Hopeless Doom

Chapter 13 Salt and the Shadow

Eleanor Gable dipped a strip of torn silk into three ounces of seawater. She wrung it out, watching the drops vanish into the parched grain of the teak deck. With the precision of a clockmaker, she dragged the wet cloth across the orange leather of her handbag.

Janice sat nearby, her spine pressed against the blistering steel railing. She watched the salt grind into the pores of the Birkin. She’s cracked, Janice thought. We’re all dying of thirst, and she’s trying to exfoliate a three-thousand-dollar relic.

“You’re killing the leather, Eleanor,” Janice said. Her voice was a dry rattle.

“It’s Hermes,” Eleanor muttered, eyes fixed on her work. “The dye is sealed. It can handle a little humidity.”

“That’s not humidity. That’s the ocean. It’s eating the finish.”

“My housekeeper has a lanolin base for this,” Eleanor said. Her tone was light, airy—as if they were in a Manhattan penthouse instead of a drifting coffin. “I need to find her. She keeps the polish in the lower cabin.”

“Your housekeeper is in steerage, Eleanor. She’s currently shitting her guts out with dysentery.”

“She knows I like the circular motions,” Eleanor whispered, dipping the rag again.

Fifty yards away, the shadow of Lifeboat Station Four was a packed, sweating sanctuary. Thirty people were jammed into a sliver of shade meant for ten—a tangle of raw limbs and sour breath.

A man in a blue polo shirt shoved through the mass, dragging a woman by the wrist. He stepped over a pair of legs, his work boot coming down hard on someone’s knuckles.

“Watch it!” the victim hissed, jerking his hand back.

“Move over,” the man in the polo barked. He shoved his knee into the other man’s ribs. “My wife needs the shade. Get up.”

“I’ve been here since five a.m. Find your own hole.”

“I paid for a premium suite, you prick. I’m not roasting out here with the help.”

The sitting man didn't argue. He reached out, grabbed the man’s ankle, and pulled.

The man in the polo hit the deck hard. He scrambled up, his face turning a bruised purple. He grabbed the other man’s collar and landed a punch that sounded like a dry branch snapping. Blood sprayed the white teak.

Sarah heard the c***k from thirty feet away. She didn't think; she grabbed her tote and ran.

“Move! Get back!” Sarah shoved through the crowd and dropped to her knees in the blood.

The man in the polo wasn't finished. He c****d his leg for a kick at the injured man’s head. “I told you to move!”

Sarah stood up, stepping directly into his path. “That’s enough!”

The man glared at her. His lips were peeling, strips of dead skin hanging like gray confetti. “He took my space, Doc. Get out of the way.”

“It’s a shadow, not a deed,” Sarah said. “Back off.”

“Move. Before I move you.”

The man lunged, shoving Sarah in the chest. Her soles slipped on the fresh blood. She went down, the back of her head hitting the deck with a dull, hollow thud. Her bag spilled—iodine, bandages, and useless paperwork scattering into the grime.

Before the man could take another step, Matt was there.

Matt didn't waste time on a warning. He caught the man by the throat and the belt, launching him forward. The passenger slammed into the steel bulkhead, the air leaving his lungs in a ragged wheeze.

Matt pinned him there, a forearm crushed against the man’s windpipe. He pulled the heavy iron Maglite from his hip and rested the cold bezel against the man’s temple.

“Pick up the bag,” Matt whispered. The quiet was more terrifying than a scream.

The man clawed at the steel, gasping for air.

“Pick. It. Up.”

Matt stepped back. The man slumped to the deck, shivering. He crawled on all fours, frantically gathering the iodine and gauze, his fingers shaking as he set the bag at Sarah’s feet.

Matt looked at the crowd. No one made eye contact. They just stared at the iron bar in his hand.

Sarah sat up, rubbing the knot on the back of her head. No blood, just a heavy pulse thumping against her skull. She ignored Matt’s hand and pulled herself up using the railing.

“You okay?” Matt asked.

“I’m fine.” Sarah slung her bag over her shoulder. Her eyes were stones.

“I can toss him in the brig,” Matt offered, jerking a thumb at the man now scuttling toward the stairs.

“There’s no air in the brig, Matt. He’d be cooked in six hours.” Sarah looked at the crowd in the shadow—those desperate, hollowed-out eyes. “He shoved me because he’s scared. They’re all scared. You start locking people up for being terrified, you’re going to run out of handcuffs.”

“Nathan wants discipline, Sarah. He wants them to see the uniform.”

“The uniform is a rag, Matt. It doesn’t bring the temperature down.”

Matt didn't have an answer. He watched her walk away, his grip still white on the flashlight.

Back at the railing, Eleanor Gable was still rubbing. The orange leather was ruined—stiff, salt-stained, and cracked. But she kept the circular motions going, eyes fixed on the horizon, waiting for a housekeeper who was never coming back, in a world that was already gone.

