Enemy of Oceans (16 page)

“We should try to find him,” Barkley said.

“Track a frilled shark in that mess? You can count me out!” Velenka exclaimed, a little louder than she should have. Even though the current and rustling greenie were loud it was never wise to give your position away.

Leilani flicked her fins in disgust. “I guess we can count you out of everything!”

“I wish you would!” the mako replied.

“Quiet,” Barkley told her.

She slashed her tail through the water. “I won't! This is crazy!”

A frilled shark rose behind Velenka. It wasn't as large as Hokuu, but that didn't make it any less terrifying. Its red eyes glowed as it reared back and opened its mouth, filled with deadly, tri-hooked teeth.

“LOOK OUT!” yelled Barkley as he streaked forward and butted Velenka straight into the frill's stomach. The prehistore's gaping mouth crashed into the rock bed behind them, a flipper length from taking Velenka's head off. “SWIM!” Barkley shouted, and they both broke in different directions. The frilled shark was disoriented from driving his face into the stony seabed and lost Barkley and Velenka.

But Leilani was hovering a foot above the scrub greenie and directly in front of the beast. It locked its crimson eyes on her and whooshed forward. Barkley knew there was no way for him to defend the spinner shark.

Leilani was about to die when . . .

Something happened.

Not something, but someone.

Snork.

The sawfish rushed underneath Leilani and bolted upward as the monstrous frilled shark reared back to send her to the Sparkle Blue. This time, instead of striking with his mouth, the monster sent his spiked tail through the water so fast it made a high-pitched whine.

Snork whipped his bill from right to left and smashed the monster's tail into the ground! It must have hurt because the frilled shark let out a howl. Barkley blinked, sure he was dreaming. The enraged prehistore roared and tried to bite Snork's head off. But the sawfish never stopped moving and whipped his bill in the other direction. It met the enraged frilled shark's neck and cut its head off!

Swimming over to the speechless Leilani, Barkley asked Snork, “How—how did you do that?”

“I don't know,” Snork stammered. “I've been practicing, though.”

They all stared at the frilled shark's head slowly spinning in the water in front of them. It had a look of absolute surprise frozen on its face, probably the same one that Snork and Leilani were wearing.

“I'll say you have,” Barkley told the sawfish.

Just then the sounds of the battle above increased once more.

THE BATTLE HAD TURNED INTO A FEROCIOUS
melee. Gray roared forward and rammed a frilled shark in the gills. He didn't stop swimming until he pushed it off the ledge and it was swept away. Three other frills had managed to make it onto their defensive position. Striiker sent mariners to fight the beasts, but the Riptide sharks were no match for them.

“Re-form around the Seazarein!” Shear ordered the remaining finja guardians.

“No!” Gray yelled. “Have them attack the frilled sharks!”

“You need to be protected!” Shear shouted.

“We're all going to die if Grimkahn and his jurassics take this position!” Gray answered. “Striiker can't concentrate on the jurassics if the frills are behind him! Now do it!”

The guardians were technically Gray's to command but they did look to Shear, who was responsible for the Seazarein's safety. He gave them the signal to go. “Clear the area. Then resume guarding the Seazarein.”

“Let's take out that mosasaur!” Gray told Shear as he gestured to the one farthest from Grimkahn.

“You're making it very hard to protect you!” the tiger finja said, but he streaked with Gray at the jurassic that had gotten onto their plateau. Grimkahn and another were making progress, but the Riptide mariners' attacks were keeping them off balance. Twice they had dislodged one of their taloned flippers, but each time Grimkahn and the other mosasaur found another spot on the mountainside to sink their claws into and hold fast.

The opening to the ledge was smaller than the back part, where the Riptide mariners were arranged. This was good, as it created a choke point. Only three of the giant mosasaurs could try to get onto the area at once. The current above and below the outcropping was too strong for someone to swim against with someone defending.

“We have to get that one off!” Gray shouted over the sounds of battle. “I'll get its attention, you bang it on the head!” He didn't wait for Shear to respond. Gray swam under the mosasaur's jaw and gave it a tremendous fin slap. The jurassic roared as broken teeth rained from its mouth. When the mosasaur stretched forward to snap at Gray, Shear rammed it in the skull.

