FIGHT

It’s dark and cold and I am alone in a lifeboat to six men.

Out there, a storm so strong that I feel like a toy being thrown from side to side by an angry dog, as the sound of the rain and thunder deaf me.
I keep track of the time I am here using my reliable wrist watch, gift of my deceased father, a man who always cared much for me. Every time the cruel storm gives me a chance, I look at it and try to stay in tune with reality.
Six hours after my ship sunk. Six hours since the moment I was dragged in the darkness by a man who saved my life, probably at expense of his own. Six hours since I heard human voices for the last time, crying, screaming and shouting orders. My boat had more than five hundred passengers like me, and at least a hundred sailors, maybe more.

This ominous feeling that i am the last survivor crush me with a burden most wouldn't understand: they would say "be thankful for be alive", and i would say I can't, not after hearing men, women and child asking to be save and be unable to do anything.

Six men, the capacity of this boat.

Keep six men, dry, feed and hydrated for a week, while transponders scream a rescue signal to satellites everywhere. Once I were told that such boats could actually support twice more, twelve souls, for three day. Rescue usually takes only one.
And yet, I lay here alone, the emptiness of this cell crushing my mind. I'm not a good person, I am a man who cheat in his taxes, when my boss isn't looking I escape job earlier, I often don’t give tips, don’t go to church for about two years, don’t donate money to good causes...nothing. My life wasn't worth 12 other's.

At seventh hour my mind starts to slip. Or I hope so. Out there, the sound of screaming, the voices of the boat. Fighting against the motion that throw me like a ragdoll against the bouncing walls of this boat, closed like a tent, I reach for the door, and scream in answer, I say to them were I am, tell them to be strong. But the word is a dark turmoil out there. I see no one.

The storm now is calmer, nine hours since the tragedy. I think I fainted, for I heard a voice whispering to me:
"Be strong."
Startled I cry, don’t know why, and drag myself to the door again, a rubber wall closed by a zipper. I open it and scream at the top of my lungs:

"PLEASE, EVERYONE, BE STRONG!"
But outside, nothing but darkness.

After twelve hours, I see ghosts when I close my eyes, blurred images of people who jump at me and say I didn't deserve to live, they want me to jump out the boat and die with them. It's something so strong that I can't resist. I crawl to the door, to jump in the cold brutal sea and die with them.
But when I touch the zipper a voice whispers at my ear, strong, familiar:

"Don't give up of living, fight and survive!"
I burst into tears, open the zipper and once again, I scream so laud I feel my throat hurt:

"'EVERYONE! DON’T GIVE UP OF LIVING, FIGHT AND SURVIVE!!"

But then, only the dark and the storm are there.
Fifteen hours. I feel like I’m surrounded by them, angry and resentful, in the darkness of the life boat, they summon me to jump and die, they say its the right thing to do, that it will be for the best.
Then, the familiar voice talk to me, not whispering anymore, and for a second, is like a burst of light blow and makes all the angry voices vanish in the storm.

"You are not alone, you have to fight! You have to survive!"

I cry again, and once more I drag my tired body to the opening and scream against the storm:

"YOU ARE NOT ALONE! YOU HAVE TO FIGHT! YOU HAVE TO SURVIVE!!!"

Twenty hours.
My body is cold and full of bruises; I have no more tears to shed. I remember all the times I did wrong, all the times I forgot to say "thank you” or "I love you". I lived like a spoiled child, after money. But now I see I was wrong: Life is more than money, is family, is friends, and is enjoy good times, while you can.
Family.
Friends.
Good times.
I wasted my time and turned my back to such treasures. Thinking like that is only fair I die here, cold, scared and alone.
I don't know how long I am here anymore: Could be years, or seconds. I crawled for a time that looked like an eternity, to finally reach the opening.

I can't take it anymore. I want it to stop. I regret so much, I am so alone, I HAVE to end it.

I open the boat for the last time, but what I see is pure blinding white light.
A hand reaches for mine, and I see a familiar face. He smile at me and day everything is OK, I am safe now.

His warm hand closes around mine, and I feel the sea water and rubber on it. The man uses a orange suit and a helmet. He holds me tight, and I see above me a red and white helicopter. The sound of its propellers kills the sound of the storm.
I faint as I hear them telling me that everything will be alright now.

In my sleep I am at the boat again. I’m so scared I can’t even think properly, for the first time I realize I am probably the last person aboard. Then he comes and grabs my arm, shouting "Quick son! This way!"

It can’t be, is my father! He put me into the last boat and put me out of the harm's way.
Now I am in the boat, alone. The darkness is gone, and I see someone sitting by my side.
He gives me strength, and shout me to fight!
I can’t believe I didn't recognize his voice, is my father, again!
When I sunk in self pity and despised my own life, he cried and comfort me telling me that it was non-sense, I was a good son.
Every moment, he was there for me.

I wake up in a white hospital room.

