Stefán Máni - The Ship

Too little, too late. ‘We don’t have much time,’ says Guðmundur as he looks at the dial of his watch, where the second hand is beginning to eat up the last minute before midnight. ‘Go up on the roof and shoot off an emergency flare. If we’re lucky there’ll be other ships in the area.’

‘Captain?’ says Sæli, his voice trembling, and he grips Guðmundur Berndsen’s left arm hard.

‘ Up on the roof, now! ’ screams the captain and he slaps Sæli across the face with the palm of his right hand. ‘If nobody comes to help us we’ll all be dead before tomorrow dawns.’

23:59

Big John is standing in front of the generator with an adjustable spanner in his right hand, a dirty rag in his left, grimy ear protectors on his head, and a dead cigar clamped in the right corner of his mouth.

The chief engineer listens carefully to the rhythmic rattling of these big diesel engines as he reduces the fuel injection in one of them. At night the use of electricity is at a low, so he’s decided to run the generators one at a time at half speed, both to reduce fuel consumption and limit wear and tear and, thus, reduce the danger of a breakdown.

‘ There! ’ says Big John to himself as he gives the rattling engines a friendly pat. He puts the wrench back where it belongs, wipes the oil off his fingers with the rag and saunters over the iron floor and into the storeroom.

The evening watch is over and the chief engineer is on his way to bed. He takes off his ear protectors, steps out of his overalls and hangs them up, kicks off his work shoes and slips on his clogs.

Whatever happened to that picture of a girl he’d hung up inside the door of the control room?

John lights a match and sucks life into his cigar stub before he turns out the light in the cubbyhole and saunters up to A-deck.

In front of the food locker a light blinks, as if the bulb is about to give out. But it’s been acting that way for the whole voyage.

‘I’ll change you tomorrow,’ says the chief engineer as he grasps the stair rail leading up to B-deck, but he stops when a black shadow appears at the top of the stairwell.

‘Who…’ Big John Pétursson half closes his eyes under his hairy eyebrows and wrinkled forehead.

A light blinks in front of the shadow. A light like a candle that flames and dies at incredible speed.

And with this light comes a terrific noise. Rhythmic, thundering blows with a metallic undertone. Like a heavy iron chain running noisily over a sharp iron edge.

Ratatatata!

Then silence as empty as the night, which smells of bitter smoke and blood.

Warning bells start to sound throughout the ship and at the same time the chief engineer falls slowly but surely backwards, like the last tree in the forest.

The light blinks, the light dims, the light goes out.

His heart stops.

Stop.

And everything goes black.

00:00

Guðmundur is standing forwards on the starboard bridge wing, watching five black-clad men sail a hard-bottomed inflatable up to the ship’s side, where they kill the outboard motor and throw a line with a three-pronged hook on the end onto the weather deck.

What should he do?

The captain runs into the bridge to get his shotgun. He flips off the safety catch, clutches it to his chest and, bent over, sneaks back out onto the bridge wing. When he looks out from the wing he sees that the men in black have tied the dinghy to the railing on the overhanging side of the ship; three of them are already up on the weather deck and the other two are about to leave the boat. They are dressed like terrorists, in black military boots with black berets on their heads and machine guns on short shoulder straps.

Skuggi coils up under the table in the chart room, whining like a puppy.

The captain shudders as he bends his knees, leans on the metal wall and aims the gun at the men, who are running single file along the weather deck. He aims at the leader of the group, his cold index finger trembles on the trigger, his eyes fill with salty liquid, his heart hammers, his blood rushes through his veins, and he breathes quickly through his open mouth.

He can’t do it! But he must. He has to !

Guðmundur Berndsen pulls the trigger. The gun goes off and slams him hard in the shoulder. For one second he sees only black and it’s as if time stands still, but then his eyes open, his lungs draw breath and the ship moves up and down. He lifts the gun and peers over the wall. Below on the weather deck run four black-clad men, stepping over their comrade, who lies curled up on the cold metal.

Is he dead? It doesn’t matter.

Guðmundur pumps the shotgun and aims again. He has to hit at least one or two more before they get under the bridge wing and up to B-deck. Once they are on B-deck they’re as good as into the wheelhouse.

But before the captain can pull the trigger a second time he hears the monotonous bark of a large machine gun, and heavy lead bullets crash into the bridge, making a fearsome commotion. Sparks fly in all directions and slivers of metal, shards of glass and chips of paint rain down. The captain throws himself face down on the floor and covers his ears while the pirates’ mother ship pumps lead over the ship’s wheelhouse.

Silence.

Guðmundur takes his hands away from his ears and opens his eyes. Beside him lies the shotgun, covered with pieces of glass and white chips of paint, like the captain himself.

The alarm bell! He has to ring the alarm bell! There are bloodthirsty gunmen on board the ship and the only thing to do is get the crew into the lifeboat and abandon ship before it is too late.

The captain clasps the shotgun close and crawls on all fours into the damaged bridge. Then he runs across to the red box in the middle of the bridge, opens it and pushes the fire alarm. Immediately, all the bells in the ship begin to ring.

Guðmundur looks at his watch.

00:02:30

The captain intends to wait for up to two minutes on the bridge, then go straight down to the boat deck and be the last to get on board the lifeboat. It doesn’t matter what danger threatens the ship and crew: the captain does not abandon ship until the last minute and he is always the last to leave the ship, or loses his life if it comes to that.

Guðmundur takes a few steps over to the starboard side of the ship and peers out the door that opens onto the bridge wing. A sea of green light floats above the black water while a red globe flames up in the heavily clouded sky.

The noise from the bells makes it difficult to think clearly and every nerve in his body is incandescent as a lightbulb. Skuggi has crawled into hiding and is keeping quiet.

‘NO SUDDEN MOVES!’ shouts someone behind him.

The captain clenches his hands around the shotgun, looks to the right and slowly straightens up…

00:00

Sæli stands on the platform back of the wheelhouse on the bridge deck holding the flare gun in his right hand and the flare cartridge in his left. A flare gun is like an ordinary handgun except that the barrel is as wide as the exhaust pipe on a car. Sæli opens the gun with shaking fingers, puts the cartridge in place and shuts it again. Then he climbs up onto the roof of the ship, which is running wet and tilting uncomfortably to starboard.

Sæli is cold, his every muscle is twitching, his teeth are chattering and his stomach is clenching into a tight knot.