by EJ Altbacker
Striiker turned to his mariners and yelled over the noise. “Very soon a bunch of flippers are coming to try to eat us! You remember Hokuu? I sure do! It’s him that we’re fighting! He may come in different shapes and sizes, but it’s the same filthy worm that destroyed our homes!” Striiker shouted as loudly as he could, “RIPTIDE MARINERS! WE ARE GOING TO WIN THIS BATTLE! WE WILL HOLD THIS LEDGE UNTIL EVERY STINKING MONSTER IS DEAD OR GRAY SAYS DIFFERENT! DO YOU GET ME?”
“WE GET YOU, SIR!” the Riptide mariners roared.
“They come,” said Shear to Gray.
The first through the greenie were the frilled sharks. The eel-like creatures didn’t look fast but that was an illusion. They were lightning quick. They didn’t blast out of the greenie so much as squirt from between the stalks forming the globe.
“DOUBLE CLUSTERS AT THE READY!” Striiker shouted.
The initial wave of frills didn’t roar straight at them. They tried to juke and jitter as Gray had seen Hokuu do in battle. It was hard for a defender to stay in position to defend when a frilled shark could shift to either side and strike at a flank.
But these attackers were fooled by the calm waters within the greenie. Since it wasn’t moving fast why would the water thirty feet away by the ledge be any different?
Mistake.
The wicked current took the frills totally by surprise. Two of the first five were folded in half, their flexible spines not flexible enough to withstand the pressure. The other three were mashed into each other. They were swept into the rocks, which crushed their skulls and scraped the skin from their bodies when they hit the jagged mountainside.
If only all the frills and jurassics had attacked together; then maybe the battle would have been over. But that wasn’t the case. Grimkahn’s forces moved in a loose pack so only the first and fastest swam the Sparkle Blue. The other frills recognized the trap and stopped.
Being slower, the mosasaurs did not see this. Two pushed the frill sharks in front of them into the current, and so ten more frilled sharkkind were swept into the rocks. The first giant mosasaur, at least ten feet larger than Gray, wasn’t strong enough to withstand the current. In a stroke of luck, he was the furthest up the current. When he tumbled, he took several other jurassics with him!
For a fleeting moment Gray felt a surge of hope.
They would hold the ledge.
They could not only win but maybe wouldn’t lose a mariner!
That thought ended when Grimkahn blasted through the greenie a split second afterward. Yes, the mosasaur leader was surprised by the current, but he was so terrifically strong he overcame it.
Grimkahn smashed into the ledge and used his gigantic jaws to battle the lower part of the Riptide formation. He sunk the huge claws on his flippers into the rock and would not be moved. “TO ME!” he shouted. “TO ME!”
Two other mosasaurs made it the ledge, holding fast with their own clawed flippers.
“DOUBLE CLUSTERS; ONE, TWO, AND THREE!” shouted Striiker. “GO, GO, GO!”
Blocks of twenty sharks launched themselves at each one of the mosasaurs. They struck the jurassics in the face and ripped at their flippers. One monster tumbled away, but Grimkahn and his ally crunched sharkkind bodies in their terrible jaws, throwing the broken bodies of Gray’s mariners into the current.
Other frills found a way to avoid the worst of the current and joined the fight. They were smaller but still twice as long as most of the sharkkind defenders. Striiker kept sending sharks to ram those that attempted to gain the ledge.
“FOUR, FIVE, SIX, SEVEN! GO! GO! GO! GO!” he yelled.
But for every frilled shark rammed back into the current, another made it onto the ledge. Once free from that obstacle, the frills were deadly. They jittered side to side, using their spiked tails to stab sharks through the gills and eyes. Gray saw one mariner die from a tail spike though the skull before he swam over and bit down on that attacker’s head.
Grimkahn yelled at Gray, “Today you die, Seazarein! You will all die!”
“You must get to safety!” shouted Shear to Gray. “We must retreat!”
“No!” Gray answered. “We’re staying!”
