The Circle

was holding the lobster over the water.
Drop it
, Mae thought to herself.
Please drop it
.
    But Georgia was holding it over the water, presumably for the benefit of Mae and her
     viewers. The shark, meanwhile, had sensed the lobster, had no doubt mapped its shape
     with whatever sensors it possessed, and was circling quicker, still obedient but at
     the end of its patience.
    “Some sharks can process the shells of crustaceans like this, some can’t,” Georgia
     said, now dangling the lobster such that its claw was lazily touching the surface.
Drop it, please
, Mae thought.
Please drop it now
.
    “So I’ll just drop this little guy into—”
    But before she could finish her sentence the shark had risen up and snatched the lobster
     from the caretaker’s hand. By the time Georgia let out a squeal and grabbed her fingers,
     as if to count them, the shark was already back in the middle of the tank, the lobster
     engulfed in its jaws, the crustacean’s white flesh spraying from the shark’s wide
     mouth.
    “Did he get you?” Mae asked.
    Georgia shook her head, holding back tears. “Almost.” She rubbed her hand as if it
     had been burned.
    The lobster had been consumed, and Mae saw something gruesome and wonderful: the lobster
     was being processed, inside the shark, in front of her, with lightning speed and incredible
     clarity. Mae saw the lobster broken into dozens, then hundreds of pieces, in the shark’s
     mouth, then saw those pieces make their way through the shark’s gullet, its stomach,
     its intestines. In minutes the lobster had been reduced to a grainy, particulate substance.
     The waste left the shark and fell like snow to the aquarium floor.
    “Looks like he’s still hungry,” Georgia said. She was atop the ladder again, but now
     with a different lucite container. While Mae had been watching the digestion of the
     lobster, Georgia had retrieved a second meal.
    “Is that what I think it is?” Mae asked.
    “This is a Pacific sea turtle,” Georgia said, holding up the container that held the
     reptile. It was about as big as Georgia’s torso, painted in a patchwork of green and
     blue and brown, a beautiful animal unable to move in the tight space. Georgia opened
     the door atone end of the container, as if inviting the turtle to exit if he so chose. He chose
     to stay where he was.
    “There’s little chance our shark has encountered one of these, given the difference
     in their habitats,” Georgia said. “This turtle would have no reason to spend time
     where Stenton’s shark dwells, and the shark surely has never seen the light-dappled
     areas where the turtles live.”
    Mae wanted to ask if Georgia were truly about to feed that turtle to the shark. Its
     eyes had beheld the predator below, and was now, with the slow energy it could harness,
     pushing its way to the back of the container. Feeding this kindly creature to the
     shark, no matter the necessity or scientific benefit, would not please many of Mae’s
     watchers. Already zings were coming through her wrist.
Please don’t kill that turtle. It looks like my granddad!
There was a second thread, though, that insisted the shark, which was not much bigger
     than the turtle, would not be able to swallow or digest the reptile, with its impenetrable
     shell. But just when Mae was about to question the imminent feeding, an AG voice came
     through Mae’s earpiece. “Hold tight. Stenton wants to see this happen.”
    In the tank, the shark was circling again, looking every bit as lean and ravenous
     as before. The lobster had been nothing to it, a meaningless snack. Now it rose closer
     to Georgia, knowing the main course was approaching.
    “Here we go,” Georgia said, and tilted the container until the turtle began sliding,
     slowly, toward the neon water, which was swirling beneath him—the shark’s turning
     had created a vortex. When the container was vertical, and the turtle’s head had cleared
     the lucite threshold, the shark could wait no longer. It rose up, grabbed theturtle’s head in its jaws, and pulled it under. And like the lobster, the turtle was
     consumed in seconds, but this time it took a shape-shifting that the crustacean hadn’t
     required. The shark seemed to unhook its jaw, doubling the size of its mouth, enabling
     it to easily subsume the whole of the turtle in one swallow. Georgia was narrating,
     saying something about how many sharks, when eating turtles, will turn their stomachs
     inside out,