Barracuda (24 page)

“To exhibit the same abnormalities as other
residents of the atoll, I’d say that it was here all the time,” Dr.
Collins answered. “Maybe it was a juvenile that just matured and is
just now becoming territorial, or maybe the radiation made it a
docile giant until recently when adult hormones and testosterone
kicked in.”

“Then why aren’t the sharks huge like the other
mutated marine creatures?” Micko countered.

“Probably because they don’t live in the
radioactive lagoon, and only arrive to feast, then depart.” Dr.
Collins replied.

“That’s very interesting, Doctor, and I concur,”
James agreed.

The two wise men were off on a tangent and in
deep discussion. Micko was no longer listening. It had just
occurred to him that there was another reason that this beast had
been restrained—the goddamn hatch!

***

Tanya raced the powerful twin engines of the
Happy Monkey
for all they were worth. She had to get back to
the dock before the armada blocked her way in order to set her plan
into action before the night’s extravagant fireworks display.

The water was flat, and in no time the speedy
boat cut in front of the barge with the train of smaller boats
trailing. Tanya reached the wharf unimpaired by the snail-like
flotilla.

Steve was waiting on the pier when she docked,
and his anger was evident. She jumped off the unleashed boat and
yelled, “Do your job!” with an air of sarcasm before running off
toward the hotel.

Shaking his head, Steve tied up the boat’s bow
and stern lines, and checked the fuel. He pulled out his cell phone
and alerted his crew and recovery team that the
Happy Monkey
was back and would depart as soon as they all arrived. He told them
that it was urgent they arrive at the dock immediately since the
incoming barge would force him to wait on the water while the barge
crew unloaded barrels of fuel and other provisions for the night’s
festivities. Then the barge would be anchored in the middle of the
atoll for the fireworks exhibition.

Most of Steve’s people were at the dock when
Hiroshi stormed in. “Move the
Happy Monkey
out into the
lagoon now!” he screamed. “Can’t you see my barge needs to pull
in?”

“Mr. Hiroshi, can the barge wait two or three
minutes?” Steve asked. “I need to gather my entire crew to complete
this task safely.”

“No! Move now!” Hiroshi was beside himself with
anger.

Steve could read Hiroshi’s body language and
knew that arguing would be useless. “Peter, Joe, Mark, jump on
board!” he called to his crew. “Carol, untie the lines.”

The Happy Monkey slowly left the dock and went a
few hundred feet into the lagoon out of the way of the
Lily
I
,
Lily II
, and the barge.

***

Tanya intercepted Hiroshi as he was walking from
the hotel to meet the barge at the dock. Hiroshi always supervised
the unloading of material from the barge and other delivery ships.
Theft was a major problem that was absent when he was present.

“Oh, Mr. Hiroshi, I’m so glad that I caught
you,” Tanya said. “I have some very disturbing news that I must
share with you.”

“Not now. No time.” Hiroshi motioned her away as
he brushed past.

“It’s about the Bible, Mr. Hiroshi,” she
added.

Hiroshi stopped in his tracks. He knew that the
Bible was his Sword of Damocles. His authority and reign were
virtually unopposed on Shark Alley Island, but the Bible was the
exclusive reason for the existence of the Majestic resort. “What
about the Bible, woman? Speak up! I’m a very busy man,” he
snapped.

“It was stolen last night by one of Andrej’s
bodyguards….” She let her sentence trail off as she looked for his
reaction.

Hiroshi stiffened, his eyes glowing with hate.
“Where is it now?”

“In the bottom of the atoll along with the
bodies of the New York cop, Disco, and Nike,” she told him.

Hiroshi stole a glance at the harbor and saw
that he still had time. “What on God’s earth happened?”

“Last night, during the blackout, Nike used his
passkey to steal the Bible during the disturbance. He gave it to
the cop in exchange for immunity. He was selling you out to save
his own skin.”

“And you know this how?” Hiroshi demanded.

