Black Tide, page 22
But none of that happens, because this time Natalia turns the wheel. The Jeep begins a slow, labored arc in our direction. I pump my fists and squeal, even as a single razorblade foot effortlessly slides through the overhead sunshade. Mike, impressively, doesn’t empty the magazine into the roof. He’s waiting for just the right opportunity to introduce that ugly worm bastard to our crudely effective form of leaden death. I’m so proud of him.
Once Natalia is aimed at us, she keeps the wheel steady, not even bothering to try to steer back toward dry land. Good, that’s good. Keep it simple. The engine roars, the tires spray plumes of water into the evening sky.
“She’s doing it!” I scream deliriously. “Mike! She’s doing it!”
The shrieker on the roof sees her coming, and quickly loses interest in the visor, turning its attention to this new threat.
The Jeep rolls through the drifting tangle of hellvines, the tire tread catching them and dragging them under and grinding them into the sand. The water that sprays up has a distinctively maroon tint to it.
The shrieker above us lets out an alarmed cackle, and the rest charge blindly into the waves to beat against the side of the Jeep, trying to slow it down. One of them gets on top and begins pummeling what I realize is a semi-transparent skylight panel that makes up the forward third of the roof. It must be made of strong acrylic, because it doesn’t even crack or cave inward as the shrieker beats against it. Natalia ducks her head anyway, her face a mask of pure, human terror.
But she’s not slowing down. Her foot is on the floor, the engine screaming at the top of first gear, steam pouring out from beneath the hood. The next wave sends the shriekers rolling back onto the beach, but the Jeep keeps closing the distance.
“You told her when to stop, right?” Mike asks.
“Hell no I didn’t.” I slide into the rear seat and wrap my arms around Jake, bracing for impact. Mike flattens himself against the front passenger window. Across from us, the view of the beach and water we’ve grown so familiar with is swallowed up by the grille of a Jeep Wrangler.
And then Natalia’s world collides with ours, with all the force of a meteorite slamming into Earth.
29
MIKE
The impact lifts the Subaru’s passenger-side wheels up off the sand, just as a surge of tidewater rushes in, raising the entire car until it tips sideways. Before I can take another gulp of air, Beth and I are lying on our backs, and all the water that was filling the footwells is crashing down on top of us. Jake yips and splashes frantically to reorient himself, while Beth coughs up lungfuls of salt water.
Natalia lets off the clutch, and the Jeep dies before it can roll us over onto the roof. She’s screaming in there—I can barely hear it above the water chugging in through the open sunroof. She doesn’t sound hurt, nor is she calling to us, she’s just shrieking bloody murder. I can’t really blame her, she probably didn’t expect her brief drive to end with nearly killing us.
I stand and grab the door handle above me and push. The door doesn’t budge. It’s been dented in severely, the latch mechanism mangled in the crash. I’m not sure I’d have the strength to lift it anyway. There must be a manual release for the hatch, but I don’t want to waste any time searching for it. The sunroof is looking like the best option, since it’s already open.
“Beth!” I shout.
She’s hunched near the hatch, staring wildly into the dark, cold, quickly rising water. Looking for the pistol, maybe. Or her camera. The pistol might be salvageable once we’re out of here and can get it dried and cleaned, but the Nikon is gone for good. There will be no more pictures of the day.
“Come on! We have to get out!”
She just gapes at me as though my words have no meaning. Blood trickles down her neck from somewhere in her hair. She must have hit her head in the rollover, and hard. Between this and that bullet graze, her poor brain must be bruised black and blue. But we don’t have time for shock and trauma either. Movement is life.
“Hold Jake,” I tell her. Maybe giving her a specific task will bring her back to earth. “Keep him above water. I’ll try to get that window open so we can lift him out.” I have no idea if the shrieker is still out there. I don’t hear it, but I can’t hear much at all above the waves. Which might just work in my favor.
The water level is even with the newly horizontal driver’s seat. Jake’s nose brushes the passenger window as he does his best to keep it in the quickly diminishing pocket of air. His eyes are huge, the water around him dark with fresh blood. The salt water must burn like live fire, but he’s not issuing even a whine of complaint. Beth pulls him close and whispers into his ear, pressing her own face to the glass.
