Meg: Hell's Aquarium (45 page)

Jonas and Mac stand on the
McFarland’s
bridge, a red-tiled command center equipped with banks of new computer consoles and GPS electronics, surrounded on all four sides by large bay windows. Stretched out before them are the main deck and mammoth hopper, the open hold occupying the deck space between the  bridge superstructure and the ship’s bow. The 175-foot-long, 45-foot-wide, 55-foot-deep tub is filled with seawater, all of the machinery designed to stir the captured slurry long-since removed. The port and starboard drag arms have been fixed at shallow depths so that they now channel seawater into the hopper, not sand.

Mac shakes his head in amazement. “When did you do all this?”

“Four years ago, about three months after Angel birthed her pups. I knew the Institute couldn’t house six full-grown Megs. I figured we’d eventually need something large enough to transport a few of them to buyers. The Feds practically gave her away. Cost us about two hundred grand to gut the hopper and refurbish her. Not too bad for a tax write-off.”

“Brilliant. Where was I during all this?”

“On your honeymoon. I told you about it when you got back.”

“When you said a dredger, I assumed you just wanted to keep the canal clear.” Mac walks across the control room’s wide expanse to gaze out the aft bay windows and the stern, the back end of the ship situated less than one hundred feet from the Tanaka Lagoon’s canal doors.

“How far is it from the canal doors to the hopper’s hull doors?”

“The skipper approximated 225 feet. Clearance between the bottom of the hull and the sea floor is only sixty feet, which helps. We’ll drop heavy cargo nets along either side of the ship as well as the bow, forcing Angel inside the open hopper.”

“What if she doesn’t want to go in?”

“We’re baiting the hopper. Plus Dr. Nichols will be enticing her, using the neurotransmitter. And hopefully the anesthetic will take the fight out of her. Once she’s secured in the hopper, Dr. Nichols will put her in sleep-mode for the duration of the trip and off we go. Figure a five day voyage to the Mariana Trench.”

Mac smiles. “I like it. And you know what part I like best?”

“That you don’t have to get wet?”

“Exactly. Wait . . . you said anesthetic. Who’s administering that? You?”

“It’s not a big deal. I’m not entering the canal. I’m just directing the feed tube through one of the pores.”

“J.T., not to overuse a cliché, but you’re getting too old for this shit. Let one of our divers handle it.”

“After what happened to Hendricks, no way. Besides, we still don’t know who’s been leaking the Meg Pen footage to that animal rights group. Terry and I want to keep Angel’s release quiet. Everyone thinks the dredger’s simply cleaning out the canal entrance. Terry’s doing a live televised debate with R.A.W.’s new spokesman this afternoon at the Monterey Aquarium. By the time the staff and the rest of the world figures out Angel’s gone, we’ll be far out to sea.”

“Nice.”

“Trish okay with you being gone?”

“She’s cool with it.” Mac stares at the canal, grinning from ear to ear.

“What?”

“Trish found out the sex of the baby. It’s a boy.”

“Yeah?” Jonas slaps his friend on the back. “Mac Junior, huh? Man, that’s great. I can’t wait.”

“The way I figure, I’ll be teaching him how to play baseball using my walker. You know we should be documenting this whole thing.”

“Your son’s birth?”

“Angel’s release. I bet it’d make a great documentary. I’d love to stick it right in those R.A.W. a-holes’ faces.”

“It’s already in the works. Dani’s handling it. She just hired a film crew.” Jonas points below to the stern deck where a tall man with a receding, dirty-blonde hairline and matching goatee is directing a shorter Italian gentleman with slicked-back, dark hair.

Mac’s eyes go wide. “Erik Hollander and James Gelet? You hired Maren’s stooges?”

“Hollander didn’t know what Maren was up to. Besides, they do nice work. You saw that
Jaws
documentary:
The Shark Is Still Working
? That was theirs.”

“I don’t know . . . Is Hollander getting in the water with you?”

“Hell, no.”

