Deeper (23 page)

"What do
you think, Jacob?
 
Do you think there's
more than one of them?"

"Honestly?
 
Yes.
 
I
do.
 
I think there has to be, because I
can't imagine just one of those things living by itself in the water."

"So how
come they were never discovered?"

"I
shouldn't have to explain that to you, Joe.
 
We've barely even touched on the things in the water.
 
There're too many obstacles to slow us
down."

I nodded at
that and thought about it for a while.
 
The human body is an amazing machine, but it was never meant for diving
deep into the ocean and even the best equipment only allows us to go so far
into the depths.

"You
think they're intelligent?"

"At least
smart enough to write on the walls."

I thought
about that as I finished my cigarette.
 
I
thought about it some more before I spoke.
 
"What would you do if someone came into your house and took Mary by
force?"

"After I
was finished having a panic attack I'd call the police."

"What if
you knew where they had taken her?"

Jacob looked
at me and shrugged.
 
"I suppose I'd
come after them with as much help as I could get."
 
He shook his head and sighed.
 
"I know what you're getting at,
Joe.
 
I do.
 
But you're applying human emotions to these
things."

I shook my
head.
 
"Not human emotions, just
emotions.
 
Bears protect their young and
wolves look out for their own."

"Sharks
don't care about their schools and frogs could not care less if someone grabs
their neighbor."

He had me
there.
 
"I hope you're right on this
one, Jacob.
 
I wouldn’t want to be your
professor if I'm right."

"There
are no certainties in this sort of business.
 
But I'll tell you something, Joe.
 
I was very glad to see what you did when that thing started calling
out."

"Why's
that?"

"Because
if it was calling for help and nothing had a chance to respond, then maybe,
even if those things act more like bears than they do sharks, there's nothing
to worry about.
 
If they could have
tracked the one we caught, they probably would have by now."

"Well,
here's hoping you're right about that, too."
 
I saluted him with my empty coffee cup and
then went to fill it.
 
The coffeepot gave
me a great view of the choppy waves between the reef and the town off in the
distance.

Outside the
cabin the winds were picking up and the storm was blowing harder.
 
Fat raindrops fell from the sky and killed
themselves on the deck, leaving everything wet and slippery as all hell.
 
If it got too much worse, I'd call the day
finished when the divers came up for replacement tanks and surface time.

I thought I
saw something in the water, a gray movement that vanished as soon as I noticed
it.
 
I looked at the water a lot more
intently after that, and while I couldn't be sure with the size of the waves, I
might have seen something.

"Okay,
Jacob, call me paranoid, but I think there's something out in the water."

He stood up
and moved my way, never hesitating.
 
I
made room for him at the window and we both spent some time looking for any
signs of life out in the water, but to no avail.

After a few
minutes, we gave up.
 
Or rather, Jacob
did.
 
I chose to go outside and risk the
nasty weather for a better look.
 
I've
never been one to give up easily if I think I saw something.
 
I was almost sure that I had seen a shape
moving along the tops of the waves.

I got myself
dressed in a slicker and a hat, feeling ridiculously like one of those little
wooden sailors you could find in damn near every port town, and walked out onto
the deck, careful to keep my footing on the slick surface.

Maybe I was
being paranoid, I don't really know, but I kept seeing that fish man in my
mind's eye and it wouldn't leave me alone.
 
There were four people other than me on the
Isabella
, and I didn't want to take any chances with their health.

The sea was
churning up a lot of waves and several that were larger than usual were
bouncing around the edges of the reef and rocking the yacht a little.
 
A smaller vessel might have been in trouble,
but so far there weren't any waves big enough to make me sweat.
 
I stared out at the water, looking nowhere in
particular and trying to catch that motion in the water again.
 
The thing about watching the waves is once
you're actually looking at them, they seem to hide whatever secrets they
have.
 
You only get lucky enough to catch
the oddities from the corner of the eye.
 
Or at least it seems to work that way for me.

I was so busy
looking at nothing that I almost missed the gray thing the next time it showed
up.
 
It bobbed in the water for a second
and then ducked down behind a wave that swelled and grew, like a man drawing in
a deep breath.
 
This one was going to hit
the
Isabella
hard, I could tell by
the way it seemed to hesitate for a moment even as it grew larger.
 
It wasn't going to be enough to wash
everything off the deck, but it was probably going to cover me with water up to
my knees.

I realized
that just in time to know it was too late to get away.
 
I backed up as fast as I could, but some
things can't be escaped very easily.

The water hit
the side of the
Isabella
and rose up
in a swell, spilling over the railing and sloshing forward with enough force to
shove me into the wall and knock me off my feet at the same time.
 
I tasted salt water and felt the cold ocean
wave soak my clothes and chill my flesh.
 
I also got a mouthful of the stuff that tried to force its way into my
lungs.
 
While I managed to cough it out,
it was the sort of thing that took all of my energy.
 
So I barely had any fight left as I grabbed
for anything I could use as purchase, because as the water pulled back away
from the
Isabella
, it tried to take
me with it.

I think I
would have wound up in the ocean, but lucky me, I managed to hit one of the railing
posts and it slid up the inside of my leg and landed firmly in my crotch.
 