At my side, a full infirmary, familiar faces, children and parents smiling. Hurt, but happy to be alive.
No fear or suffering, I even think I’m still dreaming, when an angelical nurse softly touch me and ask how I am:
-Where am I?
-This is Harbor City hospital, you gave us some work, mister! - She said joking.

I am informed that no life was lost that day. Smiling and thanking god I shout:

-That’s why I had to fight!

A child in the bed next to mine and his mother look at me with great surprise.
I am about to apologies, when she say something incredible

-You were the man shouting during the storm! I can recognize your voice! You told us to be strong and not give up!

Soon patients on the other beds rise and say the same. I rest surprised once again.

How could those, in different boats, split by a raging storm, hear my voice? How those all could hear it?
I didn’t know.

What I know is life is, indeed, worth fighting for.

AS I LAY DOWN

AS I LAY DOWN.

For years I have lived a tiring life with a first class husband, who would spent more time with his insects than with me. At first, I was angry about it, but then, I found company, and soon I start having fun at his back every time he went hunting for bugs.

But slowly, it would turn more and more annoying, until it became impossible to bear. His image, his touch, the sound of his voice, was absolutely disgusting, how could I live like that, with that man? He probably knew about my affairs and done NOTHING!

Then I decided to end it, I forged his signature in a insurance policy and found a poison no one would suspect. As I have friends in police, his body would pass straight to cremation, no questions asked. Perfect.

In the day I have decided to kill him, he arrived earlier, and brought two large suitcases with him. I asked what was that, and he said it was a gift to me, for our late anniversary.

Oh as if it could save his life, I smiled to myself, as I told him to rush and eat some of my “special” dinner.

For a moment, I was worried. He stopped and stared at the plate for a minute, then said:

Is better that way.

And eat it.

The poison took effect soon and he died at my feet, strangely calm.

Curious I decided to look at my gifts as I called my lover, in each suitcase, a expensive dark fur coat, and one single envelope, closed. I loved. I begged for years for those, well at least he made something right!

I laughed and put one of them, as I opened the envelope, there I read:

“my dear wife,

Life didn’t turn to be both of us wanted, I guess. I’m sorry it have to end like this. Don’t bother looking for antidotes, the poison is simply too strong and fast.

Love”

And he signed.

I almost screamed in fear, he did know about the poison, did he told anyone?!?

Was when I realized what poison he meant to:

The first bite was like a needle piercing my skin, and soon dozens of other bites followed. I fighted to take of the coat, and trow it away, but my body become numb in pain and I lost all movement.

As I lay down paralyzed I see not only the smile of my dead husband, but the dozen, maybe hundreds of black widows  crawling of my coat over my face. They also crawl out from the other coat and spread around the room. I see a chemical bottle at the bottom of each bag, something to make the spiders sleepy.

I try to scream but its too late.

guess who has too much free time in hand?

An idle mind...

HARVEST

HARVEST.

I am a soldier, a sailor, serving in a “concrete” submarine, the Vindicator. Are six of us in this vessel, and our task is to locate and destroy any enemy ship, military or not. At first, was a difficult job: You aim at a boat, and know that maybe hundreds or even thousands of civilians will probably die if you push that red button, and yet, you do it, for our homeland, for our honor, for anything right and good, or so we are told?

My first civilian target was a large cruiser, evacuating wounded soldiers and civilians from the Falklands towards the Latin Alliance territory. Trough our light enhanced periscope I saw the red cross symbol painted on its sides, visible from miles, and instead of diverting my weapons from it, I used it to aim my torpedo.

Torpedoes, at least the type we used, don’t kill by exploding in the target, they kill by exploding under it, creating a vacuum that suck everything on surface, crushing anything. If you are lucky, you will be crushed too and die quickly. If not, you will find yourself in the darkness, in the depth, crushed in debris and drowning without any chance of escape. No ship I ever hit, military or not, had survivors. Not a single soul. That’s war, that’s why we studied so hard and spent so much time and money, to assure death to others.

At the bottom of the ocean, we calmly and silently wait: Soon a large enemy convoy will pass over us, eight cargo ships, heading to Congo with supplies.  An escort of two corvettes, a frigate and three destroyers safeguard it, but they are outdated ships with poorly trained crew, a ragtag disposable crew for a second class mission on dangerous waters, or so were told to us by the military intelligence.

Our outer hull is made of soft concrete matter, which absorbs sonar waves. It also contains a chemical product that produce bubbles when electrified, that double such absorbing ability making us invisibles to them.

The first ship to get in range is a corvette, small and fragile, an easy prey, too easy. This “scout” is nothing else than a bait, to subs or mines. We ignore them completely.

The second ship is also a corvette, ad it’s using the active sonar to scan the waters. We keep silently; even our breathing is slow and calm. We let them pass too.

Then comes one of the destroyers, and on its tracks, two cargo ships, and the frigate. The frigate is our nemesis, an anti-submarine ship. It keeps silence, and uses an old silent propulsion system, that fails to evade our surveillance. Its sonar is off, on passive mode. The plan becomes clear. All ships that came before the frigate were baits to lure us in a trap. We would attack them and revel our position to the frigate, who would counter attack.

