Sargasso

by Russell C. Connor

  The man in the recliner snapped his fingers, then resumed the interrogation. “What do you mean, what kinda ‘thing?’”

  “I don’t know, I barely saw it.”

  “Was it a shark?”

  She ground her teeth in frustration, but she really couldn’t blame him; she’d tried that rationalization herself. “This thing was too big to be a shark. It had disgusting skin, too. Almost leathery.”

  “Uh huh. And tell me, just how much weed did you kids blaze through tonight? Although, if you’re hallucinatin that bad, I gotta believe you laced it with somethin.”

  “It’s true!” Cherrywine pulled her palms away from her face long enough to add. “It was a monster, just like the one that attacked me!”

  “Monster?” He frowned. “What, that pelican?”

  Amber threw her hands up. “Don’t tell me we imagined that, you saw it yourself!”

  “What I saw was a diseased bird, so I put it out of its misery. It was probably more scared of you than you were of it.”

  “That thing didn’t look scared.”

  He lifted a shoulder. “Maybe, but the point is, it wasn’t Freddy fuckin Krueger either.”

  She clenched her jaw. “Whether you believe us or not, we don’t have your man. We tried to help him, even after everything he did. I can’t tell you anything more than that, so do what you want.”

  Hawaiian Shirt squeezed the arms of the recliner a few times before pointing at the small man behind the couch, and then twisting around to a pirate beside the door wearing a Tampa Bay Rays jersey. “You two, check the entire boat for him, top to bottom. If there’s anyone else here, bring them out to join the party.”

  They nodded and hurried down the hall toward the front of the houseboat, the one from the door pulling a pistol. Beside Amber, Eric tensed up, craning his neck to watch the pair as they headed toward the driver’s compartment.

  Don’t worry, she thought. They’re not gonna find your little toy in there.

  After the two men were gone, their leader crossed his legs and went back to studying them. His gaze lingered on Cherrywine until she pulled down her shirt as far as it would go over her legs. Out of all them, Amber was the most dressed, and the only one wearing shoes, even if they were just slip-on sandals. His eyes finally settled back on Amber’s face. “Explain to me this: why were you havin to drag our man?”

  “He was hurt. Shot in the leg.”

  “Who shot ‘im?”

  Amber turned her head to the right to glance at Eric, still slouched in his seat.

  “That’s your cue, kid. You shoot my man?”

  Eric snorted through the ruins of his nose. “Yeah, and if I had a gun now, I’d shoot all you fuckers, too.”

  Hawaiian Shirt’s mouth stretched into a grin through the hole of his knit mask. He held up the revolver in his lap and gave it a shake. “Well, rich boy, I guess it’s a good thing we got the guns then. Tell me, did my guy do that to your nose?”

  “Yeah, right. That big pussy was crying for his momma before he died.”

  “Eric…” Amber mumbled.

  But the other man didn’t seem offended. He shrugged and said, “I wouldn’t say that in front of the small guy that just left. He’s a little touchy about the subject.”

  “Why, they fags?” Eric smirked, but the expression dropped from his face fast. “Would you just get to the point already? You obviously know who I am, so what do you want?”

  “Kid…maybe you’re the center of the universe where you come from, but that don’t mean the rest of the world carries your picture around in our wallets.”

  Eric stared at him in awe. “Unbelievable. You’re telling me you really are just a bunch of lowlife pirates?”

  “Sorry if we didn’t meet your expectations. We’ll try to look more like Johnny Depp next time.”

  “And you don’t have any idea who my father is?”

  “Nope. Don’t care.”

  “You will when he hunts you down and puts your balls in a meatgrinder.”

  “Shut up, Eric,” Amber hissed through clenched teeth.

  Hawaiian Shirt turned in his chair to look at the man still by the door. Both of them chuckled. “Thanks for the warning, but we’ll take our chances with Daddy Warbucks. What is he, a stock broker? Accountant, maybe?”

  “You wish.” Eric sat forward with a savage grin of his own. “And you may not know who I am, but I sure as fuck know who you are. See, I recognized your big, dumb friend with the tattoos. Next time you scout a mark, you probably shouldn’t get close enough for them to notice you, retard.”

