Jack couldn't stop grinning. He twisted his body in a tight corkscrew avoiding the sharp sides of a rock half covered by the sea of kelp around him. This was awesome! He glanced down at the readout on the speeding dive engine he held onto. The goggles he wore pulled light out of nowhere as far as he could tell. He could see around him like he was in the middle of a high level game. The motor he was strapped to skidded through the heavy pressure water like it was butter. He didn't know how fast he was going but he felt like it was faster than Superman lassoing a comet.
The goggles were some sort of sonar computer reconstruction something or other. The dive motor looked like standard diving equipment in a heavy triangular wedge. Hiro had tried to explain to him how it worked. He didn't care as long as it got him to Mac in record time. His elation at speeding through the water faded. He checked the readout on the engine. He saw the tiniest figure lit up. He ducked under something floating and twisted aiming for it.
They were on a countdown. The Pod wouldn't be keeping air for much longer, and Mac would be dead soon if he didn't get air. Jack shrugged his shoulder to make sure the small bag attached to it was still there. He let out a steady breath of relief feeling it bump against his back.
His relief evaporated when he looked up. He could see Mac clearly on the readout now, and he could read something large swimming around him in lazy circles. Jack had no idea what kind of monster lived in the hell of this depth, but he knew the fins from years of watching Shark Week. Oh hell no! Jack growled. He kicked his feet as if that could make him go faster. He squinted through the goggles. Unfortunately, they didn't focus like his eyes would. As he got closer he could see the size of the thing. It bucked its toothy snout up and nudged Mac as if making sure he was dead-or smelling his blood.
"Shit." Jack growled. He pulled closer to the thick steel of the engine and set himself. Without slowing he adjusted his heading and aimed directly for the middle of the fish. The giant creature was in its element. It thrashed away before Jack could touch it. Jack slowed the motor and drifted to Mac. He turned the motor off when he felt his partner's body in his hands.
Jack hoped the picture coming in the goggles wasn't what Mac looked like in reality. He looked pale like a dead fish. Jack rolled Mac over and pulled out the small cartridge.
"Ok, turn knob...open hatch…" Jack mumbled directions Hiro had taught him. He could feel the buzz under his hand as the tiny motor clicked into place and started working. Jack made sure the hatch was closed. He rolled Mac back over. The glass on his face shield was starting to fog. Jack let out a sigh of relief. The environmental controls or whatever were working again. Jack jumped when he felt a large something bump his leg. He forced himself to remain still. A fin brushed his arm as the shark passed under him.
Jack frowned studying his environment. They had to scoot fast back to the Pod, but the second he started the engine Ol' Toothy down there would be on them. Sharks are drawn to agitation in the water and his rocket suit definitely counted. Jack waited until the big fish wandered away then ducked. Using the strap from the bag, he tied Mac to the engine. He floated behind his partner and put his hands on the handlebars keeping his arms under Mac's armpits. He circled his legs around Mac's legs pulling them in. Not ideal, but it would have to do. Making sure Toothy wasn't anywhere around, Jack spun them back the way he'd come and gunned it. He grunted when Mac's body slipped back and the kid's head thumped into his chest. He had a moment of panic. In a normal suit that would have broken something, maybe on the suit absolutely on him. He would have a hell of a bruise, but otherwise everything seemed ok. He shifted and locked his legs around Mac tighter. He had a harder time seeing around Mac's head so he kept low.
The wall of kelp he slid through was worse than any forest or jungle he'd had to run through. He shivered. It was a dark and creepy alien wood. Fish would flash across his goggles. Luckily most of them had faster reflexes than he did and were gone before he could blink. Jack spit when a thick green blade slapped into his helmet. He chided himself when he remembered he was seeing a reproduction of his environment. He'd forgotten he wore a helmet.
In other circumstances, Jack would have enjoyed seeing the weird creatures in this weird world. They were all floaty and glowing. Lots of jellyfish. Something that looked like a goldfish poked out in front of him. The tiny dangler was replaced by a fish as big as his arm with teeth to match.
"Son of a bitch!" Jack growled doing a barrel roll through a school of jellies-were a big bunch of jellyfish still a school? Jack gasped as a giant shadow exploded from the tall green around them. A giant mouth snapped over the fish. Jack gulped and dove deeper. He swore he could feel the huge shadow follow him. He glanced over his shoulder. Sure enough Toothy grinned at him as the fish sliced through the water in dogged pursuit. Great.
