Fragment

12:01 P.M.

A sliver of shimmering light appeared on the horizon, and then the guano-crowned cliff began to rise from the ocean like a snow-capped ridge.

Nell and the others gathered on the mezzanine deck to watch the island as it was raised.

“What a wall!” exclaimed Dante De Santos. The muscular twenty-three-year-old cook’s assistant had Maori-style tattoos on his tanned arms, and jet-black hair combed back from a pugnacious face and tiger-opal eyes.

Nell remembered that he was an amateur rock climber who had been itching to pull out his gear and give it some use.

“I could make that ascent, no problem, if we can’t find a way to land, man!” he bragged. “Remember to tell the captain for me if we can’t get ashore, OK, Nell?”

She smiled. “OK, Dante.”

Nell watched the wide wall of Henders Island rise more than twice the height of the Statue of Liberty from the horizon. The monolithic palisade seemed so lonely out here in the middle of nowhere, where so few had ever set eyes upon it. She was reminded, with a pang of uneasiness, how very far away they were from everything.

Revving boat engines echoed off the rock face of a cove as four Zodiacs raced toward a crescent beach.

Two 150-horsepower Evinrude outboards powered the large Zodiac that took the lead with Jesse at the rudder. Jesse’s passengers feared for their lives: Nell and Glyn clung to the edge rail as the inflatable jumped the breakers, its dual engines whining as they launched from each crest.

The cliff around the cove rose seven hundred feet straight up, swirled with faded bands of color like pigments in an overturned bucket of paint. Centered in the cliff, a dark crack had spewed broken rock over the beach down to the water. Judging from the fresh red and green color of the rubble, the crevasse had opened fairly recently.

Washed aground on this outpouring of jagged rock, the hull of a thirty-foot sailboat lay on her side like a swollen whale carcass.

“That crack looks new,” Glyn shouted.

Nell nodded, grinning. “It may give us a way inland.”

The Trident rolled on swells in the cove, anchored to one of the few submarine ledges their sonar had picked up around the island. They had nearly circumnavigated the entire island before locating this inlet, which they could have found in a few minutes had they circled in the other direction.

Now they had no time for setup. They had to dive into the boats and go live.

Peach got the camera feeds up as he counted down to the satellite uplink in the control room.

The three cameramen marked Peach’s countdown in their headsets aboard the speeding rafts. They carried waterproof videocams and backpack transmitters with a thousand-meter range.

Cynthea looked from the stern of the Trident and fired off orders to her camera crew. “OK, this goddamn island has a beach after all, and we’re in at 5:49, Fred! We’re going hot right now! Peach, tell me you’re on top of the uplink!”

“TWO-ONE-ZERO. I’m there, we’re live,” Peach said, cuing Zero’s feed first.

Cynthea ran down a passageway belowdeck, toward the control room in the starboard pontoon. “Glyn! Glyn? Can you hear me, Glyn?”

Glyn wore a wireless earmuff transmitter on his right ear and carried the SeaLife flag at the prow of the Zodiac. The British biologist sported an orange SeaLife T-shirt, shorts, and Nikes, the last thing Nell thought she’d ever see on him. “Yes, Cynthea,” Glyn said. “I hear you!”

Nell could hear Cynthea shouting through Glyn’s earphone: “Plant the flag on the beach!”

Nell grinned with excitement as she gripped the edge rail of the speeding boat and scanned the beach. The adrenaline pumping through her veins made her want to leap out of the boat and fly to the shore.

Cynthea crashed through the door into the control room, where three camera shots zoomed toward the shore in the bank of monitors above Peach’s head.

The small Zodiac landed first. Zero and Copepod jumped out into the surf. Copepod barked excitedly and darted up the beach. Zero sidestepped out of the water to cover the other Zodiacs landing.

The rest of the crew watched intently from the decks of the Trident.

Andy ran to the ship’s rail in striped pajamas. “I can’t believe they didn’t WAKE ME UP!” he yelled. “They give me the night watch and then they don’t wake me up? God damn it, I’m tired of getting SCREWED all the time!”

Andy turned to see a camera recording the moment and noticed some of the uniformed crew laughing nearby. “Screw you!” he screamed.

Cynthea cut back to Glyn planting the SeaLife flag in the sand.

“I claim this island for SeaLife!” Glyn cried.

Fans cheered in their living rooms and dorm rooms across the globe; Glyn had just become an instant star.

The network chiefs smiled, and for the first time in a month leaned back in relief as they watched their screens.

Millions went “Ooo!” as Cynthea caught Dawn flashing a look at Glyn and Nell squinting at Dawn.

Cynthea winked at Peach.

He nodded. “Drama.”