The New Shipment

            Harrick pulled the ear-flaps down on his hat. The cold winds were blowing stronger now in Port O’ James, as they had been for the last few years. It played horrible games with the old wound. Judy had suggested he get a cane, but Harrick had too much pride for that. It’s hard to be intimidating when you’re leaning on a cane. Well, maybe if you were rich you could pull it off, but the last thing he needed was the dockworkers seeing him hardly able to stand.

            There was an immense yellow-tape fence around the entire ship. The “Ostrich” was its name. Strange name for a ship, Harrick thought. He ducked under the tape and a young uniform came up to him.

            “Ok, what’s the gist?”

            “The ship came into harbor, but the crew’s missing.”

            “They docked, though?”

            “Yes sir.”

            The dock master was a new one. In fact, Harrick hadn’t yet met him. Most of the dockworkers hated enforcement, so he resolved to be brief and succinct. The dock master told him nothing he didn’t already know. At four that morning, the Ostrich came in to dock at pier 37. The communication center had been in contact with the ship’s captain, a man named Yeeves, within four hours of the ship’s landing, but they were unable to get a response after that.

            After the ship landed, a few dockworkers boarded, only to discover the entire crew had disappeared. It was a real mystery, but weren’t those happening more often than they used to these days?

            It was a big ship – a freighter. Port O’James wasn’t a huge town, but it was an important stop on the route to the south. Lots of ships came this way, north around Elderland. The waters were cold and there was ice to watch out for, but most companies and most captains were happy to brave the frigid waters if it meant avoiding the constant battles between the Red and Black Sails. After sailing for hundreds and hundreds of tracks through bitter frozen wilderness, with nothing but snow, trees, and ice on the shores, Port O’ James looked like a massive metropolis.

            Detective Sweeney was already on board when Harrick pulled himself up the gangplank. Sweeney was a good kid, just shy of thirty. She had great potential, but it was tough being a woman in Port O’ James enforcement. They were a bit old-fashioned here.

            “Anything interesting?” Harrick asked.

            Sweeney looked at her notes. “Not much, though we’re still sweeping through. It’s a big ship. Perry-class freighter registered to the Thunderbird Transport Company.”  That could be something. Perry ships were common enough, but they were particularly popular with smugglers. It was going to be a long day.

            “Have you looked in the containers?” Harrick asked. There were about a thousand of the things, so he guessed the answer was no.

            “Not yet. We’re going through the crew chambers. Sir, one important thing.”

            “Yes?”

            “We can’t get into the bridge.”

            “What do you mean?”

            “Here, come. Let me show you.” Sweeney and Harrick made their way aft and climbed up the stairs leading to the bridge. There was a small sort of lounge – not quite a crew’s mess, but perhaps something for the bridge officers, with an electric icebox and a light-oven. In front of the door to the bridge, there was a giant iron bar that had fallen from the ceiling. It seemed to be part of the structure of the ship – the ceiling and roof above the lounge. The bar, and much of the debris that had come with it, made access to the bridge impossible.

            “Is there another way in?” asked Harrick. Sweeney shook her head. “Can we at least see inside?”

            “There’s a row of windows, of course, but it’s too high up.”

            Harrick walked out onto the balcony on the port side of the lounge. Still, at this angle, one could hardly see into the bridge. He noticed that there was a small ledge, only about eight inches wide, but it went around the entire bridge. Sweeney followed him out, gasping slightly at the shock of cold air.

            “What are you looking for?”

            Harrick furrowed his brow. “Stay here, I’m going to try to take a look.”

            He climbed up, gripping to the bars between the windows, and carefully placing his feet on the ledge. “Sir, don’t do that. It doesn’t look safe.”

            Harrick shook his head. “I’ll be fine.” He looked down. The fall was about forty feet. He tried not to think about that. Slowly, he inched his way around, taking care to make sure one foot was totally stable before he lifted the next. It took nearly a full minute, but finally he was able to see into the bridge.

            “Well, there’s Captain Yeeves, alright,” he called back to Sweeney.

