Chapter 1

While the pay was quite a bit nicer, so far James was not all that happy with his new duties aboard the Ocean Princess. They'd already made the long trip from Los Angeles to Hawaii, and were now steaming south-southwest towards their next port of call, Samoa. While he did enjoy having a better choice of his bridge shifts, the secondary duty of a First Officer—being in charge of emergency communication, navigation, and equipment—was somewhat tedious. Checking the backup communication and navigational equipment was no problem for him, but the emergency 'equipment' meant lights, lifeboats, and life vests for over seven-hundred passengers and another three hundred crew members.

Of course, this duty meant half his time aboard was working closely with the ship's Safety Officer and her three bosuns. Actually, James thought to himself as he sipped strong rich coffee from a metal mug and stared out the bridge windows into the black night, This job wouldn't be so bad if it weren't for that damned woman.

The woman in question was the ship's Safety Officer. While technically his subordinate, she was generally considered the ship's biggest bitch on wheels because Jessica Barnes was the one and only daughter of Captain Barnes. While most of the staff officers aboard the Ocean Princess were former Navy officers, Jessica Barnes was definitely one of the exceptions. Rank meant nothing to her. As far as she was concerned, since she was the ship Captain's daughter, she was second in command. This made every minute he spent overseeing those safety duties almost unbearable.

James' sense of duty and an actual sense of what ship safety meant made the job all that much harder, for Jessica Barnes could care less about actual ship's safety. As far as she was concerned, the worst safety concern aboard a modern cruise ship was that the food was prepared cleanly and safely, as the only time negative news stories were published about cruise lines, it was due to stories of food poisoning. So far though, James had managed to swallow his anger and simply go behind her back to make sure the bosuns working for her kept the ship's safety equipment in working condition.

He hadn't really had much contact with Jessica Barnes on their first voyage—when he was serving as Second Officer—but now that he was forced to be within her proximity of overbearing bitchiness, he'd begun to realize the rumors about her were true. More than two thirds of all the customers of Princess Cruises were people who only considered taking a cruise after becoming fans of The Love Boat, and they wanted experiences like those depicted on the show. That meant a wide variety of customers, but it was almost expected for staff and crew members to mingle socially with the passengers where acceptable.

Sometimes this meant just being friendly, and other times this meant a night in a passenger's cabin. Yet Jessica Barnes seemed to have a serious stick up her ass when it came to "mingling" of any sort. She had issues with crew and staff dating passengers. She had issues with crew and staff dating each other. Hell, just a few days ago, he'd been told a story about another cruise ship she and her father had served on together where she'd actually gone to her father because one of the ship's doctors had switched berths with a female deck officer so he could share a cabin with another female deck officer. Though according to the story teller, it was one of those rare cases where her father got her to back down because the doctor and the deck officer in question were married. Not that it made much difference to Miss Barnes.

James was really only thinking about her now because he'd had a serious blow-up with Jessica earlier in the day when she'd discovered that he'd ordered her bosuns to inspect several of the life rafts because they were scheduled for inspection, not bothering to go through her since he knew she would have simply told him it wasn't worth bothering. She'd berated him and told him the job was a worthless waste of her subordinate's time and effort when she could have had them assisting in other duties.

He knew that probably wasn't the end of it, and he'd probably hear about it from her father. But in this case, he figured her father would back him up.

It was at 02:16 local that the radio officer on duty spoke up from his station, "Sir, something's going on out there."

Marshall walked over to the man's station, "Explain."

"All the sudden, I've got a bunch of mayday calls."

"How many?" James asked.

The radio officer shrugged, "Five, maybe six. Wait ... there's another one."

"Where?"

"Uh ... only one has given their position, it's ... about five nautical miles north-northwest of us," he answered, getting up to point the position on the chart.

"Chief?"

There were only four people in the bridge this time of night, himself—the command officer—, a watch commander in charge of all the men on watch stationed around the ship, the radio officer, and the helmsman. In the case of the current watch commander, it was the Chief Officer who in terms of rank and status held the same rank as Marshall, yet generally was held in higher esteem. For some reason, the old man who had a long career in the US Navy before joining Princess Cruises preferred the night watch over the more active and usually preferable day watches.

"Yes, Sir?" he answered.

"An updated weather report, please."

The chief was already at the small radar display in anticipation of the order, and quickly printed out a summary and handed it to James.

"All clear according to the radar, Sir."

James stared at the printout, which confirmed the ship was right smack in the center of a high pressure area, and the nearest storms were hundreds of miles away.

"Radio? Give me an update. What exactly is the nature of the emergencies being reported."

The radio officer shook his head, "It doesn't make sense. I've had seven distinct calls now, I think. They simply report an emergency, then go off the air before they can report anything else. Wait!" he started, listening closely to his headset.

"The Sjora Andante. She was one of the first maydays I heard. Position is ... six miles out, same general direction ... about ... here," he pointed on the chart, "he thinks. His English is pretty good but he hasn't let off the transmitter. Probably an amateur sailor. Sounds Swedish."

Then the radio man stopped and spoke into his mic, "Sjora Andante. This is the cruise ship Ocean Princess receiving. We have your position. What is the cause of the emergency?"

Then James heard his radio operator curse, "Oh shit." The man turned to Marshall, his face scared, "He says it was a tidal wave."

Before James could order it, the chief was on his radio ordering all watch officers on deck and observation duty to report in. James walked up to the helmsman and ordered him to go wake the Captain and the Staff Captain immediately, taking over at the helm.

The radio officer continued to report, "Sjora Andante's captain reports he is the only survivor aboard, his family are either trapped inside or missing. He was on deck when the wave hit. He estimates it was over 30 meters high—Jesus, that's over 100 feet!"

Ignoring him, James kept his eyes out on the blackness, though since it was a moonless night, the inky sky and sea were indistinguishable. He waited for the chief to report and finally the man said, "Sir, watch officers say they can't see shit. It's just too goddamned dark out there."

A few seconds later, Captain Barnes and the Staff Captain entered the bridge with the helmsman who took over his post again.

"Report," Barnes ordered.

"Sir, we have scattered maydays coming in from north-northwest of us at distances between five and six nautical miles. Most of the calls come, then cannot be contacted again. One managed to give their position before dropping off the air. Another came back on the air a minute ago and reported the yacht was capsized, and all aboard were either trapped inside or lost. The captain of the Sjora Andante says the ship was hit by a massive wave, he estimated it at larger than 30 meters," James told him.

"Weather report?"

"It was clear."

The captain thought for only a moment, then nodded, "Chief, sound general quarters. Wake everybody up. Marshall, get down to the deck and stand by for emergency."

Marshall immediately left the bridge. As he passed by his own stateroom, he opened the door long enough to snatch the waist bag hanging from the hook there. Every cruise ship crew and staff member was trained to keep a small emergency bag filled with additional safety and survival equipment in their quarters in case of a shipboard emergency, and while most crew and staff probably ignored this, James was not one of them—especially not after seeing how this ship's Safety Officer treated preventative safety measures.