Title: A Shark Tale of a Different Kind 3/4
Author: Gail Christison
Rating: PG-15 for mild nudity, sexual references; sharks
Summary: You take Rupert with you on a shark diving expedition
Timeline: Post-Chosen. A few references to the seventh season.
Disclaimer: S'all Joss's. Just playing with Rupert for a while
Feedback: Would be lovely chriscln@iinet.net.au
Distribution: All those who have permission feel free :-) Anyone else wants it...ask and it's yours.
Author's Note: The ship is fictional though inspired by a real one. No I haven't been shark diving. Yes, I've watched way too many documentaries <g> Yes I have been diving and snorkelling and yes I've been sailing on an 81 foot ketch, and yes I know the area I'm describing ...some more, some less, but it is my home state :-)
Dedication: This is for Kim, who loves sharks and Giles...not necessarily in that order <g>
Pairing: ABH; G/OC
Dinner is late because of daylight savings, and afterward most of the passengers relax with a beer or a glass of wine and talk about the island and the seals or what they hope will happen tomorrow. The host is talking to a small group composed of crew and a few of the older male passengers, and holding them in thrall about something.
It's exceedingly peaceful out here as the sun slips below the horizon and the breeze drops on the turn of the tide, leaving a unique stillness you know you'll yearn for in weeks, months, and years to come. Rupert, too, seems to be affected by it as the two of you sit, spoon fashion, with your back leaning against Rupert's, against the mizzen mast. There's no need for conversation, nor any real desire for it. His large hand covers your folded ones and his body is warm against yours, and against the cool evening air.
It's not until you both stir, mutually ready to hit the bunks in the knowledge that you'll probably be up with sun in the morning, that Rupert looks up and draws a stunned breath. Your gaze follows his and your mouth drops open, just a little. The moonless night sky is almost painfully beautiful. You could almost reach out and touch it...myriads of glittering jewels on black velvet, all offering themselves to you...
Rupert, in endearing awe, is picking out constellations while you follow his forefinger and drink in the river of light spilled across the roof of the world. He stops for a moment when he reaches Taurus in the west. You follow his enchanted gaze and see a cluster you already know by name, but never expected to see in such splendor.
"The Pleiades," he says softly, and you can see him counting silently. "My God...fourteen at least. I've never..."
You smile slowly. You didn't think there was anything left in the world that could give Rupert such childlike delight. He looks the way the small boy he was once was, might have looked on Christmas morning...even in the reflected glow of the cabin lights.
"They're beautiful," you agree, and mean it, but you're also talking about him. In all of the time you've known him, you've struggled to get past the worn old cynic, the moments of bitterness and the endless immersion in his calling. Even in the little free time he was able to spend with you, he was always tired both in body and spirit, always at least a little 'elsewhere', even when he was doing his damnedest to make sure you knew how much he cared for you. You've never seen him like this and you like it...a lot.
He finally pulls his gaze away from the sky to turn and look at you. His eyes and his face are still glowing with pleasure. He doesn't speak, but reaches out with the unnaturally bent and scarred fingers of his left hand to touch your face.
"Why do you put up with me?" he asks.
"Why did you drag your butt half way across the world with me when you have a million other things you need to do?" you retort before you can stop yourself, but he seems to understand. You continue to stare at each other, almost as though you can't look away.
"I love you," he says finally, so softly that you barely hear him over the silence that's now screaming at you over the lapping of the water against the hull.
You freeze for a moment. Words aren't going to cover this. Instead, you put your hand over the one still resting against your cheek and lean upward, your kiss telling him how long you've loved him, how much you needed to hear those words from his lips. It's a long, long while before either of you pulls away again, but even then neither of you can bear the moment to end.
So you find yourself drawn lovingly back against Rupert's chest once more and turned so both of you are facing east. His arms are holding you snug against the, now quite chilled, night air, his breath warm on your right ear as you listen to his soft, soothing tones begin to identify more constellations, star clusters and other objects. You're fascinated, but at this point you wouldn't care if he were doing a soliloquy on cross-referencing.
You will remember this night always...
*******
Two medium-sized sharks come visiting the next day, but by the time everyone gets organized to go into the top cages, they've worried a couple of baits and dived again. Only those already in the bottom cages really get to enjoy them, and Rupert isn't qualified to go to the bottom.
Instead the two of you finally join one of the shore parties and thoroughly enjoy yourselves. The weather is holding and the sun is hot. The island has it's own unique smell, unsurprising given the amount of inhabitants, both avian and mammal. You love the seals, especially the doe-eyed pups, though Rupert is more interested in the birds, particularly the majestic sea eagles.
When you return there is excited chatter about sightings of giant stingrays, and someone who was on the bottom swears they saw the murky shape of a *big* great white at the very edge of visual range, but a crewman shakes his head.
"It's February. You don't generally see the big fellas in summer. The winter months, maybe."
Everyone is quiet for a few moments, wondering if their trip is going to be quite the *adventure* they expected it to be.
