Hey there, my weekend was alright, I guess, except for a minor episode.
The story really began back on the night of the 13th--you know, the Day of the Pelican in the ancient Aztec calendar. I was up late in the gym, alone, trying to bench 230. To my surprise, I heard a faint murmur from the corner of the gym. Thinking it to be a rodent, I crept over to the shadows whence it came, and to my surprise found fitness celebrity John Basedow pinned to the floor beneath a 400-pound barbell!
His face was contorted in pain, redder than a Polish beet in springtime. I rushed to his aid and hoisted the bar from his chest, but even as I reassured him and administered the Heimlich, I knew it was too late. His ribcage was cracked irrevocably; his lungs, punctured, air whistling through the perforations like doves on the banks of the Yangtze, but less peaceful, because they were punctured lungs and not birds of peace.
As the air continued to whistle and blood continued to flow (and other disgusting cracking noises continued to fill my ears which I dare not describe), I bent over the poor fitness celebrity's broken frame and asked if he had any last words or wishes (secretly hoping, I own, that this man knew the location of a hidden treasure trove).
“My friend,” he said, the air whistling through his lungs with his every word, “the memories are coming back. I cannot escape the sins of my past. As I was squatting, I saw them again…the eyes… the red eyes!”
He coughed up blood, and continued: “I was so frightened my hand must have slipped. Oh and by the way, I also know the location of a hidden treasure trove.”
Suddenly he grasped my wrist, and with wide and piercing eyes he stared—at nothing, as if his vision were fading. And as the final few breaths whistled out of the dying celebrity, so did his final words: “the eyes… the eyes!”
After a moment of reverent silence, and disheartened not only by his failure to tell me the location of the treasure but also by his death, I reached into the fitness celebrity’s pocket and took his wallet, to identify him, of course. I reached in and grabbed his wad of cash and put it in my own, to return to his family, of course. But one of the bills felt peculiar, like a frail parchment; I unfolded it and found it was none other than a treasure map! It was written in Aramaic, of which I couldn’t understand a word, but it had a peculiar design that might have been mistaken for an ink stain by lesser minds, but which I knew immediately to be a clue.
The map itself was either of Nebraska or ancient Canaan, and after a hapless seven-week sojourn to the former left me bitter, half-naked, and four thousand dollars in debt, a quick Ask Jeeves! query informed me that Aramaic was the ancient language of northwestern Canaan. It was then that my journey began.
Debt was no issue for me—I knew the sparkle in the eye of that dying fitness celebrity could only have been born of Gold, mountains of it. Therefore I pawned all my earthly belongings and invested all my funds into a yacht, which I outfitted with the most technologically advanced weaponry, and hired men whom I knew to be good sailors, namely, Steve Buscemi and Lou Diamond Philips, as my first and second mates, respectively. I’d sailed with these lads before many years ago, before we went our separate ways, they to fame, I to glory.
Thus we embarked on our journey across the Atlantic, and together we endured many a tears and tribulation. But our days were filled also with revelry and camaraderie, including many a night of karaoke. Buscemi would sing often about the islands of Greece, which he hoped to see one day. We crossed the Strait of Gibraltar as the sun descended in a most spectacular palette of orange and burnt sienna. However, our entrance into the Mediterranean would mark the beginning of the end.
One night a thick fog engulfed our ship and left us with no vision of the lilting ocean around us. Out of this fog we spied red lights to starboard, dim and flickering as some irresistible force seemed to draw us nearer.
It’s only the lights of Malta, I told myself, the lights of the harbor lit for the befogged wayfarer—but a voice deep within me knew this could not be true, as I heard the creaking of wood as the dotted glows became brighter and clearer.
The lights of Malta, I told myself, even as I stepped backward in terror, and tripped as the clanking of iron and fell voices floated over the silent water; still the phantom mass before me lay shrouded in fog, except for its looming beacons that seemed to rise higher and higher.
The lights of Malta, I said, and then it was revealed: the curtain of fog receded from its colossal hull: oak planks and iron chains, grey and ghastly in the light of the moon. Forms went back and forth on deck above: crouching forms and hulking forms, creeping forms and lurching forms, glints of sharp metal flashing now and again in the torchlight.
Prying my eyes from the ship, I looked around for my mates, but a sudden splash told me that Buscemi had chosen the perils of the sea over the pirates. Lou Diamond was nowhere to be seen, the coward. I reached to my side to grab my trusty revolver, but to my horror found the holster empty. I had pawned it to raise funds for my war-yacht.
Even as the ropes of the pirates were thrown on my deck, and as a great plank was hoisted down, I frantically ran to the nearest gun turret. But already the dark figures were on deck, and I saw their scimitars, and heard their cries; and a great arm grabbed me as I reached for the gun, but I spun just in time and fired off a couple dozen rounds. I took out no less than eight pirates before they closed in on all sides.