The jurassic tottered as the vicious current tugged at its tail. But it didn't fall away. And Gray and Shear were out of room. Striiker and the remaining Riptide mariners couldn't aid them. They were all fighting.

“GOLDEN RUSH, ATTACK!” cried a voice.

At that moment Xander came swimming down from above them. The AuzyAuzy mariners numbered only a hundred. A single battle fin was all that could come down from the mountainside and onto the plateau at once. They bashed into the mosasaur attacking Gray and Shear and blew it clean off the ledge. Once the current hit the monster it was swept away and struck the mountainside solidly.

The AuzyAuzy mariners bit and chewed at the newest mosasaur until it couldn't hold on any longer. It too was carried off by the rip current.

“Sorry we're late,” said Xander. “It was a bit of a scrumble to get here.”

“By my thinking you're right on time!” Gray said, giving the hammerhead a quick flank bump.

“Yes, right on time! To die with your friends!” roared Grimkahn as he got his fourth clawed flipper up on the plateau. He was out of the current. “Now you'll pay for defying me!”

Within moments he and his other mosasaur mariner were both on the plateau. Other jurassics grabbed for the ledge behind their leader. Striiker's forces had been pushed out of position and couldn't do anything about it.

Hokuu crept close to the edge of the greenie mass, being careful not to expose himself. It looked like Grimkahn had finally gotten the upper fin—or, in his case, flipper. He and his forces were going to wipe out the pup and everyone else. Sure, reinforcements had come, but only a single battlefin of a hundred mariners. That wasn't enough. Not nearly.

Hokuu grinned as he took it all in. There was nothing that could stop Grimkahn's rise to absolute power.

And with that, my own, Hokuu thought.

He reveled in the chaos unfolding in front of his eyes, loving every second of it.

This beautiful interlude was interrupted by a faraway whale call. It was distorted, coming from a great distance with the raging current. Hokuu tried to block out the noise but it nagged at the back of his mind. The whale call sounded again, intruding on the moment of his victory once more. Then a group of bluefin tuna flashed by, sparkling as the sun reflected off their silvered bodies. It was a small group. They were propelled by the fierce current and so were gone in an instant.

Another group flashed by, this one twice as large.

Then Hokuu realized what was bothering him.

The Tuna Run! It wasn't happening this week . . .

It was happening now!

Hokuu realized that they had blundered into a devious trap. He understood the great danger that was coming for Grimkahn, the jurassics, the frilled sharks, and most importantly for his own hopes and dreams.

He darted forward, intent on getting to the safety of the ledge and warning Grimkahn.

Hokuu braced himself to swim through the current but was pulled back into the kelp ball by some force. He found himself looking at Takiza, who hovered in the chaotic mass of greenie as if it were the calmest of days in the Caribbi Sea.

“Leaving so soon, Hokuu?” the betta asked. “I thought you and I might speak.”

“You thought wrong!” Hokuu spat. “But I can stay around long enough to kill you!”

He brought his power to bear and shot a bolt of electricity at Takiza. It was blocked easily, as Hokuu knew it would be. He had only done it to get close enough to launch what he liked to call
hurling grace
, his vomit attack. The acid in his stomach was thick and stuck to whatever it hit, dissolving anything covered within a minute.

But the betta was too quick, zipping away and stinging him with a shock to the flank. “Your puny powers alone can't beat me!” Hokuu shot his spiked tail through the water.

It would split Takiza in two—

But his attack was blocked and pushed wide!

A huge marlin then smacked him on the forehead with his bill, causing Hokuu's eyes to water and vision to blur for a moment. “My name is Diego Benedicto Pacifico Salamanca, and I am here to take your measure.”

“Salamanca,” Hokuu said in disgust. He knew of the billfish and didn't like him one bit. “I thought you never left the waters of Spain and Portuga.”

“It was a nice day for a swim,” the marlin answered. “Now, I would see you fight. En garde!”

