Loch Ness Revenge

by Hunter Shea

  “I know,” he whispers in my ear. “I know.”

  When he puts me down, I’m more in control of myself. Sometimes you just need a good, quick cry and a hug. Especially when you’re moments away from exacting the revenge that has been eating you alive for twenty years.

  “Do I get a hug?” Henrik asks Austin.

  “No, but how about a hearty pat on the back?”

  I get aboard Vindicta. My poor baby. She’s already taken a beating. I’m not sure she’s going to make it back this time. I vow that when we’re done here, and after we help Henrik, I’m going to find a nice lake house in New England, buy another pontoon boat, and call it Vindicta 2.

  I’ll have to do my research first, make sure there are no stories of lake monsters wherever I decide to settle.

  Henrik starts up the cigarette boat with a loud roar. He jumps about two feet off the deck.

  “It sounds very powerful,” he shouts over to us.

  “That’s because it is. Just take it slow. It’ll ride rougher that way, but I don’t want you taking off and crashing. Remember, you’re in charge of our escape pod.”

  An escape pod that’s also loaded with weapons. He has no plans on being a casual observer.

  “Just follow me, to my starboard. Don’t creep up behind me. If you juice it too much, you’ll ride over Vindicta like it’s a ramp and you’re a German Fonzie.”

  He gives me a shaky thumbs-up. I’ll bet he has no clue who Fonzie is.

  Maybe I should have had Austin take the cigarette boat, but he’s my brother – my twin brother.

  We have to do this together.

  I pull away from the slip for what I hope is the last time. Austin has a meaty hand on my head as if he’s palming a basketball. It used to irritate the crap out of me when we were kids.

  My, how things have changed.

  The spot I’ve determined we’ll release the bait is eight miles up the loch. I’m anxious as all get out to get there.

  Until I hear the screams.

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  I turn Vindicta around a spit of land dotted with dead trees and scrub grass. It’s a seldom-used fishing spot in the summer because there’s no way to get out from under the sun’s punishing glare. The Scots are not sun worshippers. At least not the ones I’ve met. Worse still, the midges swarm it when it’s hot out, making it highly uncomfortable. Nothing is more irritating that being covered in those damn midges. One minute is enough to make a person go mad.

  There’s a rowboat tied to a tree stump, the loch’s turgid waters making it dance as if it were in a mosh pit.

  The screaming is coming from an older man in hip waders. He’s out of the boat, on his ass, scrabbling backwards.

  One of the creatures is half-in, half-out of the water, inching toward him.

  Inching isn’t quite right. It’s coming for him at a pretty good clip. As its body clears the water, I see it’s one of the creatures from last night’s attack on my RV. The man isn’t Nessie chow already only because it’s having a rough time navigating dry land on just the one flipper.

  “There’s your buddy.”

  Austin reaches under the bench and grabs an AR-15. “I guess he was too wounded to get very far.”

  “Or waiting for us and this poor schmuck just happened to be in the wrong place as the wrong time.”

  I keep ascribing a cold intelligence to these creatures. For some reason, it’s hard for me to think of them as unintelligent animals. To survive this long in relative secrecy requires either an incredible amount of dumb luck or some kind of ability to learn and plan and coordinate.

  Austin hops over the side of Vindicta. The water is up to his chest. He holds the assault rifle over his head, careful not to get it wet. We have other weapons onboard specifically designed to work underwater, but the AR-15 isn’t one of them.

  “Sir, I need you to get out of the way!” Austin barks, fighting through the water.

  The creature snaps its jaws at the old man, and instead of moving faster, he freezes.

  I can’t help but shout, “Get the hell up and run!”

  Henrik pulls the cigarette boat alongside me. He has a rifle in his hands, looking down the sight. He takes a shot. There’s a sharp crack, and I see a hole bore into the monster’s rear end.

  It may not be a killing blow, but it gets its attention.

  I scream at the man again, “Now! Go! Go! Go!”