Hokuu remained five feet inside the greenie so that he was unseen as he slithered through it. He could feel that the kelp was being kept in a circular bubble by shar-kata energy.
Takiza was near.
But where?
Hokuu watched as Grimkahn fought snout to snout with Gray’s mariners. The much smaller sharkkind were doing a good job protecting their position. Still, they were slowly losing ground. If Grimkahn got his entire body onto the plateau it would be over. Without the current threatening to rip the jurassic from the mountainside, Gray would be lunch.
Hokuu saw the pup Seazarein save the life of the captain of his guardians, a sickeningly loyal tiger finja named Shear. Hokuu began to weave his dark-kata power into a bolt that would send both to the Sparkle Blue. This would be detected by Takiza, so Hokuu would have to speed to a different position afterward, but the risk was well worth the reward.
Hokuu released his ball of orange energy, and it zipped straight at Gray and Shear.
But the current got hold of it.
The globe of crackling power detonated inside a group of twenty sharkkind and vaporized them. Their blackened remains were sucked away by the current. Hokuu cursed himself. He should have corrected for the rip current! If those twenty sharkkind had been with the whole Riptide formation the energy would have leapt into every mariner! All would have swum the Sparkle Blue instead of a mere twenty!
Once again he couldn’t believe Gray’s luck.
Hokuu thought he felt someone coming his way from underneath. He couldn’t see through the whirling greenie all around him, but that didn’t mean someone wasn’t there. He zipped away, changing directions several times. Hokuu would make his way forward to try again.
And this time my aim will be true, he thought.
“You did that on purpose!” Barkley hissed at Velenka as the frilled shark zipped away. “Hokuu must have seen you.”
The mako shook her head. “If he spotted us we would be dead. Especially me.”
“I don’t think he saw us, Barkley,” Leilani said.
The three of them could see only bits and pieces of the fight going on by the ledge above them because of all the tumbling kelp. Their position ten feet underneath the mass allowed them a clear area to view inside and sometimes through the greenie as they hid in the short and thick scrub kelp below.
They had spotted Hokuu after he released an orange ball of energy and it lit up the waters. Barkley didn’t see who or what was hit. He hoped Gray and everyone else was all right. If they had just been able to spot Hokuu a little earlier they could have attacked his belly.
“We should try to find him,” Barkley said.
“Track a frilled shark in that mess? You can count me out!” Velenka exclaimed, a little louder than she should have. Even though the current and rustling greenie were loud it was never wise to give your position away.
Leilani flicked her fins in disgust. “I guess we can count you out of everything!”
“I wish you would!” the mako replied.
“Quiet,” Barkley told her.
She slashed her tail through the water. “I won’t! This is crazy!”
A frilled shark rose behind Velenka. It wasn’t as large as Hokuu, but that didn’t make it any less terrifying. Its red eyes glowed as it reared back and opened its mouth, filled with deadly, tri-hooked teeth.
“LOOK OUT!” yelled Barkley as he streaked forward and butted Velenka straight into the frill’s stomach. The prehistore’s gaping mouth crashed into the rock bed behind them, a flipper length from taking Velenka’s head off. “SWIM!” Barkley shouted, and they both broke in different directions. The frilled
shark was disoriented from driving his face into the stony seabed and lost Barkley and Velenka.
But Leilani was hovering a foot above the scrub greenie and directly in front of the beast. It locked its crimson eyes on her and whooshed forward. Barkley knew there was no way for him to defend the spinner shark.
Leilani was about to die when . . .
Something happened.
Not something, but someone.
Snork.
The sawfish rushed underneath Leilani and bolted upward as the monstrous frilled shark reared back to send her to the Sparkle Blue. This time, instead of striking with his mouth, the monster sent his spiked tail through the water so fast it made a high-pitched whine.
