Sharkman (25 page)

42

I see your hair is burning, hills are filled with fire

If they say I never loved you, you know they are a liar

Driving down your freeways, midnight alleys roam

Cops in cars, the topless bars, never saw a woman so alone

So alone, so alone . . .

—The Doors, “L.A. Woman”

I
am fury.

Naked in the cockpit of the speedboat, the cold wind pasting brine to my flesh, I watched the bow rise to greet the northern horizon as my fiberglass steed violated the sea doing eighty-five knots.

I am revenge.

Cold-blooded, my back faced a searing hot wind that blasted a hole in the sea, igniting a flame as brilliant as the sun—my enemies’ ashes inhaled into the upper atmosphere.

I am destiny’s offspring.

Conceived twice; birthed once. A dual existence condemned by my genes.

Orphaned by fate. Predator by design.

Alone.

Epilogue

Another Diver Devoured by “Virgin Mary”

KEY LARGO, FL (Associated Press). Two weeks ago, scuba divers had dubbed her the “Virgin Mary of the Deep,” describing her as a black tiger shark with gray stripes, bearing an angelic face, fore-fins resembling human arms, and black animated eyes. Now they’re just calling her the Devil.

She was first sighted by divers visiting Christ of the Abyss, a two-ton, eight-foot-high bronze statue of Jesus Christ that was submerged back in 1965 in twenty-five feet of water in Key Largo’s protected Marine Sanctuary. The “Virgin” began appearing at dusk, perhaps attracted to the electrical field produced by the statue’s metal surface. Word of the mysterious creature’s presence created a surge of night dives in the area—and multiple fatalities.

The first victim was Lou Foster, a senior software developer at Studio-332. The shark-like creature targeted the silver-haired diver from a group of seventeen, repeatedly biting his neck until he was literally decapitated before horrified eyewitnesses. Two more attacks occurred over the last week—all bites to the neck.

Shark expert Dr. Sara Jernigan believes the creature’s sensory system is ultrasensitive to the beating pulse of its victim’s carotid pulse. “Obviously, we’re dealing with an undiscovered species that has adapted to the taste of human blood.”

Mary’s latest victim was Ronnie Edward Rahn of Sheffield, Illinois. Mr. Rahn was scuba diving half a mile from the statue when the shark appeared suddenly from a clump of sea grass and bit the stunned diver in his stomach. Rahn was transported to a local hospital where he remains in intensive care.

Delray Beach, Florida

I
n the end, naval authorities attributed the twelve kiloton blast to the damaged nuclear reactor of the USS
Philadelphia
—a decommissioned Los Angeles attack sub that was returning from the Persian Gulf on a covert mission. According to my friend Jesse Gordon, “covert” is government speak for “we screwed up, but since we’re in charge we don’t have to explain ourselves.”

Jesse and his father had arrived in Port Everglades at 6:56 p.m.

The Delray police arrived at Seacrest High School twenty minutes later where they freed a shivering Anya Patel, Principal Anthony Lockhart, and Rachel Solomon. The official story was that my father was delivering a sizeable ransom to the school, only my kidnappers panicked when I escaped (yes, I had been kidnapped from the Breakers Resort, not rushed to a drug rehab center as reported). The kidnappers locked up three eyewitnesses, then took the Admiral and Professor Patel to an undisclosed location where they killed them, incinerating their remains.

It was a gruesome tale, but as my friend Jesse Gordon says, “A lie remains the truth until it becomes conspiracy theory.” Regardless, I’ve been warned not to bring light to the situation on
Oprah
.

Anya and her mother moved back to London. Professor Patel, being the kind and loving man that he was, had left his wife and daughter quite a large sum of money.

Admiral Wilson, being the career military man that he was, left his fortune to the Veterans of Foreign Wars. Yours truly received his sword and a box of medals, which my grandmother and I pawned to buy me a used car.

I never told Anya about her father. I would never want any human being to feel the kind of hurt I felt in those final moments aboard the
Malchut.

Rachel informed me that the Amalek were the enemies of Moses and the Israelites. According to the Bible, King Saul was instructed to wipe out the nation of Amalek—every man, woman, and child—even the cattle. King Saul did his job, only he decided to spare the Amalek king, costing himself his own crown.

As for the Council of Amalek . . . they’re still out there, no doubt seething over the trillion dollars I cost them by preventing yet another war in the Middle East.

I’m back in school, only my crown has lost its luster. Without the injections of human growth hormone, my muscles eventually returned to semi-normal size. I’m still cut and I can still play ball, I just can’t dunk anymore—call it Asian man’s disease. But my shark DNA remains with me, and when I’m in the water . . . or when I’m in that quiet place in my mind’s eye, away from all the anger, I can still summon the predator within me—and I feel free.

I’m still not sure what my true purpose is yet, but as Rachel Solomon reminds me, God has a plan for each one of us. Sure, the unknown may be a bit scary, but we have two choices; we can either wallow in our own misery or be the cause of something far greater, creating happiness through the act of giving, sharing, loving, caring, and being generous to others.

For the record, I don’t consider myself redeemed. You don’t cleanse a tarnished soul by killing others, even if you feel they deserved it.

I guess in many ways, I’m still evolving.

—Kwan Wilson