Thompkins bent to retrieve the paper.
“So sorry,” I repeated.
I took a step back, pulling the sword from my cane. Thompkins must have heard the soft whisk of metal on metal, but gave no sign of understanding its meaning. As he rose, innocent, unsuspecting smile on his face, I lunged forward and skewered him through the heart.
This time, I did not miss the killing stroke. Thompkins pitched forward and collapsed at my feet. Dead.
I waited.
No angry ghost. No wailing.
Thompkins had followed a different path into the afterlife than Stephen.
“Rest in peace,” I muttered, not sure what that even meant.
No sense in hiding this body. Unlike the other two, Thompkins would be missed in time. I had to hope that, with the amount of people experiencing madness, the crew would be too busy to bother with one missing steward anytime soon.
The hallway outside was empty except for a cart of meals, which I wheeled into my overcrowded cabin.
“Now what?”
I locked the door behind me, picked a direction and started walking. In motion I could think.
The captain’s letter allowing me run of the ship was gone. Even if I did still have it, the crew would know by now what had happened to me. An alarm would be raised if I approached any of the gates. I couldn’t be sure the book was still in steerage anyway. Stopping to sense, it told me it was everywhere.
The decks were now mostly empty, and those that were around gave signs they would also rather be left alone. I took up residence in one of the more secluded deck chairs, staring at the ocean.
“Now what?” I repeated.
After sunset, I worried less about being recognized and moved to the rail, chill night air pushing at me as I continued contemplating my next move. The last option of killing my way to the book was still available, and might be my only option now. If only I knew for certain where it was.
Lacking any better ideas, I decided to return to the gate, see if anything had changed. Two steps into that direction, my mind was assaulted and my body hammered to the wooden deck.
“Evil. Evil. The evil. The horror. The sleeping death. Cthul …”
I stopped myself. My words had grown from chant to near frantic scream.
“No. No.”
I wouldn’t allow that. Not again.
Between rail and cane I was able to get back to my feet.
Waves of hate and evil assaulted me, but I was ready.
“They’re reading the book again. Reading the words. Reading …”
Stop it!
Yes, they were reading it again, but this time they weren’t stopping at a word or two. Oh God, they kept reading and my head felt like it would burst.
“No! Oh, sleeping gods of ancient death …”
The morphine! I fumbled the syringe from my pocket, stripping my arm bare and injecting the needle. Fear and desperation said to depress the syringe the entire way, but I stopped at just enough to dull the assault.
The attack eased, my brain feeling less like it was being squeezed in a giant fist.
And I knew.
They were on this deck now.
Following the sensation back to them was simple. Two men, standing at the extreme bow of the ship.
The first was one of the people from steerage who refused to speak with me. He had been suspicious, but no more so than any of the others in steerage had been. The other, holding the book open in both hands, wore the splendid clothing of someone who had come from formal dinner, completely incongruous next to the thief. He was familiar too. Weston? No, Wilson.
Both had their backs to me, Wilson reading from the book.
Ph’nglui mglw’nafh Cthulhu R’lyeh wgah’nagl fhtagn.
“No!” I yelled, not thinking.
Wilson paused in his chants, turning first to me then the thief. “Get him.”
The thief pulled a blade from inside his jacket and started toward me. I allowed him to advance, thinking I had the advantage of reach on the open deck. When I drew the sword from my cane the thief stopped and looked down, as if comparing his blade to mine, then he grinned and started forward again.
The man feinted left then went right. I kept my sword trained on him through both movements, then committed to an attack when an opening presented itself. I thrust forward and he dodged around my sword to swing his knife. Whether through luck or providence I still held the cane in my free hand and managed to get it in the way of the stroke so only the tip of it cut me. Even so it hurt like fire as the blade raked a shallow furrow along my left arm. I swung the cane up and slammed it across the thief’s face.
Wilson continued chanting. What the hell was he trying to do?
Ph’nglui mglw’nafh Cthulhu R’lyeh wgah’nagl fhtagn.
Wind increased, chilling me to the bone, making my hands tight and frozen. My fingers wanted to open, to drop the sword but that meant death and worse.
The thief’s mouth widened into a grin more toothless than his friend in my wardrobe. He knew all he needed to win was to keep me from his master. The advantage was his.
The ship rocked to one side, throwing us all with it. Wilson kept his balance, leaning against the rails and grasping the book. I used my cane as a third leg, though without the head it was more of an effort. Only the thief lost his balance and stumbled, his hand opening involuntarily and dropping the knife to clatter against the boards of the deck.
Without a thought, I thrust forward with the sword and ran the man through, the tip of the blade entering the man’s stomach, though I’d been aiming for the heart. He screamed and twisted, dragging the sword from my grasp and staggering back toward his master.
“Damn it, you fool,” Wilson said. “Kill him.”
He resumed chanting and the thief rushed me. The man was dead, but a stomach wound could take hours and I didn’t have that much time. The fire of a fanatic was in his eyes as he rushed forward. Blood trickled from his mouth and sprayed with each exhale. We collided and he drove me back against the wall, hands reaching for my face and thumbs digging for my eyes.
