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A
lthough the threat was obscured by darkness, they knew it was there.

Through the dense seawater, even their sensitive eyes could detect almost nothing but absolute blackness. It was too deep. All the sunlight had been fully absorbed in the layers of water above them. But they could sense the silent, hulking figure nearby, perhaps through smell, perhaps through the vibrations that emanated off its surface through the water. The size and shape they perceived indicated a known threat, based on instincts bred deep into their being. But there was something wrong with this creature.

Hovering in the deep a short distance from the enormous animal, the shoal’s fear was gradually replaced by curiosity. A detachment of large squid maneuvered away from the others to approach the leviathan, which rested, unmoving, on the fine, smooth sediments of the level ocean floor. While the great creature’s rows of conical teeth may once have been a threat, they were no longer. The many tons of flesh cloaking the jaws and impressive body had begun to decay, and white ribs rose gleaming from the beast’s sides, serving as visible beacons in the black water as the squid neared.

As the one-eyed female drew closer, she detected movement on the whale carcass. A group of squirming, wormlike beasts twisted and bored their limbless bodies into the flesh as they fed. Some of the more zealous eagerly wriggled themselves through the rotting flesh and vanished into the body of the dead whale. Though they were small enough to be prey, she kept her distance from the unfamiliar creatures. Her natural fear of the great whale, regardless of its death, was enough to prevent her from approaching any closer.

The shoal had thrived in recent weeks. Drifting along a steady current in the broad undersea channel, they had risen each night to take advantage of the abundance of sea life gathered there to utilize the free flow of nutrients. Despite these successful hunting efforts, however, the shoal was beginning to behave erratically.

Although she was not capable of assessing her own actions, the one-eyed female felt a dim confusion. At the moment, hovering above the bottom of the ocean near the whale fall, she and the other squid began a slow progression back toward shallower waters. Though the shoal thrived in deep water, they had no reason to be this far down, this close to the ocean floor, and would not find food here.

She eyed her scarred sister, who moved alongside her, and her tentacles twitched impulsively outward. She retracted them. Her sister was nearly as large as herself, and posed too much of a threat.

The members of the shoal normally sought out smaller, weaker individuals of their own kind when food was scarce, but recently they had attacked one another seemingly without reason. Many of the smallest members of the enormous group had already been eaten or mortally wounded in the past few weeks. Cannibalism was becoming impossible.

The shoal was beginning to lose its natural rhythms and drives, replaced by an ever-increasing state of unfocused aggression that pervaded its collective being.

And beneath its members’ streamlined exteriors, clusters of tiny worms, much smaller than those on the whale carcass, coiled and looped their segments around swollen organs, disrupting the normal functions of each squid as they too fed.

S
turman and Val had been at sea almost continually for four straight days. Although they could wash off sweat and grime with a dip in the ocean or quick shower, their skin constantly had a skiff of fine, itchy salt on the surface, which nagged quietly at them. The freshwater on the boat was not for bathing, since the tanks were not large enough to allow for very long trips and the shower was crammed with gear anyway. They had brought some extra water, but extra fuel containers also took up a share of the boat’s space and weight limits.

Val was amused by Bud’s toilet habits. Sturman had long ago taught the dog to relieve himself in a makeshift wooden litter box stowed inside the cabin. He would sometimes set the box in the stern to let the dog do his deed, then he would fling the goods overboard. One day, Val asked him if he had ever been caught in rough seas and bad weather, unable to even move the box and its contents to the stern. He had grunted and nodded in the shade of his hat.

Despite their days of effort, they had not located the shoal. With their one tagged squid in a different shoal still located somewhere far to the south, nearer to San Diego, the only way to find the shoal of interest was once again to utilize a needle-in-a-haystack approach. Starting just south of where the swimmer had been killed by the shoal, Sturman and Val had motored northward in the San Pedro Channel for countless hours each day, using a sweeping, zigzag search pattern. They utilized broad-beam sonar with an alert set to go off if a large school or object was detected between five hundred and fifteen hundred feet, where Val suspected the shoal would spend the daytime.

Each evening they followed the same routine. They shut the sonar down just before dark and sped to the nearest mooring, at Gull Harbor on Catalina Island, to tie off for the night. They slept separately, he on the cushioned bench in the galley, she in the private berth in the bow, and then departed immediately at dawn to resume where they had left off the day before.

Val was becoming frustrated. Although she had expected this to be difficult, she hadn’t realized just what a tall order it was to try and locate a specific shoal in an area almost totally devoid of Humboldt squid. In Baja, it had always been easy to locate the animals. There, she was interested in any shoal they could attract, and there were so many millions of squid that locating an unspecific group on any given night was almost a guarantee. She now realized that quickly locating the first shoal with Sturman must have been beginner’s luck.

