Damocles

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DAMOCLES Chapter 4

As Chris watched the dead stumbling into the waters off Providence, he found himself almost feeling pity for the “living impaired” creatures. He didn’t have too much time to dwell on the plight of the creatures as he felt a rather sharp object, not so gently pricking the skin of his throat. With some difficulty; Chris turned his head slightly and looked down.

The skipper flanked him, holding what appeared to be a harpoon to his neck. He felt a slow lazy trickle of blood begin to meander down into his thick denim jacket. Absently he wondered how much pressure the skipper would have to exert to pierce his jugular vein. Watching the eyes of the skipper change, from bloodshot red to an almost friendly blue colour, due to the influence of sobering fresh sea air was a most unnerving sight.

Chris scrutinised the skippers gnarled, well worn face, not that he had much choice, he couldn’t move his head and he was pretty sure that if he closed his eyes he might wake up somewhere else altogether. So he studied, watched and noted the coarse, white whiskers beginning to sprout on the grizzled chin of a sailor born. He imagined that once the skipper had been just plain ugly, now with a nose pitted and swelled with the infusion of several hundred too many bottles of rum, the skipper was a sight to behold. A mixture of Ernest Borgnine and Karl Malden, the skipper would never collect $10 for finishing second in a beauty contest but he did however put the fear of God into the increasingly scared booksmith.

“If you ever fucking do anything on this ship without my express permission, I’ll fucking kill you, and feed you chunk by chunk to the fishes, capiche?” said the skipper, understandably somewhat angry.

Chris always one to listen to such germane advice; answered with as deep a voice as he could muster “whatever you say skipper”. Instantly Chris felt the pressure ease from his throat, the skipper lowering his weapon spat vociferously on the deck and said “How in the name of Poseidon’s balls did you manage to get us this close without scuttling her?”

The once and future author looked at the skipper and said “skip, I have no fucken idea”……..

The skipper looked at the dock and watched the slow dance of the corpses as more and more gathered awaiting the arrival of S.S Fresh Meat……

From the building he’d been watching at night for days he saw a face appear, anxious, nervous but full of hope and determination. The skipper turned once more to Chris and said “ get me my gun out my bunk, and for God’s sake raise that damn anchor”…..

Chris rushed through the shattered door to the stairs leading below. Taking them two at a time and leaping onto the galley area Chris found the wreckage of both the skippers drunken fumbling last night and the viscious anger he’d displayed when awaking from his drunken stupor.

Heading straight for the skippers berth, Chris entered the inner sanctum of the bucolic skipper. His mind registered photos of both military personnel and a young guy with his arm around a pretty young Asian girl. Further imported data consisted of skidmarked long johns and a dozen empty bottles of rotgut lying haphazardly across the wooden planks. While this may have been collated and stored within the recesses of his mind, all Chris could think of was the rifle lying across the skippers bed and the several full clips of ammunition lying beside it.

Gathering them into his arms and running back up the stairs; (no mean feet in choppy Atlantic waters) took more time than Chris had imagined. Whilst he hadn’t felt the reassuringly gruesome tug of seasickness since yesterday, the constant rolling of the boat made any movement a chore, running across the deck with his lethal load proved impossible.

Sprawled on the deck, a victim of a puddle of seawaters sick sense of humour, Chris felt a fool. This feeling wasn’t helped by the roaring laughter of the skipper and the catcalls of the dead coming from just a couple of dozen feet away.

The skipper looked down at the suitably embarrassed Chris and chortled “ shit boy I thought I was going to have to shoot you but your too damn funny, for a landlubber your alright”. With that backhanded compliment the skipper stooped to collect his weaponry.

Standing unsteadily, knees bruised, pride hurt, Chris watched the horrifying sight of a man with a gun going bang……

Amidst the smell of cordite and devastation Chris saw what one lone gunman was capable of, where before a dozen zombies had stood in anticipation, now stood none….

With ears ringing from the recital of lead, Chris wondered just how in the hell those corpses had won when there were men like the skipper around…….

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5


Chris muttered obscenities under his breath as he listened to the skipper issue yet another order, this time on the best way to inflate the friggin’ dinghy. Never one for D.I.Y or household chores, Chris was not only struggling to make the dinghy rise, he was also making himself look stupid in the process.

