Southern Ocean Early March
FEEDING on schools of fish and squid, which had the misfortune to cross his migratory path, the large bull swam without haste. Leaving the frigid Antarctic, he was on his solitary annual pilgrimage to the harem, which awaited him North of the equator.
Diving, he scooped up squid and octopus from the sea floor, crushing and swallowing them in his huge mouth. Other floor dwellers drew back into dark crevices and remained immobile, while his immense presence passed lazily overhead. The seemingly unmoving ocean was momentarily in turmoil as he made a downward movement with his enormous and powerful tail. As his dark bulk disappeared into the lightless distance, his would-be prey began to emerge from their hiding-places, buffeted by the curls of current.
And so it was that during early March, at the end of the Southern Hemisphere summer, he continued his journey, propelling his streamlined fish-shaped body by fins and flukes in effortless grace.
Driven by a millennia-old instinct, he was unaware of the impending drama that was about to turn the hunter into the hunted.
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