Flotsam and Jetsam

Otto Kendall, Andreas Lawson, the Claymoores and Anne Campbell watched them from a noticeable distance. Maybe they were afraid of being declared expendable, now that the raft was finished and didn't want to draw attention. Maybe they were afraid of being shanghaied. They were opportunistic assholes, but I didn't envy them for having to live with King Liam the Crazy for so long. Only Emily helped them push the thing into the sea, showing a surprising amount of muscle, and bade farewell to her champion with a steamy kiss.

With a sinking feeling, we watched Liam and the ghost starting to paddle towards us.

"So it begins," I sighed. "However the day will end, no more than seven or eight out of fourteen will be alive."

"We didn't ask for any of this. Our task is to be among those seven or eight."

"True. I don't want to fight, but I will if I'm forced."

"I have never hurt anyone, Jacob, but I will do so now without the slightest hesitation if I need to. Liam killed Helene. If he wants a fight, I'm in."

"Right," I lamely added, wondering if she really felt that confident or only had tried to motivate us.

We assumed our positions.

It took them almost two hours to cover the distance. Swimming would definitely have been quicker. As we had a few difficulties entering the ship, we had thought about greeting them right at the torn passageway. We discounted that, as they'd be standing on a raft, we couldn't count on the disadvantage Holloway had. We assumed that Liam and Pattinson could easily jump aboard.

We were wrong. Their boarding was a degrading spectacle, unworthy of any real seaman. They were stokers and not used to contact with water, I reminded myself. Finally, they were aboard, looking around warily. I knew they couldn't see us. They were in the blindingly bright, torn open part of the ship, looking into the black hole of the corridor.

"What a shithole," Liam exclaimed. "Myers! I know that you're in there. Just come out, we will spare your life."

Damn, what a master negotiator. Of course, neither of us said a word.

"Shit. Okay, Alfie, let's go. You go first."

Pattinson looked at Liam in surprise, but finally nodded and began to grope his way along the corridor that was pitch black from their point of view.

Surprisingly, Liam went the other way, across the distorted wreckage that blocked it partially and made progress tedious. Damn, we had counted on him taking the easy way, as he usually did. If he wanted to surprise us, he had succeeded. This fight was just about to start and our plans had already been derailed.

I looked at Liz. She had turned out to be a crafty and physically strong woman and had started to wear men's clothes while aboard ship. She had a determined look on her beautiful face as she gestured at me to go around the galley and meet Liam before he could get behind us. We weren't prepared for this scenario, so we had to improvise. I wasn't happy about this, as I didn't want us to split up, but it seemed like the best option.

I nodded and offered her the machete. Wordlessly, she declined. I knew what she had in mind, kissed her one more time and went to meet Liam.

As silent as possible, I rounded the galley, trying to estimate Liam's position. I stopped at a corner. I was sure he'd be in the corridor behind it. We both had machetes, but he was much bigger, stronger and an experienced killer.

"Aaaaaaah," Pattinson shrieked in the distance. I smiled and thought about the numerous traps we had installed along the dark corridor. I thought that it was the first sound Pattinson had ever made and I hoped it would also be the last.

"Shit," I heard right behind me.

Cautiously, I turned around and saw Liam maybe 6 feet away. He was looking towards the scream and obviously hadn't yet seen me. How the fuck had he managed to get behind me? I was stiff with fear, he looked like a giant in these small corridors. His machete was gleaming and his muscles seemed big enough to move a small city.

I tried not to breathe as I sneaked backward. After a few steps, something creaked under my foot. Shit. Not now, please.

"Hey, asshole. There you are. Finally," he said while he slowly and confidently turned around. Shit, shit, shit. I had nowhere to go. If I ran to where he came from, I'd have to cross the rubble and he'd catch me easily. No, I'd have to fight it out right here. Damn, I had no idea how to do this. I had rarely been in fights and certainly never to the death or with a machete. He, on the other hand, was grinning and seemed relaxed and genuinely happy.

"Why, Liam?"

He knew exactly what I meant. Why the violence, the hostility, the murders?

"Who gives a fuck, Myers? Because I can. This may be a shit hole island, but it's my shit hole island. I do it because I can. I have nothing else to do and I have already killed people I've liked a lot better than you."

