CHAOS

Bud Harris dragged himself off the polished wooden floor, unsure of what had just taken place.  The Magnate was drifting, her twin engines off.  He glanced sideways in time to see the helicopter's blades slipping beneath the waves.

"Fuck you," he muttered, then pressed the "on" switch, attempting to restart the engines.  Nothing.

"Shit.  Danielson, Heller!  Where the fuck are you guys?"  Bud headed out on deck, locating the men standing by the transom.

"Well?  Is the monster dead?"

Danielson and Heller looked at each other.  "Gotta be," said Danielson, not sounding very sure of himself.

"You don't seem real confident," questioned Bud.

"Unfortunately," said Danielson, "we had to let the charge go a little early when that lunatic attacked."

"We need to get out of here," said Heller.

"Yes, well, boys, that's gonna be a bit of a problem," said Bud.  "The engines are dead.  Your damn explosive apparently loosened a connection, and I'm not exactly Mr. Goodwrench."

"Christ, you're telling us we're stuck out her with that Meg?"  Heller shook his head, his jaws locked tight.

"Frank, the monster's dead.  Trust me," said Danielson.  "We'll be watching it float belly-up any second now."

Heller looked at his former CO.  "Dick, it's a fucking shark.  It's not going to float; if she's really dead she'll sink to the bottom."

At that moment they heard a splashing sound to their left.  The yacht seemed to drop, and then a hand appeared at the ladder, Mac dragging himself on board the Magnate.

"Beautiful morning, isn't it, assholes?" he said, collapsing on deck.

*        *        *        *        *

Jonas lay on his stomach, head down, his claustrophobia causing shortness of breath.  The lifeless Abyss Glider's left midwing had caught on the cargo net, keeping the sub at eye level with the Megalodon.  Jonas watched in fascination and horror as the female's blue-gray eye continued focusing involuntarily on the tiny submersible.

She's blind, thought Jonas, but she knows I'm here, she senses a presence.

Now the caudal fin began to swish in heavy, side-to-side movements, propelling the predator slowly forward.  The gill slits towered into view, passing quickly.  And then the prominent snout suddenly whipped back and forth, freeing the AG I's wing from the net as the most frightening animal on the planet snapped awake.

The submersible contined to rise tail-first.  Jonas looked down, watching the Megalodon lurch forward, but the cargo net immediately ensnarled her pectoral fins.  Enraged, she rolled once, then twice, twisting and tangling herself tighter in the trap.

The AG I tossed backward in the Meg's wake.  With no means of control, Jonas lost sight of the creature.  Then, as the sub's cone drifted downward, he caught a glimpse of the furious Megalodon, completely entined from her gills slits to her pelvic fin in the cargo net.

"She's going to drown," he whispered to himself.

*        *        *        *        *

The myriad of boaters anchored in waiting outside the Tanaka Lagoon had witnessed the super-yacht break from the group to rendezvous with the incoming guest of honor.  The had seen the helicopter intercept, and attack the vessel, only to end up crashing into the sea as the depth charge had detonated.  Now the onlookers grew anxious, wondering if the explosion had killed the creature they had paid good money to see.  Almost as one, several dozen of the largest fishing boats grew daring, gradually moving toward the listless Kiku, intent on filming the creature, dead or alive.

Nine media helicopters were hovering above Kiku, perpetually shifting positions in their attempt to gain better camera angles.  The underwater explosion created a new twist on the story.  The networks ordered their helicopter crews to assess whether the Megalodon had survived.

David Adashek was in the back of the Channel 9 Action News copter, straining to see over his cameraman's shoulder.  The white glow of the creature was visible, but whether the shark was dead or alive was impossible to determine.  The pilot tapped his arm, motioning him to look toward the opposite side of the copter.

Racing toward the Megalodon was a flotilla of pleasure boats.

