All mirth left him as he poured vinegar over the wounds. His eyes squeezed shut. His teeth clenched tighter than a virgin’s legs. His free hand gripped the shower railing so hard that his knuckles bleached white.
But he was alive. He was clean. The copious amounts of aloe he applied to his face and body were already resurrecting his skin.
He had only his mind left to attend to.
It demanded revenge.
Maybe I’ll just take the boat, leave them here to rot. That’s much better than how they left me. Better than they deserve.
Maurice didn’t even know where here was. He certainly didn’t know how to pilot a yacht or navigate the high seas. The others could have been partying at some rich island estate owned by Doc Asshole or one of his asshole friends. Maybe they were only minutes away from a city or civilization. His idea might leave him worse off than they were.
He finished washing, dressing, and tending to his wounds, then searched the boat for weapons. In addition to his butcher knife, with which he had carved the best damn sashimi that side of Tokyo—the way southern side , he assumed—he grabbed a flare gun from the emergency kit and a gaff hook that looked like it could haul in Moby Dick.
He stared over the rail at the bow, scanning the shore and the lush palms beyond as he gobbled the rest of his apple. The fruit was a light snack to test the agreeability of his stomach. He wondered if he should pack some food but decided against it. If his plan was a success, he’d half plenty of time to come back and eat his fill. And if it was not successful, he figured he would have no need of food then.
He spotted one of the yacht’s lifeboats, its back end lolling in the shallows just waiting for the undertow to drag it away. He wondered how long it had been there, why it had been left forgotten. The more pressing questions concerned what its owners were up to and how Maurice could exact his revenge.
Planning had never been his forte. He knew he wanted to see Doc Asshole, Olivia, and the entire crew—except maybe Samuel —dead at his hands, but hadn’t the faintest idea on how to bring that about. The knife in his grip seemed a good start, but how was he going to stab one without the rest noticing? He could ambush them on the boat, but that would give him little room to maneuver unseen. He’d get one, maybe two, before the rest overcame him.
On land, he could sneak up behind them, take them out one by one, ninja-style. A ninja he was not, but the idea had a certain appeal to it. Regardless, his best odds of success seemed to be on solid ground.
He counted his fingers: one, two, three, four, five. Five! There was the captain, the two deckhands, Logan and Samuel, Doc Asshole, and his blushing bride. The doctor was the least threatening. Maurice grinned. He’d save him for last. Olivia was a hellcat, though. She scared him the most, even more so than the brawny captain.
You can do this , he told himself, trying to summon confidence. Why should they get to live when they left you to die?
His legs throbbed their agreement. His back and shoulders ached their hurrahs. His fever still hadn’t broken, but he knew the heat in his face had more to do with his festering anger than what ailed him.
He lowered the remaining lifeboat and tossed the gaff hook and knife inside it. He tucked the flare gun into his belt, climbed into the boat, and rowed to shore. The physical exertion punished already exhausted muscles. His body yearned for his cozy bed.
I’ll sleep when this is over.
Maurice had never been a violent man. He’d never been overly moral either. Still, nothing about his intentions seemed wrong. He bit into his lower lip, thinking black, delicious thoughts. His plan may not have been right, but it sure as hell felt righteous.
On the shore, he found tracks leading from the other lifeboat into the jungle. They were set in groups of three, side by side, too many to belong to just the crew. Unless they came and went more than once . It could have been the same group. The outer footprints in each threesome were made by bare feet, and those in the center were made by shoes scuffing the sand.
After pulling both lifeboats farther up the beach, he followed the tracks toward the trees. Just before sand yielded to thick underbrush, two sets of footprints veered off to the right in long strides. Maurice followed them twenty feet where they stopped abruptly. Spots of what looked like raspberry jam dotted the white sand. Tracks then veered into the jungle. Two narrow grooves were dug in the sand as if something, or someone , had been dragged.
He followed the tracks as far into the jungle as he could before he lost them. He was no tracker and trod carefully, guessing that the dangers of the jungle likely matched those of the sea. At least on land, feet firmly planted, he stood a fighting chance against anything thrown his way.
