The Danger ( PDFDrive.com )

Kaz knew a lot about sharks. Their cold black eyes, torpedolike bodies, and
gaping jaws full of razor-sharp teeth had haunted his dreams as far back as he
could remember. His phobia had been cranked higher and tighter over the years
by a personal library of books about the notorious sea predators, constantly read
and reread. Kaz knew, for example, that all sharks had to swim to survive. There
was only one exception to this rule: when an underwater vent created a stream of
bubbles that could aerate the gills of a “sleeping” shark.
There were six animals assembled along the path of bubbles, hanging
perfectly still. Five were blue sharks, ranging in length from four to seven feet. It
was the remaining one, the biggest, that drew his eyes and filled him with
unspeakable horror.
Clarence, the eighteen-foot tiger shark of local legend. Two tons of
destructive power, with a mouth large enough to swallow a fourteen-year-old
hockey player whole.
For weeks, the interns had pondered what had kept this monster in the waters
around Saint-Luc while other tigers wandered the oceans. They had questioned
what had lured it from the abundant food of the reef down to the empty depths.
At last, the mystery was revealed — this vent, this special place.
Yet there was no moment of enlightenment, no finger-snapping
understanding. Kaz realized too late that his light had been shining directly into
Clarence’s unhooded black eye. The crescent tail moved first — just a twitch.
That muscle contraction traveled all the way along the eighteen-foot body. The
head swung toward him, giving Kaz a view past the forest of serrated teeth, clear
into the predator’s cavernous gullet.
He felt his grip on reality starting to slip away. In that instant, he forgot
Marina in the one-atmosphere suit, and a billion dollars in treasure. His universe
became, quite simply, the nine feet of water separating him from his ultimate
nightmare — to be ripped apart and devoured as prey.