by Jake Bible
“Come back for the bodies,” Kaafi said, “they will stink up the bridge.”
“And do what with them?” Abshir asked.
“Throw them overboard,” Kaafi said.
“Oh,” Abshir said.
“Is that a problem?” Kaafi asked.
“No, just…”
“What? Out with it, Abshir.”
“Should they not be blessed?” Abshir asked. “What about their souls?”
“They are Christians,” Kaafi laughed. “They have no souls. Into the sea with them.”
Abshir nodded. He followed Tarabi out and they secured the men with rope to the rows of pipe that ran the length of the bridge. The sun was boiling hot and would kill the men in hours if they were left like that. But in the time it would take to get to the rendezvous point, they would only be weak and not dead. It would keep them from fighting back if they got any sudden burst of courage.
Once secured, Abshir went back and dragged the two corpses one at a time to the railing. He set his rifle down and squatted, struggling to lift the First Engineer over the rail. After considerable effort, he managed it, and watched as the body tumbled through the air and was lost into the churning wake below.
Catching his breath, Abshir started with the Second Engineer. As he got the body halfway over the rail, something fell from the man’s pocket. Abshir, leaving the corpse draped over the rail, bent down, and picked up a brand new iPhone.
“Look, Tarabi!” Abshir shouted, waving the phone.
“Good for you,” Tarabi nodded. “What’s that around it?”
Abshir studied the case the phone was in. It was hard plastic, but with an orange foam outer shell. He squeezed it a couple times and the foam returned to form each time. “I think it floats,” Abshir smiled, “in case it falls into the water.”
“Yes, that would be a good place to float,” Tarabi mocked. “Now get rid of that body.”
Abshir grabbed the man’s legs and lifted the corpse again. He nearly screamed when the man struggled slightly, not quite dead.
“Bitte,” the man whispered.
Abshir ignored the man’s plea and shoved with all of his strength. He leaned over the rail and watched as the body bounced off the hull, sending it flying just to the outside of the ship’s wake. The body hit the water and floated away. Abshir watched it as it bobbed face down in the water, the man finally dead from the impact. He wondered if that man had a photograph on him of his family; he should have checked his pockets, but was too startled by the man being alive.
Abshir was about to turn away when something caught his eye. Even all the way up on the upper deck, Abshir could see the shadow of a large shape down in the water. It was huge. Abshir shook his head and squinted, thinking it was a trick of the sunlight playing across the water. But the shape was there and moving towards the floating corpse.
“Tarabi?” Abshir called, keeping his eyes focused on the shadow. “Come see this.”
“Are you stupid?” Tarabi asked. “I am watching the crew.”
“But---”
“Shut up, boy,” Tarabi said, “don’t waste my time.”
Before Abshir could respond, the shadow became substantial, its mouth, filled with row after row of teeth, broke the surface of the water, swallowing the corpse whole. Abshir jumped back, a small cry escaping his throat, his eyes wide with fear. The thing was gigantic. Bigger than anything he’d ever seen.
“What is wrong with you, Abshir?” Tarabi asked. “You cry like a girl.”
“Out there,” Abshir said, pointing towards the rail as he backed away, “something out there.”
“In the ocean? Really?” Tarabi laughed. “There are many something’s out there.”
“It was a shark,” Abshir said, his eyes wide with fright, “a very large shark.”
“Good for it,” Tarabi said. “It found some free food.”
“It was a giant,” Abshir said.
“Like me,” Tarabi smiled, “the Tarabi of the sea!” He watched how Abshir shook. “What is wrong with you? Sharks can’t fly. Unless you go swimming, it won’t get you. But I will if you don’t stop being like a little girl.”
Abshir nodded. “Yes. Sorry.”
He tried to smile at Tarabi, but he couldn’t quite do it. The image of the size of that mouth filled his mind. He was not good at math, barely having had any schooling, but he knew sharks well enough to figure out the length of the creature. If he was right, he didn’t think the shark would need to fly for its mouth to reach the upper deck fifty feet above the water.
