by David Klass
Great whites fight back. Lightning-fast strikes at dolphins. Bullies of the block. Reassert their authority.
Dolphins outmatched. In the wrong weight class. Great whites are too big, too tough, too mean.
Thanks, guys. You tried. Very brave of you. I’ll try to do as well when they come for me …
Which they are doing … Gnawing off the final piece of the overhang … Looking down at me …
A SHADOW FALLS OVER THIS WHOLE SECTOR OF OCEAN FLOOR! Sperm whale! Diving out of nowhere, taking a chomp out of the side of one of the great whites!
Sharks don’t flee. Don’t even retreat. Go right after Moby. Battle royal in water. Sharks, whales, and dolphins. Teeth, fins, and flippers.
Monday Night Raw, forty feet down.
I make my move. Squirm out of grotto. Swim and run and wiggle at top speed over ocean floor, toward cave.
Twenty feet of ocean floor to cross. Fifteen.
A great white sees me. Wheels in my direction. It’s a race. I’m horribly slow. He’s gonna catch me.
Cave mouth yawning just ahead of me.
I make one final effort to throw myself in.
Not enough. Shark catches me. Bites my head off.
Injured. Dying. Dead. Yes, I’m dead. Death is inky black. The blackest black there is.
Cold, too. And excruciatingly painful.
No, wait. How can being dead be painful? The flashing, shattering agony I’m feeling is because I bashed my head on the lip of the cave as I threw myself inside.
Shark missed me! I made it! This isn’t death. This cold blackness is the inside of an undersea lava cave!
70
Blackest black imaginable. Suffocatingly dark. Like being trapped inside a chunk of carbon.
Freezing. Feels like the refrigerator door just swung shut. Lights out. Cooling system on full. So silent.
Need light or I’ll go crazy! My watch. Switch it on telepathically. Illuminates cave. Warms me.
Tunnel twists down toward the center of the earth. Looks like an indirect route to hell. I hesitate.
Caves have always scared me. This one looks particularly creepy. What kind of cave starts under the ocean? Then again, what choice do I have?
Doesn’t make much sense to go back the way I came in. Great whites lingering there.
So I swim forward, deeper into underwater cavern.
Steep downward slant. Swimming and crawling through tunnels that interconnect. Some I can barely squeeze through. Cold, lifeless volcanic rocks. Sharp edges.
Heading where? I don’t know. Hopelessly lost. But Firestorm is very close. Calling me. Summoning me.
I use it as my compass. Every time I have a choice of direction, I head for the mysterious pulse beat that seems to rhythmically chant my name: “Come, Jack. Come, Jack.”
Maybe I am fated to find it. But then what? Will I know how to use it? How can one man stop the destruction of the oceans?
If someone had found King Arthur’s sword, could he have staved off the Dark Ages with it? Would finding the Holy Grail have ushered in an age of light? Or are quests really just wild-goose chases, embodying man’s desperate hope that if he strives for something impossible with all his might, divine assistance will be forthcoming?
“Come, Jack. Come, Jack.”
Exhausted. Numb. But I haven’t come this far to lie down and give up in some lousy tunnel.
Suddenly the water’s moving. Swirling. Whirlpool!
Trapped before I even know what it is. Scylla and Charybdis. I’m being flushed down a bottomless toilet. Slamming off walls. One crashing blow after another.
I use my arms and legs to push away from sharp rocks and try to protect my face as I swirl down and around, deeper and deeper.
Grab a ledge. Yank myself out of swirling current and plunge into a side channel. How deep am I now? Who knew the earth had this volcanic plumbing system?
Firestorm more insistent. Come, Jack. Hurry.
So I come. Swimming. But no longer sharply downward. The tunnel stops descending! Maybe I’ve reached the mezzanine of hell.
No life at all here. No crabs. No spiders. No cave-dwelling eyeless fish.
Tunnel starts to slant upward.
Water subsides. Hip-deep. Knee-deep.
Soon I’m crawling rather than swimming. Knees bloody. Exhausted. Legs cramping.
Minutes twisting into hours. Hours knotting into what feels like days. How far can this tunnel system possibly reach? Am I heading back toward Dargon’s island, or out under the Atlantic?