“I sort of figured it out and sent Disco to beat
the truth out of Flacka, the pool barmaid,” Tanya said. “She knows
everything that goes on around here, and she set up the blackout
with the rebels to help Nike and that cop get the Bible. She told
Disco that the cop was going to hide the Bible on the wreck of the
Apogon
submarine this morning. I had Disco call Nike, and
the three of us followed them to the dive site. The cop dove before
we could stop and return the Bible. Disco and Nike dove after him
and killed him, and Disco was supposed to get the Bible and
dispatch Nike for being a traitor. Something went wrong, though, I
think it was with the oxygen, and Nike and Disco killed each
other.” She let her eyes grow convincingly wide.

“I just raced back here in time to tell you.
Andrej will come up with some wild story, but it was his man who
turned traitor and stole the ledger. He has disgraced you and
placed all our lives in danger. If you deal with him, the home
office will send you a new copy of the Bible and all will be back
to normal, and you’ll control the journal from now on. I’m
experienced enough to step in and take Andrej’s job, either in a
temporary position or permanently. I will be your eyes and ears
with the Russians. I hope that I just proved my loyalty to you and
the organization.” Tanya had made her play, and she hoped it was
convincing enough for her to profit by it.

Hiroshi gave her a stern look. “Keep all of this
to yourself,” he ordered. “We will speak again later.”

11

The
Thor
drifted listlessly, waiting for
the barge and its mini-flotilla to pass. Rat and the other
Renegades were furious with the delay. The entire Renegade club was
already dressed and geared up for their scavenger hunt.

“Let’s just run right over these runts,” Rat
demanded.

Denise was quite calm as she answered, “It will
only be a few more minutes, guys. Keep your pants on.”

The men grumbled and sat down, but a few of the
women were extremely obnoxious.

“Hey, bitch, tell these annoying bastards to
make room for us to pass!” one of them yelled.

Then a large woman named Sheila grabbed Denise
by the hair and stated, “I will rearrange your face so that even
your mother won’t recognize you if you don’t get us to the
Saratoga
right now!”

Sheila looked demented—and this scared Denise.
She knew she could handle the men, but these manly women were too
much.

“Shorty, see if you can cut through,” she yelled
to the captain in the wheelhouse.

“You know we can’t do that, Denise!” he yelled
back. “It’s a native tradition, and we must abide by the
rules.”

“Do it or Blondie here takes a bath overboard!”
Sheila screamed to the applause of the Renegades.

Shorty realized what he was up against, so he
sounded his horn and slowly cruised between a few small fishing
canoes, whose sailors responded with colorful curses. The Renegades
returned more colorful expletives of their own as the
Thor
moved closer to the
Saratoga
mooring ball.

Denise had a bad feeling that the Renegades, who
were already geared up, weren’t going to listen to her pre-dive
lecture. She knew that they would go into the water and race to the
hole as soon as the
Thor
was tied up to the wreck’s buoy.
She would have little or no control over these animals. She was
thankful that Steve had closed the hole the day before. He should
be done with the body recoveries and the permanent sealing of the
hole by the time they got there. The Renegades would then swim
aimlessly, looking for a place to penetrate the wreck—and they
would be denied. Like minnows, they would follow her to the
decompression stops. When the dive ended, she would be able to
reclaim control and substitute a scavenger hunt on a shallower,
less dangerous wreck. Otherwise, it would be a very long week of
diving with these foul-mouthed brutes.

Steve, however, was antsy waiting for the barge
to unload. He knew that although Hiroshi was barking out orders,
the prick was in no hurry to help him. Steve maneuvered the
Happy Monkey
over to the
Lily II
and yelled over to
her captain, “Hey, Mara! Can you get a few locals to pick up my
team at the end of the pier and bring them to me without
interfering with the off loading operation?”

“Sure thing, Steve,” Mara returned.

Steve knew that, being a local, Mara could coax
a few sailors to dock at the far end of the pier and take
passengers out to the
Happy Monkey
. This way he could race
out to the
Saratoga
. A few minutes later, an older native
with a thirty-five-foot Boston Whaler braved the curses of Hiroshi,
picked up the rest of Steve’s rescue team, and delivered them to
the waiting boat.

“Thanks, Mara,” Steve said with a smile and a
wave. “The beer is on me tonight!”

