The Maltese Incident

by Russell Moran

  Chapter Twenty-Seven

  The atmosphere aboard the Melody of the Seas became one of pandemonium once word got around that smoke could be seen ashore. The chance of possible human contact swept through the ship like a fresh breeze.

  Al and I went to the bridge to personally report the fire to Captain Lars.

  “Do you two know anything about fires, Buster?” Lars asked.

  “I’m trying to remember the name of a guy from Detroit I met the other day,” I said. “Maxwell, yes that’s his name, Frank Maxwell. He’s a retired fire chief.”

  The first officer picked up the phone and announced, “Mr. Frank Maxwell, please report to the bridge.”

  Maxwell walked onto the bridge, stumbling over a stool as he stared at the fire ashore.

  “It’s strange to look at that fire without the sound of sirens,” Maxwell said. “I feel like I should be in uniform.”

  “Mr. Maxwell, I understand that you’re a retired fire chief,” Captain Lars said. “Please describe that fire.”

  “I’m sure it’s a chemical fire, probably paint or more likely wood stain or turpentine from the looks of the thick smoke. If we were within a mile of the fire you could smell it.”

  “So, you think the fire is man-made?” I asked.

  “I can’t tell how it was set, of course,” Maxwell said, “but I’m sure the fuel is man-made, most likely chemical in origin. Fires like that usually happen by spontaneous combustion because some jerk packed a locker too tight with wood stain, rags and other combustible. Also, from the billowy nature of the smoke, it looks like somebody hosed it down. As a matter of fact, it may no longer be a fire, just the water-soaked remnants of one. From the way our bow is pointed, captain, it looks like we’re going to have ourselves a closer look.”

  “Yes, we are, Mr. Maxwell. Please remain on the bridge to help us with your knowledge.”

  “Oh my God, what’s that?” Maxwell yelled, pointing to the left.

  Lars looked through a high intensity telescope and focused on the object Maxwell pointed to.

  “That, ladies and gentlemen, is a ship,” Lars yelled. “The name on her hull is Maltese.”

  ***

  After making sure the fire was safely extinguished, Meg and I decided to skip the fish and munch a couple of apples down by the ocean. The electric fence didn’t extend all the way to the water, but terminated about 50 feet from the edge, near the top of a berm. A gate led to the water, with a switch to turn the current on and off. The rule in Malta Town was to avoid walking near the water unarmed because there was no electric fence to deter dinosaurs.

  We stood on top of the berm enjoying the wind from the ocean, which blew away the smoke from the paint locker fire.

  Meg spit out a chunk of apple.

  “Oh my God, I don’t believe it, Harry,” Meg screamed, grabbing my arm. “Can I really be seeing that? Please tell me it’s not my imagination.”

  “What do you see, hon, a Megalodon?”

  “Harry, just look, straight ahead.” She handed me her binoculars.

  The Melody of the Seas appeared majestically about two miles from our position, heading straight for us.

  “Holy shit,” I observed.

  “Somehow I knew you’d say that, Harry.”

  I had the same feeling that I had over 10 years ago when we went through the wormhole. I couldn’t believe what I was seeing.

  “It’s heading in this direction, Harry. We can’t see the name from the side, but it looks like one of those huge new cruise ships.”

  I looked at Meg and smiled. “I bet she carries a lot of fuel.”

  “Enough to get to that wormhole thingy that Bob Flowers spoke about?”

  “Hey, Meg, what the hell are we doing standing here talking? We need to attract that ship.”

  I took the radio from my belt.

  “Malta Town Headquarters, this is Captain Harry, come in.”

  “This is Jim Valente, go ahead, Harry.”

  “You won’t fucking believe it, Jim, but Meg and I are on the beach looking at a big cruise ship heading our way. Grab as many signal flares as you can and tell anybody you see. We need to go outside the fence to the water line, so make sure you send at least two Guard Patrols to protect us from animals and help with the boat. We want to welcome that big ship in style. I don’t know the ship’s name but I’ll try to get her on my radio.”

  “Just call her anything, Harry. I’m sure they don’t get much radio traffic.”

  “Any vessel, any vessel, this is Captain Harry Fenton of the ship Maltese, come in please.”

  The bridge on the Melody erupted in screams.

