The Black Lung Captain - By Chris Wooding Page 0,63
the front of the echo chamber. The door, the seal that kept the daemon inside, hung ajar.
Crake reached out and pulled the door open. He steeled his nerve and shone his light inside.
The chamber was empty.
He heard wet, clicking breaths coming from beyond the range of his lantern.
No, he thought to himself. Please not that. Don't make me see her again.
He became aware of a dripping sound, and looked down. In his hand was a letter knife with the crest of his university on the hilt. His hand and the knife were covered in blood. It dripped from the blade on to the stone floor.
He cried out in pain and flung the blade down. Something scraped in the darkness behind him. He spun around, but saw nothing.
'Curse you!' he shouted. 'You are not that daemon!'
Not the one that made him do what he did. Not the one that made him stab his niece seventeen times with a letter knife.
Then, a voice from the blackness. His niece's voice.
'Why'd you put me in there, Uncle Grayther?'
Crake looked around, teeth gritted, desperately seeking the source of the voice. He knew it to be a trick, but tears welled in his eyes anyway. He couldn't help it.
'Why'd you put me in there?' the haunting voice asked again. There was a groan of metal, and the armoured suit tipped forward with a crash, cables snapping free as it fell.
'You're not her! How dare you pretend you are!' he cried.
But despite what his mind knew, his senses told him otherwise. That was Bess's voice, who he'd put into an echo chamber while she was dying, and whose essence he'd transferred into an armoured suit. But the process had been crude and hurried and was way beyond his abilities; she hadn't come through it whole. What was left was a simple creature, more like a pet than the little girl he knew. A daily reminder of his crime.
'I'm so lonely, Uncle,' came her voice again. 'I'm so lonely and it'll never end.'
'You rot-hearted bastard!' Crake shrieked into the dark. 'I loved her!'
'It's so hard to think in here, Uncle. What did you do to me?'
Crake choked back a sob.
'You should've let me die,' she said.
'I loved you! I love you!' he protested.
'How could you?' came the whisper, from right by his ear. He swung around in alarm.
She was there, reaching towards him, sodden red, open wounds pulsing with blood. But the look in her eyes was pleading.
'How could you?'
He screamed, and the light from his lantern went out.
Hysterical, weeping breathlessly, he fumbled for his matches again, but in his haste to light them he dropped them on the floor. He went down on his knees, searching. At any moment he expected to feel the dreadful touch of the bloodied apparition. But then his fingers found the matchbox, and he managed to steady his trembling hands long enough to strike one. He touched the tiny flame to the wick of his lantern, and light returned to the freezing room.
There was no sign of Bess. But there, lying next to him like an accusation, was the letter knife.
He put the lantern on the floor. Sobs racked him, each one like a punch in the chest. He stayed on his knees. He wasn't sure he had the strength to stand any more.
'I thought I could control it,' he gasped between sobs. 'You weren't supposed to be there.'
'Sssh,' came the disembodied voice. 'You know what you have to do.'
'I couldn't let you die.'
'Sssh.'
His fingers closed around the hilt of the knife. A sense of peace filled him at its touch. Yes, it would be so simple, wouldn't it? An end to the constant, grinding agony of memory.
'You've suffered enough, Uncle. It's time to rest.'
Time to rest. He liked that. She'd given him her blessing, hadn't she? And he was so very tired.
He put the blade to his neck, angling it under the curve of his jaw. One swift cut in the right place, and he could sleep. He couldn't remember the last time he'd slept well.
'Now push!' hissed the voice from the darkness. 'Push! Push!'
He felt a trickle of blood running down his throat, and realised he'd already broken the skin. He was already that far along; why not go a little further?
He took a breath, steadied his hand for the final thrust.
'Goodbye, Uncle,' said the voice.
And Crake stopped. Goodbye, indeed. With that one quick cut, he'd be leaving her. He'd be at rest. But Bess wouldn't.