Shark Adventure

by Anthony McGowan

  By then they had reached the hut. It didn’t look in great condition from the outside. The roof was little more than gaping holes joined together by a few tattered palm leaves.

  Like the other village huts, the roof was supported by stout poles, and the actual walls were formed from flimsy blinds that could be pulled up or down. They served more the function of allowing the residents a little privacy, rather than protecting them from the weather – in fact, during a tropical storm the walls would be pulled up to allow the wind to pass through the dwelling rather than blowing it away.

  However, the blinds of their hut were in a terrible state – some half up, hanging at crazy angles; others lay broken on the floor.

  ‘Looks like a hurricane hit this place,’ said Frazer.

  ‘You realize, don’t you,’ said Bluey, ‘that it probably did? As I keep telling you, it’s not the storm season right now, but we’re right in the zone for tropical cyclones, or typhoons as they call them in this part of the world.’

  The inside was even worse. The floor was dusty and dirty, and strewn with dead palm leaves and other rubbish from the village. The trash had encouraged millipedes and cockroaches and other squirming creatures, which swarmed over the floor. They looked around at the chaos, each lost in their own thoughts.

  ‘Bit of a mess,’ said Amazon, ‘but we’ll get it sorted in no time.’

  ‘I’ve a tarp in my pack we can use to cover up one of those holes,’ said Bluey. ‘We can kind of camp under it. It’ll be fun.’

  ‘Unless that typhoon strikes,’ said Frazer. ‘Then it’ll be … epic. By the way, is there anything to eat around here? I’m hungry enough to eat one of those giant millipedes.’

  Bluey slapped his head. ‘Mr Hunt expected that we’d be looked after by the villagers. I was counting on that, so all we have are pretty basic supplies.’

  ‘Oh no, not the spaceman food!’ groaned Frazer. ‘I hate that stuff.’

  Amazon looked confused. ‘Spaceman …?’

  ‘Yeah, you know, dried soya, tubes of yeast extract. And all the trail mix you can eat. Which is fine for a couple of days, but then you never want to see another raisin for the rest of your life.’

  Amazon looked out through a gap in the wall. ‘There are coconuts …’

  ‘Good attitude, Zonnie,’ said Bluey. ‘I say we explore and see what we can find. The information I’ve had is that there are two beaches used by the turtles – the one we’re on here, with the village at one end and us at the other. The second is just round that headland. Let’s scope it out and see if we can’t forage up some grub while we’re at it. We can unpack properly and set up our camp in here when we’re done.’

  ‘Cool, but there’s something I’m bringing with me,’ said Frazer, reaching into his pack. ‘Matahi gave it to me on the ship. He said it might come in useful. I guess he meant for opening coconuts.’

  What Frazer finally pulled out was Matahi’s old machete. It managed to look lethal even when it was still in its sheath. When he drew it out, its edge glistened like starlight. But that didn’t stop Amazon from giggling.

  ‘What are you laughing at?’ said Frazer, who’d expected something a bit more reverential. ‘This thing is at the absolute cutting edge of, er, cutting-edge technology.’

  ‘It’s that sound you made,’ said Amazon, still spluttering.

  ‘What sound?’

  ‘That sort of shwiiiiiinnnng noise that you always get on the telly when anyone draws a sword out of a scabbard.’

  ‘I didn’t make any noise!’ protested Frazer. ‘I just took it out …’

  ‘I’m afraid you did, Fraze. She’s got you this time,’ laughed Bluey.

  ‘You’re trying to ruin it for me. I’ve always wanted my own sword. I mean machete …’

  ‘It’s because you think you’re in a film, don’t you? Like you’re a cross between King Arthur and Indiana Jones.’

  ‘Oh, get lost, Amazon.’

  Bluey took the long knife from Frazer. He admired the way the old blade had been ground to an edge sharp enough to shave with. He shook his head, smiled and handed the machete back to Frazer.

