life boat and spent a day at sea before Chase picked us up in a second boat.”
“And they’ve been holding it over you since?”
She sniffs and wipes her nose. “That’s why I spied on you.”
“And why you were on the bridge.”
Another nod. “They know…they know I won’t say anything.”
I start to feel bad for Peach. Despite her heart being in the right place, she fell in with people who value animals over people and who had no qualms about controlling her with fear. “Will you testify against them?”
She looks terrified by the idea.
“Look,” I say. “With everything I’ve seen and heard, if we survive, we can both testify against them and put them in jail for what they’ve done. You’ve been used and manipulated. You’re a victim, not a murderer. I guarantee you won’t do time.”
A weight lifts from her shoulders and the tears return. “Thanks…but…what about the whales?”
“What?” I ask.
“Who will stand up for the whales if the Sentinel isn’t around?”
I nearly smack her upside the head, but take a deep breath and explain, “The Sentinel ’s actions are turning public opinion against anti-whaling organizations. Public opinion determines what laws are put in place. And those laws might very well make the anti-whaling community the villains. Right now, the law is on our side, and yeah, whales are being killed, but far more whales will be killed when all anti-whaling organizations are shut down or have their hands tied by expanded yearly quotas. That’s why the WSPA sent me here. If we can prove the Sea Sentinel is an extremist group and shut them down, we can get back to making lasting progress against the whalers.”
She sits back and says nothing, absorbing what I’ve told her. I’m mostly impressed with the amount of chutzpah I put into my speech. Seems there’s some whale-hugger in me after all.
“Umm,” Jenny says. “The camera is ready.”
I’d totally forgotten about the camera in my hand. I pop open the 2.5 inch view screen and hit the play button. After two seconds of black screen, there’s five seconds of my room. The picture is framed by clothes. The angle of the image and the purple and white stripped sock helps me identify the location as a shelf in the far corner of our room that’s been covered in clothes from day one. I shake my head and sigh.
“That’s so Single White Female,” Jenny says, and I’m glad we have a similar sense of humor. She’ll help keep me sane over the coming days.
Peach inches closer, sees the image on screen. She offers another apology, but I’m not listening. The image has changed. It’s a white linoleum floor covered with black shoe scuffs. I hear Chase’s voice. Then McAfee’s. The camera pans up. The bridge.
For ten minutes, we watch the inner circle of the Sentinel go about their business without a care in the world. McAfee’s talking on the bridge phone, which is a satellite phone capable of calling other ships or someone on the other side of the planet. His face looks serious, but his conversation is private. He hangs up and turns toward Chase. “We might have a problem. The Bliksem is closing on our position.”
“Was Jackson sp—”
“Get as many people on deck as possible. If they get close, throw everything we have at them. Get them to turn away.”
“Turn away?” Chase asks.
McAfee furrows his eyebrows. “Do it, Chase. Now.”
“Yes, sir,” Chase says, then picks up the bridge phone and dials a three digit extension.
“The next ten-ish minutes is when they started throwing the meat,” Peach says from next to me. “You can fast forward through it.”
But I don’t. And when the first chunk of bloody whale meat slaps up against the bridge window and slowly slides out of view, I nearly laugh. Not so much because whale meat on a window is funny, but because of the abject horror that ripples through the bridge crew when they realize what’s just happened. There’s screaming and wailing
Yvette Hines, Monique Lamont