Home From the Sea

by William Meikle

  "Row you buggers," Muir shouted. "Row like your lives depended on it."

  The crew took to the oars. The other boat got the message, and they too began to row, but the short delay cost them dear. A thicker patch of fog fell on the rear end of their boat even as they turned and began to move away. I closed my eyes, unwilling to see what was impossible to prevent. Seconds later the screaming started, but it was mercifully short. When I opened my eyes there was nothing to see but debris in the water. . . and a tendril of fog, almost luminescent, stretching ever closer to our own lifeboat.

  The rowers could see it all too clearly. Our doom was coming straight for us. Beyond that, the ship was sinking fast, the prow raised high in the air, the fog curling and writhing, buckling the hull and tearing the vessel apart even as it went under hissing and groaning like a dying beast.

  "Row," Muir shouted. The men put their backs into it, but the fog crept ever closer. Muir came and pulled me aside so he could be the one standing at the stern.

  "If it wants anyone else, let it take me," he said.

  The sinking ship gave out one last creaking wail, then with a hiss of steam it went under. The fog swirled and fomented above the spot. The tendrils retracted, falling back into a globular cloud that descended and sank with the ship, a last glimpse of luminescence showing in the night for several seconds before descending into the depths, until it was finally too dim to see.

  We drifted in a clear, calm bay under a blanket of cold night stars.

  *

  Later, much later, there were recriminations and inquiries, funerals and wakes. But the one thing I will forever remember, the thing that still wakes me in a cold sweat, was the conversation between Muir and Squires even as the lifeboat was rowed into the small harbor in Dunfield.

  "I've failed," Muir said. "I got all those men killed."

  Squires looked pensive.

  "I'm not sure the brass will see it that way, old chap," he said, patting Muir on the back. "You didn't give us a means of defending our ships, that's true." He paused, and looked back out to sea, as if trying to mark the spot in his mind where the ship went down. "But it seems to me that you've developed a mighty efficient weapon."

  Home From the Sea

  "The Irishman's in trouble."

  It was no night to be out on the water, but it was an unwritten law in Trinity. If one of us is in trouble, we all are. I drank down the shot of rum I had but left the ale where it sat. The sea was going to be rough enough as it was without having sour beer rolling in my guts as well. I was in a crowd of about a score that headed out to the dock to peer through the wind and spray.

  "How far out?" someone asked.

  "Just past the narrows. Floundering bad and holed on the port side," came the answer. "We'll need four boats at least."

  The long rowboats normally took eight men each, but we had to leave room for bringing the Irishman and his crew back with us if need be. We set out, five boats with four of us in each, rowing hard into a headwind and swell that threatened to send us near as far back as forward with every stroke.

  It wasn't the first time I'd been out in such conditions, but it was a first attempt to rescue a big whaler such as The Dubliner. I knew they'd been out for three weeks, and guessed they might even have a catch aboard. Their weight, the weather, and the sheer number of crew we were going to have to shift were large in my mind as I heaved on my oar, trying to ignore the increasing pain and tiredness that I knew was only the start of the evening's trials.

  By the time we reached the narrowsthe outlet from the relative calm of the harbor into the rougher seas of the larger bay beyond we were all near spent, and matters weren't helped much when the first boat out got caught in heavy swell and tipped over. They were too far away for us to help, but I saw clear enough that all four men made it to higher ground ashore, although their boat was smashed into so much kindling against the rocks below them.

  The men clambered up to the point and waved that they were safe. I knew they were soaked to the skin, and had a long wet walk ahead of them to get back to the warmth of a tavern. But I couldn't waste time worrying on their part, as we too had to fight the rising swell and a crosswind that threatened to send us to the same fate.

  I was so busy concentrating on keeping us upright and moving forward that I was nearly thrown from my seat as the prow hit something, hard. I turned to yell an oath at Roberts at the bow. . . and looked up to see the massive bulk of The Dubliner loom over us.