  It took this a second to sink in for Amber, but once she remembered the rough-looking men from back at the restaurant, everything fell into place.

  The pirate just shrugged again, completely unflappable, and said, “Well…I guess these aren’t doin much good then, huh?” He reached up and peeled off the ski mask to reveal a rugged Latin face, with high cheekbones and a buzz of jet black hair. The man at the door opened his mouth as if to protest, then closed it and took off his own mask. He was a bit heftier, and had a black ponytail.

  “Look,” Amber said, “we answered all your questions. Now you tell us, is Justin really okay?”

  “He’s fine. He’s back on our ship bein treated to a steak dinner.”

  “So what are you gonna do with us?”

  “Haven’t decided yet. Mostly depends on you.”

  “We’re not going to tell anybody about this, I promise. And we don’t even have anything for you to steal. You can just let us go. Leave us right here on this boat, if you want.”

  The pirate settled into the recliner. “Tell me, gringa…with all the ghouls and goblins around, are you sure you want us to do that?”

  12

  Carlos and Jorge cleared the front of the houseboat first, checking the hall closets and all the way to the forward driving compartment. At some point, Jorge began to mutter in Spanish, “Rabid, where you at man, you gotta be here somewhere…”

  Carlos let himself grin in the darkness. If those white kids had really offed the big tattooed inbred, they’d done him a favor. The whole side of his face still burned where the fucker hit him.

  But, as usual, time was running out. Once Jericho discovered the missing fuel line, it was all over for Carlos. Lito was a dick, but he wasn’t stupid. Surely he’d know who to blame for the sabotage, and it might not even be a stretch for him to figure out why.

  Real question was…what would their newly zen captain do about it? There had to be a limit to his patience.

  The only place left to search on the houseboat was below deck. The stairs in the hallway disappeared into pitch black after a few steps. A charred stench drifted up to assault their nostrils. He and Jorge pulled out flashlights, lifted their masks over their eyes, and started down.

  “Rabid!” Jorge called down softly. “You down here, man?”

  “You heard what those kids said, homey. Rabid’s fuckin dead. Got ate by a sea monster or some shit.”

  “I don’t believe that. Rabid can’t be dead. And if he is…I’m gonna take care of those pendejo shitheads, no matter what Lito says.”

  “Why you care anyway, man? You act like you in love with Rabid. Shit, you practically wash his dick for ‘im.”

  They’d reached the bottom of the stairs, and Jorge wheeled around. Dude was a full foot shorter than him, so he had to look up at Carlos as he snarled, “Shut the fuck up. Rabid’s been takin care of me for years, and unlike some whiny little putos, I actually ‘preciate when someone’s watchin my back.”

  “Yo, what the fuck’s that supposed ta mean?”

  “Figure it out, ese.” Jorge turned and walked down a hall in the lower level that led back toward the stern of the boat, where that pungent odor got worse. Two doors stood open on the left and one far down on the right. The skinny Cuban leaned in each one as he came to it—first a kid’s bedroom with tiny bunkbeds and then a small bathroom—and waved his flashlight around the interior. “You
think you tough, talkin all that shit Carlos, but you don’t know jack about bein a real man.”

  “You know…you right,” Carlos agreed, coming down the hall behind him. “I just need ta step up and be a man.” As Jorge reached the last door and looked inside, Carlos raised his pistol and placed the barrel tip just an inch away from the back of his shaved skull. Lito and Ray, standing somewhere above their heads, would hear the gunshot, but Carlos would find a way to deal with them and then get back over to the Steel Runner to finish up.

  Yeah, and if you start the party now, who’s gonna get the ship fixed up so you can get it outta here?

  “Madre de dios,” Jorge whispered, breaking into his deliberation.

  Carlos looked over his shoulder. The bedroom beyond the door was adequately lit by their flashlights to show the same shitty retro décor and scrim of dust as the space upstairs, but the white bedspread was covered in old, rust-colored stains. Dried blood reached to every corner of the bed, and more had been splashed on the surrounding beige carpet and bulkhead walls. The smell in here—like a closed-in barbecue where burnt hair and overcooked meat were on the menu—was thick enough to gag on.