  “Harry, great to hear your voice, my friend. This is Lars Ragnarssen on the Melody of the Seas. I read you loud and clear. The world has been wondering what happened to you folks. Now they’re wondering what happened to us.”

  “Lars and I had a few drinks after a training seminar,” I said to Meg. “He’s a good guy.”

  I had a hard time hearing Lars through the pandemonium on the Melody’s bridge.

  “Lars, how the hell are you? A few of us are coming out to meet you. We have a lot to talk about.”

  Our motor launch had long ago run out of fuel, so we all pulled on oars.

  Randy Borg and Bob Flowers joined Meg and me. We all rowed in unison and pulled up next to the ship within minutes. It would have been easier to simply wait for one of the ship’s motor launches to come to us, but we wanted to see the Melody up close. The deck crew lowered the boat platform on the starboard side of the ship. One of the Melody crewmen escorted us to an elevator that took us to the bridge. When we entered the bridge, everybody cheered so loud it actually hurt my ears. Wait till they come to Malta Town, I thought.

  Lars looked at the gray hair that was sprouting on my head.

  “I see you’ve grown some gray hair, Harry. I guess the stress of the last two months aged you a bit.”

  “Last two months?” I shouted. “Lars, we’ve been here for 10 fucking years. Meg and I just celebrated our 10th wedding anniversary. Did I misunderstand you?”

  “Harry, what date do you think this is?” Lars asked as he sat down, his face suddenly pale.

  “April 20, 2027. Why do you ask? What date do you think it is?”

  “Harry, I don’t know how to break this to you, but today is June 15, 2017. The Maltese has only been missing for two months.”

  I pointed to the rusty hulk of the Maltese, still anchored in shallow water.

  “Lars, does that ship look like it’s been gone for two months? It’s a rusting pile of metal. We stripped every useful item from the ship and used the stuff to build Malta Town.”

  “Malta Town? You built a compound on land? In just two months?”

  “Well, it took a couple of years. Despite the dinosaurs we managed to build a town.”

  “Dinosaurs? You’ve got to be kidding me,” Lars said. “Are you telling me that dinosaurs inhabit this land?” He turned to look at Dr. Thurber, the paleontologist. “Ike, would you like to comment?”

  “My God,” said Thurber, “that could explain our sightings of the Megalodons.”

  “We were bumped by one of those monsters before we went through the crazy event,” I said.

  “By ‘crazy event,’ I guess you mean the night becoming day and a rumbling along the ship’s hull,” Lars said. “That’s exactly what happened to the Melody. What happened to you folks has become known as the Maltese Incident. It’s a worldwide sensation—a ship that simply disappeared. They’re still searching for the Maltese, but have pretty much given up hope.”

  “A scientist in our group told us that the strange light and bumping event was caused by crossing a time portal, also known as a wormhole. That, according to Dr. Bob Flowers, the man standing next to me, is how we’ve travelled through time.”

  “Traveled through time?” Lars said. “Do you think it’s too early for me to have a drink?”

  All of us at Malta Town have had 10 years to ad
just to our new surroundings, which aren’t new anymore. Captain Lars and the people on the bridge of the Melody looked like they’d been struck by lightning. Shock doesn’t describe the look on their faces. I can imagine what my face looked like. I glanced down at Meg, who was hugging me so tight it’s as if she thought I’d blow away.

  “So now there’s a Melody Incident,” I said. “Welcome to our club. But let me change the subject, Lars. How much fuel do you carry?”

  “Close to 5,000 gallons. We topped off before we left Lisbon. Why do you ask?”

  “I’ll let Bob Flowers explain his theory,” I said.

  “To make it simple, captain,” Bob Flowers said, “I believe that we can get back to where we came from by steaming across the exact location we hit when the event occurred. We didn’t have enough fuel on the Maltese, so that’s why we haven’t tried it. As Harry said, it’s called a wormhole or a time portal, a key part of the science behind time travel. That’s what happened to all of us. We’ve time traveled, every one of us. I’m 65 years old, and I look forward to going back to when I was 55.”

  “Bob,” Meg said. “I’ve heard you say it before, but please repeat yourself. Are you saying that we’ll be 10 years younger when we cross that wormhole thing?”

  “Yes, that’s exactly what I’m saying. We’ll travel back to 2017. I look forward to attending your wedding—again.”

  Lars mopped his brow. I wiped mine.

