The Ocean Dark

by Christopher Golden

  Gabe slipped the key into the lock, turned it silently, and rotated the door handle. He held his breath, thinking: you changed the rules, not me. You knew what you were getting when you married me. The door slid open and he saw the antique mirror he’d bought her with money he’d made breaking the law, and the gourmet kitchen he’d put in himself, and the glass-top table in the eat-in. On the table were a cell phone and a key ring that didn’t belong to Maya.

  And he heard her laugh, soft and girlish, like she had laughed for him in better days.

  Lost in fury and despair, he clapped both hands to the sides of his head and squeezed his eyes tightly shut. Alarms were going off in his mind as though to drive him out, to force him to flee before the imminent catastrophe could unfold. What he saw now he could never unsee.

  But then a horrid sound began to build in his chest and throat--a bestial roar. Gabe had been frozen to the spot, but now he stormed through the foyer and the eat-in kitchen and turned through the archway into the living room, big hands curled into fists, tasting violence on his tongue.

  “You made a big fucking mistake, having him here, puta! Whatever happens now, it’s on your goddamn…”

  He couldn’t finish the sentence. Gabe stood mutely, just inside the living room, staring at the scene before him. Maya sat cross-legged in a plush chair. On the sofa, a beer on the coffee table in front of him, Miguel stared back at Gabe in obvious dismay. What broke Gabe, though, was the pity in his brother’s eyes.

  “Bro,” Miguel said. “What the hell are you doing?”

  Gabe’s fists opened and he shook his head. “No. Don’t you do it. Don’t you take her side.” His voice grew louder once more, rising to a shout. “She’s a lying whore, man! She’s been fucking some guy, doing it in my own damn bed!”

  Maya let out a long, disgusted sigh and shook her head. “That’s enough.”

  “It’s not nearly enough!” Gabe yelled. Then he turned on his brother. “And what the hell are you even doing here?”

  Miguel stood up, decades of sibling fireworks coming into play. “Trying to help, you asshole. Maya called me, looking for advice. I was trying to help save your marriage.”

  “You were wasting your time,” Gabe sneered.

  Miguel threw his hands up. “I can see that now.”

  He started to leave. Maya reached out and grabbed his wrist, held him in place.

  “Miguel, wait,” she said, and her gaze shifted to Gabe. “Take him with you.”

  Gabe started to argue. He had been wrong tonight, but that didn’t erase the past month. He knew she had been cheating on him.

  Maya shook her head. “Just leave. You want to spend your life on the ocean, banging girls in clubs whenever you’re in port, have fun with that. I tried to give you a home.”

  “I wanted a wife, not a home.”

  Maya’s upper lip curled and her eyes nailed him to the spot. “Well, now you don’t have either.”

  ~45~

  Josh’s eyes snapped open, but it took a few seconds before he realized that he had been sleeping. He sat in the stained, ugly, stuffed chair he’d been in when Captain Rio had decided to have Hank Boggs beat the crap out of him.

  With a low groan he sat up straighter, wincing at a brand new kink in his back. The skin on his face felt tight where he’d been struck, but it didn’t pulsate the way it had before. What remained was a deep ache, and an aversion to making any complicated facial expressions. A smile would hurt like hell. Fortunately, he didn’t foresee having any reason to smile in the near future.

  “This sucks!” a voice said, just outside the starboard side door.

  Josh frowned, then hissed through his teeth at the pain that shot through his swollen, cut up face, and wondered if it would be possible to avoid facial expressions altogether. Slowly, bones popping from napping in a contorted position, he got up from the chair and started toward that door.

  He had woken abruptly. That probably meant this wasn’t the first outburst from the other side of the door. Last he had checked, Anton had been guarding the port side door and Jimenez had returned for a second shift on the starboard side. Now, though, he heard a familiar voice outside.

  “Look, I don’t like it any more than you do,” Angie Tyree was saying, “but Tupper’s got something going on down below, and they need you to take over as duty engineer. That means I’m back on guard duty. Believe me, I’m thrilled.”

  Josh peeked through the louvered shutters. A tired and annoyed Jimenez faced off with Angie on the walkway outside the door.

