Legend: An Event Group Thriller

by David L. Golemon

  “Until man intervened on the island,” Keating interjected. “Then many of these amazing new species went extinct, like the dodo bird, once found on Madagascar and now gone forever.”

  The group brooded quietly as Keating reminded them that although the mother animal that had attached Teacher had been a killer, still she couldn’t compare to the relentlessness of man. The uncomfortable silence continued until Danielle broke in with questions.

  “But how does an animal escape the very extinction that killed its land cousins? If I remember my biology classes correctly, wasn’t the plesiosaur a saltwater species?”

  “As for its escaping extinction, the argument has been made that many varieties of sea animal may have escaped the fate of their cousins by the simple fact of their enjoying a more abundant food chain in a particular location,” Keating said as Ellenshaw agreed, aggressively bobbing his white head.

  “And the fact that this variety of plesiosaur is clearly living in freshwater indicates that the creatures may have left the harsher, more competitive hunting grounds of the oceans for the less dangerous waterways to be found inland. We may never know. I have a new theory about the animal that attacked us, as I have looked at the carcass very closely. I believe one reason this beast didn’t go along gracefully to extinction land is the fact—” Ellenshaw paused for dramatic effect, “I believe this particular species has turned into what we know today as the giant sea turtle.”

  “Oh, come on! How can you speculate so carelessly like that?”

  With that, the argument was on between the two scientists.

  Ignoring them, Sarah asked Jack, “How in the world did you kill the mother animal?”

  “I didn’t,” he answered as he popped half a sausage into his mouth.

  “Jack, something killed it. Tore its head right off and then staked its body to the side of the boat,” Carl said.

  The major turned around and looked out of the tinted side window. He opened it and breathed deeply. His eyes scanned the water and then the small beach he had been on only an hour before.

  “Something saved me from the creature and dragged me up on that beach. It was something big,” he said as he turned back to face the others. He took Sarah’s hand in his own and didn’t care who saw it. “I was as good as dead; the plesiosaur had me dead in her sights and there could have been no way I could have escaped on my own. I was pulled down by the smaller ones, hard enough to sprain my ankle. I was taken deep underwater. Every time I tried to fight to the surface, I was pulled even deeper. Then something came at the animal with incredible speed. I only saw a violent strike by something and then I was released. There was blood in the water; I could taste it. I didn’t know if it was my blood or someone or something else’s. Then before I could reach the surface, I was grabbed by my ankle and pulled away. All I remember after that was the feeling of being pulled along in the water. Then whatever saved me from the animal left me on the sand, and that is all I remember until I woke up with one of Sanchez’s small monkey fishes trying to feed me.”

  “Then what was it in that water that saved you, Jack?” Virginia asked.

  “I don’t know, but according to the footprints that were left in the sand where I woke up, it’s huge. Its feet resembled those on the couple of statues we came across.”

  “My god,” cried Charles Hindershot Ellenshaw III. “It’s real! The legend of a creature that walks upright is real!” His amazement was enough to interrupt his argument with Keating.

  The Rio Madonna was at anchor, and Farbeaux thought the captain should count himself lucky for being that way. When the Americans went off the radar Farbeaux became curious as to why, when suddenly Captain Santos threw his engines in reverse and brought the Rio Madonna to a standstill in the middle of the river. There, the captain had sent a small party ahead to reconnoiter the river. They were gone but an hour when they reported the rapids lay in front of the ship. Santos had narrowly missed smashing the Rio Madonna to splinters. Of course Mendez was angry at this development, stomping the decks, threatening everyone who crossed his path. But the captain smiled and watched how coolly Farbeaux handled him, by not handling him at all. The Frenchman seemed content to wait and the captain was curious as to why.

  “I’m afraid this perpetual false twilight is affecting your capacity to see my point, señor,” Farbeaux said, “The Americans are there and we are not. Do you wish to charge in there with your guns blazing and take by force that which we can have with no risks by just waiting?”

