Blue Pelagic

By

Shane Griffin



Smash Words Edition Published by Poupichou Press


Copyright Shane Griffin 2011








Smashwords Edition, License Notes


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Captain Landar cursed vehemently as the nets drew out of the water and his first mate, Mouse, shook his head to indicate yet another miserly load. Not that he needed the confirmation, he was already able to tell by the ease with which the boat's winch engines dragged up the nets without any strain.
He looked forwards again through the front windscreen and sea water sprayed against it in a fine mist. The waves were already starting to sneak over the bow. The low black clouds of a massive thunderstorm were now visibly closer. If he did not turn back south soon he would not have a chance of keeping ahead of it. To make things worse the elusive catch was dragging them directly towards the storm. He cursed again and mashed his heavily calloused hands down onto the trawler's control console.
“That’s the fifth worthless load in a row! Nothing, barely a skerrick. What now captain?” yelled Mouse over the noise of the trawler's engines, his lanky form leaning inside the cabin through the open rear door. 
“We’ll go again damn it! So far we haven’t even made enough to pay for the fuel,” he shouted back sharply. Mouse frowned and disappeared back to the deck. Landar hadn’t meant to chastise his first mate specifically, but he needed to make sure he took the right message back to the crew. For what he was about to do he needed them switched on and motivated.
“Mouse!” he yelled out again and when his first mate reappeared Landar shot him a crooked smile, the closest thing he was likely to get to an apology. “Tell the crew to hang on tight and be bloody ready. I’m going to try and get ahead of the stream and come at it head on before the storm gets us. We’re going back to land as rich men or we’re going to the bottom!” Mouse returned the smile then spun around, stepped back out onto the deck and started barking orders to the crew.
Landar left his first mate to organise them and tried to work out exactly how he was going to pull this off. He looked down upon his radar screen at the enormous storm that lay ahead. Being caught out in that was not his idea of a smart career move. His Manta jet trawler, Staudinger, was not designed for that type of weather so far out at sea, especially not in clean ocean. Even if they could weather the storm it was sure to break up the stream he was chasing. 
He shook his head as he carefully studied the radar and then the sonar. Ever since the world wide charter to stop producing any new plastics had been ratified things had gotten steadily worse for his business. Not that long ago he could have brought in a full load just by heading out a few hundred kilometres into the Great Pacific Garbage patch and coming back out again in a straight line. These days all he was chasing were wispy streams like the one he was after now. Of course prices were not as high in the early days and there wasn’t much competition so it was all about the volume. Nobody could have predicted how fast all that waste plastic would be consumed, but with prices for recycled plastics so high everyone wanted a piece of the action.
“Blasted greenies,” he thought disconsolately.
He gunned the Staudinger’s engines and the trawler’s bow raised as it surged towards the oncoming storm. The engines worked by skimming water from the surface of the ocean, compressing it and then firing it at supersonic speed out of the propeller-less hydro-jets at the rear of the trawler. Staudinger could hit fifty knots in calm waters and could move through a plastic patch ten feet deep and as thick as pea soup without running foul.
As Staudinger crashed against the waves each one harder than the last his aging bones felt each impact. He yearned for the good old days, not just because business was better, but also for his youth. Strong bones and enthusiasm were two things you lost with age, so he’d learned. His sea legs were growing weary. Now everything depended on landing that one last big catch. With the prices they way they were now he would have enough to retire on and finally sell off Staudinger to Mouse.
Landar kept one sharp eye on the sonar as he negotiated the larger waves that threatened to swamp the trawler. He slowly caught and then overtook the large drifting mass. If this load was half as big as it looked on the sonar he was going to get his wish. 
Annoyingly the currents had the whole mass moving fast and even changing directions sharply from time to time. In calmer conditions he may have paid more attention to how abnormal that was. It didn’t matter though because he was ahead of it now and he spun the trawler hard to port and back into the catch. He then slowed Staudinger to a crawl.
“OK, drop’em fast boys here it comes!”
The nets went overboard and he set the trawler to a gentle netting speed. A few minutes passed and nothing seemed to happen. Mouse popped his head inside the cabin to better hear the engine revs.
“Damn it, again?” groaned Mouse in disbelief.
“Wait,” replied Landar as he crooked his head trying to hear minute changes in the pitch of the engines amongst the cacophony of other sounds around them. Suddenly a smile crept across his face, a genuinely happy smile. A moment later Mouse heard it too and pumped his fist in the air. “Well don’t just stand there, get to it son!”
Moments later the crew had the winches fired up and bringing in the nets. It was a beautiful sound, a rare sound, to hear the winches strain and creak. He was so excited that for a moment her forgot himself and let out an ecstatic yahoo.
When he heard the nets break the surface and the shouts from his crew he could not wait any longer to see, so he popped the controls onto autopilot and stepped out to the deck to have a look for himself.
Landar stopped dead in his tracks only a single step outside the cabin door as he saw the silvery squirming mass overflowing from each of the giant nets.
“Those damned greenies curse them all to hell!” he roared, spit ejecting from his mouth in the suddenly epileptic surge of rage and disgust. It seemed all that was in the oceans these days was bloody fish!


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