Classics Mutilated

by John Shirley

  “It did not matter to me that I had a child-bride and an infant son awaiting me in Nantucket. Nor did it matter that thirty men, brave and true, had placed their lives and livelihoods in my care. There was a fire in my bosom that burned day and night, and naught would extinguish it, save the blood of the whale that maimed me. Now my child-bride is a withered crone, my infant son dead on the end of a Confederate’s bayonet, and my brave crew, save for one, sleeps at the bottom of the sea.

  “I chased the accursed beast halfway across the world, and sank my harpoon into its damned hide, only to run afoul of the line. A flying turn of rope wrapped itself about my neck, yanking me below the waves, drowning me within seconds. Yet, to my horror, though I knew myself dead, I was still aware of all that transpired about me. I was helpless witness to the destruction of my ship and the deaths of my men by the whale I had pursued across three seas and two oceans.

  “And when it was over, the hated whale pulled me down, down, down—past sunken galleons, past the lairs of slumbering leviathans, past the drowned towers of long-lost kingdoms—down to the very floor of the ocean. With dead man’s eyes I beheld a great chasm, from which boiled dreadful beasts with the bodies of men and heads like that of jellyfish. These abominations freed me of my tether and escorted me down into the rift, which lead into the very belly of the world, Hell itself. There I swam not through a mere lake of fire, but an entire ocean, until I came at last to a great throne.

  “The throne was fashioned of horn and upon it sat the King of the Fallen, the Devil himself. The Lord of the Damned resembled nothing so much as a gigantic shadow in the shape of a man, with wings of flame and eyes that shone like burnished shields. The Devil spoke unto me, and though he had no mouth, his voice rang like a gong, shaking me to my marrow.

  “ ‘Ahab’, he said, ‘Thou promised me thine soul in exchange for the life of the whale. Yet here you stand before me, and the fish still swims! Let it not be said that I do not honor my covenants. I have within my kingdom a park unlike any seen on Earth, with trees of bone and rivers of blood. I would populate it with monsters for the pleasure of my sport. Bring me as many fiends as men you led to death, and I shall return thy soul, to do with as thou wish.’ ”

  Although I did not want to believe the outrageous tale the old sailor had just told me, my curiosity got the better of me. “How many men died under your command?”

  “Nine and twenty,” he replied solemnly.

  “And how many monsters have you hunted?”

  “This will be the second,” he admitted. “There. I have told thee what thou asked, nothing more, nothing less. I have come to this place on the Devil’s business, and I cannot leave until it is finished. It is as simple as that.”

  “I have had enough of this lunacy!” I exclaimed, hoping the anger in my voice would hide the fear in my heart. “You are welcome to the cabin, but I am taking the dogs and returning to the trading post!”

  “The wendigo will be upon thee within minutes of setting forth,” Ahab cautioned.

  “I have my rifle and my axe,” I countered. “I won’t be as easy to kill as Martin.”

  “Mortal weapons are of no use against that thing.”

  “It seemed to let go of me quickly enough when you jabbed it with that over-glorified pig-sticker of yours,” I pointed out.

  “This is no mere harpoon,” Ahab said, nodding to the spear lying across his lap. “It was forged from the hardest iron there is: the nail-stubs of steel horseshoes—the ones that racehorses wear. I myself hammered together the twelve rods for its shank, winding them together like the yarns of a rope. The barbs were cast from my own shaving razors—the finest, sharpest steel to ever touch human skin. But, most important of all, it was tempered not in water, but the blood of three pagan hunters, who, at my bidding, opened their veins so that the instrument of my revenge might partake of their strength. Thus I baptized it not in the name of the Father, but the Devil himself. That is why the wendigo feared it.”

  “All that may very well be true, but I am not a man prone to fancy. If I can see a thing, and hear a thing, and most certainly smell a thing, then to my mind it is of this world, not the next. And that means I can kill it. And if it gets in my way, I will do just that, Devil’s menagerie or no!”

  “I have no claim on thee,” Ahab said quietly as he returned to his whetstone. “Escape if thee can.”

