Plastic Beach
by Kristof Szinnay
The foghorn’s rumble rolls over the choppy waves along the ragged stretch of windswept sand, pockmarked with esoteric detritus and glinting lumps of polished glass. Stokenman stiffens and looks up from the bags and bottles, sweeping his glacial gaze across the tense foraging party. He lingers on me for a moment; tilts his gaunt head, revealing a sharp tendon in his neck, and slightly narrows his seafoam eyes as he considers me. Perhaps he thinks I’m the most fitting today. Not sure how I feel about that. His focus shifts, and he turns his lanky frame, bones jutting out from beneath dark, matted skin pockmarked by scars, to face ahead again. The blazing sun hammers his back into a slumping curve.
“Back to the village.”
His voice is empty, the defeated hollowness of those broken by the universe, simply too tired to fight back. His bare feet carve shallow canyons in the filthy sand as he drags himself by his walking cane towards the encampment. We think Stokenman’s about 27, maybe 30 at most, but as we tail behind him in a little amalgam cloud of rags and plastic, he looks no less than 60. Our movements are sharp, unlike his; most of our survival instincts are still functional, and they scream a cacophony of vivid stress across our collective consciousnesses as the sand gives way to dry topsoil under us. Nobody is thinking about anyone but themselves—compassion, empathy, and love being long-lost privileges on Plastic Beach.
We push past the ramshackle driftwood palisade at the edge of the village and look down what passes for main street in Sand Town, a foul amalgamation of ancient, crumbling concrete and rotting wood, exposed rebar and makeshift thatch roofs. Hortho and his crew are already gathering the locals; the wretched bastards must have landed on the opposite shore to have beat us here.
With each move, the pirates rattle, necklaces of rusty tin and kitbashed kalashnikovs scraping against each other. Hortho notices our approach, and yells down the squelching dirt path, waving his weathered metal arm around in cold greeting, or maybe as a command to hurry up.
“Any other teams out?” he asks, voice professional but conversational, like a dutiful neighborhood watchman, as we shamble up and join the crowd.
“Nah,” says Stokenman, without looking at him, glossy eyes staring off somewhere in the middle distance.
“Good.” He takes our word for it. He knows we don’t try to lie anymore. “Let’s get started.”
Hortho steps onto the dinky, sagging stage, once a gallows, at the front of the square, and raises his arm as a gesture for silence. His guys surround him and the crowd, some bringing in a final few stragglers before joining the containing ring. They shift their weight constantly, traipsing through the wet mud in an attempt to keep their balance. Sounds something like what I imagine those “octopus” creatures must have sounded like, with all those suction cups and whatnot. It’s the only noise left as the disheartened chatter dies down. Hortho steps to the front of the platform, the weak driftwood construction voicing its discontent. Dropping his arm with a hollow clank, he addresses the crowd with that self-certain, quietly assertive tone of his.
“Right. Today, I think we need… four. Yeah, four sounds right.” No malice, though. Never malice. He takes no pleasure in his work, the animal.
“Let’s judge volunteers. If you want it, come up and we’ll see if you’re fitting. The more fat on you the better; we all know how this goes.”
The crowd slowly mumbles and parts like the Red Sea for a few dejected Moseses. They shuffle forward, corpse-esque, eyes interchangeably full of emptiness or steely determination.
“Not you, Achev. We’ve gone over this. You’re too small; go back.” He waves his hand without a hint of unkindness at a scrawny woman clutching filthy rags to herself. “You, too, Casio.” I had no idea that guy was called Casio. Christ, he knows their names better than me.
Hortho appraises the remaining volunteers: a fellow about 25, and a really old guy, maybe even 70. He stares at them like a jeweler at a rough gem, angling himself to inspect various nooks and crannies for flaws. No disrespect or mockery, per se, more a baseline understanding that what stands before him is hardly more than merchandise. The boards creak again as he steps back.
“Sharp, you’re good. Thanks for volunteering. Mr. Brooks, I’m gonna need to weigh you. Step up, if you please.” He extends his arm down to help, and pulls the struggling Brooks onto the podium. “You’ve got it, Mr. Brooks. Well done.”
How the fuck can he talk to us like this?
Behind Hortho stands the dog-eared gallows, tattered rope replaced with a rusty fishing scale. He graciously gestures towards it, easily lifting Brooks and hooking him onto the scale by the back of his faded shirt. Brooks grunts, and the scale shrieks in pained metal on metal. Hortho leans back and squints his unnervingly comfortable eyes. Some of his mannerisms remind me of the more positive plastic scroungers or salt farmers, like this is all a normal course of events.