*        *        *        *        *

From the tip of her snout to the edge of her caudal fin, the Megalodon's skin contained fine, toothlike prickles called dermal denticles, literally "skin teeth."  Sharp and sandpaperlike in texture, the denticles were another in the predator's arsenal of natural weapons.  As the female twisted insanely within the cargo net, the dermal denticles began sawing through the rope, slowing slicing it to ribbons.

Jonas watched the female shake herself free from her bonds as he desperately checked the sub's fuses.  Finally, she turned in his direction, jaw slack, triangular teeth splayed.  Desperate, Jonas tried the power switch again—still dead, as the monster propelled itself upward.

*        *        *        *        *

DeMarco manned the harpoon gun, training the barrel on his target.  He released the safety as the Meg surfaced.  He watched as she swam upside down now along the surface, a river of water passing into her mouth as she exposed her glistening white belly to the world.  DeMarco aimed, pulled the trigger.

Click.

"Goddamnit!"  The explosion had jammed the gun's inner chamber.  The entire crew was on deck now, frantically donning orange life vests.  In the pilothouse, the ship's physician tended to Masao, now conscious. Terry and Pasquale stood over them.

"He's fractured his skull, Terry," said the doctor.  "We need to get him to a hospital as soon as possible."

He could hear the swarm of media copters hovering above.  "Pasquale, get on the radio, try to get one of those news choppers to land on the Kiku.  Tell 'em we have a serious injury.  Doc, stay with my father.  I'll be aft.

She ran out of the pilothouse, making her way to the hangar deck.

*        *        *        *        *

David Adashek saw her first, waving emphatically on the pad.  "I know that girl," he said.  "That's Tanaka's daughter.  Captain, can you land this bird on the KIKU? "

"No problem."

"Hold it," said the cameraman.  "My producer's screaming at me in my earphones to get close-ups of the Meg.  He'll have my balls for breakfast if you land on that ship."

"Look," said David, "the Meg is attacking the Kiku—"

"All the more reason why we're not landing."

"Hey," said the pilot, "I'm getting a distress call from the Kiku.  They're requesting we transport an injured man to shore.  Radioman says it's Masao Tanaka.  Looks serious."

"Land the copter," ordered Adashek.

The cameraman looked at him with a scowl.  "Fuck you."

Adashek ripped the camera from the man, holding it out of the pilot's open door.  "We land or I feed this to the Meg."

Moments later, the helicopter touched down on the pad.

*        *        *        *        *

The Megalodon circled madly beneath the Kiku,  The ship's exposed metal hull, immersed in seawater, generated galvanic currents, electrical impulses that stimulated the female's ampullae of Lorenzini like fingernails on a chalkboard, driving her to attack.

Sweating profusely, Jonas could feel his claustrophobia building as he strained to reach the battery connections at the rear of his sub.  Blindly, he groped the terminals inside the rear panels, searching in vain for a loose connection.

A sudden current twisted the AG I around and upward, giving Jonas an ubobstructed view of a scene that sent pangs of fear through his heart:  the Megalodon plunging her snout into the hull of the Kiku.

*        *        *        *        *

The collision brought the entire crew to its knees.  Metal screamed and a low-pitched moan emanated from below.

"Son of a bitch," swore Captain Barre, "that fucking monster's eating my ship.  Man the lifeboats!  Pilot, get Masao off this boat.  We don't need his blood in the water!"

The pilot of the news copter looked at Adashek and the cameraman.  "One of you guys has to get off if we're taking on wounded."

The cameraman looked at Adashek with an evil grin.  "Hope you can swim, pal."

David felt butterflies in his stomach as he exited the safety of the chopper, allowing the doctor and Terry Tanaka to load Masao on board.  He stood on the lopsided deck and watched the copter fly off toward the mainland.  "What the hell did you just get yourself into, David?" he asked himself aloud.

*        *        *        *        *

Crumpled against the port rail, Dick Danielson stood painfully, grabbed Heller beneath his armpits, and hoisted him to his feet.  "We're sinking!"

