Cray Cray Vacay:
An Ant-Man and The Wasp Adventure
Prologue
"Increase to one third, Mister Stewart."
"Aye, aye, Captain."
The engines' deep-throated hum increased with the ship's speed. The massive turbines strained like restless thoroughbreds, anxious to burst free of their restraints.
"Coming on the outer buoy, sir."
"Very good, Mister Stewart. Take us out slow and easy." It wouldn't do to disturb their guests.
Night had begun to fall in that particularly swift way that it does in the tropics. He'd been at sea for over thirty years, and in all that time he'd never gotten over just how peaceful it looked in that twilight realm between night and day.
Nature's Prozac he thought, amused. But it was true enough. The sea did have an uncanny way of calming even the most troubled of souls.
Water, water, everywhere… The captain turned back to his helmsman.
"Position?"
"We've cleared the outer buoy, sir. We should be entering International Waters this time tomorrow."
"That's fine, Mister Stewart. You have the Con."
As captain, he was expected at dinner, one of the minor inconveniences of being a captain of a cruise ship. Still, the chow beat anything he'd been served back in the Navy. Not to mention the pay was better. Way better.
Being captain of an ocean liner was more than just being in charge of the crew personnel. He also had to play host to all the passengers on board. So a certain amount of diplomacy was needed for the job. Not only did one have to deal with uncooperative staff, but pompous rich socialites as well. In reality, it was more like being a babysitter to hundreds of children. Some you had to coddle, some you admonished, and occasionally, some you had to spank.
He reflected on all of this as he entered the ship's main dinning room.
"Captain! Oh, Captain!" Mrs. Rothmaid waved a gaudily bejeweled hand at the captain. She was to dine with him tonight, along with others at the Captain's Table.
Having to eat with stuffy, overbearing, rich people. Another of the burdens of command.
"Oh, Captain, you simply must hear Sir Grottby's story. It is simply too much!" Mrs. Rothmaid enthused.
"I'm sure it is," the captain politely responded. Sitting down, he motioned for the waiter to begin serving dinner.
For the next hour and a half, the captain was forced to make small talk and smile at the stale banality of his guests. He supposed that they weren't bad people, but having trawled the ocean's waves for some three decades had made him impatient to the niceties of dealing with people. Sailors were not, on average, the most genteel of company.
If only they weren't such landlubbers. It seemed as though the most basic of nautical occurrences were tantamount to unfathomable mysteries to these people. To someone of his salt, having to answer the same inane questions over and over again was grating to say the least.
"I was rather hoping for a bit of action myself," a young wastrel down the table said languidly, idly eying his rapidly decreasing liquor glass.
The captain turned his attention back to his guests. "Excuse me?"
"I was saying how I had rather hoped for a bit of action on this cruise. It's been a tad dull so far."
"What kind of action, sir?"
"Well, this is the sea you know. The 'great briny deep' and all that. Mysterious goings on are supposed to always be happening. The Bermuda Triangle's around here isn't it?"
"We're not near Bermuda," the captain said, humoring the lad. "I hate to disappoint you (though in reality he didn't), but the cruise line frowns upon any undue excitement on our trips. Something to do with insurance premiums I imagine…"
The diners laughed good naturedly as the young man merely shrugged and turned his attention back to his drink.
Excitement. Adventure. If these people really wanted these things they wouldn't take a trip on one of these floating amusement parks. If they really wanted to experience the 'thrills and chills' of ocean travel, they'd buy their own sloop, yacht, whatever, and sail themselves around.
As it was, that 'honor' was his at the moment. And while playing nursemaid to the idle rich wasn't what he had gone to sea for lo those many years ago, it did provide him with a ship under his feet, and at the end of the day that was compensation enough.
The rest of diner went smoothly, and after a suitable amount of time, he excused himself from the passengers and made his way back to the bridge.
"Nothing to report, sir," Mister Stewart said as the captain entered.
"Very good, Mister Stewart. I'll take it from here, why don't you turn in for the night."
"Thank you, sir. Good night, sir," the helmsman said as he left the bridge.
As the captain gazed out over the darkened seascape, he couldn't help but utter a sigh of contentment. This is what it was all about. A man and the sea. Whether it was a tuna boat or a destroyer, it was all the same; the connection between a captain, his ship, and the ocean. That three fourths of the world's surface was covered with it, and yet man knew practically nothing as to what lurked in its depths… Small wonder it continued to hold the same fascination over humanity it had since time immemorial.
An hour later, the captain began to think that it was time to call it a night. Granted, his first mate could handle most of the day-to-day chores as well as he could if he wanted to sleep in, after all, commanding a cruise ship wasn't exactly the same as piloting a nuclear submarine in hostile waters. But at the end of the day, he was captain, and as such, he had an image to maintain. Cruise ship or no, it was still a ship of the line.
But just as he was turning away from the Con, the ship's lights flickered and then went out completely. Save for the moonlight filtering in through the windows, he suddenly found himself on a darkened bridge.
"Navigator, report!" he barked out.
"Everything's out, sir. The console's completely dead."
"What about the backup generators?"
"Everything's down, sir. At least from up here."
"Well, find out if it's ship wide. We may only be having a localized problem. If we can—"
"What in the world is that?" the navigator interrupted, wonderment, and not a bit of panic, in his voice.
"What's where?" the captain asked, annoyed. "It's pitch black. We need—"
"Out there, beyond the bow," the navigator said, interrupting again.
Cross, the captain looked out through the bridge's forward viewing area, striving to make out in the starlight whatever it was that was causing his navigator to get antsy.
Straining, he could just make out something in the dark. At first he couldn't tell what it was. It looked like some kind of ripple. Like what one would see on the surface of a pond.
Gropingly, the captain made his way as far forward as he could. As he pressed his face against the glass, he could clearly see that his ship was getting steadily closer to it.
What was more, the disturbance itself was widening to the point where the captain could tell what it was.
"Full reverse!" the captain shouted, whirling around.
"We can't, Captain. None of the systems are responding. What is it sir?"
"It's death," the captain responded, his voice unnaturally calm.
"Wha—what?" the navigator stammered.
"Son," the captain said, now unable to tear his eyes away from the growing anomaly, "that's what we call a maelstrom."
Where it had come from, or how it had formed, he didn't know. But what he did know was that the ship was bearing down on the mother of all whirlpools. Like a figment out of some demented nightmare, the mawing, gapping mouth yawned ever wider, intent upon swallowing them whole.
Almost as if he were in a movie, the captain saw it approach in slow motion. The stars hanging in the sky lent an air of unreality to the entire situation. At any moment he expected to wake up in a cold sweat, having realized that it was all just a bad dream. Yet there was no waking up from this. It was very much real.
The entire ship rocked when it made contact at last with the massive sinkhole. It was as though the ocean was a giant tub and someone had decided to pull the plug. The captain imagined himself some kind of bath toy as he saw the sides of the whirlpool go around faster and faster. The roar of water filled his senses, pounding his inner ear into submission. It was all that he could do to hold onto to the wheel with both hands to keep from flying across the bridge.
It was only a matter of time before the gravitational forces worked their magic and he blacked out. However, had he been able to remain conscious only a couple of minutes longer, he would have realized that the whirlpool was only the opening act of this drama.