  Austin is on the bank now, water sluicing off his suit. The monster lashes its tail at him, but he dodges to his left. “Fool me once, bitch.”

  The old man, counter to anything a rational person would do, heads toward the monster in a blind panic.

  Henrik puts his rifle down. “What the hell is he doing?”

  “I don’t know.”

  I figure his close encounter has literally shattered his brain. Any ability to think clearly is now encased in a fog of numb stupidity.

  Then I see exactly what he’s doing, and it still doesn’t make much sense. “He’s going for his boat.”

  Austin is so fixated by the monster that he doesn’t notice the scared witless man dashing alongside its long, sinuous body. He opens up with the AR-15, starting from the head and working his way down with a continuous barrage of armor-piercing bullets.

  The Loch Ness Monster bleats like a wounded goat…or more like a hundred wounded goats. Its cries echo over the loch.

  Foul flesh and gouts of blood erupt in a meandering line down to its tail. It’s like watching little connect the dots magically appear. The creature flips sideways. When it’s down but still gyrating, Austin rushes to its head. He steps on its neck and with a roar of his own, he empties the gun into its vile face, reducing it to an oozing mush.

  Even without a head, the body still twitches and writes, just like an eel. But despite all of the recent theories that the beast has been some sort of giant eel all along, I can plainly see that’s just not true.

  I let out a hearty whoop, raising my fist in the air. We’ve been on the water for less than five minutes and we’ve already bagged one. Austin looks back at me with an impish grin. He’s covered from head to toe in Nessie blood.

  Then Henrik says, “Where did that man go?”

  The rowboat is still there – empty.

  “Austin, the guy, where is he?”

  My brother looks confused. He was so busy trying to stay alive himself and kill the beast, he probably didn’t notice him at all.

  I can hear Henrik groan over the idling of both boats. “I think I see him. Or at least his arm.”

  I follow where he’s pointing and see it, too.

  There’s just an arm, the fingers locked into a claw.

  The rest of him is under the creature. I tell Austin where he is and he hops over the body, sliding down its torso. He crouches down and is out of sight for a few seconds. When he pops up, his body language has completely changed.

  “He’s gone, Nat. It squashed him flat.”

  Well, fuck!

  Chapter Twenty-Three

  That takes the wind out of our sails.

  Austin and I don’t speak when he gets back on board. Henrik asks if we should call an ambulance, anonymously, of course. He informs me that he has several burner phones. I tell him it can wait. There’s nothing they can do for him now, anyway. We’ll call when we’re done.

  “I killed him.”

  My brother is sitting on one of the lounge benches, the rifle between his legs, his head hanging low. I can’t have him falling apart.

  “You didn’t. That thing killed him.”

  “I was reckless. I should have been paying attention. I thought saving him was the reason I jumped out of the boat, but now I’m not so sure.”

  The rain is pelting the awning over us so hard, it sounds like a continuous rumble of thunder.

  “You did what you had to do. If he hadn’t gone in the wrong direction, he’d be running home right now. You couldn’t know he’d do that.”

  Austin’s eyes a
re red. “But I could have watched out for the guy! Jesus, we didn’t come here to get innocent people killed. What would Mom and Dad say?”

  The truth is, they’ve been gone so long, I can barely remember their voices, much less take a stab at their thoughts. I still love them dearly and miss them with every fiber of my being, but aside from the nightmare, my tether to them fades each year like a photograph left out in the sun.

  Henrik is doing a good enough job with the cigarette boat. He’s not getting so close that I worry about any collisions, but I can clearly see him through the curtain of rain glancing over at us, at Austin specifically. He’s as worried as I am. If what just happened causes Austin to hesitate later, it could cost him his life. Or all our lives.

  I hate the whole tough love concept. Love is unconditional, not cold. But right now, it might be the only chance we’ve got.

  “You’re going to have to forget about it.”

  He glares at me. “What did you say?”

