A Ship Outside of Timepart 2by Jonathan Ruland |
Table of Contents Part 1 appears in this issue. |
Smitter stood and clapped him on the shoulder. “Well, matey, why don’t ye come on and meet the crew?”
Smitter led him up the narrow staircase and into the bright sunlight, and then the cool, salty wind was washing over him and seagulls were crying in the sky and there were big pirates all around him.
“This is my ship,” he said. “The Hammer.” He raised his voice. “Gather round, men! We’ve got us a new mate!”
They turned from whatever it was each of them were doing — mopping the decks, tying knots, dicing, laughing, spitting over the side railings — and grinned big grins as they approached.
“Oi! What’ve we got ’ere?” said a man head and shoulders taller than him in a sleeveless shirt.
“Looky, boys! Fresh meat!” He looked up to see a man high above him at the top of one of the tall masts, where a white skull and crossbones flew against black.
“He’s scrawnier than a willow tree!” That was another big man with an eyepatch.
“Come to give us some fun, eh, boy?” That last was a shirtless man with a hairy chest and a wicked grin. Ray swallowed.
“Now, boys,” said Smitter. There looked to be about fifty of them altogether. “This is Ray. Ye be real good to ’im, all right?”
“All right, boss!”
“Sure.”
“‘Course we will!”
Ray didn’t believe them. They were looking at him like dogs eying a cat.
“Aw, want out already, little boy?” The hairy man without a shirt grinned and stepped forward.
“No,” said Ray, raising his chin.
“Sure you don’t. Lemme show ’im around the ship, Smitter.”
“Go ahead.”
The man put his arm around Ray’s shoulders and began leading him away. Ray wrinkled his nose at the smell. The other men went back to what they had been doing.
“Name’s Skag.” The man extended his hand.
“It’s a—“ He clenched his teeth as the man’s iron grip clamped down. He waited for the release, but it only grew tighter, tighter, and pain was shooting through along his arm and his eyes were watering and Skag was laughing, laughing!
Skag released him. His hand shook as he held it before his eyes, and it was blotched with red.
“For me, too, matey,” said Skag. “A real pleasure for me, too!” Skag took him by the belt with both hands, and then he was flying over the railing and the air was rushing over his face and the waves were shooting up to meet him and he plunged face-first into the surging sea.
Icy water rushed over him and he thrashed, kicked. His head burst above the waves and he had just enough time to take a gulp of air before he was under again. He kicked until he burst above the waves a second time, and he yelled up to the ship and saw that men were lining the rails. Then he was under again.
When he came up his eyes stung and he blew water out his nose.
“Line!” was all he heard as the waves crashed against his ears and the water was above him, flooding his head, then “Grab it!” Something brushed his face, and he threw up his hands to ward off the sharks, but it turned out to be rough and stringy and he grabbed it because it was a rope. He held on for his life as they hauled him up. He hit the side of the ship and rose above the waves toward the railing against the wooden planks, and the wind chilled him to his spine and he couldn’t stop the mad shivers that wracked him.
Arms pulled him over the railing and he collapsed in a wet heap on the deck, gasping and coughing and spitting the salty water from his mouth, his lungs, his stomach.
When he managed to control his convulsions and keep his eyes open, he saw jeering faces above him. “What the hell?” he tried to say, but he didn’t hear anything even though he felt the words in his throat. He shook his head and felt the water drain from his ears, and their raucous laughter came crashing down.
“You asshole!” he yelled at Skag. He searched among the ugly faces for Smitter until he found the long black hair, the scars, and the buttons. “He threw me in!”
“C’mon, matey,” laughed Smitter. “Let’s get ye some proper clothes, as those’re all wet now.”
He stared in disbelief. “You’re not going to do anything?”
“Skag!” said Smitter. Ray’s mouth quirked in satisfaction. “Give ’im some real clothes.” Smitter turned and started away. Ray scowled.
The crowd was dissolving now, but Skag was still grinning down at him. “C’mon, lad,” he said. “Follow me.”
