Chapter Seven

Hephaistos slept well, though he was woken up part way through the night when a sopping wet Scroat stumbled in to the stateroom muttering about fucking bastard weather only raining when he was on deck and what he was going to do to the next weather god he came across.

The next morning brought more power oats and coffee. And, once more, Scroat immediately went back into the cabin to sleep again after eating.

Poseidon happily took his place at the wheel again. Hep grabbed the book of knots, a knife, and some of the scrap line Poseidon had lying about the boat. Poseidon had indeed had a golf ball stashed away, and gave it to Hep. He used to to tie a monkey’s fist, which the book explained was useful for throwing a line to another boat.

“What that book won’t tell you, Hep, is that if you put a one inch steel ball bearing in there instead of something light, you’ve got a formidable weapon. I’ve seen some real damage done with a monkey’s fist,” Poseidon said.

“Cool,” Hep said.

“What it also won’t tell you is that if you throw a line with a monkey’s fist to a dockhand, they’ll cut it off. They’ll also probably say bad things about your mother. Most people don’t like having rope-covered rocks thrown at them.”

“Good to know,” Hep said. He picked up the knot book again and flipped through it a bit. He decided he’d try making some boat fenders next.

He had been tying knot after knot for an hour an a half when Scroat came up out of the cabin with a panicked look on his face.

“What’s up, Scroat?” Hep asked.

“Something’s gone horribly wrong down there,” Scroat said.

“What, exactly, went wrong?” Poseidon asked. He turned on the autopilot and stepped out from behind the wheel. “What, exactly, has happened to my boat?”

That’s when they noticed the stench of raw sewage coming out of the cabin.

“It’s fucking horrible,” Scroat said.

Poseidon pushed Scroat to one side and hustled down into the cabin. He discovered the problem immediately - one of the hoses leading from the head to the holding tank had broken free and spread, well, the contents of the hose all over.

“Damn it,” Poseidon said. He went back up on deck. Scroat had gone forward to the bow, and was taking deep breaths. Poseidon went up to the bow as well.

“So, you know, the person who broke the shitter is the person in charge of repairing the shitter,” he said.

Scroat started to protest, but decided against it when he realized there was no way Hep or Poseidon were about to step in and take care of the problem.

“If I were you,” Poseidon said, ”I’d take off all my clothes before I did the repair. It’ll be a lot easier to wash the shit off of you than it would be to wash it out of your clothes, and believe me, you are going to be covered in shit. You’ll find the repair kit in the locker under the sink. By the way, there’s a tub of Vick’s Vapor Rub in there. Wipe a bit of it under your nose. Believe me, the smell is going to get worse, otherwise. There are some old rags down there you can use to clean up the head afterwards. When you’re done, come back up and we’ll stop the boat so you can go for a swim.”

Scroat nodded, went down into the cabin and stripped off his clothes. He found the tool kit, smeared a generous amount of vapor rub under his nose, and got to work.

“Your friend has some kind of bad luck,” Poseidon said, and laughed a bit. “Most people get to sail for quite a while before they have to much around with the head.”

“Well, I’m sure he can handle it,” Hep said. He took the rope he was working with forward a bit to get away from the smell coming from the open hatch. A couple hours later, he had finished a fender.

Scroat called out from the cabin, “Hey, what should I do with these rags?”

Poseidon answered, “There’s a ratty mesh bag in the same locker, stuff ‘em in there and bring them up.”

Scroat found the bag, stuffed the dirty rags into it, and went up on deck, still naked. He was covered with smears of unspeakable substances. “OK, now what?”

“Tie a line to the bag, secure it to the boat and throw it overboard,” Poseidon said. “Hey, Hep, help me bring the sails down, looks like Scroat needs a swim.”

While Scroat was tossing the dirty rags overboard, Poseidon opened a locker in the cockpit, and pulled out an old bottle of dish soap and a bucket with a rope attached to the handle.

“Here, start lathering up,” he said.

“Thanks,” Scroat said. He dropped the bucket overboard, then hauled it up again. He dumped it over himself, then gathered more water and set the bucket on the deck. It sloshed a bit as the boat moved. Scroat opened the bottle of dish soap, squirted a huge amount into his hand, and began furiously scrubbing himself.

Meanwhile, Hep furled the jib, and helped Poseidon wrestle down the mainsail. When the boat had come to a stop, Poseidon dropped a ladder over the stern.

He turned to Hep and said, “You don’t mind staying on the boat while I go for a swim, do you?”

Hep wasn’t much of a swimmer, so he said, “Not at all.”

“Great!”

Poseidon started stripping off his clothes, and noticed Scroat was just standing there on the deck, covered in soap suds.

“Well?” he said as he unbuttoned his shirt. “Jump in and swim around a bit.”

Scroat shrugged, climbed over the lifelines and leapt away from the boat and into the ocean.

Scroat burst up from underwater, flailing at the ocean. “Holy fuck this is the coldest water I’ve ever been in!”

“Suck it up, princess,” Poseidon said, and dove in as well. “It’s not bad at all in here, I don’t know what you’re complaining about.”

“Of course not. You’re the fucking god of the fucking ocean. I’m sure this is all sunshine and motherfucking kisses to you even when it should be ice. On the other hand, I am from the fucking desert. I think my dick has just turned from an outtie into an innie.”

“It was an outtie once?”

“Fuck. You.” Scroat said, he climbed up the ladder on to the boat and stomped towards the companionway.

“Hey,” Poseidon called, “You’re going to want to rinse yourself off with some fresh water.”

“Yeah, right,” Scroat said, and went down into the cabin. A few moments later Hep could hear him turn on the shower and start sloshing water around.

Poseidon swam around the boat a few times, and finally climbed back up the ladder.

“He’s not being a very good sport about this at all,” he said to Hep.

“Well, I agree, but I’m going to cut him some slack this time since he did just spend a couple hours crawling around in shit.”

“Yeah, I guess that’s fair,” Poseidon said. He went to the companionway and called in “Hey, I was just teasing you, Scroat. No hard feelings?”

“Oh, no. No hard feelings. Though you’re a cock-biter and I suspect you are also a shit eater. But no hard feelings.”

“Well, as long as we’re square.”

Poseidon toweled himself off, and sat down behind the wheel with no shirt on. “Man, it’s a glorious day today. Just beautiful out here.”

“I guess it is,” Hep said. “So, should we get the sails back up?”

“Yep. Hey, Scroat! Get back up here and help hoist the mainsail.”

“You got it, Captain Dickface.”

Scroat came back up on deck and worked with Hep to raise the sail. It caught the wind with a THUMP, and they unfurled the jib, trimmed the sails, and settled in to watch the ocean as they sailed.

“See, it’s not all that bad, is it?” Poseidon said.

“No, it’s just peachy keen until I spend three hours getting rained on, and then two hours fending off rogue turds.”

“Well, when we get to Brookings we’ll make some time for you to go find some stuff to keep occupied while we’re sailing.”

“Great. I can’t wait,” Scroat said. “Fuck I’m tired. I’m going to go sleep for a while. Wake me when it’s time to eat.”

“Sure thing,” Hep said.
He was a little tired of tying knots for the day, and went below to see what other books Poseidon had in his library. Every single book had to do with sailing. There was a book on weather tactics, navigation, boat maintenance, marine engine repair, sea stories, and a guide to sailing Alaska.

Hep took a look at the book on navigation, decided it was too much math to deal with , and settled on the marine engine repair guide. He was soon entirely absorbed in the technical details, and didn’t take his head out of the book until Poseidon asked him to fire up the stove.