  Jorge walked into the room, covering his nose with his gun hand and shining his flashlight around in awe. Carlos let the pistol drop back to his side and followed. Bile collected in the back of his throat, but he swallowed it down.

  “Whachoo think happened here, man?”

  “Don’t know. But yo, somebody got whacked, that’s for sure. Maybe a couple of somebodies.”

  Carlos studied the stains. From their patterns—some of them reaching as high as the ceiling—it almost looked like a geyser of blood had gone off in the middle of the room, a volcanic eruption of gore.

  But there were no bodies.

  He would never admit it, but this place creeped him out. He was actually kind of glad he hadn’t killed Jorge now, so he didn’t have to be alone in this room.

  And, as he looked around, he noticed something in the corner that struck him as even stranger.

  “Check that out, homey.” He moved his flashlight beam to the corner, where a common, everyday, potted houseplant sat, long stems jutting up proudly to display a thick growth of broad, flat leaves.

  “So what, dude? It’s a plant.”

  “Yeah…but why the fuck is it still alive, if it’s been down here all this time with no sun or water?” In fact, not only was the plant still kicking, its leaves looked vibrantly green and healthy, almost glowing.

  No, not green. Now that he drew closer, he saw that the color of the plant was actually closer to a deep aquamarine.

  A fucking blue plant. Sounded like something you’d find in the rain forest.

  Jorge shrugged, which didn’t surprise Carlos. The guy wouldn’t have the mental capacity to wipe his ass if the order didn’t come from above. “I dunno, it’s probably one of those, like, camel plants or whatever.”

  “Camel plants?”

  “Yeah, you know. The ones that only need water, like, every ten years or somethin. Like a camel. I seen it on the nature channel once.”

  Carlos snickered. “I don’t know ‘bout no camel plants, but that shit looks like somethin my moms woulda had in her garden. The kind that died if they didn’t get water every day.” He could actually remember his mother’s little garden quite well, one of the last lingering memories he’d retained, even when her face had melted from his memory. But he didn’t think any of her plants had been blue.

  From down the hall, Ray’s voice shouted, “Guys, get back up here!”

  “C’mon,” Jorge said, hurrying past him and back into the hall. “Mondo was right, this place is spooky as hell.”

  Carlos went too, forcing himself not to run to catch up. As he reached the door, he glanced back, swinging his flashlight wildly through the bloodstained bedroom, and saw something he would later convince himself he must’ve imagined, but only once he reached the safety of the upper level.

  The leaves of the houseplant seemed to be straining on their long stems, reaching out to him as he left.

  13

  Lito took Ray over to the door when he returned from calling down to the lower deck and whispered, “You believe any of it?”

  “About Loch Ness eating Rabid?” Ray glanced at their three captives, sitting in a row on the couch across the room. The blonde still had her head down, and the rich boy with the cocky mouth had his eyes fixed on the wall as he shook his head and muttered to himself, but the one in the middle, the brunette with the pixie-short hair, was watching the two of them while they talked with obvious interest. “Not a fuckin chance. But then again, I don’t believe they’re lyin.”

  “Wow, that helps.”

  “I don’t know what to tell you, Lito. I can only say that wherever Rabid is, he prob’ly ain’t vertical, if you catch my drift.”

  “I was afraid you’d say that.” Lito shrugged, unsure how to feel about the idea of the big bruiser’s demise. He’d never gotten to know the man, had used him only as muscle and intimidation, but he was still a member of the crew. “In that case, we’re just wastin our time here. Jorge’s gonna be pissed, but if we wanna find out what’s up with these other boats, we need to get movin.”

  “Now that you mention it…” Ray twirled a finger toward the ceiling to indicate the houseboat. “What do you make of this place? If we’re excludin the Triangle as an explanation—”

  “Which we definitely are.”

  “—and not even gettin into the other ships we saw, then walk me through the steps that end up with a houseboat this nice goin derelict. What, the owner comes out here alone, has a heart attack, falls in the water?”

