15 comments/ 72988 views/ 6 favorites Red Sky By: Kaishaku * * * * * Click Here to listen. (7 min/mp3) * * * * * The stars had faded to the morning's red sky as I approached the house. I guess I should have paid more attention, heeded the warning glaring on the distant clouds, but no, I was too focused on my plan. I'd returned home from my journey two days early for this as if I was going to win some prize, yeah some hollow victory it would turn out to be. I didn't even notice the strange car in my driveway as I crossed the front lawn and quietly slipped inside the house. I tiptoed through the living room and down the hall hearing the sounds of heavy breathing with considerable groaning. From the hall I could see the clothes piled at the foot of the bed, two pairs of men's boots alongside my wife's black heels. Leaning against the wall to steady myself, I took a deep breath and considered what to do. This was where my plan kind of fell apart. I was so meticulous in arranging airline flights and a taxi ride home I didn't really think though what would happen when I walked in on it all. I guess I was really hoping she'd be home alone waiting for me. Instead it was much worse than I could have imagined... two men, I came home to find two men in bed with her. Slowly I crept closer to the bedroom, noticing the dark velvet bedspread tossed carelessly on the floor beside the clothing. I still couldn't see the bed, but from the sounds I heard I knew I had caught the group red handed. I considered barging in, picturing myself blindsiding at least one of the men, hopefully knocking him senseless enough to take care of the other. Wait, the closet... I could grab a tennis racket. Damn that would work, really mess both the guys up swinging that racket. But no, something else took hold of me. I had to know, had to know what she was doing, how she could do it. I had to see her, her face... I had to see if she enjoyed it, if it was like when she was with me or was it more. I silently stepped into the doorway and looked in. My wife was on her back with her legs spread wide as one man worked his cock in and out of her. His ass flexed with each thrust as his balls slapped down on her ass. I could see her breasts slosh up and down as her body recoiled and then returned to him in their rhythmic movement. All the while as she was getting thoroughly fucked, she worked her hands over the balls and shaft of the other guy as her cheeks sucked inward with the suction she applied to the head of his cock. She worked him like I'd never seen her do in our twenty years of marriage. Suddenly my attention was drawn back to the man fucking her as he moaned loudly crying out, "Oh yeah baby, here I come." He arched his back and shoved deep into her. I could see his balls tighten and loosen with each spurt into her. After a moment or two, he finished and moved over alongside her as his friend quickly slipped his cock from her mouth and moved between her legs. I watched his cock slip easily into her and then saw as he quickly picked up the rhythm, his ass flexing and his balls bouncing much like the first man. This time it was a bit different for my wife, no longer needing to concentrate on sucking a cock, she concentrated on getting fucked. Her body moved with him, her ass lifting from the bed as she met his every thrust with a shove of her wide open pussy onto his cock. The other man reached down and began diddling her clit as she moved fast and faster, moaning loudly. Finally she cried out, "Oh yes that's it, that's it." Her body went limp as the man continued crashing into her. After a few moments he moaned loudly and pushed hard into her and then collapsed on top of her. That was when my wife finally noticed me as she peeked between the two naked bodies. I started to move toward the bed but she pushed the man from on top of her and leapt up. "No Mike, don't," she shouted as she grabbed me, embracing me while pushing me back against the wall. "Please, please, let me explain," she continued as the men quickly grabbed their clothes and rushed out of the bedroom, the second one closing the door behind him. "Mike, Mike, you've got to understand, this meant nothing... they mean nothing to me." "Nothing, that didn't look like nothing, and two of them, what the hell?" "Don't you get it? That should show you it means nothing." "What should?" "That there were two. If it was just one man you might be jealous, I might have gotten attached, but with two it was just the sex. Don't you get it?" "You're saying..." "I'm saying I love you. Only you and the fact that I was with two guys should prove that to you." "You being with two guys means you love me?" "Yes, it means with them it was only sex, but with you, just you it is love. I'm sure you understand." "So you're saying that being with the two of them, doing all that..." "Yes, if it was just one man you