Making Waves

by Susannah McFarlane

  A little reassured, EJ dropped into the water. The wetsuit that had felt tight and clammy was now almost impossible to feel at all. It was like a second skin. EJ dunked her head to wet her hair and put on her goggles.

  ‘You remember how to use your scuba gear?’ checked C2C. ‘Just breathe normally through your mouthpiece, go slowly down and check your air supply regularly. When you come up, go slowly as well. Right down we go.’

  And before EJ could say, ‘I think I might stay here for a while,’ C2C had pressed the Down button for the pontoon. She slipped under the water and began to swim away. EJ had no choice but to swim after her. At first she paddled with her head above the water but then put her head under the surface and kicked off with her flippers. She slid through the water and a trail of tiny bubbles streamed from her scuba gear as she breathed.

  EJ soon adjusted to breathing underwater with the scuba gear. All her practice dives in the SHINE training pool had paid off. What took a little longer to get used to was the silence all around her. The only thing she could hear was her own breathing and the sound of the bubbles. It was as if she had entered a different, silent world where she was the only noisy one. There was nothing to hear. There was also not much to look at, only sand, murky water and some brown seaweed waving at the bottom. EJ felt a little disappointed. It was not at all like the pictures on the Light Screen.

  Then, in the distance, a shape seemed to be forming, something dark and round against the green-blue sea. EJ stiffened slightly and watched. As the shape came closer, she could make out two things slowly rising and falling, like wings, from its sides. It was swimming right at C2C and EJ.

  EJ squealed, but with excitement not fear as she realised what was coming towards her. The round thing was a sea turtle, a large wrinkly-necked sea turtle, gliding effortlessly through the water with just the occasional flap of its flippers. It came within a metre of EJ, looked straight at her with its large, old-looking eyes and then began to chew on EJ’s flippers. EJ was amused but also confused as to what to do next.

  C2C gestured to EJ, shaking her charm bracelet.

  Of course, thought EJ, feed it so it stops feeding on my flipper! She took her turtle charm and twisted it. In seconds she was holding a bag of sponges. EJ took one out and deactivated the charm. She then held a sponge out to the sea turtle. It immediately let go of EJ’s flipper and took the sponge right out of her hand and swam away.

  EJ gave C2C the thumbs up and they swam on, following the turtle, until they came to a reef.

  EJ was entranced. She had seen the pictures of the ocean underwater on the Light Screen, on TV, even in 3D at the movies, but nothing prepared her for what she was seeing, what she was in, now.

  The seabed was transformed from sand to an underwater flowerbed, bursting, overflowing with brightly coloured coral. There was round coral, spiky coral, wavy coral, coral that looked liked cabbage, coral that looked like little trees and coral that didn’t look like anything EJ had ever seen before. And the colours were amazing: yellows, orange, blues, reds and purples even more vivid than on the Light Screen. And everywhere, simply everywhere, there were fish. Small fish, big fish, fish in schools and fish swimming solo. There were whirlpools of tiny silver fish that moved as one, swooping and darting in and out of the reef. There were larger fish: bright blue with vibrant yellow fins, zebra-striped fish, orange and white-striped fish, blue fish with yellow tails, green fish with yellow eyes. EJ took out her phone and activated the animal app and fish pictures and names flashed on her screen: now she knew there were clown fish wriggling in sea anemones, angel fish feeding on sponges and brightly coloured butterfly fish dashing from coral to coral.

  EJ watched in wonder as the fish swam through the shafts of sunlight that dappled the reef, as if they were crossing a busy intersection, going about their business. She saw sea sponges and starfish and, then, incredibly, a seahorse floating with its tiny almost transparent fins fluttering and its long snout moving up and down. EJ watched as it whirred its way between long, waving strands of seaweed. It was magical.

  She was so absorbed by what she was watching that EJ completely forgot she was on a mission until, swimming just above a coral bed, she spied something that didn’t belong there. She signalled to C2C and then dived down to pick it up. It was an underwater video camera. But whose camera was it and what had it filmed? EJ and C2C swam quickly back to the pontoon to find out.