I fill my lungs and sink. The salt and cold sting my eyes, but I force them open. At first I’m blind, the world around me a claustrophobic cyclone of sand and seawater. The knife rests on the submerged window. Not as useful as the pistol, if things get ugly out there, but it’s something. No sign of the gun.
I come up for air. “Beth.”
This time when she looks at me, her eyes are clear.
“I’m going out. I promise I’ll be right back. For you and for Jake.”
“You fucking better,” she says.
There’s the Beth I remember. The one I need right now. I can tell she wants to smile—she knows how close we are, that we’ve nearly made it—but she doesn’t dare. This is the point at which even an ounce of optimism will poison whatever luck you have left, and she knows we’re nothing if not the luckiest people on the planet.
“You better, Mike,” she says again. This time it’s a warning. If I lose my shit out there, if I leave her to sink alone, she’ll hunt me down from her watery grave and deliver a fate worse than the shriekers could ever have managed.
But I won’t lose my shit. And I won’t lose her. Not after all this.
I inhale until my lungs feel fit to burst, and go back under.
* * *
I paw my way through dead fish and clouds of sand, refusing to look toward the horizon, toward that darkness into which the land plummets. I know if I do, it will start speaking to me again. I have no intention of listening. Not anymore. Not ever again. But I have no idea what other tricks it has up its sleeve. For all I know, if I look, I might see Sarah clawing her way toward me, bloated and gray, her hair swirling around like algae, mouth twisted into a toothless chasm from which tiny marine creatures dart, and I don’t know if I could handle that. Hearing it on the beach last night was bad enough. A full close-up might just be enough to break me for good.
I squeeze through the sunroof, slicing open my bicep on a hidden edge of the assembly, the water clouding red around me. I don’t even feel the cut as I push off the sand and burst into open air.
Natalia stops screaming as I haul myself up onto the Subaru’s side. I have to do a double take. I’d forgotten how small she is. It hits me hard, how such a little thing could be our salvation. How in the face of all of this, she could be so brave. If Beth and I are evidence of the human race’s will to endure, Natalia is proof that it deserves to.
The queen’s minions relentlessly battle the tide in their efforts to reach the Jeep. I can feel the heat of the fire, and I’m sure they can too. I don’t see the queen herself, but she’s out there. They don’t have many other places to go, at this point.
The window above Natalia’s head looks to be made of sturdier stuff than glass, though I have no trouble believing the shriekers could get through if they put their minds to it. But they aren’t going to get the opportunity.
“Hang on!” I shout, and she nods.
I pull on the Subaru’s rear passenger door, and the latch catches. For a second I think it might open, and my heart leaps into my throat. I give it a great tug; it does open an inch, but won’t budge any farther.
Beth stares up at me through the window. They have only a few inches of air bubble remaining.
“Cover your eyes!” I order.
She does, moving aside and pulling Jake with her as I stomp on the cracked glass. It takes a few tries, throwing all my weight into it—then the glass shatters, raining shiny pebbles into the water below. I clear out the remaining chunks with the hilt of the knife, then drop to my knees and reach both arms into the car.
“Jake!” I shout, the blade clutched between my teeth.
Beth shoves him into my arms. She pushes as I lift, my back—weak from a year of moping about my house—lights up with stabs of pain. Jake kicks and writhes and contorts impossibly, his tail tucked tightly between his quivering legs.
And then he’s out.
I set him carefully on the slippery surface of the driver’s door, his claws screeching against the paint as he struggles to find balance on the rocking car. I’m about to reach for Beth, but the Subaru shakes violently, nearly throwing me off. I brace, waiting for the wave to pass.
But it isn’t the tide jostling us this time.
Jake’s body goes rigid, his hackles rise, and he issues a short, fierce warning bark.
It’s the queen. Perched on the back quarter panel, inches from my own face. And this time, there’s nowhere to run.
