Prosper’s eyes slid over to Vanderwalt, the Brit put his hands up. “I don’t know, but I will find out. She was a thoroughly vetted flight attendant. Five years in, but I know that doesn’t matter. I will find out how she was turned.”
Prosper though wasn’t even to the revenge stage of grief yet.
He was numb, just numb.
He’d lived his entire life with the best wing man in the world. He’d never doubted that Johnny J had his back. His friend had died proving that point.
What was he going to do without him?
Prosper had no good idea.
“Prosper. Colonel!” Tandy raised his voice enough to break through the fog that surrounded Prosper.
“Yes? Sorry,” Prosper replied.
“We’ve got a red coded mission. Command needs to know if we are available to take it.”
Those words were so odd to hear from Tandy. Usually Johnny J received their field assignments, but of course command couldn’t get hold of Johnny J so they went to the next highest ranking officer and that would be their medic.
“Yes,” Prosper said, blinking rapidly trying to get his head back into the game.
“Sir, if I may,” Tandy said. “We don’t have to take this mission. We can head to London and regroup.”
“No,” Prosper snapped. “They wouldn’t have called us if there was another Rapid Response team in the area. We are taking it.”
“But --”
“Tell me, what would Johnny J say right now?”
Tandy didn’t answer. Instead he turned away and spoke on his sat phone.
Vanderwalt rose. “I’ll tell the pilot.”
All Prosper could do was nod.
Maybe this was best. Action might clear his blood of this terrible burden.
Prosper had to fight the urge to turn to his left. The spot Johnny J usually occupied. Normally he would consult Johnny J. He would turn to him for consolation if needed.
Johnny J was gone. Forever gone.
But it was time to put on his game face. There was a crisis apparently in eastern Afghanistan, by the way the jet was turning southeast.
The only way Prosper could honor his fallen friend was to win another battle.
This one was for Johnny J.
If you would like to purchase the Rapid Response International Thriller series simply click here…
Bullies: The prequel short story to the Apex Predator Thriller Series
If you aren’t afraid of sharks now, you will be after reading this series!
CHAPTER 1
Callum McClay stood at the bow of their ship, the Salechii. The Indonesian afternoon was warm. Warm enough that he’d stripped down to just his swimming trunks. Despite only close friends and crew on the ship, it still felt slightly uncomfortable to allow the stump of his arm to be uncovered.
Plus he had to be careful because the ragged scar from the Great White attack burned easily.
“We’ve got ‘em!” an excited shout came from the bridge. An enthusiasm that only youth could bring. His son, Dillon.
“Them?” Callum shouted back. They were only tracking one bull shark.
Dillon’s big flop of blonde hair poked through the window as he nodded so vigorously that his hair bounced like a slinky. “Yep! Come and see.”
Callum grabbed the railing with this one good hand and pulled himself up the steps to arrive at the bridge in only a few moments.
Dr. Shalie Hofstrum smiled as warmly at the Indonesian sun as he climbed aboard the bridge. For a moment Callum cringed as her eyes swept over his chest and to his stump. Perhaps he was being overly sensitive to think her smile fell just a little at seeing the partial limb.
Behind the doctor stood QX59. The robot’s titanium skeleton glistened in the afternoon sun. Unlike most “lame robots” as Dillon would call them, the QXs were built off of animal models rather than human. For the most part they looked like a cross between a gorilla and a chimp, only they had a prehensile tail.
A tail which was up and quivering at the moment. QX59 was not a happy camper. He had been built to go into the water in situations like this. Unfortunately QX59 looked about as squeamish as something built out of the strongest metal in the world could.
“Don’t worry about him,” Shalie said, nodding to QX59. “I’ve got five others ready to hit the water on your call.”
Callum nodded. This was their first true test of the QXs in the wild. They had been trained at the Salechii Park with other sharks they had captured, but this would be their first time they were out in open water with wild sharks.
Hopefully they performed as well as their creator, Tonaka Yashimoto had promised. They had best or they would be no more. His stump proved that.
“Look how big the lead shark is,” Dillon exclaimed, as all the air seemed to rush out of his lungs.
Callum stared at the modified radar. They were only looking at the ghost of the creature and Dillon was right, it was huge. “A female then.”
“And what a girl!” Dillon stated “She’s got to be eight feet long if she’s an inch.”
“The other looks to be about seven feet?” Shalie asked. “Does that make it a male for sure?”
Callum was pleasantly surprised at Shalie’s knowledge of the bull shark’s anatomy, although he shouldn’t have been. Even though her doctorates were in the robotics field, she took on any disciple she was involved in with rigorous study. She was nearly as versed in shark knowledge as most academian she just had no field experience which she insisted on correcting on this trip. He’d rather have her stay back at the shark park, but there was no keeping her back, not with her robots going out for their first time.
Up until now their acquisitions had focused on smaller, easier to manage sharks such as the nursery, grey and sand sharks to test the park’s infrastructure. So far so good. No major incidents. So far. They kept piling on the safety and security measures to make sure. Callum wanted nothing, but nothing to take attention away from his message that sharks were a vital and necessary part of the ocean’s ecosystem.
