Death by Water

by Alessandro Manzetti

  “This will do just fine,” William said, arriving at the sweet spot.

  “Would you like me to remove your shoes and socks, William?” Ori motioned to the old man’s feet.

  “No, no, that won’t be necessary today, Ori. I just want to watch for a while.”

  “Of course, William. You are suitably protected from the sun”—the android raised a hand toward the cloud-strewn sky—“and your temperature is currently thirty-seven-point-two degrees— ”

  “Can I just watch the ocean in peace, Ori?”

  Ori nodded, bowed slightly, and took a step back, away from the surf. “Of course, William. Please tell me when you next wish for me to speak.”

  And so they stood for a while, the Atlantic stretching out before them for hundreds of miles. Gulls swooped and soared and, off in the distance, a cruiser shifted slowly across the horizon, off to somewhere exotic, its cargo thousands of affluent passengers whose only goal was to see as much of the world as possible before the sun blinked out of existence or they died, whichever came first.

  “It’s beautiful, isn’t it?” William said.

  Nothing.

  William turned to find Ori staring unblinkingly out toward the cruiser, a slight pre-programmed smile playing about his features.

  “It wasn’t rhetorical, Ori,” William said.

  Ori snapped out of it, perhaps satisfied he had been given permission to speak again. “Yes, William, it is quite beautiful.”

  It was time. William knew it was time, and there would be no better occasion, for this was, he surmised, his final journey to the ocean. “Ori, I have an order for you.”

  “An order, William?”

  “Well, let’s call it a favour. Is that better?”

  “As you wish, William.”

  William turned his attention back to the ocean, to the gulls in the sky and the boat on the horizon, and everything in between. “I wish to be buried at sea, Ori. I want to exist out there forever, not in some wooden box any curious or recalcitrant kid could dig up, if the fancy took it.”

  “Hopefully, you are speaking of something which will not happen for many years yet, William.” When William turned to chastise his PCA, he saw something like genuine love within Ori’s piercing blue eyes.

  “It will be soon, Ori. You know that as well as I do, and we must prepare for the day, for time is quickly running out. We are down to the last grains of sand in an hourglass; is it not best to be organised for when the hourglass falls empty?”

  “It is, William,” Ori said. “And I have already updated your digital will and testament so that, when it does happen—many years from now—those lawyers who access it shall know precisely what your wishes are.”

  William turned to face the sea again. “Thank you, Ori.”

  “You’re welcome, William.”

  The cruiser continued inexorably toward hotter climes in the distance and the gulls squabbled in the sky over morsels of food in beaks too small to see.

  William smiled a little, but it soon became a grimace as a twinge in his chest reminded him—how very noble of it—of his own impending mortality.

  THREE

  When they arrived back in the city, William was pleased to discover Vox had prepared a lunch of soup and crusted bread. The ocean always made him hungry; perhaps it was the salt lingering in the air, the scent of battered fish being cooked in kiosks across the seafront. Whatever it was, William was glad of the soup and bread, which he took in his large, oval dining room.

  “Will there be anything else, William?” the cook asked as she circled the table, rearranging cutlery next to placemats which had never been used. “Perhaps a glass of water?”

  William laughed. “Ha! I have seen enough water for one day, thank you. Perhaps a glass of wine? Something red and fruity?”

  “We have a vintage Dolcetto in the cellar, William,” said Vox, stopping at the door. “Would you have me bring it up?”

  “I would,” William said, dipping his bread in the minestrone. “I would indeed.” He pushed the salty bread into his mouth and chewed frantically.

  “As you wish, William.” Vox left, leaving William alone for the first time all day. Lord knew where Ori was—probably off in some corner of the mansion, running medical data updates on himself—but William was glad of the solitude and the silence which came with it. It had been an emotional day—at least for William, for Ori was not capable of true emotion, not the way, say, another human being was—and his desire to spend the rest of it alone, without the persistent wittering of his PCA, had never been stronger.

