Then the coup de grace, Lebowski smacked Gabby in the face with his huge tail. Unsteady, the Great White shimmied off, looking cowed, slinking off into the distance until she finally disappeared.
She could feel her father pull up on the fin. Lebowski seemed to understand and quickly surfaced.
Nami took in a deep breath, hugging the whale shark as tightly as she could. They weren’t all monsters.
* * *
Dillon felt the coward as he reached the deck. He should have done more. Granted QX59 had a death grip on him, Dillon still should have swam out and diverted Gabby’s attention or something. He was eternally thankful that Nick and Nami were safe, but not through any action of his own. He’d allowed QX59 to hold him back.
His father came from behind, grabbing him in a one armed embrace. “Thank god,” his father exhaled. Dillon hugged him back.
“I’m so sorry,” Dillon sobbed.
“For what?” his father asked.
“I should have done more. I should have rescued them,” he admitted.
“No, son, don’t do that to yourself,” Callum said. “You did exactly right. When there are Great Whites involved there are no heroics.”
“But you did,” Dillon stated. Everyone knew the story of how his father went back in the water to get his buddies out, knowing there was a Great White on the prowl.
“And look what happened,” his father said looking down at his stump of an arm. “And it could have been ten times worse. I don’t ever want you to take the risk I did.”
Dillon leaned into the hug, putting his ear on his father’s chest, listening to his heart beat quickly against his sternum. If things had gone wrong back then, Dillon would have no one. No mother. No father. An orphan.
“Do you think Nami will ever forgive me?” Dillon asked, pulling back from his father’s embrace, not wanting to look like a baby in front of all the crew pouring out of the control room. Some robots were wheeling out a pallet of brine shrimp containers. The big ones, not the smaller buckets. That was probably a month’s worth of brine shrimp on that pallet.
“Lebowski!” the crowd cheered, grabbing the containers and dumping them over the side.
“I don’t think Nami thinks there is anything to forgive,” his father said nodding toward the girl as she flung brine shrimp to her savior.
The whale shark was in heaven, surfacing with his mouth wide open, gulping down the brine shrimp in loud swallows.
A true hero’s reward.
* * *
Nick nearly threw his back out lifting the last of the containers. His daughter, apparently high on adrenaline and life, slid it over to the side, tipping it over into Lebowski’s gaping mouth.
She even leaned over and kissed the whale shark on the cheek. “Thank you. Thank you,” she murmured.
Nick felt the sting of tears pouring out his eyes. His daughter was not just alive. She was alive.
Nami turned to him, and seeing him crying, ran to him, throwing herself in his arms.
“You came for me,” she said.
“Of course,” Nick mumbled, kissing her on the top of her head. “How are you?”
“You mean after my worst nightmare just happened?” Nami asked, raising her face to him.
“Pretty much.”
“You know, pretty darned good,” Nami responded. “Maybe this whole face your fears thing works. It was awesome to see Lebowski make Gabby his bitch.”
Usually Nick didn’t like his daughter to curse, but in this case? She was right on.
“Let’s get you to your room and cleaned up,” Nick suggested. Lord knew, he needed a hot shower. At this point he thought he was more messed up than Nami.
“I still get the pony, right?” she asked.
“Pony? Heck you are getting a thoroughbred jumper. No, a stable full of them,” her father promised.
She squeezed his hand. Not too bad for surviving a Great White attack. It had almost been worth it.
As they turned to go, Dillon ran up. “Hey, Nami.”
“Yes?” his daughter asked squirming out from Nick’s arm. Glad to see her being embarrassed by her father was still intact.
“I just wanted to say how sorry I am,” Dillon said, his eyes downcast on his shoes.
“Why? We’re good.”
“I meant for not trying harder out there.”
Dillon scuffed his boot foot against the deck, refusing to look up. Nick felt sorry for the kid.
