Hotel Megalodon: A Deep Sea Thriller

by Rick Chesler

  Then she was broken out of her thoughts by her radio bleating frantically with the sound of the Egyptian diver’s voice as the pod reached the edge of the canyon, the entrance to the true deep. “...Coco....happening...moving too much...open....”

  She gripped the talk button on her handset. “Hatem, listen to me: the shark is pushing the pod off the reef and down the canyon. Get out! Get out and scuba if you can now before you get too deep!” She released the talk button, and heard only a tapestry of commotion—clicking noises, static, a grunt? a scream?—before the transmission ceased. The megalodon was moving the pod faster now, too; making tighter turns to circle back and ram it, sending it longer distances across the reef.

  Then the pod wedged into the narrow entrance to the canyon and stuck there, its long axis contacting the reef on either side. Coco didn’t know if the Egyptian could hear her any longer, but she shouted into her radio anyway: “Go now if you can, Hatem. It’s coming around again!”

  The megalodon looped back, very hard to see from this distance, but its large size made it possible. Then it thrust its enormous bulk into the pod once more...

  ...and the structure tumbled down the incline into the submarine canyon.

  Chapter 31

  “They’re gone!” Coco, leaned her forehead into the lobby window as a tear rolled down her cheek. Neither James White nor her engineer offered anything to contradict her. They were gone. Swept off the reef into the abyss by the mega-predator. In full view of the clientele, no less, some of whom approached White now.

  “Excuse us, Mr. White?” The Japanese couple who White had seen eating in the restaurant earlier approached cautiously, aware they had all just witnessed a traumatic event. White turned and looked at them without saying anything. Several of the other guests were huddled near the lobby entrance, watching the interaction.

  The man spoke after it was clear White was not going to. “A group of us were talking over there, and we decided we don’t want to try to evacuate in one of the escape pods.”

  White nodded curtly. “Understandable, naturally. Let us focus on the situation here for the time being, Mr. Takamoto, and I can assure you that you, your wife, and everyone else here will be well taken care of.” At this Takamoto frowned slightly but said nothing, and retreated with his wife back to his group, who appeared eager to hear what had transpired.

  White addressed Coco. “You know the edge of the reef better than anyone else here. What’s it like? How steep is it where they went over?”

  Coco stared out onto the darkening reef as she reflected on this, mentally recalling images from her sub dive yesterday to practice her tour of the drop-off area. She laughed sarcastically to herself at how naive she had been yesterday, how she thought she would be cracking jokes to the guests in the sub during her suave presentation at the edge of the reef. And now look at what had happened. She forced herself to stay focused.

  “It’s a steep incline, kind of a sandy path sandwiched between two coral walls that slopes down for maybe...fifty feet or so, and then...” She trailed off as she considered the fate of those in the escape pod should that pod tumble past the edge of the sandy trail into the abyss.

  “The drop-off?” White prompted.

  She nodded wordlessly. If the pod went over that, there was nothing anyone on Earth would be able to do for them in time.

  “The crush depth for the pods is only about 1,000 feet,” the engineer said dryly. “More than enough considering they were intended to be deployed in forty feet of water.”

  “But if they roll off that shelf at the end of the slope, they’ll go to...I don’t know what—10,000 feet?” White said, looking at Coco.

  “Twelve,” she returned.

  “Jesus.”

  “The pod is pretty big,” Coco went on. “I’m hoping it got wedged between the coral shelves on the sandy slope. It hasn’t popped up to the surface yet or Mick would have said something.”

  Her eyes brightened at the mention of his name. “That gives me an idea.” She raised her radio and spoke into it.

  “Mick, Coco here—you copy?”

  They heard the roar of a boat motor accompany his reply. “I copy you, Coco. No sign of anything up here now—no pod, no shark, no people, over!”

  “I saw the shark bump the pod off the reef, down the slope!”

