Chapter 10

It was a great day to be on a boat. The weather was great and the water was calmer than usual. Chuck stood on the deck of the Bloated Shark looking out at the horizon. Having grown up on an island, he knew for a fact that he wouldn’t get seasick. Most people who were raised on the islands spent a lot of time around the water. They surfed, boated, or swam. Chuck had done all three while growing up.

So far, the trip had been rather boring. They had pulled out of port early that morning and spent four hours heading towards a spot known for having a lot of sharks. They had stopped thirty minutes earlier and had been floating there moving with the current.

He was now waiting and wondering what was going to happen next. Beside him were Tim and Andy, two of the regular crew members. He had been introduced to them, but his relationship to Betsy hadn’t been explicitly stated. The two guys assumed that he was just another crew member.

He spent the time while they were drifting talking to the two guys. He liked Tim. Tim was married and talked almost nonstop about his family. He didn’t like Andy. Andy was from Australia, and talked almost nonstop about women.

Betsy had been busy in the lab, getting ready to tag some sharks. She had prepared three plastic trays, each loaded with a transmitter, a sample syringe, and a measuring tape. Each item was in a tray that was marked with a common identifier, to prevent confusion as to which sample belonged to which shark.

Betsy appeared on the deck and shouted, “It’s show time.”

Chuck turned to look at his girlfriend. She was standing there wearing a tee shirt and shorts. Her long hair was loose, and hung behind her. He had been expecting to see her in a swimsuit.

Andy handed him a bucket while saying, “Dump this in the water. We need to chum the water, to attract the sharks.”

Holding his head as far from the bucket as possible, Chuck looked at the smelly mess not even wanting to know what was inside. He knew that it would draw every shark within miles, to the boat. He went to the side of the boat and dumped the contents of the bucket into the water. He turned to find another bucket being thrust into his hands. He dumped the contents of that one into the water.

Two buckets of chum later, he looked across the surface of the ocean. He could see fins cutting through the water.

He shouted, “Sharks!”

Betsy smiled and said, “Good.”

He turned to look at her. She was busy stripping out of her clothes. He watched, unable to believe that she would strip like that in front of three men. He was looking around for a towel to cover her. When she was naked, she put on the rebreather and checked to ensure it was functioning. She leaned down, grabbed a transmitter and a large plastic syringe from the plastic tub, and then jumped into the water.

“Don’t!” he shouted.

Tim said, “She’s swimming with the sharks, dude. Now we have to wait for her to toss up the syringe.”

“She’s going to get killed,” Chuck said, looking in horror at the spot where she had jumped into the water.

Tim said, “No, dude. She’s cool.”

Chuck leaned over the side. The sharks were moving around in an agitated manner. They were in a frenzy from the smell of blood that permeated the water. He was sure that any second now her blood would be joining that which he had dumped overboard.

He caught a glimpse of her swimming past. There was a shark that was at least three feet longer than she was, swimming right next to her. It had a tooth filled mouth large enough to swallow a cow in four bites! They were right in the middle of the blood filled water!

Even more sharks were gathering around the boat. Chuck was terrified that he was going to watch her get swallowed, whole. He looked up and spotted at a fin cutting through the water. It was headed directly at the boat. The fin belonged to a monster shark!

“Look at that shark!” Chuck shouted.

“That’s a big one,” Andy said.

Stepping back from the side of the boat, Tim said, “I hope it doesn’t ram us.”

The shark veered off at the last second, and took one of the fish heads floating in the water. Betsy was right there with it. He couldn’t see what she did, but the next thing he saw was that the transmitter was attached to the fin of the shark. A few seconds later, the syringe flew through the air and landed on the deck.

“Get that syringe!” Andy shouted.

Chuck went over and picked it up. It was filled with bits of flesh and fluid. He saw Tim throw a yellow thing into the water.

“What was that?”

“Tape measure,” Tim answered. “She’s got to measure it.”

Chuck rushed back to the side of the boat. He looked over the edge in time to see the monster shark make another pass by the boat. Betsy was in front of it. She disappeared from sight. Convinced that she had gotten swallowed whole, he stood there paralyzed. Then, a second later, she reappeared.

It seemed to him that time was not running correctly. It was running fast and slow at the same time. He couldn’t tell how much time actually passed while she swam with the monster shark. He did notice that Andy occasionally added more chum to the water, to keep the sharks around the boat.

The tape measure flew through the air and landed on the deck. Confused, Chuck looked at the measuring tape wondering why she had thrown it back on the boat. He didn’t realize that she had physically marked the measurements on the tape. It was also a way for her to let the crew know that she was going to tag another shark.

Tim shouted, “She’s finished measuring it and is going after another one. Get the next kit.”