A hale brute wrapped his arms around me from behind, and I jumped backward and smashed him into the door of the cabin, breaking it off the hinges. Thanks to my biology class and the excellent tutelage of Professor Joseph Montoya, I have an uncanny understanding of organ functions, and I managed to elbow my assailant in the spleen, harming his reticuloendothelial system, in particular his body’s ability to remove old lymphocytes and harmful waste products from his bloodstream.
He gave a wheezing groan and relinquished his grasp, and I sprang to my feet and was about to break his patellas when I felt a sharp pain in my shoulder blade. Though my arms could not reach far enough behind me to remove the instrument, I knew a knife had been thrown at me. I stumbled forward over the brute’s face and struggled to open the door to the inner cabin. I had hardly touched the knob when another knife struck me in the lower back, and I fell to the ground. By this time the other pirates poured into the room, but I managed to open the door and fall into the inner room.
I rolled in and locked the door. I had a moment of relief; this room contained a stockpile of military-grade armaments, and for now, at least, the pirates were held at bay. But then I heard the shattering of glass from my right, and the villains came pouring in, the filthy lot of them.
I held my own for twenty minutes, spending three hundred metric kilos of ammunition before moving on to a rocket launcher, which I used for blunt melee, wise enough not to fire at such a close range, though understandably tempted. The pirate bodies accumulated at my feet like leaves in autumn—filthy bloodthirsty leaves that smelled of tar and cabbage. One of the cretins, though, must have broken down the door and blackjacked me, for I felt a sudden impact on the back of my head, my vision failed me, and I fell forward in a daze.
But rage and adrenaline must have saturated my veins, and even as they carried me up the great planks rising up to the deck of their ship, I revived briefly and gave a vicious struggle. Such no doubt was the rage of the vikings of yore, when the fury of Thor filled their blood and they tasted both the rapture and rage of the warrior-halls of paradise, where the mead of the brave spills o’er the brim of the eternity. One of the pirates lost his balance and fell off the narrow plank into the water.
But again I was struck on the head, and this time blackness filled my vision and all thoughts departed from my mind—all except for two torches, looming and red.
The lights of Malta, I thought, a final hope like a hand thrust up through a flood; but a darker thought soon drowned it, and in the abysm of my soul I echoed the words of Basedow as he died: the eyes, the eyes!
I awoke from my coma after only a few days, and found myself not in a cell below deck, as you would have expected, but in a cabin, which was as opulent and elegant as a pirate-cabin can get. By the food that was placed around me, I gathered that my captors were well-traveled: Ecuadorian bananas, camquats from the shores of the Bay of Bengal, pomegranates from the Holy Land. But I was also stunned by the hospitality, especially to one who had slain some of their best men. I feared the rogues had taken my map, and were merely flattering me with hospitality so that I would reveal more about the location of the hidden treasure, but I was surprised to find the map still in my wallet. Basedow’s thirty four bucks were missing, and I scowled and shook my fist before I remembered that I had used those thirty four bucks to buy rum for myself, Buscemi, and Philips. Then I thought of my mates and wondered how they had fared, hoping they had made it to Malta or had been found by some ship or plane, but fearing in my heart they had been consumed by the deep.
I peered out the window of my cabin, and to my inexpressible awe beheld the most breathtaking chain of islands I had ever seen. The ocean beat steady against the rocky cliffs and beaches, and the white towns shone bright in the daylight. I thought sadly of my first mate, and all the times he had sung about wishing to see these Isles of Greece. Now he would never see them.
At that moment I heard a great ruckus on deck. I crept to the door and listened, when to my unutterable astonishment, I heard the voice of none other than my dear first mate, Buscemi! I felt as much relief and dismay as a man may feel at the same time: Buscemi was alive, but apparently not for long, for it sounded like the pirates were ushering him to the end of a gangplank.
I rammed the door several times, but it was made of the thickest oak. After trying to unfasten the hinges, it crossed my mind to try the doorknob. I turned the knob, and by Jove, the door opened. But to my everlasting regret, I was moments too late. They had already placed Buscemi in the cannon, and I could hardly open my mouth before they lit the fuse and fired his flailing body over the great wide ocean, until he vanished into a tiny speck plummeting towards the coast of the nearest island. I shed a tear. He would get his wish and taste the sands of Greece after all. By this time, the pirates had caught sight of me, and their laughter died away.
To my surprise, their faces were filled with awe, rather than hate. They said no word and made no movement as their leader approached me. I should mention in advance this man looked nothing like Johnny Depp. He did look a little bit like Oded Fehr, and he had an eyepatch, a turban, a black cloak, and a cutlass at his side. He ascended the stairs to the poop deck. He looked me in the eye before bowing.
