by Ade Grant
Tetrazzini looked at him blankly, impatient to leave.
“What I mean to say is, these clips are rather... vanilla? Perhaps you’d like something more... exciting?”
How fast things change. A year or so ago, he’d have described the footage contained on the USB stick as anything but vanilla. But now? How many wanks had it taken to dull the image of a five year old abused by her father? How many ejaculations diminished the impact of an infant having his sphincter split wide? These days there were few pleasures to be had in such videos; if anything it was the appropriation that tickled the adrenal glands, that sight of the progress bar as it was fed by a thousand other torrents, a thousand other like-minded pariahs. No, these days the videos that gave him wood were rarer fare.
“I can get you videos that are a little rougher?” he persisted, though Tetrazzini still kept his thoughts locked away behind a granite face. The admission hang between them. Harris had taken a risk, for even amongst paedophiles there were degrees of severity and morality that could easily be breached. “They’re good. You won’t see anything like it anywhere else.”
“No. Thank you,” Tetrazzini said, rising from his seat to leave. “These will be suitable.”
Embarrassment made anger flare up inside. Who the fuck did this guy think he was, looking down on him like that? He wasn’t the Pope for Christ’s sake!
All of a sudden, Harris wanted rid of Tetrazzini, but he was the only other person with even vaguely similar appetites, and Harris had one question he wanted to ask first. He reached out and grabbed the doctor’s arm, preventing him from passing.
“Do you ever... you know?”
“I don’t know what the fuck you’re taking about,” Tetrazzini growled.
“Do you ever act out the videos? Do it for real, I mean?”
Tetrazzini smiled thinly, a smile that contained all Harris needed to know. It spoke of a secret satisfaction, an honour at experiencing what was forbidden to all. “What about you?”
“Yes,” whispered Harris. “Once.” It had occurred nine months ago, his sister’s kid. Jennie had left him alone with little Rachel for an hour whilst she popped out to buy credit for the gas meter. In that time he’d gotten... curious. He shivered at the recollection, the thrill of intrusion.
“Just once huh?”
And Harris almost believed it, except there had been that other time, that exquisite afternoon, when he’d indulged the fantasy fuelled by the other videos. But he wouldn’t talk about that. He’d never talk about it. Not while the police investigation was still on-going. Not while that girl’s parents still showed their tearful blotchy faces on TV, pleading for news of their daughter’s whereabouts.
“Well, be careful, huh?” Tetrazzini said as if reading Harris’ thoughts. “Restraint goes a long way,” and with a wink added, “Loose lips sink ships.” The doctor looked up as the bus came to a halt outside a small park, nestled amongst tall office blocks. “I’m going to take full advantage of this splendid weather and enjoy my sandwich. Have a good day, Rolf.”
Harris watched the doctor leave, envious of the man’s choice of destination. The park did look nice, bathed in bright light, despite being next to several tall office blocks. Perhaps he’d get out and have a stroll himself? Have a think about what to ask Tetrazzini next time?
He never got a chance to meet the doctor again. The world broke mere minutes later.
Harris looked at Grace with a mixture of sickness and want written across his features. His face twisted and turned, sometimes pulling apart as if in horror, but then curling together in lust. One hand was placed against his cheek, idly scratching, whilst the other gently rubbed the front of his trousers.
“Harris?”
His attention broke to McConnell and eyes were freed from their mist. “Christopher,” he stammered, “I’m sorry.” But McConnell shook his head.
“Oh, Harris, what have you done?” The reverend groaned, realising his mistake.
Tears grew heavy in the captain’s eyes. “It’s something I do. It’s just something I do.”
“But...” McConnell’s head was spinning. And behind him he could hear the sound of a child being raped. “But... the Mariner? Arthur? I thought it was Arthur...”
“I did that for us, for all of us,” the man pleaded. “That lunatic is dangerous, you know it. If we’d followed him to the Pope, we’d all be dead. Like Barnett and the rest... All of us!” Harris jabbered whilst his eyes kept flicking over McConnell’s shoulder, dragged towards the sight played out behind. “If I’d been caught, we’d all be dead. So you see? I was right wasn’t I? I was right. I was right. No-one was supposed to know. Loose lips sink ships! Loose lips sink ships!”
There was a sickening snap of bone as whatever play that was being enacted behind him ended in its grim climax. Harris’ attention dragged to it fully and he gave an involuntary gasp of pleasure at the sight.
Screaming with fury, McConnell threw himself forward, open palms hitting the monster’s chest. His eyes widened in almost comical surprise at the fantasy’s interruption, and in a blur of flailing arms and legs tumbled backwards, somersaulting overboard.
For a brief moment, he hung on the edge by the fingertips of his right hand, face upturned and pleading, but with a faint squeak his fingers skidded, and Harris fell into the depths.
And then, as if the magic had been dispelled, the image of Grace dropped back into the ocean. There was no need for the eels to continue their ploy. The mind they’d been trying to tempt was with them. Now they could finally feed.
McConnell placed his hands to his face as Harris gave his final gurgling screams. There wasn’t much, the boat was still moving and his protests would soon be beyond ear shot.