  I had no idea if Ahab was mad, damned, or a liar, and I had no desire to find which was the truth. Lantern in hand, I left the cabin and hurried to the pen where the dogs were kept. However, before I was halfway there I heard an unholy cacophony of yelps and barks. I quickened my pace, trying not to lose my footing in the knee-high snow and ice, and arrived at the dog-pen just in time to see the wendigo attack the last of the team.

  The wendigo, now easily twice the size of man, held the hapless animal by the tail and lowered it, head-first, into its gaping mouth, the jaws of which were dislocated like those of a serpent. The fiend’s belly was hideously distended, far beyond human limits, and I could clearly see the outlines of the other dogs squirming underneath its ash-gray skin as they were digested alive. The wendigo’s jaws snapped shut like a trap, severing the tail of the last dog, which fell to the snow in a gout of crimson.

  I had been so horrified by the scene before me, I was rooted to the spot. But the sight of the dog’s blood snapped me out of my petrified state, and I turned and fled back to the safety of the cabin. I did not dare turn and look behind me, for fear of what I might see in pursuit.

  As I burst into the cabin, I found Ahab where I had left him, patiently applying the whetstone to his harpoon. “The dogs are dead!” I shouted. “It ate all of them!”

  Ahab nodded as if this was something to be expected. “The wendigo is hunger incarnate. No matter how much it eats, its belly is never full; it exists in a perpetual state of starvation. The more it eats, the larger it grows; the larger it grows, the hungrier it gets. There is no end to it.”

  My mind was still reeling from the fresh horror I had just witnessed, and was only just realizing I was trapped. While I might have been able to flee the wendigo using the sled, there was no way I could possibly escape the camp on foot. It was then I surrendered my disbelief and embraced Ahab’s reality as my own.

  “How can we fight against this monster?”

  If Ahab had an answer I did not hear it, for, at that exact moment, the window in front of which I stood abruptly shattered inward. I turned to see an emaciated arm as long as I am tall reach through the broken sash. I screamed in terror as the wendigo’s fingers, the tips black from frostbite, closed about my leg, dragging me inexorably toward whatever stood on the other side.

  Ahab was on his feet as quick as lightning, his harpoon at the ready. Without hesitation he dashed forward and plunged the spear into the wendigo’s arm. The monster screamed in agony and anger as it let go of me, the absurdly long extremity withdrawing like a snake fleeing a fire.

  “I have cost it an arm, if I’m lucky!” the old sailor said excitedly, pointing to a foul-smelling, tar-like substance splashed across the floor. “That bastard won’t escape me by climbing the rigging this time!”

  Harpoon in hand, Ahab rushed out of the cabin and into the snowy night. I followed close behind, for fear the creature might return while he was gone. I saw Ahab standing in the door-yard beside the sled that was to have been my escape, surveying his surroundings with eyes accustomed to scanning the open ocean for the fleeting flash of a fluke or the spume of a distant whale.

  “Thar she blows!” Ahab sang out, pointing to a shambling shape moving off in the distance. I could barely make out the gray silhouette framed against the darkness, but it was obvious that the wendigo’s right arm hung uselessly at its side.

  Ahab hurled his harpoon after the fleeing figure. Because it had its back to us, the creature was unable to play its trick of turning sideways and disappearing, and this time the harpoon found its target, striking the creature between the shoulder
blades.

  The wendigo roared in angry pain and instantly took flight, running faster than any creature on two legs ever could. Ahab quickly grabbed the towline attached to the end of the harpoon and secured it to the brush bow of the sled.

  “Fare thee well, friend,” Ahab said as he took his place behind the handlebars. “Lord willing, we shall never meet again, in this world or the next!” And with that the sled sped away, shooting across the snow-covered landscape like a longboat dragged by a stricken whale.

  As the Devil’s huntsman and his monstrous quarry disappeared from sight, I could hear Ahab’s shouted curses carried on the wind, mixed with the unholy wail of the wendigo, until they became one and the same.

  So exhausted was I by the terrors I had undergone, I returned to the cabin, where I immediately collapsed into a deep sleep. When I awoke the next day, it was to find the blizzard abated and a gun in my face.

  I discovered that a posse had been sent out from the trading post in search of me on account of my stealing three dogs. I insisted that I was innocent of the charges—that the dogs had been paid for, cash on the barrelhead. But even if they had been willing to believe me in regard to the dogs, there was still the matter of the mutilated corpse that lay twenty feet from where I slept.

