Summary: During the red crab season, Sig begins to suffer from horrific nightmares. As the Captain struggles to cope with the additional stress, he wonders if his ominous dreams are a sign that he's losing his sanity or if the nightmares are forewarning him of danger in the future.
Disclaimer: The Deadliest Catch is the property of Original Productions and the Discovery Channel. I adore Sig and the crew of the F/V Northwestern and I mean no disrespect towards them or anyone else who appears on the show by writing this story.
Author's Note: Sig, Edgar, and Norman all speak fluent Norwegian; they learned that language first since their Norwegian parents (Snefryd and Sverre Hansen) immigrated to the United States and spoke it almost exclusively at home. I do not speak Norwegian, so the translation in this chapter was done by googletranslate.
Nearly thirty-one hours after Sig had spot-checked the first pot, the Northwestern finally arrived on her new fishing grounds. 'Could've been here sooner if not for that frickin' hose,' Sig thought, frustrated that they'd lost hours of valuable time[i] because they'd first had to find and then fix a leak in one of the hydraulic hoses. He removed his reading glasses and wearily rubbed his eyes before setting the spectacles down on the console. Sig glanced at the live camera feed from the deck and frowned when he saw the deckhands' slow pace.
Between the disheartening duty of hauling blanks and single digits,[ii] the time-consuming task of locating and repairing the hydraulic leak, the nerve-wracking[iii] necessity of stacking all two hundred pots, and the prolonged hours out on deck, it was hardly a surprise that the crew's morale had deteriorated; hell, if Sig was honest, he'd been feeling dispirited too, but now he was irritated by the deckhands' apathetic attitudes.
"When I wanna go fast, they go slow,"[iv] Sig grumbled as he reached for his cigarettes. Another glance at the monitor showed Jake and Edgar yawning in quick succession. "Poor things,"[v] Sig scoffed, sliding the filtered end between his lips and lighting the cigarette with the flame from his lighter. "They had a five hour nap while I watched the boat on the run up here.[vi] I've been workin' non-stop for the last thirty frickin' hours, but you don't see me draggin' my feet or cryin' about how tired I am…." Deciding to give his lagging crew a little pep talk, Sig grabbed the loudhailer. "I know we've had a rough start," he began, "But let's get the chains off the stack, get the gear in the water, and catch some crab!"
"Roger!" the deckhands responded.
"Yes, sir!" Edgar answered, injecting equal parts sarcasm and forced enthusiasm into his voice as he gave the wheelhouse a mock-salute.
"Set 'em whenever you're ready," Sig said, purposefully ignoring his brother's patronizing tone. "We'll just blast 'em off here."[vii] Sig lowered the loudhailer and swallowed against a suddenly tight throat as a memory from one of his nightmares flashed before his eyes: The knot on the crane hook slipped loose, sending the pot into a free-fall on a collision course with the deckhands.
Sig cleared his throat and lifted the loudhailer towards his mouth. "Mavar?" he called as Nick scrambled up on top of the towering stack. "Make sure those knots are secure on the crane hook before you clear the pots to come off the stack."
Nick waved to acknowledge the Captain's command. 'We've never had a problem with my knots before,' he mused as he knelt down and began to unlace the pot ties that bound the crab cage to the others in the stack. 'But, I guess it never hurts to re-check,' Nick thought as he attached the pot to the crane hook. 'Don't wanna get complacent.'[viii] Nick double-checked the knot before he motioned for Norman to lower the pot down to deck level.
Seventeen hours later, the last pot of the final string splashed over the starboard rail. "Good job," Sig said over the loudhailer, pleased and proud of how his crew had stepped up their game to get all two hundred pots baited and set. The fair-haired Hansen rested his chin in the palm of his left hand as he studied the plotter. 'I've got half a mind to run over and spot-check some pots in that Eastern string,' he thought.
Sig shifted his attention to the screen that showed the five deckhands working to clean and secure the deck. 'They might get pretty snippy if I delay their break,' Sig thought, realizing it was about two in the morning. 'But, I'm just gonna plug my ears.[ix] I got 'em trained to suffer.'[x] The fourth generation fisherman grabbed the loudhailer to inform his crew. "All right," he began, "I'm gonna head East here and we'll spot-check a couple pots, okay? So just sit tight."
"Roger!" "Okay!" "Great…" various voices called simultaneously as the deckhands moved towards the alcove just outside the entryway door.[xi] Nick and Edgar sat down in the collapsible quad chairs, Jake sat on an overturned ten-gallon pail, Norman leaned against the doorframe, and Matt sat down on the deck with his back to the wall.
"I'm kinda curious to see what's in those pots," Nick commented.
"Yeah, me too," Jake agreed. "I just wish we could've taken a break in between."
"Suck it up, Junior," Edgar interjected unsympathetically. "We've been workin' just as long and as hard as you, but you don't hear us complainin'."
"I'm not complaining," Anderson argued. "I'm just saying that it would've been nice, that's all."
"Too bad you can't fall asleep at the drop of a hat like Matt," Norman commented as he tugged off his glove and put a pinch of Copenhagen[xii] into his mouth.
"This is perfect," Edgar remarked gleefully, brown eyes twinkling with mischief as he eyed the snoring deckhand. "Somebody go get me a Sharpie."
"I'll get one," Jake volunteered. He returned a few minutes later with a permanent marker and handed it to the deck boss.
"You're not gonna draw something lewd are you?" Nick asked, raising a disapproving eyebrow as Edgar uncapped the marker.
"I wouldn't do that,"[xiii] the youngest Hansen deadpanned, earning a snort of skepticism and a choked-back chuckle from Norman and Jake respectively.
"Ooh, I know," Jake chuckled, "You should draw an anchor on his forehead." He pushed the bill of his cap up and indicated the spot between his eyebrows.
"Oh, like this?" Edgar laughed as he extended the tip of the uncapped marker towards the bared skin.
"Not me, man!" Jake exclaimed, trying to dodge out of the deck boss's reach and earning a crooked black stripe down the bridge of his nose for his efforts. "Shit," he swore, rubbing furiously at the mark in an unsuccessful attempt to remove it. "That's permanent ink, dude," Jake complained.
"A couple Bering Sea baths and it'll come off," Nick chortled, grinning at his nephew.
"Nail polish remover,"[xiv] Norman suggested. The hydraulics expert self-consciously shifted his weight from foot to foot when Edgar, Jake, and Nick simultaneously turned to stare at him. "What?" he asked defensively.
"Nail polish remover?" Edgar asked, eying his older brother with a mix of curiosity and disbelief. He pointed at Norman's rubber rain boots. "Take those off."
"What for?" Norman queried, forehead creasing with confusion.
"So I can see what color you painted your toenails," the deck boss replied with a smirk.
"Cajun Shrimp?"[xv] Nick said, gazing contemplatively down at Norman's booted feet.
"Flashbulb Fuchsia?"[xvi] Jake snickered.
Up in the wheelhouse, Sig had overheard the conversation via the loudhailer and wanted to join the good-natured teasing. "Opie Red,"[xvii] he declared over the hailer, startling Edgar, Nick, Jake, and Norman with his unexpected contribution to their conversation.
Norman incredulously regarded his fellow deckhands, both eyebrows rising to previously unconquered heights. "You're all insane," the hydraulics expert decided, slowly shaking his head. He warily eyed his younger brother, who was hunched over in his red lawn chair, shoulders shaking like a fault line. "What's the matter with you?"
Edgar burst out laughing, tears of mirth pooling in the corners of his dark-brown eyes. "Those…Those are actual colors, aren't they?" he wheezed, wrapping his arm around his laugh-sore ribs.
"My wife-" "My sisters-"[xviii] Nick and Jake simultaneously began, making Edgar laugh even harder.
The deck boss unthinkingly reached up to wipe the laughter-induced tears off his face, forgetting the uncapped Sharpie in his hand and inadvertently drawing a wide stripe across his cheek. 'Awe, damn it,' Edgar thought, before deciding to embrace his mistake. He shrugged and purposefully drew a matching stripe across his other cheek. "War paint!" Edgar declared, brandishing the marker.
"We should all wear it," Jake remarked, no longer upset about the ink on his own face.
"Norm's next," Edgar decided, walking over to his reclusive sibling. "C'mon," he cajoled, "A little ink never hurt anybody."
