Operation M.I.A: Missing in Action (IN NEED OF REVISING)

Chapter XV

"Reasons one through eight: Octopi have a lot of legs," Mia replies.

All of a sudden, the hovercraft randomly lurches forward, and it starts having difficulty moving forward. I fly foward in my seat, and several other people standing around lose their balance.

"It's got Shanna!" Mackenzie yells in horror, pointing through the trapdoor in the hovercraft's floor that Shanna's reel line is sticking through. A quick look at one of the hovercraft's cameras confirms this for me. Two of the octopus' tentacles have grabbed ahold of Shanna.

The rope slowly starts ripping away from the reel, so Sean, Mia, Mackenzie, Avery, Heath, Luke, and Skylar grab onto it and pull on it with all their strength. Unfortunately, not even the strength of all seven of them combined is enough to keep Shanna attached to the hovercraft. The rope snaps off of the reel, and the octopus starts swimming away. The hovercraft rocks back and forth a few times before quickly straightening out again.

"Oh boy, here we go," I mumble, once again turning the hovercraft around, this time to follow the octopus. I kick the hovercraft's speed up a notch, and we quickly start gaining on the octopus.

"Sam, does the submarine mode have any good weapons we can use?" Sean asks, a look of desperation on his face.

"None of the hovercraft's normal weapons work underwater, but we do have..." I open up the hovercraft's weapon library and browse through it for anything useful. "Torpedoes?"

"Give it a shot," Heath tells me.

I let Elle take over the piloting controls and switch to the torpedo cannon. I look through the scope, aim right at the octopus' head, and fire twice. Both shots miss due to being too high.

"Man, this thing's aim is terrible," I grumble, setting up for another shot.

"Are you sure it's not your aim?" Mia yells. I ignore her and fire three more shots. All three torpedoes hit this time, and the octopus slowly begins floating down to the surface. I activate a tractor beam and fire it at Shanna, who has just been released from the tentacles. I use the tractor beam to pull her closer to the trapdoor, and then instruct her to swim to the trapdoor. When her head pops up through the small opening, Mia, Mackenzie, and Sean pulls her inside. The first thing she does is collapse on the floor.

"Thank you," she gasps. Heath takes the mask off of her and she gulps in a deep breath of fresh air. I'm about to resurface us when I notice a large shadow looming over us...

LUKE

Music: Once Again, Here Comes the Ship of Brothers from Gokujou Parodius

All of us (except for Sam and Elle, who are at the hovercraft's control panels) are currently working on comforting Shanna and getting her seated and comfortable again. Then it just randomly becomes darker inside the hovercraft. There's no indoor lighting for this submarine, so the only reason this could be is something blocking the moonlight from above us.

Sure enough, when I look up, a gigantic, dark, oval-ish shadow is present at the water's surface. Sam sends the submarine up to the surface and opens up all of the walls so we can get a better look for ourselves.

What's creating the shadow is a large, mostly black cruise ship. A steam engine on top of it sends puffs of smoke flying off into the horizon. It moves slowly, and if it weren't for the extremely dark colors, honestly could pass as a vacation cruise ship.

But given the circumstances, we know better than that. I nudge Sam and motion for him to steer us closer to the ship. When we're just a few feet away, I pull out my 3DMG+ grappling hook and fire it at the side of the ship. I then motion for Sam and Heath to come near me.