Aquifer: A Novel

by Gary Barnes

  After a few moments Larry cast the beam of his flashlight on an ambiguous lump of fur partially hidden behind a stalagmite about thirty feet in front of them. “There, I think that’s a dog,” he whispered.

  They carefully picked their way along the cave floor as they cautiously approached the dog. However, as they rounded the stalagmite they startled a huge alien that had been sleeping behind the drip-water formation.

  The startled creature sprang to its feet in a foul mood from having been so abruptly awakened. It groggily lunged for the couple. Still half asleep, the alien’s reflexes were somewhat sluggish, which allowed Larry and Tina to successfully dodge its powerful jaws.

  “Run!” shouted Larry as he fired two rounds at the creature.

  They sprinted for the river with the groggy alien lumbering after them in pursuit.

  When they were just a few feet from the water’s edge, Gimp Foot surfaced at the edge of the lagoon. Both Larry and Tina immediately froze. The pursuing alien instinctively broke off pursuit, abandoning his prey in deference to the huge creature before them.

  Gimp Foot’s reflexes were quick. Before either Larry or Tina could react it spit neurol-toxin into Tina's face. She screamed, trying to wipe the sticky venom from her face, but within two seconds she fell to the floor, comatose.

  Larry fired the remainder of the shells he had at the massive alien but the bullets had no effect whatsoever upon the beast. In an effort to divert the alien away from Tina, Larry leapt onto Gimp Foot's back as it climbed out of the lagoon onto the dry embankment. In the process he was slammed by Gimp Foot’s massive tail, sending him hurling into the cave wall. He fell, sliding down the wall, behind a mound of clay, and landed squarely upon the deck of his catamaran.

  From the bow of his catamaran Larry sipped a cup of coffee, peacefully watching a family of humpback whales swim off the port bow. They playfully jumped high into the air then fell back into the water as they rolled over onto their backs. When they dove they playfully slapped the water with their massive tails, creating a curtain of spray. The family pod seemed to revel in simply being alive. Larry smiled as he watched the rollicking whales enjoy themselves. In the background he heard the eery moaning of whale songs. It was a new song, one that he was not familiar with. Regretfully, he realized that he had forgotten to bring his tape recorder.

  Slowly and blurrily however, his eyes began to focus. The whale images before him began to morph, congealing into a large mound of clay flanked by several stalagmites in the dark cavern, plasmicly back-lit by the blinding light which streamed from the underwater opening to Blue Spring.

  Gradually Larry began to realize that he was not on his catamaran watching whales rollicking in the ocean, but was lying on the cave floor at the Blue Spring nesting chamber. He rubbed his painfully throbbing head. A huge bump was beginning to form which was quite sensitive to touch. From deep in the tunnels of the dark caverns the whale songs persisted in their eery and forlorn moaning.

  Now fully conscious, Larry listened attentively. He was very familiar with all the variations of whale songs, yet he could not place what he was hearing. Though these songs were similar to the whale songs he had recorded, they were distinctly different – not quite as melodious. They had a raspier pitch, a wider vocal range and were a lot more choppy. Suddenly Larry realized that he was not listening to whales at all. These songs were being sung by the alien creatures.

  “So . . . you can sing,” he said out loud, as if talking directly to the creatures. “Wait till I tell Tina . . .” Then Larry winced as he suddenly recalled where he was and what had happened to Tina. Almost in hysteria, and with complete disregard for his own safety, he called out her name as loudly as he could. “TINA!!!”

  He grabbed his flashlight, which lay on the floor of the cave near his left hand. Quickly he sprang to his feet while tucking the now-emptied pistol into his waist band, calling Tina’s name again. But the only answer he heard was the echo of his own voice and the faint retreating songs of the alien creatures.

  Frantically he began to search for her, sweeping the area with the beam of his flashlight in a wide arc. Then, just a short distance away, not far from the edge of the lagoon, he spotted her lying on the cold, damp clay of the cave floor. She was comatose and covered with egg jelly.

  Quickly Larry rushed over to her and knelt by her side. He called her name several times as he gently tried to shake her into consciousness. In vain he tried to wipe off the eggs that had adhered to her skin. Then he shook her again. “Tina, I know you can hear me. I know you can see me.” He shook her again. “I’m not leaving here without you, just hang on. I’ll figure something out.”