“Very good Mr. Brooks. 42 kilograms, give or take. You’ll do just fine. Anyone else wanna volunteer?” His eyes sweep the crowd.
“Alright, that’s fine. I’ll pick.” The judgmental gaze of the appraiser replaces the flitting stare of the disinterested worker as Hortho narrows his eyes, focus shifting from person to person with utmost professionalism. It’s like he’s walking between livestock, turning our heads and looking at our teeth. As Stokenman’s before him, his gaze rests a moment on me, but mercifully passes on.
Hortho twists his face into a slightly overblown grimace of consideration.
“Hmm… okay… Thatcher, and…” Metal arm gestures at one of many. “You, blue shirt, says ABERC on it; sorry I don’t know your name. Come up, please. Don’t make this harder than it has to be.”
The one who’s apparently called Thatcher stumbles forward, stricken face that horrible pallid color of the sun-bleached plastic down on the shore. She trips twice on the way to the front, her shivering extremities failing to cooperate.
The other just stands in place and eyeballs the mud, body swaying a little. He lets out a little shriek, like a feral creature of some sort, and bolts towards the edge of the crowd, where a waiting pirate, a massive, hulking man with fists larger than his brain, sets him parallel to the ground with an unpleasant, fleshy thud.
“Don’t be that way, please,” Hortho chides the bleeding escapee groaning in the mud. “Bring him here, would you, Guilliver?” and gestures to the guard massaging his knuckle.
“Please don’t try and run, everyone. Small island like this, there’s nowhere to go. No boats, either; you know the fleet would find you in minutes, and that’s bad for both of us. Smack on my head; hole in yours, right?” The guard swaggers up and roughly plants the man on the podium next to the other three.
“Thank you, Guilliver. All right, fellas. Let’s get this unpleasantness over with, shall we?”
Four pirates move forward in lockstep. Hortho stops one of them. “Not you, McRae. Let the new guy do it. Come on up… Jascinth, was it?”
From behind the podium steps a pirate I haven’t seen before. Their mannerisms resemble Thatcher more than Guilliver, McRae or Hortho; pale face, small posture, a reluctance that I’ve never seen in any of the others. White knuckles grip the carry handle of their rifle.
“Y-yes, Captain, sir?” a meek voice squeaks from beneath a mat of mousy brown hair. They’re like a little prey animal, or something.
“You’ll do the honors today, Jascinth.” Hortho casually gestures to the four waiting villagers. “Take your pick.”
Jascinth’s eyes widen a little, their gun rattling in their shaking grip. “Uh, with a-all due respect, Captain H-Hortho, sir. I really don’t—”
“Take your pick.”
Hortho’s voice carries shocking menace, an irrefutable command and a promise of pain.
“Yes, Sir. Sorry, Sir!” Jascinth hurriedly jumps to attention.
Some of the pirates chuckle. The terrified newbie measures up the selections with visible remorse.
“U-uh, I… I’ll do Mr. Brooks, Sir.”
That’s who I would pick if I had to. Less guilt. The guy’s lived his whole life already.
“As you wish. Line up.”
The other three pirates stand before the remaining selections, and stare down at them, chins raised, with an air of absolute superiority. Hortho guides Jascinth to Mr. Brooks, hand on shoulder. Hortho leans his scarred head to the side, but maintains his gaze on the kneeling man, pointing at either side of his chest.
“Here, and here. One in each lung, yeah? Heart’s a delicacy and the skull’s a trophy, so we keep those intact. Try to make sure they bleed as little as possible; some buyers like that. Whenever you’re ready. Oh, and don’t mind the sounds.”
The pirates raise their guns, executioner style, a range of stoicism and satisfaction on their faces, a far cry from Hortho. Six shots ring out as if they were two, bang-bang[1] [2] ; one in each lung, and the bodies fall down. Some more interchangeable pirates quickly begin wrapping the wheezing victims in gauze, to staunch the flow of blood, preserve the merchandise. Finally, with Hortho towering over their shoulder, Jascinth lets fly two unsteady bullets, and Mr. Brooks joins the other three, twitching and gasping for air that never comes.