"What about ink poisoning?" Norman snarked.
"That's only if you ingest it," Edgar argued. "Now come on," he continued, knowing it would boost morale if everyone joined in.
"You're gonna keep bugging me about this 'til I give in, aren't you?"
"Yep," Edgar agreed.
"Fine," Norman capitulated, "But I don't want that marker anywhere near my face."
"Where then?" Edgar asked as Jake began persuading his uncle to join the fun.
"Put it here," Norman replied, pulling off his glove and indicating the back of his hand. "I don't care what you draw as long as it's not crass."
"Sweet," Edgar grinned. He glanced at the Hansen brothers' crest painted on the wall by the orange life ring and easily replicated the emblem on Norman's skin. "There!" Edgar proclaimed, stepping back to admire his work.
"Cool," Jake said as Norman tugged his blue rubber glove back on. "C'mon, Uncle Nick, let Edgar draw somethin' on you."
"Yeah, Mavar," Edgar commented. "Where's your team spirit?"
"Oh, all right," Nick assented, prompting a cheer from Jake and a maniacal laugh from Edgar.
The noise roused Matt from his impromptu nap. The deckhand blinked, watching confusedly as Nick removed his rain jacket, pushed the sleeve of his sweatshirt up to the crook of his elbow, and offered his bared arm to Edgar. "Uh, guys? What're you doin'?" Matt asked as the deck boss painstakingly wrote 'F/V Northwestern' down the length of Mavar's inner forearm with a Sharpie marker.
"It started as a prank," Norman explained, "But it snowballed into some bizarre show of solidarity."
"You have to get inked too, Matt," Jake informed the older fisherman as Edgar finished the script on Nick's skin with a flourish.
"Yeah, I'm game," Matt agreed. He already had several tattoos, so he wasn't bothered by a little Sharpie ink.
"What should I draw?" Edgar asked as Matt pulled the collar of his hooded Helly Hansen[xix] sweatshirt aside and pointed to the side of his neck.
"I like Jake's anchor idea," Nick remarked.
"Works for me," Matt said with a shrug.
"All right," Edgar replied, "One anchor comin' right up." He set the tip of the marker against Matt's skin and quickly drew a large anchor. "Done!" the deck boss declared, capping the Sharpie.
"How's it look?" Matt asked as he showed the mark to the others.
Jake whistled with appreciation as he examined the makeshift tattoo. "That doesn't look half bad."
"I might have to bring you along the next time I decide to get a tattoo," Matt said.
"Sure," Edgar chuckled, "I'd go along for moral support or whatever."
"You ever think about getting one, Boss?" Jake asked curiously.
"What, a tattoo?" Edgar clarified. "Man, my wife would kill me," he laughed. "What about you, Junior? You gonna get inked?"
"It'd be kinda cool," Jake said thoughtfully.
"You had better clear that with your mom first," Nick advised his nephew, causing Jake to blush and the others to laugh.
"All right," Sig's voice came over the loudhailer, "First pot's comin' up here."
"Well, guess that means break time's over," Matt observed, levering himself to his feet.
The deckhands returned to work, eager to see if Sig's new fishing spot would pay off. Nick picked up the grappling hook and threw it, aiming for the bright buoy bag that bobbed on the surface of the dark water. He efficiently fed the line into the block before passing the rope to Jake so his nephew could string the rope into the Marco King coiler. Nick stepped back over to the rail and took the picking hook in hand, pausing briefly when he saw that Sig was standing near the blue-painted railing on the upper deck.
"Here she comes!" Edgar announced, leaning over the starboard rail to get a glimpse of the pot as it broke the surface. "Yeah~!" he cheered.
"Oh it looks good!" Nick exclaimed as he attached the picking hook.
"Nice," Norman said appreciatively.
"We'll take that all day long!" Matt declared as the picking crane hoisted the pot up over the rail.
"There's gotta be sixteen keepers in there!" Jake remarked, grinning widely.
"Not bad for a ten hour soak,"[xx] Sig chuckled as the crab spilled out onto the sorting table. "Get that set back,"[xxi] he ordered, "And we'll run further up the string and check a couple more."
"Roger!" the deckhands responded.
Two hours later, the deckhands had spot-checked several more pots and had found a higher-than-average number of keepers in each one. Confident that he was now dialed in on the crab, Sig altered the Northwestern's course towards his first string. He stood up to go tell his crew that they could come inside and take a break, but swayed when a wave of fatigue washed over him. "Shit," Sig swore, grabbing hold of his chair to steady himself.
Recovering from the dizzy spell, the eldest Hansen released his white-knuckled grip on the leather backrest and crossed the short distance to the wheelhouse door. Sig made it halfway down the small flight of steel steps before another rush of lightheadedness struck, causing him to stumble down the last two stairs. He unsteadily approached the blue-painted railing, blinking his blurred vision back into focus.
"What's up, Sig?" Matt called when he noticed the Captain's presence.
The vertigo subsided and Sig realized that all five deckhands were expectantly looking up at him. "Once you guys get this pot re-set, you can head in and take a break," he said, fervently hoping that no one had seen how close he'd come to passing out.
"Sleep!" "Food!" Matt and Jake cheered, high-fiving each other.
"A break would be nice," Norman remarked, smothering a yawn in the sleeve of his orange rain jacket as Edgar and Nick nodded their agreement.
'We've worked back-to-back twenty hour shifts and got five hours of rest in between,' Nick thought, 'But Sig watched the boat on the trip to the new fishing grounds.' His eyes widened as he came to a startling realization. 'Sig's been awake for at least forty-eight hours!' Nick squinted against the glare from deck floods: Sig's skin looked like pale wax under the bright sodium vapor lights and the dark shadows that encircled his eyes made him look downright cadaverous. Nick glanced at the others, but no one else had noticed Sig's exhaustion. 'I almost didn't realize it either,' he thought, feeling ashamed. Nick cleared his throat as Sig turned away from the rail and headed back towards the wheelhouse. "What d'you wanna do about watches?"
'I guess I should've asked about that,' Edgar mused. Much to his chagrin, he'd been so excited to take a break that he'd neglected to ask if his brother needed someone to substitute for him at the helm.
"I'll take the first watch while you guys get some sleep," Sig answered, wearily combing his fingers through his feathered hair.[xxii]
"You sure?" Nick asked uncertainly.
"Yeah, I'll be fine 'til someone comes to relieve me," the Captain replied. "Just do me a favor and bring me a cup of coffee before you hit the rack."
"Okay, I can do that," Edgar agreed, watching as the shorter[xxiii] man returned to the wheelhouse.
Sig peered down at the face of his Gold Nugget[xxiv] watch. 'I've been awake for over fifty hours,'[xxv] he realized dazedly. The fair-haired fisherman made a slight course adjustment and leaned back in his seat. "Fuck I'm tired,"[xxvi] Sig muttered as he rubbed his burning eyes. He picked up his Northwestern coffee mug and downed the last of the stone-cold liquid; caffeine, nicotine, and chocolate[xxvii] wouldn't help him stay awake much longer.
Still grasping the empty cup, he shifted his attention to the front windows and gazed out at the rolling sea, blinking blearily as he watched the waves break over thebow.[xxviii] The hypnotizing sea spray splashing against the windowpanes soon had the exhausted man entranced. Despite his efforts to stay awake, Sig slumped in his chair and his eyes slipped shut; the coffee mug tumbled from his slack fingers and rolled across the carpeted floor.
Sig frowned as a cocoon of thick fog swallowed the Northwestern whole. 'I don't like the looks of this,' he thought. An ominous, looming shadow suddenly appeared within the shapeless ash-colored mist; fearing a collision with another vessel, Sig tried to evade the fast-approaching shadow. He swore in a creative mix of English and Norwegian, realizing that the shadow-enshrouded beast was actually a massive wave.
A heartbeat later, the wave smashed into the wheelhouse, simultaneously shattering all the windows and flooding the bridge deck with frigid seawater. Sig ducked and tried to protect himself from the flying glass, but the sharp shards easily tore through the fabric of his shirt and sliced into his skin. With each new cut, split-second images flashed before Sig's eyes: A falling crab pot, a bright orange buoy bag, a coffin, blood staining his hands, and a bruised and bloody face that flashed by too fast for Sig to identify….
