New Homeport Island (33 page)

Everyone was too stunned to respond or even dwell on
 the idea. Michael said, “So…I guess we make them a fishing
 boat now?” Michelle replied, “As soon as they start delivering
 grain.”
Artimus didn’t head right back to the landing site, “He
 looked at the only thing he had gained to offer but couldn’t help
 but to see the accomplishment of it. The cloth bag was made
 from plant fibers on the island and resembled burlap, the
 dominos were the standard rectangles divided in the middle with
 a line and divots that had been darken but also had a decorative
 pattern not unlike the plants of the island. He decided to
 embellish upon the design by using plants to stain the decorative
 design, maybe a little flare of color would add some leverage to
 whatever scheme he could devise.  
As Dave Artimus added green, to the Japanese
 knotweed embellishments which he took for bamboo, and add
 red dots to the sorghum which took to be holly berries he sat
 thinking, “What the hell am I supposed to tell these guys?” He
 heard some laughter in the distance and realized it came from
 down the beach away from the landings as well as over the cliff
 like slope of the island directly across from the boiler site and
 decided to find out who was there.
Artimus didn’t want to be caught ‘deviating from
 mission’ so he was as stealthy as he could be. The majority of
 the black sailors had found a way to slip over to a secluded
 beach where they were playing what appeared to be lawn darts.
In Dave’s prior experience as a captain in the navy ethnic
 segregation was always a bad sign but so long as there was at
 least one Hispanic, or Pilipino, things seemed to work out okay,
 but that wasn’t the case here. Dave quietly slipped back toward
 the clearing in the tree line to face the rest of the music.

Artimus went over toward Bruce Deckly carrying the
 small bag and Atrisia saw it she called out, “Tell me those aren’t
 magic beans.” Artimus looked at Bruce and asked, “Did
 anything subside at all.” Bruce replied, “No, sir. I did my best
 but it seems at the very least they expect to strip you of your title
 and may want to incarcerate you for two weeks.” Artimus
 announced, “I have here a gift from the natives, a gesture of
 good will. They have provided us with the only entertainment
 they could muster, that being dominos.” Chief Dotle   cried out,
“What the fuck are those assholes doing over there.” Artimus
 signaled his cabin boy and Robert Wildly thought to himself, ‘he
 said to defend the natives…’ so he interjected, “more than
 you’re doing over here jack ass, need I remind you they are
 providing the food!!?” Artimus rubbed his eyes and thought to
 himself, ‘That wasn’t what I was looking for’ then voiced
 loudly, “The natives are providing the food, but they abandoned
 their obligations to this crew. They are however…keeping us
 alive.” Koleson retorted, “So wha’d you get us honey bear?”
Artimus once again got that odd, twisted homicidal look on his
 face and dropped the small bag of dominos and sprinted at
Koleson tackling him and yelling, “I’m gonna give you a…” his
 dialogue continued but was all unintelligible gibberish.  
 As Dave Artimus was hauled kicking and snarling
 back to his cage Bruce Deckly tried to reassure him, “Dave it’s
 just not your day.” Becky Clarkson commented from near the
 tree line to Jane, “I think all that time on the water damaged his
 vocabulary, he doesn’t go into a homicidal rage, he goes into a
 homosexual rage.”
As four men held the cage door closed and it was
 secured with lashing and braces and pins, Artimus pointed at

Koleson yelling, “I’m gonna’ suck your fleeberson epchky
 cokosaflaaahhh!!”    
There was a pause in the trial and those domino tiles
 sat on the judges table for three days, rations were delivered and
 as had become the custom both those at the landing site and
 those delivering the rations made a significant effort to show no
 signs of aggression, like feeding tigers in a cage.
Mike Elper waited to resume his role as the judge but
 was looking for more of a leadership position. He tried to get
 them to dig the trench necessary for the fire to cure the clay for
 the ‘evaporative distillation plant’, or boiler as we were calling
 them but the landings group was too militant. The existence of a
 chain of command was their first and only priority and the junior
 ranking refused to dig their own graves.
He tried to make a fishing net and was mocked for
 trying to make himself a dress. They demonstrated to him every
 way possible that they would not be led by a third class petty
 officer all while their captain sat in a wooden cage deliriously
 enraged.
He sat playing dominos with Eric Milson and as they
 played he said, “Yep, screw the fishing, screw the water, let’s
 just all starve or make those assholes do it.” using his thumb to
 gesture over his shoulder to our side of the island. Eric laughed
 as he placed a domino saying, “They aren’t in the military.”
Mike retorted with a snide fake laugh, “Ya, which does what?”
Eric responded, “Just relax. Look your just a third class, I was a
 third class once. You’ll understand once you make second class,
 you just have to start moving in that direction.” Artimus in his
 cage nearby violently shook the bars and said, “Ya, you might
 even make captain someday then they’ll cage you too.” Mike

