The Midnight Hunt

An inky blue pooled against the horizon as the humid day was drawing to a close, a few lonesome boats still gliding through the briny water. The regular fishing boats docked, seagulls circling overhead, uttering shrill screams as nets filled with trembling fish were unloaded by men with calloused hands and rough faces.

A thick river of murky blood ran through the gutters, a fresh wave joining every time the still-swaying sharks were unloaded from the harpooning boats. The stench of fish guts, blood and the sea, amplified by the scorching heat, day after day, could cling to a man, soak into his skin and tongue, unable to be washed out by the harshest of soaps.

Andrei watched a0s a group of men left the dock, giving his worn uniform a wide-eyed stare before scattering, their day ending, his beginning. The thick rubber mask that hung limply at his belt stared after them as he continued to make his way towards his own destination. The Astrea, a sizeable boat, gently dipped and bobbed with the sway of the water as her captain, Abe, a weather-beaten man sat by her side, smoking something foul from his pipe. Andrei had yet to exchange five words with the man, but Jonah assured him that he was one of the best captains for night sailing. Jonah himself was currently helping to shift boxes of harpoons and nets with Otho while Dmitri eagerly stood at the bow, Andrei already running later than the rest of them.

Otho spotted Andrei before the rest and pointedly looked to the sky before raising what used to be his eyebrow, splotchy old burns encompassing most of the left side of his face. Andrei waved him off and stepped down onto the soft wood of the deck. He began to unmoor them from the dock when Abe shook himself out of his idle respite and headed for the helm. Dmitri joined Andrei, grinning broadly, the faintest dregs of childhood clinging to his soft face.

“Hello Mister Andrei.” He said, his fingers plucking at his mask.

Andrei grunted his greeting. Dmitri shifted from foot to foot, trembling with anticipation.

“Is it true that some men have died during the hunt?” He blurted out, no fear just pure awe shining in his baby-blue eyes.

Andrei gave noncommittal hum, privately thinking the boy was overexcited and under trained for this type of job.

“How old were you when you started?” Dmitri asked.

Andrei straightened up and levelled Dmitri with a cool look, his grey eyes glinting in the fading light.

“Younger than you, which means I’ve been at this job longer.” He leaned in. “Which means listen to me when I say- get back to the bow and be the lookout for tonight.”

Dmitri’s gleaming smile didn’t even falter; in fact, he gave a salute and darted back across the boat. Jonah caught Andrei’s eye and smiled, his eyebrows raised playfully before resuming to bark orders. Otho sidled over, his lips twisted into a faint smile as they watched Dmitri already begin to stare into the water.

Before too long, they were joining a dozen or so other vessels heading into the twilight, Abe sombrely steering, Jonah passing around a flask and Dmitri keeping an eye-out while Andrei and Otho sat by, waiting.

“Still know your longitude from your latitude, old man?” Jonah grinned as he offered his flask to Abe.

“You’re paying me enough to do you a service, not enough to get chatty.” Abe said after he took a hearty swig.

While Jonah tried to convince the captain that alcohol was a form of payment and Otho took out a battered packet of smokes, Andrei watched the useless flapping of a few hopeful seagulls and idly adjusted his mask straps. He could remember the first time he had ever gone on a midnight hunt. He didn’t know anyone else on the rickety boat and his uniform had been twice his size, his palms so sweaty that his rubber gloves kept slipping off his hands. His breath had fogged up his goggles and he had nearly pulled his humid mask off mid-hunt if Jonah hadn’t gripped his wrist with a bruising force. After the trip, Jonah had taken him for his first rum.

“There!” Dmitri’s form suddenly tensed, pointing to flickering fluorescent lights dancing beneath the water. Jonah hastily signalled Abe, who bundled himself off towards the back of the boat, pulling a ragged scarf over his mouth and nose. The other four men hurriedly pulled their rubber masks over their head and grabbed harpoons before standing by the edge, peering down. Then it began.

The harpoons were thrust into the water, withdrawing, water sloshing over the deck and their clothes as the men yelled and jabbed at the writhing lights.

Andrei got the first catch. His harpoon pierced through a hard shell and he triumphantly ripped the snapping, hissing creature from the depths. A putrid substance was dripping from where he stabbed it, filling the air with a foul stench. It tried uselessly snapped at his face, but Andrei only had eyes for its pearly shell, sparkling in the light from the boat.

He ran a gloved thumb over its bejewelled back, deaf to its pained squeals. He felt a sharp jab to his ribs as Jonah’s muffled voice yelled for him to keep working. Andrei nodded and dropped the squirming creature into the net.

The shouts from the men and the shrieks from the creatures would continue until the sun breached the horizon and the light from their shimmering shells would vanish and be lost till another night.

-

In the dim light of Otho’s kitchen, his wife bustled around, serving thick, steamy broth into chipped bowls. Lydia, a portly woman with her whitened hair pulled into a loose bun, had adapted well to her husband’s schedule of rising in the late afternoon and serving dinner at dawn to a group of hungry, tired men.

