Blood Cruise

by Mats Strandberg

  He suddenly feels so disconnected from reality it gives him vertigo.

  ‘I want to get out of here!’ a woman shouts.

  ‘Not until we know more about what the fuck’s going on,’ a man with a boomingly deep voice counters. ‘What was with those lads?’

  ‘I need to get back to my cabin. They’ve told us to go back to our cabins.’

  ‘For fuck’s sake! We’re safe in here. Can’t you hear the screaming out there?’

  ‘I can. And my children are out there. They won’t make it on—’

  ‘Then maybe you shouldn’t have left them alone to go out boozing!’

  ‘How was I supposed to know this would happen?’

  Suddenly, everyone is yelling at once. The voices rise like a tidal wave as everyone tries to talk over everyone else.

  The woman has rolled onto her side. She is spitting blood. Her whimpering is getting fainter.

  Marisol looks straight into Filip’s eyes. Her fear is shining through, so strongly he has to turn away. Out of the corner of his eye, he sees that she has started stroking the woman’s hair.

  The telephone behind the bar rings. He runs to snatch up the receiver.

  ‘Hello?’ he says. ‘Mika, is that you?’

  ‘No, it’s me.’

  ‘Calle! Is everything okay?’

  He can feel everyone’s eyes on him as the idiocy of his question sinks in.

  ‘What the fuck’s going on?’ Calle says. ‘People have started gathering in the mess, but I don’t think anyone knows what’s happening. Mika said something about a contagion, but that … that sounds insane.’

  ‘It is insane,’ Filip says quietly, sticking a finger in his ear to shut out the loud discussions. ‘We have a woman here who’s been bitten, Calle.’

  ‘Bitten?’

  ‘It’s like they have rabies or something.’

  Calle doesn’t respond. There is a rushing sound on the line, like a chorus of whispers from somewhere far, far away.

  Filip swallows. ‘We’ve pulled the grille down. We should be okay, for now.’

  ‘Good,’ Calle says. ‘Fucking ace. Can you stay there until help arrives from the mainland?’

  ‘I hope so.’

  ‘Is Vincent with you?’

  ‘No. I haven’t seen him since you left.’

  Calle is quiet again. Filip gets it. ‘Stay where you are,’ he says. ‘It’s your best option.’

  ‘Pia called me,’ Calle says. ‘She said … she said that if I saw her, I should run as far away as I could.’

  Filip shuts his eyes and pictures Pia, how happy she was when they were hanging the streamers in the suite. Where is she now?

  What is she now?

  ‘If that’s what she said,’ he says, turning around to look at the woman on the floor, ‘then I think you’d better do just that.’

  Calle

  Calle dials the number for the suite. The phone rings, again and again. Vincent clearly isn’t going to answer, but he can’t bring himself to hang up.

  Mika is speaking over the PA system, a message going out only to the staff quarters, repeating that everyone has to report to the mess as soon as possible.

  If there is a fire on board, or if the Charisma is at risk of sinking, the staff are supposed to gather in smaller groups at their assigned muster stations. There are lifeboats and rafts for every passenger, with plenty of extra capacity, just to be safe. But what do you do when there is an outbreak on board? As far as Calle knows, there are no routines for that.

  The phone keeps ringing.

  Where could Vincent be, if he is not in the suite?

  Marianne

  Marianne and Vincent have left their table at McCharisma. The bartender has told them everyone has to return to their cabins. Tens of people have run past the pub. They seemed to be coming from that awful club upstairs. Several of them were screaming, sounding completely panicked, but what does Marianne know? She has never understood the need some people have of making a racket as soon as they have had a sip or two of alcohol. Fear is fluttering inside her, but she doesn’t want to make a fool of herself, to be the one who overreacts.

  She notices a dark-haired woman standing stock-still in the hallway. She has closed her eyes, appears to be trying to hear something. There is something familiar about her. She is beautiful; her hair is healthy and curly, her cheeks naturally rosy. Among all the cheap fast fashion and heavy makeup Marianne has observed on board, this woman stands out as strangely timeless. She doesn’t seem to belong here. Marianne almost wants to ask Vincent if he can see her too, but decides against it. Mustn’t come across as a complete lunatic.

