Killer Whale by Justin D'Ath

Author:Justin D'Ath
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781742282077
Publisher: Penguin Group Australia
Published: 2008-12-09T05:00:00+00:00

15

GO DOWN FIGHTING

It was too late to turn. I grabbed the throttle lever and pulled it back as far as it would go. There was a rumble under my feet and the Black pimpernel trembled from stem to stern as its propeller went into reverse. We started slowing down, but not fast enough. Penguins scooted right and left as the edge of the ice came rushing towards the ship and disappeared under its bow.

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 The initial, bone-jarring crunch of impact had been replaced by a creaking noise that seemed to reverberate around the whole ship.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.

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