Leaning against his car next to the dangling side view mirror that Moni’s psychotic ex had smashed, he watched the red hue of the sun climbing over the horizon to signal the start of morning. The crimson light scattered across the healthy waters of the Indian River Lagoon along the Atlantic Marine Research Institute’s headquarters in Fort Pierce. Aaron wondered what awaited him underneath the waters further north.
The answer made the bacteria that he had dreaded earlier seem like bath oil by comparison. After a late night of research, he and Professor Swartzman had confirmed the presence of nano-cyborgs in an infected rat—just like the Lagoon Watcher had described. They were herding the bacteria and calling the shots in the animal’s brain. They must have ordered the rat to stop breathing, because it suffocated to death once they started messing with its tiny masters. About a minute after the host died, they disappeared.
Following that, Swartzman doused the whole lab with sterilizer and made everyone shower off.
The close encounter thrilled the scientists, but it didn’t sway Sneed or Brigadier General Colon. They didn’t believe something so small could mastermind the wave of attacks. So Aaron and his professor set out to prove the second part of the Lagoon Watcher’s story—the “colony” in the deepest part of the lagoon. If they put photos in their hands, they couldn’t deny that the source of the problem lies below the water, rather than above it.
It bummed out Aaron that he hadn’t told Moni a word of this. He figured that she needed some time with Mariella after rescuing her. That served as a convenient excuse. How could he tell Moni that the girl she loved probably had microscopic cyborgs inside her? She cared about the girl so much, that she would never forgive him if he broke the news that severed their bond, he thought. What’s the urgency? It’s not like Mariella has endangered anybody.
After making sure that Swartzman hadn’t arrived yet, Aaron took out his cell phone and dialed her up. He couldn’t tell her everything, but she still needed his support after nearly losing Mariella for the second time in two days.
“Hello.” Moni answered the phone as if she didn’t recognize his number.
“Hey there. Sorry to wake you.” Aaron stopped himself. He heard a humming engine on the other line. “Okay, scratch that. Sorry to disturb your absurdly early morning drive. What has you hopping to it at the crack of dawn?”
He waited for her to take an easy shot at him by asking why he was up before noon. “There’s somewhere I need to go,” said Moni, who must have left her wit at home.
“Yeah, that’s usually why people drive,” he replied. “So how is Mariella?”
“Uh, Mariella.” She stumbled over her words as if she were coming out of a trance. “She’s right here. Don’t worry about her. I’ll make sure she’s safe.”
That didn’t exactly answer his question. If she didn’t feel like telling him, then he better not freak her out by pressing her. What set off even more of his alarm buzzers was that she didn’t have any questions for him, such as: “Have you found Mrs. Mint in the forest?” or “How’d your interrogation of the Lagoon Watcher go?”
He should tell her anyway, Aaron thought. The woman is in shock. He promised himself that he’d go directly to Moni after he captured some photos of the monstrosity in the lagoon and showed them to the authorities. Until then, he could only drop on his knees and pray that she keeps out of the fray.
“I think you know by now that Mariella isn’t safe yet. None of us are,” Aaron said. “Jailing the Lagoon Watcher hasn’t ended this. So whatever you do, keep a close eye on Mariella. Make sure she doesn’t act, you know, strange.” As if she had ever acted normal, he thought. “And don’t go near the lagoon. The stuff in there is nastier than we thought.”
“That’s good advice. You should follow it too… Please.”
Aaron glanced at the full body wetsuit in his back seat and then replied, “You got it.”
“Good,” she said with a sigh. “I’m sure we’ll have a lot to talk about later. See ya.”
She hung up before he got out a goodbye.
* * * *
Around the time they crossed the Sebastian Inlet marking the ocean’s final lifeline into the lagoon, Aaron wished he had followed Moni’s advice. He had expected the smell, even though it reeked worse than ever, but something about the channel of water made him feel as if a spider had crawled up his neck. He didn’t see any fish splashing, and the only birds that approached the lagoon flew like drunks. Not only were they the only craft on the water, no one who lived along the lagoon dared venture into their backyards or leave their windows open. Some of the houses looked abandoned. In some cases, the backyards had been ransacked, with the fences, piers and anything with iron or fuel stripped away.
