The Third Bear (25 page)

iv. The Relationship Between the Shark God and His Army

Dakuwaqa led this shark army, of course, and he had an excellent record against the other gods. He had to. Because of the rules by which the gods are bound, Dakuwaqa's shark army could not move in until Dakuwaqa had first vanquished the god being attacked. If the attacked god defeated him, or he showed any other sign of weakness, Dakuwaqa would find his shark army attacking him. Nothing would please the remoras, the lion fish, the skates, more than to feast upon rich god-flesh. For Dakuwaqa may have been a god, but he was not invincible; he could be sorely wounded by mortal teeth.

At the thought of this possibility, Dakuwaqa always laughed and told Selqu, "Those bastards can't take me. I'm Dakuwaqa, the Shark God - the most ruthless killer in all the ocean."

"Yes," Selqu would say. "Yes, you are."

Dakuwaqa was very young. He loved the thrill of dominion so much that he had never acquired any fear of defeat, of limitation. He had come fully formed from the Sacred Egg Sac and never known his father or his mother. This had made him think of himself as deathless and ageless. Dakuwaqa did not know that immortality could contain a kind of death within its endless span.

Every morning, he would swim out from his sumptuous coral palace to inspect his shark army, secure in the knowledge that they would always be loyal because he would never be vulnerable.

v. The Shark God's Excellent Record Against the Other Gods - And Why This Was a Bad Thing

In a matter of just a few years, Dakuwaqa and his army had beaten the God of the Dolphins, the God of the Whales, the God of the Moray Eels, the God of the Lobsters, the God of the Lesser Fish, and the God of the Greater Fish. Not only had he defeated these gods, he had eaten most of them, ransacked their seas, and taken from them the islands under their protection.

Dakuwaqa became more powerful with each victory. His gleaming gray legions grew in size as he grew in size. His name evoked fear from Easter Island to Viti Levu, from Papua New Guinea to Tonga.

The people of the defeated islands could no longer fish in the seas for fear of Dakuwaqa and his army of sharks. The animals in the sea cowered in their homes, hoping that Dakuwaqa or his remora messengers would not knock on their doors and say, "We need one more, just one more."

The women of the islands no longer smiled at dark-eyed muscular young men. They looked away. They boarded up their huts and homes when they heard, carried by the breeze, from the sea, the breathy thick whisper of "Come down to the water, my beautiful ones. Come down here." Often now followed by, as the women grew more wary, the words "Come the fuck down here! Now!"

"Why won't they come out of their homes? Why won't they come down to the sea?" Dakuwaqa would moan to Selqu. "Why do they disobey me so?"

"They are not like the creatures of the sea," Selqu would respond. "They, my God-Emperor, do not understand your glory."

"Well, you might be right about that," Dakuwaqa would say. "It is not an easy weight to bear, my glory. But the hell with it - I'll manage somehow." And so saying, he would have another tuna fish brought to him for dinner.

For a long time, it looked as if the God-Emperor Dakuwaqa would defeat all of the other gods and become God of the Sea.

VI. The Previous God of the Sea

Now, it should be revealed that no god had been powerful enough to become the God of the Sea for centuries. The last God of the Sea had been the God of the Turtles, many centuries before. The God of the Turtles was the size of a large island. In fact, he was an island - a slow-floating island carried by the current, atop which birds had, over the years, dropped seeds and soil. Until now, from his back, there grew a great jungle of plants and trees. Animals roamed the surface of his covered shell like fleas upon an uncaring dog.

The God of the Turtles could have beaten Dakuwaqa with his size and his implacable calm, garnered from thousands of years of slow, deep thought. But he was very old and, for his own unknowable reasons, had abdicated his place as God of the Sea in favor of finding the deepest, most remote oceans. And there he floated, lost in deep turtle thought, surrounded by the most ancient of waves, while creatures lived and died upon his shell.

Some said he dreamed - that he had dreamed for centuries now, and that the God of the World had recruited him to dream the World through its next few thousand years of existence so that the God of the World could take a brief vacation from that duty.

As the God of the Manta Rays, whom Dakuwaqa had always considered inedible, said from his prison deep beneath the sea, "The God of the Turtles dreams the dream of this world, and woe to him who goes against that dream."

"That's bullshit," Dakuwaqa had responded, wondering how they'd even gotten on the subject. "Dreaming is bullshit." He had always hated the way that the God of the Manta Rays spoke.

