“I’m sorry to hear they didn’t find Justin,” Robin said sympathetically.
“Yeah, me too,” I said, resting my forehead on my palm and looking at my feet. I didn’t want to talk about it. If I did, I’d burst into tears and never be able to stop crying. I just wanted to be airlifted directly to La Jolla where I could hide in my house without speaking to anyone. We’ll all be dead soon anyway.
Chapter Eighteen
I took a two-week leave of absence from work. Friends and relatives left messages, saying they were very sorry, that even though it was a difficult time for me, eventually everything would be better. Life would go on. Their words only made me realize how much different I was from them. To me, it felt overwhelmingly unfair that the sun still shone brightly, that people still laughed and enjoyed their lives while I tumbled deeper and deeper into a black hole of despair. I knew I would never recover from the loss of the man I loved. I wasn’t like everyone else—able to write people off like they never existed, able to just shrug my shoulders and look for a proxy to replace the man I adored so much. There was only one Justin. And now that he was gone, part of me was lost forever.
My whole being felt infected with negative emotions. After my phone rang five times within a short interval, I yanked it from its cradle and heaved it toward the wall. The hard plastic shattered and scattered across the tile floor. I spent the better part of twelve days in bed. I never bothered to change clothes, bathe, or eat anything other than a handful or two of dry cereal. When the doorbell rang, I uprooted myself from the couch and went to answer it. I pulled the door open and the last thing I remember is seeing my tile floor rush toward my face.
I awoke in a white-walled room with an IV attached to my arm, my body draped in a tent-sized hospital gown. A police officer stood at my bedside.
“Hi Miss Jones, I’m Jaime Castillo, La Jolla Police Department. Are you feeling better today?”
I gave the bronzed-skinned officer a puzzled look in response. I couldn’t remember what had happened. What am I doing here?
“I rang your doorbell last night,” he said. “But when you opened the door, you collapsed. The doctor said he believed you hadn’t had much to drink or eat in over a week. Your mother called us and said she’d been trying to reach you but couldn’t. She was very upset.” His brows dipped and his dark eyes seemed to reprimand me.
I looked away, feeling guilty. For a disoriented minute or two, I’d forgotten my predicament. Renewed sadness descended on me like a heavy, crushing weight. Even breathing felt like more exertion than it was worth. My dear, dear Justin—I’ve lost him. He’s gone. I ground my teeth together and willed back tears. My poor mom. I hadn’t wanted to hurt her or anyone else, but the suffering had huddled me up into a protective ball. “I just couldn’t talk to anyone.” My voice shuddered and my eyes filled with tears.
“Miss Jones, I’m very sorry to hear about the loss of your boyfriend.” His big dark eyes radiated with empathy.
I appreciated his kindness, but the reminder only escalated the flow of tears. “Thank you.” I rubbed my eyes and struggled to regain control of my emotions. “I appreciate your concern. There must be some reason why you’re visiting me here?”
“Yes, I’m afraid there is. Two men came looking for you at work last week. Your colleague, Sharon, reported it. They asked for your address, said they were running buddies of yours, and wanted to send flowers. When Sharon asked how they knew about the accident, they said that you’d notified them by phone. But she found it illogical that you would call mere acquaintances when you refused calls from your mother and closest friends.”
“What did they look like?” My curiosity to know more perked up my energy level a notch. I raised my hospital bed to a more upright position.
The men he described were clearly Raoul and Michael. Perhaps they’d been tipped off by the men on the plane and been sent to retrieve the notebook. Finding them is my only chance. Only they know Justin’s fate. Perhaps they had killed him or there’d been a struggle and Justin had escaped. I had to know.
“Those two men were on the dive boat with me,” I said. “The one that went down.”
“Do they have any reason to cause you any harm,” Jaime asked.
“Yes, I think so. I believe they stole my journal which contains confidential information about my meteorite research, information which proves the end of the world is near.”
“Yes, I see,” said the officer. His lips curled up in a doubtful smile and he patted me on the hand.
He thinks I’m delusional. “I’m serious.” I waved my arms in frustration.
“I’m sure you are, Miss Jones. Now why don’t you get some rest, and we’ll talk about this in a couple of days.”
He turned and walked from the room.
I was released from the hospital two days later. The police said they were unable to turn up any viable leads on Raoul and Michael. I figured they just didn’t find my story believable. I gave up morning ocean swims and runs with Jennifer. Back at work, I avoided conversation whenever possible. I focused on my assigned research and conveniently ignored the world’s impending doom. After work, I’d go home, flip on the news and sit down with a TV dinner and a few gin and tonics. I have no control over this—drinking my problems away is in my genes anyway, I’d think to myself as I mixed myself another glass. Occasionally, when I got really obliterated, I’d slide in a kickboxing DVD and practice some moves to entertain myself. I shattered several lamps and decorative plates in the process. Every morning I’d drink four cups of coffee to chase off the previous night’s hangover. After six months of this, I’d never felt worse in my life.
