Im on my fuckass Titanic shit again (this ship is my roman empire she is the reason I love the ocean the stars the sea and all of their history).
Can you imagine being an engineer aboard her? How the entire engineering and electrical crew stayed until there was no point? Perhaps not until the bitter end, no, but that would have been a waste of lives. Until the water was at the soles of their feet, though. Until salt reached their ankles, until the incline sent them stumbling. Sent up as the last of your part of the ship, volunteering to stay, to keep the lights on, to keep the steam running and the wireless talking. How terrifying it must have been for the last of them, hearing metal cry and electricity snap, feeling the darkness like she had weight, trapped in the bowels of the great vessel. Not a single one of them survived, to my knowledge, all hands lost to ensure those in their care could make it
And what of the band? They had every right to leave, to abandon ship, to join the staff and passengers who couldn't help. They had every right to see their friends and families again. They chose to stay, though, to play songs that will echo only in the memories of the dead. They chose to keep up spirits, to warm human souls when the death's cold fingers choked ever tighter, ever deeper. They chose to play and play and play until the waters wouldn't let them, until the incline of their coffin meant time was up. They played to the night, to the sea, to the stars above them in the same way the rockets and wireless called for aid. A dying gasp of a great ship, a beacon of hope and help for any who would listen.
The Carpathia, little ship she was, only able to help because the little lady had a crew just as helpful as her. Because her radio operator wanted to be kind and pass along a message to the Titanic before turning in, only to get echoes of screams and desperate calls in return. A radio operator who wasn't trusted by the crew to have heard what he heard, who risked *everything* kicking the captain awake. A captain who leapt to because it's better to be safe than sorry, because those dying screams wouldn't go unanswered, because you need to try even if it looks hopeless. Everyone leapt to when Titanic's screams began to carry the waves, from the extra men pushed into the boiler rooms to the bridge crew doing their damnedest. Passengers donating clothes, distributing weight, to offer the sweat off their brows and hands made to help. I've heard it said, though probably a tall tale, that many took to the stern of the ship to help her propellers chop into deeper waters. I choose to believe it, that these mere humans stood atop shrieking boilers and sizzling steel because it *might,* it *MIGHT* gain them an extra minute, an extra life.
Can you imagine how that ship must have felt? The crew who knew that the shrieking boilers and moaning metal meant they were mere seconds from their own disaster. The passengers who only knew a great tragedy was being reflected upon the stars. The wireless operator who listened to the screams and cries of his dying friend. The captain who took every last drop of speed the Carpathia offered and then demanded more. The crew chiefs who disabled governors, who covered pressure gauges, who told their men more, More, MORE. The ship herself, melting to slag, shuddering and shivering in a sea that took down a ship much greater than her. A mere serf racing to save her Queen, to save her Idol, to Do What She Can. Nobody demanded Carpathia make that journey. Nobody would have questioned if they'd merely pushed the limits and come up wanting.
She didn't, though. She would question. Her crew would question. Her passengers would question. It's said she reached around 17-19 of her rated 14 knot top speed, and sure if you take a calculator and ask it how many knots you'd have to go to make 58 miles in three hours then that makes sense. This is a steamship, though, a girl who had to work up from an idle gait to a roaring race. This is a little lady who's used to ambling along the waves as they lap at her skin. She needs Time to work up to speed. She needs Distance to work up to speed. Ive read some reports that say she cleared 20 knots, some that attempt to make a case for closer to 25. A long shot, that, but one I'd believe. Who else knew how to care for boilers well over capacity then the souls of the ship she's racing to save, after all? The first to fall, the first hands to guide their savior.
Have you pushed a ship over its limits before? Have you heard how she squeals, shivers, screams when you just *toe* the line over? Have you listened to the churning of steam engines, the 'fwhump-fwhump' and the whistles and jostling of coal? Can you *imagine* how much Carpathia had to be shaking, how heavy she had to be breathing, how much her bones and lungs and limbs had to be *breaking,* on a gamble? On a maybe? She'd never make her top speed again, never even close. She broke her own back to carry the tide.
And what of the others? The young boy who caught Titanic's cries, who went to Mama and Papa and learned that a great tragedy was unfolding? A young boy who probably spent the rest of his life thinking about the screams over the seas. What of the Norwegian and German little ships that tried to relay messages? That didnt speak the language but offered to help? What of the coastal relays, trying, trying, trying to hear, to note, to understand. What of the Olympic, of her crew, her passengers, her engineers, pouring every hopeless ounce they could *knowing* it wouldn't make a difference? What of Olympic, who reached for her sister across the stars, who was always *just* out of reach, *just* over the horizon? What of the Olympic, who shouted out without class or decorum to Please Shut Up I Cannot Hear My Sister. What of the Olympic, who had to listen to her younger sibling grow colder and colder, who had to come to terms knowing she couldn't save her? What of the Olympic, whos shout for silence offered her scant messages to hear Titanic's final shudders? Of her crew who sat behind similar, near carbon copies of the instruments, the decor, the design that currently slipped under? What of this Oldest Sibling, this Old Girl who had to listen as her proud, boisterous, confident sister succumbed to the sea? She did all she could, too, even if all it meant was we could hear the Titanic's rattles and cries until the bitter end.
Carpathia listened to all of it, the shouts, the screams, the old girls and little ladies offering to help. She listened to it all and she raced like hell to the rescue anyway, pushing past her limits. Titanic's engineers had to have helped care for her boilers, for who else but an engineer could push them so hard? Her crew had to have helped guide her over the waves, for they had just passed these bergs, hadn't they? Her Captain had to have helped guide Carpathia's journey, Titanic's souls were still in his care after all, even those lost. The sea may have claimed the Titanic's bodies, but their souls made sure Carpathia made her trip swiftly.