Very clever.

So they aren’t as poorly trained as we were informed, doesn’t matter anyway. We arm our supercavitanting torpedoes, seven of them. One to spare, we will save it for later.

We carefully aim them at the ships. At first, we will spare the cargo vessels. No need of such state of art weapon to kill such meek pray.

We flood the tubes and at the same time we fire a volley of four squall on the warships, we activate our silent propulsion. Hit and run.

Those torpedoes are so fast that they all are dragged into the murderous waters without even an chance of counter attack.

The two remaining destroyers fire torpedoes to our previous location, but we are already far from there. They drop their acoustic buoys to track us and confuse our sensors, but its too late.

We fire a volley with two more squalls. They die quickly, or at least I hope so. Now the cargo ships are unprotected. Our sonar indicates that they are already evacuating the ships. Smart but pointless. We can’t wait until they reach a safe distance from the cargo ships, so once we fire, they all will be dragged to death with the vessels they abandoned.

We flood the tubes for our conventional torpedoes and we activate our active sonar, two pings will suffice to kill them all, once we can fire 4 torpedoes at each time.

We fire the first volley of conventional torpedoes after the first ping. As usual, we can listen they praying and crying just before the detonation. After that, we can’t hear anything in the chaos. We prepare to the second volley, when four torpedoes appear from nowhere. Hunter-seeker torpedoes with active sonar, from where they came from?

Something close to the bottom of the ocean appear and disappear like a ghost.

An enemy submarine.

We are the prey, we always were the prey. ALL the convoy was bait. They waited for us to use our active sonar.

The torpedoes approach fast. We use our own counter measure buoys, but they are ignored.

One of my men cry, other pray. I listen to one saying the name of his young wife for the last time. None of them is older than 19, none of us is. I close my eyes, hit the button to eject the ship’s diary and silently await for what I deserved.

You reap what you sow .

And it’s time for the harvest.

The almost simultaneous explosion make the entire submarine resonate for a second, a second and nothing more. The sound, like the sound of a bell announces our doom.

So let it come. The pressure.

The pressure crushes us with the anger of a beast, and we are crushed within it. I see the man at my left be mercifully decapitated not by steel, but by a gush of water. For the first time I understand why men pray before dying, so they don’t have to see what I see next. The man who cried is crushed to something inhumane by the armored bulkheads they said would protect our lives, but then, we always knew it was another lie.

The one who called for his young wife is horrible grinded for our instruments. It takes only few seconds, but his face, his cry of agony, to me it lasted an eternity.
Is my turn to pay. I’m crushed against my chair, but not killed. I don’t feel my legs, I think I don’t have them anymore. The water is cold, everything now is dark.

I feel the pressure having its way with my ears. It hurts, but I don’t care anymore.

I feel like we are floating, but I know we are about to hit the bottom. I let my breath escape my lungs. I want it to be fast.

But it isn’t, not enough. The pain, the despair, I deserve it, but still I try to get free from my steel coffin. And I fail.

I am now dead.

I am next to the remains of our ship, the Vindicator. What it was meant to avenge? I don’t remember anymore. My mutilated body floats like jelly fish, mine and the bodies of my friends.

I realize, it’s the first time I recognize them as friends, and suddenly death wasn’t so tragic anymore, once I was surrounded by friends and not alone. Even mutilated and crushed, I know who they are, and I’m not scared of the horror and gore. We are nothing but light, pale light at the bottom of the ocean. I see the ships we sunk, some are already at the bottom, some soon will be. A flock of pale lights descent over me and my friends. Those who once were my enemies are with us now, but I don’t hate them anymore, I finally don’t have to hate them anymore. They are also mutilated. The horror, there are no words to describe the vision on hundreds so mutilated that cant be identified anymore as human.

But still, I’m not scared. They too, are calm.

We all accept what we got, that was how things were, when we lived. Now we don’t live anymore, and we reject those chains of fear and hatred.

Now we are marching, or floating? I don’t know. We are just moving, like a procession, silently by the bottom of this ocean. Many others joined us, now we are thousands. Men, women, children, doesn’t matter anymore. We just go with the flow of sea water.

We are the only light that exists. Are we at the bottom? Is the sand under us or is it mist?

Those tiny goblets of light are mere dust or are something more spiritual? I don’t know. Nobody does.

I don’t know how many days or years have passed, but now are so many of us… I can see only this light, our light. I don’t know if I’m going forward, up or down.

We are now reaching something different. Is a light golden like the sun. We are gently dragged to it, and we disappear on it.

It’s the end? Or just a gate for a new place? We don’t know.

We are so many, like star in the sky. And maybe we are, who could know?

We are changed, purified. We lost our human tracts in the way; we are brighter, and more colorful.

Soon will be my time to enter the light.

If I was still a man, I would smile, I think. I can’t be sure, once all my past was washed away in the journey.

