Experiment in Terror 03 Dead Sky Morning (16 page)

How many times had I heard that?

And off he went. The little boat straggled a bit at first and I could see Dex jerking the engine around, fighting off the current, but as soon as the boat picked up speed, it was smooth sailing.

I watched him, aware that the wheel was trying hard to be free of my grasp. There was no way in hell I was letting go for anything. The rope trailed out from behind the Zodiac and it looked like the spool of it at my feet was going to unwind sooner rather than later.

Just when the rope’s length was almost all used, Dex reached the rocky outcrop beneath the cliff. He killed the engine, leaped on land, climbed up over a few wet boulders and reached the tree. It made me nervous. It was obvious that he knew what he was doing and Dex could certainly be a little monkey at times, but seeing him scamper over those wet boulders, crashing waves beneath him, I knew it just took one wrong step for him to lose his footing and tumble backward into the sea.

This seemed like an awful lot of trouble just to visit this island. Why the government decided to make it a park was beyond me. How the hell did most campers get here anyway? No wonder there was rarely anyone here – half the people probably gave up. There was another island only a few miles away that had a dock and everything. The smart boaters went there; the crazy ones came to this hostile place.

Hostile was the most apt term. From the moment we saw this place, this feeling of GET OUT was running through my bones. I didn’t like it at all and all this trouble with the currents and the boat weren’t helping.

Dex got the job done though. He had tied the line around the tree as much as he could before there was no more slack and got back into the Zodiac. He started the engine, motored along loudly and within a minute he was back at the boat and climbing aboard.

He breathlessly tied the Zodiac back to the boat and said, “Now let go.”

I did so and braced myself for the swing. The boat moved over but stopped after a couple of feet, the rope straining tightly against the tree. I could hear the anchor chains from the bow rattling. But we weren’t going anywhere.

We breathed out a sigh of relief in unison.

“You’re not a bad skipper,” he said to me. “Maybe you should take up sailing after this.”

“We’ll see,” I said.

Now that that was all done, we climbed below and started organizing everything for our pilgrimage to the campsite on the opposite side of the island. We had two large backpacks each full of our personal crap, a small cooler that Dex had stuffed with food we had purchased on the way to the marina, a small cooking stove with propane, a long duffel containing the tent, pegs, mattresses and a tarp, two sleeping bags, two pillows, the large professional camera, the handheld camcorder, a strange old camera case I hadn’t seen before, an SLR camera, two large golf umbrellas, lighting boards, a small pack full of our ghost–hunting equipment and the like, Dex’s laptop…and a bunch of other crap.

“Uh, don’t you think it’ll be easier if we just left everything on the boat?” I pointed at all the junk. “It’s going to take several trips to the island just to take everything.”

“So it will,” he mused, gathering up his backpack. “Can’t forget the jackets either.”

He went to the forward cabin and pulled them out. They were real, proper sailing jackets. I knew they would come down to the knees on me. He placed them in my hands then noticed the look on my face. “What?”

“I’m just saying, maybe I should stay on the boat? That will at least cut down on bringing some stuff.”

“Are you getting cold feet?”

“I’ve had cold feet this whole time.”

“So you’re scared?”

“Yeah! It’s called Island of Death for a reason and it obviously doesn’t want us here.”

“Don’t be so dramatic.”

I felt like throwing the jackets in his face but just held his gaze steadily and with a stern eye. I could see the wheels working behind his brow.

“Fine,” he said, “if you want to stay on the boat tonight, that’s fine. Do whatever you got to do. But you know you still have to come on the island, bringing the rest of the stuff, and do all the damn filming we have planned.”

I nodded; of course I knew that. He did not look impressed with my decision though.

“Well, I’ll go do the first run. You stay here. Try not to wet yourself.”

He turned, gathering up as much stuff as he could and climbed on the upper deck. I sat down and opened the cooler looking for something to eat. It was way past lunch by now and the nausea that had killed my appetite earlier was gone.

I heard the sound of the Zodiac starting and through one of the portholes, saw Dex on it as he passed briefly outside, heading for the shore.

There was just enough food in the cooler for the weekend. We erred on the side of being cheap and having less to carry. As long as we had coffee, I was good. In fact, the two of us could live off coffee.

There was a strange poking feeling in the back of my conscious that was starting to make me reconsider though. Now that I was here, going to the island with minimal rations didn’t seem like the smartest idea.

I walked over to the galley and opened the tiny fridge and freezer. Empty, obviously.

I pulled open the cupboards up above and found a few boxes of half eaten cereal, several cans of soup, some canned vegetables, pasta sauce and an unopened box of Triscuits. That made me feel a bit better knowing there was food on board. No one said we couldn’t come back to the boat.

I grabbed the Triscuits and opened them. I doubted Zach would miss it and it was better than me nibbling at the food we were bringing to the island. I shoved a few in my mouth and walked over to the table.

A movement out of the corner of my eye made me stop. I slowly turned my head to the wall.

There was a hand on the outside of the porthole glass. A hand reaching up from the depths.

I screamed like hell, dropped the box and made a frantic dash for the stairs, pulling myself up them in a ragged, scrambling hurry.

I fell on the deck, scraping my knees on the pebbly surface, and scampered for the wheel, pulling myself behind it as if that was going to offer me some protection.

Dex had finished dropping the gear high on the beach and was walking back to the Zodiac. I couldn’t tell if he had heard my scream or not; it didn’t seem like it. I looked back at the cabin and let the sticky, eerie feeling wash over me. The cabin wasn’t the problem. The hand had been on the outside of the boat. Someone had to have been in the water, like they were trying to climb on board.