might be jealous, but not two. I know you understand, I know you do, you're too much of a man not to." "But..." She held her fingers to my lips and said, "You do get it, I know you do. And look," she continued, reaching down and grasping me, "you're hard, you enjoyed watching me." "I, I..." Kneeling in front of me she said, "Shhh, shhh, let me show you what love is." She unzipped my pants, pulled out my cock and slipped her mouth over it. It was slow, so tender and loving as she sucked on me, teasing my balls while stroking my shaft. I leaned back against the sink as she continued gazing up at me with such deep devotion. After a few minutes she moved her mouth off of me, took my hand and led me into the bedroom. She undressed me and then, after I climbed into bed, she crawled up on top of me, took hold of my cock and guided it to her pussy. My cock slid easily into her wet opening as she lowered herself onto me. She leaned over and gently kissed my face all over as she moved her body, sliding her pussy up and down my cock. It was so slow, so loving and tender. Her hands moved over my chest and toyed with my nipples as she moved on me, squeezing herself inside, tightening her wet, soft pussy over me. It felt so good as I felt the pleasure build inside me and then as she took me so deep into her body I came, spurting my cum into her again and again. We spent the rest of the morning together in bed, gently kissing and caressing each other, reminding ourselves of what love really is. It was so beautifully satisfying that it was difficult to slip out of bed after she drifted off to sleep. Yes, she must have been tired. I quietly dressed in the dark. Even though it was almost noon it was dark as night with the storm outside. When I finished getting dressed, I stood at the bedroom door and looked at my wife, so beautifully naked in our bed. This is true love I thought to myself. What a wonderful thought, true love. Yes, it was such a beautiful thought I had to stop my car and look back. The red sky proclaimed my love as the house burned in the distance. Red Sky At Nicht A nautical romance of gender politics and the Flying Dutchman, as well as a short intermission in which the cast of characters perform a musical composition of their own devising. Having been some days in preparation, a splendid time is guaranteed for all. etc." I. ODD GIRLS AT SEA Getting laid while 3200 miles out at sea, especially somewhere in the icy dark of the Bering Sea, is no more challenging than getting laid at any other compass point on this crazy world, especially if you are on the right boat and part of the right crew. The MAMI WATA, a brawny maritime tug, happened to be such a boat and the three women and one young man that made her skip, tick and jump were such a crew. Cum, Southern Comfort and Diesel Dyke Juice being the three main ingredients that kept the old tub afloat, or at least that how the running joke went. Now, three days out from Sanak Island, young Guillaume asked the tug's captain, a certain Sidonie-Hélène Régnier, one of the many innocent questions that had been on his mind of late. "Ma'am," he began, his lisp slightly more pronounced in his post-coital fuck fog, watching his own 21 year-old cum dribble down the older woman's chin. "Why is it you enjoy cock so much and yet insist on calling yourself a lesbian? Wouldn't that make you more bisexual?" The boy had been eying a "That's Captain Dyke To You, Asshole!" bumper-sticker Sidonie had slapped up over her bunk years and years ago. To answer such a question one has to know that in 1992 the Queer Nation movement was just beginning to find its short-lived baby legs. The academic halls of Bernard College were still riven over the whole Femme/Butch dualistic schism. Andrea Dworkin and her ilk were doing their damnedest to dismantle 3rd Wave Feminism from within by redirecting focus away from equal pay and civil rights and instead drafting obscenity laws making all pornographic images a federal offense and defining all acts of penetration as rape. "Because it is 1992 and there are still a lot ignorant fools walking the face of this world making sure sisterhood isn't powerful after all. Seriously, when academics started taking books like Dworkin's Intercourse at face value, well, I looked at the writing on the wall and thought that it was a good time as any to haul scrap iron across the Bering Sea for the Canadian government," Sidonie smiles, licking her fingers clean. "As for what I call myself? Shit, baby, we're a long way from home and the sea doesn't care whose cock I suck or whose cunt I fist. When I is a titty-biddy Sidonie I always wanted to run away to sea and live in my own little gypsy boat. And here I am, doing just that. Of course, back then, I thought I is going to grow up to be Lindsay Wagner from The Bionic Woman TV show, too, but this life we have for ourselves