New Year Island

by Paul Draker

  Feeling trapped, JT started toward him, unable to back down now.

  Juan held the yellow case with one hand and ripped the tag away with the other. “Points or prize, JT—which’ll it be?”

  JT stopped. “Points.”

  Juan tossed the tag toward him. He caught it and scanned it, sensing the others relaxing around him as he did. Someone released a breath they had been holding.

  “What’s in the box?” JT shouted, glad things hadn’t gone further.

  Juan shrugged and knelt to pop the latches. He lifted the lid of the yellow case and let it fall back.

  JT and the others moved in closer to see. A foot-long orange cylinder nestled inside, topped with a thick, black, rubbery wand.

  Veronica tossed her hair, shaking blond highlights out of her face, and squatted next to Juan. “What the hell is it—an ice-cream maker?”

  “An eepurb.” Juan pulled out a folded paper instructions manual and read the cover. “GME AccuSat 406 Cat 2 EPIRB.” He looked up. “An emergency position-indicating radio beacon.”

  Veronica snorted, stood up, and walked away.

  JT gave a barking laugh. “I was hoping for a George Foreman grill and some burgers,” he said. “But we can fire this up instead and tell the Coast Guard to bring pizza when they get here.”

  Ten more days like this, together, stuck here?

  His eyes met Juan’s. The dive captain regarded him with the same lazy, unshakable calm as always.

  You and me, JT thought, we’re going to have a big fucking problem.

  CHAPTER 41

  Jordan wiggled her toes in the cool sand and looked back up the wooden stairs. The bluff’s edge cut off her view of whatever was going on up above. From down here, she couldn’t see any of the other contestants. The beach around her was as crowded as St. Tropez or Majorca on a hot July day, but instead of European tourists on towels, she had seals and sea lions lolling all around her.

  Across the channel lay the mainland, its sandy bluffs and sea grass-covered dunes sloping up into the redwood-covered hills of Big Basin and Chalk Mountain beyond. Her parents’ home in Woodside, where she had grown up, was less than thirty miles away—just on the other side of the mountain range. So was most of the Bay Area’s population of seven million. But from where Jordan stood, she could see no signs of civilization other than a lonely, abandoned-looking farmhouse a mile inland. This particular stretch of coast was mostly protected wilderness, so it was like traveling back in time.

  After the rocks and gravelly dirt of the island’s elevated surface, the beach sand felt soothing under her feet. She would be able to move fast here.

  She eyed the dark shapes of the elephant seals in the distance. In the surf, three or four large males basked in the sun while keeping their distance from each other. One raised its head to shuffle a few yards up the beach, and Jordan’s breath sped up slightly. Now that she was down at their level, the alpha bulls looked impossibly huge—monsters that weighed forty times what she did. She would have to be careful.

  Stepping around a cluster of sea lions, she moved north, scanning the surrounding beach. Just ahead, one branch of the elevated wooden walkway crossed her path. Extending from the bluff staircase, it ran six feet above the sand, stretching all the way across the beach to where it ended over the water. Creosote-log piers supported the walkway every fifteen feet or so. Beneath the walkway, next to the concrete base of a pier, something gleamed white.

  She wove through the seals and sea lions, getting closer, until she could make out a large white Tupperware container tucked next to the pier. Food! Gray elephant seals surrounded the pier, but they were smaller ones—females, not the huge, aggressive males.

  Jordan crept forward. The elephant seals shifted nervously as she approached, watching her with suspicious eyes. She slowed, changing the rhythm of her steps, and the seals seemed to relax.

  Pushing through the last group of seals, she knelt in front of the container. The seals around her suddenly erupted into motion, scrambling away in a panic.

  She scooped up the slick plastic carton, shot to her feet, and tossed it onto the walkway above her head. A deep basso roar sounded from behind, vibrating through her chest and shaking the beach beneath her feet. Grabbing the walkway’s edge with both hands, she pulled herself up in a single smooth motion, her waist at the level of the wooden beam. Her legs dangled below, vulnerable.