* * *
She sits there, shimmering like a mirage in the setting sun. Those massive jaws open, her rip-saw teeth part, and the ugly worm rises to stare at us like a snake on the verge of striking. I don’t even try to kid myself that she’s hesitating out of caution. A dying dog and a middle-aged oaf armed with what may as well be a dulled toothpick. The only reason she hasn’t attacked is she can’t decide which of us she wants to kill first.
“Mike! What are you doing?” Beth calls up. She grabs the window frame and starts to pull herself out, which would put her directly between me and the queen, securing her position as the first to leave the stage, permanently.
“Stay there! Don’t come out here!” I say. Which is stupid. The water is rising so fast, she’s not going to have a choice in a few seconds.
But she sees I mean it and heeds my advice. For the moment.
Jake keeps barking, though he’s learned his lesson about those feet. He limps forward cautiously.
I grip the pathetic knife, blade pointed at the sky. Or should I hold it the opposite way, blade pointed down? That would be better for stabbing. But stabbing means I have to get inside those jaws first.
As if mocking me, the worm opens wide, showing me all its neat little teeth, the ring of black eyes sizing us up hungrily.
“We just want to leave.” Those words come from my lips all on their own. What am I doing? “I know you’re just trying to protect yourself. I know you don’t want to be here any more than we do. We’re trying to go. To leave you alone.”
The queen is smart, I know that. She learned about water, figured out guns. But if she can identify the pleading, nonthreatening tone of my voice, she doesn’t show it. We’re well past the point of mutual understanding. And I don’t think I can blame her. If instead Beth and I had been trapped over there, in their world, we’d have fought tooth and nail against anything that came to investigate our presence, no matter how innocuous the intentions.
Before either of us can make a move, a terrible sound reaches my ears, a sound I’d hoped dearly not to hear again once the cloudfish had disappeared behind the curtain of smoke. Instead, it simply went up and over, and now it’s descending straight down toward the beach.
“Mike,” Beth squeaks from inside the car.
Even the queen dares to angle herself enough to look back, and all her minions begin chittering in a panicked discord. Countless grotesquely ethereal ropes drop from the yawning black mouth. I’ve seen what those things can do. Seen them lift a police SUV off the beach and carry it through the air like it was an egg snatched from a bird’s nest. But looking straight up into that maw is even worse. My mind rejects the sight with extreme prejudice.
The rest of the queen’s brood wail in protest, their instincts of self-preservation—urging them to flee—conflicting with their need to stay and protect their queen. Some of them freeze up entirely, but they’re all so caked in sand and salt at this point that their natural camouflage is useless.
The lowest tentacle gropes lazily for the first shrieker it nears, and the monster lashes out, slicing cleanly through the thorny flesh. The cloudfish barely appears to notice, another arm coiling around the shrieker from behind and yanking it straight up and flicking it into that mouth like a piece of candy, howling all the way.
Seizing on the opportunity this distraction provides, Jake attacks, issuing a volley of ferocious, short barks before clamping down on one of the queen’s front legs above the bladed foot, holding it in place with his weight. Her tough exterior is no match for his teeth, and sticky black blood sprays across his muzzle, staining his golden fur.
The queen roars in protest, her other feet slashing toward him. Jake backs up, pulling her off balance, and her swings go wide. She tries jerking her leg free, but he’s got an iron-trap hold, snarling and foaming, eyes white with determination, claws tearing trenches through the Subaru’s paint. The rest of the shriekers raise their voices in outrage, as though they feel their queen’s pain, and another one is snatched up by the living cloud.
The queen throws all her strength into a 180-degree spin, flinging Jake off into the water. He cries out in surprise, then vanishes with a small splash. Natalia screams in fury and pounds on the horn. The cloudfish rotates toward this new curiosity. Our window of opportunity is about to slam shut. But if I can keep it open, even just for a moment, enough time to allow Beth and Natalia to escape, then that’s what I’m going to do.
Before the queen can turn around, I leap onto her back. The feel of her beneath me is repulsive, like squeezing a just-ripe avocado. An avocado with legs. Fighting the nearly irrepressible urge to let go, like I’ve grabbed on to something only to find it covered in bugs, I swing the knife.
