Errol's Folly

by Dave Brown

  The flood of people going north slowed as he neared the collision site and finally stopped just as he crossed onto Skellen Nippon. He had been calling Anne's name on the bullhorn since he parted ways with George, but hadn't heard a response yet. The big bulker beneath his feet was not designed for container hauling but the planning committee had arranged a few rows anyway to maintain the walkway. He crossed over them now and saw the first of the dead below him on the deck. There were a few packs feeding on some of the people that didn't make it off the ship. He turned away from the gruesome sights, willing himself to believe Anne was not among them. There were lots of the creatures simply wandering aimlessly. When they spotted him they gained new purpose, scrabbling at the sides of the container cluster he was using.

  He turned his attention to the Boi and the cruise ship. The container hauler at the south end of New Taiwan was clearly in distress. Her port side was easily five feet lower than starboard. Errol didn't think she had long before she sank. He paid new attention to a metallic groaning sound he had been hearing for the last few minutes. He assumed at first that it was stress between Boi and Galápagos, but as he got closer to the port side of Skellen he saw that wasn't the case. The steel cables lashing the two spinal ships together were pulled taut. The rest of the island was trying to hold Boi afloat, and it looked liked the battle was going inexorably in favor of the Pacific.

  “Errol!”

  His head snapped up and he looked around. Anne was standing atop a container on Boi. The elevated walkways between the two ships had come apart. She was trapped.

  Chapter 18

  When George told her there had been a collision at the south end of the island, the rational half of Anne's mind switched off. She ran past her friend and continued south as fast as she could. It was difficult working against the terrified mob of people going the other direction, but after a few minutes they were all behind her. It didn't take her long rushing through container clusters to reach Skellen Nippon. When she got to the port side she saw that Boi was listing away, but the plank between the two ships was still there. She hurried across and started following stenciled markers for Boi's port side mooring point, where the Folly should be. When she turned her second corner and saw three corpses squatting on the deck and consuming a motionless fourth, her rationality snapped back on like an unadorned hundred watt bulb, glaring and hot.

  She backed slowly around the corner, hoping they hadn't seen her. The starboard side was four container lengths behind her, or maybe it was five. She'd been in such a hurry that she hadn't paid attention. She turned in that direction and took two steps, then stopped short as she saw something out of a nightmare shambling toward her. It wore a face she recognized, though not enough to put a name with it. It was just one of the many people she'd seen more than once during her time on New Taiwan. The person inside had once been a man but was gone now, leaving only a gory mess walking around looking for food. Its face was missing an ovoid section of flesh on the left cheek but there was no blood flowing from the wound. Two of the fingers on its right hand were gone, little stubs of bone sticking out of the stumps. It opened its mouth, the wound on the cheek distorting in a way that made her stomach turn, and let out that horrible moan she had heard so often in the night, alone in her bunk. It was returned quickly from behind her.

  She didn't know what to do. She thought if she rushed it she could knock it over, maybe get past it, but remembered Patty's story about how Pablo died. He had tried the same thing and ended up tripping over the creature he meant to knock down. Fear of that situation kept her from trying it. She could hear scraping and shuffling sounds behind her. The hungry trio back that way must have gotten to their feet, following the haunting call to feed. It felt like she had a gallon of adrenaline shooting through her veins but she couldn't decide what to do. Just when she was thinking about trying for the tackle, there was a hollow bang behind and above her head.

  “Hey, Grundig!” She whipped around and saw Zeke, the mooring pilot and guide, lying flat on top of the container with an arm outstretched. “Grab my hand, I'll pull you up!”

  She turned and jumped, grabbing his hand with one of hers and using the other to cling to a slab of metal welded to the side of the steel box. She flailed her feet until they found purchase on a band around the middle and pushed upward with her legs. Zeke pulled too, but it was slow going. She felt fingers brushing against her ankle and the adrenaline finally slammed into all the right places. Her legs kicked hard against the metal band and got everything above her waist on the roof of the container. Zeke pulled more as she swung a leg up and over the side. Finally she lay flat on her back looking up at the sky, catching her breath. A few gray clouds were starting to form.