I just nodded and gripped my machete tighter. This wasn't about to end well for one of us. Problem was, that one was probably going to be me.

"Why did you blow up the whole ship?" I asked as nonchalantly as I could. This was my one chance to get a few answers.

"The ship? We didn't do that."

"Yeah, sure. You had a lifeboat conveniently prepared for life on a remote island. And it was just a coincidence that you weren't near the boiler when it exploded. It happened right when we passed a nice, inhabitable island."

"Why would I lie to you? You're going to be dead in a few minutes anyway."

He had a point there, I had to admit that.

"It was sheer luck, man. Sheer luck," he continued, grinning. "The captain had this idea that I had murdered Brown."

"Brown was dead?"

"Yeah, I mean, I killed him. But he was tampering with a boiler. I had to stop him. I didn't even want to kill him. He was just so damn fragile. Honestly. We knew the captain wouldn't believe me. He never liked me. We just wanted to get away before he made up his mind."

He suddenly looked like an oversized schoolboy, trying to convince me that it wasn't him who had pranked the teacher.

"Eeeeeeeeeeee," Pattinson had started to screech again in the distance. "Lllliiiaaaaaa." The scream abruptly stopped. I guessed that he had stepped into another trap. Possibly the foot hole with the barbed hooks. That had got to hurt. The end of his cry for help was probably Liz using her club. Poor bastard. The only word I had ever heard him say way "Liam," of all things.

"You assholes," Liam growled with renewed hatred. Damn, that was the clear downside of our victory. He charged me with a raised machete and swung downwards. I was able to deflect it with mine, but it was a terribly powerful blow and I almost lost the thing.

I tried to retreat further, without having a clear idea about what to achieve with that move. It just seemed the right thing to do. Only sheer luck might save me now, and I didn't have the best record with that in the past.

Liam charged again, looking like a raging bull. To some extent, I could even understand him. We had just killed his only friend in the world. Liz had. Brave, beautiful Liz. I would never see her again and that thought made me incredibly sad. Damn, if I die here, he will get Liz as well, I thought. No, sir, that mustn't happen.

With renewed motivation, I sidestepped his next attack, sending him crashing into a bulkhead that had been behind me without even noticing it.

I planned to use his moment of weakness to attack him, but someone had forgotten to tell him about this. He turned around surprisingly nimble for a man of his size and charged me immediately. This time he held the machete lower, trying to stab me. Unsure how to react, I used mine to deflect it, but couldn't avoid his bulk running into me.

We both crashed onto the floor, with him on top of me. A car crash would have been more comfortable, I thought, as his weight pushed the air out of my lungs.

Shit, I was now trapped under him. He punched me in the face, but he did not have enough leeway to do any real damage. The punch turned my face to the right, though, where I saw two things. One machete lying on the floor a few feet away. Another machete in my right hand. Oh. I had forgotten about that.

I could hardly move at all with that mountain lying on top of me, so my swinging movement was totally awkward.

"Ahh," he cried. I guessed that the blade had cut into his ass. Problem was that there was quite a lot of ass to cut and this was far from incapacitating him. It had one effect, though, and that was to spur him on.

"You asshole," he repeated. For some reason, he seemed disappointed with my behavior, like I was disappointed with his limited vocabulary.

He lifted himself a bit off me to get more room for the next punch. Either the machete was too long or my arm was too short for stabbing, so I used the time for the next cutting swing.

"I'll kill you." That is old news, I thought, as I watched him pull his fist back so far that it almost looked misty in the distance, to deliver the one killing punch.

"Hey, Liam. Such a pleasure to meet you again." We both looked towards the syrupy sweet voice from above our heads. Liz. Run, Liz, I thought.

I looked back at Liam's surprised face. Why isn't he happier to see her, I thought, when suddenly the back end of an arrow appeared where his eye used to be, accompanied by a sickening sound.

I just managed to avoid being stabbed by that arrow when Liam's limp body crashed down on me.

"Have I ever mentioned that crossbow shooting was one of my favorite pastimes, Jacob?" she asked as she started to try to pull Liam off of me.

"No, you somehow omitted to mention that," I answered after having escaped the mass of dead man above me, still out of breath and confused to find myself still alive.

