The Lost Island

by Paul Kearney

  They trudged on through the mud, barely able to see. In the litter, Stephen lay like a waxen image, clutching his side and coughing, though the sound of his struggles was lost in the majesty of the storm.

  Willoby stopped. He was staring at his compass, but the needle was spinning like a top. Disgusted, he threw it away into the ferns.

  “Connor!” he yelled. “Check that thing of yours. Give me a bearing — I can’t see a damned thing in front of me.”

  Connor checked the detector. The green light was crawling into amber. His face fell.

  “It’s to our right a bit. We’ve come too far to the left, Go right, Captain.”

  “How far?”

  “I don’t know — a couple of kilometres maybe. It’s fading, the signal is fading. Professor, the anomaly is going to disappear!”

  That galvanised them. They began to follow Willoby at a brisk trot, and Stephen bounced up and down on the crude litter in their midst, his face a colourless rictus of pain. Brice didn’t seem much better off. Jenny had to take his unbroken arm and help him keep up with the others. He was biting his lip as he ran, and soon there was a red trickle amid the rain on his face where he had bitten it through.

  It became pitch dark, except for the concatenations of the lightning, which chopped their vision up into stuttered glimpses, as though they were looking out through an old Victorian magic lantern. The thunder rendered any communication below a shout inaudible, and more alarmingly, the rain seemed to be gathering in rivulets and streams around their feet. At times they splashed through water ankle-deep, and below it the softening earth was quickly becoming a mire.

  Cutter tripped, his left foot sucked in the muck. He went headlong, dropping his corner of the litter, and Stephen rolled out onto the ground. His mouth opened in a scream as he splashed into the mud and he lay there clutching his chest. There was blood on his lips.

  They lifted him back onto the litter, becoming slimed with mud in the process. Abby’s bright bob was smeared black all down one side.

  Then they stumbled onwards. Willoby came back down the now straggling line and grabbed Connor’s arm.

  “The detector!” he yelled in the younger man’s ear. “I can’t see where we’re going!”

  Connor fished it out. They stared at the fading light of the LED screen. Connor swung it round for a second and the signal strengthened. Then the battery finally gave way and the device went dead. Connor’s lips thinned. He stared at the thing for a second, and then hurled it out into the rain-lashed darkness.

  “What did you do that for?” Abby asked shrilly.

  “I’ll build a better one!” he snapped back.

  “Follow me — I think it helped. I think I have an idea now,” Willoby said.

  They toiled on. Once, the lightning struck the ground not ten metres in front of them, and it erupted with a burnt smell and a momentary flame, drenched out by the rain a half-second later.

  The water grew deeper around their feet. It was as though they were wading through a shallow river. It climbed to their shins, and then their calves, and below it the soft ground clutched at their boots so that every step forward was a battle to free their feet from the earth before setting them down again. They had to lift Stephen higher, to avoid dragging him through the water.

  Cutter looked around. A strange noise had begun, a kind of distant roar that hummed below the brash staccato rattles of the thunder. It was familiar. Then he remembered a dig in Kenya, at the start of the rainy season, and realised what the sound was.

  “Run!” he yelled. “Get to the high ground! Move, move, now!”

  They began a hobbled, agonising jog, which was the best they could muster in the boggy ground.

  “What is it?” Willoby demanded. “What did you see?”

  “Water,” Cutter told him. “Flash flood. It’s building up along the plain. We have to get higher!”

  Heedless of direction, they ran for the rising ground ahead, lifting the litter onto their shoulders. Cutter had never in his life before made such an agonising physical effort. But he was still able to catch the grey flash out of the corner of his eye, duller than the lightning. The ground under his feet was shaking.

  They made a final, lung-searing effort, and collapsed on a low knoll that jutted above the smooth rise of the fern prairie to the north — or they thought it was north. By now, no one had any idea which direction they were facing.

  The flood of water broke around them. It was as though a hungry sea had invaded the world and was intent on swallowing it. The torrent of brown water smashed round the hem of the knoll on which they stood, cutting them off from the high ground where Connor and Willoby had seen the anomaly.

