Gannon Snippets

At The End Of The World - Snippet 13 Giselle leaned across the table, reached out her hand. Lice just shook her head again. I have to admit I wasn't surprised. Ever since we pulled Lice out of the water, she avoided group talks, particularly those which focused on our future. Sometimes, when we were on deck, I'd see her looking at the water and I couldn't help suspecting that she regretted not having the courage to take a lungful before we got to her. And in just the last twenty-four hours, she'd kind of detached from us. She'd spent most of...

At The End Of The World - Snippet 12 I kept my distance, not wanting to wind up on the captain's ninja radar. He and Keywood ultimately slipped into the marine stores shed, just a little bit east of the boathouse that fronted on the pier. I went around to the rear of the huge "shed", eased open the back door. I had missed the opening part of the conversation, but I had no trouble picking up the topic. "-- so I don't want to have to pull rank, Alan, but this time, you can't make your decision as a free agent." "You don't have enough rank to...

At The End Of The World - Snippet 11 The captain took a half step toward Keywood; it looked like a prelude to a plea, rather than a threat. "Anyone coming out here will know where KEP is, but they won't have gone to the other bays. They won't know to look for us at --" Keywood stepped back. "No. That's madness. This is the only facility big enough to hold us. And we could never move enough of the stores in time. Besides, this is about you and that bloody glacier again. What is it, Alan? A death wish of some kind?" "I don't give a tinker's...

At The End Of The World - Snippet 10 Keywood nodded. "That's the gist of it. There's always a few veterans in every dodgy lot, and they're likely to recognize our call signs, and figure out that this plague might not have reached us. And as the bodies pile up around them, there will be little to stop them from grabbing a ship and seeing for themselves. That's why we didn't answer your transmissions, Alan. Orders. And we couldn't take the chance of encouraging them." The captain seemed to be sucking at something caught in his teeth. "Won't...

At The End Of The World - Snippet 09 August 5 We had following seas and the wind a-stern all the way to South Georgia Island. That was a good, but not great, combo. The wind coming from directly behind meant we had to tack a bit, which, all told, probably cost us an extra day. But the seas became calmer as we edged a bit north, and the grey line of clouds to the south receded. From the Galapagos onward, the captain had warned us that this could be the roughest part of the voyage. But once we were hugging Tierra del Fuego, he added the caveat...

At The End Of The World - Snippet 08 The last crewmember is Lice. Which is short for Alice, but she spends so much time scratching at the dark brown rat's nest on her head that I had almost forgotten her real name. Lice is how she introduced herself, and she seems to take pride in that, along with the other weird behaviors and clothes that kind of make her emo and punk at the same time. Unfortunately, that combo means she never tells you -- or even shows you -- what she really thinks. She rolls her eyes at everything. Especially anything that...

At The End Of The World - Snippet 07 July 20 I didn't know I'd have trouble writing this entry, but when I finally got to my bunk and picked up my pen, my hand started shaking. This is the third try. I hope I can get it all down. The day started normally enough. The captain was up first, as always. And he went to the place that was now his full-time station: the radio. With the exception of a short trip down to the condensers, he kept tuning through the dial, again and again. And every time he caught a scratchy snippet of some signal, he...

At The End Of The World - Snippet 06 July 6 It turns out that Chloe had problems in school. Discipline problems, mostly, but they spilled over into her academics. If she works too long, or runs into a dead end, she gets tense, which means she gets snippy and then resentful if you try to keep her at it. Frankly, she's okay at math. In fact, she's better than average at almost everything. It's her attitude that sucks. On the first day, she was so hostile that I figured I'd better start by finding her comfort zone. So I asked her what subject...