Prompt-A-Day Collection II: Prompt's Revenge

by Admiral Biscuit

12: A Three-Hour Tour

It was supposed to be a simple cruise. No one ever expected that iceberg so close to the equator.

It was really nobody’s fault. The HMS Lutefisk was running at full-steam to escape from a possible U-boat sighting, and the bridge crew mostly had their binoculars trained over the stern, hoping against hope to spot the telltale trails of a torpedo in time to take some evasive action. Even the pilot was paying more attention to the bridge wings than the ocean, and who could blame him? It was the middle of the Atlantic Ocean, so what could they possibly hit?

It hadn’t been a big iceberg, but it was big enough. The hull plates were torn open, and the engineering crew quickly reported that water was coming in much faster than the pumps had any hope of coping with.

Captain Smith made a hard decision in an instant. He ordered the engineering crew to keep the boilers up for as long as they could, but once water began entering the engine room to open the safeties and get out. The lifeboats were run out in their davits, ready for a quick launch, and the XO ordered a check to ensure that they were fully supplied.

To prolong the inevitable, the captain ordered full speed astern. There was a small chain of islands within a few hours steaming; the closer they could get before the ship sank, the better off they’d be.

There weren’t supposed to be any U-boats, the captain muttered. Not all the way out here. Just a short hop . . . ha!

Were he a younger man, he might have lamented the loss of his ship. This was wartime, though. It was the third ship that had been sunk under his command, and—if he survived—it probably wouldn’t be the last.

He rounded up a few personal belongings from his cabin and made sure he knew where the logbook was. If at all possible, it should survive the sinking. He wasn’t sure why it mattered, but it seemed like the thing to do.

Almost two hours after striking the iceberg, the Captain made his final entry: Finished with engines. Abandoning ship. He put the pen in his pocket, the logbook in his rucksack, and walked down to the main deck. The sun was just beginning to rise, which would help them land, and the navigator had gotten several good fixes. They were no more than twenty miles from the islands.

The boats were launched with little fanfare. The small gasoline motors started easily—the crew had had plenty of time to make sure they would—and the pair of lifeboats motored away from the doomed vessel on a steady easterly course. The ocean was as flat as a millpond.

Every five minutes Captain Smith looked back. Each time, the ship sat lower in the water; when he judged it was close, he kept watch until the Ludefisk finally slipped below the water. He looked down at his watch and noted the time in the logbook. Good record-keeping was vital, even in stressful times.

• • •

It was not long after the sinking that the islands were spotted. The crew headed towards the largest—although even that was not particularly big. Still, it was better than nothing.

As they got closer, they angled towards a natural cove. A small sailboat was moored in the harbor, which was a good sign. It looked to the captain somewhat like a dhow, but he suspected that whatever natives lived here had their own name for it.

As the ship closed in on the beach, shouts could be heard from the cluster of huts that surrounded the harbor. Natives giving warning, I suppose, the captain thought. Uncomfortable memories of books and movies where the primitives were cannibals came bubbling to the surface of his thoughts, but he suppressed them. Even if there had been such people once, the world had been explored and all the natives had been found. No matter how remote these islands were, there was likely to be a village elder or someone who spoke a smattering of English. They’d radioed the Admiralty with their position and intent to make for the islands after hitting the iceberg, so rescue could be expected in a few days.

They pulled the boats up on the beach and secured them. Most of the officers and crew stayed to watch the boats, while the captain and cook—who spoke Swahili—went to look for help in the village. The radio operator pointed as a cluster of zebra ran across a hill and out of sight.

They got to the huts sooner than Smith had expected. They were smaller than he’d expected, which was why he’d assumed they were farther away. The doors were only chest-high. “Are there pygmies living on these islands?” he wondered out loud.

“No idea.” The cook peered through a window. The inside of the hut was fairly primitive: tribal masks hung on the wall, and clay bottles and jars filled an alcove on one wall. The center of the hut had a small fire in it with a tripod above it, and two mats were laid out on opposite sides of the fire.

“Maybe they’re all in their fields or something. Might have chased off those zebra we saw earlier.”

