TEN

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WHILE DEALING WITH THE VILE HUNGER and the terror of being lost in the middle of the ocean, Anij starts to think about his parents. This kind of urgency always springs up whenever he is powerless. He starts to look for his parents again. This time he reassures himself that he will find at least one of them. There is always hope, even when he knows that he is shooting in complete darkness. And with no proper light, he can’t decipher anyone’s face who is just over a few feet away. It doesn’t really matter how meticulously he observes faces. They all look alike in the dark. He scans in all directions again. But the eventuality kicks him out of the line of hope. Only rotating red sirens are the source of lights here, just like in a butcher shop. With tedious eyeball-rolling, he somehow finds his mom and calls to her loudly, “Mom!”

The woman turns her face. But she is not his mom, of course. Anij quickly puts on a bitter smile. Tears of joy climb back up again to his eyes. He keeps looking at everyone’s scared eyes. Quickly he spots another one and now he reassures himself again. He stands up and calls out to her, “Mom!”

He gets close to her. Yet again that is not his mom. His brain is hallucinated by his eagerness to find his parents. As he tries to get back to his seat, he accidentally steps on someone’s leg.

“Watch out! You little brat!” Anij gets a smack. A little too harsh for a kid who is so desperate to find his parents. The smack was hard enough to knock him down to the deck. There is no need to complain. His life is already sorry enough.

He gets up immediately as a reflex then apologizes to the man who had just smacked him. “I am sorry, sir. I was just trying to find my parents . . . I was just — ”

The man speaks very quietly and slowly with a psycho look in his eyes. “I am already in a very, very, very bad mood. Okay?”

Anij looks at him and apologizes to the man again. “Sorry, sir . . . It will not happen again . . .”

The man gives Anij a dismal look for a good five seconds. In fact, Anij doesn’t really care if he is in a bad mood or looks scary. He gathers himself and goes back to his seat. Not even a single accusation from anyone against that immoral man. Anij is deeply disappointed with everyone, as they had all given up their morality. They must have vomited their duties and rights long before.

After numerous searches for his parents, he cannot see them anywhere. His sweat throws itself up out of his skin, as much as he hates to be in the sun. He keeps attempting to find them. All the luck in the world must have run out quite some time ago. His eyes are giving up. But his brain whips his muscles to search for his parents over and over.

A big siren goes off with ear-tearing volume. It echoes on and on.

Anij shivers and is woken up by the sound. It is again very dark. He cannot see much at all except by the spinning red siren lights. Every few hours, the siren lights spin around the cargo and light up the area, looking as horrific as in any horror movie. The red lights spin around and never seem to stop. Everyone is just pissed off at the red lights. A man abruptly stands and walks up to the siren. He looks at the siren as it shows his face with the spinning red light. Everyone is curious to see what he will do. He gets closer and closer to the siren then punches the siren with all his power. The plastic cover shatters and the siren stops. His hand is bleeding, with a few shards stuck in it. He doesn’t even look at his hand or seem to feel his pain. It must give him a joy after the destruction of their enemy. With the same scary face, he goes back to his seat. Everyone is shocked; but also happy, because they don’t have to deal with the stupid siren anymore. A few words of thanks are spoken. This is the first quiet riot for them or the first revolution against their unbeatable nemesis.

While all this was happening, Anij is just leaning on the corner and looking at the wall. The wall must be talking to his old memories. The wall can be Anij’s friend for now. His eyes are moist.

“Squeak!”

Anij looks at the wall.

“Squeak!”

He recognizes it. It is the same noise that he heard yesterday. He puts his ear to the wall. He can’t hear it, since the engine noise is already pounding so loudly. He repositions his ear again on the wall. There is nothing again. A long pause. Then suddenly, a little hole unveils itself beside his foot.

What is that? he asks himself. Then he brings his head to the ground for a closer look. There is a rat trying to nibble its way into the cargo. He must have detected some food lying around here. Many thoughts are running on in Anij’s mind. But he doesn’t want to see the rat, so he kicks the hole.

“Squeak!”

The rat stops nibbling. Anij thinks that the rat is scared and has gone away. Wrong. Soon after, the rat comes back and undertakes the destruction of the wall again.

“Squeak. Squeak. Squeak.”

It gets more violent every bite. Anij persistently kicks the hole even harder. No damage is done to the rat. The hole is getting bigger by the minute. While everyone is feeling happy about the absence of the siren, Anij is still kicking the wall. No one cares what Anij is doing with the wall. The hole is now a lot bigger. He can almost see the rat inside the wall. Now there seem to be more rats than just one. Suddenly a stream of cockroaches just pours out from the hole. That is so not what he was expecting! Gross-out to the max! Anij pulls himself away from the hole immediately. The people next to him get pushed aside. Obviously, they are not amused.

“Hey, what are you doing? Stop pushing!”

“Look at those cockroaches!”

“What? Shit!”

“Ack!”

“What the . . . Where the hell are they coming from?”

“Move! Move out of my way!”

“You are in my way!”

“Let’s get out of here! Now!”

“Ahhh!”

As everyone sees the cockroaches, they move away from them as fast as they can. Some guys come closer to the hole and start killing those cockroaches. Others are just running away. This creates a big circle around the hole. Cockroaches are being crushed with their guts out. Surviving cockroaches are running for their lives. After a few seconds, they detect food not too far away from them. This food must have been rotten for a long time. They don’t mind because they are scavengers. They are scuttling away as quickly and precisely as they can to survive without being crushed. People are struggling to get rid of these monsters. Not a dull moment.

“Get out!”

“Leave me alone!”

“Get out of here!”

“Somebody! Do something!”

Lots of people are hopelessly screaming. Of course, the cockroaches outnumber the humans by far. It is no match. The cockroaches simply overrun the entire deck with blazing speed. Just to bring out the mother of aggravation, the rats have been diligently nibbling their way in. Finally they join the party. If hell is filled with inferno, this must be Lucifer’s cousin or something. People just don’t know where to put their feet. Even though they are trying to kill them as fast as they can, it doesn’t look like it will end very soon. Cockroaches are small, but rats are big. And they are both world-class sprinters. No doubt about that. This time, the animal kingdom takes over ground control.

Anij is not far from the hole where everything started. But he is in good shape. The cockroaches and rats were only too eager to get out of the wall. They are nowhere near the hole. It is any animal’s instinct to cover as much territory as possible. While everyone is dancing with the rats and cockroaches, Anij is laughing hard, watching them making stupid gyrations. For a while now, he has been looking for some entertainment. Here it unveils before his eyes.