“Go get Najiib,” Tarabi said. “Tell him to go to the bridge like Kaafi asked.”
“Right,” Abshir said absently, “I’ll get him.”
He made his way to the aft hatch and down to the engine room slowly. He felt better in the cool darkness, away from the rail and the water. He found Najiib walking towards him and he stopped.
“What is the largest shark you have seen?” Abshir asked.
“What kind of question is that?” Najiib replied. “Why ask me that?”
“I saw a shark,” Abshir said, “it ate one of the corpses.”
“One of the corpses?” Najiib asked, looking up towards the upper deck. “How many men did Tarabi kill?”
“None,” Abshir said. “Kaafi killed the Second Engineer when you got the power going again. To make an example.”
“Oh,” Najiib said. “So what is this about a shark?”
“The one I saw was sixty, maybe seventy feet long,” Abshir said. He saw the look on Najiib’s face. “No, no, I am serious, Najiib! It was a giant of the sea!”
“There are no sharks that big,” Najiib said, pushing past the boy and taking the steps up. “Not even great whites. Maybe a whale shark, but even that doesn’t get sixty feet. And doesn’t eat corpses. Your eyes tricked you. It was the sun on the waves making the shark look bigger than it was.”
“Right,” Abshir said, following Najiib up, “you must be right.”
“Do not mention what you saw to your father,” Najiib said. “He will think you are not fit for runs. Men that cannot trust their eyes cannot be trusted at all. Keep what you said to yourself and I will keep it to myself. Understood?”
“Understood,” Abshir said. “But I already told Tarabi.”
“He is a fool and your father will not listen to him,” Najiib said, tapping the side of his head. “Nothing up here worth your father’s time.”
“Yes, okay,” Abshir replied, “thank you, Najiib.”
“Go help Tarabi and I will speak to Kaafi,” Najiib said. “And no more monster sharks.”
“No more monster sharks,” Abshir smiled, feeling silly over what he saw. Of course it hadn’t been seventy feet long. That was stupid. That was little boy thinking. And his father didn’t send a little boy on a run, he sent a young man.
Najiib was able to adjust the ship’s heading and they were at the rendezvous point in under an hour, pushing the engines at full. Abshir stayed by the rail, his eyes scanning the horizon for his father’s ship. He purposely avoided looking down into the water.
“There!” Abshir yelled towards the bridge. “I see them!”
Per procedure, Kaafi had stayed off the radio, but turned it on when he got the word from Abshir. He switched channels until he found the one Daacad had given him.
“We see you,” Daacad’s voice said after they finished their quick greetings. “Bring to full stop and wait. A skiff is on its way to you.”
The skiff bounced across the waves as it sped towards the ship. At full stop, the ship didn’t produce a dangerous wake, but it was still a trial getting the captive crew down to the skiff. Abshir watched as the skiff sped away, Tarabi seated behind the prisoners with his AK covering them, and headed back to the mother ship. There hadn’t been enough room for everyone to go at once, so he waited behind. The skiff would come back with a small crew to help Najiib pilot the ship to the secure port.
Then there it was again: a dark shadow in the wat
er, just behind the returning skiff.
He thought about telling someone, but remembered Najiib’s words. If he mentioned a monster shark to anyone else, he’d never be allowed to go out on a run again. He could feel his pulse quicken and watched as the skiff pulled alongside the ship. The shadow continued underneath, lost below the ship.
“Ready, young Abshir?” Kaafi asked, making Abshir jump. “Relax. You have done your father proud.”
“Yes, thank you,” Abshir said.
Kaafi greeted the men that climbed up over the rail and pointed them towards the bridge so they could join Najiib. He then slapped Abshir on the back and pointed to the ladder dangling over the side to the skiff fifty feet below.
Abshir slung his rifle across his back and swung himself over the rail, placing his feet carefully on the ladder, terrified of what would happen if he fell. More than likely, he would snap his neck from the fall, but that was not what terrified him. What if he didn’t snap his neck? What if what was in the water got him?
