Captain Ahab's Lonely Hearts Club Band

An OceanPunk story by krazydiamond

A melancholy tune rose from the bowels of the Ponaturi, slow and mournful like a bloody whale song. I shared a horrified expression with my first mate Ajax, who shrugged a 'I told you so' and pivoted with me for the door. The engine room was six decks down, six decks until I could wring Jonah's scrawny neck for putting the whole crew in danger, again.

It was the fifth time this week. Last time the doctor threatened to sew his lips shut. It wouldn't have helped, the boy would pound sound out through those freaky looking slits on the side of his neck, which only appeared when he sang. Ajax suggested we just cut his head off and be done with it, but dammit, I had a soft spot for the kid.

There were also no other qualified engineers onboard the Ponaturi. We were stuck with him. No matter how much we wanted to shove him out the pressurized lock to watch the crushing depths pop him like a grape in a massive fist. I bet I could make a hefty sum selling tickets to that show.

"Val, we can't keep doing this," Ajax puffed as he jogged beside me. "Either we shut him up or we draw the heat of the entire Sea Dog Navy on top of us.

I ground my teeth. It would be easy to shift all the blame on the kid, but that wasn't the truth of it. It wouldn't matter if Jonah sang like a canary in a mine shaft if the last job hadn't exploded in our faces.

"I didn't understand," I said.

Jonah was an idiot savant. A nineteen year old kid who made the fussy bucket of rust and outdated mods that was the Ponaturi's engine purr like a well fed tiger. In all my years pirating this quadrant of the Endless Seas, I'd never seen anything like it. The problem was that talent came with a huge downside.

I turned the corner before the engine room, boots skidding over the polished floor. Here, the song was almost deafening. It throbbed against my ears, filled my head to the brim. It was terrible and beautiful and full of dark promises if only you listened, if you followed the song to its end.

I snarled. I had about enough of that nonsense. The door to the engine room was wide open. It only closed if the engine was on fire, though the gears were probably so rusted the door would fail to do that. One of the many repairs the interior of the ship needed, like new engine parts, but I'd spent all the excess money from our last gig on the exterior of the ship, strengthening the hull, patching the weak points. The crew grumbled at me then, but they weren't whining now, not when that strengthened chrome held up nicely against the vise of water outside.

Jonah stood at the edge of the observation platform, the thick dome of clear plastic a window to the outside darkness. His arms were spread wide, like a conductor to the grand orchestras that performed in the port towns. The slits on his neck were open, his mouth a perfect 'O' while his eyes were closed. His expression was lost, blissful, while outside the window, shapes moved, lurking in the dark. I stopped short as some hulking creature rubbed against the glass like an affectionate cat, the scaly underbelly an iridescent violet that sparked with bioluminescent blue lights.

Good lord, what sort of monster had he dredged up from the depths now? I crossed the floor to my engineer. My ears popped at the pressure of the song. I ignored it, hoping my brain didn't liquefy and pour out of my skull as I laid a hand on his shoulder. The song abruptly cut off. The shapes outside the window scattered into the pitch black water.

Jonah glanced at me with shockingly turquoise eyes. "I didn't it again, didn't I?"

I nodded. Jonah's shoulders slumped. "I'm sorry Captain. Will you punish me?" He asked in that oddly servile tone he had that drove me up the wall.

Ajax snorted from the doorway. "If it were up to me, I'd throw your ass in the brig to rot."

"Ah, but it's not up to you," I said. Ajax pouted. I raised an eyebrow and the big man blushed. For his grumbling and bluster, we both knew it was an empty threat. If we were all more honest with ourselves, even if Jonah wasn't an indispensable member of the crew, we wouldn't have shoved him out the pressure lock. The little idiot was family, no one else could drive you that crazy.

"That's the third time in the past forty eight hours, Jonah. You know we are on lock down."

"I'm sorry Captain," Jonah murmured. His eyes dropped to his feet and stayed there. I sighed. This sucked and it was all my fault. I should have pulled the crew out early. The whole job felt wrong from the beginning and now we were paying for it, scuttling at the bottom of the Endless Sea while we licked our wounds and prayed the Sea Dogs didn't find us. It wouldn't be the first time my crew had to lie low but this was the first time we had Jonah with us, and he was a heck of an outlier.

"He done singing, Valerie?" The Doc strolled in with his Valise of Instruments of Cruel and Unusual Punishment. He refused to call me anything other than my name, a relic from my father's crew who knew me as a knee high tot making a nuisance of myself as I scrambled along the decks.

"Seems so," I said.