He stayed in that pose, curled up and alone, praying that he could undo everything in his life that had gone so terribly wrong. But wishes are never answered. What’s done cannot be undone.
Eventually, he rose and took hold of the steering. They had drifted off course, and now the Neptune was to the left, horrendously close to the squat waterfall.
They had come to the final chapter. It was time to find an end.
46
THE WASP
LIKE AN OLD NAG’S FINAL jaunt about the field, the Neptune sailed with a speed and dignity previously unseen. It sliced through the waters gracefully, drawn towards the cocoon’s tear like a spirit’s ascent. He was close, so close he could almost feel the eye of the Wasp upon him. How would it react? How could any creature cope with the rebellion of a cell?
Ahead was the Waterfall, shrunk in height, as if whatever strange faucet dispensing the endless torrent had been brought closer to the surface.
The Mariner, clutching the side of the Neptune and leaning out over the ocean below, looked up at the great plume of liquid. “I’m here!” he told the sky. “Look at me! Listen to me!”
Suddenly the ship lurched, dropping into the ocean as if pushed. Above, one of the masts splintered, and with a mighty crack, broke, dropping onto the decking, hitting the boards beneath like a cannon-ball. Splinters flew in a spiky cloud and the Mariner was thrown down, rolling uncontrollably as the ship lurched, a terrible rupturing sending vibrations through his back to his teeth.
The Neptune came to a halt.
With shaky legs, the Mariner got to his feet and dashed to the bow, peering over, trying to spot the rocks she must have hit. There was none, just the lapping of the waves, strangely higher than they should be upon the hull.
Finally he looked up, and saw the cause of the jolt.
A great groove cut into the sky, The mast had crumpled the light blue around it into piles of displaced matter, cutting into some barrier above that gave the illusion of depth, yet really as firm as the ceiling of a cave.
He turned, inspecting the sky, trying to see any change in its nature. The sun was still there, but it had lost all definition. Didn’t it used to be an orb? Now it was just a hue, a changing tone from blue to bright, a patch of heat in an otherwise clear sky.
And the world was filling up.
He looked at the Waterfall, spewing from the office block like an almighty broken hydrant, the great source of water drenching a land that once made sense, the degradation of the cocoon given form. The waters were rising, pressing each and every ship upwards to be squashed against the barrier of forgotten sky.
The Neptune groaned, wedged tight, crushed against an invisible ceiling.
“I’m sorry girl,” he said, stroking her wooden carapace. She wailed and cracked. The old nag had fallen and broken a leg. “There may still be time for it to turn out right.”
The voice struck him, not in the ears, but through his whole body, as if every inch of flesh had been made a radio and adjusted to a specific frequency.
His head span as he tried to comprehend the concepts landing in his mind. Not sentences, but a jumble of meanings all at once, like having a conversation compressed into a single violent scream.
“This has got to end,” he pleaded as he gazed into the air, seeing nothing, but sensing the world he’d once known hovering just beyond sight. His words felt stupid and basic compared to the complexity landing in his head, clumsy in his mouth. “Take us all, or come back, you can’t exist like this.”
“No,” he argued, though as he conversed his body became weak, legs wobbling beneath with the effort of keeping him aloft. “You’re sick, you’re not whole. I’m sorry I scared you, I’m sorry I hurt you, but you can’t destroy yourself just because you’re too scared to face up to the truth.”
There was silence within, the Wasp refusing to negotiate with its rogue cell. Beneath him, the Neptune gave a final juddering sigh as she died, water pouring through her wounds, rocking the corpse as it sank.
“If you want to come back, you can. You did a little before; you inched closer when I remembered... how to love. You were less afraid of me and brought back Grace’s zoo.”
“You can’t take the health from a man and leave only the rotten! You can’t judge him man based on that. Come back to us, not just a little closer as you did before, but fully. Return and go to sleep! You woke too soon!”
“Nothing is perfect. The woman I loved was not perfect. That wasn’t the problem. The problem was I couldn’t understand there is still beauty in imperfection. Plato’s forms don’t mean shit. I understand that now. I emotionally ran away and in the process became corrupted and rotten. I know what it’s like to be too scared to accept the whole, of myself as well as another, but if you don’t learn to accept, you’ll never find peace. You’ll become obsessed with my failings just as I became obsessed with hers.”
He sank to his knees, legs giving way, and cried as he confessed. “If you don’t accept me, if you don’t accept that large parts of us do feel wrong, are ugly, then you’ll be chasing a fantasy, a dream of perfection, one that can never be achieved. You’ll always remain Shattered.”
“Don’t be.”
“Then you’re just as bad as me, another fantasist fleeing reality.”
The Mariner closed his eyes, completely drained by the scale of maintaining a bond with billions of minds made one. “Please,” he whispered, his lips against the wood. “I know my mind’s disgusting, but you’ve got to overcome it, even if just for yourself. Come home or take us all.”
And with that the link was severed. The Mariner felt his whole body relax, like an electrical current turned off. Physical relief however, was overshadowed by frustration. A slither of energy remained, available now the voice of the Wasp was gone.
