The Mariner (43 page)

40
THE WASP AWAKENS

“T
HERE IS NO TRUTH.
O
NLY
the Wasp.” The Pope spoke with mocking certainty that both enraged and terrified the Mariner in equal measure, rooting him amongst the flagellating congregation, unable to move.

“Where is the Wasp?”

“First I must return what I took.”

“I don’t remember you.” The Pope looked at him as if he were mad, stupid or both. “You know who I am?”

“Of course. I know a great deal of you.”

The Mariner grabbed the Pope by his robes, but immediately let go. The man seemed to radiate a strange energy that made the Mariner’s muscles spasm when in close proximity. “Who am I? You have to tell me that. I thought I was Arthur Philip, but that’s not true is it? He’s the good one. I’m Traill. Donald Traill.”

The Pope laughed and then seized the Mariner’s arm. The twitching and trembling returned and he felt himself becoming lost in those strange eyes.

“I’ll show you. It’s a simple process, much like a penguin regurgitating a fish. They’re partly digested, but still good to eat. Feast chickling. Feast little monkey. Have your bile back.”

His heart gathered pace, blood rushing through the Mariner’s body as he was held in place, staring into the Pope’s eyes. He could feel it coursing through his veins like race-cars around a track. His head throbbed as if it were about to burst, and suddenly a host of thoughts and feelings popped into his head. Somewhere outside he could still hear the Pope’s voice, but his concern was the images burning into his consciousness.

“Feast now....”

He tumbled. And as he fell, a segment of his life came flooding back.

Port Jackson, 3rd August 1790

Governor Arthur Philip was roused from troubled sleep by a panic stricken Wandsworth. Hairs aloft in huge cow-licks, his tired assistant shook Philip’s shoulders and babbled incoherently, panic and exhaustion making nonsense of his alarm.

“What is it? Damn you! What is it?” Philip snapped, scrambling to put his spectacles on.

“It’s the Neptune sir, she’s back!”

The Neptune? He’d sent the ship away a month ago, along with her tragic cargo, and been glad to see her gone! But now she was back? That bastard Traill should be well on the way to England by now, what was he doing here?

“Have they sent anyone to shore?”

“No, Sir,” Wandsworth blurted, eyes blinking. “But she is flying distressed colours.”

“So they’ve come afoul of their own misdeeds and returned to seek our aid, have they? A strange choice, this is the last place I’d seek refuge.” Philip swung out of bed, rubbing the night from his face whilst Wandsworth gathered his clothes. “Let’s go deal with them. I won’t have that man step one foot on land. If his crew are in peril, they can join our ranks and be charged for their abuses, but if Traill is to remain immune, then to hell with him.”

The two dashed through the small encampment, making their way towards the dock. Wandsworth led a path, holding a lantern before him, drawing a cloud of insects as an escort. Small creatures scuttled in the shadows, avoiding the footfalls of the clumsy men.

Ahead, Philip could make out the outline of the Neptune against the grey moon-lit ocean. The deck was dark, no lights to be seen. For a moment he imagined all the crew dead, killed by plague from the rotting corpses he’d refused to unload, but then dismissed the idea as absurd. There was no way the ship could have returned without a crew. Ships couldn’t sail themselves, could they?

Upon the dock was a small number of men who were, as instructed by Wandsworth, preparing a row-boat to approach the ship. They stood to attention as the governor arrived.

“Listen here,” he said, ignoring formalities. “Find out what the nature of their distress is, but impress upon them they do not have permission to dock. If Traill thinks he can blight my horizon without a bloody decent explanation, he’s profoundly mistaken.”

As the men readied themselves, he continued. “Keep your weapons handy. I don’t like the stench of this. Not one bit.”

Slowly, the row-boat began the long journey away from the shore, out to the Neptune. Soon the crew were cloaked by the night air and all Philip could make out was the small lantern bobbing with the waves.

“Should I awaken the camp, Sir?” Wandsworth seemed to have gathered his wits now that someone else was in charge.

“No, not yet. I don’t want to start a panic. Those that survived their last experience of Traill are apt to go quite mad at the thought he’s returned to finish the job. No, let’s find out what he wants first.”

