FIGHT

It’s dark and cold and I am alone in a lifeboat to six men.

Out there, a storm so strong that I feel like a toy being thrown from side to side by an angry dog, as the sound of the rain and thunder deaf me.
I keep track of the time I am here using my reliable wrist watch, gift of my deceased father, a man who always cared much for me. Every time the cruel storm gives me a chance, I look at it and try to stay in tune with reality.
Six hours after my ship sunk. Six hours since the moment I was dragged in the darkness by a man who saved my life, probably at expense of his own. Six hours since I heard human voices for the last time, crying, screaming and shouting orders. My boat had more than five hundred passengers like me, and at least a hundred sailors, maybe more.

This ominous feeling that i am the last survivor crush me with a burden most wouldn't understand: they would say "be thankful for be alive", and i would say I can't, not after hearing men, women and child asking to be save and be unable to do anything.

Six men, the capacity of this boat.

Keep six men, dry, feed and hydrated for a week, while transponders scream a rescue signal to satellites everywhere. Once I were told that such boats could actually support twice more, twelve souls, for three day. Rescue usually takes only one.
And yet, I lay here alone, the emptiness of this cell crushing my mind. I'm not a good person, I am a man who cheat in his taxes, when my boss isn't looking I escape job earlier, I often don’t give tips, don’t go to church for about two years, don’t donate money to good causes...nothing. My life wasn't worth 12 other's.

At seventh hour my mind starts to slip. Or I hope so. Out there, the sound of screaming, the voices of the boat. Fighting against the motion that throw me like a ragdoll against the bouncing walls of this boat, closed like a tent, I reach for the door, and scream in answer, I say to them were I am, tell them to be strong. But the word is a dark turmoil out there. I see no one.

The storm now is calmer, nine hours since the tragedy. I think I fainted, for I heard a voice whispering to me:
"Be strong."
Startled I cry, don’t know why, and drag myself to the door again, a rubber wall closed by a zipper. I open it and scream at the top of my lungs:

"PLEASE, EVERYONE, BE STRONG!"
But outside, nothing but darkness.

After twelve hours, I see ghosts when I close my eyes, blurred images of people who jump at me and say I didn't deserve to live, they want me to jump out the boat and die with them. It's something so strong that I can't resist. I crawl to the door, to jump in the cold brutal sea and die with them.
But when I touch the zipper a voice whispers at my ear, strong, familiar:

"Don't give up of living, fight and survive!"
I burst into tears, open the zipper and once again, I scream so laud I feel my throat hurt:

"'EVERYONE! DON’T GIVE UP OF LIVING, FIGHT AND SURVIVE!!"

But then, only the dark and the storm are there.
Fifteen hours. I feel like I’m surrounded by them, angry and resentful, in the darkness of the life boat, they summon me to jump and die, they say its the right thing to do, that it will be for the best.
Then, the familiar voice talk to me, not whispering anymore, and for a second, is like a burst of light blow and makes all the angry voices vanish in the storm.

"You are not alone, you have to fight! You have to survive!"

I cry again, and once more I drag my tired body to the opening and scream against the storm:

"YOU ARE NOT ALONE! YOU HAVE TO FIGHT! YOU HAVE TO SURVIVE!!!"

Twenty hours.
My body is cold and full of bruises; I have no more tears to shed. I remember all the times I did wrong, all the times I forgot to say "thank you” or "I love you". I lived like a spoiled child, after money. But now I see I was wrong: Life is more than money, is family, is friends, and is enjoy good times, while you can.
Family.
Friends.
Good times.
I wasted my time and turned my back to such treasures. Thinking like that is only fair I die here, cold, scared and alone.
I don't know how long I am here anymore: Could be years, or seconds. I crawled for a time that looked like an eternity, to finally reach the opening.

I can't take it anymore. I want it to stop. I regret so much, I am so alone, I HAVE to end it.

I open the boat for the last time, but what I see is pure blinding white light.
A hand reaches for mine, and I see a familiar face. He smile at me and day everything is OK, I am safe now.

His warm hand closes around mine, and I feel the sea water and rubber on it. The man uses a orange suit and a helmet. He holds me tight, and I see above me a red and white helicopter. The sound of its propellers kills the sound of the storm.
I faint as I hear them telling me that everything will be alright now.

