Deathlands 118: Blood Red Tide Read Online Free PDF Page A

watch came up and the ceaseless work continued. “Follow me. You mess with us. Word is the last hunting party brought back a barrel or two of bush meat. Enjoy it. We lost a lot of stores in the battle when the hull was pierced. Boiler and Skillet are both in the med. We’ll be on hard rations and badly cooked at that when we sail.” Hardstone limped for the hatch. Ryan stopped beneath Doc. Earlier Doc had been mumbling to his wife and children hundreds of years gone. Now Doc moaned, pleading to a baron only he could see.
    Ryan flinched. Doc was spiraling down into the cellar of the horrors he had experienced. “Doc, you have to listen to me. You’re going to die up in those ropes unless you get it together.”
    Some rational section of Doc’s unraveling mind sobbed in response. “Oh to be so blessed...”
    Ryan could sense the nearby crew listening in. Doc’s utter loyalty to his friends often shored up his sanity. “Doc, we’re in a hard place and it’s getting harder. I need you. We all need you.” Ryan grasped at Doc’s words and his talents. “You said it yourself. This is a square-rigged ship. A thing from your time. You know about these things. Find something. Anything! Anything that could make you useful and get you cut down so we can get you to Mildred.”
    “Mildred...”
    “Doc.” Ryan put the iron of command in his voice. “You and I are friends. Now we’re watch mates. You die on my watch, and Krysty will never forgive me.”
    “Krysty...”
    “Loves you,” Ryan snarled. “Now you got to get yourself together, get yourself down out of those shrouds and make yourself useful! Tell me you hear me!”
    A barely sane whisper responded. “Ryan...”
    “Doc, you heard me. I know you heard me. Tell me you...” Ryan’s shoulders sagged in defeat as Doc’s chin had dropped to his chest and the evening breeze stirred the rivulet of drool hanging from his chin.
    Manrape cooed. “Mr. Ryan, are you talking to a man under ship’s punishment?”
    Ryan spun. Manrape lunged. Ryan was three steps too slow from exhaustion and still holding his bedding. He started to drop the bundle and go for the knife and marlinspike, but Manrape’s rope end slammed into his chest. Ryan fell back onto the deck. The tactical part of his mind noted that one end of Manrape’s double-ended rope was loaded. He gasped like a fish and tried to breathe.
    Manrape knelt and put a knee on Ryan’s chest. The blond titan held his rope end between his legs and dangled the knot over Ryan’s face in horrible metaphor. “You haven’t been proved otherwise, so I can’t kill you. But know this. You are unsigned. You do not know the creed. You are not protected by the code. You’re lucky because we need every hand able or otherwise and for the good of the ship, so I’ll not put you in the med. This time. Now go mess with your mates.”
    Manrape rose and walked away whistling. Chilling rage boiled behind Ryan’s eye and the red mist clouded his vision as he reeled to his feet. Hardstone stepped between them and gathered up Ryan’s meager belongings. A sailor Ryan had heard called Atlast hurried to his side. Atlast was the ship’s master of sails and spars. He was a head shorter than Ryan and Hardstone, but his shoulders were just as broad, his legs bowed like a horseman and what could only be described as a whiteman’s Afro was pulled back and barely restrained by a short pigtail.
    “Listen, Ryan. We need the likes of you aboard this ship, then, don’t we? Best you go easy like around the bos’n.”
    “Go easy.” Despite his rage, he knew Hardstone and Atlast were looking out for him. “Around Manrape?”
    “Don’t rock the bloody boat, then. You’ve felt the thunderbolt.”
    “The rope,” Ryan muttered.
    “Yeah, well, Manrape’s rope end has two ends, doesn’t it? One’s a regular rope end knot, the other’s a monkey’s paw he’s woven in, and that paw holds four good grams of lead shot. One end’s for