Something important. Something magnificent even.
It was also something that definitely did not belong here. In this place. At this time. The realization triggered the hairs on the back of King’s neck to stand straight up.
“Finkle!” he half-whispered, half-yelled at the old man, as he was walking by. The scientist turned to him with a questioning look. “Come with me. Bring a musket, but don’t let on about it.”
“Why? What’s going on?”
“Trust me, if this is what I think it is, you’re definitely going to want to see it without the crew around.”
Without another word, Finkle scurried back to where the men lounged, swiped a long-barreled musket, and returned to King. With a nod from the ancient pirate, the two melted further into the jungle without anyone noticing. They crept forward nearly fifty yards, coming to a clearing. Finkle nearly shouted when he saw the beast before them, but King clamped a hand over his mouth.
“Shhh. Just watch. We’re in no danger as long as we stay perfectly still.”
The two leaned forward, moving aside a cluster of palmetto fronds for a better look at the creature before them. Its head stood about seven feet off the ground, but its immense body could have easily measured thirty feet in length. It stooped over on its hind legs, with its forelegs nearly dragging the ground. Scales, salmon-like in color, covered its entire body, with a soft downy coat of pink and white feathers running down its back. Its large horse-like head reached up, plucking leaves from an oddly shaped bush, and its neck shook violently as it swallowed the vegetation down its long gullet.
“W-what is that?” Finkle whispered. His eyes were wide, but it didn’t seem to be from fear. More like the look one gets from appraising priceless pieces of art in the Louvre. There was a sadness in those eyes, as well, which King couldn’t quite understand.
“I’ll admit something here. This is way over my head.”
Finkle cocked his head, not understanding the figure of speech.
“What’s happening here is beyond my understanding. If I remember correctly, dinosaur fossils won’t be discovered for another fifty years or so.” King pointed at the creature. “But that, my friend, will be called a dinosaur.”
“Terrible lizard,” Finkle said, translating the Greek meaning of the word. “Seems appropriate…except for those feathers.”
“That’s a long story actually. But this particular type of dinosaur, if I’m not mistaken, is called an Iguanodon. They’re herbivores. Harmless to us, and from all accounts, gentle.”
“But you’ve seen all kinds of things,” Finkle said. “I saw those bones in your graveyard. Why does such a creature as this perplex you the way it does?”
King watched as the iguanodon crunched down on a mouthful of leaves, before letting them slide down its long throat with another violent shake of the neck. “Dinosaurs have been extinct for millions of years. There shouldn’t be any left.”
“Oh.” Finkle swallowed as he pondered the meaning of it all.
Of course, King knew there were tales of dinosaurs haunting the darkest recesses of the world even up until the twenty-first century. The Loch Ness Monster was one of the more famous. But the more he thought about it, the more he recalled something similar to what he was seeing now. A paper written by some whack-job cryptozoologist named Jackson—or something like that—about a creature haunting the shores of the St. Johns River known as Pinky. An iguanodon-like creature with pink skin that started making an appearance in the area in the late 1960s and on into the 1980s.
So is this it? Is this Pinky? King let those questions sink in. Could this living dinosaur still really exist in the modern world? With the discovery of the plastic army man the day before, King somehow doubted it. Two temporal anomalies in the same general vicinity, representing such extreme points in time…it just didn’t seem like a coincidence.
“Finkle! Where the blazes are you?” Captain Reardon shouted from their temporary rest area. Suddenly, the dinosaur’s head reared up nervously. Its huge nostrils flared back and forth with a powerful huff of air, then it bolted away faster than what seemed possible for its huge, unwieldy body. In less than three seconds, it had disappeared from sight into the forest.
“Blast that Irishman!” Finkle spat. “He has the uncanny ability to ruin even the most beautiful of things.”
But King wasn’t paying attention. Instead, he stood from his crouched hiding position, and was moving directly into the clearing. Toward the seven oddly shaped shrubs from which the dinosaur had been feeding. “Finkle, over here.”
He heard the old scientist climbing out from the wooded blind they’d used to spy on the creature, but he didn’t wait for the man. Instead, he brushed away a few of the stray leaves growing on a cluster of vibrantly green vines over the shrub. He let out a low whistle at what he saw.
Finkle came up next to him and came to an abrupt halt. “Is…is that what I think it is?”
King nodded. “Looks like our British friends beat us here,” he said. “And suffered the same fate as Mr. Spratt.”
20
Finkle stared at the macabre sight in front of him. Each of the seven shrubs had, at one time, been living, breathing human beings. From the tattered remains of what was left of their clothing, King was right. They had been British. Soldiers. God-fearing servants of King George. Now, they were like petrified, vegetative statues. More plant than anything else. Their skin had been ripped apart as tendrils of vines had encapsulated them, wrapping them in a living, photosensitive cocoon. Their extremities were almost wooden, still clutching their muskets with both branch-like hands. Their upper arms, torsos and heads were thick with vines, leaves and oddly colored flowers.
The flowers were more unsettling than anything, as the winter months were fast approaching. Even in Florida, plants didn’t typically flower after the early part of May. So why were these poor unfortunate souls covered in them?
