Ocean Grave

by Matt Serafini

  To the layman, the astrolabe was a plate. A golden, disc-shaped inclinometer that, for all intents and purposes, enabled the user to hold the universe in the palm of their hand. It was used in the old world by astronomers and navigators to measure the position of a celestial body, day or night.

  “This is it,” Sara said, triumph in her voice.

  Atop the disc was a smaller ring that allowed for the user to hang it eye level in order to look through it while on a ship’s deck. The disc had a pen-tip sized hole at its center and a line passed straight through that, representing the horizon line.

  Sara recalled the short, stocky Middle Eastern professor, Dr. Paul, who had taught the class, and had brought them an astrolabe from his private collection in order to illustrate its many uses. Across the disc, or “plate” as Isabella had described it, was a series of pointers that each signified a particular star in the sky. Depending on location, the astrolabe would swap out plates with different navigational engravings.

  The back of the disc had a small ruler fastened to it, with tiny sights on both ends that could be used to tell time by dangling the astrolabe and pointing the ruler toward the sun, keeping the palm of your hand flat beneath it so that the sunlight would pool there.

  “Are you... looking for something?” Carly asked. “Because I might know a little about that.”

  It never occurred to Sara that Carly would’ve been in on this hunt.

  “My boyfriend brought me out here,” she said. “And I was stupid enough to think it was going to be a week at sea... just the two of us. Instead it was a group of men I’d never seen before. That fish out there got them all and the only clue I had about any of it was a single document clipped to an old map of the ocean.”

  “They were looking for Roche, too.”

  “Roche?”

  “Can I see that map? And the document?”

  Carly pointed to the plate. “Tell me what that is first.”

  “An ancient calculator, I guess. Used to identify stars or planets. Or to determine local latitude.”

  All of this energized Sara. Holding the ancient device in her hand was the only distraction, and the possibility of finding Isabella loomed large once more.

  “Help me with this,” Carly said. “Once we clean up, I’ll take you up to check the map.”

  They dragged the headless pirate by the arms. A trail of blood, closer to grape jelly, followed them onto the deck where they struggled to get him up over the railing and overboard.

  The storm made the sky blacker than a burnt match. And while they weren’t exactly far away from the Frozen Cocktail, the weather had disappeared the other vessel entirely.

  Carly stretched again and allowed the rainwater to rinse her blood once more.

  They swept the ship for weapons next and rounded up a single handgun stuffed with a magazine of five shots, one Swiss army knife in the draw of a passenger bunk, and a rusted machete brought aboard by one of the pirates. As Carly had told her, the radio room was all smashed equipment and there was no way to leverage any of it.

  Sara asked again to see the map and Carly begged first for a quick shower. “Won’t be able to think straight until I get the chill out of my bones.”

  Sara was about to say that was none of her business when the actress added a caveat. “You mind waiting with me? Once I stick my hand under a hot stream, it’ll be sheer luck if I don’t pass out.”

  Sara kind of did mind, but followed her into the bathroom anyway while Carly got the water piping. The blonde slipped inside the standup shower where the curves of her outline were perfectly amplified by patterned glass.

  Sara watched the oppressive blackness outside the portal window. It was as if they’d sailed beyond civilization to an uncharted world.

  She wondered if on some level the actress wasn’t simply scared to be alone after all this time. The way Carly kept turning her head toward the glass to ensure Sara was still out there. Sara understood that. Carly was just as glad to be in the comfort of someone else who wanted to get out of this mess.

  The actress stepped out and wrapped a towel around her body, flashing her damaged hand that continued to dribble thin red streams down her wrist and forearm. “Can you bandage this? And my ankle?”

  Sara rummaged through the first aid box and popped the peroxide cap, then doused the wounds. The blonde’s bones tensed and her muscles flexed.

  “Hurts,” Carly sighed.

  “Could be worse.” Sara wrapped the gauze tight and clipped it into place.

