Waypoint Alaska

by Shauna R. Schober[thriller]

  “Hey, hey wake up, you okay?” The voice asked over and over. Lacey couldn’t respond she was in between consciousness; she could hear but couldn’t seem to force herself to respond. As the pain in her rib became stronger she was able to articulate nothing more than a whimper. Her brain was telling her to scream out; she needed to make sure Ben was okay, she needed to get back to Megan, she needed to figure out what was wrong with her and why she hurt so horribly bad. Her lists of needs were overcome by her reality, as she whimpered again she slowly opened her eyes, a shaggy blonde haired man knelt beside her.

  The same scratchy voice echoed in her ears, “She’s coming to, hey guys, she’s waking up,” followed by the sound and feel of heavy footsteps pounding the floor under her. Lacey gained enough energy, finally to speak, she began and found no air behind her words. She tried again, this time they came out more as a whistle than anything else.

  “Ben, is Ben okay?” she softly whimpered in agony as the words crossed her lips. She looked up to the shaggy haired man, he had a friendly face, instantly she knew he was here to help and not harm her. His response didn’t make sense though, she thought about his words and shook her head as firmly as she could as he repeated himself,

  “Ben? Who’s Ben? There’s no one here but you.” He looked up at the other men surrounding Lacey, all she could see were their large slimy rubber boots, she focused her eyes and looked beyond the boots, expecting to see the walls of the elevator, the industrial brooms, anything to verify her last memory. All she saw were blue buckets, large blue buckets, lining the walls of the warehouse she and Ben had ran out of. The only difference this time was that the buckets were filled with crabs, the conveyor belts were moving, slowly disappearing into the thick plastic sheets on the other side of the room, and humming five feet away from her was the large forklift. She looked it up and down, as if it would give her the answer to her question, and then as she focused on the thick, sharp metal forks a connection was made in her brain. She looked at the glossy red shine at the end of one of the forks, she followed the trail of red until she had to refocus and look more closely, she lifted her hand from the severe pain in her rib and just as she passed out she recognized that it too, was covered in blood.

  11

  The distant sound of a helicopter pulled Megan out of her daze, as it got closer worry began to fill her. It was coming right toward the docks and it was a coast guard helicopter which meant something was wrong, someone was hurt or missing. She nudged Trent, who had dozed off, and jumped to her feet, eager to see what was happening.

  They both jogged over to where the helicopter was hovering over the ground, the sea grass swirled about and dust filled the air, as the helicopter landed a few men in orange coverall flight suits hopped out, they unhooked a metal and canvas stretcher from the side of the helicopter and started running toward the large rollup door in the warehouse that Ben and Lacey had gone into. Megan chased after them, but stopped outside the door as she watched them run into a crowd of men bent over someone on the ground. She looked more closely at the ground and gasped when she saw all the blood on the cement floor.

  As the medics wheeled Lacey’s unconscious body out, Megan and Trent chased after them, yelling and screaming questions out, “Is she okay?” Megan’s voice broke as tears began rolling down her cheeks.

  “Most likely a punctured lung, nope she’s not okay.” One medic responded.

  “Where are you taking her?” Trent called out.

  “Anchorage, are you with her?” the medic replied as he stepped onto the side of the helicopter.

  “I am. I have to stay with the kids though. I’ll call her sister, and we’ll be there soon.”

  “Okay, and uh…” the medic paused not sure if he should finish his thought, “I’d hurry, if I were you.”

  The chopper began to lift off the ground, Megan and Trent guarded their eyes and ducked back toward the building. Megan sobbed as she dialed her mom’s phone number. Trent grabbed her shoulder and told her he was going in to the warehouse to find Ben.

  He ran into the building through the large rollup door, spotting the same group of men, he hollered, “Hey where’s the kid?”

  “What kid?” one of the men replied. “Aint no kid here.”

  “No, there was a kid with the girl, Ben. You didn’t see a blonde kid with the girl that was hurt?” Trent demanded.

  “Ben you say?” A blonde, shaggy haired man stepped out from the group. “The girl, she asked about a Ben too. This is a kid that was with her?”

