Perfect instructions for a Shark.

Two more attackers are just climbing over the rail. Gem makes them pay for their late arrival by shooting both of them center mass. They topple backward, flickering like defective Christmas lights until they hit the water. Maybe their wetsuits will keep them afloat. Maybe they’ll come to before they drown. At the moment, that’s not my biggest concern.

Dru Cardenas shoots another intruder. Unfortunately, the electricity also arcs to Nelinha, who had been in the process of pummeling said intruder with a socket wrench. Both of them go down.

Five enemies left, scuffling with about ten of our crew who happened to be on deck at the time. Why would they attack us with so few? And where is Dr. Hewett? He hasn’t yet followed us out from the bridge. Just as I was starting to believe he might not be a traitor, my trust pendulum swings back toward extreme doubt.

I can’t tell much about our attackers. Dive masks and full hoods obscure their faces. Nevertheless, the Land Institute insignia is clearly emblazoned on the breast of each wetsuit: an old-fashioned harpoon in silver, its rope making a circle around the letters LI.

Our attackers must be upperclassmen—they look taller and older than us, but not like adults. Land Institute surely has faculty trained in combat, armed security, adult alumni. If catching us is so important, why are they sending students? And as nasty as those harpoon guns look, they don’t appear designed to kill. After destroying our entire school, why hesitate to use lethal force?

I wonder if this could be a ruse…some sort of training exercise. No. The destruction of HP was real enough.

But this whole thing smells fishy….

My hands are sweaty on the stock of the Leyden gun. I can’t get a clear shot. After what happened to Nelinha, I’m not going to fire randomly into the crowd with a weapon I don’t fully understand.

One attacker shoots Meadow Newman point-blank with a mini-harpoon Leyden pistol. She falls, electric sparks popping around her. Ester gets revenge by body-slamming the guy—Ester is an excellent defensive lineman—and the attacker goes down flailing. Top joins the party, clamping his jaws around the guy’s throat, which is absolutely a form of emotional support. If not for the strange bulletproof fabric of the dive hood, the guy would be Top’s lunch. As it is, he crab-walks backward, screaming and trying to shake off the furious twenty-pound fluff demon attached to his windpipe.

This is too easy, I mutter to myself, though I doubt my unconscious classmates would agree. Six are now out of commission, some bleeding from nasty harpoon barbs.

Still, I feel like I’m missing something….

Perhaps Land Institute wasn’t expecting opposition. After destroying our school, maybe they thought they’d find a bunch of terrified freshmen who would plead for their lives. The four remaining attackers are holding their own, kicking, jabbing, using their greater size and strength, but it’s only a matter of time before we overwhelm them. Gem, Dru, and Kiya keep their guns trained on the chaos, though I can tell from their postures even they are starting to relax. They think we’ve almost won.