ain't so bad now, is it?" Guillaume wasn't sure if his captain had actually answered his question but gender politics is a complicated issue on the best of days, not to mention a buzz-kill after a toe-curling orgasm, and since it was the fey young man's turn to make Sidonie cum he simply grinned and marveled at her flexibility as he pressed the older woman's ankles back, further and further over her shoulders, until they framed either side of her round face, her neatly trimmed cunt slowly opening like the Ark of the Covenant, something precious only gods and fools can stand before and not be consumed in divine fire. "Mmm, Isis," the other sighed softly between her lips. "Make me cum, boy. Make me cum." ... and he did, while, under them, one deck down, Tanisha lay on her back, finishing up tightening a giant bolt with an equally giant sprocket wrench. From a distance, people always thought Tanisha an attractive man. Two thousand years ago her shapely, solid, muscular body would have served her well in gladiatorial combat. One could imagine her standing in the Circus Maximus of ancient Rome, naked save for a plumed helmet, clit ring and notched ax, while the glorious elite thundered their applause. Now she stood, shaven bald, tattooed, her sassy brown eyes squinting as she tugged and struggled with the wrench. She had mastered tomboy chic at an early age and decided she liked engines and machines far more than boys and frilly dresses. Actually, Tanisha chuckled, machines are better than girls, too, since straddling a carbine at full throttle could always bring her to orgasm but it would never talk shit behind her back the next day. Whether or not the new crew member, Aizanne, shared in this sentiment was something to be seen. To her way of thinking, Tanisha was a bit of an enigma in more ways than just her appearance. Aizanne deduced early on that the captain had a weakness for beautiful young men, since the little effeminate twenty-something rarely left her cabin when he wasn't on duty. What got Tanisha's juices flowing, however, Aizanne did not know, but wanted to find out. She was damn sure that she wasn't about to spend two weeks below deck, working along side this Amazonian goddess on the diesel turbines of the MAMI WATA and not get any nookie sucking, finger fucking, muff-diving, double-headed dildo action. A girl is only human, after all. As Tanisha yanked the sprocket wrench away she pulled her tank top to one side, letting her left nipple pop out like a lone lighthouse on a cliff. At that moment, she caught Aizanne's gaze with an unspoken challenge, as if daring the initiate to look even closer. Then she rolled toward her, giving Aizanne a full view of both breasts as she clamored off the bench. "See anythin' ye loch?" she asked in her thick Berwick-upon-Tweed accent. Aizanne could not keep her eyes off Tanisha's muscular body and broad back. The ambient light softened her edges, turning a bald, curvy hooligan into something otherworldly and exotic. This would be a fun run across the Straits. She slowly nodded. Tanisha simply grabbed the other's hand and led her out from the engines to the locker room. Aizanne felt heat beat up between her legs at the strange woman's touch and was grateful when they were finally inside the small ship's head. Tanisha sat down on a metal Neiman Marcus chair and proceeded to strip off her tank top. She motioned for Aizanne to come in and do the same. Being the product of a nightmarish childhood in the Japanese port city of Fukuoka, after a many long years of hard living Aizanne finally found her calling and sanctuary in the heart of the sea. Under the filth and oil, the orange jacket, the Doc Martins and Polypropylene shirts and a pair of insulated coveralls, she might even be considered beautiful. Today, though, she was rude and filthy, a grease monkey in every sense of the term and there has yet to be an erotic story written for grease monkeys. Perhaps one day there will be. With a quick motion, Tanisha pulled off her overalls and boxer shorts while revealing a billowy mound of curly brown hair nestled between dark caramel legs. Tanisha grinned at Aizanne, still only half undressed, staring at the naked body before her, and began toying with the belted waistband of Aizanne's grease-covered coveralls. The night runs chill and lashes at the tug outside the tiny porthole but inside the shower was hot and steam crept into every muscle and joint of the two women. As Tanisha tugged at Aizanne's clothing, she slipped her hand down inside of the other's coveralls, under her the wet swelling mound and began to play with the thong fabric that defined the curves of Aizanne's plump cunt lips. Hot water ran over both of their bodies, washing away a lifetime of cheap beer, engine grime and pain, all with a sassy smile. Tanisha reached over and kissed Aizanne hard on her mouth. Soon