Operation Pacific Thunder Struck Down
"Ouch! Don't pinch me, you yellow-bellied buffoon!" Kayla Gupta twists her head to slap her first-mate, Norton, rightfully in the smacker but then thinks otherwise.
"Why don't you keep your ragga-muffin mitts in your pockets where they belong? How am I supposed to finish my famous apricot-curried chutney with you abusing my delicate bodice?"
"Ptooey to your disgusting goop for chutney! chortles Norton with a playful glint in his right eye -- the other more inquisitive eye lies dab-smack centered on the ripe bottom he had just managed to goose.
"I'm off to the poop deck for some real chow. I'll save you a seat."
"Thanks Nort, you scurrilous boob, I'm almost finished so I'll meet up with you in two shakes of a lamb's tail."
But Kayla has other things on her not-so-expansive mind. Her famous concoction of stewed apricots, nutmeg and other forbidden spices was the talk of the town, or rather the navy frigate of Operation Pacific Thunder, as it were. And she wasn't about to let it boil over. She stirs it with a passion. She is quite attractive for a 3rd-rate kitchen hand. Her pretty coconut-shaded skin and gracefully sine-like form had caught the attention of more than a few deck-hands -- not to mention the admiral's youngest son, playfully nicknamed Dweezle, for his endearing frizzled mullet for a hairdo.
Clocking in at 32 years of age she has seen her share of the world. Yet, the icy cold seas of the southern Pacific have always pulled a string in her heart for a reason she would never be able to fully explain. Kayla sincerely missed her much older brother, Sir Sanjay, stationed in a decrepit old New Zealand lighthouse for the last 14 years. Perhaps her great desire to reunite with him was the key to her urges to see these miserable waters neighboring the antarctic north coast.
"Finite'!" she voices aloud in her best Italian accent to no one but the Mickey-Mouse clock hanging on the aft wall.
"If only I were payed extra for this delicacy." Kayla carefully flicks off the burner and removes the crock pot from the heated surface.
"Chow time!" She then extricates herself from her apron and bounds up the steep staircase out the kitchen and into the poop deck where Norton and Dweezle eagerly await her company.
"There you are, my Sri Lankan beauty! Saved you a seat," burps out Nort as he smacks his beerstein on the cedar table."
"No ma'am, you should sit next to me," belches out the delightful Dweezle as he gives Nort a stiff shove. Now Dweezle was a good man. A bright man. With a mangy mullet and a prominent nose, he dazzled the ladies back home in Corpus Christi, Texas. His southern roots shine through his infectious smile. Nonetheless, he often acted brazenly when confronted with competition.
"I took the liberty of ordering for you, Kayla. Beetroot salad sprinkled with oregano and a little curried quail. Purple kool-aid to wash it all down."
"No thanks," replies Kayla with a frown. "I'm a strict vegetarian. You continually forget!" She heads over to the food line and serves herself a satisfactory breakfast portion (because it is only 6am) of collared greens and turnip stew, then returns to where the blaberus men sit.
"Do you know what I hate most about you guys," Kayla voices with a hint of a smile. "It's that every time one of you makes an attempt at being chivalrous, you get it all wrong and do something thoughtless. Last time it was you, Nort, ordering that roast antelope with deviled desiree potatoes and gravy. Vegetarians don't eat anything that once had blood -- that includes your 'vegetables of the sea', as you so stupidly put it, Dweezle," Kayla says, referring to Dweezle's not-so-clever euphemism for dead fish. She then proceeds to daintily scarf down her chow as she pretends to enjoy the fellas' playful banter.
...
Ten minutes later, their world is suddenly shattered by a piercing scream coming from the stern of the ship as a massive sonic boom reverberates all around the sailors eating their meals. Over the PA, the voice of the captain announces that they have just collided with one of their oil tankers and that every man must fend for themselves.
"This ship is going down! abandon ship!" They happen to be only 10 kilometers off the coast of the South Island, New Zealand when this most unfortunate incident occurs. Thankfully, dear Sir Sanjay Gupta, estranged brother of Kayla, is all eyes and ears waiting in his little lighthouse for such a moment as this to come to their rescue. But that account will have to wait. Here is where the suffering begins: but not for Kayla and her crew, but for me, Antoine Musclejouz, of Operation Pacific Thunder...