He said his name was Abdul Al Haziz, and his men hailed from Tripoli, though he had spent most his life in the deserts of Arabia. He explained to me that because of my unprecedented valor, he would offer me the rarest of honors: a place as first mate of his ship. (I had ruptured the spleen of his first mate; the unfortunate chap had decided he’d had enough of the pirate life, gave a big hug and kiss to his mates, shed a few tears, and rowed off in a little skiff to retire on a desert island, where he could get finally get some quality R & R and catch up on the Harry Potter books, promising to send postcards by way of carrier-parrot. A sensitive guy, really.)
But first I demanded that they tell me why they had fired my own first mate Steve Buscemi from a cannon, and based on such conduct, how could I be sure they weren’t planning the same for me? I was told that they found poor Buscemi dog-paddling his way from their ship. As they took him on board, they had no intentions of actually killing him, but he begged for his life anyway, proclaiming he had nothing to do with me and would tell them all about the treasure I was seeking if they spared him. Disgusted by his faithlessness, they had no choice but to fire the wretch from a cannon.
Anyway, I was flattered by their offer to join the crew, and bowed before my hospitable captor; but I replied that I would require time to think about it. He understood, and I returned to my cabin to ponder my next move. After all, if I declined, I had no guarantee the men would not kill me. And as much as I’ve always wanted to join a band of scalawags, the timing was poor, as I was in search of a treasure I had no intentions of sharing. After several hours, Abdul returned to my cabin.
In his hands he held a gleaming sabre. Fearing that I would have no choice but to agree to the corsair’s terms, I opened my mouth to speak, but suddenly he knelt before me and presented the sword before me. He told me that his shipmates would be glad to welcome them into his brotherhood, though many felt bitter for the loss of their comrades and, moreover, for the loss of their dearly retired first mate’s spleen. But Abdul promised that whatever he decided was law, and all the men would follow his example; there had never been a mutiny among the men, such was their regard not only for their noble leader, but for the principles of honor and fidelity.
Yet the man must have sensed my hesitation, and he sighed, saying that I was a free man, and he would not bar my passage if I chose to leave the ship and pursue my treasure alone; but that I would always find a home on board the Nomad. Never in my life would I have expected such words from a pirate, much less a pirate whose crew I had decimated. I thanked him heartily and decided it might be safe to show him the map and see if he had any insight, being as he was a child of the sands, though a master of the sea.
He looked at it in wonder and read the words as one possessed: “This is no ordinary map, my friend. It speaks of the location of a forgotten holy treasure—the Font of Might! The basin from which Samson, Achilles, Chuck Norris and Dwayne ‘the Rock’ Johnson drank! Although clearly, Chuck Norris drank the most. This is the prize for which Cyrus, Alexander, Saladin, Napoleon, and Hitler sent thousands to their deaths on fruitless expeditions. You are a lucky man, my friend! I am the only living soul that knows the location of the—”
At that moment he gave a cry of pain and his eyes glazed over. He collapsed in a heap at my feet, a great streaming gash on his back. There in the doorway stood Lou Diamond Philips, a broadsword in his hands, kelp in his hair, urchins clinging to his arms. The prodigal mate had returned to rescue me, but I had no gratitude, as he had just cut down the one man that could lead me to my treasure.
In fury, I pounced on the confused Philips and shook him by the neck with one hand; with the other, I smote him repeatedly in the face with the hilt of the sabre, sending kelp and barnacles flying about. At that moment the second mate of the Nomad appeared in the doorway; he saw me holding the sabre in the air and his beloved captain dead on the floor, a great slash on his back. At once he gave a cry for his men to join him, proclaiming me a traitor, and I heard the infuriated mob rushing towards the cabin. Scrambling to my feet, and reluctantly helping the dazed Lou Diamond Philips to his own, I broke the window and dove out into the ocean.
After a minute of splashing about in confusion, Lou came to his senses and showed me over to the motorboat he had used to board the ship. We clambered in and sped off through the ocean, leaving behind the bitter cries of the pirates and the memory of the most honorable pirate captain that ever walked this earth.
We sped off towards the closest shore, which happened to be Egypt, but all the while I said no word to my second mate Philips, disgusted by his rash behavior. He sat in shameful silence, tending to his wounds with an assortment of sea sponges and rare herbs he had no doubt pilfered from the pirates.
After landing ashore, we pursued the footsteps of the Chosen People of yore, through the peninsula of Sinai and its hallowed mountain passes, until after many adversities and a minor side-trip to Sheba we found ourselves on the banks of the Dead Sea, tired and jaded by our misfortunes as we stepped foot upon the shores of those grim waters. But we had arrived at our destination, at long last, and neither of us were about to let our fatigue keep us from our destiny, much less from our treasure.