Overwhelmed by the onslaught, Sig lost his balance and fell, slamming his right shoulder against the edge of the console. He squeezed his eyes shut, trying to stop the disconcerting montage, but the disjointed visions escalated, coming faster and faster until they were nothing more than a whirling kaleidoscope of colors….
Sig's sea-blue eyes snapped open as he awoke with a sharply indrawn breath. "Fuck," the fair-haired sailor swore, startled to discover that he was lying on the floor in narrow space between the Captain's chair and the console. 'Must've fallen when I nodded off,' he thought. Sig re-seated himself, rubbing his throbbing shoulder before reaching up to turn on the overhead light.
"Frickin' nightmares," Sig muttered, shading his eyes against the glare of the incandescent bulb. He reached for the nearly empty pack of Camels next to the jog stick, but paused when he heard Edgar's familiar footfalls on the stairs. 'Must be time for Edgar's watch.' Sig slid the cigarettes into the pocket of his light-blue, button-down shirt. 'If Edgar would've come a couple minutes earlier, he'd've found me on the floor,' Sig thought, grateful to have avoided that embarrassing scenario.
"How's it goin'?" Edgar asked. He was a few minutes late for his watch; scrubbing the Sharpie ink off his face had taken longer than he'd thought it would. The deck boss did a double take when Sig met his gaze with bloodshot blue eyes. 'He looks like crap!' Aside from the dark shadows under his eyes, Sig's face was shockingly pale. 'Stress, sickness, or a combination of both…?' Edgar wondered.
"It's been pretty quiet," Sig answered, unaware of Edgar's alarmed observations. "Not a lot of radio chatter and no mechanical problems or anything," he continued as he absently rubbed his aching right shoulder. "Hell, even the weather has stayed relatively calm."
Edgar stepped forward to relieve his older brother at the helm, but paused when he encountered something on the floor with his sock-covered toe. Focused on retrieving the fallen object, Edgar missed how Sig swayed upon standing, exhaustion threatening to send him sprawling back into his chair. The brunette's forehead wrinkled in confusion as he plucked Sig's favorite coffee cup off the carpet. "You lose somethin'?" he queried, holding the mug aloft as he straightened back up to his full height.
"Oh, yeah," Sig replied as he circled clockwise around the Captain's chair, giving Edgar room to take his place at the wheel. "I wondered-" he yawned, "-where that went." He reached out to take the mug from his brother's hand and frowned when he had to try twice before he was able to grasp the cup successfully. Sig rubbed his gritty eyes and shuffled towards the stairs. "Who's takin' watch after you?"
"Norm volunteered," Edgar answered as he settled into the plush leather chair.
"Okay," Sig responded. He paused at the top of the narrow stairway as his vision tunneled alarmingly. 'Shit,' Sig swore silently, blinking repeatedly to clear the encroaching black shadows from the edges of his vision. The vertigo made it seem like he was standing at the top of Mount Everest and he didn't want to lose his balance and tumble over the precipice.
'Looks like he's fallin' asleep on his feet,' Edgar mused, worriedly eyeing Sig, who stood at the top of the stairs. The deck boss cleared his throat. "Thought you were goin' to bed?"
The dizzy spell passed and Sig breathed an inaudible sigh of relief. "I am," Sig answered, glancing quickly at the relief skipper before returning his attention to the obstacle in front of him. He distrustfully eyed the staircase before shaking his head. Sig took a deep breath, hoping that his equilibrium would stay steady so he wouldn't topple head over heels. "'Night," he muttered as he took the first step of the daunting journey down to his stateroom.
"Goodnight," Edgar called, watching his sleep-deprived sibling disappear down the stairs before reaching up and switching off the overhead light.
Sig glanced at live feed from the deck camera and smiled when he saw his crew hard at work. "Next pot's comin' up," he called over the loudhailer as he skillfully steered the Northwestern towards the set of bobbing buoys bags.
"I see it," Nick answered, approaching the rail with the grappling hook. He caught the line of the trailer buoy on the first toss and efficiently fed the shot into the block. Nick tossed the buoys aside, so they'd land near Jake's feet, as Matt fed the line into the automatic coiler. The block hoisted the crab pot up from the depths of the Bering Sea until it hung just below the starboard rail. Nick reached down and attached the picking hook to the bridle so Norman could bring it aboard with the winch.
"Number seventy-seven," Jake remarked as he corralled the buoys.
"Double the luck," Edgar laughed as the picking crane lifted the pot. The deck boss whistled appreciatively when he saw how much King crab filled the pot. He helped Nick spin the cage so it would be right side up when set down on the launcher. "Bring her up, Norman."
Sig's stomach clenched and cold sweat beaded on his skin as a sickening flash of foreboding struck him. He watched helplessly as the hydraulic winch lifted the pot higher into the air. The crab cage swung like a pendulum above the launcher and the sorting table, and time slowed to a crawl as the bridle snapped; the eight hundred pound pot slammed into Edgar as the deck boss tried to dodge out of the way, picking him up off his feet and throwing him roughly aside. The pot cartwheeled across the deck and slammed into the port side shelter deck[xxxi] before crashing down and laying flat.
The wheelhouse door banged against the side of the boat, shattering the windowpane as Sig abandoned the bridge. "Edgar!" he yelled, bypassing the six rungs on the vertical ladder and descending to the lower deck by griping the handrails like a firemen's pole and sliding down; in a rush to reach his brother, Sig ignored the friction burns on his unprotected palms and the jarring pain from his right ankle as he landed wrong. "Edgar!" Sig shouted, circumnavigating the sorting table and dropping to his knees beside his brother. "Answer me!" he demanded, throat tight as he voiced the half-plea, half-prayer. Willfully steadying his shaking hands, Sig gently touched Edgar's neck in search of a pulse. Vennligst,[xxxii]" he whispered, slipping into his first language as his fingertips found nothing but displaced vertebrae and thick trails of blood from a heart no longer beating.
"Vennligst…." The anguished whisper passed Sig's lips as he jolted awake in his bunk aboard the Northwestern. He fumbled for the light above his bed, eager to banish the lingering nightmare by illuminating the room; seconds later, the light clicked on to reveal the familiar wood paneling and the gray-painted walls of his stateroom. "God," Sig gasped breathlessly, gripping the fabric of his navy-blue sleep shirt with white-knuckled fingers as his racing heart gradually slowed to resume its normal rhythm.
Sig pushed the tangled bedding aside and swung his legs over the edge of his bed, closing his eyes against a rush of lightheadedness. He sat still for a moment, bare feet flat against the floor and proud shoulders bowed with the weight of Captaincy; as the Captain, it was his responsibility to keep his crew, his seafaring family, safe.[xxxiii] Scenes from his dream began to replay against the darkened screen of his closed eyelids and Sig snapped his eyes open to escape them. He shook his head in an attempt to further dispel the images and stood up. Sig strode across his stateroom into his private bathroom, stripping off his sweat-drenched shirt as he walked.
The fourth generation fisherman turned on the shower and finished disrobing as he waited for the water to warm. Sig scowled as he caught sight of his wraith-like reflection in the mirrored medicine cabinet over the sink. He reached up to touch the dark smudges that accentuated his bloodshot blue eyes. Shaking his head, Sig turned away from the mirror and stepped into the shower stall. The spray flattened his feathered hair and Sig efficiently worked the quarter-sized dollop of shampoo into a thick, bubbly lather atop his head. 'A shower, shave, a smoke, and some coffee and I'll be ready to get back to work,' Sig thought, tipping his head back to rinse out the soap.
The scent of fresh-brewed coffee and the sound of near-silent footsteps alerted Edgar to the fact that someone else aboard the Northwestern was awake. 'That's odd,' he mused, twisting in the Captain's chair so he could see the vintage mariner's clock by the wheelhouse door. 'My watch isn't over for another hour yet.' Edgar craned his neck, curious to see who was coming to the wheelhouse. 'Maybe Norman's gonna take over early,' he mused hopefully.
"Anybody awake up here?" Sig called quietly.
"What're you doin' up?" Edgar asked incredulously as his blonde-haired brother appeared. 'Sig is the last person I expected to be awake,' he thought. 'Especially since he was on the verge of fallin' asleep when I relieved him an hour ago.'
"Thought you might like some coffee," Sig said, sidestepping Edgar's question.
