Shipwreck Lullaby

I shut my eyes tightly and braced for impact. My body shattered the water like glass, scattering droplets across the cool air. I dropped with startling violence, reaching depth with terrifying speed. The waves pulled at my flailing limbs, and my panic rose with the tides. A sense of overwhelming helplessness flooded over me, immediate in my collision with this watery beast. It brought forth a feeling as primal as my growing need to breathe. These monstrous waves were relentless, with a ravenous appetite. First they took my ship and now they came back for me. Guiding my puny body to the bottomless pit of its collective belly. Its hunger so unceasing, so brutal, even the skies opened up in mourning. The clouds poured out incessantly for my unsalvageable soul. To my horror, the heavy rain seemed to expand the ocean even further.

I could not think of fighting back. I did not know how to. Every sailor understood the risk: no man was tougher than the raging sea. And I floated there, a mere microbe to the enormous liquid-salted mass, which punched down on itself with waves of foamy fists. There was a sudden flash of electricity above the surface, but the darkness I was heading towards swallowed any fragment of light. The sea was a God at war, and I drowned in the wound of the aftermath. A battle that swarmed acres of land with rivers of its cerulean blood. That same refracting blue substance that took me under. Until I could sink no further. Viciously it bathed me, and water trickled into my lungs. All I could do was freeze, wasting time. A mad thought crossed my mind—to look for my ship. Then the panic deepened, turned much more serious. Desperate and out of options, I aimed to slow my heartbeat, knowing I had to fight.

I ignored the pain through my state of shock. I had one directive. With what little force left in my body, I kicked my feet. It felt futile, as though I were dragging on for lifetimes. But I could see the surface nearing. My heart rate increased once more. Everything ached and I was becoming dizzy from holding my breath. I wanted to rebel, to breathe in and fish the waters in case of a molecule of oxygen. At last, I jumped through the suffocating veil of sea and broke the surface. I convulsed instantly, snorting up the dribble of water that had slipped into my lungs. The air lurched at me with a euphoric gust. I could taste it. Felt it fill my deflated chest and spirit with all of its sweet life. Never had breathing been so intoxicating. My fear subsided briefly and relief took its place. I gasped in breath after breath. Gorging myself. Despite the chaos ensuing around me and the vicious pitter-patter of rain pounding my head like hydrogen stones, I could only revel in air.

But in my delirious haze, I failed to account for the building tides. My mind could not comprehend the gravity of this mountainous wave above me. Its menacing height shocked me out of my sudden relief. The swell mocked me. It seemed to vibrate with crude laughter at my foolishness, at my believing that I could have possibly escaped its wrath. My despair meant nothing to it. Much less did my life. As a final act of cruelty, the colossal wave clobbered me into the flying debris of my sunken vessel. There she was at last: my beloved Ayyur, which I had sailed most of my days with. Her nautical beauty turned into the weapons with which the currents ravaged me. A piece of her metal smashed my shin into fragments. With blinding pain, my bones scattered like mosaic pieces. Again, I was yanked beneath the surface. So thoroughly was I defeated, that I could not spare the feeling of sorrow. This was it for me. A cautionary tale come true. I would continue to suffer, and then I would die.

The same sequence of agony repeated itself all over. But this time I was twice as weak. And seemed to have resolved on the end. I used to believe that mourning followed solely and always after death. That was before I heard my dying mind speak. The physical torment was starting to leave the forefront, now that survival was a story from a past life. And death, in its place, had become imminent. It was not a matter of deep spiritual acceptance, but merely a biological process beyond my control. When the fight wore off, the body knew to submit. As I convulsed with each pulsating heartbeat, a rush of seawater streamed into my lungs. Like a feeling of deep tearing, it was building to rupture.

I felt saddened that it could end this way. Alone, drowning in a pit of ever darkening blue. I would be lost to these waters forevermore. Here is where I would decompose, drifting into the mouths of sharks. When they finished digesting me, my very last remains would snow down on bottom feeders. Yet, what was I to do? It would not matter much longer. I simply wished to be given the decency to cry. Not for myself, but for my ship and the dreams of mine she’d carried. Perhaps this was my path all along: inevitably merging with the stream that had called to me.

My pain started to fade notably. As did the sensations in my arms and legs. I knew that I was dissolving, somehow unbecoming. All my molecules were reversing. My body knew it too, slowly ceasing its pursuit towards recovery.

All that remained was one last attempt at respiration, a languid spasm stirring in the ribs in search for breath. So I did it. I inhaled. The water grinding my chest became lighter than air. It washed my heart, filled my ears with a gentle susurration. Every part of my body, of my spirit, lifted. The solace I found in breathing again was so intense that I could not bother acknowledging the sheer insanity of it. So engulfed was I by the water, tasting better than any particle of pure oxygen ever had. I must have been slipping into eternity, of this there was no doubt. I remembered the sayings about a moment of peace glossing over a dying body. There was ease in submission. The final act of survival commenced as I let go.

But I would not fade as my consciousness persisted. If anything, the underwater world cleared. And my vision with it. Out of a heavy blue haze that had worn on me like a mantle, came an opening. First, it was tunnel vision. Then, coral reefs swaying. Their rich hues were nearly blinding. With peach-blushed tentacles, these corals danced to a tune I could not yet hear. Life bloomed between their cluttered and textured bodies. Fishes with colours across a broad visible spectrum swam in quick, short bursts. They rapidly waved their tiny tails. I could barely grasp what was unravelling before me. One of the slightly bigger fish flamed like the sun. It had ripe blood-orange fins in the shape of water wings. The majestic little marine creatures paid my suspended body no mind. Behind their swimming tails, I watched something else start to peek out of the coral and their skeletal structures. It was not solid. Instead, a dark blue vapour appeared. As if an electric eel had been stripped of skin and bone, but not of essence. It glided my way in fluid motions. There was no fear coursing through me, I noted. Only awe. With my eyes I traced its smoky trails that continued to near me. Elegantly, it coiled around me. Its watery limbs grazed my skin, and glowed. Bioluminescent waves emitted from its snake-shaped self. I was sure they sparked life back into me. If this was it, then death must mean re-emergence.