We set out at once exploring the many caves that surrounded the great sea, the arching rocks and murky grottoes, the phosphorescent coral, arcane goblets, pots, and the occasional—skeleton! After many fruitless searches, and many more hallucinations in which the ghost of Basedow mocked me whilst smugly grinning cats circled round his head in fighter planes, we finally found a grotto whose mouth resembled what appeared to be nothing more than an ink stain on the map.
It faced the sea, and had many great boulders piled about it, and after a few feet the cavern plunged abruptly underwater, where none but the most valiant durst venture. Since the cavern faced eastward, the rays of the rising sun poured into the grotto, sending a magnificent spectrum of light pouring into the subaquatic cavern.
We swam through what seemed an interminable underwater passageway, until at length we emerged from the water deep within the bowels of the mountains. The light from the grotto-passage danced upon the ceiling as we clambered out and peered around. Straight ahead was a staircase which disappeared in a mysterious, unearthly glow, as produced in the movies by dry-ice and careful lighting, but genuinely supernatural in the authentic true-to-life tale I am at this moment recounting.
We cautiously descended the staircase (Lou Diamond Philips volunteering to go first, after much goading on my part), and found ourselves in an expansive chamber. In the center was a ring of columns surrounding a dais, and upon the dais rested a gigantic fountain with a basin in its midst, from whose gleaming brim the most crystalline water bubbled and flowed. There could be no doubt this was the Font of Might, from which the heroes of the ages had tasted the waters of Glory. In the center of the basin stood a life-size statue of Arnold Schwarzenegger, flexing his Apollonian musculature and spouting water from his pursed lips.
But there was an unwholesome air to the room, as though something foul were afoot: some peril lurking in the shadows, or some curse brooding in the restless heart of the mountain. And this ominous feeling was only partly attributable to the string quartet in the corner of the room who happened to be playing a most unmelodious tune as when something disastrous is about to befall the heroes of the story.
Nevertheless, my second mate and I approached the dais. Slowly we stepped over to the great fountain, and gazed up at the basin from which the Governor of California loomed. (As if on cue, the quartet switched to Chopin’s funeral march). After a moment’s pause, Philips and I reached our cupped hands into the fountain, and poured the seraphic elixir into mouths. At once it felt as if I had the strength of a thousand men. Basedow, you cad! thought I. I know your secret, you devil, and it’s not a high-repetition low-intensity cardio workout. But even as I flexed my own muscles in imitation of Arnold, a great rumble filled the cavern.
From the further end of chamber, two great boulders fell out of clefts in the wall. In their place, I beheld an image that haunts my waking eyes to this day: the very vision, indeed, that haunted Basedow unto his dying day—the eyes, the red eyes! Two great channels hewn into the rock, furrowing deep into the hearts core, no doubt, for the infernal glow grew brighter and brighter as we stood there in horror. The string quartet played appropriately dramatic music as lava suddenly came streaming out of the horrid eyes straight towards us!
Without a moment’s thought, Lou Diamond Philips sprang from the dais, and with the unearthly strength of the fountain, was able to roll one of the boulders forward, averting the path of the lava. Instead of streaming straight towards us, the burning river engulfed the gentlemen playing the stringed instruments, incinerating their bodies in the blink of an eye. But the magma continued to gush out, seemingly without end, and it began to fill the room. I still had a clear passage to the exit, thanks to Lou Diamond Philips, but the poor man was surrounded on every side by the rising magma.
“Run!” he shouted to me. “Save yourself, Capitan! Use the fountain for good! Become a fitness celebrity, for the good of the world!” I turned as if to run but could not bring myself to leave. I looked back as the island of rock shrank amidst the encroaching magma. Lou Diamond Philips looked into my eyes, and I into his, and though he had killed my friend Abdul and nearly ruined my journey and crushed my dreams, I realized, now, at the end of all things, that I had never known a truer mate.
I drew my sabre, and with all the strength I could muster, I clove the great basin in twain. As the mighty statue keeled over, the waters gushed over the dais and into the cavern, extinguishing the lava around Philips. He leapt over the steaming rocks to my side. But as is often the case when one destroys a Holy Artifact in its Sacred Resting Place, the chamber began to cave in.
Rocks rained down upon our heads as we fled up the stairs and dove into the water, barely escaping with our lives as we came up gasping from the waves of the Dead Sea, just in time to see the cavern collapse. So collapsed our dreams of treasure and glory. Our strength soon returned to normal, but the lessons I have learned from my journey remain. There are two types of friends in this world: friends that you may drink with, and sing with, but who will betray you when the waters get rough, like Buscemi; and friends that will risk their lives for you, friends worth spilling the very waters of the Font of Might to save, like Lou Diamond Philips—and all of you guys. So what I really mean to say is, Merry Christmas!