  He fitfully looked about, trying to decide what to do. Glancing to his side, he riveted his eyes upon the dark tunnel from which the distantly receding alien songs could still be heard, driving home the realization that the large creatures could return at any moment. He had to figure something out, fast.

  Looking down, he noticed Tina’s waterproof fanny pack, which was still attached to her waist. Quickly he opened it and fumbled for a syringe and a bottle of antidote. “This has got to work,” he mumbled to himself.

  He ripped open a disposable alcohol swab and sterilized a section of her forearm. Hastily he filled a syringe, flicked it with his finger and gently depressed the plunger until a tiny spirt of serum squirted to evacuate any air trapped in the vial or needle. Lifting Tina’s arm, he thrust the needle into her flesh and completed depressing the plunger, injecting Tina with the test serum. This task finished, he took out his pocketknife, opened the blade and began to lacerate the eggs, draining the fluid from each. He spoke to her as he worked.

  “Tina, stay with me here. You’re going to be just fine. I’ll have you out of here in no time.” He spoke encouragement and comfort to her constantly as he continued to lacerate and drain the fluid from each egg cluster. Once drained, he gently peeled or scrapped each egg from her skin. Since they were freshly laid, the eggs had not had sufficient time to complete the adhesion process. Tina’s skin retained a slight red mark indicating the location from which each egg had been removed. Larry vigorously rubbed her arms and cheeks to get the blood circulating.

  Slowly, Tina began to show faint signs of revival. After several minutes, she stared into Larry’s eyes and groggily moaned, “Thank you for staying with me.”

  “But you made it. Your anti-toxin works.”

  “Yeah, but I hadn’t planned on testing it on myself. That was the most horrifying experience of my life.”

  “I don’t doubt that, but if you’re strong enough to walk we’ve got to get you out of here before those things come back. Can you stand?”

  “I think so.”

  She rose to her feet with Larry’s assistance, a little wobbly at first, but she regained her strength quickly and within moments they began walking toward the river and the underwater exit.

  “Larry, we’ve got to get back to the lab and make more of this stuff. We’re going to need a lot more of it real quick.”

  “Yeah, well right now let’s just worry about getting you out of here safely.”

  At that moment the ground beneath them began to pitch in a gentle rolling action which speedily increased in intensity until it shook so violently that it knocked the couple off their feet and sloshed water in the lagoon onto the cave floor.

  “An earthquake!” shouted Larry. He instinctively rolled towards Tina in an effort to shield her from any falling debris.

  The brief tremor was only a minor earthquake, having a duration of just a few seconds and causing no real damage. When the rolling action ceased Larry stood and helped Tina to her feet. He then brushed the dirt from his clothes.

  “We get about one of those a year,” Tina explained quite matter-of-factly. “You get used to them.”

  “I doubt that I ever would. It’s unnerving.”

  “Oh, come on! It wasn’t even a four-pointer.”

  This was a conversation that Larry definitely did n
ot want to continue. “Ummm . . . let’s just get out of here and go make some more anti-toxin.”

  Tina flashed him a flirtatious smile and they headed for the exit lagoon, quickly covering the twenty feet that separated them from the water.

  Arriving at the edge of the lagoon they were shocked to discover that the water level in the pool had dropped about two feet.

  “Apparently that earthquake has disrupted the flow rate of the spring,” observed Larry.

  “Do you think it’s still safe to swim out?” Tina asked.

  Before Larry could reply they heard a growling, trumpet-like roar coming from the dark tunnel behind them.

  “They’re coming back!”exclaimed Larry. “That earthquake must have spooked them. I don’t think we have any other choice.”

  Tina glanced over her shoulder and saw Gimp Foot and two other large creatures emerging from the tunnel, seventy feet away. Larry turned to match her gaze. Seeing the creatures, they both spun around to face the spring again. Without further hesitation, they jumped from the embankment into the lagoon, hastily securing their swim masks during their free fall.