  Mendez stopped his pacing at the stern of the boat. He stared out at the anchored barge behind them and thought for a moment.

  “I wish to do something, anything,” he grumbled.

  “As I would, but I am a patient man. The Americans cannot leave here without going through us; we have effectively cut off any retreat they may have. Besides, my friend, the minerals have been there since the beginning of time; they’re not going anywhere.”

  Mendez made a decision. “As always, you are right; I must learn to be as you. But you must understand, it is hard for a man such as I.” He turned to face Farbeaux. “What is your plan?”

  “We will wait until the middle of the night and utilize our rebreather scuba equipment, which won’t leave any telltale bubbles on the surface, and simply swim under or around the Americans and reconnoiter the mine. Are you ready for a swim, Señor Mendez?”

  “Yes, this is a good plan. But I must ask as I am curious, why not just place a charge on the bottom of their boat and send her to the bottom of the lagoon?”

  “And then if there are survivors, señor, what then? What if three or four of those highly capable men survive? I am prone to believe they wouldn’t be in a very charitable mood because we tried to kill them, do you?”

  Mendez just glared at Farbeaux. He hated having things explained to him as if he were a wayward schoolboy.

  “I know these people you seem so quick to try and murder, señor. They are capable of cutting your men to pieces.” Farbeaux glanced toward the sneering Rosolo. “Let’s find out first if we even have a reason for such ruthlessness, shall we?”

  Mendez relaxed and finally smiled. “That is why men such as I pay handsomely for men such as you, my friend; they think on another level.”

  Farbeaux nodded and then moved away toward the bridge.

  As soon as his back was turned Mendez ceased to smile and addressed Rosolo.

  “You will of course place the charge and send the people he admires so much to the bottom. Just make sure it won’t detonate until we are well within the mine.”

  Captain Rosolo grinned. “Sí, jefe.”

  “You look like a man who is concerned about a problem, señor,” Santos said when Farbeaux closed the bridge door.

  “There is no doubt about your ability to observe. And of course, I do have problems. Señor Mendez is a fool. But I have observed you, Captain Santos, and I don’t believe you are one.” Farbeaux held the captain’s eyes. “And since you and I are not fools, tell me how a river captain, one who has said that he has never traveled this particular tributary before, knew there would be rapids ahead.”

  Santos smiled broadly. “I was born with a sense for danger, señor. My own mother, she was always crossing herself and telling me I was of Satan’s villa. Proclaimed this until the day she sent me to Bogotá and the Catholic nuns there. Then when they couldn’t figure me out, I was sent even farther away to study at the seminary. But, señor, the river, she was always calling for my return. So you see, I feel the river, I know the river and her many moods.”

  Farbeaux laughed. “You have a gift all right, señor, but it is a gift of storytelling. Be careful in the coming day or so, Captain, and hide this strange … ability of yours; someone other than myself may become suspicious.”

  Santos watched as Farbeaux left his bridge. He crossed himself and again kissed and then caressed his medal before dropping it back into his shirt. Then he went to the window and checked on the men on deck. He opened a dra
wer and removed a Colt .38 Police Special, all the while watching.

  “Sí, señor, I will watch them very closely. But you, I will watch even closer,” he said as he checked the loads in the pistol.

  PANAMA CITY, PANAMA

  Jason Ryan stood in the giant hangar and watched as the modified Boeing 747–400 aircraft taxied after landing in the hot afternoon sun. Ryan was dressed in casual clothes, as was his two-man Delta escort. Each was armed with a nine-millimeter Berretta. As the giant plane approached they heard the whine of her four large engines slowly throttling down. Her falsified camouflage had been painted on by the United States Air Force and was styled after the livery colors of blue, white, and red. The words federal express were written across her side and the giant tail.

  Ryan could see almost no variation from a regular civilian cargo carrier. But he did notice the strange protrusions on the nose of the 747. There were no windows; it was one long, sealed aircraft. The Boeing plane taxied slowly to the front of the hangar, where the engines shut down. A large yellow vehicle streaked forward, and a ground crew immediately hooked up the nose wheel and started pulling her in.

