THE BOAT TRIP: Stampy And Squid

Prejudice

--DAVIDS POV--
My dreams stopped. And my eyes were urged to open..
Slowly I opened my eyes to see myself lying flat on my stomach.. On top of Joe.
Our eyes opened at the same time, and we both yelled incredibly loudly and rolled in unison off the bed and on to the floor,
"Jesus Christ!" Joe yelled.
"If my head wasn't sore before it most certainly is now!" I said, planting my middle and index fingers in my inner corners of my eyes.

We both lay on the ground for a few minutes,
"Right we should probably get up.." Joe began, his hand planted across his head.
"You got a bit of a hangover, love?" I laughed,
"Oh try and pretend you don't!"
"Meh.." I sighed, standing up and holding my heavy head. "What happened last night?"
"Well if neither of us know and we're the only ones involved I think we're alright." He replied.

I wobbled out of the cabin out onto the deck,
"Where the heck are we?" I asked, I saw land in the distance, a tiny navy shadow amongst the sea.
"We, David Spencer, are about to enter a new continent."
"Oh my god is that Africa?!"
"Yes it is my friend! Morocco!"
I looked over at the meter, "we're getting pretty low on fuel, anywhere in Morocco we can get some diesel?"
"Tangler, maybe- if not there then in the capital, Rabat."
"Didn't one of the guys at Maker Studios give us a guide to like every country we might visit?" I asked,
"Yeah-" we went to the inside driving area where we looked through the files till we saw the divider AFRICA, and found MOROCCO.
"There is a high terrorist warning in Morocco- do not grow attached or speak to many people in Morocco- stay armed at all times." Stampy read,
"Oh god do we really want to stop in Morocco?"
"We've only got about twenty miles left in the tank, we don't really have a choice
"Or we could take a short cut and instead of going round the west side of Africa-" I skimmed my finger on the world map, "we could turn east and go through the Mediterranean Sea then through the Suez Canal through to the Red Sea then out at the other side, this is ultimately a shorter route but didn't Courtney talk about meeting with people in South Africa?"
"That is a good plan my friend.. However.. Only ships and oil tankers are allowed through the canal."
"I'm sure we could find a way to convince them, give them some money."
"How much have we got? Only like five grand, and we need to spend it on fuel."
"Well it's just a faster alternative- anyway, we probably should stop off here in Morocco." I said, the land was very close now, I turned the boat off autopilot and steered it towards Tangler. I was now able to see the docks where hundreds of old fishing boats were tied up and huge sandy buildings mounted against the hill.
"Wow I've never been anywhere like this before.."
"Yeah it's definitely.. Something.."
The city was like an ancient roman city, light creamy colours, decorated like a colosseum, yet with a modern vibe with the seaside road.
Beside the docks there was a large green area before a beach, it seemed so peaceful, but I knew that the people here were either incredibly rich or incredibly poor: there was no in between.

"Right Stamps, let's get armed up then."
"I've never held a gun in my life.." He sighed,
"Well let's hope we won't have to use it."
"Won't we look like terrorists? Foreign men with pistols in our pockets-"
"What is the main religion here, and the main language?" I asked him,
"I think the main language here is Arabic, and Islam is the main religion."
"Do you think many people know English?"
"I hope to god at least someone does!" He replied. We went back inside and unlocked a cabinet, I hesitated before taking a small handgun and tucking it inside my trousers, I handed one to Stampy, he inhaled before doing the same.

We tied up and looked around, sunglasses down but still our eyes squinted till we saw a young brunette lady, fair skinned, she didn't look African, she was the only woman around that didn't wear a hijab wrap around her hair.
"Hello? Can I help you?" She said, walking up to us.
"English?" Stampy replied, walking up to the girl, her accent was beautiful, completely understandable, English with a touch of African and.. French? I wasn't sure.
"Yes, nice to meet you, what are your names?" She asked us, shaking Stampy's hand and mine,
"Joe." He said,
"Dave." I said.
"I'm Eva, I teach English at a local school- what brings you here?"
I was about to speak when Stampy did, "we-" he looked at me, "it's complicated.. A little, it's kind of for work."
"Kind of?"
"Basically we're travelling around the world in that boat over there and the company we work for is making some kind of TV show out of it." I told her,
"-but we only film inside the boat- don't worry." Joe added,
"Rrrrrright..." She said,
"So what's it like here?"
"It's.. Nice.. But you live life on edge, knowing that every day could be your last, but the people are quite nice, well, most of them, the children are so lovely, I work with them, I show them English videos- that's what they're watching today, every Friday they get a video."
"That's nice of you- where did you get the-"
"We funded to buy an old tv, it's costed about the equivalent of £100, it's a little box thing but it's so much better than nothing I can assure you- also.. Have I met you before? Your voice.."
"Umm... I don't think so.. Where abouts in England did you live?" Joe asked,
"How did you know I lived in England?" She replied, they faced eachother smiling cheekily,
"Well your voice, it sounds English."
"It's that a good thing or a bad thing?" Eva raised an eyebrow.
"It's amazing." He said. Is he flirting?
"Well.. I'm from Nottingham, if you must know- I lived there for fifteen years before moving to Morocco after my parents died."
"I'm sorry to hear-"
"It's fine, they weren't incredibly good people, I wouldn't leave here, I couldn't go back, my conscience just wouldn't let me leave here, leaving the children would just be awful of me."
"They depend on you?" Stampy moved quite close to her,
"You'd be surprised at the amount of orphans and parentless children there are around here: or parents that are too young to look after the baby, or the mother dies-"
I felt a pang inside of me.
A reminder of an untold secret.

"-anyway would you like to come and see the kids? They are basically fluent at English." Eva invited us,
"Yes of course, sure." Joe said, we followed her into a tiny plastered room which was completely filled with children from about the age of 4 to the age of eleven.
I recognised a voice: the video they were watching,
I looked at the small TV screen and laughed, looking at Joe,
The whole room gasped when they saw us:
They were watching Building time!