Another week passed on the edge of Old Ana, this time the boys were on the deck trying to fight against the capricious wind that did nothing but ruin their lives.

Unfortunately for Ricardo, this was the part he was the worst at and the one they had to do the almost every day, he never worked as a sailor adjusting the sails in the correct position, so from time to time he made a mistake that it took more effort.

The ship's policy since there were 7 people left is that everyone does everything, however only Ron, Dima and the captain could give orders to the 5 sailors, this caused the appearance of unfair orders that undermined the morale of the sailors, for which the captain changed his strategy.

This week Wiliam had added another rule to the crew, the one who gave the order, was the first to do the task, which helped maintain the morale of the crew, seeing that if one of the officers gave an unfair order, if or if he had to do it first.

But the wear kept accumulating, and all the crew members had hands just as bare as Ricardo. Now what was failing the sailors were their legs, more than one fell to the ground to not get up for a long time, but if they wanted to continue marching towards the island they had to position the sails favorable to the wind.

"Calix, go help the boy with the ropes!!" The captain ordered, as he went to help Taras with his ropes, although Taras did not need help, he had worked as a sailor for several years.

Calix dragging his completely torn feet went slowly to help Ricardo, each step he took was slower than the previous one and blood stained the ground. The whiplash wounds on his back had become infected, and he had been having a fever for many days, which prevented him from sleeping.

Ricardo stopped his task and turned to see Calix, the sorry state of the sailor caused him pain, even though Calix was the most injured, as punishment the captain made him work more than the rest.

Calix looked at the cabin boy who was looking at him, his eyes met, as if that were his last mission in this life, he fell to the ground as he fell, he kept looking at the cabin boy, as if his gaze contained a code hidden.

*Puff* The body had fallen face down on the floor.

"Calix!" One of the sailors shouted, as he ran to see the sailor, all the sailors had the same reaction, no matter how crazy they were, these weeks of working as slaves had united them more than ever.

Ricardo was stunned, especially when Ron claimed that Calix was dead...

The day continued to pass normally, it seemed that the death of one of them was not enough to earn a break, they had to reach the port, otherwise they would all die.

"Ricardo, let's go upstairs, I have something to discuss" Taras whispered to Ricardo.

They could not go to the cabins alone, but they could go to the helm area, but it was only empty at the end of the sailing time, when they lowered the sails because they had to sleep, and they could not continue worrying about whether the wind carried them in the opposite direction.

The two of them were at the helm, they had little time in private, so they had to take advantage of it

"If we continue at this rate, we will achieve what Wiliam seeks... Kill us all" Taras murmured to Ricardo.

"Are you sure that's the case? … I have no doubt that at this rate we die, but are you sure that he does it deliberately?" Ricardo also asked in a low voice.

"I sailed on a fishing boat for many years, I know the times of rest and work. The working times of this ship, the only thing they seek is to wear us down and kill us…" Taras muttered, looking at Ricardo seriously and making sure no one came up with them.

"Boy, I was finding out what the past Calix was, not many knows, but he was a helmsman before committing a crime for which he was fired from his ship, an experienced helmsman would be the first to notice the work rate anomaly, What I was looking for was not to not work, it was to give a signal to the rest”. Taras's voice grew heavier as he spoke.

"Can't we tell some officers to talk some sense into the captain?" Ricardo asked, he did not doubt, it was not the time to doubt, now they had little time to talk before the others noticed that they were not going to sleep in the cabins.

"Everyone is looking for the same thing, you remember Ron's speech… 'True sailors' that is the key to his speech, but what they are looking for are suicides who kill themselves sailing… With the level of organization that this ship was showing in these last 3 weeks, do you think there would have been so many deaths from madness?… No, the captain released the ship so that we could kill each other and thus reduce our number" Taras said with even more seriousness and fear.

"Wouldn't it be easier to kill us all at once?" Ricardo asked, trying to get as much information as possible.

"For some reason, he doesn't want to do that… There are rules, but I don't understand them, he could have killed Calix with lashes, but he wanted him to die working…" Taras said, looking Ricardo in the eyes with concern, putting a hand on his shoulder as the young boy continued:

"You may not believe it... But Lucas was afraid of the captain and died before he could react... I doubted the captain, and I've been looking into Cadix's past for these weeks... If I follow Lucas' path they're going to look for an excuse and I'm going to die tonight, I realized late how serious the problem was, Ricardo"

"What the fuck is he saying?" Ricardo asked, almost shouting, but Taras covered his mouth in time, muffling the noise.

"Boy we don't have time, what I'm telling you is just a possibility, remember the talk we had the day of the mutiny in the bow store, this ship was always weird... I'm just realizing it now... It's very likely that the captain and the first officers were consumed by the murmurs, that is why we heard them throughout the trip... Or they want to kill us all to achieve some objective that they cannot understand" Taras replied somewhat hurriedly, they were running out of time.

"But that was always the objective of the captain... To kill us as 'True Sailors'... Cadix did not die by magic, you saw the lashes that the captain gave him, he wanted to kill him and he succeeded... Now I know more and they will do the same, I have no way of escaping..."

"Remember Ricardo, no matter what happens you have to pretend that this conversion never existed, no matter what happens" Taras said staring into the young sailor's eyes.

"You have a big challenge ahead of you... If we follow orders they kill us, if we don't follow orders they kill us... I don't know how you're going to do it, but you're bound to do it... I saved your ass today, boy, don't let my life be worthless" Taras told him turning around, there was no time, he couldn't let anyone see them talking to themselves.