Disclaimer: Not mine. The concept goes to America's Best Comics and Alan Moore and Fox 20th cent., the characters come from their classics. I don't make any money off this, and as a starving student, neither will you if you sue me.

            As it turned out, they both told Nemo and now they stood waiting for his reply.

            "How many are dead?"

            "W-we found three," Sawyer said, holding his gun in both hands, looking rather foolish and out of place. Skinner's coat tickled his neck because he'd thrown it on too fast to turn the collar out. Now he wasn't sure if he was allowed to move.

            Nothing showed on the Indian's face, except for a hardening around his eyes. Skinner found himself holding his breath.

            "Bring Marlowe to me," Nemo said. They didn't question – they turned and left and outside Skinner let out his breath in a whoosh. He felt rather silly; Nemo was on their side, in their League, yet the invisible man felt rather like he'd just barely escaped.

            "What do we do?" Tom asked him uncertainly. Skinner shrugged.

            "You heard the man. Find Marlowe. You think 'e's back on his own boat?"

            "I-I don't know."

            "You're the secret agent!" Skinner whirled on the boy and Sawyer stepped back.

            "I – " but he didn't get a chance to answer.

            At first, Skinner thought it may have been some animal, a primal deep roar that sank into his bones and rattled around his skull, interspersed with all too human screams. Sawyer looked confused for a moment, then he turned to run, "Jekyll!" he threw over his shoulder.

            Skinner cursed and followed, shrugging out of his coat as he went.

            Nothing was really left of the man who had the misfortune to attack Jekyll, then Hyde, except for a few paltry stains smeared on the floor and puddles of gore that couldn't yet seep into an already soaked carpet. Hyde berated them for a few seconds, meaningless swearing and raw fury that subtracted from their worry. If the beast was this chatty, it couldn't have been that bad.

            "I'll go check on Mina," Sawyer said, and Skinner turned to follow him but Hyde's hand shot out and caught Skinner neatly. The invisible man was so shocked he didn't even protest until Sawyer was out of the room.

            "W-" what was going to be an irritated protest died on his lips as he remembered who he was talking to. He swallowed.

            Hyde regarded him for a moment and Skinner felt goosebumps rise on his flesh – it had been so long since anyone had seen him, had looked at him purposefully with meaning and not just by chance accident.

            "Wot's, ah, up?" he asked.

            The beast wrinkled his nose and thrust the thief away from him. "You stink of fear," he stated.

            Skinner stepped back gratefully.

            "It has come to my attention that you are doing more than fishing for information." Hyde pulled his lips back from his teeth in a grimace or a grin, it really was hard to tell.

            Skinner raised an eyebrow, "Beg pardon?"

            "I know who and what you are, and what you are to the good doctor."

            Skinner licked his lips nervously, "And w-wot would that be?" But the monster didn't answer. The thief shifted his weight to another foot and waited for Hyde to say something. He regarded the chessboard instead.

            "Ah, while yer here…" the beast looked at him with one eyebrow raised, "Ducks said I should ask you about the third, ah, person…the first two being 'enry and you, heh," he started to smile then swallowed convulsively.

            "There isn't one."

            "What?!"

            "I said, there isn't one. You can tell all those plotters that they have nothing to fear but – me," he smiled grimly looking again at Skinner and the invisible man shivered. "I believe Henry is going insane. Or already is," the beast turned back to the chess game and touched a pawn gently. "He has begun to converse with a side of his subconscious that not even I can control. It tells him rather disturbing things such as convincing him he has killed – "

            "Hasn't he?"

            The beast fixed him with such a look that Skinner nearly wet himself. "Ah," he whispered.

            "Francis's father objected to their – relationship. About a year later I objected to his – continued existence…I have studied Henry and his recent changes, and his growing dependence on your presence."

            "Wo – wot do you mean?"

            "I believe we must make a deal, you and I…He does not hear this other voice when you are near to pull him back to reality – " Hyde sighed. "This is a complex matter. I'm afraid Henry's continued existence is a matter of great importance to me. If he is no longer able to take care of himself in these times between, well, I certainly have no wish to pass on." Hyde gave him a toothy grin and Skinner wrinkled his brow.

            "Wot are you saying? That 'e's…" crazy, and possibly suicidal. Well, anyone who so much as looked at the man in the past few days would know that. "So wot does this 'ave to do with me?"

