Free The Beast of Cretacea by Todd Strasser

“You don’t want him.” She gestured to the leg braces propped against the wall.
    In the past that had been enough to end the conversation, but when the three visitors began to whisper again, Ishmael and Archie eyed each other uneasily. Then the tall, stooped man said, “What if we took them both?”
    Archie’s eyes instantly widened with hope. No one had ever suggested that before. But Ms. Hussey looked down at her tablet and shook her head. “As much as I’d love to get them both off my hands, it appears that you were fortunate to be approved for even one foster child given how small your home is. But why don’t you follow me? There are some excellent candidates in the room next door.”
    She started away, but the couple and the stocky bearded man lingered for several moments more, speaking in low voices. When they’d gone, Ishmael and Archie shared a disheartened look. Being taken together would have been a miracle, but they were old enough to know that there was no such thing.

Fifty feet away, the chase boat bounces wildly as the hump tries again and again to dive. Somehow Queequeg has managed to remain aboard and is being tossed around inside the boat like a doll. Ishmael can’t imagine how he’s able to hold on and keep from being flung off. Why doesn’t he just let go and jump overboard?
    Then Ishmael sees why: Queequeg’s not holding on — he’s being
held.
The back of his PFD is caught on something, and in the mayhem he can’t reach around to free himself.
    Flask rushes up on the wave racer with Billy riding on the back. “What in the universe is he doin’?”
    “He’s caught!” Ishmael yells from the water.
    Crack!
A plank of the chase boat’s flooring breaks off, sails into the air, and smacks down into the water near them. The hump is pulling the boat to pieces. Sooner or later it’s going to jerk down hard enough to yank the hull right off the pontoons, and when that happens, what’s left of the chase boat is going straight to the bottom — and Queequeg with it.
    A loud ripping sound fills the air as one of the pontoons tears free of the hull. The chase boat cants to one side, and Queequeg is slammed silly.
    “Can’t we do something?” Ishmael shouts at Flask.
    “Like what?” the third mate yells back.
    Ishmael doesn’t have an answer, but he’s not going to bob around and watch his friend perish. His fear of drowning momentarily forgotten, he begins mimicking the movements of Fedallah swimming. He lacks the grace of the older sailor, and the PFD slows his progress, but even so, he’s able to propel himself forward.
    “Stop!” Flask shouts. “You’ll get yerself killed!”
    Ishmael ignores him.
    “Come back! That’s an order!”
    As Ishmael splashes closer to the chase boat, a burnt-chemical smell hits his nose and the water’s surface becomes oily. The chase boat is being pummeled so violently that it’s spilling lubricants.
    Strangely, when he’s about ten feet away, everything goes still. The remains of the chase boat float peacefully, and Ishmael can see that this would be the perfect moment for Queequeg to free himself. But his friend hangs limp and stunned, thanks to the beating he’s taken.
    Ishmael splashes closer. Five feet away . . . three feet . . . He can almost reach out and touch Queequeg.
    “Get back!” Flask bellows behind him. “It’s breaching!”
    Ishmael doesn’t know what “breaching” means, but there’s no retreating now. He’s reached Queequeg. A loop of fabric on the back of his friend’s PFD is caught on the float hook.
    “Ishmael, it’s going to surface!” shouts Gwen.
    Deep below them, a dark spot is rapidly growing larger.
    “W-watch out!” Billy shouts from the back of the wave racer.
    The water around the chase boat begins to roil. Ishmael gropes for his knife.
    “Leave him!” Flask shouts.
    Ishmael reaches up and slices through the fabric loop — just as something slams into them from below.

In the morning, the couple