He scratched his head. What would possess Doc Asshole and his crew to leave the safety and comfort of the yacht for the wilds of an untamed land? Maurice would have to watch his step, but he was determined to pursue his revenge before the island could take it for him.
The smell suddenly made him forget all that. Like the blissful aroma of a Brazilian rotisserie, the scent of sizzling meat wafted toward him on a warm breeze. It revitalized his stomach’s longings. The apple had been nowhere near enough to abate his hunger. He swallowed the saliva pooling in his mouth. God, what I wouldn’t do for a taste of that .
Led by his nose, Maurice pressed farther into the jungle. The gaff hook hung loosely over his shoulder, its point jammed into a wine cork. His butcher knife, firmly in his grasp, pierced the air as he held it in front of him. Every now and then, he used it to bat away a fern or branch that blocked his path.
He knew he should be cautious, but his stomach would have none of it. If he died of snake venom or malaria or some other bullshit, at least he’d die after a satisfying meal.
A low moan, carried on thin wisps of smoke, made its way toward Maurice. It quickly crescendoed, becoming the mad howls of human suffering. Maurice stopped dead. The hairs rose on his neck. He held his breath. The screaming turned his blood to ice. He was sure a man was being tortured. Or skinned alive.
Or roasted .
His stomach gurgled and turned at the thought. The pool in his mouth went stagnant. Yet the smell of the meat remained savory and inviting.
At the sound of a dull thud, the screaming stopped. Run, moron! He knew he should, but his feet crept forward. The knife quivered in his hand. Smoke writhed in thick tendrils like a giant squid searching for Captain Nemo. It billowed over leaves, covered Maurice in haze, and burned his eyes. He nearly stepped into the clearing before he saw it, throwing his back against a tree at the edge of the open space before, he hoped, anyone could have seen him. He clutched the butcher knife to his chest.
Chancing a peek at the clearing, he saw nothing in the split second he allowed himself. He crouched low and looked again, spotting a crackling fire and two long, dark, cylindrical animals skewered over it. They were thick like boa constrictors, but not quite so evenly shaped.
Deer legs? No, not deer. Maurice covered his mouth. He looked away.
Human .
The rest of Samuel lay beside the pit. His legs had been removed a few inches above his knees, the stumps blackened, cauterized to stop the bleeding. Flies flew circles around the wounds and the spitted meat. Samuel’s eyes were closed. He wasn’t moving except for the faint rise and fall of his chest.
Christ, he’s still alive! Maurice bit his knuckle to hold back a scream. His first instinct was to help Samuel, and he acted on it before logic could hold him in check. The young deckhand had at least tossed Maurice a lifesaver, while the others just turned their backs like the cowards they were.
“The others,” he whispered, as he crawled hastily to Samuel’s side. The boy was unconscious, his arms tied behind his back. His hair was matted against his skull. He appeared to have been clubbed. His legs crackled and charred above them. Rivulets of blood boiled and bubbled and ran fiery trenches through ashen fields of flesh.
But where were the others? Did they do this to him for helping me?
Have they all gone mad? Maurice sawed through Samuel’s bonds, unable to take his eyes off his task for fear of stabbing the boy and taking off more parts than the poor kid had already lost. He hadn’t seen the others, hadn’t spotted who had done this to Samuel, not until he grabbed the deckhand under his arms and straightened to drag him away from his savory-smelling other half.
And saw the pointed tips of spears aimed at his face.
He dropped Samuel and slashed at the air, but the knife did nothing to slow his attackers’ approach. He ripped the flare gun from his belt, and the five dark-skinned islanders jumped back. One dropped his spear and ran. The others stood their ground, but their weapons trembled in their hands.
“So you recognize guns?” Maurice had acted without thinking, had no time to be afraid, but the flare gun had bought him some time to think. The island’s natives seemed terrified of it. Yet there were four spears to one flare gun and one knife. Maurice did not like his odds. Still, the fact that he didn’t yet feel sharp points stabbing into his back made him think there might not be many natives other than those who stood before him. White men with guns might have had something do with that.
