by Steve Alten
"I understand, but—"
"But nothin'. Grab yer sign an' come join us before the cameras get here."
"I can't. Sorry."
"Sorry? You'll be the one that's sorry when we lose oor upland areas. Hey—"
Waving her off, I circled the construction fence, hoping to get a glimpse inside. Building a large-scale hydroelectric scheme so close to Loch Ness must have required a detailed environmental assessment, but then how does one properly access the ecological impact on an undiscovered water creature?
With no foreman visible and no way in, I headed back down the road toward Loch Ness, not sure what to do with this potentially new piece of the puzzle.
Foyers, Loch Ness
The town of Foyers lies a third of the way up Loch Ness on its eastern shore. While the beginnings of the village can be traced to an inn, built back in 1655 at a time when Cromwell's troops occupied Inverness, it was not until the late 1800s that the North British Aluminum Company put Foyers on the map. For years the aluminum mills dominated the industry, until a drastic drop in the price of the metal, combined with Kinlochleven's easier access to the open sea forced the townspeople to refocus Foyers primary source of commerce. The answer lay in the village's abundant and varied sources of water, which included lochs, streams, and the River Foyers, which plunged a spectacular 140-foot chasm into Loch Ness. In their search for a suitable source of power for a new Highlands hydroelectric plant, British engineers quickly targeted Foyers Falls. Work began in 1969 with the construction of a two-and-a-half-mile-long pressurized tunnel connecting Loch Mhor to Loch Ness …
"… this major undertakin' allowin' the turbines, erected in the auld aluminum plant we're now passin', tae reverse the flow o' water back tae Loch Mhor at night when demand wis easier tae calculate, keepin' the head water supplied at all times."
The tour guide paused as the open-air bus rolled to a stop and belched exhaust in front of the old smelting plant.
Twenty-four-year-old Justin Wagner fought to conceal his yawn from the tour guide, then nudged his childhood friend, Amber Korpela. "We've seen the falls, let's skip the rest of the tour and go boating."
"Not yet. I want to see Boleskin House. The original owner was supposed to be heavy into devil worship. Did you know that after he died, Jimmy Paige bought the house and—"
"Amber, who cares? I didn't fly all the way from Alaska to see some stupid house. Let's grab a few more rolls of film, rent a boat, and do some serious monster sighting."
Taking Amber by the hand, Justin dragged her past the tour guide and off the bus. "Sorry, dude, Nessie calls."
Twenty minutes later, the two Alaskans were hiking down a wooded hillside path through lower Foyers, heading for Loch Ness.
Glen Doe Forest
With the sun beginning to set, I found my way to a small clearing in the thick of the forest, adjacent to a twisting creek that drained into Loch Ness. Whoever had occupied the campsite last had used dead branches to fashioned a lean-to, no doubt to keep out of the rain. Exhausted and hungry, I slid my backpack off, then set off to gather wood for a fire.
After finishing a less-than-appetizing can of green pea soup, I set my tent up beneath the lean-to. A heavy forest separated my campsite from the waters of Loch Ness, which loomed a good hundred yards down sloping woods to the west. With darkness settling on the Great Glen, I began feeling a bit uneasy, my thoughts lingering on True's warning. Like it or not, I was vulnerable, and I seriously considered spending the night in the lower branches of a tree. But the likelihood of being attacked so far from the water's edge was considerably less than falling out of a tree and breaking my neck, so I opted for a weapon.
Using my hunting knife, I fashioned several four-foot-long spears out of tree branches before my eyes grew too weary to focus. Stoking the fire one last time, I crawled into my sleeping bag, and spent the next few hours drifting in and out of a restless sleep.
Foyers, Loch Ness
The motorized raft, commonly known as a Zodiac, spewed oily fumes as it cut an erratic course through darkness and mist.
Justin Wagner tried to quell the hot waves of frustration coursing through his blood. Four hours earlier, he and Amber Korpela had rented the watercraft, guiding it across Loch Ness to its western shores. They had journeyed as far south as Cherry Island, enjoying a sun-soaked summer evening exploring the man-made crannog before embarking on the long ride back. But with their reserve tank of gasoline running low and dusk coming quickly, Justin had decided to save time and distance by taking a northeasterly shortcut across the Loch.
