“Yah see that, me hardies? You know what that is?” Murdoc staggered back and forth across the shifting deck as he spoke, pointing out into the darkness. “Do you know what that is?”
“The Ocean?” enquired Cranston. The year was 1869 it was Sunday, our Lord’s day, and we, were aboard a commercial pursuit vessel named the Hack Chicken. The gulls were asleep, clouds were gone and the moon was full, obscured only by the occasional passing land-vulture, who had followed our smell out to the open ocean. These stupid birds were too fat to land on our ship, due to all the rigging and to absorbent float on the water like gulls. They wheeled in doomed arcs, waiting for a snack, but they were already tired and probably wouldn’t have the energy to follow our ship back to port.
“The OCEAN!?” screamed Murdoc. “THE OCEAN!?!” Murdoc again pointed out across the great cold expanse of water. “That Ain’t the Ocean, me matie, tis the motherfucking SEA.”
“Murdoc,” I finally snapped, “You drunk asshole, sit down and be quiet. You’re going to scare away all the fucking whales.”
“The whales be damned, ye scurvy, land loving son of a bitch.”
“Why you talking all funny like?” Asked Cranston.
“I’ll talk however I like ya shiesty land loving scurvy pilgrim.”
“Murdoc, yeah the way you‘re talking is mad annoying, but if you‘re gonna do it, please just do it quietly and sit down, you’re either gonna scare the goddamn whales or fall overboard and I totally call ‘not it’ on fishing your drunk ass out of the ocean or sea or whatever you wanna call it.” Murdoc was as seasoned a mariner as myself, but had a reputation for, well fucking everything up. I gotta apologize, actually off the bat, dear readers, I’m usually a lot more fun, but in this particular case, we needed to come up with dead whales. We’d already been out at sea for six weeks and caught nothing and since it was my name on the boat rental, if we didn’t catch at least a half dozen, it was my ass that would have to eat the loss.
“Do whales even have ears?” Asked Cranston, “I just reckon like I’ve seen my fare share of whales and I aint never seen one with ears.” Cranston was a fucking idiot.
“Of course them briny beasts don’t have ears,” ranted Murdoc. “They communicate by ‘radar.’ Burt’s just being a dick…” Oh yeah, my name is Burt by the way. Captain Burt Nurthill, please to make all of your acquaintances.
“…so yell all ye want me maties, the whale’s radar can’t hear it!”
“You are the only one yelling, Murdoc.”
“Wait, What in the hell is raydar.”
“Me matey, you are a radar-D. Ohhhh burned.”
“And you’re drunk, Murdoc.”
“So are you, ya survey keel haller.”
“That may be true, but that’s just all the more reason that I am NOT jumping in after your drunk ass when you fall the fuck overboard.”
“Guys c‘mon, I need to learn this stuff, can someone please tell me what in the san hill a raydard is!” Cranston babbled timidly. Murdoc found this absolutely fucking hilarious. He was right, I was drunk, but not as drunk as his ass and whatever - spending six weeks out to sea with a bunch of dudes, hoping that you might, by some immense good fortune, get to kill some whales is a huge bummer, you’d be drinking too. Murdoc tripped and almost tumbled overboard in his fit of laughter.
“Maybe Captain Burt is right Murdoc, maybe you aughta chill out. Even if yer not scaring the whales, ya don‘t wanna fall overboard. I heard these waters is home to mad, like, sea beasts, n shit.”
“Eye, sea beast, me young supple lassie? Sea beasts? You mean ‘The Kraken!’”
“Murdoc, you got to stop confusin me with all these big city book words. Krekens and Raydards and Chlamydias and whatnot.”
“Eye, me shartie, I shall tell the tail of the Kraken, a beast ten times as ferocious as Chlamydia. Gather round-”
“Murdoc, who the hell are you telling to gather round, there’s only three of us on this friggin boat, you’re standing six inches from Cranston’s face, wasted and yelling, and I’m obviously trying as hard as I can to fucking ignore you.”
“The Kraken be a bulbous barnacled beast from the briny abyss, and though of recent, Man has been the whale’s greatest foe, for years before it’d been the Kraken. And they still lurk, hungry, salty and jealous, over the bloody courtship between Man and whale. We robbed the salty sea-devils of their major food supply and now they hunger for our man-guts and…
Whaling just wasn’t the game it used to be.
