150 reported pirate attacks in the past year. Hendrik pored over the numbers in his head. It came out to a little under one attack every 2.5 days. He checked the United Nation’s report for the fourth time in the past hour, hoping maybe this time the numbers would change. The last attack had been on August 17, 2011; a little over four days ago. He now regretted taking those statistics courses back in university.
He took and exhaled a deep breath, before rolling out of his cramped bunk. He hated being on ships. He couldn't believe he'd been reassigned from his cushy desk job to this iron casket. Maybe he'd talk to the Captain, or even get on the satellite phone for a few minutes with his friends back home. Anything to take his mind off those pirate attacks. God protect me, he thought.
He ducked under the low hanging tops of the ship's doorways, wobbling slightly on his unsteady sea legs.
On the way through he squeezed by and around the vessel's hodgepodge crew of locals and United Nation's personnel. The former wore tattered cloths and were armed with old Russian automatic rifles, worn slung across their backs. The latter were dressed smartly in brown uniforms topped off with either light blue berets or pith helmets. Each UN employee had been authorized to carry the standard issue side arm, but regulation insisted that they leave them unloaded, in their holster, and with the safety on. The single round of bullets issued for the voyage felt weighty in Hendrik's pocket as he walked. Maybe they were waited so that you wouldn't forget you had them, he thought. As if you could.
The entrance to the bridge required him to step out into the open air. He'd stayed below decks for most of the journey, never much liking the outdoors. His first breath of damp, heavy air did nothing to reverse this opinion. The air of South-East Asia had an almost sticky quality to it; it clung to the lungs, to the face, the clothes. He even preferred the stale air of his cabin to it. And who knew how much pollution he'd be breathing in? He'd read the UNESCO reports: breathing the air in some third world countries was the equivalent of smoking a pack of cigarettes. God, he missed cigarettes.
He jogged up the iron steps and threw the latch on the door to the bridge, first noting the moon's reflection in its window. At least there was still coffee, he rationalized as he poured the dark liquid into a white Styrofoam cup. He sipped it, and it was surprisingly good too. They must've loaded the good stuff on board, unlike the weak, watery, brew that had sustained them around India. He knew it well; it was the UN's version of the 'K' ration: the worst, most mass-producible stuff that mankind could brew up.
He took another sip, before calling out to the man at the wheel, "Hello, captain. How goes the voyage?"
The captain turned from the ship's instruments to flash his passenger a toothy grin, "It's the nicest voyage I've ever captained. It's never been smoother."
The man the UN contracted to pilot the vessel was a Malaysian man, who'd taken this route many times. He looked wild to Hendrik, bright red ribbons tied through his hair, garrish gold loops on his ears. A large pistol sat menacingly in a shoulder holster. He recalled the images of buccaneers that Hendrik had read in his Dutch children's books. But his crew was experienced, and so was he. And well-armed, which, in these waters, was nearly as important.
"I... this sounds so silly, excuse me; but, lately I've been worried by dangers of-"
"Pirates?" the captain volunteered helpfully.
"Yes." Hendrik let out a sigh, "You've never been attacked by pirates here, have you?"
"Ah... just once."
"And- What happened?"
The toothy grin reflected at Hendrik from the windshield and the man patted his massive pistol. "They died." He let out a deep throaty laugh.
"Oh. That's... good. I guess. Thank you."
"Not a problem. Enjoy your coffee, and try to get some sleep. We'll be through the straits by tomorrow."
"Okay, thank you captain." The man waved jauntily, as Hendrik walked back out into the damp tropical night.
Hendrik saw the familiar orange pinpoint of a lit cigarette a ways down the deck. He strolled over to the man puffing on the smoke and gave him a 'hello' in English. The man cocked his head, clearly not understanding. He must not speak English. Maybe Malaysian? Hendrik switched languages and offered a traditional Malaysian greeting. Still a blank look. Hendrik squinched his eyes, it was almost impossible to guess which dialect or which island this man hailed from. Then, a thought occurred, "Olá?" Hendrik struggled, his command of the tongue sub-par, “Como vai você?”
The man's eye's lit up and he responded back in his own broken Portuguese, "Fine. You?"
"Good." The man looked back out towards the water, and took a drag on the cigarette as Hendrik wracked his brains for a phrase, "Where are you from?" he managed to spit out.
"Koh Kong.”
"Sorry. Uh, bigger place?"
The man gave him a look, before comprehending, "Oh. Cambodia."
Hendrik switched languages, "It's been a while since I've spoken Cambodian. Forgive my mistakes."
The man smiled, "Ah, you speak Cambodian! You're lucky, not many of you foreign devils are wise enough to learn the most glorious of tongues." He held out the cigarette to the Dutchman, apparently at ease, "Smoke?"
Oh thank God, finally! "Yes, yes, please. Thank very much!"
"Thank you very much." the man corrected.
"Ah yes, thank you very much." Hendrik took a deep drag on the cigarette, and held the biting smoke in his lungs for several seconds before blowing it out. Sure, they were bad for him, but it couldn't be worse than the normal air. It had been several weeks since he’d smoked one, the rush of the drug usually calmed his jittered nerves, but he felt just as bad as he had before.
“Is it like this always for people like I?”
“What do you mean?”
“So… afraid? In the night.”
“Nervous?” the sailor looked sympathetic.
“Yes.”
“That’s why man invented the cigarette.” he responded, grabbing it back from Hendrik and sucking in short, frequent breaths.
