WEWERE BOBBING ONTHE WATERS OF PURE INSANITY.

Even more people grew seasick. Still, there were enough to pack the Liberty Lab for the Horokane’s screening of their documentary about the Paris terrorist attack on the Bataclan concert hall in November 2015, which they maintained was part of one large false-flag operation. It turned out to be a plotless pastiche of Hollywood movie trailers ( Wag the Dog, Our Brand Is Crisis), interview segments with survivors of the Bataclan theatre attack downloaded from Youtube and clips of Sherri and Len talking in front of a green screen that had been digitally rendered to look like a news desk. Drawings of Satan and banners denouncing the militant media scrolled behind Sherri’s head, as did several advertisements for Len’s supplement company, Healthy World Organisation.

The film’s central thesis went like this: Hollywood superagent Ari Emanuel (who represents Eagles of Death Metal, the band that was playing at the Bataclan when it was attacked) was in cahoots with the Lagardère Group, a French media conglomerate that had purchased the Bataclan in September 2015. Because Qatar Holding has a stake in Lagardère and because the government of Qatar has been criticised for tacitly allowing terrorist groups to do their banking in the United Arab Emirates and because – and this is where they totally lost me – Ari Emanuel is the brother of Rahm Emanuel, the mayor of Chicago, the Horokane believed Dina, our photographer, who was circling the room taking pictures.

“Come up here,” Sherri said. “I want you to tell everybody who you work for.”

“I’m with Popular Mechanics,” Dina said. “Everybody knows that.”

As though she were talking to a small child, Sherri continued, “And can you tell everybody what Popular Mechanics has to do with a conspiracy cruise?”

Someone in the audience interrupted, “You know she’s the photographer, not the reporter?”

“Let me ask the questions, okay!” Sherri snapped, turning back to Dina. “And can you tell everyone why Popular Mechanics would be interested in people like us?”

Dina just smiled. “What, you don’t think you are interesting?”

“You’re taking photos so that you can label us conspiracy theorists!”

Dannion Brinkley groaned. “Let’s keep it in 528, y’all,” he said.

A woman named Abbie, who taught free yoga classes every morning, also stepped in. “That’s enough, guys,” she said. “And who are you?” Sherri said. “She’s a plant!” someone yelled from the audience. Eyes rolled. Heads shook. People filtered out. Someone muttered, “She’s the yoga teacher.”

WHEN WE ARRIVED at the Liberty Lab the next afternoon, Len accosted Dina in the doorway. His eyes were the size of dinner plates.

“I want you to see something!” he shouted as he tried to force a packet of papers into her hands, then mine. They were articles from Popular Mechanics debunking bad science. Apparently Len and Sherri had been up all night Googling the magazine and printing out documents in the ship’s computer centre. There was also a Wikipedia entry that linked the magazine’s parent company, Hearst, to the Lagardère Group.

I tried to laugh it off and go around him, but Len wouldn’t let me pass.

“Look at this!” he shouted, his face contorting