FOURTEEN

David Ingles awoke, finding himself in a sitting position, upper torso lying over Declan Irvin’s detailed and stunning journal. Dry-mouthed and exhausted, he looked over his shoulder to where Kelly Irvin softly moaned in her sleep, and for a moment, he studied her features where she lay in her clothes. She looked so lovely and so normal, he thought and offered a prayer for a millisecond that it had all been a bad dream—her crazy story. It felt good to hope for this up till the moment of fully recalling Declan Irvin’s journal; it all came rushing in at him again, vividly gripping, the intern’s voice lifting off the page! So compelling, so sure, so authentic until the tale had enraptured David so completely until sleep had forced him to stop reading. Thus the final truth of the sinking of the unsinkable Titanic—whatever that truth might be—sank now into his befuddled mind.

Most assuredly many tenacious reservations and doubts held sway. A part of his mind kept fencing with it, doing battle, disbelieving, but then the disbelief was suspended when he recalled Irvin’s details to this point, not to mention Kelly’s strange saber tooth and her certainty that the Titanic’s captain and crew had acted with intent… had actually planned to take her to the bottom of the Atlantic. With good reason… due to some disease organism on board. Men who ought to be heroes of their day had come to the conclusion that Titanic could not find any other home than on the ocean floor—to freeze this Black Plague-like organism running rampant on the ship. Could it truly be that a secret cabal aboard Titanic was set on this course? That they actually scuttled her? Logic told him i was impossible.

The lookout in the crow’s nest, Frederick Fleet, and the officers on deck, turned her bow into that now famous iceberg and rammed the mountain of ice. Meantime, below decks, the chief engineer—acting under direct orders of Captain Smith—opened up the bulkheads built to be sealed off at the ceiling ensuring each compartment below the water line would fill in succession with the cold Atlantic. The controls were right there on the bridge, immediately at the captain’s disposal, so why didn’t he seal off these compartments? The records said it was already too late, but was it?

These same officers and crewmen, according to pages that he had skipped ahead to, opened large bilge tubes to speed up the process of taking on water after she struck the iceberg. In fact, men were knocked down while officers above managed to veer the ship off the spur of the iceberg, the lowest deck shaking earthquake fashion.

On the one hand, it was all too fantastic to swallow, yet on the other the detailed account rang such a convincing bell; it sounded so honest.

For now, Ingles had to slip out of here unnoticed and hope that Bowman hadn’t missed him—likely an impossibility. Kelly moaned in her sleep, and he imagined her having vivid dreams for certain if she believed everything in her ancestor’s journal. Wildly insane dreams really if she believed that someone aboard Scorpio today was the descendant of some alien creature supposedly escaped from a prehistoric beast buried in a mine shaft. Then the supposed thing hitched a ‘ride’ as any parasite in nature does via a carrier, in this case a human host, on board the Titanic? Yeah sure, he thought. Only to survive the sinking of Titanic and leave some weird egg-sacs it’d laid—and now it was back? And finally, that it had the potential to destroy all of humanity?

If Kelly truly believed the ‘facts’ laid out in the 1912 journal, she might well endanger Scorpio’s mission and everyone aboard. ‘Beware the man—or woman—of one book’ warned some forgotten philosopher in David’s head.

David hesitated at the door, wondering if he should not take the journal with him, wrap it in a girly magazine and read more during the day. He glanced outside; some people moving about down the corridor. He ducked back inside, decided to take the journal, and then considered the larger question now galloping through his fevered mind: Shall I continue to read this journal or turn it over to Swigart and Forbes? Let them deal with Dr. Irvin and her crazy agenda? Is she psychotic or suffering from delusions of grandeur? Either way, they’ll put her off Scorpio… and she’d no longer be my problem.

Then he recalled that she had worked with Forbes years before; how long had she lived with this plan to disrupt Dr. Juris Forbes’ expedition, a mission taking years to fund, organize, and get started? Her cover for being on board now appeared a sure infiltration, but how radical might she become—if she didn’t get her own way? Had her plans been ongoing for three years? Four years? For the better part of her life? Was she OCD on this subject or just insane? Maybe an insanity gene ran in her family. This seemed more logical than this next question: suppose the disease carrying parasitic monster did exist? Suppose she was the one infected? What if she were possessed of this so-called sentient, blood-sucking, parasite leech without a name? What if it had simply chosen her family to take root in through the generations? Why not?