  “Feels better,” Carly said and lifted her leg atop the sink. The gash there was deep but somehow dry. Her body was in impossibly good shape. Sara guessed Carly Grayson was probably fifteen to twenty years older, though her stomach was somehow tighter.

  Sara wondered how she could notice minutiae amidst a crisis, though she was beginning to understand that superfluous details are often what keep people from going insane.

  Once the blonde was bandaged up, she slipped a black summer dress over her head and took the pistol from Sara. “Now you. Get clean and don’t worry, I’m staying right here.”

  Sara stripped reluctantly and Carly averted her eyes, checking the gun’s magazine. She handled it with certainty, the way most people held cell phones.

  Sara got beneath the stream and soaped up. “You were pretty good with that shotgun,” she called over the water.

  “Did a couple of movies where I had to make it convincing,” Carly called back. “I sorta kept up with it. Surprisingly relaxing.”

  “Thought you weren’t allowed to like guns in Hollywood.”

  “Thing about Hollywood... nobody there says what they really think.”

  Sara washed and noticed the wedding band on her finger. A cruel reminder of the life she thought she’d been signing up for after saying “I do.”

  She got a few tears out, careful to cry in silence.

  Blake often talked about how quickly someone’s life could change. He saw examples of it each time he went to work. Someone glances at his cell phone while driving just as a child steps into the street and in a flash everything’s different.

  Sara’s hair was still soaked when she slipped back into the humidity. Carly handed her the semi-damp towel and stole a quick glance at her naked body while she dried off.

  Sara slipped her clothes back on and they went to the helm together.

  “There’s another problem,” Carly said. “We’re almost out of fuel.”

  “How close?”

  “Won’t get back to make Madagascar,” she said. “But here’s the thing. They kept this boat hidden in an island cluster somewhere close by. They needed somewhere to hold us tight while the pirates searched out a buyer. The islands had almost no traffic. A group of fishermen came near one time and the pirates shot guns at them until they took off.”

  “What good does it do us to make for an uninhabited island?” Sara asked. The right play was to get back to port, away from the sickos that hunted them. But if they couldn’t do that...

  The pirates had tossed them into the ocean as bait for that thing. Sara thought again of the creature and was at a total loss to describe it. It was so surreal that she knew in a few days she’d be able to deny it had happened at all.

  Carly was already trying to make that a reality and Sara couldn’t blame her.

  “Do we make for Madagascar and see how far we get?” Carly said.

  “I think that’s the play,” Sara agreed.

  Carly attempted to steer the ship around while Sara checked over the navigation tools. The Gyrocompass said they’d been moving northeast. The radar had no pings for land or any other ships. It was like the Frozen Cocktail had disappeared entirely.

  “If we can point this thing southwest, we should be in decent shape.”

  “Until we run out of fuel,” Carly said.

  “There is that.”

  “I’ll try and be more optimistic.”

  “Why don’t I look it over while you go and get those d
ocuments. Please, Carly. I need to see what you have. I think I’m close to finding it.”

  “I still don’t know what it is...”

  Blinding halogen flooded the helm. Electric white beamed through the cab’s windows. Sara lifted her fingers to try and blot it out, but it was everywhere at once, growing brighter with every passing moment.

  Carly flung the door wide, gun in hand, and took aim at the sky. Sara ran for her, eager to yank her back toward the safety of the cab, but found herself staring up at whirring helicopter blades.

  For a split second, everything seemed fine. Like all the hopeless strategizing they’d just done was all for nothing. Because here was the Coast Guard. Had to be.

  And not a moment too soon.

  “Prepare to be boarded,” a voice thundered from overhead. God himself calling down. The order froze the women where they stood.

  Twenty-Nine

  Each time the fish rammed the hull, it felt as though the Frozen Cocktail was running aground. The sides of the ship creaked like worn floorboards as the creature continued its barrage.