Hokuu was enraged. He forgot about Takiza and fired his tail at the disrespectful blue marlin. This buffoon didn't even have brains enough to be afraid for his life. Well, Hokuu would teach him fear right before killing him!

As a target, Salamanca was too large to miss. But the bladefish blocked each one of his tail spike attacks, clanging them off his stout nose.

“You are as unskilled with your tail as you are ugly,” the marlin said.

What am I doing? Hokuu thought. Why am I fighting this fool snout to snout? He was Hokuu, master of shar-kata! He whirled his tail, gathering power.

But a searing charge of electricity sent by Takiza disrupted his concentration.

The betta waved a gauzy fin in a scolding manner. “Using your powers against a foe without his own would be less than honorable.”

Then, instead of running, Salamanca closed the distance between them. Hokuu tried gathering energy for a quicker shar-kata attack, but he was again jolted by Takiza.

“Fine!” he yelled at the marlin. “I'll send you to the Sparkle Blue the old-fashioned way!”

“
Excelente!
” the crazy marlin answered. “It is for this Salamanca has come!”

Hokuu fought with the marlin on a purely physical level. He would kill Takiza's friend right in front of him. But Salamanca blocked and parried his strikes. The billfish was incredibly agile over short distances. Hokuu used every tail attack he could think of: over the shoulder, from underneath, around each side. Feinting one way, attacking the other.

Nothing worked.

Then Salamanca jabbed his sharp bill right inside Hokuu's nostril!

Pain exploded inside his head and all Hokuu could smell was his own blood. The marlin shook his bill and said, “You are deeply disappointing.”

Luckily for Hokuu the marlin had to dodge when a drove of bluefin ripped through the greenie. These were the fastest tuna, leading the way for the others. Soon the main mass of fish would come through and demolish everything in their path.

Hokuu made the only decision he could.

He fled.

Grimkahn would find out about the Tuna Run soon enough.

Striiker sent wave after wave of mariners at Grimkahn and the five mosasaurs that were marching forward on the ledge. Riptide and AuzyAuzy mariners fought bravely. Some were crushed by the terrible jaws of the jurassics. Frilled sharks also took lives, but Shear and his guardians were using their finja abilities and scoring mortal hits to their gills.

“Dip your snout into the muck and call me king!” yelled Grimkahn. “I'll make your trip to the Sparkle Blue a quick one!”

“Thanks but no thanks,” Gray told the giant jurassic. “Xander, it's time!”

The scalloped hammerhead nodded and gave a tail waggle that was seen by the rest of his mariners still at the top of the Atlantis Spine. They had been warned about the current after the first wave and corrected for it as they dived down the rockside.

Grimkahn swung his giant tail through the water and cleared his area of an assault team headed by Striiker himself. “It is only a matter of time before I have you in my jaws!” he told Gray.

“That's right, Grimkahn! It is only a matter of time!” Gray said as he saw the stream of bluefin off to the side thicken. The Tuna Run would whip past in barely a minute. “And yours is up!”

“BREAK, BREAK, BREAK!” bellowed Striiker.

Olph clicked out the command but the area was small enough that the great white's shout did most of the work. The Riptide mariners, along with one AuzyAuzy battle fin, scattered to make room for wave after wave of new mariners. A full three battle fins of AuzyAuzy mariners came at the mosasaurs and pummeled them to the edge of the ledge.

Gray was about to lead the charge to finish them with Striiker but Xander put his tail out. “Hold on for a bit,” he said. “I've got a surprise for you, savvy?”

Then two Indi Shiver battle fins streaked into the fray, led by Tydal!

“For Indi Shiver and VICTORY!” Tydal shouted.

These were the superbly trained remnants of the Black Wave armada. Each battle fin twisted and turned on their way down, confusing Grimkahn and the jurassics to no end. The mosasaurs took the combined impact of the battle fins straight to their face and trunks. The giants were ejected from the plateau's ledge right as the main body of bluefin tuna came through.

Gray's forces had timed it perfectly.

The main body of the Tuna Run roared through the area like an unstoppable force.