“You better hurry,” Mara told him. “I just saw
the
Thor
cut through the tail end of the convoy, and she’s
headed for the
Saratoga
.”

Steve hated it, but he knew he would have to do
the same thing and disrupt native tradition. He knew that if the
Renegades dove on the wreck before he properly secured the opening,
a few swipes of a sharp knife would allow them access and a
disaster would result. Those irresponsible idiots would enter the
wreck and race into the interior until they got entangled, became
lost, or ran out of air—and suffer the same fate as the brothers.
He pushed the throttle, swamping three natives in their dugout
canoes in the process.

***

“Take a heading for the
Saratoga
,
Celestial!” Micko yelled to the
Hummingbird
’s captain. “I
have a very bad feeling.” He gathered the men into the wheelhouse
and explained how the Barrett brothers had entered and died in the
Saratoga
as part of a scavenger hunt, and that twelve
Renegades would dive there that morning.

“What does that have to do with the barracuda?”
Dr. Collins asked.

“I’m not sure,” Micko responded, “but I think
the Barretts may have unintentionally released the barracuda. It
may have been trapped in the hold of the ship for years. Maybe
generations of barracuda were born, lived, and died inside. They
would have adapted to their new environment, but now that this
one’s been released, we are seeing strange aggressive
behavior.”

“So, why the urgency?” James wondered.

“If the barracuda has a den inside the carrier,
it will protect it with the same immoral viciousness it extended to
the sharks. The Renegades will be annihilated if we don’t stop them
from diving. In fact, all diving must cease until this fish is
destroyed. Period.”

***

“Look, Rat!” Bulldog yelled. “There are two
boats coming from different directions. I think they’re trying to
head us off!”

Rat looked toward the Majestic harbor and saw a
sport fishing boat bounding across the atoll at top speed in their
direction. Bulldog pointed across the lagoon in the opposite
direction, and Rat saw another boat bearing toward them at a high
rate of speed.

“Shit!” Rat cursed. “That bitch ratted us out!
She must have used her cell phone.”

The Renegade leader gathered his club around him
and discreetly announced a new plan.

The
Thor
pulled up to the mooring line,
and Shorty killed the engines as Denise reached down to tie into
the buoy. Suddenly, Sheila pushed Denise overboard and the entire
Renegade club leaped off the
Thor
and into the water.

***

It had been very busy fighting sharks and
feeding, and now It was full and tired. It swam into Its den, past
the dangling remains of Billy Barrett. It was keeping Billy hanging
as a lure for large fish that would then become a meal for the big
barracuda. This was a new life for It. The den was home, but the
atoll had become Its domain. No longer was It confined to the
interior of the carrier. The carrier was huge, and it was the only
world that It had known. Now the lagoon was much larger and Its
world had expanded.

It circled the den until It found a spot that
afforded It cover from the rear and a view from ahead. It never
closed Its eyes, but went into a trance-like state that would give
It rest and recharge It.

***

As the
Hummingbird
grew closer, all the
men gathered in the wheelhouse and nervously watched. It was like a
death race. If the
Happy Monkey
or the
Hummingbird
arrived first, a lifesaving warning could be issued. If the
Renegades entered the water not knowing what might lie ahead, a
catastrophe was imminent.

Both boats arrived at the same time from
opposite directions, just as the Renegades launched themselves
overboard. Denise was just climbing back onto the
Thor
as
Steve was yelling at her to get the Renegades back on board.

“I didn’t get a chance to shore up the hole or
recover the bodies yet!” he yelled.

“I couldn’t stop them!” Denise cried. “I don’t
even have my dive gear on. They pushed me overboard so I couldn’t
prevent them from their stupid scavenger hunt.” She was
furious.

As the
Hummingbird
got closer, Micko
called out, “Do you have a diver recall siren on your boat?”

“Yes, we do,” Denise shouted. “Shorty, give it a
try!”

Shorty pressed the button that emitted a loud
siren that divers know as a recall. It ordered all divers to return
to the boat immediately because a dangerous condition had come
about topside—an injured diver needing medical attention on land,
or some other emergency.