I don’t know if he’s telling the truth or not, but I always fall for his distractions. As soon as he has my attention, he turns and jumps off the cliff.
I curse. ‘Oh, you little –’
Whoever jumps in first has a better chance of finding Socrates first.
I take a deep breath and leap after him.
Cliff-diving is the ultimate rush. I free-fall ten stories, wind and adrenalin screaming in my ears, then punch through the icy water.
I relish the shock to my system: the sudden cold, the sting of the brine on my cuts and scrapes. （If you don’t have cuts and scrapes as a student at HP, you haven’t been doing your combat exercises right.）
I plunge straight through a school of copper rockfish – dozens of frilly orange-and-white bruisers who look like punk-rock koi. But their tough looks are just for show, since they scatter with a massive burst of YIKES! Ten metres below me, I spot the shimmering whirlwind of Dev’s bubble trail. I follow it down.
My static apnoea record is five minutes. Obviously, I can’t hold my breath that long when I’m exerting myself, but still, this is my environment. On the surface, Dev has the advantage of strength and speed. Underwater, I’ve got the endurance and agility. At least, that’s what I tell myself.
My brother floats above the sandy seabed, his legs crossed like he’s been meditating there for hours. He’s keeping the squid behind his back, because Socrates has arrived and is nuzzling Dev’s chest as if to say, C’mon, I know what you’ve got for me.
Socrates is a gorgeous animal. And I don’t say that just because my house is Dolphin. He’s a young male bottlenose, nine feet long, with bluish-grey skin and a prominent dark streak across his dorsal fin. I know he isn’t actually smiling. His long-beaked mouth is just shaped that way. Still, I find it unbelievably cute.
Dev produces his squid. Socrates snaps it up and swallows it whole. Dev grins at me, a bubble escaping from his lips. His expression says Ha-ha, the dolphin likes me best.
I offer Socrates my squid. He’s only too happy to have seconds. He lets me scratch his head, which is as smooth and taut as a water balloon, then rub his pectoral fins. （Dolphins are suckers for pectoral-fin rubs.）
Then he does something I’m not expecting. He bucks, pushing my hand up with his rostrum in a gesture I’ve come to read as Let’s go! or Hurry! He veers and swims off, the wake from his tail buffeting my face.
I watch until he disappears into the gloom. I wait for him to circle back. He doesn’t.
I don’t understand.
Usually he doesn’t eat and run. He likes to hang out. Dolphins are naturally social. Most days, he’ll follow us to the surface and leap over our heads, or play hide-and-seek, or pepper us with squeaks and clicks that sound like questions. That’s why we call him Socrates. He never gives answers – just asks questions.
But today he seemed agitated … almost worried.
At the edge of my vision, the blue lights of the security grid stretch across the mouth of the bay – a glowing diamond pattern I’ve grown used to over the last two years. As I watch, the lights wink out, then flicker back on. I’ve never seen them do that before.
I glance at Dev. He doesn’t appear to have noticed the change in the grid. He points up. Race you.
He kicks for the surface, leaving me in a cloud of sand.
I want to stay under longer. I’m curious to see if the lights go out again, or if Socrates comes back. But my lungs are burning. Reluctantly, I follow Dev.
After I join him on the surface and catch my breath, I ask if he saw the grid flicker off.
He squints at me. ‘Are you sure you weren’t just blacking out?’
I splash his face. ‘I’m serious. We should tell somebody.’
Dev wipes the water from his eyes. He still looks sceptical.
To be honest, I’ve never understood why we have a state-of-the-art electronic underwater barrier across the mouth of the bay. I know it’s supposed to keep the sea life safe by keeping out everything else, like poachers, recreational divers and pranksters from our rival high school, Land Institute. But it seems like overkill, even for a school that produces the world’s best marine scientists and naval cadets. I don’t know exactly how the grid works. I do know it isn’t supposed to flicker, though.
Dev must see that I’m genuinely worried. ‘Fine,’ he says. ‘I’ll report it.’
‘Also, Socrates was acting weird.’
‘A dolphin acting weird. Okay, I’ll report that, too.’
‘I could do it, but, like you always say, I’m just a lowly freshman. You’re the big, powerful house captain of the Sharks, so –’