One thing was for certain. She needed help, but not from David Ingles. She needed the best shrink money could buy. David’s mind raced as he thought sure, her ancestor creates this HP Lovecraft-styled nightmare, a fantastical tale about what happened aboard Titanic, offering this crazy story, and she buys it hook, line, and sinker? Fine but David Ingles’ mama raised no fools.

She rolled over onto her side, still deep in slumber. “Crazy beautiful creature,” he muttered, grabbed up the journal, and with a deep breath, he stepped out into the passageway. There he came face to face with Lena Gambio and Will Bowman who seemed in high spirits. Their conversation ceased suddenly and each stared from David to Kelly’s room and back again.

“Looks like you’re not the only one got lucky last night, Bowman,” Lena said, punched Will in the arm with a solid blow, and rushed ahead for the galley, saying, “I need that coffee, man.”

Bowman, a sure look of guilt on his black face, said, “Hey, man. Woke up, found you gone, took a stroll on deck, and Lena and me… we got to talking. Know how it is? It’s been a while.”

“Yeah, I understand.” Ingles kept the book at his side.

Bowman glanced at Kelly’s closed door, lifted his chin and smiled. “Guess you couldn’t sleep either, eh bro?”

“No… too excited about the dive to Titanic.”

“Listen, man, you got my back, I got yours. Deal?”

“Deal. Say that coffee smells good.”

“On my way, too.”

“Let me just stow this.” David snatched open their shared compartment door. “Catch up to you in a minute.”

“Reading the sailor’s bible, eh? Moby Dick?”

“Rhyme of the Ancient Mariner,” he lied, “freakin’ first edition Dr. Irvin has. We ahhh talked all night about it. Seems we share a taste for classic lit.”

“Yeah, right… talked books, got it… sure! Later then.” He gave Ingles a jumping thumbs up, obviously certain that David had done more than discuss poetry with Dr. Irvin. He finished with a fist-bump and a toothy grin before rushing off to catch up with Lena.

David had no problem translating the salacious grin on his dive partner’s face; it’d spoken volumes as Bowman had turned to make his way toward mid-ship and the galley. David heard his mutterings and laughter, his body language clearly accepting the fact that the bosses, not even Swigart, could keep human nature in line.

David saw Mendenhall who’d just then come out of his compartment. He’d been masked by Bowman until Will had passed the other diver. Jacob gave David that evil eye of his, a cold stare, studying him acutely and likely curious about both the book in David’s hand and why the look on David’s face. Had Jacob also seen him exiting Irvin’s cabin. No knowing smirk from Jacob and none expected, no laughter or thumbs up or any gesture whatsoever—just that examining eye.

David decided that if Jacob knew anything Lou Swigart would have him on the carpet by noon, and then people would really be talking. Was his secret rendezvous already out? If so, it would spread throughout the ship. “Damn,” he muttered to himself while watching Mendenhall’s back as the taller man followed in Bowman’s wake, heading to the galley, David assumed.

Moments later, David slipped into his room and tucked the journal deep below his bunk. He undressed and wrapped himself in a robe. Shortly, he exited and went to the showers, waving at other crewmen, a TV news cameraman and reporter Craig Powers. They had met the day before, but David now waved him off any thought of an interview, and instead ducked into the tight space of the shower room. He imagined himself at the center of a cellblock murder, feeling claustrophobic as there was only one way in and one way out. He replayed the shower scene in Psycho, Hitchcock’s black and white thriller—which he’d read in its original as Robert Bloch’s novel—only now in his paranoid imaginings, the victim in the shower was him!

As a result, he rushed through the shower.

Toweling off, about to exit the showers, he turned to find Kelly, her jaw set, standing in his way. She tossed his robe at him, and he quickly covered himself. “You have no right to have taken the journal without my knowledge, Dave. What’re you thinking? To turn me in? Have me booted off the boat?”

“It crossed my mind, yeah, but I’m reserving judgment until I can finish the… uh, narrative,” he only half lied as during his shower, he felt more and more compelled to read on.

“Where is it, David? Where the hell’d you put it? Damn you!”