One tiny mishap and all of the negative publicity would overwhelm his message and the very purpose of the park.
“Let’s go get them,” Callum ordered.
“Them?” Dillon questioned. “As in both?”
“Why not?”
“Um, like a gazillion reasons,” Dillon replied. His mother had raised him right. He was even more cautious and thoughtful than Callum. “First off, we only have one transport bay on the ship.”
His son wasn’t wrong. They had specially custom made a loading bay that was based on the “endless pool” theory so that the sharks could be kept in a stationary tank yet still have water flow over their gills to keep them alive. The only problem, the thing wasn’t very wide. It had been built for one shark, not two.
Even QX59 seemed concerned. The robot might not have eyebrows yet his expression certainly conveyed incredulousness at the idea plain enough.
Yet…
Callum turned to their resident veterinarian. “Well, Clint?”
Dr. Clint Tatus shrugged. “They do seem to be a bonded pair,” he said indicating to the radar. And they are swimming more tightly together now than they would have to in the tank.”
“But with the stress of capture and confinement?” Dillon pressed. “They could turn on each other.”
“With enough sedation I think we can swing it,” the vet replied.
Dillon frowned, which was an uncommon occurrence. Despite all the hardship of his mother’s cancer and death, Dillon had been a beacon of hope to Callum. He’d thought he’d permanently screwed up seventeen years ago. This was like he had hit some kind of cosmic, “do over” lottery. Which he knew full well he was probably going to screw up, but for now he just looked at his son with such pride. He had such a good head on his shoulders.
“Swing it?” Dillon repeated. “I think we need a few more percentage points on that before we decide it is worth the risk to the sharks.”
&n
bsp; Callum drew in a deep breath. His mother had clearly instilled a deep sense of love for the animal kingdom. Callum wished that he could say he had given Dillon his respect for sharks, but it had been his mother.
“I agree,” Shalie weighed in. “I want some numbers as well.”
Callum couldn’t help but smile at the robotics doctor. She was all math and percentages. Her whole world ran on specifics. Callum was more of a fluid dynamics person.
“Clint, can you get some figures to calm our companions?” Callum asked.
The veterinarian nodded. “I’ll work out the dosage versus mass equations to see exactly how quiet I can get the couple.”
“There, are you two happy now?” Callum asked his son and Shalie.
“I will be once I see the results,” Shalie responded. He wasn’t quite sure if she was teasing him or not. There was the tiniest tug up of her lips that implied she might be pulling his chain.
“Alright while we wait on the numbers, let’s run through the drills and get ready to drop the cage.”
* * *
Dillon checked the wench, again. They had run through the drill like a gazillion times already. The vet gave them an eighty five point four percent chance of success so his dad had given the go ahead. Even Shalie agreed. Dillon still had his reservations, but was outvoted.
“This is the stupidest thing to date we have attempted and we have attempted some pretty stupid stuff,” Quax, aka QX59, stated next to Dillon.
The theory was to pull ahead of the sharks, which was no small feat with bull sharks, then drop the cage over them. Immediately darting them with high potency, quick acting tranquilizers then have the robots help them transfer the sharks into the tank and keep them sedated through drugs in the water for the trip back to Australia and the shark park.
It sounded so simple. It was anything but.
“At least you only have to help with the cage,” Dillon reminded his friend. He knew how much the robot hated to be out on the water. He swore that he got seasick. And his phobia around sharks didn’t help much either.
“Only?” Quax responded. “Only? We will be within feet of the bullies. If anything goes wrong, whack! We will join your dad in the limbless club.”
Dillon shook his head. If it had to do with sharks, Quax always took it to the worst case scenario.
Quax steadied Dillon as he nearly fell over when the engines kicked in. He could hear the rumble of as they tried to overtake the sharks. They needed to catch up soon since they were headed toward one of the hundreds of archipelagos that dotted the ocean and combined together to be the country of Indonesia.
It got pretty shallow between the islands, which is what the bullies liked. They were known for shallow water hunting which meant they were likely to come into contact, i.e., read attack humans.
It wasn’t just their looks that got them the name Bull shark. It was also their temperament. They were unpredictable and highly reactive. Plus they were strong as heck which made them possibly their most dangerous catch. Only the Great White would be more difficult.
Despite his qualms, Dillon could hardly wait until they went after a Great White though. To date no one had been able to keep a Great White shark alive in captivity longer than a few months. But “they” didn’t have Salechii. A park built specifically to keep sharks healthy and happy while still allowing the public to safely be in close contact.
It was going to be amazing. Five long years of work would finally pay off. Of course for his dad it was twenty long years of work. Dillon was proud to be a part of Salechii. His mom would be so proud. This had been her dream as well. She’d only gone back to Montana to raise him around family. How he wished she could have seen Salechii. She would have lost her mind.
Dillon smiled. He liked to think his mom was with him now. Smelling the sea brine, feeling the wind in her hair. Her freckles multiplying under the late afternoon sun. The sunset promised to be spectacular tonight.
“Are we ready?” His dad shouted from the bridge.
Dillon gave a big thumbs up. The rig was ready. He was ready. Were the bullies?