her strong, muscular thighs strained as Aizanne licked her way down to her goddess-giver cunt. Golden skin on golden skin. Aizanne marveled at Tanisha's tattoos, sea maps to unknown lands. She even stopped to feast on Tanisha's right nipple and reach up to embrace her athletic frame. As Aizanne swirled Tanisha's thick pubic hair around her tongue she could easily sense the other's rapid readiness. The orgasm is divine, it is the prime directive of the living and everything that the dead long for. It is what the drowned remember fifty fathoms deep. The wind in the sails mimics our cumming cries. The waves yawp and break the way cum dashes itself from deep inside our souls -- always up and out and into the open. Sea spray. Sex spray. The sea is one storm-tossed orgasm after another. Slowly, the new woman shifted her position and edged down to the top of the amazon's clit, gently rubbing the rising knob. Tanisha let out a throaty ohhh as Aizanne's fingers parted her soaking lips and pushed into the warm, throbbing depths of her folds. In pleasure, as in pain, Tanisha made noises as the sea fowls do, screaming over the yawning gulf, until her orgasm collapsed in upon herself and the great shroud of pleasure rolled over her as it has rolled over all us for a million-million years. II. SEA FEVER It was Thursday and Guillaume, wearing a life vest and tool belt, jumped down into the darkness. He stood in a great cavernous hull listening: an oily, resonating sound mixes with the screaky, rusty steel grinding slowly away and the occasional slap-slap of a vast ocean moving over the barge's sides, only a few feet away. This was the bread and butter of the crew of the MAMI WATA; rusty piles of industry and girders ranged in corroded heaps, disappearing into the gloom. Scrap metal would always fetch a reasonable price wherever it was that they were going. On a normal run the MAMI WATA could easily pull the decrepit, 6000-ton tank barge. It might take two weeks but the tug was designed especially for that job. Except now, despite the protesting engines, the crew and their cargo at the other end of a 150 foot tow cable were losing speed, day after day. Guillaume reached a low point in the black hull and shown his flashlight down upon a small lake of sloshing brine, foul as rancid milk in a dish, lapping noisily against the side of the bulkhead. The young man was able to estimate, after staring for a moment as the water slushed back and forth, that just below the waterline there must rest a leak in the ancient seams of the barge's steel plates. If not corrected the barge would break apart, sinking to the depth and dragging the MAMI WATA with it. Guillaume stopped at the foot of the companionway and pulled himself up the rickety metal ladder, standing for a moment on the swaying deck. It was a typical summer day in the southern Straits; a healthy swell and a stiff icy breeze that arrived endlessly out from the southeast. He closed the hatch behind him and made his way forward. Up ahead the tug chugged steadily on, its pink-black clouds of exhaust rising from massive diesel turbine vents. Guillaume cinched and checked his body harness. There was not an ounce of machismo in his slender frame and yet, deep down, he relished the thrills of working on the open sea. This primitive method of crossing the gulf that separated the two vessels was such an example. He clipped his harness onto a heavy pair of eye-cleats and then climbed out, onto the swaying tow cable, a tiny speck hanging over the endless, black, crushing depths as the waves crest and crashed across the bow, only a foot or so beneath him. It reminded him of the old Tom Swift stories his mother once read to him, stories of future people simply shuttling between lighter-than-air vehicles hanging miles over the earth, all on guide ropes, as nonchalant and easy going as crossing a street. The only difference being that if a roller knocked him off his perch the rest of the tug's crew would have no way of saving him from being crushed by the rusty bulk of the barge. Still, he thought as he starts off toward the tug at the other end, this was exciting. On the opposite end of the metal cable Aizanne and Tanisha monitored the young man's progress from the stern. Aizanne had been hired on as chief engineer. She now wore the same soiled coveralls and nicotine stained fingers that were de rigueur for all nautical mechanics the world over. Tanisha was the acting first mate of the MAMI WATA. As far as Aizanne could figure out her new lover hailed from some backwater, red-neck hellhole, probably Carlisle or maybe Newcastle, populated by the type of people who always feel threatened by everything that symbolizes this particular Afro-Jamaican. "They didne ken whether tae caa me dyke ur faggot sae they called me baith until Ah was auld enaw tae stain up fur myself. 