So they waited in the dark for the row-boat to return, Wandsworth fidgeting nervously, whilst Philip kept his eyes unwavering upon the alien vessel.

“Governor Philip I presume?” The voice called to them from the pitch-black surf.

“Who goes there?” Wandsworth cried, jumping in front of his master with earnest concern. With the reply came the sight of a man, standing waist deep in the ocean, not far from the shore.

“My name is Donald Traill.”

“What are you doing here, Traill?” Philip asked cautiously. “I told you not to return. I made that clear to you and your crew.”

“The crew are dead.”

And in the dim moonlight, Philip knew the man spoke the truth. It was as he’d feared.

“Plague?”

“The corpses did ‘em in, that’s for sure, but not by disease. I watched each one get taken. There’s just me and the ship left now.”

“And yet my word still stands. You’re not welcome.”

“I’m not on the shore,” Traill replied with a dark chuckle. “I’m ten feet from it.”

“Go back to your ship,” Philip commanded, his voice trembling ever so slightly. Traill was mad, he could sense that, but there was something else. Something worse. Some intrinsic evil, deep down in the man’s soul. Some men were good, some were bad. It was in their eyes. It was even in their smell.

But Traill would not acquiesce. He’d come to say his piece, and say it he would.

“That ship is cursed, and it is your doing, just as it is mine, Arthur Philip. You sent it out there with a hundred corpses, you allowed those spirits to remain. Well now the Neptune is full of ghosts.. and I am one of them!”

“What a load of bollocks.”

[The Mariner] closed the book he’d been reading with a disappointed sigh. The story had ridiculously spiralled into mediocrity, ruining what little promise it had shown. He turned it over in his hands to once again review the blurb. ‘The Neptune’s Curse’, a splatter-punk tale of gore and horror. He had purchased it under the promise that it was based on fact. As it turned out, the facts were thin on the ground, as were the prose. Whatever actual events had inspired the pulp tale, that was their only role: inspiration. And trashy inspiration at that.

A door opened from a small office beyond the even smaller waiting room. “Would you like to come through?” The doctor smiled warmly, looking expectant. [The Mariner] had been to several therapists and counsellors over the years, and although each had done their best to appear kind and understanding they usually proved to be useless in the end.

He stood, somewhat awkwardly, and followed, holding the trashy horror novel in his hands. As he closed the door the therapist apologised for the wait. “I’m pleased to meet you, I think I can help.”

“Thank you doctor,” he replied, absent-mindedly stroking his arm and wincing at the dull throb. “I appreciate you finding an appointment for me so quickly.”

“Don’t be silly, it’s no problem at all. And please, call me Edgar.”

[The Mariner] sat in a large comfortable armchair and looked out the window. The therapist’s office was high up, almost at the top of the multi-story building split between many private offices, and through the grimy glass he could see the skyline of London, in all its equally grimy glory.

The therapist had what [The Mariner] assumed to be his file in his lap, and he quickly flicked through making the occasional grunt. Finally he looked up, and smiled.

“I see you’ve tried medication, CBT, traditional counselling and psychoanalysis.”

“Yes,” [The Mariner] nodded, his hands folded neatly over the book. The therapist looked down at it.

“Any good?”

“The book or the therapies?”

Edgar grinned. “The book.”

“It’s ok. Started well, got a bit silly as it went on.”

“What’s it about?”

[The Mariner] had seen this approach many times. A new counsellor or therapist tries to engage on a seemingly benign topic to assess the patient’s social skills. All very standard.

“It’s roughly based upon a ship that transported convicts to Australia in the 18th century. A lot of them died on the way.”

“A true story then?”

“Not really. The author has fictionalised a couple of characters, a sadistic captain and a noble governor. There’s a supernatural element that’s pretty juvenile, lets the narrative down. I hate it when authors throw in weird shit for no reason.”

“So no good then?”

“Naa.”

Edgar stared intently. “When you read a story like that, who do you associate with?”

“I’m sorry?”

“Whose shoes do you place yourself in?”

“In this story? Neither.”

“Oh?”

“Traill appears to be evil through and through. I don’t think anyone’s like that. But Philip is just as unbelievable; I’ve read over a hundred pages and he hasn’t done anything other than act selflessly.” He shrugged. “That’s bullshit.”