Everyone said time would heal me, thinking it would help. Since time only intensified my longing for Justin, their words only intensified my grief, making me feel like some kind of deviant for still loving him. Justin’s twinkling green eyes were the last thing I thought about before I drifted into sleep and the first thing I thought of when I awakened. Whether I drove or walked or sulked in my house alone, I always saw flashbacks of our time together as if they were happening at that very moment. Most of my friends wrote me off as too far gone to bother with. People hate talking to a depressed person because they don’t know what to say. You can’t be cheered up and they don’t want you to sour their mood, so they avoid you. As far as I was concerned, that was just fine. I didn’t want to pretend to be happy any more than I wanted to be responsible for ruining anyone’s day. Despite my miserable company, two people never gave up on me. My mother was one of them. Jennifer was the other.
The phone rang. I recognized Jennifer’s number on the caller ID and picked up. We exchanged greetings and then she got to the point, which was, as usual, a proposition to pry me out of my condo. “How about if we go to the Hard Rock Café for lunch this weekend?” I muted the news I’d turned on for background noise to hear better. “I don’t know…”
“Come on, what else do you have planned?”
“Nothing really, I guess.” As usual, I didn’t want to go, but if I said no, she’d just call again. She called me almost every day. Most peoples’ friends would have just given up by now. But not Jennifer. No matter how abysmal my state of mind, she still kept on trying to help. Until Justin, I’d always believed I didn’t need others—that it was only others who needed me. Then I’d fallen in love with someone who understood me better than anyone ever had. And then I’d lost him. Jennifer had stood by me ever since, offering me the caring handhold I could use if I chose to pull myself up from this dark pit. I agreed to the lunch because I’d been nothing but trouble for her. It was the least I could do.
“So that means we’re on?” Her voice pitch rose in excitement. It was a major achievement convincing clinically depressed me to step out, especially since it was the last thing I wanted to do. I wanted to lie in bed all day with the shades pulled and throw myself another pity party.
“Sure, we’re on.”
“We can take a thirty minute walk before we eat.
What time is good for you?”
She’d managed to get me exercising semi-regularly in recent weeks. I occasionally even experienced short bouts of energy not induced by caffeine. “It really doesn’t matter.” She knew only too well I spent most weekends drinking myself into a sedated haze. I glanced over at the TV. A photo of the boy who had disappeared at the beach several months ago appeared on the screen. “Hey, can I call you right back?”
“Sure, no problem.” Once I hung up, I raised the volume to listen to the report. “Five divers disappeared near La Jolla Shores this afternoon. The boat driver reported they were diving on the fringes of the La Jolla Canyon. This canyon is over six hundred feet deep in some areas and projects out from the La Jolla Shores. They began their dive, which was expected to last forty-five minutes, at two twenty PM. At the time the divers were expected to surface, the boat driver saw a green light under the water. Rescue personnel called to the area reported seeing large circular green areas on the ocean bottom, but were unable to find any evidence of the missing dive master or his four clients. Worldwide, reports have been flooding in about mysterious green glows in oceans and lakes. Animals have also been observed wading into glowing water and disappearing. If I didn’t know better, I’d think this was some kind of close encounter with aliens. What do you think, Martha?”
“Well something certainly seems amiss about this, Steve. But we’ll have to wait for more reports to come in before making a verdict.”
The phone rang again. Reluctantly, I snatched up the receiver without muting the television volume, keeping my gaze glued to the screen. “Marissa, I just saw that report about those divers disappearing,” said my director, Matt. “We need to talk. Now.”
I fumbled with the stone in my pocket and was surprised when it tugged my fingers right through it. “Holy shit.”
“Marissa, what is it? I need you to come down here.”
The NRG sites are some kind of tunnels. “It’s nothing important. Don’t worry, I’ll come down there now.”
That’s what he was trying to tell me, I thought. I whipped off my bathrobe and slipped on jeans and a T-shirt. Justin must have been trying to write the word green. The NRG sites might be the ticket, not only to saving the world, but also to finding Justin. For the first time in months, I couldn’t wait to get to work.
Chapter Nineteen
“I believe they’re some kind of transportation tunnels,” I said, gazing at Matt to read his expression. I pointed to the configuration of the craters I’d seen during the rare times they were visible. “When the minerals transform to a permeable state, they glow green. It’s my theory that any solid body that contacts them when they’re in that particular molecular configuration will be pulled through them. The same way it happened to my fingers.”
Matt wrinkled his brow. “But why would people pass through them if water doesn’t?”
“I believe when something with a solid molecular structure contacts the rock, it reacts by pulling it through. But that’s only my theory.”
“What do you think produced these so-called craters?”
I explained how the configuration of the sites formed the shape of a distant galaxy. “I think intelligent beings from somewhere in the Armi di Fuoco Galaxy may be trying to communicate with us. They may have installed some kind of transport tunnels for us to escape through because of the imminent inundation of comets we’re in for.”
“Marissa, we’ve gone over this before. You don’t really have tangible evidence that this will take place.”
“I’ve collected thousands of Precambrian rock samples that show evidence of periodic catastrophic comet impacts before life began on earth. According to my calculations, the next cycle of comet impacts will strike in about forty-five days. Even those who survive won’t make it long with the dramatic climate shifts that will follow.”
“This sounds so farfetched,” said Matt.
