The Last Airship by Christopher Cartwright

without any effort on its skipper’s part.
    To
his dismay, the other ship immediately altered its course to collide.
    He
sounded three sudden loud bursts with his fog horn.
    It
was loud enough to wake the dead, the living, and anything in-between.
    And
still no response!
    Sam
turned on his engine and increased speed. There was no time to try to reverse
his way out of the imminent collision. His only hope was to somehow pass in
front of the other vessel’s bow by making a ninety degree tack to starboard.
    He
heard the screech of his 150 horse power Yanmar Diesel engine exceed its
maximum RPMs. He then gently pushed the throttle past its highest point and
held it there with his hand against its will.
    He
would have liked to get out a Mayday signal before the collision took place,
but there was no time to do so.
    One
hundred feet, turned into fifty.
    Still
no change.
    Then
fifty feet became twenty five.
    His
bow and the center cockpit passed the other vessel’s evil wall of steel.
    It
was going to be close.
    Maybe
only a matter of a second, whether or not the other ship would clip his
transom, the large butt at the end of Second Chance , which housed much
of his equipment.
    At
that moment, he realized there was nothing more he could do. He was going to
collide with the larger vessel.
    Sam
felt nothing but utter dismay at the fact that he was about to be demolished by
a stupid rich guy’s toy off the coast of Australia, of all places.
    Surely
it must be a mistake.
    Who’s
ever heard of pirates in Australian waters?
    Then
it happened.
    He
knew it would, but the sound of metal and plastic colliding made the most
sickening sound he had ever heard.
    And
then it was over as the larger ship continued on.
    Innocently,
its enormous propellers kept turning after it passed, without any hint that it
had recently been in a collision.
    *
    Sam’s
thoughts were taken to another world.
    Accidents
like this one never happened in modern times, certainly not with the modern
technologies available and required on such large vessels. He struggled to
comprehend what had just happened.
    At
first, he didn’t even notice the enormous hole in the stern of Second Chance ,
where seawater was now flooding in. Instead, Sam looked up at the huge transom
of the other vessel as it was slowly moving away, like the evil machine it was,
totally unaware of the carnage it had just inflicted.
    It
was painted entirely blue, and it bore no registration number or name on the
hull. Located on its aft deck was a small helipad and tied down on it, was what
Sam recognized as a black Sikorsky SH-3 Sea King helicopter – the kind most
commonly used by the U.S. Navy for anti-submarine warfare.
    What’s
that doing on a civilian vessel?
    On
the rear of the helicopter, Sam could make out the words, “Wolfgang
Corporation.”
    His
curiosity abated when he noticed how quickly his beautiful ketch was taking on
water. The entire transom was missing. “Taking on water” was an understatement.
In truth, the seawater was gushing in. He’d heard about ships hit by containers
out at sea sinking so quickly that its occupants never even realized what had
happened. He was about to see firsthand just how such a catastrophe actually
happened.
    Although Second Chance held so much safety equipment on board, Sam had no time to
reach any of it. He cursed himself for his distraction. His mind simply
couldn’t accept the fact that he’d be in a collision just two miles offshore
from a holiday town in Australian waters!
    He
barely had enough time to pop the lid off his inflatable life raft.
    The
thing weighed forty five kilograms and required that he pull the emergency tabs
and throw it overboard to allow it to inflate properly away from the sinking
yacht. Forty-five kilograms wasn’t too onerous a weight for a grown man to
lift, especially one who is experiencing the adrenaline rush that came from his
fight or flight response on a sinking vessel.
    Sam
carefully tied one end of the