  It wasn’t until they were mid-air that they realized that the water level in the lagoon had dropped another six feet and was continuing to drop rapidly. A loud sucking-noise coming from the center of the lagoon caught their attention just before they hit the water. They had unwittingly jumped into a massive whirlpool that was rapidly draining the lagoon.

  As soon as they hit the water they could feel the sucking tow of the swirling water dragging them toward the whirlpool.

  “Swim for the edge and try to grab onto something,” Tina yelled.

  They frantically began to swim, fighting to make it back to the bank which now towered as a cliff twelve feet above them. They valiantly, but vainly struggled. The mighty arms of the spinning maelstrom caught them in the water’s tow and drew them toward the swirling vortex that was quickly draining the lagoon. They struggled to stay together, bobbing like corks as they circled ever closer and closer to the center of the sucking funnel of water.

  As she was pulled into the funnel’s center, Tina looked down into the water and saw the tail of the vortex curve beneath them and extend into the exit tunnel at the bottom of the lagoon a few feet below them where the whirling, frothy maelstrom blended with the brilliant light streaming through the exit tunnel that led to Blue Spring.

  Just as Tina and Larry reached the center of the whirling mass and were sucked underwater, their feet struck the bottom of the lagoon floor. The lagoon had so completely drained that they could have stood, but the rushing waters prevented that and flushed them into the exit tunnel that led to Blue Spring. They were speedily whisked along the rocky tunnel floor, bouncing off boulders and scrapped across the gravelly bottom.

  Halfway down the short tunnel Tina’s head broke the water’s surface, as the tunnel was less than half filled with water. She gasped for air then looked back the way she had come, hoping to see Larry. She clawed at the sidewall for something to cling to, but the walls were too slick to grasp. The water level in the tunnel was rapidly dropping now that the lagoon behind them had been drained.

  “Larry!” she yelled. Her voice echoed in the long tunnel.

  “Right here!” Larry yelled back. He was about eight feet farther down the tunnel.

  Quickly Tina spun about to see him. Then, looking past him, she was suddenly filled with terror. The tunnel should have emptied into Blue Spring. They should have been twenty-five feet below the surface of the spring, but the spring was gone and its basin was empty. The raging waters draining the tunnel spilled over the lip of a cliff and into a chasm that once fed Blue Spring.

  The tunnel was rapidly draining and the force of the rushing water knocked the couple off their feet when they tried to stand. They floundered in the fast moving water, now only one foot deep, as it washed them toward the end of the tunnel. Though only moments earlier it had been an underwater connective tunnel it was now a dry cave, the mouth of which ended in an abrupt drop-off into bottomless nothingness.

  Larry was the first to reach the rim of the cave’s mouth, being deposited there by the fast moving water. Just before being washed over the lip of the craggy drop-off, he wedged his outstretched body between two large rocks guarding the edge of the precipice. Quickly, he looked up and saw Tina hurling toward him.

  “Grab my hands,” he yelled.

  Within seconds Tina slammed into him and wrapped her arms about him tightly. Frantically they clung to each other as the last of the water draining the tunnel plunged over the edge, cascading down the sheer rock face at the cave opening.

  At last they were freed from the sucking pull of the rushing waters.

  “Are you okay?” Larry asked.

  “Yeah, I think so.”

  Cautiously they crawled to the edge of the drop-off. While laying on their stomachs they peered over the edge of the massive precipice and discovered that the waters of Blue Spring had receded down its vertical shaft. They gazed down into an empty hole over four hundred feet deep. At the bottom, the cold waters of Blue Spring seemed to boil in a bubbly, frothy caldron that continued to recede away from them as the water level proceeded to drop.

  Tina raised her head and looked about to get a better view of the brief vision she had experienced only moments earlier while sliding down the tunnel. The chasm before them was about thirty-five feet across and at least four hundred feet deep.

  The top of the vertical shaft, which normally fed water to Blue Spring, ended at the mouth of the cave. On the other side of the chasm was the dry basin which formed what used to be the floor of the spring’s lagoon. The gravelly basin floor was very steep, rising at a forty-five degree angle for about fifteen feet. Then the angle decreased significantly, creating a bowl shaped gravel bed which extended in a gentle slope for another forty feet. Beyond that, the basin curved upward quite steeply for ten feet, capped by the embankment that rimmed the previously filled pool. The one hundred-foot-high bluff wall which rose above Tina and Larry, sliced through the semi-circular basin creating half of a perfectly shaped funnel which sloped toward the bluff until it suddenly dropped down the vertical shaft. Tina and Larry were perched at the top of the massive funnel stem and peered over the edge, down into its seemingly bottomless extended throat.

