Ruby Redfort Take Your Last Breath (35 page)

Ruby raised her gaze one last time.
Say good-bye to your world,
she told herself, and as she did so, she saw a little silver fish swimming down to escort her away to the underworld. It twinkled in the gloom, and she looked at it as it moved closer and closer and became not a fish but a buckle.

A breathing buckle.

Clancy’s aim had been lucky, and the little device traveled straight to her. She reached out and felt it in her hand, clutching her fingers around it, bringing it to her mouth, and then she breathed.

Not that breathing was to be her salvation: she was still in the grip of a strangling sea monster. It curled her toward it, bringing her close to its strange and ancient face, drawing her to its razor-sharp beak. She looked into its eyes, but could see no flicker of mercy. She turned her face away from it and found herself looking into the dead eyes of Mr. Darling, his body squeezed lifeless by one of the monster’s massive arms.

She twisted around, struggling now, fighting for her life, and suddenly out of the gloom came a tiny blue figure, growing larger with every heartbeat.

The figure was a diver — a man she thought she recognized. The man from her dreams. He latched on to the creature’s great limbs, pulling and stabbing with a tiny weapon; a miniature diver fighting a sea giant with a tiny dagger.

What chance did he stand?

But a chance was all he needed: his knife struck lucky and the octopus released its orange-tentacled grip, spilling ink as it did so, and Ruby began to rise away from the beast, back through indigo, through blue, through turquoise, and to air.

She felt hands grabbing, pulling her free of the sea. She felt rock grazing her face. She tasted salt in her mouth and smelled dank, acrid air.

She heard a sound so muffled she could not identify it as a voice, and then through the blur she saw eyes she knew well.

She looked up.

“Clancy,” she said, “did anyone ever tell you that you’re the coolest boy alive?”

“ARE YOU QUITE ALL RIGHT IN THE HEAD, RUBE?”
Clancy looked concerned.

“I’m just telling you you’re cool, Clance. Is there a law against telling someone they’re cool?”

“No,” said Clancy warily. “It’s just it isn’t like you to come out with a compliment like that — for no reason I mean.”

“You think I don’t pay compliments?” said Ruby.

“I think you swallowed a lot of seawater down there, Rube.”

“
Sometimes
you can be a total bozo,” she said. “But when you pull it together, you really are super cool.”

“OK, Rube, maybe you should sit down. I’m getting worried here. How did you get away from that octopus?” he asked.

“A tiny man saved me, a miniature diver.” This wasn’t entirely inaccurate; against the colossal size of the octopus he had indeed appeared minuscule. But Clancy was not to know this, and now he was beginning to worry that perhaps Ruby had held her breath after all. Held it a minute too long. Holding your breath was considered a highly dangerous activity, he knew that.

“You threw me the buckle,” she said, her words singsongy and happy. “Smartest kid I ever knew.”

Clancy was relieved. OK, so maybe she was just in shock. That would explain things.

“Ruby, you know you’re all blue?” he said. He looked at her hard, and it all began to dawn on him. Not only was she covered in indigo, but she had probably also swallowed some of the stuff too — drunk on indigo might be the best way to describe her state. He remembered what Ruby had told him about the ink of the giant octopus, the serum. She was blabbing the truth.

“Where did that Count go?” she asked.

“He sort of vaporized,” said Clancy. “Not literally, but he suddenly wasn’t there.”

“He does that,” said Ruby. “Though I’m real surprised he didn’t kill you.”

“Thanks for being so honest.”

“I can’t help it,” said Ruby. “I swallowed the ink; I can’t tell a lie.”

“So I can ask you anything and you’ll answer me truthfully?”

“Yes.” She beamed.

“So what next?”

“We have to get out of here fast or we’ll drown.”

“What? You’re kidding?”

“Can’t kid, Clance.”

“But why are we gonna drown?” Clancy was flapping.

“The currents are returning. I felt it. The asteroid is getting too far away.”

“That’s what the Count said.” Clancy was beginning to panic.

“Any minute now, a giant whirlpool will swirl up and drag us down to the unexplored deep.” The serum had the unfortunate side effect of making the speaker sound happy and relaxed, which was annoying for the person listening, especially when the news wasn’t good. “It happened to my great-great-great-grandmother Martha.” Ruby was smiling. “But she was lucky enough to climb inside an apple barrel.”

“OK,” said Clancy, trying to keep upbeat. “So we get a bit scratched, grazed even, but we’ll live.”

“No, I don’t think so, Clance. You see, Martha’s barrel would have contained air, and you need air to breathe while you’re held under by the current, and to be honest even then you might suffocate. I mean, who knows how long we’ll be under?”

Clancy looked around desperately. “You see an apple barrel anywhere?”

“No,” said Ruby.

“Don’t you have any ideas?” said Clancy.

“Too bad we don’t have the rescue watch; it might have some device that could have saved us,” said Ruby.

“But we do!” said Clancy, his voice bright again. “We do, the Count returned it.”

“So where is it?” said Ruby.

“I threw it at the wall,” said Clancy, pointing toward the furthest corner of the cave.

“You what? What kind of bozo are you?” She ran to look. “Darn it, Clance!” That part of the cave was filled with supplies, equipment, and demolition tools all left by the pirates. She picked her way through the rocks and rubble.

“Can you see it?” called an anxious Clancy.

“No,” replied Ruby.

“It might have landed in something,” said Clancy. “It sounded like it dropped inside a container of some sort.”

Ruby looked up from her crouching position to see a large blue plastic cylinder; its lid lay on the ground next to it. Not an apple barrel exactly, but something that might do just as well. She peered inside; it was empty but for Bradley Baker’s watch.