The Doc set his valise down with a solid metallic clank. I barely held back a shudder. The Doc collected 'medical' instruments at every port, though it was anyone's guess what half of them actually did. We all learned not to volunteer as test subjects around the Doc, except Jonah. Jonah bounced back from just about anything and he was the Doc's favorite toy. Still, his hands were gentle as he framed Jonah's face and tipped his head side to side to get a look at his neck.

"I've picked up a couple instruments in Tortuga I've been meaning to test," said the Doc, as if he were starting a mild conversation.

"Oh here we go again," mutter Ajax.

"I believe I've caught you fast enough after an episode to test them," said the Doc.

"If you think it's necessary," said Jonah.

Ajax rolled his eyes. "I'll be on deck, Cap. Keeping an eye out for trouble."

The big man sauntered away with surprising grace for a guy his size.

"Keep you head tilted please," said the Doc. My attention focused on the two clowns once more. I should be on the deck, but the Doc had a tendency toward enthusiasm and Jonah never refused. It was a worrisome combination.

We 'liberated' Jonah from an island lab facility over a year ago. It wasn't part of the job. An enterprising gentlemen hired us to bring the contents of the main safe to him in exchange for a fifty fifty split. Easy job for our standards. We were all set to slip in and out when Doc wandered to the subject area. It was eerily quiet. He flicked on the lights and the whole crew just stopped and stared. Our oarsman Peter barely made it to the trashcan to vomit. Some nights I still woke up in a cold sweat from what I saw in that room. Human experimentation is never a pretty sight.

Doc theorized they were attempting to splice, though what they what DNA they were using was beyond anyone's guess. Tank after briny tank sloshed in the room, disfigured monsters swimming in aimless circles. Some of their bits still looked human. Some looked like had been turned inside out, pulsating glistening masses of tissue and bone twisted into unrecognizable shapes in the water. Ajax suggested we should torch the whole place, put the poor bastards out of their misery, when we heard it.

It wrapped around us, slid against the skin cool and slick and suffocating like a tangle of seaweed. It sank into our bones and held us there, communicating a bottomless misery. By the time it stopped, not a single member of my crew had a dry eye. His tank was tucked at the back of the room, hidden behind the monsters. He looked almost human, with a small cloth at his waist to protect his modesty. His body was pale, long, and lean, a swimmer's build, and his turquoise eyes glowed in the murky water of the tank. Almost human, but for the slits on his neck that filtered the water. They dilated as we watched, his mouth opened with the first notes of another song. I didn't need to hear it. I heard more than enough. I fired high, punching two bullets into the glass. Cracks spiderwebbed out, until the pressure did the rest of the work. The tank caved and spat the boy onto the concrete floor of the facility.

The Doc chewed me out good for that. "What if he doesn't breathe air anymore?"

"Then we put him out of his misery," I told him.

The boy did breathe our air. He gasped like a fish for the first couple seconds before the slits sealed shut, like they never existed, and he took a deep gasping breath. Breathing was the easy part. The water atrophied his muscles. Ajax carried him out without a word. He had no name. Couldn't remember one. Jonah seemed as good a name as any. He was the only one we saved that day.

Now our altruism was biting in the ass, hard. The Doc extracted some nightmare of an instrument that looked like a giant metal mosquito and jabbed the needle into the kids neck. That was enough for me. I strolled away from the two of them, taking Jonah's place at the observation window. Here I was trying to lay the blame on the kid's feet. He'd been nothing but an asset since we brought him on board. It wasn't his fault we were being hunted. I wondered if he even understood the danger.

"Captain," Ajax's voice crackled to life in my ear through the comm stud pierced through my earlobe.

I tapped it. "What is it?"

"There are six Sea Dog ships circling the water topside. Two of them just dropped depth charges."

"Keep me informed." I closed my eyes and swore softly. My worst nightmare come true. If we moved now, they'd definitely spot us and we didn't have the engine power to out maneuver six Sea Dogs, the powerhouse elite law enforcement of the Endless Sea. If we stayed put, there was about a fifty fifty chance the depth charges would hit. If they missed, the Sea Dogs might think they hit a dud lead and move on. If one hit, it would either weaken the hull enough to force us to surface or punch a hole through and crush us like a soda can. Neither scenario was good.

This was my fault for not listening to my gut. It was a sweet cherry of a gig, one of the many pleasure cruise ships that floated around Neptune's Trident, a bunch of wealthy prigs on a 'vacation' around the semi reputable hot spots in this upper east quadrant of the Endless Sea. The boat contained its own bank for the patrons to withdraw funds as needed. It was practically a honeypot teasing a horde of bears. It was amazing no one had hit it yet. We snagged the info from a fairly reliable source, but I should have known. There was a reason it hadn't been hit yet. All those internal alarm bells ringing and I still went with it like Captain Ahab after his white whale until Ajax smashed into the first uniformed Sea Dog. The honeypot was chock full of big angry hornets, and we got our asses stung.

