“Ejaculated again,” Quinne said. “Seems to me like someone is getting lazy with their thesaurus.”
“Or someone just thinks the word ‘ejaculated’ is inherently funny,” Wanda added.
“Well yeah, who wouldn’t?”
“We have had a bad day! We all know this!” Masterson ejected. “Everyone knows by now what’s happening! Everyone has seen the dinosaurs in the water by now!”
From the way a number of the people murmured, Quinne guessed that a majority of the passengers had seen nothing of the sort, and most of them were still in denial that such a thing was possible.
“Wait, what is he doing?” Amani asked Quinne.
“My guess is this is supposed to be the big rousing speech before the final fight to survive.”
“Quinne, how many movies do you actually watch that you keep thinking of things this way?”
“Not that many, I swear.”
“…but this is the trait that has made us the dominant species on the planet!” Masterson continued expounding. “Our will to survive! And now, that trait is going to be…”
“Seriously, this sounds rehearsed,” Jimmy said.
“Do you think maybe he was practicing while he was doing that bimbo over there?” Wanda asked.
“God, that would be a funny sight,” Jimmy said. “Probably a little disturbing, too.”
“… the last thing they ever did! That’s what made the Romans so formidable!” Masterson erupted. “Even if they did get fruity in the bedroom, we should still omelet-late them for…”
“Oh for fuck’s sake, seriously?” Quinne said. “Did the bastard really have to pull out the casual homophobia?”
“Probably doesn’t even realize what he said was offensive,” Amani said.
“Omelet-late?” Wanda asked. “Could someone please tell me what that’s supposed to mean?”
“I think he meant ‘emulate,’” Jimmy said.
“Okay, ever second I keep listening to this, I can feel my brain breaking down into its base elements,” Quinne said.
“So here’s what’s going to happen!” Masterson enervated. “We’re going to fight! We’re going to survive! We’re going to dine on the blood of…”
“What do you want to bet his speech tags have devolved to the point where they’re nothing but random, meaningless words that begin with E?” Quinne asked.
“Nuh-uh. No more bets for me,” Jimmy said. “I already owe you money I won’t be able to pay before I die.”
“Is there any real reason that we’re still here listening to this?” Amani asked.
“Maybe he actually has important information he needs to tell us,” Wanda said.
“Chocolate!” Masterson encumbered. “With a cherry on top!”
“Or not,” Wanda said.
“Maybe it would be less annoying if we went back out on the deck?” Amani asked.
“We could wait and see if the helicopters are going to show up. They should be here soon, right?” Quinne asked. “If they’re coming at all, that is. For all we know, all that talk was bullshit.”
“Now here’s the deal!” Masterson echo-located. “There are helicopters coming! There will only be three of them at first, but there will be more afterward! We have already come up with an intricate way of deciding who will get on the first ones…”
“Hell, actual information,” Wanda said. “I’m almost impressed. Almost.”
“Intricate way of deciding my ass. That’s just his way of keeping people from freaking out that the higher-paying passengers get to go first,” Quinne said. “Such bullshit.”
“Wait, is anybody out there waiting for the helicopters right now?” Amani asked.
“Well, there’s got to be, right?” Quinne asked. “It’s not like they would have all just abandoned their spot out there…”
The four of them looked around themselves at the people gathered in the rotunda. From where they stood, it would have been easy to believe that nearly every person on the ship was here listening to every word Masterson electrocuted, or ennuied, or equidistanced, or whatever the hell he might be doing now. Quinne had stopped trying to figure it out. On a balcony looking down on Masterson, Quinne saw the asshole with the red trucker hat and his angry lady-friend, both of them staring slack-jawed at the man as though Masterson preached the word of God itself. Off to their right, she saw most of the people that had previously been fighting to get on the lifeboats. There were also a number of people in various Letroix Corporation uniforms, from the café staff to the janitors to the… well, whatever the hell other type of shit jobs people had to do on a cruise ship.
Everyone. In here. Listening.
“Guys? Back out very slowly,” Quinne whispered to the others. “While everyone is distracted.”
“Why are we whispering?” Jimmy whispered back.
“Because if the helicopters show up while this idiot has a captive audience, then we might actually have a chance at being on one of the first choppers out.”
“I’m sure there’s got to be others that we should help first,” Jimmy said. “Injured people, children…”
“You’re right. It’s selfish of me to think otherwise. But how much do you think we’re going to see that from these douchbags we saw trying to get into the boats earlier? We should get out there, now, where we can help the most. And maybe have a chance not to die today.”
It would have been a good idea. It might have even helped them, as well as others, and possibly saved lives. Except that was the moment where they all ran out of time.
Something hit the ship. Whatever it had been, it was far bigger than any of the creatures they had seen thus far.
Chapter Thirteen
The floor beneath everyone tilted as the entire huge cruise ship noticeably swayed with the impact. The rotunda was packed so full that some large pockets of people stayed upright simply because there was no room for them to fall, while in other places everyone toppled over. Quinne managed to keep her feet, although she almost fell over herself with the pain when Amani, unthinkingly trying to grab onto anything she could for support, took Quinne by the arm. Quinne thought Amani might have apologized, but the rotunda was full of confused screams and crying, drowning out everything except Quinne’s panicked thoughts. Looking at the screeching, confused mass of humanity all around her, she realized this was probably the last place they wanted to be right now.
