Killer Whale

by Justin D'Ath

  CRUNCH!

  The impact threw me across the bridge. I slammed into the forward bulkhead and hit my head on the window. for a moment I saw stars. I gripped the window ledge to hold myself up.

  It was noisy. The initial, bone-jarring crunch of impact had been replaced by a creaking noise that seemed to reverberate around the whole ship. I felt a shaking sensation through the soles of my boots. The floor didn’t seem level. I blinked to clear my vision. My face was pressed against the window and my breath fogged the glass. I wiped it clear with my elbow.

  The first thing I saw was the grinning skull of the Jolly Roger flag. It was much higher than it should have been – nearly level with the bridge.

  The Black pimpernel was a converted fishing trawler, not an icebreaker. When it hit the ice, its bow had ridden up onto the ice shelf. Now it was stuck there, with its bow high in the air and its stern under water.

  So much for my career as a sea captain. Five minutes at the helm and I’d run us aground.

  Except it wasn’t ground we were stuck on, it was ice. And the ice was cracking.

  CREEEEEEEEAK!

  I looked up in the direction of the noise.

  Uh oh!

  Two enormous cliffs of ice loomed overhead – one on either side of the stranded ship’s bow. They were the two ice peaks I had mistaken for separate icebergs. Now the Black pimpernel was right underneath them. And – CREEEEEEAK! – a long, zigzagging crack ran from the ship’s bow, across the ice bridge and up the side of one of them. It was almost all the way to the top, and growing wider every moment.

  I could see what was about to happen. As soon as the crack reached the top, a chunk of ice weighing several thousand tonnes was going to break away from the cliff face and fall. It would land directly on top of us.

  The Black pimpernel would be flattened.

  CREEEEEEEEAK!

  I was alone on the ship’s bridge. Where was Captain Dan? Where was Frøya? until they returned, I was in charge. The safety of the ship and the lives of every one aboard was in my hands. And what was I doing?

  Nothing.

  But what could I do?

  The ship was stuck on the ice like a beached whale. Like a killer whale on an icefloe, said a little voice in my head. That gave me an idea.

  Remembering how the killer whale that attacked Harry and me had wriggled from side to side to get off the ice-floe, I raced back to the Black pimpernel ’s wheel and spun it as far as I could to the right. Then I spun it left.

  Nothing seemed to happen. The engine was in full reverse, but its single propeller couldn’t get enough grip on the water to drag the eight-hundred-tonne ship off the ice. I spun the helm back to the right. My hands were sweaty on the polished knobs of the big wooden wheel and my arm muscles were tingling.

  CREEEEEEEEAK!

  High overhead, the crack had nearly reached the top of the ice cliff.

  Heart racing, I spun the wheel the other way.

  A slight tremor ran through the ship and there was a grinding noise under my feet. Did the Black pimpernel move, or had I just imagined it?

  I spun the wheel again.

  ‘Sam, what has happened?’

  Frøya was halfway up the companionway, straining to support Captain Dan, who leaned heavily on her shoulder. He didn’t look well. His face was as white as the ice outside and his eyes looked bloodshot and glazed.

  ‘Give me … a hand … bud,’ he groaned.

  I shook my head, ‘Sorry. Too busy,’ and spun the wheel as far as it would turn to the right. I was disobeying a direct order from the ship’s captain, but there was not a moment to lose. One eye on the wall of ice hanging over us, I began spinning the helm back to the left.

  And the floor beneath my feet moved – just a fraction – to the right.

  I spun the helm the other way and felt another slight movement through the soles of my boots.

  There was a grinding noise and the Black pimpernel slid backwards two or three centimetres. I spun the wheel again. We slid back five more centimetres. I was sweating inside my exposure suit; it takes a lot of effort to turn the helm of a ship and my arms felt like they were going to drop off, but I didn’t stop turning the wheel. Left, right, left, right. Slowly the ship was wriggling off the ice, just like the killer whale had done, only slower.

  Too slow.

  CREEEEEEEEAK!

  Then there was an ominous silence.

  The crack had reached the top of the cliff! A huge section of the iceberg broke away and started tilting outwards. It blocked out the sky.