Dreaming the world. What a load of whale crap. Why, Dakuwaqa thought to himself as he swam through the coral outcroppings of his crab-built palace, I never dream. I never have time to dream - I just swim endlessly forward, and that is enough for me.

Still, in building his empire, Dakuwaqa had been very careful to avoid the Turtle.

vii. Kadavu Island and the Octopus God

Soon Dakuwaqa ruled all of the ocean except for the Turtle and one island: Kadavu island, on the western fringes of his empire.

Kadavu Island was large and bountiful. Its clear streams provided water for animals and people alike. Its forests provided shelter and food. Its hills and small mountains provided relief from heat in the hottest part of the year. Banana and breadfruit grew there. A barrier reef encircled most of the island, and within its embrace lay many lagoons in which to fish. Not a single shark patrolled those lagoons. The god that protected the lagoon would not permit it.

Kadavu Island's guardian was the Octopus God. He had large, deep eyes that seemed to contain a vortex of shooting stars. He had eight tentacles that could act as hands or feet or tools - or rip a whale in half. If he wanted the day to end early, he would shoot his ink into the sky and the sun and sky would disappear into new-born night. (It was said that were he to release all of his ink, the world would be black for a thousand years.) The Octopus God could not change shape, but he could change size - from the size of the smallest of fiddler crabs to the largest whale, or so large that four of his tentacles could reach around one side of the island while the other four reached around the other, to meet in a menacing embrace.

The Octopus God had lived for thousands of years, and was said to be slightly mad. Sometimes, the ocean would strobe with emerald-ruby-goldblue-green phosphorescence late at night and even Kadavu's many nocturnal fishers, from people to eels to crabs to herons, would retire for the evening. They were certain the Octopus God was having an episode. (Others thought he was merely perfecting the details of what he called the Octopus God Triumphant, an underwater light show reenacting his greatest victories; he had been working on it for centuries.)

No one living at that time had ever spoken to the Octopus God, but they knew the Octopus God had been friends with the God of Turtles for many centuries. They knew that the Octopus God had consulted with the God of Turtles on many matters. Some believed that the Octopus God knew the secret of the Turtle's dreaming, that he was as smart as the God of Turtles.

"But not as smart as me," Dakuwaqa said, as he relaxed in his seaweed bath, being cleaned by a pair of exotic remoras.

"No, not as smart as you," said Selqu, lost in a daydream where even the two remoras cleaning Dakuwaqa brought him tribute and let him mate with them.

"I am close now to what I've wanted since I popped out of that stupid egg sac," Dakuwaqa said. "The Turtle doesn't matter. All that matters is the Octopus. Remove the Octopus and I can be the God of the Sea. And then what soft plump girl will be able to say no to me then? What defeated god will dare fuck with me, then?"

"No one," Selqu said softly. "No one. It is time. Just one more." His gills rippled with excitement.

Behind him, Dakuwaqa reflexively ate one of the remoras that was cleaning him and let out of a mighty God-burp. Selqu did not notice.

viii. Dakuwaqa Reviews His Troops

The next morning, Dakuwaqa, Selqu at his side, consulted with his shark army underlings. They were lined up in the green-blue water outside of his palace while he floated in the entrance hole. Behind them the army of sharks they commanded formed a circle that went round and round without end.

"What do you think?" roared Dakuwaqa at his army. "Do you think I will be the God of the Sea? Or do you think the Octopus God will kick my tail? Tell me the truth, or I'll need one more, just one more, right fucking now!"

Dakuwaqa sometimes ate one or two of his lieutenants, just to make sure that the others didn't get any ideas about disobeying him. Nothing inspired fear in his army like seeing him shit out a fellow soldier and piss the unfor- tunate's blood through his skin.

With one voice, the shark army shouted, "You will be the God of the Sea. You will be the God of the Sea! No one can defeat you! The Octopus God will become one more! One More! One More! One More!"

"That's what I thought," Dakuwaqa said, cleaning the space between his teeth with a piece of seaweed before, to his ever-lasting humiliation, Selqu could do it for him. "I thought you might say that." He admired his toothy smile in a shiny piece of sailfish scale Selqu held up to him. "I can't say I disagree. No, not at all."

"This will be a glorious day, God-Emperor," Selqu said. "You will become God of the Sea and, lo! the tales of centuries will revolve around your God-Head."

Dakuwaqa frowned. He hated it when Selqu sounded like the God of the Manta Rays. And not just because it sounded false, but because then he was reminded of what the manta ray had said about the God of the Turtles.