Nami shook her head. “Are you kidding me? You saved our lives. I probably would have panicked and headed for the dock.” She reached out and clasped his hands. “If you liked brine shrimp, I’d pour it down your gullet.”
Okay, that was perhaps the strangest compliment Nick had ever heard, but apparently to a marine biologist, it was the highest compliment you could get. The teen’s expression went from abject depression to his usual sunny smile in zero point two seconds flat.
“Really?” he asked.
“Really,” Nami said. “Maybe I’ll buy you some chocolate chip pancakes tomorrow morning? How does that sound?”
“Bloody brilliant,” Dillon said.
“You know what?” Quax stated next to them. “I’m okay, thanks so much for asking.”
Nami ran over and gave him a hug. “I’m so glad.”
Even the robot looked brighter at her attention.
She turned to Dillon. “Tomorrow then,” Nami said, grabbed Nick’s hand and headed to the door, leaving Dillon standing there looking more than a little stunned but delighted.
Was that what he looked like when Shalie walked away?
Nick certainly hoped so.
CHAPTER 16
Shalie scanned the computer screens, checking for any damage to QX59.
“How do you feel?”
“Violated,” he answered.
“You know for such a coward, you were pretty brave out there.”
“And how would that be? I oiled all over myself.”
Shalie chuckled. “Perhaps, but it was you who thought of the Flacks to stay with the whale shark.”
QX59 tried to shrug it off.
“Don’t bother,” Shalie said. “I saw the tape. You told Dillon to tell them.”
“Maybe I did, but that was a pretty easy statistical calculation. Their only hope was to stay close to the largest object in the tank.”
“And keeping Dillon safe? How are you going to explain that away?”
“I was terrified. I needed the physical comfort of his hand in mine.”
“Or,” Shalie suggested. “You were keeping him from harming himself. Putting himself at risk. If he’d gone out there and gotten even injured, there would have been blood in the water. If that had happened, I don’t think even Lebowski could have survived the frenzy that ensued.”
“That is your story, I’m sticking to mine. Anything I did, I did out of sheer terror. I was out of my mind with terror.”
Shalie smiled. For a robot, QX59 was such a guy. “Funny, because in your terror you realized that Callum might have to employ the nuclear option.”
“Of course. That is only a small leap of logic forward.”
She repositioned the stool under her so that she was eye height with QX59. “Perhaps, however in this ‘terror’ state you also realized the voltage could kill Dillon. You switched all of your circuits over to be a ground. You were willing to risk your life to save Dillon’s.”
“First of all, I have no ‘life’ so I can have no ‘death’ especially since you can simply take my operating chip out and put it into any other robot body.”
Shalie shook her head. “If you absorbed that much electricity, not only would your systems be fried, but your operating chip would have been wiped clean. You, as QX59, Quax, would have been wiped out.”
“Really? Oh dear, I had no idea,” QX59 stated, rising. “Am I cleared to report back to duty?”
“Sure,” Shalie stated. There was no point in trying to press the point. She’d had these discussions with Qua
x before. To date, she’d never won one. Yet.
As he exited, her stool jerked forward. The second half of the hurricane must have made landfall on the island. Even though it had been downgraded to a category two hurricane, it was still a hurricane. The projections were for it to take most of the day to pass over them, hopefully somewhere along the line to decline to a tropical storm.
Then perhaps things could go back to normal.
* * *
Knightly whistled as he walked. Two near disasters had been avoided and if anything the events had increased the buzz about the place. The investors were eating it up like a Ben and Jerry’s sundae. They were offering even more money beyond what Callum had asked for.
You had to love it.
“There you are,” Susie said, walking toward him down the glass tunnel.
Okay, he seriously had to talk to Callum about the privacy concerns regarding the chip placed in the hotel keys. Anyone booked into the same room could find you if you had your key on you. Which was fine with moms who wanted to track down their kids, but not so much when you wanted to ditch your mistress for a few minutes.
