Seven Wonders Book 1: The Colossus Rises by Peter Lerangis

said, flipping onto my back as I grabbed Cass’s hand.
    “Aly…” he moaned. “She…”
    “Marco has her!” I said.
    Cass was trying to shout something, but I couldn’t understand him.
    “I’m here!” Marco cried out in the darkness. “Follow my voice! Let’s swim to shore!”
    “Where is it?” I yelled.
    “ I don’t know! ”
    In that moment, I knew we were dead. Left, right, forward, back—it all looked exactly the same. Marco was guessing where to go, towing Aly. And he was almost out of my sight. I was an okay swimmer but not great, and I’d swallowed a ton of seawater.
    Lightning split the sky, followed almost immediately by thunder. It was getting closer. I hoped the wash of light would reveal some sign of land, but all I could see were rain and whitecaps.
    Cass’s grip was getting firmer. He groaned. “ Treat…ment …”
    “What?” I shot back.
    “Aly…” he said. “Missed her…treatment…”
    I realized what he meant. Aly wasn’t seasick. Something else was wrong. Her illness was all about her treatment. The one she had blown off.
    My hands plunged into the weed-choked water. I tried to measure my strokes, to conserve energy. But my fingers were weakening, and Cass slipped away. I saw in an instant that he didn’t know how to swim. He was slapping the water crazily, choking.
    “Going…to die…” he said.
    My lungs were filling up. My body felt as if it were full of solid lead. I reached desperately for Cass’s wrist and held tight.
    His leg swung around and kicked up from underneath.
    No. It couldn’t have been his leg. Something else was down there, thick and smooth, pushing up against my own feet. It was lifting me. Lifting Cass.
    His hand unclasped. We were both sliding now, off to one side.
    Shark .
    I tried to swim away, but my strength was gone. The beast broke the surface of the water, its skin black against the storm. It was too big for a shark. Enormous. It must have been a whale, like the one that washed ashore. I felt around desperately for Cass.
    He was barely afloat. All I could see were the whites of his frightened eyes.
    “ Swim! ” I yelled. “Move your legs and arms! Come on!”
    “No,” he shot back. “Jack, look—lights!”
    I turned toward the undersea intruder. Its shadow was now a solid hull, its skin gleaming metal. At one end a light blinked on a small rectangular housing. As it rose, I could see shapes painted on its hull.
    The letters K and I . And, between them, a star.
    “She had about another half hour to live, even in the best of circumstances,” Professor Bhegad announced as he emerged from a hatch in the submarine’s control room. “The doctor has managed to stabilize her. She is undergoing the treatment and will continue when we dock.” He stepped into the small room and eyed us meaningfully. “Without any trickery, I trust.”
    “Thank you,” I said, shivering.
    Despite the tropical climate, our body temperatures had dropped while we were in the stormy sea. I was wet and shivering beneath an oversized KI beach towel. I sat opposite Cass and Marco on wooden benches, our knees touching. The submarine was small and cramped, but the dryness felt unbelievably good. My arms shaking, I sipped a cup of hot chocolate.
    “This is my fault, P. Beg—I mean, Professor,” Marco said. “I did all the planning, organized the breakout all by myself—”
    “You are an extraordinary athlete, Marco, not an actor,” Professor Bhegad said. He was sitting next to me, his face drawn and grim. “You do not need to cover for your friends. It is enough that I found you all alive.”
    I glared at him. Was this another of his planned rescues, like the Miracle of the Monkey? It wasn’t supposed to happen that way. Aly had rigged the surveillance system. He couldn’t have seen us. “Just how did you find us?” I asked.
    “Why did I have to find you?” he snapped back at me. “Do you understand the absolute folly of what you just attempted? And the