  I was promptly arrested for the murder of Ben Martin—as well as Dick Buchan, even though his body was never found—and taken back to the trading post and locked up in the stockade. And here I sit, awaiting the thaw, when I will be taken down to Winnipeg and put on trial.

  I tried to explain about Ahab, and how he had bought the dogs for me, but the clerk who had waited on me and took the doubloon in payment claims no such person was ever in his store, nor is there any coin in the trading post’s coffers matching the description I gave.

  My only hope is that Jack will reappear and vouch for what he saw in Buchan’s gaunt, sunken eyes. For now, too late, I realize the reason for the Indian abandoning the camp. If he does not come forward, then I will either be hung as a murderer or imprisoned as a madman.

  Sometimes, late at night, when the frigid wind blows out of the north and whistles cruelly through the bars of my cell, I still hear Ahab’s voice as he is dragged across the vast, uncharted wilderness by his captured fiend: "Run! Run! Run to thy infernal master! To the last I grapple with thee; from Hell’s heart, I stab at thee!"

  Vicious

  By Mark Morris

  There was this bird. John said she was bad news. But then John thinks everyone’s bad news. He’s just fucking paranoid.

  Not as bad as Malcolm, though. Malcolm thinks the CIA and the FBI and fuck knows who else is following us. He thinks they’re waiting for the chance to blow us all away. Wipe the Sex Pistols off the face of the earth.

  Well, ha fucking ha. They won’t get me. I’m Sid Vicious. I’m fucking indestructible. I’m gonna live forever.

  This bird, though. Came on to me after the gig. These American birds love me. “Sid, Sid, fuck me.” "Yeah, alright, darlin'. Anything to oblige.”

  John says I’m disgusting. He says I’m turning into a Rolling Stone. But he’s just uptight and jealous. He ain’t as pretty as me. Ain’t got no anarchy in his soul no more. I’m the only one with any anarchy left. Steve and Paul. What a couple of cunts. They’re just the backing band. After the gig tonight Steve went mental. Said I was out of control. Said I was dragging them all down.

  “We’re supposed to be out of control, you fucker,” I told him. “We’re the Sex Pistols.”

  He told me if I didn’t sort myself out I’d be out of the band.

  “You can’t throw me out,” I said. “You’d be nothing without me. People don’t come to see you. They come to see me.”

  “Yeah,” said John. He was sitting in the corner on his own, with a can of beer in his hand like an old man in a pub. “But that’s ’cos most of the morons who go to the circus prefer the clowns to the artistes.”

  He don’t know what he’s talking about. He’s so full of shit. He’s a miserable bastard. They’re all miserable bastards. Not me, though. I’m having a great time. I ain’t got no gear, and that’s fucking killing me, but at least I’m making an effort.

  Thing is, I hurt all over from not having any stuff, and I can’t sleep, and every time I eat something I throw it back up. And I fucking itch. Itch, itch, itch. All over. My arm, where I cut myself, and my chest, where I carved Gimme A Fix (and I don’t even remember doing that), and my fucking bollocks. My bollocks most of all.

  I thought I had some disease. I thought I was dying. Our tour manager, Noel Monk. He’s a fucking hippie, with a moustache like a fucking faggot cowboy, but he’s all right.

  “Noel,” I said. “There’s something wrong with me. I fucked some bitch before I come here and I fucking itch like crazy.”

  He laughed. “Don’t worry, Sid. You got crabs, that’s all,” he said.

  So yeah. I hurt and I itch and I’m sick and I need some stuff so bad and I’m missing Nancy, but that don’t stop me enjoying myself. Fucking America. It’s great.

  So this bird. She come up and she wanted to fuck me. We were hanging out after the show. We’re in this place. Baton Rouge. Louisiana. The Kingfish Club.

  I was feeling all right. I was drinking peppermint schnapps ’cos it stops the hurting, and Noel had given me some of his valiums, and I was floating. Everything soft and mellow. And this bird said, “Sid, you’re beautiful. I want to fuck you.”