In my sleep I am at the boat again. I’m so scared I can’t even think properly, for the first time I realize I am probably the last person aboard. Then he comes and grabs my arm, shouting "Quick son! This way!"

It can’t be, is my father! He put me into the last boat and put me out of the harm's way.
Now I am in the boat, alone. The darkness is gone, and I see someone sitting by my side.
He gives me strength, and shout me to fight!
I can’t believe I didn't recognize his voice, is my father, again!
When I sunk in self pity and despised my own life, he cried and comfort me telling me that it was non-sense, I was a good son.
Every moment, he was there for me.

I wake up in a white hospital room.

At my side, a full infirmary, familiar faces, children and parents smiling. Hurt, but happy to be alive.
No fear or suffering, I even think I’m still dreaming, when an angelical nurse softly touch me and ask how I am:
-Where am I?
-This is Harbor City hospital, you gave us some work, mister! - She said joking.

I am informed that no life was lost that day. Smiling and thanking god I shout:

-That’s why I had to fight!

A child in the bed next to mine and his mother look at me with great surprise.
I am about to apologies, when she say something incredible

-You were the man shouting during the storm! I can recognize your voice! You told us to be strong and not give up!

Soon patients on the other beds rise and say the same. I rest surprised once again.

How could those, in different boats, split by a raging storm, hear my voice? How those all could hear it?
I didn’t know.

What I know is life is, indeed, worth fighting for.

HARVEST

HARVEST.

I am a soldier, a sailor, serving in a “concrete” submarine, the Vindicator. Are six of us in this vessel, and our task is to locate and destroy any enemy ship, military or not. At first, was a difficult job: You aim at a boat, and know that maybe hundreds or even thousands of civilians will probably die if you push that red button, and yet, you do it, for our homeland, for our honor, for anything right and good, or so we are told?

My first civilian target was a large cruiser, evacuating wounded soldiers and civilians from the Falklands towards the Latin Alliance territory. Trough our light enhanced periscope I saw the red cross symbol painted on its sides, visible from miles, and instead of diverting my weapons from it, I used it to aim my torpedo.

Torpedoes, at least the type we used, don’t kill by exploding in the target, they kill by exploding under it, creating a vacuum that suck everything on surface, crushing anything. If you are lucky, you will be crushed too and die quickly. If not, you will find yourself in the darkness, in the depth, crushed in debris and drowning without any chance of escape. No ship I ever hit, military or not, had survivors. Not a single soul. That’s war, that’s why we studied so hard and spent so much time and money, to assure death to others.

At the bottom of the ocean, we calmly and silently wait: Soon a large enemy convoy will pass over us, eight cargo ships, heading to Congo with supplies.  An escort of two corvettes, a frigate and three destroyers safeguard it, but they are outdated ships with poorly trained crew, a ragtag disposable crew for a second class mission on dangerous waters, or so were told to us by the military intelligence.

Our outer hull is made of soft concrete matter, which absorbs sonar waves. It also contains a chemical product that produce bubbles when electrified, that double such absorbing ability making us invisibles to them.

The first ship to get in range is a corvette, small and fragile, an easy prey, too easy. This “scout” is nothing else than a bait, to subs or mines. We ignore them completely.

The second ship is also a corvette, ad it’s using the active sonar to scan the waters. We keep silently; even our breathing is slow and calm. We let them pass too.

Then comes one of the destroyers, and on its tracks, two cargo ships, and the frigate. The frigate is our nemesis, an anti-submarine ship. It keeps silence, and uses an old silent propulsion system, that fails to evade our surveillance. Its sonar is off, on passive mode. The plan becomes clear. All ships that came before the frigate were baits to lure us in a trap. We would attack them and revel our position to the frigate, who would counter attack.

Very clever.

So they aren’t as poorly trained as we were informed, doesn’t matter anyway. We arm our supercavitanting torpedoes, seven of them. One to spare, we will save it for later.

We carefully aim them at the ships. At first, we will spare the cargo vessels. No need of such state of art weapon to kill such meek pray.

We flood the tubes and at the same time we fire a volley of four squall on the warships, we activate our silent propulsion. Hit and run.

Those torpedoes are so fast that they all are dragged into the murderous waters without even an chance of counter attack.

The two remaining destroyers fire torpedoes to our previous location, but we are already far from there. They drop their acoustic buoys to track us and confuse our sensors, but its too late.