  Their heavy oxygen tanks beside them, EJ and C2C sat on the pontoon of the dive station and replayed the footage on the camera EJ had found.

  ‘I think this was taken in much deeper water,’ said C2C. ‘You can see it’s darker.’

  ‘Yes, and that’s black coral,’ said EJ. ‘I recognise it from the images F15H showed me. It only grows in deep water. Look, there is masses of it, it’s like a field. I wonder if this is where Adriana plans to harvest.’ EJ zoomed in. ‘And see here, on the seabed, C2C,’ she continued, thinking there were rather a lot of cs, seas and sees for one sentence, ‘there are small metal discs with flashing lights running along in a line by the coral.’

  ‘They’re some kind of marker,’ said C2C looking closely. ‘But what are they marking? The harvest area?’

  The camera screen went black. There was no more footage. EJ turned the camera around, examining it closely. Then she saw it, in small writing on the bottom of the camera: ‘Aqua-Cam—Another brilliant AX creation for SHADOW Inc.’

  ‘It’s Adriana’s camera!’ she said. ‘She must have dropped it while she was looking for beds of black coral and laying her markers. If we can find the markers, maybe we can find Adriana. But how will we be able to find those small markers in all this ocean?’

  C2C smiled. ‘With a little bit of help from SHINE’s secret underwater weapon. I think A1 mentioned it and now you can meet it, or should I say, her. Squirt can find those markers.’

  ‘Who?’ said EJ.

  ‘Squirt.’

  ‘Pardon?’

  ‘Squirt, your mission buddy. She’s a dolphin.’

  EJ smiled. She loved being a secret agent.

  ‘SHINE has been working with dolphins for some time now, training them to help search for things in the ocean,’ explained C2C. ‘Dolphins have a natural sonar system that allows them to locate objects in the water. They find things better than any device we could ever invent and they are naturally curious. They are excellent search agents, just like our sniffer dogs on land. And Squirt is one of the best agents in our marine mammal division.’

  ‘So a dolphin can help me find Adriana and her A-Sub?’ asked EJ.

  ‘Exactly,’ said Agent C2C. ‘Now activate your dolphin charm and call in your buddy.’

  EJ didn’t need to be asked twice. She took the dolphin charm and twisted it. It transformed into a small black box with a SHINE logo on it. There were two buttons labelled Return and Search.

  ‘We can’t really talk to dolphins,’ continued C2C, ‘but we have been successful in teaching them basic commands. This device sends out the commands with a noise the dolphins have learned.’

  ‘Why do they come?’ asked EJ.

  ‘Because they are curious,’ said C2C, ‘and because we have their favourite fish. Mainly because of the fish.’

  ‘We have fish?’

  ‘Oh yes. Inside the dive cabin you’ll find a chill chest that holds large buckets of fish. You’ll need to have fish with you when you work with Squirt. Every time she does what you ask her to, you must reward her. There is also a small pouch so you can carry the fish while you are diving.’

  EJ went over to the dive cabin and returned with a big white bucket. She was holding it as far away from herself as she could.

  ‘Oh, I forgot to warn you,’ said C2C, laughing, ‘they smell a bit! Now let’s see if Squirt is around. Push the Return button, EJ.’

  EJ pushed and could just make out a high-pitched squeal.

  She pushed the button again.

  EJ waited and watched, her eyes scanning the ocean, but she co
uldn’t see anything. She kept looking, scrunching her eyes as if somehow that would help her see better, and craning her neck. Then she thought she saw something. Just a little wave? No it wasn’t, it was darker, more definite in shape. It was a fin, and suddenly a dolphin leapt out of the water, high into the sky, before diving back into the ocean. EJ was delighted.

  ‘There she is!’ cried EJ. ‘She’s so, so beautiful, so graceful! Look, she’s jumping again. Look, she’s coming over!’

  ‘Why don’t you go in and meet her?’ asked C2C. ‘But be careful EJ, don’t touch Squirt and don’t flap your flippers. Dolphins take that as a sign of aggression. But do take the fish and you’ll soon be friends.’

