by C. W. Trisef
“Way ahead of you, bro,” Ana informed. “She unlocked the front gate and is waiting for us in the main entry.”
“Wow, you’re good,” Ret remarked.
“It’s called texting,” Ana said. “You might want to try it sometime.”
Paige welcomed the Coopers through the giant double doors. “Dad’s down in the lounge,” she told them, knowing the purpose of their visit. “I’m so glad you’re here; I hope you can help him.” Ret and Ana sensed a hint of nervousness in her voice.
Paige led them into the shadows of one of the many corridors lining the arch of the semicircular entryway. Ret paid little attention to where they were going, so swallowed up was his mind in what new information he hoped Mr. Coy had for them.
They found Mr. Coy in a most unusual setting. The lounge was quite literally a life-size billiards table. With green cloth for carpet, the floor rivaled a football field, its perimeter raised and lined with the traditional strips of rubber cushion. The balls, either striped or solid, were the size of small cars, and one enormous triangle rack hung from the ceiling, waiting for its next use. Ret peered over the edge of the massive corner pocket closest to them but steadied himself upon realizing it was bottomless.
“He’s in the cue ball,” Paige explained, pointing to the one colorless object on the table. Due to its transparency, the Coopers could see how the cue ball was actually a ball within a ball. Somewhat like an egg, its outer shell enclosed a slightly smaller chamber which had a series of wheels protruding from it. The wheels permitted the inner chamber to move independent of the shell, allowing Mr. Coy to remain upright while the cue ball was in motion.
“Dad,” Paige called out to him. “Dad!” There was no answer. “See,” Paige said in defeat to Ret and Ana. “He won’t even answer me.” Apparently oblivious to his daughter, Mr. Coy used the joystick in front of him to aim a red laser at the next ball he wanted to hit. Then he pressed a button, and the cue ball propelled itself, colliding with a striped ball and sending it into a side pocket. Mr. Coy remained emotionless.
“Sir,” Ret stepped forward, noticing Paige was at her wit’s end. He spoke loudly, unsure if Mr. Coy could hear him. “We’re wondering if you’ve learned anything more about my scars.” For several moments, there was silence as Mr. Coy continued to roam around the table. When a turn put him very near his visitors, Ret asked again, “You know—the Oracle?”
“You mean the itch I can’t reach,” Mr. Coy said at last, though in a very subdued voice.
“Um, sure,” Ret replied in confusion. An abnormal somberness had taken hold of Mr. Coy’s typically spry demeanor. His customarily quick and vivacious movements had become slow and methodical. His gaze was downcast, his face morose, and his tongue refused to speak the thoughts that seemed to occupy his mind. Only once had Ret seen Mr. Coy in such a mood: when he accidentally insulted his efforts at parenting.
“I went many places,” Mr. Coy sighed softly, sounding defeated. “I did many things.” Ret had to strain to hear his despondent whispers through the scanty air holes in the cue ball. “But I still cannot reach my meddlesome itch.” He whizzed across the table, pocketing another striped ball along the way.
Inwardly, Ret was quite displeased with Mr. Coy. After patiently waiting for three months, they were not any closer to dispelling the mystery surrounding the Oracle. A part of Ret believed he was better off alone, but the possibility that Mr. Coy had some role to play was enough to stick it out as a group, at least for now.
“Mr. Coy,” Ret shouted, knowing he could hear him, “I need you to take me to the place where Jaret disappeared.” Out of the corner of his eye, Ret saw Ana’s jaw drop, but he pretended not to see it. “I’d like to see what’s there for myself.”
Mr. Coy slowly played his way over to their side of the table again. “I agree,” he said in a hushed tone. Ret’s heart jumped for joy. “We’ll leave first thing Monday morning in the helicopter.”
“Thank you, sir,” Ret responded, trying to contain his excitement. He turned to rejoin Ana, but before they had exited the lounge, Mr. Coy called out to them.
“Mr. Cooper,” he said, “I’m glad you came by today.” Ret had never heard more sincere words from Mr. Coy’s lips. “For the first time in months, I can finally scratch.” And Mr. Coy sent himself sailing into one of the corner pockets, disappearing from sight.
