Huge bubbles rise out from under the deck as the hull fills with water. People scream as the deck sinks deeper and the water starts creeping up your legs. Some people are scrambling onto the wheel-house roof, which causes the whole boat to tilt, plunging people off the sides into the inky water, which churns with thrashing people scrambling to climb back aboard. The sound of children’s sobs rises above the scene like a terrible song.
Your body is pounding with anticipation – your stomach clenched tight, your hands tingling with adrenaline – but you find that your mind is filled with a floodlit beam of focus.
I’m going to save us.
The water is up to your knees now. From the corner of your eye, you see that one of the big near-empty plastic water drums has started to float away from the boat.
‘Jump!’ you shout to Jamilah, and with all your strength you launch off the side of the boat, away from the splashing crowds and the debris, towards the plastic drum, Jamilah at your side.
The saltwater forces its way up your nose with a burning intensity. You keep a fistful of Jamilah’s clothes in one hand, and thrash frantically towards the drum bobbing just out of reach, your head slipping up and down between air and sea.
You reach the drum, struggling to hold it still as you haul Jamilah up onto it. She hugs the drum with her arms and rests her head against it, while you grip it by a handle from below, up to your neck in the water, panting hard.
The water is cold, and your soaked clothes cling and balloon heavily. The night air is filled with screams and sobs.
You see a mother in the water near you, her head nearly underwater as she struggles to lift her baby higher than herself. You keep a tight hold on the drum and kick desperately towards them, reaching them just as the waves close over the woman’s hijab. You haul her up, and she lies sobbing with her face against the plastic drum, holding her wailing baby close.
You bob in the inky, deep blackness, gasping and looking around wildly. A few men are swimming away from the wreck, heading for the black shape you thought you saw earlier – it is a rocky outcrop in the ocean! If there are rocks jutting out of the water, then surely you’re not too far from the coastline of Australia?
If you could make it to the rocks, pulling Jamilah and the mother and baby along, you’d all be able to climb up out of the water. You might then be able to take the plastic drum back to the wreck to rescue others. But the rocks are a long way away.
Just then, one of the fishermen fires a flare, which rockets into the sky above the boat in a blazing trail of orange smoke. It hovers overhead like a hissing star.
Is there anyone out there to see it? you wonder. Did anyone hear our distress call?
What if you set out for the rocks and a boat comes to the wreck to save everyone? You might not be found. But if nobody comes, then up on the rocks is the best place to be …
You look back at the rocks and see a tiny black figure – one of the swimmers has reached the rocks. He jumps up and down, waving his arms. He made it!
Will you try to make it too?
If you swim for the rocks, go to scene 37
If you stay with the boat, go to scene 36.
Water slaps your face and you cough, trying to heave yourself a little higher onto the drum. It bucks under you, in danger of tipping off Jamilah and the woman with her baby. The rocks are too far away in seas this rough, you decide – it’s best to cling to the drum and stay with the wreck.
The flare still casts an eerie red light over the scene. The rim of the deck is still just above the waterline, and you see the fishermen’ silhouettes hunched over their radio, broadcasting a call for help for as long as they can. The water around them churns with people, many trying to clamber up onto the wreckage, their weight only sending it down faster.
Jamilah’s wide eyes are shining in the dim moonlight as she takes in the scene around you. Even through this chaos, you can hear a faint rasping noise as she struggles to force each breath in and out. You pray that she doesn’t faint again.
You touch her hand and her eyes snap onto yours. ‘We’ll be okay,’ you whisper. ‘We’ll be okay.’
She nods. Inside, you hate yourself for choosing this night, this boat, this journey, when you knew she was so sick.
Then your ears pick out a new sound: a bassline that thrums under the wailing of wind and voice, a steady chug-chug-chug that seems to be getting louder.
A spotlight drenches the scene, making the boat behind it into a huge black silhouette. Is it a container ship? Another fishing boat?
‘Angkatan laut Australia kedatangan!’ whoops one of the fishermen, waving his arms about wildly, and the water erupts into sobs of joy and desperate squeals as the black ship surges towards you.
You keep pedalling your legs through the water. Hurry, hurry, please hurry.
A few minutes later, a rubber dinghy buzzes closer, with a woman in uniform at the bow. She takes the baby, then hauls up the mother, then Jamilah.
You grab the edge of the boat with both arms. It’s slippery, and heaving up and down with the waves. With a final, awkward move, the navy officer yanks you up by the seat of your pants, and you lurch