Then the murmuring starts again, and the clink of more stubbies being liberated from iceboxes as the evening wears on.
Next morning you realize the boat has moved to a new anchorage during the night. You and Rupert have discussed your plans, and made certain you will be among the first into the top cages, sharks or no.
The water is surprisingly pleasant under the hot summer sun, and you both slide into the cage without incident, though the weight you're carrying in order to stand in it is a little daunting. You content yourself at first with watching Rupert interact with the unfamiliar environment. He's told you that his previous experience with diving had to do with training for an archeological [Council] expedition, part of which was underwater, in a lake. He was twenty years younger and, well, it was a lake...with murky water and silt-covered ruins...not exactly wonderland.
He's quite obviously too entranced by the adventure to be in the least anxious about being under water, which you're pleased about. After several minutes without much of anything happening by, other than the various fish attracted by the berley and chum, you both surface again and watch out of the top of the cage. Others are doing the same in the other cages. Seabirds are wheeling overhead and making a raucous fuss about something, and a radio is playing somewhere in the bowels of the ship, a muffled, distant sound, strangely out of place.
An hour later, still nothing has happened, apart from one adventurous seal almost giving Rupert a heart attack when it popped up from beneath the cage and looked him right in the facemask. You almost choked on your regulator whilst discovering how difficult it is to roar with laugh underwater.
"I'm sorry things haven't worked out better," he offers when you surface again. "You could try for a spot in one of the bottom cages this afternoon. I thought I might try my hand at angling...and there's always Homer," he points out.
He really is a dear. You know he's not the least bit interested in fishing, but knowing him, he'd probably be just as happy up in the bow net with Homer. You murmur something about thinking about it and kiss his very cold lips, the masks you've both pushed up onto your foreheads clashing as you do.
At that point there's a major commotion and someone yelling something. You both realize after a few moments that someone is yelling about a shark and that a number of the passengers have stampeded amidships where one of the bait lines is being frantically hauled in by a crew member, the passenger who yelled dancing about in excitement as the bait is followed in by stunningly large shape. If this was a small one...
You and Rupert look at each other, then fit your masks back on, but leave the regulators for the moment, not wanting to miss anything that might happen on the surface. Cameras are clicking and flashing and the professional gentleman who joined the boat in Port Lincoln is filming the shark, which has now broken the surface and is doing its level best to wrest the bait from its line. The crew is also doing their best to encourage it to indulge in various known behaviors for the cameras. They even raise the bait, prompting it to breach in order to reach it.
Everyone is riveted by the action, so that when Rupert taps you on the shoulder as you're taking shots of your own, adrenaline shoots through you and you physically 'jump' in the water. He motions behind you. There's an impossibly large fin cutting through the water, apparently headed for the bait on the other side of your cage. You tremble with anticipation and look at Rupert, who nods. You replace your regulator and he takes your hand as you both submerge once again, letting the weight take you down.
The bait is only feet from your cage. It's all you can do to remember to breathe slowly and correctly as you wait, hoping the new arrival isn't on its way to join its companion.
And then it arrives, not charging as your nerves anticipate, even though intellectually you know better, but reconnoitering...circling...and considering. It's a stupendous size. Allowing for magnification error in the water, you're confident it would still have to be at least five meters, probably more. It's too big for this time of year, but you guess it probably fancies seal-pup s'mores as much as the next white pointer, and it is that time of year for the seal colony...
It takes you a few more minutes to remember your camera and to begin photographing everything you possibly can, framing shots with indecent haste while the great white finally decides it's going to have the morsel of bait and lunges at it. Your photos begin to take on a whole new dimension as that maw and those teeth come within inches of your lens. Your heart is hammering in your chest and part of you wishes you could see Rupert's face, but all of you that's able, is focused on the shoot, and getting as many usable shots as possible.
The shark has managed to detach the bait before the crew has realized it's there. It has chomped through the big chunk of dogtooth tuna on the line, inadvertently flicking part of the pelagic into the cage, where it's now floating between Rupert and yourself.
The great white has also noticed. At which point you discover that it's nigh on impossible to successfully focus a shot while a ton or more of shark is violently head-butting the cage you're shooting through. You persist, though, until Rupert throws an arm around your waist and braces you, so that you can shoot with your feet off the bottom of the cage as the huge leviathan circles. You wonder in passing if Rupert can feel your heart hammering through your back as the shark turns and makes another run.
As the cage swings and vibrates from the impact, you're sure he's wondering, as you are, why someone topside hasn't begun using more bait to entice the beast to perform for those on deck and in the other cages, thereby giving you a break from its attentions. As exciting as it's been, you aren't sure you your nerves can take much more of this rattling.
At exactly that moment Rupert hooks the large chunk of dead tuna and pushes it out the opposite side of the cage from where the shark is once again turning its annoyed bulk. The tidbit is sinking, and is almost gone before 'jaws' has swung back towards you.
