The Creeping Kelp (3 page)

He nodded. He handed her the axe.

“Be careful. Chop first, ask questions later. I’m right behind you. Okay?”

“Got it,” she replied, and started up the small set of steps.

Noble looked back along the corridor. The black tendrils were less than five feet away and seemed eager to reach for him. He just had time to load the gun and send another flare into the main mass before heading after Suzie out onto the deck. Light and heat followed him out. He turned just beyond the door, loading the flare-gun, but no protoplasm came out of the corridor.

“Noble,” Suzie cried from nearby. “I need help here.”

She stood by the side of the Zodiac. A long tendril was raised high over her, and she was barely keeping it at bay with the axe. What she
couldn’t
see was a second appendage creeping along the deck behind her.

“Get down,” he called, hoping that her reflex would be as quick as his had been earlier. He raised the gun and fired just as she threw herself forward. The flare embedded itself in the side of the dinghy and burned furiously. Suzie scuttled across the deck to stand with him as they watched it blaze.

It took most of the two tendrils with it. Noble was about to celebrate when the Zodiac’s fuel tank exploded, the blast knocking him backwards to teeter on the steps to the lower deck. He would have fallen back if Suzie hadn’t steadied him.

He looked around.  Tall black tendrils still wafted on high all around the hull.

But they’re staying well away from the fires. Maybe we have a weapon after all.

“Help me,” he shouted. “I’ve got an idea.”

A minute later he was using the axe to break into the fuel storage area in the stern. There were five plastic containers stacked there, each holding fifty litres of diesel for the Zodiac. Noble stuffed the flare gun into his belt and started to lug the canisters out on the deck.

The Zodiac had burned itself out and lay in pieces, a smouldering ruin. All around, the tendrils raised themselves up higher, swaying from side to side. Pale green eyes stared down from the heights.

“Now or never,” Noble whispered.

He started to pour diesel across the deck. He emptied the first canister completely, making sure the others were sitting in the pool of liquid.

“Get to the upper deck,” he said. “Quickly. I’ll cover you.”

She left at a run, clambering up the exterior ladder to the raised deck that sat above the crew quarters. The tendrils continued to sway above the bow, but for now at least, they encroached no further. Noble said a silent prayer and ran for the ladder. A tendril struck at him and missed by mere inches, slapping into the deck at his feet and splashing diesel over his ankles. The air shimmered as the fuel evaporated in the heat.

Suzie stretched down a hand and helped him haul himself up beside her. He stood, turned… and gasped. The view from the bridge hadn’t really imposed itself on him. At the time, he’d been too preoccupied with merely staying alive for a few minutes longer. But from here on the upper deck, he couldn’t ignore it.

Black tendrils rose into the sky from horizon to horizon, waving slowly in unison like an audience at a concert moving in time to a ballad. Nowhere could the ocean be seen. All that was visible was a thick mat of black protoplasm anchoring the tendrils.

And the eyes were everywhere—pale, green, and unblinking. As Noble noticed them, so they noticed him. Tens of thousands of eyes swivelled and fixed their stare on the boat.

The chant rose, filling the air with noise.

Tekeli Li. Tekeli Li.

Tendrils surged forward, crawling over the bow, dragging the protoplasm behind in a dense carpet that started to smother the lower deck.

“Do it now,” Suzie shouted. “Before it’s too late.”

Noble waited for several seconds more, until the tendrils had almost reached the fuel canisters.

“Burn, you bastards,” he shouted and fired the last flare down into the pool of diesel. They had to stand back as the fire took. Tendrils thrashed in frenzy, trying to escape the flames that were suddenly everywhere. Noble threw Suzie to the ground and lay atop her, covering her with his body. The fuel canisters went up, one after the other, the explosions drumming in his ears, the heat singeing his hair. Then all was silence.