  EJ couldn’t believe how lucky she was—she was going to meet a dolphin! Completely forgetting to worry about the deep water, she strapped on the fish pouch and filled it with the small fish from the bucket. She then lifted on her tanks again, pulled her goggles over her head and put her snorkel in her mouth. EJ dropped down into the water and looked in the direction where she had last seen the dolphin leaping.

  EJ heard Squirt long before she saw her. In an otherwise silent ocean, she first heard a series of clicking noises and then some whistles and then more clicks. And then, just metres away, she saw her, a bottlenose dolphin. She was much bigger than EJ thought she would be, twice, nearly three times EJ’s size, but there something about her face that made EJ feel safe, even happy. She squealed with excitement. The dolphin seemed to look right at her and then let out another whistle sound before leaping out of the water and diving back in again. EJ squealed again through her snorkel and the dolphin repeated its trick. Then EJ held out some fish and the dolphin swam up and took it from her hand. No one would believe this—not that she would be able to tell anyone. EJ swam back to the platform and climbed up. When she turned around, Squirt was there, waiting for her—and for more fish.

  ‘Okay, here are some more,’ she said laughing as she threw out some more fish. The dolphin lept up and out of the water to catch the fish. EJ laughed. ‘You sure do like these fish!’ she cried.

  ‘You can use your agent ID app on your phone to find out about your new partner,’ C2C suggested.

  EJ took a photo of the dolphin and opened the app. Her screen flashed.

  ‘Hey, we’re the same age!’ cried EJ. ‘What a team!’

  Squirt did a flip in the air. Could she have possibly understood?

  Piinngg!

  It was EJ’s phone.

  ‘It’s a message from SHINE,’ said EJ. ‘At least a message from SHINE saying that they have intercepted another message from SHADOW.’

  ‘What does SHADOW’s message say?’ asked C2C.

  ‘I’m not sure yet,’ said EJ. ‘I don’t recognise the code.’

  EJ stared at the message on the screen but it didn’t seem to make any sense to her.

  Was it a letter code or was it a picture code? EJ thought it could be either.

  ‘What is that?’ asked C2C, looking over EJ’s shoulder.

  ‘It’s a code but I am not sure what sort yet,’ replied EJ. ‘But Adriana usually uses the same code and just changes it around a bit each time. Which means it should be another mirror code. I am going to try that first.’

  EJ copied the message and pasted it in to the SHINE code app on her phone. Then she scrolled through the code app menu until she found ‘apply mirror’. She pressed enter and the screen flashed once. More writing appeared and this time EJ could almost read it. She looked at the first two lines.

  ‘Hmmm,’ she said. ‘That doesn’t look much better, or, wait a moment, does it? They are letters, just really curly ones, almost like coral. That’s it!’

  ‘What is?’ asked C2C. ‘I can’t see any letters.’

  ‘Look closer,’ said EJ. ‘The first letter is H, then there’s A, then R, V, E, S, T. The first word is HARVEST. Adriana has just made the code harder to read this time by using a curly font.’

  ‘Well done, EJ,’ cried C2C. ‘What does the rest of the message say?’

  EJ keyed in the letters in a clearer font above the first two lines.

  ‘And now for the next line,’ EJ said.

  ‘This isn’t good,’ said EJ, ‘there were dolphins stuck in one of Adriana’s nets. There’s one more line in the message. I hope it is good news.’

  It wasn’t. EJ looked horrified as she keyed out the last lines.

  Now EJ had the whole message. She deleted the curly writing.

  ‘Oh no!’ cried EJ. ‘We’re too late. Adriana has already harvested more coral and she’s left dolphins trapped in one of her nets.’ EJ quickly checked her animal app on her phone. ‘This is awful: dolphins can’t last much longer than thirty minutes without air.’

  ‘We need to act fast, EJ,’ said C2C climbing on her SHINE mobile. ‘And we will need to split up. I’ll search for Adriana. Your phone can give me the location where the message was intercepted. If she stopped to add more nets, she won’t have had time to go too far from that point. I should be able to catch her. Squirt will be able to find the sunken net. She is trained to locate any new objects on the ocean floor. You need to get to those dolphins fast. Good luck, EJ12. I hope we both make it in time.’