Jerome Toby stood before the key cabinet, his hand hovering over the master ring. He only thought about the peach syrup—the way that sugar would hit his blood.

He climbed the stairs, eyes fixed on the carpet. He couldn't look at the passengers. Their eyes were too wide, too wet, full of questions he couldn't answer.

When he reached the Oak Room, Brian was there, clutching a table leg. He didn't ask questions. He just stepped back and let the traitor in.

Jeffrey was eating. A silver fork, a porcelain bowl, and a thick slice of peach sitting in golden syrup. Byron Fox stood in the corner, a silent wall of muscle.

Jerome dropped the keys on the mahogany table. Clang. The sound of the ship’s last defenses hitting the floor.

“Lower dry store,” Jerome rasped. He couldn't stop staring at the bowl.

“Everything?” Jeffrey asked, his voice level.

“The gate. The deadbolts. Nathan’s still on the bridge playing the hero. He doesn't have a clue.”

Jeffrey wiped his mouth with a linen napkin. He moved with the calm of a man who had already seen the end of the world. He tossed the master ring to Brian. “Take Byron. Get the meat. Leave the rice—we aren't wasting water to boil it.”

“What about Matt?” Brian asked. “He’s on the promenade.”

“If he gets in the way, break his knee,” Jeffrey said, stabbing another peach. “He can’t patrol if he can’t walk.”

Jerome’s stomach gave a violent, twisting cramp. Jeffrey saw the look and pushed the empty tin toward him. Two slices were left, drowning in syrup.

“Eat,” Jeffrey said. It wasn't an invitation; it was a transaction.

Jerome didn't use a fork. He grabbed the can with shaking hands and drank.

Sarah tore a strip of duct tape with her teeth. She jammed it against the doorframe, her thumb smoothing the adhesive until it bit into the wood.

“Pull it tight, Alice,” Sarah commanded.

Alice Stevenson pulled the heavy painter’s plastic taut—a clear, crinkling wall between the living and the doomed. On the other side, a man sat with his head on his knees. His cough was deep—a wet, drowning gurgle. A string of mucus hit the carpet.

“He needs water, Sarah,” Alice whispered.

“He drinks, he pukes. He pukes, he loses more than he kept,” Sarah said, reaching for a marker. “The vents are next.”

“It’ll be a hundred degrees in there by noon.”

“Then they’ll be hot. But they won't be breathing their sickness into Deck Six.” Sarah stood up, her back a map of pain. “Dysentery lives on the floor. This thing? It’s in the air, Alice. It’s looking for a new home.”

A woman pressed her gray palms against the plastic from the inside. She tried to scream, but it turned into a hacking fit that left sweaty smears on the barrier.

Sarah grabbed the marker and drew a massive, jagged X on the wall. “Nobody goes in. If some i***t slips under the tape to find their family, they stay there. You don’t ask them to come out. You tell them they’re already dead.”

“I’m a nurse, Sarah. Not a jailer.”

“Right now, there isn't a difference.” Sarah capped the marker. “Fear is the only medicine I have left that works.”

The purser’s station was a tomb. Captain Nathan pushed the door open, the beam of Matt’s Maglite slicing through the dark.

The brass hook for ‘Lower Provision’ was empty.

Nelson let out a sound that was half-laugh, half-sob. “Jerome. He was on shift three hours ago.”

“He sold us out for a snack,” Matt muttered, his grip tightening on the iron flashlight.

Nathan didn't yell. He didn't even look surprised. He walked to the back of the office, toward a steel cabinet painted emergency orange. The digital keypad was a dead eye.

“Lock’s fried,” Matt said.

“I don’t care about the lock,” Nathan said. “Take the hinges.”

Matt stepped up. He swung the Maglite like a sledgehammer. Smash. The keypad shattered into black plastic teeth. He swung again, denting the steel, then jammed the handle into the gap and wrenched. The door groaned and popped.

Nathan reached in and pulled out a red flare g*n. He cracked the barrel. A twelve-gauge magnesium shell sat there, waiting to burn. He handed it to Nelson.

Nelson’s hands were trembling. “Nathan... this is for distress signals.”

“It fires at two thousand degrees,” Nathan said, reaching for a fire axe. “It won't stop a crowd, but it’ll stop a man. It’ll turn him into a candle.”

He handed the yellow-handled axe to Matt. The weight of the steel pulled at Matt’s shoulder—a physical reminder of what they were becoming. Nathan grabbed a second flare g*n for himself and stuffed two extra shells into his pocket.

“We aren't going to the Oak Room,” Nathan said. His voice was cold, stripped of any captain's warmth. “We secure the bridge. We secure the water. If anyone crosses the line, you don't issue a warning. You end it.”

“You’re arming us against the passengers,” Nelson whispered.

“There are no passengers,” Nathan said, looking at the axe in Matt’s hand. “Just survivors and targets. Let’s move.”