  “Here’s a big question, Lars,” I said. “We started out with 1,050 adults but are down to 1023 after a few deaths. Add to that 178 children. Can you accommodate that many people? people? If you look at the Maltese, you can see that she’s obviously not seaworthy. We don’t need luxury quarters, just a place to rest our heads.”

  “We’ve got plenty of room, Harry. We left behind 1,200 people in Lisbon who chose to fly home rather than wait for our home office to make up its mind about our itinerary.”

  “If Bob’s theory doesn’t work,” I said, “we can expand Malta Town and you can move ashore with us. Dinosaurs can be fun if you leave them alone.”

  Lars just stared at me, apparently not excited by the prospect of living among dinosaurs.

  Chapter Twenty-Eight

  William Orlando, the Speaker of the Malta Town legislature, called the meeting of 20 legislators to order. He banged his gavel, which consisted of a carpenter’s hammer and a block of wood.

  “Hello, everyone,” Orlando said. “In view of the work in front of us, can I hear a motion to suspend the reading of the minutes from the last meeting? I’m as excited as anyone else here, so pardon me if I step on a few words. We’re happy that our captain, mayor, and good friend, Harry Fenton, is with us this morning, along with his lovely wife, Meg. I’ve also invited Rebecca Flynn, the Chief Judge of the Malta Town court, and Randy Borg, CEO of Malta. This is a special meeting of the Malta Town Legislature, and with any kind of luck, it will be the last. You all know the details of the past few days. The ship Melody of the Seas has graced our shores and brought with her, praise be to God, our possible ticket home. With a hell of a lot of diligence on the part of a lot of people, we’ve put together a functioning town, with a legislature and a court. We operate under a constitution that we’ve tailor made to our circumstances, as a small group of people living among the dinosaurs. Because we’ve all agreed to operate under the laws as enacted, I’ve called this special meeting.”

  “Let’s hear it for Bill Orlando,” Rebecca Flynn announced as she stood up and clapped. Everyone laughed and applauded because Judge Flynn had just used the Malta Town traditional method to get the loquacious Bill Orlando to shut up and get to the point.

  “Okay, I can take a hint,” Orlando said, laughing, “and here’s the reason for this meeting. The next few days will be totally different from our past 10 years. As we pack our meager belongings and move aboard the Melody of the Seas for our journey home, we need to change our system of laws. If we don’t we’ll probably find ourselves in constant violation of law and waste a lot of time before Judge Rebecca. We need to move fast, and make decisions quickly. Therefore, as we’ve discussed in committee, I’ll entertain a motion to suspend the laws of Malta Town and give all decision-making power to our mayor, Captain Harry Fenton.”

  After he heard a second, Bill Orlando said, “Discussion on the motion?”

  Rebecca Flynn’s hand shot up.

  “Although I’m not a member of the legislature, I would like to comment on this motion unless somebody objects. Vesting all power in a single individual is normally a terrible idea, especially in our little democracy. But under the rapidly changing circumstances, and because Bill Orlando asked that power be vested in the finest gentleman in Malta Town, I support this motion. We long ago elected Harry as our mayor, but to us he’ll always be known as Captain Harry. I urge everybody to vote ‘yea’ on the motion. We can count on Meg being at his side to help him, and hopefully curb his colorful language.”

  “You can fucking count on it, Becky,” I said from the back of the room. Meg delivered an elbow to my ribs.

  Everyone cracked up as one legislator shouted, “Move the question.”

  The motion carried unanimously.

  “And now a word from our fearless leader, Captain Harry,” Orlando said.

  “It’s no exaggeration that I love you guys,” I said. “I don’t think you’ll need a captain, or a mayor for that matter, because we’ll be guests on somebody else’s ship. So, you’ve honored me with this temporary position because we need to make a lot of fast decisions. As soon as we’re all aboard the Melody, I will step down from my position in favor of Captain Ragnarssen. We’ve gotten to know each other in the past 10 years, or two months according to the Melody people, and therefore I give you my solemn pledge—I’ll try not to screw it up. I’m going to say something that I only dreamed about over the years—we’re going home. Hey, let’s go, we’ve got moving to do.”