“Hold on! Easy, Kelly, it’s in a safe place.”

“Where? There is no safe place for an object like that.”

“My room; I didn’t want people to get the wrong idea—snuck out early and I wanted to keep reading.”

Her angry features softened. “You should’ve wakened me.”

“You were sleeping soundly and—”

“I can’t be exposed on this, David; it’s our only chance, and we have no chance if that… that killer aboard knows we are onto it.”

“I think I’m already exposed,” he tried to make light of it, looking down at his bare chest, the robe now tied snugly about him.

“Sorry but I feared the worst—that you’d already turned me in.”

He raised both arms in a gesture of defeat.

“I’m out of here. Read the rest of the journal, please, before you make the worst mistake of your life.” She rushed out.

“Will do,” he promised, his voice trailing after her.

But David wasn’t sure he believed it himself. He had a great deal to weigh up, and if news got out that he and Irvin had had secret rendezvous aboard, he had no doubt that Swigart would send them both packing.

After dressing, David made his way topside; he needed air and a look at the sea—a balm that always refreshed his mind. That saber tooth kept returning to his thoughts like an evil talisman, but he knew that Kelly might’ve picked it up in the backroom of any museum of natural history in America. But for now he felt a clawing familiar claustrophobia at the back of his mind that began creeping along his skin and every pore; a feeling that everything was closing in on him including time, a feeling he’d experienced only once before—with Terry’s death deep inside that sub in the Sea of Japan.

Topside, the sea breeze, sunshine, and ocean spray filled his senses and conspired to make what he had learned from the Irvin journal more absurd than he had earlier thought. The cool light of day could have that effect along with a cool breeze on a freshly showered sailor. In fact, it often felt nature was the best teacher, and her lessons were not lost on this sun-drenched deck in the middle of the ocean where the loveliness of this day argued for calm, steady, and perfectly sane seas. It argued for him to sit down with Swigart, Irvin’s ‘evidence’ in hand, and lay it all out for him.

But he’d promised Kelly, and aside from barging into the men’s room—and this wild story of some alien disease aboard Titanic—she seemed sane, calm, and as sure as the sea, the sun, moon and stars. Perhaps I should just lie low, he cautioned himself. Remain in my compartment—away from her… and pray any rumors might die before they take hold. Take the coward’s way out. He now muttered, “Never said I was a hero.”

He knew a lot depended on the other male divers, Will Bowman and Jacob Mendenhall in particular; they’d both seen him exiting Kelly’s room as had Lena, and all three had assumed that which most anyone might. He trusted Lena to keep it to herself. There seemed something positive in her passing look. Most certainly, she probably liked gossip as much as the next person, but David guessed otherwise when it came to matters of the heart. On the other hand, Bowman, and possibly Mendenhall, would be unable to keep their mouths shut.

He decided to grab a couple of biscuits from the galley and return to his room to hibernate there and perhaps read on; to be honest with himself, and despite his doubts about the authenticity of the journal, the story did have a certain allure in and of itself—absurd as it was! Still, it somehow compelled him to find out—according to Declan Irvin—what happened next?

After all, once Titanic left Belfast for the open sea, it was run through a series of tests before arriving at Southampton, England, and a few days interval would have elapsed. If those men of 1912 had suspected something aboard, something unnatural and horrible, then why did they wait until it was too late to quarantine the ship before thousands of men, women, and children boarded her and began the journey to America?

Perhaps the answers rested in the pages he had yet to read and digest.

Before he could get below to the galley, however, Kelly again found him, asking “Have you seen Dr. Alandale? Where’s Alandale?” The sound of the ship coursing over the surface of the sea softened her shouting. She shaded her eyes against the brilliant sun.

“Alandale? I dunno. Haven’t seen him since… well since you fawned all over him when you boarded.”

“Fawned all over him?” She gave him another angry look. “What’re you talking about, Dave?”

“You are one damn good actress, Dr. Irvin. I thought you were a groupie about to ask him for his autograph.”

“I do have one of his books in my bags for his signature; I wasn’t acting, Dave.”

“Then you are a groupie?”

“I hold a degree in Oceanography, but you know that. I’ve read every word Alandale ever put to paper. Haven’t you?”

