The Deep (22 page)

Did Clayton’s expression change just a bit? A wounded wince?

“I’m here for what you might
accomplish
. For the people it could benefit. But now that I see all this . . . I’m not so sure. Hell, maybe you’ll figure out how to harness this stuff. But right now I’m getting a seriously fucked-up vibe here, okay? That’s all I was suggesting. We head topside and recalibrate. Then, if you want to come back down, I say fuck it. Fill your boots, asshole.”

Clayton smiled thinly. “You’re a better liar than you used to be. I’ll give you that.”

The men considered each other, neither talking. The guinea pig scratched at the cooler.

Luke thought:
Westlake’s computer.

“Westlake said there was a hole in the station. In his lab.”

Clayton’s voice was laced with disdain. “Westlake said this? What a shock. Now,
he
did go crazy—nutty as squirrel turds, as our darling mother would have said.”

After listening to Westlake’s files, Luke wasn’t about to argue that the man hadn’t gone insane. But, having spent only a little time aboard the
Trieste
, Luke wasn’t about to blame him either. Luke told his brother about the sound files. The tests. Westlake and the hole.

“About these files, Lucas,” said Clayton, his scorn undisguised. “Tell me, did you hear anything besides Westlake’s voice?”

“There were . . . knocks.”

“Knocks. Uh-
huh
.”

Luke bit back a jeering rejoinder. Hadn’t he dismissed Westlake’s claims himself, just hours ago? Mocked them as Clayton was mocking them now?

“Why don’t we give them a listen? You tell me what you hear.”

Luke was convinced Clayton would dismiss the offer out of hand; instead, he surprised Luke by nodding curtly and saying: “Fine, show me.”

6.

THE MAIN LAB
was unoccupied.

“Al?” Luke called out. “Hey,
Al
!”

Silence from the tunnels leading into the lab. How long had he been in Clay’s lab? Less than a half hour? Luke now felt treacherous for leaving Alice out here all alone, but he wouldn’t have gained entry into Clayton’s lab any other way.

His ears caught the buzz emanating from behind Westlake’s door. The sound crested and ebbed, the sonic equivalent of waves crashing on a beach.

“You’re sure that hatch isn’t going to open?” Luke asked.

Clayton shook his head. “Password protected. Our labs are meant to be bastions of privacy. If we wanted to share research, we did so out here.”

Luke turned from Westlake’s lab; it continued to exert an uncomfortable pull on his thoughts—insistent fingers tickling his forehead, seeking entrance.

He faced the viewing window. The sea was endless and hungering. It stirred a childlike fear in Luke: the dread of getting lost in the dark only to find yourself prey to whatever creatures made a home of that inhospitable element.

“Turn the lights on, will you?” Luke said.

Clayton switched on the spots. Twenty yards of sea floor was washed in a skeletal pall.

Something moved at the edge of the light . . . or had it flinched? Skittishly fled? No, it hadn’t really done that, had it? When you prod a snail with a stick, it will retreat inside its shell. Things react that way when they’re scared.

But the things occupying the mammoth sea beyond the window weren’t startled; Luke was sure of that much. If they were there at all, if they weren’t just fabrications of his overheated brain, then they had merely withdrawn—the shadowy fluttering of black scarves wavering through the water—because for the moment, they preferred to remain hidden.

“It’s not dangerous,” he heard Clayton say. “Not if you respect it.”

Luke turned to find Clay’s cold mineral eyes trapping his own.

LUKE LED CLAYTON
to Westlake’s chambers. He opened the laptop on the cot. The screen was black. He pushed a few letter keys. It remained stolidly black.

Did the battery die? It still had plenty of juice when he’d shut it down last.

Stupid goddamn thing. He pressed the
start
button with increasing irritation. The computer screen remained obstinately black.

“I’m telling you, Clay. This was working a few hours ago.”

“
Oooookay
. Well, it’s not working now. And whatever’s on it isn’t the proof you believe it to be anyway.”

Luke wanted to put his fist through the fucking screen. It would feel so damn good—a release of the poisonous tension pulsing behind the bones of his face. Put his fist through it, and then plant that same fist square in his brother’s smug mouth. He wouldn’t be expecting that, would he? Fuckin-a right. It’d be so easy. His fist pistoning until Clay’s skull was nothing but a bowl of red mush, Luke laughing and laughing, his lips flecked with blood.