The pair walked out of town, looking for some sign of the occupants. There was no one anywhere, much to their frustration. Finally, the cook spotted a well-worn path leading towards the center of the island.

“Keep alert,” Smith muttered. “They might be waiting to ambush us.”

• • •

The path led them up a grassy hill, before it turned towards a stand of trees. Off in the distance, they could see dozens of zebras watching their every move.

“How would zebras get out here anyway?”

“I . . . don’t know. Maybe a ship carrying some ran around and they swam off?” The captain walked forwards into the woods. “Are you thinking of catching one for dinner?”

“Too much work. Doubt we’d ever get close enough to hit one with a pistol, and I don’t know if it would bring it down, even if we did. Maybe when we run low on supplies, I’ll reconsider. Until then, I—”

Too late, Smith realized that they’d walked into a trap. Instinctively, he grabbed his gun and spun around. If there was only one of them . . .

But there was no one behind the cook. Only a zebra.

He started to lower his gun when a voice muttered something behind him. He didn’t recognize the language, but the sharp jab in his back told him all he needed to know. He dropped the gun and turned his head, hoping to plead his case.

He looked down at the wielder of the spear, then back towards the cook. “You . . . don’t happen to speak zebra, do you?”

Author's Note:

Prompt: It was supposed to be a simple cruise. No one ever expected that iceberg so close to the equator. Good thing you’ve landed on...

Why? Because nobody's written a Human in Zebrica story yet, that's why.

Various bits and bobs:
• Torpedos, I've been told, leave a phosphorescent trail through the water, and in WWII, could potentially be avoided if the captain took prompt action.
• If they don't vent the boilers, they'll explode when cold seawater hits them.
• XO is slang for executive officer, second-in-command on a vessel.
• IRL equines can swim. Several islands have a horse population which swam there after a shipwreck.

Comments

[PunIntended Consequences]

Wait, where does the 'tour' aspect come into play? This is clearly a war scenario...

Also, it would probably be a bad idea to "catch one and eat it for dinner", captain.

[Admiral Biscuit]

3963433

Wait, where does the 'tour' aspect come into play?

Most of the chapter titles are taken from the title of the prompt, whether or not they really fit with the story. This is because the vast majority of these one-shots have less than an hour's work from start to completion, and I can't be bothered to come up with a clever title in such a short amount of time.

[Fana Farouche]

HMS Lutefisk

Apropos of nothing, I read a book review recently, which raised an interesting point, I quote:

...failure to cut off the transatlantic trade that, in those crucial early years, kept Britain fed and re-armed. German submarines could have done the job, but (and we should be grateful for this) there were not enough of them.

Hitler never really understood sea power, his mindset as landlocked as Austria, the country of his birth. He starved his navy of the steel it needed to build more ships, and what little the Kriegsmarine did get generally went on grandiose battleships, rather than churning out more subs.

Used effectively and in greater numbers, U-boats could have won the war, starving Britain into submission and, by ruling the Atlantic, dissuading the U.S. from joining in. But there was no focused effort to employ them.

Instead, four subs were on permanent loan to the Luftwaffe as weather-watchers, issuing meteorological reports instead of sinking enemy ships. For the invasion of Russia, Hitler inexplicably ordered eight to the Baltic, where there was nothing for them to do. Meanwhile, in the Atlantic, the vast majority of convoys got through, enabling Britain to survive and prepare for the entry of the U.S. into the war that, in time, would seal Hitler's fate.

The book in question, if in the UK.
Or in the US.

Of course the Wolfpacks came later, but it was too little, too late.

[Admiral Biscuit]

6659090
I don't think Hitler knew how desperate England was to get supplies, especially early in the war, before the US joined in and started churning out Liberty ships faster than the Nazis could sink them. Between that tactical error, and invading Russia, he stretched himself too thin when victory was all but assured.

[MrZJunior]

6659090
Where would they have gotten the fuel to run all of those submarines? Germany could barely keep it's army moving, much less it's army, navy, and air Force.

[cogwheelbrain]

...but you didn't get the part where the iceberg had been stalking them because of the Zebra magic!

[Admiral Biscuit]

9315384
I’m just picturing the zebras having a ship voodoo doll, and one of them bumping it with ice cubes.