What do I do? What do I do?
A third question, encapsulating the previous two. And still no answer. Not with Cal following him into the wheelhouse, watching as he went to the radio, pulled the mic off its clip….
And salvation came. Something Raven wouldn't have thought of, but was entirely perfect.
He waved the mic, trailing a spiral cord that went not to the radio but to a ragged edge that had been cut away from the main part of the radio. And the radio itself, now that he noticed, had been sabotaged. The knobs popped off, the screen scratched and in portions completely broken through.
He nearly laughed.
He didn't know how it had happened. Maybe Haeberle. Maybe someone else –
Though who else would do this? Why?
It didn't matter. The world was, perhaps, finally turning his way.
TANGLE
~^~^~^~^~
Tim stopped at the line that trailed into the darkness, heading down the current to some dark place. Somewhere that only Haeberle was willing to go, driven by whatever hopes or fears would push someone into waters so deep, a place so dangerous and unknown.
And what else was down here? What else would he see? Would he find his own doll? Would children from some woman's past reach out to him?
He forced the thoughts from his mind. It was hard, though, with the drumbeat of narcosis pounding clarity from him, pushing sanity to a faraway place that could not be found this deep in the ocean.
He tied his line near Haeberle's. Then bled some air into his BC so he was floating just above it. He let go of the anchor line. Kicked once.
Then the current had him.
It was fast. Faster than he remembered, faster than it had been, he was sure. Like an underwater river had moved here in the single day since he had been in the area.
Why not? The entire ocean floor moved up, why not a measly current?
He was moving with it. Fast, then too fast. A sudden surge caught his fin, spun him without warning. Nothing he could do about it. He turned, turned. Trying to right himself.
Tangling in his own go-home line.
The drums got louder in his ears, only now they weren't just empty beats, they screamed you'll die, you'll die, you'll die in time with his heart. The shriek pushed rationality from his mind. Narced, unable to think.
You'll die, you'll die, you'll die.
He caught glimpses, spinning on three axes. The brightness of his light, leading at times only to a dark horizon, at times flashing over the wreck as he continued to spin his way over it.
Catching movement. Shifting in the dark/not-dark of the empty portholes and doorways of the wreck, visible in quick slices as he turned and twisted and tried to regain control.
Part of him screamed. Not because he was tangled, not because he might drown. Because he was seeing something wrong. The movements in the ship were in the shadows, just barely too dark to see. But they weren't fish, weren't human. Nothing that could possibly be here. An intruder, something that had pushed its way into this place… and wanted to push its way into him, too. He could feel it.
He realized Haeberle's line was dropping. Either because Tim was ascending, or because Haeberle had dropped a bit more toward the ship.
He panicked. Now the drums said you'll get bent, you'll get bent, you'll get bent.
He tried to right himself. Tried to pull himself free of loops of his line, curled around arms and legs.
Failed.
CONTAGION
~^~^~^~^~
Sue had Mercedes' head in her lap. Not sure what she hoped to accomplish by that, but she hesitated to move her too much, even though her pulse had strengthened and stabilized.
Still, it seemed wrong to just leave her laying on the hard deck. She hadn't seemed to hit her head on anything, so Sue didn't think there were spinal injuries. Surely lifting her head a little, so she'd be more comfortable, wouldn't hurt anything.
She heard the clank of feet on metal rungs and looked over to see Mr. Raven coming down the ladder that led to the wheelhouse. Her father descended as well, his face a grim, stiff mask.
"What did they say?" she asked.
"Someone's destroyed the radio," said Mr. Raven. For some reason it looked like he was trying hard not to smile.
"What?" She nearly shouted. "Who would do that?"
The almost-smile disappeared from Mr. Raven's features. Replaced by a challenging scowl. "How the hell should I know?"
No one spoke. No one moved. The sun burned down on them.
Two more days. Two days until help comes.
She looked at Mercedes. "Let's get her inside. Out of the sun."
Suddenly she felt something shift under her hands. Pulled back the neck of Mercedes' blouse. She didn't want to touch the hands or arms, with their skin peeled off and wet muscle oozing dark pus beneath. But here…
… safe?
No. It was worse. Nothing could have prepared her for the motion beneath Mercedes' skin. The black lines like discolored veins. Only these veins moved. Swished back and forth like reeds in a wind.
She kicked back. Heard Mr. Raven scream in rage and disgust. "What the hell is that? Is it contagious? Get her away! What if it's contagious?"
And as she watched, the lines disappeared.
Her father stepped forward. And, surprisingly, stepped up. He took Mercedes' shoulders. "Let's get her inside."
"Are you insane?" demanded Mr. Raven. "What if we can catch something?"
"If she's contagious," said Sue's father, "then it jumped from Jimmy J to her in a single day… and we've already caught it."
He waited.
Sue took Mercedes' legs.
Together, they moved her inside.
CENTER
~^~^~^~^~
One… more… pull….
There!