  Both Frøya and Captain Dan saw the shadow and turned their faces skywards.

  Nobody said a word. We all knew we were going to die.

  But I kept spinning the wheel. Left, right, left, right.

  The Black pimpernel ground backwards another ten centimetres.

  Still leaning on Frøya, Captain Dan staggered up the last of the stairs. He lurched across the bridge and reached for the wheel, but I blocked him with my elbow.

  ‘Sorry, Captain,’ I said. If he was too weak to climb the stairs on his own, no way was he strong enough to spin the helm.

  I had got us into this mess; it was up to me to get us out of it.

  Or I would go down fighting.

  16

  SAVE US!

  There wasn’t a crash or a boom, just a deafening roar that went on and on as several thousand tonnes of ice and snow exploded across the Black pimpernel ’s bow. The floor dropped under my feet like a lift that’s broken its cable, then heaved back up again. It would have thrown me across the bridge if I hadn’t been gripping the helm. Frøya and Captain Dan crashed into the chart table and fell in a heap on the floor. A broken radio mast toppled past the window, but other than that nothing was visible outside. The world had turned completely blue.

  My heart did a backflip. We were underwater!

  Then the roaring stopped and I saw why everything was blue. It wasn’t water outside the window, it was ice. The Black pimpernel was crawling backwards through the choppy sea with a chunk of iceberg the size of a house resting crookedly on her main deck. The weight of it was slowly tipping us sideways.

  ‘We’re going to capsize!’ cried Frøya. She tried to stand up but her left ankle gave out under her and she sat heavily back down on the floor.

  Captain Dan didn’t say anything. Perhaps he was too stunned to speak. He just looked at me across the steeply sloping bridge, and I thought I saw a pleading look in his eyes. A look that said: Save us!

  But I didn’t know what to do. I’d reversed the Black pimpernel off the ice, escaping the full force of the ice-fall, but part of the collapsing iceberg had somehow ended up on our deck and it was going to roll us over.

  You save us, I wanted to say to Captain Dan, but he was obviously too weak and groggy to do anything. And Frøya had hurt her ankle. So everyone’s fate was still in my hands.

  But I no longer wanted the responsibility. Captain Dan was right – I was only a boy. I’d tried to save us and look what had happened!

  It no longer felt cool to be Captain Sam.

  A large wave rolled under the Black pimpernel ’s hull and we tipped even further to starboard. Another few degrees and we’d capsize for sure.

  I had to do something.

  But what?

  The ship was still in reverse. I couldn’t go forward because the ice chunk on the deck made it impossible to see what lay in front of us. But I could turn.

  I looked out the rear window to check that all was clear, then spun the wheel as far to the right as it would go. The reversing ship went into a sharp starboard turn. Just as I’d hoped, the tilt lessened by two or three degrees and held there – the turn was counteracting the sideways lean caused by the ice chunk. As long as I kept reversing the ship in circles, we wouldn’t tip over. But I knew we couldn’t keep it up forever. Eventually we would either run out of petrol or run into an iceberg.

  I grabbed the radio to call for help, but I couldn’t make it work.
The radio mast had been sheared off by the falling ice. We were on our own.

  Think, Sam, think!

  There were icebergs all around us. Several of them were small – chunks that had broken off the falling ice wall and landed in the sea – but there were some big ones, too. one of them was almost as large as the Sydney opera House. It looked familiar, except now there was no longer an underwater bridge connecting it to the one next to it. The falling ice must have broken them apart. Near the bottom of the iceberg, a prong of ice poked out over the sea like a giant anvil.

  When we reversed past the anvil for the third time, I peered carefully beneath it to make sure there were no underwater ice shelves.

  Then, on our fourth time round, I gingerly straightened the helm. As the reversing Black pimpernel came out of its sharp right-hand turn, the weight of the ice chunk began to tip us to starboard again. Over we went, further and further, until the waves were splashing through the starboard rails and washing across the deck.

  Favouring her sore ankle, Frøya pulled herself up to one of the windows so she could see out.

