I'm Fine, But You Appear to Be Sinking. Leyna Krow

      I’m Fine,

      But You

      Appear

      to Be

      Sinking

      From the notebook of Captain C.J. Wyle, February 1

      It’s just me, Gideon, and Plymouth now.

      Strangely, the Artemis seems smaller with only the three of us onboard. At ten people, our 112-foot trimaran felt spacious, with plenty of room for everyone to go about their respective tasks. There was a constant human hum, but we weren’t on top of each other.

      Now Gideon and I can’t seem to escape ourselves and Plymouth is always under foot. His barking echoes through the narrow hatchways. Shrunken—that’s how this whole arrangement feels.

      The Pacific Ocean, however, is the same size it’s always been.

      I don’t want to admit anxiety or desperation. That seems unprofessional. But if the boat has moved in recent days, it has been by its own accord and certainly not in any productive direction. We lack the necessary manpower and know-how. I try not to blame Gideon for this. He is, after all, only an intern.

      So far, I’ve managed to avoid making hasty decisions. Inaction, for the time being, seems the safest course of action. The trip has been so marred already by the pitfall of optimism.

      When the others started making their preparations, the clouds were high. By the time they had descended and darkened, the inflatable skiff, Righteous Fury, had already been lowered off the stern of the Artemis and into the sea. The protest banners were unfurled and the megaphone batteries charged. It occurs to me now that reasonable men with reasonable aims would have called for a rain check. That’s the problem with radicals—they rarely take weather into account.

      Gideon had been left behind to keep watch. Together, we observed from the bow as the skiff containing our eight crewmates set off after a whaling ship of unknown nationality. Gideon held a digital video camera. His face was a wide grin.

      “Civil disobedience is the highest form of civic participation,” he informed me.

      I asked whether the maxim still applied in ungovernable waters where there is no civil or civic anything to speak of. Gideon shook his head and told me that right and wrong transcend international boundaries.

      The whaling ship had been spotted near the horizon that morning by Gideon himself. It was the first encounter of the trip and the crew’s excitement was palpable. I watched as they readied themselves, speaking hurriedly, faces flushed. They knew how to say, “You are in violation of the Endangered Species Act and International Whaling Convention” in thirteen languages. A few had worked out phrases of their own such as, “How would you like to be harpooned?” and, “Every humpback is someone’s child.” Though technically it would be more accurate to say, “Every humpback is someone’s calf,” but I suppose that doesn’t have quite the same ring.

      If the banner waving and slogan shouting did not convince the whalers to turn back, I’d been told by certain crew members that they were prepared to board the rogue vessel. No one would say what might happen once they were inside.

      Did this necessity ever come to pass? We’ll never know. The skiff was not yet in shouting distance of the whalers when the sky, already gray and noisy, closed in on us, obstructing our view of the only other souls Gideon or I knew in the entire hemisphere. For the next five hours, we were no more than a buoy, bobbing alone in the sputtering froth of warm rain and salty wind.

      When the clouds lifted, the whaling vessel was gone from the horizon and so was the skiff Righteous Fury.

      It should be noted that the day of the storm, it was Nelson’s turn in the galley. Gideon and I were unable to reach an amicable agreement as to who should pick up the slack and make dinner. And

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