Andy grabbed a transmitter and a syringe out of the second plastic tub. He went over to the side of the boat. He waited for Betsy to make another pass and then then tossed the two items into the water several feet ahead of her. She grabbed the items when she swam past where he had thrown them.

Still unable to believe what his eyes were telling him, Chuck watched her swim through the shark infested waters. She was moving beside a smaller shark; although ‘small’ was just a relative term he used, when comparing size to the monster that she had been with earlier. When they next passed by, where he was watching, a transmitter had been attached to the shark. He had no idea when she had managed to do it. A second later, the second syringe landed on the deck. He scrambled after it. He turned back to watch the deckhand leaning over the edge of the boat watching the water.

Andy shouted, “She’s coming aboard.”

Betsy climbed up the back of the boat. She was grinning from ear to ear. Excitedly, she said, “Did you see that shark?”

“Yes,” Chuck said although he felt she should used the plural because there were a lot of sharks there.

“He was a male, at eleven feet and ten inches.”

Weakly, Chuck said, “Great.”

“I bet he weighed a thousand pounds,” Betsy said.

Betsy shrugged off the rebreather and went over to where her clothes were on the deck. She calmly got dressed. Chuck was fluttering around, holding the two syringes, not quite sure what he was supposed to be doing. This whole thing had totally freaked him out. He wondered how many guys could claim that their girlfriend swam with man eating sharks. He figured it was a pretty small number.

Betsy grabbed the samples from his hands and said, “I’ve got to get up to the lab and record my measurements. I’ll be back in an hour.”

“Sure,” Chuck said.

She rushed over to the ladder and made her way to the second deck.

Andy came over to where Chuck was standing.

He said, “She’s a trip, isn’t she? First time she stripped, I cracked a fat. Then I saw her jump into the chum filled water, with all of those sharks, and I nearly shit my strides.”

“What did you say?”

Tim said, “Speak English, Andy.”

“You mean, ‘American’?”

“Right.”

“I said that the first time she stripped, I got an erection. When she jumped in the water I nearly shit my britches.”

“I had about the same reaction,” Chuck said.

“Let me warn you, though. You’ve got to keep your hands off of her. According to Captain Jack, she’s more dangerous than those sharks, and won’t take kindly to any kind of mistreatment,” Tim said.

Andy said, “I read a bunch of articles about her. She’s not someone to mess around with.”

“Thanks for the warning,” Chuck said.

Tim said, “I’ve been on a couple of trips with her. She’s the nicest person you’d ever want to meet. Just be cool around her.”

“I will.”

Andy said, “We better clean up the deck. Captain Jack likes a clean boat.”

Tim said, “Dinner will be in half an hour.”

“Dinner?” Chuck asked.

“It’s nearly seven,” Tim answered.

“That means she was in the water for almost six hours,” Chuck said doing the math in his head.

“That’s right.”

“It sure didn’t seem like it,” Chuck said unable to believe that much time had passed.

To him it felt like only minutes had passed rather than hours. He would admit that it felt like time was playing tricks on him. Physically, he felt the passage of time. He was stiff and sore from the tension he’d been under.

The sudden vibrations of the motors running let him know that Captain Jack was moving the boat.

“What’s happening?” Chuck asked.

“Captain Jack likes to move away from the sharks after Betsy’s done with them. We’ve got to spray any and all blood off of the deck, and squeegee it down. If we don’t waste any time, it won’t take long. Tim will be in the galley making supper while we’re working.”

Chuck shrugged his shoulders. Andy handed him a squeegee with a long handle. The next thing he knew, Andy was spraying the deck. He followed behind, pushing water over the side of the boat with the squeegee. It didn’t take long at all to clean up the deck.

Chuck followed Andy up the stairs to the second deck. He entered the recreation area and was hit with the odor of fish cooking. His stomach growled at the smell, letting him know that he was hungry.

Tim stuck his head out from the galley and shouted, “Dinner in five minutes.”

Chuck said, “I’ll get Betsy.”

Andy said, “Take it easy around her. She’s dangerous.”

“You’ve told me that before,” Chuck said wondering what they had been told that would make them so cautious around Betsy.

He walked into the laboratory where Betsy was busy at work. He watched her for a minute. She was dressed in her tee shirt and shorts, both a little damp from having been put on while she was wet. Her long hair was still wet but held back now with a ribbon.

He said, “Dinner’s ready.”

Without looking up from what she was doing, she said, “Great. I’m starving.”

“I thought you might be,” Chuck said with a smile.

Betsy looked over at him. He had kind of a waxen appearance with a troubled expression on his face. She had been afraid that watching her with the sharks, might have been a little too much for him.