“Get out!” Quinne yelled to her companions. “Out on the deck!” In truth, she wasn’t sure that would be a very safe place for them at all, but she had the feeling that no single place on the ship could be called safe anymore. Their best chance, then, was to not be in the middle of a crowd that was on the verge of stampeding, if they could only stand back up on the still-slanting floor.
Wanda and Jimmy had taken a tumble, but Wanda was up and helping Jimmy to his feet before either Quinne or Amani could assist them. Once they were out on the deck, the severe tilt of the ship was more noticeable, thanks to the distant horizon clearly not being parallel to the boards beneath their feet. It wasn’t quite so slanted, though, that none of them would lose their footing. Or, at least, not yet. Another colossal bang hit the ship, and this time every one of the four toppled over. The hit had managed to set the Lucky Lady Duck back to being something more or less flat. However, although it easily could have been Quinne’s imagination, once she stood back up she thought that the view of the water over the side was slightly closer than it had been before.
“Is the ship sinking?” Quinne asked.
The entire ship shifted again as it was hit with a wave that shouldn’t have existed this far out to sea without a storm.
“I don’t think the problem is that it’s sinking,” Jimmy said. “I think there’s something going on over there off the uh, port side? Starboard side? I don’t even know which is supposed to be which.”
“Left,” Wanda said, pointing in that direction. “Something’s happening over on the left side.”
“Do w
e even want to know?” Amani asked.
“At this point, I think that’s kind of the same thing as asking if we want to have any chance at all of surviving,” Quinne said. “Way too much has already happened that we don’t have the details to.”
That same mournful, ungodly loud moan that they’d heard earlier echoed out over the Arctic Ocean, only this time the volume made Quinne think that, whatever had made it, it was closer. As if in response, something hit the ship again, although not with quite the same devastating force that they’d felt earlier. Eager to know and yet at the same time not wanting to know at all, Quinne moved closer to the edge of the deck on the left side, taking every step carefully just in case the ship rocked violently underneath them again. They didn’t have to go far before she could see the massive splashes and waves, and then just a little farther before their first view of the phenomenon. “Phenomenon” was about the only word Quinne’s head could come up with to describe it at first, as she didn’t have any sort of context with which to categorize it. Except perhaps in the movies. Or in wrestling. Maybe it was her association with Masterson as a failed pro-wrestler, but that was where she suddenly found the best contest.
This was a cage match, a royal rumble, or whatever the hell it was called when all the biggest wrestling name were in the ring together and all going at each other in a free-for-fall. This was Sea Monster Survival Series: The Pay-Per-View Event of the Year.
She could clearly see all three of the previously noted sea-dwelling dinosaurs. The megalodon was pacing the perimeter of a massive patch of sea, what Quinne was now stuck thinking of as the ring, while the plesiosaurus and the liopleurodon swam at each other and snapped and made hissing noises completely unlike any serpent she had ever heard before. The ring, unfortunately, seemed to share one whole side with the Lucky Lady Duck. The liopleurodon leaped and made an attempt at the plesiosaurus’s neck, and the resulting disruption of the sea when it landed caused another wave to buffet the ship, shaking it slightly.
“Those waves,” Amani said. “Are those what we keep hearing hitting the ship?”
“No,” Quinne said. “I don’t think so. I think those big bangs are when… incoming!”
As if to illustrate what she had just been about to say, the megalodon peeled off from its route and went for the liopleurodon. The liopleurodon was close enough to the ship that when it thrashed in an attempt to get out of the way, its tail smacked the ship. That caused a shudder significantly greater than the wave, but even that was not equal to the massive lurch the cruise ship had made the first time. Instead, they felt another one of those seconds later as the megalodon, its jaws wide open just like when it had swallowed Troid and Murga whole, rammed the liopleurodon, and the force of its hit smashed both creatures into the side of the ship. Quinne heard the horrible creaking of metal and breaking of plastics that signaled major damage to the side of the ship. The Lucky Lady Duck lurched again, worse than the first time, and Quinne, Amani, and the newlyweds all had to grab hold of something bolted down in order to keep from being flung over the side.
“That’s not the same side as the first hit!” Jimmy said over the tortured squeal of parts of the ship giving way somewhere lower to the water. “Are there more than just these three on the other side?”
The three creatures answered that question for him. The plesiosaur darted off toward the back of the boat with a speed that Quinne would never have guessed from something so huge and awkward looking. The megalodon followed immediately after, and within a few seconds she could hear them fighting somewhere else. There didn’t need to be more than just the three. They alone were fast and desperate enough to circle around the ship, putting the cruise ship directly in the center of their aquatic melee. The liopleurodon came into view a few seconds later and followed them, although at a significantly slower pace than before. It was hard to be sure, but Quinne thought she saw it trailing blood behind it.
