Twisted All To Hell

by J E Moore

hissing fish."

  Tom speculated it had a pocket of air trapped in its gullet and John, as usual, tried to make light of the incident. "Must be because we're in the Bermuda Triangle. All the fish hiss in here."

  "Come again?" responded Terri.

  "Oh yeah, Baby. That's why they call it the Devil's Triangle," while speaking in a spooky voice and wiggling his fingers. "Ouuh, ouuh. Yep. We entered the western tip a coupla miles back yonder."

  She turned to Tom, "Don't you fib to me. Is it true or are you and Johnny just trying to make another funny?"

  "No, it's true," asserted the ex-Navy man.

  "Swell, the Devil's Triangle. I don't want to be here," fretted Terri. "I've heard scary stories about this place. Don't people disappear in here? I think we should go back."

  "Oh, Terri, don't be such a whinny butt!" chastised her husband. "All those stories are a bunch of caca... old wife's tales. We've been coming here for years and you didn't know that? Tell you what, when we catch a fish that's got horns and a pointed tail then we'll go back. Not before. Okay, Sweetie?" She conceded with a sour face.

  Tom interrupted, "Hey! Something's banging the heck outta the chum basket!" Their attention turned to the wire container now floating thirty feet to starboard.

  "How'd it get so far away?" questioned Terri.

  "Somethin' musta pulled out all our slack," reasoned Tom. "Draw 'er in, Buddy."

  John retrieved the nylon rope, looping the slack in a coil on the deck. At twenty feet from the boat, the basket rose out of the water - locked in the jaws of a fifteen foot long Hammerhead shark. "Yeow!" howled John and then threw down the rope. "You can have it!" The brownish-grey monster hovered on the surface. Its ominous, coal-black eyes transfixed the trio. 'Crunch!' The basket was crushed by layered rows of razor-sharp teeth. The severed rope dropped and floated to the side. The man-eater inched toward them, sinking slowly as it came until just his two-foot high dorsal fin remained exposed above the water, which had mysteriously turned from blue-green to black. 'Whump', the fin struck the bottom of the craft as it passed underneath.

  "Holy crap! Let's get out of here!" shouted John. "That sonnavabitch must weigh a thousand pounds!"

  "Closer to twelve hundred," estimated Tom.

  "Great. If he rams us, we'll split open like a can of instant biscuits." cried out John.

  "Aren't we unsinkable?" asked his shaken wife.

  "Oh, yeah," retorted John. "Us and the Titanic." He jerked his hands back from the side-rail. Terri gave him a glare for his sarcasm. "Only the life jackets and seat cushions are unsinkable, Baby. And I sure as heck don't want my jewels dangling in the water with Jaws roaming about." He pressed the electric auto-start engine button. No response, not a sound. Deadsville. Again and harder he mashed it repeatedly while uttering an obscenity under his breath a little too loudly.

  "Johnny, please. If you don't mind, your language..." chastised Terri.

  His frustration flared, "Sorry, dear. Goddam motor! Is that better?" He smacked the casing with an open hand and stung his fingers. "I knew we should've had it overhauled last month."

  "Crank it manually," suggested Tom.

  "Good idea, Bro." He primed the seventy-five horsepower Johnson outboard motor and gave a mighty tug on the pull cord: once, twice - repeatedly, until his face turned red and his arm tired. Huffing, "Piece of junk." John used a towel to wipe the sweat from his brow as he stared toward the horizon. "Oh boy, now what?"

  The situation had worsened, they were quickly losing visibility: there appeared to be an eerie, grey mist closing in from a quarter of a mile away. "Where'd everybody go?" observed Terri. They appeared to be all alone.

  Tom silently speculated: "Had the other boaters seen bad weather approaching on radar and hightailed it for land while we were preoccupied with the sailfish and shark? I don't understand how so many boats could have left the area without my noticing at least one." An unidentified foreboding made his skin crawl. He whispered to himself, "Something feels awful wrong." He thought, "I'm no psychic but I'd swear there's something lurking close by that's more dangerous than this shark. Is that possible?" He forced the disturbing thoughts aside, "Nah... don't be ridiculous. Right or wrong, it's best to keep my mouth shut, for Terri's sake. No need to create a panic."

  "Tom, you were a Swabbe. Where'd this fog come from?" asked John. "It's a little late in the day isn't it?"

  "You're right about that." He studied the shrinking horizon, "Strange. It doesn't feel cool enough to produce the kind a fog I'm familiar with. Guess we'll find out soon enough when it gets here." Panning from side to side, "Now that's really odd. It's all around us in a big circle. Fog usually rolls in a front, a straight line. That's why they call it a bank."

