Author Games Compilation [Cycle 2]

Task 1 - Peter Bancain

The air drifting up over the silver gangway came from the ocean and wrapped warmly about a multitude of exposed ankles, all clanging up the metal. It brushed the hair on a man's bare arms, tousled the carefully placed locks atop his head, touched him with a breeze so salty that, when he parted his lips to lick them, it seemed to suck all the moisture free of his mouth. He welcomed the taste, though, and smiled, because there was ocean beneath his feet now, and the Sunlit Mariner up ahead. There was nowhere to go but the Sunlit Mariner; even if he wanted to back out now, the line behind him was so clogged he'd have a better chance of diving to the thin stretch of water down below.

The claustrophobia of the situation only made him smile wider, only made his chest tighten with a rising thrill. The Sunlit Mariner. Holy. Shit.

She was a monument in size and grandiosity, decks reaching so far down he had to crane his head all the way down to see where it met the ocean, deck reaching so far up he had to crane his head all the way back to see where it ended. Gargantuan in length, too, but granted, he hadn't many experiences with anything this horizontal before. She was, like, so horizontal.

The portholes were countless, and even if he wanted to try, the sides glistened a white so polished it would probably blind him to stare for so long. Nearly pulled a whole salute out of him, it did. That would be inappropriate though. In front of all these rich folks, at least, who'd probably been on ships twice the size as this. They'd turn their nose at him, pah. They wouldn't be dumb enough to stare and blind themselves (if they even could after lifetimes of staring at shiny silver platters, but that was tea for another time).

Quickly, he averted his gaze. He wouldn't be a very good cameraman if he went and blinded himself, now would he? Maybe some other time he could ogle, some other time when the truth was already unearthed and he could rest easy, but now? No. Not when those decks reached down below those waves, decks without windows through which to see the ongoings of the lower decks. Not when those lower decks stayed locked and a million twisted experiments lay in the dark.

Well, he'd bring them to light. It was his life's duty, had to be. If it wasn't, what good was he to anyone? Sure, he could try his hand at writing BuzzFeed articles that everyone would ultimately ignore and instead laud as "lol shit 4 brains content just post anothre quiz alr lmao," but did he want that? No! That would be a miserable and purposeless life in the pursuit of capital that would never allow him to make his mother proud and finally move into a house of his own! A house? In this economy? Sadly, no. What he wanted was justice, truth, higher purpose to life and this was it. Helius Inc, you sneaky bastards, you're going down in the name of the law. And the law's name is

"Peter Bancain, fifty-four hour passenger, deck thirteen, midship, is this accurate to your stay with us, sir?"

A man hangs through the open door on the side of the ship, blinking at the identification hung around Peter's neck. The latter glances down at his own chest, makes a grunt of approval, a bit like the peanut-butter baby ingrained in his mind from years of being on the internet for far too long, and then offers a two-handed thumbs-up. "Yup. That's me, broski."

The officer inhales sharply but otherwise doesn't regard the nickname. "And you have confirmation you passed security and your belongings have been checked?"

Those perky thumbs of his dive into his shirt pocket and extract a small slip, which he hands to the officer. With a curt nod, then, the man lets him pass through, and it's all he can do to not skip through the doorway and frolic down the corridor. He's glad he doesn't - a woman in a crisp dark uniform smiles at him warmly, offers a much kinder nod than the officer'd given, and says, "Welcome to CTS."

With two cheeks full of joy, he steps over to her and offers a hand, a gesture she doesn't expect but she shakes it nonetheless. Earnestly, and with full eye contact, Peter says, "Thank you. That is a great hat. Also, can you remind me when the cardiovascular tech panel begins? It hasn't changed at all?"