I reach it.

I dive on it.

FIN

By LHSC

Aka

PGonTL.

GO FISHING

To my pals from /x/, specially Dutch, please enjoy it, and if you can, follow me on twitter, and you will know when i publish new tales...@atariownersgen

GO FISHING.

Hello, my name is Sam “Dutch”, and I usually go with my friends Jeff, Bradley and Cole in those “midnight fishing weekends”, when we would drink a couple beers and fish in a small motor boat, the “Grubby Cock”-the name keep our wives away- in a lake near our houses. The fishing was always good and the chat even better. The lake, covered in mist, always made a good excuse to tell ghost stories and the likes of it. There four of us, most of the times, and we did it those trips once every couple of months, in summer mostly.

During the day, the lake was crowded with families and kids in enjoying the clear waters, but one year ago something happened and scared everyone from there. A couple of small children, a boy named Jessy, six years old, and a girl, Samantha, 8. Brother and sister, disappeared to never be seen again. The mother told they went together in a calm spot of the lake, when they started playing around and, in a moment of distraction, both fall in the water. The mother said she tried to save them, but she couldn’t swim.

But something wasn’t quite right. Before the death, witness told the woman climbed in the boat carrying two big black plastic garbage bags, full with something, and then returned without the mysterious cargo. No one had seen the children that day, or the day before it.

Further investigation show that the room had signs of blood and struggle, especially in the bath tub, and two months earlier the mother’s boy friend had signed a life insurance in the name of both children. With little effort the boyfriend confess everything and it turn out that the mother had killed her child, planning to use the money to pay drug debts. The bodies were never found, and everyone avoided the lake for a good time.

I and my friends only heard about it in the newspapers, and we decided not let it ruin a long fishing tradition.

We packed everything, baits, food and of course beers in our little 4 person boat and we went to our “secret place”, an excellent fishing spot we used for years. Even doing that monthly, this time we had some trouble with the mist. It was unusually thick, as the air get more and more cold.

-Damn, thank god I brought my leather jacket- I said, trying to relax and put away that strange feeling I had since the moment I stepped in the boat.

-Yeah, global warming my ass…I’m freezing here- Said one of my friends. We all laugh and things looked normal again. We started our fishing and inevitable our chat went to our favorite subject, ghost stories.

A bit drunk, and still concerned with that children murder, like everyone in town, I brought the subject I the talk, what later prove to be a bad call.

-Say, what you think about that crazy mother? The one who killed her two children?

-Jesus Dutch, why you had to remember me of that? Give me the chills!

-Yeah, in me too, I mean, her own son and daughter, gotta be some crazy mother, that woman.

-I blame it to the drugs. She and her boyfriend were two junkies, crack users I’m sure!

-Yeah…poor kids, they deserved better. I heard they were never found.

We went silent for some time, when one of my friends,Jeff, the one who loved the supernatural more than the rest of us, whispered:

-Hey, I had an idea…Do you know the “Ouija board”?

Oh yes I knew, my mom told me to never play that shit, and she meant it. She actually said that she would let me slip with stealing my dad car on the weekends; smoking cigars on my room, and buying marijuana, but only if I promised never play that devilish game. She actually said it in front of my DAD, that was how serious she was about it.

I didn’t want to chicken out in front of my pals, so I decided to change the subject:

-Ouija board? Oh c’mmon Jeff! That’s for girl’s slumber parties! And the board? Don’t tell me you go fish with an Ouija board in your backpack!

We all laughed, but Jeff was adamant.

-We don’t need one, we could ask questions and they would reply knocking in the wood!

I tried telling them to cut that, but damn, everyone was in the mood to do it, and I ended joining them.

My friend started:

-Okay, let’s give hands…

-Hey, cut that, this is not “broke back mountain”, we actually FISH here!-said Brad.

We laugh but we agreed in doing like he said. With a solemn tone he started:

-Oh spirits of the river…we call you…join us in this cold night…share you wisdom with us…

-And some beer, I could use some- I said trying to stop that, In respect to my mother instructions…But after some laugh he continued:

-Oh spirits who wander on those waters, we call you to answer our questions with honesty, knocking one time on the wood for “yes” – and he hit the bottom of the boat with his feet once- and two times for “no”!

I was with the hair of the back of my neck up, and noticing it one of my pals, Cole, decided to mock me about it:

-Hey spirits! Is our pal “Dutch” scared?- And he hit the bottom of the boat once. The other did the same and everyone laugh: “yes”, ”yes”, “yes” and “yes”. Was when I noticed, 3 guys hit the floor one time, but we got four knocks.

-Someone said “no”.

-What? I said yes-Spoke Cole.

-Me too Dutch, you are scared like a girl!-Teased Bradley.

-Yeah, I said “yes” too, sorry but is true Dutch!-Smiled Jeff

-I heard four knocks, not three, and I DIDN’T knocked in the wood!

They laughed at me.