I am left forced to swim in dizzying circles within a roaring sea of fire. Vast tongued sheets of lighting shatter the early morning sky. Jellyfish in the rip current cling to my scalp sending synaptic shocks down my porcelain spine, and I scream in terror.
The water is nearly saturated with the petroleum spilled from the tanker struck down by incendiary napalm (or so I thought) but a few minutes ago. My flesh soaks with fuel as my hair becomes singed from the flames. So this is akin to the hell my grandfather told me about as one bitter cold winter night he relayed to me his experiences in the death troughs of WWI. Then, he told me, that he was under heavy artillery fire from the enemy as the air wafted the fumes of mustard gas toward his trench. That couldn't be much worse than I felt this minute as the flames licked my shoulder blades and the jellyfish made a meal of the receding hair loosely attached to my skull.
This was suffering at its worst.
I am alone with my thoughts on mandatory autopilot as I await an unlikely rescue. The waters are anything but pacific, and I am somewhere beyond 10 kilometers northeast of Gore, New Zealand. I read during one quiet moment of my tour of these seas that hammerhead sharks frequent these tumultuous waters. Yet I doubt that the sharks would approach now. Thank God (as if he actually exists)!
My mind, in one blessed moment, wanders to the thought that those ferocious and magnificent creatures must never cease moving through the water lest they die. They even sleep as they swim. I too, must imitate their behavior now.
Before my thoughts could arrive at a more meaningful conclusion, I am jostled by the deep booming of thunder sending hollowed sound vibrations through my ears tympani. My now brittle bones reverberate with the aftershock of the storm. The dark of night now almost constantly eerily illuminated between the green haze from the wreck and the ceaseless forks of lightning skating across the sky as if vipers wielding roller skates.
I let out another hideous scream for no other reason than the fear of a toxic death trap as this was.
Was there nothing beautiful or peaceful I could now think of to distract me from the tearing pain ripping across my saturated body? Impossible! Or was it? My eyeballs rolled up into my skull, and if anyone were watching, they would have seen just the muddied whites of these ball-bearing eyes now marred by the thick sickly black fuel.
There was a time many years ago when I had taken a vacation out to the majestic mountains of the Rockies. It was the birth of summer in Aspen, Colorado and my beautiful newly wedded wife and I were strolling through these lush pastures of yellow poppy plants. The weather was an amazing 76 degrees with but a speckle of cumulus cloud here and there. The horizon hinted of a fiery gold and violet luminance as the sun was setting beyond those beautiful mountain peaks. Our love was so strong, the heat felt between the palms of our enjoined hands. We had set up our little two person bivouac by the crystal lake and I remember our passionate positions as the cicadas droned across the warm evening air....
The memory was not to last. I returned to my current terror-gripping position lost at sea as my mind recoiled into a midnight cloud of despair. My legs now numb from treading in the brine-laden ocean felt like they would fall off any minute. Yet the heat of the flames all around was keeping me warm from the pressing cold.
I know now that Operation Pacific Thunder was a failure as we were blasted out of the water before we completed our mission to transport 150,000 gallons of diesel fuel to the Chatham Islands where our fighter pilots waited. Nothing was worse than the failure of our mission -- my final thought as I slowly and agonizingly began to sink into the depths never to be seen or heard from again (or so I thought). Little did I know, but Sir Sanjay Gupta was to come to the rescue. And our story now turns to him and his exploits...
Deep, deep south. Bluff, New Zealand
0600 hours
A cold and blistery morning
Age is absent for this old man. Why? because he is content in a place any other soul would despise. Stationed in a nearly derelict lighthouse 600 km or so, north of Antarctica, he holds high his responsibility to keep his light beaming into the darkness of the sea. The gale force winds bash walls of icy water onto the persistent little lighthouse. Like the grizzly man, it stands against all odds in the line of duty -- battling the storms with blanched impunity.
This pillar of hope has stood tall for nearly sixty-seven harrowing years. At first, it was a post-WWII beacon allowing steaming passenger ships to traverse safely the cold pacific waters from Scotland to Dunedin, New Zealand. Now the lighthouse is more of an undying monument rather than a guardian of the sea. Rarely do freighters travel this far south, yet there it remains in the off chance that a weather-beaten ship should lose its way in the tempest of the South Pacific Ocean.