That was over an hour ago.
Justin, an accomplished boater back in Alaska, had not counted on the sun disappearing so suddenly behind the mountains, nor had he planned on the bank of fog moving in from the east.
The whine of the Zodiac's single-prop sixty horsepower engine, combined with her companion's constant course changes, had given Amber Korpela a pounding headache. "Okay, Magellan, enough's enough. Where the hell are we?"
"Somewhere in the middle of Loch Ness… I think."
"No shit. Don't you have a compass?"
"What makes you think I'd have a compass?"
"I don't know. I guess I didn't expect you to be stupid enough to get us lost on Loch Ness."
"You want to take the tiller, be my guest."
"Instead of zigzagging back and forth, why don't you just keep us pointed in one direction until we hit land?"
"Land? Can you see land in this fog? What if we're pointing north? We could cover twenty miles before we hit—"
"Shh! I think I hear something."
"Yeah, my stomach growling."
"No, I'm serious. It sounds like people's voices. Justin, cut the engine."
Justin turned off the motor. The raft rose and dropped beneath its own swell, then continued drifting forward. "You're crazy, I don't hear a thing."
"Shh. Listen."
Justin listened, then he heard it… splashing sounds, followed by strange whimpers, coming toward them from their right. "Sounds almost like a baby crying."
Amber leaned out over the bow. "Oh my God, look! It's a deer… no, it's a herd of deer."
Justin moved next to her as the heads and slender necks of a half dozen Sika deer appeared out of the fog. "Excellent. The deer know their way, we'll just follow them in to shore. Told you I'd get us back to Foyers."
"How do you know they're headed to Foyers? They could be swimming towards the western shore."
"At this point, who cares?"
The first two deer paddled past the Zodiac's bow, their hoofs churning water in a frenzy of movement, their nostrils lathered in foam with the effort.
"Justin, do they seemed frightened?"
"They're probably cold."
Another deer appeared from out of the fog. Suddenly the animal let out a high-pitched, "nehhhh—" tossed its head back… and disappeared in a froth of waves.
Amber clutched Justin's arm. "Did you see that? Oh my God, something huge just dragged that deer underwater!"
Justin searched the surface. "No. It… it must've got tired and drowned, that's all."
"It didn't drown! Something ate it!"
"Easy, girl. I was just teasing you before about Nessie. There's no such thing."
"Hey, I'm not stupid. I'm telling you, something big just took that deer. Start the engine!"
They grabbed one another as the Zodiac rocked violently, then spun counterclockwise several quick revolutions before drifting sideways.
"Okay, what the hell was that?"
Now Justin was trembling. "Let's just get out of here."
"Justin, watch out!"
Emerging from the mist, a panicking buck veered for the Zodiac, lunging its front hoofs out of the water and over the edge of the rubber raft.
"Shit!" Grabbing the wild animal by its neck and antlers, Justin fought to shove the two-hundred-pound beast back into the water without being lanced. "Amber, help—"
The buck continued thras
hing and kicking, intent on climbing out of the water, when it was seized by its hindquarters by an unseen force and dragged below.
Pulled off-balance, Justin Wagner tumbled overboard after it.
"Justin!" Amber knelt on her bench seat, looking in every direction. "Justin? Justin, where are you?!" She heard splashing sounds behind her and turned to the source. "Justin?"
"Ambhhhhhh—" Justin's head poked free of the freezing waters, his arms slapping frantically at the fog-covered surface. "It's fuuuuckinnng freeeezing!"
"Hold on!" Amber climbed back to the stern. "Okay, you can do this." She pushed the tiller out of her way, then stood behind the outboard and attacked the starter cord with both hands.
It took her several awkward jerks before the engine started. But as the revving propeller caught water, the bent tiller sent the raft lurching sideways, spilling Amber Korpela headfirst into the Loch.