  ‘We have to, C2C,’ cried EJ as she ran for her SHINE mobile, taking a bucket of fish and stowing it under her seat. ‘We just have to!’

  EJ looked at Squirt. Squirt looked at EJ.

  ‘Let’s go,’ EJ said, pressing the Search button on the dolphin trainer. Another high-pitched tone sounded. That was Squirt’s command to begin her search and the dolphin took off immediately.

  EJ jumped on her SHINE mobile and took off after Squirt, thumping over the waves as Squirt dived in and out of them. Then EJ noticed that Squirt was spending less time jumping and more and more time swimming in the water.

  Is she picking up something? Are we close? wondered EJ. I need to be able to follow Squirt. She checked the time. It was twelve minutes since Adriana had sent the message. EJ had to get to those trapped dolphins quickly. She pressed the S-button on the SHINE mobile and waited while a shield came over the top of her and the jet-skis folded up underneath. SHINE mobile 3 had converted to sub mode and EJ12 steered it downwards, following Squirt as the dolphin dived deeper and deeper.

  It was getting darker. The sun’s rays were weaker this far down and it was harder to see. EJ switched on SHINE mobile 3’ s headlights and powered through the water past schools of fish. As she sped along after Squirt, EJ noticed that there were fewer and fewer fish and the water was growing murkier.

  EJ was suspicious. Keeping one hand on the steering wheel, she activated her test flask charm and inserted it into the robotic aqua-arm cabinet and shut the watertight door. She switched the arm on and it slowly moved, extending outside the sub. Once outside, the flask took in water. EJ pressed the button again and the arm retracted with the flask. Even as she took the flask back out of the cabinet she could see the water was extremely cloudy with streaks of black through it. EJ pressed the small button on the neck of the flask. The results would be sent to her phone. As she waited for them, she suddenly realised that she could no longer see Squirt. Just as EJ began to worry, she saw the dolphin coming down from the surface.

  She must have gone up for air, thought EJ. She can, unlike the poor dolphins trapped in Adriana’s nets.

  Squirt swam forwards and EJ followed closely behind.

  Piinngg!

  Oil? From the A-Sub perhaps? thought EJ. At least it is only a trace.

  EJ knew the real problem was the pollution and the industrial activity that caused it and as she looked up away from her phone and out the window she could see exactly what that activity had done. Horrified, EJ saw that they had come to a part of the reef that had been completely destroyed. There were broken and crushed bits of coral and shredded seaweed. A solitary zebra fish darted to and fro as if looking for its home.

  EJ had found Adriana’s harvest area but too late. She hoped however that she could still save the do
lphins.

  ‘Adriana has been here so the net must be close,’ she said to herself. ‘Come on Squirt, where is it?’

  Squirt had gone back up for air but was now swimming down again, all the time clicking. EJ could hear the dolphin through a speaker that went outside the sub. It was the clicking noises that enabled the dolphin to find things and EJ was amazed how the dolphin moved so quickly through the dark water. Then, all of a sudden, as Squirt swam through the destroyed reef, her clicking stopped and was replaced by a short, piercing whistle. Then EJ heard new noises, more distressed-sounding than Squirt’s. Squirt started to make buzzing noises, blowing bubbles furiously and flapping her tail.

  EJ saw why. Squirt had found the broken net and tangled up inside it were two bottlenose dolphins, thrashing to get out, making frantic buzzing, whistling noises as they did. EJ couldn’t believe it. Adriana had just left the dolphins there to die. EJ had no time to lose if she was to save them.

  Slowly she drove the sub close to the net. She checked the dashboard, activated the robotic aquaarm and switched the sub onto auto-hover. Using a joystick to guide the robotic arm, EJ tried to pull the net away from the trapped dolphins.

  ‘Come on, come on,’ she urged herself, but the net was too tangled.

  I’m going to have to cut them free, thought EJ and she pressed another button on the sub’s dashboard. Another arm extended from the side of the sub. This one had a cutting saw on its end. Carefully, knowing that one wrong move could cut a dolphin and not the net, EJ used the grip arm to hold a piece of net up and the cutter to tear it. The two trapped dolphins stopped thrashing around, as if they knew EJ was trying to help them.