Tunnel ends. Nowhere to go. That’s it.
I look up. Vertical shaft gaping above me. No ropes or ladders to scale it with.
I brace my back against one wall. Hands and knees on other wall of shaft. Squirm and claw and snake my way up.
Don’t look down, Jack. One slip and I’ll plummet. Crack bones. Die slowly in dark chimney. No one to hear my cries.
Arms aching from the climb. Feels like crawling upward through my own coffin.
Am I already dead?
My thoughts bouncing off the stones. A white spot on the shaft’s rocky wall. I fix on it.
It’s growing, morphing …
The face of death that has haunted me throughout my journey, in visions and nightmares. An older version of Dargon. Looking back at me impassively.
No, it’s the pained face of my imprisoned father, with his flowing white hair—a face that has reached out to me across the centuries, as he’s tried to warn me.
Strange that I never noticed how close the two faces are. What did Dargon say? Two old foes, locked together.
I blink. It’s a white speck on a dark rock wall again. That’s all. I look up. See the lip of the shaft. Reach for it. Pull myself up and over and out of my own coffin. Lie there, gasping. Agony. Muscles cramping.
Somehow I get back to my feet.
Larger chamber. I can walk upright.
Drip, drip of water.
Things growing on the rocks. Plants? No, minerals.
Stalactites like daggers pointed down at me. Stalagmites like lost souls reaching out to me from the river Styx.
Firestorm pulsing: Come, Jack. Come, Jack. The walls of the cavern seem to shake with every throb.
My watch dimming. Wait! Don’t go out yet!
A little light. Less. Complete and utter darkness.
No, not complete. Far in front of me I see a silvery radiance. Flickering. Twinkling. An underground star.
I head for it. Silver light grows stronger.
I know what it is. What it must be.
Firestorm!
Right here. So close it’s now lighting my path.
I fumble along and reach the rock outcropping that separates the cave chamber I’m in from the next one. Like a dark doorway. Separating me from my fate.
I stand very still. Hesitate a long beat.
Take a deep breath.
And then I step inside.
71
Throne room. That’s what I think of first. The ornate gallery in the palace where the King presides in all his royal glory.
Don’t get me wrong, no King here. No sycophantic courtiers. No haughty Queen. No one at all, in fact. Just a bleeding, befuddled jester, Jack Danielson, limping in.
But it is gloriously ornate. A crystal coronation room. Folds of thin, translucent calcite billow like drapery from the walls in orange-brown beaded patterns. White gypsum snowdrifts layer the floor. Crystals of every color glitter from the walls in the pulsing, silvery light that emanates from … a throne!
I step farther into the room. No, not a throne. A shimmering platform. Some sort of glowing dais. Could it be one enormous diamond? No, that’s impossible.
“Come, Jack. Come, Jack.” It’s reaching out to me. With each step I feel like I’m going to meet an old friend.
My body tingles. Every cell being zapped with a tiny electric charge. I’m terrified and at the same time exhilarated. I keep advancing. Moses tiptoeing near the burning bush. This is w
hat my parents sent me back a thousand years for. This is what my whole childhood was about. This single moment in time.
I see it. Encased in the shimmering crystal dais but clearly visible. Heart-shaped. Silvery-white. With every pulse beat its form appears to shift slightly. Cardioid. Spherical. Crescentic. Con-chate.
But that’s not the strangest thing.
It seems to have a consciousness. I swear I can feel it. It’s alive, albeit in a way I can’t understand.
Powerful emotions bubble beneath its surface. It’s angry. No, not angry. Wounded. It’s been grievously hurt.
I’m standing right above Firestorm. Reach out one finger. Tremulously touch the hard rock of the dais.
As I reach down for Firestorm, I feel it reach up to me through the impenetrable, shimmering crystal that encases it. Suddenly I’m bathed from head to foot in silvery light. It cascades around me. Inside me. A bright memory …
A summer’s day when P.J. and I went on a picnic. One of our first drive-away-from-home dates.
We drove along the bank of the Hudson and parked on a grassy knoll by the water’s edge. Spread out a blanket, sat down side by side, and kissed passionately.
