We're about midway through a week-long cruise that Kensington was kind enough to book for us second class, White Star Line. Nothing flashy like the Majestic, mind you, think smaller. Clayton wasn't with us, exactly - something about a job opening up he needed to look into; he had transportation arranged for that and we would hopefully be able to meet up in London when he got there.
As for the rest of us, rest and relaxation were the order of the day, though as usual since the Ju-Ju House incident, Dr. Baker was testy and cold, while Pretty Boy had a bit of a case of shell shock. Some things, a man never gets over, and Honest to God in Heaven I feel truly awful for the kid... He was still mumbling about seeing a man get eaten. I can't imagine the nightmares he's been having... him or Dr. Baker. Thankfully, on the respectable White Maiden, we found plenty to occupy us and ease our minds - gym practice to keep us limber, shooting seabirds off the sides of the boat for practice, pretty women to chat with, and best of all, no Prohibition out here on the open ocean. I know that sounds real funny coming from a man of the law like myself, but I like a good drink myself, and I ain't no rum-catcher. That's Hemlock's job.
Remember how I said you can't judge a book by its cover? Pretty Boy proved that one easily - you tell me how in the hell a speakeasy owner is such a lush he can't even handle a double-shot of whiskey. I'm pretty sure even the bartender laughed, not that Pretty Boy cared. He was too loaded to, and laughed with the guy. Boy turns into an absolute schmoozy, giggling fool when he drinks, but at least he ain't a mean drunk or a sobby drunk. I can't stand them sorts, and besides, at least Pretty Boy turned his irritating Yankee New Yorker blabbing to some pretty young lady and her girlfriends in the corner of the room.
It was there, in the middle of a bar in the middle of a ship in the middle of the open Atlantic, that things took a turn. One of the crewmen burst into the room, a huge bleeding gash in his head like someone had coshed him, his clothes a mess, and his eyes wild and frightened. Looked like a panicking stallion he did, seeking any route he could out, when his eyes fell on the bartender and he ran up to him.
"Jesus Christ, Lawrence, you okay?" the barman murmured, trying to keep things calm.
"I-It's the guards," the panicked crewman replied. "There's been a robbery of one of the shipments for London. Nate and I were both knocked out before we saw too much, and when we came to, the guards... they were dead."
Well, that got our attention real fast, and I think even Pretty Boy sobered up a bit. Hemlock was all over it, right in his element and giving orders immediately as his police instincts kicked in.
"Don't let anyone go down there until I've had a look," he said, flashing his badge. "Federal Marshall. You keep your eyes out for anything suspicious and you tell the captain what happened, now. We'll look into it."
Just damn like him to volunteer us all. Like I said, we can't even catch a break on our time off.
We headed downstairs, to the engine and cargo hold, and took a look around. The first thing we noticed, and which Dr. Baker quickly took charge of, was the large muscular black man lying unconscious on the floor, some odd Egyptian-type tattoos on his arms and chest. They looked like those weird eyes you see on all those Egyptian artifacts, and there was some sort of faceted crystal between them. He also had bands of hieroglyphic writing on his arms, which I couldn't really read. They were nice pieces, I guess, and he did look like he was of Egyptian descent except with darker skin, so we didn't think much of it at the time. While the Good Doctor worked to revive the fallen crewman, we found two others who weren't so lucky. They were lying on their backs, heads carved up on the forehead and chests ripped open and bloody, like carcasses in a slaughter house. Behind them, a crate was open, straw and its contents rifled through, probably once holding something of value.
Now, of course our minds went where yours probably did - these corpses looked an awful lot like how we found poor old Elias, chests torn open and heads carved up. This looked terribly similar to the way the Bloody Tongue cult dispatched its victims, and well... that put us all on high alert. Even more so when the Dr. Baker revived the Egyptian-looking man, who we found out was named Nate. Nate quickly told us that he was over in the engine room working when he heard Lawrence cry out for help, so he ran over. Then he saw some man, he thinks a Kenyan but he didn't see details, with some sort of weird head dress on and a long, strange-looking blade. There was a bit of a struggle, and it ended with Nate unconscious on the floor, bleeding from his head. He figures the attacker thought he was dead, or not worth the effort to kill, and spared him.
