The Origin (The Sighting #2)

by Christopher Coleman

  Kitchi nodded his head in agreement. “No, that is true, Nadie. But the Croatoan did not kill for the pleasure of their gods.”

  “Then what, Kitchi, what are you telling me?”

  “The Croatoan. The beast of the sea. The tribe sacrificed their victims for the vision of it. For the pleasure of watching it kill.”

  “Pleasure of watching it kill? I don’t know what that even means? Where is this coming from, Kitchi? I never heard any of these stories from Numohshomus. He did speak of a sea creature, black and awful he had said, full of brute strength and teeth. And he spoke of it in the way we speak of travelers from the stars or our own tales of the sea. With great exaggeration, in the language of cautionary tales. Those were never intended to be heard literally.”

  Kitchi listened to his sister speak, granting her the space to find the truth.

  Nadie held her brother’s eyes, and the resolute nature of them made her suddenly doubt her own recollection and the sincerity of her grandfather’s tales. “He did tell me the Croatoan took their name from this creature, but...that this thing, which he never quite described fully, rose and fed every cycle and a half or so.”

  “Just as he told it to me.”

  “It was a rather nonsensical tale, really. I recall it bored me.” Nadie tried to manufacture a laugh of dismissal, but it came out as nervous and fearful. “So many of his tales had such great creativity. Great metaphors that gave a tiny addition of meaning to life. But not this one. With this one, I never knew what story he was really trying to tell.”

  “This was no metaphor, Nadie. That is why it seemed out of place. He was telling the story as it happened. The story that he was a witness to. Numohshomus saw this creature with his own eyes. Saw it rise from the ocean like a devil from a watery hell. He saw it kill.”

  Nadie shook her head again, faster now, not wanting to give her brother’s tale any more merit. “No, no. Just because he said he saw it, that doesn’t make it so, Kitchi.” Nadie’s words came fast now, shaky. “He was your grandfather, he was trying to entertain his grandson. That is what grandfathers do.”

  Kitchi shook his head, his eyes fixed on Nadie. “No, Nadie. I heard his other stories too, just as you did. I heard all of them many times. But this one...this one always presented differently. And it was the one he told me in his last days, again and again, even in the hours just before he died. And it was on that occasion that he added more.”

  Nadie remembered the final days of her grandfather. The sickness and dementia. The smell of the longhouse where they kept him. She rarely went to see him during those days, and when she did, it was only when several other members of her family had already gathered.

  But Kitchi was there constantly. Often lying in bed with him, stroking his grandfather’s head and speaking with him as if they were on a fishing boat in the sound.

  “What more?”

  Kitchi closed his eyes and took in a deep breath, gathering his thoughts. Nadie could see her brother was thankful that she was willing to hear him out.

  “Numohshomus was sold to the Croatoan during one of the beast’s feeding cycles; it was just a coincidence. And it was during those weeks just before one of the new cycles that he remembered vividly. Even more than the feedings themselves.”

  Nadie turned away at the word ‘feedings.’

  “He spoke of an energy that arose in the village, one that he had never felt before or since. But it was no positive energy, like those felt during our Manitou ceremonies. It was an energy born of stress and...”

  “And what?”

  “Malevolence.” Kitchi swallowed and rubbed his hands across his face before continuing. “Numohshomus said that only a few members of the tribe were permitted to gather at the beach each time. The rest of the tribe would stay behind, nervously waiting for those who had traveled to the beach to return with detailed descriptions of the events. Begging for as much detail as possible.”

  “Details about what?” Nadie listened without skepticism now, having decided to turn fully into the story.

  “About the killing. About the feeding.”

  “Why...who were the chosen?”

  “I asked this questions to Numohshomus as well, but he never quite knew how the witnesses were selected. At first, he thought it was to do with their status in the village, elders and such, but the more he observed, the more he saw it wasn’t that at all. It seemed to be random, that perhaps they were selected based on some lottery system. And Numohshomus would always speak of that nervousness. How important those days just prior were, how the village was consumed with the selection, how they would speak of little else, other than their hopes of viewing the ‘magic’ of the kill.”