“You know we’ve been finding more and more evidence of catastrophic meteorite impacts, even in recent times. Take the three-hundred-meter in diameter Gulf of Carpentaria object that struck in 536 AD. It released the energy of a thousand nuclear bombs and caused widespread devastation that would have been much worse had it struck land. And we’ve found evidence of objects much larger hitting the seas, ones as large as three to five kilometers across. These are planet killers, Matt. And we’re going to be getting hit repeatedly by objects this size. Even if their angular momentum prevents some of them from penetrating the earth’s atmosphere, every statistical analysis I’ve been able to run suggests there’ll be more than enough to annihilate us.”
“Are you sure about this?”
“I’ve been in touch with Gina Martinelli at the University of Hawaii observatory. I told her to see if she could get a glimpse of this mass of comets through the telescope. She’s had trouble detecting them--they’re only visible when illuminated a certain way. But she sees evidence of some kind of massive approach. She’s been pestering NASA and the Secretary of Defense, too, but to no avail. We don’t have much time. I have to travel through one of these tunnels to find out if we can somehow escape.”
He shook his head. “That sounds risky, Marissa. We don’t want this journey to be a one way trip for you.”
Impatient, I raised my hands and let them flop to my sides. “If someone doesn’t act soon, we’re all going to die.”
Matt pursed his lips and scratched his chin. After a long pause, he said, “Very well.”
“I have a favor to ask and it’s major.” I clung to the possibility I’d once again awaken wrapped up in sheets warmed by Justin’s body instead of to a cold empty bed.
Matt frowned. “Well, I don’t see how this whole thing can possibly get much crazier?”
“I want to enter tunnels I believe are located near Half Moon Caye.”
“Near where?” Matt touched his hand to his forehead as if stricken by a sudden headache.
“It’s in Belize. Where Justin disappeared. But we’re going to need to hire some security personnel. Other people know about my research. And they’ve stolen some of my notes.”
“Are you serious?” He frowned and scratched his chin. He seemed to be fighting a battle within himself as to whether he should believe me or write me off as over the edge.
“I wish I wasn’t. I still somehow think I was the reason for the boat accident.”
“Right now let’s stay focused on getting to the tunnels. I’ll book our flights right away,” said Matt. “Why don’t you gather what you’ll need for the trip from here and I’ll call for a police escort to accompany you to your house.”
I flew with Matt and five other scientists to Belize City on the first available flight. I struggled to get comfortable in my seat, which angled my head and neck uncomfortably forward, but since it was a red-eye flight, eventually I fell into a restless sleep.
He rose up on a platform from one of the green craters. He gazed at me with those familiar I want-you-naked green eyes. As I swam toward him, he slowly sank back down into the glowing green gel. I landed in the gel in front of him, grasping him around the waist. “I love you, Justin,” I said. But he didn’t answer. And then I sank into the green gel, which slurped at our feet. The gel swallowed me and I tried to swim through it, but my arms and legs were too weak. Why did I stop training? If only I hadn’t had dumped my healthy lifestyle for that stupor of liquor and clinical depression, maybe I could have saved him. I slowly choked on the sticky, unoxygenated green gel.
“Marissa, wake up.” Matt tapped me on the shoulder and gazed at me with concern. “That must have been one hell of a dream. You’re shaking.”
I jerked upright in my seat. “Oh, it was nothing.” But I’d seen Justin standing so close just a minute ago, even if it had only been a dream. And now it hurt to breathe. Justin, my heart called out.
Chapter Twenty
A chartered boat took us to Half Moon Caye late the next morning. We persuaded two local police officers to accompany us to the island. I
read off the coordinates where the boat had crashed on the leeward side of the island to the boat pilot. He programmed them into his GPS and steered the boat toward our destination. The boat crossed open ocean until we reached the turquoise shallows of the Turneffe Islands and then plunged through deep ocean toward Lighthouse Reef, a reef rimmed by three islands, including Half Moon Caye. I wrung my hands together and paced across the deck as we bounced over one wave after another. Motion sickness never troubled me. Matt, on the other hand, a typical executive who rarely ventured out in the field, leaned over the deck on more than one occasion to vomit.
We veered toward that familiar white sliver of sand surrounded by shallow turquoise water. The boat pilot announced a brief stop on Half Moon Caye to refuel. I found this plan odd, as the island, which lacked any structures other than a restroom facility, a bird watching tower and a smattering of picnic tables, had appeared far too remote for any kind of commercial services.
Two crewmembers groaned with exertion as they pulled the front of the boat up onto the sand. Everyone waited for me, the only woman onboard, to disembark first. The instant I stepped into the sand, the click of a safety release startled me almost as much as the hand that reached out from behind a tree to grab me.
The man’s angry breath blew against my neck and his grasp around my chest forced every ounce of air from my lungs. “Keep your hands in the air or she’s dead,” said a familiar voice. Raoul. This guy is like bad food you keep burping up.
The boat driver, a man named Manuel, snatched the handguns from the holsters of the two police officers. He pointed one of the Glock nine millimeters toward everyone on the boat and waved it in the air. “Off the boat,” he ordered.
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