We fire a volley with two more squalls. They die quickly, or at least I hope so. Now the cargo ships are unprotected. Our sonar indicates that they are already evacuating the ships. Smart but pointless. We can’t wait until they reach a safe distance from the cargo ships, so once we fire, they all will be dragged to death with the vessels they abandoned.

We flood the tubes for our conventional torpedoes and we activate our active sonar, two pings will suffice to kill them all, once we can fire 4 torpedoes at each time.

We fire the first volley of conventional torpedoes after the first ping. As usual, we can listen they praying and crying just before the detonation. After that, we can’t hear anything in the chaos. We prepare to the second volley, when four torpedoes appear from nowhere. Hunter-seeker torpedoes with active sonar, from where they came from?

Something close to the bottom of the ocean appear and disappear like a ghost.

An enemy submarine.

We are the prey, we always were the prey. ALL the convoy was bait. They waited for us to use our active sonar.

The torpedoes approach fast. We use our own counter measure buoys, but they are ignored.

One of my men cry, other pray. I listen to one saying the name of his young wife for the last time. None of them is older than 19, none of us is. I close my eyes, hit the button to eject the ship’s diary and silently await for what I deserved.

You reap what you sow .

And it’s time for the harvest.

The almost simultaneous explosion make the entire submarine resonate for a second, a second and nothing more. The sound, like the sound of a bell announces our doom.

So let it come. The pressure.

The pressure crushes us with the anger of a beast, and we are crushed within it. I see the man at my left be mercifully decapitated not by steel, but by a gush of water. For the first time I understand why men pray before dying, so they don’t have to see what I see next. The man who cried is crushed to something inhumane by the armored bulkheads they said would protect our lives, but then, we always knew it was another lie.

The one who called for his young wife is horrible grinded for our instruments. It takes only few seconds, but his face, his cry of agony, to me it lasted an eternity.
Is my turn to pay. I’m crushed against my chair, but not killed. I don’t feel my legs, I think I don’t have them anymore. The water is cold, everything now is dark.

I feel the pressure having its way with my ears. It hurts, but I don’t care anymore.

I feel like we are floating, but I know we are about to hit the bottom. I let my breath escape my lungs. I want it to be fast.

But it isn’t, not enough. The pain, the despair, I deserve it, but still I try to get free from my steel coffin. And I fail.

I am now dead.

I am next to the remains of our ship, the Vindicator. What it was meant to avenge? I don’t remember anymore. My mutilated body floats like jelly fish, mine and the bodies of my friends.

I realize, it’s the first time I recognize them as friends, and suddenly death wasn’t so tragic anymore, once I was surrounded by friends and not alone. Even mutilated and crushed, I know who they are, and I’m not scared of the horror and gore. We are nothing but light, pale light at the bottom of the ocean. I see the ships we sunk, some are already at the bottom, some soon will be. A flock of pale lights descent over me and my friends. Those who once were my enemies are with us now, but I don’t hate them anymore, I finally don’t have to hate them anymore. They are also mutilated. The horror, there are no words to describe the vision on hundreds so mutilated that cant be identified anymore as human.

But still, I’m not scared. They too, are calm.

We all accept what we got, that was how things were, when we lived. Now we don’t live anymore, and we reject those chains of fear and hatred.

Now we are marching, or floating? I don’t know. We are just moving, like a procession, silently by the bottom of this ocean. Many others joined us, now we are thousands. Men, women, children, doesn’t matter anymore. We just go with the flow of sea water.

We are the only light that exists. Are we at the bottom? Is the sand under us or is it mist?

Those tiny goblets of light are mere dust or are something more spiritual? I don’t know. Nobody does.

I don’t know how many days or years have passed, but now are so many of us… I can see only this light, our light. I don’t know if I’m going forward, up or down.

We are now reaching something different. Is a light golden like the sun. We are gently dragged to it, and we disappear on it.

It’s the end? Or just a gate for a new place? We don’t know.

We are so many, like star in the sky. And maybe we are, who could know?

We are changed, purified. We lost our human tracts in the way; we are brighter, and more colorful.

Soon will be my time to enter the light.

If I was still a man, I would smile, I think. I can’t be sure, once all my past was washed away in the journey.

I reach it.

I dive on it.

FIN

By LHSC

Aka

PGonTL.