  Once he was sure Vox would be well on her way to the wine cellar, William took the letter he had received from BioTech from his suit pocket and, after reading it one final time—those bastards! Those bastards would be nothing without me!—he produced the box of matches usually reserved for lighting his pipe and drew the large, glass ashtray toward him.

  He would burn it. He would burn it, and that would be that, for he knew no amount of supplication would change their minds.

  And William Schaeffer had never beseeched anyone in all his years; he wasn’t about to start doing so now, as his life drew to a close.

  He pushed his soup bowl aside, dusted breadcrumbs from the table, and set the letter down so that he had free hands to liberate a match from its box. He gave the box a shake and the drawer flew open a little too violently, spilling matches all across the dining table and carpet.

  “Dammit!”

  He didn’t have time to pick them all up now; would have Vox do it upon her return from the wine cellar. He took one up from the table and struck it against the box.

  It lit on the first attempt. Posthaste, he picked up the letter and held the match to its corner, the corner signed by that condescending prick, Arthur Levine, CEO. With a bit of luck the paper would act as some sort of rudimentary voodoo doll, and, somewhere in his multi-billion credit penthouse, Levine would burst into flames.

  The thought brought a smile to William’s face and he held the match a little closer, browning the corner of the page but not lighting it straight away.

  And then it happened. The pain in his chest returned, worse than it had ever been before. It was as if someone had bound his heart with barbed wire and was now pulling it tight, piercing all four chambers at once.

  The lit match fell from between his thumb and forefinger and landed upon the table, thankfully now extinguished; the worst letter William had ever received fell from his other hand, floated down, down, down to the dining room carpet, swooping like the gulls from earlier that morning, the gulls with morsels of food in beaks too tiny to see.

  Sweat soaked William’s shirt, the seat of his trousers, as he threw himself back in his chair, willing the pain to leave his body as if he were some kind of agony exorcist.

  But this time the pain did not abate. It grew more intense, and all at once William knew, without a shadow of a doubt, that he had just been a guest at his own last supper. And now he would die alone—as it was always going to be—sitting at a dining table with matches all around him and the BioTech letter there for all to see.

  Through the pain which had turned his lips red with blood, he considered calling out for Ori. The SECPER had been his best friend, his confidant, and his primary carer for the past five years. Wouldn’t it be nice to see his beautiful, smooth face one last time before he passed on to pastures greener?

  He was still torn between hollering for Ori and simply allowing what will be to be when the decision was removed.

  Darkness swallowed him up as he toppled sideways from his chair, his last breath coming at some point between the chair and the dining room floor.

  Vox placed the Dolcetto upon the dining room table and crossed the room to where William lay, prone and not breathing. A quick scan told her all she needed to know; her master was dead.

  “William Schaeffer is deceased,” she said, without any trace of emotion. There was nothing she could do for the old man—nothing anyone could do fo
r him, really—but Vox knew Ori, as William’s PCA, was assigned to care posthumously for their creator, and so set off to find the android.

  Upon locating Ori in the library, where he was in the middle of an important update—cables protruding from the nape of his neck were plugged into a huge server—Vox said, “William Schaeffer is deceased,” in exactly the same manner she had said it a moment ago in the dining room. With almost infuriating indifference.

  Ori’s cataract eyes snapped open, the colour returning to them almost immediately. He stood, pulled the cables from the back of his neck, and turned to face Vox. “Please repeat.”

  “William Schaeffer is dead.”

  “Where is he, Vox?”

  “Dining room floor— ”

  Ori raced from the room so quickly, he didn’t hear Vox finish her sentence with:

  “—but he’s most definitely dead.”

  Ori sat with William for more than eight hours, both of them on the floor, William’s rapidly cooling head resting in Ori’s lap. Vox did not interrupt; Ori could hear her working away in the kitchen, clattering pots and pans, even though there was no longer anyone to appreciate her meals, or indeed anyone to tell her what to cook.

  Defunct.

  Obsolete.

  It was the prerogative of BioTech to recall those SECPERs whose masters no longer reside in the world of the living, and that is what would happen to Vox.

  To him.

