The Devil’s Peak II, page 10
In seconds more the first wave of water began to come over the side. The cormorants knew there was trouble and began to scream. But there was nothing he could do as the boat was anchored in place by the horrifying things invading his boat.
He knew they were demons, and he had no doubt that once they had his boat sunk they would grab him and take him down into the muddy depths. And perhaps one day, his small hut would be an empty enigma and the children would ask whatever happened to old Hun Lee, as they looked at the paintings and fading pictures still clinging to his walls.
His girls screamed again and flapped their wings. But they had the cords still tied around their necks and secured to the boat. If he and the boat went down, they were as doomed as he was.
Hun Lee could never let that happen. He dropped the paddle, picked up a fishing knife, and went to them, and one by one he cut the cords at their necks.
He widened his stance in the rocking boat and bent to kiss the top of each of their tiny heads and set them free. They squawked, complaining as they flapped their wings, but knew there was trouble and took flight, heading away to a far bank.
The water spilled over then as the boat went below the surface. In his last seconds above water, Hun Lee kept his eyes on the birds, wishing they would take his spirit with them.
The cold embrace of the tentacles revolted him, as they wrapped his legs, torso, and then neck.
As soon as his head went under, he felt the dagger spikes of the teeth on him. He didn’t wait to die slowly, but instead opened his mouth and sucked in a huge draught of cold slimy water. His lungs spasmed, and his brain went into shock almost just as quickly.
Hun Lee’s last sensation was of flying away to the far reed birds to be with his girls.
EPISODE 08
There are worse things than death.
CHAPTER 15
Drake Stoker and Clive Benson hunkered down behind a mound of rotted wood. Vermin like long slater bugs crawled in and out of it but the men ignored them and focused their binoculars on the dark water stretching before them.
Drake turned to look down along the shoreline and saw the towering creatures, each a hundred feet high, that he had at first thought were abandoned heavy machinery.
The skeletal creatures were on all fours at the water’s edge and from time to time they reached forward to pick something from the dark water that wriggled like a caught worm in their colossal hands. They would then lift it back to stuff it into a hidden mouth under shawls of what might have been beard-like growths of either flesh or fungal extrusions.
Drake lowered his glasses, satisfied that each of them seemed rooted to the spot and made no effort to move as they fossicked in the stinking shallows.
He then turned back to the water and the object of their interest.
“What do you think?” he asked.
“Well, it’s a boat. And still floating,” Benson replied.
“Sitting low in the water. Could have a rotted hull,” Drake said. “But beggars can’t be choosers.”
“Damn right.” Benson lowered his binoculars. “So, how do we get to it? And don’t say swim.”
“How about we find something that floats, anything, and we use it to row or even paddle out on.” Drake grinned at him. “Something like a surfboard.”
Benson’s eyebrows shot up. “Do I look like I’m built for surfing?”
“You can do it.” Drake grinned and slapped Benson’s upper arm. “Come on, let’s look for something we can use.”
The pair scouted the shoreline, moving fast but staying low. As they searched along what might have been a tide line, revolting things scuttled from their way, and from time to time, worms’ heads popped from the black slime to peer at them with the horrifying human faces. This time Benson gave them a wide berth.
“Hey, forget the boat.” Benson pointed. “Let’s fly outta here.”
Half stuck in the decrepit mud was a small plane. It might have been silver once, but now it was covered in slime and there were things on it like barnacles, but they rose up on tiny sharp legs and moved off as the pair of men approached.
“That’s one of ours,” Drake said. “I think it’s a Super Sabre. A jet from the mid-fifties. Years back I saw a model of one in my CO’s office.”
“How you spose’ it get in here?” Benson asked.
Drake looked up at the miserable blackness above them. “How’d the city get in here? How’d we get in here?”
“Yeah, you’re right, dumb question.” Benson sighed. “The boat it is then.”
They continued their search. There was little washed up, but in an hour they found the remains of another boat, this one smashed to pieces, and some of the planks with half-moon bite marks the size of which would have put a giant great white shark to shame.
However, the old boat being in pieces made it easier to select some of the largest boards to use as floats without having to resort to their knives to try and cut or lever some free.
They had no rope, nails, or anything to hold multiple sheets together, so each man took a piece and dragged them back to the waterline closest to the boat – even then it was still a good five hundred yards from them over dark water. And the water wasn’t still; it swirled and bubbles popped at the surface.
Drake couldn’t see movement, but he just had a gut feeling there were things living in there. If anything down here could be called living, he thought.
“Who’s first?” Drake asked.
Benson rubbed his chin. “Do I go first and run into some monster? Or do I go last and get picked off from behind? Tough choice.” He turned with eyebrows raised. “How about we go together?”
“Works for me. Besides, you’re a much bigger target.” Drake laughed, but felt nervous as hell. He drew in a deep breath. “Let’s get this over with.” He waded into the dark water, dragging his seven foot long and three foot wide plank of wood.
Benson did the same with an even longer chunk and together the men carefully paddled out. Drake had that weird flipping feeling in his gut from nerves as he tried to create as small a ripple as possible.