  "Odd?" charged John. "I think not. I've had my fill of weird and odd today, thank you very much."

  Just then the shark rose out of the water again. One cold, black eye stared from the end of its bony, hammer-shaped head. He circled at twenty yards from their now-growing, tinier craft. Tom directed, "Everybody sit down on the bottom of the boat."

  John nudged Terri and whispered, "What if I tell 'Jaws' we're not Cuban refugees. Think he'll leave us alone? He's probably used to Spanish food."

  "Shut up, Johnny," she snapped. "You're not being funny. Hundreds of Cubans have died out here."

  "Quiet, you two and sit down. It'll be harder for him to see us. Maybe, he's just curious and will leave if he doesn't see movement."

  "Okay, Tom," agreed John. "It's worth a try," and plopped his butt down... into water. "What the?" An inch of water swished around his soggy jeans.

  Tom immediately reacted and started checking for a crack in the hull where the shark had passed underneath. He rubbed his fingertips back and forth on the side walls and flooring. "Feels solid."

  John blurted, "The drain plug!"

  Tom, being quick to act, grabbed it. "It's in... but wait. I feel water coming in! It's either loose or cracked!" He fought to get a good grip on it and wiggled it slightly. I..., I think it's just loose," and rammed it in tighter. He then dragged the portable gas can over and placed it on top of the plug. "That should hold it in place."

  "Good job, Bro! Damn shark probably tried to push it in." No one felt like disagreeing with his opinion.

  That scary scene taken care of, they returned to encounter another. In less than three minutes the boat had been completely encircled by a wall of thick, warm fog only ten yards away from them. The ocean had become dead calm. No visible current or swells; the surface was smooth as wet glass.

  "I have to go pee-pee," complained Terri.

  "Me too," retorted John. "But I ain't about to hang my weenie over the side with that guy out there. Hey, at least you're sitting in water. Feel free."

  "I said can the chatter!" ordered Tom.

  Peeking over the side, "I can't see him anymore. Maybe he swam away," entreated his brother.

  "Don't worry, he's still there and he can see and hear your big mouth just fine," assured Tom. "Trust me."

  "I want to go home now," lamented Terri. "Which way is home?"

  While keeping his head low, so as not to draw attention, Tom extracted a compass from his tackle box and flipped open the cover. The magnetic needle spun erratically. He tapped it - no change. "Atmospheric interference. This is a good compass... fog shouldn't cause this." Peering hard into the overhead mist cover, "I can't see the sun to get a bearing, it's too thick." Lifting his damp tee-shirt off his neck, "Strange, fog should be cool and clammy not warm like this stuff."

  "What time is it, Johnny?" asked Terri.

  "Ten thirty," he advised. "No wait, my watch has stopped. The battery must be..." Terri's nerves were beginning to fray; she uncharacteristically cut him off, "No, John! It's digital. If the battery dies the screen will go blank. It can't stop working and still show time. Tom?" His timepiece was frozen also.

  "I'm scared, what can we..." she started.

  "Shush," Tom held a finger to his lips. "Hear that?" All c
raned their necks to listen. The noise, an irregular fluttering sound, grew louder.

  "Birds," said Terri. "There's a flock of birds overhead."

  "Must be seagulls," deduced John. Unexpectedly, a small, blackish-brown bird dropped down from the swirling mist and landed on the port railing.

  "That's not a gull," asserted Terri. "That's a sparrow. We have those in our backyard."

  "A sparrow ten miles off shore? How can that be," puzzled John. "Hey, mister ex-Navy man, what's the deal? How'd this little guy get all the way out here?"

  "Beats me," returned Tom.

  Terri took a small bit of bait and offered it, "Here, birdie." It inspected her and the soft morsel. "Oh, look, it has a broken toe." The left claw was bent, red and swollen. "Poor birdie," she held her hand closer so it didn't have to come to her. The sparrow's pointed beak darted forward, pricking Terri's finger. "Ow!"

  "Sonnavabitch!" barked John. Waving his arms, "Ungrateful bastard, get outta here!" The bird was not alarmed in the least. He calmly picked up the bait and flew back into the overhead fog. "Good riddance. Let me see your finger, Sugar." A single drop of his wife's blood dripped onto a middle horizontal seat before John could apply a dab of antiseptic ointment and a band-aid from the first aid kit. A perplexed look crossed his face, "Tom, do you remember the Stephen King movie, 'The Dark Half'? Wasn't it sparrows that pecked the bad guy to pieces and carried his bones off to Hell?"

  "I think so, can't swear to it though."

  "I wonder where King got the