Now we had the whole fleet breathing down our necks. If they didn't kill us outright, they would capture us and haul us to the Shark Tank. The Sea Dogs were creative with the execution of their prisoners and being eaten alive was about the worst death I could imagine.

Jonah made a small whimpering sound as the Doc extracted the needle from his neck. I turned and plastered a smile on my face. The Doc froze.

"Shit, we're under attack." He crossed himself and spat on the ground. Jonah looked between us, wide eyed and lost.

I scowled. "Yes, thank you for breaking the news with such tact."

The Doc shook his head and jabbed a few buttons on his device with irritated gusto. "I could always run through the ship, yelling myself hoarse."

"Your sarcasm isn't appreciated."

"But my science might be," quipped the Doc.

I raised a brow. "Did one of your useless instruments finally tell you something important?"

"My instruments are never useless, extraneous perhaps but never useless."

Jonah glanced at me. "Doesn't that mean--"

I held a finger to my lips and shook my head.

The instrument whirred, blinked, and put on quite the flashy show. I didn't even know what it was supposed to do but it sure looked impressive.

"How bad is it?" The Doc's tone was light but there was a heavy resignation in his eyes that felt like a punch in the gut.

"Half a dozen Sea Dogs. They've dropped charges." My gaze slid to Jonah before I realized what I was doing.

The kid caught my gaze and looked downright miserable. "Because of me. I drew them here?"

Gut punch number two. I wrapped an arm around Jonah's shoulders. "No, I drew them here. You weren't doing anything out of the ordinary."

I knew full well he'd sing no matter where we hid. The fugue states came and went amid his flashes of mechanical brilliance. He made pods of dolphins dance and sharks surface to show their bellies. It was why I took the Ponaturi so deep under the water, hoping if I sank us deep enough, the Sea Dogs would pass us off as a submerged pod of whales. It was a futile plan but it was the best I had at the time.

The instrument came to a stop with a loud ding that made us jump. The Doc looked down at it in bemusement. I watched his expression shift to absolute awe.

"Ha! I knew it!"

"What is it?"

"You know Valerie, ever since we raided that lab, I've been mulling over what in the name of Calypso were they splicing their subjects with. I had a few theories but nothing refined enough to scan for it until I found this analyzer in the Tortuga markets." He grinned as he flipped the machine toward me. "I was bloody right."

There was a collection of script I couldn't make heads or tails out of but at the bottom of the analysis was a scroll of labeled numerical data. Human 72%, Unknown, Divine 5%, Siren 23%.

I blinked. "Sirens don't exist," was my intelligent contribution.

The Doc snorted. "Girl, you haven't been across the Endless Sea and back, like your father. Believe me, we saw plenty of shit that doesn't exist."

I chewed on that for a moment. "What does that Unknown Divine mean?"

Doc shrugged. "Probably tossed some deity's blood in the mix, useful if you need something to stick to something it shouldn't."

Oh, good, our engineer was part god.

"And part siren," I murmured. I looked at him. I need the myths of sirens. No pirate worth their salt didn't know the myths and legends of the sea, but that was all I thought of them, as bedtime stories my father told me to get me to sleep. "Did you know you were part siren?"

Jonah looked away. "I didn't want to scare you."

That was an interesting idea. In the stories, sirens lured men to their deaths against their rocky shores. They feasted on human misery. They were also supposedly female. All of which Jonah was not.

I squinted at the Doc. "How exaggerated are those myths?"

"Have you not noticed how every creature is big breasted woman?" Good point.

"So what can a siren do?"

The Doc rocked on his feet. "They have a pretty deep connection to other ocean beasties."

"Like control?"

"Somewhat like that. It's hard to explain. I don't know if the kid has any control."

Jonah shuffled. "When I was in the lab, they used music at various tempos."

I held up a hand. "Wait, are you telling me, if you had a beat, you had more control?"

Jonah nodded, unable to look me in the eye. A plan was forming. It was a stupid, reckless plan but if it saved up from a small fleet of Sea Dogs, it was worth exploring.

An hard ripple of sound slammed into the ship. The depth charge found us. The deck bucked beneath us, tossing us right off our feet. I slammed down on my backside, hard enough to jar my bones. Jonah crawled to me.

"Are you alright captain?"

"I'm okay. Doc?"