His fluttering stomach pleaded with him to turn the boat around. The little baddies in the lagoon had killed cops and firefighters; a surfing student wouldn’t stand much of a chance. Of course, none of them had known the source of what they were up against—not that Aaron had any idea how he could take advantage of that knowledge.
But who would step up if he chickened out? Aaron didn’t know another jabroni stupid enough to dive into the heart of the toxic lagoon, and photo the tiny terrors in their nest.
As Aaron adjusted the hood on his wetsuit, Professor Swartzman undid a button on the collar of his polo shirt to air out his hairy chest on this already-steamy morning. The professor had swimming trunks on, just in case, and they had a spare wetsuit in the skiff’s trunk, but Aaron knew that he wouldn’t jump into the water if he could help it. Seeing those bizarre life forms in the rat last night had left Swartzman speechless. The way he freaked out when they left their dead host, Aaron figured his professor wouldn’t even let his toes got wet.
Aaron didn’t have an opt-out card, but he was cool with it. Since he started at the institute, Swartzman had always invited other students on his missions—sometimes going back to them twice—before getting around to Aaron. He never got the prime slots for dolphin study, or the week-long jaunts in the Caribbean. That’s why he got stuck on sea turtle duty. This time, the professor invited Aaron, and didn’t bother with anyone else. It could have been that Swartzman finally had confidence in his totally awesome scientific skills but Aaron didn’t get caught up in that delusion. Even if the professor had invited the other students, only Aaron had the balls to jump into the lagoon with the invaders.
If I pull this off, I won’t be a last resort any more. I’ll be a first-teamer. When my dad asks me why he’s paying my tuition, I’ll show him my name on a published research paper and make him eat it.
“Make sure that your wetsuit covers your entire body. I mean 100 percent,” Professor Swartzman said as he studied the water rushing by the skiff while they pressed on northward. Instead of its usual soupy dark green, the lagoon had grown yellowish and what resembled a yellow fog swirled through the water. “You don’t want those unclassified organisms getting in there.”
He didn’t use the word “unclassified” very often. The man had a biology encyclopedia lodged in his brain,but no one had a better name for those things besides the Lagoon Watcher’s “cyborgs” comparison.
When he strapped his wetsuit hood tightly against his scuba mask, Aaron figured that the body invaders wouldn’t get him. He worried more about their big, toothy friends.
“I’ll be as dry as a nun’s cooter in this suit,” Aaron said. “And if anybody tries unwrapping me, I got something for them.” He patted his speargun. Aaron had fooled around with it on his own and nabbed a catfish, but Swartzman hadn’t let him officially take one on the water until now.
“If you need any backup, I’ve got this.” Swartzman pointed to the rifle strapped to the side of the skiff. Aaron doubted his professor had actually fired one of those before. If he did, the kickback might throw his putty-strength body overboard.
“You sure you can handle that bad boy?”
“Well…” The professor pushed his sunglasses further up his nose. “I didn’t think you could handle t
hese missions at first. The dean initially forced me to take you along so you wouldn’t flunk. And go figure, you’re the most valuable student we have when it comes to the most important investigation in the institute’s history. If a lollygagger like you can pick up this job so quickly, an old man losing his sea legs can fire a gun when he has to.”
The smile stuck on Aaron’s face until they passed beneath the Eau Gallie Causeway. A few minutes later, the professor cut the motor and the skiff drifted to a stop. The time had come.
Aaron made sure his scuba mask was air tight, and then slipped on his flippers. He tethered the speargun, and the underwater camera to his belt. Then he took few deep breaths of the concentrated oxygen in his tank.
Having finished his mental checklist, and passed the professor’s inspection, Aaron sat on the edge of the skiff with his flippers dangling just above the yellowish water. Before every other dive in his life, Aaron hadn’t hesitated for a second at that point. Back then, he couldn’t wait until he dove underwater, and soared through the blue overtop gardens of coral or sea grass. This time, Aaron choked. The blood vessels in his head swelled and pulsated. He had a feeling that something lived down there that he wasn’t meant to see.