When they were a safe distance away from the manor, Ana turned to Ret and exploded with questions.
“Look,” Ret said to cut off her rambling, “all I’m thinking is maybe there are some clues hiding where the ship went down.”
“But Ret, the site’s been searched a hundred times,” Ana reasoned. “Nothing was ever found. What makes you think—”
“Because maybe there’s something that only I can find—only I can understand. Remember the message on the parchment?”
Ana was speechless for the last few minutes of their trek. Ret wondered if he had her support. As they neared the kayak to take them across Tybee Creek, she finally said something: “You do realize it’ll be like pulling teeth to get Mom to come with us. You know how temperamental she is about the whole thing.”
“Then you can just stay home with her,” Ret suggested with a smile, knowing Ana would never allow such a thing.
“While you spend spring break in the Bahamas? Fat chance!”
“Thought so,” Ret remarked happily, for if he couldn’t convince Pauline of the necessity of the trip, Ana could.
* * * * *
Before they knew it, Monday morning had arrived. Fortunately, Ana had been successful in convincing her mother to join them on their adventure, which Pauline did more out of fear for her children than any other motivation.
“Welcome aboard the Coy chopper, ladies and gentlemen,” Mr. Coy announced from the cockpit, where he sat next to Ivan. “Please fasten your seatbelts as we will be on our way momentarily.” Despite Mr. Coy’s infatuation with the intercom, the passengers were willing to endure a little in-flight commentary if it meant keeping the controls in Ivan’s care. Ret was pleased to find Mr. Coy in much happier spirits than he had been at their last visit.
Upon arriving at the manor, the Coopers had been escorted to a vast hangar, which they deduced was underground thanks to the several minutes they spent making their descent in an elevator. When the elevator doors at last opened, light spilled into the darkness just long enough to illuminate their path to the helicopter, whose dim cabin light and colored exterior lights did little to penetrate the darkness. A red light on the tail flashed every few seconds, and Ret thought he saw multiple shiny objects catch its reflection deep within the hangar.
The cabin was pleasantly spacious. Two rows of seats ran parallel to one another, allowing passengers to face each other during flight. Mr. Coy was quick to point out the cabin’s airtight seal, allowing it to achieve greater altitudes and snuff out the noise of the rotors.
“Should there be a loss in cabin pressure,” Mr. Coy continued as head steward, “please hold your breath.” Pauline reacted to this directive with a moment of silent consternation.
“Fire up the engines, skipper,” Coy instructed Ivan.
“My name ith not skeepayrr.”
“Roger, Roger.”
Annoyed, Ivan set things in motion. The helicopter vibrated as the powerful rotors reached their optimum spinning speed.
“In the event of total engine failure,” said Mr. Coy nonchalantly, “please panic quietly so as not to wake other passengers who may be napping. Thank you, and enjoy the flight.”
Even though he sensed the craft had lifted off the ground, Ret had little idea where it was headed in the darkness of the hangar. Every few seconds, the chopper’s blinking lights informed Ret that they were steadily rising above the hangar’s floor. Just when he wondered if they might collide with the ceiling, Ret watched as drops of water began to appear on the cabin’s windows.
“Are we outside?” Ana asked, thoroughly confused.
Sud
denly, filtered light poured into the hangar as a huge area of the ceiling began to cave upwards, splitting into two large panels, resembling an upside-down funnel. As the panels continued to extend higher, they eventually peeked and revealed blue sky. With millions of gallons of water rushing past the helicopter on all sides, Ret realized that the panels were parting the large lagoon on the manor’s grounds.
“Tut-tut, looks like rain,” said Mr. Coy. Lightly dusted by the thick mist from the waterfalls surrounding them, the chopper rose through the conduit of the volcano-like throat until it was soaring above Little Tybee Island. Then Ivan set their course southward.
Ret was awestruck by his first known flight. Even if he had flown before he lost his memory, he didn’t see how he could forget something so thrilling. In every direction, the mighty Atlantic stretched without end, except to the west, where rows of foamy waves licked the mainland. Never did he feel so small, so helpless.