Mac offers a wicked smile. “He is now.”

Monterey Bay Aquarium
Monterey, California

The Monterey Bay Aquarium is located seven miles up the coast from the Tanaka Institute in downtown Monterey, close to Cannery Row. Considered one of the top aquariums in the world, the facility features two hundred galleries and exhibits, including a living kelp forest, and was the first to house and keep a great white shark alive.

The debate between the Tanaka Institute and the celebrity spokeswoman for R.A.W. is set to take place on the first floor of the aquarium’s Portola Café, its open deck facing the ocean. Security and local police have cordoned off the café’s seating area, isolating the two panelist and Channel-5’s camera crews from the invited public.

Lana Wood closes her eyes, allowing the make-up artist to powder her eyelids. The former film star, excited to be back in front of the camera again, feels the old adrenaline pumping, even if it is only to represent an animal rights group.

Terry Taylor refuses make-up, her almond eyes fixed on the horizon and the large ship anchored in the distance, just outside the Tanaka Lagoon. Her pulse is racing too, only with fear, knowing that her husband must once more place himself in harm’s way.

Keep him safe, God. Let this be the end of it, once and for all . . .

Barbara Raby, president of California’s League of Women Voters, takes her place at the podium. She welcomes her two guests and begins the debate.

“Ms. Wood—”

“Please, call me Lana.”

“Lana, R.A.W. has spent the last four years pushing the Tanaka Institute to release their captive Megalodons back into the wild. Why do you support this position, given that public sentiment clearly favors keeping these dangerous predators secured in their pens?”

“Barbara, I believe in the mission of aquariums and zoos—to educate and inform the public by exhibiting wild animals. That support ends when an animal is abused by its keepers. Our organization has clearly shown that overcrowding in the Meg Pen has led to the death of one pup, the drowning death of trainer Steven Moretti, and a near catastrophe only days ago when one of the juvenile Megs struck, and nearly shattered, the main gallery glass. The two remaining Megalodon pups are far too large to share one tank. As such, we’re asking the Tanaka Institute to do the right thing and release the remaining pups back into the wild where they belong.”

“Mrs. Taylor.”

“The Institute recognizes that something must be done in the near future to afford Belle and Lizzy more living space; however, releasing these two juveniles into the wild is extremely dangerous.”

“And why is that?” asks Lana. “You’ve said yourself on several occasions that humans are not part of the Megalodon diet. Monterey Bay is part of the Red Triangle, home to hundreds of great white sharks and the seal and sea lion populations they feed off of. Why can’t these creatures exist in Nature’s harmony like their modern-day cousins?”

“Belle and Lizzy are adolescent Megalodons, not great whites. They possess far different dispositions, including a fearlessness that drives them to attack anything and everything that provokes them.”

“Yes, we saw just how your trainers provoked them, using five-thousand-volt bang sticks.”

“Lizzy and Belle have never been abused, Ms. Wood,” Terry retorts. “Shocking them with a five-thousand-volt bang stick is the equivalent of using a Taser on a charging elephant. As for Belle striking the gallery window, video footage taken on the day of the incident clearly shows a teenager in the crowd using a laser pointer to agitate her. That’s why she went berserk.”

“That’s horrible,” Lana says. “Still, it’s no reason to keep the two pups captive.”

“There’s another reason. The sisters, as we call them, have formed a symbiotic predatory relationship when it comes to territoriality. We believe releasing them into Monterey Bay could potentially play havoc with the food chain while endangering boaters and divers as well. In many ways it’s far safer to release Angel than her two siblings.”

The statement draws a shocked response from the crowd.

Barbara Raby signals for quiet. “Mrs. Taylor, I don’t think the members of R.A.W. or any other animal rights group is suggesting Angel be released . . . are they, Lana?”

Lana Wood searches the audience where Jesse Thompson is emphatically shaking her head “No.”

“Of course not. Angel seems perfectly content in her lagoon. Our concern is only in doing what’s best for her abused pups.”