  They heard the sound of the motor diminish as Mick slowed his craft, probably in order to better hear the radio. “Say what?”

  Coco repeated herself. Mick replied, “Jesus! I won’t be able to see down there now, though, it’s too dark.”

  “Can you take the sub down, and have a look-see?”

  White and the engineer exchanged glances, but neither said a word. Coco broke the ensuing silence where no doubt all of them considered how dangerous that might be for Mick. The megalodon could swallow the mini-sub whole. Yet half a dozen lives were at stake, and only a quick look down the slope would be required to at least find out if the pod was still there. Coco said as much and Mick replied.

  “Sure, I’ll drop down in the sub and have a look. But listen, just looking at them isn’t going to help them you know? And even if it’s there sitting on the slope, it might be too wedged in to use lift bags on it.”

  “So what’s’ your point?” Coco grew more exasperated by the minute. People were dying out there, and everyone seemed impotent to help.

  “You said they have scuba gear in there with them, right?”

  “That’s right, all of them. If they could only use it.”

  “I might have a way. Earlier today in the sub shack...” Mick paused for a moment, and Coco wondered if he realized how awkward referencing the sub shack was given what Coco had found him doing there earlier. He continued after a beat. “Earlier I worked on fitting an acetylene torch to the sub’s grab arm, because after our dive on the intake pipe it hit me how much that would have come in handy.”

  “Yeah?” Coco felt a faint swelling of hope stir within her.

  “Yeah, and I got it working. Haven’t tested it yet, but I guess there’s no time for that. But what I was saying is, I can take the sub down, and if it’s there and there’s some reason they’re stuck inside still, like the hatch won’t open or it’s pressed up against something, then I can cut a new hatch through the wall of the pod for them.”

  White looked to the engineer who shrugged, and then nodded. “It could work,” he said, but didn’t sound all that convinced.

  Coco was quick to reply. “Okay, Mick, sounds great. Why don’t you head back to the sub dock and try it?”

  They heard the sound of an outboard motor decelerating. “Been heading back during our whole chat. I’m at the pier now. I’ll radio back when I’m in the sub, out.”

  Chapter 32

  The radio call that came in from Mick was a crushing blow to everyone within earshot of Coco’s radio.

  “Triton-1 to Coco, Triton-1 to Coco, I am over the slope and report that there is no pod here. I repeat—the pod is not here, over.”

  Coco choked back a sob. “It’s been swept over?”

  Mick’s voice came back trying to sound strong, but with a detectable waver to it nonetheless. “I see a lot of broken off chunks of coral like there was a struggle here, and the water is still a little cloudy from where the sand was stirred up, but there’s definitely no pod anywhere on the slope, Coco. I snapped a few pics, too.”

  Coco switched channels to the one Hatem used from the pod, and tried hailing him. Nothing came back. She switched back over to Mick’s channel.

  “I did a sweep of the reef edge, too, just in case they ended up not down the slope, but along the reef somewhere else, but it’s not there, Coco. That pod is too big not to see. I’m sorry, but it looks like it went over the wall into the deep.”

  A weighty silence followed during which Coco tried not to visualize the final moments of those people as the pod passed its crush depth, and water pulverized them in complete darkness. Even with scuba gear on, the sudden pressure an
d incoming force of the water would kill them. She placated herself with the knowledge that it must have been a swift death, preferable to being torn apart like a random prey item in the jaws of the prehistoric monster.

  “Thanks for trying, Mick. Bring it back in, might as well—“

  The suddenness with which the megalodon appeared in front of the lobby window was something that unnerved Coco more than anything she could remember. One second there was only the reef and empty water illuminated by the hotel’s exterior underwater lights, and the next an enormous set of jaws occupied most of the acrylic wall.

  Then came the impact.

  Immediately the plastic glass cracked and water came running in from where the window met the ceiling, which was also an acrylic panel. The guests near the entrance withdrew into the main hallway. White lifted his own radio, and shouted into it to a technician in another part of the hotel.