Something in the way she delivered her last words made him wonder. “You’ve had quite an unusual career trajectory, Kelly. Straight from being a filing clerk for Forbes to Dr. Irvin.”

“Oceanography was required to keep on top of what was going on with Titanic exploration; I knew the French expedition, for instance, could not get to those things inside Titanic, but I learned early on about the breakthrough with Perflourocarbons, liquid air—and then I knew.”

“Knew? Knew what?”

“Knew that the thing my great-great grandfather tried to destroy… if it got off Titanic as I’ve surmised—and as he feared it might—that it would be watching for any chance to get at its prize! Those eggs it—that thing—left on board when Titanic went down.”

Suddenly, Swigart’s voice broke into their conversation. “You two look like you’re on a g’damn honeymoon; I hope you’re keeping it professional, people. Already have to keep my eye on Bowman and Gambio.”

She turned abruptly. “Talking protocol, sir. Want to make sure we work as a team,” she lied. “Keeping it professional,” she tossed his words back and added, “Making sure we have our hand signals down in case anyone loses audio.” She allowed her hands to do a bit of dance before Swigart, sending him a mock distress signal—indicating strangulation by noose, tongue lolling, all of which made Lou laugh like a kid. David again thought how adept she was at manipulating men… and at lying.

“But you’re doing it in isolation; you have a third team member,” quarreled Swigart, “so this doesn’t look good.”

“My fault, sir,” David jumped in. “I… I followed Dr. Irvin here,” he now lied. “Wanted to ask her a couple of questions about her inside knowledge of our captain, sir, as Dr. Irvin has worked with him previously, sir.”

“Is that right, Mr. Ingles?”

“Yes, sir.”

“I see… well.” Swigart looked sternly at the two of them. “Be sure to keep it professional then, and carry on.” Swigart moved on, and Kelly and David exchanged a look that said ‘close call’.

Still, David wondered at Swigart’s choice of words—‘carry on’. Did he mean it as the normal phrase among sailors? Or was it a jibe or a warning? “Yes sir, thank you,” he called out to Swigart as the man decreased in size going away from them.

Swigart started with a yelp that David at first thought to be a reply, but it was anything but. The older seaman had slipped on a slick of oil, and he went down on one knee, saying, “What the hell?”

The others rushed to help Swigart to his feet; the big man was asking, “What’d I step in? There shouldn’t be any oil on deck. Where’s this leak coming from?”

“Appears to be coming from the seals to the winch, else it’s coming from the submersible,” said David, among those helping him to his feet.

“Damn, that’s bad either way if it’s the case.” OPFC liquid air-equipped submersible was state-of-the-art, equipped with the most highly sensitive tracking devices and global positioning system on the planet, and the thing cost more than Scorpio IV and her three previous sister ships combined. It could uncomfortably accommodate up to twelve people on a dare; eight far more reasonably. Meanwhile, thanks to new technology, MAX could remain submerged indefinitely—as with any nuclear powered sub, but while its electronics were operated from a nuclear reactor, its propulsion was, in a sense, low tech—a thing of beauty as it mimicked the method of propulsion found naturally in much of undersea life.

“It could sabotage the whole operation.” David’s accusing eyes met Kelly’s, and she slowly shook her head as if to say she had nothing to do with it. Dave asked, “Who would have enough know how to remove a seal from such a mechanism?”

“Alandale and his crew of engineers—Houston Ford in particular, but they know every inch.” Swigart looked around as if to take note of every crewman near the winch and Max, as everyone called the sub. “Gotta be the winch. I’ll see to it Alandale gets his best man on it—if we can find him! Seems he’s gone missing; fear is he and Alandale for whatever mad reason have taken a collapsible lifeboat and have gotten off Scorpio.”

“That’s… that seems so unlikely,” she said.“We were just talking about Alandale,” added Kelly, pushing back a strand of hair. “Was wondering where he might’ve gotten off to.”

“Damn peculiar,” added David.

Swigart, weather-worn face pinched,“No one’s seen either man, and there’s that small boat—gone! I’ve been asking around.”

“This other man, Ford?” asked David. “He was on Alandale’s engineering crew, his top man, right?”

Lou nodded. “Tech savvy fellow, yeah. Likeable heavyset, bearded, hair as long as a pirate—you know that Jack Sparrow look that I despise.”