I screamed.
Something dug painfully against my own stomach and I grasped blindly, knowing what it must be. The sword’s hilt, now sitting flush against him. Thumbs pressed against my eyes, pushing them into my skull.
Finding the sword hilt, I twisted it one full circle.
A gasp and the pressure against my eyes relaxed.
I pushed the hilt downward, like a lever, then reversed the action. I’d intended to go left and right next, but the thief staggered away. Fanatic he may be, but the human brain still fought to avoid death.
Through blurry vision I watched him retreat toward the rail.
The ship rocked again, this time to the other side and more violently. Wilson took one step back before pushing himself into the rail once again. The thief, in his desire to get away, toppled over the edge and into the freezing water below, taking my sword with him.
I tried using the remaining cane half for balance again, planting it against the deck, but the slickness of blood on my hands made it too difficult to hold onto. I slipped, losing my grip on the cane and watched it skitter across the deck.
The lunatic words poured from Wilson’s mouth. My mind was under siege, pulled sideways into a state of thinking I did not want to return to.
I was on all fours now, crawling toward Wilson. Without the cane this was much faster, though the pain in my lame leg was legendary. Hands and knees pressed against the wooden deck in step after step until one touched metal. The discarded knife of the thief was under hand and I grabbed it, not slowing my progress.
The chants had become more frenzied. Wilson had lost his mind and I had no idea how he could continue standing, much less reading. I doubled my speed, needing to stop the words pouring from that man�
��s mouth before my sanity left as well.
Reaching Wilson I rammed the knife into the meaty upper part of his right thigh. He gave a short hiss between two syllables but no other sign he had been hurt. I pulled myself up to my feet, reaching to stab him again. Still reading he swung one fist around and connected with the side of my head. Reeling I watched the blade sail away across deck.
With no options left I attacked Wilson with my fists. Puny, ineffective things. I might as well have been a child. He laughed. I cried and stepped backward.
What could I …?
My hand darted into the jacket pocket and came out with the syringe, still more than three-quarters full of morphine. I swung around and stabbed it into the side of Wilson’s neck, pressing on the plunger at the same time. The man sagged, whether from the drug or the wound I didn’t care.
He dropped the book to the deck, still chanting.
Bracing myself, I reached down and grabbed Wilson by the lower legs, lifting the man and flipping him over the side of the ship and into the water below.
The book called to me, whispering, ordering me to finish what was begun.
I shook my head and looked down, seeing the pages. The book was in my hands, face up, the words burning into my mind.
Had I been reading?
Had I said any of this aloud?
“No. It has to be over. Please.”
The ship lurched again as, in front of me, a shape rose from the water. Immense, coursing with rivers of slimy, stagnant water. A rounded, bulbous head ending in tentacles. An ancient god, asleep no more.
“No! No, no, no, no, no, no.”
Once again I looked at the book, at the words that were there, at the madness awaiting. The ceremony had not been completed. I could see the spot where I’d interrupted Wilson. It blazed in my mind like fiery letters written across the sky, spiking into my mind like a silver needle of agony. Nothing else occupied my world except for the words of the book and this waiting, ancient deity.
READ!
I heard the word inside his head, felt it inside my soul, to the core of my being and beyond. Nothing else.
Nothing!
“Please.”
I closed my eyes.
The words filled my head. I saw them, saw what I was expected to say, commanded to read.
READ THE WORDS!
“Yes. Read the words.”
Had I said that?
Yes. Yes I had. And I saw it was true. I did need to read those words dancing in front of my eyes.
Fhtagn wgah’nagl R’lyeh Cthulhu mglw’nafh Ph’nglui
I read them. Backward.
More tumbled from my mouth. Word after word until I was screaming myself hoarse and had lost all sense of who I was.
The ancient god raged at the reversal of ceremony, thrashing as it returned to the depths. One appendage—A wing? An arm?—collided with the ship. The screech of rending, tearing steel filled the air.
I lost my balance as the ship was rocked sideways. That damned tome went overboard, following its god back to the ocean’s bottom. A moment later I followed it, watching the freezing water rushing toward me.
The book was gone, my mission with it, and I welcomed death.
When my eyes opened I was lying in a lifeboat, cold and sodden, a blanket wrapped around me. Inside the rocking boat hunkered people with the haunted expressions of ones who had gone through war.
“Rest easy, Doctor. You’re safe,” a familiar voice said.
“Mrs. Hooper?”
“You’re lucky the steward saw you.”
“What happened?” I asked.
“Something hit the ship,” the steward said. “Some sort of …”
I knew the word monster was on the man’s lips, but he wouldn’t allow himself to speak it. His mind didn’t want to acknowledge it. None of these people did.
“Iceberg,” I said. “Yes, I saw it.”
Everyone in the lifeboat focussed on me and I repeated the word several times. Iceberg. They were ready for any explanation but the truth of what they had seen.