  “So this is Proteus?” he said as he watched the plane being pulled inside. The large hangar door began to lower after the five-story tail section cleared the opening.

  When the aircraft stopped, a gangway was driven forward just beneath the crew door and it opened. Several men scrambled down. They were air police and two came quickly forward. Four others remained in back with two lethal-looking MP-5 machine guns pointed toward the hangar offices and two others pointed somewhat toward Ryan and his men. Two advanced and asked for identification from Ryan and his men. He examined each, looking very doubtful about Ryan’s navy card, enough to give him a nervous moment. Then the man quickly handed the cards back and then turned and waved toward the giant plane. Twenty U.S. Air Force personnel started down the gangway.

  “Which one of you is Ryan?” asked the largest man the lieutenant had ever seen in a military uniform. He was a black full-bird colonel. His voice boomed throughout the hangar.

  “Lieutenant, JG Ryan, sir,” replied Ryan as he again handed over his military ID.

  “So, I was told you have the targeting data? I hear it’s a small one.”

  “Yes, sir, think you can hit it?” Ryan asked, putting his ID back into his wallet.

  “Son, we haven’t hit a goddamned thing yet in thirty-one attempts, and two of the test targets were an ocean, an ocean! Hell, the last time out we nearly blew the fucking tail off this thing,” he said with half a smile.

  Ryan looked over at the two Delta men and closed his eyes, “Be sure we bring the high-altitude chutes just in case, I have a feeling Operation Spoiled Sport may not work out.”

  18

  Jack, Virginia, and Carl had come to the conclusion that, after an inspection of the mine, regardless of whether they found the lost students, the expedition would need to be terminated for reasons that included a possible Broken Arrow situation in the valley. Jack knew he would have to alert Niles and then get a full military team in here somehow to conduct a proper search for the weapon, if there was one. But between the discovery of a black operational unit that had been clandestinely attached to Zachary’s team and the finding of an activated nuclear trigger key, the odds were soaring that this particular expedition could turn bad real quick. Jack would tell the others about the nuclear aspect only after the lagoon and the mine were checked for possible survivors of the lost expedition.

  Before a party was sent under the falls and into the mine that Padilla’s map indicated was indeed there, he first needed to know if there was another way out, in case of an emergency. Thanks to sonar readings, the science team had determined that this whole valley was riddled with caves and tunnels because of ancient lava flows. Blow-out shafts were clearly indicated in their readings.

  So Jack ordered the diving bell and submersible out to map the lagoon walls and try to discover any escape openings, as well as any possible wreckage of Zachary’s chartered boat and barge. He urged the people to hurry as much as safety would allow. Even Jenks had cut short his very long list of checks of both craft.

  The submersible, according to Jenks who would be piloting her, was fast and maneuverable. It could ride shotgun for the diving bell as that was lowered into place for the sonar soundings they needed to make. As for any aggressive life form they might encounter underwater, the master chief assured Jack that the submersible could handle it with its full magazine of pneumatic spearguns. Thirty-five in all had been placed in a swivel gun in front of the pilot and were operated from within the dry environment of the submersible.

  Jack didn’t want to seem overly protective, but he made Jenks give him assurances that the bell would be protected, because it was holding a cargo that was becoming more and more precious to him, Sarah herself. She was the logical choice for this probe, as she knew what to look for in the lava rock strata that made up the walls of the lagoon. For viewing the underwater life, “Crazy Charlie” Ellenshaw, as he had come to be known behind his back of course, would accompany Sarah—along with Professor Keating, who wouldn’t let Ellenshaw out of his sight. Mendenhall had volunteered to go with Jenks in the two-man submersible.