“Oh, yeah… dreadlocks and ponytail,” said Kelly. “I noticed him last night. Thought he was skulking about.”

David shrugged. “Something odd about all this.”

“I’ll put out a call on the PA for Alandale. If he doesn’t answer, we know he’s gotten off the ship and is adrift at our wake someplace in that small boat.”

“He’s got to be here somewhere on board,” Kelly insisted.

Swigart went in the opposite direction he’d been heading toward, now going for the bridge where he could put out an APB of sorts to direct Alandale to the bridge. He wanted to get to the bottom of the ominous oil slick on deck, and to get repairs underway before they lost time.

Just then David noticed what Kelly was staring at, and he shouted, “Hold on, Lou,” David waved him back. Look here.” He pointed to a space behind an overhanging lifeboat on davits. Someone else stepped in the oil other than you, and obviously failed to report it.”

Swigart and Kelly stared at the boot print outlined in oil. “A size smaller than mine,” Lou muttered. “Good catch, Ingles.”

“Not me, the detective here spotted it. “He pointed to Kelly.”

“Oh, well then, good eye, Dr. Irvin.”

“There’s a pattern to every boot and shoe; you find a match to these indents and swirls,” she replied, “and you might have your saboteur.”

“If it proves to be sabotage and not simply a breakdown, and if we have to, we’ll search every man aboard to find the oil-stained matching shoe. But who’d intentionally sabotage the mission? And why?”

Again David shared a quick look between himself and Kelly that Swigart, usually an extremely observant man, missed. But David chalked it up to Lou’s being distracted by the oil leak as well. The leak appeared to be coming from the swivel arm of the davit that was to take the submersible to a position to lower it into the water, but not without hydraulic fluid.

“Who aboard this vessel would do such a thing?” muttered David, frowning, shaking his head.

“Whoever wears a size eight and a half N-sneaker,” she sharply replied. “See the misshapen N in the pattern.”

“He looked closer. Could as well be a Z.”

“Well… whatever you want to call the pattern—it’s not going anywhere.”

“Unless it’s over the side.”

For Swigart, she took out her cell phone and photographed the footprint. “Not a large person,” she said to David. She pointed out a vague design in the oily footprint. It took some straining, but David made out how she had determined his Z to be a wavy N in a circle. “Nike maybe… maybe New Balance?”

“Most likely a boot; does Nike make boots as well as sneakers?”

Swigart was already in the pilot house and on the horn, repeatedly calling out Alandale’s name, following up with Ford, asking both to report to the bridge. David and Kelly looked in every direction, expecting Alandale to pop up from a hatchway somewhere, and Ford to come from one of the holds to make their way to the bridge. But no one showed, and it seemed everyone on board noticed, and they all waited… and they waited but neither Alandale nor Houston Ford made an appearance.

“We’d best check his compartment,” she said, going for the nearest hatch leading below—David on her heels. “He could be in some distress, a man his age!”

On arriving at Alandale’s door, David knocked and when no answer came, he pounded the door, and finally he tore it open, calling out, “Doctor! Dr. Alandale!”

But the room was empty, and eerily so; books, papers on the desk open, a candle-shaped lamp lit, a half eaten sandwich left atop the desk, the old fellow’s pipe resting on its stand, a final curl of smoke rising from it. “He can’t be far,” said David, pointing out the rising smoke. “Come on!” David started away, but she grabbed his arm.

“Hold on. There against the wall on the floor. See it?”

“See what?”

She lifted the candle-shaped lamp close, adding, “See this brown-to-black debris on the floor. What is that?”

David saw what she was alluding to, and he bent nearer to inspect it. “Looks like dust.”

“Soil?”

“Yeah… dirt—like soil only… I dunno, spilled tobacco?”

“Dave—the wall…” she pointed to a vent panel. “W-What’s behind the vents?”

There were parallel vents along the wall above the debris.

“Dunno.”

“I can smell it. Something’s behind that vent.”

David found a grip on the large square panel and yanked. It came down in a crash, sending up the debris that had first attracted them. “Not dirt. Dust flakes, like wood mold—or darkened, hardened skin cells.” He coughed even as he realized they had discovered Dr. Alandale. His body had been stuffed into the vent, legs and arms broken and fitted to his torso with a cord so his body looked more like a laundry package than a body!

