Slightly before Selene had her meal of orca and had that argument with herself over whether to swallow or unbirth him, luck brought her a lifeboat full of crewmen from a foundered fishing boat.

It was lucky for her, less lucky for the crew, for Selene immediately swallowed the boat crew and all. A few managed to leap out the hatch before it went down her throat but the only refuge they found was the stomachs of Whistle-Click and Aida, for naturally Selene's dolphin friend and her mother were there to collect “scraps from her table.”

The weather deck on the lifeboat kept Selene's stomach acids at bay for a time, but the creak of dissolving timbers and smell of bile told them that soon their sanctuary would collapse under the weight of inward pressing leopard seal fat, at which point nature would take its course.

As Selene and her mother lay on a pleasant beach digesting their meals a crewman, in an act of unfathomable heroism, grabbed the flare gun and leapt out the hatch into the churning acid of Selene's belly. Even as he was digested alive he pushed his hand through a sphincter and fired the flare, hoping help would arrive to save his friends before the monstrous sea leopard's stomach finished its work.

He would have been better served to fire it into her stomach wall, but hope springs eternal. The sting Selene felt as the flare was fired out of her asshole was only momentary, and she blinked in confusion at the star-like explosion high overhead. Then she shrugged and went to sleep.

The fishing ship, the lifeboat and the crew are listed as “Lost at sea.” No bodies were ever recovered.