Eventually, watching with hands in pockets, face suitably flushed Chris watched the increasingly frustrated skipper throw the fully inflated dinghy attached only by a thin rope to the Damocles into the chilly waters of the Atlantic.

The skipper, moving with a speed belying his age swiftly threw a rope ladder over the side and picked up his rifle before promptly falling flat on his face, twitching wildly, his arms flailing like a jacknifed truck full of bricks.

Tears welling in his eyes and fear gripping his heart, Chris ran to the side of the grizzled sea-dog and looked down at his face whiter than the snows of Hoth, with foam bubbling at the corners of his jagged mouth. He watched as the skipper mouth silent words and saw his fumbling hands reach inside his coat…

Chris grabbed the skippers hand and found a small, round mother of pearl box within.

Upon opening the container; Chris was surprised to see hundreds of small round pellets. Still not having a clue as to how to save the skipper, he felt the skippers knotted hand reach into the box and take a pill and place it reverently underneath the nicotine stained tongue of the irascible old man.

Minutes of soul shaking, concern riddled time passed, and as it did so Chris watched the skipper slowly, agonisingly return to something approaching normality. Eventually though, even time catches up with most ardent attempts at avoidance and so the skipper slowly, gingerly sat up.

Looking less like a hardened veteran, and much more like the lonely old man that he truly was, the skipper turned to face Chris and spoke.

“Son; that was an angina attack, have you ever left that landlubbing, city dwelling cocoon of yours?”……

Chris, both embarrassed and concerned replied, “I’m…sorry skipper, I just froze”.

Smiling, his somewhat less than handsome face transformed into something approaching just homely laughingly said “ Son, don’t you ever stand behind me with a loaded gun, now get me up before I get piles off the f***ing deck”.

And so the two spectrums of life experiences climbed into the dinghy, swirling eddies lifting and caressing the would be heroes as they rose and fell, safe for now in the hands of nature’s greatest cleanser.

If only the wind had not been blowing inland, and if only the strange bedfellows had been listening harder they may have heard the sounds of a fierce battle for survival taking place less than two miles away.

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Damocles chapter 6


Being caught up in the maelstrom of the end of days had taught Chris some very valuable lessons. The most important of which was Life; it’s said that a man is only truly alive when he knows he is dying.

Well Chris was dying and it felt wonderful; every lungful of sea air that he inhaled took him closer to his grave. “It’s only a matter of time” Chris thought to himself, “one day they’ll get me but f*** it, until they do I’m alive, alive and for once able to make a difference….”.

The dinghy, finally crossing the short distance between the Damocles and the shore bumped gently against the now deserted jetty of pier 19. Chris; drawn once more to the sky above, noted with pleasure the clear blue sky and dazzling sun, completely oblivious to the carnage being wrought below it.

The skipper roped and knotted the dinghy to the wooden struts of the jetty, using skills honed from a lifetime afloat the skipper stood up, balancing against the swell and surge of the tide and clambered up the wooden ladder with an agility even a cat would be proud of.

Chris followed the skipper like a mule, sure and steady, afraid of drowning and clowning in equal measure.

Once on the piers wooden, well trodden boards Chris took in the view of a postcard sent straight from zip code 666. The lack of noise and distraction told the tale of a world in ruins...

Fires, now smouldering, sent smoke signals heralding the end of the plastic age and the replacement of Homo sapiens with Homo cadaverosus.

The skipper, punching Chris’s arm somewhat harder than necessary whispered “they’re holed up over there by the forklift truck” ….Chris didn’t need the skippers arm pointing, to work out where the refugees of the apocalypse were staying…..

As the survivors rushed out of the storage facility and began hugging and kissing the stunned rescuers, Chris couldn’t help but remember the black and white footage of the liberation of Belsen….”surely we haven’t fallen this far again?” thought Chris his soul seared from searching for an unimaginable answer.

Several minutes had passed; gentle backslapping and vigorous handshaking over, the throng fell back and Chris found himself facing an elderly man in a tweed jacket, unlit pipe hanging rakishly from his mouth.

“Yardley, Herbert Yardley, damned glad to meet you” stated the high browed, intellectually appearing man in front of Chris. The one time writer replied “I’m Chris, this is the skipper” as he hooked a thumb towards the well creased captain.