  “I’m not pissed at you, Angie,” Jimenez said. “I just need a break, you know? I had, what, three hours? I slept for one, and the other two I was on duty until Tupper came on. I’ve been either guarding the damn cook or down below since before the sun came up. Now I’m back on duty?”

  “Practically half the crew’s ashore, and someone’s got to watch Josh. We’re all in this, Oscar.”

  The big man sighed and nodded. “I know. I know. I’m going. You have fun. Shoulda brought a magazine or something, though. I’m bringing a book up next time. A little while longer, I’d have been in there playing ping pong with Mr. FBI.”

  Josh watched through the shutters as Angie smiled. She gave away nothing. Moments later, Jimenez walked over to the stairs and started down. Angie waved over the railing, smiling at him for a few seconds. Then her smile vanished and she took a step back, looked around, and rushed for the door.

  When Angie came into the rec room, her eyes were frantic.

  “Did you find it?” Josh whispered, fearful that Anton might overhear them through the other door. “Did you set off the beacon?”

  Angie shook her head. “It’s in the wheelhouse, but I couldn’t get to it.”

  “Then what are you—“

  A flash of anger crossed her face. “Just shut up and listen. We’re out of time.”

  “You mean they’re going to—“

  “Just. Shut. Up.” Angie looked around, stepped up to the window and peeked through the louvers, then spun toward him again. “Something’s happening. Something crazy. They found the guns, and one of the lifeboats was coming back.”

  She described what she’d seen--the lifeboat upended, a sailor trying to drag himself from the water until he was dragged under, blood in the water. The lifeboat destroyed.

  Josh stared at her. “This is true? This really happened?”

  Angie nodded, and swallowed hard. “Something’s in the water, Josh. And not just near the island. Rogan and Tupper, they heard something slamming into the hull from outside, down belowdecks.”

  Josh tried to process it, figure out what it meant. But Angie didn’t give him time. She put one hand behind her back, tugged up her shirt, and pulled out a pistol, which she handed over to him. He took it, checked the clip and the chamber out of habit, then looked up at her.

  “We need to set off that beacon right now,” Angie said. “We need help.”

  Josh nodded. “Don’t worry. We’ll get it.”

  ~46~

  Rogan felt like a cornered animal, tensed to bolt, but with nowhere to run. Minutes had passed since his run up from belowdecks to the wheelhouse—all those goddamn stairs—and he should have recovered by now, but his chest rose and fell and his breath came too fast, and he knew it wasn’t about the exertion at all.

  Miguel and Suarez were talking in quick, clipped tones, both of them just as tense as Rogan felt. They looked like boxers waiting for the bell.

  “Think,” Miguel said, staring at Suarez like he expected the guy to do a magic trick. “Come up with something. We can’t just leave them out there.”

  “I’m thinking,” Suarez said. Another time he might’ve taken offense at Miguel’s tone—Rogan had seen it happen before—but now he was focused. “The only thing we’ve got that can get to them is more lifeboats, and you saw that one go down. We send anyone else out there, the same thing could happen.”

  Miguel rested his hands on the wheel, stared out at the wat
er. “Shit, shit, shit.” He spun and strode over to the door, then stared out at the island, where his brother and the other four crew members who were busy doing something on the beach. “What does that? Goddamn sharks don’t flip boats. Maybe an alligator would drag somebody down from below like that, but we’re in the Caribbean, not the fuckin’ Everglades. And the boat’s wrecked, now. Whatever flipped it—and killed those guys—trashed the boat, too. What does that?”

  Silence engulfed the three men in the wheelhouse.

  Rogan cleared his throat. “There’s only one thing we can do.”

  Miguel and Suarez pivoted to look at him.

  “What?” Suarez asked.

  Rogan fixed Miguel with a hard look. “We get our asses out of here. We fire up the engines and get on our way.”

  Miguel looked more disgusted than angry. “Yeah, that’s helpful. You think I’m going to leave my brother out there?”

  Rogan gazed out at the island, pressed his forehead against the glass, and took a breath.