said to Eric, “Well..? Your retirement plan is talking to you
 dude.”  
Chapter Nine
Caging a man’s desires
Artimus has been in his cage waiting for his passive
 aggressive rage to subside for hours . The trial has been in recess
 so long some have lost interest or thought that it had become a
 game and lost its propriety.  
Artimus has been requesting visitation time with
 everyone to establish his motives were pure and that he was still
 a good guy. He is massing social support and sympathy, with
 emotional ploy’s and romantic images of a Navy Captain
 valiantly fighting for his crew, his ship, and his station. Those
 romantic images had a back lash though, bragging to his own
 crew about the hard work they had done which earned him merit
 and credit and afford them only a bent back and a damaged
 social life. In speaking with more than one of the former
 crewmembers he placed himself working directly on a critical
 problem with a chief petty officer speaking directly to the third
 class or second class petty officer that actually did do the work.
For Dave Artimus former captain of DD-964 his cage
 had finally become a jail cell rather than the antics of a wayward
 crew, sleep deprived and malnourished.  
Bruce Deckly acting as defense attorney fought in
 deliberations rather than the actual trial to determine reasonable
 and arguable charges. They narrowed it down to the captain
 simply did not know anything about the existing hazards on the

ship or it’s failing condition and judged him to be criminally
 negligent.  
Having refused a navy achievement medal and sat in the
 captain’s chair as a reward instead, by the captains instruction
 for a day, by the squadron commanders instruction for three
 days, and by order of the department of defense upon calling for
 special deputization to ensure the legality of my being in that
 chair, for two weeks. I practiced a high level of paranoia;
 reading each and every instruction; designing work sheets for
 each department head, division officer, and work center
 supervisor. And through these efforts I found what, had I been
 ignorant of, could lead to a charge of criminal neglect and
 guarded myself with work sheets for the captains station as
 well…which turned mostly into ‘how-to’s’ as far as filling in
 standard forms. I found the job was nearly effortless, but also
 analyzing the captain’s usual way of doing things reflected the
 job gets much harder if you have a political agenda.
The criminal neglect Artimus was found guilty of, mostly
 regarded engineering spaces and equipment as well as material
 state of various other systems throughout the ship. A preliminary
 conclusion was drawn as to the loss of the ship. First, that as a
 result of trauma no one fully remembered or understood what
 had happened. Second, the command as a unit failed to respond.
And lastly, the unit had not been maintained, either in material
 state and fighting ability, nor in personnel qualifications or
 training. Team building had developed into a tangent and
 become a means of bullying and molesting subordinates as a
 copping mechanism for the mutually assured failure dynamic
 built into the units’ social structure.
Artimus was ordered to surrender the title and entitlements
 of Captain, but Bruce managed to maintain Artimus’s station as