Noble heard his heart pounding in his ears. He stood, carefully lifting the axe from where it lay by Suzie’s right hand. Fires burned across the lower deck.  The boat listed sharply to starboard. The Shoggoths
backed off, leaving a twenty-meter
moat
of sea all the way around the hull. Tendrils still swayed lazily in the air, but there was no longer any sign of watching eyes.

Noble lifted Suzie up.

“We’re safe. For now.”

“Maybe for a bit longer than that,” she said. She pointed out to the port side. At the same time, he heard it, the
chug-chug
of a chopper’s rotor blades. They stood on the deck, waving and grinning like excited school kids as the rescue chopper got closer and hovered overhead. Even as they were lifted upward, the tendrils started to creep back towards the boat, slowly at first, and then faster as there was no sign of further fire.

When the chopper banked to turn away, Noble got a clear view of the boat, completely covered now, sinking under the weight of the thick black carpet.  It went under with scarcely a splash.

But that wasn’t quite the end of it.

By now, the sun was setting. Beneath them, the black carpet shone, a shimmering green that looked almost peaceful. Even above the sound of the rotors, he thought he could hear them, would always hear them, a chorus, stronger than any choir, singing in perfect unison.

Tekeli Li. Tekeli Li.
 

A sea of eyes watched as the chopper headed away over the horizon.

July 22nd - At the Beach

Maggie Welsh was in a foul mood and wasn’t slow in letting everybody know about it.

“Kimmeridge bloody Bay,” she said in disgust, for maybe the fourth time since her husband had brought their car onto the car park on the cliffs above. “It’s not exactly Lanzarote, is it?”

Dave Welsh looked at her over the top of his newspaper. His nose and cheeks were liberally splattered with thick suntan lotion, only serving to accentuate the deepening redness of the sunburn on his balding pate.

“What’s not to like?” he said softly. “It’s a beach, it’s the hottest summer in years, and the kids are loving it.”

Maggie was too deeply entrenched in her annoyance to let logic get in her way.

“There’s bugger all to do except sit here and fry,” she said. She was aware that, if they
had
gone to Lanzarote, they’d just be sitting on a different beach and frying.

But that’s not the point!

If they’d gone to Lanzarote she’d have been able to spend
days
telling the others in the Hair Salon about the trip—about the toned waiters and the tight butts in swimsuits, about the posh nights out in expensive lounges. Now what was she going to say?

He took me to Dorset and all I got was this lousy tan?

“Denise Shaw is in Mallorca. Have you
any
idea how affronted I’m going to be when she asks where we went? Have you
any
idea how much of her
crap
I’m going to have to put up with?”

He’d stopped listening; his newspaper raised like a bulwark between them. But she wasn’t ready to stop venting yet—she might not be for
quite
some time. She turned her ire towards the sea, looking for their children.

They’ll be doing something I can shout at them for. I need a good shout.

Their youngest, Mary, paddled around in the shallows some twenty yards away, splashing merrily and singing a song that was almost recognisable as something she’d recently heard on the radio. Zane was further out, pretending to swim, hanging around at the fringe of a group of older boys and trying to get noticed. She sighed as she realised there was nothing to find fault with.

Well that’s just no fun at all.

She looked along the length of the beach. Although it was a warm, indeed
very
warm day, and the beach was golden, there were relatively few people around; some thirty in total on the beach itself, and the same number again, mostly children, in the water trying to get away from the heat. Further out, two small yachts tacked and veered in what little breeze they could grab, but here on the sand it was almost oppressively calm and balmy. If she hadn’t been quite so keen on a shouting match, she might even start enjoying herself. But the thought of Denise Shaw
crowing
about Mallorca from now until Christmas was just too much to bear.

Once again, she found her thoughts straying to exotic shores, places where the beaches were packed and there were
many
more opportunities to pick up brownie points back at the salon. She was so lost in reverie that she didn’t notice when the splashing from nearby took on a frantic tone, and she only looked up when a young voice rose in a high scream.