“Iceberg,” I repeated one final time.
There were murmurs of agreement and the repeating of my final words as I slipped away.
Iceberg.
Tomorrow’s Miracles
by L. Ron Hubbard
* * *
One might say that L. Ron Hubbard wasn’t just a writer. He had an extraordinarily inquisitive and receptive mind, which led him as a youth to begin a lifelong exploration of the world and the nature of man.
He studied firsthand more than twenty-one different races and cultures; from the Indian tribes of North America, to the Kayans of Borneo and the Mongols living in the Western Hills of China. He was a licensed master mariner, a pilot of early aircraft and an organizer and leader of expeditions which carried the flag of the Explorers Club. Coupled with this insatiable curiosity and love of adventure was an ability to look at the world and, all in a glance, reach often brilliant and startling insights based upon his observations.
L. Ron Hubbard began his professional writing career in 1930, scripting and directing action radio dramas. He was also a correspondent for a national aviation magazine before becoming a writer of popular fiction. Within a few years he had written a multitude of action, sea, and air adventure stories and rose to the top ranks of published authors. His work carried a verisimilitude that most other authors could not match, for while they fantasized about faraway places, storms at sea and death-defying aerobatics, L. Ron Hubbard had lived those adventures. With remarkable versatility, he soon added mystery, western, and historical fiction to his growing markets.
By 1938, Ron Hubbard was already established and recognized as one of the top-selling authors, when Street & Smith, publishers of Astounding Science Fiction magazine urged him to try his hand at science fiction. Though he had studied nuclear physics at George Washington University, he protested that he did not write about “machines and machinery” but that he wrote about people. “That’s just what we want,” he was told.
The result was a barrage of stories from L. Ron Hubbard that expanded the scope and played a part in changing the face of the literary genre, gaining Ron Hubbard repute as one of the founding fathers of the great Golden Age of Science Fiction.
The following notes were written by Ron in 1938. He had just found himself fully immersed in the world of science fiction. Not just writing soon-to-be popular stories, but also partaking in many friendly discussions about what is possible, what could be or has been. These thought-provoking notes share insight into the character of science fiction writers of the Golden Age and the inherent quality of those writers who are creating new worlds and existences far beyond what is known or possible.
He began his exploratory essay with this, “We are all more interested in these speculations about matter, space and time than we will care to admit to the professors who sometimes prove ‘something less than kind.’ I began to wonder about the validity of this inner circle of ‘science-fiction.’ Was it science at all? Or was it something else, even greater? Are we children of science or, to be blunt, philosophers? What would be the difference between them? And so we begin.”
Tomorrow’s Miracles
How many men have ever paused in the summer night to look up at the stars and give a thought, not to astronomy, but to the men who first slashed the Gordian knot of planetary motion? Of course, all educated men have, at one time or another, scraped the surface of the source of such facts. But, today we speak grandly of galaxies and consider astronomy an exact science and bow down before facts.
There probably does not exist a professor in the world who has not, unwittingly or otherwise, held the ignorance of the ancients to ridicule; and there is no field where this is more apparent than astronomy.
Some of the facts are these:
Early Hebrews
and Chaldeans, among others, believed in a flat earth, a sky supported by mountains and which upheld a sea, which, in turn, leaked through and caused rain. The flat plain was supported by nothing in particular. Of course we all know this, but there is a worthwhile point to make.
The Hindus believed that the earth was a hemisphere, supported by four large elephants. “This seems to have been entirely satisfactory until someone asked what was holding the elephants up. After some discussion, the wise men of India agreed that the four elephants were standing on a large mud turtle. Again, the people seem to have been satisfied until some inquisitive person raised the question as to what was holding the mud turtle up. I imagine the philosophers had grown tired of answering these questions by this time, for they are said to have replied that there was mud under the mud turtle and mud all the rest of the way.” (Astronomy by Arthur M. Harding, PhD p. 4).
Twelve pillars, according to the Veda of India, supported the earth, leaving plenty of room for the sun and the moon to dive under and come up on the other side.
If you wish, you can find a multitude of such beliefs, all common enough. But there are two facts concerning these and their presentation which are most erroneous. By examining the above quote, one sees that terms have been confused. Men who ask questions and then figure out answers are, indeed, philosophers. The masses take anything which seems to have a certain academic reverence attached and cling to it desperately. The other error is considering that these beliefs were foolish and that scientists, laboring in their laboratories or observatories are wholly responsible for the ideas which permeate the world of thought.
It is not that we here wish to maintain these facts about the state of the earth. On the contrary. But, they are not presented for ridicule because they are the ideas which some philosopher developed painfully with the scant data he had at hand and who had to aid him no means of communication, travel, instruments or even mathematics. They are, what we chose to call, hypotheses possessing sufficient truth to be accepted. Today, thanks to Copernicus and all the rest, we know about gravity. Thanks to Newton, we have mathematics. Thanks to a lens grinder, we have a telescope.
L. Ron Hubbard Presents Writers of the Future Volume 35 Page 13