  “The FBI are on our asses. They could show up at any time. We can’t send anybody else to the island without risking their lives, too. And whatever’s in the water, it’s hammering at our hull. I thought maybe it was just stupid, but now I wonder if maybe it—or they—think they can actually get through. So I think you have two choices, Miguel. You can get us all out of here, save the lives you can, or you can keep us here while you watch your brother die trying to get back to the ship, and risk the rest of our lives in the bargain.”

  He heard Miguel coming for him, but didn’t turn in time. Miguel’s fist slammed into his temple, and as Miguel tried to follow up with another blow, Rogan stumbled backward and sprawled to the floor. He looked up in time to see Miguel drawing the gun he carried holstered at the small of his back.

  “You listen to me, you Irish prick,” Miguel snarled, upper lip trembling. “My brother’s worth a hundred of you. I’m not leaving here without him, and if I do decide to send another lifeboat out there, you’ll be its goddamn captain.”

  Rogan didn’t try to get up. He didn’t want to set Miguel off. Instead he glanced at Suarez, who seemed contemplative as ever, just taking it all in.

  “Talk to him, Suarez.”

  Suarez only shook his head.

  “No?” Rogan said. “You want to shoot me? Go on and do it, then. Better a bullet than dying the way those two poor bastards did.”

  Miguel gritted his teeth, nostrils flaring. For a second, Rogan thought he would actually pull the trigger, but then he swore under his breath and lowered the pistol.

  “You want to get out of here,” Miguel said, staring down at Rogan, “and I’m not leaving without Gabe. So I guess you better start figuring out how we can both get what we want.”

  Rogan wanted to throw him through the windshield. Instead he held up his hands to make sure Miguel knew he wasn’t about to try anything stupid, and climbed back to his feet.

  “You’re the man with the gun,” he said. “All right. I’m goin’ to assume Captain Rio isn’t going to just sit around out there. He’ll make a try, won’t he?”

  Miguel frowned. “He’s not stupid. Why would he do that instead of waiting for us to figure out a way to get to him?”

  Suarez slid his hands into his pockets. Somehow, he managed to look relaxed. “No, Rogan’s right. The captain’s got a lot of guns. He’ll try to get back to the Antoinette as soon as possible.”

  “I don’t get it,” Miguel said. “He should just—“

  “There should be other survivors,” Rogan explained. “From the Mariposa, or one of those other tubs, yeah? But there aren’t. Which tells us that those things in the water don’t always stay in the water.”

  Suarez went to the wheel. “First things first, then. We get this ship as close to shore as we can without running aground.”

  Rogan watched as this new information filtered into Miguel’s mind, and new fear blossomed behind his eyes. If the man hadn’t knocked him on his ass and then held a gun on him a minute ago, Rogan might even have felt bad for him.

  “Yeah,” Miguel said to Suarez. “Do it.”

  Then he holstered his gun and went to grab the radio, probably for another conversation with his brother. As he picked it up, the door swung open, and all three of them turned to look.

  Josh stepped into the wheelhouse, gun in hand.

  “Fuck,” Miguel snapped, drawing his own weapon again.

  The chief mate and the FBI man faced off across the wheelhouse, pistols aimed. As they did, Angie followed Josh through the door, her eyes haunted by guilt and terror.

  Rogan stared at her. “You treacherous bitch.”

  She started to lower her eyes, then straightened up, raising her chin, meeting his glare with one of her own.

  Josh backed into a corner where he could cover them all at once, but his focus remained on Miguel, who had the only other gun in the wheelhouse.

  “Your timing sucks,” Miguel told him. “What now?”

  “I think we need to talk.”

  Rogan glanced out the window, toward the island, and his eyes widened. Captain Rio had gotten the others onto the surviving lifeboat and they were pushing off from shore.

  “Sorry to break it to you, guys,” he said, “but it may be too late for talking.”

  ~47~

  Tori knelt in the prow of the lifeboat, taking deep, steady breaths as Gabe climbed aboard. Kevonne throttled gently forward, turning out to sea, and they all trained their guns on the water around them. Though the angle of the sunlight had changed, and the water did not have the same crystal clarity it had at midday, it was shallow enough here that they could see the sandy bottom, and they watched for any sign of movement below the surface.