Touching Firestorm, I’m transported back there. My God, I am right there on the blanket!
The feel of P.J.’s lips. Honeyed sweetness of her breath. Wide river flowing by.
We ate lunch and kissed some more, and then P.J. fell asleep in my arms.
Half dozing myself. Lying with my head turned sideways. Watching her shut eyes. Each separate breath making her chest rise and fall. Hot summer sun baking bristling stubble tips of grass.
That’s when it hit me, for the very first time. I realized that I loved P.J. But not just that. Love itself! It existed. Not just in poems and movies. It was a real thing, a powerful thing, and it was possible for me to feel it! The most spiritual moment of my life. Closest I’ve come to making sense of life or believing in God or accepting death. And also the least complicated moment of my life, a waking dream, wrapped up in the simple sunlit gauze of a July afternoon, the hungry chirping of the crickets, the musty smell of river clay, the tuneless fiddling of breeze-stirred reeds.
P.J. woke and saw tears on my cheeks. “What’s wrong?”
“Nothing,” I told her. But I couldn’t stop the tears. “Must be allergies,” I mumbled.
Somehow, she understood. Held me close. Tenderly. We watched the afternoon come on.
And that was it. An epiphany. A break point. I never saw the world quite the same way again. Can’t explain it. But that was the day and the hour.
And there are tears streaming down my face as I stand in the crystal throne room touching the shimmering dais.
I still don’t know what Firestorm is, but I now know what it’s not. It doesn’t come from outer space. Nor was it created by a wizard.
It’s of us. Of the earth. It has the depth of life. The joy of our own love. The pain of our guilt. It has power. Fantastic power. Maybe even the power to save the seas and change the future. And it’s been waiting for me.
But what do I do now? How do I use it? Or even get to it? If I had a diamond drill, it would probably take hours to dig it out.
I close my eyes. Empty my mind. Focus on my own breathing. Racing faster and faster.
No. Not breathing.
Footsteps!
I turn.
Dargon. In an elegant black robe. Parrot perched on shoulder.
In his right hand is a very large and unusual gun.
72
“Thank you for finding Firestorm for me,” Dargon says.
He’s bone-dry and his robe is neat and clean. He didn’t swim through the tunnels or clamber up a steep shaft. “How could you possibly have followed me here?” I gasp.
His gray eyes seem to pulse with the silver light from Firestorm. “Questions, Jack, always so many questions from you. Why do you think I cut off your finger joint?”
“You were punishing me for damaging your boat.”
“No. I was creating an opportunity. Femi bandaged you up and placed a little tracking bug in your plaster cast. I knew you were fated to find Firestorm, so I took you as close as I could to it in the boat and let you lead me the rest of the way. I followed your signal, down through the island’s cave tunnels, which I have explored for two years. And here we are. You found it. It’s time to complete my mission.”
He aims the enormous gun and hits a switch. The weapon starts to power up. It reminds me of the gun my father fired when he made his valiant last stand. I’m pretty sure it doesn’t fire bullets. Some kind of laser or beam of energy. But my father’s gun was relatively small. This looks like the laser equivalent of a howitzer.
“Destroy it,” the parrot trills. “Destroy Firestorm. Kill Jack. Shoot now. Blast away.”
“Patience, Apollo. We’ve come a long way for this. A few more seconds to power up and we’ll be ready.”
I’m seized by an urge to protect Firestorm. I step between him and the dais. “Why are you going to destroy it?” I ask. “I thought you wanted to use it yourself. To be a modern-day Hannibal.”
“You didn’t buy that story before, so why would you buy it now?” Dargon asks. “No, my place is in the future, Jack. That’s one difference between us. I know who I am.”
Gun powered up. His finger tightens on trigger. The laser will slice right through me. I dive behind the dais.
There’s a flash of tremendous light and heat. But the shimmering dais protects me. Maybe it is one enormous diamond after all! The hardest substance known. Whatever it is, it repels and reflects the beam from Dargon’s super-gun.
He’s momentarily blinded by the flash that bounces back at him. Rubs his eyes, furious at being thwarted. “Get it for me, Jack,” he hisses. “You found it. Only you can free it. Get it and I’ll spare your life. You have my word. Otherwise you’ll die an agonizing death.”