“I see you look lovely. Did you get that body wrap you wanted?” Knightly asked, trying to avoid the tongue-lashing he was about to get.
Susie rubbed her hand along her arm. “Why, yes I did, but don’t think that gets you out of brunch.”
“Fine,” Knightly said. He wasn’t remotely hungry but perhaps Susie would shut up if he filled her up. “To the dining room.”
Looking very pleased with herself, as if she’d just won something besides a one way ticket to the ex-mistress train, Susie caught up with him, taking his arm as the bull shark swam up to the glass.
“Back for more, huh?” Knightly said, fake charging the glass. The bull shark swam off, but came back. “What did I say? Get!”
The bull shark ran straight into the glass. It rattled, but held.
“Kevin, honey, look,” Susie begged, clinging to his arm.
“That all you got?” Knightly shouted, ignoring her. “That it?”
“Kevin!” she shouted. “There’s a crack.”
Too late, Knightly realized his mistress was correct. The next time the bull shark hit, the tiny crack split into dozens as they spread up the glass tunnel.
“Run!” he shouted, dragging Susie behind him. She was too slow though in those high heels. He let go of her hand as the bull shark hit a third time, shattering the tube.
He looked behind him to see the water rush into the tube, lifting Susie up, throwing her down the tunnel, the bull shark right behind her.
Knightly hit the door at a run. It swished open. As soon as he cleared the threshold, he hit the “close” button. He couldn’t leave it at that. The sensors would pick up the bull shark’s bulk and open the door for him, so Knightly hit the “lock” button too.
Susie sloshed up to the door. She scrambled to her feet, hitting the “open” button. Quickly she realized that wasn’t going to happen as the tube filled with water.
“Kev --” she started to scream, but was cut off as the bull shark grabbed her around the waist, shaking her like a rag doll. Her mouth gaped open, but to Knightly she just sounded like a gurgle followed by a stream of bloody bubbles.
He turned away as the bull shark opened his mouth again. When Knightly turned back, Susie was gone. The bull shark slammed into the glass door. This time it held. Really held, no cracks.
Knightly tried to quiet his shaking hands. He would not show fear as the shark swam by, glaring at him with that black eye.
“It’s going to take more than that mother effer,” Knightly challenged, although his voice cracked half way through.
The shark made a turn, preparing for another charge. Knightly didn’t stick around to watch that one. He ran, straight for the control room.
* * *
“Turn those down” Callum shouted. The control room was awash in red and blaring sirens. He got it. Catastrophe had hit. A woman was dead. Salechii had failed at its most basic purpose.
The ear-splitting alarms were not helping anything.
Suddenly the decibel level was cut in half.
“Thank you,” he said to his son. “Is she the only fatality?”
Dillon nodded. “According to our scans, yes,”
“Thank god for that,” Callum whispered. One was bad enough. They needed to stop the bleeding, literally.
He announced to the control room, figuring each person could decide which was their duty. “Lock all doors, I mean all doors. I don’t want any shark getting into the internal tunnel system. Key cards can open the doors, but not auto open. Is that understood?”
“Got it,” Dillon said beside him. “And done.”
Why exactly did he have two dozen other employees if his son was the only one doing anything?
“I want all shutters down in the rooms.”
“You know it,” Dillon said hitting a series of commands on one of the computer terminals.
“Explain on all in-room displays for everyone to get ready for the second half of storm, to stay in their rooms with the shutters down. I want the gym and restaurants cleared out.”
“Already done,” Dillon stated.
“What do you mean?” Callum asked.
Dillon shrugged. “I figured you wanted a complete lock down so I ordered the robots to get that started like five minutes ago.”
Callum had perhaps never been more proud of his son. “Excellent. Everyone should be paying attention,” Callum stated. “That is the kind of proactive thinking I want everyone doing.”
The room nodded in unison.
“Good, we’ve got a lot of ground to cover. We’ve got to figure out where each and every breach of the coral reef has happened and secure them.”