Beside him, Benson nearly slid off his plank and kicked, his legs thrashing for a moment, to climb back on.
“Will you cut that shit out?” Drake hissed.
Benson grimaced. “I’m tryin’, man, but I ain’t built for this,” he grunted as he climbed back on. “Besides, this shit piece of wood is covered in slimy-ass moss.”
Drake saw they had already covered about a third of the way, and was beginning to feel confident.
He kept his eyes on the boat, and was already mentally planning his climb aboard. He just hoped it wasn’t in worse condition than it looked. He didn’t want to climb up over the side and find it was full of stinking black water. And then they’d have to paddle back to shore.
Drake scoffed. He still had no idea where, or which way they were going to head. But he liked the idea of being on the boat.
First things first, he thought.
Drake dug his hand in the water about to pull forward again, when his hand touched something slippery. He snatched it back.
“Contact,” he whispered.
Benson turned to him. He didn’t say a word, but simply nodded. The big man then reached down to pull one of his blades from its scabbard at his hip.
Around the men the water swirled as something beneath them began to circle the pair. From the water’s disturbance, Drake guessed it was big, and he suddenly remembered the sharks from the trip in.
“Dark water,” Drake muttered. “I hate dark water.”
The two men bobbed on their homemade surfboards for several minutes as something unseen glided beneath them in the impenetrable darkness.
“Benson,” Drake whispered.
“Yeah,” he replied dismally.
“Until whatever this thing is comes at us, we ignore it. We have to.” Drake looked up. “We’re nearly there.”
“Ignore it?” Benson scoffed. “Well, if it ignores me, I’ll ignore it.”
The pair began to paddle again. They closed in on the boat, and at around twenty feet from it, a huge lump rose between them and the vessel.
“Oh fuck,” Drake exhaled.
The thing was a mottled grey, and featureless.
The men stared, waiting for the thing to attack, but it didn’t move. After a few moments, Drake began to paddle again.
“We go around it.”
Drake and Benson began to go around the thing and as they did it floated closer. It turned around in the water.
“Oh, god no.” Benson looked away.
But Drake stared, feeling the hairs on his neck rise – pressed into the grey mottled flesh was Gunner. Or at least the Aussie’s face.
And then the face screamed.
“It’s fucking Gunner. He’s in there, man,” Benson yelled over the man’s agonized scream. “We need to get him out.”
“How?” Drake gritted his teeth. “He’s part of it.”
He stared back at Gunner’s face. The eyes rolled madly but never fixed on him. He saw then that there were other faces stuck there like boils on the side of a massive whale-like hide – he saw Thor, Brody, Vince, and all the others, all somehow pressed into the flesh and all screaming or wailing for help he could never give.
The thing glided closer. “Get away. Get the fuck away from me.” Drake back-paddled. “That’s not Gunner. It’s not any of them,” Drake yelled. “It’s a trick to try and scare us.”
“It’s damn working, man,” Benson yelled back.
“Keep paddling, we’re almost there.” Drake then pulled deep strokes on his plank and edged closer to the boat. He heard Benson behind him. The big man had given up any attempt at stealth and dragged huge swathes of water back with each stroke.
Drake felt something touch the back of his feet, and it was like he was given a jolt of electricity as he paddled harder than he ever had in his life until he came to the boat’s stern, grabbed on, and began hauling himself to his feet on his makeshift surfboard.
He pulled himself over the stern wall and immediately turned back to throw his arm out for his friend.
“Come on, buddy, we’re here.” He stretched.
Benson got to the boat and then tried to stand on the wobbling planks of wood while trying to watch the plank, the boat, and also keep an eye on the surrounding dark water.
“Here you go.” Drake stretched further.
Benson did the same and Drake grabbed his hand, and then the big guy scrambled over the railing and immediately lay on the deck, arms out, and breathing like he’d just run a marathon.
“Don’t ever make me do that shit again,” Benson gasped.
Drake grinned as he looked back out over the inky water – it was dead calm. There was no sign of their pursuer, and he wondered now if it had been real at all, or if it was something conjured by the Devil himself who was enjoying their torment.
He still couldn’t get the images of his former Reapers’ faces from his mind. The way they were somehow trapped in that sea beast, and had become part of it. He shuddered.
At that moment he realized that there were worse things than dying.
“Okay man, break’s over,” he said and turned back to the boat’s deck. “We need to see exactly what we’ve got.”
Benson groaned to his feet.
The men looked around at the deck, the rigging, and the super-structure – the boat looked to be an old seventy foot sail boat that had once undoubtedly been engine powered as well. The sails hung limp, and were streaked with mold and drips of stuff that looked like long bird shits, and Drake didn’t want to know what sort of monstrous ass dropped them from above.
He leaned back over the stern and read the name. “The Hacienda,” he said. “Name rings a bell for some reason.”
Up top there was a wheel house, and Drake climbed to it. Frozen over the wheel was a body that was now just an age blackened skeleton, with jaws gaping in a perpetual scream. The flesh had long sagged to ribbons of rotten meat and the smell was of ripe corruption.