“To my right is Cape Canaveral,” Mr. Coy pointed out, as he had been doing since takeoff. “Known as Cape Kennedy from 1963 to 1973, it is separated from Merritt Island by the Banana River…”
As they made their way down the Florida panhandle, Ivan steered the helicopter in a more southeasterly direction. Though Ret absorbed every minute of the flight and its view, Ana and Paige passed the time by identifying many of the things they had learned in Mr. Quirk’s Caribbean Studies—or, rather, World Geography—class.
“…To my left is a terrific view of the Gulf Stream,” Mr. Coy observed. “This warm current flows north toward Europe where it joins the North Atlantic Drift…”
“How could anyone see a stream within the ocean?” Pauline murmured incredulously.
“Well, Mother,” Ana continued, “the waters of the Gulf Stream look swifter—more unsettled—than the rest of the ocean. Its current does move at about five to six miles per hour. At least, that’s what Quirk said.”
“…But if you think that’s hard to see, folks” Mr. Coy was heard again, “try spotting the Blake Ridge, the underwater basin we’ve been flying over since departure. Famous for its large deposits of methane hydrates, which rise through mud volcanoes on the seafloor before being released as natural gas at the surface…”
Soon, the first few islands of the Bahamas came into view.
“…Straight ahead sits Grand Bahama, the fifth largest island in the Bahamas chain,” Mr. Coy’s nonstop commentary continued. “The Spanish named the island Gran Bajamar, meaning ‘Great Shallows’…”
“What’s that?” Paige interrupted, pointing to a large shadow in the ocean, immediately off the shore of a tiny island to the west.
“Looks like a whale,” Ana guessed.
“That’s a pretty big whale,” Pauline remarked sarcastically.
“Okay,” Ana improvised, “maybe it’s a pack of whales.”
“You mean a pod?” Ret butted in. “Let me see.” He slid over to their window. As soon as Ret saw what they were looking at, he experienced an acute feeling in his hand. It was not so much a sharp pain as it was a poignant numbness, coming from the symbol of the hook and triangle on his right palm. It was as if there were two magnets under his skin, their like sides facing each other, wanting to connect but annoyingly unable to do so. When Ret looked down to inspect his hand, the sensation fled, only to return when he reaffixed his gaze on the shadow in the water. With Pauline and the girls still pressed up against the window, only Mr. Coy, who peered into the cabin at the commotion, noticed Ret’s puzzlement.
“How silly of me, maybe it’s a pod of whales,” Ana corrected herself sneeringly, “and look—it’s turning around.” Ret looked at her skeptically. “What?” she said, defending herself. “Why else would it have one curled end?” Paige and the Coopers continued to study the image, occasionally offering ideas of what it might be.
Just then, the entire helicopter shook for a moment, as if struck by some sort of tremor. No one had a chance to say anything before the chopper rattled again, this time more violently than the first. When the commotion struck a third time and persisted, Pauline yelled to the cockpit, “Is this thing safe?”
Mr. Coy whispered to Ivan, “Get us out of this, would you?”
“I vould like to, thirr,” Ivan replied, “but I am affray-ed all ov zhe eenthtrumentth arre expeeree-encing eenterrfeerrence.”
“What?” Coy asked in shock.
“And ve arre lootheeng powerr quite rrapeedly,” Ivan added. The helicopter’s lights flickered repeatedly, and at times it sounded as if the engine was giving out.
“I think we should turn around,” Pauline pled earnestly. Terror-stricken, she clung to whatever she could grab as the helicopter rocked uncontrollably.
“Take us home,” Coy instructed.
“Rright avay, thirr,” Ivan obeyed.
The helicopter continued to reel with every jolt of turbulence. Soon after Ivan turned around, however, the chaos subsided, and the chopper stabilized.
The return trip to Tybee was deathly quiet, partly because everyone was a bit shaken up by the frightening turbulence but mostly because Mr. Coy didn’t say a word. As unpleasant as his commentary had been, Ret and the others found they preferred it over the awkward silence that now engrossed their tour guide. Each of them knew a thing or two about Mr. Coy’s unpredictability, but when it turned mute, it was something altogether menacing.
“Is something wrong, Ret?” Pauline broke the silence, noticing how Ret had been caressing his hand for the last several minutes.
