Mad Ship by C. C. MacApp

Author:C. C. MacApp
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Worlds of IF
Published: 1969-05-05T16:00:00+00:00

* * *

Pry complied, and found what Tomsun wanted him to see.

There'd been people, all right; He hovered, staring down and puzzling thing out. There was chopped firewood, and the ancient remains of many fires. So that was what had happened to most of the trees.

He realized suddenly that these folk must have kept a vigil here, on the highest deck they could reach, during a long perpetual night. Had they stared up at his own half of the sinus, where there was still sometimes light?

They must have been near starvation at the last; all of the fifty or more corpses were horribly emaciated—mere skin draped over bones.

But they hadn't all died of starvation. Moving slowly, directing his beam about, Pry gradually built up the story. Many had died in a single way—by having their skulls split open with an axe. Blood had long since turned to a solid dark stuff. He found the axe that had done it, and the wielder.

Angry horror formed within him. Had the man been insane? Had he obeyed some raving of Captain Gerlik? Or... had he turned to cannibalism?

No, there was no sign of that. The killer had apparently completed his work, then leaned the axe against a stump and lain down nearby.

Then Pry saw the knife in the corpse's chest, with the fingers of the right hand still clenched around the hilt. Finally he saw the bit of paper clutched in the shrunken spidery fingers of the left hand.

So they'd all been dying, and one—with enough vigor left—had gone around finishing them off quickly, then killed himself. They must have consented; there was no sign of struggle.

An awful thing. But at least they hadn't descended to cannibalism. Pry choked on emotion. He ought, he knew, to go down and try to work that scrap of paper free from the dead hand to read the last message. But he couldn't bring himself to it—not now. If things turned out right, he might do it on the way home; or someone else would do it later.

Slowly, in a carefully-controlled voice, he described the scene to Ben Tomsun, who'd never had a complete description before. When he was finished, Ben Tomsun answered as slowly. "It's about as I'd thought. And it would have been so easy to rescue them, if we hadn't been prevented! So easy!" There was a pause. "Well, you'd better hurry on. You have to go down five more decks, then out to the sinus wall. Be very watchful—keep turning your beam in all directions. If anything moves, get away from it fast!"

Pry nodded, more than willing to obey that advice.

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