“You’re a genius, Clance; we might just make it outta here after all.”

Without further discussion the two of them worked to pull the container out of the debris. The roar of the water was getting stronger, and as Ruby and Clancy climbed into the makeshift barrel, they were aware of the whirling water bubbling over the edge of the rock floor. They fumbled with the lid.

“Quick, duh brain! We don’t have time for this.”

“
Quick
yourself, buster!”

Finally, they lined it up right and twisted it in place, which was lucky for them because one second later there was an almighty crashing as several tons of water forced their way into the cave, and a half second later the barrel was lifted high into the air before being sucked down, down, down into the eye of the whirling thing.

“You know we still stand a very good chance of dying!” shouted Ruby merrily.

THE MAKESHIFT CRAFT WAS SUCKED DOWN
into the whirling ocean current, tossed and tumbled by the returning Sibling tide. It seemed to spin and rise and sink and spin, over and over. They might have been underwater for several hours, days even, or just ten minutes, they really couldn’t tell, but it felt like a very long time.

Finally, the pressure forced the barrel up and out, and they surfaced somewhere to the east of Little Sister rock. Not that Ruby and Clancy were aware of that — for all they knew they could be in the Atlantic or the Dead Sea. The only thing they were sure of was that they were bobbing on the water, a little bruised, very shaken, and slightly queasy.

“Am I still alive?” moaned Clancy.

“Yeah, but you look awful. You’ve turned a funny color.”

“It’s the barrel, bozo,” said Clancy. “It’s making us look blue. Although you already are blue.”

Ruby inspected her arms. “I guess I am kinda blue.”

“I hope that ink comes off,” said Clancy, “or your parents are gonna be asking some pretty tricky questions. You do look weird.”

“Yeah, well, you’re not exactly looking picture-perfect there,” said Ruby. “Kinda ugly actually.”

“Thanks a whole bunch,” muttered Clancy. “Speaking of ugly, what happened to Mr. Darling?”

Ruby wrapped her fingers around her throat. “Squeezed to death.”

Clancy shivered. “I guess that octopus got his tentacles on him.”

“Arms,” corrected Ruby. “They’re called arms.”

“You’ve been calling them tentacles,” Clancy pointed out. “I heard you say tentacles.”

“Yeah, but they’re called arms — technically they’re arms.”

“Could you quit being so pedantic?” said Clancy.

“I can’t help it. I swallowed the truth serum, I gotta say what’s on my mind.”

“You always say what’s on your mind. What’s the difference?”

“Listen!” hissed Ruby. “Do you hear that?”

“The Sea Whisperer?” Clancy sounded alarmed.

“It’s a boat, buster!” snapped Ruby.

Then they heard voices. Two of them.

“Do you think it’s the pirates?” whispered Clancy. Their container wasn’t spacious enough to flap in, but Clancy’s arms were thinking about it.

“Do I look like I have X-ray vision?” said Ruby.

“Well, you certainly look weird,” replied Clancy.

There wasn’t a whole lot they could do, so they just sat there while they felt the barrel being tugged toward the boat and the boat’s occupants struggling with the lid.

They breathed in fresh air and looked up at two puzzled faces.

“Kid, what are you doing in there?” said a familiar voice.

“Just holding my breath,” replied Ruby, staring up at Hitch. She switched her gaze to the other face and was surprised to see Kekoa. “Hey, how come you’re out and about? I thought you were in the hospital nearly dying?”

“I figured you’d be somewhere you shouldn’t be,” said Kekoa.

“You figured I’d be in a barrel?” said Ruby.

“No,” said Kekoa flatly. “But I tried to call you and your signal was off, so I figured you’d gotten yourself somewhere you shouldn’t be. Listening isn’t your strongest attribute.”

“I’ll say,” said Hitch. He leaned in and pulled out first Clancy and then Ruby. “Kekoa dragged herself out of her hospital bed and came to find me. She guessed where you’d be, kid.”

“But how?” said Ruby.

“I did some reading while I was convalescing.” Kekoa held up a copy of the orange book,
The Sea Whisperer.
“Not a myth after all. The monster, the wreck, the cave, the treasure, it all began to sound like it could be true.”

Ruby’s eyes took in the familiar cover and then they focused beyond the book on a man who was standing a little distance behind Agent Kekoa. He was clad in a blue wet suit that had a rip at the shoulder. His face was lined and brown from too many days in the scorching sun.

“Francesco Fornetti?” asked Ruby.

He smiled just barely — he looked all out of energy. “
Buon giorno,
Ruby Redfort.”

She looked at him hard. “It
was
you down there!” she said.

He nodded.

“I read that book of yours,” she continued. “It was interesting. I thought it was going to be pretty bad, you know, what with the professional ridicule and all, but I was actually impressed.”

“You speak the truth,” laughed Fornetti.

“It must have been hard knowing you were right about something when everyone else thought you were a looney tune,” said Ruby. “A madman, a complete ding —”

Clancy clamped a hand over her mouth.

“Sorry, Mr. Fornetti. She’s drunk a little too much ink and doesn’t know how to keep her mouth shut. But thanks for saving her life.”

“Ah, no problem,” said the diver. “It was my pleasure.”

“Yeah, that’s right,” said Ruby, freeing herself from Clancy’s grip. “I owe you one.”

Francesco Fornetti raised his thumb and forefinger. “Two,” he croaked.

“How’d ya mean, two?” said Ruby.

“You owe me two. I saved your life twice. Once before, many, many years ago,” he said.