He had no idea what the Lagoon Watcher had meant by a “colony” in the depths of the channel. Trainer hadn’t explained how he had found it, or whether he had gone down there himself or simply lowered a camera. Aaron would have preferred the latter option, but the professor said it wouldn’t work. The last time a research mission tried that in an infected section of the lagoon, the rope came up sans camera.
That story didn’t make Aaron feel any better about his chances.
“Are you feeling okay?” Swartzman asked.
“I’m fine,” replied Aaron, who noted that he didn’t ask him whether he still wanted to go through with this. Despite his nerves, Aaron was glad he didn’t ask. Moni needs this. She won’t be safe, and Mariella won’t be cured until he flushes the cyborgs back to wherever the hell they came from.
“Keep a sharp eye out up here, prof,” Aaron said. “I’ll be back in a jiff.”
He popped his mouthpiece in, and dropped into the lagoon. Immediately, he found that the changes on the surface were nothing compared to what had occurred below. Instead of sea grass, and a sandy bottom, he found the underside of the lagoon lined with what resembled blurry, yellow stained glass. When he brushed his gloved hand against it, it didn’t give. He smacked it harder. The smooth surface didn’t vibrate. He noticed the sand shifting beneath the glass. He wished he could sample that dirt. If he could, Aaron would bet his left nut that it contained a ton of sulfur and iron.
Aaron snapped a few photos of the strange lagoon bed. He knew that wasn’t the main attraction, though. For that, he skimmed along a foot off the bottom until he came to a slope where the lagoon floor descended from a depth of seven feet down to twelve feet. Without following the slope down, Aaron couldn’t see far enough through the hazy yellow water to view the bottom of the channel.
His skull rattled, as if the jet engine of a 747 roared a foot from his head and his teeth trembled. Even though he didn’t feel any change in the water, Aaron thrashed his arms and legs and frantically backed away from the edge of the channel. Quickly regaining his senses, he remembered that struggling would use up his oxygen faster. He steadied himself. Aaron let his heart and breathing rates ease. The racket in his head faded into silence. He stared at the hazy channel and treaded water.
Aaron remembered his father’s words when he made him try out for little league. He had earned a starting spot with solid play in practice, but he had struck out in all three at bats in his first game and quit. His father had told him, “Sure, you stick with it when it’s going your way, but you always give up when things get hard. If you don’t suck it up, and go back out there, you’ll never learn how to pick yourself up.”
Aaron realized that he never did learn. When school got tough for him—usually socially more than academically—he bailed and hit the beach. Even with how much he impressed his friends surfing, he never entered the competitions. Now a real risk awaited him, and he had the most meaningful relationship of his life on the line.
Everything in Moni’s life rested on this investigation. There in front of him, awaited the answer. Hovering a foot off the bottom of the lagoon, Aaron floated halfway above the revelation and halfway to surfacing with his life. He could leave. He could trek across the beachside with his surfboard under his arm, and ignore the nightmare unfolding in the lagoon. But he couldn’t forget Moni. If he didn’t uncover this, he might lose her to the cyborgs inside Mariella, or worse.
That made it worth stepping into the batter’s box—even if he struck out or got beaned in the head by a pitch.
Aaron paddled down the slope into the channel. By the time the bottom flatted out, he recognized something gigantic in front of him. Its bulky gray hide spanned six feet high. It was so long that he couldn’t see its end in either direction. It reminded him of a giant worm resting in the middle of the channel, but this worm was anything but round.
When he aimed his camera’s light and snapped a photo, Aaron saw an outboard motor embedded halfway into the mound of flesh. Its propeller still turned, even though he couldn’t spot a fuel source. Along the bottom, where the thing’s fatty rolls swelled over the exposed sand, he saw more than a dozen exhaust pipes. Few of them matched. He figured that they had been swiped from various cars and trucks.
Swimming around the expansive collection of biomass and spare parts, Aaron captured photos of wires, transmission lines and even a shovel all trapped in its flesh like flies in ointment. It didn’t merely collect metal and tools. Aaron found several sets of gills, but they weren’t breathing the water. They were sealed closed as if the thing were holding its breath.
