The Blood Line Read Online Free PDF Page A

to come to a decision when his eyes came to rest on Bub. The other sailors quickly made a space around him.
    'We need to head over and see what's going on.' He brought a finger up to point at the most unpopular man on board. 'Bub, you can go.'
    It was only a matter of minutes before Bub found himself bobbing alongside the ghost ship, the USS Eldridge, in an inflatable boat with one of the other men. He was able to get a rope and grapple over the side of the ship and then he began to haul himself up. As soon his feet were out of the inflatable the other man sped off, back to the Furuseth, leaving only water below Bub as he climbed. Bub cursed him but eventually he reached the top and pulled himself over the edge to land on the deck.
    This was not going to go well. He rubbed his shoulders, tired from the slow climb up the rope. He stepped over the body of a man which looked as though some nightmare demon had shoved an arm up inside it and pulled the poor sod completely inside out. He was more a pile of gore in human shape than a body. Bub crouched down for a closer look. Fascinating, the body was indeed turned completely inside out but with no sign of any cuts or other damage. Blood ran away to the edge of the deck and down a gulley there. There was a lot of blood. Loads of it. Bub stood, watching it trickle away.
    'What do you see?' came the voice of Beeson on the loud-hailer.
    Bub just raised an arm and waved dismissively as he headed towards the door which would take him inside and to the lower decks. Let them wait. Dorie Miller, the hero of Pearl Harbour, would have just walked straight in without fear. Well, so would Bub. Distinguished devotion to duty, extraordinary courage and disregard for his own personal safety. He’d show them.
    He opened the door and descended steep metal steps into a dimly lit corridor, using legs hooked over the handrails to slide quickly to the bottom.
    The next body he found was missing everything above the waist. It was simply a pair of hips and legs, still clad in crisp white uniform, although heavily stained with blood. It was as though some giant pair of scissors had snipped the body in half, so neat and straight was the cut. But if the top half of the corpse was still around Bub couldn’t see it. In fact, he couldn’t see much of anything with so little light. What on earth had happened here? He heard a sound ahead and he crept along the metal corridor.
    The next man he found was still alive.
    His arm was trapped in the very wall of the ship. Otherwise he seemed to be unhurt although he stank of fear and vomit.
    'What happened?' said Bub.
    The trapped man shook, his eyes unfocused and febrile. He gibbered.
    'Wh...w…w...w...how…d…d…did…did we?'
    Bub ignored his ravings and inspected where the arm was stuck inside the wall. Interesting. It was as though the metal had melted and the man's arm had been pushed inside before the wall cooled. But there was no sign of any melted wall and the man's arm was not burnt. It was as though the ship had just formed itself around him. Ship and man had fused and become one when the ship had mysteriously appeared. What was this? Some kind of secret military experiment gone wrong? This was almost like magic. An entire ship suddenly appearing out of nowhere with a maimed, deformed and dead crew.
    The trapped man had a name badge. Bub ripped it off the man’s chest and was about to carry on investigating the ship when he felt something begin to change and shift. The air pressure began to build around him until it quickly became unbearable. It was as though the entire ship vibrated too fast to see. His head felt like it would crack like an egg. Bub fell to his knees, clutching his skull. Suddenly there was a bright blue flash making Bub flinch and close his eyes. When he opened them a split second later the man who had been trapped had disappeared as if he had never been there. Bub felt himself become weightless, disembodied but at the same time