Today began like every other morning for Sir Sanjay Gupta. Born into a delightful little coconut farm somewhere south of Tamil Land, Sri Lanka, his large extended family raised him with utmost love. For this reason, over the past nineteen years he would arise at precisely 0500 hours from a dreamy sleep of succulent coconuts and wavy palm trees. Quick to touching his furry feet to the floor, he'd spring out from the sheets like a jack-in-the-box and immediately he would carefully make his bed, taking extra care to crease the sheets at perfect ninety degree angles to the edge of the bed. You see, he long had learned that perfectionism was an art worth holding on to, and he respected the harmony of routine.
On this blistery, bone marrow-freezing pre-dawn, Sanjay, after meticulously making up the bed, then proceeds to his little make-shift kitchen for breakfast. The brutal sea sees him and attacks the lighthouse with disdain. However, he hardly notices as his almost obsessive attention transfixes him to the wee kettle boiling on the burner.
Sir Sanjay Gupta is not a man to forget his toast served lightly toasted and buttered alongside his McGregor's decaffeinated coffee, imported especially from Lochshire, Scotland. Nor does he forget on this morning either. He brazenly removes a couple slices of Momma's fresh pumpernickel bread from his hoister sock, jamming them into the toaster.
His power bill is neither alarming nor relevant to this morning's events yet he keeps mindfully aware of his ability to attend to breakfast with the light off. With breakfast at hand, he abruptly kneels on his plush corduroy hassock and slowly gobbles down his aromatic pumpernickel toast.
After two sips of the pungent cup of joe, his mind carries him to the day's duties: triple check the valves on the spotlight, collect the afternoon weather forecast from the AM radio, mop down the brittle wooden floor, don his Inverness-issued snorkel gear and go coggeling for clams. Pondering of this sort excites him and his vegas nerve rapidly pumps norepinephrine out of his locus ceruleus and into the surrounding, almost necrotic, tissue. Everyday is like this: Routine Routine Routine. But what a wonderful routine tis!
CLACK CLACK crIckLY CracK! He springs up once again like a mad-hatter jump-in-the-box, this time startled out of his dreamy trance by the sound of his staccato-strap -- a device that only goes off when there is a ship at sea sending out a distress call. Only twice in three years had it alarmed, all three times(this being the third) resulting in a bruised head from smacking into the low wooded ceiling. Rubbing vigorously his portly head, he moves over to the light and cancels the autopilot strobe into manual.
Back and forth he shines the beam until he spots the weather-beaten vessel. Appearing to be a cargo freighter of the oddest sorts, Sanjay notes that it was nearly perpendicular to the rough waters jostling it back and forth across the white-capped froth.
Aside from blazing the blinding light directly into the ship's cabin, he could do nothing more along the means of help so he shrugs his shoulders and resumes his humble breakfast as his thoughts slide into memories of his youth selling pretty-colored clam shells in the Tamil fish bazaar. But then it suddenly dawns on him: "I am Sir Sanjay Gupta: Protecter of the high seas. I must attend to this distess call lest I forever drown in my shame!" With this new resignation, he jolts up and away, quickly slipping into his Inverness snorkling gear including Paddington bear flippers, and then leaps out the window like a frog on a hot stove. Rest assured, he does this every day anyhow when he goes coggling, never using the door, so he is relatively safe flopping into the choppy waters like this. And of to the rescue he goes!
I am suddenly yanked into consciousness by something (or someone) ripping at my hair. To my great surprise, it is a furry old man with a raging mustache and deep-set eyes hidden beneath prominent eyebrows. These bushy, musk-like eyebrows are even clearly visible through the mask the man is wearing, unlike the hair which was hidden beneath a silicon swim cap with 'bubbles' on the decal.
My brain hurts. My skull reverberates to the aftershock of the thunder still rumbling up above, but at least now my vision is clearing up. The smoke and eeiry green flames are still present, yet I seem to have drifted slightly away from the oil sludging on the surface. Then the furry man speaks:
"Ahoy there, wee man! Looks like you've got zee self in oont mess. But don't worry I will save thee. Hang on to my neck and I will drag you to this boat that's sinking. Maybe we can find a lifeboat."
With my last ounce of renewed strength I reach across his hairy chest and grab his bulging neck. What a strong old man he is, I thought. With me in tow, Sir Sanjay violently flutter-kicks toward the sinking frigate.
...
Meanwhile, Kayle and her ambivalent men are boarding the smallest of the life rafts, a three person skooner. And down the raft goes, into the rough ocean where their fate awaits them. Two minutes later, Kayla yells out, "Guys look! Over yonder. See them? A pair of men amongst the wreckage of the other ship! They need our help!" And so the three direct their twin-turbine motor towards the swimming men.