'en Ah showed them some 'Come tae Jesus' pay back." "A big pay back?" Tanisha was silent for a moment, then she picked up the other woman's hands and lightly kissed each fingertip. "Bairn, thaur was some stoatin' satisfaction tae be foond in breakin' aw th' teeth ay a snot-nosed rich college brat fa thought jist coz he had tois an' a half inches atween his legs he could dae whatever he wants. Let's jist say efter 'at Ah hud tae disappear sae Ah cam it haur." The two women watched as Guillaume pulled himself, inch by inch, toward them, the cable occasionally dipping down a few feet with ocean spray as a passing swell moves by. Tanisha smiled at the boy, showing something close to sisterly pride. "Swatch at th' life we've got. Nae bigots ur religioos fools tae be gettin' intae yer business. Jist 'ard wark an' 'ard feckin' an' a pay check when we pull intae dock. That's th' guid life, mah bairn, th' guid life." It was exactly for that same reasons that the effeminate young man had signed up to work on the MAMI WATA; a lifetime of abuse by the good folks in Topeka, Kansas, had taught Guillaume that the only use God-fearin' holy rollers had for delicate boys was to break them in the most sadistic ways possible. Those same good folks nearly had done just that until Sidonie chanced upon him and taken him on-board. That changed everything and it was from then on that the old tug began collecting her orphan crew of Amor Oscuro, as the Spanish poet Federico Garcia Lorca once called this particular flavor of love. The two women hurried forward to help Guillaume pull himself into the stern where the cable wound into the housing for the tow anchor. Guillaume explained what he saw and added: "It's a slow leak." He unfastened his harness and dropped to the deck. Tanisha was concerned, "Whit dae ye pure techt by 'slow'?" The young man ran a hand through his glorious mane of hair and thought for a second, "Maybe twenty gallons an hour? Maybe more?" Now it was Aizanne's turn to look concerned, "Where was it coming in from?" "Amidship, somewhere starboard down at the beam," Guillaume shrugged. "Just under the waterline. Maybe it's a problem." Tanisha laughed and slapped the boy on the shoulder. There was no sexual attraction between the two, which let Tanisha treat the young man as a friend, sometimes even as a kid brother, "Hear 'at, Aizanne, loove? Guillaume thought it micht be a problem." The smile fails to return to the other's eyes but it was clear to him that Aizanne was not angry at the bearer of bad news, rather her scowl was directed to the dark hulk that moved slowly behind them in their wake. She scanned the horizon for a moment, taking in the endless, empty heavens, before turning back to her comrades, "Good. I'll sleep better knowing that." Inside the tug's pilothouse, the captain, Sidonie, stared at the green glow cast by the GPS navigation equipment. At 48 she had been at sea for most of her adult life and it manifested itself in the crows feet at the corners of her eyes and the great swath of silver hair that cascades like a frozen waterfall, from the widow's peak at the top of her forehead, all the way to the shapely apple-curve of her ass. She sipped her coffee and glanced out across the wide stretch of infinite sea. A walkie-talkie by her elbow suddenly rattled to life. "Yes?" She listened to her first mate on the other end, Tanisha's accent mixed with the cry of wind. "Th' number nine oan th' starboard side's half flooded. Guillaume says it's a slaw leak jist under th' waterline, abit twintie gallons an hoor. We must've burst somethin' afair we left Sitka." Sidonie frowned. "Did we?" It was not a question, it wasn't even dry humor. Finally she said: "What do you think, Aizanne?" Aizanne's voice, suddenly half-consumed in white static, drifted away for a second and then came back strong. "If it started out at twenty an hour we'd be at the bottom of the Straits by right now, Ma'am. Still, whether it'll make Nova Scotia was still to be seen." Sidonie thought about it for a moment while Tanisha signed off in the curious manner the four of them developed, more to amuse themselves than anything else. "Red sky at nicht, sailor's delecht," Tanisha chuckled into the microphone. "Red sky at morning," echoed Sidonie, finishing the nursery rhyme, "Sailors take warning." III. INTERMISSION According to the Pirate Captain, in the yarn, The Pirates! in an Adventure with Scientists, the best thing about being a pirate are the sea shanties. This was just as true for the crew of the MAMI WATA as it was back in the old shiver-me-timber days of Black Bellamy. In fact, being such avid fans of shanties, when the tug docked in Liverpool, more often than not the quartet could be found down in the old Pog Mo Thoin Pub, enlivening the crowd with snatches of song and ribald descriptions of their daring-do. Tanisha, naturally, played the washboard and spoons