The story really began back on the night of the 13th--you know, the Day of the Pelican in the ancient Aztec calendar. I was up late in the gym, alone, trying to bench 230. To my surprise, I heard a faint murmur from the corner of the gym. Thinking it to be a rodent, I crept over to the shadows whence it came, and to my surprise found fitness celebrity John Basedow pinned to the floor beneath a 400-pound barbell!
His face was contorted in pain, redder than a Polish beet in springtime. I rushed to his aid and hoisted the bar from his chest, but even as I reassured him and administered the Heimlich, I knew it was too late. His ribcage was cracked irrevocably; his lungs, punctured, air whistling through the perforations like doves on the banks of the Yangtze, but less peaceful, because they were punctured lungs and not birds of peace.
As the air continued to whistle and blood continued to flow (and other disgusting cracking noises continued to fill my ears which I dare not describe), I bent over the poor fitness celebrity's broken frame and asked if he had any last words or wishes (secretly hoping, I own, that this man knew the location of a hidden treasure trove).
“My friend,” he said, the air whistling through his lungs with his every word, “the memories are coming back. I cannot escape the sins of my past. As I was squatting, I saw them again…the eyes… the red eyes!”
He coughed up blood, and continued: “I was so frightened my hand must have slipped. Oh and by the way, I also know the location of a hidden treasure trove.”
Suddenly he grasped my wrist, and with wide and piercing eyes he stared—at nothing, as if his vision were fading. And as the final few breaths whistled out of the dying celebrity, so did his final words: “the eyes… the eyes!”
After a moment of reverent silence, and disheartened not only by his failure to tell me the location of the treasure but also by his death, I reached into the fitness celebrity’s pocket and took his wallet, to identify him, of course. I reached in and grabbed his wad of cash and put it in my own, to return to his family, of course. But one of the bills felt peculiar, like a frail parchment; I unfolded it and found it was none other than a treasure map! It was written in Aramaic, of which I couldn’t understand a word, but it had a peculiar design that might have been mistaken for an ink stain by lesser minds, but which I knew immediately to be a clue.
The map itself was either of Nebraska or ancient Canaan, and after a hapless seven-week sojourn to the former left me bitter, half-naked, and four thousand dollars in debt, a quick Ask Jeeves! query informed me that Aramaic was the ancient language of northwestern Canaan. It was then that my journey began.
Debt was no issue for me—I knew the sparkle in the eye of that dying fitness celebrity could only have been born of Gold, mountains of it. Therefore I pawned all my earthly belongings and invested all my funds into a yacht, which I outfitted with the most technologically advanced weaponry, and hired men whom I knew to be good sailors, namely, Steve Buscemi and Lou Diamond Philips, as my first and second mates, respectively. I’d sailed with these lads before many years ago, before we went our separate ways, they to fame, I to glory.
Thus we embarked on our journey across the Atlantic, and together we endured many a tears and tribulation. But our days were filled also with revelry and camaraderie, including many a night of karaoke. Buscemi would sing often about the islands of Greece, which he hoped to see one day. We crossed the Strait of Gibraltar as the sun descended in a most spectacular palette of orange and burnt sienna. However, our entrance into the Mediterranean would mark the beginning of the end.
One night a thick fog engulfed our ship and left us with no vision of the lilting ocean around us. Out of this fog we spied red lights to starboard, dim and flickering as some irresistible force seemed to draw us nearer.
It’s only the lights of Malta, I told myself, the lights of the harbor lit for the befogged wayfarer—but a voice deep within me knew this could not be true, as I heard the creaking of wood as the dotted glows became brighter and clearer.
The lights of Malta, I told myself, even as I stepped backward in terror, and tripped as the clanking of iron and fell voices floated over the silent water; still the phantom mass before me lay shrouded in fog, except for its looming beacons that seemed to rise higher and higher.
The lights of Malta, I said, and then it was revealed: the curtain of fog receded from its colossal hull: oak planks and iron chains, grey and ghastly in the light of the moon. Forms went back and forth on deck above: crouching forms and hulking forms, creeping forms and lurching forms, glints of sharp metal flashing now and again in the torchlight.
Prying my eyes from the ship, I looked around for my mates, but a sudden splash told me that Buscemi had chosen the perils of the sea over the pirates. Lou Diamond was nowhere to be seen, the coward. I reached to my side to grab my trusty revolver, but to my horror found the holster empty. I had pawned it to raise funds for my war-yacht.
Even as the ropes of the pirates were thrown on my deck, and as a great plank was hoisted down, I frantically ran to the nearest gun turret. But already the dark figures were on deck, and I saw their scimitars, and heard their cries; and a great arm grabbed me as I reached for the gun, but I spun just in time and fired off a couple dozen rounds. I took out no less than eight pirates before they closed in on all sides.
