An initial search throws up a mixture of international companies which no longer exist, together with a number of shell companies around the world, although word is circulating online that the gaming ship has been advertised on the dark web. If that is true, then it suggests what was happening on board needs further investigation.

So, who currently owns the ghost ship MV Orlova? What was she being used for? Who are the three dead people aboard and how or why did they die?

As an investigative reporter who has pursued illegal activities around the world over the last ten years, I fully intend to try to answer these questions.

Once made secure, the MV Orlova will be towed into Scapa Flow, anchoring off Houton Pier, which will allow access for the major crime investigation team expected from Glasgow, assisted by Inspector Erling Flett from Kirkwall police station.

Maybe then we can discover who the victims are, and in what circumstances they lost their lives.

Ava Clouston, Investigative Reporter

Ava read over her article. She had been careful by simply stating that two men and one woman had been found dead in suspicious circumstances. She’d not given away any aspect of their deaths, which, as in any small close-knit community, had quickly become common knowledge. She had made no mention that one guy had been found in the computer room. Nor that the couple found in a mock arena may have been duelling with one another.

What the hell had been going on aboard that ship?

Ava pressed the send button with the same surge of excitement that always surfaced when she began another investigation.

The MV Orlova and its reincarnation from a cargo ship to a pleasure craft, apparently with high-class guest accommodation for up to eight, plus service personnel and crew, suggested a stay on board would not have come cheap.

So what had really been on offer via the Orlova and who was interested in sampling its pleasures? And how did that apparently lead to their deaths?

The story would appear in The Orcadian, of course, but by also sending it to her London editor, David Morris, it would reach numerous international news outlets and channels. David, a keen advocate of her investigative reports over the years, especially those from Afghanistan, would recognize the international interest this one from her home island would generate. A report no doubt would also go out on tonight’s BBC News. The world would soon know of the MV Orlova and be asking what had really happened on board the abandoned ship.

Ava rose from the kitchen table and went to refill her coffee cup. The trip to Yesnaby and the resultant article had taken up most of her day. Also, they hadn’t eaten as yet. Although she’d told Dougie they would set the kye free tonight, she decided that would have to wait now until the morning.