"Thanks," Edgar replied, gratefully accepting the proffered beverage. "You, uh, want me to move?" he queried as Sig came to stand behind his chair.
"Nah," Sig answered as he casually rested his right hand on the headrest. He took a sip from his white mug and idly tapped his fingers against the black leather, causing the diamonds in his gold, rectangle-faced ring to glimmer prettily in the faint light of the computer screens. "I sit in that chair for thirty,[xxxiv] thirty-four,[xxxv] forty,[xxxvi] forty-eight hours[xxxvii] at a stretch," the Captain continued, "It feels good to stand awhile."
"Suit yourself," Edgar remarked with a shrug. In a habitual move to release the tension in his neck, he tilted his head from side to side to realign the vertebrae.
The grotesque clicks echoed loudly in the otherwise silent wheelhouse, brutally reminding Sig of pressing his fingertips to the side of his brother's broken neck and confirming his worst fear, that Edgar was….The black coffee suddenly tasted rancid in Sig's mouth, but he forced himself to swallow it. Sig inhaled deeply through his nose and shakily expelled the breath out through his mouth; he swallowed thickly, battling back the nausea brought on by the nightmare he'd endured.
The protesting creak of leather and the sound of an unsteady exhalation drew Edgar's attention away from the radar. He shifted to regard his brother: Sig gripped the headrest hard enough to scar the smooth leather with his fingernails and all the color had drained from his face. Afraid that his brother was about to pass out, Edgar set his coffee cup aside and got to his feet; he grasped Sig's upper arms and guided the shorter Norwegian into the vacant chair. "Jesus Christ, Sig!" Edgar exclaimed. "Sit down before you fall down!" He reached up and switched on the overhead light, squinting against the sudden brightness.
Sig startled, jarred back to reality as Edgar manhandled him into the Captain's chair. "I'm fine," he protested. Sig discarded his mostly-full coffee cup on the window ledge and habitually reached for the cigarettes that resided in the front pocket of his long-sleeved, navy-blue polo shirt.
"Bullshit," Edgar argued. He raised a single eyebrow and gazed pointedly at Sig's shaking hands as Sig selected a cigarette and tucked it between his lips. "What's wrong?" he asked, forehead creasing with concern as his brother struggled with the cigarette lighter.
After four failed attempts, Sig successfully lit the cigarette and took a deep drag. He held the smoke in his lungs as he composed himself, banishing the nightmare to the back of his mind and forcing the trembling in his hands to subside. The fair-haired fisherman exhaled a stream of blue-white smoke before meeting Edgar's eyes. "It's nothing."
Edgar frowned, clearly unconvinced. Sig's reticence wasn't a surprise; like their father, Sverre Hansen, Sig rarely shared his private thoughts, but Edgar still felt slighted by Sig's refusal to confide in him. He huffed out a frustrated sigh. Edgar knew from past experience that no amount of pestering would make his stubborn older brother talk if he didn't want to; if he continued to pressure Sig for an explanation, the other man would undoubtedly get angry and Edgar didn't want to instigate a screaming match. "I'm grateful for the company," he began, "But you look like you could use a little more rack time."
Sig opened his mouth to disagree, but his body betrayed him by yawning. 'Damn it,' he cursed silently. Less than an hour of nightmare-riddled sleep wasn't nearly enough to make up for the fifty-odd hours he'd worked. "Yeah, you're right," Sig said, surprising Edgar with his admission. He levered his weary body up out of his chair and gestured for Edgar to take his place at the helm.
Sig stepped over to the wheelhouse door, resting his hand on the latch as he took a final puff of his cigarette; he briefly opened the door and tossed the butt outside. Sig pulled the door closed and walked wearily to the staircase, but hesitated at the top, reluctant to go back to bed and endure another nightmare. "You know," he said, running his hand through his hair, "I think I'll ride shotgun 'til the caffeine and nicotine wear off."
"Suit yourself," Edgar replied dubiously as Sig walked to the far side of the wheelhouse, plopped down into the Co-Captain's chair, and propped his feet up near the port side driving station. Once settled, he gazed out the window, watching the waves break over the Northwestern's bow. A few minutes later, Sig's eyes slipped shut and his head lolled to the side as the rhythmic rocking of the boat lulled the exhausted Captain to sleep.
Norman sleepily rubbed his eyes as he climbed the steps to the wheelhouse. "Hey," he called, greeting his younger brother around a yawn.
"Shh," the deck boss hissed.
Bewildered by Edgar's request for silence, Norman obligingly lowered his voice as he queried, "Why? What's up?"
"Don't wanna wake Sig," Edgar replied quietly, pointing towards the opposite side of the wheelhouse.
Norman peered into the darkness, squinting to catch a glimpse of his older brother: The fair-haired Hansen half-sat, half-sprawled in the Co-Captain's chair. The hydraulics expert winced when he saw Sig's slumped-over posture. "Why is he sleeping there?"
"Beats the hell outta me," Edgar admitted. "He wandered up here about an hour after I came on watch to bring me coffee."
"No mechanical problems or anything?" Norman asked, even though he would've been notified of any such issues.
"Nope," Edgar replied. The relief skipper shook his head, clearly at a loss to explain his brother's behavior. He stood, yawning widely as he relinquished the helm controls to the other fisherman. "Just do me a favor, huh?"
"Sure," Norman agreed as he settled into the Captain's chair. "What is it?"
"Keep an eye on him, okay?" Edgar nodded over at their dozing older brother. "I don't know if it's the stress of meeting our quota[xxxviii] before the prices drop or if they moved up our delivery date[xxxix] or what, but somethin's up with him. I honestly thought he was gonna keel over on me before."
"What!?" Norman exclaimed, the volume of his voice briefly rousing Sig. The younger fishermen stilled, practically holding their breath, until Sig settled with an incoherent grunt. "He almost passed out?" Norman asked, belatedly lowering his voice.
"His face went real pale, like flour white, and-" Edgar paused. He ran his hand over the soft leather of the Captain's chair, his callused fingertips catching on the crescent-shaped gouges that marred the material.
"And?" Norman prompted, anxious to hear the rest of the story.
"And," Edgar continued, "He grabbed the chair and clawed into the headrest with his fingernails."
Norman frowned. Sig would never intentionally damage the Captain's chair, a poignant symbol of his captaincy as well as the family legacy. He winced, hoping he was nowhere nearby when Sig inevitably discovered the damage.
"I asked what was wrong, but he insisted he was 'fine.'" Edgar concluded, his tone betraying the bitterness he felt at being brushed off.
"He'd tell us if it was something serious," Norman counseled.
"Yeah, I guess," Edgar replied, unconvinced.
"Go on," Norman said. "I've got the watch and I'll keep an eye on Sig too."
"Right," the deck boss nodded. "I'm gonna hit the rack."
"'Night, Edgar."
"Goodnight Norman."
Sig took a sip from his Northwestern mug as he climbed the narrow staircase to the wheelhouse. The blonde blinked with startled bewilderment when he reached the last step; in the few minutes he'd been in the galley, someone, presumably Edgar, had decided to play a prank on him. His mischievous brother had somehow gotten his hands on, of all things, a bubble-making machine and had set the seldom-used stereo to play Don Ho's "Tiny Bubbles"[xl] on repeat. 'I've gotta give him credit for this one,' Sig thought, absently humming the song's melody as the machine merrily expelled another batch of iridescent spheres.
A bubble drifted lazily into his line of sight, giving the Norwegian a brief glimpse of its chameleon-like surface, swirling with various hues of blues, purples, yellows, and greens, before it popped and vanished. Sig shook his head as the machine spat out another stream of bubbles. "Christ, they're everywhere," he groused, waving his arm to shoo the floating spheres away from the computer equipment that was arranged on the console around the Captain's chair. Depositing his coffee cup on the wooden windowsill, Sig bent down and unplugged the little machine just as it unleashed another barrage of bubbles.
Sig paused, the tip of his index finger millimeters away from puncturing the closest delicate sphere, and tilted his head slightly to the side as he scrutinized the bubble. "The hell…?" the eldest Hansen muttered. As he watched, the bubble swelled in size and lost its rainbow-like sheen, taking on the same neon-orange color of a buoy bag. A quick glance at the other bubbles confirmed that they were undergoing the same mysterious transformation. Sig returned his attention to the one that hovered nearest to him and stumbled back a step in surprise when he saw that it was now the same size as a balloon used by car dealerships to attract customers.
