THERE WAS A SHIP
An Agony in Twelve Fits
Revision 2; July 2007
(Alternate title:
There was Another,
Better Ship.)
Scribe Figaro
The best lack all conviction, while the worst
Are full of passionate intensity.
Surely some revelation is at hand;
Surely the Second Coming is at hand.
-W.B. Yeats
He holds him with his skinny hand,
'There was a ship', quoth he.
-Samuel Taylor Coleridge
Contents
Prologue. Dreams in Which I'm Dying
1. One of Three
2. The Wedding Party
3. The Storm Blast
4. A Hellish Thing
5. A Hot and Copper Sky
6. The Very Deep
7. Mist and Snow
8. One by One
9. A Thousand Thousand Slimy Things
10. An Orphan's Curse
11. Night, Calm Night
12. Down Like Lead
Epilogue: Goodly Company
Prologue: Dreams in Which I'm Dying
What would I give for tears! Not smiles but scalding tears,
To wash the black mark clean, and to thaw the frost of years,
To wash the stain ingrain, and to make me clean again.
- Christina Georgina Rossetti
I.
In the year 1552, at the eastern bank of a slow, wide, semi-brackish bend of the Sagami River, some 30 kilometers southwest of a well, which tectonic activity had separated from the water table, and some other activity had separated from the standard conventions of space and time, Sango half-drowned. In a shelter with her traveling companion, while sleet rained, her lungs filled with fluid and she drowned the rest of the way. She was mourned. She was buried.
In the year 1555, Naraku was defeated and a monk took the Shikon Jewel and made a wish.
II.
In another year 1552 at the eastern bank of a slow, wide, semi-brackish bend of the Sagami River, some 30 kilometers southwest of a well, which tectonic activity had separated from the water table, and some other activity had separated from the standard conventions of space and time, Sango half-drowned. In a shelter with her traveling companion, while sleet rained, she recovered.
One week later, Kagome, Inuyasha, Miroku, and Kirara were shot to death. Thirty years passed. Sango, the trusted general of Oda Nobunaga, took from him the Shikon Jewel and made a wish.
III.
In another year 1552, at the eastern bank of a slow, wide, semi-brackish bend of the Sagami River, some 30 kilometers southwest of a well, which tectonic activity had separated from the water table, and some other activity had separated from the standard conventions of space and time, Sango half-drowned.
In a shelter with her traveling companion, sleet rained.
Author's Note: The only way to finish this story was to write it a second time. About half of the story has been kept.