Meg: Hell's Aquarium (23 page)

Banks of ultraviolet lights are aimed at areas of the tank where coral blooms have taken root. A horizontal gantry, similar to the crane at the Meg Pen, spans the width of the tank. The group follows Magued onto its ten-foot-high steel bridge.

Looking down through the crystal clear waters, David can see the large gallery window and notes how the rock formations have been strategically situated to enhance the visitor’s view.

“Gives one a different perspective, doesn’t it,” Magued says. “Each tank operates like a sophisticated, giant saltwater swimming pool. The water that fills our exhibits originates from the Persian Gulf, but it must be cleansed of all impurities, including salt, before we allow it to enter the system. The process actually begins at a desalination plant at the Persian Gulf, where salt water is filtered. The fresh water is then pumped through miles of pipe into the man-made reservoir that surrounds this complex. The reservoir serves as a backup and drainage area. Before this fresh water is used in any of our aquariums, it must be conditioned and processed.

“The first stop is a series of foam fractioners, which eliminate organic compounds like oil and protein from the water. From there, huge sand filters remove particles and provide an optimum environment for the growth of bacteria, which is used to consume the specimen’s waste products. Heat and cold exchangers regulate water temperatures, while a de-nitrication filter uses natural processes to remove ammonia from the water. Again, these animals are defecating in their habitats, so the water must be filtered twenty-four hours a day, seven days a week.

“The water then passes through an ozone contact chamber which disinfects and decolorizes, while a deairation tower agitates the water to remove excess dissolved gases. Now that the water is properly treated, we add back salt and minerals using a product called “instant ocean.” Again, the levels of minerals and salinity within each tank are regulated based upon the animal’s natural habitat.

“If you look below, you’ll see a series of large grates located throughout the tank. In addition to keeping the water filtered, balanced, and clean, we’ve installed currents within each tank. The ocean, of course, has currents, and we’ve found that aquatic animals prefer to swim with and against them. We’ve positioned them to channel the animals past our viewing gallery, which adds to the spectacle.

“Any questions? No? Then follow me, and I’ll give you a quick look at our filtration devices and current machines.”

Magued leads the group off the gantry to a filtration room.

Monty taps David on the shoulder. He points to the far end of the tank at a giant coil of steel mesh. The mesh, set in grooves situated around the deck gutters, can be unraveled from its massive spool in a manner similar to that of a baseball infield tarmac. When rolled in place, the grating will cover the entire surface of the aquarium.

“What do you suppose that’s for?”

“I imagine to keep the staff from falling in the tank. Maybe this aquarium is designated to hold one of the two Meg pups.”

“No, that would be T-2 and T-10.”

“And how would you possibly know that?” Kaylie asks, annoyed.

“Rule of thumb.”

“Excuse me?”

“You never heard of the rule of thumb? See, back in the 1400s, England ruled that a man could legally beat his woman with a stick, as long as the stick was no thicker than his thumb. Ergo, we have the rule of thumb. Not sure if the law applies to new girlfriends, but—”

“What the hell does any of this have to do with the two Meg tanks?”

“Nothing, really, except my own rule of thumb is to never make assumptions unless provided with proof positive . . . proof positive, in this case, being this diagram.” Monty unfolds a hand-written floor map of the aquarium, galleries T-2 and T-10 marked in Arabic. “See? Those words translate to
abayad akht
. . . white sister. I suspect Magued means your sharks, unless he’s having Hillary Clinton over for dinner.”

David grabs the floor plan, using his back to shield it from the others, who are filing into the filtration room. “Where did you get this?”

“It sort of fell out of our Egyptian director’s back pocket as he was bending over to tie his shoe.”

“Jesus, Monty. I hope Captain Ball-buster didn’t see you swipe this.”

“Leave him be,” Kaylie says. “He’s nothing but a common thief.”

“I resent that. There’s nothing common about me.”

“Shh. Knock it off.” David quickly examines the floor plan. “There’s something else here, marked in gallery T-1. Monty, can you read this?”

Monty squints at the hand-scrawled Arabic: “
Ar
r
n samak
. It means . . . bad fish.”

14.

Tanaka Oceanographic Institute
Monterey, California

It is after two in the morning by the time Jonas and Mac return to the Institute.

The research lab is located in the basement of the new Meg Pen wing—an air-locked chamber covering three thousand square feet, not counting its two-hundred-foot walk-in freezer. There are six work stations equipped with aluminum tables, fresh and salt water sinks, and high-speed computers, each linked to high-capacity duplex laser printers, a format plotter, slide scanner, and an image analyzer. Another work table spans the length of the entire back wall, its table top littered with beakers and test tubes, petri dishes, refrigerated centrifuges, fluorometers, spectrophotometers, pH meters, and both inverted and compound microscopes equipped with cameras and Nomarski optics.

Seated between Dr. Stelzer and Dr. Nichols along the back wall is a husky Caucasian man with brown-black hair and a matching goatee, trimmed close. He’s peering through a microscope, making notes on a legal pad.

Dr. Nichols greets Jonas and Mac as they enter the heavily air conditioned chamber. “Jonas, my sincerest condolences regarding the death of your sub pilot. If I had known—”

“Why am I here?”

“You’re here because we’ve discovered something important . . . as fascinating as it is frightening.”

Mac points. “Who’s the new guy?”

“A colleague of mine, Dr. Jesse Brown. Dr. Brown’s a forensic scientist. I hope you don’t mind me asking him here, but what we found . . . it’s way over my head. Better I let Dr. Brown explain it . . . he’s the expert.”

Jesse Brown looks up from his microscope, his glasses fogging. He wipes them, using his tie. “Dr. Taylor, heard you had a rough day. Hope I’m not adding to it.”