  *

  I helped Roberts and Gallagher tie us up, and we got the other three boats alongside so that we were all arranged in a line along the whaler's keel on the starboard side, protected from the wind. It was around then I started to worry. I would have expected someone topside to have at least acknowledged our presence. Instead all we could hear was the whistling wind and the crash of waves.

  "Ahoy aboard," Roberts called out. He had a bellow like a foghorn and if there were anyone aboard they'd surely hear him. But we got no answer. I saw the same fear in Gallagher's eyes that I felt. Nothing good had happened here. And I wasn't at all sure that any good was going to come of us investigating further.

  But as I said already; if one is in trouble, we all are. When Roberts started to clamber out the rowboat to head up onto The Dubliner, I was second in line behind him, with Gallagher at my heels.

  As I climbed I steeled myself for the sights to come; I'd seen plenty of dead men smashed to no more than broken puppets by storms, and I expected that more of the same awaited us on deck.

  I climbed over the gunwales and stood beside Roberts. The deck lay empty save for the large whale carcass on the platform at the stern. My fears of finding corpses were allayed, for the moment, but I had a sinking feeling in my gut as I realized we were going to have to search the vessel.

  The deck lurched beneath us as the boat was caught in a larger swell, and for a second I thought we were going to be tumbled back over the side, but the keel righted itself; this time.

  As the boat steadied, more men came up out of the rowboats. Roberts waited until there were more than a dozen of us on deck, then organized the search. I went with Gallagher and Roberts himself. We headed for the crew quarters, while others went to search the engine room, the mess and the cargo holds. Four men were put to work trying to get the vessel moving again, the plan being to get her at least through the narrows to quieter waters in the sheltered bay inside.

  The first thing that struck me as we went below was the quiet. The big steam engine wasn't running and there was no one at the wheel as we passed. And as we went down, the silence seemed to fall on us like a blanket. Several oil lamps hung overhead at irregular intervals, and they provided a modicum of light, but as they swung in the swell they cast bands of dark shadows along our way, shadows that seemed to cavort and caper, leading us deeper into what I feared would be our own doom.

  I'm not afraid to admit that my legs felt like jelly, and every fiber of me just wanted to flee, back to the tavern and the welcoming arms of as much rum as I could get inside of me. But for the presence of Foster and Gallagher, I might even have allowed myself to succumb to the terror. But my fear of ridicule was stronger still, and I followed Roberts as we went deeper into the boat.

  The Captain, Irish Frank, wasn't in his cabin. It was empty save for a bottle of rum on the sideboard that shouted at me even as we turned away to the corridor. When we looked in to the next cabin I wished I had listened.

  We had found our first corpse.

  At first I was not entirely sure what I was seeing. It looked like someone had left a pile of clothing on the floor. Then I saw the blood, a slimy trail of it that led in a six-inch wide strip away from the clothing, across the floor. . . and then up the wall to where it stopped at the open porthole. As I bent for a closer look, it became all too obvious that what was left of a man was still inside the clothing, but it was little more than a sack of skin and bones, as if all the wet parts had been somehow sucked out of him. I heard Gallagh
er gag and spew, but I couldn't take my eyes off the sight. I had no idea what could do this to a man; I only knew that I did not want to meet the culprit any time soon.

  "I know that jacket," Roberts said softly. "It's Edward Malone."

  I forced myself to take another look. Roberts was right. It was Ted, or rather what was left of him. A fierce drinker, a born seaman. . . and a man who would fight you as quick as look at you. Anything that could reduce so ferocious a sailor to a pile of rags and leave no sign of a struggle wasn't anything I wanted to meet. I started to back away when Gallagher shouted from out in the corridor.

  "There's another one here."

  Now that we knew what to look for, we found more remains at every turn. And in each case we found no indication as to the cause of the deaths, only more bloody trails, most of which led from the bodies to outside of the vessel by the most direct route available.

