Title: Ghost ship (Now re-written)
Rating: PG due to references to a real life event.
Summary: Ray wins a trip to France for the team, but does Alex know something awful about the ferry's future?
Note: I would just like to take a moment to explain why I wrote this. First off, I have now worked for a ferry company for 9 years and, as a result, I obviously spend an awful lot of my time on car ferries.
I also have something of an interest in ferries and thier histories.
This fic touches on a real event that occured on March 6th 1987. I decided to do an Ashes story based on theme of this event (but not directly involving it) because I wondered how it would feel if, having gone back in time, you came face to face with something that you knew would one day end in disaster.
I have done my very best to write this as respectfully as possible.
Those who are too young to remember 1987 may wish to go to Google or Wiki and look up a ship named the "Herald of Free Enterprise".
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"That, boys and girls, is a job well done!".
Gene was stood tall and proud in front of his CID colleagues who were sat around their usual table in Luigi's wine bar. Everyone, as usual, had a drink in front of them.
He triumphantly held up that day's copy of The Sun newspaper, jabbing his finger forcefully at the headline as his colleagues burst into drunken applause and cheering.
"COPS NAB BANK KILLERS!" read the front page in bold lettering for all to see.
In recent weeks a nationwide hunt had followed a spate of violent bank robberies in major cities around the country and it had been a matter of time until it was Londons turn.
Each time the robbers had struck they had made off with thousands of pounds in cash and left two bank managers dead from knife wounds.
"Nasty bastards!" Gene said venomously at the picture of the robbers under arrest, "Not on my patch!"
A tip off, some very crude detective work and a little bit of profiling had brought it to Gene's attention that the robbers' next target would be London - a bank not far from Fenchurch East Police station.
The robbers had been totally unprepared and had been taken completely by surprise when the bank had turned out to be crawling with undercover Police.
Caught red handed, they would be going down for a very long stretch indeed.
Gene sat himself back down at the table to enjoy the celebratory drinks.
He usually sat slightly away from the rest of CID, in his own little corner of Luigi's, sometimes with Alex.
But tonight was special, they had caught those bastards red handed and stopped them in their tracks. Nobody else would be harmed by them, and it was all down to his team.
He chucked the newspaper over to Ray, who had bought it earlier, but he decided against mentioning the racing tips he had clipped from the sports pages at the back.
"Oh cheers, Guv!" Ray nodded and began to flick through the paper, stopping momentarilly to whistle at page 3, after taking a mouthful of his beer.
Gene also took a sip of his own drink. He had bought a bottle of Luigi's house red to share with Alex, whilst his colleagues had settled for their usual pints.
"It's partly down to you Bolls" Gene admitted as he looked to his D.I who was sat opposite him, "You and your profiling"
"My psychiatry you mean?" Alex said with a cheeky smile as she refilled her glass.
Gene smirked at her pretend error, at least he thought it was pretend but he couldn't be sure as Alex was now on her third glass of red wine.
"I don't bloody believe it!" Ray suddenly exclaimed.
The Detective Sargeants outburst plunged the murmers and chatter of the assembled CID into silence as everyone stopped what they were doing and looked to Ray.
Ray stood up with the newspaper open in his hands and a look of surprise on his face, "I've bloody won!!"
"Won what?" Gene demanded, "the Nobel peace prize? Moustahce of year award?".
"...I've won!" Ray repeated yet again, still staring at the page as if he couldn't quite comprehend.
"What, a competition, like?" Chris looked up from where he sat next to Ray.
Ray turned the newspaper round and pointed to a small article regarding a competition about football teams.
"Look!" he said as he continued to point to some names in small print, "That's my name!"
"Well done, Ray" Alex raised her glass in sincere congratulations "What have you won?"
Ray sat himself back down and read from the newspaper...
"The winning entries have won return ferry tickets for a car and four people to France!"
There was a murmur of approval from the gathered CID officers.
"Hey that's not bad is it, Guv?" Chris sounded genuinely pleased.
"Not bad if you like snails for lunch, I suppose" Gene leant back in his chair and took a sip of his wine.
"There's much more to France than that" Alex protested "The Eiffel tower, the culture, the language"
"...the baguettes, the onion sellers" Gene continued "The surrendering to bleedin' 'itler and needin' us to bail 'em out"
Alex's tutted, rolled her eyes and shook her head.
"So who are you taking then Raymondo?" Gene asked moving the topic along.
"I dunno Guv" Ray shrugged "Does anyone 'ere speak French?"
"I bet I know who does" Gene looked to his D.I, as did everyone else in the vicinity.
Alex stopped, glass almost to her lips, "Why is everyone looking at me?" she enquired.
"Do you speak Frog?" Ray asked sounding hopeful.
"What?" Alex asked having clearly missed some of the conversation due to her wine intake.
"He means, Bolly" Gene cut in "Do you speak French"
"Oh!" Alex raised her eyebrows "Oui Monsieur"
"I think that's a yes" Chris confirmed.