“Saints preserve us,” Reardon said, as he approached the shrubs. “They’re just like…”
“Spratt,” Finkle answered. “We know.”
“But how is it happening? What is causing this?”
King shrugged. “Not sure. But this is the third weird thing going on around here. Between the vines, the plastic figurine and the…er, creature we just saw, there is definitely something strange happening. And I have a feeling it’s tied directly to this ‘Fountain’ you’re looking for.”
“Could it be the witch’s doing?” Finkle asked.
“I don’t think so. Don’t think she’s had enough time to set any of this in motion.” King pointed down at the ground a few feet away from the shrubs. “But she’s been here. There are her tracks. Looks like she’s turned southwest.”
“So what do we do now?” Finkle asked.
“Same thing we were already doing. We need to track Asherah and stop her. We just need to make one little alteration to the plan.”
“What’s that?” asked Reardon.
“Be mindful of the vegetation.”
The three of them glanced around, taking in the thick walls of cypress and live oak, and the vast river cane breaks surrounding them. Their eyes scanned the thick, hanging strands of moss drooping from tree limbs, and the palmetto bushes blocking even the slightest trace of a path in every direction.
“That might be more difficult than it sounds,” Finkle said, wiping a stream of sweat from his forehead.
“No kidding,” King answered, before pulling his sword from its sheath, and slicing a path for the crew to follow.
Day 5
King struggled to breathe as he sat, cross-legged, in his bedding. No matter how much he struggled, he couldn’t keep his hands from shaking at the memories flooding through his mind’s eye. It had been nearly thirty minutes since he’d awakened, dripping in his own sweat. Still the experience had left him drained—despite his remarkable recuperative powers.
The day before, the expedition had finally broken away from the tributaries and come to
the main body of the St. Johns River. Two more of the crew had succumbed to the strange vegetative transformation since they’d left the clearing with the human shrubbery, and one more man had been scratched and was currently under the watchful eye of the closest thing to a surgeon the crew had, the cook named Nichols.
They’d set up camp the night before and tried to rest, but the entire crew had been disturbed by grisly dreams from their pasts. Their worst moments, relived in vivid recollection, in a steady fit of REM sleep. King, apparently, had not been immune either. The faded memories of hundreds, if not thousands of souls, bleeding out as a result of his own sword, had played over and over in his dream state. The final image—the woman he loved, Sara, albeit an older one than he remembered, dying in his arms.
“O’Leary and Quinton won’t wake up,” Finkle said solemnly, from over King’s shoulder. The old scientist looked as if he’d aged a decade overnight. Apparently, he too, had felt the brunt of a fitful night of terrors.
“What do you mean, they won’t wake up?”
“Just as it sounds. They’re breathing. Quinton’s hair’s gone snow white. Both their eyes are wide open, but they won’t budge. They don’t even blink. It’s the damndest thing.”
King looked up at Finkle. “Let me guess. Your nightmares—you were reliving the most brutal portions of your life. Right?”
“You, too?”
King nodded. “So that’s the fourth oddity we’ve faced since entering this jungle,” he said. “And the third having to do with Time.”
“Beg your pardon?”
“Think about it. First was the army man figurine. That’s from the future.” King ignored the questioning glance Finkle gave him. “Then the dinosaur. From the past. Now, the dreams. Reliving moments from our past…and if I’m not mistaken, some scenes from our future as well.”
“They were just dreams, Jack. Nothing more than that.”
“Nightmares. From all accounts, every single one of us had them, except the few left as lookouts, and Nichols. But these weren’t typical nightmares. There were no boogeymen in them. No monsters under the bed. There was no trying to run away, only to be caught in slow motion.”
Finkle let out a half-hearted chuckle. “Your language continues to vex me so, my boy.”
“My point is, these dreams weren’t over-dramatized, surreal impressions of past events in our lives. If yours were like mine, they played out perfectly with history. There were no exaggerations. No metaphorical misrepresentations. They were perfect, play-by-play recollections of things that have happened to us in the past.”
Finkle seemed to consider this for a moment before giving a brief nod. “I suppose you’re right. But what does it mean?”
A blood-curdling scream erupted amid the shaken, weary sailors, interrupting King’s and Finkle’s conversation. A man leapt up from his bedding, facing to the north. His eyes were wild with terror.
“Da? It’s not my fault,” the sailor said. “I didn’t mean to break it.”
Finkle stepped forward, about to go to the man’s aid, but King’s strong hand stopped him. “Wait. Let’s see what happens.”
The sailor stepped back, raising one arm above his face. “Please, Da! I’m sorry!”
“Who’s he talking…”
That was when they both saw it. A spectral figure ambled toward the disturbed sailor. Though near transparent, the figure was human shaped—a large, robust man with a cruel, angry face.
“Da, please, no!”
“W-what are we seeing here?” Finkle asked. “A ghost?”
“I don’t think so. I think it’s something else entirely.”
Without warning, the transparent man raised a hand up and brought it down across the stricken sailor’s face. The impact, loud enough to be heard from a hundred feet away, knocked the sailor to the ground.