  “How did Numohshomus see it? Surely, he wasn’t chosen. Not as a slave boy.”

  “No, of course not. But it was his slave work that brought him to the Yapam that day. He was well up the beach from where the ritual was being held that first time, cleaning the barnacles from the bottom of the fishing boats. It was a part of his weekly duties, though he normally did it earlier in the day. But that day had gotten loose from him, and it was closer to dusk when he made it to the beach. During the time of sacrifice. He was at some distance, perhaps four or five hundred paces, a detail he always admitted to me. But he could tell its size even from there.”

  “Who was this victim? Why did she allow to be taken?”

  “It was no woman,” Kitchi corrected. “Women were not the only ones to be offered. Numohshomus said the victim on his day was an older man. And that they buried his legs in the sand up to the waist. There was no struggle from the man at first, but...”

  “But what?”

  “After the witnesses buried him, they retreated to the dunes, taking distance from the shore, leaving no doubt as to who the creature’s victim would be. And though this chosen man didn’t struggle at first, Numohshomus said when the beast appeared, as it began slowly to rise from the sea, climbing the slope of the shore, that is when the screams began. He told me the sounds of those screams never left him. That there was never a day that went by, even in his old age, that he didn’t hear them.”

  Kitchi frowned and bowed his head, seeming to sympathize with both the victim and his grandfather’s memories.

  “The beast ripped the man’s arms from his torso and then tore his face from his head. He was alive for several minutes until the screams finally died.” Kitchi was quiet for several beats, allowing the magnitude of the story to weigh on his sister. He then said, “It is no metaphor, Nadie. The story is real.”

  Nadie stared at her brother silently, studying his face, and then, as if it had floated down from above her, the reason why her brother was telling her this finally struck her. She stood slowly, suspiciously, and then a surge of anger filled her, propelling her to the side of her brother’s bed. She stooped down and leaned forward so that her face was only inches from Kitchi’s.

  “Are you saying that Nootau was killed by this creature?” Nadie asked. “By the Croatoan? Is that why you’re telling me this story now?”

  “I believe it is the time of the next cycle. I believe it more than the story of Morris Cook’s son.”

  Nadie looked off to the side, considering the possibility that this tale was true, and that her son had been a victim of some ancient sea beast. She looked back to Kitchi and said, “But it was Nootau who knew of the boat at the sound. It was Nootau who would have led Samuel to the beach. There is no way Samuel Cook knew this story of Numohshomus, so it was Nootau...”

  Kitchi averted his eyes from sister.

  “Look at me, Kitchi.”

  Kitchi turned back, his sad stare locking with the defiant one of his sister’s.

  “How did Nootau know about this story?”

  “I told him.”

  Chapter 8

  Danny sat shivering on a fold-out chair in a crumbling parking lot that sat just beside the Wickard Beach boardwalk. He wasn’t quite sure how he’d arrived here, in this exact spot, as he had
been drifting in and out of sleep since the beach, internally debating whether everything that had happened that afternoon had, in fact, just been a dream.

  His eyes drooped again, but he rapidly snapped them wide, and then gritted his teeth and clenched the muscles in his back to keep himself awake. He held a thick towel across his shoulders and neck, and he pressed it tightly against his skin, trying to soak up the cold of the ocean that seemed to have seeped into his blood.

  He looked over at the deserted boardwalk, which was a rather lofty term to define the three or four blocks of stores of which this walk consisted. And the stores themselves were depressing: a couple of low-end restaurants, a dilapidated arcade, and dozen or so trinket and t-shirt shops that all basically sold same thing.

  Had he made a mistake in coming here? Now that he was so close to it again? Danny began to re-trace the events of the afternoon one last time, trying to remember how it all had concluded.

  The baby.