Though I had a name that I remembered. As well as my previously fleeting existence. I knew it was still me, for there was nothing as familiar as my life. My physical body elevated, and the waters now acted in my favour. They held my limbs to align with their flow. That is when I heard it too: the song to which everything waltzed. The chorus that had struck peace into this nightmare. Ocean bubbles popped gently around me. I could swear everything under the surface had become a woven melody; all elements harmonising. The waves were no longer a terrifying thunder. They tuned to the sound of water hitting the shores, reminiscent of a warm beach night under the stars. A low, hummed serenity imbued my blood. I eased, all tension further dissipating. A revelation came to me, whispered by this living brine—this was the home I had always belonged to. I saw it in the reefs and their pinkish, flowery hands. And the fish too, who were no longer in a hurry. They circled the coral formation lazily. At this moment, I embraced the incandescent bluish tendrils as part of me. It had fully shaped to my frame.

My mind grew lighter while the song progressed. An angelic voice resounded in layered harmonies. Singing in different octaves all at once, with a single source playing a collective melody. Whatever this might have been was attuned to the ocean. It released sonar waves of paradisiacal crooning, a musical quiver that vibrated the sea. It swivelled over me, thrumming me along its marine world. Behind waving corals, which eventually parted, the lulling creature came nearer. My body remained in place. It obeyed, hypnotised. The creature’s hymn bounced against the walls of the sea, reverberating around for miles—a vacuum of a song. I became encased in it. It flowed through my pores, and kindled me aglow. I lived just to hear this song; everything until this point had led me to it, this cosmic redemption. The ocean had been turned into a cathedral of tranquillity. The scent of algae and sweet decay surrounded me. Sweeter than it should have been. It was hard to believe I had wasted all that time above the surface. Had I known what awaited me past the point of drowning, I would have stoked the fire on my ship, and jumped. Although a strange thought for a grieving mind to have, I didn’t resist it. I didn’t want to resist it.

With pupils dilated, I witnessed the emergence of a dark glimmer. Scales reflected silver and aegean. The moonlight suddenly seemed much brighter, and the once raging storm had turned into a soft serein. There shone a chrome ray of moonshine like a halo framing the creature. Its tail glistened and the music of the ocean kept tumbling from its tongue. I hung motionless in the water, still dressed by those luminous trails. One moment I was dying and the next I came upon a different realm, where none of the rules I knew applied. The violent sea had been tamed, submerging me tenderly. Unlike the sodium that had viciously burned me, this saltwater was warm, kind.

I was wholly serene when the creature slowly approached. Not by choice, but out of an unfamiliar necessity. Its silhouette kept growing alarmingly, but I was far from alarmed. No matter what this being was, for some strange reason I was convinced it would give me the clarity I sought. At last, it circled me in the shadows, swimming upwards and heading for my upper body. Its tail swished an uninterrupted brushstroke painting bluish silver patterns my way. To my shock the creature’s fishy scales did not sit on thick blubber, but grew out of pliable… human skin.

The strong body of a woman hovered in my vision. Her tail ended at her rounded belly, where a protective layer of fat hugged her muscular abdomen. A siren. As grotesque as she was mesmerising. Out of all the stories I had heard, nothing could have prepared me enough. She was a dark shade of teal dotted with metallic gleams. Her scaled breasts sat as two dew drops on her heaving chest. In fact, her entire flesh was coated in shiny scales. It marked her undeniable beauty with harrowing beastliness. Phosphorescent eyes locked on me, big and round. Mostly pupil and very little colour. They made me feel tiny, insignificant, though not absent purpose. As she drew even closer, I was able to see swirls of aquamarine and specks of gold in her irises. A flood of warmth started in my lungs. Filling my head quickly. I had never seen anything, anyone as terrifying and ethereal as she was. I instinctively knew I never would again.

I watched her lips form that melody that had been ringing with the heavenly lilt of Arcadia. She trilled me her aria, whilst curling the currents around me into a void. The school of jewels wading in their reefs were washed away. Stupefied, I had sense for nothing but her. I was an infant star, and she the universe that cradled me.

I could no longer recount the concept of aching, of suffering. It had become alien to me then. ‘Being nothing, it sets you free’, her sonic pulse told me. Reaching out a webbed hand, she stroked my cheek with her clawed nails. Whatever remnants of doubt I had eroded with her touch. She cocked her head to the side. Her vocalisation slowly faded into froth. Like an aquatic deity she culled the abyss into silence. And it stirred so easily to each of her whims. Naively, I figured she must have been smiling at me. Even though the manner in which her mouth parted sent terror down my spine. It was as if my ability to reason had been shut down. I was paralysed not only in body, but in spirit and mind. Gradually, her jaw lowered beyond what should have been possible. Confusion struck in the backdrop of my catatonic state, corroding my mind further. With her maw split wide open, she revealed to me her rows and rows of steel teeth; vicious blades blinking in lunar light. And in those thick razor wires, I glimpsed my fate. Reality engulfed me at once. She was not the birth of the cosmos after all—she was the entropy that ended it.