by Steve Alten
I felt her coming and stopped swimming. She appeared in the murky, sun-drenched shallows seconds later—a gray, blunt-nosed devil racing toward me at twenty knots.
I settled upright on the bottom, offering her an easy target.
Her back muscles arched, her jaws opening as she launched her attack.
I balled my fists—and ducked.
Momentarily blinded by her protective nictitating eyelids, the half-ton behemoth soared inches over my head—the bladed edges of my denticle-covered knuckles slicing open her exposed soft underbelly like an electric knife carving through a Thanksgiving Day ham.
The agitated bull shark continued another ten yards, then circled back and forth through a crimson cloud of blood, never realizing the meal she was consuming was her own eviscerated entrails.
Sensing my predatory instincts returning, I continued gliding inland, away from the tempting taste of blood. Locating a deserted stretch of shallows, I rose out of a breaking swell and trudged toward shore. I expelled seawater from my gills, then inhaled a lung-inflating gasp of salty air as my vision cleared. I felt my porous scalp tighten, and my flattened nose pop back into place as my sinus cavity returned, my flesh continuing to thin as I shed my shark armor.
Naked and alone, I collapsed to my knees on the deserted resort shoreline.
Kwan Wilson . . . fugitive.
“Hey, Dad, I found a naked man.”
“Don’t go near him, Blake.”
I opened my eyes to a cobalt-blue sky and a man in bathing trunks who was covering his six-year-old son’s eyes. “This isn’t a nude beach, fella.”
“Sorry. I . . . uh, I must have lost my bathing suit in the surf.”
He tossed me his towel, which I wrapped around my waist. “The waves are rough today. My son and I had to come in.” He uncovered the boy’s eyes. “See the man’s big muscles, Blake. Eat your veggies and one day you’ll be big and strong like him.”
“Why aren’t you big and strong like him, Dad?”
“Because Daddy doesn’t use steroids. Wait a sec . . . you’re him! The crippled fella who plays basketball. Gordon Walpole, nice to meet you . . . ?”
“Kwan.”
“Kwan, right. Our family’s down from Canada; the wife and I saw you last week on the evening news. Can you wait here? I want to get my camera.”
“Think you can bring me some clothes, Gordon?”
“Clothes? Sure. There’s a shop by the pool. Do you have any money? No, I guess not. No problem, happy to come to your rescue. Say, what happened to your knuckles?”
I looked at the back of my hands, which were bleeding, the skin scraped clean off. “Must have sliced them on some corral.”
“That’s dangerous, you could draw sharks. Wait here, then; I’ll only be a minute. Come on, Blake, Daddy needs to get his wallet.”
32
Annie Moir knocked on my bungalow door at five minutes before nine the next morning. In one hand she held a suit bag containing a freshly pressed pair of black dress pants and a matching polo shirt, in the other were dress shoes, a leather belt, and clean underwear. She entered the cottage, kissed me on the cheek, laid the clothes out on the bed, and then sniffed the air. “What is that God-awful stench?”
“Sorry. Must’ve been something I ate.”
“Teenagers. You have cast-iron stomachs. Before I forget, your grandmother said not to call her until later this afternoon, something about working in the OR.”
“Was she upset about me not calling her yesterday?”
“She was furious. I told her we were prepping you for your interview and she calmed down.”
“Good one.”
“Don’t make me lie for you again. Better get dressed, the network’s sending a limo for us at nine thirty.”
“Turn around.” I slipped out of the sweat suit Gordon Walpole had purchased for me, pulling on my boxers and pants. “The interview’s still live, correct?”
“Live at eleven a.m., just like we discussed earlier. They’re preempting a taped interview with Justin Bieber, which is perfect—the viewer demographics should be close.”
“I’ve been watching Oprah’s network all morning and didn’t see one announcement.”
The publicist frowned. “You said you wanted it live to avoid your father shutting us down. What’s the point if we let the world know hours before you go on?”
