Two particularly large rats were seen to jump off the foundering wreck of the SS New Labour yesterday and begin paddling frantically in different directions.
With only the stern sticking out of the water, it was thought that there was no hope remaining for any of the souls still on board. However, the rats were seen to squirm through the open porthole of the vessel's radio room and drop into the murky, swirling waters, leaving only one rat to go down with the ship and its stubborn master.
The first rat, The Guardian, swam in circles for a few minutes before heading for the nearby SS Liberal Democrat, which has already taken off most of the survivors of the New Labour. It was fished out of the water by crewmen, wrapped in a hand-knitted Fairtrade sweater and taken to the bridge to meet Captain Clegg, whom it promptly hailed as the hero of the hour.
"When the New Labour's Captain Blair jumped overboard, leaving the ship's purser in charge, many of the passengers expressed misgivings," said the shivering rat. "But I decided back then to throw my weight behind the new acting captain, despite the black clouds looming on the horizon.
"With hindsight, perhaps I should have noticed that Captain Blair and his entire crew were only qualified to sail in fine weather. Nobody checked the radar, and when the sea started to get choppy Captain Brown didn't even batten down the hatches or cancel the deck games. He attempted to restore confidence by throwing all the ballast overboard, but that only made us more queasy. Even when the ship started going down by the head, he was still on the poop deck, rearranging the deckchairs in the teeth of a raging thunderstorm."
The bedraggled rat was taken to the Liberal Democrat's unusually-crowded lounge to be reunited with the New Labour's first-class passengers, who took to the lifeboats in panic when the doomed ship tore its bottom open on a well-known bank.
The other rat, The Times, was picked up by a helicopter chartered by the billionaire philanthropist Rupert Murdoch, who had booked a first-class stateroom on the New Labour's maiden voyage but never actually set foot on the doomed vessel.
Many people expressed surprise that the rat had remained aboard the New Labour until the last minute, as it had been sending out critical signals for some time.
"Captain Brown pleaded that somebody had to stay behind to broadcast a final Mayday message," explained the shivering rat later, aboard Mr Murdoch's sleek yacht, as cabin boy Cameron brought him a tot of rum. "But with the water flooding into the radio room, I decided it was time to join my brother The Sun, who cast off weeks ago in a rubber dinghy. But I thought it best to stay aboard for as long as possible, because somebody had to let the world know how bad things were getting."
Rescuers say there is little hope for the elderly passengers in steerage, most of whom booked years before the New Labour was even laid down, hoping for the dream voyage of a lifetime.
Prescott the steward - who disappeared into his cabin some time ago with a bottle of whisky - has lately been seen staggering around the ship, together with the last rat, The Daily Mirror, trying to reassure those remaining that the ship was still maintaining its original course. Tragically, many of the doddering old paupers believed the humble rating was one of the officers, even as the foolhardy Captain Blair was recklessly steering them into uncharted waters.
Now, with only the purser remaining above decks, loudly cursing the passengers for his predicament, salvage experts fear that the once-gleaming cruise vessel will soon be a total write-off.
"Fortunately, thanks to Purser Brown giving us the entire contents of the ship's locker and bundling us into the first lifeboat away, at least we won't be going down with the ship," said a spokesman for Lloyds. "Unlike him."
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