The tip sinks through her outermost layers before coming to a sudden stop against something as hard as bone. My hand slides right down the blade, opening my palm from thumb to little finger, a river of bright red blood pouring out across the squirming body beneath me. The knife wiggles free and falls into the water.
With nothing else to fight with, I hug the monster as tightly as I can and heave myself sideways with all my body weight. Between the slippery paint and the rocking of the waves, it’s easy enough to throw her off balance, and we both roll off the car and into the surf.
“Mike!” Beth screams, hauling herself out of the car just as the water goes over my head.
Please don’t come after me. Please just get in the Jeep. Go, Beth. Go!
My back meets the soft sand, the queen’s considerable heft pressing me into it. She’s strong, but I’m two hundred pounds of deadweight anchoring her in place. She snaps and slashes, leaving behind swirls of black blood. Her sword-like feet peel layers off my arms and legs. There’s no pain. I’m numb, from adrenaline and cold.
The worm extends from the safety of its shell, stretching desperately for the surface, for a gulp of air that doesn’t belong to it. But it can’t quite reach. Can’t quite escape the raging black tide. I know how she must feel. I’ve been there. And while she’s got a lot of fight left, it turns out that I do too. More than I could ever have imagined in myself last night. Because despite everything, and perhaps against all reason, I do still want to be here. I discovered that the hard way.
And so will the queen.
The worm goes rigid. It screams, a piercing wail that can probably be heard across the Pacific, and then the creature falls limp.
30
BETH
I spot the queen first, drifting lifelessly in the surf. I half expect the worm to jettison itself from its armored suit and flop away in search of a new home, but another wave rolls over it, and the worm disappears into the dark water. It’s dead. Really dead. I wait for the invisibility to turn off, revealing the creature in all its awful glory, but it doesn’t.
There’s an immediate change in the others. Whatever strange telepathy connected them, it’s been permanently severed, and they don’t have any idea what to do. A few run in angry little circles, one even coming too close to my infected buddy. A hellvine shoots from its mouth and wraps around the other shrieker’s leg in a death grip. It cries out, but the others don’t come to its aid. Every monster for itself, fleeing in both directions, up and down the beach. Now that the queen is dead, getting as far as possible from the cloudfish is their primary objective.
Kinda like I should be doing.
“Mike!” I jump down into the water, mindful of those tentacles worming their way toward me. He still hasn’t surfaced. Either he’s drowned, and I’m going to have to drag his corpse to the Jeep with me—because there’s no way I’m leaving him out here to become cloudfish food—or he’s unconscious and I’ll have to perform CPR, which will definitely kill him.
He saves me from both scenarios by sitting bolt upright, coughing and spitting water and gasping for fresh air. It’s the best sound I’ve heard all day. I want to crush him in my arms, cover him with kisses, but I settle for hauling him to his feet. I can show him how happy I am that he’s alive later.
“Look!” I say, pointing at the queen’s dispersing horde. “We’re wide open!” The only shrieker left on the beach is the poor bastard caught by the newly sprouted hellvine. It tears violently at its dead sibling, trying to kill the vine, ripping out the lifeless worm and flinging it through the air like a dog with a nightmare chew toy.
Dog. Jake. Where is he?
“Jake?” I ask Mike. We both look around stupidly. How do you lose a dog? Actually, don’t ask me that.
Then I see him, dragging himself from the surf and limping onto the sand. He lies down, panting, his ears cocked attentively. The cloudfish doesn’t see him; it’s still drifting toward us.
I wrap my arm around Mike’s waist and help him through the water. Like last night, the air smells heavily of sea spray and smoke, although this time the fire is quite a bit larger. It’s spreading mostly inland and to the north, but I see flames making their way toward the access road. If only we’d managed to set the coast on fire a few hours ago, when all the shriekers were still hiding out in the dunes. Two non-native, invasive species; one Molotov cocktail. But that doesn’t matter now. They’re gone. There’s only one thing left to do, and it’s on me to do it right.
