Tue Oct 26, 2021 7:51 pm
Recount of First Mate Quinn of the Turucambi Convoy
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*This post is in spirit of Quint's speech from the movie Jaws.
First Mate Quinn’s recount of the Turucambi convoy: The Kraken wrapped some of it’s tentacles around two of our masts. Was coming back from a bootleg supply run to Turucambi, from Port Toli. A convoy of six ships sailing together. We just received the rare corals, shells and rare supplies requested by the port and were headed back. 300 plus men went into the water. Vessel went down in 12 minutes. It was like the Kraken just wanted to destroy the ship. Didn’t see the first sahaugin and sharks for about half an hour. Tiger, 13 footer with a sahaugin warrior wielding a trident riding it. Know how you know that when you’re in the water mate? You tell by lookin’ from the dorsal to the tail. What we didn’t know was our bootleg supply run had been so secret no distress signal had been sent…..
No one knew where we were when we didn’t return and no one looked for us for over a week past due coming back to port. Very first light mate, sharks and predators come crusin’. We formed ourselves into tight groups and grabbed what we could to defend ourselves. Kinda like old squares of troops on a battlefield, like the Battle of a Fortnights Length. The idea was, shark or sahaugin comes to the nearest man, that man starts poundin’, hollerin’, screamin’. Sometimes the shark go away, sometimes he wouldn’t go away. Sometimes that evil from the sea looks right into ya, right into your eyes. You know a thing about a sahaugin, he’s got lifeless eyes. Black eyes, like a doll’s eyes. He comes at ya, doesn’t seem to be livin’until he bites or claws ya and those black eyes roll over wide. And then, then you hear that terrible high-pitched screamin’. The ocean turns red. In spite of the pounding and hollering, they all come in. They rip you to pieces. You know, by the end of that first dawn, lost a hundred men. I don’t know how many sahaugin and sharks, maybe a thousand. I don’t know how many men. They averaged six an hour.
On the next morning, I bumped into an old shipmate of mine going way back, Bill Roberts, from Port Toli, a boatswain’s mate. I thought he was asleep. Reached over to wake him up. Bobbed up and down in the water like a top. Upended. Well, he’d been bitten in half below the waist. Noon the fifth day, mate, a small fishing boat spotted us with a young captain, much younger than you mate. Lucky for us, there was a Sea Mage on board who sent a message out for a bigger ship to come pick us up. Hours later a large sailing ship comes in and positions itself to pick us up. That was the time I was most frightened, waiting for my turn. So, 318 men went in the water. 27 men come out. The sahaugin, sharks and creatures of the Oljatt sea took the rest. I’ll never go back to Turucambi or the Oljatt Sea. The rare corals, shells and treasures are incredible. Tales of underwater cities, reef communities and the terrible Jungle of Lost Ships are enough temptation for those tryin’ to make their mark in adventure, to me it’s not worth it.
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