  “I'm glad to see somebody else alive,” Zeke said. “I was in the visitor's center down at the stern when the cruiser nailed us. I didn't think I'd even make it out of the tower.”

  “Thanks,” Anne said, the only thing that came to mind.

  “No worries.”

  She sat up suddenly and looked to port. What she saw there was so far removed from her expectation that it simply didn't register at first. There was just no way her mind would accept that the mooring point could be empty, the Folly nowhere to be seen. She saw the cruise ship, its bow embedded in Boi's side. She saw zombies falling over the edge of the bow, and others coming out of gashes in the hull.

  “Where's the Folly?” she asked.

  “I saw it going toward the north end a few minutes ago.” He pointed back the way she had come and she turned to look. Here on top of the container she had a good view of the island. She saw the Folly's familiar tower moving steadily away from her. She couldn't believe she'd been so stupid, running from George like that. Now that she was thinking clearly again, she could remember him telling her to get to the north end.

  “What do we do?”

  “A few minutes ago we could have walked there along the tops. Those things can't get up here and I've seen plenty of people doing just that. But the last big lurch knocked the planks loose.” His face was grim. Anne started walking back to Boi's starboard side along the top of the container. There was a noticeable upward slope and she realized the ship must be tilted severely to port. Zeke followed along behind her until they reached the edge. The gap between the ships used to be about four feet. Now with Boi drooping away from the rest of the island it had grown to at least six.

  “Can we jump?” she asked, eying the containers on the other side.

  Zeke blew a sigh through his lips. “Don't know. Maybe, if we had a running start.” He walked back to the far end of the twenty-foot container they were standing on and turned around. She saw he was gathering his focus for the attempt and stepped to one side. Without a word he started sprinting down the length of the box. His speed was impressive and she was certain he would make it. One step before the end, the ship lurched sickeningly to port again and the container shifted a few inches. His last step came down at a different angle than he had planned. He shoved hard anyway but the sudden change in the landscape was enough to seriously impede his leap. He sailed a few feet and then started falling rapidly. She heard a whispering squeak that must have been his fingers grazing the hull of the other ship. She scrambled to the edge of the container just in time to see him plunge into the water below.

  “Zeke!” she yelled, but there was no reply. She looked around, frantic. There had to be some way off the ship. She turned her eyes to the water below. Errol and Reg had done it, but they knew where to go when they did. She supposed she could swim for the closer long side of the island, grab on to whatever boat she found first.

  She was taking several deep breaths to oxygenate her blood when she noticed somebody running across the tops of the containers on Skellen. As the person got closer she saw who it was.

  “Errol!” she called. He looked at her and she saw on his face that he understood her predicament almost immediately. He started turning quickly, scanning the surroundings. Within seconds he had
selected something and ran to it. She saw him dragging a metal plank toward the gap. It looked long enough to reach her side but she had no idea how he was going to get it across to her. “What are you going to do?”

  “Slide it across about half way and then put all my weight at the back. You can jump across the smaller gap and hopefully I'll be able to keep it still.”

  It sounded pretty crazy to her, but still better than going for a swim. She backed up like poor Zeke had done, hoping the ship would hold steady for her jump. Errol got the plank to the edge and began to slide it out over the gap. The metallic scraping sound brought back hints of fear from when the cruise ship had first collided, but she pushed it out of her mind. The sound was also attracting the dead to the Boi's starboard side. She could hear them moving along below her but kept her focus on the gap, the plank, and her friend trying to save her.

  He appeared satisfied with the placement of the metal slab and lay his body flat across it at the far end. There was a cable tie at the side of the container. Anne saw him pull his belt off and slip it through the eyelet, then cinch it closed and grab it with both hands. “Go!” he yelled.