As if guided by a higher power, Jascinth looks up, and their teary eyes meet mine instantly through the crowd. It’s only for a second, but it feels like an hour-long conversation, about sorrow, remorse, hatred, anger at the system and at Hortho and at the Pirates and at the Eco-Terrorists for making the world this way. We talk about wanting to eat fish, to walk a clean beach, to live and let live, to love, to die, to go back to the way things were before, like Mr. Brooks talked about. To be free and be prosperous, to be what we know we cannot be. Their eyes widen a little, shocked as I am at the level of comprehension in that moment’s connection.
I flick my head imperceptibly to nod at Hortho, and they understand. They move their head to glance at the assorted pirates, and I understand. They do not want to kill, but they already have. I do not want to kill, but something must be done.
Hortho addresses the crowd. “My condolences to all acquaintances and loved ones. It’s nothing personal, but there’s not enough to go around and the higher ups need to eat.”
I believe him. It truly is nothing personal. How can it be? He harbors no ill will towards us, just as a farmer holds nothing against his sheep. As the pirates begin leaving at Hortho’s bequest, Jascinth bumps me, and I feel a cold pressure in my hand. A bundle of bullets, wrapped in dirty gauze.
The next time Hortho’s crew come, it’s windy, air churning choppy waves into forever oscillating mountain ranges with each gust. The ever-present colorful plastic layer shifts with the water, forming fancy abstract art pieces as it rises and falls. I’m on the salt pans today, raking away at the discolored lumps under my feet. The salt keeps us alive on Plastic Beach, allowing us to ration our insignificant haul of sour-tasting produce and tiny, misshapen fish for just long enough to not collapse into the wind.
Once again, the group follows Stokenman’s crooked frame back to town, back to the square where the crowd is hemmed in by the brutish fellows with the guns. Once again, we stare dejectedly at the gallows podium where the steel-armed man stands, hair fluttering in the wind.
This time, Jascinth is assigned a spot on the perimeter, close enough to the crowd that I can shimmy over and stand next to them during selection.
“Juliard, Buffet… Suzuki, and… Jemima. And Finch. Come up.”
As the crowd sways to let them pass, I inch closer to Jascinth, and press my arm against theirs. A metallic weight is placed in my hand, coupled with the gentle crackle of moist paper. As the shots ring out, I reintegrate myself into the mass of people. Hortho says his condolences, and the pirates leave, bodies slung over their shoulders.
That night, when I get back to the hovel I sleep in, I see that the metal weight is a beat-up receiver and magazine, wrapped in a map of some sort.
Apparently, if the map is not a coincidence and holds some meaning from Jascinth, Plastic Beach used to be somewhere called the British Virgin Islands, before the Eco-Terrorists. At least, that’s what the map is of, and a circled island matches up quite well with the coastline, so it’s probably not the worst assumption. Based on what I can tell, it’s north of a large land mass, and the pirates always come from the west, so who knows, maybe it’s a way out. Not that it matters.
The next time the pirates visit, it’s cloudy. They take Puma, Clarkson, and Wrigley, and I am given a barrel. The time after that, it’s raining. They take Deere and three other guys I don’t know, and I am given a stock. After that it’s clear again, they take Mexico, Ramsey, and the angry woman down the street, and I am given sights. Windy, Boeing and four guys, scrap metal. Raining, Budweiser, two girls and a guy, a spring. And so the pattern continues, until I fashion the mismatched parts into what loosely resembles the pirates’ Kalashnikovs. Its knobbly, disjunct parts strapped together with rivets rattle in my careful grip, but with any luck, it can disgorge the one bullet I need it to.
It’s overcast, and Hortho’s here again. He scouts the crowd for victims as he usually does, checking for any scrap of fat or meat left on anyone. I puff out my shriveled stomach in an effort to be seen, like some macabre inflatable doll, weapon clinking under the back of my torn shirt. Hortho’s eyes pause on me as they have many times before, his head tilts like Stokenman’s does. He leans back.
“Starsky, Cirque, and Asterisk. Come up, please.”
It dawns on me that’s the first time I’ve been called by name in years. It’s strange, being the one for whom the crowd parts, as I shuffle towards the executioner’s stand. I can see Jascinth’s eyes on me.
Finally, I stand before Hortho, and look up at his jagged visage. I swing the gun to point at his temple, and in that moment, regardless of whether it fires or not, I feel it was all worth it for the way his eyes widen and muscles tense as my finger curls around the trigger.