“That’s definitely no ghost!” King dashed forward, as the phantasm pressed in for another attack. It was about to strike the fallen man again, just as King’s body slammed into it. A sudden arc of blue electricity ripped through the air where they met, sending a violent jolt through every muscle in King’s body. Screaming, he fell to the ground, near the trembling sailor. King felt every single hair on his scalp, arms and legs stand on end as he sucked in a powerfully deep breath to force away the pain. When he looked up, the figure was gone.
“What, pray tell, was that?” Reardon asked, as he trotted up to King.
But King ignored him, and instead moved over to the still tearful sailor. “Are you all right?”
“I-I’m so sorry, Da! I didn’t mean to drop your whiskey. It was an accident.” The sailor’s bloodshot eyes stared off past King’s shoulder, as if the apparition was still as visible as it had been seconds before. A trail of tears washed away the dirt and grime covering the sailor’s cheeks as he sobbed. The half-cleaned face now revealed a bright red and blue bruise, just below his left eye. Evidence of the blow he’d sustained. “The bottle just slipped outta my hand. I did’na mean for it to happen.”
King looked around the campsite. Several—over half, if he wasn’t mistaken—of the crew were packing up their things, and running into the jungle in the direction where they’d laid anchor.
“Wait!” Reardon shouted. “Come back here, ye cowards!”
But it was too late. One by one, the crew members disappeared into the vegetation carrying whatever they could. Now, only a handful remained, and most of them were wide-eyed—possibly paralyzed in place by fear.
“‘Tis mutiny!” Reardon fumed. “Plain and simple. I’ll see them hang if it’s…”
“Captain!” King growled. “Calm down. Your man here needs to be tended to. We’ll deal with your crew later.”
Reardon nodded, then helped King lift the man from the ground. They dragged him over to one of the few remaining bed rolls left in camp. Carefully, they lowered him onto the makeshift bed, just as Nichols rushed over with a bucket of water and clean rag.
“I’ll tend to him, Captain,” he said, dipping the rag in the water and brushing it across the sailor’s forehead.
A few minutes later, Reardon, Finkle, Greer and King huddled around the campfire, talking in hushed tones so that the remaining crew members couldn’t hear what was being said.
“…so if that wasn’t a ghost, what was it?” Finkle asked. The lines across his forehead were furrowed, and King couldn’t tell if it was from frustration or from fear.
“All right. So far, we’ve experienced some pretty unusual activity since coming to Florida.” King began counting off on his fingers. “First, there are the vines. We don’t know what’s causing them, but they seem to be infecting us somehow. Turning us into…well, I’m not entirely sure. Second, we have the plastic figurine from my childhood.”
“There’s that toy again!” Quartermaster Greer spat. “Why do you keep bringing it up? Compared to what we’ve seen, that’s the least of our troubles.”
“If you’d let me finish, Englishman, I’ll explain why it’s so important.” King glared at the quartermaster, causing Greer to shrink against his shoulders. “After the figurine, Finkle and I saw a creature that hasn’t existed in millions of years.” Greer opened his mouth to say something, but was instantly silenced by a warning glance from King. “And finally, this ‘ghost’ thing we all just witnessed. Only, I don’t believe it was a ghost. As a matter of fact, when your man…”
“Jenkins. Robert Jenkins,” Reardon said.
“When your man, Jenkins, gets himself under control, I’m betting we’ll learn that the apparition was his father. Even more, I have a feeling Jenkins’s father isn’t even dead. I’ve got nothing substantial to prove that, mind you. Just a feeling.”
“So you’re saying he was attacked by the ghost of his father, who’s still living?” Finkle asked. “How is that possible? A demon, maybe? Disguised as his father?”
King shook his head. “There have been at least four unexplained phenomena we’ve witnessed in the past few days. Of those fou
r, one—the vines—is the odd man out. The other three have one common characteristic.”
“And that is?”
“Time, gentlemen. The commonality is Time.”
21
“How much farther do you think it is?” Reardon asked, glancing back at Finkle, who immediately riffled through the copied journal.
They’d left Nichols back at camp to tend to Jenkins and the young sailor who’d become infected with vine growth later that day. King had led them on their trek through the St. Johns River basin. Now, only eleven of the original twenty-three crew members in the expedition remained, and they marched warily behind King, Reardon and Finkle. Greer took up the rear, making sure no one else would decide to desert. They were following the river, bending back and forth from a southeast to easterly direction. The going would have been slow under normal circumstances, but as they took great pains to avoid contact with any of the surrounding vegetation, they crept along at an excruciating pace.
Finkle shook his head. “As I’ve said before, there aren’t many landmarks written down. It’s difficult to say.”
“We’re close,” King said. He couldn’t explain it. He didn’t quite understand it himself, but he was beginning to feel an unmistakable tug toward their destination. Something deep within him had been guiding their trek for the past six hours. The closer they came to the Fountain, the stronger the feeling had become.
Whatever is going on, it has to do with Time Displacement, he thought. Maybe since I’m already outside of my own time, it’s affecting me differently than the others. It was the only explanation he could come up with.
Patriot (A Jack Sigler Continuum Novella) Page 11