  Broken down, perhaps, for spare parts. Assigned to another ailing BioTech employee who would be nowhere near as dear to Ori as William Schaeffer was. And the irony was, this was all BioTech’s fault. Ori had seen the letter, one corner burnt, sitting on the dining room table. He was certain that discourteous missive had brought forward William’s demise.

  “Why did you not tell me, William? Why did you not confide in me?” Ori said, running a hand across his former master’s face. The sensors in his fingertips sent a series of complex messages to his microprocessor; rigor mortis was beginning to set in. Soon, William Schaeffer would be stiff as a board, and about as full of life as one, too.

  We are down to the last grains of sand in an hourglass; is it not best to be organised for when the hourglass falls empty?

  Some of the last words William had spoken to him.

  I wish to be buried at sea, Ori. I want to exist out there forever…

  Ori knew what he must do, and that was honour William Schaeffer’s last wishes.

  It was quickly growing dark beyond the walls of the mansion.

  “As you wish, William,” Ori said. “As you wish.”

  FOUR

  Ori returned to the very same spot he and William had stood the day before. Only now it was dark—beyond dark—and gone was the scent of fish and chips and the squabbling gulls. Other than the hiss and whisper of the tide as it ebbed and flowed, Ori could hear nothing.

  In his arms, William Schaeffer felt as light as a feather. Wrapped in a bedsheet, beneath which he now wore his favourite suit, William was already beginning to smell. Perhaps not to human olfactory organs—it would be another twelve or so hours before humans would catch a whiff of death, by which time William would be gone—but to Ori, the stench was almost unbearable.

  “I brought you, William,” Ori said. “I brought you to your favourite place. The ocean…it will be yours forever.”

  But something didn’t seem quite right about that, for Ori was not ready to leave his master, his friend, his creator. Not now.

  Perhaps not ever.

  Before he knew what he was doing, Ori had taken one step forward, toward the foaming surf. And then another. And a third.

  The freezing water washed over his feet, filled his shoes, drenched his pure-white socks. And still forward he walked, to his knees, his waist, and for some reason he held William above the surface, as if its sudden chill might disconcert him. It was ridiculous, but years of service to this man, of putting William’s needs above everything and everyone else, meant that it would take an eternity to care about anything else.

  Not that he would ever have to care about anything else again.

  Stopping only to remove the sheet from William’s corpse, Ori watched as it floated away on the black Atlantic, a spectre made of only the best cotton, for William enjoyed his luxuries as much as the next man.

  Seawater buffeted Ori as he moved implacably on, but he wouldn’t drop William Schaeffer. He would never drop William Schaeffer, whose face and body were now entirely submerged.

  Somewhere back on the promenade, a fight was breaking out between rival gangs. Ori pitied them. He pitied them all, for they had never met William Schaeffer.

  But he had.

  One foot in front of the other, over and over again. Ori walked for two miles, his feet remaining stuck to the seabed due to his immense bodyweight caused by his mechanical innards. He sidestepped huge, hulking rocks, battled through fronds of seaweed and fields of coral, searching for the right place to stop.

  At two miles, his microprocessor hissed, gave out a single spark, and brought the AI synthetic to a halt. But Ori didn’t mind, for it had fried at the precise moment he had glanced down at his creator’s face.

  In the oceanic abyss they would exist forever, creator and creation, as it was always meant to be.

  Ori’s eyes clouded over for the final time, a smile spreading across his flawless face.

  We did it, William Schaeffer.

  We did it.

  Water does not resist. Water flows. When you plunge your hand into it, all you feel is a caress. Water is not a solid wall, it will not stop you. But water always goes where it wants to go, and nothing in the end can stand against it. Water is patient. Dripping water wears away a stone. Remember that, my child. Remember you are half water.

  If you can't go through an obstacle, go around it. Water does.

