Titanic 2020: Cannibal City

Epilogue: The Titanic Times

Every newspaper needs an editor, someone to make the decisions. It is not something that is easily done by committee. A newspaper needs a voice. The Titanic Times had two voices, and for several hours now they'd been locked in the office, shouting at each other.

The reporters and the rest of the team remained outside in the corridor, but they could hear it all. That's where Ronni found Ty, leaning against a wall, lazily chewing a sandwich. She was in awe of the Titanic. She had spent the twenty-four hours since they'd landed exploring as much of it as she possibly could, forgetting about sleep, just letting out little whoops of delight at every new, incredible thing she discovered. She bubbled excitedly to Ty about how fantastic the ship was.

Ty shrugged. 'You should have seen it before the President of the United States blew holes in it.'

'The holes aren't that big,' said Ronni.

'That's what they said about the iceberg,' observed Ty.

'We escaped, didn't we? And he was never really the President. He was just power-crazy, wasn't he?'

'Aren't they all?' asked Ty.

More shouting erupted from within.

'What are they fighting about?' Ronni asked.

Ty swallowed another mouthful. 'Well,' he said. 'On the surface, it's about who edits the paper. So much has happened in the past few days that there's isn't space to fit it all into just one edition, so we're going to do it over several days. They're arguing about what stories go into tomorrow's edition. But I think, deep down, they're fighting about something else.'

'Like what?'

Ty shrugged again.

'I saw some of Claire's photos earlier,' said Ronni. 'They're really cool. The President's ships attacking the Titanic! It looks like a real war!'

'It was a real war.'

'And I saw her picture of that Mr Rodriguez being reunited with his wife after everyone thought she'd been eaten.'

'Have you seen her?' Ty asked. 'Who would want to eat her? Anyway, the photos take up too much space. Espeically if they want to run Jimmy's story about Fort Hope, and the elephant, and Cleaver, and then there's all the stuff about what the passengers found when they went to look for their families, and the cannibals, and King Slash and . . .Well, you know what I mean. There's just too much stuff.'

'Were you not looking for your family as well, Ty?'

Ty nodded, and was silent for a bit. 'Yeah, but once I saw what the city was like, I changed my mind. My parents are dead. I'm not particularly interested in finding a second cousin twice removed I never knew in the first place. This is my home. This is my family. Besides, I've met a girl now.'

'Have you?' Ronni asked. 'Who?'

Ty shrugged. 'She'll find out. In due course.'

Ronni decided to change the subject. 'It's gone very quiet in there. What do you think is . . . ?'

Ty nodded at the door. 'Well, I think they're either kissing, or they've killed each other.'

Ronni stood beside him. 'Which do you think it is?'

'I don't know,' said Ty.