He took a seat in the skiff and watched the gently rolling waves as he waited for Kaafi to join them. Once in his own seat, Kaafi gave the order, and the skiff turned and headed towards the mother ship.
“What are you looking at?” Kaafi finally asked, worried about the way Abshir stared at the water. “Do you see something?”
Unfortunately for Abshir, he did see something. He tried not to look too scared, but it was impossible to hide it from Kaafi. The man leaned past Abshir and looked into the water. Down below, many feet below he could see a shape.
“What is that?” he asked.
“You see it?” Abshir asked.
“Yes, of course, why wouldn’t I see it?” Kaafi asked. “It is huge. And fast.”
“Yes,” Abshir nodded. “Is it a shark?”
“Could be,” Kaafi said then looked harder. His death grin became an actual smile for the first time in years. “No, no, look!”
The shape began to surface, maybe thirty yards from the skiff.
“What is that?” Abshir asked. “That’s not a shark.”
“It’s a whale!” Kaafi laughed. “Look at it!”
The beast surfaced, shooting water fifty feet into the air from its blowhole, and then dove back down again. The men on the skiff all laughed and pointed, excited by such a rare sight.
“What kind of whale is it?” Abshir asked. “Did you see its mouth? Those teeth?”
The whale had opened its mouth briefly when it surfaced, and Abshir was shocked to see two full rows of teeth –one row on top, one row on the bottom- that looked like they were meant for more than eating krill.
“Yes,” Kaafi said, puzzled, “I have never seen a whale that big with teeth like that. I don’t know what kind it is.”
Abshir wished his father could see the creature, he knew a lot about sea life. Then he realized he had something that he could use. He pulled the iPhone from his pocket and turned the video camera on, aiming where the whale had last been.
“Where’d you get that?” Kaafi asked.
“Off the Second Engineer,” Abshir said. “Tarabi was jealous. I think he wanted it, but I found it first.”
“Good for you,” Kaafi said, his eyes scanning the surface of the water for signs of the whale. “There!”
Abshir turned the camera on and aimed it at where Kaafi was pointing. In just seconds, the whale surfaced again, but this time it breached and came up out of the water, half of its body visible as it twisted in the air and then fell back again. The wave it produced rolled towards the skiff and the men didn’t realize what was going to happen until it was too late.
The wave hit the side of the skiff, flipping it like a piece of paper. The men went flying into the water, their cries of surprise cut short as they went under. Abshir struggled to get back to the surface and was both happy and dismayed. Dismayed because he had lost his AK-47, but happy because he still clutched the iPhone. It hadn’t been the whale’s fault they had capsized. It wasn’t the men’s fault either, since none could have known there would be something so large in the water that day.
The skiff floated upside down and Abshir swam towards it. He reached it and crawled on top of the hull. He checked the phone and the case had kept it protected. The camera was still recording and he almost turned it off when he saw another shadow. Just below where Kaafi was swimming.
“Uh oh!” he shouted at Kaafi. “The whale is below you! Swim! Swim!”
Abshir wasn’t sure if the whale would attack a man, but the image of the huge mouth swallowing the Second Engineer’s corpse rushed to the forefront of his mind. And that image troubled him. It wasn’t the same as the whale. Sure, he was not an expert on sea life, but still he wasn’t stupid.
“Kaafi!” he yelled. “Hurry!”
The shadow was coming to the surface quickly, right at Kaafi.
“It won’t eat me,” Kaafi yelled, spitting sea water from his mouth, “I’m not whale food!”
And he was right, because the whale breached a good forty yards away. This time it didn’t roll and splash, but came up and quickly dove back down. When its tail was in the air, Abshir gasped.
Half of its tail had been bitten off. Abshir had no doubt about that, he could plainly see the gouges of teeth marks. But what could do that to a whale so big? His eyes fell on Kaafi and the man looked at Abshir, terrified, then down at the shadow that wasn’t a whale, and coming up at him.
