by Jones, K. J.
“Yeah. I’m hungry. Hope I don’t projectile vomit it.”
“I’ll go get you some broth. We have a fresh box of vegetable broth. Angela cooks on the fire.”
“Hmm.”
He didn’t care. His face showed depression creeping in.
“I’ll be back soon with it.”
“I’ll be here.”
“Tyler will want to see you.”
“Could that wait? I’d like to be alone.”
“Okay. He was with you through the night. He’s on the cruise ship loot right now.”
He nodded, uninterested.
2.
“Where the hell is there a kitchen?” Tyler demanded.
The cruise ship looting team walked on the tilted floor of a corridor.
“Mullen,” Mazy said. “Is it close?”
“Yeah. Well, I mean, the restaurant I saw. There’s probably a ton of them here.”
“Each with their own nonperishable stores for us to take.”
“Can this sink?” asked Brandon.
“Anything is possible,” answered Mazy.
They reached dead elevators.
“We have to take the stairs,” said Mullen. “This way.”
“I feel like I’m in the Poseidon Adventure,” said Brandon.
“Didn’t they go upside down?” asked Mazy.
“Yeah.”
“I liked the original better,” said Mullen. “With … who’s that fat lady?”
“Shelly Winters,” Mazy answered.
“Yeah. But I didn’t like the remake.”
“Remakes often suck. I’m glad they won’t remake the original Star Wars trilogy because no one can do Han Solo as good as Harrison Ford. Love him.”
“Do you like the prequels?” Brandon asked.
“No. I’m strictly an original trilogy girl.”
Mullen asked, “Are you a Kirk girl or a Picard girl?”
“Picard, definitely.”
“I like Kirk better,” said Brandon.
Tyler chuckled. “Then you’re a Kirk girl.”
“Do you even know what we’re talking about?” Mullen asked.
“I seen some of the Star Wars movies.”
“Prequels, probably. Or Disney.”
Tyler shrugged.
“We’re talking Star Trek, though. Kirk and Picard are Star Trek.”
“Whatever.”
They reached the landing door and followed Mullen in. The restaurant with everything pushed up against the glass walls and doors. Ignoring dead bodies, they walked on until they found a kitchen.
“Holy Christ,” Mazy said. “This galley is huge.”
“Fingers crossed it’s well-stocked,” said Brandon.
Silver surfaces gleamed in cleanliness as their flashlight and headlamp beams illuminated an industrial-sized kitchen. It appeared to go on forever. Pots hung from hooks, tilted in the direction of the ship’s listing. Anything loose had slid to that side.
A problem on the floor. They were below the water level. The tilting downward side had a few feet of standing water.
Fortunately, the pantries were to the opposite side.
They made their way to the first pantry, bypassing a walk-in freezer. Without electricity, everything in there should be rotten and vile.
Tyler hurried to the first pantry door.
“Ty,” Mazy reprimanded. “Together.”
Too late. He opened the door. “Whoa.”
Mullen looked over Tyler’s head. “We struck paydirt.”
“Is that … coffee?” Mazy asked.
“How do we make it without electricity?” Mullen asked.
“A French press,” she said. “All you need is boiling water and the coffee. And we have all of that.”
“We got tons of water,” Brandon called from the next pantry. “Warehouses of food and drink supplies.”
Rotted fruits and veg pantries were closed back up and marked with a Sharpie black marker. These were bug ecosystems, several generations beyond the original rot.
Mazy said, “So, no one hit this the whole time? I can’t believe it.”
“Those looters were from inland,” said Brandon. “Maybe there’s not been enough people to loot this ship.”
“That makes me think there eventually will be. Guarding this ship, on top of everything else we guard, is going to be a pain in the ass.”
“We take the food,” said Tyler.
“Your arms big enough for that, kid?” asked Brandon.
“We take turns. Bring it home.”
“Is that house home?”
Tyler shrugged. “It’s kind of our home now. Except for the Molly. That’s always the real home.”