“Right.” I smiled, embarrassed. “Okay, you can turn around.”
“My God, every time I see you your muscles look bigger. Stop working out so much; it’s tough to find shirts that fit you.”
“Did you try calling Anya’s parents again?”
“Three times. I finally got through to her father’s graduate assistant at FAU. He said the family left for London last night to attend a cousin’s funeral. They’ll be back Friday.”
“Did he give you the cousin’s name?”
“Kwan, the cousin’s dead. Why do I need a name?”
I felt my blood pressure rising. What if they deported Anya’s family . . . or worse? I forced myself to take a few long, deep breaths to cool off. Fear and anger—stay calm.
Annie’s cell phone rang. “Moir Agency, Annie speaking.” She paused to listen. “You’re early. We’re in Bungalow Seven.” She hung up. “The limo’s here.”
“Who were you talking to?”
“I hired a security guard. If there’s really a threat to keep you off the air, then we may need him. Plus it adds a little intrigue to your story . . . whatever it is.”
“You don’t believe me?”
“You haven’t told me anything, Kwan. Tell me something not to believe.”
“You’ll hear everything when Oprah hears it.”
I went into the bathroom to brush my teeth and make sure my gill slits weren’t showing. I was anxious about Anya, worried Jeff Elrod might endanger her life in order to flush me out of hiding.
Relax. In less than two hours you’ll be the one flushing.
I heard a man’s heavy knock on the bungalow door.
Mark Edward Burton sported square-cut glasses and a brown goatee that matched his short-cropped hair. He had some size to him, was dressed like a South Beach businessman in loafers with no socks, and was carrying a 9mm Glock in a holster beneath his white sports coat.
He walked past my handshake to search the bedroom and bath, adding to my annoyance by sniffing the air. “Something reeks like bad fish.”
“It’s your mother. She was over last night.”
Burton shot me a snarky grin. “They said you were a wiseass.”
A jolt of adrenaline shot through me. “Who’s they? Elrod? My father?”
His smile disappeared, his eyes darting to Annie.
My publicist’s expression dropped, along with my heart. “There is no interview scheduled with Oprah, is there, Annie?”
“Kwan—”
“The Admiral’s people got to you, didn’t they? Didn’t they?!”
Burton reached for his gun, only he miscalculated my quickness—my front thrust kick meeting his chest like a sledgehammer striking concrete, cracking his sternum while sending him flying backward across an end table, shattering a lamp.
They were through the bungalow door before his body hit the floor—two assassins armed with dart guns. One projectile hit me in the chest, the other penetrated my right thigh.
Refusing to go down, I plowed through them and into the suddenly brilliant tunnel of daylight, the ocean sparkling thirty yards away.
Get to the water!
I searched for the path, my legs moving in slow motion . . . everything spinning. My breathing became labored as I toppled sideways over a shrub . . . into darkness.
Pain forced open an eye. I was in an ambulance. I tried to move, but my wrists were handcuffed to the sides of a gurney. There was an I
V and it was spinning like a carousel, and one of the bungalow dudes was speaking in distorted echoes over a cell phone.
Hey, Bungalow Bill. What did you kill . . . Bungalow Bill.
“Kwan?”
A familiar male voice dragged me out of a drug-induced sleep.
“Open your eyes.”
I opened them. I was lying on my back in a blue collar office, staring at a water-stained drop ceiling and fake wood-paneled walls. Someone had dressed me in a camouflage-colored neoprene body suit. For a frightening moment I feared I was paralyzed again—I couldn’t move my arms and legs—until I realized my wrists and ankles were shackled to the gurney.
“It’s good to see you, son.”
The face now looming over me belonged to a man in his late fifties, his rugged features giving him a slight resemblance to Liam Neeson, the actor who played the kick-ass dude in Taken . . . a guy who had been kicking my ass for most of the last seventeen years.
“Admiral?”
“I’m your father, Kwan. Why don’t you try calling me Dad.”