Sig's eyes narrowed as the buoy-bubble rotated in mid-air, displaying the number seventy-seven embossed in black on its side. In his peripheral vision, he could see the others, all labeled with the same ominous number, slowly closing in on him until he was completely surrounded. Sig had never suffered from claustrophobia[xli]…such a fear would've made it impossible for him to survive the weeks at sea…but the bright orange spheres were pressing closer and closer and he desperately wanted them out of his space
Sig reached up to push the bubble-turned-buoy away, but the second his palms made contact with its smooth surface, it broke with a resounding *bang* and warm liquid sprayed out, coating the Captain's outstretched hands. He looked down, stunned to see crimson blood pooling in the center of his palms and dripping through the spaces between his fingers. The demise of one had evidently started a chain reaction; the other spheres swelled up threateningly, like a tire inflated with too much air, and Sig shielded his face with his arms mere seconds before they exploded with a deafening *boom,* rattling the wheelhouse windows and splattering the sea-eyed sailor with an entire body's worth of blood.
'Looks like we're getting close to the beginning of the first string,' Norman thought, comparing the Northwestern's current position with the coordinates Sig had recorded in the logbook. He leaned back in the Captain's chair, peering around the array of computer monitors to see Sig sleeping restlessly at the port side driving station. Deciding to let his brother rest as long as possible, Norman spun counter-clockwise in the chair and grabbed the white phone[xlii] on the wall behind him.
"Yeah?" Matt answered, voice groggy with sleep.
"Hey," Norman murmured quietly, not wanting to disturb Sig. "We're almost on the gear, so can you wake everybody and get some breakfast started?"
"Okay," Matt yawned.
Norman returned the phone to its cradle and checked the time, his lips moving soundlessly as he mentally calculated how long it'd take to arrive at the first pot. His eyes were involuntarily drawn back to the slumbering form of his brother when Sig unexpectedly hummed a few measures of a familiar melody in his sleep. A small smile tugged at the corners of Norman's mouth. 'I've heard of sleepwalking,' he thought wryly, 'But I've never heard of sleep-singing before.' Norman shook his head. 'Edgar will tease him mercilessly if he ever finds out about this.'
Half an hour later, the delicious smells of cooking breakfast foods wafted up from the galley below, a clear sign that the others were up and about. Norman's stomach rumbled hungrily and he checked the time again, deciding to wake Sig. Norman got to his feet, stretching his arms up over his head to release the kinks in his back and shoulders.
The hydraulics expert flipped one of the overhead switches, bathing the starboard side of the wheelhouse with warm, yellow-white light from the incandescent bulb overhead. "Sig?" he called as he approached the sleeping skipper. "Sig," Norman continued, "It's time to get up." He reached out and touched Sig's right shoulder to rouse him, unaware of the bruises that marred his brother's skin. Norm barely dodged out of the way when Sig, still asleep, jerked his arms up like he was trying to protect his face; the eldest Hansen startled awake with a gasping yell that raised the fine hairs on the back of Norman's neck.
"Jesus fuck!" Sig swore breathlessly, unaware of his audience. He swallowed hard, battling back the urge to be sick…with every inhalation, the cloying, coppery scent of spilled blood seemed to intensify. Sig hesitantly lowered his arms from their defensive position and warily appraised his hands; he blinked, half-expecting them to be stained with blood, but relieved to see clean, pale skin instead.
"Sig?"
The Captain jumped, startled. Sig looked up to see Norman standing just out of reach, mouth pulled down into a worried frown. "I'm awake," he said, simultaneously responding to his brother's call and assuring himself that he'd escaped another nightmare.
"You okay?"
"I'm fine," Sig answered, absently rubbing at the dull ache in his bruised right shoulder before combing his fingers through his disheveled blonde hair in an attempt to smooth it into place. The fourth generation fisherman stood, briefly closing his eyes against the rush of lightheadedness that seemed to plague him after every nightmare; he gradually straightened to his full height, fighting back a pained wince as his back muscles spasmed in protestation of his sleeping arrangements. "We back to the top of the string?" he asked, shifting his focus towards fishing.
"Yeah almost," Norman replied, allowing Sig to change the subject. "I already rang down and got the others up," he explained as Sig made his way across the wheelhouse. Norman's stomach growled, demanding to be fed. "C'mon," he continued, "We're missing breakfast."
Sig paled at the mention of food, still nauseated by the phantom-smell of blood. The coppery scent hung so thick in the air that Sig could taste it on his tongue and he desperately needed something to overpower it. He spied his coffee cup, which he'd abandoned on the window ledge hours earlier, and picked it up.
Norman frowned as Sig settled himself in the Captain's chair and reached for the white mug. "Hasn't that congealed by now?"
Sig took a tentative sip, his face scrunching up as he swallowed the stone-cold beverage. The hours-old coffee wouldn't win any awards for taste, but the bitter flavor was enough to nullify the persistent smell and taste of blood. "Ugh," Sig grimaced. 'I can't catch a break,' he thought, setting the coffee cup down with a muted thump. The cold coffee had cleared the bloody tang from his olfactory senses, but the frigid liquid roiled in the pit of his unsettled stomach like a wriggling eel.
"Come on," Norman said as he waited patiently by the stairs, "We've got time to eat."
"Yeah, okay," Sig said, still nauseated by the notion of eating, but enticed by the siren call of caffeine. He engaged the autopilot and stood up, pausing momentarily to fling the stale coffee out the starboard window. Sig joined his younger brother at the peak of the stairway and gestured for the shorter[xliii] Norwegian to precede him down to the galley. Sig stopped on the small landing outside his stateroom, not following Norman down the second set of steps.
Sig leaned against the wall and breathed shallowly through his mouth; the scent of eggs, pancakes,[xliv] bacon, and sausage made his stomach churn and he swallowed convulsively against the urge to be sick. Another whiff of the greasy food wafted up the steps and Sig gagged, pivoting on his heel and racing into his stateroom. He sprinted to his private bathroom and dropped to his knees in front of the toilet, barely making it before he lost his battle against the nausea. With the exception of a mouthful of stale coffee, there wasn't anything in Sig's stomach to throw up. 'This…frickin'…sucks,' he thought, holding onto the rim of toilet bowl with white-knuckled fingers as he heaved. After what seemed like an eternity, the vomiting mercifully subsided.
"Shit," Sig swore, wearily forcing himself to his feet and flushing away the evidence of his illness. He grimaced at the acidic aftertaste of bile and stepped over to the sink. Sig opened the mirror-faced medicine cabinet and snatched his toothbrush off the small shelf; once finished, he spit a mouthful of saliva and toothpaste into the basin and wiped his mouth with the tan hand towel. Sig closed the cabinet door and flinched when he saw his reflection. He wiped the sweat off forehead and sighed when he heard Norman calling his name. "Suck it up," he said sternly before leaving the room to go see what his brother wanted.
Nick, Matt, Jake, and Edgar looked up from their meals when Norman entered the galley. "Hey," Edgar said, purposefully catching his older brother's eye, "How was the watch?"
"Uneventful for the most part," Norman replied, noticing the emphasis Edgar had put on the word, but unwilling to discuss Sig's health in front of the others.
"Mr. Northwestern[xlv] watchin' the wheel or is he sleepin' in?" Matt asked.
Norman's brow creased with confusion and glanced over his shoulder to discover that Sig had disappeared. "He was right behind me," Norm muttered, moving back towards the staircase. "Sig?" he called, peering around the banister. "Sig?" he repeated, climbing halfway up the steps.
"What?" Sig asked gruffly, frowning as he emerged from his stateroom.
"Just wondered where you went," Norman said with a shrug. He studied the blonde as Sig came downstairs and strode into the small kitchen. 'I think Edgar was right,' Norman thought, raising an incredulous eyebrow when he saw Sig scowl at the sudsy water in the sink. 'Something is wrong. I can't put my finger on it, not with Sig's poker[xlvi] face in place, but…" He frowned, remembering how Sig had reacted when he'd woke him up. 'That definitely wasn't normal.'