I remember back when I was first getting into it, you would hit whale country just as soon as you got out of the harbor and it was such a sure thing, speculators would pay for the boat, the booze and hoorez all up front. All you needed to bring was your own harpoon. And in those days, we had real ships, evil fucking galleons with radar, sonar, fish scopes, and latitudinal navigations systems. These three hundred foot goliaths would be a wash in whale blood, blubber and baleen within a week and the big fuckers would limp home, heavy with meat, crew trashed, with some coked out hooker actually DRIVING the thing, and the party wouldn’t stop when we hit the dock.
I remember one time crashing into the pier in Brooklyn after a three day slaughter fest. Each crewman’s share, after expenses was then million and big fat mustachioed Monopoly Men were begging us to marry their daughters. Well I don’t really remember clearly, because I was wicked hammered, but all I know is that I woke up next to the biggest, fattest, warmest Monopoly Babe that I’d ever laid my eyes on. With fresh Whale oil raging through the Port Hotel’s heating system, me and this chick didn’t leave the room till after Christmas. That’s how it was back then - a half a week cold and drunk at sea and then three months warm and drunk, ordering room service with some fat check. The glory days of whaling.
I remember it like it was a thousand years ago. Then, back to the present. Nothing like a thousand years later, maybe more like 5 years later, three years since that goddamn fascist Woodrow Wilson shut town half the blubber mills on the east coast, in an attempt to “re-tool our nations economy to better meet the needs of 1864.” Supposedly, that old pervert got enough people rich to get himself re-elected, but I sure as hell wasn’t one of them. All it got me, was stuck on a boat about the size of a subway car, tryna make an honest living, whaling in seas since stripped bare by industrial whaling platforms out of Canada. Business was still booming in Canada. I had a ticket to Halifax and a chance to work up there, but I’d have been pushing buttons, pulling levers and crunching numbers while automatons did all the fun shit. Nah man, I need the sea air in my eyes and a harpoon in my hand. Although at least aboard a Canadian Sea Life Processor I probably wouldn’t have to deal with retards like Murdoc and Cranston.
“…and there are really Kraken in these hear waters, Murdoc?”
“Yar, fergit the Crackin, we be huntin whales me matie, and I got a feeling about yon patch of salty shimmerin-”
“Goddamn it, with the fucking pirate voice, dude.”
“I’m turnin this hear vessel around!”
Murdoc awkwardly ascended to the wheel cabin, and spun the motherfucker like he was playing roulette. I let out a sigh and packed some stale tobacco into my pipe. Cranston grabbed his harpoon and let out a ferocious cry.
“So, what‘s going on now? We’re letting the fucking drunk guy drive the boat?”
“But I thought you said you was drunk too, Captain Burt.”
“I am, but I had the auto-pilot on. How bout you kid? I said and lit my pipe. “You drunk?”
“Oh I’m drunker n a racoon in Church, Captain.” Slurred Cranston. I tried to figure out what the hell he was talking about and opened my mouth, hoping something vulgar about Cranston being a retard would come out, but all I had the energy for was a sigh. I puffed on my pipe and mentally re-grouped.
“At least there’s nothing he can hit out here.” I cracked another beer. “Although I don’t see why we don’t just let the autopilot drive like it’s been doing and keep drinking.”
“Eye, ya mutinous dog, throw me another beer!” Murdoc said, still just recklessly spinning the wheel.
“Mutinous dog? Dude, I’m the fucking captain. If anything, you’re the one being a mutinous dog, which is fine, but once again please just do it quietly.”
“Eye, but what of thee beer?” Murdoc spun the wheel the other way, the stars swung wide overhead and I almost lost my balance as I opened the cooler, pulled out another beer and cracked it. The cooler was still mostly full.
“We’re out.” I said. Murdoc howled.
“O cruelest Poseidon, why have ye forsaken our beer supply.”
“I dunno, guy’s a dick.” I said. Murdoc cursed the heavens as I pulled the cooler across the deck and hid it under a pile of old sails and shit.