            "Keep him in one piece and I'll let you live. Oh, and I'll be a 'team player'…" his voice trailed away and Skinner wondered if the last part ended with an 'until I feel otherwise'.

            Hyde looked to one side and then back at Skinner, "It's wearing off now. Be a good boy and get Henry to another room until this filth is cleaned up."

            And then suddenly Skinner was looking at Jekyll's ashen features growing even paler as he took in the sight before him.

            "I assure you, I most certainly did not 'see this coming,'" Marlowe explained. He swallowed, his adam's apple touching Nemo's blade point gently. The gentleman was bent nearly backwards as Nemo interrogated him brusquely. Sawyer watched to one side, gun discarded at one point a few moments back as he had fought with a former member of Marlowe's crew. The man had been standing over Tom with a broken beer bottle in one hand about to slash the boy's throat when he had toppled over suddenly, a knife in his back. Marlowe stood behind and reached a hand down to help Sawyer up and it had been an easy matter to twist the man's arm around and frog-march him to Nemo.

            "My crew is dead – "

            "As is most of mine! This is mutiny! Not some carefully crafted plot. Did you not realize that they slew yours and mine at the same time?!"

            You had to give him that, with a sword to his throat and no discernible allies, he still tried to reason with an enraged death-worshipper. It was like a Mexican standoff, but like this bunch would even know what that was. All they needed now was some sort of diversion…

            Sawyer shifted slightly. Any minute now, some miraculous interruption…waiting for the startling revelation, someone to run up…still waiting. Nemo pressed the sword just a little harder to draw a neat thin line of liquid from Marlowe's flesh. It slid down the man's neck and disappeared into his shirt.

            Both men stayed perfectly still and suddenly Nemo dropped his sword down by his leg and took a step back while Marlowe sprang upwards once more. "Indeed," Nemo murmured.

            Sawyer relaxed just slightly.

            Nemo turned to look his way, not quite facing the agent, "Where is Ms. Harker?"

            Tom shrugged, "I dunno. I couldn't find her."

            Nemo shook his head once, "She is quite capable on her own. Did I hear the beast earlier?"

            "Yeah. Uh, Skinner's talking to him, I think," Sawyer said. He knew the thief hadn't followed him out into the hall, had spent a few precious seconds twirling in a circle as if to find the man, but to no avail.

            "Roit here, mates. Wot's the latest?"

            Sawyer stiffened as he felt a breath on the back of his neck. Damn invisible rodent. He willed himself not to jump. "What'd Hyde tell ya?"

            "I asked first, boy," Skinner said.

            "Captain Marlowe and I have lost parts of our crew due to an unfortunate mutiny. Half of his has led an unsuccessful takeover, they will be hunted down and dealt with," Nemo stated. He kept his eyes on the once more benign gentleman. Tom thought he should maybe have a problem with talk of hunting down men like they were creatures, but this wasn't his ship. He stayed silent.

            "Ah, well, int that too bad. Any word on Quatermain?"

            Tom started again, guiltily. He hadn't even thought of man since Skinner's discovery of the first corpse.

            "I have yet to check on the surviving members of my crew," Marlowe stated quietly.

            Tom turned and left at that. He would check.

            "Where is the boy going?" Nemo asked.

            "To see the old boy, course. Should I go with him?" Skinner added a little worried. Sawyer had left a tad abruptly, as though in a daze of some sort.

            "First, tell me what the monster said to you," as he had spoken before, Nemo's eyes had wandered. Now he leveled his sword at the invisible man's approximation of a throat. Skinner used one finger to gently press the flat of the blade away from his chin.

            "Ah," he said, "Hyde said that there's no other monster in Jekyll's head. It's just a part of Jekyll. He says there's nothing to fear in there but, ah, him. Aheh." The last had squeaked out in a nervous hiccup as Skinner waited for Nemo to take his sword away.

            The Indian narrowed his eyes, "What do you mean, a part of Jekyll?"

            "It's just something that popped up in 'is mind. Hyde and- ngh – I have a plan to deal with it. We hope," Skinner muttered.

            Nemo lowered his sword and sheathed it decisively. His eyes did not leave Skinner's general vicinity.

            "Very well."

            Amazing how such a simple statement could hold so much menace. Skinner shifted slightly and nodded though no one knew but himself.

AN~

Okay, the long awaited update (yikes! A month!) so terribly sorry it took so long. There's maybe five (or more) parts coming.