Hal and Jerry Chapter 1 - To The New World

It was three months since they boarded the ship. Three long months of rocking, stale bread, salted fish and drunken company. The boys were promised countless riches and glorious fame if they made it there and back--alive, that is.

Hal was 14 and Jerry was 10. Never Harold and Gerald - just Hal and Jerry. They were orphans, abandoned at the roadside when Jerry was barely weaned. Hal had vague memories of his parents, but never got the urge to know about the parents who had abandoned them.

A kindly old childless couple had taken them in and raised them as their own, until the plague struck and Old Mr and Mrs Becker passed away. Hal had gone door to door, doing odd-jobs to feed himself and Jerry. 

One afternoon Jerry came back from spending all day with the other street urchins shouting animatedly about countless riches and fame, access to parties and posh ballrooms, various delights and delicacies. Hal had laughed at him and ruffled Jerry's head fondly, telling him not to get his head stuck in the clouds.

As tired out by the numerous chores he had done that day, Hal could not sleep. He tossed and turned in the straw, mulling over Jerry's words--what if there was a way out of this? This working-his-butt-off just to merely feed and clothe the two of them. For what seemed like ages Hal lay one way, then the other, but exhaustion eventually pulled him under.

The next morning he decided to follow Jerry to the street urchins. Apparently there was a bunch of lunatics that not only believed that the earth was round, they were going to sail to the New World - where the Spanish found gold, mind you - and come back rich as kings!

As with all hare-brained schemes, this sounded both enticing and dangerous. Mountains of solid gold, heaps of precious jewels that he didn't even know the names of. Oh the things he could do! Hal's mind was made up. He would go to this New World - with Jerry, of course - and come back and never have to lift a finger to feed themselves again.

That was all three months ago. Since then they had not seen the smallest strip of land-- just blue, blue sea, as far as the eye could see. They had met with some unpleasant weather, pirates, and even some incapacitating illness that took out half the crew, but this storm looked the worst yet.

They had braced themselves, tied down all loose items, and tightly furled all the sails. Everyone was wide-eyed and cross-fingered, praying to their various gods for safe passage and a successful journey.

Jerry was still sick from the last bout of flu and was lying below deck, while Hal was on deck, running around on the captain's orders, checking and double-checking that everything was secure.

It was like entering the maw of some primeval monstrosity. The ship was tossed around as if it didn't weigh more than a feather. Gale-force winds and twenty-foot waves threatened to snap the hull like a toothpick. Lightning would flash and light up the sky with vehemence and then thunder would follow, leaving the crew temporarily blind and deaf. The rain stung every inch of exposed skin; like an army of angry red ants sinking their pincers into soft skin over and over again

The storm raged throughout a good part of the night, but maybe the gods heard their prayers and decided to be merciful, and the storm subsided just in time for Hal to enjoy the sunrise.

The sun peeped over the horizon, golden rays racing across the sea-green waves and giving warmth to Hal. He felt renewed, reenergised, ready for a new day...until he saw the ship in its battered condition. His heart fell - he remembered all too clearly the HMS Halcyon in all her christening glory, how it sparkled.

"LAND HO!" the lookout cried, stirring up a near-stampede as each and every crew member ran to the bow, leaning over and craning their necks, all with one intention: to see land.

-Odysseus
I didn't plan for such a long story haha. maybe I'll conclude it within 3 chapters