She laughed sweetly. "We won, didn't we."

"Yes," I smiled. "Well, technically, you won. Where did you get that crossbow?"

"That's Charlie. He's always been my favorite. He's going to have a place on our mantlepiece, don't you think?"

"Our..." I was at a loss for words. No, Jacob, don't spoil the mood by starting to think practically. This is still the holiday romance. She will come to her senses as soon as we re-enter civilization. "How did you get a hold of it?" I asked instead.

"I'm so sorry for letting you wait. After I killed the ghost, I ran to help you, but I got lost in the corridors. Then I stumbled directly into my cabin. There was Charlie, right on my suitcases. Can you believe it? I'll finally have something decent to wear."

We used the time to explore the corridor we somehow had overlooked all the time. As expected, those were the first-class cabins. I was able to find a few decent clothes for myself as well, to match Liz' renewed perfect lady-like attire.

"This looks like a junkyard," Liz remarked while overlooking the remnants ofPacific's once-proud bridge. "I don't think there's anything here that might be usable."

"The safe..." I said, not believing what I saw.

"What?"

"The old captain's safe at the back of the bridge. Sturdy old bastard. Look at that! It's practically unharmed."

"Oh, that's... well... what use is it when we can't open it?"

"You are right," I said. "We should open it then."

"What?"

"I know the combination."

"That's nice, but how does it help? We're certainly not short on cash. He doesn't have some nice green tea in there, I guess?"

"We might get some answers. The logbooks are in there."

We did get some answers. The captain had indeed investigated Brown's death. As Liam had told me, he had killed Brown in the boiler room while he tampered with some safety valve. There had been some previous sabotage attempts, so the captain had already exonerated Liam, but hadn't told him yet. That detail had apparently saved the three stoker's lives. For a while, at least.

Somehow, I had a bad feeling about all of this. Someone had deliberately blown up thePacific and killed all those people, and I still didn't know who it was and whether the person was still around.

"Liz, I don't like this. Someone obviously wants to see us dead. I just don't know..."

"A ship!" she interrupted me.

"What?"

"Look! There! We're going home! Finally!"

She was about to climb the stairs to the bridge's roof to get their attention, but I stopped her.

"Wait, Liz. They're coming here anyway."

"Yes. So what?"

"Liz, we've just learned that someone wanted to kill us. We don't know who."

"Yes, but we survived and we're about to be rescued."

"Who is on that ship? Let's just wait and see, okay?"

"Jacob, that's ridiculous."

"Do it for me, okay?"

"Okay. I still think it's silly, but I'll do it for the man I love, even if he's paranoid."

"You... love... what?"

She kissed me to stop my confusion and it worked.

So we hid in the torn passageway we had used to enter the wreck. We had a nice view of the beach, the dinghy that approached the beach, and the six survivors. The raft had long since dissolved.

The dinghy looked rather full and I wondered how they planned to pick up any more people. That question was quickly answered when three men on the dinghy raised automatic weapons and blew the small group of people on the beach to pieces.

"Nooo..." Liz started to cry before I silenced her with a hand on her mouth. "Oh, god," she just sobbed afterward. "Why did they do that?"

"Those must be the people who blew up the ship in the first place. For some reason, they really seem to prefer a strict no-survivor scenario."

"I see. Sorry for not trusting you."

"Hey, you saved my life by shooting Liam. We're even now."

"I think we own each other now, according to some Indian tradition, right?"

I had to laugh. How could she come up with such things in this situation? "We're not out of the woods yet. They're going to search the island first. Then they're going to search the wreck. They don't seem to be fond of witnesses."

"Shit."

"Language, Liz!" We both had to laugh.

"Seriously, Liz! Let's take the logbook and the other documents in there. As soon as they approach the wreck, we're going to hide somewhere."

"But where?"

"Don't worry, I know this ship like no one else." The others who knew this ship were all dead by now. The thought made me sad, but I kept my mouth shut.

That was exactly what we did. It took them two days to methodically search the island. I wondered if they found our cave. I hoped they hadn't: I didn't like the thought of those bastards entering our sacred place. The place where we had made love for the first time.

