I suppose historians will say it sailed bravely in trecherous times, but you all know the word “embellishment”. At least it had a lofty goal - they searched for none other than the Holy Grail. If only they’d followed the footsteps of Lancelot, aye? Sail ho for Eric the Red, we all cried, and oh, how your humble narrators cries, cries tears of liquid death, yea, my Midas touch, my leper’s curse. It wasn’t storms stirred by Mercury’s heels, as he raced to Neptune’s lair with news of our travels, that sunk us in the end. Even though the two sat down to tea and schemed as only two titanic bitches overcome with the ennui of immortality can scheme, and yea, like housewives of vast inertia did they poke and meddle. We survived the whoopsies and the upsydaises, the woooh’s and the aargh’s. And the time Neptune, to the egging of Zeus and the flattery of Hera, stood at the end of the world and took the carpet of the sea by it’s hem and shook the dirt out - nations fell, civilisations crumbled, but still we sailed. What defeated us, then? We were a ship of fools. Is that accurate enough? I hear my albatross harking with despair. Perhaps - perhaps if we *were* a ship of fools, we might have survived? What I am getting at is… is… look, we were all at sea, for months on end. How long can one look at the same painting without wishing it’s colours in a different arrangement? We can only remain static for so long, as a species. Or so I thought. I bought up my objections with the crew, and they tied leper bells upon me. I tried to remain still out of deference to my fellow passengers. We had one who looked toward the sun and asked why it glared him. He needed to know in a spiritual sense. We had another who refused to believe in the biscuit barrell. Most other people believed in the barrell, and seemed to defend it’s existence in an odd, defeated sort of way. My assumption was that it was due to their knowledge that the unbeliever lead an altogether more colourful existence. They decided that our ultimate destination would be happy and lovely utopia of shining light and complete harmony, and so appeared to switch themselves off. I spent my time staring at the sea. Often, I would see haunting images which reflected those of the clouds above. I saw the vast reaches of Neptune’s suburbs, saw the soap operas of seahorses marrying goldfish, posted messages on the flying fish and waited breathlessly for their return. I often spoke with the man who glared at the sun. I persuaded him that his lifetime would be spent in the pursuit of the answer to his question, and that each new day would bring new answers, if he would let it. He eventually got the hang of this and managed to find time enough to play naughts and crosses with me on the sail. This was generally frowned at, but after time I lost the ability to listen to moaning without content, and was blissfully unaware of their existence. When the time came for the end, I knew I wasn’t ready. Something just seemed wrong, unfullfilled. I steered the ship to port and disembarked secretly. Last I heard, they were still sailing there, to their inevitable somewhere at the end of the world, a silent ship on a turbulent sea.