In fact, if he’d had no head, it would appear a near perfect square. But the worst of it was that the entire body appeared the color of mahogany and was about as stiff as wood—precisely as described in Declan Irvin’s Titanic journal. Here was a body far too fresh to look this ancient. Nothing in David’s experience could explain it.

“Oh my god, look! It’s your Z and my N on the shoes, David! It was Alandale who sabotaged the ship. It’s begun and far sooner than I’d expected; you heard Swigart. Besides Dr. Alandale, there’s still a missing crewman.”

“Yes, Ford; perhaps he’s the one who killed Alandale.”

“You don’t get it still, Dave; no one knows who or what the killer is until it gets hold of them.”

“All right… OK, so, what do we do now?”

“Put the wall panel back—cover him in his coffin here.”

“What? Swigart’s likely on his way here now.”

“And this thing could be inside Swigart, controlling him. Put the panel back; we have to play dumb. It’s imperative the thing continues to believe no one is onto it.”

David did as told, quickly replacing the panel, Kelly helping out. They heard Swigart and the others coming down the corridor. They completed the task, stood, made for the door and met Swigart face to face, and behind Swigart stood Will Bowen and Lena Gambio, flashing her lashes. Mendenhall and Jens joined them. Kyle Fiske was conspicuously absent.

“What’s going on here?” demanded Swigart.

“We thought Alandale might be ill,” Kelly blurted out.

“That he might need help, sir,” added David, shrugging, “you know when he didn’t respond or show when you called him on the PA.”

“So where in Sam Hill is he?” Swigart bellowed, his eyes steaming. “Confound it!”

“Not here,” muttered Kelly, sighing heavily.

“We called for him but no answer.” David looked about at the other six faces standing about here and in the corridor. “When he failed to answer, we stepped in to make sure he hadn’t collapsed.”

Kelly added, “We feared a heart attack or something.”

“My God, did we lose two men overboard?” Lou asked. “What the hell is going on around here?”

Swigart expected no answers, and no one provided any.

“I’ve got to report this to Forbes; we need to turn around, find those men in the water, and pray they’re treading water by the time we locate ’em.”

Swigart turned to go back the way he came. Bowman passed by the other divers, all of whom stared at David and Kelly. Finally, David said, “What?”

“This expedition’s already feeling cursed,” replied Bowman.

“What’re you suggesting?”

“Nothing,” muttered Bowman.

“Look, I don’t like the idea of losing men overboard or turning the ship around anymore than you do, Will,” replied David. “But what choice do we have?”

“Two men just don’t go over the side,” said Lena. “One maybe, but two?” Lena looked around and added, “Something definitely smells about all of it—the screwed up machinery and now this.”

“And you two getting so chummy,” added Steve Jens.

“What about Bowman and Lena!” countered Mendenhall.

“That’s our business and none of yours,” Lena defended, staring down anyone who might challenge her.

“And it’s got nothing to do with missing men,” added David.

“You sure of that?” asked Mendenhall, eyeing David as she spoke. “Tell me, Dr. Irvin, was Ingles here perhaps defending your honor the other night when he got into it with the missing crewman? Then Alandale maybe tries to break it up, and he gets tossed over the side as well? All an accident of course?”

“God, Jacob, you’ve got an imagination after all!” said Kelly, smiling.

David agreed, facing Jacob and saying, “The first time you open your mouth beyond a grunt, and you write a soap opera.” David stepped back. “Hell of an imagination. Too bad it’s confused. I’m going to sack out for awhile.”

Lena Gambio snickered and said, “You need company in that sack?”

“Later,” he said, “as in another life!”

“You could do a lot worse, Davey boy,” she countered, flashing her big eyes before she broke into derisive laughter.

This made Bowman laugh and the tension was broken. The other divers dispersed, grumbling, upset at the prospect of turning the ship around and losing valuable time.

Kelly watched as the passageway was cleared. Once everyone else had disappeared and she was alone, she ducked her head into David’s compartment and saw that he’d gone back to reading the journal again. “Good,” she said, making him start. “Read on! You must know the whole story… the whole truth.”

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