Andrew Stewart - We Shall Sing a Song into the Deep

His eyelids have grown heavier, but he shows no sign of stopping, of not talking. I look out the door, peek either way down the hall outside to see if anyone is in earshot. But Brother Callum seems not to care. He continues:

“That’s how you were rescued, you know… from a boat, adrift at sea. Skin blistered and salt-cracked when we found you—I remember. Skinny little thing. Didn’t think you would survive. Caplain took a liking to you, all right. Good thing, because Marston would have just left you there. But Caplain nursed you back to health hisself. A good man, in all. Harsh, but good. Said you were special. An’ he was right about that, wasn’t he?”

“I… I suppose,” I say, not knowing how to respond.

I remember the burn of the sun behind my eyelids, just now. A flash of blinding light bursting through layers and buried memory. The feel of it. The dry, salty, stinging lips.

“Was I alone?” I ask. “When I was found?”

Brother Callum blinks slowly, groggily. “You know, I don’t remember.”

He gives half a colorless laugh.

“Remember when I first heard you sing, yeah. All of us knew… we knew you were special. Knew God had spared you for a reason. Silas loved it. Loved hearing your voice. Said it sounded like an angel.”

His eye is welling up now. Red, and angry.

“Here, I want you to listen to something,” he says suddenly, pulling one side of the headset on his ear while turning the tuning knob on the console, clearly searching for something.

“Listen?”

“It’ll all be over soon, won’t it?” he asks, words thick now, whispering. “It won’t matter. I want you to hear something. Sometimes I listen. Something just for me. Ah, this is a good one…” He smiles, his mouth slack. Before I can respond, he has removed the headset from around his neck and is placing them over my ears.

The creaking of the boat, the squeal and the whine of distressed metal disappear in a sea of crackling, popping static. Harsh. Loud. I want to pull it off. Then I hear it. Swimming somewhere behind the static

Music. Music without voices. Rhythm. Cracks. Instruments that blare, lurking behind a curtain of static that pitches and wails and sometimes swallows but does not fully obscure.

Where is the voice? I think.

And then she enters—a melody, sung not in English. In some other beautiful language—a voice that seems to be moving in hot, short notes.

Energy. Life. Being transmitted out from some island, from some city, where people live and walk and breathe the free air. Something indescribably happy that pours into me. Pours in through my ears, into my heart.

When have I ever felt so light?

“What is it called?” I ask.

But Brother Callum is already fast asleep, still seated in his chair, head slumped.

I don’t want this to end—this music—but I must. There is no time. I can’t risk being caught.

I pull the headphones off and turn the same big knob on the massive console Brother Callum was adjusting only moments before until the needle on the dial rests at the appropriate wavelength. I follow the instructions Adolphine went over in detail. Next, I pull away a plastic cover from the teletype machine to reveal an array of dusty, grey-colored keys. I toggle the power switch and wait. The machine hums gently as the green indicator light slowly winks to life. Still works.

I take the slip of parchment tucked in my bindings and quickly begin to punch in the series of letters and numbers scratched on one of the pieces of parchment Caplain Amita gave me years ago for practicing my letters.

A coded message detailing the Leviathan ’s launch destination and instructions for how to approach.

It’s a noisy business. Each imprinted key causes a sharp snapping sound to emanate from the machine when I press it. Thankfully, the Leviathan is loud tonight, groaning metal and clangs and knocks with every swell and dip. Brother Callum remains slumped in his seat, in a deep slumber. After I have quickly, carefully punched in the sequence, I find the orange TRANSMIT key just where Adolphine said it would be. I strike it.

And with a muted ticking, the message is sent into the world. And perhaps our salvation. A way for us all to survive.

To not drown in these icy depths.

I look over to find Brother Callum slumped in the exact same position, snoring softly. He’ll get in trouble if he’s found sleeping on his watch. But not as much trouble as he would get in if Ex-Oh Goines found me in here with him.

Quietly as I can, I stand, I turn the tuning dial back to the channel he had been scanning when I first came in. Switch off the teletype machine, covering it.

I’m about to leave when I hear the crackling voice speaking through the headphones.

I should leave now. The corridor is empty. No one will see me slip out. But the temptation is too great.

I put one side of the headset over my ear.

It’s a man speaking. English. Though, the reception is especially fuzzy. More so than the channel that was broadcasting the music.

“—ations are underway for Prime Minister Aldeway… formally surrender CPN forces to… Liánméng navy after the utter defeat of the… tion fleet in the battle for Subic Bay… not yet clear whether the Northern Protectorate… comply with Minister Aldeway’s plea for peace… end to war. Word has not yet come from Guam…”

The report is swallowed, disappears in the din.

When I remove the headset, I hear a sharp intake of breath from behind me.

There, standing just outside the half-opened door, Ephraim. Lips drawn tight. Expression inscrutable.

“CAN WE TRADE TEETH?” Caleb asks, placing his spoon down beside his mess kit.

“Why bother?” St. John asks. “We surely only have days left before we deliver the Last Judgment. What good will such earthly goods be to us?”

Caleb falls silent, looks down to his murky broth.

“You need not sour his spirits so,” I say. “He’s scared.”

“He should be rejoicing,” St. John says, that haughty, superior tone. “At last, our service will be rewarded.”

“Regardless,” I say, unable to keep quiet, looking at Caleb’s pale face. “It might be a… frightening time to some.”

Ephraim glances up at me. Normally, he would step in, particularly when Caleb is involved.

I tried reasoning with Ephraim after he found me in the radio room, hooking him by the arm before he could scurry off down the corridor.

“It was nothing,” I told him.

But he wouldn’t look at me. As though I was diseased, as though, just by proximity, he himself was damned.

How much had he seen?

“I was listening to music,” I said. “I had never listened before. And Brother Callum fell asleep…”

“Remy…” he said, pulling his arm away. “I don’t know what you’re up to… . I don’t want to know… but St. John does. And if he finds out, you’ll be… you’ll be in so much trouble. You know Caplain Marston… and if he finds out I knew and didn’t say anything…”

“I won’t get caught. And even if I did, the caplain won’t find out about you. Not from me,” I said, laying a hand at the center of his chest. “Promise.”

He swallowed. Finally, he looked up. Such young eyes, fearful eyes, even though he is at least three years older than me. I’d never noticed before then.

His whole body shook.

“Do you trust me?” I asked him.

And he nodded, taking in a breath.

“Things are happening. About to happen. I can’t tell you any more than that. Just… please keep trusting me. Please?”

He nodded again.

But he has remained cool toward me, even two days later. Not glancing up, and speaking little, if at all, during meals. Our usual silence punctuated somehow by a greater silence.