  ***

  After a discussion with Captain Ragnarssen, Randy agreed to lead group tours of passengers from the ship, showing them how a thousand people created a thriving town in a forest full of nasty animals. First Officer Jim Valente and Frank Murphy, the dinosaur expert, agreed to help him. They used four motor launches from the Melody, each capable of carrying 25 passengers, so the total tour operation of 1,200 people at two tours a day would take six days, enough time to enable the residents of Malta Town to pack our belongings and board the Melody. I assigned 10 extra people to armed guard duty. We wouldn’t want to lose any of our new friends to a hungry dinosaur. I called a general meeting in the “ballroom” to discuss the plans for moving to the ship.

  “Hello everybody,” I said. “It’s safe to say that we’re all as excited as hell. In a few days we’re going to test Bob Flowers’ theory of time travel and go back to where we came from. But first we need to discuss an orderly move from our land-based home in Malta Town to our new temporary home, the Melody of the Seas. Captain Lars told me that the Melody is traveling light with only 1,200 passengers and a small crew. That leaves plenty of room for us. But we can’t take all our belongings, so please make careful choices on what to bring. If anybody wants to bring aboard some dinosaur souvenirs, and Dr. Bob Flowers thinks it’s a good idea, please take nothing bigger than a Velociraptor skull. We estimate that the move will take six days. I appointed a team of 10 moving supervisors, so direct any questions or problems to one of them. Each supervisor will be wearing a large badge that reads, ‘Homeward Bound.’ Hey, we carved a civilization out of a forest, so moving to the ship should be easy. When you go aboard the Melody, please follow the instructions of the crew. They will first lead you to a huge auditorium where we’ll be given inoculations in case we picked up some jungle rot that we don’t know about. Any questions?”

  “Harry, it’s been 10 years since any of us saw money,” Jim Valente said. “I’m sure Randy doesn’t want to drop off a bunch of broke and homeless securities dealers.”

  “I talked to Randy about exac
tly that. Remember, we’re going to travel back to 2017. We’ll only have been gone for a little over two months from that year. Although he may no longer be CEO, he is a major voting shareholder and his word carries a lot of clout. I’m sure the board will reappoint him as CEO anyway. Randy figures that Malta will pay your salaries back to the date we disappeared, plus any incidental expenses such as late mortgage payments. Malta was a thriving investment company when we left, and I’m sure it couldn’t go downhill in a couple of months. Captain Lars tells me that the stock market’s been in bull territory since we left, so I really wouldn’t worry about money. We’ve all been on a bizarre forced saving plan.”

  “Harry, can you give us a rough idea of timing?” Dom Maslow asked.

  “Hey, Dom, you’re talking to a mariner. I can give you an exact idea, not a rough idea. Captain Lars and I calculated that it will take us 8 days to get to the wormhole, after which we set a course for home. We’ll top off our fuel tanks at one of the Azores islands. Add on another 12 days to get back to New York, which means 20 days of sailing, beginning as soon as we’ve moved our stuff aboard. I don’t know about you, but I’m looking forward to some luxury cruise ship food. If that isn’t incentive to move quickly I don’t know what is.”

  After the meeting, Meg grabbed my hand. She didn’t look happy.

  “Harry, I’m really worried about something, and I haven’t a clue what to do about it.”

  “We’re going home, babe. We’ll start a new life together in an already existing civilization, not a forest full of nasty animals. Why aren’t you smiling?”

  “I’m not concerned about you and me, Harry. You’re right, we’ll start our lives anew and that sounds wonderful. But I’m worried about a lot of our people, people who’ve become our friends, our families. I see it in a lot of faces, faces that look worried. To all of us, we’ve been gone for 10 years. People have moved on and started new lives in Malta Town. They all assumed that their spouses or lovers also started new lives and that they’d never see them again. So, they decided to start over again. Of the 1010 people we started out with, I counted 120 who paired off and got married, just like us. But unlike us, most of them had spouses on the other side of the friggin wormhole. You and I were single, Harry. Big difference. So, when we return to 2017, after having been gone for only two months, I can picture a bunch of husbands and wives, not to mention kids, standing on the dock to welcome back their families from the Maltese Incident, not realizing that in our alternate reality we’ve been gone for 10 years. Harry, can you picture it? ‘Hi honey, great to see you. I’d like to introduce my new wife.’ And I’m not even thinking about the legal details. I guess I’m being stupid, thinking about things I can’t control. I hate the idea of returning our friends to emotional hell. What do you think we should do?”