off with all his might. The two of them went staggering backwards, crashing through the railing and tumbling to the ballroom below.

Archer slammed into the ground, rolling away from Bardarian as quickly as he could. He crawled forward, gasping for that incredible source of oxygen he now had access to. It felt like there wasn't enough to go around.

Behind him, he heard Bardarian's smooth tone as he recovered, "Crafty."

Archer kept crawling until his vision cleared, then spun around and stumbled backward, hands and shins still slippery with blood. He could've beaten Bardarian—maybe—if he'd been fresh. Not like this.

The Captain rolled his shoulders, loosening them for whatever he had planned. He took a few steps closer, an ugly grin on his charming face.

Think, think, think, think. What would Silta do? How would she recover? How would she turn this around? When her body failed, her mind was the playscape.

His voice came out as a whisper, his throat raw, "You don't deserve it. The Avourienne. Silta. You deserve none of it." In this circumstance, he'd finally be able to speak free of politics and power. Here, he could tell Bardarian what he truly thought.

The Captain smiled, taking another step forward. "And you do?" he inquired. "You're a child, Archer." He sputtered out a laugh. "You're barely a damn adult."

"You love to throw that around," Archer snarled back, trying to show bite in his words where his body couldn't, still shuffling away from him on the ground, still covered in Denver's blood. "You love to tell me that I'm a child—that you're the man in the room—but doesn't that make it worse? Isn't it more embarrassing to get outsmarted and outplayed by a kid?"

Bardarian laughed, perfectly antagonized. "You know what you have going for you, Minnow? Shininess, that's what. She likes new things that she can't understand, so she entertained you until I gave her what she wanted. You only got away with this whole scheme because she was protecting you. She always comes back to the authority, Kingsley, not the orphaned sailor."

"You were so terrified of losing to that orphaned sailor that you threw all the power you had to make her stay." Archer gritted his teeth, finally getting to his feet, still taking heaving breaths. "I know what else you did, too. You stripped down your performance, you made her look you in the eye, and you told her this situation felt familiar. Does it taste like rum, Bardarian?" he asked, voice quivering.

The Captain lifted his chin, but he didn't flinch, didn't twitch. Why wouldn't he break, get angry, lose sight of logic?

Archer felt his fingers shaking, blood still dripping from his hands. He wasn't ready. "You know how I know that?" he asked, desperate to bait Bardarian into a mistake. "She told me. In her corner room, under the expensive sheets."

He only smiled, the epitome of self-regulation. "You think you'd be any less self-destructive in that state, Kingsley?" he wondered, taking a step closer.

No, Archer didn't think he'd do any better. He did not think Bardarian was weak for his depression nor his alcoholism; he thought Silta was exactly the kind of woman whose leaving would break someone. But that was not the point.

"You could've lost everything over her," Archer said, desperately clawing at a way to get out of this without having to fight. "She's the one who made a promise to you—she's your damn fiancé, for angel's sake—but she gets your forgiveness, and I get your wrath? I'm just like you. I was starry-eyed and manipulated into her aura. She's the ringleader. You know it."

"I do know it, Kingsley," Bardarian replied. "I don't blame you for sleeping with her, and I never did. I'm after you now for the betrayal. You came onto my ship, benefitted from my resources and my reputation, and then lied to me. You manipulated me into sailing my ship somewhere for your own purpose. You put yourself in this position—not Silta, not Farley. You're my problem, Kingsley, and the things you did out of your own free will. Nothing else."

And there, Bardarian may have had a point.

"I never planned to harm you or your ship," Archer told him truthfully. "I just needed a ride."

Bardarian barked out a laugh, sobering quickly with a shake of his head. "By the Devil, Kingsley," he murmured. "I wish I could've kept you. Your clever games, your cunning plans. Even now—you're stalling here, recovering, right? Played me again?"

Archer stopped stepping back. There was no way out of this, was there?

He took a deep breath. Those muscles in Bardarian's shoulders, that confidence in his step. Archer was just...he was scared. He was in over his head. He should've taken that window when he had the chance.

"I don't want to fight you," he admitted, his voice breaking. His limbs were tired. His lungs were stinging. Then, whispered with all the emotion he had left, "I don't want to die."