  It caught Brice as he scrambled to keep his footing in the soft mud, and spun him round, bearing him away. Abby launched herself through the air and managed to grasp his hand, whilst Connor and Jenny hung on to her thighs. They pulled him in, the water smashing in a savage torrent around them all, and fought their way up the knoll again. Their little hill had become an island, and around it the floodwaters foamed and gibbered in a brown and white fury, whilst above them the sky was livid with lightning.

  They sat, staring dully into the rain. Once an entire tree washed past them, a straight-boled conifer, and in its branches a dinosaur the size of a turkey writhed and snapped, a tiny-headed creature with a long neck.

  Stephen was unconscious, the rain sheeting down over his white face. They had lost or cast aside the last of their belongings in their haste to clear the water, and now sat with only the clothes they stood up in, and whatever the soldiers had stowed in their webbing. Willoby, Doody and Fox still had their rifles, but all the other firearms had gone by the board except Cutter’s pistol, for which he had precisely four rounds left.

  He joined Willoby, who was sitting staring uphill, at the high ground where the anomaly had been the night before.

  “This water will go down soon — then we’ll take off again. Are you sure that’s where you saw it, Captain?”

  Willoby wiped rain out of his eyes.

  “I think so. To tell the truth, Cutter, I’m not certain. We’ve got turned around a couple of times, and compasses don’t seem to be any use in this storm.” He paused, and stared out into the lightning-shattered darkness.

  “I think we’re screwed,” he said.

  “We’re not dead yet,” Cutter said, almost angrily. But he was taken aback. He had never seen Willoby at a loss up to now, or anything other than positive.

  “The way home is up on that high ground, and we’re going to find it, Captain. Because if we don’t, we’re all dead — do you hear me? All of us. And I won’t let that happen to my team. Not to these people. We are all going home,” he said. “Do you hear me?”

  “I hear you.” Willoby smiled slightly. “I never took you for a hopeless optimist.”

  “I’m a glass half-full kind of guy,” Cutter shot back. “I just hide it well, that’s all.”

  They waited, hunkered down in the mud of the knoll while the floodwaters coursed around them. After less then a quarter of an hour, the flow began to visibly recede. Cutter stepped out into it first, finding the water up to his thighs. It was still a powerful current, but it was dwindling moment by moment.

  “Come on!” he shouted at the others. “We can do this. Grab Stephen and let’s get moving.”

  “You heard the man,” Willoby said, rising. No one else had moved. “What, do you want to lie down and die here? Get off your fat lazy arses — Sergeant Fox, get that bloody litter up on your shoulders, that’s an order. Doody, on your feet. We’re still on the clock here. You can relax in your own time.”

  The team hauled themselves upright, looking like nothing so much as a demoralised nest of half-drowned rats. They moved off into the water, which was knee deep now, and splashed their way in Cutter’s wake as he forged ahead into the storm. Willoby brought up the rear.

  They set their faces towards the high ground, and began ascending it, foot by l
abouring foot.

  TWENTY-ONE

  The storm was easing, it was definite now. Lester raised his face to the sky and actually saw a bar of sunlight strike the black rocks of the island plateau. Ahead of him, the three anomalies weren’t nearly so bright as when he had first seen them. They seemed now like candles brought into daylight, withering even as he looked.

  The French marines had taken up firing positions amid the rocks surrounding the phenomena. The Puma had made another landing now that the wind was dying down, and a full platoon of soldiers had landed, with more on their way.

  The sat-phone buzzed. Lester answered it.

  “James Lester.”

  “Report,” a voice said.

  Lester tensed. “The French have secured the sites of all four phenomena on the island. There is, as yet, no sign of our people.”

  “What’s the confirmed body count?”

  “So far, four, we think.”

  “You think?”

  “The bodies were in an advanced state of mutilation. In fact, very little was left of them at all. We know one was female, and from the uniforms at least one was from the Aoife. Forensics will be needed to give an ironclad breakdown.”