Meanwhile, we started looking for more evidence. Hemlock found bloody drag marks, as if the men had died elsewhere and been pulled over to the crate, positioned that way. This Kenyan cultist probably would still have bloody hands from his misdeeds. I took a look at the crate, and soon realized the inside must have held something large and valuable. On the outside, I found a label, and took a closer look to determine who it was for or where it was bound.
NAIROBI, KENYA
TO: P. F.
LONDON, ENGLAND, UNITED KINGDOM
CONTENTS FRAGILE! HANDLE WITH CARE
It was a nice theory, but one that Dr. Baker debunked when she examined the bodies. The carving on the foreheads was nothing more than bleeding gashes from being knocked out. As for the split-open chests, no organs were removed. In fact, some of them had been pulped or torn apart. It looked more like the exit wound of a shotgun blast to her, but a bladed weapon wouldn't be out of the question. This was no Bloody Tongue cult murder - someone just wanted to make it look like it was. But then the question became, who would fake a cult murder, and why? Who knew we were on the ship and wanted us to blame the cult for it? Also oddly, both of the bodies had tattoos of ankhs on them, upside down ones on their forearms. Both Ralph and Pretty Boy found that awful strange, considering the ankh was apparently a symbol of life and order for Ancient Egyptians. Why would someone change that idea to death and chaos by inverting it? It was sinister and chilling, and we filed away the possibility that something else bigger was going on. We needed more info, and fast.
We split up and took to asking people around the ship. Pretty Boy went to speak with the bartender, Ralph took to the galley to ask if the chef had seen anything odd or any odd-looking people, and Dr. Baker and myself headed to speak with the Captain. He was pretty genial and even let passengers come into the bridge and learn about how a ship was run, something we didn't really expect. He was an old gent, clearly with a military background judging from the disciplined look in his one unpatched eye and the hook he had for a left hand. Despite the grizzled appearance, he was kindly, and seemed to care deeply for his crew. He wanted justice for those who died just as much as we wanted to capture their murderer.
We asked him about what he knew, and tried to seek records of the logs for the ship, but he unfortunately knew about as much as we did concerning the incident, and told us the log books were off limits. "Federal document. I'm afraid I can't let you see them, sorry." Then Dr. Baker thought to ask about Nate, and that's when things took a... darker turn.
"Nate?" The sea dog murmured, chewing on the stem of his pipe in thought. "Nate who?"
"He's one of your crewmen," I replied, "Works in the engine room. Egyptian-looking guy, has tattoos all over his chest?"
"Old sport, you must be mistaken... I don't have any crewmen from Egypt named Nate..."
We both had a brief moment of panic then, and gave each other a look of realization. Was this Nate fellow... the stowaway who had murdered the crewmen? Hadn't Lawrence told us about him earlier?
We ran into the Captain's Quarters, where Lawrence was resting up and dealing with his wound, to speak with him. He seemed confused from being knocked out, his brain rattled from the impact, but he explained the situation. Apparently Nate was a recent hire as far as he knew, and they picked him up when they hired some men on from Cairo. As for what was in the crate, he didn't know. He said last he knew, a darker-skinned man wielding some sort of blade had grabbed him from behind, and hit him over the head. When he came to, everyone was dead, except Nate who was unconscious. As far as he knew, the attacker wasn't wearing any sort of head dress, nor had he left the ship. He didn't have any other information. So much for that. We didn't learn anything about the rest of what was going on until Ralph got back with us and told us what he found out, but he could explain that better than I could. Besides, it's nothing compared to what happened next...