Tim had spun out of control for what felt like miles, what felt like hours. But neither could have been true, because he was tangled, so he couldn't have been moving far, if at all. Still, it took a long forever for him to realize that he would never be able to simply swim his way out of the knot he had found himself at the center of.
He switched tactics. Pulling on the nearest loop, around his leg. It tightened against his other leg.
How long is this taking me?
When will I run out of air?
He tried another loop. Pulled. Felt no corresponding pain in his other extremities. He worked it off his leg. Felt himself slam out a few feet as the current took up the slack he had created.
One down. How many to go?
He forced himself not to think of what would happen, what he might face if he ran out of air and couldn't start his ascent.
Pull. Find. Unloop. Pull. Find.
Forever.
He finally loosed the last loop. The spool at his side started unwinding again.
And he saw Haeberle.
A good twenty feet below him, the glow of the other man's light joining with the one on Tim's shoulder to form a ghostly hourglass in the dark.
And between Haeberle's light and his own, the two combined to create a greater light, a broader range of vision. Allowed Tim to see….
How many are there?
Wrecks. The one they had explored already, which he could now see was a World War II destroyer. And beyond that, the bow of a galleon that looked like it had been old when the 1700s rolled around. The curving edges of a submarine.
Something that looked like a yacht or a research vessel. The name Evermore on its hull, with a logo and the words Nelson Chemical below it.
More. Ships of all shapes and sizes, as far as their lights could illuminate. The only thing they had in common was that they pointed toward a single point, like enormous spokes of a rotting wagon wheel.
In the center there was nothing. No wrecks, no life. Only a strange radiance, a blossom of blue-purple like the world's most intense black light, something on the outer edge of humanity's capability to visually apprehend. The black light reached fingers in
to the deep, casting all into purples and white-blues that made everything seem even more dead than it already was. Tiny specks of sediment stirred by the current, perhaps dead plant and animal matter so small it normally passed beneath notice, caught the strange light and reflected, refracted it. The place at the center of the ships was not merely a blossoming flower of alien light, but a flower in a snowstorm. A blizzard that whirled in a tight circle, a snow globe of impossible proportions.
Haeberle stood at the leading edge of the black light. His light waving rhythmically back and forth as he leaned forward, back, forward, back. Almost touching the blizzard, nearly a part of the storm.
Tim swam for him. Grabbed his arm.
Haeberle kept weaving. Didn't seem to even notice Tim.
Tim pulled him again. And now Haeberle did notice. His eyes widened behind his mask. With fear or lust or greed or some other ugly emotion so potent and so deep that it frightened Tim.
Haeberle shook him away. Tim grabbed for him again, but Haeberle was swimming for the black light, for the sepulchral bloom in the center of this graveyard.
Tim grabbed his foot, just before the other man touched the leading edge of the snow globe. Haeberle kicked at him, but he refused to let go. He started to haul both of them back, winding his go-home line around his arm and drawing them toward the anchor line an inch at a time.
Haeberle kicked at him again. Tim barely avoided getting a heel to the face, and realized belatedly that this wasn't going to work. He wasn't going to be able to get them both back to the anchor by pulling them like this.
He stopped, just hung motionless for a moment. The current had died here, as though once drawing them into the center it could dissipate.
Tim suddenly remembered the fish. The currents he had experienced before.
Were they all for this? All to draw us here?
He didn't know. It was crazy, but even narced it felt like a reality. Or maybe it was because he was narced. Maybe only someone in the half-haze of narcosis would see this and think something –
(old alien alive maleficent corrupt)
– had drawn them here with a purpose.
Haeberle kicked out once more. This time he connected. Hit Tim on the back of the head. Not hard enough to daze him, but enough to drive home the fact that he had to do something, fast.
He pushed forward. A quick pump of his fins that drove him up Haeberle's length. Then, before the other man could grab him or try to strike him again, Tim looped his go-home line over the man's wrist. Then a quick twist around his trailing leg.
Haeberle didn't know what was happening, that was clear. He started kicking violently, trying to get away. But that just gave Tim an easier target as he continued to foul the other man on the line. Soon Haeberle was at the center of a knot rivaling that of an amateur fisherman casting his first line.
Tim let out about ten feet of line. Enough to be out of reach, but not so much that Haeberle would be out of his sight. He swam around the still-thrashing man, then grabbed the trailing edge of the go-home line. Began pulling them both back to the anchor, hand over hand.
The current picked up again. Hard. Pulling debris at them. Bits of flotsam. Small animals that had been noticeably absent when Tim was moving toward the center of the wrecks.
Then the fish came. Schools. Thousands, millions. Mismatched creatures – silver and yellow and blue and a hundred thousand colors stolen from a hundred thousand rainbows. Species that did not belong together, that should be fighting or fleeing or feeding, but all focused instead on him.
That's crazy.
That's impossible.
It's true.
And he knew it was. Knew he had to get out of here, because whatever was at the center of the boats was –
(hungry)
– evil, and meant him only harm.
Haeberle was a dead weight. A drag that caused Tim to breathe harder, faster, deeper. He knew his air was getting low enough he would have to go up soon – or not at all.