  “Yeah they came in here looking for a geocache, you didn’t see ‘em together?”

  “All I know is I was loading up a bucket and my forklift hit something, I back up and she falls to the ground, bleeding like crazy. I had no idea she was back behind the bucket, but there was no one else, it was just her.” The man wiped his eyes, clearly injuring Lacey had really upset him. “I’m really sorry man.” He turned and walked back into the group of men, who all seemed to turn away from Trent to try to comfort their friend.

  Trent went back outside, Megan said goodbye then hung up the phone.

  “We’ve got a major problem,” Trent said fearfully.

  “What? Where’s Ben?”

  “That’s the problem, no one here has seen him,” Trent rubbed his forehead trying to figure out what had gone wrong, trying to figure out what to do. “Are your parents going to Anchorage?” he asked.

  “They were booking a flight as I talked to them on the phone.”

  “Okay, well that’s gonna take a few hours, we know that Lacey is in good hands, we gotta figure out where Ben is, as soon as we do, we’ll be in the air.

  Horror filled every cell of Ben’s body, he stared mouth wide open as he tried to think of something to do. The crabs were piling on top of each other below him, and above him a group of ghostly men were inching and edging their way over the edge of the cliff. They all stared down at Ben, eyes locked as they clung with the fingers and feet, almost spider-like to the cliff wall. Some used the rope on the net, others seemed to just float. The figures were translucent, the lines of their bodies were smudged, they flew and floated and all were speaking with deep scary voices.

  “Ghosts?” Ben whispered to himself and shuttered as he closed his eyes and tried to get rid of the image. As he opened his eyes he let out a huge scream, directly in front of him was the face of a man, the translucent image was floating only inches away. Ben swung in the net, trying to free himself, anything to get away from the ghosts who were quickly surrounding him. They laughed at his effort, their ghostly, deep, voices echoing off the walls of the cavern they were in. It was too much, Ben choked on the fear in his throat, he thrashed and yelled trying to escape them, they danced and swayed inches from him, tormenting him with their yells, screams, and taunts. More and more of them came, each crawling and climbing down the cliff to where Ben was trapped, he continued to try to climb, although his efforts were sabotaged by the gang of spirits.

  “Please!” Ben pleaded with them, “Please let me go, please leave me alone!”

  Suddenly a ghost that was larger than the rest appeared inches from Ben’s nose, “BOO!” he screamed in Ben’s face, then laughed uncontrollably. The laughter was contagious and the entire group began violently laughing, the noise was unbearable. It boomed through the cavern, it rattled Ben’s ears as if he were standing next to an amp at a concert.

  The group composed themselves, then the large one raised his translucent hand and stretched it out toward Ben. Ben shrugged away from it, but soon couldn’t escape and was forced to allow the ghost to place his hand on his shoulder. There was no weight to the hand, only cold, a cold pressure pushing down. Ben sighed trying to contain his unbelievable fear. “Who are you?” he stuttered.

  “Captain Dwight.” The ghost’s face turned into a smile, he looked at his colleagues all floating and swirling around Ben.

  “Are these your men?” Ben managed to stutter again.

  “Oh no,” Captain Dw
ight stated matter-of-factly. “We just hang out together, not a lot to do when you’re dead.” The captain laughed.

  “Who…who killed you?” Ben stumbled over his words once again.

  “Not who, but what…” the captain paused, “You’re looking at the ‘Bearing Sea’s Bounty.’ She took every one of us. One day we’re fishing, the next we’re dead. Some of us are from ship wrecks, others fell overboard, a few…” he leaned in closer to Ben, “Murdered.” He whispered creepily.

  “Wow…uh so what um…okay you gonna kill me or what?” Ben pleaded. Again howls of laughter filled the cave, ghosts started erratically flying, swooping, brushing up against Ben’s back and face, they swirled around him, they shook the net which held him in the air, they shook in violent spasms and then disappeared, only to pop back up, out of thin air inches from Ben’s face, he cried and hid his face. The laughter grew louder and louder, it hurt his ears. Then suddenly it was silent, Ben opened his eyes.