"Gotcha!" screams out Dweezle as he reaches down into the violent water and drags into the boat both Sanjay and me.
"What will happen to our crew?" cries out Kayla, but then gasps in shock for she notices her brother hidden behind the snorkle mask. "Sanjii! I am so happy to see you!
"Yes, very good indeed," says Sanjay, surprisingly with indifference. "Greetings and what-not after we arrive to my lighthouse!" yells the furry man. The crew, with a great struggle manage their way to the pier.
...
Once in the lighthouse, Sir Sanjay says, "Come now. Quickly! Enter my boardroom and change out of your wet clothes. I will give you all a bite to eat afterward." The boardroom was merely a 5x5 meter room below the main quarters with a couple of cardboard boxes for furniture. But it would have to make do, I thought with disdain. Yet I had no energy left. I immediately crumbled to the hardwood floor and passed out.
...
Thirty-five minutes pass in darkness until my eyelids flip backwards allowing the dim light of the room to enter my retinas.
"You looked like you were a gonner, my friend." Kayla vocalizes to me with concern in her beautiful cow-like eyes. I sit up and respond. "We were hit. We were hit!" They attacked us."
"Nobody attacked nobody, pal --- I'm Kayla by the way And this is my brother Sanjii and my first mates Nort and Dweezle. -- We collided with your ship it seems. You are part of Operation Pacific Thunder, yes?"
I moan. "I was yes. I'm antoine Musclejouz, of the ship The Classifier SS-7. Your ship?"
"Dragnot 42-E" blurts out Norton, out of turn. "Pleased to meet your acquaintance, mate!"
"Yeah. I'm glad you found me out there." I turn to Sanjay. "And THANK YOU! I was a dead man out there but for you. Thank the heavens you showed up. Let me tell you something. I don't believe in God but I sometimes talk to him just in case. Well this time I thought to him that I wanted a helping hand. The hand was furry. Just like yours! But then I lost consciousness and started to sink. You must have yanked my hair at just the right moment!"
"I live to serve eend proteect" says Sanjay as he looks affectionately at me with a sparkle in his eyes. Come into my quarters everyone and have some breakfast."
The time is now 0715 zulu time.
We climb the rickety spiral staircase and enter another very cramped room with nothing but a small bed, and a make-shift kitchen. There is a chamber pot and a half opened chest on the floor where Sanjay keeps his snorkle gear.
"Cozy place," I say.
"Yesh, it servsh me well. For over 16 years!" Sanjay slurs. "Come. I will make some coconut-curried pokoras and some darinjili tea, courtesy of the queen." He works his magic on the stove and no sooner could the group speak out in objection, everything was prepared and ready to serve. Piping hot and delicious.
"Sissy mentioned something about an Operation Pacific Thunder. Would someone tell me about this?"
My eyes bulge outwards in surprise. I was caught off-guard with a half-eaten pokora stuffed in my gaping mouth. I then mumble, "Well the mission is double-D top secret but basically it was to transport fuel to our fighter jets stationed in the Chatham Islands. You know them?"
"Yesh!" slurres Sir Sanjay once again (what was causing this I will never know). "They are a small cluster of islands, some populated, 500 km east of Christchurch. But I didn't know that there was a navy base their."
"Well that's the classified bit." Kayla states with a blush. "Nort, do you have anything to add?"
"No my dear."
"Well then shut up."
"but I didn't say anythin..."
"Stay quiet anyhow." Kayla scoffs. "Anyhow Sanjii, brother-from-another-mother, I never told you that I was a part of this mission because I wasn't sure we were going to travel by this route. Besides, you don't have a telephone and sending letters is pointless because you don't know how to read. Anyhow I didn't think I would see you this time. But I have so much I want to tell you!"
...
By now the thunder has all but dwindled away to a purr and the sun gloriously rises above the particulate horizon. The Dragnot 42-E and Classifier SS-7 are all but a memory in the minds of this now comfortable and warm gang. Only the heavens know what happened to the rest of the crews and the final fate of Operation Pacifc Thunder. For now, life is in a state of returning normalicy. Kayla and Sir Sanjay Gupta, the lovable Dweezle, Norton, and I, your narrator, live on for other great adventures.
Till next time, This is Antoine Musclejouz signing off.
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