Part XI: Night of 1,000 Dolphins

Not being a sailor, he wasn't familiar with sailor's customs, their ways of life, or what they did for a living. Although he was pretty sure it was sailing.

He didn't know, for example, the old tale of Sammy the Deck Swabber, who swabbed the deck so hard he swabbed a hole right through it. He also had never heard the story about the island where old sailors retired, until they got sick of retirement, lifted the island of it's moorings, and sailed it off into the sunset.

Hiro was well aware of the Great Fish. Every boy who had grown up in Japan knew about the Great Fish. Mothers would chide their children: "Now Hiro, don't go into the water too far, or the Great Fish will get you;" "If you keep making that infernal racket, I'll throw you to the Great Fish;" and "Beware the Great Fish. Beware! BEWWWWWAAAAARRRREEEEEE!!!!"

As Hiro had gotten older, he had realized that the Great Fish was a myth made to scare children, like vampires, or government subsidized health care. In time, he forgot all he knew about the Great Fish, forgot he had ever spent an entire summer staying away from the well just in case the Great Fish swam up it and got him.

Sitting huddled in the center of his boat, shaking with fear, Hiro realized he had been terribly wrong. If he had just seen a giant eye below the surface of the water, he could have said, "Wow. A giant eye. Too bad it's not attached to anything." If he had just seen a huge chasm with teeth open the depths of the sea, he could have said, "Huh, the water is growing teeth now. Better avoid that spot." And if he had just seen a dolphin disappear below the surface, he could have thought, "Magic!"

But all three of these things had happened at once. Hiro stared at the ocean, and hoped it didn't stare back at him.

The Great Fish, the stories said, wouldn't kill sailors. It would swallow them and their boats whole, digesting them for awhile, and then spitting them back out halfway around the world. That is, except on the Night of 1,000 Dolphins.

On the Night of 1,000 Dolphins, the Great Fish would call the creatures of the sea to it, singing a horrible song that screeched through the night. On that night, if a sailor was unlucky enough to be caught near the Great Fish, he would be swallowed for all time, living his life, half-digested, inside the Great Fish.

It was also said that inside the Great Fish lived other... things. Nobody knew what they were, but it was generally believed they were horrible. Which isn't actually too hard to imagine, what with them living inside a giant fish's stomach and all.

Hiro didn't want to be swallowed by the Great Fish. He didn't want to end up on the other side of the world, with no chance to ever get back to Japan. And he certainly didn't want to end up in the Great Fish forever.

He had to get moving. Carefully standing up, Hiro began to roll out his sail, hoping to catch the light Southern breeze. The boat slowly began to move in the water, inch by inch. Hiro began to relax. He was going to get far, far away from this patch of sea.

The X-Ball glinted softly in the moonlight on the deck of the ship, and Hiro smiled, seeing that it was exuding a warm, friendly glow. Perhaps things were looking up, he thought.

A terrible note tore through the air, shattering the peaceful evening. And Hiro froze, staring out at the school of dolphins that were swimming around his boat...*

*Which is meant to signify the beginning of the Night of 1,000 Dolphins. Hence the title of this part of the story.


NEXT WEEK: Enter The Whirlpool


THE COMPLETE HISTORY OF X-BALL:
PART I       PART II       PART III       PART IV

PART V      PART VI      PART VII      PART VIII

PART IX      PART X      PART XI