  “I need your head in this, Austin. You have the rest of your life to second guess, to punish yourself. And I’ll be there to remind you that none of it was your fault. For now, you have to compartmentalize. Lock it in cold storage. Because if you fuck up and get yourself killed, I’ll kill you again. That’s what Mom and Dad would say.”

  He opens his mouth to speak, then closes it, tightening his grip on the barrel of the rifle. I can see his muscles flexing under his skintight suit. It’s like he’s waging a silent war within himself.

  When he finally speaks, I almost sag against the wheel with relief.

  “You’re right. I promise, I’ll stow that shit away. You won’t have to worry about me.”

  He looks like he’s come out of his fugue. Looks can be deceiving, but Austin is a pretty open book to me.

  We have about ten more minutes before we get to the bait drop point. I hope Rob is already there…and safe.

  “Good, because I have enough on my hands worrying about myself. Now get that big ass rifle out of sight in case someone happens to see us. I don’t want to get arrested before the big dance.”

  Henrik gooses the cigarette boat’s twin engines and spurts ahead of me. It’s good he’s testing it a bit, getting a feel for her. Boats made for speed work the water like a hot knife through clotted cream. When they’re going slow, they’re like wartime jeeps on a bombed out road.

  I see Rob waving to us from the shore. He’s surrounded by cameras mounted on tripods. Looks like he has still and video going. I know there are plenty more set up all over the area, including some strapped to trees to get better angles. It’s a relief not to see him being hunted down like today’s hot plate special.

  “Hang on just a sec,” I say, bringing the boat to the shore. I jump into the water that goes past my waist. Henrik’s suit does the trick, keeping me nice and dry. Carrying a rope, I walk to the rocky bit of land and tie it off on a tree limb.

  Rob keeps sucking his lower lip in, then letting it out. He’s as nervous as a kid on his first day of kindergarten.

  “I thought I heard gunfire,” he says.

  “Damn. I was hoping it wouldn’t carry this far. We ran across one of the creatures back there. It was on land.”

  Rob’s eyes go wide. “Another one on land?”

  “Afraid so. It was the same one that attacked my RV. At least I’m pretty sure it was.” I look around the little video studio he’s set up. “Where’s your Uzi?”

  He points to a black plastic case. The case has a tripod and video camera sitting on it.

  “I really need you to make sure you have it on you. Not buried under equipment.”

  “Natalie, I just don’t think…”

  I cut him off by raising my hand, and my voice. “I’m not asking you to think. Just do it. There was a man fishing back there. The creature came out of the water to eat him. I can’t do what I have to do if I don’t feel you’re taking every precaution.”

  Ron walks over to the case, gently removing the tripod.

  “Is the man who was fishing all right?”

  I try to hide the inevitable sigh. This time, I’m not going to lie. “No, Rob. He’s dead. The thing rolled over on him. But Austin managed to kill it.”

  He looks like he’s going to throw up. I give him time to collect himself. “Look, you can just get your stuff and go back to your camp. Stay safe. I’m not going to force you to do this.”

  I hope he heeds my advice. I’m now very concerned for the little, nervous man.

  Instead, he stands a little straighter, tapping the side of the Uzi.

  “I think I’ll stay. You let me in on something bigger than both of us. If I walked away now, I’d be throwing away all the years I spent waiting for a moment like this. Look, I know you’re worried, but I’ll take care of myself. I really appreciate this. I won’t let you guys down.”

  I bring Rob in for a hug.

  “You better take care of yourself,” I say.

  I wade back in the water and Austin pulled me onto the boat.

  “Everything all right?”

  I look back at Rob, who’s back checking all of his equipment, the deadly gun bouncing off his hip.

  “Jesus, I hope so.”

  Turning Vindicta to the middle of the loch, we stop a few hundred yards from shore.

  “We’re here. Your big boy muscles up to unloading all this Grade D beef?”