  “How many still missing?”

  “Ten. Eight of our own, and two Irish.”

  “How far up has this balloon gone so far?”

  Lester rubbed his chin. “Helicopter crash on remote island, ships sent to lend a hand with a rescue under difficult climactic circumstances. Page seven of The Times this morning I believe.” He thanked God he had called the ARC to keep himself abreast of the press reaction.

  “Next of kin?”

  “We’ll sit on that until we have a final body count.” And until we can come up with a believable story, Lester thought.

  “Good. A pity the French got involved, but there was nothing else for it. Keep me informed.”

  The line went dead.

  Lester replaced the headset in the cradle. His career wasn’t over just yet, it seemed.

  He stood looking at the anomalies, trying to put himself in Cutter’s shoes once more. What was it like over there, in that world? Was Cutter even close to finding a way back? Why did the man have to be so tire-somely unpredicable?

  If I lose that entire team, plus an SAS captain, then it really is all over, he thought. I’ll be lucky if they let me stay on to make tea.

  He made up his mind.

  If you want a job done properly...

  “Lieutenant Desaix, lend me your rifle, will you — there’s a good fellow.”

  “What do you need a rifle for? We have the whole area covered.”

  “And some of those dinky little flares, you know the type.” Lester didn’t even acknowledge the man’s question. “You snap the top off, and away they go. Come on, man, I haven’t got all day.”

  “Monsieur Lester...”

  “The rifle, Lieutenant. Ah, thank you.”

  “Do you know how to —”

  “I know which is the dangerous end, thank you. Now tell your men to stand fast.”

  With the Famas on his shoulder and a pocket-full of flares, Lester walked up to the three anomalies. His heart was thudding faster as he approached them.

  “Eenie, meenie, minie, mo,” he muttered, and then, coolly and deliberately, he walked straight into the middle one, and disappeared.

  Willoby turned around and raised the muzzle of the rifle.

  Even over the chaotic roar of the electrical storm, he was sure something had been splashing through the water behind them, but in the black and white flicker of the lightning, it was like trying to recognise someone’s face across a crowded dance floor. There was nothing there — nothing to be seen. What could be tracking them in the middle of this?

  He clicked off the safety catch, all the same.

  They were well up onto the higher ground now, and the floodwaters had been left behind. The soil underfoot was still drenched and running with rain, but it wasn’t the sucking mire it had been further below. They began to make better time.

  “The storm is passing,” Connor said. “I think the rain is easing off a little.”

  “I think you’re a born optimist, Connor,” Jenny told him. “It looks dark as pitch to me.”

  “I hope your boss knows where he’s going,” Doody said to them.

  “He always knows,” Abby retorted.

  Willoby jogged past them.

  “Fox, take rearguard.” He joined Cutter at the front of their bedraggled little column.

  “Do you know where you’re going?” he asked Cutter.

  “Everybody seems to be asking that question,” Cutter smiled. “Connor’s right, the rain is easing off.”

  “Cutter —”

  “You tell me, Willoby. Does this place look familiar?”

  “I don’t know. I can barely make out a thing in this —” His last word was drowned out by a rolling barrage of thunder.

  “With all this lightning, an anomaly isn’t going to stand out in the dark, especially if it’s fading,” Cutter said.

  “Or if it’s disappeared,” Willoby rejoined.

  “These things come and go. If it happens that —”

  There was a burst of gunfire at the rear of the party.

  “Stand-to! Enemy rear!” It was Sergeant Fox. Instantly they bunched up, facing outwards.

  “Sitrep!” Willoby bellowed.

  “There’s something out there, boss — more than one of ‘em. They’re not big, but they’re moving fast through the ferns.”

  “All right, lads. Mark your targets and conserve your ammo. Three round bursts —”

  Something leapt through the air at them, visible in snatched flashes of lightning. They caught a glimpse of a snapping, sharp, beak-like head, and then it had landed right in the midst of the party, scattering them like skittles. It reached out with a sinewed foreleg and slashed left and right. Brice was caught along his back, and he went down with a cry.