  — Margaret Atwood, The Penelopiad

  ABOUT THE EDITORS

  Alessandro Manzetti is a Bram Stoker Award®-winning author (and four-time finalist), editor, and translator of horror fiction and dark poetry whose work has been published extensively in Italian, including novels, short and long fiction, poetry, essays, and collections. English publications include his collections The Garden of Delight, The Massacre of the Mermaids, The Monster, the Bad and the Ugly (with Paolo Di Orazio) and the poetry collections No Mercy, Eden Underground (Bram Stoker Award winner 2015), Sacrificial Nights, and Venus Intervention (with Corrine de Winter). His stories and poems have appeared in Italian, USA, and UK magazines. He edited the 2016 Bram Stoker Award nominee anthology The Beauty of Death volume 1. He is currently serving as a member of the Board of Trustees of the Horror Writers Association, and lives in Trieste, Italy.

  Website: www.battiago.com

  Jodi Renée Lester is an editor and writer. She has worked with several authors and anthologists on award-winning projects, including Alessandro Manzetti (Stoker Award winner for superior achievement in a poetry collection, Eden Underground, 2015), Maria Alexander (Stoker Award winner for superior achievement in a first novel, Mr. Wicker, 2014), Deborah Khoshaba, Psy.D. (National Indie and Excellence Award in the personal growth category, Getting to Oz, 2014), and Lisa Morton (Black Quill Award winner for best dark fiction anthology and Stoker Award nominee for superior achievement in an anthology, Midnight Walk, 2009). She currently works as the English language editor for Independent Legions Publishing based in Italy. In 2016, her story “Just Watch Me Now” first appeared in The Lovecraft eZine, issue #37. Her stories “Casting Lots” and “The Guixi Sisters” appeared in the anthologies Songs of the Satyrs (2014) and Midnight Walk (2009), respectively. She earned her bachelor’s degree in biology at CSU Fullerton, studied creative writing with Dennis Etchison, and honed her editing skills with independent crime publisher UglyTown. She lives in the Lowcountry of South Carolina with her husband Mike, dog Ilona, and cats Mathias, Klaus, and Maggie.

  AUTHOR BIOS

  Michael Arnzen holds four Bram Stoker Awards and an International Horror
Guild Award for his disturbing (and often funny) fiction, poetry, and literary experiments. Actually born in Amityville, New York, Arnzen now haunts the zombielands of Pittsburgh, PA. He has been teaching as a professor of English in the MFA program in Writing Popular Fiction at Seton Hill University since 1999, which provided the basis for his instructional guide, Many Genres, One Craft. See what he’s up to now at gorelets.com.

  Michael Bailey is a multi-award-winning writer, editor, and book designer, and the recipient of over two dozen literary accolades, including the Bram Stoker Award, Benjamin Franklin Award, Eric Hoffer Book Award, International Book Award, and Independent Publisher Book Award. His nonlinear novels include Palindrome Hannah, Phoenix Rose, and Psychotropic Dragon, and he has published two short story and poetry collections, Scales and Petals and Inkblots and Blood Spots, as well as Enso, a children’s book. He has created anthologies such as Qualia Nous, The Library of the Dead, four volumes of Chiral Mad, You Human, and a series of illustrated books.

  Clive Barker is an English writer, film director, and visual artist. He is the recipient of World Fantasy, Bram Stoker, and International Horror Guild awards, and many others international prizes. Barker came to prominence in the mid-1980s with a series of short stories, the Books of Blood, which established him as a leading horror writer. He has since written many novels and other works, and his fiction has been adapted into films, notably the Hellraiser and Candyman series. He began writing horror early in his career, mostly in the form of short stories (collected in Books of Blood 1-6) and the Faustian novel The Damnation Game (1985). Later he moved toward modern-day fantasy and urban fantasy with horror elements in Weaveworld (1987), The Great and Secret Show (1989), the world-spanning Imajica (1991), and Sacrament. Among his works as a writer: The Hellbound Heart (1986), Cabal (1988), The Thief of Always (1992), Everville (1994), Coldheart Canyon (2001), Abarat (2002), Days of Magic, Nights of War (2004), Mister B. Gone (2007), Absolute Midnight (2011), and The Scarlet Gospels (2015). Website: www.clivebarker.info