Emilia
Tuesday, March 22nd, 2022 (The day of the Shutdown)
“Are you being stupid?! I came to you because you were supposed to be smart. Does that seem smart?” a voice attempted to whisper but the man’s volatile temper took the better of him.
It was Marcus Noren.
“Me?! I’m not the one passing off a half-baked plan as some kind of masterpiece. There are too many flaws in your idea to make it work.”
Groaning about her beauty rest being disturbed, Emilia slipped out from under the covers. Her headache had greatly subsided, enough for her to think clearly again.
Crunch.
Adjusting to the low light, it took her a while to understand what she was looking at.
Staring down at the glass bottle she stepped on, she glanced at the door to see if they heard. The conversation continued without any indication they did.
Relieved, her attention shifted to the mess around her. Supplies were strewn across the floor and a pile of them collected around her bed. Next to her, a bed had ripped free from the chains that latched it to the floor and had fallen on its side.
Outside, the conversation had escalated to an argument, reclaiming her attention.
Ignoring the mess at her feet, she crept toward the door and she pressed her ear to it to listen in.
“ — it’s possible if we have a larger team. Something that you and I will work on,” Marcus argued, his tone trying to placate the man.
Peeping through the door’s window, she gasped aloud. Their heads spun in unison, trying to locate the sound, but the shadows concealed her. Her heart was still racing as crouched beneath the porthole.
It was only a fleeting moment but Emilia recognized the contours of the man Marcus was speaking to — it was the Chief Engineer.
“What was that sound?” Marcus asked, his voice threatening violence.
“Relax, it was someone in the sickbay. Listen, I’ve been covering for your shit up until now, don’t make me regret it. Until you find a better idea or recruit more men, don’t think of talking to me in front of the others.”
Walking back up the steps to the main deck, the door to the accommodations clicked closed behind him.
“Fuckin’ yellow-bellied son of a bitch!” Marcus abruptly roared, slamming his beefy fist into a nearby wall.
Emilia’s entire section of the lower decks shuddered at the force of the punch, eliciting a moan from another man who was in the bed beside her.
Rushing back to the safety of her covers, she stilled her breathing until she was certain that Marcus had left.
His heavy feet slapped against the floor and with a crash, the pale light from outside was cut off and everything returned back to the still gloom of the cabin.
Mulling over the conversation, she debated her next course of action. Should I tell the others?… No, Jeff and my father have their problems to worry about. It would be best to forget about it.
The blood from her wound had coagulated and dried, the last of it reaching her chin.
Taking it as a sign she was almost healed, she tied back the loose strands of her long brown hair and carefully left the confines of the medical bay.
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She was at the end of a long hall that connected most of the rooms on the lower deck. Above her, level with the main deck was the accommodations building where there were the sleeping cabins, the gym, the recreation room, and her favorite — the cafeteria. Even further above that was the bridge of the ship through which all of the commands of the ship were relayed.
At the end of the hall was the door to the main deck. Her eyes locked onto the small porthole that showed outside.
Something’s wrong.
Creeping towards it, she was interrupted by the sound of several people coming down the stairwell beside her.
Just as she hid herself in a nearby room, the shuffling of feet came to a halt in front of the door.
“We might be stuck here for a while,” Captain Oliver said, in his dry voice.
“I was hoping you wouldn't say that. How long is a while? Like a few days or more like a couple of weeks?” one of the men in his party asked.
Sighing, the captain replied, “More like a couple of weeks.”
Groaning broke out only to be quickly quelled by Mr. Daniels. “I think it's abundantly clear that this information must only stay between the officers. If news of this were to get out, we might have a riot situation on our hands.”
An officer began to laugh but quickly stopped when he realized that he was the only one. Covering his embarrassment with a cough, he began. “Surely you’re kidding. A full-blown riot? That's something that happens in prisons, right?”
“Yes, but we had stocked enough food to last us a month in the best-case scenario. The trip from Osaka to Seattle should have taken us just over 15 days with good conditions. We had only a week left. Now, we’re stuck in the middle of the Pacific Ocean with a crew of 25, who might be looking at an additional month aboard this vessel. We will only just have enough if we ration the food. And when that food begins to dwindle, what do you think’s going to happen?”
An uneasy silence followed Mr. Daniels' statement.
“Alright, so when do we break the news to them?” an officer inquired.
“Tomorrow. For now, call the cooks and see if we can get some warm food into their stomachs. We’ll start the rationing tomorrow as well. Also, where is Officer Chase? If you find him, send him to the bridge,” he said, his tone brokering no room for argument.
Taking his tone as a dismissal, the two officers thanked both of them and walked out to the main deck.
As the door closed and the corridor was once more cast into shadows, the captain and the first officer stood there, a heavy silence lying between them.
“I didn’t want to say it in front of them, but don’t you think a riot is a bit much Charles?” the captain asked.
“No, not at all, especially when there are some rather unsavory characters onboard.”
***
After they’d returned to the main deck, Emila finally let out a pent up breath of air, trying to digest the bombshell she just heard.
When Katherine told them they would be stuck for a while, she’d mentally prepared herself for a prolonged voyage of another week at sea at most.
But another month…
The character of the crew was something Emilia had grown all too familiar with. She and her father had been with them for many years and she’d built amicable relationships with them.
But there were two sides to every coin. If the news of the voyage extending for a month was true, friction between the crew members would happen sooner rather than later.
She thought back to the meeting between Marcus Noren and the Chief Engineer.
Maybe a lot sooner.
To the other point that Mr. Daniels had brought up, they didn’t have enough food to last the journey and rationing would be implemented by tomorrow. Before she thought of anything else, some precautions were necessary.
Vigilantly opening the door, she crept upstairs, her callused hands running over the grooves in the welded walls as she tried to find her way in the dark.
It didn’t take her long to reach the kitchen, having grown intimate with the layout of the Santa Marino over the past 9 years.
The first floor of the accommodations building was empty aside from her. Amongst the sailors, it was known by the name, “Dungeon”, due to the infamous lack of windows the floor housed.
For once, she wasn’t complaining. Concealed in the shadows, she made it to the floor’s supply closest and grabbed a flashlight.
Click.
The damned thing didn’t turn on.
Slapping it against her leg to see if it was an issue of the cells being loose, she flipped the switch, and the entire floor was suddenly illuminated.
She was on the clock now.
The entire floor might have one window but as the light outside faded, it only took one ray of light escaping from that window for people to start wondering why someone was snooping around when they were all supposed to be on deck.
Walking past the recreation room to the right of the storage shack, she arrived at the kitchen. Ignoring any possible bounty the fridge might offer she went for the cabinet over the sink.
Opening it, she smiled at the welcoming sight. It was a canned beans haven.
Taking four of the small metallic tins, she rearranged the cabinet so it wouldn’t look like anything was amiss and fumbled her way out of the kitchen. Checking to see if the coast was clear, Emilia descended the stairs to where her secret awaited her.