I grinned, barely conscious. “Why don’t you try treating me like a son instead of an enlisted man . . . or a prisoner of war. Do I get an attorney, or are you sending me to Gitmo?”
“The restraints were necessary. You crushed Mr. Burton’s chest and nearly killed him. As for treating you like a son—you’re right, I was too hard on you. But it’s not too late to make amends.”
“By kidnapping your only child? Not off to a great start, are we, Dad?”
“Do you know why you can walk again, Kwan? You can walk again and run like a deer and dunk a basketball because I funded the research that healed your spine . . . research that one day may heal a lot of paralyzed people’s spines. Had you only waited until Dr. Becker completed her work you would have been one of the first chosen to receive the stem cell injections. Instead, as always, you had to do things your way.”
“Hey, you were the one who kicked me out of the internship program.”
“That’s because I know the way you are, and your actions proved me right. Why is it that the basic rules of society don’t seem to apply to you? Hacking into my e-mails . . . texting while driving—your mother’s dead because you couldn’t follow a simple rule. Stealing Becker’s stem cells . . . injecting them into your body with no regard for protocol—all you ever cared about was yourself.”
I swallowed a lump in my throat, feeling the cartilage in my esophagus. My old man may have been a bastard, but he was right.
“Believe it or not, Kwan, I’m here to offer you a chance to earn your cure and redeem yourself in my eyes and in the eyes of our Lord and Savior. First, however, we need to do a little test. You won’t be in any danger; Dr. Kamrowski and I simply need to know the limits of your mutation. Depending upon how well you do, I may offer you a mission that utilizes your newfound aquatic skills. Complete the task and Dr. Becker will administer the beta-blockers that will neutralize your mutation. Once you’re cured, you can return to the life of fame and fortune that awaits you.”
“What’s the test?”
“Nothing strenuous or dangerous. We just want to see if your mutated state can handle a little water pressure.”
My heart pounded in my chest. “How much is a little?”
He patted me on the chest. “Just do your best, son.”
Geez . . .
The two men who had tranquilized me wheeled my gurney out of the office and down a short corridor into an empty warehouse—empty, save for a massive hyperbaric chamber.
Waiting for me by the pressurized door was Nadja Kamrowski.
“Kwan, inside this hyperbaric chamber is a sphere. After I release you, you’ll enter the chamber and climb inside the sphere, sealing the hatch. Inside the sphere is a control panel with a green button and a red button. Push the green button once and the capsule will begin filling with seawater. Allow your respiratory system to mutate. Once the capsule is filled with water and you feel ready to proceed, press the green button twice more and we’ll begin gradually increasing the pressure within the hyperbaric chamber which will raise the water pressure inside the sphere. If you feel like it’s too much, press the red button and we’ll dial it back and get you out of there. Even though your gills won’t allow you to talk, we’ll be communicating with you through the entire process. We’ll also be monitoring your heart rate and blood pressure using instruments built into your neoprene suit. Do you have any questions before I uncuff you?”
“Where’s Anya?”
“Somewhere safe. She’ll be released after you complete the test.”
The two guards raised their weapons while Dr. Kamrowski keyed my restraints. I stood up, rubbing my wrists, peeking inside the hyperbaric chamber. Inside was an eight-foot-in-diameter metal sphere, the hatch propped open on top.
I hesitated, then entered the chamber. Stepping over a spider’s web of hoses and cables, I mounted the sphere and lowered myself through the open hatch, twisting it shut behind me.
The interior was padded—small, but not claustrophobic. I sat down on a bench seat that faced two colored buttons and a digital pressure gauge set at 0.00.
Would they hurt Anya if I refused to cooperate? I didn’t think so. Still, there was a desperateness in my father’s eyes that suggested now was not the time to test his boundaries.
The question was—how far did they intend to test mine?
I took a few deep breaths, then pressed the green button.