  ‘Turn, Sam!’ she cried. ‘We are going to hit that iceberg!’

  Captain Dan had dragged himself up, too. He didn’t say anything. I could see him mentally gauging angles and distances and speeds. His face was bathed in sweat.

  So was mine. The Black pimpernel was leaning over at an impossible angle – forty-five degrees, maybe fifty degrees from the horizontal! At any moment, we were going to capsize.

  But still I kept her on a steady course.

  Hang in there, ship! I urged her. Stay upright just a bit longer!

  The Black pimpernel chugged backwards towards the projecting prong of ice. We were nearly there. Thirty metres, twenty-five, twenty …

  Hang in there! You can do it!

  Fifteen metres, ten …

  Suddenly I felt the floor pitch sideways. The Black pimpernel had passed its point of balance. We were going over!

  It takes several seconds for a ship to capsize. Enough time for it to travel quite a long way – even if it’s going backwards. I held my breath and watched the ice prong. It loomed above our stern, growing steadily larger as the foundering ship reversed towards it.

  Five metres, four metres, three …

  Here goes nothing! I thought. And spun the helm hard right.

  A tremor passed through the Black pimpernel ’s hull as its rudder bit into the sea. The ship slewed around in a heart-stopping broadside and fell against the iceberg. Steel met ice with a bone-jarring thump. There was a tortured SCREEEEECH as the prong scraped along the side of the bridge, tearing into the superstructure and smashing several of the windows. Then – CRUNCH! – the prong collided with the huge block of ice that was sitting on the Black pimpernel ’s deck.

  The ship shuddered as if it had run into a giant brick wall, and stopped. Almost in slow motion, the massive iceblock rolled into the sea.

  Just as I’d hoped.

  No longer weighed down by its icy cargo, the Black pimpernel slowly righted herself. Her metal superstructure creaked and groaned. Water poured over the sides into the sea. We’d made it!

  Captain Dan turned then and gave me a small nod.

  ‘Nice work, mister,’ he said.

  17

  COMPANY

  But our troubles were far from over. The hospital ship was now a lost ship. Not only had the icefall destroyed the Black pimpernel ’s radio mast, but it had severed the main electrical cable to the bridge as well. None of the navigational instruments were working, except for a small compass. And that wasn’t much help.

  ‘You can’t rely on a compass so close to the South Pole,’ Captain Dan said. He was slumped in the captain’s chair, too weak even to sit up properly. ‘Just keep away from icebergs, Sam, until one of the maintenance boys is well enough to fix the wiring.’

  Who knew how long that would take? Everyone was still pretty sick, including Captain Dan. He had to go back below deck after only ten minutes on the bridge. I helped him down to his cabin, then went to check on Harry. My little brother was semiconscious and his teeth were chattering. I made him drink half a mug of water, then found some more blankets and a couple of unused ski jackets to pile on top of him.

  ‘What was that … banging noise?’ he asked weakly.

  ‘We ran into an iceberg.’

  ‘Wicked!’ Harry breathed, and went back to sleep.

  I stopped in at the infirmary to get a bandage, then climbed the stairway to the bridge and bound up Frøya’s ankle. It was badly swollen and she couldn’t walk on it. I helped her to the captain’s chair, then took charge of the helm.

  I was glad to see that the weather had cleared. There was a good view in all directions. But the only direction that interested me was straight ahead. Keep away from icebergs, Captain Dan had said. I didn’t need to be told twice. No way was I going within a kilometre of an iceberg after what happened last time.

  ‘We have company,’ Frøya said.

  I looked where she was pointing, expecting to see another ship, but nothing was there except a few icebergs on the horizon.

  ‘I don’t see anyth–’

  A spout of vapour shot out of the water about fifty metres to our left. My skin prickled. Harry’s and my encounter with the killer whales was still fresh in my mind. Then two more whales spouted in the distance, followed by a third one much closer. Suddenly there was a splash just forward of the Black pimpernel ’s bow. A huge glossy mound rolled out of the waves, followed by a broad grey tail. It looked bigger than a killer whale and was so close that I could see barnacles speckled across its rubbery skin.