“Yeah,” Ret said unconvincingly, “I just had this weird feeling in my hand while we were looking at that shadow of the pod of whales—or whatever it was.” He continued to massage the scar of the hook and triangle.
“What did it feel like?” Pauline wondered. “Did it hurt? Are you feeling sick? I’m feeling a bit of motion sickness myself.” She pressed her hand against his forehead as she usually did when her children complained of feeling strange.
“No, I feel fine,” he said. “It was just in my hand, under my scar. It felt like—like something was coming together, or at least trying to—under my skin. But it didn’t.”
Unsure of how to help, Pauline simply patted Ret’s knee lovingly. Paige and Ana watched from across the aisle, their moods mellowed by the raucous flight. Ivan’s eyes remained alert behind his aviator goggles.
Meanwhile, Mr. Coy was all ears as Ret expounded on the feeling associated with his scar. Though still speechless, he wondered why his helicopter malfunctioned at precisely the same time as when Ret was struck by his sensation—all while flying over that very small island.
Back in the hangar, the tension that had prevailed in the air seemed to disperse as soon as the chopper’s skids made contact with the earth. As they exited the craft, Mr. Coy suddenly regained his voice.
“I want to thank each of you for coming, and I apologize for any discomfort you may have experienced,” Mr. Coy said sincerely, much to the shock of Paige and the Coopers. “Paige will escort you out.” He extended his arm in the direction of the elevator.
“What’s gotten into him?” Ana asked as they stepped into the elevator. Paige shrugged. Everyone agreed that Mr. Coy’s graciousness was not like him at all.
“I don’t know,” Pauline remarked, “but it’s about time.”
Once his daughter and the Coopers were out of earshot, Mr. Coy turned to Ivan and said with exhilaration, “Refuel the bird, and load the diving equipment. We’re headed back to that island tonight.” Ivan sighed, having just unbuckled his seatbelt. “Look alive, my boy!” Mr. Coy continued. “I think I’ve solved the mystery of the hook and triangle!”
CHAPTER 10
SPEAK OF THE DEVIL
“Who was that, Mom?” Ana asked from her seat at the breakfast table as Pauline came in from the porch at the conclusion of her phone call.
“Oh, just Principal Stone, honey,” answered Pauline, speaking in a finite tone of voice to discourage any further questions.
“Since when do you
and Principal Stone talk on the phone?” Ana said in surprise. “Is Ret in trouble? Am I?”
“No, no,” Pauline dismissed. “Everything’s fine, which is exactly why I’ve been checking in with your good principal every now and then: to make sure you and Ret are safe.” Ana looked at her mother disbelievingly as she sipped her orange juice. “And you are,” Pauline reaffirmed. “Now, off you go. Here comes the bus.”
But Ana wasn’t entirely convinced, and the same could be said of Ret and Paige. Despite Pauline’s reassurances, the trio employed extreme caution whenever Stone or Quirk was near. Notwithstanding their trepidation, it seemed to them as though all of Pauline’s conversations with Principal Stone were having their intended effect.
Before long, the students of Tybee High found themselves facing the bittersweet reality of final exams at the conclusion of the academic year. Ana and Paige had been studying for weeks in nervous preparation for their first round of high school finals, but Ret found it difficult to hit the books when he would much rather hit the beach. For him, the most challenging thing about school was the windows in the classrooms.
“Quirk’s final essay should be a breeze,” Ana assessed as they headed to his class on the last day of school.
“Especially since he already told us the prompt,” Paige added.
Ana sifted through her notes to read the prompt one more time: “Choose a topic about the Caribbean that means the most to you personally, and write a three- to five-page essay explaining why. Piece of cake.”
“Yeah, but I doubt Quirk will accept an essay all about Jaret’s disappearance,” Ret remarked with dissatisfaction, assuming he ought not to choose the topic that truly meant the most to him.
“You never know,” said Ana. “If you make it sentimental enough, you might just strike a nerve on Quirk’s soft side. After all, word from the teachers’ lounge is Quirk has a pink princess lunch pail.”
“I’m sure you’ll do fine, Ret, just like all the other finals so far,” Paige encouraged. “It’ll all be over soon. Oh, and guess what? My dad said he wants to celebrate the end of the school year by taking us all on a cruise!”
