D. MacHale - The Lost City of Faar

Believe it or not, the shark being so big turned out to be a good thing. Its head slid underneath the ledge, but its dorsal fin hit the rock above. Yes! It was too big to fit under the ledge. It couldn’t get to us! Uncle Press lowered the speargun because the immediate danger was gone. That is, unless the quig could figure out how to squeeze in sideways. I didn’t think that would happen. Fish don’t swim sideways.

“So much for your decoy theory,” I said.

“It worked,” replied Uncle Press. “But this bad boy was quicker than I thought. Look.”

I saw that stuck in the shark’s teeth was the decoy water sled, completely tangled up in pants and vines. The quig went for the bait all right, but it was just an appetizer. It now wanted the main course. Us.

The huge quig wriggled and squirmed, trying to force its way under the rock shelf. If it’s possible for a fish to look angry, this thing looked major-league ticked. It writhed its body, swung its tail and gnashed its jaws, desperately trying to get at us. We were just out of its reach by a few yards. Too close, in my book, but no matter how furiously the quig pushed, its body was too big to squeeze any closer. Phew!

“If you’ve got a plan B, now’s the time to tell me,” I said nervously.

“I’ve always got a plan B,” came the confident reply. “I’m going to swim over to the left and come out from under the ledge. When it sees me, I guarantee it’ll come after me. As soon as I get a clear shot at it, I’ll take it. Its skull is thin. One shot and he’s gone.”

“Why wait?” I shouted. “Do it here!”

“I can’t get a good shot through the sand. I don’t want to miss.”

He was right. The quig’s violent thrashing had kicked up a storm of sand and it was hard to tell which end was up.

“As soon as it follows me, swim out as fast as you can, and keep swimming straight ahead along the reef. About a hundred yards dead ahead you’ll see an anchor line that’ll lead you up to the skimmer. I’ll catch up with the water sled. Got it?”

“No, I don’t,” I said with rising panic. “What if you miss? What if the spear misses the skull and all you end up doing is pissing him off more? I want a plan C.”

“There is only a plan B.” Then he added with a confident smile, “And I never miss.”

“Uncle Press I — “

He didn’t stay to listen. He kicked off forward, coming dangerously close to the snapping jaws of the quig, then shot off to the left using the speedy water sled to pull him along. He did a great job of tempting the quig, because it pulled its body back out from under the ledge and started to shadow him.

Now was the time. The quig was busy, and if I was going to get out of here, it had to be now. Unfortunately, I couldn’t move. Panic had set in and I was frozen. The idea of swimming out into open water where that quig could turn around and chomp me like a Slim Jim had shut down all of my systems. I was absolutely, totally incapable of moving.

Then I spotted something. The billowing sand was starting to settle and I saw it lying on the bottom near the edge of the rock outcropping. It was the water sled Uncle Press had used as a decoy! The quig must have dropped it out of its mouth when it backed out. It gave me a flash of hope. If I could use the speed of that water sled, then maybe I had a chance of getting to the skimmer before Moby Dick came a-nibbling. That was it. I had to do it.

My legs worked again. I pushed forward and quickly swam to the tangle of pants and vines that engulfed the water sled. I picked it up to find that the pants were totally wrapped around the thing. The fruit stuffing was gone though. The quig had gotten a treat out of this after all. But there was a problem. I quickly saw that the sled wasn’t going to work because the pants were totally wrapped around it. The pants kept water from entering the slits, and that’s where it got its power. I had to get rid of the pants, or the sled would be useless. So I frantically began tugging at them.

While I worked I glanced up to where Uncle Press had gone, but there was no sign of him, or the quig. Had he speared it already? I had absolute confidence in Uncle Press. If he said he was going to shoot the quig, then the quig would be shot. But what if the quig had hisownplan B and decided not to follow him? Then all bets were off. I had to think less and work faster. Finally I figured out how the pants had gotten twisted around the sled and with a final yank, I pulled them free.

Big, big mistake.

You know what it’s like when you’re walking in bare feet and stub your toe really hard? A weird thing happens. There’s about a half-second delay between the time you crunch your toe and when the pain registers in your brain. That’s just enough time to think “Uh-oh!” before you feel the hurt. I don’t know why that happens, but it does. Well, that’s kind of what happened to me right then and there. The instant I pulled the pants off the water sled, I realized I had made a huge mistake.

What hit me was that the little piece of vine Uncle Press had used to tie the trigger down was still in place. The sled was still turned on. The only reason it wasn’t moving was because the pants had prevented water from entering the slits. But as soon as I pulled the pants away, the slits were cleared and water could rush in to power the engine and — like when you stub your toe — I had about a half-second to think “Uh-oh!”

Oh, yeah. The sled was on and ready to go. I wasn’t. Too bad.

Things happened fast. The powerful little engine sprang to life and jumped out of my hand. It only got worse. While trying to get the pants away from the sled, I had gotten the vine twisted around my wrist. It was the vine that had tied the pants to the water sled. It was the vine that wasstilltied to the water sled, and the other end was now wrapped around my wrist. Yeah, you guessed it. The vine snapped taut and an instant later I was yanked sideways and dragged through the water by the runaway sled, full throttle.

Worse still, it pulled me out from under the rock ledge, into open water and right in the same direction that Uncle Press had lured the quig. That was thelastplace I wanted to go, but I had no way of steering because the sled was out of my reach. I desperately tried to pull the vine off my wrist, but it was so twisted I couldn’t free it. I was absolutely, totally out of control. I tried to look ahead, but I was moving so fast the force of the water kept spinning me around. No matter what I did to kick my fins or twist my body, I kept spinning helplessly. I felt like the tail on an out-of-control kite. I wasn’t the one in charge, it was the runaway water sled that was calling all the shots, and right now it was pulling me toward an angry quig.

I twisted my neck to look up ahead and sure enough, there it was. I saw the immense gray shape of the quig, lurking just outside the rock ledge, peering in at what I guessed was Uncle Press. I was traveling parallel to the rock ledge, further out than the quig. In a few seconds I would pass by the monster and unless it was deaf and blind, I would get its attention. I could only hope that between now and then Uncle Press would nail it with the speargun. But he would have to shoot fast because I was almost at the quig.

Then two things happened. When I flew by the quig, it heard me coming and it made a sudden, surprised turn to see me. It was a small turn, but enough to let something else happen that made me want to scream. I saw the glint of a spear come shooting out from under the rock ledge — and miss its mark. The missile sliced through the water just over the quig’s head. Uncle Press assured me that he wouldn’t miss, but he hadn’t figured that I’d be flying by like an idiot to distract his prey.