Chapter 20

"You wanna know about the first voyage I'll tell you. I'll tell you the horrible fuggin truth about what happened four years ago," blurted Ramses.

He'd gotten his hands on a bottle of Brazilian rum Gilfoy snuck in one of the ration bags. His drunk persona was bubbly and honest, with the presence of an old uncle, despite being close to my age.

"It was all based on a collective dream."

I looked around to see everyone else sleeping, sunrise was upon us. We literally weathered the storm, but the engine never came back to life. Sitting ducks, we were. I kept my hallucination of Ken to myself, and let Ramses spill his guts.

"They said to Ken that all eveleleven…'scuse me, all E-leven of em, had crossed into each other's dreamscapes."

"Dreamscapes"

"Ya huh, you been having weird dreams out here Seeing weird shit You heard ol' bonkers boy, 'cept he was daydreaming. Sometimes that shit even brings out stuff you had buried deep, forgotten memories. Basically, and this is some crazy shit, man. In fact…"

Ramses moved close to my face. Uncomfortably close, close enough to kiss me on the lips.

"…don't tell nobody I said this crazy shit. I'm the normal one. Remember that…me, Ramses, I ain't brainwashed, and I aint no nut. So we crystal"

I wanted to nod my head, but my face was too close, so I kept my mouth closed and forced out a guttural 'mmhhmm.'

"Good, so where was I Oh, yea, they crossed each other's dreamscapes. Meaning all eleven of them shared a dream where they saw some sort of creature out there in the water. It told them to be reborn in the River of Styx, despite Ken's orders not too. The message was too powerful, especially when they confirmed the same vision, note for note. They overpowered Ken, held hands, and jumped overboard together."

"And you were there"

"Yup, Apollo we got soon after we arrived at the pier in Mexico. The goal then was to kill the current president. The Black Horse is more politically motivated than most would think."

"Why were you on board"

"Oh, one thing I forgot. Helen was there too. She was the only one who didn't jump. But uh, to answer your question, I was on board because I was in The Black Horse. I'd recently crossed over from the Alt-right…too white supreme-acy over there, though not all them guys are racist. Tell you the truth, all evil is the same evil. Just different names, different hats. Money laundering, drugs, kill-for-hire, my old bread and butter, cult activity, human trafficking, conspiracy, assassination, politics. All of it, man. I had a hand in it."

"So, all that conspiracy shit is true"

"Nope, it's backward. The shit that reaches the public is misinformation. Whole world is blind. However, Cyrus, now he believed in going deeper, further into history. He spoke about ancient times that predict today's time. Nostradamus shit and ancient gods, even though he was one. Batty but decent, and he was basically Ken's daddy. So… you can put the dots together."

"Where is he now"

Ramses took a long swig.

"Ken killed him, buried him. He got ordered to do it, but if you ask him, he'd say the voices made him do it. For a minute, he was saying the same thing ol' bonkers boy was saying. But he got it together, The Black Horse stood with him, and he started going by the name Ankh after that. I was hired to clean up his dirty work. Took out some journalists for a small magazine in order to keep our organization a secret. Felt bad, but the money felt better."

A snail's pace. Ramses killed the people. Ken had to be there to inscribe that message into the floor. The mystery thoroughly debunked, as Aries stretched, waking up. I wouldn't let her out my sight.

"She starting to look good again, now that her hair is growing back. But I see how you look at her, you can have her. The other one looks better anyway," Ramses burped as he lifted himself to his feet.

We both approached the main deck, I scanned both sides, but Ken's body was nowhere in sight. I watched Ramses stumble into the engine room below, giving it another go-round. Meanwhile, behind me, Hoover had awakened and walked into Ken's chambers. He looked at the electronics, big lights, and power strips like they were alien technology. A row of long steel rods with sequential numbers lining the back wall. That's how Ken branded them all, and from the looks of it, he was expecting eleven people. Hoover started squinting to assess if anything in the room held mysticism. Besides the stale air of burnt wires and sweat, the room was nothing more than that…just a room.

"Hmm, maybe it's all in my head"

"You ever remember your name" I questioned him.

"Hoover…my name is Hoover," he responded proudly and continued his investigation of the room.

I looked down on a sprawled out, half-sleep Aries and chanted her name to her like I was teaching a baby.

"Aries, that's your name. Aries. Aries Mulligan."

"You've said that many times, and I appreciate the gesture, but that's not my name. Remember your truth when father returns. He is testing us," she said defiantly.

Aries looked at the holes in the wall, the broken tarp dangling down from the ceiling and other miscellaneous damage from the rainstorm.

"He will not be pleased with what he sees, either."

"I keep telling you he's not coming back!" bellowed Ramses from the engine room.

"He is coming back, I saw him in my dreams!" retorted Raena, as everyone seemed to wake up in a domino effect.

"See, Dimitri. What I tell you, dreamscapes man. The women are still crazy, give it another day," shouted Ramses.

"Number 7…I mean, Dimitri, come check this out," requested Hoover from Ken's cabin.

I hesitated to leave Aries, and peek into the brainwashing room, but both had to be done. As I neared Hoover, I observed the hungry eyes salivating in his face. He slowly locked the door behind me and started whispering.

"Remember that talk we had when we were fishing…bout someone else going over"

"We don't have to do that anymore, Hoover. We're in control now, Apollo is nothing. No threat, just a burden."

"Hmm, you think we're in control"

"What do you mean"

"What if this is all part of father's plan"

"Ken was just a human."

"You really believe that Just a human"

"Get it together man, the last thing we need is everyone going crazy on a stalled boat. Focus on getting home."

I stormed out, mad at the thought of all this being pre-destined. Hoover stayed inside, quiet, a bit defeated. Hoping that I'd be his tag-a-along in removing Apollo. I walked back out to the main deck to soak in the sun, and give Aries some space. I let the sparkling diamond reflection of the water ease my mind. Once Ramses fixes the engine, we're going home.

"All you people start looking for a float plan somewhere on this vessel. And a flare gun, cause the engine ain't working. I think water got in it. We got a leak down here."

"Ramses is like a great comedian, he is innately a liar."