“I wonder if the water tanks are undamaged,” said Mazy. “How would we find that out?”
“What are you thinking?” Brandon asked.
“Siphon from these water tanks to the Molly and, I don’t know, somehow to the house, if possible.”
“Sounds good on paper. But I’m pretty sure their water tanks would be below decks due to water’s weight. And below decks is underwater. That’s assuming the tanks don’t have a gaping hole in the side like the ship’s hull, courtesy of the United States Armed Forces, I’m sure.”
“We also need to find a dolly to haul supplies out to the little boat.”
“Ty’s the biggest snoop that finds things,” said Mullen.
“We also still need to find a dolly to haul that nasty fridge out of our kitchen,” said Brandon.
“Pell, you and Ty look for a dolly preferably, but anything to haul the loot,” said Mazy. “You find them, start loading up. We’ll meet back here. Mullen, you’re on me.”
“Wait,” said Mullen. “Where are we going?”
“Below decks.”
“Fucking fab.”
* * *
“There’s no way we can get through this, Maze.”
They went as far down as they could. The corridors ceased to be attractive. It was crew only territory.
“There should be less water this way. We’ll try it.”
“God,” he whined as he followed her.
“The water would be deepest back there.”
Their boots were soaked down to their dirty socks. Water up to their knees. They sloshed through, moving floating objects out of the way.
“Oh, Christ.”
Mazy stepped closer to Mullen and moved the bloated body away.
“Better, sister?”
“Ha-ha. Didn’t think you’d make sexist jokes.”
“I’m gonna move you over to Stanton’s house if you keep up this way.”
“Oh, so, a nasty floating body is supposed to be okay? Should I poke it with a stick like Ty?”
“Better than nearly retching on it.”
“I do not like dead floating bodies, okay? Phebe doesn’t like poo. We all got our things. What’s yours?”
“Not telling you.”
“Wait. I heard a rumor it was big ass hairy spiders.”
“Never mind that. Focus, Mullen.”
“I’m right.” He laughed. “Your clown-pig is spiders.”
“Cut the chitchat, kid.”
“Damn. I should have looked around for something clown. Scare Sully with it. When he gets better.”
The water level rose again, reaching their thighs.
“I bet there’s some kind of clown shit in this place. Some people like clowns.”
A pressed-wood desk floated. Mazy maneuvered it out of their way. From the corner of her eye, she caught something big charge out of the water. “Mul –”
A huge mouth with large teeth.
She opened fire at it.
Mullen fell backward into the water as the mouth came at his face.
“Mullen,” she screamed. Her hands fished for him. “Mullen!”
The alligator’s white belly floated to the surface.
Mullen erupted. Soaked, panting and coughing. She grabbed him and pulled him to the higher ground of stairs.<
br />
Holding him, they looked to the upside-down floating reptile.
“What the fuck?”
“Are you bit? You’re bleeding.”
“I got my arm still.” He wiggled his fingers.
“Pull up your sleeve, dickhead.”
“Nice talk.”
“Do it.”
“Working on it, tyrant lady. ZBDUs ain’t easy to undo.”
The leather was ripped at his forearm. Once he rolled up the sleeve, ugly deep gashes tore his pale flesh.
“Oh. Shit.” He looked a little faint.
“You need stitches, Crocodile Dundee.”
“It almost got me.” He stared at the dead animal. “How’d it … um, get that way?”
“I shot it. Apparently, I shot it very well.”
His gaze turned to her face. “You did that?”
She shrugged. “Instinct.”
A smile rose on his mouth. “You. Are. Awesome!”
“’Bout time you realized.” She winked. “Get off of me. Think we got our fresh meat dinner.”
“You are so very awesome.”
“Keep that arm raised. We don’t need more attacks. Get a fucking bull shark or something.”
“Do we have a first aid kit?”
“No. But I’ll call for those who do. Guys, you copy?”