  And so we fucked. Right there on the bar. Animal magnetism. People were watching and taking photos, but I didn’t care. Let 'em. It’s their problem if they wanna be perverts, not mine.

  She was going down on me, and I was lying back, thinking of England (ha ha ha) and then there was all this shouting, and I opened my eyes, and there was Noel and Glen, one of the security blokes, and some other geezers, and everyone was going apeshit. Glen was trying to grab someone’s camera and Noel was pulling the bird off me, and so I took a swing at him with my bottle, but I missed.

  “What the fuck are you doing, Noel?” I said. “You said I could shag who I wanted.”

  It’s true. He wouldn’t get me no smack, but he said any time I saw a bird I liked he’d bring her to me.

  “And so you can, Sid,” he said. “But not here. Here is a bit too … public.”

  I saw John out of the corner of my eye. He curled his lip and sneered at me. He looked disgusted.

  “Where then?” I said.

  “We'll find somewhere. Come on.”

  They took us away. Me and the bird. It was like being arrested. Surrounded by all these bodies. Big guys. Like a fucking moving wall. I saw faces through the wall. A blur of faces, looking at me. I spat at them. “Fuck off.” They were like demons. Grinning. Eyes shining. “Fuck off, fuck off.” I wanted to slash them all open.

  We didn’t have a hotel. When the equipment was packed we were all getting back on the bus and driving through the snow and the dark and the shit. Endless fucking black roads. Driving and driving.

  I don’t mind the driving, to be honest. It’s a bit boring, but it’s all right. I like that we stop at roadside diners. Steak and eggs. I love my steak and eggs. Steak rare, eggs runny. But I can never keep it down. Eat it all up, yum yum, lovely. But then my guts cramp and I have to run for the bog and throw it back up again. All over the wall. In the sink. Everywhere. Blood and puke all over America. Sid was here.

  “Oi, Glen,” I said.

  Glen looked at me. He’s a big fucking guy. Big fucking beard. I told him only hippies and arseholes have beards, but he’s all right. Glen’s tough.

  “Yeah, Sid?”

  “Where we going tonight?”

  “When we’ve finished here, you mean?”

  “Yeah.”

  “We’re going to Dallas, Sid.”

  “Oh yeah,” I said.

  Dallas. That’s where that President got shot. I remember my mum telling me about that when I was a kid. Big deal. Big news. Maybe we'll get shot in Dallas too. Maybe we'll b
e as famous as that President.

  “Dallas,” I said. “Yeah, brilliant.”

  Noel and Glen found us this place backstage. Fucking broom cupboard. Sink in the corner.

  “We'll be right outside, Sid,” Noel said, “so don’t get any smart ideas about running out on us.”

  “I won’t, Noel. No way.”

  He shut the door. It was fucking dark in there, but me and the bird fucked on the floor. I was knackered. I felt sick. I puked in the sink. My head was pounding.

  “You okay, Sid?” the bird asked. She tried to touch me, but my skin was sore. Her touch was like needles. I shrugged her off.

  “Don’t fucking touch me,” I said.

  “Jeez,” she said. “What’s your problem?”

  “You,” I said. “You’re my fucking problem.”

  She went all whiny. “What have I done wrong, Sid? Tell me what I’ve done wrong and I’ll put it right.”

  “I need smack,” I said. “You got any smack?”

  “No,” she said.

  “Then you’re no fucking good to me,” I said. “Why don’t you fuck off?”

  She started to cry. Black lines trickling down her face. I felt bad. “Fucking hell,” I said. “Don’t cry.”

  “I can’t help it. You’re mad at me.”

  “No, I’m not,” I said. “I’m not mad at you. I just need some stuff. Noel and that lot, they won’t let me out. They won’t let me go anywhere. They think if I go off somewhere I’ll end up killing myself.”

  “And will you?” said the bird. Little squeaky voice.

  I laughed. I was hurting again. Sweats and chills. Body cramps. “Yeah, probably,” I said. “Or some fucking cowboy will shoot me. They hate us here. Fucking America hates the Sex Pistols.”

  “I don’t,” said the bird. “I love the Sex Pistols.”

  “Yeah, well, you’re one of the smart ones,” I said. “Most people are scared of us. They think we’re gonna destroy America.”