A figure materializes behind him. Stepping soundlessly in and out of shadows. A woman.
Dargon doesn’t see her because he’s circling the dais, blinking his eyes, trying to corner me.
But I see her. She holds her finger to her lips, signaling for me to be silent.
Her blond hair seems aflame in the silvery light.
She’s wearing a thong sarong.
Kylie.
Dargon circles back unexpectedly and traps me. He smiles and takes careful aim. “This is your last chance …”
Kylie leaps. Sails through the air. Kicks the gun out of his hand. It clatters to the cave floor.
Parrot knocked off perch. Cursing and flapping wings.
Dargon doesn’t even look to see who’s behind him. He dives after gun. But she gets to it first and kicks it away.
Enormous laser gun spins and clatters across the bumpy cave floor and disappears down a deep crevice.
Only then does Dargon look to see who attacked him.
It registers that he’s been ambushed by his own beach bimbo. I never saw Dargon surprised before, but for a second he’s incredulous. Shocked. Aghast. Then furious. “What the hell are you doing here, you fool?” he demands.
“One of us is surely a fool,” Kylie tells him in a surprisingly strong voice that sounds oddly familiar.
73
Dargon steps toward Kylie. “You don’t know what you’ve done, twit, but I’ll tear your brainless head off your shoulders. And then I’ll rip your new boyfriend apart with my bare hands.” With his fighting skills, those aren’t idle threats.
“Kill her,” the parrot trills. “Break her bones.”
But then Dargon stops walking. Parrot stops whistling.
Because she’s changing.
Blond hair darkening. Features of face realigning. Eko! Holding a samurai sword. Its tip pointed threateningly at Dargon’s throat. Her voice unmistakable. “Jack, this is your moment. You are our beacon of hope!”
Dargon apparently knows her. And he’s not that thrilled at her little masquerade. “So you tricked me, High Whore of
Dann!”
“Found you, tricked you, and now I’ll kill you if you take another step.”
“I think not,” he says. “Apollo.”
Treacherous bird has circled behind her and silently climbed cave wall. Does a little hop, skip, and comes down with a jump on her face, bright feathers flapping.
Dargon uses her momentary blindness to kick the sword away.
He bends to pick it up, and is knocked off his feet by a growling gray-brown blur.
Gisco! Powering forward like a canine locomotive.
For a minute the cave chamber echoes with blows and cries. Dog trying to devour parrot. Parrot pecking at canine eyes and snout. Eko spinning like a dervish, kicking at Dargon with either foot. Dargon punching back at her so hard his fist goes right through a stalactite.
And then they all stop. Everything stops. It must stop. Because there’s a CLAP OF THUNDER.
Firestorm! It’s had enough. I can feel it, reaching out to me through the dais. The clap of thunder echoes. Crystals peel off walls. Dust rises from the floor.
Firestorm is no longer a warm, silvery presence. Now the silver light is tinged with red. Angry. Vengeful. It wants to act. But it needs my help.
“Seize the moment, Jack,” Eko urges. “This is what your father sent you back a thousand years for!”
“NO!” Dargon’s voice is loud and desperate. “Don’t do it. She’s using you. Manipulating you for an evil end. The Dannites are a suicide cult, Jack. They don’t want you to save the future. THEY WANT YOU TO WIPE IT OUT. They’ve lost, so they’re willing to destroy everything!”
“Don’t listen to his lies,” Eko urges. “Every second is crucial. Do what you were born to do!”
But I am listening to Dargon. Can’t help it. He’s making sense. “You have lost in the future,” I say to Eko. “Gisco told me that.”
She doesn’t look happy to hear this. Searches for the right words to argue.
Dargon beats her to it. “Yes, they’ve lost! So they sent you back in time on a suicide mission. If you use Firestorm to save the oceans, you’ll drastically change the future. A thousand years from now, everything will be different. Not just coral reefs, but also the people. Your father and mother will never have been born. If you do what they want and change the present, your parents will cease to exist in the future. And then you, their son, must also cease to exist. A few minutes after you do it, everyone in this room will blink out. You will be committing suicide, killing both your parents and the whole world from which you come!”
