The ocean had no mercy.
Raghav had learned that much during the endless drifting days.
The small boat rocked slowly across the water, carried wherever the currents decided. His tiny body had grown weaker. Hunger gnawed at him constantly, and sleep came more often than wakefulness.
Sometimes he wondered if he was already dying.
Perhaps this ocean would quietly become his grave.
Then the sea suddenly trembled.
At first it was subtle.
A deep vibration beneath the water.
The small boat shook slightly.
Raghav slowly opened his eyes.
Something enormous was approaching.
The waves around him began rising and falling in unnatural patterns, pushed aside by an unseen force.
Then a shadow swallowed the sunlight.
Raghav blinked weakly.
Above him rose a wall of dark wood and metal so vast that his mind struggled to understand it.
A ship.
No…
A monstrous vessel.
It towered above the ocean like a floating fortress.
From where Raghav lay, he couldn't even see the top of it. The hull alone looked like a towering cliff stretching endlessly upward.
His tiny boat was nothing more than a speck beside it.
A mosquito beside a mountain.
Fear exploded inside him.
If that ship passes over me…
The waves it created alone could easily flip his fragile boat.
One wrong movement and he would disappear beneath the sea forever.
His tiny hands trembled.
He tried to sit up but his weak body barely moved.
Panic filled his chest.
Someone… please…
For the first time since being abandoned, Raghav cried without restraint.
All the fear, loneliness, and desperation he had been holding back burst out of him.
"WAAAH!"
His cry was hoarse and weak, but he forced every bit of strength into it.
Again and again he cried.
Begging the sky.
Begging the ocean.
Begging anyone on that massive ship to notice him.
Please…
Please hear me…
The enormous vessel continued cutting through the sea like a moving mountain.
From Raghav's perspective, it felt like the world itself was passing over him.
His boat bounced violently in the waves created by the ship.
Water splashed over the sides.
Cold seawater soaked the cloth wrapped around his tiny body.
His vision started blurring.
The exhaustion was overwhelming.
Still he cried.
Again.
And again.
With every last bit of strength he had left.
But the giant ship showed no sign of stopping.
It continued moving forward.
Indifferent.
Unaware of the fragile life drifting beneath it.
Raghav's heart sank.
No one heard me…
His cries slowly weakened.
The sky spun above him.
His body had reached its limit.
His eyes slowly closed.
The last thing he saw was the towering shadow of the ship passing above him like a moving mountain.
Then darkness swallowed his vision.
And Raghav fainted.