“Avast! We must find a store, pronto! I’m turning this vessel around, if tis mutiny, then let me hang, are ye with me crew?” Cranston cheered as Murdoc spun the wheel again.
“Sorry about this here mutiny Captain,” Cranston said as he threw his arm around me. “but we really gotta find a beer store.”
Dear readers, I had just about given up. The boat crashed through the open ocean back and forth in drunken arcs. The whale oil-boiler sputtered and struggled as Murdoc throttled up. He laughed like a maniac and his eyes bulged through the rigging and darkness.
“MUTINEY! Yah hear that Burt, ya scurvey stern pirate, we’re takin command of this here vessel.” I pulled my coat around me, sat down on the deck and leaned against the camouflaged cooler. At this point, I decided, protecting the hidden beer stock was actually more important than stopping Murdoc from driving the boat. Murdoc revved the engine like an asshole.
“Mutiny all you want, dude, but if I wake up tomorrow morning and we’re out of gas in the middle of the ocean, I’m actually gonna kick your ass.”
“Ta thee beer store me maties!”
“We’re in the middle of the fucking ocean there’s no beer store! Plus it‘s Sunday, the lord‘s day, 1869, no beer stores are open!” Murdoc had tuned me out, which was good, at least he was quiet now. Cranston was leaning over the rail hurling his harpoon clumsily at the circling land-vultures.
“Fuck hunting whales, yall, let’s just kill these things.”
At least there was nothing for Murdoc to hit out here. The sea is actually a great place for drunk driving in that respect. I thought about it quickly in my head, we had plenty of fuel and beer, even with Murdoc driving at full speed out into open water all night and me drinking hard as shit. Murdoc wouldn’t drive all night anyway. I mentally gave him about another two hours before he would get bored and probably pass out, I just had to stay awake till then, then I could turn the ship around, and set a course back for port. I was sick of this shit. I puffed on my pipe. There was a thud and a screech and a splash.
“Whooooo weeee! I got one!” shouted Cranston, as he reeled his harpoon back. The kid was a fucking moron, but goddamn he was a good shot with a harpoon. I started to think about roast vulture and how I probably hadn’t had anything to eat in a couple hours now.
“Check it out, yall.” Cranston held aloft his harpoon, showering himself with blood and sea water. “We gonna cook us up the illest vulture chops ever-” Murdoc killed the engine and tumbled out of the wheel shack. The boat lurched yet another direction. I put my head back down.
“Wake me up when you guys get your shit together and cook the damn thing.”
“Yar, tis no vulture, me matie!” I heard Murdoc explain. “Tis a goose! A Canadian goose!”
“It don’t look like no goose I ever seen.”
“Yar, that because you’ve never been this far north, don’t you see laddie, we’ve entered Canadian waters!”
“Wow! Canadian waters.”
“Yar, and that there is the national bird of Canada, here, tie it around your neck me matie, just like this, that way if we come upon a Canadian Man-o-War that wants to get cute with us, they’ll know that we mean business and are scurvy scallywags nart to be fucked with. Eye, fucking Canadians-” I had had enough.
“Murdoc, godamn it,” I said, rising from behind the beer cooler, and turning to insult my crew. “There’s no way we’re in Canadian waters and…” My blood ran cold as I identified the bird hanging wet around Cranston’s neck and leaking it’s red vital fluids onto our deck.
“Cranston.” I said. “That’s no goose.”
“Eye, tis a vulture then!”
“It’s not a vulture either.”
“Then tis perhaps a gull, perhaps the largest Canadian gull ever-”
“Murdoc, shut the fuck up. That’s no gull. That’s an Albatross.”
“… … … yar.”
“Is that bad?” Asked Cranston. I cracked another beer passed it to Cranston, then another to Murdoc. I Cracked one more for myself and drank hard.
“Yes. Very.”
“Yar…”
“Wait, wait, why is that bad? What happens if you kill an Albatross.”
“Yar, well nothing if tis an accident, but if ye pridefully tie it around ye neck.”
“Murdoc, you tied it around my neck.”
“…yar. Still counts.”
“Murdoc, whats gonna happen?”
