WHILE THE AUDIENCE CLEARED from the amphitheater, a florid-faced man wearing a tie and an Ocean Kingdoms uniform hurried toward them. “Miss, I am so sorry for any inconvenience Shoru’s poor performance may have caused you. I assure you Shoru has never misbehaved in any way before. Thank goodness it was such a minor incident.” His dark eyes tried too hard to be sincere, while he downplayed the danger Gwen had just faced.
Minor incident? Inconvenience? The man made it sound as if the killer whale had done little more than splash a bit of water on her. Gwen’s weak knees seemed only now to be comprehending how close she’d come to being chomped.
“You should have seen it from where we were sitting!” Vic broke in, sounding more excited than afraid. “Sheesh, those jaws only missed you by an inch or two!”
“I apologize for your distress,” the administrator said. “Please accept our hospitality while you calm down. I’ll show you to the VIP area, where we serve our finest refreshments.” Gwen’s stomach was already queasy from all the junk food they had eaten. Another round of refreshments didn’t sound very appealing.
Uncle Cap seemed a bit jumpy. “That really won’t be necessary,” he told the administrator. His voice sounded strange and distant. “It wasn’t Shoru’s fault.” He kept glancing around, studying the last few people leaving the stands, as if expecting some new threat to leap out at them. She wondered if he had seen the creepy man, too.
“I’d rather just go home,” Gwen admitted.
“Of course, of course!” said the administrator. “But let us offer you some small tokens of our regard. Nobody should leave Ocean Kingdoms without a pleasant memory of their time here. I can authorize a free annual pass to the park, and any souvenir you would like from the shop near the park entrance.”
He bustled them out of the amphitheater to the nearby Aquatic Emporium. “Now you just look around in here, Miss. And you, too, young man. Find yourself a souvenir — as if this day wasn’t memorable enough!” He gave an unconvincing chuckle. “I’ll just run to my office to get you some releases to sign. No hurry. Take your time.”
Gwen knew the man was trying to make sure she didn’t file a lawsuit against Ocean Kingdoms. Her uncle certainly realized what the administrator was doing, but he seemed more preoccupied and unsettled than she had ever seen him. Gwen bit her lower lip. “It was an accident, wasn’t it, Uncle Cap?”
A one-of-a-kind accident… just like the mysterious car wreck that had killed her mother and father. Accident. Even the police had been baffled. Her parents’ car had fallen through a high bridge on a rugged section of the Pacific coast. They hadn’t driven off the highway, but dropped through it. Several girders and support plates had been missing — not fallen away, broken off, or cut apart. Just… missing.
Clearly troubled, her uncle shook his head.
“I thought — I thought I sensed something,” Gwen said. “I saw a strange man in a row not far behind you, and his eyes looked wrong somehow. He was watching me as if he knew something was going to happen.”
A shadow crossed Cap’s face. “We have to go home, kids. It would be best if we got away from here as soon as possible. There’s no telling …” His voice trailed off.
Vic was pawing through the sweatshirts, stuffed dolphins, plastic Shoru toys, T-shirts, and puzzles. “Just a minute, Dad. That man said we could have anything we want in here. I’ll make it quick.”
“All right, hurry up.” Uncle Cap still seemed distant, and for some reason, his gaze lingered on the five-sided medallion Gwen always wore on a leather cord around her neck. Her mother had given it to Gwen at her birth. Vic’s mother had given him one exactly like it, which he kept as a fob on his keychain.
The pendants were five-sided, paper-thin disks of iridescent metal the size of a penny, etched with a strange design of loops and angles. Fyera and Kyara had never explained the significance of the medallions, but the unusual symbols had always intrigued Gwen.
After the Lost Spring — Uncle Cap’s name for the three months following the death of Gwen’s parents and Kyara’s disappearance — her uncle had become obsessed with the exotic symbols. Giving up his tenured professorship, Dr. Pierce took a job as a curator for a local museum and spent much of his spare time researching the medallions. He scanned the symbols into his computer and ran worldwide searches for similarities, for any clue that could lead him to his missing wife. He found nothing….
Vic chose his souvenir in less than three minutes, a muscle tee tie-dyed in shades of green and blue that said:
SEA CREATURE.
SEE CREATURE SWIM.
SWIM, CREATURE, SWIM.
Still flustered by what she had been through, Gwen agonized over the selections for a full fifteen minutes, while Vic shifted from foot to foot. “Come on, Doc. I could have built a working submarine out of an oil drum and a couple of table fans by now.” He took out his frustration by scratching a mosquito bite on his arm until it bled; he asked the woman behind the counter for a bandage.
Finally, the Ocean Kingdoms administrator came back, still all smiles, with season passes, a bag of “VIP Goodies,” and — almost as an afterthought — release forms for them to sign. Gwen was astonished at how quickly Uncle Cap signed them. “Don’t worry about it.” He seemed to be brushing the man aside. “Come on, kids. We really need to get out of here.” He looked around again, very wary.
“I still need to pick something.” Gwen narrowed her choices to a baby pink camisole tee with OCEAN PRINCESS spelled out in glittery silver bubbles and a lilac hooded sweatshirt with the same design.
Vic whispered, “The sweatshirt’s more expensive. Get that.”
Hovering nearby, the Ocean Kingdoms man overheard. “Please, take them both. I insist. In fact —” He picked up a pair of zippered jackets in dark green fleece with embroidered logos and gave them to Vic and his father. “Take these, too, with our best wishes.”
After curtly thanking the man, Uncle Cap hurried them past the jostling crowds to the parking area. Vic was already making plans about the next time they could use their season passes. “I wouldn’t worry about that,” his father said. “I don’t know when we’ll be back.” He looked quickly over his shoulder, as if someone might be following them. “I’ve decided we should lay low for a while, keep out of sight. In fact, we may…” His voice caught. From his stricken expression, Gwen wondered if he was suddenly reminded of how his wife had vanished.
“Uncle Cap, what’s wrong? What are you talking about?”
Vic’s eyes were also wide. “Hey, does this have anything to do with those big crates that arrived yesterday?”
Gwen knew her uncle had been excited about the shipment — assorted chunks of exotic and expensive crystal. It didn’t seem likely he would want to pack up and drive off so soon. She wondered if the creepy man in the audience was involved somehow. A rival researcher, maybe?
“Yes, a big breakthrough … I hope. I’ll be getting you both up at three-thirty in the morning — no complaints, now. This could be the key to … well, let’s just wait and see if it works.”
“If what works?” Vic asked.
Uncle Cap’s voice was agitated. “I need you two where I can protect you. Pack an overnight bag — a change of clothes, a toothbrush, a book — I’ll take care of the rest. We’ll leave early, but I’ve got a lot of work to do before then.” Cap unlocked the car doors for them. “After what happened today, it’s more important than ever that I get everything right.”