-Ah Dutch, relax, we were just teasing you! See, let’s ask the spirits again, then you will see that there are no such things as ghosts. Spirits, are any ghost here with us?

And they all stood silent for almost a minute, before bursting in laughs at my expense, once no knock sounded. But once they stop laughing, we all heard a knock, loud and clear.

“yes”.

This time we all stood quiet.

-Dutch, cut that, isn’t funny anymore.

-Fuck Cole, I did nothing, not this time, and not the last time!

-Easy guys, probably was just a branch under water…

Another minute passed in silence.

-Maybe we should try asking another question…

-No way, stop messing with that Jeff, damn it!

But they keep on the subject until Jeff spoke seriously:

-Lets ask if there are anyone here.

-Oh sure! Freaking brilliant Jeff!- I snapped at him, angry- SPIRITS, ARE YOU THERE?

That wasn’t meant to be a formal question, but them we heard it, once again, a knock on the bottom of the boat.

“yes”.

I froze, like a soldier who realized that he just stepped on a landmine.

-What was that?!-Screamed Cole.

I was quite scared, so I decided to call it the day and go back.

-Guys, I think we already drink too much; we should go back now…

Everyone agreed, but when I tried to start the engine it won’t work.

-Great, now we are stuck here! “lets talk with spirits”, nice one man!

-Hey stop Dutch, I was just joking, right? And it’s not like a ghost sabotaged our engine!

But I was mad and I keep talking:

-So let’s ask the spirits! Spirits, are you holding us here!?

Once again it wasn’t meant to be serious, but a hard knock hit the bottom of the boat, this time hard enough to shake it.

“yes”.

No one would talk, and we barely breathed, but Bradley decided to try again.

-Spirts, are you holding us here?

A loud know sounded, coming from the bottom of the “Grubby Cock”.

“yes”.

We screamed and I start trying to get the engine to work again, with out success. Bradley and Cole start looking for paddles, but Jeff was silent. Undisturbed by our mess, he spoke.

-Spirits, how many are you? If possible knock the number to us.

Two knocks.

-Jessy is here?

“yes”.

The blood disappeared from our faces as we stared at the bottom of the boat.

-Jesus Jeff, stop making questions!

But Jeff didn’t listened to Bradley.

-Samantha is here?

“yes”.

I started shacking. Cole and Bradley looked very scared, but Jeff, the bastard, looked more curious than anything else.

-Jeff, don’t play with what you don’t understand damn it!

But Jeff didn’t listened.

-Are you the children who disappeared last summer?

“yes”.

Cole, normally a calm person, jumped over Jeff and both almost made the boat capsize.

-Jeff, you stop now! It’s not fun anymore!

-It’s not meant to be fun! –Snapped Jeff almost punching Cole.

-You two, calm down before you turn the Grabby!-Ordered Bradley in vain. Jeff resumed his interrogatory:

-You died by accident?

Two strong knocks resounded in the misty night.

“no”.

-You were murdered?

“yes”.

In the lake?

“no”.

This time I was the one a lose my temper. I tried to punch Jeff, but I tripped and like Bradley predicted, we capsized the Grubby and we all dived in the dark cold waters. I desperately tried to swim to the surface, when something grabbed my foot . I turned to face it, thinking it was jeff, when I saw the spectral vision of two small skeletons, holding my feet with both hands.

I panic, I screamed, losing all my breath. The darkness involved me while the moon light shined upon the two dead children. And as I fainted I could hear:

“Don’t leave us alone.”

I don’t know how long I was in he water, but I know I own my life to Bradley, the quiet guy. Everyone should have a friend like that, no talk just action. He save my life in the nick of time, at least was what the paramedics told me. The sun was rising when they put me on the ambulance. Worried I look for the others, and I saw them, talking to the cops, but not harmed.

More calm I laid back and said, almost whispering:

-what fishing night…Sure I got more than I was expecting for.

The paramedic, a gorgeous woman, seem to agree:

-Oh yes, I can understand. No one would like to fish what you did. But look at the good side, at least they are getting a proper funeral…

I fished? A funeral? She probably saw how puzzled I was and looking in my eyes she said.

-Jessy and Samantha, you found them. Your boat got stuck in the same tree where the mother hide the bodies.

PROBE.

PROBE.

Oceans are the last great frontier for mineral resources. Mankind had devoured the resources of the surface of earth to the bone and left nothing but devastation behind. Now the market demands new resources, and consumption boosted the ocean floor exploration. In a unprecedented effort the first under-water mine sites had been built in places man can’t go in person. Huge plants are operated by remote-control and autonomous robots. Still, men are kept in control, supervising all operations from floating Mid-way bases, similar to oil platforms, who float hundreds and sometimes, thousands of meters above the mining sites.

Not more than a dozen of workers stay at those bases, for periods of no less than two months each. Two medics, a cook, two geologists, one marine biologist and six technicians who do most of the jobs, controlling the extraction and prospection machinery.