  ‘I can keep it?’ said Frazer, his face full of hope.

  ‘Just you be careful with that thing, OK? I don’t want you accidentally cutting off your own leg.’

  Frazer, smiling, put the machete back in its sheath – only at the last second resisting the temptation to go shwiiiiiinnnng.

  They left the hut and walked barefoot along the beach, in the opposite direction to the village, with the gently lapping lagoon on one side and the graceful palm trees on the other. They rounded the headland – little more than a spur of sand with a thin line of palms – and saw before them a long stretch of perfect white sand. It really was like a vision of what an ideal desert island should be like. Apart, that is, from the weather – the sky was still grey and overcast and gloomy, and the air felt heavy and ominous.

  ‘This beach has thousands of precious eggs, just about ready to hatch out,’ said Bluey. ‘This is why we’re here, guys.’

  The beach looked flat and peaceful to Amazon – there was no indication that a miracle was about to take place underground.

  ‘I thought we’d be able to see where they’d dug their nests,’ said Frazer. ‘I mean I thought there’d be a bump or something, to show where they’d laid.’

  ‘The mother turtle doesn’t do any caring once the babies are hatched out,’ explained Bluey, ‘but she puts a lot of effort into making sure that no predators can tell where the egg chamber is. She levels the ground off with the underside of her shell, and even flicks dry sand back over the top to camouflage it. You don’t get to survive for millions of years without having a trick or two up your sleeve.’

  ‘And I don’t suppose it’s plain sailing even when they hatch out,’ said Amazon.

  ‘That’s right, Zonnie. Frigate birds and crabs on the beach snaffle plenty of them. That’s the most dangerous part of the whole process. But even when they reach the water there are plenty of things that would gladly snack on them. Reef sharks gobble them up like popcorn. Conger eels, barracuda … tough-going for the little guys. But, like I said, it’s getting over the beach that’s the real challenge.’

  ‘And that’s why we’re here,’ said Frazer, swinging his machete around like a pirate cutlass for no good reason, ‘to give them a fighting chance.’

  Once they’d checked out the beach, they began to walk back towards their hut, this time going through the trees.

  ‘What other sorts of creatures live on these islands?’ asked Amazon, staring into the dense green of the palm forest.

  ‘Birds mainly,’ replied Bluey. ‘Polynesian rats. Coconut crabs. Bugs. Not a lot else.’

  Amazon was surprised. It seemed so remote and unspoiled here that she’d assumed there must be lots of wildlife.

  ‘How come? It seems like … paradise.’

  ‘You have to remember that these islands are among the most remote in the world. Unless you can fly, it’s just really, really hard to reach here. Land animals have to be brought by people – which is how the rats and pigs arrived – or they have to drift here on mats of vegetation, which doesn’t happen very often. And then, of course, one animal reached here and wiped out a lot of the others.’

  ‘Let me guess,’ said Amazon. ‘Humans.’

  ‘You got it. As soon as people came along, there was a mass extinction right across Polynesia. Just about everything that couldn’t run or fly or swim away got eaten up, pretty quickly. Almost every island had unique species of parrot and pigeons, but most of them were hunted into oblivion.’

  ‘So sad,�
� said Amazon, thinking of the bright colours and strident calls that no one would ever see or hear again.

  ‘And it’s us who have to nurture what remains. That’s why we’re Trackers, and that’s why we’re here.’

  While Amazon and Bluey had been talking, Frazer had been using his machete to cut a path through the woods, even though it wasn’t strictly necessary, as there was plenty of room beneath the trees. But it made Frazer happy to swipe away at the thin air and occasionally cut a twig in half. Now he announced that they’d made it through.

  ‘Home ahead!’ he cried and they all came out of the trees very close to their hut.

  They saw that things had changed before they even entered. The blinds had all been fixed, and there were fresh palm leaves covering up the holes in the roof. Inside there was an even greater surprise. The floor had been swept clean, and rush mats were laid out for them. And there, in the middle of the floor, were two wooden bowls, one laden with fruit and the other with cooked fish, wrapped in banana leaves.