  Doody opened fire, the muzzle-flash yellow and blinding at close range. The creature squawked and bounced to its feet as though built of steel springs. It leapt at Doody and bowled him over, the rifle going off again as they rolled in the wet ferns and mud.

  Another came tearing in at them, and then another. Cutter saw one blur past him and fired four rounds in quick succession. Then the pistol clicked in his hand with the slide jammed backwards. It was empty.

  When the creature came snapping at his face, he snarled like an animal himself, and smashed the barrel of the pistol into its snout. It broke away, hopping like a monstrous magpie.

  Another came at Abby, its claws ripped through her jacket and sliced the webbing belt at her waist in half. Then it sat on top of her and cocked back its head triumphantly for the killer blow.

  Connor launched himself at it bodily, knocking it off her. He had a long knife in his hand which gleamed like a streak of silver in the lightning flashes. He locked one arm about the creature’s corded neck, and stabbed and stabbed at it with the other, screaming wordless fury. The thing thrashed in his grip, scrabbling in the mud and squealing.

  Willoby set his boot upon its neck and put a bullet in its brain.

  The creatures were leaping in and out of the party’s ranks, calling to one another in sharp barks and caws, the sound like an argument between a sea lion and a raven. Cutter bent and slid out one of the poles from Stephen’s litter, then stood over his prostrate friend and swung the heavy stick in an arc at any animal that came close, swearing, his eyes showing the whites like a horse smelling fire.

  Rifle shots here and there, in three round bursts. Fox, Willoby and Doody were firing almost blind. Two of the creatures latched onto Brice as he lay slashed and bleeding, and started to drag him away. A volley smashed through them and they hobbled off into the dark, yowling.

  “Christ, they’re everywhere,” Willoby said.

  “I can’t get a shot in, boss,” Fox shouted. “They’re too bloody fast.”

  “Back to back, and
face outwards,” Cutter told them. “Keep them at bay. If they split us up, we’ll be picked off one by one.”

  “Abby... Abby.” Connor was on his knees, lifting up her head.

  “I’m all right,” she said, running her hands up and down her torso. “Just scratched.”

  “I see something,” Jenny said. She was staring along the crest of the slope to their right. “I see a light.”

  “Lightning,” Willoby said, dismissing her. He fired off another burst, and then shouted “Magazine!” as his weapon clicked dry. He searched for another clip in his webbing.

  They came in again, three, four at a time. The soldiers fired off their weapons as the creatures leapt towards them, tracer zooming out into the storm-split dark. There were squeals of pain. Two made it through into the middle of the party. One Willoby clubbed with his rifle butt, and then Connor and Abby tackled it, Connor’s knife taking it through the eye. The other was clubbed by Cutter with his unwieldy pole, and before it could rise to its feet again Sergeant Fox smashed the stock of his rifle into its head again and again, the movements made into staccato stop-motion by the lightning flashes.

  “There’s a light!” Jenny cried. “Look will you — off to the right!”

  Breathing heavily, Cutter took a moment to stare. Out in the darkness was a pinkish gleam, guttering and flaring in the storm dark.

  “That’s not an anomaly,” he said.

  “It’s good enough for me,” Willoby said. “Let’s move. Doody, Fox, pick up Hart. Cutter, help Brice.”

  Cutter bent and examined the Irish pilot.

  “He’s dead,” he said.

  “Leave him then. Come on, people, before they come at us again!”

  Dragging Stephen in their midst, they stumbled towards the strange light like a battered group of Cro-Magnons, Cutter wielding his pole, Connor his knife, and the soldiers slotting their last full clips into their rifles. The ferns were slippery underfoot, but the rain had almost stopped. The storm was passing.

  It began to grow light again. They had almost forgotten that this was mid-morning. The storm had skewed their sense of things. They no longer cared about scientific enquiry, or national security, or even the bodies of those they had left behind. They were motivated purely by the desire to stay alive, to come through the nightmare. They laboured through the growing light of the day with murderous determination in their eyes.