  No judges here, no trophies, and no second place—she would only get one shot at this.

  Certain that she would feel sharp teeth closing on her ankle or calf at any moment, Jordan kicked her legs out to the sides and thrust herself up with her arms—executing a perfect straddle beam mount. Her bare feet thumped onto the walkway.

  She crouched there, arms outstretched for balance, and gasped in relief.

  A massive dark shape slammed into the pier below.

  The impact shook the boards beneath her feet and tumbled her to one knee. The Tupperware container lay on its side in front of her. She grabbed it and tucked it under one arm as a wet bulk rose three feet above the rim of the walkway next to her.

  Kneeling, Jordan found herself staring a bull elephant seal right in the eye. It roared, blowing a blast of foul breath into her face.

  Go!

  Gagging on the smell of rotting fish, she sprang to her feet and sprinted down the walkway toward the bluff.

  The bull’s teeth splintered the boards behind her, sending chunks of wood flying.

  Jordan hurtled along the catwalk, leaping over the gaps where the planks were missing, her bare feet slipping and skidding on the slick gray-and-white bird droppings. Roosting birds launched themselves out of her way and went flapping into the air.

  Churning through the sand alongside the walkway, the elephant seal tried to head her off. She felt its teeth tear into the wood just behind her bare ankles as she bounded from board to board, desperately trying not to fall.

  Reaching the edge of the bluff, she hurled herself up the stairs that led toward the flat ground above. The elephant seal roared again in warning and turned to shuffle back to his harem.

  Breathing rapidly, Jordan collapsed on the steps. Adrenaline coursed through her body.

  She watched the seal retreat, and her breaths slowed to a calm evenness. Eyes narrowing in concentration, she replayed the encounter in her head. The elephant seal had been surprisingly fast, given its bulk—she had no doubt it could outrun her in a straight line on open ground. But its reaction times were slow. It wasn’t very smart.

  Looking down at the Tupperware container in her arms, she peeled back its lid. A couple of dozen candy bars lay stacked inside, “Snickers” written on their brown labels. Her shoulders stiffened. Reclosing the lid of the container, she pulled the scanner from her belt and scanned the container’s tag, earning eight points.

  Jordan stared after the departing bull seal again, and her jaw hardened with resentment.

  When an elephant seal lifted its chest to charge like this one had, it wouldn’t be able to see what was right in front of it. Her seal had a distinctive zigzagging scar under its right eye, and a pale patch on its trunk.

  She’d be able to recognize it again.

  Mouth tight, she sat on the steps watching the seal that had chased her for a long time.

  CHAPTER 42

  Lauren stood beneath the rusted framework of the fallen lighthouse tower, flexing her fingers and looking up. A cylindrical bundle hung from one of the tower’s higher spars, thirty feet off the ground.

  She could climb it, no problem. But the spars were rusty steel, badly corroded and flaking from the salt air—would they hold her weight? She bounced on her toes and looked around to see what the other contestants were doing.

  Some sort of huddle was breaking up by the breakwater. Juan closed a yellow plastic case and stood up. Then he, Veronica, Brent, and JT all headed their separate ways.

  Lauren looked up again. The bundle was about the size of a liter water bottle, and that decided
it for her. Grabbing the nearest spar, she levered herself up onto the scaffolding. She scanned for hand- and footholds, ignoring the ominous creak of metal, and soon was twenty feet above the ground.

  Glancing down, she tensed. Right below her, a tangle of rebar spikes stuck out of the broken concrete. She would be impaled if she fell. She reset her feet and pulled herself higher on the fallen tower, angry with herself. Why was she sketching out? This was nothing.

  A burst of liquid, sexy laughter from below startled her, and she tensed again. Veronica better not be laughing at her.

  She wasn’t. Lauren watched her pull something from a section of broken red-clay sewer pipe and hold it up, still chuckling. Rolls of toilet paper, still in their plastic wrap. Veronica scanned the tag and stood up, brushing the dirt from her jeans. With a moue of disgust on her face, she inspected something smeared on the arm of her sweater.