-- Ted Bates, Bounty Hunter (February 7th, 1928)
While the rest of the party split up, I took it upon myself to interview the chef in the galley. He'd been busy most of the evening cooking, but he did mention a terrified-looking black man with a massive knife running into the galley earlier. He panicked at first and held up his cleaver to defend himself, but it became apparent the man wasn't interested in a fight. The unknown party immediately took to running into the broom closet and hiding, shaking and murmuring that someone was going to kill him. He couldn't get the man to come out, and wasn't about to try, armed to the teeth as he was.
I immediately realized the situation was different than I thought, and took up my handgun as I crept to the closet, trying to speak with the man. He was frantic and unable to speak at first, but quickly acquiesced to my order to drop his weapon and open the door. When I saw him, I knew I both had my man, and didn't. He was indeed dark-skinned, but he had no head dress or other cult regalia, and the weapon he dropped was a long, serrated machete, nothing like the pranga that had taken my hand off. The man himself had wild and insanely frantic eyes, his hair gone white from intense shock and terror, and he constantly whimpered and shook, muttering to himself.
"Na na n-na nyar na-na la nyar na..."
"Snap out of it, man," I said, hand firm on my gun and eyes locked on his. "Tell me what happened. Tell me everything."
He sang like a canary. Apparently, his boss said there was something of great value in a crate down in the cargo bay, and he wanted it to sell. The object was some sort of semi-pharonic statue, lightweight and made of onyx with gold and ruby inlay. It looked a bit like a six-armed angelic figure as well, and it didn't have a face. The man was very insistent that it was the real deal, from Egypt, but he didn't know where it had been found. Only that his boss wanted it, and he had to steal it. All they were planning to do was knock the guards out, then take the item and scram. It didn't happen that way, and here's where the man's story got as crazy as him.
Apparently, after knocking out one of the crewmen and getting the statue in hand, the two guards with the inverse ankh tattoos saw him and his boss. His boss fled, and he was left to deal with two very angry guards converging on him. Then he heard a noise behind him, and they stopped, looking very nervous. He turned to find an Egyptian man with tattoos of two Wadjet eyes and a crystal on his chest, muscle-bound, one of the crewmen... and the Egyptian was not happy. From what he says, the Egyptian's head split open into tentacles like an octopus, and he grew two more sets of clawed hands as he became some sort of awful, winged creature. It looked a bit like the statue, is what he told me, and it slaughtered the remaining crew with some sort of blast of force from one hand. It would have killed him too, but it spared him for some unknown reason, telling him it was coming for him later and giving its name. He ran after that, and hid in the galley - it was the only place he thought he'd be safe.
"Listen," I responded, a chill running through me as I realized this madman might have been telling the truth. "I'll believe you, I've seen some things myself. I'm not going to arrest you, but I think your boss might have been taking advantage of you. I can protect you from your boss, but I need to know his name."
"No-no..." the lunatic shook his head, fearful. "N-no, it's not my boss I'm scared of, it's the Egyptian Man! He'll come, and he'll kill me... he'll kill me! He'll... na... na n-nyar la na na nahahahaha!"
"We can protect you from him, too, but I need to know your boss's name. We can put you under witness protection. I promise, nobody's going to hurt you..."
He seemed to believe me, and I felt pity for the poor shaken man. He was clearly insane, and my thought was that his boss was using him as a clever excuse, a scapegoat. The thought rankled me, but not nearly as much as what he told me his boss's name was.
"Walter," he responded, shakily. "His name is Walter."
"Does he have a last name?" I replied, eyebrow raising.
"Y-yes," he said, chillingly clear. "Kimble."
My blood boiled. Walter Kimble... I should have known that snake in the grass would have done something like this... Mark my fucking words, Kimble. You'll pay for this. For this, and for all of your crimes. I'm not letting you escape this time.
-- Ralph Hemlock, Federal Marshall of the United States of America (February 7th, 1928)