Snork whipped his bill from right to left and smashed the monster’s tail into the ground! It must have hurt because the frilled shark let out a howl. Barkley blinked, sure he was dreaming. The enraged prehistore roared and tried to bite Snork’s head off. But the sawfish never stopped moving and whipped his bill in the other direction. It met the enraged frilled shark’s neck and cut its head off!
Swimming over to the speechless Leilani, Barkley asked Snork, “How—how did you do that?”
“I don’t know,” Snork stammered. “I’ve been practicing, though.”
They all stared at the frilled shark’s head slowly spinning in the water in front of them. It had a look of absolute surprise frozen on its face, probably the same one that Snork and Leilani were wearing.
“I’ll say you have,” Barkley told the sawfish.
Just then the sounds of the battle above increased once more.
THE BATTLE HAD TURNED INTO A FEROCIOUS melee. Gray roared forward and rammed a frilled shark in the gills. He didn’t stop swimming until he pushed it off the ledge and it was swept away. Three other frills had managed to make it onto their defensive position. Striiker sent mariners to fight the beasts, but the Riptide sharks were no match for them.
“Re-form around the Seazarein!” Shear ordered the remaining finja guardians.
“No!” Gray yelled. “Have them attack the frilled sharks!”
“You need to be protected!” Shear shouted.
“We’re all going to die if Grimkahn and his jurassics take this position!” Gray answered. “Striiker can’t concentrate on the jurassics if the frills are behind him! Now do it!”
The guardians were technically Gray’s to command but they did look to Shear, who was responsible for the Seazarein’s safety. He gave them the signal to go. “Clear the area. Then resume guarding the Seazarein.”
“Let’s take out that mosasaur!” Gray told Shear as he gestured to the one farthest from Grimkahn.
“You’re making it very hard to protect you!” the tiger finja said, but he streaked with Gray at the jurassic that had gotten onto their plateau. Grimkahn and another were making progress, but the Riptide mariners’ attacks were keeping them off balance. Twice they had dislodged one of their taloned flippers, but each time Grimkahn and the other mosasaur found another spot on the mountainside to sink their claws into and hold fast.
The opening to the ledge was smaller than the back part, where the Riptide mariners were arranged. This was good, as it created a choke point. Only three of the giant mosasaurs could try to get onto the area at once. The current above and below the outcropping was too strong for someone to swim against with someone defending.
“We have to get that one off!” Gray shouted over the sounds of battle. “I’ll get its attention, you bang it on the head!” He didn’t wait for Shear to respond. Gray swam under the mosasaur’s jaw and gave it a tremendous fin slap. The jurassic roared as broken teeth rained from its mouth. When the mosasaur stretched forward to snap at Gray, Shear rammed it in the skull.
The jurassic tottered as the vicious current tugged at its tail. But it didn’t fall away. And Gray and Shear were out of room. Striiker and the remaining Riptide mariners couldn’t aid them. They were all fighting.
“GOLDEN RUSH, ATTACK!” cried a voice.
At that moment Xander came swimming down from above them. The AuzyAuzy mariners numbered only a hundred. A single battle fin was all that could come down from the mountainside and onto the plateau at once. They bashed into the mosasaur attacking Gray and Shear and blew it clean off the ledge. Once the current hit the monster it was swept away and struck the mountainside solidly.
The AuzyAuzy mariners bit and chewed at the newest mosasaur until it couldn’t hold on any longer. It too was carried off by the rip current.
“Sorry we’re late,” said Xander. “It was a bit of a scrumble to get here.”
“By my thinking you’re right on time!” Gray said, giving the hammerhead a quick flank bump.
“Yes, right on time! To die with your friends!” roared Grimkahn as he got his fourth clawed flipper up on the plateau. He was out of the current. “Now you’ll pay for defying me!”
Within moments he and his other mosasaur mariner were both on the plateau. Other jurassics grabbed for the ledge behind their leader. Striiker’s forces had been pushed out of position and couldn’t do anything about it.