* * *
Shalie studied the monitors. They hadn’t been able to catch up to the bullies before they ducked into the island system. Which meant the sharks and they had to slow down a bit. There were a myriad of reefs and land shelves to navigate in here. She was monitoring the radar extremely closely for any signs of danger.
“All stop!” she cried out. The captain of the ship looked at her sideways. She didn’t have time to explain. Breaking protocol, Shalie reached over and hit the large emergency red button that killed the engines.
“Oy!” the Aussie captain yelled, shoving her out of the way.
The ship lurched, then stalled. They coasted forward with their inertia though. Shalie gripped the railing with both hands.
Callum rushed onto the bridge. “What’s the bloody problem? The sharks are getting away!”
Shalie let Callum’s anger wash over her and pointed to the radar screen.
“What the hell are those?” he asked.
The captain took in a sharp breath. “Bloody hell.”
Dillon swung into the bridge, literally swung, “What’s going on?”
It took his young eyes a few seconds to recognize the danger on the screen. Shalie watched as his pupils dilated. Then a loud clang filled the bridge.
“Did we just hit a sea mine?” Dillon asked with a hiss.
Shalie nodded.
“If we’d been going full speed…” the captain whispered.
“Good call, Shalie,” Callum said as they slipped past two other mines.
“What the heck are they doing way out here?” Dillon asked.
Shalie sat down and tried to loosen her grip on the railing. “During World War II both sides laid down hundreds of thousands of mines.”
“But why here?” Callum asked.
Shalie was not a World War II expert, but before coming out here, she had done extensive research into Indonesia. She wanted to hit the ground running. “This area, like Guam were strategic footholds in the battle for the Pacific.” Shalie went on. “The Allies laid mines throughout this region to keep it free of lurking subs.”
“But I thought those mines were taken care of?” Dillon asked.
“They did try to do a thorough sweep, but many pockets like this still exist. This region is uninhabited so no fishermen came across them to report them.”
Callum sucked in a loud breath. “So we can’t try and navigate around them?”
Both Shalie and the captain shook their heads.
“This appears to be an active field. We’re just too bloody big,” the captain whispered.
“So we’ve got to let the bullies go?” Dillon asked.
“I’m afraid so,” Shalie responded to watch father and son’s face fall.
“Wait,” Callum said. “Not so fast.”
* * *
Callum watched the bullies on the radar screen. Almost like they knew they had the advantage they had slowed, coursing around the mines, hunting. They had probably done this a hundred times, not knowing that the floating orbs were filled with enough munitions to blow them sky high. The bullies and the humans.
“We’ve got the submersible.”
Dillon backed away a step, his lips turning down. “We can’t contain the bullies with the sub.”
“No,” Callum said. “But we can chase them out of the mines and back into the open water.”
He looked around. No one seemed to believe him.
“What?” Callum asked. “Along with the QXs, we should be able to get them to turn around.”
Still the room looked skeptical.
“We’re really going to let two bullies go, that we’ve been chasing after for three weeks?”
Shalie frowned. “Or we could wait for them to exit on their own.”
“For how long? We’ve only got so much time to gather our specimens.”
“Dad, we’ve got nine months before t
he opening. We’ve got time.”
Callum leaned against the control panel. “Do we? We’ve still got a Great White, which are not territorial. It could take us months to track one. Then the hammerheads? And a whale shark? Nine months sounds like a long time, but it’s not.”
How well he knew that. The last five years had passed by in a blur. Everyday the shark park looked different as all of the underpinnings were done, they were terraforming the surface, making it look like a natural archipelago, much like the one that lay ahead.
Opening day would descend upon them in no time at all.
“What is the harm in trying?” Callum asked.
Shalie opened her mouth then shut it. Dillon did the same.
“Again, why are we catching sharks?” QX59 asked, breaking the tension in the room.
Both Shalie and Dillon chuckled.
“No risk, no reward,” Callum reminded them.
Shalie sighed. “Talk us through it.”
* * *
Dillon listened to his dad. How did everything he say always make it sound so easy? Sure, just take the submersible, dart around a couple dozen live mines, somehow intimidate a pair of full grown bull sharks and drive them out of the channels.
No big deal.
“I supposed you’re going to need me in the submersible?” Quax asked.
“You are the best rated at the controls,” his dad stated.
“Damn me and my excellence,” Quax said, shaking his fist at the sky.
“Who all is going down?” Dillon asked.
“QX59 and me,” his dad said.
“And me,” Dillon insisted.
His father frowned.
“Hey, if this is such an easy run, why not?” Dillon pressed.
He had his father in a bind. If he admitted it was dangerous, Shalie was going to weigh in and try to nix the whole thing. If his dad admitted it wasn’t that dangerous, why not let Dillon go?
“Fine, the three of us then,” his father relented, probably not wishing to give Shalie a reason to start asking for success percentages.
Dillon held up his hand and Quax gave him a high five. “Expertly done,” Quax whispered. Dillon knew how much Quax did not want to go down there with just his dad. His dad could get, how would you say it? Intense.
The 3rd Cycle of the Betrayed Series Collection: Extremely Controversial Historical Thrillers (Betrayed Series Boxed set) Page 51