while Aizanne was a pro on the upside down washtub with a broom handle, standing in for a dandy, upright bass. Guillaume, as the band's vocalist, naturally was drawn to the more macabre and gruesome tunes, hailing, as he was, from the Midwest. The Flying Dutchman, the legend of a 18th century ghost mar-of-war that can never make it around the Cape of Good Hope, doomed to sail the oceans forever, was one of his favorites. Sidonie was a master on the tenor saxophone and between the four of them they kept the shanties hoping all through the night. THE SCHEMING VICARS, for that was the band name they adopted, were popular enough to draw a steady crowd. Jazz-fusion shanties are hard to discover in their natural element, but when one does stumble upon one, it is well worth the effort. De vliegende Hollander. De vliegende Hollander. 'Twas on a dark and cheerless night to the south side of the Cape, from a bitter and cruel nor'wester we had just barely made our escape. Like a Bairn in her cradle, all hands lay fast asleep; and peacefully we sailed along, o'er the bosom of The Deep. De vliegende Hollander. De vliegende Hollander. Just then the watchman gave a fearful shout as if some dark shadow had just blotted the moon out. The sea all round us turned to blood and moonshine, and we saw the Flying Dutchman come a-bounding o'er the brine. De vliegende Hollander. De vliegende Hollander. Oi! our gallant crew, all hands to the rigging as the ghost ship passed o'er our lee. It takes a real bull-dagger to beat the Devil of the Sea. Pity poor Vanderdecken, forever is his doom; and the seas around our storm-tossed Cape remain his living tomb. He's doomed to sail forever and a day and never again shall his soul enter the sheltered cove at Halifax Bay. IV. THE CURSE OF THE FLYING DUTCHMAN All afternoon the MAMI WATA pulled its barge between the swells of the gray ocean and grim sky. At midnight it was Tanisha's watch at the wheel and as night crept over the sea and visibility diminished she periodically turned her head to check the GPS radar against their position. At exactly 12:34 in the morning she paused and stared. A frown crossed over her chiseled, androgynous features. The radar beeps a second time and her frown deepened. Reaching across to her walkie-talkie she spoke into the white static hiss. Red Sky At Nicht "Tanisha tae Sidonie." Waiting for a response Tanisha studied the neon-green radar display once more. Finally Sidonie's sleepy voice could be dimly heard with a pronounced, "yar?" "Sorry tae wake ye, Ma'am, but there's a large vessel abit twintie miles tae th' soothwest ay us. She seems tae be driftin'." There was another crackle of static as the captain of the ship thought this over. Then: "Right, I'm on my way up." In a few minutes the whole crew was assembled in the little pilothouse. Sidonie sat at her desk over the ship's log, working the radio. Nearby Aizanne, crouched over the radar, gazed at the display as the digital sweeping arm lit up at a bright green blip out in the middle of nowhere. "Ah hae bin watchin' it fur close tae an hoor an' it hasnae moved," Tanisha explained. "Ah cannae raise it oan th' radio either. Makes me hink it micht be in trooble." Sidonie shrugged, as if to say, we'll soon see. Then she spoke evenly into the microphone, " Merchant vessel, this is the tugboat MAMI WATA, whiskey tango foxtrot zero niner. Over." Only the quiet hiss of white noise came back from the speaker as the mysterious bright point flashed on the radar. "Merchant vessel, this is the tugboat MAMI WATA, whiskey tango foxtrot zero niner. Over." "Too deep to be anchored out here," Sidonie muttered. "Looks loch it's adrift," Tanisha pointed out. Guillaume spoke up, "Er, could she be a fishing boat?" Tanisha shook her head, "Tay big. She's mair freighter size." Sidonie sighed. "No, it's way out of the shipping lanes. What in the hell would a freighter be doing way up here, anyway? There's not a port for a thousand miles." Aizanne, doubtfully, offered: "Whaler, perhaps?" Sidonie raised the mic once more to her lips. "Merchant vessel, this is MAMI WATA. Please respond. Over." Again, only the quiet hiss of static could be heard. "Maybe we should call the Canadian Coastguard?" Aizanne asked. "Does Canada even have a Coast Guard?" "Of course, but let's not do it just yet. Steer to one eight five, Missus Tanisha. Let's check her out." The crew fell silent as the MAMI WATA cut a foamy break in the inky night water. Sidonie looked on as Tanisha piloted, Aizanne and Guillaume watching the phantom point flash closer on the radar. Finally Sidonie murmured, "Alright. Back it off." Tanisha throttled back. As the tug moved along, the halogen floods flared to life, sweeping a broad swath across the water. The four peered into the black void as they slowly inched forward and then, suddenly, alien and hideously out of place, a shadow