“You threw me in!”
“Aye.”
Ray stared. “You...” He ground his teeth, but nothing came to his lips.
Skag turned, motioned over his shoulder. “C’mon.” He started away. Ray sat shivering on the deck and didn’t follow. Skag disappeared below deck without looking back.
He stood, shivering in the salty breeze. Around him the blue, white-capped ocean stretched out as far as he could see, though seagulls cried overhead. He decided they must be close to land.
On the ship, men moved about, talking and laughing and going about their duties, occasionally grinning at him. The sea breeze filled the three white masts reaching high over his head.
He tried to hide his shivers, but it probably just made him look sillier.
There was a bout of laughter behind him and when he turned a group of sailors were pointing and laughing. He gritted his teeth and started after Skag.
When he reached the narrow stairway that led below decks, Skag reappeared, holding a white short-sleeved shirt and breeches. Or at least they might have been white, once. Now they were sun-dyed and sweat-stained.
Skag threw them at his feet. “Here ye go, kid.” He started for a group of sailors.
Ray sighed and took them below. The smell of sweat and old food met him as he descended into the hold. He saw hammocks, tables, chairs, crates. He approached the nearest sailor, a man with a bandana across his forehead and a wide sword at his side, and asked where he could change. The man looked at him like he was speaking the wrong language.
“Where do I change?” he said, enunciating every syllable.
The man wrinkled his nose. “What’s the matter with you, boy? Bashful?” He shook his head and turned his shoulder.
Ray sighed and found a corner. He dropped his trousers and slipped on the breeches as fast as he could, then did the same with the shirt. He coughed and made a face. Maybe they wouldn’t have gotten so stained if they had been washed once or twice.
When he got back above deck, Skag met him and shoved a mop and bucket into his hands. “Smitter says to mop all the decks, boy.”
He gritted his teeth and took a minute to cool down, then he began mopping the decks. When he was nearly finished with the main deck, Smitter strolled by and after a look said that it needed to be done again. Ray cursed and started over, wondering why he was doing this. Dreaming. Duh.
The sun sank into the sea and painted the waves a deep red. When stars began to twinkle into the sky, a bell rang three times.
“Time to eat,” said a passing sailor, heading below the deck. Ray followed.
He couldn’t have said he enjoyed the food, but it was better than nothing and his stomach had been wagging like an empty sack. At least the ale was OK, or whatever it was supposed to be.
He was sitting in a corner by himself, finishing his biscuit thing that thankfully didn’t have any worms, when Skag approached and picked up his half-finished mug of ale, turned it bottom up and drained it in three swallows. He let out a breath of satisfaction, wiped his lips, and walked away. Ray stared.
He stood, strode over to where Skag sat, and reached for his ale mug. Skag’s hand beat him there. His eyes were like blue ice boring into his skull.
“You’d better get outta here, boy,” he said. The talk quieted down and all eyes turned to them.
“You took my drink, Skag,” he said, and pulled. Skag held onto the mug. He pulled harder, and then Skag leapt to his feet like lightning and slammed a heavy fist into his cheekbone. He fell to the floor, and then Skag was over him and blows were landing on his ribs, his stomach, his nose.
When they finally stopped he realized he was curled into a ball and there were tears streaming down his cheeks. First he managed to stop his pitiful whimpers, then he managed to dry his eyes, and at last he pushed himself to his shaky legs and staggered up the staircase and across the dark main deck to Smitter’s cabin. He banged on the door until it opened.
“What?” said Smitter, his mouth twisting in distaste. “Get in a fight already?”
“Skag,” he panted. It wasn’t almost a sob. No it wasn’t. “Skag did it.”
“Why?”
“He... took my ale–“
”So you want me to hold yer hand? I’m no babysitter, boy.” Smitter started to close the door. Ray stopped it with his hand.
“I’m through,” he said.
Smitter sighed and rolled his eyes as if to say he wasn’t surprised. He moved aside and motioned to the door back home. “Go ahead and get splatted, boy.”