“I’ll let you know after I’ve heard what you have to say.”

“At the request of Dr. Nichols, I’ve spent the better part of the last six hours analyzing DNA samples taken from the Megalodon you call Angel, her deceased runt, the runt’s big sister, and the two potential fathers. Before I explain the results, it’s important that you understand the process. Essentially what we’re doing is creating a nuclear DNA profile. Be it prehistoric shark or human, each of us receives half our DNA from our mother and half from our father. This is set at conception and does not change over time, except when cancerous cells are involved. No two individuals, other than identical siblings, have the same DNA profile.

“In humans, DNA is the same throughout the body . . . be it hair roots, skin cells, or white blood cells. Reproductive cells all have the same DNA profile. We don’t use red blood cells as they don’t have a nucleus. Now, I’m not a marine biologist, nor am I a Megalodon expert, but I think it’s safe to assume that the DNA rules that apply to humans and other species also apply to your monsters.

“Forensically, we’re evaluating sixteen Short Tandem Repeats, or STRs in the nuclear DNA. STRs, are short sequences of DNA, normally two to five base pairs in length, that are repeated numerous times in a head-tail manner throughout the genome. For instance—” Dr. Brown points to his computer screen “—in this sixteen base pair sequence of ‘tagatagatagataga’ we have four head-tail copies of the tetramer ‘taga,’ a sequence that demonstrates sufficient commonality among individuals, making them—

Jonas yawns, cutting him off. “Sorry. No disrespect, but it’s late, and my brain’s not functioning well at the moment.”

“Then I’ll cut to the chase. When it comes to determining if a specific male Megalodon conceived either the dead runt or its bigger sibling, we’re pretty conservative with our cutoff, 99.9% being the minimum value for stating that the male is most likely the biological father. If it’s 99.89%, then the male is definitely
not
the father.”

“That’s pretty scary,” says Mac, stretching out on an aluminum table. “Having once been accused of fathering a child to a certain Filipino woman back in my heydays on Guam, I would have had a heart attack if you told me there was a 99.89% chance that little Rafael Herrera carried Mackreides blood.”

Dr. Brown smiles. “It may not seem like a big difference, but in the world of DNA, it’s day and night. The reality is, we share a lot of DNA with a lot of different things. Almost 60% of our DNA is shared with a bacteria. We share 98% with chimps. A recent study found we share 154 genes with mice, dogs, and, believe it or not, elephant sharks. It’s only the slightest percentile that makes us unique.”

“That’s what I told Concepción, but she wouldn’t listen. Hell, the woman had fourteen kids . . . she was playing the lottery.”

Jonas clears his throat. “Doc, the Megs?”

“Right. Let’s begin with the big sibling, Belle. My tests reveal a 99.9999% chance or higher in favor of an inclusion, meaning the big male was definitely Belle’s father. As for the runt, Angelica, the shark DNA profile is 98.7% for both the big male and the Meg you call Scarface. Absolutely no match. Zero.”

Jonas squeezes the bridge of his nose. “Which means there’s another male out there.”

“No, there’s not,” Dr. Nichols states, his eyes widening. “This is the fascinating and really scary part. Tell him, Jesse.”

“The three runts—Angelica, Mary Kate, and Ashley—were not conceived by a male Megalodon. Angel’s eggs were fertilized . . . by Angel.”

Jonas feels queasy. “You lost me. Did you just say Angel conceived the three runts herself . . . that there was no father?”

“Precisely.”

“That’s not all, J.T.,” Dr. Stelzer adds. “I checked the eggs we removed from Angelica. The runt’s eggs were fertilized as well.”

Jonas finds an empty chair and sits, his mind attempting to grasp the information at hand. “How is any of this possible? I mean, you’re looking at a guy who grew up questioning the whole immaculate conception deal with the Virgin Mary, but this?”

“Sex-free reproduction in the animal kingdom is far from unprecedented,” says Dr. Brown, defogging his glasses again with his tie. “We know of more than five hundred different species that reproduce without sex. Take the common greenfly. Every summer the females give birth to exact replicas of themselves, sex never entering the equation. Another example is the whiptail lizard, found in the southwestern United States. There are no known male whiptail lizards in existence, the species is made entirely of females that lay eggs which hatch as females genetically identical to their mother.”

“Several examples of asexual, or parthenogenesis have now been documented in sharks,” Dr. Nichols adds. “The first case was in Florida Bay a few years back when a hammerhead shark gave birth without mating. At first, scientists thought someone had dropped the pup in the tank as a hoax, but after testing its DNA they determined it was a genetic duplicate of its mother—with no paternal genes. Same thing happened with a blacktip reef shark a few years later. Man has been decimating the ocean’s shark populations . . . perhaps nature found a way to counteract some of the effects.”

“Yes, but aren’t these fatherless offspring weaker?”

“Not at all. Granted, the two siblings—Belle and Lizzy—are far bigger specimens than the three runts. But I think it’s safe to say that in years to come, the runts will grow to be just as large as their mother. After all, they are Angel’s genetic duplicate.”

“Wonderful,” Jonas whispers. “Just what we need.”

“I don’t get it,” Mac says. “Are you saying male Megs are on the outs?”

“It’s very possible. For a moment, forget the fact that sex is pleasurable and remains, at least for now, the most common way in which humans reproduce. I say most common, because there are, of course, other ways to impregnate a female, including in vitro fertilization. For now, accept the fact that sex and reproduction are two entirely different things. By definition, sex is two cells fusing to become one, while reproduction is one cell dividing to become two. When it comes down to the survival of a species, reproduction is far more important than sex.