Out on the horizon one of the yachts she’d watched earlier upended, the prow pointing straight up before it vanished without a splash. The other seemed to be covered in writhing black snakes. Even as she tried to make sense of what she was seeing, the small vessel imploded, crushed to kindling and torn canvas within seconds.

Another scream brought her attention closer to shore.

The sea... it’s alive.
 

The surface frothed and swelled in a patch the size of a football field, as if something pushed the water upwards from below. She saw Mary standing just at the water’s edge, pointing at a spot further out. Where there had been a group of boys a minute before, now there was only a foaming patch of water. Something dark
surged
just below the surface.

Shark? Can’t be.

As quickly as it had started, the sea fell calm. A sudden quiet fell all around them. Maggie realised there were fewer children in the water now—a
lot
fewer children. All along the shore, concerned parents started to head for the waterline.

Zane?

Maggie stood, knocking over her chair, almost falling into Dave’s arms as he too rose awkwardly from the depths of the chair.  His newspaper fell to the sand unnoticed as they both looked out onto the calm patch of sea.

“Zane!” she shouted. Then the two of them were running headlong down the beach, kicking sand behind them, shouting at the top of their voices. “Zane Welsh,” she yelled. “You get out of that water this instant.”

But she already knew something
bad
had happened. There was no sign of Zane... of any of the boys. As they got closer she saw that Mary stood, wide-eyed, thumb in her mouth, looking down at something the waves had washed in. She gathered the girl in her arms, then looked to see what was on the sand.

A dismembered foot lay there, with white bone showing at the ankle where it had been roughly torn from the body. But that wasn’t the worst thing. The worst thing was the split nail on the big toe... the same split nail she had stopped Zane from worrying at just fifteen minutes before.

This isn’t happening.

She heard Dave cry out, heard him splash away into the water, but she couldn’t lift her gaze from the foot.

Just wait until I get you home, Zane Welsh. You are in big trouble this time.

Mary started to cry and burrowed her head in Maggie’s neck. She pulled the girl tighter, and that small act of motherhood dragged her back to some semblance of reality.

Zane? Where are you, lad? Mum’s getting worried.

Around a dozen parents, Dave included, were frantically searching for the lost boys, splashing around and parting the water with their hands as if they might be able to open it up and reveal what secrets it kept. A black hump, like a breaching whale, rose up out of the water mere feet from the group. The black hump
spread
and Maggie was reminded of an old horror movie with
Count Dracula
opening his cape to enfold his victim. The darkness fell on the parents like a black sheet. Where it touched their skin, they started to scream.

Dave?

The sea was now a roiling mass of thrashing limbs and white spray that suddenly frothed pink. Maggie’s mothering instincts finally kicked in. She turned and fled, with Mary clasped tight at her breast. The screams of the dying rose ever higher behind her, but she didn’t look back. Her gaze was fixed on the family car, perched near the edge at the top of the cliff.

Everything will be okay if I get to the car.

Everything will be okay if I get to the car.

She repeated it to herself like a mantra as the hot sand sucked at her feet and Mary sobbed uncontrollably at her ear. At some point she became aware that the screaming had stopped and that the beach had once more fallen deathly quiet.

Is it over?

She refused to look round to check. The car was closer now. There were mere yards between her and the foot of the steps that led up to the car park.

She put a foot on the bottom step.

Should have gone to Lanzarote.

That was her last thought. By some instinct she turned, knowing
something
was coming. A shadow sped up the beach, a black wave several feet high. She grabbed Mary tight and threw herself backward towards the steps, towards safety.

She had time for just one scream.

July 22nd - A Dawning Realization

Noble had spent a futile night explaining, and explaining again, the events of the previous day, first to the coastguard, then the police. He could tell by their eyes that they didn’t believe him. They thought both he and Suzie were in shock at the loss of their crewmates in an accident that had sunk the ship. The idea of some kind of
creature
lurking offshore, one big enough to take down the
Earth Rescue
, was just too large for them to comprehend.