Iceberg ahead!
The Captain is unaware that the sailors are in a panic. They are trying to close the great flood gates while at the same time trying to act productive and efficient when inspectors walk by, not wanting to highlight the ensuing flood least they be docked of a wage or deemed incompetent. They try to keep still, calm, though the water rises, gushing through the vessel this very moment. The bottom is beginning to push deeper into the sea and several of the miner workers are drowning now.
The Captain is in the upper bistro trying to resurface old memories with fierce red wine. He dines with the finest dressed people in town. They discuss financial possibilities. The Captain is in a mood of professional chat, whilst plucking succulent chicken chunks from his gravy soaked plate, Tis all rather higher class and witty, intellectual, rhetorical hobnobbing.
The Sailors remain deeply distressed, the situation remains erratic. The ship has a wound on its front the size of a burst heart. The ships nose is dipping down into the ocean. The boat is sinking. Fast. The sailors are still keeping up appearances; looking mechanical and industrious. No one can tell the fate of the panic in their face. The lower passenger floor is filling up with water nicely. Passengers are beginning to catch on to the idea that something is happening, something very wrong.
The Captain, oblivious, wouldn’t care anyway. He has a secret small plane to escape in when things get too watery. He is a member of the Boys Club and knows all the associations.
The sailors are still keeping silent out of some disturbed respect for the Captain and his pay packet and his air. The sailors are naïve and loyal – because they were the ships flag on their sleeves. They invent a duty and perish by its obligation. They fasten themselves, as the ship sinks deeper, to the masts and life boats; they sense the title of heroism. The sailor died trying to save…
Wild hysteria grips the passengers, mass clam up and fast sprawling and falling. The ship is in many ways an ant hill. The ship is nose first in the ocean, getting sucked further into the vacuum of the sea. The sailors are organizing the descent. They are conjuring heroic leaps and daring climbs. Fiercely gripping and pulling at slippery ropes and thin safety lines. They scream in passionate adrenaline: “Women and children first!†They are reciting famous and chivalrous passages from the bible, comforting, telling one and all to be strong, dignified. They are willingly lunging into the fierce fire of water that tears through the ship like a vessel.
The Captain is ushered onto his helicopter, even though he is entirely unaware of this, due to excessive flirting with the brandy and the whiskey. A small bureaucratic few wave him off as they sink.
The sailors are writing last poems. Wishing it had all been different, drowning slowly. Whimpers and water gurgled through throats can be heard in the distance, cacophony of dying music, a pathetic death dirge. It seems this ship was for many - The Last Court, The Final Consecration, and The Day of Judgment.
The tragedy of this tale lies not only in the chaos and confusion and tragic loose of human life it incurred, but in the stark face of the cold bald fact that This Great Ship never even left the port.