“Fuckin’ A.” Hendrik agreed, in English.
The sailor contemplated this for a second before confirming, “Fucking A.”
Hendrik was remembering why he hated coming outside, as he strained to peer through the darkness. This geography was out of some nightmare. The banks were forested and littered with wooden docks housing small personal watercraft. The river traffic was enormously heavy, even during the night hours, and passing green and red ship lights pierced through the dark.
With the sound of the motors you couldn’t really hear any particular boat out of the mob. It was tough to hear much at all, more than a few feet away from you. Like, Hendrik later reflected, the crack of a high powered rifle.
He’d never seen a man get shot before. The bullet pierced the cigarette smoking sailor only a few feet next to him and a red plume of something sprayed out of the man as he twisted back into the deck. Blood.
A swell of dizziness rose to Hendrik’s head and he crouched down to help the man, though he didn't know what on earth he was going to do.
“Are you okay? What happened?” he asked stupidly. The man looked at him terrified and Hendrik realized he just addressed the wounded man in Dutch, the trauma having reverted him to the language of his childhood.
But it didn’t matter. Though he didn't know it, the man’s lungs were quickly filling with fluid, and talking was quite impossible. Hendrik held the back of the sailor’s head, as he struggled weakly. The wounded man coughed, and a fleck of blood sprayed over Hendrik's shirt. The Dutchman wasn't sure what to do; the man was drowning. From the inside. In his own blood. The dying man reached out and grabbed a hold of Hendrik's shirt in an iron grip; the cradled man's eyes were darting about, as though he couldn't focus them. There was fluid running from his mouth down his neck as his mouth silently opened and closed. A klaxon began to blare over Hendrik’s head, and he saw that further down the ship a sailor had pulled an alarm and was gesturing for him to get moving.
He felt the man's hand unclench and fall off the front of his shirt. He gave a cursory glance to the man he'd been cradling; now clearly dead. Hendrik dropped the man’s head and began to run crouched as low as he could.
Bodies came streaming out of the underbelly of the ship all with pistols out or rifle stocks leveled against their shoulders. Semiautomatic rifle fire came sporadically out of the darkness dropping sailors one by one, who had no idea of where or what to shoot. A loud shunk noise was heard and he’d seen enough reports from the Middle East to recognize the noise of an RPG firing. A fiery explosion rocked the side of the ship, throwing shrapnel into many of the men defending the ship and tossing Hendrik into the steel siding. Another two explosions smashed into the back of the ship near the engines, the fuel lighting ablaze, even in the water.
He clambered unsteadily to his feet, his shoulder in agony from where he’d slammed into the wall. The roar of powerful engines came bursting out of the darkness and a small rubber attack boat dashed across a stretch the moonlit water before disappearing once more into the black.
By now, Hendrik made it to the rest of the sailors and was about to sprint below decks when he was tackled to the floor. Automatic rifle fire raked the wall behind him, where his chest had been.
He was now huddled against the steel floor of the deck with the native sailors, some alive, some dead, some dying. He saw no sign of any other UN personnel. From his vantage point he could see the heads and torsos of their attackers as the boat came about 20 feet off the port side of the ship.
A long thin gun on a heavy tripod swung around and a lever was pulled on the side of the gun. He could make out an imposing belt of ammunition feeding into the side of the gun like a snake. An MG 42, his brain remembered curiously from world war two documentaries of his youth, rather than worrying how he'd get out of this
He grabbed the nearest body and pulled it close, hunkering behind the human shield. He knew this was cowardly if the man was dead, and murderous if the man were still alive, but he didn't care. He just wanted something between him and those terrible rounds.
By now, ship traffic had ceased and the boat’s own engines had either been stopped or disabled.
It was all quiet except the crying and moaning of the pile of men he was in. The attacking vessels had used the noise and confusion of the strait's heavy boat traffic to sneak in close. But once the attack started the other ships had all powered down their own engines and lights, hoping to wait the assault out. There was no code of brotherhood to assist the pirated among the pilot's of the Malacca strait. It was every ship for themselves in these situations.
Then the silence was shattered by a a noise that sounded like cloth ripping and the deck of the ship became a killing field.
The gun, designed to lay down as much fire as was mechanically possible, slammed rounds into the bodies of the men around him and punched holes in the ship’s thin armor plating surrounding them.
The fire continued for what seemed like ages, before it came to an abrupt stop. Hendrik, through his bureaucrat nature, thought they were simply reloading, but more experienced sailors, whose fathers or family had possibly faced down these types of guns in Vietnam, or in World War II, knew different.
“It’s jammed! Move!” Hendrik heard shouted from a language his brain automatically translated, though his mind was not in a state to know which language it had been.
The mass of bodies that could rise, did, and frantically scrambled for the deck door behind them that lead to the ship’s underbelly. As Hendrik pushed his way through the frantic mass, some of whom were felled by fire from the craft floating off their side, he stole a glance at the windows of the bridge. A flash of light and the crack of shattered glass foreshadowed a splash of blood and brain against the window. Either he’d been shot or… the captain had shot himself, his brain slowly recognized, before he scrambled into the safety of the hull.
The wheel lock on the door got twisted as hard as it could, as bullets pinged off the outside. At least one piece of metal on this tub could stop a round. The walls of the hallway showed large exit holes from where rounds had blasted through them. It made him feel uneasy about the safety of this new locale.
If he got out of this, he'd be letting the UN know right away: It was 151 now.