  A high-maintenance type for sure, forty but trying hard to look twenty. She wouldn’t last much longer here. Lauren felt a brief twinge of sympathy for the older woman, then turned her attention back to the bundle above.

  A couple of minutes later, she released her grip and dropped the last short distance to the ground, landing lightly on her feet. The cylinder in her hand—a plastic mailing tube—was disappointingly light. She shook it but didn’t hear anything. She scanned the tag for five points, then tore the end cap off and peered in.

  Disappointed, she scissored with two fingers and pulled out the sealed envelope rolled inside. She squinted at it in confusion. The plastic address window was taped over with black friction tape, but she could read the letter’s return address:

  California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation

  2100 Peabody Road

  Vacaville, CA 95696

  Lauren frowned. What the fuck?

  CHAPTER 43

  Even though Travis wasn’t visible right now, Mason knew he was still lurking close by, shadowing him. In the distance, JT, Juan, Camilla, and Lauren made their separate ways across the rocky northern end of the island. Mason watched them for a few seconds, then hopped down into the cracked concrete catchment basin. Shifting a piece of broken concrete that lay in the shadow of the dome overhead, he pulled out a briefcase-size white plastic case with a red cross painted on top.

  Mason laughed. He stood up inside the concrete basin, like a man waist-deep in an empty swimming pool, and a shadow fell across him from the rim above.

  “A first-aid kit.” Travis rubbed his chin, grinning down at Mason. “Why, I reckon that’ll come in handy sooner or later. Hand it on up or you’ll be needing it yourself real quick.”

  Mason looked around. No one else was in sight.

  “And while we’re at it,” Travis said, “I’ll take anything else you’re carrying, too. I don’t suppose you’ve scanned them, so according to the rules, they ain’t really yours.”

  “I wonder if there’s any baking soda in this first-aid kit?” Mason kept his voice easy, conversational. “That’s supposed to provide relief from pepper spray.”

  He brought his other hand into view, holding the black cylinder, and smiled. “But this is bear spray, actually, so it’s a little more powerful. Not really intended for use on people. I suspect it’ll cause some lasting damage—leave you blind, maybe?”

  CHAPTER 44

  Veronica reached up and tore the padded envelope loose from under the eaves of the small concrete blockhouse, where it had been taped. She turned it over in her hands and scanned the attached tag. The scanner registered zero points. Sweeping the blond tips of her hair out of her face, she scanned it again. Zero points.

  A wordless growl escaped through her gritted teeth.

  Frustrated, she looked around her. From where she stood, hidden by the corner of the blockhouse, she couldn’t see anyone else. She tore the end off the padded envelope and fanned it open, letting the compact object inside slide out into her hand. An old-fashioned black text pager—the kind Blackberries and smartphones had made obsolete—sat on her palm. Her eyebrows rose.

  She checked that the pager was set to vibrate rather than beep, and turned it on. The display lit up, and a short text message ticked across it:

  STAND BY FOR INSTRUCTIONS…

  Veronica looked around again to make sure no one had seen her, then slid the pager into a front pocket of her jeans.

  CHAPTER 45

  Lauren shaded her eyes with her hand and looked to where Juan was pointing. Her heart gave a thump of excitement.

  “Hell yes I see ‘em,” she said. “You think we can swim it?”

  Juan shook his head. “No. It’d be like climbing inside a washing machine filled with sharp rocks.”

  “Chicken?” she sneered. “I thought you were some kind of bad-ass scuba diver.”

  A wave exploded against the jagged rocks below them, throwing spray into the air and sprinkling her arms with droplets.

  “Look at the rip current pouring through this channel down here,” he said. “It’ll beat us to pieces, then sweep us out into the strait before we’re a quarter of the way there.”

  At the island’s northernmost edge, the ocean foamed white over a tumble of broken rocks extending from land’s end. The rocks disappeared and reappeared as green waves crashed over them with unrestrained violence and spiraled outward in eddies of white foam.

  Lauren shifted restlessly from leg to leg, probing the roof of her parched mouth with her tongue, feeling peeling sandpaper.