“The only problem is we only have a couple hundred feet of Great White grade temporary fencing and there are miles upon miles of coral reef blockades,” Dillon stated.
“We will secure the more important junctures. We’ve got to keep the sharks away from each other and from the guests.”
Dillon gave a sharp nod as Knightly burst into the room.
* * *
“What the hell is going on?” Knightly demanded as his eyes adjusted to all the red in the room, it was bathed in it. It looked a little like the blood saturated water from the tube.
“Mr. Knightly,” Callum stated, stepping in front of him. “I’m sorry for your loss, but I must insist --”
“Sorry for what?” Knightly demanded.
“Your wife,” Callum said. “I’m sorry for your loss.”
“Oh, please. I wish that had been my wife. Do you know how much alimony I would have saved.” Knightly said with a wave of his hand. “No, that wasn’t my wife, that was my mistress.”
He kind of enjoyed the look of shock then bewilderment that crossed McClay’s face. “And if you met you would know she was kind of a downer so no great loss there.”
“I…I…” Callum sputtered.
“What I want to know is how you are going to protect my investment. The island.”
Callum straightened to his full height. “Which is exactly what I was doing when you burst in. Now, can you please go back to your room and secure the door?”
“Go back? Have you seen it back there? The shark blew out the tube, it is gone.”
“There are back ways, mate,” Callum insisted.
“Eff you and your back ways. I’m staying here.”
* * *
Callum took a deep breath. He was losing precious seconds arguing with Knightly. It just wasn’t worth it.
He regrouped and turned to his staff. “Alright, beyond visual inspection we can also monitor water flow velocity and turbulence. If a breach has opened it should --”
“Sir!” a voice shouted from the back interrupting Callum. He was none too thrilled about it.
“Yes?”
“I’ve got a fishing ship on the horn,” the comm officer stated hurriedly. “They received our d
istress call.”
“Good call,” Knightly stated although Callum didn’t need his reassurance.
“How far out?” Callum asked.
“Thirty minutes,” the comm officer answered.
“How many?” Callum asked.
The comm officer took a moment to get the report back. “Twenty, safely. Thirty at the max.”
“I am so on that boat,” Knightly said next to him.
Callum shook his head as he did quick calculations. There were over four hundred guests plus another forty or so staff. There was no way to get them all off. So then how to pick who went?
He looked to Dillon who clearly had been doing the same math in his head. “We can only get the kids under thirteen off. There are forty five of them.”
“Announce the evacuation only to rooms with young children, nursing mothers and pregnant women.”
“What? Are you crazy? We can get off of here!” Knightly demanded.
Callum was kind of tired of the moneyman demanding quite so much. This was no longer about the financial survival of Salechii, but the survival of all the humans on the island. Knightly no longer had any sway here.
“Dillon, make it happen.”
“Already posted to the appropriate rooms, unlocking their doors, and activating the floor navigation to take them only through the safe routes.” His son turned to the comm officer. “What direction is the boat coming from?”
“The west,” the officer relayed.
“We’ll meet them to the west then,” Dillon said.
“What the hell is that shark doing?” Knightly asked, pointing to one of the monitors.
A tinny clunk sounded over the speakers. Gabby was ramming a metal wall. What was she doing?
“Bring it up on the main screen.”
In one hundred and ten inch glory they watched the Great White shark batter and dent a metal panel. “Where the bloody hell is that?” Callum asked.
Dillon was of course the one to answer. “The electrical switching room,” Callum’s stomach sank as his son continued. “The clicking must be attracting her attention.”
“What does that mean?” Knightly asked.
“It means --”
Before he could explain, Gabby broke through the metal. The water rushed into the electrical room, blowing all the circuits. With a loud whine, every screen and computer in the control room screeched to a halt. The room was plunged into darkness.
Apex Predator Thriller Series Collection (Including the blockbuster new shark park thriller, Salechii) Page 19