“Ye have angered the spirits of the sea, and-” I finally backhanded Murdoc.
“Murdoc doesn’t fucking know, and neither do I, I’ve never been on a boat with anyone stupid enough to fucking kill one.”
“It was an accident, I couldn’t see, I thought it was a vulture, it’s darker n a raccoon’s titty out there. I thought it was a vulture.”
“Maybe tis a vulture! Or a scurvy Canadian Goose, we could-”
“It’s not a fucking Goose, Murdoc.”
“Eye, did ye check the wingspan? The wingspan and the beak that’s-”
“It’s a fucking Albatross, Murdoc, hanging around the kids neck.”
“But what’s that mean?”
Suddenly the gentle night breeze stopped, and the waves were silent, but the helm spun in the wheelhouse as if Murdoc’s drunken disembodied spirit were still up there spinning it. Spinning it straight to hell. The ship creaked and banked sharply in a way Murdoc had never been able to bend it and with no wind in the sails or fire in the boiler, we splashed forwards into the darkness.
“Where are we going?” cried Cranston.
“Yar, wherever this hex ye brought upon us wills it, ye soggy shithead.”
“Murdoc we’re clearly being spirited away by some fucking ancient curse of the deep, PROBABLY to our doom and why? Oh wait I know, because you were being a drunk asshole and trying to piss off Canadians by tying a mystery birds to this retard’s neck, so can you please, for Christ’s sake, drop the stupid voice?”
“Yar, once ye get started it’s hard to stop.” The stars and the moon were blotted out, the remaining birds disappeared from the sky and we huddled together and drank our beers for what seemed like an hour, then with a lurch, we stopped.
“Yar, what the Devil?”
“That what I’m afraid of.”
“C’mon, lets see upon what god forsaken soil we have come to rest.” But it wasn’t soil. The boat still bobbed drunkly as Murdoc and Cranston bobbed equally as drunkenly up to the bow. I re-lit my pipe and got another beer out of the cooler.
“Yo, Murdoc,” I yelled up to them. “Fuck this shit, you wanna play mutiny, get us cursed and shit, then you go right ahead, I quit.” Up on the bow, Murdoc and Cranston peered into the water.
“A WHALE!!!!” The cry ran out from both of them. They grabbed harpoons and jumped overboard. I could hear them yelling and stabbing, and had to admit I was a little curious. So, I ambled up to the bow, holding a beer instead of my harpoon and checked out the situation. The scene was oily black but I could see sure enough it was a whale. The two stood atop it’s floating mass screaming and stabbing relentlessly, till I yelled down to them.
“What the fuck are you guys stabbing a dead whale for.” Murdoc and Cranston ceased their harpooning.
“Dead?” inquired Cranston.
“Yeah, you know, like, not alive anymore. Come on, lets get some ropes, strap this thing to the side of the boat and head back for port. I’m wasted and tired, but maybe this whole thing isn’t a complete loss. The meats probably no good, but we can still get a decent price on the oil.”
“The meat is still good as shit motherfucker.” a massive voice bellowed from the blackness. “Now will you fool please get the FUCK off my lunch.” Cranston and Murdoc stood paralyzed. I lit a lamp, knowing exactly what lay before us.
“THE KRAKEN!!!” Murdoc and Cranston cried as they were lifted into the air by the massive tentacled leviathan. Goddamnit, time to be the Captain again.
“Look, uh, dude.”
“Mr. Motherfuckin Kraken to you, dick. I hope you know, I’m bout to eat your motherfucking crew.”
“Yeah, uh, could you please not do that. Look, we’re really sorry-”
“You got dirty deck scuz all over my motherfuckin whale.”
“Yo, definitely our bad.” I sighed as Murdoc and Cranston dangled in front of the Kraken’s massive yellow eyeball. My buzz was totally killed, but my brain was still soaking and as I searched for the right next words, I not so quickly became aware of a low humming rumble somewhere off in the darkness.
“Look, these guys are idiots. They know they’re idiots and I’ve been telling them all night. I think we may have even caught some sort of ancient maritime curse or something, I don’t know if you’re part of it, hopefully your not and we can just say we’re sorry we fucked up your food and be on our way. We won’t bother you again. Say you’re sorry to the Kraken, guys.