“So no-one then?”

“Sounds strange, but if I had to identify with something from the story, it’d be the ship.”

“‘The ship’?”

““There’s this cursed ship called the Neptune that carries the convicts. Later it is doomed to sail for eternity, haunted by their souls.”

“Sounds pretty kooky. You think that’s more realistic than goodies and baddies?”

“Yeah, because the ship hasn’t done anything wrong. It was just in the wrong place at the wrong time. But now it’s damned. There’s only one thing left for that ship to do, and that’s sink.”

“Is that how you feel? Nothing left to do but sink?”

[The Mariner] looked out the window to the vast crowds below, pushing to and fro in the busy streets, and wondered if he had the energy to explain it all over again. Could voicing his corrupted mind, his stinking foetid brain, really bring any change other than further shame?

He wanted to leave and ignore the malfunctions inside his head, but he’d promised to try, he’d
promised
. So instead he took a deep breath, and allowed it all to come spilling out.

[The Mariner] lay in bed, awake despite the early hours. Not the early hours of horror films, usually around the one-thirty mark, but the
genuine
early hours. The sort that make you wince and want to poke out your eyes at a glimpse of the clock. Hours beyond three and before six. Those are
true
witching hours, the horrifying ones that bring despair to the insomniac.

His wife lay beside him, breathing gently. She moved slightly in her slumber and murmured. A stranger might take this as a sign of waking, but he’d been married to her for years and spouses learn their partner’s sleeping patterns better than their own. She was in deep, as far into the Land of Nod as he was out of it. Tonight, for him, that land was off-limits. He was barred.

[The Mariner] stared at the ceiling whilst idly fidgeting with his cock, trying to lure his mind into erotic fantasy, rather than dwelling upon concerns. But he failed. The pecker failed to peck. Concerns won the night.

Work was one of them. Not far off, the hours would slide by with the resistance of oil. Soon he’d be presented with what he regarded the ‘early morning apocalypse’, when no matter what the day promised, he would wake consumed by a terror of it. Only in films did people open they eyes, yawn and greet the morn with a smile upon their face. Real people kept theirs tightly shut, hoping and praying and pleading against the mechanical protests of their alarm clock. A miniature CIA agent, employing torture of the most persistent kind. There must be some mistake. There had to be. Could life truly be this dreadful?

The morning mourning would pass (given enough coffee), but the depression would not relent. It would look over every thought that passed through his mind like a conveyor belt before a quality inspector, twisting and morphing. A tabloid stance on every topic. Always the worst. Always the darkest.

Crippling. Even now, in the dead of night when there was no social interaction to be had, his chest hurt from the tightness of a panic attack. Day in and day out he felt as if he were on top of a roller-coaster about to plunge from an enormous height. Except that moment never came. He was left with the expectant feeling and never the release. It made him want to scream, but of course he never did.

Well... almost never.

Sometimes, on nights like this, he stuffed a towel into his mouth so sound couldn’t escape and howled. For a second, as he expelled every cubit of air in his lungs till they shook, he’d believe the pain had escaped, that perhaps he’d birthed the horrible monster inside him, but it was all a cruel trick. It was still there, deep down. It always was.

His psychotherapist had suggested that all the problems stemmed back to childhood. Apparently all the problematic behaviour could be traced to those early days. Not a difficult child, but perhaps one a tad too quiet, too withdrawn, too needy for approval. And perhaps that had been caused by the incident with the pillow?

Well, whatever the cause, be it parental influence, chemical imbalance, or just a sharp knock to the head, what’s done was done. He was stuck with a mind that viewed the world through a tint.

3:47

Time steadily progressed and still sleep eluded him. Once again he tried to fantasise in the hope that an orgasm would release enough endorphins to end this rut. Like any man, he conjured images pornographic in style, lacking setting or plot. Simple, functional and explicit. Fantastically pliable and sluttish women entertained, dragging his mind away from the cycle of anxiety and into lust.

And then, just as things were looking up, an image he spent his waking life trying to avoid popped in. Her, his wife, with
him
. That arsehole who’d managed to plague his insecurities ever since he’d blundered into their lives five years ago. Martin Marling, his wife’s temporary darling. And the man he wanted to kill.