  ‘Do you think there’s something going on?’ Vincent says.

  ‘I don’t know,’ Marianne replies. ‘That “technical difficulties” thing is hardly what you want to hear in the middle of the sea.’

  ‘Bloody hell, just calm down,’ says an old man sitting alone by one of the tables close to the hallway. ‘I’ve been on hundreds of cruises and nothing has ever happened to me. You’re in more danger getting in a car.’

  ‘But what about the screaming?’ Vincent retorts.

  ‘Bah,’ the old man sneers. ‘Just people working themselves into a tizzy.’

  ‘I’m sorry,’ the man behind the bar says. ‘I have to ask you to return to your cabins. There is no need to worry, but I do have to insist.’

  Marianne turns to him. When their eyes meet, he looks away far too quickly.

  Whatever happens, she can’t go back to her sub-surface cabin. If the ship is sinking, she’d be trapped down there. She glances at Vincent and knows he is thinking about his friend. She wonders if it would be right for her to ask.

  ‘I don’t want to be alone,’ she says.

  ‘Me neither,’ he replies, and stands up. ‘Come on.’

  The woman in the hallway is gone when Marianne looks out again.

  The Baltic Charisma

  ‘Ladies and gentlemen. We would like to ask all passengers to return to their cabins …’ Mika’s voice is back in the public spaces. The people who went to bed early are wide awake now and listening intently. ‘… ask you to calmly return to your cabin … the staff thank you for your cooperation …’

  The dark-haired woman walks down the hallway towards Charisma Starlight and stops next to the bodies on the floor. A man in a blue shirt stops her, begging, ‘Please, please, please help. I can’t take it, I can’t do it.’ Blood fills his mouth.

  She looks at the grille at the end of the hallway and sees people moving behind it, but no one is looking her way just now. She grabs the man’s chin, puts her other hand behind his neck, says everything is going to be okay, then gently pushes his chin towards the floor. Hushing him, she pulls his neck the other way in a quick motion. The tissue connecting his vertebrae snaps. She closes his eyes. He won’t open them again.

  The woman continues to the other bodies. While she works, she can hear screams and the sound of running feet from the floor above her. There are so many of them. Too many. The smell of terror is wafting down the aft stairs. And she is suddenly struck by the unequivocal realisation that this is the catastrophe the Old Ones always warned her about. It could have unimaginable consequences.

  The woman squats next to the last of the bodies, a pretty young girl with curly hair. The bite marks on her neck have already healed. The transformation has begun. The woman glances at the grille again, then breaks the girl’s neck. She thinks of the bodies in the hallway as a disease. They are not just infected, they are the contagion. They will multiply indiscriminately if given the chance. She has to stop this. Somehow, she has to stop it, without harming her son. And she has to resist the temptation herself. Because all the running, the screaming, the blood have awakened her own hunger, even though she just fed.

  *

  The music has stopped at Club Charisma, but the lights are still flashing across the dance floor, which is dark and slick with blood and human innards. By the main entrance, people are
pushing and tugging at each other, trying to get out through the compact wall of bodies, climbing over the backs of the people in front. But there are some who want to climb in rather than out. They are as desperate as the humans, but it is insatiable appetite that has driven them here. They left the grille at Starlight when they caught the scents. They push into the crowd, the bodies slick with sweat, tearing open flesh, filling their mouths with blood, but the hunger rages on. The hot bodies escape in the tumult, slip away and are shoved aside or trampled onto the floor.

  A few of the people who have reached the doors realise what is happening, even if they don’t understand how or why, and try to run back into the club, but those further back are pushing forward with increasing force. On the other side of the dance floor, people are trying to escape onto the afterdeck. A little boy in a red hoodie is walking back and forth through the chaos out there. Every now and then he lets his teeth glide through exposed skin, slicing open hands and arms in the commotion. Most people don’t even notice.