Despite the lack of hygiene and her frustration at the tedious task, Val found she was enjoying herself. While
Maria
plied the blue water, all they had to do was stay on course and snack on sweet or salty junk food. Though Sturman was frustratingly uncommunicative, she found herself increasingly curious about him. She pried into his past with little luck. He could clam up with the best of them. And just when she was beginning to feel affection for him, he would revert to the jerk she had first met.

She had just ended a cell phone call in the quieter cabin of the boat as she made her way up the steps to the stiff breeze and sunshine on the stern deck. The door swung against her shoulder, and she slammed it irritably behind her. “Goddammit!”

“What’d Montoya say?” Sturman stood in the flying bridge, wearing his sweat-stained cowboy hat and an unbuttoned short-sleeved shirt that flapped in the wind. Val climbed the wooden ladder and fell into the padded bench seat next to him. She scratched Bud’s stubby ears. The short-haired mutt was resting in his usual spot, under Sturman’s feet. She was impressed at how far the man went to accommodate his dog, not only having thought up the litter box but also seeming always happy to lift the big dog up to join them in the flying bridge when they were motoring for long hours.

“The idiots want to try and catch the shoal.”

“You don’t say.” Sturman smiled and pulled off his hat to run a calloused hand over his head. “The whole shoal?”

“The whole shoal.” She and Sturman both laughed. “I guess the conference call went on for hours. Quite a few people joined in—probably because of the novelty of this situation. Some of the big-time law enforcement officials and a few local politicians wanted to take a more reactive approach than just releasing some warning information, because of the high number of deaths. They’re now putting the suspected death toll at between eleven and thirty, depending on how many immigrants died a month ago.”

“That many?”

“Yeah. It sounds like a lot, doesn’t it?”

Sturman nodded.

“Anyway, Joe said he tried to convey my opinion that it was a waste of time to try and catch the shoal, and that as long as people didn’t put themselves in unique situations that might lead to an encounter, there was no cause for alarm. But I’m not so sure he tried that hard.”

“What do you mean?”

“I know Joe is your friend, but after our talk the other night I suspect he didn’t feel compelled to plead my case.”

Sturman set his jaw and turned away. She had learned that the man had a temper, and a strong loyalty to the few people in his life whom he was close to. His eyes narrowed and he began to open his mouth, but she cut him off.

“I don’t mean that. Sorry. I’m sure Joe did his best. But with this story all over the news now, these big shots obviously feel they need to put on some sort of show for the taxpayers.”

There were a few minutes of silence. Val thought about what would happen next as she scanned the sparkling water and listened to the drone of the twin engines.

Sturman turned and looked at her, his eyes crinkling. “So how the hell they gonna capture these things if we can’t even find them?”

She smiled. “Good question. I don’t plan to help them, so I have no idea. Joe said something about hiring commercial fishermen, and trying to net them like they’re just a bunch of tiny market squid. It will never work.”

“Then why you getting your panties in a bunch?”

She smiled again. He was right. The shoal would probably move on, and might even die before anyone could find them. Its members seemed to be fully mature and now sick with parasites, and fast-growing Humboldt squid only had a lifespan of a few years.

“I don’t know. I guess I was hoping that somehow I’d get more of a chance to study them.”

“They’re like squid in the sea.”

“What?”

“You know, the expression—like fish in the sea? There will be other shoals. You said it yourself—there are more than enough in Baja.”

“Yeah, but not like this one. This is an incredibly unique situation, and could allow me to help predict if this might happen again, and how it happens. And—”

“Doc, there you go analyzing everything again. I hear what you’re saying. If you want, we can keep trying to find these things on our own. But it doesn’t look like we’ll get cooperation from anyone else.”

Val sighed and shook her head. She tugged at her ponytail and looked off toward the mainland. “I just thought these meetings would actually generate some help for us. Make my job easier, not harder.”

Sturman grinned at her and shook his head. “I’ve got another favorite expression for you.”

“Better than ‘fish in the sea’?”

“Yeah, smart aleck. One of my favorites. ‘You can’t change the wind. But you can adjust your sails.’ ”

T
hat night, Val decided to take Sturman’s advice to adjust her sails. It was a calm, beautiful evening as they headed south toward Catalina Island. A perfect time to open three sheets to the wind.

Sturman didn’t need much prodding to join her. When she commented that she just wished they could have a beer, he muttered that he kept some medicinal booze on the boat. Seeing her face light up, he went below and came back with a mostly full plastic bottle of light rum, along with two clear plastic glasses.

“I’ve even got limes.” He smiled and sat down across from her in the flying bridge.