  I try to help Austin, but he doesn’t let me. It would be easiest to just push them over the side of the boat, but he elects for a clean and jerk, followed by a cow toss. They hit the water with a tremendous splash, the bodies and the buoys going completely under for a moment. I worry that we didn’t chain them up tight enough and the carcasses are slipping free, sinking to the bottom where they’ll do us no good.

  I breathe again when the buoys bob to the surface.

  “You okay over there, Henrik?”

  The cigarette boat isn’t designed so he can easily push or flip the bait over the side. He’s struggling to get the first one up and over. When it does slip out of his hands, diving into the dingy loch, his black suit is smeared with cow goo. He looks down in disgust.

  I tell him, “The rain will take care of that.”

  “Yeah, just don’t go for a quick dip,” Austin adds, manhandling the fourth hunk of bait over Vindicta.

  Grunt. Splash. Grunt. Splash. The sounds are repeated over and over until everything’s in the pool. Vindicta feels infinitely lighter, which is very good, because it’s not a stretch to think she’ll be motoring her ass off at some point today.

  I call Rob on my cell phone.

  “You all set?”

  I picture him shaking his head rapidly, like a prairie dog with a case of the yips. “Anything that happens out there will be captured six ways to Sunday.”

  I’m tempted to ask if it matters that it’s Wednesday, but he doesn’t seem like he’d get the joke. Levity is in short supply about now. His voice is tight and I know his nerves are on a razor’s edge.

  I’m sure the windfall that will come his way later will more than pay for any therapy he needs to get right with the world again. Maybe we can get a two-for-one deal with a shrink.

  The orange buoys bob violently on the loch. The wind’s picked up. The water is nothing but whitecaps.

  “We should load up,” Austin says, lifting the lounge cushion. So many shiny weapons. At least we know they work. We also position the depth charges around Vindicta so it will be easy to deploy them when the time comes.

  Henrik says, “The water is so choppy, they’re going to have to breach the surface for us to know they’re going for the bait.”

  He’s right. Every buoy has the appearance of being tugged on from beneath. For all we know, there could be a Loch Ness Monster feast going on below our feet. I’m betting those big boys and girls are going to churn things up considerably when they get to feeding. We’ll know when they’re here, all right.

  All three of us have strapped Bullpup rifles across our chests
. They’re made for amphibious shooting. I insisted we do it just in case things get rocky and someone goes overboard. Or if Austin decides to play Tarzan again. We can’t be in the drink with no way to defend ourselves.

  The strap is cutting my cleavage something fierce, but I have to suck it up. Not having it is not an option.

  As far as I can see, there isn’t another boat on the loch or person by the shores, other than Rob. I’m sure there might be another fisherman or two about, but the Loch is huge and I just pray they’re nowhere near here.

  “Come on, you hungry little butt wipes. The restaurant is all yours.”

  The buoys are starting to scatter, tossed by the roiling current. I’m worried that they’ll spread across an area too wide to control. It’s great that we have privacy, but it’s coming at the cost of…

  “There it goes!” Austin shouts, pointing to our port side. I turn just in time to see one of the buoys slip completely under. We wait a few beats. It doesn’t pop back up. “One of them must be munching on it right now.”

  I hope it’s tearing in like Henry VIII on a turkey leg. What those creatures don’t know is that we made small cuts throughout all of the carcasses, filling each with what look like tiny jacks, except all of the points are razor sharp. If they somehow chew through the bait without cutting up their mouths, the barbed surprises will surely wreak havoc on their internal systems.

  Austin and I have our AR-15s pointed at the spot where the buoy was last seen. Henrik has something much, much bigger in his hands.

  “What is that?”

  His face breaks out in a wolfish smile. “Just a grenade launcher.”

  So much for keeping things on the down low, at least at the start.

  There’s an explosion of water behind us.

  We spin around, ready to blast whatever we see straight to hell.

  We’re not prepared for this particular sight.

  Chapter Twenty-Four

  I’m literally catching rain in my open mouth as I watch the meat missile soar twenty feet in the air. It’s headed straight for the scrub-choked shore, and possibly one of Rob’s cameras.