Under the surface

Preface

Nasty saltwater was splashing in her face, when she was scrubbing the metal railing with a rough brush, while that she was having struggles by standing up properly, because the ship was moving up and down. Every time she stepped further, she had to clench her hands around the railing.

It was her punishment for behavior earlier in the kitchen, when the cook was trying to dump her face into the food waste and she refused. She could dodge the attempt, grabbing some of the stinky stuff and throwing it right into his disgusting smirking face.

"YOU'RE GOING TO PAY, LITTLE BASTARD!" And after the cook was staggering out of the kitchen with his too fat legs, leaving her behind with a smelly hand and looking disturbed after him.

"AGH!" Her hand was slipping over the railing, her feet were sliding apart and she landed onto the floor, where some rusty edges drilled into her clothes and she groaned out in pain.

"You can stop." A deep voice was near her head, so she looked up and spotted the well-known face of the first officer of the Pequod. His dark-toned glasses looked in her direction, hiding his eyes behind it and preventing to look him straight in his eyes. There were scars placed in the middle of his forehead and his long white hair knotted back in a bun.

"The office, Sir?"

"You got it, boy." He answered, stepping over the deck, without slipping out once, while she could hardly take a step forward. Finally, she reached the entry for the inner ship and walked behind the impatient waiting first officer. They walked along the tight ship passage, sometimes some mates of her passed their way and they winked at her with a hidden smirk, wishing her luck and patience.

His electronic pencil was scratching over the iPad. Seconds passed and he stopped for thinking, mumbling inaudible words and then moving on with writing it down. Her attention got caught by the feeling of something warm running down her arm and when she glanced down, she noticed a slight smaller wound was located there.

"Sir, do you have any bandages, I could use?" No response. She glared at the writing officer, inspecting his face again and again, slowly admitting how handsome Commander Starbuck still was. She blushed, blinking a few times and getting aware of the blood on her arm again.

"Sir, I need bandages!" Again, there was no reaction. Usually, she was used to this and waited for him to finally speak up. But today was different.

"SIR-"

"SHUT UP, OLIVER." Starbuck shouted at her. Calling her by her invented boy name, made her shut up and just glare at him. Within the silence, she remembered how she came up with the idea of pretending to be a boy to avoid any strange situations. She had suffered through a lot of these in the last few years, until she decided to 'be a boy'.

Her glance went down onto her hand to a finger, on which was a ring with the letters: I V Y. She once found it laying on the ground and she liked the name, so she turned it into her name. Until she became the boy, Oliver.

For this, she had cut her hair short with some sort of undercut, stealing manly clothes and with the past three years she could learn how to behave pretty well.

"So... what did you think, when you did another stupid thing, while you were already stuck in a punishment? I should've thrown you into jail, instead of just scrubbing our railing. I swear next time and I know there will be a next time, I will throw you into jail for three days in a row!" Starbuck seemed to have gathered his patience again, confronting Ivy with his usual telling-off and bouncing on his feet really upset. While talking, he walked up and down in front of Ivy and complaining about all the stuff she had done until now.

"I'm really starting to ask myself, if you're doing this on purpose... " When Starbuck said that, Ivy looked up to him and he was leaning against the table, his dark glasses reflecting the light and Ivy could only imagine how his eyes pierced through her. She felt uncomfortable with this, her heart pounding faster and she feared that he could overhear her pulse.

"Anyways. You'll start working tomorrow, I'm done. Leave!" With this, Ivy stood up and left the office, shuffling down to the bedrooms to get some rest and meet up with her mates. They were already hanging on their beds, waiting for her.

"So, did he spare you again?" Maxim grinned at Ivy, showing his yellow teeth and that he didn't seem to have cleaned them in a while. In that time, Roy and Merlin stick their heads out, which where hidden behind the curtains. There was also a grinning expression on their faces.

"If you call this sparing." The deep tune of her voice changer sounded through the sleeping room, telling the others to look at her arm, when she dragged her jumper up and revealed a bleeding wound.

Maxim's eyes widened, turning around and making some puking noises, because he wasn't able to see human blood. Roy jumped down of his bunk bed, causing a few members of the ship to groan loudly or curse.

"Jeez. Did you push him to the breaking point? Need bandages?" Ivy nodded, taking the bandages Roy gave her and looking on her bed for exchangeable clothes.

"I slipped at work, stabbing my arm somehow. It wasn't him. But he added some more days in jail." This time, Merlin was the one to ask something. His head hanging down and his eyes fixed at the ceiling, he opened up his mouth.

"So... how many days will you suffer?"

"Three... allegedly." All three giggled, Maxim couldn't because he was still to distracted by his illness.

"I'll take a shower now." The others mumbled something like, she shouldn't get back too late, because they had to work tomorrow and it's going to be early. She just affirmed, walking to the bathrooms and there locking up the door.

With a heavy groan, she undressed her jumper and her ripped jeans, to reveal the wet suit under it and opening it with a zipper at the back. Finally, she could turn off the voice changer at her neck, hidden by the wet suit.

She sighed softly.

Her voice felt so weird. But good.

Ivy started to hum softly, turning on one of the many showers and moving under it, when it was warm. The wet stuff washed off the bad smell on her body and made her feel clean again. Ivy still worshipped the running water coming out of these metal nozzles. She never ever had seen something like this on the earth, she used to bath in sand and dirty air, luckily her hair was too short to become matted at this time.

Now they had grown longer and stick on her forehead until her nose. She brushed them out of their face. The pain on her arm rose up again and she cursed suddenly, when the soap water ran over the wound.

"At least it's clean now." Her voice sounded grumpy through the bathing room and with that her shower ended.

"When do you plan to tell the others about your little secret?" Roy was leaning against the wall a few meters away, his back looking in the direction of Ivy so, he couldn't see her naked.

With fast movements, she wrapped the bandages around er thin arm and slipped into a clean wet suit and exchanging clothes. After that, she activated the voice changer again, finally answering Roy's question.

"I don't know... Maybe in a few weeks..." He was the only one on the ship, who found out about her real gender and he accepted to keep his mouth shut about this.

"They're slowly getting suspicious... because you're always showering by yourself." Ivy scratched her head, looking aside a little bit insecure.

"I'll make sure, they won't find out sooner... Come on, we'll go to bed." With that, Roy stepped toward Ivy and stroked roughly through her wet hair. They sneaked back in the sleeping hall, the light was already out and made it a little difficult to find her bunk bed. Her hands reached out to prevent Ivy from falling or walking into something. She did it and laid down, one look on the clock and she knew, she only had a few hours left to sleep.