Light was still struggling to reach the horizon, trying to slip in like an unwelcome guest. However, the soft amber light from the lanterns placed around did manage to light up the room pleasantly. Even though Otho worked as a Hunter, and Lydia worked comfortably both as a Seamstress and a cook for the local school, they still couldn’t afford electricity, nor any of the luxuries that could be found in the upper districts. A crackling fire was close to dying out in the hearth and Dmitri was set to the task of making tea, a job he jumped at despite being more fatigued than the rest of the men.

Andrei, with his hands folded neatly on the scrubbed table, watched as Otho sidled up to Lydia and pressed a gentle kiss to her neck, wrapping his burly arms around her midriff. Andrei quickly dropped his gaze to his nails. He spied rusty red blood encrusted into his nail bed, almost soaked into his skin completely. He had already scrubbed at his hands furiously; the gritty soap having worked up a weak foam but to no avail.

“Food’s ready.” Lydia served up four bowls to the table before she caught Otho’s questioning eye. “I already ate, love.”

She turned to Jonah, who stood at the countertop, meticulously slicing a loaf of bread.

“No Abe?”

“He’s not that sort of guy.”

“Ah. Shame.” Lydia turned back to Otho, dipping her smaller hands into his.

She stood on her toes to kiss his scruffy cheek before leaving the room. The other men took their seat around the table and began to dig in, a comfortable quiet settling on the scene. Andrei felt Jonah’s foot gently bump against his. He kept eating, not looking up.

“So, did I do good?” Dmitri finally blurted out.

“You caught two.” Andrei said.

“Which is good for a first timer.” Jonah’s foot nudged his. Andrei nudged him back.

Otho grunted in agreement. Jonah nudged Andrei a bit harder, making him look up at him. His dark skin gave a healthy glow in the cosy light and his rosewood eyes had a hint of reproach clouding them.

“You did okay.” Andrei finally settled on.

Dmitri lit up, his smile radiant in the small kitchen. The kettle on the stove started whistling and he made his way over, Otho returning to his stew. Jonah smiled warmly at Andrei, who huffed and ducked his head, dragging his spoon around the chunks of beef and carrots.

“I’ve been meaning to ask,” Dmitri spoke up again, pouring the tea into four mismatched mugs. “Why do we need the masks?”

“Haven’t you noticed the smell those things give off?” Andrei picked up a chunk of dark bread and started to drown it in his stew.

“I mean… Yeah.” Dmitri’s face flushed as he brought over the steaming mugs.

“Well, the masks are needed because when we pierce them, not only do they start to smell real bad but also their insides are acid to the skin,” Jonah said. “It’s why Otho looks so handsome.”

Dmitri glanced quickly at Otho, to the damage done to the entire left side of his face, burns which still looked shiny and red despite being over a decade old.

“Oh.”

“So, keep your gear on and you won’t have any problems.” Andrei ignored the small pot of sugar in the middle of the table and sipped his bitter tea.

“Big talk coming from you,” Jonah huffed. “You almost took your damn mask off the first time you went hunting.”

“You did?” Dmitri said, his words laced with glee.

Andrei levelled him with a stony look and Dmitri immediately ducked his head in apology. It didn’t curb his curiosity, however.

“So, you and Jonah have been hunting together a while?”

“Over 7 years now.” Andrei kept his eyes on his dark tea, but he could almost hear the smile in Jonah’s voice. “I was only three years older than him when we met but I had been at it since I was barely thirteen.”

Dmitri gave a low whistle. Andrei had never asked but he assumed the boy was about to hit his twenties, maybe being as young as seventeen at a stretch.

“And Otho?” The boy asked.

“Good old Otho here has been hunting since he was a kid,” Jonah gave the man a nudge. “Going on fifty years now?”

Otho gave a wry smile.

The men lapsed back into silence, finish their meal in the companionable quiet they were used to. Andrei finished first, pushing his bowl away and knocking back the rest of his tea. He was long since grown used to the tart taste and it couldn’t make him recoil as it did when he first had it. Jonah’s eyes twinkled as he set the cup back down.

“Give Lydia my thanks.” He said to Otho, before giving a quick nod to the rest around the table. “I’ll be off.”

Jonah pushed his chair back and stood up.

“I’ll walk with you. Better be get some sleep as well.”

Andrei said nothing but pulled his coat on, only half listening to Jonah’s farewells to the others. Lydia seemed to be asleep, so they quietly left the house and walked down the hushed street, most workers firmly set on getting a few more moments of sleep.

Their footsteps seem to almost echo in the still morning as they made their way towards the outskirts of the district, their own incomes being too small to afford anything nicer than a run-down apartment. Andrei looked over his shoulder, at the increasingly distant lights in Otho’s home, burning behind threadbare curtains.

He nearly jumped out of his skin when Jonah suddenly clapped his hands, the sound echoing over the rooftops, breaking the soft quiet. He glowered at the other man.

“What?” Jonah said. “It started to feel suffocating.”

“I like the silence.”

Jonah pressed his shoulder against Andrei’s, their wrists nudging against each other’s. The side of Andrei’s lip quirked up into a smile.

“You should smile more.” Jonah said. “Makes you seem less grumpy.”

“I like looking grumpy.” Andrei countered. “People leave me alone.”

“I don’t.”

Andrei hummed but didn’t respond. Jonah smiled. They walked. They made it back just as the fishing boats started gliding on their way back out to sea.