The two men and two women stood mostly naked except for the women’s grass skirts and the men’s banana hammocks, which were held up with twigs. Necklaces circled their throats like chokers, with bones and teeth—human, dog, and others Maurice couldn’t identify—dangling from them. Each held a six-foot spear with a wooden shaft and a stone blade. They were hunters; Maurice could tell by the deft way in which they handled their weapons, but they were not successful ones if their emaciated frames told a story.
Or perhaps they had just run low on their preferred game.
Others stood behind them, well out of harm’s way. Two small children hung by their mother’s side as a babe nursed from her tit. An old man with a malformed arm glowered like a wild dog whose meal had been stolen from its snapping jaws. Seeing their teeth filed into points and Samuel’s legs roasting over the fire, Maurice didn’t have to guess whose company he kept: cannibals, and by the looks of them, the worst kind—hungry.
If he didn’t see them with his own eyes, Maurice might not have believed cannibals still existed in the civilized world. But he was far away from what he considered civilization and had recently drawn the conclusion that what he mistook for civilized society wasn’t truly civilized at all.
“Is that Maury?” a woman’s voice called from an animal pen at the other side of the clearing. “Help us, Maury! They’re cannibals!”
“No shit.”
Olivia stood behind a row of tall, wooden spikes thatched together to form a crude picket fence. Her clothes were tattered and revealing, and Maurice couldn’t help the movement in his pants when he thought of her glorious fake tits. Hardly the time for it , he chided himself, but he was just a man.
Behind Olivia, the remaining crew of the Wakemaster rose along with the good doctor. They appeared to have been roughed up a bit.
Tenderized .
Maurice considered his options. The right thing to do, he supposed, would be to try and save them. The smart thing to do would be to walk away, take the yacht and retreat far from the island, leaving the rest of them to their well-deserved fates. The idea curled up the corners of his mouth, even if revenge would not come at his hands. With four sharp spears between him and their freedom, Maurice figured walking away was the only chance any of them had of surviving.
One surviving was better than none.
As he stood deadlocked with four starving cannibals, his arm began to tire. But one of the hunters lowered his weapon first. He pointed a finger at Samuel, who lay at Maurice’s feet. Then he slowly brought his hand to his mouth and opened wide to stuff it full of air. He repeated the gesture, only this time he pointed at Maurice after he raised his hand to his lips.
Is he offering to share? Maurice’s gaze fell upon the fenced-in prisoners. Doc Asshole glared back at him, not pleading for forgiveness, not begging for help, but instead wearing that same smug asshole face that only pretentious, know-it-all smug assholes wear, beady eyes peering down a narrow asshole’s nose, mouth pressed asshole flat, and arms asshole-crossed as if his patience was dwindling and his entitlement to rescue had never been in question. Seeing that face, Maurice’s rage rose so quickly that it spawned a third option.
That mother fucker . Maurice seethed. He hadn’t survived two days at sea, having every hell visited upon him the ocean could muster, only to be ridiculed by a man certain to die unless he did something. Oh, I’ll do something all right, you piece of shit. I’ll fucking do something. Who says revenge is a dish that has to be served cold?
He lowered the flare gun, hands steady and deliberate as a surgeon’s, though his eyes twitched with just a hint of madness. He tucked the gun into his belt. The islanders raised their brows and cast quizzical looks at one another. Maurice made no sudden movements. He crouched beside Samuel.
“I’m sorry,” he whispered, though the words rang hollow. “It’s too late for you.” With a grimace of effort and concentration, he slid his knife into the boy’s muscular thigh and began to shear meat from bone. Samuel’s eyes burst open. His mouth contorted as if he were yawning. His fingers clawed deep grooves into the earth at his sides. A silent scream froze on his face as his eyelids fluttered, and he passed back out.
Maurice severed an eight-inch slab of human. He slid the gaff hook off his shoulder and speared the meat with it as if he were going fishing for leviathans. The curled point looked like a giant teriyaki beef skewer. He held it over the fire but not too close, patiently letting the meat cook evenly while the islanders watched with savage curiosity. Any fear seemed to have dissipated along with their murderous intent, as if the cooking muscle had a hypnotic power over them, lulling them into quiet hunger.