The rest of the men had made it to the skiff and they all scrambled up onto it, yelling at each other not to make it roll and sink, while also yelling for Kaafi to swim. They saw the shadow as well.
Their yells ceased the second the shadow was a shadow no more and exploded from the water. Half of them screamed as Kaafi was swallowed almost whole. Almost. When the massive jaws bit down, his shoulders, neck, and head, went flying into the water, blood spreading everywhere.
“KAAFI!” Abshir shouted. “KAAFI!”
The thing fell back into the water and the men clutched at each other, their eyes scanning the waves, looking for signs of its return.
“What was that?” Daacad shouted, pulling his binoculars away from his face, as he stood on the deck of his ship. The men behind him stared out at the water, stunned. “Did any of you see that?”
“I do not believe it,” Tarabi said, “he was right.”
“Who was right?” Daacad asked. “Tarabi? Who was right? About what?” But the man didn’t respond. Daacad looked at the other men and rage filled his features. “Get us over there! Get us to that skiff!”
His order was relayed to the bridge and the ship began to turn and move across the water towards the overturned skiff. But it was too late. Daacad watched in horror as the thing surfaced again, this time lifting the entire skiff into the air and biting it in half. Men screamed, Daacad heard them crying for help, and he was positive one of the voices was his son’s.
“Faster!” Daacad yelled. “Faster!”
The creature had submerged again, and when they got to the wreckage of the skiff, it was nowhere to be seen. Daacad, careful not to sound panicked and lose face in front of his men, shouted orders left and right. The wreckage had spread across the water by the time they got there, so a net was tossed out in hopes of retrieving some of it and anyone left alive that possibly clutched to the shattered and splintered boards.
After three passes, all of the wreckage was retrieved, but not a single man. Not whole, at least. When the net was hauled to the ship’s deck and opened, an arm slid from under a snapped board. Tarabi was the first to see it, and what the arm’s hand held. He quickly picked it up and pocketed what he found, and then waved the arm at the others.
“This is all that’s left!” he shouted. “What happened?”
A blow to the back of his head knocked him to his knees, which was not an easy thing to do to a young man Tarabi’s size. He got up and spun around quickly, ready to fight, but stopped instantly, as he looked down into the eyes of Daacad.
“Give. Me. That
,” Daacad snarled.
Tarabi handed the severed arm over like it was made of hot lead and stepped well out of Daacad’s reach. The leader of the pirate gang held the arm carefully, his eyes welling with tears. On the inside of the arm, close by the wrist, was a long, jagged scar. He knew that scar. It was from when his son was small and fell from a tree, catching his arm on a broken branch. A wave of anguish washed over him and it was his turn to fall to his knees.
No one on deck moved a muscle until their leader was done sobbing and crying over the loss of his son.
When Daacad was able to gather himself and get to his feet, he looked at Tarabi.
“I want to know what that was,” he said. “I will not rest until I do.”
Tarabi nodded, and then waited as the man turned away, still clutching the arm, and walked up and into the bridge. He shouted at the other men to get to work and they scattered even though some had seniority over Tarabi. When he was sure no one was watching, Tarabi slipped below. Everyone was on the upper deck, so he was alone when he pulled the iPhone from his pocket. Despite its time in the seawater, there was still blood on it, stuck in the crevices between the hard case and the outer protection of the foam.
He double-checked that he was alone, and then turned on the phone. The video app came up immediately and Tarabi played the last video shot. He watched it over and over, listening to the surprised voices of Kaafi and Abshir as they watched the whale breach. It was on the eighth or ninth viewing that he noticed it: a shadow in the water close by the whale. He could tell by the angle of the sun that the shadow was not from the whale itself, but something just as large under the water’s surface. The shark.
He briefly thought of taking the phone to Daacad and showing him the video, but decided against it. Daacad would take the phone from him and keep it for himself. Tarabi couldn’t stomach the thought of losing it, not even to his gang leader. It was an iPhone! No, he would keep it for himself. He’d only ever had a flip phone, so he wasn’t quite sure how it worked, but he knew a guy back in Hilweyne that would.