  *

  Dan Appelgren has found a young couple trying to hide in the DJ booth. They cling to each other, tears streaming down both their faces. He pulls the girl out; she shakes her head, says no, no, no, her eyes glowing with fear. Every part of Dan’s body responds. Adam has warned him against drinking too much and he tries to refrain, but it is difficult. Everyone is unique. Their feelings feed his intoxication. He doesn’t want to let them go until he has extinguished them utterly. His heart contracts to imitate heartbeats. His body is swollen. His rings dig into the flesh of his fingers. He pulls the girl into his arms like an embrace, rips her cleavage open and squeezes one of her breasts hard. He wants her boyfriend to see it. She tries to strike at him, but he bites through the meaty muscle above her collarbone and her arm stops waving about, goes limp. He throws her aside, looks at the boyfriend who did nothing to help her, just squirmed further into the booth, rolled up and shut his eyes, as though hoping Dan wouldn’t want him. But Dan does. He smiles at the young man, thinking about what awaits him. What an incredible, historical event he is part of. Behind Dan, a few bodies fall from the mezzanine.

  *

  The glass wall of the Charisma Spa has been shattered. An electric wheelchair is lying on its side just beyond it. In the faint light, the shattered glass gleams like blood-spattered diamonds. Pia has curled up behind the reception counter a few feet away. Her cheek rests against the cool floor. She can feel the vibrations, familiar, soothing. The blood she has drunk is spreading through her body and she is at peace. All her thoughts have gone silent. No voices can get to her here.

  Calle

  He decides to go the long way around, past the mess. He pops his head in. It looks the same: the coffee-stained Thermos; the chequered tablecloths; the plastic potted plants; the fruit bowl; the basket of leftover bread from the restaurants, even the same old breadknife with its bright yellow handle is there. But the atmosphere is different from anything he has ever experienced on board before. The air is heavy with fear. The few people who are talking are doing so in low voices. Antti is standing just inside the door with the general manager, Andreas. They give him a vague nod. Calle wonders where Sophia is, but says nothing. None of the security officers are present, no one from the bridge.

  ‘All personnel to the mess immediately,’ Mika’s voice says over the PA system again.

  Calle thinks he can hear screaming in the background through the crackling and rustling.

  ‘We will start in a few minutes. General Manager Andreas Dahlgren is the highest-ranking crew member present and will therefore lead the meeting, which will, I repeat, begin in a few minutes.’ The speakers click and fall silent.

  His thoughts racing, Calle hurries past the empty common room, where the television is emitting a spectral blue light, and continues towards the stairwell. If Andreas holds the highest rank at that meeting, it means neither the captain nor the staff captain nor the chief engineer will be there, and that makes him even more worried, but also more determined. He has to find Vincent. Somehow. Right now.

  He opens the door to the stairwell. While he runs down the steps, he realises he doesn’t know where he is going. Where should he start?

  ‘Is the boat sinking?’ someone shouts when he gets down to the landing, and Calle jumps, as if lifted off the floor by a tightly wound internal spring.

  A pitiful figure is curled up on the floor a bit further down the railing, looking up at him. ‘For Pete’s sake, you have to let us go. You have to unlock these goddamn fucking …’

  There’s a metallic rattling when the man yanks at the handcuffs chaining him to the railing, and Calle swallows and takes a step back, until his back hits the big metal door of the goods lift.

  ‘I don’t have a key,’ he says, holding his hands out in an apologetic gesture.

  ‘Bloody find someone who does then!’

  ‘I’ll see what I can do,’ Calle says.

  It is so obviously an empty promise. The man glowers at him with silent loathing.

  ‘Help us!’ someone calls out further down the stairwell, and there’s more metallic rattling from down there.

  Are these the men Pia had to leave him to go apprehend? Are they the ones who infected her?

  ‘I’m sorry,’ Calle replies. He looks at the steel door leading out to the public areas. He is on the ninth floor now. He realises what he has to do when he gets out there: he needs to get up to the sun deck, start there and work his way down the Charisma.