“Five by five,” responded Brandon. “Go ahead, Maze. Over.”
“We got dinner. Over.”
3.
Matt was up and about. He looked like warmed over death, but he was independently mobile. His handsome face marred by an ugly wound across his cheek, which glistened from antibiotic gel smeared across it.
He joined the others on the dock to greet the ship scavengers. The skiff low in the water from stacks of canned foods and bottled water. And a dead alligator.
“Is that …?” he asked Ben.
“Dinner? Thinking so.”
“Oh. Not sure I can eat that yet.” Matt touched his stomach. “Do you know how to skin one of them?”
“Gators pretty thin in South Dakota. But bet I can figure it out.”
“I’ll help. We should smoke some for later.”
“Glad you lived.”
“Glad someone is.”
“Aw. Don’t be that way. We got food.”
“Looking up, huh?”
“We live in a gorgeous house. It has no amenities, but it’s nice to look at.”
“Really?”
“It’s fully loaded for a cruise,” Mazy told them. Gentleman Jayce helped her onto the deck. “We struck rich, y’all. Enough for thousands of people. It’ll take us a week just to move it all. But we had some complications when we tried to check out the water tanks.”
“Mullen,” said Matt. “You’re profusely bleeding. Where’s my bag, people?”
“Those shaky hands ain’t stitching me up.”
“Who else?”
“Where’s the plastic surgeon? He’ll do a better job than you.”
“Afraid you won’t be pretty at the end?”
“Yeah, cos pretty was what I was doing before.”
Jayce grinned. “Girls like scars.”
“Yeah? Somehow I doubt on me.”
Jayce gestured his head to Karen staring down from the Molly. “Maybe she does.”
“She’s looking at the dead gator, not me.”
“You are a downer, man.”
4.
Gator steaks on the gas grill. Its skin hung from a makeshift clothesline stretching from a piazza pillar to a tree across the yard.
Brandon did the grill. He drank a warm beer looted from the ship and hummed to himself.
“Happy?” Emily asked.
“Feels like normal, ya know?”
“Sure. I’ll go with that. Here’s that seasoning you asked for.”
“Rocking good.”
“Whatever.” She chuckled as she returned to the kitchen.
“We have to celebrate Ty’s birthday,” Phebe said as she found places to put the loot in the pantry. “He turned thirteen and we missed it.”
“Ty,” Jayce yelled out the door. “You want a birthday party?”
“No.”
“No? Why not, man?”
“Not until everybody can be there. Chris ain’t good.”
“Chris is strong,” Phebe hollered. “He’ll fight.” She muttered, “He better fight.”
Among boiling pots over the fire in the kitchen, Angela boiled vegetable stock from a sealed box.
* * *
The first fresh meat since the end of the island, everyone dug in. The alligator taste was weird, but even the fussiest eaters didn’t balk. Canned veggies as the sides, at Angela’s insistence for an attempt at a well-balanced meal. Beans and rice, the staple of every meal.
The stitches in Mullen’s right forearm made usage of the appendage difficult. He hoped to get Karen to cut up his meat, but instead, it was Angela. Another disappointment.
Matt, laying on the lounger, slurped his broth. He looked even more exhausted and he couldn’t finish the bowl. Another trip to the makeshift outhouse. He then downed a bottle of water.
“Who brings broth to Eric?” Emily asked.
“This would be after thanking the grill chef, right?” asked Brandon.
“Sorry. It was great gator. If I knew what gator was supposed to taste like.”
“Like chicken,” said Jayce.
“Hey.” Nia looked around for her pets.
“Sundown,” said Brandon. “They went to bed.”
“How come they do that?”
“They just do, Nie.”
“How do you know so much about chickens?”
“I just do.”
5.
After Phebe ate her dinner, she took a bowl of vegetable stock to Peter. Karen brought a plate of food to her father who was watching over Chris in the master bedroom.
“Do you want to visit your friend?” Karen asked her in the saloon.