Luke recoiled, snorting like a man who’d been given smelling salts.

Where had those thoughts come from?

He’d never perpetrated premeditated violence on another person in his life. Yet he’d seen himself doing it. His fist slamming down again and again. His eyes alight with mad glee. An insectile buzz invading his mind as he nursed crude animalistic impulses. . . .

Clayton was scrutinizing him now. “You all right, brother?”

“Yeah.” Luke laughed coldly. “Just pissed this thing won’t work.”

“Down here, it’s unwise to let your emotions get out of hand.”

Are you coming down with a case of the sea-sillies, El Capitán?
His mother’s mocking voice.
You weren’t built for rough water, sailor.

Luke shut his eyes and squeezed her out of his head.

7.

THEY FOUND ALICE
in the main lab. She was once again staring at Westlake’s hatch.

Her skin had a sickly pallor—
cadaverous
was the word that sprang into Luke’s mind—her eyes peering out of her cored sockets with bovine confusion. Her lips moved, reciting words or phrases Luke could not make out.

She ran a hand over the hatch . . . intimately, somehow searchingly. Luke could hear snatches of her speech now.

“I want to . . . yes, oh yes, I’d
love
to . . .”

Luke said: “Al?”

Her hand circled the hatch, tracing odd patterns. Her fingers fell to the keypad.

Clayton flicked a switch, bathing the lab in a harsh wash of halogen light. Al blinked, disoriented. In that moment her face held a wrathful, almost murderous look—the look of a person awoken from a dream she wished would never end.

Luke said: “You okay, Al?”

Al swiped her palm across her nose, a childlike gesture.

“Never better, Doc. Feelin’ fine like cherry wine.”

Luke peered out the window. Those inky scarves unfurled beyond the spotlights. A wave of panic rose in him. He tasted it: the tang of pure dread, acrid as the juice in a springtime leaf.

Get out of here,
he thought wildly.
You have to convince Al to leave.

“Alice, listen . . . Do things feel a bit hinky down here? I’m asking because you’ve spent years underwater. Maybe it’s just me.”

Al pulled her gaze away from Westlake’s lab with what seemed like a
great, almost Herculean effort. Somewhat reluctantly, she nodded. “It’s not just you.”

Luke pointed to Westlake’s lab. “Something happened in there, I’m pretty sure. Something . . . not good. For all I know, it’s still happening.”

Clayton grunted dismissively. Luke ignored him.

“And oh yeah—Clayton showed me something very interesting.”

“Don’t you say a word,” Clayton snapped.

“Oh, screw off, Clay,” Luke said casually. “Al, you should give Clay a round of applause. Why? Well, my brilliant, brainy brother was able to cure a guinea pig of what is commonly viewed as a terminal condition. A condition known in the veterinary biz as
getting its fucking head cut off
.”

He told Al everything. The ambrosia, the shears, the blood-tentacles. About Westlake’s files, too. The
hole
.

“Is this true?” Al asked Clayton.

Clayton said: “The ambrosia, you mean? Yes. It’s a remarkable substance. But regarding this hole my brother keeps babbling about?” Clayton rotated his finger around his ear, the universal gesture for
loony
.

“That does sound a little nuts,” Al said to Luke with a charitable smile. “And Westlake . . . well.”

“I never claimed it was
sane
,” Luke said defensively. “I think it’s . . . symptomatic, maybe. Of what’s happening down here—how this place tears at your head. Westlake went nuts, fine. A hole in the wall
is
impossible. I thought so, too. But maybe the
Trieste
or whatever, it caved in his mind.”

Al nodded sympathetically—but to Luke it seemed too much like the pinched, dismissive nod someone would offer a raving bag lady.

“Some people aren’t built for this,” she said. “Doesn’t matter how smart they are or how rugged in every other way. This is a specific kind of pressure, and you can’t toughen yourself against it.”

“How do
you
feel, Luke?” Clayton asked with mock concern.

“This from the guy who’s walking around in his sleep, sending up pleading transmissions.” Luke’s voice rose to a reedy falsetto. “
Oh brother, oh brother, where art thou my brother—I
neeeeeeeds
you!
”

Clayton’s jaw tightened. “I did no such thing. I’d as soon have called for a janitor.”