He kept pulling.
He got to the anchor line.
Tim clipped onto the anchor line.
And just as he did, an explosion threw him sideways, and the water pulsed like it had passed through a sonic boom.
BONES
~^~^~^~^~
They lay Mercedes on one of the lower berths. The table in the salon was too small, the chairs and benches absolutely not designed to hold an unconscious human of any size.
So they ported her down the stairs, past the cracked-open door to the galley storage. Then into the cabin, to the bunk Mercedes had slept on last night.
Was she going through this all night? Sue wondered. Did she just not tell us for some reason?
That would be lunacy.
But things were hardly sane right now, were they?
She and her father got Mercedes in the berth, and she tried not to notice the strips of flesh that peeled their way across the sheets and blanket as she and her father placed the unconscious woman there. She caught a glimpse of Mr. Raven's face, scrunched in a scowl of pure disgust.
She felt like punching him.
They had barely gotten Mercedes settled when something boomed. It was like the previous explosions, only it seemed even louder this time. Maybe that was just because they were all below the water line, closer to wherever it was coming from, but the sound nearly deafened Sue.
Then she forgot about the pain in her ears as the entire cabin tilted sideways. She saw Mr. Raven slam into a wall that had abruptly shifted from "beside" to "below."
Sue felt arms grab her. Felt her father hold her as they both tumbled to the side. Heard him "oof" as he slammed into one of the berths with both his weight and hers driving him down.
She saw, as the world tilted, Mercedes slam limply sideways and up. The crunch of bone breaking as she hit the bunk above hers.
Then she was lost in a new sound. The creak of wood, the shriek of joints.
The sound of a boat under strain it had not been designed to withstand.
The sound of a boat breaking apart.
She felt water on her feet.
TRUST
~^~^~^~^~
The anchor line whipped around like a snake, jerking Tim and Haeberle with bruising force. Even with the water's drag, even under all the pressure down here, Tim felt himself tossed like a leaf in a hurricane.
What's going on?
The ship. Something wrong above.
The thoughts flitted in and out of his mind, tiny fish disappearing in a black reef of pain, fear, confusion, narcosis.
Then, as fast as they came, the surges of current that had batted at him dissipated and disappeared completely.
He looked at Haeberle. The guy had lost his regulator, and Tim swam over and put it back in his mouth. Haeberle's eyes had changed. No longer dazed, hypnotized. Whatever had just happened had shaken him out of his mindless state, his empty need to flee to the darkness where…
… where the explosion came from.
Tim knew it was true. Didn't know how, but sensed that he had been close to something of great power. And great malevolence.
He looked Haeberle in the eye. Trying to gauge if the man was going to fight him or not. Realized that he was hearing a beeping. He checked his dive computer. It said he had a couple minutes left before his ascent time.
Tim checked Haeberle's DC; noted he was into the time he should ascend.
He wrote on his wrist slate: "Don't fight me or we BOTH DIE."
Haeberle nodded. He pointed his chin at the closest of the cords that Tim had bound him in. Clearly motioning to be let loose.
Tim thought about it.
Thought about how hard it would be to drag Haeberle all the way up.
Then thought about how much harder it would be if the guy went batshit crazy again and tried to escape or fight him.
He wrote on his slate. "Sorry. Cant trust U."
He began his ascent, trailing Haeberle behind him like bizarre bait on the world's sho
rtest fishing line.
And tried not to think about what lay below, or what they might find above.
FUN
~^~^~^~^~
The higher they went, the more it seemed like what had just happened was simply a dream.
And if it's my dream, inside this big dream I'm already dreaming, does that make it a dream in a dream, or a dream of a dream?
A good question, but one that Haeberle couldn't seem to focus on. He was too busy remembering….
Not the boom. Not the smashing, pounding feel of water pulling in all directions at once. No, that was… unreal. Didn't seem like anything at all. Just that dream.
What was real, though… what was real about the dive was nothing short of amazing. Bliss.
He hung loose at the end of the line that Tim had wrapped around him, and was strangely content. This was his world, he understood that now on a level he had never attained before. Understood it from the subatomic particles that created him, the God of this world, to the extension of Himself that created all around him.
Especially what he had found below. A dream of a dream, a dream in a dream. And at the same time more real than anything he had experienced.
He remembered dropping to the bottom. Tying on. The pulse of his heartbeat, the beat of narcosis merely a pleasant background to his actions. Syncopation provided by him and for him – as, indeed, all creation was by and of him.
Then swimming over the wrecks. To the center. To….
He shivered. Ecstasy so great he felt like he might just lose control of his body right here.
He looked up. Saw Tim.
And something else. Something dark that hung motionless against the light of the sun that broke through the surface of the water. The anchor line led to its center.
The ship.
But the outline was wrong somehow. Instead of being a sleek wedge designed to cut through the water, it had odd bulges, strange outcroppings.
Tim swam/pulled them both closer. Then stopped suddenly. And Haeberle saw why.
The ship had capsized. Up became down, down up.
The Deep 2015.06.23 Page 20