“If this were a first blood match, then Leo would have already lost,” Quinne muttered.
“Huh? What did you say?” Wanda asked.
“Nothing. Just losing my sanity.”
“We need to get life jackets,” Jimmy said.
“What good is that going to do?” Quinne asked. “If any of us falls in the water at this point, we aren’t going to survive long enough to drown.”
“Damn it, Quinne, listen!” Jimmy said. “Can’t you hear that?”
The sounds of the fight, even as it moved again to the far side of the ship, were loud enough that at first she couldn’t hear anything else. Then it came to her that the squealing of something vital failing in the ship beneath her hadn’t stopped. The Lucky Lady Duck might have been able to survive most of the earlier abuse it had suffered, but it was coming close to its limit.
“The ship’s not going to last much longer, is it?” Quinne asked.
“We’re all about to end up in the Arctic Ocean one way or the other,” Jimmy said. “Our choices might very well be between maybe dying from getting eaten, or definitely dying of drowning.”
“I suppose it wouldn’t actually be very helpful if I pointed out that you’re forgetting about hypothermia?” Wanda asked.
“No, honey, it wouldn’t,” Jimmy responded. The way he said it, though, was sweet, almost tender, as if this were just another of many minor tiffs they would have throughout their marriage, and they already were ready to laugh about it. He even leaned over and kissed Wanda’s cheek. Quinne would have thought it cute.
If not for, you know, sea monsters and stuff.
“This way!” Amani said, pointing them in the direction of a nearby door. “If I remember the safety briefings, that’s where the life vests should be.”
By the time they had secured vests for each of themselves, more people had poured into the area. Whether they were here specifically for the life vests or they had just been running in a panic and decided that what these strangers were up to might be a good idea, they swarmed Quinne, Amani, Wanda, and Jimmy, frantically begging for life vests of their own. Quinne and the others did their best to help distribute them, trying to make sure that children and more vulnerable passengers had vests first, but it all devolved pretty quickly as the supplies in this particular cache of life vests dwindled. Many of the people moved on to the next place where they might find some, while the foursome escaped back inside through a service door. They found themselves in a plain corridor that the passengers were probably not intended to ever see, but which had numerous other doors that Quinne assumed led to other parts of the ship.
“Something tells me that wasn’t the orderly emergency procedure pre-approved by the Letroix Corporation for these kind of situations,” Wanda said.
“I don’t think this situation was one that Letroix ever had an emergency plan for at all,” Quinne said. “But I agree. You’d think that every single person on this ship, both the passengers and crew, had never in their life been told what exactly they were supposed to do on a cruise ship emergency. Somebody didn’t do their research.”
“No time to complain about implausibilities right now,” Amani said. “We’ve got to figure out what we’re going to do.”
Another massive shudder sent all four of them slamming into the wall. The floor tilted at an angle again, and Quinne didn’t think it would right itself this time.
“Anybody have any ideas?” Quinne asked.
“Don’t look at me,” Jimmy said. “My entire knowledge of what to do or not do in a nautical emergency comes from watching Titanic.”
“God, I hate that movie,” Quinne said. “So insipid.”
“Hey.” Jimmy looked legitimately hurt. “I love that movie.”
“Oh please. It’s three hours of Rose setting up Jack to murder him at the end.”
“There wasn’t enough room on the door!”
“There totally was!”
“No, if both of their weights had been on it, the buoyancy and balance would have been off, so…”
“Focus!” Amani yel
led at them. “Stop bickering humorously like you’re being written by Joss Whedon!”
“Yeah, I have to agree with that,” Wanda said. “We all know what happens to the characters in a Joss Whedon show.”
“Okay, fine,” Quinne said. “So what do we do?”
There was a light shudder and a lurch. Quinne’s stomach flipped like she was in an elevator that suddenly dropped an inch, then stopped.
“Higher ground,” Jimmy said. “As far away from the water as we can get for as long as possible. That way we can avoid both being eaten and freezing to death. At least for now.”
“As a plan, I have to say it lacks detail,” Quinne said. “But I certainly don’t have anything better. How about anyone else?”
Wanda and Amani shook their heads. Without any further words, Jimmy and Quinne led them in search of the nearest staircase or ladder or elevator, anything at all that might give them even a few more minutes of time before it would all end for them.
Chapter Fourteen
They only ran into two other people in the service corridors. One was someone in a kitchen uniform who was curled up on the floor against the wall and crying into their arms. The foursome spent about a minute trying to convince the person to get up and follow them, but the person never even acted like they heard them. Quinne couldn’t even guess at their gender, given the way the person kept their head and chest down and away from them, and the dim emergency lights of the corridor did little to help. Finally the group decided they couldn’t afford to stay there any longer and left the person behind. Quinne filed the person away in her mind as Jess, quietly wishing Jess Godspeed and hoping for the best for them. The other person they only saw briefly from a distance. She looked like a teenage girl in a white dress who walked into the corridor, stared at them from a distance, then calmly walked off around a corner. When the foursome reached the corner, they saw no sign of her.
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