Sig distrustfully eyed the bubble-encrusted dishwater in the sink. He frowned, remembering the bubbles-turned-buoys-turned-bombs from his dream. Shaking his head, Sig plunged his white mug into the lukewarm water and scrubbed away the golden-brown scum ring. He grabbed a not-as-dirty dishtowel and haphazardly dried his favorite coffee cup before tossing the towel aside. Sig crossed the room and poured himself a generous serving of fresh-brewed coffee from the carafe.
He took a tentative sip of the bitter brew as he moved to the opposite counter and loaded the four-slice toaster to capacity. Sig wrinkled his nose and nudged a platter of sausages towards the far side of the counter, causing the oblong links to roll through the grease puddle in the center of the plate. The toast popped and he retrieved the browned bread, swearing softly as the too-warm toast singed his fingers. Sig hesitated, knife poised above the butter dish, and decided to eat the toast plain; the idea of eating, even something as bland as dry toast, made his stomach clench warningly. 'But,' Sig thought, 'At least I'll have somethin' other than bile to bring up if I get sick again.'
"That all you're having?" Nick questioned as Sig carried his breakfast from the cooking area to the dining area.
"Uh huh," Sig grunted, mutely cursing Mavar for drawing unwelcome attention to how little he was eating. He sighed silently, wishing he could've retreated, unnoticed, to the solitude of his wheelhouse so he could eat, or not eat, in peace.
"You want eggs?" Edgar asked, gesturing to the heaping pile of scrambled eggs on the plate in the middle of the five-sided table. "I made plenty," he added, raising his voice slightly to be heard over the commotion Matt and Jake were making as the two deckhands squabbled over the last pancake.
Sig glanced at the eggs and swallowed queasily when he saw them wiggle every time someone bumped the table. "No thanks," Sig said, shaking his head and missing the concerned glance Norman and Edgar exchanged. Stress, exhaustion, and nausea had already given him the mother of all headaches and, the longer he listened to Anderson and Bradley's bickering, the worse it got. "For God's sake!" Sig growled, setting his dishes down on the narrow ledge formed by the half wall. Eyes flashing with blue fire, Sig snatched the lone pancake, charred black on both sides, off the plate between Matt and Jake, bringing their argument to an abrupt halt. "Grow up," the irritated Captain snapped, scowling at the two men as they sulked. Sig turned and angrily tossed the coveted pancake onto his own plate before collecting his breakfast and storming up to the wheelhouse.
"Yeesh," Matt grumbled, "Who pissed in his Wheaties this morning?"
"We all have our bad days," Nick reasoned as he stood up and began to gather the dirty dishes together. He'd no more than finished speaking before the grating, buzzing noise of the pot launch alarm sounded as the Captain repeatedly depressed the button in the wheelhouse.[xlvii]
"Today is obviously one of Sig's bad days," Matt muttered as he shoveled his remaining portion of scrambled eggs into his mouth.
"Don't take it so much to heart," Edgar advised Jake, seeing the younger deckhand's demoralized expression. "Sig was just blowin' off a little steam, that's all. Now c'mon," he continued, encouragingly slapping Jake on the back as he passed by, "We're on the gear."
The headache-inducing buzz sounded again as the deckhands scraped the leftover food into the trash and dumped their dishes into the sink full of soapy water to soak. "We're comin', we're comin'," Matt groused as he moved to don his oilskin.[xlviii]
'It's gonna be a long day,' Nick thought, stepping out on deck as Sig pressed and held the buzzer down. He waved at the camera, signaling that the others would be ready momentarily, and the alarm blessedly ceased.
"First pot's on our bow," Sig stated over the loudhailer, glaring down at the monitor as the others joined Mavar on deck.
"Roger!" the deckhands replied as they prepared to pull the pot aboard.
'Hopefully we'll see good numbers and that'll put Sig in a better mood,' Edgar thought as Matt tossed the grappling hook and snagged the buoy line.
The block sang as it hauled the crab pot up from the depths of the Bering Sea. "C'mon, big money!" Jake called as Matt leaned over the rail and attached the picking hook to the bridle.
The fishermen cheered when the steel cage cleared the rail and they saw that it contained nearly sixty keepers. "Hell yeah!" Matt yelled excitedly as the crab pot landed on the launcher.
"That's what I like to see!" Sig announced over the hailer, his sour mood shifting to satisfaction when he saw the cage full of King crab. He smiled in spite of his migraine-strength headache and unsettled stomach. 'If the rest of the strings look like this, we'll be able to plug[xlix] the boat and head in to offload.' Sig superstitiously rapped his knuckles against the wooden windowsill to ward off bad luck.
The deckhands had scarcely cleared the sorting table by the time the Northwestern arrived at the next pot. Matt ducked inside to get a cigarette, so Jake stepped up to the rail and threw the grappling hook. The block quickly pulled the pot to the surface and Jake leaned over the rail to attach the picking hook. "Riders!"[l] he exclaimed excitedly.
Sig left the wheelhouse and stood in his customary spot on the upper deck just as the avalanche of King crab spilled out onto the sorting table. "Nice!" he declared, pleased to see the table full of good, clean[li] crab.
"Man, where's the table?"[lii] Matt asked, laughing jovially as he returned and began to sort through the wriggling pile of crab.
"Looks like we landed right on top of 'em," Nick said, grinning widely.
"Yeah, we're dialed in now," Sig agreed. "Set 'em back," he ordered as he returned to the wheelhouse.
"Roger!" the deckhands chorused enthusiastically.
Sig scrawled the crab count into his notebook and returned the pencil to its makeshift holder attached to the window frame. 'The crab gods seem to be smilin' down on us,' he thought, reaching for his nearly-empty coffee mug. They were averaging about sixty crab per pot and were well on their way to filling all three holding tanks to capacity. Sig steered the Northwestern towards the next set of buoy bags and shivered as a chill zipped down his spine, bringing with it a flashback from one of his nightmares: The crab cage swung over the rail...the fraying bridle snapped…the steel pot crashed into Edgar, simultaneously snapping the deck boss's neck and throwing the youngest Hansen aside…
Sig shook off the onslaught and expelled an unsteady breath. Shaken, Sig curled his fingers into his hair, focusing on the sting of his fingernails against his scalp as he struggled to compose himself. "Fuck," he swore as a split-second clip of the breaking bridle replayed itself for a second time. "I'm way too young for a fuckin' breakdown,"[liii] Sig muttered, the unease getting progressively worse with each passing second. "Damn it," Sig growled, reaching for the loudhailer.
Matt stood ready at the rail. "Come to papa," the bearded deckhand murmured, bringing his arm back to throw the hook. He hesitated when Sig's voice came over the loudhailer.
"Heads up, guys," the Captain cautioned. "Watch the bridle on this one, okay?"
Matt, Jake, Norman, Nick, and Edgar exchanged bewildered glances, wondering how Sig could have spotted a bad bridle when the pot was still fathoms[liv] below the sea's surface. "Roger," Edgar called, nodding for Matt to proceed.
"Here we go," Matt remarked as he let the grappling hook fly. He efficiently fed the line into the block, motioning for Norman to slow the machine's speed as he tossed the buoy bags aside so they wouldn't get stuck.
"How's it look?" Jake asked curiously as the pot broke the water's surface.
Matt leaned over the rail to attach the picking hook to the pot's bridle. "Well fuck," he muttered, dark eyes widening when he saw the badly frayed bridle. "Careful with this one," Matt called, catching Norman's eyes. "It's hangin' by a thread. One good jolt and we'll never see it again."
"Right." The hydraulics expert carefully manipulated the controls and gently brought the pot aboard.
Edgar waited until the dogs[lv] clanged into place before he nudged Matt aside so he could inspect the bridle. The deck boss whistled as he examined the ragged rope. "Good call, Sig," he declared, looking up to see that Sig had left the wheelhouse and was standing on the upper deck, gazing protectively down at his crew.
"How'd you know?" Jake queried, feeling both awed and a little disconcerted by the Captain's instincts.
Sig shrugged and forced his fingers to relax their white-knuckled grip on the metal railing. "All right," he said, "We ain't gonna catch nothin' if the pot's not in the water. Replace the bridle, get the pot emptied and re-baited,[lvi] and then splash it back."
'It's like he's got some kind of sixth sense sometimes,' Edgar thought, watching Sig as he returned to the wheelhouse. The deck boss shook his head, amazed by the Captain's instincts, and set to work replacing the worn bridle.