  “Or has to ditch for some reason.”

  “Why would anyone ditch a craft that’s still seaworthy?”

  “Don’t know, Ray. That’s why I said ‘for some reason.’ Anyway, he—or she, or they—ain’t here, and that’s all I care about. Might not be the yacht we were after, but a tub like this has gotta be worth a few grand if we tow it in, even if it’s just scrap.” He grinned. “Now imagine we start makin trips back and forth, takin one or even two of these boats back to the mainland…”

  Ray looked over his shoulder and then leaned closer. “Yeah, but ain’t you the least bit freaked out, Lito? That was a Viking ship those kids ran into. We all saw it. And there’s a quarter-inch of dust on everything in this room. You know how long it takes to build up a quarter-inch of dust on the open ocean?”

  “There’s an explanation, Ray. Has to be. Don’t get your panties all bunched.”

  “Oh yeah. I remember when Confucius gave that advice.”

  “It was Buddha, asshole.”

  Jorge entered from the opposite side of the living room with Carlos. “Hey, we not wearin masks anymore or what?”

  “They know who we are. You find anything down there?”

  “A helluva lotta blood,” Carlos answered. “But it’s been there a loooooong time.”

  Lito ignored the look that Ray shot him and stood still for a moment, thinking, but came up with zilch. This situation had him completely stymied.

  He found himself looking at the brunette girl again. The blonde was extremely fuckable, no doubt, the kind of girl you would gladly take home from the bar and consider yourself blessed by the god of one-night stands, but there was just something far more interesting about the brunette.

  Starting with the fact that she wasn’t sniveling and bawling her eyes out like most women would in her position. What was she, 22? 23? College girl, no doubt; her eyes had a quick-witted gleam.

  “Find somethin to tie their hands with,” he said. “And get them in the rowboat.”

  “No, please, you don’t have to do this,” she told him.

  “Look, gringa…what’s your name?”

  “…Amber.”

  “Okay Amber, we don’t have any intention of hurtin you if you don’t make us. Trust me on that.”

  “Why should we?”

  “Because yo
u don’t have a choice. For now, you’re gonna have to cooperate and come back to our ship.”

  She leaned forward on the sofa, the beam from his flashlight turning her face into a valley of shadows. “If we try to leave in that rowboat…and that thing comes back…”

  “We made it over here and nothin happened to us.”

  “Yeah well, maybe it was just full from eating your other man.”

  “Fuck that, nobody’s tying me up!” The guy with the broken nose—Lito thought Amber had called him Eric—started to get off the couch. Jorge jumped in front of him and drove his rifle butt into the white boy’s stomach. He grunted and fell back on the couch, then growled through his teeth, “You are one dead wetback, fuckhead.”

  “If he tries that again, shoot ‘im in the leg.” Lito unclipped the radio from his belt, held the TALK button, and said, “Jer, how’s the engine lookin?”

  No response. He stepped through the door and back out onto the sunporch with Ray, then looked toward the Steel Runner before broadcasting again. “Jericho, you there?”

  On the deck of their ship, several flashes of light popped in rapid succession, accompanied by the unmistakable crack of distant gunfire.

  1

  Justin stumbled down a set of stairs in the dark, feeling like a beaten piñata. The masked hijacker who’d been called ‘Mondo’ by one of the others limped along right behind him, keeping a pistol jammed between his shoulder blades. When they reached the bottom, the man flicked a switch which turned on an unshaded bulb dangling overhead, revealing a dingy communal area-slash-kitchen. A folding table was set up in the middle, playing cards and poker chips spread across it. A mangy pitbull lay on its side on the filthy floor beneath. It opened one eye to watch them.

  “Stop right there, young ‘un.” Mondo came around in front of him, and Justin was surprised to see he was holding one of Amber’s textbooks in his free hand. He set the heavy tome on the table, then kept the gun on Justin as he moved across the room, leaned through a hatch, and came back with a plain, dark blue t-shirt. He tossed this at Justin, whose half-dead reflexes let it whap against his chest and then fall onto the floor.