Herbert coughed and said “nice to meet you but perhaps it might be wise to leave, before our flesh fixated friends realise there’s a bunch of ready meals on offer?”

The skipper turned and said “ fine then boss man, sort it out, women and children first”, with that the skipper pulled his rifle off his back and deftly removed the frontal lobe of an approaching corpse.

Herbert swiftly began separating the survivors and moments later five woman and two children were moving with all speed towards the dinghy. Chris could see that approaching from the far side of the harbour were a couple of dozen walking dead, flesh in their sights and teeth bared, the corpses ambled ever on towards their blackened hearts desire.

Loosing off volley after volley of high velocity fire, the skipper ended the miserable existence of several of the dead but the rest continued to move forward, now only fifty feet away.

Chris watched a panicked man run back into the former “safe house” and slammed the doors shut. The sound of bolts slamming home was a potential death sentence for the frightened crowd awaiting rescue.

Turning to Chris the skipper snarled and shouted “ get the f*** out of here Chris before I shoot you myself”, his face was set like stone but his eyes were twinkling like diamonds, full of pride and friendship.

Chris nodded and ran to the ladder and descended, he looked around one last time to see the men folk running in all directions trying to evade the ghouls, now only a heartbeat away.

Only the skipper and Herbert stood firm, their advanced age a major factor in their bravery.

The dinghy was full of tears, whimpers and excess weight, Chris undid the rope and pushed away from the pier with an oar and a curse.

Arms heavy and muscles strained, Chris reached the Damocles guilt his companion and regret his new best friend. Fighting back tears Chris lashed the dinghy and spent the longest time helping the survivors of pier 19 aboard the Damocles.

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Damocles chapter 7


Never looking back and refusing to dwell on might have been, Chris clumsily lowered the sails and prepared to leave Providence and the rightful captain behind. The wind had picked up; and already a strong south westerly breeze was breathing life into the silken wings adorning the Damocles strong oaken masts.

Moans and wails pierced the air, suffusing it with dread and malaise, their arms raised hopelessly, dry mouths barking guttural sounds, and the survivors of pier 19 were already starting to piss Chris off. The women and children were anything but pleased.

“Why can’t we go back?”…

“There isn’t a ladies bathroom…..”

“We can’t survive on rum……..”

“Aren’t you going to leave now?.........”

“WILL YOU SHUT THE f*** UP” replied Chris with venom and grief overriding his normally checked self control,

“MY FRIEND DIED BACK THERE, AND ALL YOU GIVE A f*** ABOUT IS A LADIES PISSPOT?........f*** OFF AND SWIM FOR SHORE IF YOU DON’T LIKE IT”

.”f***en landlubbers” Chris whispered under his breath, never realising just how much he sounded like the skipper at the moment in time.

Running up and across the deck, swells no longer bothering him, Chris readied the ship for the open sea; he guessed he’d head for Block Island and drop the screamers of there. With a derision born of apathy Chris spat a large wad of phlegm onto the decking at his feet. Just then a child screamed.

Racing across to the stern of the Damocles; Chris was confronted by the hysterical blubbering of a half dozen wretched civilians. Chris followed the pointing fingers and globular eyes down to the side of the Damocles.

Then Chris laughed; the laugh of a prisoner reprieved, a loved one reunited or even that of a man, hope renewed and faith restored.

Splashing in the water, saturated and soaked swam both the skipper and Herbert, alive and well, pride bruised but their capacity for cuss words intact, in fact if anything improved…

“Get me the f*** out of this water, you Lilly livered snotrag”, sang the skipper his dulcet tones ringing threw the air, beautiful in its own unique way.

“I say old chap, would you kindly throw down a rope please, I’m somewhat wet here”, replied the educated, understated voice of Herbert…

Just minutes later, the two bedraggled old men sat, with blankets wrapped around shoulders, stained perhaps but warm definitely, the portable heater in the skipper’s cabin providing comfort and warmth. Sipping rum laced with coffee the two silently thanked God for saving them and Chris for not leaving them.

And at the wheel of the Damocles, the new captain of the ship sailed out of Providence, towards the island and safety.

THE END



All work copyright David Heeley April 20th 2004-07-12

[Egekrusher]

Good story man. Very well written (though it could use some grammatical correction).