Jack turned forward in time to have a Jelly Fish splatter across his helmet. Jack squinted back spitting it out only to remember again that he had a helmet on. The guts of the jelly blocked part of his screen. Almost a third of his left side was smeary. He could only see blurry shadows whiz by. Jack ignored it. He'd landed a Herc by dead-stick. How hard can navigating a kelp forest be?
Jack hissed as he glanced back. The fucking shark was catching up! How fast could these things swim? Jack knew going through the kelp had to be slowing them down. He gritted his teeth and angled up. He winced and swerved as he almost ran into an overhang. Jack blinked in surprise. They were near a coral bed cliff face. Were they lost? Jack bit his lip thinking over the maps he'd seen inside the Pod. He smiled as an idea blossomed. They were near the radioactive cave. Jack glanced around him but didn't see Toothy anywhere, yet. He knew better than to think he'd given the monster the slip. When had their luck ever been that good? Well, ok, there was Madagascar…
Jack slowed the motor. The cave should be right about...Jack turned off the motor and skidded into the cavern. It was smaller than it looked on the radar...sonar...whatever the fuck-adar. He let the motor hang by its strapped and pulled him and Mac into the cave. He glanced behind him in time to see a large shadow zip past the entrance. Jack let out a breath. He didn't think the shark could fit into the cave, but he wasn't sure. Now what. Think, think, think. What would Mac do? Jack held Mac around the chest as he slowly circled the cave looking for something, anything to help them.
Jack froze when he felt a thump behind him. He whirled to find himself facing the familiar triple circles of a radiation warning sign. Shit. He was going to be glowing brighter than these fucking fish! Jack frowned realizing something was wrong. The barrel was tipped on the bottom edge of its cover. Jack put out a hand and the barrel went flying with a light tap.
"What the hell?" The others also moved with the slightest touch. He leaned closer and studied the barrels. They were fakes. Empty fakes. He frowned trying to figure out what that meant. He shook his head. Something was going on. The SEALs, Mitch O'Donnell who knew him while the SEAL commander didn't, Jem's betrayal-Jack grimaced. It stank to high heaven like a typical CIA clusterfuck. Jack decided it didn't matter. He saw movement out of the corner of his left eye. He turned to face it. He couldn't see anything out of his clearer side, but he could feel the giant menace circling out there. He and Mac were probably the biggest pieces Toothy had ever had on his menu.
"No way, Toothy, I'm to gristly and Mac...well, he's to stringy…" Jack grunted. Now he was talking to himself. Or worse a giant shark that was lurking just out of sight waiting. Jack bumped into the barrels. An idea came to him. He turned to tap a hand on the thing. Plastic and hollow. He pushed into the middle of the three barrels. A strap was holding them down. Jack unbuckled it and unwrapped them. The barrels slowly floated from their mooring like balloons let go. He wondered what they were made of to keep them from caving in like a crushed can. Jack paused to sling Mac up higher. The answer was obvious even as the question occurred to him. Jem. Only the Pod knew how to make this mesh stuff. Jack heard a loud boom and the barrels slammed into him. He could see a dim flash that vanished just as quickly. Another explosion. Jack grunted. He didn't have time for this. He let go of the diving engine and bobbed the barrels ahead of them. They barely squeezed through the cavern entrance.
Jack approached it his palm sweating and his heart pounding. He had a mental image of Toothy sitting there grinning with a giant fork and knife in his fin and a bib around his neck. Jack pulled his imagination back in. He swore and eased past the cavern a little. Fantastic no carnivore ready to pick their bones. Jack let out a breath and spun. He tied the barrels together and pulled out the environmental motor he'd taken from Mac's suit. He flicked the test switch and smiled as it began to buzz. He tied that to the barrels. He kicked them away from the stone. They caught in the backwash of the latest explosion and bobbed in the water away from him and Mac. Jack held onto Mac and floated unmoving. He closed his eyes and held his breath when he saw a fin carving through the kelp forest a few yards away. He felt the swish of water. Jack didn't know if he actually heard it, but he swore the sharg growled as it swam in dogged pursuit of the barrels. Jack waited until Toothy and his new toys were out of sight then turned on the motor and sped toward the Pod, or what was left of it, MacGyver in tow.