Luke turned to Al, refusing to be baited into a fight. “I told Clay we should head up. Just until we can get a grip on what’s happening down here.”

“I can understand how this may come as a shock,” said Clayton, recovering his poise. “The things I’ve discovered are daunting. Frightening, even. But imagine living in the shadow of a dormant volcano. It’s scary at first . . . but you get used to it. People do it all the time. They exist under perpetual threat. And there’s so much work to be done here. Up there”—he pointed toward the surface—“people are suffering.
Dying
. They need us to stay here. To be strong and persevere. Surely you understand that?”

Oh please, you sententious bastard
, Luke thought.
You only care about yourself and your research, same as it ever was.

“What about the animals?” Clay continued. It was the first time he’d referred to them as anything but specimens. “If we go, we’ll have to leave them. And Dr. Toy, as well, who could destroy the station in our absence. Can we really take that risk?”

“What’s to stop him from destroying it right now?” Luke shot back.

“Maybe us just being here?” Al said reasonably. “There’s nothing in Toy’s quarters that he could use to wreck this place—but if we leave, giving him full run . . .”

Luke was dismayed to see that Al was taking his brother’s side on this.

“So we lock the hatches,” Luke said. “Can’t we do that? Can’t we—”

“Look, I told you I’m not leaving,” Clay said simply. “There’s too much to do, and too little time left. As I keep telling you—do whatever you want.”

A sense of despair had settled under Luke’s skin, itching like pink fiberglass insulation. Al held the deciding vote.

“Fuck it,” Al said after a spell. “Dr. Nelson, no disrespect, but Luke’s got a point. I think things may be on the verge of a catastrophic fuckup.”

Clayton impassively regarded Al. “I’ve spoken my piece.”

“Fuck it,” Al said again. “Luke, let’s go talk to topside operations. Dr. Nelson, I want you to stay where I can find you.”

“I’ll be in my lab,” Clayton said.

He turned his back to them. He was singing another nursery rhyme as he retreated into his lab.

“Ladybug, ladybug, fly away home; your house is on fire, your children all gone . . .”

8.

LUKE AND LB FOLLOWED AL
to the storage area. They shimmied through the crawl-through chute. It was easier this time. Al caught LB as she rocketed awkwardly out of the chute; she licked her face appreciatively. Luke came last. They continued on to reach the storage tunnel hatch. Al spun the wheel; there was a steady hiss as the pressure abated.

“Hold the door for a sec, Luke. I don’t want us getting locked in again.”

She hunted around until she found a used air-purification canister. “Okay, come on through.”

LB hesitated—she’d been locked in the tunnel for Lord knows how long—before resignedly slipping through the doorway. Al wedged the canister in and let the hatch close under its own weight; it crimped the canister slightly but left the door propped open a few inches.

“That’ll hold,” she said. “Unless someone kicks it loose.”

“Who would do that?”

Al tilted her head—an analytical insurance adjuster’s gaze.

“I spent a lot of time with Westlake,” she said. “We trained together. Eight, ten hours a day. Most eggheads have got their head in the clouds or up their own clueless asses. Westlake was different. On the level. Even keel.”

Al headed down the storage tunnel. Luke followed. The cold locked around his limbs almost immediately, as if it had been waiting to embrace him again.

“Point being,” she continued, “Westlake and I got on. Your brother and Dr. Toy were all business. Westlake was different—
normal
. And he
was still pretty normal down here, at least at first. In fact he seemed
better
than normal.”

“Better how?”

Al shrugged as if to say it was hard to explain. But she tried.

“Training was intense, right? It ground us all down—all but your brother, who seems sorta cyborgish. I’d expected Westlake’s furlough down here to wear on him. Doctor Toy
really
struggled in training; he almost didn’t make it down, in fact. We nearly replaced him. And like I said before, you can’t do mental push-ups to prepare yourself—you’ve either got that tolerance or you don’t. So we were surprised to see that when Westlake first got down, he actually seemed brighter, stronger, healthier. I couldn’t pinpoint it, but it was a change. Maybe not a good one, either.”

“What do you mean?”

They’d made it around the gooseneck, forging down the tunnel toward the
Challenger
’s entry hatch.