Ade Grant - The Mariner

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.

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.

Like the stars, the sky was leaving, the concept forgotten. In its place was fakery, a firm barrier that could not be breached.

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.”