  ‘Look at that!’ exclaimed Frazer, his eyes as wide as the fruit bowl. ‘And I thought it was going to be trail mix till we all turned into giant rabbits.’

  ‘The villagers must have done this,’ said Amazon. ‘That’s incredibly kind. We have to thank them …’

  ‘I’m not sure we can,’ said Bluey. ‘Remember what the chief said about us not having any contact? They must have done all this behind his back.’

  ‘Or under his belly …’

  ‘Careful, guys, we’ve got to respect the culture wherever we end up – that’s part of the TRACKS philosophy.’

  ‘Bluey,’ said Frazer, eyeing up the village gifts, ‘there’s a time for philosophy, and there’s a time for food.’

  ‘For once,’ said Amazon, ‘I do believe my cousin is right.’

  And so the three of them ate the delicious fruit and the fish. When they had finished, they got to work laying out their sleeping bags on the mats, hanging mosquito nets from the rafters and setting up their battery-powered lamps.

  ‘Looks pretty good,’ said Bluey, surveying their labours. ‘I reckon we can be comfortable here. Maybe it’ll be that holiday we promised you after all.’

  ‘Can I call Uncle Hal on the sat phone, Bluey?’ asked Amazon. Cute though the hut now looked, her mind was still on her parents in Canada. She longed to hear the news that they had turned up, unharmed.

  ‘Sure,’ said Bluey. ‘I should have thought of it earlier. And you can update Mr Hunt on how we’re getting on.’

  ‘I’ll get you through,’ said Frazer, taking the handset out of Bluey’s bag. ‘These things can be a bit temperamental.’

  He extended the aerial and hit some numbers.

  All he got was a wall of static.

  ‘Of course, I forgot,’ he said. ‘It needs a clear view of the sky to work.’

  He led the way outside, and they found that the short and dramatic tropical dusk was beginning; it brought something truly incredible. The sun, which had spent all day forlornly trying to break through the clouds, now finally dipped below them. As if determined to make up for a wasted day, it spilled red fire on both the underside of the clouds and on the still water of the lagoon.

  ‘OK,’ said Amazon, ‘now that’s what I call a sunset. It’s like looking at the world through a ruby.’

  Frazer was more concerned with the sat phone. It still crackled like burning twigs.

  ‘I guess it’s this lousy weather,’ he said, looking rather puzzled. ‘That or the chief is so big he’s blocking the signal.’

  ‘Is it the battery?’ asked Bluey.

  ‘Nope, battery’s good. I charged it up on the boat.’

  Bluey saw the sadness in Amazon’s face. ‘Sorry, Zonnie. We’ll try it again in the morning. But right now I’m pretty pooped. We’ve got a big day tomorrow, starting at dawn, so I suggest we all get some shut-eye.’

  Frazer had also seen how upset Amazon was, but he really didn’t know what to say to make her feel better. The truth was that, until her parents were found, the best they could hope for was to fill her mind with distractions.

  The next morning Amazon stepped out of the hut and into a vision of intense, almost dreamlike beauty. The dark clouds and squally rain of the day before had fled, leaving a pure blue sky so perfect it made her eyes ache and her heart sing.

  The lagoon – the circle of water separating the island from the coral reef – was like glass. It reflected back the blue and added a shimmer of green, along with some darker shades where the coral reef came close to the surface.

  She had woken up in the night to hear the wind lashing the coconut palms behind the beach, but now there was only the tiniest whispering sound as the air moved lazily through the long green fronds. Further down the beach, a group of children from the village were splashing on the edge of the water, while their mothers mended the fishing nets and laughed over the latest village gossip.

  Soon the white coral sand would be too hot for bare feet, but right now it oozed deliciously between Amazon’s toes.