Ever been kicked in the testicles?
 
This was worse.
 
I wasn't capable of moving after that.
 
Instead, I spent a couple of minutes making
sure everything was where it was supposed to be and then I carefully pulled
myself away from the edge of the yacht and crawled up against the cabin wall.

"Joe."
 
The voice was soft and cold, like the sound
of the waves slapping against the reef, and I turned to the source without
thinking, without wondering who I knew that sounded like that.

And when I saw
him, I screamed.
 
Was there ever any
doubt in my mind that Tom was dead?
 
Maybe, but it was removed the second I saw him hanging on the railing,
his face turned towards mine.
 
He was
still wearing his jacket, the battered old thing he always wore when it was
cold.
 
It was waterlogged and hung from
his body heavily.
 
He was barefoot, and
aside from his coat the only thing he sported by way of clothes was a pair of
dark gray sweats I knew he slept in when he had to work on the yacht.

Tommy pulled
himself up higher on the railing; his face sagged a bit, but he managed the
feat.
 
He made me think of a bloated
spider hanging in a web and I think I tried to scream, but all that came out
was a whimper.
 
Everything about him was
unsettling.
 
He was dead; I had no reason
to believe otherwise.
 
I could see the
places on his body that had been nibbled at by fish, and I could smell him as
the wind shifted a bit.

"Tommy?"
 
I barely recognized my own voice.
 
Knowing full well that he was dead, that he
was dead and climbing up the side of my yacht, I still moved toward him
instinctively.
 
Some part of my brain
decided that dead or on
the had
to get away from the
railing and I listened to that part.
 
My
hands caught hold of his jacket and I started pulling him toward me.

His flesh
peeled back under the fabric.
 
I felt it
happen and I let him go, staggering back with a scream trying to get past my
clenched teeth.
 
Tommy fell forward and
landed with a wet sound on the deck.
 
He
stayed there for a few seconds, a lifeless, broken form, and then Tommy looked
at me again, his eyes staring not at me, but through me.

"Joe.
 
Listen.
 
They're going to come for you and everyone on the boat.
 
Be smart.
 
Take Belle and get out of here."

I heard the
words, but I shouldn’t have been able to.
 
He opened his mouth to talk and the water poured out in a nearly steady
stream.

"Tommy,
what happened to you?"
 
I was
shaking my head back and forth, and my mind felt frozen in molasses.
 
I knew I was in shock, but knowing something
doesn't mean you can override it.

"That
doesn't matter, Joe.
 
Listen to me.
 
They like their secrecy.
 
They haven't forgotten what
happened
the last time people found out about them, and they
will stop anyone from finding out what they're doing.
 
You have to leave here.
 
You have to go away and stay away before they
come."
 
He spoke with urgency and I
listened, finding it easier now that he wasn't talking through the water coming
from his mouth.

"Tommy,
please!"
 
I was starting to think
right again, but it was hard to get past the dead man talking to me.
 
My mind accepted the fish man just fine, but
seeing a kid I'd worked with since he was sixteen
crawl
out of his watery grave was pushing it too far.

Tommy stood all
the way up and staggered back against the railing as another wave hit the
Isabella
.
 
He was walking, but he didn't seem to have a
lot of strength in his limbs and coordination was a pipe dream.

"Shut the
fuck up, Joe.
 
Listen to me.
 
Get out of Golden Cove and don't come
back.
 
Stay away from this place.
 
Its gone bad and it won't get any
better.
 
They are unforgiving, Joe.
 
They..."

The wave that
hit this time was big enough to send me back and against the wall and knock me
down, but when it hit Tommy it threw him down and dragged him back into the
ocean with it.
 
Whatever he was trying to
tell me, was lost with the water.

I moved back
to the railing, still stuck with a mind that didn't want to work right.
 
I think I went over there to try to rescue
him.
 
I think I planned on getting him
back on board and somehow making him all better.
 
All I know for sure is that I went over there
and I reached for his flailing arm as it moved with the bucking waves.

He pulled his
hand away before I could touch it.
 
Tommy
looked at me with dead eyes and I think he even shook his head, but that could
have been caused by the water he was sinking under.

I think I
would have gone in after him, I know it was in my mind to dive in and grab him
and haul him back to safety; I know it was, because I was climbing over the
railing when I saw them.

They came from
below, dark shapes, with large, almost luminous eyes.
 
I could barely see them save as silhouettes
at first, but they came closer
a the
sort of speed I
thought was reserved for torpedoes.

The waters off
the starboard side seethed and the waves fell apart from inside as the things
rose up and grabbed Tommy.
 
He didn't
struggle, but went with them, covered by their webbed, clawed hands and then
overwhelmed by their bodies.

Three of the
things rose out of the water and looked at me.
 
Not a one of them was quite the same as the other.
 
Each had certain similarities to Ward's pet
fish man, the same rows of teeth, the same basic shape, but the faces were as
different from one another as human faces could be and one of them, I swear to
you, one of them had tentacles growing from the area under its eyes.

They were only
there for a second, maybe two, but I studied them the entire time and I know
they studied me in return.

A moment later
they dropped down into the water and sank like stones.

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