Terry smirks. “Those pups, as you call them, will one day be as large and just as ferocious as their mother. We’re not talking about clubbing fur seals or harpooning whales, Ms. Wood; we’re dealing with very large, very dangerous predators.”

Tanaka Oceanographic Institute
Monterey Bay, California

“I changed my mind. I am not getting into the water with that monster!” Erik Hollander pushes James Gelet and the air tank away, unzipping his wetsuit.

“Erik, I know you’re scared, but you heard Taylor, it’s perfectly safe.”

“Then you do it!”

“Hey, I’m only the producer. You’re the director. Besides, I’m not a very good swimmer.”

“Neither am I! Especially when my limbs are paralyzed in fear.”

“Erik, think of the movie. You’re about to film something no one’s ever seen. Remember when we got the Spielberg interview? This is just like that. It’s the footage that makes or breaks the documentary.”

Erik pauses from removing the BCD vest.

“Look, you heard Mackreides. If one of us doesn’t make the dive, he’ll call Kreg Lauterbach over at Ratio Productions. Next thing you know,
The History Channel
will be airing this seven times a month, and we’ll lose out on an Emmy.”

“I don’t care about any of that.”

“What about the DVDs? Do this and we’ll split sixty-forty.”

“Seventy-thirty.”

“Sixty-five, thirty-five, and you get top billing.”

Erik leans back against the rail. “I hate you.”

“Yes, but you’ll love me in an hour.” Gelet hurriedly secures the air tank to the back of his partner’s BCD vest. “Just remember, get as close to those openings in the door as you can, or else all we’ll see on film is a white blur.”

“Define close.”

“I don’t know . . . coupl’a feet. What’s the difference? As long as you stay on your side of the canal doors Angel can’t touch you.”

The blood rushes from Erik Hollander’s face. He leans over the stern rail and pukes.

Mac walks by, slapping the gagging director on the back. “That’s it, son, let it out. Beats hurling it in your face mask.”

The two divers sink feet-first behind the
McFarland
. Jonas drags the eight-inch-wide rubber feed hose into the depths. Erik Hollander grips his underwater HD video camera. The thirty-eight-year-old’s pulse is throbbing so hard in his head he feels like he’s about to have an aneurism.

“Jonas. I can’t do this.”

“Sure you can. Look behind you. You’re missing some great stuff.”

He turns as they slowly descend past the hopper dredger’s keel, the two divers dwarfed by the ship’s starboard twin screw and rudder assembly. “Geez, Louise . . .” He fumbles with the lens cap then shoots a wide-angle shot of the
McFarland’s
immense bottom. Midway to the bow, sunlight streams down from the hopper’s open bay doors. Turning to his right, he catches a veil of cargo nets as they plunge over the side, anchoring in the silt ninety feet down.

“Incredible. I feel so . . . insignificant.”

“That’s only the appetizer. The main course is this way.” Leveling out at sixty feet, Jonas swims toward the canal doors, the towering gray fortification looming ahead.

“Must you put everything in those terms?” Erik swims hard to keep up, the adrenaline and effort quickly exhausting him.

Jonas moves to within fifty feet of the door and stops.
Something doesn’t feel right . . .

Erik hovers beside him. Directly ahead, two blue portals reveal the sea on the other side of the steel barrier, but nothing resembling a white blur. “Where is she, Jonas?”

“Close enough to smell you. Wait here.” Jonas swims over to the algae and barnacle-encrusted wall, his breathing rapid, his eyes wide as he waits for the penned creature to show itself.

Nothing.

Moving to one of the two-foot-wide pores, he steals a quick peek inside, checking below and above, then both sides.

The canal is empty.

Jonas fixes his gaze down the corridor of concrete. Sunlight streams in curtains between the rolling waves, the walls thick with algae, the incoming current causing the heavy growth along the vertical enclosures to dance.

After several moments he speaks into his face mask transmitter. “Mac, she’s not in the canal. Can you see her in the lagoon?”