"That's that settled then Raymondo", Gene made the decision for Ray, "myself, Bolly and Chris 'ere will accompany you. And we'll take the quattro, plenty of room in the boot for any local booze we might pick up"
"Oh cheers, Guv!" Ray nodded, raising his glass in thanks.
"Right, next weekend then!" Gene announced.
"You do realise, and I feel I had better say this in advance," Alex began from where she sat in the Quattro's passenger seat as the red vehicle tore down the motorway at a speed easily exceeding seventy miles per hour, "that the French drive on the other side of the road?"
They had been driving, for some time after leaving London earlier that morning, and the quattro was now almost at Dover.
"Bloody French!" Gene huffed from the drivers seat, "They 'ave to be different, don't they?"
"And you're speeding" Alex pointed out eyeing the speedometer.
"I'm a copper!" Gene said defensively, "Anyone asks, we're on police business!"
Alex simply tutted and shook her head.
"Will you get out of the bloody way!!" Gene shouted as he flashed his headlights at a car he deemed to be driving too slow in the fast lane, "Christ, I've seen Zimmer frames moves faster than some of this lot!"
The car soon moved aside into the middle lane and the Quattro once again accelerated past.
"Aha!" Ray leant forward from the back seat and pointed to a rapidly approaching motorway sign, "Dover ferry port, next turn off!"
"Excellent detective work, Raymondo!" Gene nodded and moved the Quattro over to exit the motorway, "If only you were that effective on criminal cases"
"This boat we're going on" Chris began sounding a little anxious, "It's alright isn't it? I mean, there's no icebergs or anything like that out there is there?"
Alex tried not to laugh at Chris's naive question and somehow managed to succeed.
"Chris" she began, "Calais is just a short hop across the English channel, there's no icebergs in this part of the world, we'll be there before you know it"
"Oh..." Chris replied still sounding a little unsure, "but just in case, does it have lifeboats?"
"I promise you, you will be fine, Chris" Alex said as she tried to reassure him.
"It's just I don't like boats very much" Chris bit his lip, "What if it's rough?"
"Look out the window, it's a perfectly sunny morning Chris" Alex continued to reassure the nervous DC, "The sky's blue and there's not even a breeze!"
"You great twonk!" Ray couldn't resist butting in, "Scared of a bit of water? What kind of a man are you?"
"I was just asking..." Chris said sounding a little defensive.
"Right well once we're on there we'll get a pint down your neck and you'll be fine" Ray decided, "Then you won't care what's happening!"
"Can't argue with that" Gene nodded as he drove.
There was silence for a few moments before Chris began again.
"Does it have sick bags onboard?"
"Oh fer Christ's sake will you shut up Christopher!" Gene yelled, "It's a car ferry not the Ti-flaming-tanic!"
"Yeah don't be such a poof Chris" Ray jabbed him in the side with his elbow.
"Tell you what" Gene thought out loud, "Drake'll hold your hand and nursemaid you all the way across if you're going to be such a Nancyboy about it"
"Don't listen to them Chris" Alex shot Gene a look that meant shut up, "Just come and sit with me when we get on there and we'll have a nice cup of tea and be there before you know it"
Chris nodded, still not quite convinced about the sea part of this venture.
Once the chatter had died down, it wasn't long before they reached their destination.
The Quattro pulled into Dover ferry port and was directed into a marshalling area full of lanes, in which some cars were already queueing, along with some coaches and French lorries.
Gene stopped the engine as he pulled the Quattro up into the queue of cars in lane 5 to await embarkation.
"What do we do now, Guv?" Ray questioned as he passed his prize tickets over to Gene, "Just sit and wait?"
"Seems like it" Gene agreed as he took the tickets and placed them on the dashboard.
"Is that the boat?" Chris leant forward between the front seats and peered through as much of the windscreen as he could.
Everyone looked up at the view infront of them.
Alex felt an ice cold shiver run through her as she took in the sight of the large cross channel car ferry several hundred yards away.
The ship was fairly large, large for its time. It looked gleaming with its fresh paintwork shining in the sun as if it was brand new...brand new for 1981 at least.
The lower half of the ship was painted a distinctive bright red and the upper half was painted in a perfect white.
On the very top sat two large masts pointing skyward and two sky blue funnels with the letters "TT" proudly emblazoned on them.
Alex glanced at the tickets on the dashboard with an eery feeling within her.
"Townsend Thoresen" the logo printed on them read.
Alex took a deep breath and felt a shiver run through her whole body.
The sight before her reminded her of news reports she had seen in the late 1980's concerning a cross channel car ferry which had tragically rolled over just outside a place called Zeebrugge with massive loss of life.
'Couldn't be this one' she thought to herself, 'They must have lots of ships'
Alex wasn't an expert on the subject by any means, in fact she knew almost nothing about ships at all, but she certainly knew the name of the one she was thinking of...Everyone back in her real time did. It's name was etched into history, up there with the likes of Hindenburg, Titanic and Challenger.
"What's up with you?" She felt herself being nudged from her thoughts by Gene, "Lost yer nerve now we're 'ere Missus Sea-legs?"