The bone-chilling water, combined with his soaked clothing, were zapping Justin's strength. Through blurred vision he saw Amber fall overboard, the now-empty Zodiac left to cut wide circles across the surface.
Pathetic. Okay, boat first, then Amber…
He kicked for the vessel, never hearing the whines and yelps from the deer, his heart skipping a beat at Amber's bloodcurdling scream.
"Amber?" Justin stopped swimming and spun to his left. Through the fog-laced surface he saw something dark and massive breach a half dozen boat lengths away, rolling and twisting in a frenzy of movement that whipped icy water and warm fleshy shrapnel at his face.
A column of deer swam past him, whimpering and gasping with their exertion.
Justin tried to move, but couldn't, not until the attack ended with one final heavy splash.
The silence that followed was petrifying.
With trembling hand, Justin touched his forehead, smearing away gobs of blood and bone fragments.
"Amber…"
The whine of the approaching Zodiac grew louder, snapping him into action. Justin swam as hard as he could, then lunged for the passing water craft, his chest bouncing off the inflatable's side, his fingers managing to catch the raft's trim line.
Too weak to pull himself on board, Justin managed to loop his wrists around the rope, his weight counterbalancing the Zodiac's trajectory.
The motorized raft raced away, towing its semiconscious passenger along with it.
Chapter 19 Quotes
I'm fifty-nine years old, lived here all my life. When I was fourteen, we had a local farm, down here at Drumnadrochit. My late brother and late mother were in the car with me, and we were headed to Inverness. I was looking out at the Loch, its surface flat and calm, when I yelled, "Stop the car!" My brother stopped, and we all saw this huge commotion right in the center of the Loch, just opposite Aldourie Castle. The monster was gray-brown, and massive, the size of a bus. It flipped over, just flipped right over like that, crashing down. You could see it, and the waves from that point were about three feet high and ebbed to each side of the Loch.
—RONALD MACKINTOSH, RETIRED SALESMAN
I was making a routine road report call to my office using the AA box at Brackla when I turned and saw, across the water and a few hundred yards out, a head and neck and broad humped body moving from side to side. It was something out of this world, as if a dinosaur had reared up out of the Loch. After seeing it, I swore never again to venture out on Loch Ness in a small boat.
—HAMISH MACKINTOSH, AUTOMOBILE ASSOCIATION PATROLMAN, 2 FEBRUARY 1959
Chapter 19
I am soaring through darkness, the world deaf and silent. I am underwater… entering a cave. I am floating. Free.
Below me lies the body of a man, stretched out on jagged rock. Naked and broken. A lifeless soul. I hover closer.
It is me.
"No! No!"
Entangled in the sleeping bag, I kicked my way out and half crawled, half stumbled from the tent into the pre-dawn gray, my racing heart threatening to leap out of my chest.
Calm down! Breathe! You're okay, Wallace… just another dream.
I paced the campsite, frantically speaking my thoughts, forcing myself to refocus on the images of this bizarre new night terror. "I was underwater… but not as a child, this time as an adult. And I was dead. How did I die? Why was I naked? Was it a vision?"
I stared at my hands, which were still trembling, then suddenly I froze.
Something was moving through the woods!
Like a frightened deer, I looked left to right, right to left, the forest damp and still. Traces of gray mist still cloaked the ground, waiting to be burned away by dawn's first light.
And then my eyes caught movement.
There were three of them, shadowy figures, all cloaked in black, following the stream in the direction of the Loch.
I searched for my hiking boots. Shoving them over my bare feet, I tugged on the laces, then hurried after the three intruders.
They were well ahead of me, their dark tunics the perfect camouflage, though every now and then I caught a glimpse of a flashlight's beam.
The Black Knights?
The mountainside steepened now, the creek widening as it raced to empty into Loch Ness. The leaves were wet, the rocks by the stream covered in heavy moss, making the going treacherous. I rolled my ankle, yelping in pain, then paused, quickly tying my laces for more support.
That's when I noticed the blood.
Patches of crimson streaked the tops of several rocks, as if a bleeding corpse were being dragged along the brook's path.