"I'll just lie here and contemplate the meaning of life," said the Doc.

I ignored the idiot. Instead I looked at Jonah. He looked uncornered by the fact the walls were crinkling around us. We would have to surface or the ship would crumple under the water pressure. He did look worried for us and I realized Jonah would likely survive even if the ship did implode. 5% Divine. I wonder whose blood they managed to acquire and at what cost. I wrapped my hands around Jonah's wrists.

"Kid, I need you to try something for us," I said. I relayed my plan.

He stared at me, expectant and totally trusting. "What if it doesn't work?"

I shrugged. "Then we stay here until our hull gives, or we surface and face the Sea Dogs."

Jonah got a distant look in his eyes. "They funded the lab."

My eyebrows shot up. This was news to me. It shouldn't have shocked me, but it did. The Sea Dogs were supposed to be the law, fighting the good fight. They were bad news for pirates like me but I never thought they would go so far as human weaponization. However, their poor business practices worked in our favor. The distant expression in Jonah's eyes melted into a flare of rage.

"I'll do it."

He sounded awfully confident from a moment ago.

I tapped my comm stud. "Ajax, I want you to play file 783 over the ship's speakers."

"Are you out of your bleeding mind? We don't a soundtrack to die."

"That is an order," I snapped. There wasn't time to explain. The Sea Dogs would toss out another depth charge any moment and we'd be done.

The familiar fast tempo bass of file 783 hummed to life over the ships speakers. It was a smaller, more intimate group than the grand orchestras, but their music was lively, primitive and powerful. Everything Jonah needed to give his voice intent.

He stood and walked to the observation rail. "I would cover your ears Captain, and maybe relay that Ajax should raise the ship." He was giving me orders without using the language of an order. How cute.

"Raise the ship, Ajax."

"You'll be the death of me woman," Ajax growled in my ear.

"I haven't yet. Would you please trust me?"

He did. He always would. I felt the ship rumble as the Ponaturi began its ascent. Jonah opened his mouth. The slits on the side of his neck flexed and for the first time, I saw the translucent turquoise membranes fluttering within, the same color as his eyes. Sound poured out of Jonah. The power slammed into me.

"Holy shit." I wasn't a sea creature, but a lifetime spent on the open water, I heard the song of the sea in my bones and I could feel the intent of Jonah's song. I stared out the observation window in wonder as those vast creatures from before one more answered his call.

Doc did warn me the sea was full of shit that didn't exist and I now got an eyeful of it.

"Is that a goddamn dragon?" The scaled monster wound like a corkscrew toward the surface, the owner of those lovely scales that pressed against the window earlier. It's face was the stuff of nightmares, a hash of angler and moray eel with a wide maw of needle like teeth taller than me.

"Leviathan," said the Doc, settling down next to me. It was hard to hear him over the combination of music and Jonah's song but somehow, the noise was directed outward. He nodded to a mass of tentacles that shot by. "And a Kraken. Our boy is a crowd pleaser."

I stared at him. "Are all those legends true?"

The Doc tilted his head, looking thoughtful. "No, mermaids are utter bullshit."

We were still halfway to the surface when the first debris from the Sea Dog ships began to rain down, the water churning with scraps of metal, wood, and bodies. Probably weighed down by all those useless medals they insisted on pinning to their chests. Doc and I sat shoulder to shoulder, listening to Jonah's song and watching the destruction rain down to the waiting black depths.

Jonah's song finally came to a slow close. The Leviathan made a pass, nosing the window in an unmistakable affectionate gesture that nearly made me piss my pants. The music stopped. Jonah hunched over, his expression sheepish as he glanced back at us with wide eyes.

"I'm sorry," he said, his voice hoarse.

"Whatever for, kid?"

He startled, likely puzzled by the big stupid grins the Doc and I wore. "You're not--you're not mad? Or scared of me?"

"Are you kidding? That was the coolest shit I've ever seen," said the Doc.

My comm stud crackled to life. "Uh Cap, it's um, all clear up here," said Ajax. I could hear the bewilderment in his voice and my grin got so big my cheeks hurt.

Jonah shuffled over to us, his head still ducked. "You really aren't bothered by it?"

I yanked him down next to me and ruffled his hair. "You're family, idiot. Didn't you realize that the second we busted you out of that place?"

A smile finally broke through. The kid practically glowed. I reached over and tweaked his nose.

"You can sing whenever you want," I said. "But please, keep the eager to please Leviathans to a bare minimum. I don't think the Ponaturi can take much more affection."

Jonah laughed, a sound like silver bells over ice. I looked at the Doc. The Endless Seas just got a whole lot more interesting.

The End.