  Pang prayed under his breath, swinging the barrel of his machine gun, or assault rifle, or whatever the hell it was; Tori had learned to fire a gun without falling in love with them. He scanned the water, ready to fire. Gabe arranged several guns on the floor of the lifeboat around him, but they didn’t have a lot of room. There were five of them and two big cases of weapons. Anything they didn’t have ammunition for had been left back on the beach. The guns remaining in the crates were all loaded. Tori had two pistols stuffed into the waist of her shorts, the metal strangely warm against her skin. The assault rifle in her hands had felt very light until she’d loaded a clip of bullets into it, and now it hung heavily on the strap over her shoulder.

  “Oh, fuck, look out!” Bone said, practically choking. He aimed a deadly little machine pistol at the water, wire stock against his shoulder, taking aim.

  “Dude!” Pang snapped, grabbing his arm. “It’s a fish.”

  Bone’s chest was heaving and he actually laughed as he relaxed slightly. Tori didn’t laugh, and neither did Gabe. Fear lodged in her throat and for a second she had stopped breathing.

  “Jesus, Kevonne, please hurry,” she said.

  He glanced at her, nodded once, but said nothing. She wondered if he kept his mouth clamped tightly shut to keep his own fear inside, and how long that would work. Kevonne focused on the water ahead, keeping on course. They’d moved the lifeboat thirty yards down the beach before setting off from the shore. Gabe had spent long minutes studying the arrangement of the wrecked vessels that comprised the graveyard of ships and had chosen their course carefully.

  The biggest tangle of wreckage—including a fishing trawler, a fifty-foot rich boy’s toy, the two-masted schooner, and the rusty freighter they’d seen from the Antoinette’s deck—had the tightest conglomeration of vessels. It reached the closest to the island, and thrust furthest from the shore. Gabe claimed that he wanted to stick as close to the derelict ships as possible in hopes that whatever was down there might think they were just another part of the wreckage. Tori didn’t buy that for a second. Gabe wanted to stay close to the sunken ships so that if necessary they could swim to safety the way Boggs had done. And she agreed completely.

  Kevonne went slowly, hoping that keeping the noise level
low would be less likely to draw attention. Tori’s heart hammered against her rib cage and she trembled with every breath. They were moving closer to the Antoinette, but not fast enough.

  “Captain,” Pang said, his voice low and even. “Have a look at this.”

  Gabe shifted slightly, and peered over the side where Pang aimed his weapon. Tori looked as well. Perhaps fifteen feet to port, a ripple had appeared on the surface that had nothing to do with tide or undertow. Something long and white moved, serpentine, in the darkness of the steadily deepening water.

  “That’s not a fish,” Pang said in that same flat monotone.

  “No,” Gabe agreed. “It’s not.”

  Bone grunted. Instead of the whimpering he’d done before, his demeanor shifted to a kind of grim humor. “Well, do you think maybe you could fucking shoot it, now?”

  “More to starboard, Captain,” Kevonne said.

  Tori twisted around, still on her knees, and lifted her weapon, scanning the water. Twin ripples paced the boat on that side, but she thought she saw more than two silver-white streaks down in the deep. She wanted to run, but the ocean surrounded them. She wanted to cry, but she couldn’t afford to lose her focus. A cool, detached numbness began to spread through her--a feeling she hadn’t had since the last time Ted had beaten her, when she had known that her only choices were to leave him or die.

  “Wait for my word,” Gabe said.

  The ripples vanished, the things going deeper.

  “They’re gone!” Bone cried.

  “Not gone. They’re gonna come up under us!” Pang said.

  “Kevonne, gun it, then dead stop,” Gabe snapped. “Everyone hold on.”

  Tori steadied herself with one hand on the gunwale as Kevonne opened up the throttle. The lifeboat punched forward across the waves—fifteen, twenty feet—then Kevonne dropped the throttle back to neutral for a heartbeat before throwing it in reverse long enough to stop them dead.