loomed before them. Sidonie drew in her breath and ordered, "Slow, slow." Tanisha throttled down and let the boat drift as the shadow towered before them, filling the sky. It was a giant rusting bow, arching and disappearing into the darkness. Sidonie moved the searchlight about to reveal more ancient, rusting metal of a mammoth and dark superstructure. As they swung around, the name AEGIR could be seen painted in faded blue above the anchor alleys. "AEGIR?" Sidonie shrugged, the name could mean anything. She then fumbled for the mic, hit the exterior PA system, listened as it crackled to life. "Ahoy there, AEGIR." The crew gaped up at the wall of metal. There was a pause. They could hear to the slap-slap of water against metal but nothing else. The dead hulk remained impassive. Sidonie tried again, "Ahoy, AEGIR. This is civilian tugboat MAMI WATA. Is there anyone aboard?" Silence. Finally Sidonie turned around. She glanced at the other three faces illuminated by the halogen glare, as if to say "eh, at least we tried." She smiled. "Guillaume, come with me. You two girls, sit tight." It took a while but while Tanisha held the tug steady while Guillaume and Sidonie, dressed in heavy parkas, climbed a hydraulic deck crane up to the AEGIR, two pin-points of light suspended over the ever-moving ink of the nighttime water. Finally the captain of the MAMI WATA pulled herself up and jumped down onto the deck. Guillaume followed, close behind. The two tiny figures aimed their spotlights this way and that across the superstructure. All traces of paint had been rusted over, lending a still darker ominousness to the new world they were exploring. Moving across the forward deck Sidonie and Guillaume saw that, despite the ubiquitous corrosion, everything appeared to be in order. The decks were clear. There was no apparent fire damage. No indication of struggle or mutiny. A ghost ship lost in the middle of the night. Finally they happened upon at a hatchway leading into the belly of the beast. Guillaume glanced at his lover and shown his light down the darkened corridor. The two began to slowly descend, taking in the rusting floor after rusting floor, dumbfounded by the endless weather-warped teak wood that covered the walls and ceiling. As they approached a second flight of stairs Sidonie's walkie-talkie sparkled to life in a hiss of white noise and static. Tanisha's disembodied brogue came wobbling up to their ears: "Gab tae me, Ma'am." After a moment, Sidonie responded: "We're in a stairwell just under the main superstructure." As they climbed Sidonie whispered to the younger man: "This is definitely an old ship, maybe seventy? Maybe a hundred years old? Hard to tell." Ahead of them a wider passageway brought them into an open area, the galley. Their fingers of electric light probed this way and that, revealing sinks and counters and racks of old kitchen equipment, a few pots still hanging on the wall. Sidonie finally hailed her crew back on board the tug. "It's funny." "Whit was funay?" "Besides a little rust," Sidonie began, everything's--" and her voice suddenly cut off. Tanisha and Aizanne looked at each other in alarm. Only static from the other end. Tanisha, now urgently, "Whit jist happened, Sidonie?" But their captain did not reply. The two women listened to the meaningless noise, trying to fight down panic. "Sidonie?" Tanisha repeated. No answer. "Damnú air, Sidonie!" CHAPTER V: RED SKY AT NIGHT It was dark and the radio gargled. Lights flashed on what was once an elegant interior promenade at the heart of the ship. Sidonie and Guillaume marveled at the ornate opulence, tables and chairs in place near a large dance floor and orchestra pit, as well as a magnificent crystal chandelier slowly swaying with the moving waves. Moving on the two came upon the top a staircase out onto a long, darkened corridor. They moved on. Some of the doors were open and faint light from port holes illuminated small cabins with beds, desks, a few chairs. Guillaume, stooping, picked up a scrap of paper, "Check this out." Sidonie glanced over his shoulder and saw that the young man held a crumpled brochure, water-stained and dirty. "'AEGIR, Flag ship of the Böse Brothers Line. Cuxhaven.' Is that German writing?" "Looks it, or maybe Dutch, I have a hard time keeping the two separate." "Was this a Nazi boat?" "Not likely, the German Navy, Das Kriegsmarine, spent their time making U-Boats and pocket battleships, not posh, floating hotels." Guillaume slowly nodded and the two began moving forward once more. They finally came upon a hatchway marked KOMMANDANT. Stepping inside they were rewarded with a bank of windows showing them an expanse of rusting foredeck and the ocean below. "I'm going to look for the Captain's Log," Sidonie explained. "Check the door over there and see where it goes." Nodding, Guillaume stepped from the bridge into a