On the morning of the third day, the dinghy finally moved towards the wreck. We had enough time to remove all the traps and any other sign of our presence as thoroughly as possible. Our hiding place was small, hot and stifling. The fact that Liz had insisted on bringing Charlie hadn't made the place any roomier.

The guys weren't exactly quiet while they searched the ship. At one point we heard a small explosion and guessed that was the Captain's safe being blown open.

"They are not here to find something, they just want to make sure everything is destroyed and there are no witnesses."

"But why?"

"There might be some information or object on this ship that isn't supposed to get somewhere. Maybe these are Russian and American secret services fighting each other, but I wouldn't bet on who is on which side."

She just nodded sadly.

As I expected, our hiding place was impossible to find for anyone unfamiliar with the ship.

I still couldn't believe it. The house seemed bigger than thePacific had been. It was breathtakingly beautiful in a not so understated way. I still had problems with the fact that there were servants everywhere. I had deliberately chosen to live a simple life, both at sea and at home, and felt uncomfortable in these new surroundings. I couldn't manage to ask Mary for tea, I still just went to the kitchen and made it for myself, much to her disapproval. I also didn't ask Mark, the gardener, to pick up stray branches, but rather enjoyed doing it myself.

It was amazing that Liz lived in such a huge place totally alone, after having lost her parents a few years before. Small wonder she felt the need to get away for a while and travel the world.

I was living there with Liz, but for the sake of appearance, we had different rooms. Yes, this was 1955, but some things still hadn't changed. Liz was well known in East Coast society and had a reputation to uphold. I had taught her how to survive on a tropical island, this time it was her duty to teach me how to hold my own in a hostile environment. She introduced me everywhere as a good friend, but I think we didn't fool too many, certainly not the servants, when one of us sneaked into the other's room every night, anyway.

I enjoyed my time with her, but still expected it to end as soon as a more appropriate suitor would appear. At the few societal events we had attended together, there was no shortage of those, but Liz rebuffed them in a friendly but firm way.

At that moment, she was standing at the window of what she called the green library and was taking in the gorgeous view onto the soft green hills. I approached her from behind and kissed her neck.

"Thinking of Helene?"

"Yes. That's how life works. Lives are ending all the time; others begin all the time."

"She was your friend. Yes, she was... wait, what? A life begins?"

"Well, what did you expect, mister? We have worked plenty on making a baby."

"Wow, I don't know what to... wow... that's great."

Inside, I was totally confused. What would happen to us? Would she let me see the child, once she had a husband more appropriate for a lady of her standing? I knew that I loved her and had told her so countless times. So had she, but that didn't mean much in these social strata.

"So, Mr. Boatswain, what are you going to do about it? Are you going to make me an honorable lady or do you intend to keep me as your concubine?" She had a mischievous gleam in her eyes.

"Well, as usual, I'll do whatever you want me to," I said, and I meant it.

"Then get on your knee and ask me, you fool, before I spontaneously combust."

"I... What?" I might have been an idiot, but not that much of an idiot. I got onto my knee faster than anything I did before. "Liz, would you honor me and become my wife?"

"Yes!" she shouted in tears and hugged me tightly while I still couldn't believe my luck.

"I'm really glad that you knew the skipper who came by after the hit squad had left. I don't think I could have trusted anyone at that point. You know what, Jacob? Something really rankles me. We never learned what this whole shit..."

"Language, Liz!" I laughed. She really had been corrupted by her time in the wild.

"Sorry, I still have to get used to civilization again. Anyway, what this whole affair has been about."

"It was definitely not about the things in the captain's safe. That was just useless..."

We were interrupted by the door suddenly flying open and two armed men jumping into the room. I had to try to not laugh, this was a serious situation, but they were just ridiculous. They tried to look stern and pointed their automatic weapons at us, but this was massive overkill. This was a Victorian-style salon with two unarmed people drinking tea. I was glad they hadn't brought a tank along.

"Finally!" a well-dressed man who calmly entered behind them said with a heavy Russian accent. This was a man who had been to wartime and again and looked like he had not always scored clear victories. His face was covered in scars, one eye was fake and part of one ear was missing. The remaining eye exuded no more compassion than the glass eye.

"What do you want?" I said, trying to not sound too worried.