I hurried on, jogging down the slope, then heard the telltale whine of an outboard motor.
By the time I emerged from the forest, the Zodiac was racing away from shore. In the dim light I made out three men aboard the craft, all dressed in black, a heavy burlap sack between them, soaked in blood.
* * *
The eastern bank of Loch Ness is so long and straight that, looking north on a clear day, one can see the surface meet the sky. This view stayed with me over the next three hours as I followed the tree- lined shore, making my way slowly toward the village of Foyers.
In my backpack were several swabs of blood taken from the rocks. The lab in Inverness would tell me if it came from an animal or human, and then I'd confront Alban MacDonald.
In due course, the sun's rays crept over the Monadhliath Mountains, taking the chill off the crisp morning air. From the south, a dull throbbing echo bellowed into thunder as the research vessel, Nothosaur, rumbled by, its twin engines sending heavy mud-colored wakes crashing to shore. As the boat passed, I could make out several dozen sonar buoys lined up behind the transom. Hoagland's crew were launching the underwater listening devices every mile or so, creating their own sonar array. I knew they were not alone, that at least two other expeditions were completing similar tasks.
By nightfall, Loch Ness would be "Loch Mess," pinging like an amusement park video game gallery, distorting every underwater contact for miles.
I arrived at a boathouse around eight-thirty that morning, already feeling exhausted from lack of sleep. With Foyers still several miles ahead, I decided to stop for breakfast. As I sat on the edge of a pier, munching on processed cheese and crackers, a small fishing boat approached from the north, two local women on board.
The craft made a wide turn toward shore, then docked along the boathouse pier.
"Morning, ladies. How's the fishing?"
"Fish are no' bitin'," replied the shoulder length-blonde. "They havenae been bitin' a' season."
"Hey, Marti, is he no' that scientist? Ye ken, the one in the paper."
The blonde perked up. "Oh aye, ye're right! Pleased tae meet ye, Dr. Wallace. I'm Marti Evans, an' this is my friend, Tina. Ye headin' tae Foyers then?"
"Yes."
"We've jist been. Best be hurryin', afore the Polis remove the body."
My skin crawled. "Body? What body?"
* * *
I could see the crowd a quarter mile away as I neared the Foyers River Inlet, and it
took me several minutes to pick my way through the throng of locals. Reaching the police barrier, I waved at Sheriff Holmstrom to get his attention.
Holmstrom lifted the police tape to allow me through. "Dr. Wallace. Can't say I'm surprised. Seems every time we meet, someone's been butchered."
"What happened?"
He led me toward the water's edge to where a beached Zodiac was surrounded by crime scene investigators. The bow had been tied off, a gray tarpaulin tossed over the left side of the raft. The soaked ends of the tarp floated in the water, revealing a slowly spreading scarlet stain, pooling in the shallows.
"Yesterday, at approximately 4:45 P.M., two Alaskan tourists, Amber Joy Korpela, age twenty-four, and her companion, Justin Thomas Wagner, age twenty-five, rented this watercraft from a boathouse in Lower Foyers. The couple were last seen circlin' Cherry Island, sometime around nine. Accordin' tae witnesses, the Zodiac beached itsel' between six an' seven this mornin'. Prepare yoursel'. This one's gruesome; even worse than the last, but I think ye'll want tae see."
The sheriff lifted the edge of the tarp.
"Oh, Jesus…"
Unable to pull himself from the frigid water, Justin Wagner had managed to loop both his wrists around the Zodiac's guide rope. His upper torso had dangled alongside the raft as it motored, pilotless, across the Loch, his lower torso dragging through the water. There was no telling how long the victim had been in the water, but the exposed flesh on his arms, neck, and face appeared bluish, bordering on translucent.
What was frightening was Wagner's facial expression, a frozen mask, revealing both pain and terror. The glazed eyes were open and bulging, the purplish mouth grimacing, the teeth bared.
The rest of the victim's body was covered by the raft.
Holmstrom nodded to one of his men, who, with gloved hands, pushed aside the raft while carefully lifting the remains of Wagner's shirt, exposing his waistline.