  ‘Minke whales,’ Frøya said, a big smile stretching across her face. ‘For sure, they are very beautiful.’

  I wouldn’t have called them beautiful, but they certainly made an impressive sight. A pod of the huge mammals was swimming across our path from left to right. There must have been a hundred or more.

  ‘Look, there is a little one!’ Frøya pointed.

  A mother and her half-grown calf had surfaced right next to the ship. The calf was the size of a station wagon, but it did look kind of cute. I wished I had a camera.

  ‘They don’t seem bothered by us,’ I said.

  ‘Why are they to be bothered?’ Frøya asked as the mother led her calf around our stern and swam off after the others. ‘We are their friends.’

  Then I saw something that took my mind off the minke whales. Coming over the horizon to our right was a little black dot. My heart thudded as I grabbed a pair of binoculars from the shelf beneath the radio.

  ‘Helicopter!’ I cried. ‘It’s coming this way.’

  ‘Let me see,’ said Frøya, reaching for the binoculars.

  She didn’t seem very excited about it, but I put that down to her age. She was older than me and trying to be cool. I was too relieved and happy to act cool. I reckon there was a big cheesy grin on my face as I watched the helicopter grow larger and larger. It had come looking for us. Our troubles would soon be over.

  ‘Stinkers!’ breathed Frøya.

  ‘What’s the matter?’

  She passed me back the binoculars. ‘Have a look.’

  I focused on the approaching helicopter. It wasn’t black, it was orange. Painted on its fuselage was a word beginning with R. I tried to make out the other letters. There was an E, an S, another E, an A…

  Suddenly I got it: RESEARCH.

  It was the helicopter I’d seen on the rear deck of the Nisshin Maru.

  ‘Are they looking for whales?’

  Frøya nodded. ‘Already they have found them.’

  I watched the helicopter descend and fly in a big circle over the sea about two hundred metres to our right, directly above the centre of the pod. Then it rose to about five hundred metres and hovered there.

  ‘What are they doing?’

  ‘For sure, they are calling the killer ship,’ Frøya said.

  I scanned the horizon where the helicopter had first appea
red. That’s where the whaling fleet would come from. ‘What can we do?’

  ‘I don’t know.’ There were tears of frustration in Frøya’s eyes. ‘Everyone is sick.’

  ‘Except us,’ I said. I pushed the throttle lever all the way forward and spun the big wooden wheel to the right.

  18

  PLAN B

  ‘What are you doing, Sam?’ Frøya asked as the Black pimpernel began to turn slowly towards the helicopter.

  ‘I’m going to chase them away.’

  ‘How can you chase a helicopter?’

  ‘not the helicopter,’ I said. ‘The whales.’

  My grandparents own a farm in the high country of southern new South Wales. One school holidays, nan and Pop took me on a cattle round-up. On horses and motorbikes, we rode up into the mountains and drove a big mob of cows down to the winter pastures. I didn’t know if whales could be herded up like cows, but it was worth a try.

  There were several mother whales with half-grown calves in the pod, and the whole group was travelling slowly so they wouldn’t be left behind. We soon caught up. I turned the Black pimpernel across their path, but instead of changing direction like cattle, the leading whales simply dived underneath us and continued on their way. The rest of the pod swam past behind our stern.

  ‘They will not stop,’ Frøya said. ‘They are migrating.’

  Migrating straight towards the Nisshin Maru and the rest of the Japanese whaling fleet.

  It was time for Plan B. I turned the wheel the other way and the Black pimpernel slowly came round in a sweeping left-hand turn. When we were travelling parallel with the pod once more, I straightened the helm. Slowly we began overtaking the huge, strung-out line of migrating whales. The helicopter tagged along overhead. The whale spotters must have wondered what we were doing.

  ‘Frøya, can you take the helm?’

  ‘My foot is hurting very much to walk.’

  ‘I’ll help you.’ I assisted her across to the helm, then propped her injured foot on a rolled-up life jacket. ‘Is that okay?’

  She nodded and clasped the wheel. I could see she was in pain, but there was nothing I could do. Someone had to steer the ship while I put Plan B into action.