  Within his time constraints, Jenks had thoroughly checked out both systems and made sure they were operating right. The bell was the safer of the two, being attached by umbilicus to Teacher the whole time. The submersible was far more complex and dangerous, as it was totally free of the boat and could stay under for more than five hours with the oxygen it had on board. The torpedo-shaped craft was what was known as a dry diver; in other words, the crew would be totally enclosed with their own atmosphere. Jenks had named the diving bell Yoyo One, because it looked like a yoyo on a string. The submersible had the mighty name of Turtle.

  “Well, I guess that does it,” he said as he exited the Yoyo One. “Now you three keep those thermal suits on; as deep as you’re going, it gets colder than a well digger’s ass.”

  “A well what?” Ellenshaw asked, not understanding the comment.

  Jenks looked at the crazy-haired professor and removed his stump of cigar to say something else, then thought better of it and just shook his head.

  Jack was nervous as he and Carl listened to the master chief’s banter. He knew everyone wasn’t happy with his decision to delay the initial incursion into the mine itself. But he wanted all avenues of approach mapped before he risked losing his remaining probes and even a single life. They had conducted tests on the depths of the lagoon but had yet to discover a bottom. They thought they had discovered it once, but one of the softball-size probes had lodged momentarily on a jutting ledge and then rolled free, sinking into the inky blackness of the apparently bottomless lagoon.

  Sarah had announced during one of the tests that after the initial coldness of the water at the 150-foot depth, the water started heating up at a fantastic rate. She dubbed it the lagoon’s thermal layer, where volcanic activity was heating the water and forcing it through ancient steam vents. Virginia had also come in with her results from the five dropped probes. At the 200-foot level, the percentage of fluorides in the water increased by 500 percent— strange but still safe, even though she had never encountered amounts of fluorides in that high a degree before and was at a loss to explain the phenomenon.

  “Major, you won’t be able to see Turtle, but the interior of Yoyo will be on this monitor; you can switch from interior to exterior. But you and Toad keep your eyes on the pumps and power cables for the bell above all else, that clear?” asked Jenks.

  “Clear,” Jack said as he turned to Sarah and the two professors.

  “A little out of my element here,” Sarah commented.

  “Nonsense, little lieutenant; it’s just wet, otherwise it’s like one of your caves,” Jenks said as he adjusted her wetsuit. “Now climb aboard and take a seat. There’s absolutely nothing for you to do but take in your soundings and snap your pictures and observe.” He looke
d at Keating and Ellenshaw, who cowered back a step at his intense glare. “And I do mean observe, no turning of switches and no pushing of buttons, asking what’s this, what’s that. The little officer here is in charge down there, got it?”

  “Yes, Chief, by all means, no buttons or switches,” Ellenshaw said as he nodded his head slightly to the left toward Keating, indicating on the sly that it would be Keating who would indeed push buttons and turn switches, not him.

  Jenks turned his glare exclusively on Keating for a moment, who flinched back another step. He didn’t understand why he got the extra “chief” treatment because he hadn’t seen the white-haired man indicate he was the troublemaker.

  “All right, your chariot awaits, ladies.” Jenks gestured and half bowed toward the open hatch.

  Sarah and Jack exchanged a look, then she took the three steps up the small ladder and entered the bell. She was quickly followed by Keating and Ellenshaw, who were mumbling something about being called ladies. Jenks closed the hatch and turned a small wheel that tightened its seals. The passengers were out of sight below the collar that held Yoyo in place. Jenks slapped the rounded hull twice and then pulled a lever that freed the bell from its collar. Then he used a small hand pump to hydraulically open the large hatch below Yoyo, which when opened allowed a small rush of water into the space. It quickly drained and he used the winch controller to start lowering the bell. He stopped when the bell was completely awash, and put on his headphones.

  “How are you reading, Yoyo?” he called.

  “Loud and clear,” Sarah called back.

  “You’ll remain there until Turtle is in the water, clear?”

  “Clear.”

  The master chief removed the headphones and gave them to Carl and turned to a nervous-looking Mendenhall. “Okay, Sergeant, let’s get into this highly experimental, uncertified, and probably the most dangerous submersible ever built, shall we?”