Sig settled into his chair and released a relieved sigh. He reached for his cigarettes and jumped, startled when the radio crackled to life: "Northwestern, Sig, you got me? It's Johnathan on the Time Bandit."
"Yeah, John, I copy."
"Just wonderin' how things're goin' over there," the eldest Hillstrand said.
"Goin' okay here," Sig said, thinking of how they'd avoided a potentially life-threatening disaster only minutes earlier. "How's fishin'?"
"We're seein' some decent numbers in our pots," Johnathan answered, being purposefully vague about the amount of crab they were catching. 'After all,' he chuckled, 'I don't want Sig to get any ideas about comin' over to our fishin' spot.' John looked up when his younger brother Andy walked into the wheelhouse. "All right, I'll let you get back to it there," he said into the radio. "Take care, Sig."
"You too, John," Sig responded, smiling as he hung up the radio. 'Nice of him to call and see how I'm doin',' he thought, grateful to his friend and rival for the gesture of concern.
The comm. line crackled to life as Edgar reported the crab count, "Sixty-four, 6-4, in that one, Sig."
"Hell yeah!" Matt shouted in the background.
"Keep 'em comin'!" Nick added enthusiastically.
"Sixty-four? Ha ha ha!"[lvii] Sig laughed over the loudhailer as he logged the number in his notebook. He tallied the numbers, calculating how many more pounds they still needed to catch before they could head in for their scheduled offload. The sea-eyed sailor nodded, pleased with the figures, and glanced over at the plotter. "All right, we've got about fifteen minutes 'til we reach the next string," he continued. "Let's get the bait ready so we can put 'em on a town soak and head in."[lviii]
"Roger!" the five fishermen called cheerfully.
While the crew obediently headed over to the bait station to begin filling the town soak bait jars, Sig picked up his coffee mug and frowned when he realized it was empty except for the dregs at the bottom. He activated the autopilot and stood up to head down to the galley, but hesitated when the nausea from earlier suddenly returned. "Crap," Sig muttered, pressing his palm against his stomach as it lurched. "Maybe I'll hold off on that coffee," he decided, sinking back down into his chair.
Ten hours later, they had not only finished pulling and setting their gear back, but they had also stuffed the Northwestern's holding tanks to the point of bursting. Sig yawned widely as he checked the boat's course and speed as they sailed towards Akutan Island.[lix] The bouts of nausea and the unrelenting headache nearly negated any relief he might have felt after having caught enough crab in time for their scheduled offload. Sig wearily rubbed his sandpaper-dry eyes, trying to alleviate the burn from not having slept in nearly thirty hours.
Sig yawned and got to his feet, swaying slightly as he adjusted to the change in altitude. Doubting his ability to stay awake, he set the watch alarm[lx] and returned to his seat. The skipper reached for his coffee mug and grimaced as he swallowed the long-cold liquid. Sig stubbornly fought to stay awake, but it wasn't long before he lost the battle against Niorun,[lxi] succumbing to sleep and another nightmare.
Sig turned in his chair and looked out the wheelhouse door when the knuckle crane unexpectedly whirred to life; he frowned in confusion when he saw Edgar using the crane to stack the fishing gear on the stern. The fair-haired Hansen got to his feet and swung the wheelhouse door wide open. "Edgar," he called, "What the hell're you doin'? I told you to set those pots back, not stack 'em."
"Have to stack 'em," Edgar stated without turning around.
"What the hell for?" Sig demanded. "We're seein' solid numbers here!"
"Have to stack 'em," Edgar tonelessly insisted as he continued to stack the crab pots.
"Why!?"
Edgar's hands fell away from the controls, but the deck boss still didn't turn to face his brother. "Because we have to go to port."
"And why do we have to do that?" Sig snapped, irritated with Edgar's antics.
"Because…" Edgar began, finally turning his head to look at Sig. The gut-wrenching sound of snapping vertebrae echoed loudly in Sig's ears as Edgar's head kept turning. "…I don't wanna be buried at sea," Edgar explained, seemingly unbothered by his badly broken neck.
The blaring watch alarm wrenched Sig free from the nightmare. Heart pounding, Sig got dizzily to his feet and muted the alarm. He moved back towards his chair, but only made it as far as the archive cabinet before his legs buckled. Sig's head clipped the top edge of the cabinet and his back slammed against its front face as he collapsed, but he was deaf to the loud *bang* that echoed through the wheelhouse and numb to the pain of the drawer handles as they dug into his spine. Black spots danced in front of Sig's eyes; he blinked lethargically, dazed from both the nightmare and the blow to his head.
Sig raised his right hand and touched the back of his head, grimacing in pain when his fingertips found the sizeable knot. He pulled his hand away, releasing a relieved sigh when he saw no blood. Sig let his hand drop limply into his lap and gathered his strength for the challenge of climbing to his feet. He reached up, grasping the edge of the archive cabinet and using it to help him stand. Sig swore, tightening his grip when he swayed and nearly fell.
Sig stumbled to his chair and dutifully checked to make sure the Northwestern hadn't drifted off course. 'Must have some beautiful frickin' bruises on my back,' he realized, flinching as he leaned back in his chair. The eldest Hansen ran a shaking hand through his hair, grimacing when he inadvertently prodded the hidden goose egg. 'Stop cryin' about it,'[lxii] Sig thought as he laced his fingers together behind his head.
Sig sighed. He had hoped the nightmares, headaches, and nausea would end after he'd averted the near-disaster with the bad bridle, but it hadn't; if anything, it had gotten worse. The Captain silently vowed to keep his seafaring family and his ship safe. 'And I can start by not fallin' asleep at the wheel like a damn greenhorn,'[lxiii] he thought fiercely, straightening his posture and reaching for his cigarettes. 'Nicotine don't fail me now,' Sig thought as he slid the filtered end into his mouth and habitually curled the fingers around the lighter to protect the tiny, quivering flame.
References & Glossary of Terms:
[i] "I mean, every minute the clock ticks the more you're stressin' over it. It's time…time is what makes us money." (Sig Hansen, Deadliest Catch S.4-1) "Money's not the issue for us right now, it's time; time is what makes us money." (Sig Hansen, Deadliest Catch S.4-6) "Time is always an issue on a crab boat." (Sig Hansen, Deadliest Catch S.7-10)
[ii] "It's hard to keep a positive attitude, you know, when you're pulling a lot of single digits and grinding like that." (Sig Hansen, Deadliest Catch S.5-7)
[iii] Jake Anderson described running "the hydros" [the hydraulics] as "nerve-wracking." (Deadliest Catch S.5-4)
[iv] "When I wanna go fast, they go slow." (Sig Hansen, Deadliest Catch S.5-4)
[v] At the end of the 2006 Opie season, Sig opened the suggestion box that contained suggestions/complaints from the crew. One complaint read, 'More sleep! IFQ [Individual Fishing Quota]!' and Sig remarked, "Poor things." (Sig Hansen, Deadliest Catch S.2-12)
[vi] "The guys had about an hour of sleep tonight; I haven't been to bed…watch the boat on the run up and I think, uh, you know… [yawns]." (Sig Hansen, Deadliest Catch S.5-2)
[vii] "We'll just blast 'em [the pots] off." (Sig Hansen, Deadliest Catch S.2-1)
[viii] "Complacency…it's the biggest killer in the Bering Sea." (Keith Colburn, Deadliest Catch S.8-20)
[ix] "My prediction is they're gonna get pretty snippy here in a little bit and I'm just gonna plug my ears." (Sig Hansen, Deadliest Catch S.5-13)
[x] "Yeah, I got 'em trained to suffer." (Sig Hansen, Deadliest Catch S.5-15)
[xi] "This is the 'Voodoo Lounge.' This is where we hang out when we can't go inside and we're not haulin' gear. We can talk about anything, except for fishing." (Edgar Hansen, Deadliest Catch S.3-4)
[xii] "I'll stick with my Copenhagen." (Norman Hansen, Deadliest Catch S.2-1)
[xiii] Sig told Edgar, "Just don't stress me out. Period." Edgar deadpanned, "I wouldn't do that." (Deadliest Catch S.5-1)
[xiv] The acetone in nail polish remover will help remove permanent ink from one's skin.