“Sorry Mr. Kraken”
“Yar, sorry ya salty briny beast”
“Briney beast?!?” barked the Kraken.
“Jesus fucking Christ.” I mumbled. The rumbling was getting closer. It seemed somehow familiar, but I couldn’t quite place it or see past the Kraken into the darkness.
“Look here Captain, I’m gonna ignore your drunk motherfuckin friends and take a minute to look at the situation from your point of view. You guys is cold and tired, tryna hunt whales in this shitty motherfuckin sea that you and I both know‘s got almost no whales left in it. The environmental catastrophe wrought by Industrial Whaling and Corporate Interests made all of our lives hell. You think I’m happy tryna carve out a living as a sea monster these days? Shit. I’ve been living off mostly motherfuckin jellyfish and I feel like all you small time whaling motherfuckers is in the same boat. No pun intended. Seems like you’re having a rough night, probably a rough last couple of years and I gotta say I feel your motherfuckin pain. But you what? You know what I’m gonna do? I’m gonna fuck you guy’s shit up anyway.”
I swallowed hard as Cranston and Murdoc screamed and the massive droning got louder and closer. Just then off the port side, I caught something in my peripheral. A light, land, not a lighthouse, but a… beer store? A beer store claiming to be open, sitting like a beacon on the bluffs. But that couldn’t be, for it was Sunday, our lords day, in 1869 and no beer store was open. Then, over the screams and crescendoed mechanical droning, I realized that no beer stores in AMERICA were open and that we had been washed, hundreds of miles, by the Atlantic Rip Stream, into the God-Blessed heathen tides of Canadian Water.
“Hey Kraken,” I said as massive flood-lamps tweaked on, illuminating the whole scene. “I’ll see you in hell, motherfucker.”
With a roar, The Kraken was slurped up like a fork-full of spaghetti into the mechanical gut of a towering Canadian Sea Life Processing Platform. Cranston and Murdoc fell from the Kraken’s limp tentacles, and crashed painfully onto the deck. They drunkenly propped themselves up, as the platforms massive speakers blasted a friendly message, and a stinking red mist of shredded Kraken guts poured all around us.
“Thank you for choosing to be processed by a Canadian Sea Life Processing Platform. We appreciate the contribution and will have your flesh, fluids and entrails to consumers within the next 2 to 4 business days!”
Our boat bobbed safely in the shadow of the shining mechanical floating tower. The recording ended and a real voice got on the intercom.
“Oh, hey, down there, you fellas American, eh?”
“Eye we are!” Bellowed Murdoc.
“Oh fucking right, well why don’t ya come up n get dried off. We got beer, chicken wings, and hockey playin on our mechanical televisions, eh?”
Minutes later, we stood in the gangway of the massive Canadian floating factory. We were met by a greeting party of the Canadian Platforms finest, but as soon as they laid eyes upon us, their faces looked tense, something seemed off. Murdoc threw his Kracken-slime covered arms around one of them.
“Yar, God’s Grace be upon ye. Yah briny bastard have plucked us from the murky depths and-”
“Fer fucks sake,” Said a member of the Canadian greeting party. “What is that?” He pointed to the mangled bird hanging around Cranston’s neck. It dripped on the carpet.
“It’s uh… what’d ya call it yall? An Albatross. I guess it’s kinda like cursed or something, cause we’ve had a whole mess a bad luck all night. I’ll throw it overboard.” Cranston apologized, but the Canadian delegates seemed unimpressed.
“That’s no Albatross.” said another Canadian. “That’s a Canadian Goose you went and killed there, eh?”
“No!” I said, “No, way, it’s totally an Albatross. Look at it’s wingspan!”
“The wingspan don’t mean shit from singles, eh. It’s the feet, ya can tell by the feet, the feat and the beak. That there is a Canadian Goose, which puts us in one hell of a pickle, cause, although you and your buddies seem like a nice group a guys, the penalty for killing a Canadian Goose up here is, well, death.”
“Death?” squeaked Cranston.
“Yah, for the whole crew, eh?”
“Yar, I told ye it was a goose-”
“Murdoc, shut the fuck up.”