  It moved like a tank, slower than any predator Kaahin had ever seen. Its trudge so sluggish that any ship should’ve been able to lose it on open water. And yet, each time it collided, the world felt ready to shatter. The men cowered and whimpered and looked to Kaahin for reinforcement, nothing of which he could muster. Because he was certain they were going to die out here.

  “Anybody got eyes on it?” Kaahin screamed, his voice competing with the storm. Waves of rainwater rushed the deck, watery walls that crested fast and crashed hard. They soaked the floor and sent the men sliding across it.

  Visibility was next to nothing. Kaahin always caught fractured glimpses of the fish just seconds before impact. The world seemed to slow to a crawl with each sighting, his brain unable to process the otherworldliness of the thing. It looked wrong. Looked... impossible.

  “Goddamn thing’s going to puncture us,” the American screamed from across the starboard side. “If we go down right here, it just picks us off as we swim.”

  They were already down another man. One whose name Kaahin had never taken the time to learn had gone overboard in the last swell, vanishing as soon as he hit the water—as if the Death’s Head had been right there waiting.

  This is no fish, Kaahin thought, furious for continuing to label it that way. It is a demon. A demon that had learned to hunt man. Knew how to beat them at their own game. Everything Kaahin had thrown at it had failed.

  He thought it would take the women. Live bait. Their terrified splashes summoned it like a dinner bell. And yet, the demon had decided to turn its attention on him. And that was good. At first, Kaahin had been excited. Because they had enough firepower to blast it to hell.

  A lot of good any of that had done them. They hadn’t been able to hit it with anything more than a few AK-47 bursts. 7.62 x 39 rounds sunk through its hindquarters, where its armor did not appear to extend. But if the demon bled at all, they couldn’t see it.

  Kaahin had also lost sight of his prize yacht. The women had made it aboard, and he hoped that Babek had taken them. Only Babek had neglected to fire off a signal flare, meaning the struggle remained in flux.

  “We should make for deeper waters,” Kaahin called to the American. “Tire it out, make it work for its dinner.”

  “Move away from land?” the American said. He had ropes tied around one wrist and one ankle. Buntline knots attached to unoccupied brackets on the cabin’s exterior wall—a safeguard against going overboard if the swells happened to catch him just right. “You crazy, pal? We need to get closer to shore before that thing takes this ship down.”

  That couldn’t happen. The longer this creature swam these seas, the more unwelcome attention this part of the world would attract. The Malagasy had spoken of this demon in whispers for years, but it was agitated now. Striking everywhere. Constantly. If Kaahin did not stop it here, he would lose these seas above and below. Given all that he was hoping to accomplish back home, Death’s Head needed a quick death.

  “We’re sinking,” the American said, louder this time.

  “It will take hours to sink.”

  “One hour. Maybe two.”

  “Best to kill it fast, then.”

  “Shooting gallery’s not doing shit,” the American said. “I’ve put round after round into that thing and it hasn’t bled a drop.”

  If it bleeds at all, Kaahin thought. If he could get the demon’s head and drag it back home and force the whole island to see what they feared, they would know then their land was safe. And even more importantly, they would come to recognize Kaahin as a godkiller.

  Here was immortality. He only needed to take it.

  “Bring the cannisters,” Kaahin ordered.

  The American began to protest, saw the anger in Kaahin’s eyes and thought better of it. The American pulled a knife from the scabbard fastened to his shoulder, and the gesture made Kaahin take a step back and lift his weapon.

  The American sliced himself free of the ropes. He disappeared below deck and returned with two jerry cans. Once all the reserves had been brought up, he told Kaahin, “Water’s up to my knees down there. We’re dropping fast.”

  Kaahin’s men had lugged these on board in order to refuel the Frozen Cocktail. When Kaahin raided, he needed to ensure there was enough fuel on hand in order to get their bounty to wherever it was going.

