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MASON GOT UP, WENT into the dining room and came back with a chair, which he set down just out of arm’s reach. I was fastened to the bench by a pair of handcuffs and I had no idea how it had happened, except that it was typical of the sort of sordid tragedy I’d always associated with drugs.
“Comfortable?” he said.
“What’s going on?”
“Don’t worry. The key’s somewhere near to hand. I’ve put it where you can find it ... after a seemly interval. Meanwhile, I’ve turned the ship slightly so you can get a closer look at our pursuers, see what we’re up against.”
He handed me the binoculars. We were on the starboard side of the Aurora. The C&B boat had moved a long way forward since last night and was almost in front of us, obviously taking up position to pull alongside. I wasn’t interested in the binoculars, though. You’re concerned to get ‘a closer look’ when you’re conducting a field-study, not when your life’s under threat.
Nevertheless, I couldn’t help seeing the obvious. I’d assumed that the boat’s blackness was down to the fact that, whenever I’d seen it before, it was always framed by the sky. But now the sun was shining full on it. And it was still black. I had no notion of what sort of optical illusion might produce such an effect, but I’d long since lost the faculty of being surprised by the world around me.
“What’s the point of me looking?” I said bitterly. “I’m going to meet them face to face in a few minutes.”
“I know it seems that way, but you’re wrong.”
I scoffed. “Oh, really.”
“I haven’t fastened you so I can extradite you. You’re there for your own safety. The key’s close by. You’ll find it after I’ve gone, if you look hard enough. The fact is, I’m going to disable our friends’ ship. I’m going to use their own weapons against them.”
“I don’t know what you mean. And I don’t see why it means you’ve got to handcuff me to a bench.”
“Can you see any reason why I might lie?” he asked.
I couldn’t. He had me in his power in two senses now.
“You may remember Mr Russell Bittacy,” he went on. “Bittacy worked undercover for C&B. He had orders that if they needed the Aurora stopping at a moment’s notice, it was to be by any means necessary. He had explosives to scupper the engines, but I took them off him.”
“And – what? You’re going to use them to blow up their ship?”
“I’m not a murderer. I’ve told you, I’m going to take out their engines, that’s all.”
“But how, unless you go aboard?”
“I’ve already signalled my request. I am the captain of the Aurora, after all. I alone have formal authority to hand it over and they’re sticklers for formalities. Looking back, I think it’s why I got on so well with them. I’ll leave you here and slip the bomb into their ventilation intake.”
“Couldn’t you use some help?”
“The point is to save your life. We haven’t succeeded in reaching the Trench, and anyway, maybe heading there wasn’t the terrific idea we both thought it was. But you’ll remember I was present when you told Ashanta you’d find a doctor to help you. That’s never going to happen if C&B get their hands on you.”
“Why are you doing this?”
For the first time, he looked reticent. “I was ready to transform. What stopped me was I just wasn’t ... in the right condition. I’ve been selfish. I know it sounds childish but I need to do something selfless to cancel it out.”
“You – you still nurture hopes?”
“I can’t bear the feeling of having been weighed in the balance and found wanting. I’d rather be dead.”
“Do you think that’s what’s going to happen?”
“I expect them to kill me,” he said distantly, “yes.” He went into his inside pocket and took out a small book. Ashanta’s prayer book. “You recognise this?”
“Of course.”
“I’m only going to take it with your permission.”
“I thought you didn’t believe in God. Sorry, I know we’ve been through this - ”
“I like the words, that’s all.”
I considered for a moment, but it wasn’t difficult. “Take it.”
“I’ve set the transmitter to send out a repeated SOS once I’ve gone. I have absolute faith in you to retrieve the key to those cuffs, so don’t worry on that score. In about forty-eight hours, you’ll start drifting, then your fate’s in the lap of the gods. Best of luck.”
“We should do this together. At least let me give you covering fire.”
He reached into his coat pocket, took out the revolver I thought had disappeared and set it on the bench before me. “I’m counting on it. It’s why I cuffed your left hand to the bench instead of your right.”
I picked the gun up. “And what if I was to use it to shoot through the chain?”