  He needs some kind of system, and he needs to stick to it. He needs to stay in control.

  Calle pushes the door release button; it makes a hollow clicking sound, then he thrusts the door open before he has time to reconsider.

  It is like looking out into a war zone.

  People are flooding down the stairs; they must have come from the promenade deck. Some of them have torn and bloody clothes. Some are holding each other, others ruthlessly shoving everyone within reach to move forward faster. Some are desperately trying to make calls on their phones; others are using theirs to film and take pictures. They never look up, as though they want to distance themselves from the chaos by watching it on a screen. A man is standing by the stairs, crying quietly.

  Calle needs to get a grip. He needs to focus. Somewhere in this ten-storey mayhem is Vincent.

  The Baltic Charisma

  The young security officer is climbing towards the bridge on the narrow service ladder on the outside of the Charisma. He is holding a fire-axe in one hand. The wind and rain are beating against his face, making his polyester uniform cold and wet. The windows of the bridge are only a little more than an arm’s length away. Henke glances over his shoulder. Five storeys down, his colleague Pär is standing on the bow deck, trying to assist a handful of passengers who have found their way outside. Their sobbing and screaming is carried to Henke on the wind, blending with the shouting from the sun deck above him. He places his foot on the next rung, slips on the wet metal, pulls himself up and squints at the tinted windows of the bridge. He imagines bodies riddled with bullets, terrorists with semi-automatic rifles inside. There’s so much bloody talk about 9/11 but ain’t no one fucking going through the passengers’ bags when they board. Any goddamn madman could easily drive onto the ship with a homemade bomb.

  He grasps the axe more firmly, takes a few deep breaths and climbs another rung. Another. Peering in over the edge of the window. There are things moving in the gloom behind it. He almost doesn’t recognise Captain Berggren without his uniform. His hair is standing on end, his shirt is torn and under his string vest his body is flabby and out of shape. Robbed of all dignity.

  They shuffle back and forth, ignoring one another. What are they doing?

  Henke wishes he could brush his wet hair from his forehead, but it is all he can do to hold on to both axe and ladder. He looks at the broken screens and loose wires. One of his feet slips with a squeak against the wet metal rung; he almost drops the axe. He finds his footing again, his hea
rt pounding, and turns to the darkness beyond the Charisma. No other ships in sight. Only the black night. As though we’ve vanished, like that ghost plane …

  There is a thud on the other side of the window; he starts and turns around. Berggren is staring back at him. His eyes are like something out of Henke’s nightmares. There is another thud as Berggren rams his forehead against the glass. He never looks away from Henke, doesn’t blink, even though blood is gushing from his forehead. Henke resists the impulse to let go of the ladder, let himself fall to get away from here as soon as possible. He starts climbing back down. There is only one thing in his head now: I’m going to get out of here somehow, no matter what the fucking cost.

  *

  Mika has locked himself in the general manager’s office. He puts the microphone down. It is time for him to join the others in the mess. He tries to ignore the burning pain in his chest and makes sure all the buttons on his uniform jacket are buttoned. For a moment he hesitates: he just wants to hide, to fall asleep and not wake up until it is all over. The code-lock on the door beeps. Mika backs away, but is relieved to see that it is just one of the cleaners coming in. She is pale and shaken and has brought a woman Mika doesn’t recognise – a passenger. It is against regulations, but he doesn’t have time to argue about it. The woman is beautiful, dark-haired, wearing a black dress and a baggy cardigan.

  *

  The cabins are full of people who have locked their doors. Some of them are in pain. They bleed from their mouths in front of mirrors or they lie on their beds, screaming into pillows. Some of them are alone. Others are crying with friends, hugging their children, being comforted by husbands and wives locked in with them. In a handful of cabins there are passengers who haven’t noticed anything unusual. One of them is the woman sleeping soundly on deck nine on sheets covered in gold glitter. Her rigid curls rustle faintly against the pillow every time she shifts.