Ray staggered to the door, but stopped with his hand on the knob. He could just see himself stepping through that door and feeling a splat land on his scalp, like... Ellen would...
“What the hell can you do for me?” he said.
“Ye have to see for yerself, boy. You haven’t given it a chance.”
“So far I’ve gotten dunked in the ocean and had the shit kicked out of me! What are you going to do?”
“It’s not what I’m gonna do. It’s what yer gonna do for yerself.”
He could go back right now, clean himself up, go back to work and... continue.
He turned and left the cabin. Smitter closed the door behind him.
He slept that night in a hammock made of big cotton strings that were frayed and itchy, and as he tossed and dozed and turned from watch to watch, his bruises stiffened and his cuts began to itch. When the next morning came, he awoke with puffy eyes and a headache.
That day he scrubbed the decks with a wooden scrubber of what looked like pig bristles, and it made him wonder why he had been told to mop it the day before.
When the sailors jeered at him he ignored their remarks as best he could, but whenever one of them would make some particularly nasty comment and his features would slip, he would pay for it by receiving a round of mocking laughs.
That evening when Skag came to take his ale, he tried to hang onto his mug. Skag simply pushed him back against the wall and pried it away with his thick, stubby fingers.
The next evening he drank it all before Skag came. For that he received a hard slap across the face that left him dazed. When it started to puff up he knew it would be bruised for weeks.
The next evening his heart was racing, trying to beat its way out of his chest as Skag approached. It was actually painful, but he gritted his teeth and waited, waited until Skag reached for his full mug, then he threw it in his face.
Skag let out a curse and took a step back, rubbing the ale from his eyes, but just as he managed to get them open Ray’s fist slammed into his nose. To his surprise, Skag staggered and toppled backward, hitting the floor with a crash.
It wasn’t until then that Ray realized how terrified he had been. Now the terror was pushed away and he felt the power within him. Skag struggled to rise, but after a few well-placed kicks he gave up and lay gasping, holding his hands in the air to ward him off.
All the sailors were watching, silent. Ray put his back to the wall in case they decided to attack him. Maybe this hadn’t been such a good idea.
“Stupid kid.” The voice was Ray’s, and it was slow and slurred like he had been drinking all day. “Stupid kid kicking me when I tripped.”
Laughter exploded around them. “Ye didn’t trip, ye fool!” said one man, the same that had been in the crow’s nest when Ray first arrived. “That ‘stupid kid’ just beat the hell outta you!”
Three men stepped forward and clapped Ray on the back as the laughter melted back to the normal noise below deck at mealtime.
“I’d say he needed that,” said one.
“He needed more than that,” said another.
As they led him away, he saw that Skag had managed to push himself to a sitting position and was staring at him with a stupid look on his face. He didn’t try to take his ale after that.
Three days later just after noon, there was a cry from the crow’s nest. “I see a mast!” And indeed, there it was; a big white mast rising out of the blue sea to starboard.
“Prepare for battle!” bellowed Smitter. There was a cheer from the men, and everyone began running about at once.
Ray was thrust into service loading a cannon with an old, white-haired pirate without a left arm a younger pirate with a shaved head and three silver teeth.
“Drop it in there, boy!” said the old pirate. He himself was missing many more than three teeth, but Ray didn’t see any silver or gold filling the holes.
He lifted the big metal ball into the barrel and the silver-toothed pirate stood ready with a long, burning match. The smell of sulfur stung his nostrils as they waited. They were gaining on the ship, heading straight for it, now less than two hundred yards away. He could see figures scurrying about the deck and the rigging.
It swung suddenly about, and there was a flash and a puff of white. A loud boom reached his ears just as a cannonball tore across the deck and punched a hole through both railings. More flashes and puffs followed. The Hammer kept straight on, a hundred yards away now, fifty, twenty-five. He could hear the men shouting across the water and see their wide white eyes. Then,
Copyright © 2005 by Jonathan Ruland