  Larry cleared this throat, “So, Clayton was right. Even a minor earthquake can reverse the spring’s flow.”

  “Yeah, like he said, it’s happened twice before. What do we do now?”

  “We wait. That’s about all we can do. Clayton said that the water always comes back.”

  “But how long?”

  “It could be only a few minutes or a few hours.”

  Just then they heard the growling roar of the aliens behind them. Turning around they saw Gimp Foot in the cavernous room behind them climbing down the thirty-foot dry lagoon embankment, headed toward them.

  “Trapped!” exclaimed Larry.

  He looked over the edge again to see if there was a way to climb down, or a ledge to the side where they could escape to safety, but there was nothing. Then something moving caught his eye. There was a grapevine dangling from the cliff above them and suspended in mid-air about ten feet from the opening of the cave.

  “There,” said Larry, pointing to the grapevine. “If we can just get to that vine we could swing across the chasm and land on the other side.

  “But there’s no way to reach it,” protested Tina.

  “I could jump out and grab it.”

  Again Tina looked over the rim of the precipice into the 400 foot deep hole.

  “You’ve got to be crazy. If you miss you’ll die. And even if you make it, there’s no guarantee that vine will hold your weight.”

  Another roar bellowed through the cavern. The couple whirled around to see that Gimp Foot had almost reached the bottom of the embankment.

  “If I don’t jump we’ll die anyway.”

  Larry sprang to his feet and backed up sever
al steps to get a running start.

  “Wish me luck,” he said, knowing that their lives depended upon him reaching the vine.

  Larry exploded in a burst of energy as he sprinted forward. Reaching the mouth of the cave, he planted his right foot firmly on the edge of the cliff and leapt into the void with outstretched arms.

  He closed the gap quickly and grabbed the grapevine with both hands. His momentum carried him forward for several feet, swinging him well out over the gaping hole below him. He looked up and saw that the grapevine was attached to a large limb of a dead walnut tree that had precariously grown from the side of the bluff, nearly as high as the ledge from which he and Tina had jumped the day she first took him to Blue Spring. The old, dead tree appeared to be quite rotten and swayed with the weight of Larry’s body dangling from the grapevine.

  Larry’s forward motion slowed, then his direction changed and he began to swing back toward Tina. He pumped his legs like a child on a swing, trying to increase his momentum. But it wasn’t enough. The forward motion of his swing toward the cave tunnel slowed, then stopped several feet short of Tina. Slowly he began to swing back out over the abyss. He pumped his legs to increase the arc of his swing as his speed began to increase.

  On his second return swing toward Tina, Larry stretched his right hand forward as far as he could, straining to grasp her fingers and pull her to safety. Tina leaned out as far as she dared without losing her balance. Try as they might, their fingers remained mere inches apart. Once again Larry swung out over the abyss.

  At the far end of the tunnel, Gimp Foot had reached the floor of the emptied subterranean lagoon basin. Growling menacingly, the creature lumbered down the tunnel toward Tina. The two other aliens also began to climb down the sidewall of the dry lagoon embankment.

  Tina heard Gimp Foot coming and glanced over her shoulder. The tunnel wasn’t long and Gimp Foot had already reached the midpoint.

  “Larry!” she screamed. “Hurry!”

  As Larry swung out over the abyss he pumped his legs as hard as he could to increase his momentum. Just as he reached the far end of his pendulum swing he heard a loud crack and felt the grapevine vibrate as the old walnut tree shivered. But he didn’t have time to think about the possible consequences. Looking down he realized that the arc of his swing was not nearly far enough to clear the abyss. Even if he succeeded in rescuing Tina, the grapevine could not possibly carry them to the safety of the basin on the other side, because it did not swing far enough to transport them across the chasm. But even that thought was immaterial at the moment.