  She ran. With the final step she kicked as hard as she could against the container and threw her arms out. It felt like she hung in the air for a long while but it was all over in a second. Her body slapped down onto the plank and it made a little hop. She heard Errol grunt once from his position and then she was scrambling on all fours to get all the way onto the container. She crawled over him and felt him roll off the plank once she was past. There were more metallic screeches as it tipped and slid off the box.

  “We've got to get to the north end,” Errol said beside her, his breath short. “Boi's going down and she might take the rest of the island with her.”

  Anne rolled over and got to her feet. He held a hand up so she grabbed it and pulled. As he shoved himself up to his feet there was a fresh metallic tearing sound from the direction of Boi. The ship lurched beneath them and Anne, already throwing her weight backwards to help Errol get back up, started to stumble back toward the edge of the container. Errol's forward momentum also carried him toward the edge. He tried to backpedal but it was not enough. Anne went sprawling over the side of the box and landed flat on her back, the wind knocked out of her lungs. Errol managed to twist himself around and dangle from the edge rather than falling outright. He dropped to the deck and squatted next to her.

  She struggled for air and finally drew a ragged breath, coughing several times when she exhaled. Looking over Skellen's port side they saw containers starting to slide slowly down Boi's lopsided deck.

  “We gotta go. Can you get up?”

  She nodded, still coughing a little, and staggered back to her feet. They were standing in between two container rows, with perhaps twenty feet between the sides. They could see all the way to Skellen's starboard rail. Anne had taken only a few shaky steps when she heard the bone-chilling moan again, this time from ahead of them. Five walking corpses lurched out from a gap between the aft row of containers. These were in better shape than most that Anne had seen. They moved fairly fast for dead people and it didn't take long for them to effectively block their way across the deck. Errol looked frantically around at the sides of the containers.

  “Shit,” he said and pointed. There was a ladder back up to the elevated pathway but the zombies were in the way of that as well. “Okay,” Errol said, “I'll rush the one on the far left. You follow me and when I knock her down, get to that ladder. I'll be right behind you.”

  “Too dangerous,” she said. She turned around to Skellen's port side again. “Let's just swim for it.”

  “If Boi's going down there could be serious suction down there. This is safer.”

  “Damn it, Errol-” but then a gunshot rang out and startled her into silence. The head of the creature farthest astern bucked hard to its left and the body dropped to the deck. More shots rang out, some louder than others. Within seconds all four remaining zombies were just dead bodies again, sprawled motionless on the deck. Anne looked around and finally up to see Jones standing on top of a container with a pistol in his hand. Seung Jin was standing next to him with a much longer weapon.

  “Captain Stimsky,” he said, “so good to see you alive.”

  “Likewise,” Errol said, already running for the ladder. Anne followed behind him.

  “Are there any of those things north of Skellen?” she asked.

  “No. My security force has kept them contained. I wouldn't be here myself if your Mr. Jones had not insisted on coming to find you. I didn't like his odds alone so I joined him.”

  “Much obliged,” Jones said.

  Errol reached the ladder and started climbing, continuing to talk as he did so. “You need to cut Skellen loose. Boi's going down and there's no telling how many of those things are aboard this ship.”

  Seung nodded. “I was just thinking the same thing myself.” He glanced around the giant bulker. “It's a shame. Good loading equipment on this ship.”

  As soon as Anne and Errol had reached the top of the ladder, the four of them hurried back across the path to the next ship in line, a container carrier called Widmung. Seung snatched a walkie-talkie from his hip and issued a few short commands in Korean. Anne heard movement below and looked down at the gap between the two ships. All along Widmung's port side were men and women with cutting tools. They set upon the steel cables lashing the ships together and soon there was a slight rocking as the last cuts were made. The bulker heaved appreciably to its own port side as it suddenly struggled to bear the weight of a collapsing container ship without thirteen other vessels backing it up. The four of them stood still, watching. Less than an hour had passed since the collision. Anne was dazed. It seemed like only a moment ago she was happily leaving the staff room on Koninklijke with a handful of fresh copies, but the nightmare ordeal after that seemed to have taken far longer than the short time elapsed. Now they all stood perfectly still watching three ships dying in slow motion. She felt a little dizzy and decided it was time to go home.