Bardarian took one step closer, cobalt eyes steely. Archer thought he'd scoff, thought he'd laugh and say he should've thought of that before he got himself into this.

Instead, he spoke with that fatherly calm undertone, "Kingsley, lad, neither do I. But one of us has to."

And there, once again, he was right. Bardarian couldn't allow this kind of betrayal on his own ship. He had to do something about it, and Archer had to go down fighting.

"Now would be a bad time to ask for mercy, then?" Archer asked, rolling onto the balls of his feet. Here, now, he was going to fight for his life. And he'd do his best.

Bardarian rolled his shoulders. "Mercy?" He knew.

"Mercy," Archer repeated. "You've heard of it?"

He grinned, then gave Archer a 'you first' gesture. "Seldomly," he said.

Archer darted forward before he finished speaking, but even after the initial scrambling, Bardarian was nothing short of deadly strong and wildly experienced. Farley had never taught Archer any of his weaknesses, for his former friend had never fought the Captain. Very few people ever had; Archer was completely on his own.

He found it took all his energy just to avoid Bardarian's hits—much less have time to think of his own. The man had gone through every fight layout possible in the decades he'd been doing this.

Archer ducked under his punch and elbowed Bardarian's neck from behind, but the Captain caught his arm and pulled, throwing him to the ground.

Rolling out the pain and the impact, he tried to stumble up, but Bardarian snatched the blood-soaked front of Archer's shirt, putting punch after punch to his face. He was quicker than he looked, more spry than he seemed.

Struggling out of his grip, Archer twisted and tried to trip the bigger man, but he was far too heavy on his feet. Bardarian got another hit to his throat.

He was losing. How was that possible? How could he lose this fight when even Silta had declared him better—how could she guess that wrong?

Archer coughed through another throat hit, trying to get away.

"You fight just like her, Kingsley," Bardarian said, drawing back another punch, knuckles bloody from Denver and Archer, "but you lack her violence."

He was right. Silta was a killer, and she hit with the intent of one. Archer had trained himself to simply disable, but here, now, he needed to hit to kill. If he wanted to live, he needed to kill this man, and he needed to do it now—before Bardarian beat him with stamina.

He needed to use his head. He was floundering in nerves and terror. He was fighting with muscle memory rather than using his head. He had to calm down. He had to fight with his mind. What would Silta do?

Strengths and weaknesses. Reaction time—that was his strength. He had to stop trying to beat Bardarian to the punch and reply to them instead. Weight—that was Bardarian's weakness. He punched harder than anyone Archer had fought, but he put more weight behind it to do it.

It was logic, and it was really that simple. Ones and zeros, numbers and equations. Everything had a formula and from that, everything was predictable.

It was so clear—that moment the Captain began to lose, and he knew it. In just a split second, Bardarian stopped killing another man and started fighting for his life.

Archer was faster. He was more agile. He was smarter. He was, very simply, logically, better. As long as his mind didn't psych him out, as long as anxiety didn't root itself in his tactics, he could win.

He leaned forward, remembering his very first fight with a pirate, back in Port Marcel. The one where he'd grabbed the blade with his palm, drawing blood but ultimately getting where he needed to be. Sometimes, a sacrifice was needed to win the long game.

He spun into Bardarian, meeting a kick to the gut. He resisted the urge to double over like his body told him to—like his opponent figured he would do.

And in the moment between that kick and Archer's lack of a recoil, the moonlight caught the cobalt in Bardarian's eyes. There was realization there, that his split-second hesitation had just cost him his life. There was so much in his famous eyes: a lifetime of adventure, a harrowing love story—and to Archer's utter surprise, not one ounce of remorse, not one final shattering of his confidence. Even in death, he stood tall.

He crossed his arms behind Bardarian's head, taking either side of his face in his opposite hand. Nobody survived a snapped neck.

For Denver, for Jeanne, for the thousands out there. It made no difference to them in the end, did it? They were all dead, and they'd all stay that way. There was no reckoning, no sudden appearance of moral regret in the one who'd caused it all.

Captain Bardarian died the same man he'd always been. And that, Archer respected.