A hale brute wrapped his arms around me from behind, and I jumped backward and smashed him into the door of the cabin, breaking it off the hinges. Thanks to my biology class and the excellent tutelage of Professor Joseph Montoya, I have an uncanny understanding of organ functions, and I managed to elbow my assailant in the spleen, harming his reticuloendothelial system, in particular his body’s ability to remove old lymphocytes and harmful waste products from his bloodstream.
He gave a wheezing groan and relinquished his grasp, and I sprang to my feet and was about to break his patellas when I felt a sharp pain in my shoulder blade. Though my arms could not reach far enough behind me to remove the instrument, I knew a knife had been thrown at me. I stumbled forward over the brute’s face and struggled to open the door to the inner cabin. I had hardly touched the knob when another knife struck me in the lower back, and I fell to the ground. By this time the other pirates poured into the room, but I managed to open the door and fall into the inner room.
I rolled in and locked the door. I had a moment of relief; this room contained a stockpile of military-grade armaments, and for now, at least, the pirates were held at bay. But then I heard the shattering of glass from my right, and the villains came pouring in, the filthy lot of them.
I held my own for twenty minutes, spending three hundred metric kilos of ammunition before moving on to a rocket launcher, which I used for blunt melee, wise enough not to fire at such a close range, though understandably tempted. The pirate bodies accumulated at my feet like leaves in autumn—filthy bloodthirsty leaves that smelled of tar and cabbage. One of the cretins, though, must have broken down the door and blackjacked me, for I felt a sudden impact on the back of my head, my vision failed me, and I fell forward in a daze.
But rage and adrenaline must have saturated my veins, and even as they carried me up the great planks rising up to the deck of their ship, I revived briefly and gave a vicious struggle. Such no doubt was the rage of the vikings of yore, when the fury of Thor filled their blood and they tasted both the rapture and rage of the warrior-halls of paradise, where the mead of the brave spills o’er the brim of the eternity. One of the pirates lost his balance and fell off the narrow plank into the water.
But again I was struck on the head, and this time blackness filled my vision and all thoughts departed from my mind—all except for two torches, looming and red.
The lights of Malta, I thought, a final hope like a hand thrust up through a flood; but a darker thought soon drowned it, and in the abysm of my soul I echoed the words of Basedow as he died: the eyes, the eyes!
I awoke from my coma after only a few days, and found myself not in a cell below deck, as you would have expected, but in a cabin, which was as opulent and elegant as a pirate-cabin can get. By the food that was placed around me, I gathered that my captors were well-traveled: Ecuadorian bananas, camquats from the shores of the Bay of Bengal, pomegranates from the Holy Land. But I was also stunned by the hospitality, especially to one who had slain some of their best men. I feared the rogues had taken my map, and were merely flattering me with hospitality so that I would reveal more about the location of the hidden treasure, but I was surprised to find the map still in my wallet. Basedow’s thirty four bucks were missing, and I scowled and shook my fist before I remembered that I had used those thirty four bucks to buy rum for myself, Buscemi, and Philips. Then I thought of my mates and wondered how they had fared, hoping they had made it to Malta or had been found by some ship or plane, but fearing in my heart they had been consumed by the deep.
I peered out the window of my cabin, and to my inexpressible awe beheld the most breathtaking chain of islands I had ever seen. The ocean beat steady against the rocky cliffs and beaches, and the white towns shone bright in the daylight. I thought sadly of my first mate, and all the times he had sung about wishing to see these Isles of Greece. Now he would never see them.
At that moment I heard a great ruckus on deck. I crept to the door and listened, when to my unutterable astonishment, I heard the voice of none other than my dear first mate, Buscemi! I felt as much relief and dismay as a man may feel at the same time: Buscemi was alive, but apparently not for long, for it sounded like the pirates were ushering him to the end of a gangplank.
I rammed the door several times, but it was made of the thickest oak. After trying to unfasten the hinges, it crossed my mind to try the doorknob. I turned the knob, and by Jove, the door opened. But to my everlasting regret, I was moments too late. They had already placed Buscemi in the cannon, and I could hardly open my mouth before they lit the fuse and fired his flailing body over the great wide ocean, until he vanished into a tiny speck plummeting towards the coast of the nearest island. I shed a tear. He would get his wish and taste the sands of Greece after all. By this time, the pirates had caught sight of me, and their laughter died away.
To my surprise, their faces were filled with awe, rather than hate. They said no word and made no movement as their leader approached me. I should mention in advance this man looked nothing like Johnny Depp. He did look a little bit like Oded Fehr, and he had an eyepatch, a turban, a black cloak, and a cutlass at his side. He ascended the stairs to the poop deck. He looked me in the eye before bowing.
