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have a ‘type,’ Cynthea,” she said. “And I wouldn’t want to be anyone’s ‘type,’ either.”
    “Always the loner, eh, Nell?” Cynthea said. “You have to know what you’re looking for to find him, darling.”
    Nell looked Cynthea in the eyes. “I’ll know him when I see him.”
    “Well, maybe you’ll find a new rosebud or something to name tomorrow, eh? Give us some
drama
, if you do, Nell! Pretty please?”
    Cynthea turned and loped out the hatch.
    Nell looked back down at the plotting monitor, watching the island as it moved down in tiny steps from the top of the screen. As the sight overwhelmed her, she almost forgot to breathe.
    Captain Sol looked at Nell with fatherly affection. He placed a hand on her shoulder. “I’d say it was destiny, Nell, if I believed in that sort of thing.”
    She looked at him with bright eyes and impulsively squeezed his big, tanned hand.
    “Still no response on the emergency frequencies, Captain,” Warburton said.
    Nell traced a fingertip from their position over the blue plasma screen to the white circle above tiny white letters:
    O
Henders Is.
7:05 P.M.
    Huddled inside the cramped, equipment-filled brain center of
SeaLife
, tucked within the
Trident’s
starboard pontoon, Cynthea watched three camera feeds of Captain Sol and Glyn making the announcement to the crew after dinner.
    “Peach” McCloud sat by Cynthea, manning the editing/uplinking bay. Whatever original audio-visual equipment Peach wasborn with was buried under his hair and beard and replaced with man-made microphones, headphones, and VR goggles.
    Cynthea had worked with Peach on live MTV shows in Fort Lauderdale and on the island of Santorini. Her one stipulation when she accepted the job as
SeaLife’s
producer had been that Peach come along as her engineer. Without Peach, the job would have been unthinkable.
    Peach had agreed. He always agreed. Anywhere was his living room if he had a wireless connection. It really didn’t matter to Peach if he was on a boat weathering fifty-foot swells or in his Soho apartment. So long as his digital habitat came with him, Peach was happy.
    Cynthea spoke urgently through her headset, on a conference call to the
SeaLife
producers in New York. Peach equalized sound levels and switched shots according to the jabbing eraser-end of her pencil as she talked.
    “We
need
the segue, Jack. We’re getting it right now and can zap it to you in ten minutes. We’re landing on an unexplored island in the
Anything-Can-Happen
feed tomorrow, Fred—come on, that’s the hook! And it’s a
rescue
mission—we’re responding to a
distress
signal!”
    Cynthea gestured at Peach for confirmation, and Peach flashed ten fingers twice.
    “Peach can send it in fifteen minutes,” Cynthea lied. “Give us the satellite feed, Fred. Yes, Jack, as you’ve mentioned several times already, there’s no sex. The whole crew screwed each other in the first four weeks. All I’ve got to work with now are
scientists
, Jack, so come on—cut me some slack! How could I know the crew smuggled Ecstasy on board? Anyway, that’s a done deal, Fred, and we’re lucky we kept it off the Drudge Report, OK? Are you kidding me? You must be kidding me now. Then Barry should do a show with scientists and try to have sex in it. I fucking dare him to do it, that flaming asshole, especially while they’re
puking on each other!
If there were any Ecstasy left I would have slipped it into their green tea by now, Jack! I’m
suggesting
that we go back to the original
angle
, the science thing. Right,
adventure
,Fred, EXACTLY! Thank you! And what comes from adventure but
romance
, Jack—I swear, if this isn’t the play that saves this show, you can broadcast my execution. Didn’t have to think about that too long, eh, Fred? Well, boys, I’m glad to know the way to your heart. Don’t worry, sweetie—tomorrow we’re making
television history!”
    Cynthea squeezed Peach’s shoulder painfully. “We got it!”