The marine biologist is usually the guy who is there only to bother everyone about how we shouldn’t go around killing crabs and destroying the precious reproduction site of the marine ugly looking vermin who eat whales poop. Always there measuring salinity, temperature, contaminants and oxygen levels 24/7. Is impressive, but all of them never get tired of watching of our shoulders to make sure we obey all those thousands of eco-responsibility protocols by day and by night they keep watching our cams searching for a new endangered species, so they can close another good mining site.

I’m serious, if we had those guys on our necks during industrial revolution we would still live on the damned middle age. Look at this guy they sent this time, long hair, Hawaiian shirt and freaking sandals. He stay here, with me, in the monitor room night and day. See, my job is to watch over the robots prospecting for new mining sites, I keep my eye on them for almost 10 hours a day, sometimes more, if we got lucky to found something good. And this hippie stay by my side drawing shrimps and jellyfish who wander in front of our robots, and I’m supposed to help him. Yes, I have to divert a expensive marine robot and make it stalk a ugly jellyfish to please my hippie coworker.

  Today I got lucky, the guy decided to stick with the day turn, so he could see the birds doing something around our mid-way station that probably is unnatural and caused by our evil exploration of the ocean. Yeah, see if I give a damn about it.  I stop caring about the hippie when my babies start descending into the new trench, 00912#33. We lost a good lot of dummy probes – capsules tied to steel wires we use to get samples of the water and soil before designing a robot to explore the area –but the ones that came back had traces of gold and bauxite ore. Now I was conducting a robotic probe to look for good places to dig.

The HD cam showed me nothing but darkness. Even the powerful lights couldn’t pierce the everlasting darkness. A shiver went down my spine at the thought that it was the first time that light entered that cold part of the ocean. More excited, I felt the adrenalin rush when the light hit the bottom.

The image was full color, but it could be black and white, once the floor of the ocean was white, like snow. The propellers lifted a thin cloud of sand. Not a single sign of life, I said to myself wishing that my hippie coworker was there so I could see his disappointment. My first action was to order the probe to pierce the ground to fixate the safe line, a guiding line to the following robots.

The probe spread his spider-like metal legs, touched the ocean floor and put the pneumatic pole hammer, similar to a shotgun, against it. Once it was in perfect position, the probe automatically fired it. But something went wrong. The image disappeared in a maelstrom of sand, while the sensors of the probe went out of chart. Something had exploded, I thought when I start cursing. The probe probably hit a gas pocket and it exploded.

Well that solve the mystery of the missing dummy probes, and it probably would be discounted of my next pay check. While I was thinking in how to blame it on the hippie, my probe got on line again.

-Good!

Oh yeah, my baby was on line, it was just a scare. I checked all sensors. Oddly I found no signs of methane and the temperature was still below zero. The probe, a compressed titanium tube, reported mechanical impact of some kind, but the water pressure showed no fluctuation. The pneumatic hammer was missing, and a couple legs bent, but my camera was intact, even with zero visibility due to all the dust lifted by that odd explosion.

I was still trying to figure what the hell happened when the probe’s acoustic sensor pick a well know IFF sound blip. My goddamn safe-line anchor was still active, and could be retrieved! At first I was almost jumping of my control chair, the damages where minimal, so I could compensate them easily with part of my bonus, once I located a good mining place.

I stabilized the probe, and ordered a short range active sonar scan, yeah, we don’t need cameras to see our surroundings.

What I saw couldn’t be right.

All the place geography, a underwater plain which extended for kilometers in all directions was gone. The probe was now floating over nothing but cold, dark waters.

I checked the pressure sensors, and the umbilical cord range counter. It show that the probe was no more than fifth meters above his previous position, the oceanic floor.

I started flipping again, something was broken. The pressure sensors and the inertial navigation bearings could be off, and the cord, cut.

After two diagnostic routines, everything was still in place. The damn bottom of the ocean had vanished. It couldn’t have collapsed, the vacuum would drag the probe to the bottom, and any explosion so strong would have destroyed the probe too.

I activated a long range sonar scan, and I discovered that my robe was floating over a perfect round opening, five hundred meters wide, and so deep that the probe couldn’t measure it.

Ok, no rush. Everything have a logical explanation, right? Probably what collapsed was nothing more than a thin cap of debris and dust, put together over a lava duct by the currents after a millennia.

Even so, I was scared. Shivers keep going down his spine as i aimed the cams into the darkness of the new abyss who appeared under the probe. Maybe was time to call the day off and bring the probe back. But then, i didn’t had any reason to do so. The probe was more than ten kilometers from where i was. If wasn’t by the optical fiber in the umbilical cord, or the acoustic communication arrays that place would be so unreachable as the dark of the moon. Very few life forms where found there, and the risk, if any, was only of losing a robot.

I hit some buttons and fired a volley of chemical flares that burnt with almost blinding light as they slowly sunk in the abyss. He ordered the probe to go down into the darkness.