  He had dragged Shane and the backpack from the water onto the beach, unzipping the bag to the sight of a screaming infant. He had held the baby close to his bare chest, trying to imbue it with any warmth that still remained inside of him.

  Danny remembered trying to carry the baby to one of the homes along the beach, or at least devising the intention, but he simply had had no strength. Instead, he had pulled the infant into his belly and wrapped his knees around it, rubbing its back slowly. He had lain there, fetal-like, acting as a human cocoon, all the while staring over at Shane, who stood like a pillar in the sand, staring out at the water. He never once turned to Danny. He was entranced. The last thought Danny had before the EMTs arrived was that Shane was going to re-enter the water.

  Perhaps he had.

  When Danny awoke for the first time, he was still on the beach, but the baby was gone. He thought for a moment that Shane had extracted it from his grip, but when he saw the EMTs tucking blankets beneath his back and shoulders and draping the thick cloth across his chest, he decided it was safe with them. To think the other was unbearable.

  Danny was shivering so badly when he awoke that he couldn’t make out the faces of the men, so blurred were they by his quivering eyeballs. He had absently thought they looked like the fuzzy faces one sees from riders on a passing bullet train.

  “Where is Shane?” Danny had asked instantly, trying to look past the EMTs for any sign of the boy. “And the baby?”

  It was the last words he remembered speaking, and he realized now, as he sat alone in the open air of the parking lot, that he had not yet gotten an answer.

  Danny stood and tried to take a step, but his knees buckled at once, and he nearly collapsed to the pavement. He grabbed the back of the chair and sat back down.

  “For Christ’s sake, take him to the hospital,” a voice said from behind him.

  The voice was vaguely recognizable to Danny, but he couldn’t have placed it for a billion dollars.

  “He won’t go. Says he just needs to warm up and he’ll be fine. He’s groggy, fading in and out, but we can’t make him go if he doesn’t want to. We’re monitoring his body temperature though, and if he passes out again, we’ll load him in. Otherwise he’s all yours.”

  Danny didn’t quite register this last sentence, not the meaning of it anyway, and instead focused on the part about not wanting to go to the hospital. He didn’t remember refusing, but it certainly sounded like him. It was residue of his former life. Ever since the grotto, ever since his time as the prisoner of Lynn Shields, he had become phobic of entrapment, reluctant to be anyplace where he didn’t feel free to leave at any moment. Planes were out. Most boats. And he could never imagine entering a high-rise apartment building again.

  “Take this, sir.”

  Danny turned and saw a thin hand holding a cup of what was obviously coffee, the smell of it intoxicating. He took the cup and sipped it instantly, as if he had been starved of it, basking in the warmth of the fluid as it cascaded down the back of his throat. He closed his eyes and sighed, and then re-opened them, willing himself to stay alert and focused on the scene around him.

  He’s all yours.

  Danny scanned the parking lot, noting the Wickard Beach police cruisers, plus a few from the county, as well as a fire truck and two ambulances, including the one he sat beside currently. He turned his wrist, but his watch had been removed, so he looked to the sky, judging the height of the sun, which still hadn’t risen fully. That meant the events of the morning couldn’t have occurred more than a few hours ago.

  An image of the baby flooded Danny’s brain. And then of Shane and the purpose blazing in his eyes. The boy was bringing his brother to the god. As an offering. As food.

  Danny knew the truth now: the beast was here in Wickard, and the power of its allure had already been wielded over one person. At least one.

  “Hi, Danny.”

  The greeting came from a male standing somewhere to Danny’s left. It was the same voice from a moment ago, and as Danny turned toward it, he was greeted by two pairs of black boots and the tightly pressed slacks of two uniformed Wickard police officers.

  “I understand you had quite an afternoon,” the man added.

  Danny looked up to meet the faces of the two officers, one male, one female, standing hip to hip; they looked to be far enough apart in age that the man could have been the woman’s grandfather. He had never seen these two cops in person, but he recognized their pictures from the newspaper. He couldn’t remember their names, but the man’s voice was familiar to Danny, probably from the couple of occasions when he had called the local precinct.