He said his name was Abdul Al Haziz, and his men hailed from Tripoli, though he had spent most his life in the deserts of Arabia. He explained to me that because of my unprecedented valor, he would offer me the rarest of honors: a place as first mate of his ship. (I had ruptured the spleen of his first mate; the unfortunate chap had decided he’d had enough of the pirate life, gave a big hug and kiss to his mates, shed a few tears, and rowed off in a little skiff to retire on a desert island, where he could get finally get some quality R & R and catch up on the Harry Potter books, promising to send postcards by way of carrier-parrot. A sensitive guy, really.)
But first I demanded that they tell me why they had fired my own first mate Steve Buscemi from a cannon, and based on such conduct, how could I be sure they weren’t planning the same for me? I was told that they found poor Buscemi dog-paddling his way from their ship. As they took him on board, they had no intentions of actually killing him, but he begged for his life anyway, proclaiming he had nothing to do with me and would tell them all about the treasure I was seeking if they spared him. Disgusted by his faithlessness, they had no choice but to fire the wretch from a cannon.
Anyway, I was flattered by their offer to join the crew, and bowed before my hospitable captor; but I replied that I would require time to think about it. He understood, and I returned to my cabin to ponder my next move. After all, if I declined, I had no guarantee the men would not kill me. And as much as I’ve always wanted to join a band of scalawags, the timing was poor, as I was in search of a treasure I had no intentions of sharing. After several hours, Abdul returned to my cabin.
In his hands he held a gleaming sabre. Fearing that I would have no choice but to agree to the corsair’s terms, I opened my mouth to speak, but suddenly he knelt before me and presented the sword before me. He told me that his shipmates would be glad to welcome them into his brotherhood, though many felt bitter for the loss of their comrades and, moreover, for the loss of their dearly retired first mate’s spleen. But Abdul promised that whatever he decided was law, and all the men would follow his example; there had never been a mutiny among the men, such was their regard not only for their noble leader, but for the principles of honor and fidelity.
Yet the man must have sensed my hesitation, and he sighed, saying that I was a free man, and he would not bar my passage if I chose to leave the ship and pursue my treasure alone; but that I would always find a home on board the Nomad. Never in my life would I have expected such words from a pirate, much less a pirate whose crew I had decimated. I thanked him heartily and decided it might be safe to show him the map and see if he had any insight, being as he was a child of the sands, though a master of the sea.
He looked at it in wonder and read the words as one possessed: “This is no ordinary map, my friend. It speaks of the location of a forgotten holy treasure—the Font of Might! The basin from which Samson, Achilles, Chuck Norris and Dwayne ‘the Rock’ Johnson drank! Although clearly, Chuck Norris drank the most. This is the prize for which Cyrus, Alexander, Saladin, Napoleon, and Hitler sent thousands to their deaths on fruitless expeditions. You are a lucky man, my friend! I am the only living soul that knows the location of the—”
At that moment he gave a cry of pain and his eyes glazed over. He collapsed in a heap at my feet, a great streaming gash on his back. There in the doorway stood Lou Diamond Philips, a broadsword in his hands, kelp in his hair, urchins clinging to his arms. The prodigal mate had returned to rescue me, but I had no gratitude, as he had just cut down the one man that could lead me to my treasure.
In fury, I pounced on the confused Philips and shook him by the neck with one hand; with the other, I smote him repeatedly in the face with the hilt of the sabre, sending kelp and barnacles flying about. At that moment the second mate of the Nomad appeared in the doorway; he saw me holding the sabre in the air and his beloved captain dead on the floor, a great slash on his back. At once he gave a cry for his men to join him, proclaiming me a traitor, and I heard the infuriated mob rushing towards the cabin. Scrambling to my feet, and reluctantly helping the dazed Lou Diamond Philips to his own, I broke the window and dove out into the ocean.
After a minute of splashing about in confusion, Lou came to his senses and showed me over to the motorboat he had used to board the ship. We clambered in and sped off through the ocean, leaving behind the bitter cries of the pirates and the memory of the most honorable pirate captain that ever walked this earth.
We sped off towards the closest shore, which happened to be Egypt, but all the while I said no word to my second mate Philips, disgusted by his rash behavior. He sat in shameful silence, tending to his wounds with an assortment of sea sponges and rare herbs he had no doubt pilfered from the pirates.
After landing ashore, we pursued the footsteps of the Chosen People of yore, through the peninsula of Sinai and its hallowed mountain passes, until after many adversities and a minor side-trip to Sheba we found ourselves on the banks of the Dead Sea, tired and jaded by our misfortunes as we stepped foot upon the shores of those grim waters. But we had arrived at our destination, at long last, and neither of us were about to let our fatigue keep us from our destiny, much less from our treasure.
