Hotel Megalodon: A Deep Sea Thriller (16 page)

Chapter 30

“It’s charging the pod!” one of the guests shouted. Coco yelled into her radio.

“Hatem, brace yourselves, shark is ramming the pod! Get your scuba gear ready in case it breaches it!” Looking across the reef, it was mostly dark, and the colossal body of the great shark blocked the view into the escape pod window, so she couldn’t see what the people inside were doing, but then the Egyptian’s voice came back over the radio.

“Coco, we see it! It’s so big! Oh my…“

Whatever was happening, Hatem must have kept the transmitter keyed because Coco could hear the crunching impact when the shark collided with the escape pod’s outer window, followed quickly by the rising shouts of those inside.

Somehow cutting through the cacophony was Caesar’s voice, which was calm and matter-of-fact as it delivered bad news. “It moved the pod. Pushed it back.”

As Coco continued to watch, she verified that, indeed, the pod was now canted over onto one side as the rear portion of it rested on a coral outcropping. The humongous shark backed up, and moved into a forward turn, its two-story high tail moving almost the entire water column in the lagoon, top to bottom. It circled back toward the hotel lobby, where Coco, White, and the engineer were now the only three anywhere near the main window. Several of the other guests had left the lobby altogether, seeking safer ground, while those who remained hung back near the entrance, ready to turn tail if the shark got too aggressive.

The megalodon swept right past the lobby window, one of its serving plate sized eyes gazing vacantly into the hotel. White and the engineer unconsciously took a step back as it passed, but Coco stood her ground, fascinated and terrified at the same time. She pounded a fist on the glass as the mega-predator’s eye passed by her at her own eye level. She wasn’t sure why she did it—an act of frustration, maybe, or just to gauge the reaction of the animal—to see if a small gesture like that would have any effect on it.

It had an effect on the people in the room, but not the shark. “Stop, you’ll turn it on us!” White pleaded. A couple of the other guests agreed with him from their safe distance away. The megalodon, for its part, did not alter its course or behavior in any way, but continued swimming along the lobby window until it reached the end of it, and then turned out toward the escape pod once more.

“Coming at you again, Hatem,” Coco transmitted, before adding, “Faster this time!”

Undeniably, the megalodon called on a burst of acceleration she hadn’t seen before as it approached the wayward pod with its contingent of shell-shocked would-be escapees. Coco saw Mick’s Zodiac leave a soundless wake above as he traversed the area at high speed, hoping to distract the shark and draw it off. The animal continued its bull-rush unabated, however. Whether it knew boats weren’t a threat, or didn’t recognize them as anything whatsoever, Coco didn’t know, but at the moment it was fixated only on the pod. Even the hotel itself seemed to hold no interest for it. It was as if all of its primal instincts were homed in on the isolated, and therefore, vulnerable, oddity that had invaded the reef.

Coco brought a hand to her mouth in a gesture of nervous anticipation. Any hope she had that the rampaging oceanic mega-beast might choose not to hit the pod this time was quickly dispelled. This time when the megalodon crashed into the escape pod, the entire spherical structure was lifted off of the reef as if it were a football punted in slow motion. Coco watched as it tilted up on its side before hanging there over the coral. Inside she could see the six divers being tossed about like ragdolls. She radioed the Egyptian, but received no reply. She could only imagine that the radio must have been flung from his hand.

Even as the pod sat on its end, the megalodon showed no signs of letting up on its attack. It swam a tight circle, this time only traversing half the distance back to the hotel, and then immediately set back on another beeline to its target, the loose pod. The guests behind Coco screamed again as the shark prepared to swim fast into the pod.

The fish came up at its target at an angle, its gargantuan snout hammering the top of the end-up pod, sending it toppling over like a domino so that it landed on its back, with the ceiling lying on the reef. Coco could see that the lights were still on inside the former suite—a good sign that the integrity of the walls hadn’t yet been breached—but the pod was farther away now, and difficult to look inside.

Farther away now...
As she watched the pod drift and bounce across the reef away from the hotel, and the megalodon circle back around yet again, Coco felt a chill overcome her unlike any she’d ever experienced before. The shark was pushing the pod into the deeper water at the edge of the lagoon...toward the reef.

She watched as the pod took another hit from the living fossil, which sent it skidding across a contingent of brain corals at a random angle.

Toward the submarine canyon...

Coco tried radioing the pod again, without a reply. Again she saw Mick’s boat pass overhead, again without effect.

“What can we do? What can we
do
?” she implored White and the engineer, but they merely stood there, mouths agape, shaking their heads. There was nothing any of them could do except to watch, watch as the monstrous fish steamrolled into the pod over and over again, pushing it inexorably toward the edge of the reef.

“Why is it doing this?” someone cried.

“Is it...is it playing with that pod, like a cat with a toy?” White sputtered. They watched in horror as the predator battered the pod out to the very edge of the reef. It was visible to Coco now only as a dark object being jostled about the outer reef. Getting farther and farther away.

She felt helpless just standing there, unable to do anything but watch as the six people she was supposed to lead to safety went through absolute Hell on Earth. How frightening it must be for them, she considered, being tumbled about in a small enclosure underwater by a gigantic shark. Just like a hamster trapped in one of those plastic balls being batted about the floor by a housecat, Coco thought.
Just like that.
But sharks didn’t do that kind of thing for fun.
Did they?
Not as far as she knew. But then again, how much did anybody really know about megalodons?

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 and 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.