Minutes passed, with Maurice passing the hook between hands as one tired. “A fine cut,” he muttered. “Hardly any fat.” He let the blood rise to the surface before rotating it, browning the meat and searing the outermost edges to add a smoky flavor, leaving the center red and juicy. He licked his lips, unable to deny his own hunger and the fact that properly cooked human at least smelled delicious.
When Samuel’s thigh muscle had cooked to a fine medium rare, Maurice waved the gaff hook in the air to cool it. He handed the spear to the native closest to him, a woman with thick, coarse hair and devilishly black eyes set deep above pockmarked cheeks. “Careful. It’s hot.”
The woman didn’t take the gaff hook right away. She stepped back and shouted what sounded like laleo , then looked to her companions for guidance. The others grunted. She stepped forward like a wild animal, wanting the proffered treat but fearing the hand that held it out to her. She touched the hook, then recoiled, only to snatch the tool from Maurice’s grasp a moment later. As if immune to the heat, she grabbed the meat and tore it off. After sniffing it and turning it around in her hands, she bit off an enormous chunk.
The others watched in silence as she chewed. She grinned widely, then laughed with her mouth full. Chunks of meat hung like bats from a ceiling in the gaps between her teeth.
The other three islanders lowered their spears. Each took an impressive mouthful of Samuel’s thigh muscle in turn. When the last of the four had bit off more than he could chew, he passed the fist-sized leftovers to Maurice.
“I’m good.” Maurice didn’t take it. The islanders frowned. They gripped their spears a little tighter.
“Okay, okay.” Maurice took the meat, shocked by how quickly he’d folded. Did part of him actually want to try it? He let out a breath. I can do this. Before he could overthink it, he shoved the morsel into his mouth.
And smiled.
Warm blood ran down his throat, so naturally flavorful, no seasoning or marinating required. “It’s … it’s amazing!” he said with so much fervor that the islanders flinched. They all laughed after he did.
He kept chewing. By God, he wanted more!
The two children ran over
to him, apparently given the okay from their breast-feeding mother. He handed the rest of the meat to them. They tugged at it as if it were a wishbone, the little girl getting the larger chunk. She beamed with pride as she gnawed it ravenously. The little boy seemed content to nibble on the lesser half.
In the pen, Logan was hurling, and Maurice remembered that the deckhands were somehow related. Maurice shrugged. He knew he should be sick, too, but that part of him that saw and understood the wrong in his actions didn’t feel it. He had less ill will toward Samuel than he had for the rest, but the boy was as good as gone by the time he’d found him, the nearest hospital only God knew where.
The others were as good as gone, too. They just didn’t know it yet.
Or maybe they did. Olivia cried, loud sobs Maurice might have thought melodramatic had she less reason for drama. The captain huddled in a corner, hiding his face behind his hands. Doc Asshole remained defiant, smug asshole face firmly fixed.
Maurice chuckled. You’re next, asshole .
The huntress with the onyx orb eyes handed back the gaff hook. She had a wildness to her that no longer frightened him. In fact, he kind of liked it. She snapped her fingers and pointed at Samuel, who looked as pale as death. His eyes were open, but they were glazed over.
Lifeless.
Maurice felt nothing. He certainly didn’t feel responsible. He raised his hand to his mouth copying the gesture one of the males had made earlier. The huntress grunted and smiled. Maurice readied his knife, a chef once again.
They ate most of Samuel that afternoon. Maurice made steak tips out of the charred legs, flaying most of the charred skin for a few mangy dogs that lingered around the campsite. He paired Samuel’s ribs with roasted sago, pan-fried banana, and some kind of grub the islanders fussed over. He hesitated to eat the larvae, then laughed at the irony. There were other parts of Samuel—parts that even Maurice’s surprising indifference to human consumption wouldn’t permit him to eat—and they did not go wasted, the tribe picking them clean. All that was left of the boy was a pile of bones.
Wrathbone and Other Stories Page 12