            “Is he ok?”

            “Nope.” Yeeves was slumped against the door, a big chunk torn out of his lower torso. The floor around him – indeed, most of the floor of the bridge – was dark with blood.

            When they finally cleared the debris enough to get into the bridge, Harrick and Sweeney searched through the room. There had been a struggle, but it was brief. Yeeves was the only person inside.

            Sweeney was talking to one of the uniforms. “We need a secure perimeter. We don’t know what did this, but it might still be here. Nothing gets off unless we check it, double check it, and you get mine or Detective Inspector Harrick’s express approval.”

            Harrick looked over the instrument panel. Nothing appeared out of the ordinary. They did seem a little low on fuel, but they had been sailing all the way from Ternison, and strong easterly winds could easily account for that.

            “Hey Sweeney, how’d they manage to land the ship if the crew’s gone?”

            “It’s an Arizradna ship. They enchant them. Kind of an automated guidance system.” Harrick nodded. Magic always made him uncomfortable. It was a random variable.

            He looked at the instruments again. Sweeney walked over to him. “What are you looking for?”

            Harrick shook his head. “I don’t know, but it’s probably staring me in the face.” And then he saw it. There was a little light, glowing yellow, near the far end of the control panel. “What’s that?”

            Sweeney took a look. “It says ‘Hold Power.’ Maybe it means the lights, or something?”

            Harrick thought it over for a second. “I don’t think so. Let’s go take a look.”

            Most of the containers on the ship were simply stacked on the deck. Ships like these were relatively flat. Harrick and Sweeney made their way down to the deck. There was a spiral staircase leading into the bowels of the ship.

            “You know, Sweeney, whatever killed the captain is probably still here.”

            “Way ahead of you, sir,” replied Sweeney. She already had her gun drawn.

            They reached the bottom of the stairs. It was pretty dark down here, with just a single bare bulb illuminating the hallway. Harrick pulled out his flashlight and pointed it in front of him, gripped next to his gun. They followed the hallway until they were almost near the bow of the ship. Here, they came to a large, heavy door. Above it was a sign that said “COLD STORAGE.”

            “Well?” asked Sweeney.

            Harrick shrugged. He turned the wheel on the door and swung it open. If it had seemed cold outside, the air rushing past them was positively bone-chilling. There was a strangely biting smell, like alcohol or vinegar. They stepped inside the room.

            “Oh, what the fuck?” cried Sweeney, turning to look away. Harrick hardly had the capacity for such eloquence. He just stared. The cold storage room was packed – utterly packed – with corpses. They had been piled in, stacked like firewood. Sweeney had gotten over her momentary revulsion and looked again.

            “Is this the crew?” she asked.

            “I don’t know. I doubt it. The crew was mostly Arizradna, these…” he looked at the bodies, getting a strange feeling from them.

            “What?”

            “These look like Redlanders, or possibly locals, maybe Ganlean…” Something moved in the corner of his eye. He pointed his flashlight at it, only to find one of the corpses staring back at him with dead, sightless eyes. He could taste bile rising up in the back of his throat.

            Sweeney took a step toward the bodies. “Well, we should get forensics down here, see if we can identify some of the remains.”

            “Sweeney, stop, come back to me right now.”

            She froze in her tracks. “What?”

            “Come back, right now, don’t ask why, just come here.”

            She did what he told her to do. Harrick shined the flashlight at the corpses. Disgustingly enough, they seemed wet, which was odd, considering the temperature at which they were kept.

            “Sweeney, please tell me that you’re seeing what I’m seeing.”

            He flipped off his flashlight. The dead eyes, all of their dead eyes, were emitting a faint, blue glow. And then the corpses began to move.

            Sweeney was out first, Harrick slammed the door shut behind him and cranked the wheel so tightly that he could feel a bruise forming on the inside of his hand.

            “What the hell was that?” yelled Sweeney.

            “I don’t know for sure, but we need lots and lots of fire down here, right now."


(Copyright Daniel Szolovits 2012)