Phebe’s stomach tightened. “Does Chris look horrible?”
Karen shrugged. “He’s asleep.”
“I need to get this broth to my husband.” Avoidance.
She found Peter awake, staring at the ceiling. “Hey, you.”
“Hey.” He sounded despondent.
“Brought you gourmet vitals.”
“What is it?”
“Veggie broth.”
“Sounds fantastic.”
“Your starvation belly can’t handle anything more, I’m told.” She sat on the edge of the bed. “Want me to spoon feed you?”
“Not really.”
She frowned. “Okay, then. You’ll still need to sit up.”
He sighed.
“I’ll help you.”
He snapped, “I got it.”
“Whoa. Okay. All you then.”
After he propped his pillows up, he took the bowl from her. The IV tube moving with his hand.
She put a napkin on his chest. “So you’re not messy.”
“Stop it. I’m not a child.”
“What’s with you?”
“Could I get outta this place?”
“What?”
“I’m fine.” He slurped from the spoon. “You gonna watch me eat?”
“Geez. Um. Want me to go?”
“I don’t know what the fuck I want.”
“Okay. I’ll stare at the wall then.”
6.
Phebe slammed the bowl down on the counter.
“What’s with you?” Angela cleaned the kitchen.
“Peter’s acting really depressed and a general ass.”
“He finished his broth.”
“No. Half of it. I poured out the rest.”
“Add the bowl to that soaking pot. We’ll do it tomorrow after another water haul.”
Phebe looked around. The kitchen was remarkably clean for not having running water or electricity. Or at least it looked so in the glow from the bank of plumbers candles burning on the table.
“You�
�re amazing, Ange.”
“How so?” Angela leaned against the broom she had been using to sweep the floor.
“This place. What you’re doing. Amazing.”
Angela shrugged. “Just doing what I can. Trying to keep busy. Despite my youngest child’s attitude.” She resumed sweeping. “Nia wants to be a fighter.”
“You don’t like that?”
Angela sighed. “Apart from the danger –I know. I know. The dangers are everywhere no matter if my children are fighters are not. Probably best they know how to fight to keep themselves safer.”
“But you don’t approve?” Phebe pulled herself up on the counter to sit.
Another sigh. “Did you respect your mother?”
“Um. Yeah. I guess.”
“Well, I didn’t mine. Not as a young woman. I mean, she made me respect her. But I didn’t feel proud of her.”
“Why?”
“She was a maid.”
“Okay,” Phebe answered, not sure where this was going.
“I wanted to be an attorney. She didn’t graduate high school.”
“Didn’t all kinds of crazy shit happen in that generation?”
“For black people?”
“I meant for everyone.” She spotted an open wrapper of crackers, pulled them to her, and began to nibble.
“Maybe. But it certainly was for black people in the South.”
“Is her time like Civil Rights time?”
“Oh, yeah. Not to say she was part of it. Trouble makers, she called them.”
“Really?” Phebe scowled. “I didn’t think there were any black people against it.”
“There certainly were. Mama saw trouble coming down on black folks’ heads from it. Regular, working people like her, who were trying to make ends meet and put a roof over their children. Very conservative woman. Make no waves. Never buck any system.”
“Did she support you in your career goals?”
“Yes and no. The yes was after-the-fact. Then she bragged to everyone who’d listen about her lawyer daughter.”
“That implies she wasn’t while you were trying to get there.”
“That implication would be correct. She and my whole family thought I was a rebel trying to make trouble.”
“Wow. Ya know, my father hasn’t been supportive of my career. I can relate.”
Angela put the broom away. “Except I have to figure out what to do with my hair.”
“I missed that topic segue.”
A huge sigh. Angela whipped the bandana off her head. “See?”
Her straightened hair stuck out wildly from her non-straightened roots.
“You’re talking to a woman who got a hair cut via a hunter’s knife. It used to be down to here.” She gestured.