"Hello," Dan said after entering, keeping his voice stable as he met the man's gaze, "My name is Dan Reeds, I'm the captain of the Voyager, the ship that fished you from the ocean."

  "You- You saved me?" The man's voice was harsh and made it clear how dry his throat was. "From those monsters?"

  "Yes," Dan nodded. "Unfortunately, the others were all gone and we couldn't save them. Same for your arm, we couldn't do anything about it."

  The man looked blankly at Dan for a few seconds before he turned his head slowly to the stump of his amputated arm. It was clear from the movement that even doing just that was too much for him.

  "It's alright," he finally said in that same weak tone, "I'm just glad that I'm alive. When that monster got hold of me, I thought I was dead for sure."

  Dan nodded at him in understanding before asking again,

  "How are you feeling? We need to ask a few questions of you."

  "I'm good," the man said, "I can hold on for a bit more. But where am I right now?"

  After his question, the man was helped to get a few sips of water by Fleta. It wasn't much, more to wet his throat than anything else really.

  "You're on our ship, the Voyager," Dan answered without any hesitation.

  Dan saw the man look at him blankly and open his mouth as if he wanted to say something, but then he paused and only continued a few moments later.

  "Go on, ask away."

  Dan felt sorry for the man. He must have gone through quite the ordeal and for him to be still rational and answering questions like this, it was nothing but proof of his resilience. Unfortunately, he couldn't really let the man just be, they needed some answers and he was the only way they could get some.

  "What's your name and where are you from?" Dan started the slow questioning.

  "I'm called Graham, from the empire," the man clenched his one hand as he said that, "That's where I was kidnapped from to work on that hellhole."

  "Kidnapped? Hellhole?" Dan caught up to the keywords. "You mean that you were kidnapped and dropped on that island?"

  "You saw the island?" The man's voice rose before he started coughing from how high he pushed it.

  Fleta put her hand on his throat as it shone in a bright green light. The man's coughs got gentler and gentler till they disappeared completely.

  "Don't push yourself and don't get too agitated," Fleta said in a cold tone, "You're still not that well, you need to take good care of yourself for a long time before you are back to your top shape, especially with how weak your body already is."

  "Thank you," Graham said, his voice faint.

  Fleta just hummed as she stepped aside. Dan thought for a moment and then asked,

  "We did see the island, we took the path those monsters came from and eventually saw it. We didn't make ourselves known but we did get a close look. What is that place?"

  "It's a mining island," Graham said through gritted teeth, "Some noble found out about how rich in mana crystals the island's mountains are and is mining them covertly. No one would want to work in the middle of the ocean, especially on an island situated in the unknown areas where even getting there alive isn't guaranteed. That of course means that they went with the next best thing."

  The narrative has been stolen; if detected on Amazon, report the infringement.

  "So what you meant about being kidnapped before..." Dan connected the dots along with what he had seen and reached the obvious conclusion, and as expected it wasn't that far off what he had guessed once he laid eyes on the island.

  "Yes." Graham nodded weakly, as if his anger was extinguished and only left behind emptiness. "I got kidnapped to work on that island till my death. Everyone on the island is like that, either slaves kidnapped from the poor, or ones who were sold illegally by families that couldn't take care of them."

  "Didn't the empire outlaw slavery?" Fleta asked before Dan could say anything, "How could they do something like this?"

  "It is outlawed." Graham chuckled bitterly. "That's why everything is done in secret. The noble, whoever he fucking is, got a Deepdark somehow, and used it to find this place. It was also how we were brought to this island in the first place. Everything is done in the shadows, and if anyone suspects anything, a mana crystal mine makes enough revenue that shutting a few mouths would barely make a dent in the fortune he is making out of this."

  Dan could feel the air in the room turn heavy as the truth of what the man had just said settled on them. Being from a civilised world where things like slavery were mostly eradicated, especially for them, where it was nothing more than something the world left behind ages ago, such a heartless situation was unimaginable.

  Dan took deep breaths as he tried to calm himself. Acting up wouldn't do them any good and they were still gathering information on the matter. Who knows, Graham might have been making things up and wasn't honest about everything?

  Before Dan could ask another thing, he saw Graham's eyes start closing slowly as he seemed to be fighting to keep them open.

  "That's it for now," Fleta said as she took a step ahead, "He needs to rest, we can continue with him later."

  Dan didn't argue, he just gave the man one last glance before turning around and leaving the med-bay, Marcus following a few moments behind him after saying something to Hank and Ricky.

  Once they were outside, Dan found himself looking towards where the island was unconsciously, Marcus joining him as they looked on at the gradually brightening sky. They remained like that for a long time before Dan finally asked without turning towards his chief security officer:

  "What do you think?"

  "It is unbelievable," Marcus answered in his usual blank tone, "Knowing that something like that is happening out there is more than maddening really. What you're feeling is the same as what I and anyone amongst us would feel after hearing about what we just found out, it's not easy."

  Dan sighed weakly as his shoulders slumped. This new world was really putting him in some pretty bad positions and he had to deal with them one way or another.

  "You should think deeply about what you want to do," Marcus said after seeing how Dan didn't answer, "That is the first step, know what you want first, and from there see how it aligns with what you need to do."

  I want to do something about it! He almost said, but then held it back. He couldn't bring himself to say that out loud.

  The memory of what had happened the last time he made a rash decision flashed through his mind. It almost ended with them being caught by the Empire because of that noble's tracking mark. And he was almost 100% sure that doing something about the island was going to be even more dangerous than what he had pushed for back then.

  "I'm going to bring it up with everyone," he finally said in a determined tone, "I can't just push everyone towards danger due to my selfish desire, but I also can't just act as if I know nothing about this. I will tell everyone what we have found so far, and have them vote on what we should do next. No matter what the result is, I will respect it and go with it."

  "Will set it up." Marcus simply nodded.

  And just like that, Dan sat in the Skyline as he told everyone who came in for breakfast that they would be having a meeting at 10 am. And for them to spread the news to those who might not have heard of it, and those who didn't usually come for morning meals, they needed everyone to be there. And then it was 10 am.

  Dan took deep breaths as he walked to stand in front of everyone.

  "Good morning everyone, you might be wondering why I called for this. As you all know, yesterday we fished a wounded man from the Harvesters, and by following the path they came from we..." He went on to explain what they had found out about the island's situation and what Graham had said.

  The more Dan spoke, the heavier he saw the expressions of the people in the room turn. He was extremely glad that he had made sure to let the two young girls stay back and not join in the meeting.

  "And that brings us here." He finally reached the end, calming his heart as he looked at everyone in the room. "What we should do now is an important question that I can't decide on on my own, it's a question that needs you all to weigh in on, and I'm not going to take it from you.

  "So, with that in mind, we will have an anonymous vote, so you don't have to worry about anyone finding out what you chose and all that, just be honest with your heart and choices without worry."

  Being met by heavy expressions and nods, Dan took a deep breath as he watched everyone go to a secluded booth they had reworked to be their voting cubicle where everyone would put their votes.

  And just like that, the voting process went smoothly. It was almost unanimous, they would act against the island.

  That's all for now~