This all reminds me of a time when my friend, Henry, and I were at the Queen Mary. We are both fans of oceanliners, and our wives were at a convention on the ship, so it gave us an excuse to look around the engine room and sneak around in some of the unauthorized areas of the ship.

While in the very rear of the Engineering section, where the propeller shafts leave the ship we encountered a group of women wearing shawls and carrying crystals. They asked us if we knew anything about the history of the ship. We told them that we did. They asked if it was true that a young man had died nearby.

We pointed to watertight door #13, which was just a few feet away. We explained that during a drill a young man had been crushed and killed in that door when it closed. Immediately all the women were around the door, “feeling the aura” of the dead guy and trying to make spiritual contact with him. After a few minutes in which the women “communed” with the dead gentleman and we stood around looking at equipment and snickering under our breath, the women came back and asked if there had been any other tragedies in the area.

Henry and I looked at each other and knew what we had to do. Every big piece of equipment suddenly was the cause of some hideous death of some poor shmuck that we invented on the spot. The bearing that held the propeller shaft? Some sailor was killed while the Mary was outrunning a submarine and he had to fill the oil reservoir on top, while the shaft was spinning. He was careless, and was grabbed by the spinning shaft which shredded his body. What was left of him was buried at sea in a small box with great honor. The women went into transports of delight, making contact with his nonexistent spirit, assuring him that he was remembered and loved in this world.

Another guy was killed when he was thrown into the back of the electrical panel during extremely rough seas and was electrocuted. His fictional death was particularly horrible, because he was not killed instantly, but spent 15 agonizing minutes slowly cooking to death as his crew mates struggled to free him. His charred remains were removed only after they had completely carbonized several hours later. One woman was actually in tears as she “psychically connected with him and shared his pain”. Another died when crushed by the steering rams. Violent, bloody and a hit with the psychic women, even if it never actually happened.

Around the room we went, spending an hour making up horrendous deaths and poor, sad individuals who suffered them, all the time watching these ladies being all psychic and making contact with each and every one.