  "What the hell happened here?" Gallagher whispered.

  Neither Roberts nor I had an answer for him, but we wouldn't have had time in any case. The silence was broken by a scream from above; a yell of pain and suffering that tore at my heart to hear it.

  We headed topside at a run.

  *

  We arrived on deck to a scene of bloody chaos. Men ran and screamed, blood flew, the wind howled and the vessel bucked and rolled beneath us. And all around, beasts slithered, too fast for the eye to follow, only being still where they had affixed themselves to some poor sailor. On first sight I took them for octopus or squid, for they had bunches of sucker-laden tentacles that they used to cling to their prey. These tentacles were attached to a head the size of a man's clenched fist.

  But no squid ever had a face like these. The eyes were the worst, black pits that seemed to go all the way down to hell. The pits sat above a mouth of sorts, an elongated tube of muscular tissue that pierced the victim's bodies and started to feed. The moist sucking noises reached us even above the howling of the wind, and I do believe that sound was the most terrible aspect of the whole scene.

  The beasts seemed to be everywhere, swarming across the deck in fast, fluid motion. Six men had already fallen, and three more feebly tried to keep the ravenous beasts away from them with little success. Gallagher reacted first of us; he jumped at the nearest beast and tried to drag it off its victim. All he succeeded in doing was tear a fist sized lump of flesh away from the poor man's chest. The creature writhed and squirmed in Gallagher's hands, tentacles quickly circling his wrists and starting to squeeze.

  "Get the bastard thing off me," he shouted.

  Roberts obliged him, but was more circumspect in his approach. He stepped quickly down below deck and came back with an oil lamp.

  "Turn your head man," he said to Gallagher then, without waiting for a complaint, spilled hot oil on the beast's face. The black eyes popped, flesh sloughed away and it fell to the deck. Gallagher stomped on it until it was little more than jelly, just to make sure.

  Another manI'm fairly certain in was McGuinness the stoker ran past us with one of the things clamped on his face. He went over the side without a sound and fell away. I ran to the rail to look over.

  The sea below seethed, filled with the squirming, writhing tentacles of the beasts. I saw that three men had made a bolt for a rowboat, but they were caught and even now were little more than cold meat; food for scores of the creatures that massed around the corpses, tentacles waving as if excited by the kill.

  Almost as if the beasts knew I was watching, half a dozen heads turned, black eyes staring up at me. A high wail, like a gull in the wind, came from six mouth parts, then as one they moved, scrambling up the hull, coming straight for me.

  If The Dubliner had not lurched in a swell at that precise moment, I believe I would have been taken, for I was so transfixed at the sight of the creatures that I could not move from the spot. But when the deck tilted, Roberts too saw what was coming, and dragged me aside.

  "To the stern, man," he shouted. "And pray the lifeboat is there."

  We ran, even as the things clambered up over the gunwales and came after us.

  Someone fell behind me, but I didn't even stop to look. Gallagher, Roberts and I were the only men still standing by the time we reached the stern. The sight that met us there made me fear that I was not going to outlive my old mates by very long.

  A Sperm whale lay on the platform the whaler's last catch. And it was now obvious that the dead whale was also the source of the infection. Its belly was vastly swollen and distended. I would have blamed a build up of gases after its death, if I could not see the gaping hole in the blubber, and the writhing, seething nest of tentacled beasts all fighting to escape from within. It seemed the whale was little more than a carcass; a carcass filled to bursting point.

  It was equally obvious that our path to the stern lifeboatif there even was a rowboat still there was blocked by a slithering mass of the things.

  "We can get to it from below, come up from under," Roberts said.

  The thought of being trapped below decks with the creatures had me once again filled with dread, but I knew that Roberts was right. It might indeed be our only chance of escape. But first, we had to find a safe place to get below, and that in itself was no easy matter.