a commanding officer using the existence of the ‘natives’ as
 cause. It was as though there were two entirely different forms
 of chaos clashing together causing an apparition of order. Much
 in the same way legitimacy was derived from mob rule, once a
 situation or claim to ownership was deemed legitimate the basis
 of the argument became law and would apply to other
 circumstances where appropriate.
At the boiler site the wild boar had been strung up by its
 hide legs from a tree. We were making the sharpest cutting
 instruments we could. I had considered trying to make glass
 using the fire box bellows we had made from paper derived
 from plant fibers of the island and a new firebox shaped more
 like a kiln than the boilers were. The only example I had ever
 seen was at a renaissance festival.
It looked like some kind of road kill up there but it made
 my mouth water, the fish were good but it wasn’t real meat. So,
I worked with Mitch making a kiln that focused on a hot pot to
 melt sifted sand. I only needed a shard that wouldn’t break and it
 could even just be volcanic glass. We hadn’t used the bellows
 that much and all the charcoal that had been wrapped in paper
 was still sitting in a pile. We had been doing these things as a
 part of tending the boilers as though it were just a habitual ritual.
We started with some tinder at the bottom and had a hole
 dug that was less than a foot deep as a fire pit. The clay bricks
 and extra thick bowl were still wet, but this fire would be hotter
 than most. On top of the tinder we piled the charcoal but saved
 the paper, it takes too long to make to waste it. Once we got it
 hot enough there was a red crack pattern visible in the bottom of
 the bowl, we had sifted the sand first through our island made
 cloth then through dungaree shirts leaving us with a white dust
 looking sand and occasional actual grain of sand.

From what I’d seen of glass working we should be able to
 get a shard like shape from laying the molten glass flat and
 letting it settle. The majority of the work if not all the work was
 keeping that firebox hot enough, smoke and steam from the wet
 clay sputtering, cracking, and popping…and all the while I was
 terrified of a sand explosion or glass splatter. We kept adding
 the fine white sand until eventually we had a red hot puddle. I
 had burnt some of the white clay usually mixed in with the red
 onto a slender straight stick and started working the glass, ‘thick
 but sharp’ is something I continued to whisper to myself.
Once we had it done it almost looked like a work of art
 blackened, yellowed, and even a few transparent spots. It had a
 short somewhat rounded handle we wrapped with twine, and we
 used it with a sawing motion with every expectation that it
 would shatter and cut up the hand of whoever was using it, so
 we used every precaution.
Once the skin was pulled away not one of us was anything
 less than an expert butcher. We tore that boar apart expertly but
 with a hast and cheer that made it seem to be a piñata at a
 birthday party. The meat was smoked and barbequed, we did
 manage a few sausages though we didn’t end up able to collect
 the blood. We didn’t save any at all but after feasting on that
 boar, we realized we will absolutely need to start ranching them
 in a chorale and we set to devise a pen system that could hold a
 digger like a boar. What we sent to the landings was just a
 charity portion but we had no idea how hungry we really were
 until that boar was opened. The knife we treated with reverence
 as though it were a holy relic, that thing shattering in our hands
 would cause damage we would never survive.    
 Artimus had been in his cage for three weeks and those
 like James Hudlow were left to a wandering bizarre life, those

that followed Chief Randy Brosuer  were left with a military
 flare intact.  
The natives referred to themselves as the diligent group,
 pointing out that there was absolutely a delirious group on the
 island, and leaving only one suitable descriptor for the rest…the
 militant group.  
Artimus of course would only fit in to that militant group
 and would have to regain his station. As far as still holding the
 title of commanding officer that did not apply to the whole
 island by his lawyers own argument.
Deckly walked up to the knotweed cage and said to
Artimus, “Your cell time is through sir,” and with a big smile he
 continued, “Welcome back to the island.” Artimus replied with a
 hoarse voice, “Ya, thanks. I have so many plans most of them
 contradict each other and only one or two actually make sense.
Where are the ones that stood beside me?” Deckly responded,
“They regarded it as a procedure sir. We have several that are
 just delirious, we have the natives, and then we have those that
 stood beside you.”  
We diligent watched from the mountain top the whole
 while. The extra fishing boat we were going to give them was
 waiting for his release we didn’t want to be part of an escalation
 leading to his execution. We had also managed to bend and
 refine what would be the keel of our rescue ship. We realized
 that without any nails we would have to derive wood sap as glue  
 and use smoke as sealant and wooded dowels and pegs as
 fasteners, so we dubbed the ship the Woodenpeg.  
Mike Elpers brought over some of the militant group for a
 work detail building the ship. They would burn a tree trunk and
 split it into planks using what was left of our keys. We decided
 to try and make some ceramic wedges that could take a