Колин Бейтман - Titanic 2020 - Cannibal City

The Speech

It's all very well, of course, stamping your feet and saying, ' NOBODY!' when all you've got is pigs for company. They'd agree with anything as long as you kept their trough full of disgusting swill. It was quite different when it came to making the people in charge see sense. For a start, her father absolutely refused to intervene.

'I'm sorry Claire, but no. The pigs are on board for one reason and one reason alone. If we are going to get through this we need a good, healthy, balanced diet, and that means fresh meat whenever possible.'

'But she's my pet, she's my friend! Would you really eat one of my friends?'

'It's a pig, Claire.'

'Please, Daddy! My ponies were taken away from me, don't take Babe as well!'

'Claire, operational control of the Titanic rests with Captain Smith. I have promised not to intervene.'

'But what am I supposed to do?'

Her mother appeared in the bedroom doorway, swathed in a luxurious dressing gown and with her hair hidden beneath a towel. 'What about becoming a vegetarian?' she asked.

'HOW WOULD THAT HELP?' Claire yelled.

'Watch your tone, young lady!' her father immediately snapped out.

Claire stormed out of the suite. Her next stop was the bridge, where Captain Smith was seated before a computer screen, examining charts. She stood before him, breathing hard, and waited for him to notice her. And waited. And waited.

Eventually, without looking up, he asked her what she wanted.

Claire rubbed the back of her hand across her damp cheek. 'Have I ever asked you for anything before?'

'Yes, you have.'

'I mean, something really, really important?'

'What is it, Claire?' His eyes remained fixed on the screen.

'If you had the chance to save someone's life — someone who has never done anything wrong, who has never harmed anyone on purpose, who might get into trouble occasionally, but really has a heart of gold, and if I really, really begged you — would you do it, would you do it for me?'

Captain Smith typed something on his keyboard. Still without looking up he said: 'Claire, don't worry. We've already decided to keep Jimmy alive.'

'Not Jimmy!'

She could see now that his mouth was tightly shut but turned up slightly at the sides, as if he was struggling to keep himself from laughing.

He already knows — and he's laughing at me!

'It's not funny! Babe is my pig! You're not having her!'

Captain Smith finally looked up. 'Claire, I understand that you've become attached to the creature, but I'm afraid that I agree with your father. We live in difficult times and discipline is important. The pigs were brought aboard for food. I'm sorry, but when the time comes, and I believe that will be within the next few days, the pigs will be slaughtered. All of them.'

'No!' Claire glared down at him. 'You are a cruel, horrible man and I will not allow you to do this!'

She stormed away from the bridge.

She was an expert at storming.

She'd had a lot of practice.

The deadline for the next edition of the Titanic Times was fast approaching and the newspaper office, deep in the bowels of the ship, was a hive of activity when Claire came — yes, storming — in.

Jimmy looked up from his desk, recognised the look on her face, and sighed wearily. 'What is it now?' he asked.

'They're going to murder Babe!'

All around the office, work stopped.

'Ladies and gentlemen,' Jimmy said quickly, 'relax. Babe is a pig. Claire, you cannot murder a pig. Unless it's done by another pig. And even then I'm not—'

'Be quiet!' She looked deadly serious. Jimmy cleared his throat and signalled for her to continue. She looked around the room. 'I'm not stupid,' she said. 'I know the pigs were brought on board to provide us with fresh meat. That's fair enough. OK, so I've become attached to one of them. Babe's my friend. She's cute, she's lovely. But yes — she's still just a pig.' She nodded around the company. 'Captain Smith has said that all the pigs have to die. That no exceptions can be made — but what I'm asking is, why not?' Everyone, with the possible exception of Jimmy, was listening intently. 'Look,' she continued, 'our whole world has been turned upside down in the past few months. We've all lost relatives and friends. My father and Captain Smith are right when they say that to survive we must have order and discipline — but I know my history. When times are hard and people are weak, that's when dictators come along, like Hitler, like Stalin, and they take control and before you know it you have no freedom left at all, no right to make your own decisions, you're not individuals any more, you're numbers, you're slaves. Well I say — it stops here. We show them that we will not be ruled with an iron fist. We show them by refusing to allow Babe to be slaughtered. Babe must live!'

Ty hesitantly began to raise his hand. 'Surely—'

But Claire wasn't to be interrupted. 'You may ask how are we going to achieve this? After all, we are weak, and they are strong. But we have an instrument at our disposal with which to sway public opinion! The Titanic Times ! We all believe in the freedom of the press, don't we?' The reporters nodded. 'Haven't we protected that freedom in the past by defying Captain Smith? And didn't he thank us for it in the end? And didn't we defy the mutineer Pedroza by continuing to publish the Times when everyone else had given up?' There were murmurs of agreement all round. 'Then we must do it again! This newspaper must mount a campaign to spare Babe's life! We must rally the people behind Babe! She represents our freedom, our liberty, our future! Are you with me on this?'

Jimmy had to admit that she was a fantastically inspiring speaker. Their entire team of reporters and photographers, even the delivery boys and girls crowding in the doorway and the IT expert and the idiot who made the tea, they were all fired up.

'Are you WITH ME?' Claire demanded again.

And this time they all rose to their feet, clapping and punching the air and yelling: 'BABE! BABE! BABE!'

All except Jimmy, of course, who slumped down at his desk and sighed.

So began the campaign by the Titanic Times to save the life of Babe the Pig. Before very long every passenger and crew member aboard the ship was aware of Babe's plight — the other pigs were conveniently forgotten — even if they didn't immediately have an opinion on whether or not she should be put to the knife. There were news stories with huge headlines and heart-rending photographs on the front page of Babe being playful and nuzzling up to children; if she looked suspiciously clean or there appeared to be an almost human glint in her eye, well, that was just the way she was, and no suspicion that her image had been polished up by a computer program was ever aired. Nor was the campaign confined to the pages of the Times — badges were made, posters were printed, Save the Pig fundraising concerts were held. They had all survived The End of Civilisation As We Know It, the planet was in tatters and everyone's future was uncertain, but for a brief period the fate of Babe the Pig seemed like it was the most important thing in the world. It became what would once have been known as a cause célèbre.

Jimmy, although he didn't really give a fiddler's elbow for what happened to the pig, was full of admiration for Claire and how she had mounted the campaign; he thought that Scoop, the decrepit old journalist who had attempted to teach them how to be good reporters — it seemed like an age ago — would have been surprised and delighted at Claire's progress. Yes, she was still sulky and spoiled, but when she got her teeth into a good story there was no stopping her. Stopping the captain getting his teeth into Babe was not, however, a foregone conclusion.