Sea Sick: A Horror Novel(58)
The Captain looked at Jack with no indication that he believed him now any more than he had done the previous times they’d spoken. Some things just couldn’t be accomplished in a single day. Convincing Marangakis of the danger aboard his ship was one of them.
Jack sighed. “Just…if anything happens tonight, around eight-o-clock, at the first sign of danger…
Oh, I give up. Look, just contact the mainland the moment you think anything is wrong. Keep an eye on the passengers and in a few hours you’ll be wishing you’d listened to me.”
Jack examined the exit door to the room and saw that it opened from the inside via a round push button on the wall beside it. Jack raised a foot in the air and hoofed his heel against it. The door unlocked itself and the plastic button ripped from its casing. Jack opened the door and slid back into the corridor, satisfied that the broken button on the other side would be enough to buy him some time.
1800hrs
Time was running out fast. Jack raced out onto the Promenade Deck and was faced with a setting sun above a dark blue sea. If Jack didn’t do something soon, this would be the final sunset the world would ever get to enjoy before things went downhill. He had two hours left. Just two hours. Jack prayed to God that Joma’s vision of the future had been wrong, because it was starting to feel very certain that failure would be the only outcome of trying to stop the virus.
There’s nothing I can do. Tally got away, Marangakis won’t listen, and the passengers were infected yesterday. What the hell can I do? I’ve tried everything and nothing works.
Jack didn’t know how much more he had left in the tank; maybe not even enough to make it through the next two hours. He was tired, broken, and bleeding. His back throbbed where the pencil had speared him and as he reached his hand around he felt cold kiss of blood against his skin. He brought back his fingertips bloody and stared at them for a few moments, realisation setting in that the wound would not simply go away as soon as midnight hit.
This time it’s for real. Dying isn’t an option anymore.
Jack headed down the Promenade Deck and passed by a table and chairs. A half-empty bottle of water lay discarded there and Jack picked it up, unscrewed the cap. He poured the tepid liquid onto his hands and begun rubbing them together, washing away the drying blood on his fingertips. As he did so, something seemed to click into place at the corner of his mind. As his wet hands rubbed together, Jack was reminded of something. He was reminded of the day he’d boarded. There had been a man at the entrance to the ship, dispensing alcohol rub to the passengers.
But it wasn’t alcohol rub, was it?
Suddenly Jack found the answer. He knew how the virus got aboard. He knew that Claire had not been infected because she hadn’t boarded with her boyfriend, Conner. Only Jack’s boarding party had been infected because the man with the dispenser had been there to greet them. Poor little Heather got a double dose, thanks to the extra squirt her dolly got on its plastic hands (which explained Joma’s vision of a doll). That’s why she had gotten sick so quickly. The contaminated substance must have had a short exposure time, but she had been clutching the doll close enough that she would have breathed in or absorbed the additional dose. Jack was uninfected because he had dodged by the man with the dispenser. He hadn’t gotten a dose himself.
Jack shook his head. I never had a chance to stop this. The people responsible for this never even boarded the ship. They’re still out there now, hundreds of miles away in Majorca – maybe even further – and they have the deadliest virus known to man sealed up in a bottle of rubbing alcohol. They could release it again, anywhere, anytime. It probably won’t even matter if I stop the infection on this ship or not. We’re all doomed as long as they’re out there.
But Jack was damned if he was going to give them an easy ride. If infecting the passengers on this ship was their Plan A, then he was going to do his very best to make sure they were going to have to come up with a Plan B. Hopefully there would be somebody else willing to f*ck that one up, because Jack was done after this. At least, he would be if he went through with the idea that was forming in his head. The world might still have one last chance if he could do what needed to be done in time.
With a dry mouth, and a heavy heart, Jack headed for his cabin. There was a bottle of Gen Grant there with his name on it.
1900hrs
Jack had retrieved the bottle of scotch from his luggage and brought it down to the Orlap Deck. He’d also brought with him a blanket to cover Donovan up with. It felt good to share one last drink with his drinking buddy, who had just been a man caught up in a bad situation, no different than anybody else on board. Donovan was not an innocent man by any stretch of the imagination, but he was not responsible for anything that had happened since the Spirit of Kirkpatrick had set sail from Majorca. Jack was not an innocent man either. He had been a man consumed by rage, and perhaps always would be. But at least now he had the chance to make up for his past mistakes, to atone for the lives he had taken, by doing something to save others. Despite all that he had been through, starting with the loss of his soulmate, Laura, and ending with what he was about to do this very hour, Jack still valued human life. Not everyone was evil like the thugs terrorising the streets of Britain or the terrorists that released the virus. There were also good people, like Ivor and his family, Claire, Joma, and even Doctor Fortuné. It was for people like them that Jack was willing to give his life.