The acoustic IFF was below the probe, going down, slowly. Unusual. A steel pole should sink faster. Probably it was attached to some pieces of debris, which should have acted as a parachute. Still, the signal was beyond the reach of the probe’s camera.

The wall of the tunnel were also to far to be seen, but at least i could get sonar readings of them. They were incredible smooth, like polished glass, and where slowly getting closer, what could prove to be problematic. The echoes where getting reflected so well by the walls that the feedback was causing a distortion on the images.

The acoustic signal of the pole was also echoing and making hard to pinpoint his position, at least I hope was it the case, once it was moving up and down, at least 300 meters below.

I looked at the pressure control and the cable dispenser: The probe had dived more than 800 meters from its original position. Soon it would be at more than eleven kilometers under the surface of the ocean. I worried about the length of the cable. It would go for a couple more thousand meters, and then I would have to choose between returning or moving forward de-attaching the cable and using the acoustic remote control to guide it.

But I forget all that when, after a couple hundred meters more, the tunnel disappeared to give space to some type of cave so vast that it was beyond the reach of any sensor my probe had.

 I could only see the ceiling of such cave, around the tunnel entrance, also smooth like polished glass. Not even a crack or a deformation on it.

I was taken by a inexplicable fear of the absolute darkness below me, even standing thousands of meters away from there.  My heart was pounding fast and I was in the edge of my seat. I keep looking to the dark screens as if something horrible would jump and devour my artificial avatar, the probe. Computers don’t lie, and by my readings I was paralyzed by fear for almost ten minutes, but to me it looked like hours. But then, again, nothing happened.

Now the IFF was still, his signal faint, somewhere below, at least another thousand meters.

I could go straight down, firing another volley of flares, but I decided to look around the ceiling for a moment. The xenon lights aimed it, and the light was reflected back in a somehow sickening purple tone. Different from the tunnel, the ceiling was impressible reflecting, like a mirror, and have something drawn on it. Stabilizing the probe, I zoomed in and what I saw was disturbing. Thousands of images, drawings of men, women and strange monsters, engaged in some kind of horrible and nightmarish orgy. Men and women were painted with great realism, and with expressions of pure ecstasy, while they were engaged in a variety of sexual acts with each other and with huge maggot-like creatures. Every single illustration had also a brutal act of violence, beheading, mutilation, cannibalism, and men and women half monster devouring others with their genitals transformed in maggots or serpents with long sharp teeth.

Now I was sure I went too far, that couldn’t be right. Was something I could only describe as hell was painted in the walls of a cave, almost twelve kilometers under the cold sea!

My hand shacked and I was sweating. At first I decided to get out as fast as my little probe could, but then, again, something stops me. Curiosity, men’s great characteristic and sometimes, his bane. I was safe, don’t matter what. That place was ruins from another age, a lost civilization, just waiting to be discovered by a bold explorer, like…me.

Yes, for the first time occurred to me that I would become freaking rich and famous, damn, by law I could give that city my own name! the company would keep the big money, but my part of the share, like determined in my contract, would be from at least 15%, I was soon to become a millionaire.

Yeah, everything was fine, I told to myself holding my shivering hand and biting my lower lip, so I couldn’t hear the sound of my shacking teeth.

I fired another volley of chemical flares and dived again into the darkness, aiming for the IFF below.

Took me half an hour of slow, in a careful descent until my sensors picked something breathe taking.

At first I thought it was a massive stalagmite, aiming for the ceiling like a spear, but as soon as the lights of my probe reached it, I saw a great tower, covered in dust. It resembled some ancient Buddhist temple, but it had to have about eighty meters of high.

Soon, several other constructions were revealed by the sensors, and I found myself in the middle of a large city. A dead city, lost on the bottom of the ocean.

Once I got I the street levels, I was once again taken by terror. Thousands of corpses remained there, half decomposed, like underwater mummies. They floated in the cold still water, like they were frozen in the middle of something. Something disturbing.

Some were totally naked, others partially clothed, and most of them were in the middle of some kind of sexual act, or better saying, a act of violence. Like the images on the ceiling, they were apparently killing and mutilating each other, and the loners, themselves, during something that looked more like rape, if wasn’t for the look on their dead faces. They all smiled in a silent and evil satisfaction while they were abused and murdered with brutality.

I almost vomited, from the fear and the nausea caused for such disgusting sight. I tried to look at anything that wasn’t a corpse, when the probe’s propellers lifted some dust of a tall statue in the middle of the street. It was one of those maggot creatures with sharp teeth, made of gold, I was sure of that, adorned by tiny human skulls. Very tiny human skulls.

Two impulses took place in my mind, one was fear and repulsion from those skulls who should belong to children, put as a offering to that monstrous statue, who commanded me to run away immediately. The other impulse filled me with shame, even now.

Greed.

Such statue would value several millions of dollars in gold, and even more as an artifact. I could see people giving all their money just to touch it, that marvelous piece of gold.

Confuse and disgusted I decided to move on after the IFF, it would distract me from my inner conflict.