We set out at once exploring the many caves that surrounded the great sea, the arching rocks and murky grottoes, the phosphorescent coral, arcane goblets, pots, and the occasional—skeleton! After many fruitless searches, and many more hallucinations in which the ghost of Basedow mocked me whilst smugly grinning cats circled round his head in fighter planes, we finally found a grotto whose mouth resembled what appeared to be nothing more than an ink stain on the map.
It faced the sea, and had many great boulders piled about it, and after a few feet the cavern plunged abruptly underwater, where none but the most valiant durst venture. Since the cavern faced eastward, the rays of the rising sun poured into the grotto, sending a magnificent spectrum of light pouring into the subaquatic cavern.
We swam through what seemed an interminable underwater passageway, until at length we emerged from the water deep within the bowels of the mountains. The light from the grotto-passage danced upon the ceiling as we clambered out and peered around. Straight ahead was a staircase which disappeared in a mysterious, unearthly glow, as produced in the movies by dry-ice and careful lighting, but genuinely supernatural in the authentic true-to-life tale I am at this moment recounting.
We cautiously descended the staircase (Lou Diamond Philips volunteering to go first, after much goading on my part), and found ourselves in an expansive chamber. In the center was a ring of columns surrounding a dais, and upon the dais rested a gigantic fountain with a basin in its midst, from whose gleaming brim the most crystalline water bubbled and flowed. There could be no doubt this was the Font of Might, from which the heroes of the ages had tasted the waters of Glory. In the center of the basin stood a life-size statue of Arnold Schwarzenegger, flexing his Apollonian musculature and spouting water from his pursed lips.
But there was an unwholesome air to the room, as though something foul were afoot: some peril lurking in the shadows, or some curse brooding in the restless heart of the mountain. And this ominous feeling was only partly attributable to the string quartet in the corner of the room who happened to be playing a most unmelodious tune as when something disastrous is about to befall the heroes of the story.
Nevertheless, my second mate and I approached the dais. Slowly we stepped over to the great fountain, and gazed up at the basin from which the Governor of California loomed. (As if on cue, the quartet switched to Chopin’s funeral march). After a moment’s pause, Philips and I reached our cupped hands into the fountain, and poured the seraphic elixir into mouths. At once it felt as if I had the strength of a thousand men. Basedow, you cad! thought I. I know your secret, you devil, and it’s not a high-repetition low-intensity cardio workout. But even as I flexed my own muscles in imitation of Arnold, a great rumble filled the cavern.
From the further end of chamber, two great boulders fell out of clefts in the wall. In their place, I beheld an image that haunts my waking eyes to this day: the very vision, indeed, that haunted Basedow unto his dying day—the eyes, the red eyes! Two great channels hewn into the rock, furrowing deep into the hearts core, no doubt, for the infernal glow grew brighter and brighter as we stood there in horror. The string quartet played appropriately dramatic music as lava suddenly came streaming out of the horrid eyes straight towards us!
Without a moment’s thought, Lou Diamond Philips sprang from the dais, and with the unearthly strength of the fountain, was able to roll one of the boulders forward, averting the path of the lava. Instead of streaming straight towards us, the burning river engulfed the gentlemen playing the stringed instruments, incinerating their bodies in the blink of an eye. But the magma continued to gush out, seemingly without end, and it began to fill the room. I still had a clear passage to the exit, thanks to Lou Diamond Philips, but the poor man was surrounded on every side by the rising magma.
“Run!” he shouted to me. “Save yourself, Capitan! Use the fountain for good! Become a fitness celebrity, for the good of the world!” I turned as if to run but could not bring myself to leave. I looked back as the island of rock shrank amidst the encroaching magma. Lou Diamond Philips looked into my eyes, and I into his, and though he had killed my friend Abdul and nearly ruined my journey and crushed my dreams, I realized, now, at the end of all things, that I had never known a truer mate.
I drew my sabre, and with all the strength I could muster, I clove the great basin in twain. As the mighty statue keeled over, the waters gushed over the dais and into the cavern, extinguishing the lava around Philips. He leapt over the steaming rocks to my side. But as is often the case when one destroys a Holy Artifact in its Sacred Resting Place, the chamber began to cave in.
Rocks rained down upon our heads as we fled up the stairs and dove into the water, barely escaping with our lives as we came up gasping from the waves of the Dead Sea, just in time to see the cavern collapse. So collapsed our dreams of treasure and glory. Our strength soon returned to normal, but the lessons I have learned from my journey remain. There are two types of friends in this world: friends that you may drink with, and sing with, but who will betray you when the waters get rough, like Buscemi; and friends that will risk their lives for you, friends worth spilling the very waters of the Font of Might to save, like Lou Diamond Philips—and all of you guys. So what I really mean to say is, Merry Christmas!