Hokuu crept close to the edge of the greenie mass, being careful not to expose himself. It looked like Grimkahn had finally gotten the upper fin—or, in his case, flipper. He and his forces were going to wipe out the pup and everyone else. Sure, reinforcements had come, but only a single battlefin of a hundred mariners. That wasn’t enough. Not nearly.
Hokuu grinned as he took it all in. There was nothing that could stop Grimkahn’s rise to absolute power.
And with that, my own, Hokuu thought.
He reveled in the chaos unfolding in front of his eyes, loving every second of it.
This beautiful interlude was interrupted by a faraway whale call. It was distorted, coming from a great distance with the raging current. Hokuu tried to block out the noise but it nagged at the back of his mind. The whale call sounded again, intruding on the moment of his victory once more. Then a group of bluefin tuna flashed by, sparkling as the sun reflected off their silvered bodies. It was a small group. They were propelled by the fierce current and so were gone in an instant.
Another group flashed by, this one twice as large.
Then Hokuu realized what was bothering him.
The Tuna Run! It wasn’t happening this week . . .
It was happening now!
Hokuu realized that they had blundered into a devious trap. He understood the great danger that was coming for Grimkahn, the jurassics, the frilled sharks, and most importantly for his own hopes and dreams.
He darted forward, intent on getting to the safety of the ledge and warning Grimkahn.
Hokuu braced himself to swim through the current but was pulled back into the kelp ball by some force. He found himself looking at Takiza, who hovered in the chaotic mass of greenie as if it were the calmest of days in the Caribbi Sea.
“Leaving so soon, Hokuu?” the betta asked. “I thought you and I might speak.”
“You thought wrong!” Hokuu spat. “But I can stay around long enough to kill you!”
He brought his power to bear and shot a bolt of electricity at Takiza. It was blocked easily, as Hokuu knew it would be. He had only done it to get close enough to launch what he liked to call hurling grace, his vomit attack. The acid in his stomach was thick and stuck to whatever it hit, dissolving anything covered within a minute.
But the betta was too quick, zipping away and stinging him with a shock to the flank. “Your puny powers alone can’t beat me!” Hokuu shot his spiked tail through the water.
It would split Takiza in two—
But his attack was blocked and pushed wide!
A huge marlin then smacked him on the forehead with his bill, causing Hokuu’s eyes to water and vision to blur for a moment. “My name is Diego Benedicto Pacifico Salamanca, and
I am here to take your measure.”
“Salamanca,” Hokuu said in disgust. He knew of the billfish and didn’t like him one bit. “I thought you never left the waters of Spain and Portuga.”
“It was a nice day for a swim,” the marlin answered. “Now, I would see you fight. En garde!”
Hokuu was enraged. He forgot about Takiza and fired his tail at the disrespectful blue marlin. This buffoon didn’t even have brains enough to be afraid for his life. Well, Hokuu would teach him fear right before killing him!
As a target, Salamanca was too large to miss. But the bladefish blocked each one of his tail spike attacks, clanging them off his stout nose.
“You are as unskilled with your tail as you are ugly,” the marlin said.
What am I doing? Hokuu thought. Why am I fighting this fool snout to snout? He was Hokuu, master of shar-kata! He whirled his tail, gathering power.
But a searing charge of electricity sent by Takiza disrupted his concentration.
The betta waved a gauzy fin in a scolding manner. “Using your powers against a foe without his own would be less than honorable.”
Then, instead of running, Salamanca closed the distance between them. Hokuu tried gathering energy for a quicker shar-kata attack, but he was again jolted by Takiza.
“Fine!” he yelled at the marlin. “I’ll send you to the Sparkle Blue the old-fashioned way!”
“Excelente!” the crazy marlin answered. “It is for this Salamanca has come!”
Hokuu fought with the marlin on a purely physical level. He would kill Takiza’s friend right in front of him. But Salamanca blocked and parried his strikes. The billfish was incredibly agile over short distances. Hokuu used every tail attack he could think of: over the shoulder, from underneath, around each side. Feinting one way, attacking the other.