"No shit."  Heller looked around.  "Where are Harris and Mac?"

"Probably dead.  If so, they're lucky."

"The Zodiac."  Heller pointed at the rubberized raft.  "Come on."

The Magnate was taking on water rapidly.  It began to spin and roll sideways, making it more difficult for the two men to lift and lower the motorized raft over the side.  When it dropped to the surface with a splat, Danielson looked at Heller.

"Go ahead."

Heller swung over the rail, followed by his former captain.  Danielson brought the sixty-five-horsepower outboard whining to life and gunned the throttle.  The raft's lightweight bow rose high in the sea the Zodiac skimming over the waves, accelerating toward land and the pack of oncoming boats.

"Dick, watch those guys!" yelled Heller, the wind whipping in his ears.

Danielson had little room to maneuver, the stretch of motorboats too wide to circumnavigate.  He slowed, attempting to swerve around the first wave of hulls.

The female shot straight upward out of the Pacific, her open mouth missing the Zodiac, catching it instead on her broad back and launching the rubber raft fifteen feet into the air.  Heller and Danielson flew like rag dolls into the ocean on either side of the shark.

The Megalodon's sudden appearance started a chain reaction.  Two oncoming fishing boats veered sharply into adjacent vessels, creating two separate pileups.  Chaos reigned among the other craft as the rules of boating were tossed aside for self-preservation.  Screams rent the air as pilots frantically tried to turn back, only to crash into the unwitting boaters behind them.

The remaining eight news helicopters dropped to within fifty feet of the armada, contributing to the confusion.

Danielson  surfaced, coughing up seawater.  He swam toward the nearest pleasure craft, a thirty-two-foot speedboat overloaded with seventeen passengers and a golden retriever.  He clawed at the hull, unable to reach high enough to pull himself aboard.  The passengers did not see him, could not hear his cries for help over the thunder of the choppers.  Then he saw the ladder, and kicked toward it.

The cavernous maw came without warning from below, pulling Danielson underwater.  He struggled in time to catch the ladder in a death grip, feeling the sun-warmed aluminum, refusing to let go.  His legs, severed at the knees, slipped out of the monster's mouth, blood pouring from the open wounds, swirling in all directions from the boat's propellers.

The Meg's senses lost her prey.  Confused by the churning pool of blood, she submerged, attempting to relocate.

Danielson screamed, still dangling from the ladder.  Now the passengers in the stern heard him, reaching down and pulling him up by his wrists, laying him on top of the wide fiberglas transom.

The Megalodon's head levitated straight out of the sea, open jaws rotating sideways against the transom, her teeth gently gripping Danielson, tossing the crippled body up into the air high above her open mouth.  Like a dog catching a biscuit, the sixty-foot shark snatched her prey in midair, snapping her jaws closed on Danielson, gulping his remains deep into her gullet.  The monster slipped back beneath the waves before the first screams of protest from the petrified witnesses could be uttered.

Circling in a tight formation forty feet above the melee, the pilots of the eight news copters panicked, realizing for the first time how massive the Megalodon actually was.  Their first reaction was to immediately achieve a much safer altitude.  Eight joysticks were simultaneously yanked backward, eight sets of rotors climbing toward the same airspace.

The pilots were so frightened of the monster below they completely ignored the danger above.  Two copters rose at intersecting angles, their rotors slashing against one another, igniting a cataclysmic reaction.  The flying shrapnel ricocheted into the paths of the other helicopter blades, violating their airspace.  In a matter of seconds, all eight choppers either had careened sideways against each other or had been hit with shrapnel, causing their rotors to shatter.  Matching fireballs exploded upward tow at a time, raining metal, gasoline, and human body parts across the crowded sea.

Swimming fifty feet below the carnage, the predator circled slowly, snapping at the sinking debris, attempting to isolate food with her powerful senses.

The female was stimulated, ravenous with hunger.