  Second Respite

  Reginald T. Stoneham, formerly a Chief Petty Officer aboard Her Majesty's Ship Illustrious, stared down at the wooden board between himself and Errol Stimsky. It was painted with a grid of black lines and half filled with black and white circular stones placed at the intersections. Reg examined one of the corners, bottom left from his perspective and saw a way to put some of the white stones in jeopardy. He picked up a black stone from a wooden bowl in front of him and placed it on one of the open spots.

  “Atari,” he said.

  Errol wasted no time drawing a white stone from his own bowl and placing it down next to the group. Reg looked at it for a moment and saw he could again put the white group in atari. He did so, and once again Errol quickly put down another white stone. They alternated like this for a dozen moves until Reg saw the flaw in his tactics. He was driving Errol's white stones toward another white group, and leaving a disastrous chain of cutting points behind him.

  “I'm not sure I understand this game, Captain.”

  “You're doing fine, really. Go is all about incremental learning. You master one small lesson at a time, usually by losing.” He placed a white stone down, putting two of Reg's stones in atari at the same time. “And it's just Errol.”

  The sun was out and so were many of the crew. After the harrowing experience at New Taiwan, Errol had declared everybody on light duty for a few days. Reg glanced around the deck where he and Errol were playing and saw people reading, painting, or just sunning themselves. One of these was Anne, stretched out on a towel in a red bathing suit. Reg enjoyed a long look and then returned his attention to the game.

  A little while later they heard an approaching outboard motor, but this was a common occurrence lately so they didn't pay it any special attention. They did glance up when Dr. Hayes hauled himself up the ladder and over the rail, a bulky pack hanging from his shoulders. He walked over to where the board was sitting.


  “Oh, Errol's got you trying this out, eh? Never could get the hang of it, myself.”

  Reg saw Errol smiling and wondered if there was some sort of private joke between them. “I'm not so sure I will either but the Cap- I mean Errol - says I'm doing fine.”

  Hayes clapped Errol on the shoulder. “Say, guess who I treated today?”

  “Davy Jones,” Errol said, his attention focused on the board.

  “Nope. Zeke. Somebody fished him out of the water the day of the collision.”

  Reg grinned broadly. He liked the jovial New Zealander and was a bit depressed when Anne told him about the accident on Boi do Mar. He was sure the man had been killed. “That's smashing news!”

  “Yep, broken wrist and a twisted ankle. Amazing.”

  Errol finally looked up from the game. “That is good news. He's a good guy.” He stood up and looked out at the water. There were ships and boats all around the Folly, all headed roughly the same direction. After the collision, the people of New Taiwan decided hanging around all stuck together was too dangerous. The island disbanded and many of the people turned to the Folly for guidance. Reg wasn't sure how Errol was handling that. From the look on his captain's face he could tell there was no small amount of anxiety over the responsibility.

  “Any idea where we're going yet, Captain?” he asked.

  Errol looked around the fleet for a few more seconds. “Not a clue.”

  Part 3

  The Fleet, The Reef

  Chapter 19

  Errol sat in the Folly's galley, transfixed. One of the computers from the former administrative offices of New Taiwan sat before him on the table. Since most of the craft that had composed the island were now moving together, the remnants of the planning committee had a rather large logistical project to maintain. They turned to Errol and his former expertise in data modeling to help them surmount the problem. The most powerful computer they had available was transferred to the Folly. It had been a long time since he had gotten to do any software design, and he found that he missed it terribly. Sitting at the keyboard watching lines of code unfold felt like coming home. It had taken up most of his focus for the last few weeks, as he alternately upgraded the model and then ran off new projections and recommendations for the committee.