Hong Kong Young Writers Anthologies Fiction Group 3 | Page 36

Ming Treasure Fleet
Diocesan Boys' School, Lee, Jayden - 12
I always knew that I would have to serve my nation, but not as honoured as taking part as a young
crewmember of the seven voyages of the Ming treasure ship fleet.
The ships were hand-built piece by piece with wooden planks. Apart from the basic accommodations, most
of the cabin were converted into storerooms which houses the priceless presents we planned to give away,
and other things we received from the other countries, like the hundreds of jars of spices gifted from the
leader of Africa. We had been staying on the ship for a long time already. We were assigned to complete
different tasks everyday-ranging from scanning the horizon for any pirates or objects that provide an
imminent threat, to scrubbing every little surface of the ship with a rag. Crewmates were divided into two
groups- the day group and night group. The day group worked in the day and slept soundly at night, and
the night group was vice versa. The day group had a more challenging condition to work in due to the
scorching sun but were allocated to more straightforward assignments. The night group had a more arduous
job, as pirates were more prone to organise a sneak attack at us, so they must be ready to fight at any
moment’s notice. They also had to complete more wearisome jobs, as the sun wasn’t roasting them like a
pigling, and the air was more refreshing and cooler. I thought at first that being a part of the day group was
going to be so torturous, but with the constant jokes, puns and encouragement of crewmates, I was finally
paving a way through all the hardship I suffered. We joked around, talked about ourselves and often had to
calm down a mate who was homesick. We had gone through a lot of challenges with our crew mates,
which made us learn more about each other and co-operate better. We had gone through a lot of
unbelievable stories, and this is my favourite one.
We were on the ship, heading north. The sky was a dark shade of grey, threatening to rain without any
notice. The wind was howling ferociously. The sea was in a cranky mood -huge waves crashed upon each
other and humongous waves were born. The ship, in all its mighty glory, spurred on despite the harsh blows
of the waves. The ship creaked and swayed from one side to another. By then, I was already worrying that
the ship might tip, but was assured that the boat was well enough to avoid capsizing. Violent sounds of
seawater sloshing and slamming to the side of the boat came into the cabin. The crew were lolling around in
the cabin, playing traditional Chinese chess and smoking. Smoke gathered in the air. The chess pieces were
jumping up and down like hot potatoes on the chessboard due to the rocking ship. Up on the deck was only
Zheng He, navigating the ship to our destination, standing there impossibly like a lamppost, rooted there
without even stumbling over. Then the situation deteriorated. The ship lurched even more furiously and
sometimes we even lost up sense of being upright. Jars of spices and strands of pearl cascaded down from
shelves round us .Some of the crew rushed down to the storage room to check whether the porcelain vases
and other gifts were still safe and sound, as it was our meagre ways of extending an olive branch with the
leaders of the other far-flung civilizations .Others went to keep an eye on the animals we obtained from the
other leaders who willingly gave it to us in return for our presents, which were two brown animals with
even browner spots and a stretchy neck, with two tiny sprouts on top of its head. Just in all the middle of
the chaos, I peeked out of the window and what I saw was just simply bad news. There was a grey fin
protruding out of the water, bobbing around, then it reared up and the entire creature shot out of the water.
What most appealed to us was its enormous mouth and bloodstained teeth, which horrified some of us. We
all know what it was and what it was capable of, as we had all first-handily seen what happened to a crew
member when it he had fallen out of the boat by accident. The grey, pointed and slithery creature had held
the member with the enormous jaws and chomped, demolishing its meal in a short matter of time. What we
had to endure was not the blood, but the members shriek of pain and agony, which still frequently drifted
into my head. The sight of such a bloodthirsty and terrible creature make my skin go cold. My head spun,
and I felt dizzy. We all knew that we had to get away as we were sure that those gleaming teeth could gnaw
and rip its way into the ship and devour us all. There was a huge stampede as the crowd ran hell for leather
to get to the top of the deck and be on higher ground. However, we had a gigantic problem. The wind had
slashed the sails into shreds and now they were a tattered mess. We couldn’t go forwards nor backwards until
we could get a replacement for the sails. My best friend, Ni Hao, shakily suggested,” We can sew our
bedsheets together to make a makeshift sail.” As if proving us wrong, the side of the ship began to sag and
we all lost our centre of gravity. I quickly concluded that the creature must have ripped one of the wooden
planks and water was rising to the brim of the empty bottom of the ship .Zheng he , who was still rooted to
the same spot , quickly scrapped the idea of using bedsheets to make a sail as we did have the time , and
told us that even if our ship sank , we would be all be all-you-can-eat-buffet of the creature, meaning that
we had to eliminate the shark until we could solve the problem of the sinking of the ship . We couldn’t use
our knives, partly because they were only short-ranged, and partly because we had left them in the bar that
we had gone to before boarding the ship. We then relied on the only defence mechanism that was built into