  “Well, shit, cowboy,” she said. “What bright ideas do you have?”

  A loose trail of rocks and boulders curved away from the island like a giant question mark. Breaking waves slammed against them, sending eruptions of spray shooting skyward. The last boulder, three hundred feet out from the island, was the size of a house. It rose several feet above the spray, and on its dry, flat top stood a dozen or more white plastic gallon jugs.

  Water—it had to be drinking water.

  “There has to be a way,” she said. “I mean, Julian wouldn’t make it totally impossible…”—her abdominals tightened—”…would he?”

  Juan didn’t answer at first. He stood very still, arms crossed, dark eyes staring at the faraway jugs. Lauren could see salt crusted on his jaw—from dried sweat or seawater. He had shaved, she noticed, and changed his shirt, too, although this one was also black. She liked the way he smelled: sweaty but not rank. Her gaze traced the corner of his jaw, his cheekbone, his small ear, his face in profile.

  “Neither of us can get that water on our own,” he finally said.

  • • •

  “We don’t know for sure what that is.” Mason grinned. “Those jugs might turn out to be full of sea water. Or paint thinner.”

  Camilla grimaced. “Oh, shut up, Mason. It’s drinking water.”

  Fabulous, Lauren thought. Nice going, Juan. These fucking yuppies were going to be a huge help, she could see. Time to call in her own reinforcements. She turned and yelled across the island.

  “Yo, JT! Get your ass over here!”

  “Anyone thirsty?” Camilla spread the top of the backpack she held. “Here’s how we go get those.”

  Seeing the rope and climbing gear, Lauren took an excited breath. “That was supposed to be for me,” she said.

  “I’ll let you borrow it,” Camilla said. “But we all share the water.”

  “You’ll get yours.” Lauren turned away from her to meet Juan’s eyes. He seemed more energized now. She joined him at the water’s edge.

  He pointed to the nearest rock. And then another one, twenty feet up-current.

  She nodded. “Belay point.” She pointed to a jagged four-foot fang of black rock just as it disappeared in a detonation of surf. “Tough transition there.”

  “Not only that.” He pointed. “We can’t grab hold anywhere. Sea urchins.”

  Lauren could see the holes now, dotting the rocks every few inches, purple-black balls of spikes nestled inside. Involuntarily, she pulled her fingers to her chest. “Oh
Christ.”

  JT slid down the short slope to join them. “I’ll let you use these.” He held out a pair of thick leather gloves. “But it’ll cost you.”

  “We need you to belay us from shore,” she said. “Earn your share.”

  She turned to Juan. “You ready?”

  He grinned. “Let’s do it.”

  “Everybody shares that water,” Camilla said.

  Lauren frowned, and stepped up to her, toe to toe. “Listen up, Dora the Explorer. This isn’t some staff meeting you’re running, where we vote on things.” Reaching back with both hands, she swept her hair into a ponytail and tied it with a piece of shoelace, matching Camilla’s angry glare with her own. “Your team killed us yesterday, so unless you feel like getting wet yourself right now, Juan and I go get those jugs. We can discuss who keeps what when we get back.”

  Mason smiled, holding up the first aid kit. “Someone may need this before we’re done. Am I in or out?”

  “Oh god, not you, too, now.” Camilla turned and grabbed the first-aid kit from him.

  Lauren laughed.

  Juan stepped forward. “Here’s the plan: Lauren and I rope up and go. JT and Mason belay us from shore. When we get back, they each get a jug, and so do you, Camilla. Lauren and I flip a coin for the points, and the two of us split the rest of the water.”

  Silence followed.

  “Anyone else want to go instead, then?” Juan asked.

  Nobody said anything.

  “That’s what I thought.”

  • • •

  Lauren crouched on the rock nearest shore, trying to keep her balance. A wave slapped her in the face, pushing her body sideways with irresistible force. It would have peeled her off, but the ropes held her in place. Blinking salt water out of her eyes, she raised her ungloved hand and gave a thumbs-up. JT paid out more rope as Juan pulled back on his, stabilizing her.