  The things were everywhere; they clambered over the bodies of our fallen mates, sucking and feeding in a most disgusting manner. The sounds and sights assaulted my ears and eyes such that I knew they would be repeated nightly in my dreams for evermore, even if I should survive this ordeal. The vessel rocked alarmingly beneath us, reminding us, as if we needed reminding, of the need for haste.

  "We need to get off this boat," Gallagher shouted. Neither Roberts nor I disagreed with him. But the beasts blocked our way in every direction, and some were even now beginning to close. I was considering a dive overboard; swim for it and hope for the best, when Roberts started to kick and stomp at any beast in range. They burst with moist squelches and lay still.

  "The heads are their weak spot. We can make it," he said, pointing to his left at the hatch to below decks. "Just keep kicking."

  We didn't need to be told twice. The three of us moved quickly across the deck in a series of stomping and dancing steps, leaving a trail of slime and mucus behind us. One of the beasts wrapped three tentacles around my ankle and squeezed, sending a flare of hot pain up the length of my leg. I brought my heel down hard and the head popped; the tentacles fell limply away. I dived through the hatch after Roberts.

  Gallagher was just behind and even as Roberts and I turned to pull the hatch closed he fell through, screaming; one of the beasts had attached itself to his neck. The greedy mouth bored into the soft tissue between his neck and shoulder, and Gallagher's screams got louder.

  But to the man's credit, he wasn't ready to lay down and die just yet. He yanked the thing away from him, tearing out a chunk of meat and skin of his own in the process, and threw it away. It hit the wall, fell to the floor with a wet thud, then started scurrying back towards us. Roberts stepped forward and brought his boot down on its head, twice, until finally it lay still.

  We stood there, wide eyed, staring at each other as we tried to remember to breathe. There was a single scream from above, quickly lost in the wind, then we heard the scurrying and slithering of the beasts moving overhead.

  Suddenly all was silent save for the creaking of the old boat and the distant roar of the storm.

  *

  At some point in the melee I had quite lost my bearings. I thought we had descended to the area immediately above the engine room, but we were once again in the corridor that led to the crew quarters. And if the layout of the whaler was as I remembered it, there was no easy way to get to our objective in the stern from here.

  "Our situation has hardly improved for the better," Gallagher said quietly. He bled heavily from the wound in his shoulder, but waved me away when I tried to help. "I'll have time for doctoring later, if we make it."

  I looked to Roberts for guidance. He had b
ent to study the remains of the thing at our feet.

  "What the hell are these things?" Gallagher asked. "I ain't never seen the like afore."

  "Ain't never heard of the like either," Roberts replied, standing and wiping slime and mucus on his trousers. "It's some kind of squid, I think, but I'm buggered if I know anything more than that. Besides, what they are isn't important. We need to get to the stern, and fast. This boat is going into the rocks at any minute, and when that happens we're all dead anyway."

  I wasn't too keen on being reminded of that fact; I was still feeling happy at just having got below and away from the creatures. I looked down the corridor at the path we would have to take. Even with the presence of oil lamps at intervals, it was too dark to see more than ten yards or so, but my imagination filled in the blanks only too well. I started in that direction, but Roberts had other ideas.

  "We could go further down," he said. "The most direct route is through the main hold."

  "But we have no idea what might be down there," Gallagher said.

  "It can't be any worse that what's above us," Roberts replied. He lifted one of the few functioning oil lamps from its hook on the wall. "And the sooner its done, the quicker we can get off this death trap."

  I followed him as he led us to the steps that led down into more darkness, hoping against hope that his last statement was close to the truth.

  *

  We found Irish Frank at the foot of the steps.

  The creatures had got him but not before he'd taken many of them with him. Charred remains lay strewn in a wide circle around the Captain's body. A hole in his chest showed where he had finally succumbed. It hadn't been that long ago either, for the firebrand in his hand was still warm.

  "He had the right idea," Roberts said, lifting the brand and getting it lit from the flame in the oil lamp. "We should have thought of it ourselves. See if you can find more of these. We might need them."