He was thankful towards himself for not having established his office in his own home, but had set it up in an administrative building. He found that the simple act of walking in and out of a door made it easier for him to stop thinking about his work in the evenings, leaving his mind a little ease, thus making it easier to rest. Yet the news he had received the previous night had made his sleep light and unresting and the morning walk he was taking towards his office proved to not be as sobering as it usually was.

It was best if the pirates could have been caught and not simply driven away towards other places, as if he simply threw the garbage over the neighbour's fence, yet it so happened that at the sight of him and his fleet, most pirates fled East. Spread out over such a vast area though, they wouldn't have been such a great problem. A few pirates here and there would always exist, as robberies and murder and everything else will always exist in the world. The danger laid in having them congregated together.

His ships had chased a few pirates down to Cuba, until they were too far away to continue pursuing, where the chase was continued by the Spanish forces. Last night though, a ship had come from Havana to tell him that the English ships from further on in Jamaica, which were supposed to take on the pursuit, never came, so the hunt had stopped and the pirates' trail was lost. And after all of this, no reports had accounted for either Jack Rackham or Bartholomew Roberts. Though he had vowed to catch Jack, no matter the cost, he had no reason to look for Roberts in particular. Though the man was known to be the richest and most successful pirate and he was the only one to command four ships, Woodes wouldn't have minded if he'd have heard that the pirate had simply went away to plague some other parts of the world.

As he reached his office and opened the door, he was met with a surprise on his desk. There was a skull laying right on it and what looked like a piece of paper stuck in its jaws. The simple fact that somebody had a key to his office, or somehow managed to unlock it and then lock it back, was more frightening than bones could ever be. He did not let himself beat down over it, so he would simply have to change the lock and not let himself be intimidated. He pushed the skull aside as if it were something that merely wasted precious desk space, after yanking the piece of paper from between its teeth.

The paper was torn into a circle and had the black spot on it, a thing that he found to be an obsolete cliche that had long lost its morbid appeal. On the other side though, the letters AEH were written. As Bartholomew Roberts' Flag wrote ABH for "A Barbadian Head" and AMH for "A Martiniquan Head" under the two skulls on it, it was quite obvious that this meant adding "An Englishman Head". He did not quite know if he should feel seriously threatened by this invasion of personal space or if he should feel pity for a man whose bark seemed to be worse than his bite, yet before he could settle between them, he heard a knock on his door.

"Good morning, mr Rogers" said the man, whose face he vaguely knew, yet he could not name "I am one of Max's employees"

He raised himself to greet the man, most curious about what could have prompted him to come to his office so early in the morning, and noticed how the man looked rather frightened and confused at the sight of the skull.

"Good morning. Please do go on ... "

"Sir … where did you get that?" the man asked, pointing at the gift on his desk

"I found it here as I arrived. An attempt at a threat from Bartholomew Roberts" he told him, showing him the paper with the letters and the black spot "So, go on, is it something you want to report?"

"Sir"... the man stuttered "You might want to sit down"

"Why has she sent you?" he pressed on, feeling quite insulted at the suggestion of this unknown man that he should sit

"Sir … I have been sent here to report" the man started to explain, looking almost afraid of what he was about to say "That at sunrise somebody discovered that … your wife's grave had been dug up"

His mind simply stopped being able to process any thoughts for a few moments, after which he found it rather difficult to stand.

"Get out"

His eyes remained fixed on the door the man had closed behind and simply refused to move in their sockets. Her skull was creeping on him, right at his side, in the corner of his eye, without him even turning to look at it. But he knew he must look. He knew that everything that was terrifying, disgusting or disheartening in general must be faced, so after a few long minutes, he turned to look at it. He reached his hand to it and felt how smooth and cold it was, after which he turned it around to look at its face. The most horrifying detail of it all were the teeth … Though he never thought he would remember such a detail, those were her teeth, that had been her smile, though the time it spent in the dirt had made them dry and yellow, and a couple of them were missing. Though half of him was disgusted and terrified and his instincts told him to throw it away and never look, the other half of him pressed on with masochistic curiosity and bravery. After feeling immovable for God knows how much time, he gently ran one of his fingers along the lines of the forehead, the cheek bones, and then over her teeth, yet despite his gentility, one of it simply fell out as it was touched.

There was a wish he had every time somebody died, a wish that he suspected everybody had, though nobody ever talked about it. A wish to speak to the deceased once. Only once. He did not need extensive conversation, he did not expect forgiveness, but he simply wished to speak to the dead once, just once, to inform them on what had happened in the world after their death. He knew she'd be curious, he knew she'd be worried, and he simply wished to be able to take her worries away.

"... I am back to finish what we started" he told her, though she had no more ears to hear

"... And I am fine" he went on, not caring who would hear him through the doors and think him insane

As he sat there, neither alone nor in company, he realised that he was terribly aware of all the sounds around him, aware of all the noise of the street and office that he never paid attention to. There was the repetitive sweep of a broom somewhere on the hallway, there were some dogs barking in the distance and he even heard the rustling of leaves outside, though the windows were closed.

"...Max is alright" he told her "I know she took care of you and you'd want her to be well … "

He realised that his hands had been trembling and that tears were flowing from his eyes, yet he did not know when it happened.

"But the others … there's nobody left you should care about"