  “Turn off the exterior lights. They’re attracting the shark!”

  Coco had her doubts as to whether that was true, but now was not the time to argue about it, for the ginormous fish was already arcing around.

  “It’s coming back again,” Caesar said. “Back up.”

  The monster shark rammed into the window again, its cavernous maw seeming to swallow the entire room as it approached. Then it hit, and Coco swore that she saw one of its teeth actually poke through the inches-thick acrylic before the material gave way and a torrent of ocean cascaded into the lobby. Coco felt the spray of water on her face as she, White, and the engineer turned and ran to follow the guests out of the lobby.

  “Hurry, before the pressure door closes!” the engineer warned. The lead doors were designed to drop with the introduction of significant moisture, and the raging flood now entering through the shattered window was definitely going to trigger it.

  Coco heard the sound of broken window pieces hitting the floor as the transparent wall fell apart. The three of them ran out into the hall, White radioing that they were clear. Then something disturbing happened, or didn’t happen. The water followed them into the hallway, swiftly rising to around their ankles.

  White barked into his radio. “Pressure door’s not activating. Water’s breaching the main thoroughfare off the lobby.”

  “That’s not all that’s breaching,” Coco announced, pointing at the giant head of the megalodon. It now stuck into the lobby, mostly submerged in water, thrashing side to side in violent, exploratory motions.

  White’s radio blared a response from the technician. “Pressure door is not releasing. Looks like we may have a short in the circuit related to an overload from working on the train tunnel. I’m sorry.”

  Coco glanced at White’s face, his carotids bulging in his neck, face beet red as he replied into the radio. “Don’t be sorry, just fix it, damn you! We’ve got the whole lagoon pouring in here through the lobby. We need that pressure door to work. Do something!”

  Coco wasn’t about to wait around and hope the tech could get it resolved. “We better move!” But then, ironically, she froze, looking both ways down the spacious hallway. Which way to go? The guests had gone right, toward the now defunct train station, but she also had the option of going left, back toward the pods and eventually the dive shop, which was already sealed off. White was still arguing with his tech on the radio while the engineer waited for him, but glanced longingly toward the right. Coco had an idea, and addressed him.

  “Where’s the next closest pressure door besides this one?” she asked, looking back at the lobby to see if it might have activated. No such luck, and the water level was filling at an alarming rate, she noticed. The water was up to her knees here in the hallway. Her nerve endings tingled as she imagined the megalodon somehow squeezing its way all the way to her here in the hallway. It couldn’t, could it?

  “It’s this way.” Caesar pointed to the direction in which he was already looking. He tapped White on the shoulder. “Tell him to prepare to activate Door 4.”

  White changed the radio conversation with the tech accordingly, and waited for a few seconds while he said to hold on. When he came back, it was not with good news.

  “Real sorry, James, but that door has already been sealed. Not sure why. Looks like the short in the system caused some to remain open, but others to shut. Board’s lit up all crazy in here. It’ll take some time for me to wrap my head around this. I better get working on it. You should go, hold on...left, from your location, to Door 6, over.”

  Coco wondered if the guests from the lobby had made it past Door 4 before the pressure door had experienced the wonky activation. She figured they’d have turned back by now if they’d met a wall, and would at least be able to hear them.

  “You’re positive?” White shot back.

  “Don’t go right, James.”

  He looked at Coco and Caesar, and the three of them took off at a run toward Door 6.

  Chapter 33

  Not long after they started for Door 6, Coco heard a ruckus somewhere behind them. The trammel of footsteps, shouting, people calling out. Coco stopped running, and held out a hand.

  “Wait, you hear that?”

  White and Caesar slowed, but did not stop walking toward the next pressure door. White spoke into his radio.

  “Dan, what’s going on with the doors?” No reply came from the marine technician.