He smiled humourlessly. “I don’t even think that’s the sort of thing that works in films. The best that’ll happen is you’ll be seriously injured by the ricochet. Please don’t.”
I sighed.
“I’m leaving you the binoculars and an axe,” he said. “I hope you won’t need the latter. I’m going to tell them it’s safe to come alongside now. Goodbye.”
He picked up a lantern and strode over to the railing. For a long time he simply stood there with his back to me. I guessed he was signalling to C&B that it was okay to draw alongside because they gradually approached. He picked up an axe and put it through his belt at the back then pulled his coat down to conceal it.
Suddenly, I felt afraid. The ship’s blackness didn’t diminish, rather the opposite. It was as if I was looking into a black hole, someplace light goes to die. I grabbed the binoculars to see if they might help and, God help me, I almost dropped them. It was only a fervid desire to reconfirm the evidence of my senses that prevented me.
The C&B ship wasn’t crewed by anything that looked like anything I’d ever seen. I sighted two of them, but I sensed hundreds in the background. They had more than two legs. They walked upright with a lolloping gait and seemed to grope their way along with lengthy snake-like feelers. They were about my size.
In a flash, I saw what must have happened. The C&B ship had suffered a catastrophe identical to ours. But instead of bright fish, its crew had been assimilated by some form of darkness. No wonder they were so eager to learn about us.
I didn’t feel any pity for them. Don’t ask me how, but I knew they’d stop at nothing to get what they wanted. I saw my body in one of its futures, the subject of every hideous probe imaginable. I put the binoculars down and picked up the gun. It suddenly struck me with a tumbling feeling they might even be impervious to bullets.
Their ship was almost alongside now. A deep shadow fell across the Aurora. Two or three hawsers with grappling hooks landed on the deck and attached themselves to the shelf beneath the railings. Mason put down his lantern and got ready to board. I could feel his terror.
Suddenly, I saw him land on the other side. The darkness was almost impenetrable now, but I saw two of the creatures – little more than dark shapes – converge on him. Then he broke away from them at a sprint. Either he’d been rumbled, or fear had got the better of him. He ran the length of the deck and something grabbed him. He fought it off, got to his feet and pulled a revolver. Suddenly, we were both firing. He threw something – the bomb, I assume – and pulled his axe. He chopped the hawsers and was wrestled to the ground.
Then there was an almighty explosion. I fired again – I had no idea how many bullets I had left, but it couldn’t be many – and got up to join him. I was jerked back onto the bench. I’d forgotten all about the handcuffs. An alarm was going off on their side. There was a good deal of unearthly shrieking.
Mason crawled to the railings on their side, obviously wounded. He chopped the final hawser and collapsed. The Aurora began to drift away. Something from their side tried to leap the gap between the two ships, but I shot it without even thinking and it lost an ounce of momentum and smashed into the Aurora’s hull. There was a faint splash, just audible above the blare of the emergency alarm.
I was looking all over for the handcuffs key now, screaming at the top of my voice for it to make itself known. I assumed it was Sellotaped somewhere. I scoured the back of the bench, its underside, my pockets, inside my shoes and socks, even my own flesh. Then I lost all hope and I yanked at the chain until I bled and banged my wrists against the slats.
And then, the cuff on the bench opened. I looked stupidly at it for a moment. It had never been locked. All that stuff about a key was just meant to make me shut up and stay put.
Having lost all sense of caution I ran to the railings. The C&B ship was about twenty metres away now and receding. An alarm rang and a horn blared and smoke billowed. It didn’t look healthy enough to mount a pursuit any more, so I guess Mason had been successful. His body lay in the water next to one of the creatures whose exact form I was still unable to determine, although I could see that, like him, it was lifeless. A crimson aureole surrounded him.
I ran the length and breadth of the ship looking for boarders, but found nothing. The grappling hooks were still attached to the shelf beneath the railings, dangling severed cords. I undid them and threw them into the water.
I watched the C&B ship until it drifted out of view, sometime – judging by the position of the sun – around late afternoon. A light breeze stroked the sea and the sky was dappled with cirrocumulus.
Then I went into the dining room for a cup of tea and an egg mayonnaise sandwich.
