Chapter 18

GOBLIN RIPPED AND TORE AT THE GREENIE, shredding the strands

between his razor-sharp teeth and imagining the dogfish as his victim. But

Barkley wouldn't go straight to the Sparkle Blue. Oh, no. Goblin would

make sure his last moments alive were painful. Then he would eat every

last morsel of the ungrateful little flipper.

"I want to kill them all!" Goblin yelled loudly. Velenka's eyes seemed

to grow larger, if that were even possible. She had big eyes for a shark. It

was part of her beauty, he supposed. They were well away from anyone

who could hear, near a roaring volcanic vent, which added a constant hiss

and rumble to the water. If you weren't directly in front of the shark you

were talking to, your words were lost in the noise.

"How would that look to Kilo?" she yelled back, although not with

anger, but just to be heard over the noise. Velenka knew better. The fish he

chewed and spit out did nothing to relieve his temper and neither did the

greenie.

"I've wanted to deal with Mari and Striiker since they ran away! And

the others were feeding in my territory! My territory!" Goblin began taking

massive hunks out of a hard coral bed, destroying an entire section. He

might lose a few teeth but it made him feel better. "They'll swim free when

we leave for Tuna Run! And they deserve to swim the Sparkle Blue!" he

yelled.

"What if I could keep them from escaping?" Velenka mused. "Put them

somewhere to wait for your justice?"

Goblin stopped. "'To wait for my justice.' I like the sound of that." If

anyone could, Velenka would find some underhanded way to stop them.

This wasn't how he'd normally deal with a problem; it wasn't in his nature

to slink around like a mako, the sneakiest of sharks. He confronted

problems head-on, with a snap of his powerful jaws. But they couldn't do

that right now. Not in his shiver's weakened state. Not with Razor waiting

to attack.

"What about Gray?" he asked. "Why are you so interested in keeping

him in the shiver? He's just a pup."

"Exactly," she answered.

The vague response infuriated Goblin, but he wasn't about to let on he

was bothered. Velenka constantly spoke in riddles and double-talk, never

getting directly to the point unless forced. "So?"

"Have you been to the prehistore vault lately?" she asked.

"Not since I was a pup myself. Get on with it."

"You really should visit again," Velenka continued. "There's a legend

among the mako about a shark who will unite the shivers of the Big Blue."

"Yeah, every sharkkind has a legend where they'll be the ones to end up

on top," Goblin said dismissively. "Bunch of wishy-washy mush."

"That's mostly true," she agreed, "but in this case, you can be that

shark."

He laughed, his anger momentarily subsiding. "That's crazy talk. After

we get Razor's territory, maybe we'll conquer a few more. But the entire

Big Blue? Impossible."

"Not for a great leader such as yourself." Velenka rubbed against him

and whispered in his ear. "That is, a leader who has a megalodon in his Line

and obeying his orders."

He chuckled. "That would be nice, Velenka. Now find me one."

"I already have," she said smugly. "His name is Gray."

Goblin was thinking of tail-slapping that smug smile off her face when

he stopped cold. Velenka was right! The sameness of the teeth and the

overall shape—how had he not noticed that? Goblin himself was huge for

his kind, bigger than all but a few he'd ever met in the Big Blue. But the

prehistore skeleton in the vault was gigantic! It could finish him in two

bites, its mouth was that large. That's what Gray, the big reef shark really

was—a megalodon! And the pup didn't even know it!

"With him in the Line, you'd be invincible," the mako whispered in his

ear.

With a megalodon in his shiver—maybe as his first—Goblin would be

unbeatable.

Goblin saw Velenka smile and something struck him as little off. He

would have to swim carefully into this particular greenie.

Very carefully.