"greetings from roNy 300MBUNiTED" "Captain." " Captain." " Ridley." "Ridley, have you seen any other survivors?" "No, sir." "Captain, my foot is caught in some of the wreckage." " It's pulling me under." " Hold on." "Ridley!" "Ridley." "Ridley." "No." "More blood, more blood, more blood." "Delirious from nearly drowning, I saw it." "The Black Freighter." "The hell-bound ship's black sails against the yellow Indies sky." "I knew again the stench of powder and men's brains and war." "More blood, more blood, more blood." "More blood, more blood, more blood." "The waves about me were scarlet  foaming, horribly warm in the Freighter's wake." "In despair, I offered my weathered soul to almighty God  his mercy and his judgment." "When I awoke, I found myself upon a dismal beachhead  with my men." "Pieces of my men." "It was all I could do for her  though she had borne me through seas of blood." "Her damp embrace had prevented me from drifting beyond reach." "Yet this small comfort was all I could offer." "One of my crew lay ahead." "Birds were eating his thoughts and memories." "Away." "Hya!" "Hya!" "Get away." "In hell, at least the gulls are contented." "For my part, I begged that they should take my eyes." "Thus sparing me future horrors." "I thought of my family  my wife, my daughters." "Vulnerable, unsuspecting." "Awaiting my return, only to be met by damnation  bearing down upon them." "Hey!" "Over here!" "Here!" "Ridley." "A sail." "Ridley had brought me a sail." "Perhaps this could be my route back to Davidstown." "Everything I loved, everything I lived for, depended on my reaching home  in advance of that terrible Freighter." "The morning sun found me no less troubled." "Further down the shore  some of my crew had become inflated with gas." "I shuddered at my own idea, attempting to banish this repulsive notion." "Even in death, they sought to fulfill their duty  making our vessel more buoyant." "And I would do my duty to them in returning them home." "Rudely jarring my men from eternal rest, and laying them in the bed I prepared  I hoped my wife and daughters might be tucked in by gentler hands  when their turn came." "We shall get home together, my friend." "I waited for the tide." "Then, embarking, headed east." "East, across the night seas." "East, borne on the bodies of murdered men." "Hope can be a horrible thing." "With the dawn came the gulls looking for breakfast." "Ridley." "Get out." "I was reminded that I, myself, had not eaten." "I know it is unappetizing, but it is all we have." "Whoever we are, wherever we reside, we exist on the whim of murderers." "I hardly recognized my old friend Ridley." "I could not bring myself to tell him he was a horrible reflection  of his former self." "I really must get him home before..." "Before he gets any worse." "Before he succumbs." "I've heard that on less than a pint daily, a man might survive drinking saltwater." "Captain?" "What are you doing, captain?" "I'm headed for Davidstown." "That's what." "I need to warn everyone." "You think you'll reach Davidstown in advance of the Black Freighter?" "Isolation has made you mad, captain." "Mad, indeed." "But we must try." "You are a fool." "You alone survived the Freighter's attack." "Fortune has smiled upon you, and you spit in its face." "Turn your wretched craft around and go far away, as far away as you can." "No." "No, my family." "I must protect them." "The Black Freighter is already there." "Your wife, dead." " Your children, dead." " Shut your mouth." "You have failed your family, like you have failed your crew." "You'll end up dead like them." "You give your life in vain." "I give my life in nobility." "Even if I fail in my attempt, I take solace in the fact that I will see my family again in heaven." "Heaven?" "Oh, there is no heaven, captain." "Believe me, sir." "I would know by now." "Huh?" "Know this, my friends." "Hades is wet." "Hades is lonely." "And in that instant, we knew each other." "I'm sorry, my friend." "My raft had grown increasingly grotesque  reflecting my own transformation." "Adrift, my darkest imaginings welled up unchecked  spilling from brain to heart like black ink  impossible to remove." "The vessel had surely reached Davidstown already." "I pictured quiet streets overrun by the fiends from the Black Freighter." "My wife, my children, most certainly dead." "My crew, dead." "The beast I ride on, dead." "More blood, more blood, more blood." "Father?" "It can't be." "Oh, Lord, it can't be." "Father, help us." "Please." "Wait." "I'm coming." "Hurry, my dear." "Wait." "Anyone but them." "Anyone." "Anyone." "I'd swallowed too much seawater." "I'd swallowed too much horror." "God has damned me." "God has damned us all." "Truly, life is hell and death's rough hand our only deliverance." "I can endure no more." "I want to join my family desperately." "Why does death pass me by?" "Davidstown?" "Davidstown." "I was only miles away." "By now the town was overrun." "The fiends imagined themselves safe from me." "But now I was home." "And revenge would be mine." "No, not the brigands from the Black Freighter." "The man I recognized, a moneylender from Davidstown." "With Davidstown certainly captured  why would this scoundrel and his wench be allowed free passage  for this midnight tryst?" "Had he collaborated?" "Had he betrayed my people?" " My family?" " Come and get it, babe." "Here." "My heart grew cold." "Was my wife comforted before her execution  while this collaborator and his pirate masters sneered?" "My decision was hurried, but not difficult." "Who are you?" "What?" "His head burst, as if pressurized by the guilt within." "A buccaneer's whore deserves no pity." "Two figures had ridden here." "Two must ride back." "A pirate sentry." "I trotted unhurriedly to avoid suspicion." "Their violation did not stop with the good people of Davidstown  but had cut deeply, infecting my beloved homeland." "My Davidstown was not as I last saw it." "Already it was afflicted with the curse of the Black Freighter." "Soon, I would venture amongst evil men, butchers who now reside in my home  and make them fear me." "Upon my return home, I found the streets conspicuously silent." "I entered my former residence noiselessly." "Careful not to rouse the pirate butchers occupying it from their debauched slumber." "Unaware that death was amongst them  they would know its dark embrace without ever understanding why." "One, however, was awake." "Frantic." "Lest he should raise alarms  I set upon him as he entered the night-wrapped chamber." "No pirates come, but something worse." "Father?" "I look up into faces familiar, save for their terror." "Through puffed and bloodied lips, she mouthed my name." "My love, why?" "There came an understanding so large  it left no room for sanity." "So I ran." "What's happened to her?" "You." "The knowledge of my damnation paced me  shouting, celebrating its awful victory." "My deduction was flawless." "The Black Freighter was heading to Davidstown." " It should have arrived." " He went that way!" "Eventually, I came to a dismal black ocean  stretching endlessly before me." "How had I reached this appalling position with love  only love, as my guide?" "The moneylender floated at my feet." "Noble intentions had led me to atrocity." "The righteous anger fueling my ingenious, awful scheme was but delusion." "Where was my error?" "Planning to resume my flight, I raised my head and saw her." "The vessel seemed to be waiting, not hovering to strike." "And gradually, I understood what innocent intent brought me to  and waded out beyond my depth." "The unspeakable truth loomed unavoidably before me  as I swam towards the anchored Freighter." "Its dark and lurching mast filled all my vision." "All my well-meaning plans had come to this." "The world I tried to save was lost beyond recall." "A rope snaked down." "Sputtering, I grabbed it." "And from the decks above, a cheer went up  both gross and black, its stench affronting heaven." "There had been no plan to capture Davidstown." "They'd come to wait until they could collect the only prize they valued." "Claim the only soul they truly wanted." "I was a horror." "Amongst horrors must I dwell."