  “Are you okay, Danny?”

  “Where is Shane?” Danny asked, returning to the moment. “And the baby? Are they okay?”

  The woman looked at her partner, a genuine concern draped across her face, and Danny could see she was looking for permission to answer.

  “What were you doing down here at the beach today, Mr. Lynch?”

  The officer’s voice was more solemn now, and the transition from Danny to Mr. Lynch meant they were now down to business. “I live at the beach. I come here every day.” Danny didn’t mean for the answer to come across as smart-ass, but it had that ring, even in his own ears.

  The male officer frowned and nodded, as if accepting this answer as brilliant, one he hadn’t considered. “So you do.”

  The officer looked down at a small notebook, flipping through a few pages, leaving a wide space for Danny to say more. He didn’t.

  “You moved here recently.” The officer looked up from his notebook, resting his eyes on Danny. “If I have my research correct, which I think I do.” He paused. “I’m pretty sure we’ve not met. I’ve met almost everyone in Wickard Beach. At least those who have lived here for any amount of time.”

  Danny could see where this was leading, and he was already forming his strategy. He would decline to go down to the police station to answer any questions, as was his right. Unless they arrested him, of course.

  But he didn’t think they had any cause to detain him at this point, and certainly no evidence that he’d done anything wrong. He hadn’t abducted or harmed those kids, he had saved them, and though there were questions that still needed to be answered, most of all by the parents, there was nothing to suggest Danny had committed any crime.

  But Danny was objective enough to be able to place himself in the boots of the police officers, and he knew from that vantage point, the situation appeared weird and suspicious.

  The sudden thought of prison made Danny’s palms begin to sweat.

  “We have some questions to ask you, Mr. Lynch, as I’m sure you can imagine. You mind?”

  “As long as it’s here,” Danny answered, studying his coffee as he swirled the quarter-filled cup in a clockwise motion as if aerating a glass of wine.

  The male officer looked around, surveying the suitability of their current location. “I suppose that will be alright.”

  Danny sighed and nodded, bringing his attention t
o the officers again. “Then yes, of course. But first, please, just give me an answer? Are the kids okay?”

  “They will be,” the female officer blurted, and Danny could see the wince from her senior partner. “At least we think so. You likely saved two lives today, Mr. Lynch. One for sure.”

  Danny sighed again, this time with twice the relief he felt at not being hauled off to jail. Thoughts of Shane pulling his baby brother out to sea were going to stay with him for a while, but knowing the child—both children—would live, would help to soften the memory.

  The questions about that morning came from Officer Calazzo in quick, staccato bursts, very formally, not trying to lead Danny to any guilty confession or contrary point. And Danny basically just relayed the truth of how he came to be holding the baby of Gerald and Lori DeRose. Of course, the truth wasn’t the whole truth, which included his theory about why Shane was in the ocean to begin with, swimming in the frigid waters of the Atlantic, by himself, with his baby brother in tow in a zippered backpack.

  “Why did he do it?” Danny asked, flipping the script, wondering if the police had yet formed any theories.

  Calazzo frowned and shrugged, never taking his eyes from the pad. “Who can say? But the parents tell me you came into contact with the boy this morning. That they saw you talking to him on the beach just in front of your house.”

  Danny nodded.

  “What were you doing out there at that time?”

  Danny returned the shrug and grinned, trying his best not to come off as defensive. “I was right in front of my house. It was sunrise. I go out to the beach every morning, rain or shine.”

  Calazzo nodded. “I see. Rain or shine? Why so devoted?”

  “I just like it there at that time of day. I don’t know, do you find that unusual?”

  “No, not at all. But the father...” Calazzo checked his pad again. “Gerald DeRose, he says you were working with some equipment down there. Said his boy had mentioned whale sounds or something.”