  Carrying gas on raids was risky, one errant shot would turn your dinghy into a fireball. But if you gambled with the lives of your men then you owed it to them to mitigate risks. Dying came with the job. Running out of gas after you’d taken losses was something else entirely.

  “Drop anchor,” Kaahin ordered.

  “Listen, pal,” the American said. “If you’re fixing to send us up in flames, let me and my guy swim for it.”

  “The demon will take you before you can swim two kilometers.”

  The American thought about that. He looked out across the roaring ocean and suddenly had fire in his eyes. He pointed to the helm controls. “An idea, but I gotta go up there to do it.”

  “Go.”

  “I will. Just don’t want your men shooting me in the back.”

  “Just go.”

  The American did. And within a moment the Frozen Cocktail sputtered and then slept, leaving it floating on raucous waves. The American had killed the motor.

  Kaahin knew why and his next order was simple: Everyone take a canister and wait for the fish.

  Soaked, uncertain faces did as they were told. The American took two gas cans and hurried to the bow. His one remaining man followed. Kaahin’s men fanned out with the rest of the canisters.

  From the crow’s nest above, another of Kaahin’s men kept close watch with the RPG ready. Once the water around them caught fire and burned away some of this night, he’d be able to see the fish wherever it surfaced. And blast it to pieces.

  Yeah, Kaahin thought. Right. His heart began to push. Wide eyes stared down at excited water. Around him, shivering bodies braced for the inevitable.

  These last ten minutes had been the longest break between attacks so far. It wasn’t for nothing.

  Kaahin hurried around the boat and handed each man a flare. “Once the gasoline is poured, light and drop.”

  The deck was a bit closer to the water now. The American was right. They’d be swimming soon.

  The storm was loud and cold and Kaahin’s face felt chapped. His fingertips rubbed the bulb of his nose and he felt a fuzzy numbness there.

  The water flung the ship high and then dropped it back down. Their stomachs lurched with it.

  A raw scream from the stern. Kaahin started toward it, bracing against the constantly sluicing water.

  He signaled for the men to begin the gasoline pour, but aft cries were louder than even the howling wind and he wasn’t sure how many had even heard his command.

  He edged around the cabin where the deck was thinner. One of his men blocked the path for
ward, face twisted into a plea for help.

  Kaahin thought at first the ship had gone up on another large swell. Or that the hull had taken on too much water and was beginning its final descent. But Kaahin turned and saw the bow pointing straight up at the moon as if the bowsprit was looking to stake it.

  Then his feet began to slide and his back crashed against deck and he was vertical, gliding down. His bare feet connected with his man’s chest, pummeling him and sending him hurtling toward the demon that’s mouth was wedged around the entire stern.

  Kaahin saw it up close as he fell toward it.

  Its head was massive. Unblinking eyes were permanently widened and completely dead. Jaws moved up and down as if it wasn’t a mouth at all, but a wood chipper. Its bite shredded the Frozen Cocktail’s stern, reducing it to instant driftwood.

  Kaahin’s man slammed against the demon’s mouth just as Kaahin managed to grab hold of some errant netting that prevented him from following. The relief on his man’s face said he thought for a moment he’d missed the fish’s opening, but it was instead an instant where the fish’s mouth happened to be closed. Those jaws sprung wide again like a loaded bear trap and the man slipped inside and was gone.

  Overhead, the one with the RPG went tumbling from the crow’s nest with a scream, crashing headfirst into the waves and taking the RPG with him.

  At least one of Kaahin’s men had managed to light the water on fire. A small lick of flames danced portside. Because of it, Kaahin saw the demon’s eyes even better. What he’d thought had been a permanently wide glare was instead some kind of armor piece that shielded its real eye. That area was wide and niched, rough like the outer shell that encased the demon’s entire head. Its blazing eye sat beneath a cross-shaped divot.

  The fish continued to chomp, barely acknowledging Kaahin. The top half of its body was sheathed inside that protective bone, making it nearly impossible to breech.

  No wonder so few of their shots had landed.