  The captain leaned into Ben, he was inches from Ben’s nose, he laughed one more time and then said, “Don’t ya know…you’re already dead!”

  12

  Henry and Eddy sat in the small cluttered office of the diving company. They hadn’t mentioned Ben and the gold in a few hours, both were just waiting. Henry was waiting for there to be movement on Ben’s phone indicating that the group was on the move again. Eddy was waiting for Henry to tell him what to do, both sat motionless until suddenly Henry hollered out,

  “Okay, they are on the move, wow they be moving fast, too,” he pointed to the dot on the screen of the phone, the dot that represented Lacey’s phone, it was moving very quickly in the direction of Alaska’s mainland. “Okay Eddy, we wait, that’s all we can do, no sense wasting our energy until they obviously get to the gold or stop this silly wild goose chase.”

  Eddy nodded his head, he wasn’t entirely sure that there even was gold, it seemed extremely unlikely that two kids with their aunt would even know about the gold on the Princess Sophia, but going along with what Henry wanted to do was much easier than questioning him, and so he played Solitaire on the office’s old and slow computer as Henry stared at the screen of the cell phone he had stolen from Ben. Something would happen, he was sure of it, but he was pretty sure this entire chase was going to be a huge waste of time.

  The Coast Guard chopper landed carefully on top the Anchorage Hospital, a team was waiting and ran to the side of the chopper as Lacey was being unloaded, everyone yelled back commands and responses as to what she needed. They loaded her onto a hospital gurney and wheeled it into the entry way on the roof. Lacey could hear various things, she was in between consciousness and sleep, she felt as though she were floating, there was no pain, so it seemed silly that everyone around her was in such a panic. She wanted to cry out and ask where Ben and Megan were, but couldn’t find the strength. Suddenly, she didn’t have a choice as a bright light shone fiercely over her eyes, she couldn’t move her arms to shield her eyes, she had to close them and then suddenly, there was nothing.

  Ben was frozen, stunned he tried to speak and couldn’t form the words. Captain Dwight giggled at Ben’s shock, he then began laughing louder and suddenly there was a pressure on Ben’s shoulder. He turned his head and was face to face with an upside down crazy haired ghost,

  “Juuuuuust kidding,” the ghost wailed in laughter, looked at Captain Dwight and said, “Did you see the look on his face?” Captain Dwight and the entire clan continued laughing, roaring with laughter until finally Ben yelled,

  “Shut Up!” Everyone fell silent for a few seconds, they all looked around at each other, eyes wide and then once again broke into a huge thunderous laughter. Ben sagged his head. His feet were still tangled, his hands were free but if he let go now he would just be hanging upside down. Finally he decided to just calm down and play along with the ghosts. “Okay, okay guys…so what about helping me outta here?” Again there was silence.

  “Well, that depends kid, what are you here for?” Captain Dwight asked.

  “I’m just looking for a geocache, someone named the ‘Cache Master’ left it here for me.”

  “A what?”

  “A geocache, it’s just a game, you use longitude and latitude to find hidden packages, one of those packages is somewhere around here. I took the elevator down.” Captain Dwight looked around at his peers, then moved closer to Ben,

  “You say the Cache Master sent you?” he questioned.

  “Uh…yup” Ben began getting nervous.

  “Okay, okay, show me what he gave you?” Captain Dwight peered into Ben’s eyes expectantly. Ben carefully let go of the net and reached deep into his jeans pocket, the cool brass of the key felt reassuring in his hand. He pulled the key from his pocket and held it in front of Captain Dwight’s face. Captain Dwight’s eyes lit up, his smile grew wide. He shushed all fishermen around him and then announced, “We’ve finally got it boys!” He reached up his hand and tried to snatch the key away from Ben, but as he grasped, his hand went right through Ben’s, he tried again and each time no matter how still Ben stayed the Captain couldn’t grab the key. Finally, other ghosts tried to retrieve the key from Ben, but no one could get their ghostly hands around the little brass key.

  This gave Ben what he thought to be a wonderful idea, “Hey guys…guys,” he said loudly to get their attention, “Why don’t we work together.”