  Yes, this was exactly what Amazon had hoped life on a South Sea island would be like. And yet the very perfection of the place made her feel the pain of her parents’ disappearance all the more acutely. She switched on the sat phone, but got nothing but the grating static, which almost seemed to laugh at her. It was what she expected. Bluey had already tried the thing at the crack of dawn.

  She told herself that her parents had been found safe and sound, and she imagined the joy of that first conversation they would have. But, like the unexpected blue sky, it just added salt to her wound.

  Frazer emerged sleepily from the hut. He saw the glint in Amazon’s eye and knew what was causing it. Then he had a brainwave. Bluey had already set off to watch over the other beach, leaving the younger Trackers to keep watch on things on this side of the island. They were supposed to be alert to the first sign that the baby turtles were hatching, but …

  ‘You know, Zonnie, I reckon we can watch the sand perfectly well from the water.’

  Amazon caught his half-smile and returned it. She knew that this was Frazer’s way of trying to cheer her up, and she liked him even more for making the effort. So she made one back.

  ‘Race you,’ she said, and sprinted away over the beach towards the glassy water of the lagoon.

  ‘Cheat!’ yelled Frazer. He was right on her tail, but Amazon’s head start meant that she hit the sea a second or two before him. The beach shelved gently, and Amazon’s heels kicked up the spray into his face for ten strides before the water was deep enough for her to hurl herself into a flat dive.

  The lagoon retained a little of its night-time coolness, but it was still the warmest ocean Amazon had ever plunged in. She came up and Frazer hit her in the face with a great sweeping armful of water.

  ‘And to think,’ he said as she counter-attacked furiously, ‘that you didn’t want to come here!’

  The two young people fooled around for ten minutes, gradually working their way out into the middle of the lagoon, with the water now lapping round their waists. Amazon could see dozens of tiny fish, as slender as her fingers, darting under the water, but she knew that the real show was happening out on the reef itself, where the coral provided cover.

  ‘OK,’ she said, ‘I admit it, this isn’t so bad.’

  And then things got even more exciting.

  ‘Look!’ yelled Frazer, pointing across the lagoon. ‘It’s a –’

  ‘Dolphin!’

  A sleek, grey-green shape rose once, twice and then disappeared again.

  Amazon had been obsessed with dolphins for as long as she could remember. In h
er dreams sometimes she would become a dolphin, carving her way through the sea, leaping into the air, effortlessly free and happy.

  ‘But what’s it doing here?’ she asked. ‘I thought the lagoon was too shallow at low tide for anything that large?’

  ‘It must have become trapped. It should be OK until the tide rises again, and it can get out over the reef, or through the gap we came through last night. In fact, I don’t understand why it hasn’t already found the gap. Perhaps it’s fishing.’

  Then the dolphin breached again, this time leaping clear of the water. And now Amazon could see that it was not alone. A miniature copy followed its every move, like a shadow on the sunlit water.

  ‘It’s a baby!’ she sighed. ‘And it looks like a few more dolphins are in the lagoon as well,’ she said, spying some more dark shapes just below the water, and the odd fin breaking the surface. ‘Do you know what kind they are?’

  ‘Hmmm …’ said Frazer, squinting in the sunlight. ‘Well, there are several different species that live in this part of the Pacific. There are spinners and spotted and brown dolphins, and it can be hard to tell one from the other in the water. But she looks like a bottlenose – they’re bigger than the others, and they’re the most intelligent creatures in the sea.’

  Then they were distracted by the sound of voices calling from the shore.

  ‘We should ignore them,’ said Frazer. ‘I don’t want to give that Huru guy an excuse to throw us off the island. Especially not now the weather has changed …’

  ‘What are they saying?’ asked Amazon.

  ‘I have no idea,’ replied Frazer. ‘My Polynesian is a little rusty. But it looks like we’ll be finding out soon.’ Two of the older children were pushing a small canoe over the sand. One, they saw, was Oti.