Fortunately at that point another baited line *finally* plunges into the water and attracts its attention. You resume taking pictures and finally start to enjoy the action, until most of it shifts back to the surface when the shark is, at last, enticed right away from your cage. You motion to Rupert that you want to go up, so he moves his arm from around your waist and takes your free hand again.
Above the water you are able to watch at close quarters as the shark responds to the mild provocation of having its target reeled in, then hoisted in mid air. Being a larger specimen, you're less inclined to believe it will bother to use so much effort for one fish...not when specimens that size have been found to have thirty-one pound harbor dolphins, among other things, in their stomachs.
Both of you are taken aback when, after a lull, fully two thirds of the immense creature rises out of the water almost in slow motion, jaw gaping wide, and lunges at the offered morsel. Your camera holds ninety-nine images...and you know you're going to use every single one of them as the cage rocks from the wash of the huge bulk crashing back into the water again.
It's only when you're out of shots and the shark has gone to join its fellow in attacking yet another new bait thrown in next to one of the cages yet to see much close action, that you signal to Rupert, and both of you make your way topside.
You're still shaking when you put down the camera, remove your weight belt and tank, and unzip the top of your suit.
Rupert drops his own equipment and gloves, pulls the facemask off the top of his head, and his hood, and discards them as well. You watch him as he pulls the zipper of his wetsuit down to his waist, revealing the tawny chest hair beneath, and notice that he's not shaking, and barely breathing hard. You tease him about it.
He cocks his adorable head to one side and raises an eyebrow at you. "Ten thousand Turok Han, and you want me to be overawed by one oversized fish?"
Point taken.
You poke your tongue out at him anyway and he relents, with a crooked grin. "It was magnificent, wasn't it?"
Mollified, you smile back, nod and move close so you can play with that chest hair for a moment. "Hot shower," you tell him. "And then we'll find out how I went with the pictures. I wish I'd had more memory."
Rupert shifts a little and looks over the side of the ship. It's gone a little quiet now. The passengers who replaced you in your cage, those in the stern cage, and everyone topside, are waiting and watching...
"Apparently the action is over for the time being," he points out. "A shower would be rather good right now."
Later, with your equipment serviced and stowed, you've both decided to be helpful and save water by showering together. Not that it's exactly the most fruitful exercise. Shipboard showers aren't exactly mains pressure, nor are the cubicles very large. Still, there are other things to do at close quarters, in a shower...
Back in your cabin, Rupert pauses, black polo shirt in hand, to frown a little. "Are you going to be able to do the article with what you've already got?" he asks.
"Probably. I won't know for certain until I see the pictures. I will talk to the researcher tomorrow at breakfast. With whatever information she allows me to use, plus my personal viewpoint, I think I can come up with something. It helps that the big shark was pretty out of the ordinary for this time of year."
He raises his eyebrows and nods in agreement. "Although a visit from carcharadon megalodon might have made rather good copy," he muses, deadpan.
"If we'd had a visit from megaladon you'd be giving it indigestion right about now," you point out then grin again when you see the twinkle. "We all would be. You really have been researching, haven't you?"
"It's a fascinating subject. Dawn introduced me to the art of 'Google-ing'...and I'm afraid that for every site I found that was interesting, there were links to even more."
A tiny piece of you is disappointed that the he's finally been seduced by technology, but you're still overjoyed that he cared enough to take an interest in the first place.
As though reading your mind, he continues. "Not that I wouldn't have preferred visiting a library with a decent natural history section but I simply haven't had the time. Even the computer was a luxury I really couldn't afford. I took to eating lunch at my desk and researching at the same time. I shall probably need a new keyboard when I get back," he muses absently.
You giggle. "I'm glad you came," you tell him softly. "It wouldn't have been the same without you." While you're talking you remove the camera from its waterproof housing. When he smiles back but doesn't say anything else, you begin browsing the shots you took. Of a couple dozen you've already looked at, probably three are usable. Most of the others are fine for the hobbyist, but not publishing quality. You really were way too excited.
He realizes what you're doing and comes to sit alongside you, watching silently as the images pass by. There are at least four breath-taking underwater close ups that you can use and you all but bounce with joy at your success. You delete seven of the next twelve that aren't even worth keeping. And so it goes on, until out of ninety-nine shots you've deleted thirty-nine, discarded twenty-two as not professional quality, filed eleven seal and seal pup shots, and fifteen assorted shots of Rupert, most of which he wasn't aware of you shooting. Which leaves you with twelve beautiful shots of the great white, all bound to impress the editor for whom you're doing the article.
Rupert is standing now, and stretching his torso as he raises his arms to slide the polo shirt on and tuck it into the designer jeans you bought for his birthday in honour of that butt, while you enjoy the view. He looks wonderful...and will look even better when he's tamed his rapidly drying hair. His cheeks have colour in them...the facemask lines have finally disappeared, and he's showing signs of tanning for the first time, a beige flush to his face now, after the pink from the first couple of times in the sun. Without his ubiquitous glasses and with the worry and stress lines all but vanished, he looks fifteen years younger and as boyish as hell. Especially when he looks at you and those eyes flash as he grins mischievously.