Digging his paddle in, Austin was preparing for a sprint to the finish when he noticed a flicker of movement out of the corner of his eye. He turned to his right and saw a tall curved fin cutting through the water in his direction. As he watched, at least twenty more fins popped up behind the first one.
Puget Sound was home to several pods of orcas, who fed on salmon. They had become local mascots, and a big boom to the economy, attracting tourists from all over the world who flocked to Seattle to come out on whale-watch boats or take part in kayak adventures. The killer whales would come right up to the kayaks and often put on a show, breaching partially or jumping clear out of the water. Typically, the orcas would glide harmlessly past, often within a few feet of a kayak, without disturbing it.
When the first fin was about fifty feet away, the orca stood on its tail. Nearly half its twenty-five-foot length was out of the water. Austin stopped paddling to watch. He had seen the maneuver performed before, but it was still an awesome sight. The whale inspecting him was a big bull, probably the leader of the pack, and must have weighed at least seven tons. Moisture glistened on its sleek, black-and-white body.
The whale splashed back into the water, and the fin again moved rapidly in his direction. He expected from experience that at the last second the orca would duck under the kayak. But when it was only a few feet away, the whale again reared up and opened its mouth. The rows of razor-sharp teeth set in the pink mouth were close enough to touch. Austin stared in disbelief. It was as if a beloved circus clown had morphed into a monster. The jaws began to close. Austin jammed the wooden paddle into the creature's maw. There was a loud snap as the teeth closed on the paddle.
The whale's massive body came down on the front part of the thirty-five-pound kayak and smashed it to splinters. Austin went into the cold water. He sank for a second, then bobbed to the surface, buoyed by his personal flotation device. He spit out a mouthful of water and spun around. To his relief, the fin was moving away from him.
The pod of whales was between Austin and a nearby island. Rather than head in that direction, he began to swim farther out into the bay. After a few strokes, he stopped swimming and rolled onto his back. The chill that danced along his spine was not caused by the cold water alone.
A phalanx of fins was chasing after him. He kicked his water shoes off and slipped out of his cumbersome flotation vest. He knew that the gesture was a futile one. Even without his vest, he would have needed an outboard motor strapped to his back to outrun an orca. Killer whales can swim at speeds up to thirty miles per hour.
Austin had faced many human adversaries with an icy coolness, but this was different. He was driven by the primeval horror his Stone Age ancestors must have experienced: the fear of being eaten. As the whales neared, he could hear the soft watery sound they made as air was expelled through their blowholes.
Souf-souf.
Just as he expected sharp teeth to sink into his flesh, the chorus of steamy exhalations was drowned out by the roar of powerful engines. Through water-blurred eyes, he saw sun reflecting off a boat's hull. Hands reached down to grab his arms. His knees banged painfully against the hard, plastic side of the boat, and he flopped onto the deck like a landed fish.
A man was bending over him. "Are you okay?"
Austin gulped in a lungful of air and thanked the unknown Samaritan for his help.
"What's going on?" the man said.
"A whale attacked me."
"That's impossible," the man said. "They're like big, friendly dogs."
"Tell that to the whales."
Austin scrambled to his feet. He was on a well-appointed powerboat around thirty feet long. The man who had pulled him from the water had a shaved bald head with a spider tattoo on the scalp. His eyes were hidden behind sunglasses with reflective blue lenses, and he wore black jeans and a black leather jacket.
Set into the deck behind the man was a strange, cone-shaped, metal framework about six feet high. Thick electrical cables sprouted from the framework like vines. Austin stared at the weird construction for a second, but he was more interested in what was happening out on the water.
The pod of orcas that had chased him like a pack of hungry sea wolves was swinging away from the boat and was now headed toward the other kayakers. A few people had seen Austin go over, but they had not been close enough to witness the attack. With Austin gone, the racers were in a state of confusion. Some continued to paddle slowly. Most had simply stopped dead in the water, where they sat like rubber ducks in a bathtub.
The orcas were closing in fast on the bewildered racers. Even more frightening, other pods of whales had appeared around the kayak flotilla and were gathering around for the kill. The racers were unaware of the sharp-toothed danger headed their way. Many of them had paddled the sound and knew that the orcas were harmless.
Austin grabbed the boat's steering wheel. "Hope you don't mind," he said as he punched up the throttle.
The man's reply was lost in the roar of twin outboard motors. The boat quickly got up on plane. Austin pointed the bow at the narrowing gap between the kayakers and the moving fins. He hoped that the noise of the engines and hull would disrupt the orcas. His heart sank when the whales split into two groups and went around him, still intent on their targets. He knew orcas communicated with each other to coordinate their attacks. Within seconds, the pod hit the kayak fleet like a spread of torpedoes. They rammed the light boats with their huge bodies. Several kayaks went over and their passengers were thrown into the water.
Austin slowed the boat's speed and steered between the bobbing heads of children and their parents and the knifelike orca fins. The White Lightninghad moved closer to some capsized kayaks, but the situation was too chaotic for it to be of any help. Austin saw one of the tallest fins bearing down on a man who was floating in the water holding his young daughter in his arms. Austin would have to run over the other kayakers to get to them. He turned to the boat's owner.
"Do you have a rifle speargun on board?"
The bald man was fiddling frantically with an instrument box that was connected to the framework by a cable. He looked up from what he was doing and shook his head.
"It's okay," he said. "Look!" He pointed toward the mass of overturned kayaks.
The big fin had stopped moving. It remained stationary, playfully wobbling in place, only feet from the man and his daughter. Then it began to move awayfrom the broken kayaks and their hapless paddlers.
The other fins followed. The surrounding pods that had been closing in broke off their attack and meandered back into the open waters. The big bull breached in a high, playful leap. Within minutes, none of the orcas was in sight.
A young boy had become separated from his parent. His flotation vest must have been donned improperly, because his head was slipping below the surface. Austin climbed up on the gunwale and launched his body into the air. He hit the water in a shallow racing dive and stroked his way to the boy. He reached him just before he went under.