Filth abounds. As picnics go for the common louse, there are no shortage of opportunities at sea. Scalps go unwashed for days at a time, forming a geography of crust, dandruff, grime, grease. And when a shoulder bumps, a knee collides, a head knocks against another, away the lice go. As they travel, they lay eggs, microscopic Khans proliferating their kin throughout the U.S.S. Goose. What fun is a picnic, after all, without company? There is no greater delicacy than blood.
To wander as lice through the oily cracked crevices of a man’s scalp is to wander in a funhouse, encountering oneself at every turn. The same translucent, distended head, mandible, antennae. Two lice, encountering one another, put feeler to feeler, then part, neither better nor worse for it. They exist in the amniotic haze of insectkind, blessed with small nervous systems limited to pure sense. Seek survival, avoid pain. Occasionally, an errant fingernail will furiously rake the scalp, crushing one or two, but the other lice pay it no mind. They live to feed, and feed they do, reproducing as they go, spreading joyously from man to man. The spark that enlivens them is small and dim as a firefly’s light is to a man’s eye.
Yet one louse finds itself alone on this night, seeking its reflection. A few hours ago, it was cast from the head of its host by an errant drop of seawater, falling to the floor. After rolling itself dry, the louse clambered across bare planking acrid with the smell of lye, up into the rafters, into another man’s hair. It must be the scalp of a newcomer – uncolonized, free of lice. The louse wanders, laying the occasional egg, unsure of what to do about this new feeling which is like the sting of acid all over, the sting of loneliness.
The berth is dark. No light penetrates the hull. The USS Goose is a sturdy vessel, well-made. 443 souls – human souls, anyway – are aboard. In this confined space, a good many of them swing shoulder-to-shoulder in hammocks wrinkled, filthy, scrotal. They wash their clothes only when the officers force them too. Men belch, scratch, sneeze, cough, pass wind. Any belongings of value they clutch to their chests. Thieves are about, even on a vessel imbued with such noble purpose. They will not risk a family Bible, or a letter from a sweetheart.
Within this dark, dank, warm space, a quiet music rises, barely audible over the cacophony of sleep – seven whistled notes rising and then falling. The louse’s new host stirs. He swings down from the hammock, landing soundlessly on bare feet. Others are astir too, throughout the berth deck, seven in number. They do not talk, do not whisper, as they touch each other’s shoulders and arms for confirmation, then slip barefoot up the stairs to the gun deck. Nestled among hairs like an Indian in the trees, the louse observes their passage.
As they clamber up to the spar deck one by one, the men produce daggers and bludgeons from their pockets. The night wind washes over them, smelling of salt, the septic smell of the open ocean. They move through the shadows, cling to the bulwarks, pause to let their eyes adjust to starlight. Two midshipmen wander about the deck. Moving quickly, the men strike them down with decisive blows to the throat, head, and heart. Rough hands clamp down on freshly-shaven jaws, silencing the cries of the dying. When this bloody business is concluded, they return to the gun deck and make for the captain’s quarters. It is at this critical point that someone, somewhere shouts.
The louse has lost interest. It creeps through the forest of hair, depositing a few more offspring, and is nearly knocked astray, again, by a jet of liquid. This time, however, it is not seawater, but blood. Without a second thought, the louse scampers over and greedily drinks it down. Hunger reawakens, overtaking the lonesomeness. The louse sinks its proboscis into the host’s scalp and digs in, filling itself with grog-flavored blood. The electric impulses in its tiny brain might to humankind signify happiness or satisfaction, but the louse has nothing but the rude twitches of antennae and leg and proboscis to reveal itself to the world, no words, nothing to give meaning to those myriad senses. The doors of perception are, for the louse, unfortunately quite narrow. The clamor, the smoke in the air, the smell of cordite, the frenzied shouts of its host, these stimuli all pale in comparison to the blood rushing through the man’s head, adrenaline-stoked, rushing faster with every gunshot into the louse’s belly.
Blades and bludgeons are put to good use. These seven traitors are effectively trapped in the captain’s quarters. The other sailors, still bleary-eyed, throw themselves into the breach, though they do not yet understand why. It is only that a familiar voice has bidden them to rise and kill. They thrust boarding pikes wildly through the open doorway, hoping to hit the men who only a few hours ago they thought of as comrades. The master-at-arms bids the marines to stop firing their rifles into the greater cabin, fearing the captain will be hit. Unbeknownst to him, the captain is already dead.
As the sailors fight, the louse picks its way through its host’s hair, overturning flecks of dandruff, scurrying between tangled strands, stopping occasionally to feast, leisurely as Adam in Eden, and when its host is struck viciously on the head by a heavy frying pan, great gouts of blood spurt up, a sea of blood forming right in front of the louse. Joy upon joy! But still, no one to share this bounty with. The louse remembers, for a moment, the faces of its brethren, itself unaware that it bears the same countenance. It feels, in its tiny, steadily pumping heart, a heaviness that is warm and even pleasant. An oddly peaceful sorrow. For what can be lonely that has not felt companionship?
As the traitors are struck down man by man, one sailor finds a gap in their defenses and rushes into the aft cabin, leaping over the dining table to engage the louse’s host in combat. The host pivots and ducks. The saber he wields was forcibly acquired from a rogue Turkish vessel, and seized by the captain as a trophy. Many other swords and sabers line the walls of the greater cabin, remnants of past victories. Deflecting the host’s blows, slipping past his guard, the sailor lunges, and sinks his cutlass up to the pommel in the host’s midsection. The eyes of both men bulge, one in pain, the other in bloodlust. The sailor sets his shoulder against the host and pushes, drawing the blade out as he does.
All the blood in the host’s head suddenly drains away, redirecting that vital fluid to other chambers, trying to preserve itself against this sudden severe leakage – but it cannot preserve itself from simple human clumsiness. The host continues to stagger, his center of gravity shifting. The compartments of his body are in disarray. Panting, sweating, he swings his arms, looking for something to grab onto, but nothing is there. The ship pitches, the world tilts, and in one final overcorrection, the host plunges through the aft window.
Two full seconds pass before his body hits the water, but to the louse, those seconds last forever. Creatures of limited lifespan must make full use of every second, unlike men, who have time enough to forget time’s value. The ocean is suddenly overhead, and approaching rapidly the louse’s doom. It makes no move to escape. What move could it make? Even a creature so small and dull recognizes when resisting fate is futile, and its small, dull soul cries out for the company of another. O, the curse of consciousness! Had it lived to spread its progeny, to preach to its brethren on this spark of awareness, what might lousekind have become? All of this for nought. It is thus in sorrow that the louse, clinging to the scalp of a rapidly dying sailor, rides into the embrace of saltwater, and the long descent into the darkness, down to the ancient bones.