“You have to make a decision!” he screamed, but knew the Wasp wasn’t willing to talk any-more, though he could still feel it watching.
“Arthur!” It was McConnell, calling to him as he climbed a rope-ladder onto the deck. “Your ship’s sinking, quickly, get on mine.”
The Mariner turned his head to look at the reverend. The holy man seemed just as tired as he, deep lines crossed his face and dark pouches beneath his eyes were puffy from tears.
“I’m sorry Christopher, but we’re at the end. I thought for a while I might fix it and get a happy ending. I guess for some people that’s just not possible. For some that can never be.” He spoke wearily, and McConnell ran to his side to support his swaying body. “The Wasp must choose, and it must choose now.”
“I don’t understand.”
“It’s scared of me, scared of my sins. For a while... it considered coming back, Grace and I almost tempted it, it inched closer and so brought back the zoo, but then it changed its mind. I guess what I did to Grace made certain of that.”
“You didn’t.”
“What?”
“You didn’t kill Grace, Harris did. You must have been so drunk...”
The Mariner shook his head. “Even if I didn’t do the deed, the eels told of my lust for her. On the way to the Pope, they tempted me with her body.”
“No!” McConnell shook him vigorously. “That was meant for Harris, not you. It was his sin, not yours.”
But the Mariner couldn’t be persuaded. He walked over to the anchor, and began to attach a loose rope. “I want to believe you, but I know the truth. I called out her name. Ask Heidi.” He flinched, remembering what he’d done to the poor woman to facilitate his escape. “If you could ask her, she would agree. I spoke Grace’s name in lust and gave voice to my demons.”
Now two ropes were attached to the anchor, one connecting to the Neptune, the other loose. He took the loose one and tied it to his legs.
“What are you doing?” McConnell asked, not alarmed, he was beyond excitement, there was just an exhausted resolve within.
“I thought I could talk it around, but it’s too afraid to make the decision. So I shall make one for it.” Once tied tight, connected to the great weight, the Mariner paused. “You say I didn’t kill Grace. But surely innocence of one crime doesn’t excuse a multitude of others?”
“No,” McConnell agreed. “It doesn’t.”
“I deserve to die.”
The reverend paused, about to lie, but finally relented. “Yes, you do.” He pulled a small hip flask from his pocket, a small trinket he’d found back in his church. “One last drink?”
The Mariner looked at the container and shook his head. “No. I don’t need it. Don’t want it. I was never an alcoholic, just a man who woke up one day believing he was.” He sighed. “My mother tried to kill me when I was a boy. All these years I’ve known deep down that one day I would have to finish the job. It seems only proper I should drown, here at the end of it all.”
He sat on the edge of the boat, and looked out across the glinting ocean, much closer now the Neptune was sinking. “Heidi scared me on the gallows. She said that when we die, it doesn’t end.” He looked into McConnell’s eyes and the revered saw the Mariner trembled like a child. “I’m terrified she’s right. What if there is a hell? What if Diane was correct and we start all over, right back at the beginning? I can’t live this life again. I can’t live this life any longer.”
McConnell put his hand upon the monster’s shoulder. “I think it all just ends.”
“You think so?” The Mariner smiled hopefully as tears rolled down his cheek. McConnell returned it, happy to bring the man some spiritual solace.
“Yes,” he said, trying to sound as certain as he could be. “There’s nothing beyond this life, it’s all meaningless.”
Comforted, the Mariner took a deep breath of salty air, treating his lungs one final time.
“What happened here Arthur?” McConnell asked, trying to make sense of it all.
The Mariner turned two red rimmed eyes upon his companion. “The world woke up and looked through my eyes.”
“What did it see?”
“This.”
The Mariner turned and took in hand the rope that harnessed the anchor to the ship.
And with a swipe of a knife,
cut it.
No. Choose.
Suddenly, as the anchor plunged down into the water below, the rope tightened around his legs. It bit into his skin, an agonising yank and loud crunch as the leg broke and he was tugged by the loose limb over the edge. Wooden boards flying past, then out into open air.
I know. But you have to.
He plunged into the icy water, legs first, but a blink later it was over his head, rushing into his nose and ears, keen to fill his every being with chill suffocation. The world transformed to one of numbness, yet still he heard the Wasp in its panic.
No. If you want me, take me now. If not, then I’ll be gone and you can take the rest. Or go back to sleep. You won’t need to be afraid any-more, but you must choose.
There must be a reason.
The anchor sank, dragging the Mariner down into the depths. Five feet. Eight feet. His head began to hurt as the pressure worked on him, pressing down upon his chest and head.
Ten.
Fifteen.
I can’t come back. Only you can.
Blood began to bloom from his face, but still the Mariner kept the air clutched in his lungs. He opened his eyes, but the water around him was dark from blood. It didn’t matter, there was no more use for vision.
And suddenly like a light bulb within his head-
“Everything’s gonna be alright.”
She cradled him at the dining table, his head upon her shoulders. Between them his arm stretched out, lined with angry red remnants of the self-harm the night before.
“You should have woken me,” she chided, but with the calm administrations of love and acceptance. “You should always wake me.”
