The Skinner Co. Network
DDoP - 7 - The Last Ship
There is more to be told of Tekimak, and we may return at some future date, but, as the dog days of summer slip away, let us for now close Bill’s notes with one final tale.
7. The Last Ship There is more to be told of Tekomak, and we may return at some future date, but as the dog days of summer slip away let us now close Bill's notes with one final tale. Throughout his stay, the student often heard reference to the Last Ship, usually in the form of one or two idioms. The Last Ship leave me behind or if the Last Ship don't come first. The first was used as an oath, and the second, Bill understood to have the same general meaning as "don't count your chickens" before they hatch. Having heard both a half dozen times, youth finally pressed the topic with a farmer who'd been showing him about her plot. "Well," she explained, "one day, when our work is deemed complete, a tall ship shall come sailing up the lake to carry us home. This was the compact that set our ancestors here, and the accord struck with those who leave us the shore. There are no further details to provide. Each follow-up from Bill raised only a shrug. The academic recorded the tale, but it's clear from his margin notes that he thought little of the superstition. It was a large lake, but even if there had been any tall ships still sailing, there was no route beyond techoming shores. Streams and rivers fed into the broad waters, but none of the tributaries were large enough to carry anything bigger than a canoe. Yet he should have remembered the story upon his departure. Returning south that September, Bill launched into the project of assembling his notes into a cohesive whole which, over the course of winter, he eventually put forth as his thesis work. Upon publication, he became a two-week sensation, reaching beyond academic journals to catch the ear of a documentary crew, who then set about mounting an expedition to be the first to reach Tecomac when the ice melted. They found the structures mapped out just as he had said, the tall cliff that might explain the night owl, and even the dirt patch designated as the town square. Yet there was no sign of a single human chicken or cow. To documentarian's eyes, Tecomac might have been empty a season or a decade. It was impossible to know. And so neither do we. Maybe he made it up. Maybe they never existed. Or maybe, the last ship finally came.