large public room. Its tables and chairs were scattered haphazardly across molave floors. He stopped in front of an art-deco full length mirror. Nearby there was a weather-beaten shrine with its antique saints and light fell in from windows along the wall where tattered curtains hung. Something cold touched his forearm. He shivered and walked over to a deserted table. He stared down at a pair of empty glasses, an empty bourbon carafe nearby. An overflowing ashtray sat beside that. Guillaume stopped, reached down and pulled back a half-smoked cigarette, lipstick smudged at the end, yellow and fragile like the rest of the ship. Scrawled on the mirror, in dust, Guillaume could read: "It's time to put away childish things." His lungs tried to suck in the rusty air but he noticed it was oppressive and heavy. He suddenly felt the hairs on his nape stand up as cold sweat dripped down his back and chest. His heart galloped fiercely. He knew something was definitely wrong. As he stood there a mirky silhouette drifted past the open doorway. Guillaume called out, but in an instant it was gone. Dropping the cigarette, he ran out into the hallway. Nothing. He returned to the room but there was nothing to be seen. "Something is here -- please, please let it not be a ...," Guillaume began but the words died in his throat and his palms were suddenly wet with fright. He could feel unseen eyes boring into him and, unasked for, images of dozens of charred corpses came floating to his eye, effeminate young men just like himself, their faces burnt reddish-black, lips retracted into hideous grins. "What happened here?" Guillaume asked aloud. "Oh, you know, a little of this and a little of that." The young man spun around at the sound of the voice. It reminded him a lot like his own: masculine, but not deep and always with the hint of a lisp. He turned all about but saw nothing. Nothing. But still, still ... Guillaume felt a chill pass over his scruff. His throat constricted and he began trembling uncontrollably as he shut his eyes tight. It was coming. It was coming. "By the pricking of my thumbs, something wicked this way comes." The dark room became deathly cold. Guillaume's eyes stayed shut and his heart raced. It was then he felt the touch, the end of his belt being slowly unhooked, the heavy fabric of his trousers slowly being pulled to the floor. Guillaume grabbed hold of the cloth, his knuckles white from dread as the unseen hands began stripping him naked with increasing force. With a sudden jerk his trousers were yanked around his ankles, leaving Guillaume helpless and exposed, his glistening skin covered with sweat. "O Isis, protect me," he mumbled. Isis? That's what Sidonie would have said, wouldn't it? Where was she? Guillaume's cock had retreated into the subterranean lair of his groin, his skin cold and sweaty, his eyes beginning to water. Now there was a noise like a body dragging itself this was and that over a metal grate. The young man wanted to scream, but his throat was dry and no sound escaped from his frozen cords. Without warning, he felt coarse invisible hands grab his legs and spread them apart. They were incredibly strong, like vices, pinning him spread-eagle where he stood. And the smell -- the smell. There was a stench all about him, an acrid smell of burnt flesh. Then a rough sensation like cold clammy fish-flesh brushed against one of Guillaume's naked thighs, then his other. Chills ran wild up his spine as the ghostly touch, slithering ever upwards, reached his curling pubes. The young man felt a heavy weight settle upon his cock: dead and slimy like seaweed. With a terrible schloomp a wet fleshy mass encircled his knees, dragging itself to his cock, the foul odor increasing. To his terror and amazement Guillaume felt his cock begin to stir. The shade shifted its weight upwards, pushing air out of Guillaume's lungs. Now the young man's cock was rigid, as hard as it ever had been in his life. Unseen lips licked their way up his shaft, feeling every vein and crease. "Ohh – Ahh." Guillaume whimpered. He felt the ghost's mouth rolling up and down his cock, sucking and tightening its grip at every stroke. It was then that he began to feel the mounting orgasm. This was the pleasure that lies in the same bed as death. He knew he couldn't keep it back. It was coming. It was here. He was about to cum. Guillaume threw his head back and howled, a noise of pleasure and fear that filled the whole ship, made the waves tremble and the sky to burn black as sackcloth. Sidonie heard the scream, dropped what she was doing and sprinted out into the public room. It was empty, save for the yellowed cigarette laying crushed on the floor. "Guillaume!" Sidonie called out his name over and over but could hear no response. Something cold touched her forearm. Her walkie-talkie was dead and the air crackled with Saint Elmo's fire.