The man, he assumed by the size of the skeleton, gripped the wheel, but his hands seemed to have melted onto it, becoming part of it.
Drake sighed. “Sorry buddy, we might need that soon.” He lifted his hands, not wanting to touch the disgusting corpse. In the end he just kicked out with his boot. The skeleton broke off at the wrists and fell to the side of the wheel house cabin with a clatter of bones. Unfortunately, the hands were still part of the wheel.
“We’ll get those for you later,” he said to the skull that stared hollowly back at him.
Drake went back down and joined Benson and the pair went to investigate the lower level. They stopped at the doors and Drake looked at his friend and grinned.
“Ready for this?”
“Hell no,” Benson said, and shouldered open the door.
Inside, the men’s lights illuminated a small area that was like a galley come dining area. There was a table that was stacked with plastic-wrapped, brick-shaped packages. One was open spilling a white powder to the table. There were also neat piles of money.
In a chair was another of the skeletons, this was exactly like the previous guy – age blackened, melted, and forever frozen as he lorded over the drugs and counted his money.
“Drug runners,” Drake said. “Looks like they got their eternal reward.”
“Lemme check out the guest suite,” Benson said and lifted both his light and his handgun as he went towards a door that would have been to the sleeping cabins.
Drake followed him and Benson pushed the door open and looked inside. There were two small rooms, one larger than the other with a double bed and a small one with a bunk. Thankfully both didn’t have a body and were cleaner than anything they’d seen down here.
“Small mercies,” Drake said. “It’s dry, and clean.”
“I’m calling the double bed.” Benson turned and raised his eyebrows.
“You’re going to be able to sleep?” Drake scoffed.
“Nope, I just want a bed big enough to hide under.” He grinned back.
They finished their search and headed back out to the living area and went to the table. There were some papers and Drake lifted one, shook it, and held it up to his light. “A newspaper. From the sixties.” He turned. “You think this thing has been floating here for nearly seventy years?’
“I doubt it.” He grabbed the skeleton in the chair and once again its feet and hands broke off. “I’m cleaning house. If we’re going to be here for a while I’ll sleep better knowing these assholes are at the bottom of the lake, sea, or whatever it is out there.”
“I heard that. Over the side with all of it.” Benson began to grab some of the drug packages as well.
Drake kept his mouth pressed closed as he lifted the skeleton, and together the men began tossing things over the side.
Twenty minutes later, Drake wiped his hands on his pants, satisfied with the cabin now. “Okay, I’ll check the engines, but I’m guessing that is way too much to hope for.”
“Well, not much of a breeze for the sails,” Benson said and he slowly looked around. “While you do that, I’ll go up to the wheelhouse and see if I can find us a direction that looks promising.”
Drake grinned. “And the plan takes shape.”
***
Benson went up to the wheelhouse and grimaced as he lifted away stuff that was draped over the wheel and around the small cabin-like room. It was like stinking seaweed that was turning to something like long strings of snot. And it stunk like shit.
He spotted the skeletal hands gripping the wheel, and used his blade to scrape them off. He turned and then saw the broken skeleton on the floor.
“You gotta go too, buddy.”
He did a quick search until he found an old beach towel. He lay it out and pushed the bones and other crap onto it, went to the door and flung it all out into the dark water.
Benson winced and rubbed at his knee and thigh. It was the leg that had been infected before, and after a moment, he glanced around, and then took a moment to undo his belt and pull his pants down a ways so he could check himself out.
“Damn,” he whispered.
Sure enough there were red and purple veiny streaks from his infected ankle to his thigh. As well as a lumped rash. And when he went to press one of them, it squirmed under his skin and slid away from his touch.
Benson closed his eyes for a moment and exhaled. “Seems you little suckers had babies before we got you out.”
He slowly pulled his pants up and buckled his belt. He tilted his head back and looked heavenward.
“Lord, just give me enough time to get Drake home to his brother. That’s all I ask.”
He felt the painful squirm again, and he punched his thigh, hard. “And I ain’t gonna make it easy for you little bastards, either.”
He went back to work.
CHAPTER 16
Fifty miles southwest of New York – aboard the North Star cruise liner
Lieutenant Freshman frowned down at the radar. “I have a small object, two miles out, airborne, coming in at us from the west. Speed is approximately one-twenty miles per hour.”
Captain Drinkwater turned. “That’s slow for an aircraft. Is it a drone?” he asked.
Freshman slowly shook his head. “Could be, sir. Radar says non-metallic signature. Coming right at us.”
“Albatross?” Drinkwater asked.
Freshman shook his head. “Signature is ovoid shaped and around seven feet in length. But no albatross wingspan.”
“Not an albatross then. And too small for a light plane,” Michael Ferrel, his second in command observed. He tuned to his captain. “Permission to put an armed man on deck.”
Drinkwater rubbed his silver bearded chin as he thought about it. It was relatively slow moving, but he didn’t like the way it was coming right at them. Good idea to have some sort of defensive option if it turned out to be something hostile.
“Permission granted,” he said.