That thought made me want to vomit and having my back to the open sea was now becoming a problem. I stepped out from around the wheel and stood as in the middle of the cockpit as I could. I didn’t want to look on the sides of the boat; I was too afraid of what I might see.

I waited, standing as still as possible, hand on my chest, trying to hear anything besides the whoosh of blood in my head and the sweet, sweet sound of the Zodiac motoring back to me.

Well, that settled it. No way in hell was I staying alone on the boat tonight.

Within a minute, Dex was back and climbing back on board. He re–tied the rope, giving me a funny look.

“Are you OK?” he asked, coming over to me. “You look like you’ve seen…”

He didn’t finish the sentence.

“Can you do me a favor and look on the sides of the boat?” I squeaked. “The left side in particular.”

He appeared confused but did what I asked. He glanced over the left side. “What am I looking for?”

“There’s no one there?”

“No,” he said slowly. He walked over to the other side and did the same. “No one or nothing there either.”

He stopped in front of me and folded his arms. “What’s this about then? Saw another face?”

I could tell he wasn’t going to be very supportive, no matter what I said. “No, I didn’t see a face. But I’m definitely not staying on the boat tonight.”

He smiled wryly. “Decided you would miss me too much?”

“Something like that,” I answered.

A wave of suspicion clouded his eyes. I wasn’t sure if he was judging my sanity or what, but he didn’t say anything. Had it been the other way around I would have been bugging him to death but I guess that is where we differed. Well, that and the fact that I wasn’t a medicated nutter.

He let it go and I decided to as well. I probably just
thought
I saw a hand. Maybe it was a gull or something flying past, I don’t know.

We climbed back down and my eyes immediately went to the window. He was right in that he didn’t see anything. Whatever it was wasn’t there anymore.

Yet I couldn’t get the image out of my head. I know I saw a hand. I had seen it clearly. It was a greenish white, bloated and scabby. The palm had been open and pressed firmly against the glass, the wrist and arm leading down below out of sight, belonging to some… body.

Dex gathered the rest of the stuff. I supposed I should have helped but something was bothering me. I walked over to the window, heart in my throat, and peered closer at it. I moved my head around, trying to lose the glare from inside the boat and then I saw it. There was a very faint impression on the glass, like half a handprint. I could make out the lines where they would have snaked across at the top of the palm. It was fading quickly.

“Come look at this,” I commanded, no time to explain or ask nicely. To his credit Dex came right over, his head right beside mine, smelling like cigarettes and aftershave. I pointed at the mark on the glass, careful not to touch it myself. Not that it mattered, since the impression was on the other side.

“Look,” I whispered and looked at him to make sure he saw it, before the impression faded before our eyes. His eyes were locked like lasers. He saw it.

“It looks like an oil or heat smudge,” he said. “What is it?”

“It’s a handprint,” I said incredulously.

He frowned. It was all but gone now. “Are you sure? Did I touch the side of the boat?”

“No, not you. While you were on shore, I saw a hand come on the glass, on the other side, like this,” I put my hand on it to demonstrate. When I lifted it off, I too left a mark, albeit a full one.

“You saw a hand?” Now it was his turn to sound disbelieving.

“Yes,” I hissed. “I didn’t tell you because you wouldn’t believe me and then you said you didn’t see anything so then I didn’t believe me, but here it is.”

“Here it was,” he conceded. He rubbed his chin as we both watched the mark I left disappear, at a much quicker rate than the other one. I prayed that he believed me. I wasn’t crazy and I wasn’t making it up. There was proof and he saw it.

“I don’t know if that was a handprint,” he finally said. He looked at me carefully, obviously afraid that I was going to blow a gasket at him. He was on the right track but I managed to suck the explosion inside.

“It was a handprint,” I stressed through my teeth. “You could have given it a palm reading. Now what kind of fucking ghost leaves a handprint?’

“The same kind that leaves a mark…” he said invitingly and reached over with his hand and stroked his finger slowly down the length of my neck, “… here.”

I shivered internally. Partly because I was remembering when Old Roddy had left bruises on my neck after our little altercation, partly because his soft touch was borderline sensual. That and the serious, almost seductive look in his eyes as he stared at my neck, like a vampire before its first meal.

“So what do we do?” I whispered, trying to not break the moment.

His eyes met mine. I wasn’t sure if he was thinking about ghosts. I was thinking about him running his wide tongue down my neck. Maybe that’s what he was thinking too. A weird heady tension was building inside of me and spilling out into the air.

“We keep doing what we’re doing,” he said, his voice low and gravely. “And try and keep a camera on us at all times.”

He held my eyes for a few extra beats before straightening up and going back to the stuff. I eyed the glass again, feeling the tension dissipate.

“You believe me though, right?” I asked him, coming over to his side and bringing my backpack on to my shoulders. Please say you do believe me.

“I do, kiddo. If you say that was a handprint, then that’s what it was.”

“Thank you,” I said softly.

“Of course, it would be better if I had seen it too, or if you got it on tape but since we just got here, I’m going to take this as a sign of things to come. I’m sure this is only the beginning.”

He scooped up most of his gear, gesturing for me to take the cooler and the ghost equipment bag, and headed up the stairs. His words were not encouraging. This was only the beginning. We weren’t even on the island yet.

CHAPTER EIGHT

I guess when you expect the worst it’s always a pleasant surprise if everything ends up going smoothly. I totally expected some dead soul to rise up from the waves and overturn the Zodiac as Dex and I motored towards shore, or perhaps we might have run into some hidden rocks and sank (then get pulled down by that…hand).

But we didn’t. We arrived in one piece and, loaded down with stuff, pulled the Zodiac up along the pebbly beach until it was far away from any rebellious tides. Dex even tied it to a tree to be safe.