  Captain Dwight got a smirk on his face, shook his head eagerly and mischievously said, “deal.”

  As he said it, Ben suddenly got a sinking feeling in his stomach, something deep inside told him, he had just made a deal with the devil. His feeling didn’t last long though, suddenly another feeling, that of being pulled up took over. The net he was hanging on was certainly moving, as it curved over the edge of the cliff Ben started to feel relieved, once his head was above the cliff however, fear instantly took over.

  13

  Trent and Megan searched the fishing warehouse for Ben, they found nothing, not a trace of him, it was as if he had never been there with Lacey. They proceeded out of the huge building and sat on the wooden docks that separated the building from the sea. Most of the fishing boats were out catching their bounty, and as far as the eye could see was nothing but water, thick gray water that connected to thick gray skies. Megan squinted, protecting her eyes from the overcast.

  “He’s gonna be okay, right?” Megan asked Trent.

  “Yeah, don’t worry honey, we’ll find him, he may be hiding thinking they got in trouble or something.”

  “I hope you’re right,” she whispered back. “Do you think Aunt Lacey will be okay?”

  “I hope so, I really hope so.”

  In the darkness of the cavern a huge, enormous, car size king crab crouched. The creature’s legs were easily twenty feet long, it’s claws were something straight from a horror movie. The body was gigantic, the hard shell of the beast must have been a few feet thick. Its beady eyes moved around in circles and as they moved, water and air bubbles popped and hissed from they’re bulbous sockets.

  “You’re kidding me, right?” Ben asked Captain Dwight who was now floating next to him. “What am I supposed to do with him?”

  “He has your box, the one that key you got belongs to,” Captain Dwight snickered. “And well please don’t kill him, he’s kinda the crown jewel around here, hundreds of years old, never once was caught in one of our crab nets, he’s the true King of the ocean.”

  “I can’t get the box from him, are you crazy?”

  “Are you scared?” Captain Dwight laughed, “The Cache Master purposely put that box down here, knowing that whoever retrieved it really did deserve it. So, the question is, how bad you want it boy?”

  “I’m not scared, I just, well look at him, it wouldn’t be the smartest thing to aggravate something that could snap me in two,” Ben waved his hand around nervously as he spoke.

  “Your choice, but I’m pretty sure whatever is in that box, that’s your way outta here.” All of the ghosts sur
rounded Ben, they were mumbling and laughing. Eerie giggles filled the cavern and as they laughed their white outlines glowed brighter, illuminating the space. The added light allowed Ben to take a closer look at the beast before him, he saw a small box in the corner under the king crab, he just had to figure out how on earth he was going to get it. Suddenly, logic took over and somewhere deep inside a strength and courage rose in his chest. He felt confident he could take this beast on, and he refused to listen to the voice in his head that was currently screaming for him to stop.

  Ben turned, knelt down, and took the large fishing net, that had previously held him captive, into his hands. With all of his strength, he lifted and tugged it over the edge of the cliff. As he looked down, the sea of red and orange crabs below him was continuing to grown deeper. Had he still been hanging in the net over the cliff they would have reached and consumed him by now.

  He bunched the heavy net in his arms, and then laid it out in front of him, the ghost fisherman all moved to the side, as if their physical presence might actually interfere with Ben’s placement of the net. He laid it flat, then stood in the center of the net. Ben looked up to the ceiling of the cavern, on this side it was low enough that he could toss part of the net up and attempt to get it caught on the jagged rocks. The corner he chose had a long extra rope that would usually be used to pull the net up from the water. Ben took that rope in one hand and the heavy edge of the net in the other. He threw the net up toward the ceiling attempting to have it catch on the rocks, it fell with a thud to the ground. He picked it up a second time and tried again, nothing. With each throw the laughter from the ghosts got louder and the hissing sound from the crab became stronger. It lifted it legs, scratched at the floor and lifted its heavy claws which would fall with a commanding thud as they connected again to the rock floor. Finally, on what seemed to be Ben’s twentieth throw, the net just barely caught the edge of the jagged rocks, it hung creating a curtain. There was still plenty lying flat on the ground for the plan to work, he thought.