"What..err...no" Alex stumbled her words as she regained her thoughts, "Sorry, I was just thinking of something"
"Oh cripes, better watch out then" Ray joked, "She's planning her French shopping list already!"
"In that case, may I suggest adding a French maids outfit to it?" Gene suggested and then waited to be poked, hit, slapped or otherwise chastised by his D.I.
"Oh do shut up" Alex simply sighed and relaxed back in the seat, finally taking her eyes off the cross channel ferry.
"May I remind you that you're addressing a senior officer?" Gene retorted in mock anger.
"A senior officer who is very much off duty and off on a booze cruise?" Alex pointed out with a hint of friendly sarcasm.
"OoooOOOOOOOooooohhh!!" Added Chris and Ray from the back of the car.
Gene made a 'Hmpf!' sound and was about to say something back when his attention was taken by a tap on his window.
"Tickets please" the man, a member of the shore staff, asked as Gene lowered the window.
Gene grabbed the outward ticket and handed it to the man who simply nodded and then moved on to the next car in line again repeating "Tickets please"
"I don't like this French money" Chris began complaining again as he rifled through his wallet inspecting his newly aquired French cash.
"They don't use proper money like us Chris" Ray observed as he looked at the note in Chris's hand, "They use Francs"
"Who's Frank anyway?" Chris pondered.
"French bloke, I guess" Ray shrugged.
"Oh God..." Alex muttered under her breath as she listened to the ridiculous conversation going on in the back of the Quattro, "...roll on Euros"
"Rolos?" Chris spoke up only half hearing Alex's words.
"Euros!" She repeated.
"Are they like Rolos then?" The DC quizzed.
Alex closed her eyes momentarily and bit her lip. She wasn't going to be lured into one of Chris and Rays silly conversations.
"Right here we go boys!" Gene announced, "...and you Bolly!"
The Quattro's queue of cars was now beginning to move as the cars were now waved forwards towards the ferry for boarding.
"Thank goodness" Alex whispered as Chris and Ray's confused conversation ceased.
The Quattro fired up and eased forwards with the moving line of cars further and further down lane 5.
The cars ahead were slowly drivng up the loading ramp and being directed by crew members into the car deck lanes.
As the Quattro turned to head towards the ramp, Alex caught a glimpse of the vessel's name painted in large black letters. She felt a mixture of both horror and sorrow at the same time and felt her blood run cold as if she had seen a ghost.
"What's this boat called then?" Chris piped up, "I didn't quite see. Something with an H...Harr...Harry or somethin'?"
"Probably some poncy name, all boats have poncy names" Ray shrugged as the Quattro made its way up the ramp.
Natural daylight faded and was suddenly replaced with the ships own lighting as the Quattro boarded the ferry and made it's way slowly along the car deck, enclosed with the ship.
A member of the deck crew waved the Quattro forwards and then indicated for it to stop when he was satisfied it was close enough to the car in front.
"Engine off, handbreak on!" the crewman barked as he walked passed the Quattro and moved on to parking the car behind.
"I know how to park, you twit!" Gene called out from where he sat in the driver's seat and turned off the engine then applied the handbrake.
Immediately Gene got out of the car, pulling the drivers seat forwards for Chris and Ray to also climb out.
Alex was a little slower, casting her eyes around the car deck in it's brand new pristine state as she got to her feet and slowly shut the car door.
On the one side, next to the Quattro, a young family were lifting their young toddler out of the back seat of their car as the child clutched tightly to it's battered teddy bear and laughed with the excitement of going on a trip.
On the other side, a number of elderly people were disembarking from thier coach. The old ladies, peoples grans, were all dressed up ready for their day trip to France as the coach driver helped them down one by one with a smile and a joke.
Alex turned away from her colleagues momentarily. She shut her eyes for a few moments and bit her lip to compose herself.
She knew this ship was not in danger now, but that didn't stop her thinking about how this very same scene of people happily going on a trip would be the very same scene played out one fateful day in just a few short years, in 1987 - when it would end in disaster.
"Oi, Bolls!" Gene called already halfway across the car deck, "You coming? Chris 'ere needs his cuppa!"
Alex pulled herself as best she could from her lingering thoughts and turned back to her colleagues.
"Sorry, exhaust fumes" She lied and began to walk towards the group, "A little overpowering"
"S'okay Ma'am" Chris replied, "I'm gonna ask someone what the boats name is"
"I know the name of this ship Chris" Alex said as she gave one last glance back at the car deck that would, come 1987, be the scene of absolute carnage.
"What's it called then?" Chris asked as Gene and Ray waited by the exit to the stairs.
Alex said nothing for moment.
"Herald of Free Enterprise"
End
For those too young to understand: MV Herald of Free Enterprise rolled over on March 6th 1987 while departing the port of Zeebrugge. 193 passengers and crew lost thier lives. Please spare a moment to remember them.
Note: The Herald really would have been new at this time, having only been launched in 1980.
Also, exhaust fumes on car decks can be overpowering - Alex's isn't wrong.
Thanks to Gem for beta-ing.