  They heard the crowd drawing near while waiting for a reply. Looking outside the hotel, the reef was lit below, but above, the sky was dark.

  “Mr. Wang?” White prompted.

  “Here they come,” Coco said as the people ran into view.

  Then White’s radio blared with Wang’s voice. An Asian-American who dropped out of engineering school to become a technician because he claimed he wanted to make money instead of owe it, Wang had a solid reputation at Triton for getting things done, though White knew he was relatively inexperienced.

  “James, we’ve got a problem with the pressure door system. Number Four shut early on us, and we can’t get it to open again, over.”

  White’s fingers gripped the radio hard, like he wanted to crush it, while he shook his head. The guests were calling out to them now, “We couldn’t get through! There’s a wall!”

  “I show that Six is still open, James, you should get through now before—“

  “Water’s coming in,” Coco declared, splashing her foot.

  “—the water from the lobby breach is redirected your way when it bounces off Door 4.”

  White’s eyes looked as though they were about to bug out of his head. “You mean to say we’re about to flooded here, in the main hallway, right now?”

  The radio reply was quick. “Water will be coming that way James, and a lot of it, if the flow meter accuracy is anything like it should be. You should get you and your party on the other side of Six, and then I’ll seal it off, over!”

  “Copy that, I’ve got a big party crossing over Door 6 now, Dan. Don’t let it close yet, over.”

  Coco was the first of them to greet the panic-stricken faces that ran their way. She calmed them down enough to be heard over their worrying. “Follow us this way, they’re going to close a pressure door after we pass through it.’

  “Is that what happened back there?” John Rudd, the NFL player asked. His girlfriend, the model, shivered in his arms while he spoke. “They closed it before we got to it? Isn’t there some kind of communication?” He directed this latter question right to White, who merely waved an arm for him to follow, and started down the hallway.

  “Water’s coming! Water’s coming at us!” a child of about ten shouted. Coco asked her father to carry her until they passed through Door 6, and then told the group to follow her.

  “We’ve just got a little ways to go, people, then we’ll be in a dry area of the hotel. Stay with me, and let’s go.”

  Coco turned to move out in the opposite direction toward Door 6, and immediately slipped on the slick floor, landing hard on a knee. She winced in pain while she felt water flow over t
he hand on the floor supporting her weight. She felt a hand grip her arm, pulling her up, and turned to see a well-known Internet entrepreneur help her to her feet.

  She told him thanks, and he said, “No problem. When we get out of here, though, I’d like to discuss some automation software that would help out a lot around here.”

  She didn’t mention that that was the last thing she was going to care about after she got out of here, but instead said “Good idea,” and proceeded to jog with the group toward White and Caesar, a few paces ahead of them.

  It soon became clear that the water was entering faster than they had anticipated. Like a swift-flowing river, it was only up to their knees, but moving so quickly that it constantly knocked over the guests. With the lobby window caved, the hotel was truly flooding now. Coco could hear White up ahead yelling into his radio, but the oncoming water noise, along with the loud voices of the guests, made it too hard to hear what was being said. She hoped it wasn’t something about how Door 6 wasn’t working and wouldn’t be able to close, or even worse—that it was already closed, and they’d be trapped in here with the rising water...

  Coco snapped out of it when she saw White and the engineer stop running on the other side of the track where Door 6 would come down. At least it hadn’t closed already. Yet the incoming water seemed to rise faster still, and with more intensity than before. Coco looked out the window to the reef, hoping she’d see the megalodon out there, because for some reason she found it disturbing to think of the extinct mega-fish swimming around the hotel lobby. Could it fit in the hallway? She glanced back down the hall, took in the domed ceiling, gauged the width...it seemed high enough but perhaps—hopefully—a little too narrow. Nevertheless, the young marine biologist couldn’t keep from imagining that powerful set of jaws inside that yawning, gaping maw barreling down the hall, scooping all of them into its mouth, and washing them down its black, raspy gullet.