I found it a couple hundred meters from something I first thought was a massive round wall.

I found the pole stuck under it, something inexplicable. I ordered the probe to hover over it, and I saw that the “wall” was only part of a colossal statue of a maggot. Only a SMALL part of it.

The head of the body was fifty meters from the pole, but the rest of the body went for hundred meters; I didn’t dare to see how far it truly went, in the darkness.

Now I couldn’t control my fear, not anymore. The sight of such giant and realistic statue of the monster apparently worshiped by that insane dead civilization was too much to bear. Something primitive keep screaming in the depths of my mind that I went too far this time, and I should leave while I could.

With no hesitation I ordered the probe to return, and it obeyed immediately.

While I was digesting all that information, I started thinking in how those bodies weren’t crushed by the pressure. In that depth, a human body would be compressed to the size of a soccer ball. And how such city could be built inside that cave, even in a distant past?

As the probe reach the entry for the corridor and started climbing back to the outside, I felt a little relieved. Once, when I was a child, I was almost hit by a bus. Crossing the street without care, I almost didn’t see the bus coming. In a split second I jumped, by pure instinct, and saved myself.

That was the feeling I had, I was the bird who escaped the cat’s claws.

But it was too soon to celebrate. Something strange was happening again. A powerful current started pushing the probe upward. It was soon tangled in it’s on umbilical cord, and the camera registered when something went direct against it. Was like a wheel, made of polished stone on the outside, and red flesh pierced by a thousand teeth inside.

The statue was alive, and it devoured the probe!

I screamed from the bottom of my lungs, like a piece of me was torn apart by that monster.

As I fall on the floor, I could see the interior of the beast. Somehow the cable wasn’t cut.

And what I see was terrifying: Thousands of corpses, mummies like the ones in the city, but still different. Those were fully dressed, usually with hands tied, and look like old men and women, and worst, children. Inside the monster’s belly, hundreds of corpses of children waited to be found. And every single one of them had a expression of absolute horror.

I screamed once more, and tried to get out the room, like if the dead could crawl right of the screen, or worst, like I could be dragged in trough them.

My co-workers rushed to see what was going on but I couldn’t stop to explain. I yelled commanding them to get out of my way and then I hit the evacuation alarm on the wall. One of the men who was with me tried to hold me and ordered me to calm down, and then I almost did a thing I would regret.

I grabbed one fire extinguisher and swung it against his head, and almost killed him.

Luckily I hit his jaw, and not his forehead, and a torrent of blood gushed from his mouth into the wall. He was the hippie, and I really felt sorry for him. After seeing such inhuman  horrors, I immediately gained a greater respect for my fellow men.

The other man did nothing, I realized he was staring at the command screens, paralyzed.

Then, I did something unexpected to me. With a strength that man only find in the face of eminent death, I grabbed both men and pushed them till we find one of the survival boats.

Those boats, designed after the survival boat used in oil platforms, are like bright orange bullets, totally armored and sealed each with room for six men. I pushed the two men inside the boat, when the rest of the crew arrived.

I could only scream, at the top of my lungs :”ABANDON THE BASE NOW!!”.

In those situations, with alarm on, you shouldn’t ask questions, just evacuate, but one of them was too confuse and asked me what was going on.

To my luck, one of the medic interrupted him and rushed to aid the biologist I had hit and told everyone to get in the boats!

Once we closed the hatches, and air compressed system pushed us and we flew like bullets for ten meters, until be hit the water, and then the auto system kicked in, taking us away from the base.

In such boats, we have very tiny windows, and even scared I had to look trough mine.

What I saw? A giant snake like creature far taller than the base itself, rounding it like a boa constrictor about to crush it’s pray.

I wasn’t the only one to see it, but no one knew how evil that thing was. But once it crushed the base like it was made of wet paper then dragged it into the dark of the ocean, we all knew we should fear it.

A powerful storm followed and lasted three days during the time we would had surely died if the boats aren’t so resistant. I spoke nothing to no one, the man who saw the screens in control room only keep repeating that I had saved us all, but not explaining from what. The hippie was dazzled not by my attack, but by the creature he saw destroying our base – he was probably the one who didn’t was afraid of it.

After our rescue, an inquiry took place. I told everything I saw, and at first was called crazy. But in each boat existed a “black box”, a backup with all information and data of the base until the moment they were ejected in the water, and in this records were the data of the probe and our journey into hell.

I was forced to sign a secrecy clause to never spoke of any of that, what I agreed. Everyone sign one, and then a official story was made, where the bad weather caused a structural collapse, and we only survived thanks to my heroic efforts.

Yes, bullshit, but they paid us well for it.

I quit the job as soon as I got the press out of my back, and moved as far as I could from the sea. From time to time I heard news from my old friends and company, and one in particular make me stay awake at night, shivering: They built a new base, three times bigger, exactly on the same spot of the last one, and hippie, now changed into a more serious and ever darker man, is there to conduct “important biological research on exotic creatures”.