Aaron understood how the Lagoon Watcher had seen this from above and thought of it as a colony. It reminded him of a Portuguese Man O' War, where four separate organisms work together, and function as one animal. Except, this giant worm stayed true to the nature of its tiny cyborgs masters, and invited metal and machinery into the mix.
Before he finished contemplating why it would do this, Aaron spotted something up ahead. It protruded from the flesh wall like an oversized door knob. He didn’t dare touch it. Aaron shined the camera’s light ahead, and froze... He immediately recognized that face. He had seen it in the photo during the search mission the day before. That was Robin Mint—Mariella’s teacher.
Even seeing her eyes shut, he recognized those puffy cheeks, and her perm of brown hair swaying in the water. She didn’t breathe, which made sense because she didn’t have a neck. Her skin shone as pale as a corpse’s. Her lips were more than closed. They were curled inward and cinched between her teeth. It reminded him of a gargoyle head affixed to a gothic castle.
Mariella had been the last person with Mrs. Mint. No, he could no longer call Mariella a person. The microscopic cyborgs wanted the teacher for their colony and Mariella must have delivered her to them. Aaron searched for another explanation. Maybe the infected creatures caught the teacher while Mariella escaped. But that didn’t make sense. If Mariella hadn’t been infected, then she must have been their top target judging by how many times they had come after her. There’s no way she could have escaped all those times. Yet, with Mariella playing on the lagoon’s team, that means all those times it appeared the gators and snakes wanted her, they were really after the people around her.
Aaron recalled how close that snake in Moni’s house had come to biting him. He thought he had pushed Mariella out of the way, and saved her. It turns out, she had baited him. He wondered how many other people she had lured in so their heads and organs could get stuffed into her microscopic masters’ giant stocking.
With a photo of this as evidence, Sneed and Colon would finally see the real source of the bloodshed. The detective would find all the missing heads here. Aaron had no doubt that the general’s bombs had been deposited into the colony
as well. He supposed he could swim until he found the explosives wired into the fleshy warehouse, but Aaron would rather take his chances with the heads.
Aaron focused the camera on Mrs. Mint’s captive head and snapped her final photo. He doubted that this one would make the school yearbook. A moment after the flash faded, another light beamed through the water. The purple glow shined from the sockets of the teacher’s eyes. Even without pupils, they gazed upon Aaron. He paddled in reverse. He wasn’t fast enough. A ghostly pale hand pierced through the wormy flesh and seized hold of Aaron’s ankle.
Chapter 40
When the pale hand burst from the fleshy wall and caught his ankle, Aaron nearly spit out his mouthpiece. He was damn lucky that he didn’t, because the dolphin head that followed it out of the colony opened its beak and, from in between its unnaturally sharp teeth, it spewed purple mist.
Aaron sucked his mouthpiece tight against his face as the tiny beads of purple splattered across his scuba mask. The droplets that struck his mask less than an inch from his eyes didn’t look more threatening than grape juice, but he had a hunch that if he could get them under a microscope, he’d see something similar to the little beasties he saw last night inside the possessed rat.
My suit is air tight. One-hundred-percent waterproof. It better fucking be.
The suit wouldn’t stave off the microscopic army for much longer with the mutated dolphin tugging at his ankle. Despite his strongest paddling toward the surface, it yanked him down and chomped on him with its jaws. He braced for a bone-shattering impact that would leave an open wound for the microscopic predators’ invasion. The dolphin shredded his flipper. His suit and skin stayed intact. But it didn’t let him go. Through the purple light cast by the eyes of Mrs. Mint’s mounted head, Aaron saw the mutated dolphin squeeze completely free of the sticky colony wall. It trapped his leg against its belly. Two elongated jaws filled with knife-edge teeth and a purple tongue snapped up to devour his face. He met it with a speargun shot that blasted through the roof of the creature’s jaw. Its head recoiled and left Aaron in one piece. Yet, the grubby bastard wouldn’t let his ankle go. He smacked its arm with the butt of his speargun. The water slowed his swings and let the creature regain its grip after each strike.
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