Chapter 10 – A Bad Morning to be Hungover
Robert woke up on the floor of his cabin – a blanket covered him as his face rested in a pile of vomit that he hoped was his. It was not unusual for him to wake up like this, but through the fog of his brain there seemed to be a part of him that was saying this time something was wrong.
He grabbed a clean part of the blanket and wiped his face but kept it over his head. Just one more minute of blissful dark, he pleaded to himself. He enjoyed that minute listening to the woodpecker pounding the inside of his skull. Another distant message tried getting through his brain and he smacked his forehead a couple of times to help it along. What is it? What’s wrong?
And then it came to him. Silence. There was too much silence. Being the ship’s mechanic, Robert was relegated to sleeping in a room near the engine room, one where he could hastily attend to any emergencies. But right now his engine, the one that he cared for and maintained as a gardener would their garden, was quiet. She was never quiet, even in port there was always a soft hum as the generator ran to maintain power to the ship. He threw the blanket off his face and light streamed in through the round sun roof, blinding him. He blinked and rubbed his eyes, trying to push back the demon light, but he was unable to. In the end he adjusted to it just as he had adjusted to the throbbing behind his temple.
Wait! Why do I have a sunroof? At first he thought he’d ended up in someone else’s cabin. He was drunk last night but surely not that drunk. He looked around and confirmed it was his cabin, noting some of his meager possessions on the floor beside him, next to the door. Why is there a door on the floor? And then it burst through the fog in his brain like a train coming out of a tunnel – the ship was on its side. That sunroof was his porthole and this door used to be on the opposite wall. Well technically it is still on the wall - it’s just the wall that has moved. It was too early and he was too hungover to get technical with himself.
Robert opened the door and fell into the corridor. He meant to climb down but the whole coordination thing wasn’t 100 percent yet, and the ship’s weird angle wasn’t helping. Fortunately, the ship was designed for rough seas so it had many handholds and railings that he could use to get up to the deck. Each head knock and shin bang was another notch closer to sobriety as he opened the final door and fell outside into the sunlight.
He landed hard with a thud and the immediate torrent of swearwords he yelled woke Doc from his fitful slumber. Doc had decided at some point during the night that moving the patient was too risky and he would instead leave him behind. The finality of that decision provided him with enough mental clarity to snatch some form of sleep that Robert’s entrance had just disrupted.
“Doc what the fuck is going on?” Robert queried as he rubbed his tormented head.
“The ship appears to have hit a rock and listed. The crew abandoned ship thinking it would sink but it has instead run aground here,” Doc replied.
“Where are we?”
“Somewhere in Chernarus but all I can see are trees so I have no idea where.”
“And what about Arnold? Is he okay?”
Arnold was the malaria patient and also Robert’s bunkmate, in many ways a little brother to Robert – although he’d never admit that publicly. To Robert it seemed that the Captain assigned roommates based on how likely they were to clash with each other. Robert and Arnold were chalk and cheese but somehow still pretty close. Arnold was a hoarder; Robert didn’t keep anything he didn’t immediately need. Arnold took pride in his appearance; Robert wore the same jeans until other members of the crew demanded he wash them or be thrown overboard. Arnold liked to collect trinkets from the different ports they visited; while Robert stayed on the ship and used the respite from Arnold to read. It was on one of Arnold’s touristy adventures in Turkey he found the evil eye necklace and caught a bad case of malaria. Yet despite all their differences, or perhaps because of them, Robert had a big brotherly concern for Arnold. Also he was worried that if Arnold died it would be up to him to sort through all the crap in their quarters.
“Robert you need to understand that Arnold is very sick. There is nothing I can do for him on-board and the move might kill him.”
“What are you saying?” probed Robert.
“We have to get off this ship and I don’t think it would be prudent to take Arnold with us.”
“How can you say that? You’re a Doctor.”
“Yes, and a realist. I don’t think you’re fully informed about what’s waiting for us out there.”
Doc filled Robert in on all he knew about the infection and Chernarus. The information wasn’t complete and to Robert it seemed like Doc was taking the piss - until he looked at the grave expression on his face. Like others on board, he saw Doc conversing intensely with the Captain in the galley. He had heard the rumors but put them down to bullshit or hearsay. But now hearing it from Doc, with that expression, Robert knew it was real – Chernarus was now hell on earth and they may well be walking right into it.
“I get all that Doc but we can’t leave him here to die.”
“Robert if we carry him then it will take us longer to cover ground. We’ll get tired more often, need to carry more provisions.”
“So it takes longer. We are not leaving Arnold behind.”
“You’re not being rational,” Doc pleaded.
“I’m being very rational. We are stranded on a part of the Russian coast that is infected with the living dead. The military and citizens have failed to contain the infection and have instead chosen to abandon the land to them. We need to somehow get through that mess whilst carrying a very sick Arnold and find some sort of way out of here.”
“Exactly. It’s hopeless,” sighed Doc.
“I didn’t say it was hopeless. It’s a tough situation but it’s not fucking hopeless. We’re on a boat. There’s food and water here, we should be able to carry enough for a couple of days. There’s the stretcher we used to carry Arnold onboard, which we’ll now use to carry him off. We’ll go slow, carry him for an hour at a time, rest for fifteen minutes and then carry him again.
“You’re right – it will be slow, but it’s possible - and we might find a working car out there that we can put him in. There have got to be other people here, other survivors from the boat or even people who lived here and couldn’t get out. We meet up with them, we pool our resources and we all survive. It’s as simple and as complicated as that.”
Doc shook his head, “that’s a fool hearted plan. You’ll find it tough carrying him by yourself because I’ll have no part of it. I want to live. Dragging Arnold across the country with the infected out there is not the best way for me to achieve that.”
“Then let me introduce you to plan B. And you’re right I will find it tough dragging Arnold along by myself but I’ll have the soothing sounds of the ship’s fog horn to keep me motivated.”
“I don’t get it,” Doc asked confused.
“The fog horn. That really loud, really fucking loud, horn that the ship has - I’ll place something heavy on the button so it continually sounds until the ships batteries are drained. Which, if I shut the power off from everything else, should be at least a couple of days.”
“Why would you do that?”
“Because after I overpower you and tie you to one of those trees out there I’m hoping that the horn will attract whatever is out there right to you and away from me as I drag Arnold through the forest. You’ll definitely live but probably not for as long as under plan A and death won’t be as nice as starvation or dehydration.” Robert let the words sink in before he asked, “so any thoughts on the two plans?”
Reluctantly Doc responded, “I think plan A is a winner.”
“Glad you see it that way. Now let’s go get that stretcher.”
The DayZ Novel Page 10