[xv] "Cajun Shrimp" is an OPI brand nail polish color.
[xvi] "Flashbulb Fuchsia" is an OPI brand nail polish color.
[xvii] "OPI Red" is an OPI brand nail polish color. I have intentionally misspelled the name in Sig's dialogue, because if he knew such a color existed, he would probably think it referred to the color of Opilio crab.
[xviii] Jake says he was "raised by five sisters" and "raised by a bunch of girls." (Deadliest Catch S.5-14)
[xix] Everyone on the F/V Northwestern wears Helly Hansen apparel.
[xx] Fishermen usually like to see one crab for each hour of soak time; Sig has a higher-than-normal average since the pot has only been soaking for ten hours and contains sixteen crabs.
[xxi] Setting Back: When a crab pot is pulled, emptied, re-baited, and dropped back in the same location.
[xxii] "Feathered" hair was a popular hairstyle for both men and women in the 1970s and the early 1980s. The hair was grown long on both sides (normally covering the ears, although it could be shoulder length), un-layered (although some men with curly hair did have it layered), with either a side or a centre parting. The hair would be brushed back at the sides, giving an appearance similar to the feathers of a bird.
[xxiii] Edgar is 6' tall. Sig is 5'8" tall.
[xxiv] Sig wears a Gold Nugget watch.
[xxv] Sig and Edgar once had a 'last-man-standing' contest to see who could work longer; it lasted approximately 47 hours before Sig nodded off at the helm and asked for a truce. (Deadliest Catch S.4-4) An interviewer once asked Sig, "What are some of the ways you stay awake when in the wheel house?" and Sig answered, "I can stay awake for days on end if I'm excited about every pot that I pull. I've stayed awake for just over three days. And yes, you do drop off from time to time but basically coffee, cigarettes, and chocolate is my diet. It works. And being stubborn never hurt either."
[xxvi] After falling asleep at the helm (after being awake for approximately 50 hours) Sig says, "Fuck, I'm tired." (Sig Hansen, Deadliest Catch S.7-14)
[xxvii] In an interview on the De Laatste Show, Sig says he's been "awake for over 3 days; and that's coffee, cigarettes, and chocolate."
[xxviii] Bow: Front of the boat.
[xxix] Rogue Wave: A wave that is at least twice the size of other waves in the same ocean area. A rogue can topple a boat in the blink of an eye is still considered to be a natural phenomenon; research is ongoing to try and pinpoint the cause of these monster waves..An interviewer asked, "How common are rogue waves and what's the largest one you have seen?" and Sig answered, "Rogue waves are common, especially during the peak of a storm and after. They're not necessarily big. A rogue wave to me is more of a freight train coming at you. Waves are usually synchronized, and a rogue wave comes with all its power out of the blue. It has a different force behind it. They suck!"
[xxx] Port: The left side of the boat when facing forward.
[xxxi] Shelter deck: The high 'wall' on the port side of each vessel that helps block waves and sea spray; it helps shelter the crew as they work on deck. (Deadliest Catch S.5-9)
[xxxii] Vennligst: "Please" in Norwegian
[xxxiii] "The weight is always on my shoulders…somebody gets hurt, it's gonna be my fault." ('Wild' Bill Wichrowski , Deadliest Catch S.8-21)
[xxxiv] "[Sig's been] in the chair for over 30 straight hours without a break." (Mike Rowe - Narrator, Deadliest Catch S.5-2)
[xxxv] "After 34 hours of straight work, the skipper's got to go down." (Mike Rowe - Narrator, Deadliest Catch S.2-8)
[xxxvi] "[Sig's] been at the wheel for 40 hours straight." (Mike Rowe - Narrator, Deadliest Catch S.8-13)
[xxxvii] "The crew has been fishing for two days straight with only four hours of sleep. Fatigue has taken a toll. Captain Sig Hansen hasn't slept a wink." (Mike Rowe - Narrator, Deadliest Catch S.2-5) Sig has been "at the helm for 48 hours." (Mike Rowe - Narrator, Deadliest Catch S.2-7)
[xxxviii] Instead of the "derby-style" fishing in the past, now each boat is assigned an IFQ (Individual Fishing Quota). This change is supposed to make it safer for the fishermen, because they don't have to rush to catch crab to get a share of the total allowed quota.
[xxxix] Several times throughout the series, we've seen the processor move delivery dates ahead, which puts additional stress on the Captain and crew and forces the fishermen to work longer hours without promised breaks. Sig "kinda promised the guys" that he wouldn't make them pull another all-nighter, but he has to break his promise, because the processor pushed up the delivery date and the amount of crab to catch. (Deadliest Catch S.4-11) Sig is in a foul mood after receiving a call from the processor informing him that they are pushing up the F/V Northwestern's delivery date; when Matt is late to throw the hook Sig's simmering temper boils over, "I guess if Matt's gonna set the pace, I'll just crawl up to the pot! He's not even in the game; he's not even fucking here right now. He doesn't care. He's walkin'…he's not running. He's not even walking, he's fucking crawling!" (Deadliest Catch S.5-4) "And, they've already bumped our date up, which is…great." (Sig Hansen, Deadliest Catch S.5-13)
[xl] "Tiny Bubbles" by Don Ho is one of Sig's favorite songs.
[xli] Claustrophobia: An abnormal fear of being closed in or of being in a confined space.
[xlii] Phones are installed strategically around the ship and help facilitate communication to the wheelhouse.
[xliii] Sig is 5'8" tall. Norman is 5'6" tall.
[xliv] Sig reads through the suggestion box and someone requests that Sig should show his appreciation for their hard work by cooking breakfast for them. "We like pancakes." (Deadliest Catch S.2-12)
[xlv] "Mr. Northwestern" is a nickname that the Captain of the F/V Farwest Leader (Greg Moncrief) gave to Sig; it seems likely that this nickname would spread to other sailors in fleet, including Sig's own crew.
[xlvi] "[Fishing] It's just one of those things; it's a part of you. It's like a game of poker." (Sig Hansen, Deadliest Catch S.6-16)
[xlvii] Sig continuously 'buzzes' the crew to get them to pick up the pace. (Deadliest Catch S.-11) He also does this when he's irritable because he's trying to quit smoking. (Deadliest Catch S.5-12)
[xlviii] "Oilskin" is another term for rain gear.
[xlix] "Plugging" or "stuffing" the boat is where the fishermen cram as much crab as possible into the holding tanks.
[l] "Riders" are crabs that have not yet gone into the crab cage; seeing them usually indicates a full pot.
[li] "Clean" crab refers to crabs that have no discoloration on their bellies and do not have barnacles on them; "processors pay less for crab with barnacles or discoloration." (Mike Rowe - Narrator, Deadliest Catch S.2-4)
[lii] "Where's the table?" (Matt Bradley, Deadliest Catch S.5-11)
[liii] "…I'm way too young for a fuckin' breakdown, but it's on the verge. Seriously." (Sig Hansen, Deadliest Catch S.5-13)
[liv] Fathoms are often used to measure water depths; one fathom is equal to six feet.
[lv] Dogs: Metal hooks on the launcher that clamp down on the steel frame of the pot to keep it secured in place when the launcher is raised upright.
[lvi] Bait is only active for 3 days in a set pot. (Deadliest Catch S.2-2)
[lvii] "What'd you get on that last one? 6-4? Ha ha ha!" (Sig Hansen, Deadliest Catch S.8-1)
[lviii] "Put 'em on a town soak and we'll head in." (Sig Hansen, Deadliest Catch S.10-10)
[lix] Akutan Island, Alaska has been the Hansen's offload place since the 1960s. (Deadliest Catch S.3-6)
[lx] Watch Alarm: An alarm that goes off every fifteen minutes to ensure that whoever is on watch does not fall asleep at the helm.
[lxi] Niorun is the Norse goddess of dreams and she can give the gift/curse of prophetic dreams..Because of Sig's Norwegian heritage, I thought it only fitting to reference Niorun rather than the more widely known Greek god Morpheus.
[lxii] After Sig experiences strange chest pains he tells himself to "Stop cryin' about it." (Sig Hansen, Deadliest Catch S.5-11)
[lxiii] Greenhorn: A new or an inexperienced deckhand.
Author's Note: Ta da: Chapter Two! Please don't forget to review!
The Swordsman