Free Rakasa by Kyle Warner Page B

overboard?”
    “I don’t need a fucking knife,” I say. “A spoon will work
just fine.”
    Jack jumps and grits his teeth. The others notice this and
he shrinks a bit, looking sheepish. I love it.
    Jarvis Jenks says, “Can we put this to a vote? All those in
favor of the doctor’s plan, raise your hand.” Jenks does so, letting the ship
know where he expects them to stand on the issue.
    Hands start shooting up like they’ve forgotten they’re
voting to murder their shipmates for a few extra crumbs of bread.
    I keep my fists in my pockets. I’m not better than them, but
I don’t like killing those incapable of defending themselves.
    My side is outvoted thirteen to three. The only other fools
who keep their hands down are Ahmed the Indonesian storyteller and the teenage
cook who might be named Daniel… or Darren… or Dennis… whatever. I’m pretty sure
it starts with a ‘D.’
    “Good,” Jarvis Jenks says, rubbing his hands together as if
he’s looking forward to a hot meal. “Now that that’s settled, who wants to
volunteer for the deed?”
    I say nothing. I don’t raise a hand. I don’t look anybody in
the eye. I don’t even twitch. But somehow I find myself below deck with a
deadly purpose just the same.
    In a boat full of bastards, I am their elected executioner.
    Billy Damon’s choking on his own sick in a sweaty hammock
that sways with the unforgiving waves.
    I saw a gravedigger pull a man out of a casket once and
Billy looks kind of like the corpse I saw then. His face is sunken, his eyes
are glazed and yellow, and there’s a smell to him that I do not wish to name.
    The gravedigger was interested in the dead man’s liver. ‘For
scientific research,’ he said. All I’m interested in is the jugular.
    I kneel beside Billy’s hammock and he’s dimly aware of my
presence. He tries to say something. I think he’s asking for water, but one of
my instructions was to ignore all requests for food or drink.
    I shake my head, tell him there’s nothing I can do.
    His mouth smacks as he tries to talk. “The… tiger.”
    “Yeah, probably shouldn’t have eaten the tiger,” I say.
“Tried to tell you. But nobody listens to me.”
    “Any… more?” he asks.
    “Of the tiger?”
    He nods.
    The stupid bastard wants more of the meal that killed him.
    “So… hungry,” Billy Damon whispers.
    I take the edge of the blade to Billy’s exposed jugular
vein. It’s not hard to find, since his neck is so shrunken and veiny from the
sickness. Blood shoots out from his neck and he looks at me like I’m the worst
Judas that Hell ever spat out into the world.
    The blood sprays the wall and I watch his eyes go dim. I try
not to hate myself for it. I tell myself it’s the captain’s orders. But more
than that, I remind myself that they were suffering and their deaths would be
slow.
    I’m granting them release from their pain. It’s bloody and
it’s awful but I believe there is some kind of kindness to the edge of my
blade.
    Billy Damon’s dead, so I stand.
    The blade leaves a trail of red behind me as I walk the rest
of the ship and send the damned back to God… or the Devil… I care not which.

3 .
    H alf the crew is dead now. Jarvis
Jenks caught the sniffles and the doctor is missing. We’re throwing more bodies
overboard with each passing day. Not long until I catch whatever’s going around
and get on with dying, too.
    Sometimes my eyes deceive me and I think I see land off to
starboard. Always starboard. But that can’t be. We’re in the middle of the
ocean, far from land, farther from hope and a chance for survival.
    And yet we keep on living. I guess we just don’t have much
else to do.
    I wrap a rag around my face and dump today’s corpses into
the ocean. The sharks linger along the sides of the hull but they don’t eat
from the bodies. Even the sharks have abandoned us.
    Feeling lonely now.
    I tried to kill a shark by hanging over the side and
swinging a hook on a rope at the monster