Seawater entered from a floor vent, jump-starting an unexpected wave of anxiety. The sudden sensation of claustrophobia was overwhelming—the human condition refusing to release me from its stranglehold. My esophageal membrane spasmed, unable to close. For a three-minute eternity I remained in the near darkness, still gulping air—hyperventilating as the water continued to rise. I waited until it had reached my neck, then slammed my palm against the red button.
Dr. Kamrowski’s voice crackled over a speaker. “Kwan, what’s wrong?”
“Dunno. Can’t . . . calm myself.”
I heard my father’s muffled voice in the background. “Isn’t it obvious? Look at his vital signs—he’s panicking.”
He was right. I tried submerging, and still nothing was changing. It was as if the mutation refused to reveal itself to my father.
And then I heard the Admiral say something that changed the game.
“I’ve had enough. Drown the little bastard and be done with it.”
Within seconds the seawater rose above my head, stealing the last few inches of air. I pounded the tank—enraged—then burped out a belly of bubbles that collapsed my lungs and caused my gills to flutter to life.
Within thirty seconds the transformation was complete, my skin thick with dermal denticles, my air cavities having internally pancaked.
With far too much strength, I struck the green button, shattering the mechanism.
“Kwan, it’s Dr. K. Your vitals have calmed significantly; I’m assuming your gills are functioning again. If you’re ready to proceed, hit the green . . . never mind, it looks like you may have disconnected it. If you’re up to beginning the water pressure test, gently tap the red button three times.”
I complied—for all the wrong reasons.
Drown the little bastard? Now they couldn’t drag me out. I wanted to show my father what I was made of. I prayed the pressure would kill me. I’d stay in this container until my skull imploded, just to teach the heartless jerk a lesson.
My eyes adjusted, casting the dark confines in an olive aura.
As I watched, the pressure gauge began rising: 100 psi . . . 200 psi . . .
Water has weight. To calculate water pressure you start with the weight of the Earth’s atmosphere at sea level, which is 14.7 pounds per square inch. Each additional 14.7 pounds under water equates to 33 feet, a standard measurement known as an atmosphere.
Applying the math—every foot of depth under water weighs .445 pounds. A depth of one thousand feet therefore equals 445 pounds per square inch . . . the equivalent of two adults sitting on top of you.
Yesterday, my maximum depth had probably been less than five hundred feet. I felt nothing then and I felt nothing now—even though the depth gauge was passing 2,000 psi—the equivalent of descending nearly five thousand feet.
Minutes became hours. My mind grew restless.
I thought about what happened back at the resort. Annie had betrayed me . . . or more likely, she worked for Elrod and had been monitoring me from the first day I met her in the hospital. The CIA was always two steps ahead of the game, and the boys in black ops had money to burn. They had probably spent a hundred grand on the hyperbaric chamber and sphere, and would end up leaving it in this warehouse to rot.
Still, they needed me for something . . . and I had nearly failed. Would my father have allowed me to drown? Had he issued his second Do Not Resuscitate order, or was it one of his mind games to get me to perform?
And what of my performance? Anger and fear usually jump-started my adrenal glands, causing my mutation to take over physically. Why, then, had I had so much trouble engaging my gills in the sphere?
Anxiety was far different than fear. Anxiety was neither fight nor flight; it was a paralysis of the mind and body. Overcome by the panic attack, I found myself unable to function, barely able to draw a breath. It was only when my father had flooded the tank that my adrenal glands had finally taken over to rescue me from myself.
The tank creaked around me, the pressure in the hyperbaric chamber testing the sphere’s integrity.
The depth gauge passed 13,000 psi . . . and stopped.
Dr. Kamrowski’s voice reverberated through the water. “Congratulations, Kwan, you have the intestinal fortitude of a fish. Hang tight; we’ll have you out of there soon.”
Alone in the control room with the Admiral, Jeff Elrod slapped my father on the back. “Congratulations. Looks like you can recover the package and still keep us on schedule.”
