The Secret Cargo

A wave crashed over the ship and swept me across the deck. The only thing keeping me from falling overboard, was the rope tied tightly around my chest. I was on my stomach, spluttering and spitting the water I was choking on. Someone took a hold of my collar, hauling me to my feet, and quickly moved on to man his station. People were shouting and shoving, trying to keep the ship above water. The Andromeda: nothing if not grand, was rocking from side to side like a cradle, granted wherein the baby was not quite safe, threatening as it was, to tip over with every wave that struck.
As much time as I had spent at sea in my 18 years of life; I had never encountered a storm like this. It was leaving me baffled and frightened. Only pure adrenaline kept me from going numb with shock. A group of men were gathered around some loose cargo, trying their best to secure it. I skidded to their side, tying the thick slippery rope that was soaked in seawater.
“Alright there, Theo?”
I looked up into the round, ruddy face of the colonel, startled by his appearance among the men. He laughed a barking laugh at my surprised expression while making a sailors knot to secure a big box of jackfruit, which had come free from the safe place under the canvas.
Again the men were splitting up, each darting onwards with their tasks.
A wind that might have lifted a lighter person off their feet rocketed into me. I turned my head and followed its path into the dark stormy night. It brought me face to face with something that startled me even more than the colonel: namely a small, skinny boy who was standing in the downpour, looking up into the black monster that was the sky. It was not his childish complexion, that startled me so, something I had not even seen the shadow of since I left my three younger siblings at home. Nor was it the fact that a child that seemingly hadn’t existed for the three weeks we had been traveling at sea, was actually allowed unto the deck in a storm. No, it was the look on his face; neither terrified, surprised nor shocked. He was laughing. Pure joy and excitement were sailing across his features, as if he had just seen the world for the first time. As if he had just discovered or realized what he had always been searching for. His laughter reached it’s way across the deck to where I stood, stunned, able to do nothing but look.
At his side was a dog, feverishly trying to dig its claws into the wooden planks of the deck in an almost human-like fashion. It could presently not decide whether to bark furiously at the boy, or gaze terrified at the giant waves that kept crashing over the ship.
“Oi!” the boy uttered in his youthful voice.
I don’t know how I was able to hear him over the storm, but it seemed like he was standing right beside me and not across the deck.
He had a devilish, knowing grin on his face, as he glanced from my startled expression to whatever was right behind me. I only had half a second to look back, before a wave with the force of a hundred elephants crashed into my back, slamming me forwards. I barely registered what was happening as I tumbled over the side of the railing, falling, plunging into the darkness below. A sharp pain exploded across my torso, under my arms; the feeling of being ripped in two. The cord of the rope strung out between the mast up aboard, and me, dangling a few feet above sea level. I gripped frantically at the soggy cordage, rain washing over my face, making it impossible to see, as I tried to get a glimpse of the railing – had anybody seen me fall? Where was the bloody boy?
I tried to lift myself up unsuccessfully. The weight of my body tucking down hard on the rope every time my hands slipped. Without warning I felt the rope snap. I tried desperately to get a hold of the side of the ship, but my hands found nothing but empty air, as I plunged into the icy waters.