Val smiled back. It occurred to her that he hadn’t taken a drink in the five days they’d been out. “Christ, Sturman. You have anything to mix it with? Or a chaser, at least?”

“I thought you were a sailor, Doc. Drink like one.”

As Sturman poured the drinks, Val moved to the console and turned on the radio. “So you’ve gotta tell me something, cowboy. How does a guy like you end up in Southern California on a boat?”

“Oh. You mean this?” Sturman touched the brim of his hat. “I’m originally from Colorado. Grew up on a ranch. Worked it with my dad and brother, hunting, fishing, riding.”

“And . . . ?” She said it lightly.

“I liked it well enough. But ever since I was a kid, I dreamed about the ocean. Read the books, watched the shows, you know?
Moby-Dick, Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea,
Jacques Cousteau . . . even
Flipper
reruns
.
”

She smiled. “Who doesn’t love
Flipper
?”

“There was something more exciting about the distant ocean than the mountains around the ranch. First time I actually saw it was when I joined the Navy. Here, look at this.” Sturman set his cup down and pulled up his sleeve to expose the hammerhead shark tattoo on his left shoulder. “Got it as an ensign. Was on the damage control team,
USS Eisenhower
.”

“Nice. My turn, cowboy.”

Val stood and turned away from him, lifting the back of her shirt to expose the small of her back, and over one hip the top half of her own tattoo—a small blue octopus. “Spring break, Cancún. My sophomore year in college.”

“I can’t see it so well. Maybe if you pulled your shorts down a bit lower . . .”

She pulled her shirt back down and smiled. “Sorry, cowboy.”

Sturman continued adding rum to their cups as the sun melted into the sea. They talked mostly about her career path, but she managed to coax out a few of the Navy stories Joe had mentioned. He shut the boat down a few miles off Gull Harbor to let them drift lightly on the ocean and enjoy the calm evening.

She curled up on a padded bench in the flying bridge and pulled the rubber band out of her ponytail, shaking her hair loose. Sturman sat across from her, his legs outstretched and feet crossed on the seat next to her. He leaned back and closed his eyes.

“You never told me about your ring.”

“Beg your pardon?” He opened one eye and frowned.

“Your ring.” She pointed at the weathered gold band on his left hand. “You said you were married before?”

He sat up, moving his feet down to the floor. “Yeah. Once. A long time ago.”

“So why do you still wear the ring?”

“I don’t know.” Sturman gulped the remaining rum in his cup and reached for the bottle.

“I’m sorry. I know you said you don’t like to talk about it. We can talk about something else.”

Sturman sighed. “No. It’s all right. I haven’t talked about it in years.” He looked at the last color of the setting sun. “She died four years ago.”

“I’m sorry.”

“So am I.”

“Tell me about her.”

Sturman sipped at the rum and was silent for a while. “Maria. I named the boat after her. She was Joe’s sister.”

“Joe Montoya?” Val leaned toward him.

Sturman nodded. “We met through him, after he and I finished our time in the Navy.” He smiled. “Montoya came after me when he found out we’d been dating behind his back.”

Sturman remained quiet for a minute. The last color left the western sky. “She died before I really knew how much I should have appreciated her.” He emptied his cup and poured some more.

“What happened?”

“Car accident. One day she drove to work. That was it. She never came home.” He was silent again. “It was Joe who called me. A tractor-trailer hit her Toyota.” He swallowed hard.

“It must have been very hard for you, Will.” She placed a hand on his knee. “How long were you married?”

“Six years. They were good years. We hadn’t quite gotten around to having kids. It wasn’t perfect, and we fought sometimes. But I realize how good it really was when I look back.” He forced a smile. “Don’t think I didn’t notice you call me by my first name.”

Val set her cup down and moved slowly toward him. She gently slid a leg up onto the seat next to him, then the other, straddling him. His eyes never left hers. In them she saw longing, and pain.

She lifted his cowboy hat off and, cupping his jaw in her hands, she bent down and kissed him. As she pressed his warm lips against her own, he suddenly reached out and pulled her waist deep into his chest. Easing down onto his lap, she felt him growing hard against her. He kissed her back with a furious intensity.

Without warning, he pushed her forcefully off his lap and stood up, staggering.

She was breathing heavily, and her skin felt flushed. “I’m sorry, Will. I didn’t mean to . . .”

“I can’t do this.” His knuckles turned white as he gripped the rails.

“I understand. But at some point you’ve got to let her go.” As soon as she said it, she wished she hadn’t.

Sturman turned away, toward the fading light rippling on the ocean. “I’m going swimming.”

He shed his shirt, stepped to the edge of the bridge, and dived off. He didn’t come up for a long time.