{"id":1422,"date":"2016-04-23T07:21:53","date_gmt":"2016-04-23T12:21:53","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/ajscifistories.com\/?p=1422"},"modified":"2016-04-23T07:21:53","modified_gmt":"2016-04-23T12:21:53","slug":"the-curse-of-oscar","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/ajscifistories.com\/?p=1422","title":{"rendered":"The Curse of Oscar"},"content":{"rendered":"

The Curse of Oscar<\/strong><\/span><\/h2>\n

By AJ Marks<\/span><\/p>\n

The captain walked into the admiral\u2019s office, pausing to glance at the stacks of papers, maps and other knick-knacks on the desk. Lately the Nazis had been quiet but the captain knew that might change.<\/p>\n

\u201cAh, captain, what can I do for you?\u201d the admiral said, sitting behind the desk and had been looking over some reports or something.<\/p>\n

\u201cSir, it\u2019s about these transfer orders,\u201d the captain replied placing a paper on the desk which the admiral looked over.<\/p>\n

The admiral looked over the transfer paper then back up at the captain. \u201cWhat\u2019s the problem?\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cSir, you want to transfer Oscar to our ship, we won\u2019t take him,\u201d the captain said. \u201cHe\u2019s cursed, everyone knows it, the men, I know it, even you know it.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cCursed, what nonsense are you spouting, of course you can take him,\u201d the admiral replied. \u201cThere have been a few people in England who wish to meet him, heard he\u2019s to head to Belfast.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cSir, taking him on board my ship would be a mistake,\u201d the captain said. \u201cThe sailors on board would probably mutiny if he came on board.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cOscar has been nothing but good for morale around here, and from what I\u2019ve seen your crew could use some cheering up,\u201d the admiral said, looking the captain in the eye daring him to prove him wrong.<\/p>\n

\u201cOkay, he has been, but doesn\u2019t change the facts, one battleship, one destroyer and one carrier, all of which have sunk while he was on board,\u201d the captain said. \u201cOscar might raise morale, but he would be viewed by others as a curse.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cSon, are you telling me you won\u2019t take Oscar on board your cruiser even if I make it a direct order?\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cYes sir, I don\u2019t\u2019 care how much he raises morale on board, I won\u2019t lose my ship because of him,\u201d the captain said. \u201cHe is bad luck.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cAll because of some so called bad luck,\u201d the admiral shot back.<\/p>\n

\u201cSir, if he is allowed on board some of the men might think the ship is doomed, even going so far as to look for the doom which they have convinced themselves is coming.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cNot every ship he\u2019s been on board has sunk, the Lightning is still afloat last I saw,\u201d the admiral said.<\/p>\n

\u201cOnly because he didn\u2019t stay on board for long,\u201d the captain replied back to him.<\/p>\n

The rumble of thunder echoed through the room announcing the coming afternoon rains. Pausign to look out the windows they could see the dark clouds gathering as the admiral turned back to the captain.<\/p>\n

\u201cYou won\u2019t take him?\u201d the admiral asked.<\/p>\n

\u201cNo sir, he\u2019s a curse to any ship he boards,\u201d the captain replied.<\/p>\n

\u201cYou leave me with a tough decision,\u201d the admiral replied back, pausing to consider his options.<\/p>\n

\u201cYou yourself said he\u2019s a morale booster around here, keep him here,\u201d the captain said.<\/p>\n

\u201cWell, I do enjoy his company, and yet I have orders from high command,\u201d the captain said.<\/p>\n

He sat back to review his options when Oscar came waltzing into the room as if he owned it. \u201cWell, hello there Oscar, how are you doing today?\u00a0 I\u2019ve got a treat for you, managed to take some milk from the cafeteria this morning, think you\u2019ll like it,\u201d he said reaching behind his desk.<\/p>\n

Oscar glanced at the admiral for a second before answering. \u201cMew,\u201d he said, saying it again as he watched the admiral pouring the milk into a saucer and placing it on the ground.\u00a0 Oscar ran over quickly lapping at the milk, purring at the same time.<\/p>\n

\u201cI would miss him, but\u2026\u201d<\/p>\n

His words were halted as his chair broke sending him to the floor.<\/p>\n

\u201cYou see, he\u2019s cursed!\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cNonsense, that was just\u2026\u201d<\/p>\n

The end.<\/p>\n

This is a little story I could see happening if Oscar was to be placed on board another warship. Oscar, a cat, was on board the German battleship Bismarck, which sank, rescued by the British destroyer Cossack, which sank, rescued and placed on board the carrier Ark Royal, which sank.\u00a0 He was rescued again and considered an unlucky cat to have on board any ship.<\/p>\n

The British admiralty had him transferred from Gibraltar to Belfast where he stayed living to the age of 15 and was never to be the mascot of any warship again.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The Curse of Oscar By AJ Marks The captain walked into the admiral\u2019s office, pausing to glance at the stacks of papers, maps and other knick-knacks on the desk. Lately the Nazis had been quiet but the captain knew that might change. \u201cAh, captain, what can I do for you?\u201d the admiral said, sitting behind […]
Continue reading…<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_exactmetrics_skip_tracking":false,"_exactmetrics_sitenote_active":false,"_exactmetrics_sitenote_note":"","_exactmetrics_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[24],"tags":[3,63,61,64,60,28,62,65,12,59],"class_list":["post-1422","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-original","tag-aj-marks","tag-battleship","tag-british","tag-carrier","tag-navy","tag-original","tag-oscar","tag-short-story","tag-story","tag-world-war-2"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/ajscifistories.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1422","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/ajscifistories.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/ajscifistories.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ajscifistories.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ajscifistories.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1422"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/ajscifistories.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1422\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1424,"href":"https:\/\/ajscifistories.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1422\/revisions\/1424"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/ajscifistories.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1422"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ajscifistories.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1422"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ajscifistories.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1422"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}